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Interesting thread.Too bad it's so buried.
Is competition, survival of the fittest, etc., good or evil,from god or from the devil. one question.
The other is how interested everybody is, at least in the west, about anything supernatural. My take on the second question is that westerners, having essentially lost the convictiuon that an afterlife exists, but wanting one, any kind, so dearly, that they grab on to any stories or evidence of the supernatural.
I know because that is what has driven my life. Being a former athesist, which was essentially giving up on any possibility of an afterlife, I have constantly sought to convince myself that there is meaning in this life and that there is an afterlife. Cannot have one without the other.
So recently I have been working with a number of computer professionals from India. They are not interested in an afterlife. They already know, or have conviction that one exists, and so they are not concerned. Rather they are concerned with learning as much computers and American english as possible so that they can get ahead. Of course, they are all young. When they retire, that will be the time for them to get ready for the afterlife. But for now they just wantto get ahead.
I suppose I could get ahead by marketing stories about turning off lights. But alas, I'm already retired and not interested in more money.
On the first question. I think westerners, which I am, being from Cambridge, Mass USA, are too much thinking that all is good or evil. I think the devil or whatever that represents, greed, avarice, competition for material well being, even plundering our natural environment, has gotten a bad rap. Certainly we should avoid extremes. like Hitler justifying his aggressiveness by Darwin's survival of the fittest. But we should also recognize that competition is what develops most of us. And has developed all biological life via evolution, in my opinion.
So I like the approach of my Indian friends who are highly competitive early in life, and let it all go later on in life. Guess there is not much competition in Heaven. But who knows? |
