Beyond Capitalism - Looking Towards The Future

It's time for my third (of six) introductory pieces, and this time it's politics (do try to contain your excitement). I'm going to explain why I see capitalism, in it's current manifestation, as undesirable and unsustainable, whether capitalism can be modified into a more appropriate form, and a brief look at the alternatives.


What's wrong with Capitalism?

You will (or should!) already know what capitalism is, but in case you and your family have been living under a rock for the last couple of hundred years or you just need your memory jogging, click the link and take a look. In this part of the post I'm referring to the current corporate-capitalist system that prevails throughout most of the world. To give you a heads up, my criticisms of capitalism are split into three key sections - inequality and poverty perpetuated by capitalism, the instability and unsustainability of capitalism, and finally what I see as the immorality of capitalism.


Inequality - The Enemy of Peace, Happiness and Fullfillment

"In a world where 1 % of the population owns 40% of the planet's wealth, where 34,000 children die every single day from poverty and preventable diseases, and where 50% of the world's population lives on less than 2 and a half dollars a day, one thing is clear... Something is very wrong." - Peter Joseph

Like it or not, capitalism is based around inequality. More than that, it thrives on it, and perhaps even requires it to function properly. The foundation of capitalism is private ownership, the pursuit of profit and the accumulation of capital, which inevitably leads to those who have, and those who have not. From the few billionaires to the billions who scrape a living on a few dollars a day, capitalism, especially in its current form, is responsible for the deepest economic inequalities in the history of humanity, and these inequalities only continue to widen.

Not only is this level of inequality an abhorrent affront against human decency, it is linked to a whole host of social ills, from social alienation to the level of happiness, and from the number of teenage pregnancies to the suicide rate. Economic inequality tends to augment racial, religious, national and social inequalities.

Inequality is also the prime motivator in the desire for material accumulation at all levels of society, not because it will make us any happier, more fulfilled or healthier (although people often like to think it will), but simply because the enormous inequality and economic philosophy makes people feel that they must try to rise further up the ladder of wealth. Perhaps this is a natural impulse based on 'human nature', twisted by the context of modern society, but is likely to not be as I'll be discussing later (ooo... the anticipation!)

Equality should be one of the highest priorities of all governments, as promoting equality will certainly lead to a more stable, peaceful and productive society. This transition from institutionalised inequality to equality is not possible within the framework of our current economic system based on capitalism.


Poverty - Capitalism's Ultimate Crime

"The world has enough for everyone's need, but not for everyone's greed" - Gandhi

 Poverty is, of course, tied closely to inequality. Those who exist in a state of poverty are those who live towards the bottom of the long scale of economic prosperity. Many reason are proposed for poverty, from the failure of the country's government to the 'laziness' of those who live in poverty, but when the issue is looked at closely in the context of our globalised world, only one reason emerges - the unequal allocation of resources, with a disproportionate amount going to primarily northern, 'developed', countries. This arises as a result of a capitalist system monopolised by the north.

Like for inequality, capitalism can thrive off poverty. It is useful firstly as a supply of cheap 'slave' labour, with those in abject poverty forced through their financial circumstances into dangerous, poorly paid and often brutally enforced manufacturing and agricultural jobs. It also serves as a warning to citizens of wealthier countries of the dangers of not fully embracing capitalist ideals (oh, the irony!), thus leading to poorly thought out arguments like 'capitalism is good because we have a high standard of living'. These arguments usually completely ignore the billions around the world who support that comparatively high standard of living, and the level to which resources are diverted to these countries, and away from the so called 'developing' nations.

Poverty, just like equality, can not be eliminated in a corporate-capitalist system, since a large number of people living in relative poverty is virtually a perquisite of the functioning of such a system.



Instability - The Death Throes of Capitalism?

With the complex system of investment banks, stock markets and other such institutions with no tangible benefit to the vast majority of the world's people, the dominant economic system of the modern age has shown itself again and again to be highly, and increasingly, unsustainable.

Entire financial crises and recessions have been caused, not because there has been an decrease in the quantity of resources available, a decrease in the workforce size or some destructive event (such as a war or natural disaster), but simply because the risk-based system of investment, stock trading and a myriad of other such elements of the financial world has had a major screw-up. A major cause of the current economic downturn beginning in 2008 was such screw-ups, including the phantom 'derivatives market', which in 2009 stood at over $600 trillion (yes, trillion!) in value.

Although this element of instability is not a requisite of corporate capitalism, it currently plays and integral part in the current capitalist paradigm, and is likely to add further instability in the coming years if left unchecked. One thing that can be noted is that (with the exception of the Great Depression) economic crises and collapses have become more and more common over the decades, and increasingly severe, perhaps implying that capitalism is in its final death throes, and may soon make its final spectacular collapse. There is a second main reason for economic instability, which bring me nicely on to the unsustainability of capitalism.


Unsustainability - Infinite Growth faces a Finite World

"Oil depletion and climate change will create an entirely new context in which political struggles will be played out. Within that context, it is not just freedom, democracy, and equality that are at stake, but the survival of billions of humans and of whole ecosystems." - Richard Heinberg

This is, I think, the most important of the arguments against capitalism, at least in its current form, as it shows how this system could potentially lead to societal and environmental collapse that threaten the continuation of civilisation itself. Accordingly, I'm going to spend quite a bit of time on it.

One important element of the consumerist-capitalist system is that it is based off an infinite growth model - that economic growth can continue indefinitely, and that the available resources will continue to increase with demand forever. However, we live on a finite world of finite resources, and so this sort of system can not continue to function for much longer under this premise.

By far the most important of these finite resources is crude oil. Oil is the lifeblood of modern civilisation. It is an incredibly dense energy supply that can be easily transported and used in a wide variety of machines. Without oil human societies would not have been able to grow in the same way they have and continue to, or reach the extraordinary levels of energy usage and societal complexity that we have today. But as everyone knows, oil will run out, but more importantly its production will reach a peak, after which the quantity of oil available per year decreases year on year.

