Okay, okay, enough with the praise already, folks; this *is* getting
boring. ;^) hehe (Just kidding, I do appreciate it.)

But seriously, I can see why some folks would find the treatise boring.
Email on the internet is just not very conducive to readability. Another
factor I see is that the simplicity of the raw-foods ethic is part of its
appeal and has itself become ingrained as a value. When things start
getting too detailed (often necessary if you want to stay reality-based),
you can almost see people starting to pull the plug and turn off, saying,
"Aw, who cares about that, it ain't that complicated. If you just
blah-blah-blah, everything will be fine."

To me, one of the big downsides in this movement is the tendency to keep
things *so* simple and reduced to oversimplified precepts and slogans we
can live by that reality goes by the wayside. The ethic of KISS (keep it
[too] simple, stupid) kicks in, and people turn off emotionally. ("Stop me
before I think too hard, my brain might overheat!" seems to be the unspoken
objection. :-) )

But if you want it simple, actually, evolution is about as simple at the
top level of abstraction as creationism: Early things give rise to later
things through the chain of reproduction-with-modifications. I know when I
first heard about evolutionary perspectives over 15 years ago, it took some
getting used to just because it was so different.

To me the real psychological problem is it constitutes a new "paradigm"
especially for people brought up with a dualistic worldview like our
mainstream religions have. And even for those who don't consciously
subscribe to our western religions, they have still formed the subconscious
framework that undergirds the moral underpinnings of our society. (Another
question is whether morality even needs to be tied to religion--I
personally don't think so.) This set of subconscious "rules" for thinking
and behavior gives rise to all sorts of psychological predispositions about
what one is willing to believe or even think about. But once you get into
the swing of it, evolution is real simple conceptually: it's just when you
start getting into the nuts and bolts, it quickly gets complicated. (Hell,
so do theological head-of-a-pin disputes, for that matter! :^) ) But all
science is that way.

Kirt sez:
>there need be no conflict at all between evolutionists and creationists.

Not if they are keeping to their respective territories, at least. The
problem is when creationism tries to feign fallacious scientific arguments
for its objections to evolution which are at root religious objections.
Conversely, science gets itself into real trouble with the population at
large when it tries to start making pronouncements on the relevance of
spiritual worldviews that help people make sense of and give meaning to
their lives.

I think science has a real public relations problems these days. There is
the problem that science is often viewed as a Frankenstein monster out of
control--and part of that is because it perhaps takes its disdain for
questions of "meaning" way too far. Science by itself obviously has not
done much to solve the problems of inequity in distribution of material
resources around the globe: I see that as an ethical and spiritual problem.
To me the ethical/ spiritual imperatives that people subscribe to and
follow vastly outweigh science in terms of solving the world's problems. I
think everybody in the world could become vegetarian raw-foodists like NFL
wants, or Paleodieters like I might want, and in itself it would only make
a minimal difference, if the power structures in place (in the world remain
based on pure profit with little sense of social responsibility). I don't
see any necessary connection that eating differently will change much other
than affect the environment to some degree, but if people are still
strip-mining the soil with, say, fruit-orchards just to make a buck, while
paying their employees peanuts, it ain't going to amount ot much in
bringing justice or equity into the world.

I have had some discussions with a few people in the scientific world about
the lack of willingness to put their knowledge and discoveries into plain
language and write popularly so the average person with other interests can
quickly understand the impact of scientific discoveries and knowledge in
determining the technologies the world runs on that we ought to be more
consciously taking a hand in deciding about. And frankly, they "just don't
get it." I find that very frustrating, which is why I sometimes write these
long treatises, because the science can be made very understandable if one
just makes the effort.

>The debate, however,
>perhaps shows more about another "natural" inclination of human
>intelligence: the tendancy to fractionalize and jockey for position, and
>unfortunately see the other side as an enemy to be defeated--even when they
>are not stealing our food, but only thinking different thoughts.

You know, this reminds me, I may come across as someone who is atheistic or
something, but actually I am very keenly interested in psychological
metaphysical questions, as much or more so than scientific ones. I axed an
entire additional section out of the treatise that went into why it is that
it's only western religions that seems to have a problem with evolution.
Eastern religions by and large don't seem it as much of a problem, at least
from what I can tell. It seems to be primarily Christianity that has a big
beef with evolution (and of these, more the fundamentalists, since others
have slowly over the decades been giving gradual assent to evolution as
explaining the physical side of creation. I dunno really about other
western religions' possible problems with it, such as Islam, but here in
America it's a Christian phenomenon. (Can any of our European listmembers
tell us what the picture us across the big pond with the church's views on
evolution?)

Although many of the eastern religions (primarily Buddhist and Hindu ones)
suffer from the psychological motivation of wanting to avoid this world
entirely and "get off the wheel of existence" which has been responsible
for their material poverty compared to the west, on the other hand their
metaphysical views of the universe are generally much more sophisticated
than western ones. (This wouldn't necessarily be true if you allowed the
suppressed western mystical traditions hidden with the mainstream
denominations into the picture, but they are so small as to have almost no
influence on mainstream practice anymore.) It is interesting that Taoism,
for instance, has a view that the universe has been created by and is in
the continual process of spontaneously creating/evolving, which can be very
simpatico with evolutionary views.

And then there is the whole question of dualistic metaphysical views of the
universe that are typical of the west vs. monistic or non-dualistic views
in the east that I think is behind the reason why western religions have
such a problem with evolution while eastern ones have much less. (Just be
glad I didn't put *that* in the treatise, and called enough enough.) :) )
But that's another discussion entirely.

--Ward Nicholson <[log in to unmask]>