Narnia - a rereading

Narnia is a very powerful and moving allegory. Unfortunately, most commentators, not being trained in the skill of close reading, are unable to divine the true meaning of the allegory. [NB: I will not care about the nuances of Turkish delight as written about in the book, but will confine myself to the limitations of the medium from which most readers, myself included, will be most familiar with the source material.]


Reality and delusion

First and foremost, one has to remember that Narnia was purely in the realm of imagination.

Nothing that happened in Narnia affected the real (outside) world. Time spent in Narnia did not pass in the real world. And those who visited Narnia were unchanged physically; even after spending what must have been 2 decades in Narnia, the children emerged into the real world as they left it - clear proof that it was all in the children's minds (since that's the only thing in the real world which changed).

So even if you are bored, unfulfilled and unloved in the real world, there is no use retreating into a fantasy one of make-believe, since that is just self-indulgent imaginal masturbation (or any other type, if you like) in a vacuum; no matter how happy you might be, it's all a lie. Sinking into delusion could even lead to unnecessary grief (think of what would have happened if Aslan and friends had not been triumphant).

Be that as it may, we can still draw many morals from the children's foray into Narnia, even if it were fictional even in the context of the story.


False trichotomies

The Professor commented to Susan that if Lucy was not lying or crazy (about her visit to Narnia), she must have been telling the truth. Unmentioned is the possibility that she is mistaken - perhaps she bumped her head in the wardrobe, or maybe it had been too long since the thing was claned out, and she breathed in spores from hallucinogenic mushrooms*. Of course, the depiction of the Professor commiting such a glaring logical fallacy is meant to be a commentary on how having a PhD and being a Professor doesn't necessarily mean you're smart, since you can still fall afoul of basic logic.


Moral issues with betrayal

Edmund betrayed his siblings, but this betrayal came about because he was bullied and mistreated by the rest - they have themselves to blame for inciting the betrayal. Furthermore, those who are the agents of salvation are capable of mistreating even their kind: what more their lessers? Also, one might consider that without his betrayal, there would have been no victory in the end: therefore to imbue his treachery with moral undertones is most unfair**.


Free will

The Pevensie siblings feature in a prophecy, and despite their initial reluctance to fulfill it, they are swept along by the river of fate in the end and play out their preordained roles. This shows that there is no room for free will when supernatural are at work, human agency is helpless, and makes one wonder how much they deserve the accolades poured onto them. For example, if the siblings had numbered three, no matter how brave, noble and good they were, they would not have been able to prevail, for by definition the Prophecy must be fulfilled (or it would be a false one, surely one of many, but then that's another issue).


Semi-deification of Aslan

All the (good) characters have an unthinking, almost sheep-like regard for Aslan, looking up to him all the time and generally fawning over him. However, no one asks why he left the land of Narnia in the first place - if he hadn't left, the land and its inhabitants would not have suffered so greatly (and for a long 100 years) in the first place. In the intervening time, Aslan must have been hibernating, chuckling in his sleep about how the inhabitants of Narnia were suffering so and daily growing more eager for his return. At the end of the movie he is also shown walking off into the sunset, and he has obviously done that before - he is not a very reliable lion, not always being there for his people and disappearing often according to his whims.

Much is made of Aslan's sacrifice, but as is obvious from the story, it's not much of a sacrifice if one dies, only to be resurrected after half a night (and knowing that one will be resurrected to boot, resulting in one having no fear of death). Furthermore, Aslan was present when the "great magic" - the underlying magical laws of the land (or some shit like that) - were written. Presumably he had some say in their formulation. So why is it portrayed as tragic when he has to be sacrificed in accordance with these same laws that he had a hand in formulating? I can sympathise with how Aslan felt when he was shaved, though - why, just the other night (or thereabouts) I had a nightmare about the same happening to me.

History is written by the winners. If the White Witch and her minions had won, the story would read very differently, and a diametrical spin would be put on Aslan. For example, the treacherous scum violated the spirit, even if not the letter, of his agreement with the White Witch (then again, he did do that, even with a neutral reading of events).


Primacy of human agency

Although Aslan is glorified and raised to the status of a demi-god, in the end it is through the pivotal actions of humans that Narnia is saved, and they are all crowned Kings and Queens, ranking above him. The story is truly a glorification of the power of humans to change their environment and the seminal role they play in the great events of our time - even if you are a talking lion who can resurrect yourself, who cares? Without the humans you'd achieve nothing.


