#lecture reflections

Rave culture was more than about partying, getting layed and getting high -it was a movement formed by a community of people who seeked a change. An ulternative to the political choices that were around at the time, music and moshs brought people of all ethnic backgrounds together.

The political stand off was against neo liberalism, personally i’ve never really understood poltics - i would have appreciated more of a break down in regards to its policies and the impact it could bring.

Rave culture had many sub genres, from fashion to politics - there was so much to cover with little time. But i am glad it was covered, i never knew it had such an impact on peoples lives.

I've never really thought about the end of the universe as relevant to me... the closest thing I feel relevant to me personally is the death of my family and people I care about, and my own death. These are the things that worry me - the end of the universe hardly seems relevant! For me it makes no sense that we should have to worry about the universe - such a vast vast place, with so much unknown - surely that isn't as relevant as focussing on being a good person, for example.

It was good to see something I recognised this week in the lecture - Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Here it is again:

I'm pretty sure that Maslow in writing this hierarchy of needs was not coming from a religious approach! For example, on the physiological level, Maslow states that "breathing, food, water, sex, sleep, homeostasis, and excretion" are the basic needs for any human. This should be an interesting perspective for somebody who values traditional Catholic values, who would not view sex as part of the fundamental, physiological needs of a human. A biologist might disagree.

I found this lecture quite dense and never really thought about consciousness in so many ways before. Only towards the end of the lecture when there were several positions summarised, did I realise that people thought about their consciousness in so many ways. Personally I feel like I can related to 'dual-aspect monism' the most.

Really enjoyed reading this lecture and never really thought about the relationship between neuroscience and religion. I think some of the arguments provided are a little bit dodgy however. For example this statement from Newberg:

“However, what we can say is that the brain has two primary functions that can be considered from either a biological or evolutionary perspective. These two functions are self-maintenance and self-transcendence. The brain performs both of these functions throughout our lives. It turns out that religion also performs these two same functions. So, from the brain's perspective, religion is a wonderful tool because religion helps the brain perform its primary functions. Unless the human brain undergoes some fundamental change in its function, religion and God will be here for a very long time.”

It is extremely easy to explain why it is that Jesus's followers after his death.. would want to believe in miracles, and would build up stories which then would be believed by their followers...

- Richard Dawkins (from the 8B lecture)

After hearing the quoted part from the lecture this week I immediately thought of Arthur Miller's play 'The Crucible'. I read through this book briefly after high school English literature class had introduced me to Miller, and was really intrigued by how Miller was trying to make a point of his own based on the historical accounts of witch trials. Now, it seems like miracles and witch trials would be at the opposite end of the spectrum of positive-negative events, but how I see it is that they are both a form of mass hysteria.

"I want to open myself! . . . I want the light of God, I want the sweet love of Jesus! I danced for the Devil; I saw him, I wrote in his book; I go back to Jesus; I kiss His hand. I saw Sarah Good with the Devil! I saw Goody Osburn with the Devil! I saw Bridget Bishop with the Devil!"

The Crucible is a pretty simple story about a low-rung orphan girl called Abigail Williams who has an affair with a married man John Proctor, and gets extremely jealous of his wife. At the same time there are some strange events which are causing panic among the community in Puritan Salem. Abigail realises that accusing others of witchcraft in the context of these strange events will distract others from her lustful sin, and starts 'confessing' to align with the theology of Salem. She stirs a large-scale hysteria in which several characters all accuse each other to escape death sentences. The story ends when John, convinced that it would preserve his integrity, would rather die than accuse somebody else of witchcraft.

I can't say that this story is a historical account of what happened in Salem due to religious hysteria but I can say that it is ironic that Proctor, who is portrayed as the character most just in the book, ends up being falsely sentenced to death. As a result the entire experience of the book is really unsettling and honestly, I usually feel the same way when people (especially Christians! Since there are so 'miracles' in the Bible) talk about miracles... I feel like there is a certain kind of hysteria which I cannot understand. Looking into mass hysteria due to religious behaviour, it is interesting to see the kind of research that comes up (such as the events highlighted by this article)

The other point I feel like is relevant when talking of miracles is one of personal agenda. Everybody has an agenda, and when yours is desperate enough (such as how Abigail starts to accuse others into believing falsities when realises that, with her low status within the community, she is likely to be trialed to death for witchcraft), you will use desperate measures to protect yourself.

Overall I'm not quite sure where the notion of miracles came from, especially in Judeo-Christian theology, and I can't help but feel that these accounts are

Another creature to consider is the mole rat. Which theory holds water when the eye of the mole rat is considered? The ancestor of the mole rat presumably used its eyes as it lived above ground and needed them for survival. However, the mole rat has adapted to living underground in complete darkness. Its eyes have become useless--indeed, they have been buried beneath skin and fur and couldn't be used even if the mole rat came into the light. The neurons that were used for sight have been put to better use in the mole rat's brain for other sensory functions. Evolution by natural selection perfectly explains the eyes of a mole rat. A creationist must resort to faith and/or a poor designer.

For this week's lecture review I have chosen to extend on this passage I found in the linked article about the eye. I think that in many cases of religion it is common for the religious person to argue that such beautiful, wonderful, perfect things could not have possibly just come by through chance, that there must have been a supreme designer who did everything just right, and with meaning. When you ask them, however, how does God account for the creation of cancer, or 'faulty design' (as shown in the passage above), the answer is usually a little less romantic, or nor as robustly exclaimed. 

"you can't just say there is a God because the world is beautiful. You also have to account for bone cancer in children. You have to account for the fact that almost all animals in the wild live under stress, with not enough to eat, and will die violent and bloody deaths. There is not any way that you can just choose the nice bits and say that means there is a God, and ignore the true fact of what nature is"