This is known as the peak oil crisis, and there is strong evidence to suggest that it was a major factor in the economic downturn beginning in 2008. Immediately before the market crash, oil prices reached dizzying new heights that had never been experienced before. It looks likely that world oil production in around 2006, which would fit up perfectly with the subsequent rise in oil's price as the demand began to exceed the supply. As oil is required for most of the functioning of modern societies, from transport to agriculture, and from manufacture to electricity production, the astonishing increase in the price of oil helped to cause a major economic contraction. This contraction allowed the price of oil to plummet, thus allowing the now depleted supplies to build up again.

The world economy has begun to pick-up somewhat, and so demand for oil has increased accordingly. However, the initial problem still remains - that the peak in oil production has been reached, and therefore is not able to support much economic recovery at all before the supply again becomes severely restricted. If you look at the price of oil you will see that it remains at around $100 or over. Even a decade ago few people indeed would suggest that oil would ever reach that sort of price, but yet it has, and the high prices are seriously stunting any attempts at recovery. It is highly likely that a recession, or potentially a depression, could be triggered in the next couple of years as demand for oil again far exceeds the diminishing supply. This crisis may begin to be compounded by a peak in natural gas, and eventually in coal, in the next few decades.

Even if we were to ignore the affront to morality that is capitalism-caused inequality and poverty, capitalism can not survive in anything like its current form for more than a couple of decades, and the longer we hold on it to it and languish in its failure, the messier the transition to a new system will be.


Capitalism's Suicidal Tendencies

More than this, capitalism's continuing and increasing appetite for fossil fuels presents an existential threat to humanity. You will know (and should accept) that the burning of fossil fuels is releasing enormous quantities of greenhouse gases, primarily carbon dioxide, and that these are causing global temperatures to rise in most areas in a process known as global warming.

A temperature rise of even a couple of degrees from current temperatures (likely to occur within a few decades at our current level of fossil fuel consumption) would devastate food production, lead to increased extreme weather, and flood low lying areas. Current predictions for the likely increase in temperature by the end of the century range from 3 to over 10 degrees. When you consider that an increase of only 6 degrees (and possibly less if feedback events such as the release of underground methane caused by increased temperatures are included) would spell the end of most life on earth. Most ecosystems would utterly collapse, food production would become impossible in almost all regions of the world, and humanity would be pushed to the brink of extinction.

Even if you don't care about the immense suffering caused as result of inequalities, poverty and an inherently unstable economic system, you can see that not even you can escape the annihilatory environmental effects that will arise from the continuation of our current system!


Immorality - The 'Human Nature' Fallacy

"Moral certainty is always a sign of cultural inferiority. The more uncivilised the man, the surer he is that he knows precisely what is right and what is wrong. All human progress, even in morals, has been the work of men who have doubted the current moral values, not of men who have whooped them up and tried to enforce them. The truly civilised man is always sceptical and tolerant, in this field as in all others. His culture is based on 'I am not too sure.'" - H. L. Mencken

The argument that is probably brought up the most often in the debate of the merits of capitalism is the issue of 'human nature' - that capitalism is the natural outcome of primal human impulses of survival, which includes the accumulation of material goods and the brutal competition with other human beings. Therefore capitalism is the final evolution of human societies, and any other system is impossible because we are intrinsically greedy, exploitative and self-serving.

But this perspective is not based on reality. The earliest human societies (small family and tribal groups)  were probably more collaborative than any society since then - they had to be! To survive, prosper and pass on their genetic code they had no choice but to work together in close knit groups, generally with each member taking a roughly equal share. Of course it is a natural human impulse to survive, but it is not natural to do this at the expense of fellow human beings. If it was, humanity would have been unlikely to have survived for very long before people's inability to co-operate lead to them all getting eaten as they slept alone, or the majority not having enough food if one member of the group was hoarding it. In fact, the survival/self-serving instinct is best served through co-operation - you will do far better with a hundred people working with you than by working against a hundred people!

If, in the unlikely situation that the mostly baseless assumptions made by proponents of capitalism about the human condition turn out to be true, what is that to hold us back to our roots? Every major religion for thousands of years has been based on a philosophy that is almost diametrically opposed to that of capitalism; a philosophy of altruism, co-operation and spiritual wealth, compared to the capitalist philosophy of exploitation, competition and material wealth. The vast majority people recognise that greed, selfishness and materialism are negative traits to have, even though many of those people do not act on it. As a species we see that capitalism is morally reprehensible, but we continue to hold on to it. Perhaps it's time we let go.

Ultimately capitalism, specifically its prominent consumerist element, cheapens the human condition and the human experience. Consumerism, through advertisements, media and other sources, tells us that we need 'things' to be happy, so we base our lives on the pursuit of these things. Even though advances in technology have given us the ability to partially or fully automate many tasks, thus decreasing the number of hours that we need to work, people now work longer hours than at any time before, just so they can purchase more things. This is, of course, self-defeating. Material possessions rarely give us long-lasting happiness and satisfaction, even though they may appear to for a time, and by increasing the length for which they work, people are given less time to spend with their friends and families, developing as a person and exploring interests - the things that will really make us happy and fulfilled in our lives.


Can Capitalism be Saved?

From all these arguments we can see that capitalism in its corporate-consumerist state can not continue, and should not continue, if we want civilisation to continue in a stable and morally acceptable way (unless you can convince me otherwise in the comments section). Our current system has shown itself to be inefficient, unstable, destructive, unsustainable and morally repugnant, but can capitalism be modified to a more appropriate form? What, if anything, can we learn from the philosophy of capitalism?


What is Right in Capitalism?

There are a small number of elements to capitalism that are probably necessary in a new system. One of these is the importance of hard work, although preferably not for self-gain, but instead for self-fulfilment and helping others. The importance of personal freedom in capitalist philosophy is certainly necessary in a future system that can be considered moral. Aside from these two things, there is precious little that we should take from capitalism in its current form.


