On General Strategies: A Case for Meaning

    As humans, we have the unique capacity among animals to think not only in percepts (sensations, impulses), but in concepts. These are the basis of language, logic, and all levels of abstraction. This feature has secured us our position as apex predator and relative masters of the world. In this age, which people have named the Anthropocene, humans are the single greatest influence on the planet. We have the power and responsibility of shaping our environment to our own design.
    All conscious endeavors require a strategy, comprised of an objective and a theory. Some strategies refer only to a particular subset of phenomena or objectives, such as the art of gardening, or of piloting aircraft. These can be called specialized strategies. Others refer to all objectives and phenomena as a whole. We can call these general strategies. General strategies fall under two headings: religion and philosophy. The difference is that religions claim supernatural origins for their objectives and theories; philosophies claim natural ones. Natural, in this sense, refers to that which can be learned by data and logical analysis, i.e. scientific means.
    Just as a gardener cannot garden without a strategy, none of us can perform our general operations without some strategy. The gardener may have a teacher, or he may learn on his own through trial and error, or he may read a book on the subject, but he cannot avoid developing a strategy. In our general operations, our life, the same principle applies. We may learn it from our parents or our peers, from self-help books or biographies, by trial and error, etc. But at all times we must operate on some strategy: some objective/theory dynamic. This is the purpose which religions have always served, and there does not seem to be any comparable alternative. That is not least because religion organizes us as a community according to a general strategy, something philosophies seem ill-equipped to do alone. This may be because philosophies profess natural sources for their claims, and are therefore, by their own standards, up for constant scrutiny, modification, and dispute. Religions, professing supernatural solutions to the problem of goals, are more solid in nature and better suited to keep their form; they possess the stability to withstand ages.
    But if a strategy is an inevitable consequence of any given pursuit, it seems it may come about without any special effort. Surely it does not need to be dealt with; it will handle itself. But the quality of one's strategy in gardening, for example, will determine the success or failure of the crop. And a poor strategy in piloting can lead to disaster. A good strategy is of utmost importance in all pursuits, especially the broadest of pursuits, which is life.
    How can we judge general strategies? And if any of the popular religions are correct, then why have other strategies, such as science, produced more obvious innovations? One would think that the theory most closely adapted to reality would yield the most advanced technologies. But religions and philosophies are not opposites. While some philosophies, such as Existentialism, deny the validity of all religions, I cannot name one religion which would deny the validity of all philosophies. In other words, some natural explanations deny all supernatural ones, but probably all supernatural explanations allow and include naturally derived (sub) goals and phenomena. It is fair to say that religion provides the central objective, and basic theory of life, but science can expand the domain of that theory. The goal of growing food comes before observations that tomatoes grow well in a climate, or that compost contributes to their growth. The goal comes before the investigation; the theory of how to achieve it is constantly adapted to new data.
   Philosophies have either taken certain objectives for granted, or surrendered them entirely, descending into nihilism. Simply, the why of an action precedes the how; science informs the latter, but not the former. It is not alternative to religion, but its handmaiden. It is equipped to aid us in the pursuit of values, not to supply us with them. They must come from somewhere besides observation and reason merely—the supernatural, i.e. faith. After all, I am attempting the describe a path toward living well, but there is no data-based, empirical reason why I should not prefer to live badly. It sounds absurd, but certain logically consistent people have pursued this conclusion, and science cannot offer must resistance against it. I must decide on that point independent of natural inquiry—I must do so before I know what to inquire!
    By living well, I mean a fulfilling life in which one has confidence in one's actions, in which one has meaning, which one can look back on with pride. I believe that I must take on faith such a life is possible, and that its parameters are dictated by a universal order. If it can be modeled, then either it has already been or has yet to be discovered. It seems to me, from my observations of history, that all codes of values which exist today have existed in some form since the dawn of civilization. It also seems to me that people have lived well in all ages. And therefore, if this strategy can be modeled, it would have been long ago. In oral cultures, it will have been an oral tradition; in written cultures, a scripture; and in printed cultures, a book, or collection of books. However, after the advent of broadcasting, it will have become muddied and largely lost, as concepts, the things which words represent, the building blocks of abstraction, became obscured by percepts, the things which radio, television, and social media deliver in spades.