Conclusion

CS Lewis has been radically misread for decades. Luckily I've unearthed just how naughty he was (then again, see the previous post).


Endnotes:

* - Luckily there was a direct chain of transmission. If Lucy had told Edmund, who told Susan who told Peter, her original story (perhaps having dreamt of entering Narnia) could have been distorted, as anyone who's played the game "Broken Telephone" would know. Alternatively, Lucy could have said that her friend 'Bob' had been to Narnia and told her about it - in this case 'Bob' could neither have been telling the truth, nor lying nor mad, since he wouldn't have existed in the first place.

** - Some might argue that without Edmund's betrayal, victory could still have come, and at a lower price to boot. To fully address this objection, a dissertation on battle tactics and teleology (was what happened the only possible way it could have happened?) would be needed.

Also:

i) I liked the sneaky commentary about global warming and its perils (the melting river and how the children almost died). The Bush administration must be wroth.

ii) If you are ugly, you must be evil. If you look noble, you must be good. Excellent message to take home.

Away In A Manger

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be enrolled... And all went to be enrolled, each to his own city. And Joseph also went up from... Nazareth to... Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be enrolled with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child.

And while they were there, the time came for her to be delivered. And she gave birth to her first-born son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.
~Luke 2:1-7

Yes, there was quite a bit of hustle and bustle at that time because a census was going on, and everyone wanted to make themselves counted. The inns/hostels/guesthouses were all full, and Joseph and Mary had to stay with the animals. So I think, to really experience Christmas, maybe one has to visit the zoo, or at least a place with farm animals, instead of visiting the shopping centres. Farm animals don't need to make themselves counted. They're usually quite unassuming and gentle, very much like the Babe.

So there're similarities between the ancient story and what we see nowadays. Folks are busy with holiday activities, shopping, dining... business is good, inns are full, Tangs is now having a post-Christmas sale, which is probably closer to the Biblical account. (The three wise men only did their Christmas shopping after Jesus was born.)

So that's where all the action seems to be. And it's easy to get carried away. Because the real story was found in the quiet stillness of the night with hay and stuff... and the occasional mooing from the cow...

The Tale of the Twelve Officers

It was, of course, sad to hear that Ms. K had been slowly raped and murdered by a common thug over the course of one hour and fifty-five minutes; but when I found out that the ordeal had taken place in plain sight of twelve fully-armed off-duty police officers, who ignored her terrified cries for help, and instead just watched until the act was carried to its gruesome end, I found myself facing a personal crisis. You see, the officers had all been very close friends of mine, but now I found my trust in them shaken to its core. Fortunately, I was able to talk with them afterwards, and ask them how they could have stood by and done nothing when they could so easily have saved Ms. K.

"I thought about intervening," said the first officer, "but it occurred to me that it was obviously better for the murderer to be able to exercise his free will than to have it restricted. I deeply regret the choices he made, but that's the price of having a world with free agents. Would you rather everyone in the world were a robot? The attacker's choices certainly weren't in my control, so I can't be held responsible for his actions."

"Well," said the second officer, "my motivation was a little bit different. I was about to pull my gun on the murderer when I thought to myself, 'But wait, wouldn't this be a perfect opportunity for some unarmed bystander to exercise selfless heroism, should he chance to walk by? If I were to intervene all the time like I was just about to, then no one would ever be able to exercise such a virtue. In fact, everyone would probably become very spoiled and self-centered if I were to prevent every act of rape and murder.' So I backed off. It's unfortunate that no one actually showed up to heroically intervene, but that's the price of having a universe where people can display virtue and maturity. Would you rather the world were nothing but love, peace, and roses?"

"I didn't even consider stepping in," said the third officer. "I probably would have if I hadn't had so much experience of life as a whole, since Ms. K's rape and murder admittedly seems pretty horrible when taken in isolation. But when you put it into context with the rest of life, it actually adds to the overall beauty of the big picture. Ms. K.'s screams were like the discordant notes that make fine musical pieces better than they would have been had all the notes been flawless. In fact, I could scarcely keep from waving my hands around, imagining that I myself was conducting the delicious nuances of the orchestra."