Modifying Capitalism

Could capitalism be adjusted to a more stable, equal and sustainable form? The pillars of capitalism - profit, private ownership and the accumulation of capital - would suggest no, since these go against the desirable elements that an improved model of capitalism should have. Trying to accommodate these into capitalism would likely have to mean the twisting of its key tenants, rendering it vastly different to its roots - perhaps so different that it is no longer capitalism.

Capitalism is based on negative traits that people may harbour, and relies on the suppression of positive elements of the human psyche, such as compassion, altruism and a desire to work together. If we are to develop a system that fosters these positive traits, I can see no way that it can be achieved using capitalism as a framework.

We can try to patch up the box that is capitalism all we like, but still it will continue to leak its wealth, spelling untold human misery and suffering. The box threatens to burst entirely, destroying all of civilisation in the process. It is about time that we stopped trying to repair the box, and begin constructing a new one, that is strong, well filled and able to respond to changing times, before it is too late.


Towards the Future

"Where there is no vision, there is no hope." - George Washington Carver

What are we to replace the corporate-capitalist system with? Socialism, communism and sometimes fascism are often portrayed as the only alternatives to capitalism, but extraordinary times call for extraordinary thinking, beyond those which has remained mostly static for decades. We live in a world balanced precariously between despair and hope; between self-destruction and revitalisation. The forces of science and technology continue to advance inexorably, presenting new opportunities that would not have been possible even a few decades ago.


Visions of the Future

"The economics of the future is somewhat different. You see, money doesn’t exist in the 24th century. The acquisition of wealth is no longer the driving force in our lives. We work to better ourselves and the rest of humanity." - Captain Jean-Luc Picard

I implore you to, as I have done, envision the future that you want. Spend time reflecting on your life philosophy, the current state of  the world and your own experiences, and try to find what you would like the world to look like in a decade, fifty years, a century, or more from now.

I'd like to think that things like no more war or poverty are a given in your vision, but develop your views more, and always be critical of the conclusions you come to, and of course critical of others' conclusions.

In your future, what is it that drives people? What are the priorities of society? What is the role of government, if there should be one at all? What should the economic, political, social, cultural and spiritual apparatuses present to ensure the best quality of life for the highest number of people?

I'll look more at what my vision is in future posts, but it is certainly impossible to come to the conclusion that capitalism, in any form remotely like the current one with the obscenities of widening inequalities, deepening poverty, increasing instability and potential annihilation that goes along with it, will meet the criteria that a fully thought-out vision should, and I challenge you to prove me wrong!


- Daniel

Western Interference In Afghanistan: Part 2

Western Interference In Afghanistan: Part2 


[NOTE: THIS WASN'T WRITTEN BY ME, BUT BY A  FRIEND]

As described in my previous article, the USA backed the Taliban in their bid for control of Afghanistan and implementation of a brutal fundamentalist regime, helped also by Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. The basis for this is the same as for the invasion of Iraq; securing hydrocarbon resources and geopolitical manoeuvring. The Caspian Sea, in Central Asia, has valuable oil reserves, and is surrounded by post-Soviet states; most importantly in this case Turkmenistan, which shares a border with Afghanistan. Turkmenistan is landlocked, so the only economical way to transport oil out of the region is by pipeline. The easiest route for a pipeline would be to go across Iran and to Pakistan, but the USA has great antipathy for Iran, and therefore payment for the construction and lease of the pipeline as well as the taxation on the gas and oil that would pass through would benefit Iran. The US government was willing to anything to avoid this.  The only conceivable way to transport the oil and gas would be to go through Afghanistan to Pakistan.

 

In May 1996 Unocal stated that they were to build the oil pipeline, following the recent announcement of a Taliban victory in the war to control Afghanistan. There were many examples of Unocal’s support for the Taliban, including providing their militia with material support in their war against Rabbani’s forces in the north of Afghanistan, and granting them millions to keep negotiations going with the US government’s blessings. This was done without any concern for the consequences of monetary support for the Taliban, who were harbouring al-Qaeda since June 1996.

Another company involved deeply in shameless dealings with the Taliban was the former energy company Enron, synonymous with corporate corruption and wilful fraud. It had close ties to the US government, and performed the first feasibility study of a trans-Afghanistan pipeline, paid for with $750,000 by the US Agency for Trade and Development. It has been confirmed that Enron gave the Taliban millions of dollars with the US government’s approval in advance, in order to get a deal for an energy pipeline in Afghanistan. The company itself also paid more than $400 million for a study on feasibility of the pipeline, a great deal of which comprised of payoffs to the Taliban, and proposed to the Taliban to pay money in a “tax” on every cubic foot of oil and gas that was transported through the pipeline. A CIA insider gave information on Enron’s payoffs to the Taliban, and other sources indicate that officials of US administrations were fully aware of Enron’s attempts to make the Taliban their partners. Enron also took part in secret negotiations with the Taliban. A Al-Qaeda document kept from other agencies by the FBI to protect Enron, showed that American law enforcement agencies were kept in the dark or stopped from investigating secret negotiations between Enron and the Taliban in order Enron’s interests were protected. This cover-up resulted in the Taliban’s associates in al-Qaeda being able to complete their last 8 months of preparations for 9/11.

Several other companies were interested in the exploitation of Caspian Oil with the use of a pipeline, including AMOCO, BP, Chevron, EXXON and Mobile. The conversion of Afghanistan into a transhipment route for Caspian oil by the US/Western elite would allow them to weaken Iranian influence – an American motive - and Russian influence by the possibility of new trade routes. In the summer of 1998 the Clinton administration was involved in talks with the Taliban on the subject of potential pipelines to carry oil and natural gas out of Turkmenistan to the Indian Ocean, through Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The most heinous part of this US-backed corporate endeavour involving the capitalisation of the suffering of the Afghan people was that it involved direct US support of the Taliban. The US State Department and Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence Agency were in agreement to supply the Taliban with military aid and funding in their war against the Northern Alliance, and in 1999 US taxpayer money was being used to pay the wages of the Taliban’s government officials. In addition, two officials, Mr Inderfurth and Bill Richardson, visited Afghanistan in order to convince anti-Taliban factions to not go on the offensive against the Taliban, and to encourage their supporters to stop assisting these factions.  As well as benefiting the unscrupulous energy corporations, the US State Department had geo-strategic reasons for sponsoring the Taliban - to undermine Iran’s interests in the region, expand its power beyond the Amou Daria, and to influence the Federation of Russia from the South, debilitating any interests it had in the region, and the same for the North-western Chinese mainland.

