History
Typically births are registered at some county clerk’s office or other place of record keeping. At death, a certificate of death is issued and if the family or funeral home provides, a local paper might print an obituary. That is about all history records for most. Born, lived, died and sometimes, not even that much. Except for those few records, for however long the span of time between born and died whether days, years or decades it might be hard to prove that we were ever here at all. If it could be proven that we were here, what would history have to say about what we did and how we did it?
Most, whose stories fill the pages of history books, did not set out for that purpose. Wise men know when they are committing acts that history will record. They know too that throughout time, so-called history writers will pervert the truth adding their ideology and sometimes pure fable to the interpretation of historical facts. So much so that notorious criminals and killers become folk heroes and the good that made meaningful contributions to humankind, the birth and growth of nations are scorned as the enemies of human existence.
In this modern time, history is perverted before it is hours old, much less days or years. Sadly, it is perverted by people whose minds were shaped by a perverted history to begin with.
The problem with humans today is that we believe we know everything. We are sophisticated with our technology. We can instant message someone on the other side of the world. We are so sophisticated that the savage barbarians among us can broadcast their acts around the world. In ancient times their terror preceded them from village to village as they murdered and plundered, but now they can broadcast it across the world. Their acts are not new.
People gifted with communication skills, written and oral, for whatever reasons garner large audiences to whom they often provide little more than sheer lunacy for consumption. This is what causes me to turn off most broadcast news and talk programs, and avoid reading many different forms of written news because most of it is fraught with fiction and ideology – and this is what history records and this is what future Americans will come to believe about their country. To say the least, it is disconcerting.
It is humans, the only creatures on the planet who can think and reason, who challenge the laws of nature. For example, humans are the only creatures who kill their unborn. Is it because we are more advanced beings or is it because we decided we are able to change the course of nature if that is our desire and without any repercussions. In some parts of the world where killing the unborn has become a norm comes the advent of euthanasia for the aged as proposes one of the framers of our current healthcare system. This is certainly a human sickness. We do as we please in contravention to the laws of nature and nature’s God. It is only people such as these who believe that man is in control and can challenge the laws of nature that also believes we can destroy an earth we could not create simply by using what God provided for us to use.
The root of it all is the oldest battle. For as long as thinking, reasoning and communicating humans have walked this earth, good and evil have walked it side by side. In your personal life, think back as far as you can remember and you will come to realize that you arrived in this life knowing the difference between right and wrong as did every other human. What causes people to choose evil over good? What causes them to pervert history even as it occurs? What causes them to challenge the laws of nature?
The ongoing battle in our modern and sophisticated world where great problems are solved in 144 written characters or on a reality television program is the war between good and evil. So much so that what is good is called evil and what is evil is called good.
We debate about whether there is a Creator God or whether from nothing we just are. Whether there is a life after death or whether there is just darkness. A debate that can be settled by the only perfect history ever recorded. That is hard to accept for some because to accept it means that everything you are and everything you believe is wrong. And what does history say about you, me, and all the rest of us. Well, it is already written. We cannot change the course of it. To survive it, we are only required to do what it tells us to do. Most of all, it tells us to believe it, trust it, and do not challenge it. It tells us we cannot change yesterday and we cannot predict tomorrow. That only leaves us today to get it right.
© 2104 J. D. Pendry American Journal
Category: Politics
For example, humans are the only creatures who kill their unborn. Is it because we are more advanced beings or is it because we decided we are able to change the course of nature if that is our desire and without any repercussions…..
What causes them to challenge the laws of nature?
The young and the old are always the most vulnerable in any group, human or not.
Apex predators routinely kill, and eat, the young of their rivals. They regularly murder the family units of rivals and rape the females to further their own bloodlines. The laws of nature are simple, survive and do so at the expense of any who stand in your way or die….
I think what you are describing is more that humans have chosen to accept the laws of nature as an over riding reality and ignore the possibility that we can choose to be more than the animal kingdom provides on this planet.
I would counter that is has always been so, humans have been no different than any other apex predator for the bulk of their existence on this planet.
There are romantic notions about humanity such as the nonsense written during the middle ages, those of royal blood knew a different life under feudalism than the vast majority of humanity for whom life has often been ugly, brutish, and short and remains so to this day.
I believe the lie we tell ourselves is that there has ever been a “righteous” cause or a “just” humanity. Our own history is filled with a level of misery for the native inhabitants and those brought here against their will that has not been resolved to this day.
We humans have been a blight on the planet since our inception, we are a murderous, jealous, thieving lot. The planet would do well to rid our species and try again with some other life form that may yet get it right.
VOV says, “We humans have been a blight on the planet since our inception, we are a murderous, jealous, thieving lot. The planet would do well to rid our species and try again with some other life form that may yet get it right”.
I say, “you are probably correct, however considering the whole good and evil thing … This can be fixed by us (good) killing all the enemy (evil)”.
Just sayin’!