    We have often been told how the speed and distance of information that reaches us has increased, and heard this called progress. But irrelevant information is not only useless. It is counterproductive; it distracts from the useful. Books often provided us with models for processing information, also known as wisdom. Broadcasting and the internet have issued forth an unprecedented amount of sheer information, but we lack a framework for integrating it in any useful way. Interestingly, the shift from concept-based communication coincides closely with a shift away from religious practice.
    I have suggested that we require a general strategy, and that it must be informed by a supernatural insight. Some would respond that our inability to derive values from data and logic does not imply the existence of objective, divine values; that it suggests the opposite, that values are subjective and chosen. This is certainly the common sentiment in industrialized nations today, and seems to be where faith must enter the equation. Can a person summon the drive to face the trials of life, believing it essentially meaningless? Perhaps faith in the existence of the good, in meaning, in right, is necessary for people to live, whether it is true or not. Humans in general have a religious instinct. We crave meaning, a higher purpose (the source of which is called God). This is a deep, manifest longing in the human organism. Now, we crave water because our body has adapted us to do so—because water exists, and it is good for us. As with food. We crave sex, because there really is such a thing. We want these in a more or less wholesome capacity, maybe when it is inappropriate; but they are themselves the natural longings of a healthy body, because the objects of those desires exist. The apprehension of them serve the organism. There are, of course, cases of deviation, addiction, and perversion. But these are by definition the exception, like sickness, rather than the rule. Why, then, does the rule of human civilization seem to include this search for meaning, this longing for true goodness, this desire for God? It occurs in healthy, orderly, prosperous people and societies. Is it ridiculous that this natural longing might have a real object, one that can be obtained?
    Values which cannot be derived from data must issue from whim or faith. A touch of whim is harmless in small matters, but not as the source of all values. Those whose actions have no relation to any rational principle are called insane. Short of insanity, what remains is faith. We must decide what to have faith in. Will it be in society, in the popular values? Nazism was commonly held in Germany; it is now generally known as evil. Values are not valid because they are popular. We require a moral imperative to act, and we must take it on faith. I think there is a set of values that produce this good life, that it has existed from the dawn of time, and that it would have been codified long ago. I believe that the people who discovered and declared it would have been enshrined as prophets, and that it would have been passed down orally until it was possible to write it down, and that it would be written down, and this work would have been elevated to the status of scripture, and transmitted by means of ritual. That is, I believe it would constitute a religion. The characteristics of that religion must be: that it has its recesses in the furthest reaches of history, that it provides the values which support life and imbue it with direction and meaning.
    I have long studied religions, I have come to the same conclusion as C.S. Lewis on the following points: The pagan religions aren't sufficient. They do not acknowledge the fundamental oneness of creation, or the existence of a supreme value to which all others must be subject. In his search for the true religion in its full maturity, he concluded, "There were really only two answers possible: either in Hinduism or in Christianity. Everything else was either a preparation for, or else (in the French sense) a vulgarization of, these." Hinduism and its corollaries distinctly do not provide initiatives, which is what makes them so attractive to secularized young people in the West; they prefer a pantheistic god that expects nothing of them. Because of this, it does not fit the requirements for the true (or complete) religion which I have been describing. That leaves only monotheistic religions. These are principally the Abrahamic religions: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Each of these claims to be the true expression of the faith that has been carried down since the dawn of civilization and was codified in writing by Moses in Genesis. If this line of reason is sound, one of these is most likely to be the revelation, and tradition, we seek. But which of them? That question deserves a deeper analysis, and I shall deal with it in the next issue. Thank you for reading.