Dear World:
On January 16, I am going to talk with Sam Harris, on his podcast, Waking Up with Sam Harris. Dr. Harris is one of the so-called New Atheists, of which there are four. Like the other three Christopher Hitchens, Dan Dennett and Richard Dawkins – who, by the way, I have always wanted particularly to debate — Dr. Harris is a smart guy, and I’m certainly not complaining that I will encounter him, instead of Dawkins. So I am preparing my arguments, carefully (although I have been doing so for years. The specific ideas I am going to share with you today were obsessing me the moment I woke up, somewhat fitfully, this morning, so I dictated them to my son, and then edited them.
The central problem of human beings isn’t religion, as the New Atheists insist. It’s tribalism. We know this in part because chimps, our closest biological kin, go to war, and they are not religious, although they are tribal. Tribalism also has a central problem — and it’s not competition, despite the tendency of competition to produce, at least temporarily, winners and losers. it’s cooperation, because cooperation is what allows us to exist as bounded groups. A group, by definition is a collective cooperatively aiming at something. It can’t be aimed at nothing, because nothing cannot unite. It only divides. Thus, attacks on collective purpose, because of its tendency to produce tribalism, merely divides. The politics of identity, which emerge when the central purpose is criticized too destructively, inevitably produce the situation described in the story of the Tower of Babel: Everyone fragments into primitive tribes and speaks their own language.
One alternative to fragmentation is union under a banner – a collective ideal, cause, or purpose. The problem with uniting under a banner, as the postmodernists who push identity politics rightly point out, is that to value something means simultaneously to devalue other things. Thus to value is an exclusionary process. But the alternative is valuelessness, which is equivalent to nihilism – and nihilism does not produce freedom from exclusion. It just makes everyone excluded, and that is an intolerable state, directionless, uncertain, chaotic, and angst-ridden. When such uncertainty reaches a critical level, the counter-response appears: first the unconscious and then the collectively expressed demand for a leader, possessed by the spirit of totalitarian certainty, who promises above all, to restore Order. Thus, a society without a unifying principle, oscillates, unmoored, between nihilism and totalitarianism.
Human beings have been wrestling with this problem since the beginning of civilization, when our capacity to form large groups, for all its advantages, also started to pose a new threat: that of the hyper-domination of the state, collective or purpose. But without the state, there is just fragmentation into smaller groups. The group itself cannot be done away with because for better or worse, human beings are social animals, not loners, like sharks or tigers. We’re team players, but being on one team means not being on others. This means that any given team sidelines, marginalizes, and alienates those who cannot play their game, as well as conflicting with other teams.
In the west, starting in the Middle East, thousands of years ago, a new idea began to emerge (evolve is not too strong a word) in the collective imagination. You might, following Dawkins, consider it a meme, although this is far too weak a word. This idea, whose development can be traced back through Egypt to Mesopotamia, before disappearing into unwritten history, is that of the Divine Individual. This eons-old work of the imagination is a dramatic presentation of an emergent idea, which is the solution to how to organize social being without falling prey to nihilistic divisiveness or deceitful totalitarian certainty: The group must unite under the banner of the individual. The individual is the source of the new wisdom that updates the antiquated, nihilistic or totalitarian detritus and glory of the past.
For better for worse, that idea reaches its apogee in Christianity. The divine individual is masculine because the feminine is not individual: The divine feminine is, instead, mother and child. However, it a hallmark of Christian supposition that the redemption of both men and women comes through the masculine, and that is because the masculine is the individual. The central realization – expressed dramatically; symbolically – is that the subordination of the group to the ideal of the Divine Individual is the answer to the paradox of nihilism and totalitarianism.
The Divine Individual is the man that every man admires, and the man whom all women want their men to be. The Divine Individual is the ideal from which deviations are punished by the group with contempt and disgrace and fidelity to which is rewarded with attention and honor. The Divine Individual is not the winner of any individual game but the player who plays fair and is therefore continually invited to play. The Divine Individual is the builder, maintainer and expander of the state, he who boldly goes where no man has gone before, and someone who eternally watches over the widows and the children. His power of direct and honest communication is that which identifies, discusses and resolves the continually emergent problems of human existence. He is the Savior of the World.
