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Internet Book of Shadows, (Various Authors), [1999], at sacred-texts.com
IDEOLOGY
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The human mind seeks to create order out of Chaos
It is in the nature of humanity to attempt to formulate laws from ex-
perience as a guide to future action. Acting as a feedback-response
mechanism, the mind considers the results of previous behaviour and
creates laws of action in an attempt to repeat past good results and
avoid bad results. In the individual this is known as personality, in
the communal world it is known as science.
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All scientific laws are false
Science attempts to map the universe as a result of previous collec-
tive experience. Since this is limited to what has actually been
experienced so far, it is always inadequate, and since it is not what
has been experienced it is always human-centred. It cannot be objec-
tive because the object does not experience, only the subject, human-
ity, experiences. Two approaches have been used to tackle this prob-
lem. The philosophy of the western world posits that an external,
objective world interacts with us through scientific experiment, thus
science creates objectively true laws. Other European philosophy
holds, correctly in my view, that talk of an objective reality is
beyond experience and is thus meaningless babble. Moreover, scientific
experiment is no more objective than a childs attempt to walk. To Know
is not a high ideal, it is an instinct born of our particular way of
survival, and is thus survival-centred. Science is our Elephant Trunk,
our Giraffe Neck, and since it is inherently inadequate, it is a
belief system, a set of interconnected ideas-about-things. In terms of
European, Post-Hegelian philosophy, it is an ideology.
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All idealogies are subject to chaotic dissolution
Every idealogy, whether science, Christianity or whatever, seeks to
and succeeds in creating a coherent view of reality that satisfies its
believers. The problem is that there is inevitably a gulf between the
idealogy and reality. Ideologies are fixed; reality is fluid. Thus all
ideologies are subject to readjustment when a new discovery challenges
the existing view. The rediscovery of the Greek text of the New
Testament and the discovery of the non-existence of the Ether each
corroded the existing ideologies of their day.
The Christian world responded with Reformation and Counter-Reformat-
ion. (Historical note: Counter-Reformation was the Reformation of the
Catholic Church rather than an attack on the Protestant Reformation.)
Science responded with Einsteinian relativity. These new elements are
Chaotic. The extent to which the ideology can reform depends on how
deep the Chaotic element bites into the ideological structure. Every
ideology has central tenets upon which the rest depend: so the dis-
covery that Jesus was actually stoned to death rather than crucified
would cause major rumblings; the discovery that he was a woman would
cause deeper rumblings; but the discovery that he was a spaceman
carrying out a standard sociological experiment would bring down the
ideology entire. Several ideologies have completely collapsed in the
past, such as Ptolomaic astronomy, and it can happen again. Moreover,
the spread of a unified ideology over the whole globe, Western Democ-
racy, leaves the way open to a bigger collapse than ever before.
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3
There is no such thing as innate value
All present Western ideologies depend upon a concept of innate
worth, whereby certain things are automatically "better" than
others. The White Race, Men, Adults, all have had their "innate"
value knocked for six. Even the Animal Kingdom is no longer seen as
of higher worth than the Vegetable as the spread of the Gaia
hypothesis shows. This is the Chaotic element that can bring down a
whole pack of cards. There is no ethical reference point, no
beginning from which to derive an end to aim for, to praise, to work
towards. As it says in Liber Al: "let there be no difference made
between one thing and another". The result is a confusion of belief
as people scramble to find a new ideology. Fundamentalists choose
deliberate blindness and perverse stupidity. Thelemites choose "pure
will, unassuaged of purpose". Chaoists worship the confusion itself
as the only "true thing" left. Pagans begin to construct a new
ideology based on the absence of heirarchy and turn to cyclical and
egalitarian beliefs. That a new ideology, or many, will arise is
inevitable; even the truth of Chaos is only true to us, in our
experience. But so what. All things considered, I think that things
are going pretty well.
Further readings:
Knowledge and Human Interest, J.Habermas, 1967
Differance, translated as Language and Difference, Derrida, 1959
Anything by Sir Karl Popper for the view from the opposition
With fractalic greetings and laughter * Fra.: Apfelmann *
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