Things Good and Evil

 

What does it mean to say something or someone is good or evil? When we inspect things closely, even if we try hard to see what is good in all things, we may have a hard time realizing what about some things could possibly be good. What is evil?

The ancient Christian philosopher Augustine of Hippo taught that evil is not a positive substance, but merely the absence of good. This way of thinking about good and evil can help us appreciate the world as it already exists while we also inspiring us to work toward a better world to come.

All things have some aspect of goodness, even if it is only the good of existing. What appears evil about a thing is how it lacks what is good, or what is better. Its evil is a defect rather than a present substance. So, however little there is about something that is good about it, we can, if we try hard enough, find this good in it and appreciate it.

At the same time, when we see evil as inadequacy, we can see the potential for good in all things, by their ability to be built up and repaired. In fact, seeing things in this way liberates us from a foolish, rigid dualism. All things are good in some ways, but also could be better, and thus contain elements of evil.

Since everything in the world is at the same time both good and evil, the way to greater good is by filling up what is lacking in good in all things. Evil, which does not exist as a positive substance, can spontaneously disappear, like an empty space being filled.

As it says in the Nag Hammadi Gospel of Truth, "As in the case of the ignorance of a person, when he comes to have knowledge, his ignorance vanishes of itself, as the darkness vanishes when light appears, so also the deficiency vanishes in the perfection. . . . In time . . . each one will attain himself; within knowledge he will purify himself from multiplicity into unity, consuming matter within himself like fire, and darkness by light, death by life."

All of nature, including ourselves, is potentially good, and also potentially able to become better, and to make itself better. We can become better to ourselves, and to others, and to all the rest of nature. The rest of nature, that which is not human, can also become better to themselves, and to us.

By uplifting ourselves and the rest of nature into a better harmony, one yielding greater happiness, we can aim to fulfill human nature and all of nature in its distinctiveness – the complete happiness of all sentient and sapient beings.

The evils of the natural world, including the evils in ourselves, are a temporary way-station, a time of transition from what is insufficiently good on the way to becoming something better. Nature is partly good, yet on the way to becoming something better, and human nature is partly good, yet on the way to becoming something better. Humanity will be fulfilled when it has fully realized its own nature by becoming fully human -- that is, by realizing its divine nature.

Right now, we are still vulnerable to sources of evil inside ourselves and outside ourselves in the natural world. But if we uplift ourselves and help the rest of the natural world uplift itself, we will be able to become what we will be, remedying every defect in our hearts and minds, healing every illness, strengthening every weakness, and supplying every inadequacy. In that way humanity will be able to become saviors of themselves and the rest of nature. It is not the gods we believe in that will save us; rather, it is the gods we will become.

 

Nature and the Human

By nature we can mean all things, whether known or yet unknown. All things that really are, are real, as what they are. The non-natural and the supernatural  are incoherent categories and do not describe anything that exists.

 

Humanity is an expression, a manifestation, of nature. Humanity is thus natural, in all its nature (human nature). We can say that what humans make is

"artificial," but by this we mean still indirectly natural, since human beings are natural.

 

Human beings are a type of animal, not detached and separated from other animals, but kin to them and similar to them in many ways, and sharing their fate of living on this same planet Earth. The human species is not alienated from the rest of the natural world, and our way of being is not utterly alien to that of other life forms on this planet.

 

Human character, flawed as it is, is natural, of a piece with all the rest of nature, and understandable as a natural thing. Civilization, technology,

cities, and culture are products of nature and manifestations of nature, not something apart from nature.

 

Even though we are not the same as other animals, we can seek a harmony with the rest of nature, and that while still being true to ourselves - harmony, not in the sense of mere domination of humans over the nonhuman world, but harmony in the sense of a life worked out between humans and the nonhuman world which realizes our appreciation of that nonhuman world in its own nature, and our vastening to include it.