The primary image for women is not the Divine Individual, because of the heavy burden they bear for reproduction. It is, instead, the Divine Mother and Child. This is not to say that man is the Divine Individual, and woman is not, although such confusion is understandable, given the complexity of the problem. Men, like women, have the Divine Mother and Child as an element of their personality. In men, however, it’s in the background, so to speak, as the Divine Individual is in the background of the psyche for women. Men, by necessity, play a less primary role in the care of children. This frees them to act as individuals in a manner that up to now has been nearly impossible for women. Identification with these images is belief in them. Belief is not the statement of agreement with a set of facts, but the willingness to act something out, to become something, to stake your life on something. For men and women alike, this means voluntary adoption of responsibility – responsibility for oneself, family and state. In that responsibility, and not in rights, resides Meaning itself – the meaning that makes life bearable.
Societies that refuse to recognize both of these elements therefore doom their inhabitants to purposelessness, unhappiness, sterility, and the aforementioned dangers of nihilistic divisiveness and deceitful, oppressive totalitarian certainty. The meaning in responsibility is the necessary meaning in life, which can serve as a counterbalance to its terrible fragility and tenuousness.
People must unite under the banner, not of their group, and not of nothingness, but of the individual. This is a brilliant and intrinsically paradoxical solution to the problems of nihilistic nothingness and too-rigid group identity alike. It is the consciousness of the individual which transforms the chaos of potential into habitable cosmos, as the greatest origin stories repeatedly insist. It is that same consciousness which stands up, rebellious and revelatory, to break down the pathological and too rigid order of that cosmos when it has become old, infirm, wilfully blind, and corrupt. It is that consciousness which is the image of God. It dwells within every embodied human form. The fact of its existence is the reason that the Law of the Land itself must be bound by ultimate respect for the individual, regardless of his or her sins and crimes.
It is that consciousness, not the objective material substrate of Being, which should be regarded as the ultimate reality. There is no self-evident reason why dead matter should be given ontological primacy over living spirit. Although doing so has produced a massive increase in human technological power, it has left that power in hands of an increasingly disenchanted populace, and that presents a mortal danger. Such power must be wielded by those who have truly and voluntarily accepted the responsibility of Being, lest it prove fatal.
The West has long been the civilised embodiment of the idea of the divine individual, who does exactly that. That’s what the voluntarily lifting of the cross of suffering symbolically represents. For all its faults, which are manifold, the West has therefore served as a shining beacon of hope to those destined to inhabit places too chaotic or too rigid for the human spirit to tolerate. But the West is in grave danger of losing its way. The negative consequences of this can hardly be overstated.
A close reading of 20th century history indicates, as nothing else can, the horrors that accompany loss of faith in the idea of the individual. It is only the individual, after all, who suffers. The group does not suffer – only those who compose it. Thus, the reality of the individual must be regarded as primary if suffering is to be regarded seriously. Without such regard, there can be no motivation to reduce suffering and, therefore, no respite. Instead, the production of individual suffering can and has and will be again rationalized and justified for its supposed benefits for the future and the group.
Effective birth control has emerged as one of the consequences of our powerful technological materialism. This has been accompanied by the rise of states sufficiently civilized so that women who inhabit them can walk the streets unaccompanied in safety. We do not yet know how to balance the opportunities thus provided for expanded female individuality with the eternal necessity for a woman to serve as the Mother of the Divine Individual. Dividing our civilization into polarized ideological camps of female group identity and male group identity is certainly not the answer. We have to be honest, male and female alike, about what we really want, as individuals, and talk it out. We know beyond dispute that societies who emancipate their women are much more productive and peaceful, and that the relationship is causal. Thus, it’s not a matter of if but how.
But such emancipation places a dual burden on the now more autonomous woman, who is required to balance manifesting the potential of her individual spirit with the necessity of desire to bear and rear the next generation of mankind. To live with free women, and gain the advantages of their freedom and sophistication, men must therefore bring their shadowed psychic identification with the Divine Mother and Child into the light, without losing their Divine Individuality in the process. They must consciously, voluntarily, deliberately and strategically accept their responsibility for the relationship between autonomous female companionship, support, love, and the responsibility of producing that next generation. This means rejecting, among other things, the misbegotten idea of casual sexual gratification. Sex is either the impulsive, short-term gratification of a domineering biological impulse, or the union of two conscious spirits taking responsibility for what they are doing. The former is not commensurate with the demands of an advanced civilization, which requires the adoption of responsibility above all for its preservation, maintenance and expansion. It is for this reason that the sexualized interactions between young men and women – in universities, for example — are increasingly and inevitably falling under the harsh and tyrannical regulation of the state.
