Modern Myths: The world we live in

Modern Myths

Modern Myths tries to differentiate the several visions of the world and the way of living it expressed by the seventh art, from the extreme positive to the extreme negative. This category is divided by 8 different passages of the Bible: Paradise, Paradise Lost, Valley of Tears, Crossing the Desert, Promised Land, Decay, Hubris and Apocalypse.

Utopias & Dystopias

Utopia is an ideal community or society possessing a perfect socio-politico-legal system. The word was imported from Greek by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book, Utopia, describing a fictional island in the Atlantic Ocean. The term has been used to describe both intentional communities that attempt to create an ideal society, and fictional societies portrayed in literature.

In many cultures, societies, religions, and cosmogonies, there is some myth or memory of a distant past when humankind lived in a primitive and simple state, but at the same time one of perfect happiness and fulfillment.

In those days, the various myths tell us, there was an instinctive harmony between man and nature. Men’s needs were few and their desires limited. Both were easily satisfied by the abundance provided by nature. Accordingly, there were no motives whatsoever for war or oppression. Nor was there any need for hard and painful work. Humans were simple and pious, and felt themselves close to the gods.

According to one anthropological theory, hunter-gatherers were the original affluent society. These mythical or religious archetypes are inscribed in all the cultures and resurge with special vitality when people are in difficult and critical times.

However, the projection of the myth does not take place towards the remote past, but either towards the future or towards distant and fictional places, imagining that at some time of the future, at some point of the space or beyond the death must exist the possibility of living happily.

Dystopia is a futuristic, imagined universe in which oppressive societal control and the illusion of a perfect society are maintained through corporate, bureaucratic, technological, moral, or totalitarian control.

Dystopias, through an exaggeratedworst-case scenario, make a criticism about a current trend, societal norm, or political system. A dystopian society has the following characteristics:

– Propaganda is used to control the citizens of society.
– Information, independent thought, and freedom are restricted.
– A figurehead or concept is worshipped by the citizens of the society.
– Citizens are perceived to be under constant surveillance.
– Citizens have a fear of the outside world.
– Citizens live in a dehumanized state.
– The natural world is banished and distrusted.
– Citizens conform to uniform expectations. Individuality and dissent are bad.
– The society is an illusion of a perfect utopian world.

Utopias and Dystopias

What Are Utopias and Dystopias?

Utopian and dystopian fiction

Utopian and dystopian fiction

Utopia and Dystopia – Possible Futures

Utopia

Does Bimini Road lead to the lost civilization of Atlantis? – Fact or fiction?

Bimini is an island in the Bahamas, part of a chain of islands 50 miles east of Miami, Florida. Off the coast of Bimini lies an ancient stone formation submerged beneath crystal blue waters. The mysterious path makes many wonder if it is remnants of the mythical lost land of Atlantis.

A mere 20 feet down in the blue waters off the coast, a stone path can be found; large, flat rocks cut at right angles, seemingly set purposefully in straight lines. This impressive formation stretches half a mile along, with a pronounced hook at one end. The stones can measure up to 13 feet (4 metres) across.

Researchers, geologists, archaeologists, and scientists alike have visited and studied the huge, flat stones off the coast of Bimini, known as the Bimini Road. They have tried for years to discern whether the limestone blocks are a natural phenomenon, or evidence of an ancient lost civilization.

Does Bimini Road lead to the lost civilization of Atlantis?

The lost continent of Kumari Kandam – Fact or fiction?

Most people are familiar with the story of Atlantis, the legendary sunken city as described by the ancient Greek philosopher Plato. Till this day, opinion is still divided as to whether this story should be understood literally or taken merely as a morality tale. Further east in the subcontinent of India is a similar tale, though it probably is less well known compared to that of Atlantis. This is the ‘lost continent’ of Lemuria, frequently connected to the legend of Kumari Kandam by speakers of the Tamil language.

Kumari Kandam

The Lost Continent of Kumari Kandam

Ancient humans bred with completely unknown species

A new study presented to the Royal Society meeting on ancient DNA in London last week has revealed a dramatic finding – the genome of one of our ancient ancestors, the Denisovans, contains a segment of DNA that seems to have come from another species that is currently unknown to science.

The discovery suggests that there was rampant interbreeding between ancient human species in Europe and Asia more than 30,000 years ago. But, far more significant was the finding that they also mated with a mystery species from Asia – one that is neither human nor Neanderthal.