However, for any partnership with the Taliban to go ahead and for the goals of the energy corporations to be reached, the US depended on the Taliban being a “servile government”, keeping the country stable and giving the energy corporations acceptable terms to make their operation profitable. The end of the Taliban’s rule can be seen as the result of their failure to do this. The entire Unocal project was based on the assumption that the Taliban would control and stabilise Afghanistan, based on reports from countries such as Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. However, the premise was based on conquest, and would therefore make it certain that the Taliban would not be able to provide Unocal with the security needed to build the pipeline.

The US relationship faced turmoil close to the millennium, when US policymakers started to realise that the Taliban would not act as a servile government. Anti-American views began to heavily influence Taliban officials, who became vocal against Americans, the UN, Saudis and other Islamic regimes worldwide. As well as this, their war for conquest of Afghanistan, carried out with extreme brutality, was fuelling inter-factional conflict, causing destabilisation when security and stability were paramount to Unocal’s project. They became uncooperative, leading to US policy becoming more hostile. What finally caused Unocal to drop its plans was, as reported by Oil and Gas International, that the Taliban called for more than $100 million annually in the form of construction of infrastructure, and  for its ability to tap into the pipeline to supply oil and gas for Afghanistan itself. This led to further deterioration of  the US relationship with Afghanistan, and in 1999 the US began to see the Taliban as major impediment to its interests. This view was reflected in the formulation of military action against the Taliban, a significant time before 9/11 - the official reason given by the US for military action in Afghanistan. 

 

US, Russian and Indian officials met in 2001 to discuss the overthrow of the Taliban regime and its replacement with a pro-US servile government that could stabilise Afghanistan. This would hypothetically provide profitable terms for an oil and gas pipeline for foreign energy corporations such as Unocal, and provide the US with strategic geo-political influence in the region. Before the Bush administration took power (N.B. illegitimately due to election fraud, as in the 2004 elections), the United States, Russia, India and Iran were providing the anti-Taliban forces with military aid, and intelligence and logistical support to anti-Taliban forces. Military sources have shown that Tajikistan and Uzbekistan were being used to base attacks on the Taliban by the Indian and Russian militaries. In Geneva, Italian, German and Iranian officials, along with the US State Department met to discuss a strategy to replace Taliban regime and replace it with a pro-US government. 

Simultaneously, attempts were made to salvage the relationship by the Bush administration whilst military preparations were made to invade Afghanistan. In July 2001, Christian Roca (Assistant Sectary of State for South Asia) met with Taliban officials in Pakistan and offered $43 million in food and shelter aid to the Taliban government without accountability. This was followed by other secret meetings, including visits by US officials to Kabul in April, and three others earlier in the month, despite the fact that the Taliban were under UN sanctions. The administration also escalated a previous initiative - starting negotiations to save the relationship. These were usually held in Islamabad, New York or Washington. These included meetings of US and Taliban officials in February 2001 in Washington, Berlin and Islamabad. The last of these meetings was in August 2001. When the Taliban government refused to accept US terms, as the Bush administration wanted to take the oil and gas reserves in Central Asia out of Russian control, and the issue of hydrocarbon security became a military issue.  US representatives told the Taliban officials “either you accept our offer of a carpet of gold, or we bury you under a carpet of bombs.”

Niaz Naik, the Minster for Foreign Affairs in Pakistan’s government attended, and later recalled what went on in the Berlin meeting of July 2001. The discussion focused on the establishment of a coalition government of national unity with the Taliban. The Taliban were offered international economic aid if they accepted the formation of a coalition, which would most likely have made the pipeline from Central Asia across Afghanistan possible. Naik also confirmed that Tom Simons, one of the representatives, had openly threatened the Taliban with military action by August. Simons had also said that “either the Taliban behave as they ought to, or Pakistan convinces them to do so, or we will use another option”, which Simon said was “a military operation”. Throughout this period, US war plans were coming to completion, which reliable military sources report were completed by the summer, to attack Afghanistan from the North.

Just two days before 9/11, George Bush was presented with plans for a military operation to invade Afghanistan and depose the Taliban. The President was also expected to declare a worldwide operation against al-Qaeda two days before 9/11, but was reported to have not had the chance to do so before 9/11. The Bush Administration was able to respond so quickly to the terrorist attacks with the declaration of the “War on Terror” because, according to NBC’s News’ Jim Miklaszewski, they had to take the all the pre-prepared plans “off the shelf”. Interestingly, on 11^th September two US Aircraft Carrier task forces reached the Persian Gulf on “rotation”. Simultaneously the British military formed the largest invasion armada since the Falklands War, which headed to South-East Asia with 23,000 UK soldiers, while 12,000 NATO troops landed in Turkey. This had all been in planning for at least two years.

So given the previous information, it is clear that the war plan for the invasion of Afghanistan, planned over several months and in consideration for at least a year, was to secure energy reserves in Central Asia and give the US geo-political influence in the area. The concept of an invasion of Afghanistan had been in consideration for many years, evidently not as a response to the terrorist attacks of 9/11. As Francis Boyle, Professor of International Law at the University of Illinois concluded, “September 11 is a pre-text, a trigger, or both.”

As a brief summary of both parts, Afghanistan was first used by the US to draw the Soviet Union into a debilitating and wearying proxy by inspiring rebellion and religious fundamentalism to create fanatics who waged war against Afghanistan’s communist government. This attracted the Soviet Union’s attention to the situation, causing it to invade, devastating the Soviet economy and costing the government billions of rubels, hence debilitating and distracting the Soviets. The US government, along with oil corporations, then sponsored and supported the brutal Taliban despites its record of atrocities. This was all under the false assumption that they would become a pro-US servile government, allowing the USA to gain geopolitical influence in the area and give the oil corporations access to the hydrocarbon reserves in Central Asia.