In the west, we are, as well, shuttering our great cathedrals – those marvelous, monumental embodiments of the idea of the Divine Individual on which our civilisation is based. This is no mere practical, material, matter: it is a symbolic and ideational process whose importance cannot be overstated. Without that central idea, we will dissolve, and be lost. It is time for each of us to consciously realize what the great symbolic stories of the past insist upon: That we are all sons and daughters of the divine Logos, consciousness itself — Bearers of its Light – and that we must act in accordance with that great central fact, lest all hell break loose. This means, above all, to tell the truth and to care for one another, starting at the level of the individual and proceeding from that, out to the broader reaches of society itself. The alternative, as those same stories have also always insisted, is the more permanent instantiation of the horror that we already saw manifest itself in multiple forms, in the last bloody, terrible, century.
We need to wake up, individual man and woman alike, and we need to do it now. Each of us must take the world on our shoulders, insofar as we are capable of that, and adopt individual responsibility for the horrors and suffering its existence entails. In that we will find the Meaning without which Life is merely the suffering that breeds, first, resentment and then the desire for vengeance and destruction. We need to take responsibility, instead of incessantly insisting on our rights. We need to become adults, instead of aged children. We need to tell the truth. We need justice and compassion, conjoined; not judgment and pity, which crush and devour.
So, in the coming year, make yourself a better person. Fix what you can and would fix. Start now. There is something right in front of you, demanding repair, calling out to your conscience, if you would only attend to it, for your corrective efforts, however primitive they may yet be. Start small. As you master the process, you can safely and competently expand your reach. You will then become able to fix bigger things, instead of making them worse, in the arrogance of your ignorance. If you do this, there will be less pointless and unnecessary suffering, and the world, for all its shortcoming and faults, will be a better place.
Until we can imagine better than that, that is Meaning and Purpose enough.
Happy New Year, and best wishes to you all.
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No. There are those of us who love our tribe and are happy to suffer for it. Because happiness is not the end-goal – honor and survival are. If you are attacking tribalism in this day and age, you are serving the interests of the International Jew, the globalists, the neo-cons who start wars in the Middle East, the Diversity worshipers who mindlessly chant “Diversity is our Strength,” when it is only serves to strengthen the authoritarian government which you supposedly abhor. The tribe is an extended family, and if you would seek to destroy it, you are a Marxist shill.
DR. PETERSON’S “LETTER TO THE WORLD”: WHAT IT IMPLIES ABOUT THE CURRENT SEXUAL HARASSMENT CRISIS
Consider these quotes from Jordan Peterson’s December 2016 “Letter to the World”:
–“We need to take RESPONSIBILITY, instead of incessantly insisting on our RIGHTS.”
–“For men and women alike, this means voluntary adoption of RESPONSIBILITY– responsibility for oneself, family and state. In that responsibility, and not in RIGHTS, resides Meaning itself – the meaning that makes life bearable.”
–“the sexualized interactions between young men and women – in universities, for example — are increasingly and inevitably falling under the harsh and TYRANNICAL REGULATION OF THE STATE.”
–“the eternal necessity for A WOMAN to serve as the MOTHER….”
–“The individual is the source of the new wisdom….The divine individual is masculine because THE FEMININE IS NOT INDIVIDUAL: The divine feminine is, instead, MOTHER AND CHILD.”
–“But such emancipation places a dual BURDEN on the now more autonomous WOMAN, who is required to balance manifesting the potential of her individual spirit with the NECESSITY of desire to BEAR AND REAR the next generation of mankind.”
Dr. Jordan Peterson said in another video:
–“if I’m a victim then everyone else owes me something and I don’t have to take any responsibility” (see “Jordan Peterson: The victim mentality,” on the Essential Truth channel on YouTube)
Okay, so from the quotes above, we can see that Jordan Peterson stands for responsibility, and not rights, not a victim mentality.