Scientists launched into a flurry of discussion and debate upon hearing the study results and immediately began speculating about what this unknown species could be.  Some have suggested that a group may have branched off to Asia from the Homo heidelbernensis, who resided in Africa about half a million years ago. They are believed to be the ancestors of Europe’s Neanderthals.

However others, such as Chris Stringer, a paleoanthropologist at the London Natural History Museum, admitted that they “don’t have the faintest idea” what the mystery species could be.

Traces of the unknown new genome were detected in two teeth and a finger bone of a Denisovan, which was discovered in a Siberian cave. There is not much data available about the appearance of Denisovans due to lack of their fossils’ availability, but the geneticists and researchers succeeded in arranging their entire genome very precisely.

“What it begins to suggest is that we’re looking at a ‘Lord of the Rings’-type world – that there were many hominid populations,” Mark Thomas, an evolutionary geneticist at University College London.

The question is now: who were these mystery people that the Denisovans were breeding with?

Mystery humans spiced up ancients’ sex lives

The sacred balance

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The Planet is Fine, The People are Fucked

Based on David Suzuki’s best-selling book of the same name, and filmed on five continents, the sacred balance celebrates a new scientific worldview, an inclusive vision of nature in which we human beings are intimately connected to all life processes on Earth.

With Suzuki as our guide, we visit the best minds of the age. Philosophers, scholars, priests, and shamans all share their visions and perspectives of the universe. Scientists such as E.O.Wilson, Ary Goldberger, Brian Goodwin, Wade Davis, Stephen Lansing and James Lovelock reveal the meaning behind their perceptions and discoveries. We hear astonishing tales of the world’s infinite complexity. Through many knowledgeable eyes, guided by many wise hearts, we are reminded of who we are: creatures of the Earth, biological beings totally dependent upon the planet’s life support systems.

The titles in this series are:

Part 1: Journey into New Worlds – Suzuki celebrates the birth of a new scientific worldview that is holistic rather reductionist.

The Sacred Balance (2002)

Part 2: The Matrix of Life – Suzuki travels the world exploring our intimate relationship with water and air.

Part 3: The Fire of Creation – Suzuki explores the latest scientific findings which amplify the age-old reverence for the sun.

Part 4: Coming Home – Suzuki explores biophilia — the innate, hereditary need of human beings to affiliate with nature.

“War is madness”: Pope Francis says WWIII is happening already

Pope Francis has compared the current situation internationally to a third World War “fought piecemeal, with crimes, massacres and destruction.” Calling wars irrational, the Pontiff lamented conflicts are often “justified by an ideology.”

“War is irrational; its only plan is to bring destruction: it seeks to grow by destroying,” Francis said while visiting Italy’s largest war memorial Saturday. “Greed, intolerance, the lust for power. These motives underlie the decision to go to war and they are too often…”

“War is madness” which “ruins everything, even the bonds between brothers” the Pope said as he recalled the Genesis story of how Cain killed his brother Abel.

“Humanity needs to weep and this is the time to weep,” Francis said in the homily of a Mass.

Francis has also spoken during a mass at the Italian First World War memorial at Fogliano di Redipuglia, in northern Italy, where more than 100,000 fallen Italian soldiers are believed to be buried in the military graveyard.

“Here lie many victims. Today, we remember them. There are tears, there is sadness. From this place we remember all the victims of every war. Today, too, the victims are many,” the Pope said.

“Even today, after the second failure of another world war, perhaps one can speak of a third war, one fought piecemeal, with crimes, massacres and destruction,” Francis said. “And these plotters of terrorism, these schemers of conflicts, just like arms dealers, have engraved in their hearts, ‘What does it matter to me?’”

In the past few months, Francis has repeatedly called for the end of military conflicts in Ukraine, Iraq, Syria, Gaza and throughout Africa.

In July, he also made an emotional appeal to the world, calling to stop war, especially in the Middle East and Ukraine, saying that the children who live in conflict zones are suffering most and are deprived of hope and a future.

During his visit to Korea in August, the Pope said that humanity was in the midst of a Third World War.

“Today we are in a world at war everywhere. A man said to me, ‘Father, we are in World War III, but spread out in small pockets everywhere.’ He was right,” Francis said at the time.

Pope Francis urges end to violence in M. East, Ukraine for children’s sake

‘War is madness’: Pope Francis says WWIII is happening already