"When I first arrived on the scene, I actually drew my gun and pointed it right at the rapist's head," confessed the fourth officer, with a very guilty look on his face. "I'm deeply ashamed I did that. Do you know how close I came to destroying all of the goodness in the world? I mean, we all know there can't be any good without evil. Fortunately, I remembered this just in time, and a wave of such strong nausea came over me when I realized what I had almost done, that it knocked me to my hands and knees. Man, was that a close one."

"Look, there's really no point in my trying to explain the details to you," said the fifth officer, who we had nicknamed 'Brainiac' because he had an encyclopedic knowledge of literally everything and an IQ way off the charts. "There's an excellent reason for why I did not intervene, but it's just way too complicated for you to understand, so I'm not even going to bother trying. I mean, you admit you are nowhere near as knowledgeable as I am, so what right do you have to judge? Just so there's no misunderstanding, though, let me point out that no one could care about Ms. K. more than I did, and that I am, in fact, a very good person. That settles that."

"I would have defended Ms. K," said the sixth officer, who was notoriously careful about staying out of the public eye, "but it simply was not feasible. You see, I want everyone to freely choose to believe in me. But if I were to step in every time someone was about to be raped or murdered, then the evidence would be so clear-cut that everyone would be forced to believe in me. Can you imagine a more diabolical infringement upon their free wills? Obviously, it was better for me to back off and let Ms. K be raped and murdered. Now everyone can freely choose to believe that there is this extraordinary cop out there who loves them like his own children."

"What are you complaining about?" exclaimed the seventh officer when I turned to him, his eyebrows shooting up in exasperated disbelief. "I just saved a woman from getting raped and murdered last week! Do I have to jump in every time I see something like that about to happen? I would say the fact that more women are not raped and murdered in this city is almost miraculous testimony to my goodness."

The eighth officer, too, looked frustrated. "Nothing I do is good enough! Do you know how much worse it could have been? The thug actually had a blowtorch with him when he started out, but I said 'No way, not on my watch,' and knocked it away from him with my nightstick. Sure, I let him keep the switchblade, the pliers, the coat hanger, and the vial of acid, but think how much worse it would have been with a blowtorch! Ms. K should have thanked her lucky stars that someone so loving was there to watch over her."

"I'll let you in on a secret," said the ninth officer."Moments after Ms. K. flatlined, I had her resuscitated, and flown to a tropical resort where she is now experiencing extraordinary bliss, and her ordeal is just a distant memory. I'm sure you would agree that that's more than adequate compensation for her suffering, so the fact that I just stood there watching instead of intervening has no bearing at all on my goodness."

The tenth officer gave us all quite a start when he revealed a surprising secret about Ms. K. "I genetically engineered her from scratch. I made her, therefore she's my property, and I can do whatever I want with her. I could rape and murder her myself if I were so inclined, and it would be no worse than you tearing up a piece of paper you own. So there is no question of my being a bad person for not helping her."

The eleventh officer chimed in, gesturing at the tenth officer "I hired him to create Ms. K for me, because I wanted someone to love and worship me. But when I approached Ms. K about the matter, she actually turned away from me, as though she could find meaning and happiness with someone else! So I decided the loving thing to do would be to break her spirit by arranging to have her raped and murdered by a common thug, so that she might turn to me in her extraordinary suffering, thereby fulfilling the purpose for which she had been created. Well, mission accomplished, I'm happy to say! A few seconds before she died, she was so insane with terror and pain that she actually convinced herself she loved me, since she knew that only I could end her ordeal. I'll never forget the love in her eyes when she looked up at me the last time, begging for mercy, right before the thug bent over and slit her throat. It was so beautiful it still brings me to tears. Now I just have to go to that island so she can claim her prize of servitude."

"Well, this is quite a coincidence," chuckled the twelfth officer. "It looks like the thug got himself double pay, because I actually hired him to carry out the murder, too! Why? Oh, well it was just a test. Ms. K and I had been dating for some time (no offense, I didn't know she was someone else's property), and one beautiful night she finally told me she loved me. So, naturally, I wanted to see whether this was indeed love - that is, whether she would continue to adore me even while drowning in a pool of her own tears and blood, with me standing before her doing nothing."