But how does this apply to the situation of unwanted sexual advances (whether in the form of sexual words or sexual touching) in the workplace? Would Dr. Peterson say that young women and men low in the Dominance Hierarchy facing unwanted sexual advances from ugly, old men high in Dominance Hierarchy should just handle these situations on their own, without demanding their rights under Anti-Sexual Harassment Laws, and without making their allegations public in the media? Yes, I think that is Dr. Peterson’s view. Remember he said: “We need to take responsibility, instead of incessantly insisting on our rights.”
Would Jordan Peterson even say that those Anti-Sexual Harassment Laws should be repealed, perhaps on the ground that they constitute “compelled speech,” since they involve the use of State-power to forbid bosses from referring to women subordinates and co-workers as “Hot Lips,” “Honey Bun,” etc, and strictly require them to use normal names, pronouns, and titles? Yes, I think that Jordan Peterson would favor the repeal of Anti-Sexual Harassment Laws, since they are based on Gender Theory. He would prefer that people instead use the long-existing laws against Assault & Battery for unwanted touching in the workplace. I believe that Jordan Peterson would not favor any laws regulating speech (even sexual speech) in the workplace. Remember he said: “the sexualized interactions between young men and women – in universities, for example — are increasingly and inevitably falling under the harsh and TYRANNICAL REGULATION OF THE STATE.”
But how can young men and women low in the Dominance Hierarchy handle these situations on their own, as an individual? By just saying “no” to the unwanted sexual advances, and then accepting whatever consequences follow from saying “no” to these men who are towering giants and tyrants in the Dominance Hierarchy? By resigning and seeking a new job? But won’t there just be new sexually-harassing tyrants in the next workplace too? Most people cannot eat or acquire other basic necessities except by being a member of these non-democratic, usually-male-dominated Dominance Hierarchy workplaces. And in these modern times, women too need a job to survive (prior to modern times, most women married early and stayed at home).
I deduce that Jordan Peterson thinks that Sexual Harassment is simply a biologically-inevitable, unstoppable outcome of including large numbers of low-dominance sexy young women in a Dominance Hierarchy dominated by males.
I deduce that Jordan Peterson thinks that the only solution is a return to the age-old tradition of women marrying at a very young age and staying at home until they middle-aged, after all their children have been raised (i.e., every young woman goes directly from the at-home protection of her father to the at-home protection of her husband). Middle-aged women who have borne children are not generally sexually harassed. Consider the evidence in the already-quoted passages from Dr. Jordan Peterson:
–“the eternal necessity for A WOMAN to serve as the MOTHER….”
–“The individual is the source of the new wisdom….The divine individual is masculine because THE FEMININE IS NOT INDIVIDUAL: The divine feminine is, instead, MOTHER AND CHILD.”
–“But such emancipation places a dual BURDEN on the now more autonomous WOMAN, who is required to balance manifesting the potential of her individual spirit with the NECESSITY of desire to BEAR AND REAR the next generation of mankind.”
In short, Jordan Peterson’s solution to the Sexual Harassment crisis is for women to go right from school to marriage, bear children, stay home, and not enter the workplace until middle-age (or to never work outside the home).
I deduce that Jordan Peterson would also approve of the solution used in many Muslim countries of keeping all women employees strictly physically segregated from male employees.
One of the biggest problems I see in today’s society is the definition of words. There appears to often be a disparity in word definition when describing an issue or situation. It seems people come together to try and solve problems or discuss issues but each has a different way to understand what the words they express mean, therefore, there is no clear understanding and problem never get solved. I see it happening with politicians, preachers, activist groups, etc. Shouldn’t we all be using the same so called dictionary in life?
NIce memory trick. Narrative and identification with aspiration. 3 useful tools rolled into 1. A different memory trick is the dream time which includes a number of roles for different situations mapped to the landscape. Another is stories in the stars, astrology. But now days its easier to jointly develop and write down aspirational principles. Game theory helps us clearly identify what those should be. Nihilism is not required. I suggest you try reading Ostrom. The problem with the divine individual is the difficulty in getting the story to evolve. When pagans argue dogma they do so by discovering new gods. Open source coders simply branch. The trouble with post modernist marxists is that they are not post structuralist. Social Justice Warriors may be critical theorists but they are no worse than other dogmatists. Constantly challenging norms is no worse than constantly reinforcing them. Things gotta evolve. I prefer to run the evolution as game agency sims but others like to reinterpret scripture. https://www.coursehero.com/file/19061788/Ostrom-Collective-Action-and-the-Evolution-of-Social-Norms/
“The central problem of human beings isn’t religion, as the New Atheists insist. It’s tribalism.”