And so Britain, in a time of austerity, is spending about £4.5 billion a year on the war in Afghanistan - over £12 million a day - on a war that’s purpose is to give oil corporations more money to line their pockets with, sending tens of thousands to their deaths, bringing corruption and insecurity to both Afghanistan and the entire region, and driving millions from their homes. George Bush and Tony Blair told us that the “War on Terror” was to protect our freedom and maintain security, and gave these false claims credence using fear and lies, only to have inspired more terrorism, undermined and curtailed human rights, ignored international law, blocked dissidence, and clamped down on a number of freedoms. This was all so that a small elite can capitalise on their destructive obsession for black gold…

“War against a foreign country only happens when the moneyed classes think they are going to profit from it.”

-     George Orwell

Kristian Smith

 

The Ultimate Question

For my second topic introductory post I've decided to go for philosophy (if you hadn't guessed from the title), and I'm diving in at the deep end! See you on the other side...

The Ultimate Question

For £1,000,000, and the key to understanding the universe and the answers countless other philosophical issues, this is your final question:

Dun dun dunnnn...

Does God exist?

a) Yes
b) No

You can ask the audience (about 85% said yes, and 15% said no) or phone any friend you like. You're not allowed to use your 50:50 for this one...

Got an answer? Well when you have, read on, and prepare to think again...


Why God might exist

The Cosmological Argument

This is probably the ultimate argument argument for this side of the ultimate question, and certainly the one that makes your head hurt the most.

Look at the computer, laptop, or possibly phone that you're reading this on. Who made it? Probably an electronics corporation. Who founded that corporation? Most likely Bill Gates or Steve Jobs. Who 'made' them? Well. you get the idea. Eventually, assuming you accept current scientific theories, you end up with the (one of) the very first organisms, the amino acids that combined to form this first organism, the individual atoms that bonded to form the amino acids, the hydrogen atoms that fused to makes these atoms in the first seconds of the universe, the energy that made up the hydrogen atoms, and finally the Big Bang itself (or whicheverscientific theory of Genesis you happen to subscribe to).

But what started that? While a physicist, cosmologist or any scientist (who doesn't believe in God) will probably look at you sheepishly and mumble something, anyone with a religious conviction will confidently state, with their head held high, "God". To summarise the cosmological argument with some simple logic:

1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause.
2. The Universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the Universe had a cause.

It's hard (well, pretty much impossible) to get your head around it, if you don't believe in God. The universe exists, but why does it have to exist? Has someone determined that it should, or must, exist? Has it spontaneously erupted from absolute nothingness for no reason whatsoever? If your head is starting to hurt, please take a break before continuing.

To elaborate on our previous logical argument we can add a fourth condition - that this cause must not itself have a cause (to avoid an infinite regress of creation). This means that the cause must have always existed and be powerful enough to create the universe - the perfect description of God!

But this argument can only lend any credence to a God that creates the universe, and then buggers off (the foundation of Deism). In fact, the cause, be it God or something else, does not even need to stick around after it's created the universe. It could even be that the 'cause' ceased to exist after the creation of the universe, having expended itself to form the cosmos, thus conserving the energy and matter of reality (how nice).

Like all the arguments in favour of God's existence, I find the cosmological argument flwaed, for reasons that will be explained later...


The Teleological or 'Design' Argument

An argument often brought up in the God question is that the universe and our world seems to have a particular purpose, and that its 'intelligent design' greatly exceeds any human comparisons. Proponents suggest that this implies the existence of a vastly intelligent designer/creator (i.e. God). There are several elements to this particular argument.

The first is that the natural world seems to be designed so perfectly, with ecosystems functioning in harmony, and animals that appear perfectly 'designed' for their function (such as the speed of the cheetah, or the brain power of the human), and therefore there must be a designer.

The 'watchmaker analogy':  "In crossing a heath, suppose I pitched my foot against a stone, and were asked how the stone came to be there; I might possibly answer, that, for anything I knew to the contrary, it had lain there forever: nor would it perhaps be very easy to show the absurdity of this answer.
But suppose I had found a watch upon the ground, and it should be enquired how the watch happened to be in that place; I should hardly think of the answer I had before given, that for anything I knew, the watch might have always been there. There must have existed, at some time, and at some place or other, an artificer or artificers, who formed the watch for the purpose which we find it actually to answer; who comprehended its construction, and designed its use.
Every indication of contrivance, every manifestation of design, which existed in the watch, exists in the works of nature; with the difference, on the side of nature, of being greater or more, and that in a degree which exceeds all computation." - William Paley, Natural Theology
In short, that the sheer complexity of the universe implies a designer.

The 'fine-tuned' universe. This is a form of the teleological argument with a modern, scientific twist, and in my opinion the most significant of the variations of the teleological argument. It argues that all of the constants of the universe are so well tuned for human life to arise, from the ratio of the strength of gravity to that of electromagnetism, to the distance of the Earth from the Sun, and from the strength of the strong nuclear force to the number of spatial dimensions in space-time (wow, that was a tiring sentence to write).


The argument from morality

The final argument I'll be looking at is the argument from morality, which is that we all have a sense of what is right and wrong, so this must have come from an archetype of morality - i.e. God. For instance, we innately know that murder is wrong - even murderers usually understand the immorality of what they've done, even if they feel it's justified for whatever reason.

There's dozens of other arguments that God exists, such as the argument from personal experience, the ontological argument and the argument from love, but I don't feel they're worth going into (but perhaps I will some time!).


Why God probably doesn't exist (in my opinion)

I'm now going to (attempt to) tear apart the previous arguments that God exists (and probably fail).