 

Human nature is dynamic not static, evolving not rigid, changing not unchanging. We human beings in our current form arose from previous animals with a different form, and in the future we will be beings with a different form. Humanity is not to be confused with some idea of a static form that we possess or possessed in the past, or with some adaptation that was relatively fit compared to other existing options in one time or place or circumstance; what we have evolved to be now is not our future destiny. In us, nature is striving toward the divine. And not necessarily only in us.

 

From insensate matter arose life with basic senses. From that life arose sentient beings -- those who can feel, those who can experience pleasure and pain, and those who are aware. From sentient beings arose sapient beings -- those who are aware of themselves as distinct from the rest of the world, and who can reflect on themselves and their lives. From sapience will arise the divine nature that will infuse the cosmos and become its final salvation.

 

We human beings know some things about the world. But the world still contains many mysteries; the things we will learn in the future will change what we think about what we know now. We are awed by nature when it challenges the limits of our ability to understand; there are things about this world which our human minds cannot properly grasp, because of the limitations of our minds in their current form.

 

So we human beings are not only limited in our knowledge about the world, we are also limited in our ability to directly imagine or adequately comprehend some of the aspects of what exists. For example, we can estimate the number of stars or galaxies, but we cannot really, actually, imagine this number, and we certainly cannot fully grasp the significance of so many stars and galaxies in our minds. We can represent vast numbers by sequences of symbols, but our minds cannot directly grasp the reality of such numbers.

 

We human beings exist in continual ignorance of things, to a certain degree. But as we learn more, our ignorance continually lessens. In the future, we will know far more than we know now, and we will also be able to comprehend more than we could comprehend now.

 

 

 

 

 

Nature’s Double Nature

Nature is the source of all the good things we find in this world, such as the myriad sources of natural beauty. All that is good in ourselves and other persons is also part of the natural world.

 

We human beings evolved from insensate matter and non-sapient beings, so everything we care about and value in ourselves and our lives and the world arises from our natural origin. It is in us that nature possesses mindfulness and the ability to have concern for ourselves and others. The natural world includes the ability to feel compassion, empathy, sympathy, and appreciation because we human beings have evolved to possess those characteristics.

Much of nature does not yet possess mind or the ability to understand or know or be concerned about humanity. Much of the natural world does not yet have the ability to feel compassion, empathy, sympathy, or appreciation for any thing. So it is very important that we human beings, who possess these abilities as potentials, work hard to fully realize those potentials.

Yet nature is also the source of all suffering of human beings - for example, dangerous predators, deadly diseases, lack of food or water, heat or cold, or destructive weather. Because these elements of nature are generally mindless and without the ability to be concerned for human beings, they cannot be propitiated or negotiated with or appeased. It is only we human beings, by exercising our powers, who can come to understand these things and find way to protect ourselves from them.

We can enjoy the beauties of nature best from the vantage point of safety and comfort. If we are immersed in the dangers and threats of nature, we cannot afford the luxury of admiring what is harming and killing us. We bring ourselves and the rest of nature into harmony when we find a way to be happy in the midst of the rest of nature, without danger and harm, and yet while continuing to appreciate the rest of nature in its distinctiveness. A greater harmony, yielding greater happiness, will require bringing full happiness and an end to suffering to all sentient beings on Earth, and uplifting all sapient beings on Earth to their fulfillment.

The good things in us are natural, but so also are the evil things. Human beings suffer from things such as defects of the body that cause congenital diseases, aging, and death; defects of the brain that cause mental illness, mental weakness and vulnerability; and defects of character and personality; as well as instincts and innate patterns of thinking and behaving which are not best suited for our own happiness in all circumstances.

Human nature as it exists now is thus deeply flawed in some ways, while at the same time being exemplary in other ways, and divine in its potential realization. Individual human nature is thus neither purely nor originally good or evil or neutral. Each one of us contains a diversity of propensities and each one of us projects a diversity of effects on ourselves and the world around us. These propensities and effects can be good, or evil, or neutral.