True enough. It is however what helps us justify the horrible things we do to each other. Ain’t no gun deadlier than one that’s held by someone who thinks god is the one that gave permission to point it at an infidel and pull the trigger. Atheism at it’s core is about little more than making people face the reality and take responsibility.
Though the distinction between religion and faith should still be respected; not that I believe either one is vital, mind, but I do think faith is relatively harmless compared to religion.
In the story of the Tower of Babel, isn’t God’s punishment the burden of diversity?
Dear Dr. Peterson… What drives a person to ponder and think ? I’m guessing that you believe that for every question there is an answer… A correct answer, the truth of the matter. I’m going say a few things about ” The Story “, the story that started in The Garden of Eden. Now I know that you think about this story, you refer to parts and pieces of it often…
The Garden was where creation lived before the Fall… The Fall is when corruption set in or began, so “time” quite literately began with the fall. Life in the Garden was in the dimension of Eternity, no death, no unbelief, no decay or breakdown of matter… no corruption… no time. Time, decay and death was the consequence of the Fall. God clearly identified the consequence of eating of the ” Tree of Knowledge “, ” In that day you shall surely die “. Now, if you are a Christian, you are going to want to know what really happened within God’s Story. The more you know of the real story, the more everything going on around us makes sense. I don’t know everything about God, but I know and believe this…
The story of the fall… The Serpent was not a snake, he was an upright being. A beast ( an animal ) that looked like a man, talked like a man, as handsome as Adam. The Bible says, ” the most subtle beast of the field”… he was smart, cunning, crafty ( subtle). Adam and Eve knew him, probably had conversations with him before. Eve was not surprised when he spoke to her that day… when Adam wasn’t around. Adam was a son of God, The caretaker of the Garden and all of the creation on the earth. Eve, taken from his side, coequal, his wife, his helpmate… the feminine part, that which was to bring forth children. Satan, who had been kicked out to heaven and came down to earth, with a purpose… ( to be worshiped instead of God ) came and indwelt in the Serpent. Satan injected his nature in the Serpent, with the purpose of starting his own race, polluting God’s race ( Adam’s race ) and being worshiped as God… on this world. So… this is what literately what happened in the Garden that day. The Serpent, the man like beast, that Satan indwelt, seduced Eve and put his seed ( sperm) in her, and Cain was the result. When Adam found out… He put his seed there also, to protect her… and Able was the result. Twins were born to Eve. Cain, with the nature of his father, the Serpent ( Satan ) and Able with the nature of his father, Adam, the son of God. Thus the human race was fallen / hybridized… Since that time man is said to be born in sin, shaped in iniquity. Born with a carnal spirit / nature, the nature of Satan. That is why Jesus ( God ) said that a man ” must be born again “, of a new nature… the nature / spirit of the Creator / God. But the Old Nature must die first, and that comes via free moral agency, and the call of God to the deep ( the genetic spirit seed ) that lies within some men… not all.
Well, I hope I said that right… I’m not a philosopher, etc… just a believer.
Best wishes to you Mr. Peterson, God Bless you.
Hello Dr. Peterson. I just wanted to let you know that you are a huge inspiration for me. I take part in a form of high school debate that deals with issues of morality (Lincoln Douglas). Recently, our resolution for January and February was “Resolved: public colleges and universities ought not restrict any constitutionally protected speech.” A large part of my affirmitive case (agreeing with the resolution) was based off your and Dr. Ben O’Neil’s concepts of linguistic accuracy. I saw your interview online where you stated that your value was truth and I adopted it as my own for the case and my life. I personally accredit your work for allowing me to qualify for a national level tournament. Thank you so much for being a force for good in our world. In such a polarized time, it’s nice to look at you and know that there is an absolute morality. Please, keep fighting the good fight and know that others support you in it.
Dr Peterson,Does it concern you that you appear to be becoming some sort of cult leader?
My shoulders lowered for a second after reading this. Thanku
Thanks Dr. Peterson. I enjoyed reading your letter to the world. Your historically and mythologically informed line of reasoning provides a solid ground for your words. I think it’s incumbent on each and every one of us to renew Being. In the Gathas, Zarathustra says the following:
“So may we be like those making the world progress towards perfection;
May Mazda and the Divine Spirits help us and guide our efforts through Truth;
For a thinking man is where Wisdom is at home.”
