Fortunately the psychedelic experience is a good antidote for both fundamentalist religion and nationalism.
HeartCore a dit:
As long as more than 50% of the American people believe Noah's ark is an actual historic record, you can safely assume that religion still dictates the majority of our culture. Seperation of church and politics is a farce which never happened.
But politics don't determine culture. If anything influences the cultural climate of most Western countries, it is the entertainment industry, and what we get from that industry isn't a reflection of politics. The White House says we shouldn't do drugs, while Hollywood and the music industry practically glorify them all the time (especially pot). You get weird situations at festivals, where the event itself says "free your mind", and the local authorities harass or even arrest people for doing drugs.
You're right about the vast numbers of Christians in the United States. There have been those that suggested the religious idiots tend to outbreed intellectuals and mystics, which is probably true. It makes you wonder how seriously we should ultimately take this democracy, and thus politics in general. The pen is mightier than the sword. It's the intellectuals and artists that are most influential within any culture. Laws can try to regulate the public life of a culture, but never really govern or steer its inner directions. So from that perspective, there is hope.
By the way, I'm not arguing the current human state of affairs will survive much longer, just that I believe some human beings will survive whatever is going to happen, and figure out how to live a more sustainable existence.
Though the number of Chrisitans is high, there is an important difference between religion and science: Religious faith will never be strengthened by new inspirational writings, because the focus is always a fixed archaic scripture. Science however is an ever expanding body of knowledge, which means that the faith, conviction and understanding of scientists is ever increasing, especially when the disciplines start to exchange data, or when psychedelics are added to the process. So our arguments against modern Christianity, Islam and similar dogmatic and political movements are going to be more and more intricate and elaborate, while their arguments and claims become sillier and sillier. Science is also becoming more and more spiritual, gradually becoming a much more attractive source of information for spiritual seekers. When I say science, I of course mean including psychology and anthropology, and everything related to psychedelics and consciousness.