 

Reaching Higher

Many people look for meaning and purpose for their lives by looking to other people, or to a supposed god, or to a political cause, or to wealth or fame or high status. Yet no matter how we may chase such things, we can never be truly happy that way.

The true meaning and purpose of our lives is not "out there" to found or acquired; meaning and purposes are not to be randomly created, either, as the existentialists suggested.

The true meaning and purpose of our lives is already real, already inside us, waiting to be found and recognized in our already existing unique natures, which we already possess. If we examine ourselves deeply, carefully, critically, and honestly, we can discern it. It has to do with what we are -- that is, what we have come to be. And it also has to do with what we are becoming, and what we will become. It has to do with how we are living, and how we will someday live.

What we are now is the seed of what we will and must become. We must break in order for the potential inside us to sprout and grow into what is greater, what we were meant to be. We must die to what we have been in order to be born to what we could and should become. We must change in order to truly fulfill all that we already potentially are.

The human is the seed of the divine, and humanity is the seed of a  future society of gods. What we are now is not what we will become, but it contains the germ of it. The divine is what we will become, and the divine life is the life we will live. The divine life is not a life we can live now, but the life we live now can become the seed of that future, divine life, if we recognize and cultivate our lives to prepare ourselves and accelerate the time when that day will come. It is by deciding a better future and working towards it that that better future is created; it is by our belief and action today that a better future can come into being.

The divine nature will be crafted by technology and guided by science, but it will also be decided by our natures, so that what we are trying to be will be critical to determing what we will craft ourselves into by means of technology. It is only if we develop wisdom and self-understanding in ourselves, and if we continually try to live up to our "better natures', that we can stay on the path to becoming the best fulfillment of our present potential, that is, divine.

 

The Human Condition

Some people take comfort in delusion. But the comfort of delusion is not a lasting, secure comfort. We cannot afford to be complacent and we cannot afford to be delusional.  In order to become what we must become, we must understand how far we are from it now and what we must realistically do to change. Understanding the truth, however painful, is the beginning of change, improving the conditions of human life, and all life.

 

What are some of the problems before us?

 

We human beings rarely experience lives of joy. Instead, we often experience pain, sadness, anguish, and despair from the conditions of our existence, the "human condition", and the despair causes us to embrace delusion and apathy.

 

Our understanding and knowledge are limited - we are all ignorant of at least some things that are known by others - information and education are not equally available to all - but even the most knowledgeable are constrained by the present limits of human comprehension. Ignorance limits our opportunities and forecloses potential solutions to innumerable problems. But even the smartest and most capable among us are terribly ignorant and incompetent when judged against the scale of total knowledge of all things and the total power to do all things. Our minds are also afflicted by irrationality and heuristic biases and other faulty modes of thinking and decision-making.

 

Our present human bodies are filled with weakness, inadequacy, faults, and shortcomings. We often suffer terrible illnesses, diseases, and adverse conditions of the body and mind. The best medicine of this era cannot treat or cure many of these disorders, and many of us do not even have access to the best medicine of this era.

 

We are all of us today under the doom of death. We live for little over a century at most, and most of us will not even live that long. Some of us will die of conditions that could have been treated, because we do not have access to the best medicine. But the doom of death stands before us all.

 

As if our circumstances were not already bad enough, we human beings also foolishly stand in the way of our own happiness. We typically fail to appreciate the potential and actual value and good in others as much as we should. We typically fail to realize or learn how our own self-interests can be harmonized with others' self interest. We often act carelessly toward one another, harming one another or casually allowing one another to suffer. Many of us are obsessed with trying, at any cost, to achieve higher status compared to others, rather than working together towards shared happiness.

 

We are disorganized and uncoordinated even we try to help one another. We suffer from inequality - the physical inequality of body and mind compounded by the engineered inequality of injustice and lack of compassion. Many of us live under beastly conditions of life, suffering hunger or living in constant physical danger.