Ahunuvaiti Gatha: Yasna 30 / hymn 9
This hymn have always been an inspiration for me.
Hi Jordan,
I call myself an atheist, yet I align with much of your thinking.
A few quibbles with what you have written here.
Agree with you that tribalism is a problem, but not the core problem.
Cooperation is certainly in the picture, but it seems to me that not in the way you have characterised it, but I think I can see how what you say may seem sensible to you.
For me, cooperation is the essence of humanity.
For me, as someone with 50 years interest in evolution, it seems accurate to a good first order approximation to characterise all advances in the complexity of living systems as the emergence of new levels of cooperation.
Games theory is clear, that raw cooperation is always vulnerable to cheating, so to be stable requires effective attendant secondary strategies that work in practice at identifying cheats, removing any benefit from the cheating, then return the cheat to cooperative behaviour (Elinor Ostrom did some nice work in this context).
So the problem isn’t cooperation, it is a lack of effective secondary strategies to identify all the new levels of cheating. And there must always be something of an evolutionary “arms race” to such things, proving the ancient maxim – “the price of liberty is eternal vigilance”.
Tribalism seems to resolve mostly on the basis of the systems available to ordinary people to identify cheats. This comes from an ability to accurately identify individuals over time and to accurately recall prior interactions – and results in Dunbars Number – the effective size of workable cooperatives without using technology, and thus tribalism.
It does seem possible to use technology to effectively increase our power to identify individuals, as well as to accurately record, share and recall interactions, and to maintain wide social networks.
With these enhancements, it does seem possible to maintain cooperation at any number of individuals our sun is capable of sustaining.
Add to this, the infinite realms of the possible available to be explored, and there is ample room for any individuals to responsibly exercise their creative freedom in whatever realm they responsibly choose. And there is, as you have noted elsewhere, cascading levels of temporal, social and ecological responsibility within which one must apply the test of reasonableness.
And complexity theory is clear, that in such open systems all boundaries need to be flexible and negotiable (in infinitely extensible dimensions). No firm answers here, no certainty. The only real security comes from the cooperative, and many aspects of this reality we find ourselves in appear clearly to be not simply unknown but fundamentally unknowable (maximal computational complexity, Heisenberg uncertainty, chaos, stochastic, etc).
The science that is real to me acknowledges the fundamental creativity of the process of hypothesis generation, and the fundamental uncertainty in all things real. The unknown, the unknowable, and the magic (as in AC Clarke’s – any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic) must always be with us, should we manage to live for the rest of eternity.
The fundamental issue of our age seems clearly to me to be that market values are based in scarcity, and anything universally abundant must have zero value in a market. This sets up a fundamental conflict between the many positive roles markets have played in our getting to this point, and the ability of technology to deliver universal abundance of a large and exponentially expanding set of goods and services. Such abundance meets the real needs of individual people, but destroys economic value. Hence we see the rise of intellectual property laws as an obvious approach, and far more stealthy are many of the real outcomes of much of what passes as “health and safety” legislation.
I agree totally with you, that there is a fine balance in being human, between being dominated by rules, and falling into chaos – and that region defines what I call responsibility. Having just lived through a 7.8 earthquake here in Kaikoura – I see so much good in people, and also a tendency to break into smaller tribes as the stress mounts.
It is a very complex set of problems you have set yourself.
And having survived a terminal cancer diagnosis, I align with many others here in suggesting a greater focus on self care.
Having just discovered you, I do not want to lose you.
Arohanui
Ted
Dr. Peterson,
Thank you for the prologue to your conversation with Sam Harris. Since hearing you on Joe Rogan, I’ve been privately hoping for this to unfold and apparently I wasn’t the only one who felt this way. I sincerely hope that this is the beginning of an ongoing dialogue from which fruits will grow in the years to come. It would be a tragedy to see this meeting result in a series of short fuses and a final blackout to conclude. The two of you, working collectively, to reason and push through this complexity is a task unique only you both. It saddens me to see the oppression of others opinions, beliefs, and ideologies wear you down, but it is the choice you’ve made and I’m confident you will persevere. This is a point of unity for you and Sam as I am sure he has suffered similarly. As you would agree, it is your responsibility; in so much as you can bear, to lead consciousness forward. With great knowledge, with great privilege, comes great responsibility.