A Response to the Cosmological Argument

The primary objection to the cosmological argument is the pertinent question of what caused the first cause? Most theists will state that God has always existed, but this raises countless more questions. If God has always existed, it means that he existed an infinite amount of time ago, but then it would take an infinite amount of time to reach the present day (an impossibility!) Or does God exist beyond time and space, so is exempt from its rules and constraints?

What is boils down to is that while establishing a first 'cause' for the universe is a mammoth, if not impossible, task and would require a profound explanation, attempting to explain the existence of some omnipotent, omniscient 'being', who has always existed, is beyond time and space, and created the universe for no discernible reason (at least for a being infinite in every respect), is another kettle of fish entirely - and it's a kettle of vicious piranhas. Invoking the existence of God into the question of why anything exists only serves to immensely compound the difficulty of the problem.

Ultimately we may be able to establish why the universe 'happened', and perhaps we will find that it was God. However, to assume an unexplainable answer to an unanswerable question, just because it is currently the only possible answer, is arrogant and plain lazy!


Debunking the Teleological Argument

Next up, the design argument. I'm going to split this into two parts - the conventional design argument, and the 'fine-tuned' universe argument.

So first up, the conventional design argument. Just to refresh your memory, this is an argument that everything seems to be so beautiful, complex and perfectly designed that it must have an immensely intelligent designer. Let's deal with beautiful first. We, on our little planet Earth, have no benchmark for beauty other than the Earth itself. What we see on Earth is all we have ever seen of the surface of a planet inhabited by complex life, so we are in no position to claim that the Earth is so beautiful that there has to be have been a designer. After all, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and an alien intelligent species might consider our planet as a hideous blight on the galaxy...

Next, how do we explain the apparent complexity of the universe, much like the inner workings of a stopwatch? In this respect, God has become the 'God of gaps'. When, in the past, we have found something that we cannot explain, we can simply invoke the existence of a designer beyond human understanding who made it so. But today we understand much of the workings of the universe, and are able to trace the path from the chaotic burst of energy of the start of the universe to the level of complexity we see today. Since we can see how this complexity arises from the fundamental physical, chemical and biological laws of the universe, there is no longer any need to bring God into the equation, as most things can now be explained simply using scientific discoveries.

Now I'll look at the 'perfection' of life on Earth. Unless you deny the theory of evolution, which is virtually an indisputable fact, the apparent perfection of organisms on Earth is of course a result of the process of natural selection. Those life-forms that are not adapted to their environment die out, and those that are adapted survive to pass on their genetic code, thus gradually 'perfecting' that species.

But there are certainly many imperfections to life on Earth. There are carnivores that brutally hunt, kill and eat their prey - surely not the mark of an omnibenevolent creator. Humanity's technology has, in fact, far exceeded the adaptations of many life forms. For instance, solar cells have a considerably higher efficiency of capturing sunlight than the leaves on plants. In addition, would an omniscient designer knowingly let millions of species die out over time in order to reach this 'perfection'? I don't think so.

And now we come to the 'fined-tuned' universe - that the fundamental laws and variables of the universe seem to be precisely set for the rise of complex life. This fine-tuning doesn't mean that someone set them to values suitable for us, as if they were not we wouldn't even be here to think about it. In other words, having these values set as they are is a perquisite to even being able to think about the fact that they are set in this way (you might want to reread that sentence). Recent cosmological theories suggest the existence of countless other universes, blinking in and out of existence in a grand 'multiverse', most of which will not be able to support complex life as we know it, and some of which may collapse a split second after coming into existence due to a high strength of gravity. It is perfectly possible that some form of life, even intelligent life, could exist with physical laws that are vastly different to the ones in our own universe. Just because we can't easily imagine it doesn't mean it can't exist!

Some proponents have also suggested that the distance of the Earth from the Sun implies that someone placed it there. In fact, the earth could have been a few million kilometres nearer or further from the Sun, and still have life arise on it in a form that we could recognise. It's also possible that complex life could arise if the planet was considerably further from or nearer to the Sun, adapting in a very different way to how it has. And that also leads to the awkward question of why God would have decided to create countless trillions of barren rocks with no discernible use...


A Critical Look at the Argument from Morality

Finally we come to the argument that the inbuilt morality of human beings hints at an archetypal being from which this morality originated. But, like the design argument, this can also be easily explained using the brilliant Theory of Evolution.

Although a lot of our knowledge and beliefs comes from our experiences, much of it is built into our brains. Imagine that, a million years ago or so, one of our ancestors' genes mutated, resulting in the emergence a very violent element to their psyche. What would the reaction be of the tribal or family group to which this individual belonged? If he was aggressive to other members of this community, he would be shunned, or possibly killed, preventing him from passing this mutation on.

We can apply this to most elements of 'morality'. In order for a tribe to survive and propagate, it would have to be able to work closely together to gather and conserve very scarce resources - there would be no space for stealing, murder, unequal distribution, unwarranted violence, etc. if they were to survive long enough to pass on their genetic code.

So morality is probably a byproduct of the forces of natural selection and survival of the fittest, or in this case, the survival of the most moral. No external forces needed whatsoever!


The Ultimate Question (again)

Okay, that first question was unfair, so we've decided to give you another one. For the key to your understanding of the universe and of your existence, this is your final question (no prize for this one...):

Dun dun dunnnn...

Do you think that God exists?

a)  Yes
b)  Probably
c)  Probably not
d)  No

Your not allowed to ask the audience or phone a friend. If you want to go 50:50, try reading all this again. But do try to come to an answer; not based on what your parents, your friends or your community thinks, but on what you think, having looked closely at both sides of the argument (closer than just reading this post!)


Conclusion

Will we ever be able to answer the God question? Probably not, although I certainly don't think it's impossible that we could.

However, we can show the likelihood that God exists - through philosophy, through logic and through science. As these fields, especially science, have developed and advanced over the years, many of the gaps in understanding and phenomena previously ascribed to God have since been shown to arise from the fundamental laws of reality. Eventually there may nothing left for God to do, nothing left that he could have done and nothing left that he can do in the future, suggesting that there is no God at all! The existence of God has been shown to be less and less likely since the Renaissance, and continues to be shown to be less and less likely to this day.