 

We human beings are also typically cruel and contemptuous of the lives and welfare of other animals on the planet. We have already begin the widespread destruction of our biosphere, partly fueled by desperation to survive and prosper, but also by ignorance of other alternative ways to survive and prosper, and ignorance or irrational denial of the consequences of the destruction for our happiness and survival as well as the happiness and survival of other sentient and sapient beings.

 

Although our powers to create are very limited, our powers to destroy are great, and increasing. The faults of our present human natures pose tremendous dangers to the entire world. And human beings are limited to this world - our bodies are so weak and constrained, we can live only on the very surface of the Earth, under optimal conditions. We require very narrow ranges of climate, pressure, gravity, radiation, and so on to survive. We cannot yet live permanently anywhere but on Earth, so humanity is in constant danger of extinction from our own actions and various natural processes.

 

The human condition is a terrible condition compared to what it could be and should be and what we, deep down, want it to be.

True Dignity for Those Whose Lives are Interrupted

Many people have said biostasis and cryopreservation do not show the proper respect for the dead. For them, all cryopreservation techniques are inherently violations of the body. And in saying so, these people echo the benighted attitudes people once held towards anatomical dissection, surgery, and organ transplants.

 

Human dignity, they would argue, requires us to do as we have always done, especially with the dead. Even though we all know the horrible, and pointless, atrocities that are committed against the human body by funeral home embalming, still, it is the tradition, and so it is not questioned. Only thoughtless tradition gives the deceased the proper dignity? When we truly love someone, we should want them to live.

 

As Jesus of Nazareth said, "Let the dead bury the dead." And I would say, let the living save the living.

 

The greatest respect we should show to someone who is dying is to help them to overcome death by preserving their potential for life, and we can do this only by preserving their body, which contains the support for their soul. It is not respect to destroy someone's body and soul by embalming or burial or cremation.

 

This is what some people would consider dignity - burying their friends and family in the ground, like burying excrement in a latrine. This is how a cat buries its feces - it scratches a hole in the dirt, lays its feces there, and then covers it over. This is how people have been treated until now – like feces! Some people burn the bodies of the dead, incinerating people like trash and scattering the dusty refuse around. Is this dignity? Treating people like garbage and excrement?

 

This is what superstition, ignorance, and mindless tradition have led us to -- contempt and disregard for human beings, and destroying those who can be saved. Our loved ones' bodies, immediately after they fail, are still potentially alive; their bodies still contain the essence of what they were. To allow superstitious fears about death and taboos about the dead body distract us from saving worthy human beings - this would be the true violation of those human beings' actual worth, their real dignity. We need to love with informed love. We cannot "take out the trash" anymore!

 

True dignity arises from understanding and faith and love. True regard for the dignity of human beings calls us to acts expressing faith in life and the future of humanity. It is, ultimately, hope for actual resurrection, here and real. True, brave, and informed love requires us to carefully preserve the body and soul and keep them until they will be brought back to life.

A New Day Dawning

The world has so many problems; how can we say there is a better future ahead?

 

We can and should pay attention to the problems and inadequacies that exist today and do everything we can to remedy them, but we should also not take the many things humanity has accomplished until now for granted. We should not take for granted the solutions to past problems, and focus only on current problems, if that will cause us to lose heart.

 

When we remind ourselves of what has already been accomplished, we can be more confident about our readiness to continue and build further toward the better world to come.

 

That is why we need to understand that faith and hope have a role in our survival as human beings and all possibility of our future flourishing. Faith and hope can allow us to stand up to the nihilism of discouragement, cynicism, and misanthropy which can arise from our impatience and frustration, from our so high, and thus so frequently dashed, expectations for humanity.

 

The worst moments in human history may lie ahead of us, but we must be determined to hold on to faith and hope to survive those times and emerge, as humans always have eventually, victorious. We must believe that every loss and destruction we suffer can, and will, someday be redeemed.

 

A new day is dawning, and the light of this dawn arises first as a vision of happiness, and a desire for happiness, and a perception of the possibility of happiness - happiness, that is, the total fulfillment of humanity.