In my opinion, the use of the word religion in the context that you use it is a misnomer and ultimately extremely misleading. It doesn’t at all seem that you propose a progression of society toward one which endorses a traditional set of religious values- a dogmatic belief system, but rather that there IS, rather than IS NOT, some sort of guiding principles from which human beings can base their decisions. If there is not some sort of a collectively constructed ‘belief system’- you can call it religion if you want to incite a collective inflammatory response- the resultant society is one where those in control distinguish and enforce their own on others(totalitarian state) or where each individual’s own is entirely baseless and meaningless relative to others(nihilistic state). In either case, there is/are still a system /s that exist, despite whether they are conducive to the reduction of total collective suffering- or perhaps as Peterson might prefer- collective individual suffering. It seems that there is no doubt both you and Sam agree that there needs to be some system of belief, some system of morality, from which to live our lives, but it is the means by which we establish them that differs.
As Harris lays out in his work The Moral Landscape, if we can agree that some people live better or worse lives than others and that there are given states of the brain and the world from which these lives are derived, we can presume that there are better or worse ways to go about achieving the best the conditions for the prosperity of human consciousness. In Harris’ opinion, religion or religious doctrine, as it exists today, has ceased to be a constructive force in the progression of humanity towards an objectively better world. Therefore, we must move beyond it if we hope to continue moving forward. He argues in favor of the establishment of a morality from empirical study, using the scientific method. He is fearful of morality that derives from religion due to its divisive, intolerant, and unscientific nature.
You argue for the re-establishment of a morality that already exists. This is a morality that is built into the nature of the human psyche and which is ‘revealed’ by religious and mythological story. In the deepest sense, the morality is fundamental to our being and without it there is nothing but pure suffering in the face of vulnerability. You fear that the loss of this understanding, through an unchecked progression toward secularism, has the potential to lead toward a world that lacks a sufficient knowledge of metaphysics: a state that would lead to extinguished consciousness.
I believe that you each have ground to stand on. We should be fearful of a world where religious zealots have power just as we should be fearful of a world where pure secularism reigns. At this point in history, both of these scenarios are extremely dangerous and pose the potential to end humanity. If the events of 20th century are not proof of this potential, what is.
The idea that science can provide a sufficient basis of morality is perhaps the most important topic of our day. As you have said before, science provides us information about how the world is but it does not provide us information about how we should act in the world. You seem to believe that this is the precise role of religion. I hope that this is where the focus of the discussion lies. It should not be wasted on a discussion about gender pronouns. Your time is far too valuable for that to be the case.
There is a chance that your ideas, and Sam’s, in time, converge upon the same conclusion. I am suggesting that the morality determined by scientific study is the same as the morality determined by religion: a unified theory of morality. A true unified theory is likely beyond our scope of understanding, but a progression towards something of the sort is in order.
In any case, I wish you the best in this clash of minds. Dare I say, you are doing God’s work.
Best, Sean
For a very long time now I’ve been embarrassed by my metaphysical beliefs and only after carefully laying the groundwork and definitions of certain terms can I even begin to say how I feel about religion in the company of my mostly left wing artist friends. There has been no champion to point to, there has been no prominent intellectual to call upon. Not that I need an appeal to authority but it did feel like I was horribly outnumbered and not represented in academia (which I left behind years ago). I feel, personally, that you are continuing the great tradition of Canadian intellectuals. Northrop Frye, Neil Postman, Marshall McLuhan… and now you. Intellectuals who are writing from a deeply moral and spiritual place. The world needs more of this kind of thinking and I’m beyond happy to find someone who is continuing that great tradition. Thank you for your work, you are making an incredible difference in my life.
Dear Professor Peterson,
Thank you for your heroic efforts to live up to your principles. They are an inspiration to all of us fellow pilgrims in this vale of tears. Looks like you’re in “the Valley of the Shadow of Death” right now. But “fear no evil”. Even though it seems like it, you are not alone. Pray. Read Newman’s “Lead, Kindly Light”. Listen to Bach. Read the Psalms. Pray. Rest in the Lord.
I’m just an old lady, but I’m weeping with you and, more helpfully, praying for you, and I’m not the only one. More to the point, I’ve had two Masses said for you̵