- Daniel

Psychology - The Humanistic Approach

[NOTE: THIS WASN'T WRITTEN BY ME, BUT BY A FRIEND]

The Humanistic Approach to Psychology

In contemporary psychology, there are five approaches. An approach is a perspective that has certain assumptions about human behaviour, such as which parts of the mind are worth studying, the way they function and research methods on how to study them. The approaches are:

•  Biological,
• Behaviourist/Social Learning Theory
• Psychodynamics
• Cognitive
• Humanist

This piece will describe and discuss the Humanist approach.

ORIGINS 

At the time when the approach was beginning to be developed, the two main approaches were the “First force” of Freud’s research of psychoanalysis and the “Second Force” of behaviourism which developed out of Ivan Pavlov’s research of conditioned reflexes e.g. his experiments with dogs salivating to conditioned stimuli. Psychologists met in the late 1950s to discuss creating a more holistic view of psychology that was concerned exclusively with human issues. These preliminary meetings lead to other developments, resulting in the description of humanistic psychology as a “third force” in psychology, along with the other two that have been described. The Association for Humanistic Psychology was formed in 1961, and in 1971 was recognised by the American Psychological Association.

BASIC ASSUMPTIONS

• Each person is a unique individual, and psychology should focus only on the subjective experiences, and that to understand a person it is necessary to understand their emotions, feelings and thoughts. This is one of ways in which humanism is different to the other approaches, because this view is ideographic. If all of us are different there cannot be universal laws of behaviour which the other approaches attempt to develop.

• People have free will over their actions and can develop as they want, achieve what they want in life, and not be determined by any other aspect, unlike the other approaches.

•  People must be looked at from a “holistic” view, and behaviour cannot be reduced down into component parts and simple explanations, as is done in the cognitive, behaviourist and biological approaches, or else we lose what it is to be human.

• People are inherently good and are driven to fulfil their potential.

The feelings of humanist psychologists are that people are more than “robots” driven by the environment or, as Sigmund Freud claimed, by unconscious forces and conflicts.

Humanists reject determinism (that there is no free will and behaviour is determined by aspects out of human control) and reductionism (reducing behaviour down to simple explanations) as well as the usefulness of scientific psychology.

METHODOLOGY

The approach does not use scientific experiments, as it believes they are dehumanising, and also lower the ecological validity of results as people will behave differently in a lab than in “real life”. The approach instead uses qualitative methods such as case studies and interviews in research. 

IDEAS OF THE HUMANISTIC APPROACH

 Two of the formulators of the ideas of humanistic psychology are Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow.

Carl Rogers emphasised the importance of self-concept and created what is known as client-centred therapy, or more often, Rogerain Counselling, whilst Maslow was more interested in the motives that drive people.

CARL ROGERS

Carl Rogers was the primary formulator of the ideas of the humanist approach, and shared the general assumptions of humanist psychology with other humanists. He also believed that each of us perceives the world in our own unique way, and to understand what someone does you have to see the world as they do. He also believed that people had the innate tendency to “self-actualise”, which refers to people having the ability to achieve their potential in life. This potential can be academic, sporting, artistic etc., which is a much more positive view of human behaviour than the other approaches, which are often quite depressing. This is also manifested in any living thing, such as the flower that forces its way through paving stones and the forest ecosystem that spreads to be as large as it can.
 

Some of his other ideas are:

Organismic Valuing

This is the idea that every organism has the innate idea of what is good or bad for them. E.g. a baby that dislikes its food will spit it out. People will tend to move away from situations that threaten them or cause harm.

Positive Self Regard

This is a sense of self-worth or self-esteem. If we lack this, then our path to achieving our potential will become disrupted or blocked. An example of this is academic failure and disruptive behaviour from school children will low self-esteem who believe they are not good enough.

Unconditional Positive Regard

We need to be loved, valued and respected by others - it is a precondition to our development. If a child is fed and cleaned, but not loved and nurtured, it will not develop and thrive. This love, value and respect must be given without conditions or else we will not gain positive self-regard.

 Conditions of worth

The positive regard of others must not have “strings attached” or conditions, but it normally does. Over time this may result in conditional self-regard, where we believe we only have worth if we meet the conditions that have been imposed on us by society through family, friends, media etc. Examples are “I am not rich therefore I am unhappy” or “I must pass my exams, else I am worthless”.

One question that Rogers asked is why, when we live in a society that in many ways is so affluent, many of us our unhappy. In his view, at least partly, is that the things we attach value to are not things that are necessarily good for our psychological well-being. What he believed was the problem is that society can interfere with our actualising tendency. Certain things that society (through our parents, friends, teachers, media etc.) tells us are important are not necessarily the things that are actually good for our development as people. As a consequence, we continually labour to fulfil these goals which are conditions of worth, and these may not be helpful in helping us achieve our goals. As we perceive the regard of others as conditional, we only value ourselves in relation to the conditions of worth we meet that have been imposed on us. Incongruity is created when there is a gap between the “real self” which is what we could become, and the “ideal self” which is what we think we should become. If we are set for a life where we continually try to achieve the goals, and so conditions of worth that have been set for us by others, we are set for a life of unhappiness.

To try to deal with this we have defences, which are employed to cope with the feelings of anxiety associated with incongruity. An example is denial, such as when a student who doesn’t turn up for an exam never has to face bad grades. Another is distortion, where a student may blame a teacher for poor teaching or an unfair test for bad grades. These defences distort our perception of reality or deny parts of it, and if you are not in touch with reality you will lose touch with aspects of it, and be unable to accurately understand your place in the world. As a result you will never achieve your potential - the only thing that will give you a more contented life.

And so we pursue the goals that we think will make us happy. The next pay rise, the next partner, the next piece of clothing, etc. will finally make us happy, but it never will.