Boy do I have to disagree with you MCPO. First of all man was created in the light of God and the struggles we have been through are intended to bring the best that there is out of us. We are not a blight on the planet, we are the only ones on the planet given the opportunity to see the difference between right and wrong. Nature is oblivious to struggle as you say, but we represent a different kind of struggle. The arrogance of man is what you speak of Veritas. It is the arrogance of scientists and Algore that tells us the world is getting warmer, we can all see that it isn’t. It’s the The arrogance of scientists that tell us that all the matter in the universe came from nothing, that some spark sat there for countless eons and one day decided to explode because of something that we will know when we get the next largest particle accelerator… It is my arrogance that will probably get me killed, I can make that turn at 70 mph on my Harley… Here, hold my beer and watch this… We are the vision of a kind, caring and loving God. He sees us as a part of him and not some infection loosed on the world because two monkeys in 500,000 BC screwed and brought something out that stood on their two legs instead of four. I’ve seen the other side my friend and know these things to be true. That our wars although horrible are indicative of the struggle between good and evil that goes on inside all of us at any given time. Hitler was consummate evil, he was also very stupid and arrogant… He was so arrogant he thought he could fight two wars at the same time… Oops… Hitler thought it was the Jews that destroyed his country in WWI. It was the evil in man that did that. It was Hitler’s arrogance that had him kill and deport the people that could have built the Atomic Bomb for the Axis and consequently won… Read more »
We are the vision of a kind, caring and loving God. I am glad we have folks like you who believe such things. Were there more of you I suspect the world would be better in some ways. This would however, be a different god I assume than the one who killed everyone in Sodom and Gomorrah or killed everyone and everything on the planet with a flood except for a few chosen people. Different than the god who will cast you into the lake of fire and burn you for all eternity if you don’t follow his every command and accept his son as your savior yes? Because that god doesn’t sound very caring or very loving…that god sounds like a tyrant who tells you there is only one way and it’s his way and you better do exactly as instructed or you will burn in hell in agony forever….unless I read a different King James Bible than you. The arrogance of man is what you speak of Veritas. Indeed I agree wholeheartedly with this, for me though I guarantee it has a different meaning than it does for you. It is our arrogance that has created our gods, we believe ourselves so superior that we must be the design of something better, more powerful, more meaningful than an a giant cosmic accident of chemistry. We created god to provide meaning for our existence, we refuse to believe we are the result of millions of years of changing environments and changing species. Our arrogance creates in us a need to be more important, and somehow special more so than any other “lower” life forms on the planet. Sadly our behavior since recorded time would indicate there is no such reality. We can certainly find moments where one human or group of humans did something that is righteous to ease the sufferings of others, however those are the exceptions not the norm. Our societies have always had those at the top and those at the bottom, often treating those at the bottom with visible contempt or outright hostility. I am… Read more »
I’m with you, I ascribe no special morality to humans. I prefer to be the apex predator who removes the threat to his group as opposed to being removed. Whether that is good or evil is irrelevant it’s just life and survival.
It’s better to live than not. It’s better to insure your bloodline continues so there are more like you than not.
For example, humans are the only creatures who kill their unborn.
Not true. Rabbits sometimes “reabsorb” their unborn kits, killing them.
For the sake of the article above we are!
We in some cases, with purpose, kill an unborn for selfish reasons unconnected to nature!
We in some cases, with purpose, kill an unborn for selfish reasons unconnected to nature!
This sentence has no meaning to me. Man and his works are as much a part of nature as bugs and bunnies; and I don’t see how human purposes (as revolting as they sometimes are) can ever be “unconnected to nature.”
Don’t go friggin PhD on me … It makes perfect sence to me!
We humans have been a blight on the planet since our inception, we are a murderous, jealous, thieving lot. The planet would do well to rid our species and try again with some other life form that may yet get it right.
The “planet” is a mindless thing with no sense of right, wrong, or justice; the same goes for “nature.” We should use the environment well for the sake of our fellow humans, but not because we owe it to a big hunk of rock.
Humans are the only species that kill their unborn – not true. Other species do it repeatedly. There is no idyllic sense of preservation of the species built into anything. And other species are known to abandon their young the moment they are born or hatched if the parent can sense something wrong with the newborn. Your concept is baloney.
We are NOT a blight on this planet unless we choose to be. Get over yourself. There is enough depressing crap going on in the world. You don’t have to add to it, and there is plenty to offset it, if you’d bother to look around.
Mr. Pendry…Thank you for your article and insightful words. I know I may differ with some who read your post. I believe that we as humans have the capacity to act, not only from mere instinct as is the case in the animal kingdom not as gifted as we but also to act with capabilities they do not possess. Those capabilities are our knowledge of right and wrong as well as good and evil. Reasoning resources and thinking processes far beyond the rest of the animal world. We can rise above simple instinct when necessary and make a choice to behave differently, however against the grain and instinct, that choice may be. We can chose to be something against our nature, when that choice is for the better of others for example. It is a pure, primal instinct to preserve and save our own lives, yet men in combat have for as long as combat has existed, given themselves for their fellow soldiers, their cause or their nation as a whole. We same humans have often also chosen to give our lives to the progress and furthering of wrong and evil. Such as in current history, Muslim terrorists will die to kill as many as possible in the name of their beliefs. We are a complex race of beings to be sure and it will take someone greater, far smarter and wiser than I to ever explain humans to me. Yes, I do believe in and rely on the Bible for answers in life. However, many times the answer is, frustratingly, “it is not for me to know or understand in your finite, human mind”. Someday, yes but now, no. These are just my beliefs. But I do believe that for we humans to see, recognize, organize, plan and stand against wrong and evil is…right, good and just and unique to us. Animals may adapt to changing circumstances but they will always follow their primal instincts to live, eat, procreate and protect their lives and species. We humans are the only small sliver of the animal kingdom who may think,… Read more »
I’m with you Sparks.
It is also the good in mankind that takes wounded enemy soldiers to the Bn Aid Station to save their lives just after they have been in mortal combat with them.
Tell me that comes from instinct.
Thunderstixx…A long time ago in my war I saw that also. No it is not instinct. It was my instinct to kill the SOB who had just wounded or killed a friend. But we didn’t, we gave them aid. Morality and right in the face of an instinctual urge to act otherwise? That is one of the capacities which separate us from animals.