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Genocide of thinking

By David Young - posted Wednesday, 25 March 2009


Everything is now changed, except the way we think, and if this is not soon altered we will continue to drift toward unparalleled catastrophe. We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if mankind is to survive. Albert Einstein, cited in The Journal of the Franklin Institute, vol.221, No.3. March 1936.

Abrahamic religions are monotheistic faiths that recognise a spiritual tradition identified with Abraham. The religions usually identified as Abrahamic are Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

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The commonality between these three religions is a way of thinking; and it is a way of thinking which has permeated through the whole of what we know as Western and Islamic society.

To be fair to the Abrahamic religions it is a form of thinking that probably existed before Abraham, but it is these religions that have become the most visible and dominant form of this rationality.

The Abrahamic system of thought is based on the concept of right and wrong. The irony of this is that the Jewish and Christian systems at least, are built on “the woman” in the Garden of Eden eating the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

The purpose and result of Abrahamic thinking is the removal of personal responsibility. The consequence of this is that Jews and Palestinians do atrocious things to each other but neither side accepts responsibility for their actions, because they believe they are divinely right and only acting in response to the actions of the other side.

It is this removal of personal responsibility that is the most dangerous aspect of Abrahamic thinking. George Bush and his administration bear no personal responsibility for Guantanamo Bay or special rendition. They are covered by the blanket of being “right” in their war on terror.

And, of course, Osama bin Laden will have every reason why he was “right” to attack the Twin Towers. Osama and George can do anything they like and remain free of sin because they act in God’s name and therefore it must have been God’s will.

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Our legal system is Abrahamic. Personal responsibility is reduced to what is legal. In our personal lives we can negate our personal responsibility by being “right”. Using the Abrahamic system of thinking we can do anything we want to anyone at any time and remain free of sin if we are right and they are wrong.

“Debate” on issues is similarly based on claims of right or wrong; basically the idea of debate as a way of finding solutions is alien to our society. It is all about name calling and insults. We gather in groups and claim our God is the only true God, or that our way is the only way: that is the Abrahamic way of thinking.

There is no reason why we have to think the Abrahamic way. It is just the form of thinking that we have ended up with.

And so we can invade, kill and destroy cultures without any personal responsibility. We can do this because we are “right” in converting the subdued to our religion and saving their souls. Or maybe we slaughter hundreds of thousands of people to bring peace and stability to the region. All it takes is to be right.

In Australia, we have many people in the “white” Abrahamic society who are experts about customs and ways of our indigenous peoples. But we understand nothing about our indigenous population because white people cannot think “indigenous”. It is a way of thinking outside white understanding and a way of thinking white Australia is destroying with right and wrong. It is probably too late to stop the process in Australia because Abrahamic thinking has infected the Indigenous population to the extent that it cannot recover.

When Christianity over came Gnostic thought, it is probable that it wasn't just a case of two Abrahamic systems fighting over right and wrong - with one side victorious. It is more likely that the Gnostic form of thinking was not originally an Abrahamic system. It was a system of the Gnosis of truth coming from within. We can only surmise that this could have been a way of thinking based on trusting intuition. Although this may not be correct because it is based on judgment, it does illustrate that there are other forms of thinking other than the system that is commonly used in our society.

For example, the Cathar way of thinking, and the philosophical principles which went with it, were wiped out in the Genocide of the Cathars by the Christian church.

There is a standard set move Abrahamic thinking uses to destroy anyone who dares think differently to what is sanctioned by the “thought police”. It is a simple but effective method; because there is no defence.

The first part of the three-part move is a campaign of lies and misinformation. If this is executed skillfully, the victim has no way of proving the lies are lies and the misinformation unfounded. Use the principle that people will accept something as true because it cannot be proved to be false.

The second part is to raise the lies and misinformation that are now circulating freely to the level of fear and loathing. The third part is to destroy. The fear and loathing the people now have for the victim thanks to the second part will ensure that there will be no opposition to this third and final phase.

This system worked against Wicca (witchcraft); Hitler used it against the Jewish people; and it is the standard sure fire way of destroying anyone who dares to think for themselves or differs from the accepted norm.

When the victim has been destroyed all that is left are the lies and misinformation. All we think we know about Gnosticism, Wicca, and the Cathars is mostly the residual of such lies and misinformation spread by Christianity.

The two main issues for the West at the moment are climate change and the global financial crisis. The debates on both these issues are being fought on Abrahamic principles. Lies on lies, Misinformation followed by more misinformation, none of which can be proved or disproved. Any science that could give some guidance is taken, distorted, and fed back as misinformation; but with each side using their particular version of the science to try and gain the higher ground, claiming they are right and the other side wrong.

If there was any thinking involved in the climate change debate, the protagonists would understand that right and wrong does not matter. What matters is sorting out what is happening and what response (if any) is required.

Abrahamic thinking is not really thinking at all. It requires no active requirement of reasoned response. What it requires is to destroy anyone or anything that does not agree with the dogma of the particular club you belong to.

It does not require thinking to insult and abuse. It does not require thinking to conduct a campaign of lies and misinformation. It does not require thinking to ignore everything that threatens to upset our narrow little lives.

And if we do something that causes harm all we have to do is come up with an excuse why we are right, and the other person wrong. No great feat of intellectual ability required for that one.

We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if mankind is to survive. Albert Einstein.

I see it slightly differently to Einstein. We will have to learn to think if mankind is to survive. What we do at the moment is not thinking.

So what would thinking be like? Can we come up with the characteristics of thinking?

As a beginning I offer here my concept of what thinking would be like without any dogma attached because we will not know what thinking is like until we start to do it. If we have something that needs to be solved we would start from the position of knowing nothing. If we know it all already we go nowhere.

This is the reason we so often go round and round in circles. We cannot get the idea that thinking starts with knowing nothing.

Thinking would require total personal responsibility. Whatever we did would belong to us.

The bad news is we could no longer use the excuse that we were right and the other person wrong in avoiding responsibility. The lies and misinformation would also have to go.

If the human race learnt to think we would probably be able to solve our problems instead of arguing and abusing as our planet disappears down the drain.

Thinking would not mean the end of emotions, in fact it could be the beginning of emotional responses. It would not mean that everything would become rational and ordered. Thinking would bring about the things we wanted.

In an Abrahamic society we do not aspire to the things we want. Instead we aspire to the things we are told we are supposed to want. It is an un-emotional response of becoming who we are told we are supposed to be.

With thinking the first thing would be “what do we want” without any idea of right or wrong. It would be the personal responsibility of deciding what we want and then thinking about the best way to bring it about

This would work at several levels: The purely personal level that affects us only as individuals, and the collective level where we make collective decisions to design the society we want, and all points in between.

Can the human race handle thinking, or is it too into the Abrahamic way that it can only handle dogma?

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About the Author

David Young has been a writer for 20 years. At other times he has been an architect and a flying instructor. Details of his books and writings can be found at his website davidyoungauthor.com

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