The fully functioning person

Roger’s didn’t use the term “happy” when describing psychologically healthy people, even if this is what he meant in essence. He used the term “fully function person”, which is somebody whose mental set-up puts them in a position to achieve their potential. He believe that they are:

• Open to experience – they don’t distort the world
• Living in the ‘here-and-now’ – they don’t dwell on the past or worry about the future
• Doing what’s good for them – they trust organismic valuing to guide their decisions and choices
• Experientially free – they feel as if they are in control of their lives, rather than being constrained
• Creative – They contribute to the actualisation of others through art, science, parenting or their job

Client-centred Therapy

We cannot make people happy (or fully functioning). If we try to change them or tell what to do, because this would be imposing a condition of worth upon them, adding to the problem.

In client-centred therapy, conditions are created under which a person can start to make their authentic choices, and support them through the changes they decide to make.

Roger’s compared it to riding a bike. You can’t tell a person how to do it, as they will only learn through trying. You can support them while they learn, but if you never let them go they will never be able to do it independently.

 

Rogers believed that successful therapy or counselling has more to do with the relationship the therapist develops with the client than with the techniques used by the therapist.

If the therapist can develop the right sort of relationship, they can give the client room to examine their own problems, sources of unhappiness and perception of the world. Once they can do this they can make the changes they want. Rogers identified three important qualities that the therapist must have with their client in their relationship:

• CONGRUENCE – Honesty and genuineness. The therapist must relate to the client as one human being to another, rather than as a professional, such as a doctor.
• EMPATHY – The therapist must be able to feel what the client feels, because this is the only way for the client to feel as if they are genuinely understood.
• RESPECT – The therapist must show acceptance and unconditional positive regard for the client, as the lack of unconditional positive regard is often the source of the client’s unhappiness.

The main technique used is reflecting back to the client what they have said, which involves demonstrating to the client that they are really understood, whilst at the same time helping them explore their feelings and perceptions so they can arrive at their own understandings.

ABRAHAM MASLOW

Like Roger’s, Maslow believed that people are driven to fulfil their potential. His view is that we have certain needs that we need to fulfil. As we take care of one group of needs, another group becomes more important. Much of his work was focused on identifying the needs that people have, and why some fulfil their potential more than others.

Whilst Rogers was concerned with the self, Maslow was concerned with the motives that drive people, and he believed that there were two kinds: (1) Deficiency Motivation – the need to reduce psychological tensions such as hunger and thirst, and (2) Growth Motivation – which is the motivation to satisfy the need to be loved and esteemed.

The growth motives operate on the principle that, when no deficiencies remain, people then have the need to develop beyond their current condition.

Hierarchy of needs

Maslow thought that we are driven to fulfil our needs, but some take priority over others. For example you may be hungry, but you may forget it if you are thirsty, and you will certainly forget your thirst if you can’t breathe. In other words, some needs are felt more strongly than others. Maslow looked at how strongly each need was felt, and was then able to arrange them into a hierarchy.

The needs in order of priority, with those most strongly needed to be satisfied at the bottom:

• Self-actualisation – fulfilling you human potential
• Esteem – being respected by others, and having status and recognition
• Love and belonging – love, friendship and a sense of community
• Safety – freedom from threat and danger
• Physiological – food, water, oxygen etc.

In our development, we move through the levels of the hierarchy. An infant is only concerned with its physiological needs, and then it becomes aware of its need for safety, then to love and be loved. Later it begins to feel the need for self-esteem, and so on.

Depending on how our lives turn out, we generally reach a level where our most important needs are satisfied. Our activities become habitually directed to meeting the next set of needs that are to be satisfied, which become our salient needs.

However at times we may become stressed or under threat, and so may regress to meeting more basic needs. For example, you may have esteem needs as your salient needs, but if you lost a partner, love and belonging become priorities, and your needs for esteem are put on hold.

Problems or crises at a point in a person’s life can cause them to fixate on a particular set of needs, and this can affect their future happiness. A person who lived through a period of extreme deprivation may satisfy their salient needs, but may become obsessed with money or keeping enough food in their house.

Maslow believed this was the cause of neurotic mental health issues, such as anxiety or depression.

Self-Actualisation

Maslow believed that those who have met their deficit needs, and engaged with growth needs, might reach the stage of self-actualisation. Such people tend to be remarkable individuals, such as Abraham Lincoln or Martin Luther King, and so have made the most of their human potential.

The characteristics of these people are:

• Reality centred – they can tell the genuine from the fake in people
• Problem centred – they view life’s difficulties as problems to be solved
• Autonomous – they are relatively independent
• Non-conformist – they do not respond to the social pressure to fit in

Self-actualisers, as Maslow identified them, also tend to prefer solitude, have a few important personal relationships rather than many shallow ones, a non-hostile sense of humour, very accepting of themselves and others, and have a strong sense of morality and ethics. They are not perfect individuals and may harbour certain flaws or problems, such as being prone to suffering from anxiety and guilt, being absent minded, being overly kind, occasionally lose their sense of humour, or even being ruthless.

EVALUATION

Client centred therapy has shown to be effective in treating mild psychological disorders, and in explaining abnormal behaviour such as low self-worth and phobias.

The approach is optimistic about people, as it recognises that people have free will and are responsible for their own actions - not controlled by their environment or the inner unconscious. It also recognises that our experiences are important.

However, the rejection of scientific methods in explaining and investigating means that its theories and concepts cannot be investigated properly. For instance, how do you quantify incongruity? Without empirical and quantitative data, the humanist approach must use case studies and interviews, which are rich in detail, but are subjective and therefore unreliable.

Roger’s own concepts are culturally bound e.g. self-actualisation is focused on the individual in a western culture. As a result it doesn’t deal with group achievements that may be more important in an eastern culture.

Focusing on the individual means that the approach does not look at what people have in common with one-another.

Despite its limitations, the humanistic approach  has been significant and useful as the “third force” of psychology, and has made psychologists think carefully about what the subject matter of psychology should be. It has made them recognise the importance of people’s personal experiences, what they think and how they feel.

- Kristian Smith