By now, it had become clear to me that any difficulty I might have had in reconciling the presumed goodness of the officers with their behavior that day was unfounded, and that anyone who sided against them could do so only for love of evil over good. After all, anyone who has experienced their friendship in the way I have knows that they are good. Their goodness is even manifest in my life - I was in a shambles before I met them, but now everyone remarks on what a changed person I am, so much kinder and happier, apparently possessed of an inner calm. And I have met so many others who feel exactly the same way about them - so many who, like me, know in their hearts the truth that others try to rationalize away with their cold reason and sterile logic. I am ashamed that I ever doubted the entitlement of the twelve officers to my loyalty and my love.

As I was getting ready to leave, the first officer spoke up again. "By the way, I also think you should know that when we stood there watching Ms. K. get raped and stabbed over and over, we were suffering along with her, and we experienced exactly the same pain she did, or perhaps even more." And everyone in the room, myself included, nodded his head in agreement.


Copied from The Secular Web

Intelligence Design In Science Textbooks: Breathtaking Inanity

"I felt like both sides [evolution and Intelligent Design] ought to be properly taught. I think that part of education is to expose people to different schools of thought."
~George W. Bush

"The breathtaking inanity of the Board’s decision [to refer to Intelligent Design in Science classes] is evident when considered against the factual backdrop which has now been fully revealed through this trial."
~Judge Jones/Kitzmiller vs. Dover Area School District

From Jones's 139-page judgement, this was the Board's decision:

"On November 19, 2004, the Defendant Dover Area School District announced by press release that, commencing in January 2005, teachers would be required to read the following statement to students in the ninth grade biology class at Dover High School:

The Pennsylvania Academic Standards require students to learn about Darwin’s Theory of Evolution and eventually to take a standardized test of which evolution is a part.

Because Darwin’s Theory is a theory, it continues to be tested as new evidence is discovered. The Theory is not a fact. Gaps in the Theory exist for which there is no evidence. A theory is defined as a well-tested explanation that unifies a broad range of observations.

Intelligent Design is an explanation of the origin of life that differs from Darwin’s view. The reference book, Of Pandas and People, is available for students who might be interested in gaining an understanding of what Intelligent Design actually involves.

With respect to any theory, students are encouraged to keep an open mind. The school leaves the discussion of the Origins of Life to individual students and their families. As a Standards-driven district, class instruction focuses upon preparing students to achieve proficiency on Standards-based assessments"

Hooha! What a fantastic outcome of this landmark case that is related to what I talked about previously. If the school board wants to put ID in textbooks, it would be perfectly reasonable as well to say in textbooks that 'the pink unicorn in my backyard created the universe'. It's non-falsifiable, but I know it's true! Furthermore, the theory of evolution fails to explain everything, but my unicorn knows everything! Yeah, it's breathtakingly ridiculous. The following is Jones' conclusion.

The proper application of both the endorsement and Lemon tests to the facts of this case makes it abundantly clear that the Board’s ID Policy violates the Establishment Clause. In making this determination, we have addressed the seminal question of whether ID is science. We have concluded that it is not, and moreover that ID cannot uncouple itself from its creationist, and thus religious, antecedents.

Both Defendants and many of the leading proponents of ID make a bedrock assumption which is utterly false. Their presupposition is that evolutionary theory is antithetical to a belief in the existence of a supreme being and to religion in general. Repeatedly in this trial, Plaintiffs’ scientific experts testified that the theory of evolution represents good science, is overwhelmingly accepted by the scientific community, and that it in no way conflicts with, nor does it deny, the existence of a divine creator.

To be sure, Darwin’s theory of evolution is imperfect. However, the fact that a scientific theory cannot yet render an explanation on every point should not be used as a pretext to thrust an untestable alternative hypothesis grounded in religion into the science classroom or to misrepresent well-established scientific propositions.

The citizens of the Dover area were poorly served by the members of the Board who voted for the ID Policy. It is ironic that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would time and again lie to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose behind the ID Policy.

With that said, we do not question that many of the leading advocates of ID have bona fide and deeply held beliefs which drive their scholarly endeavors. Nor do we controvert that ID should continue to be studied, debated, and discussed. As stated, our conclusion today is that it is unconstitutional to teach ID as an alternative to evolution in a public school science classroom. Those who disagree with our holding will likely mark it as the product of an activist judge. If so, they will have erred as this is manifestly not an activist Court.

Rather, this case came to us as the result of the activism of an ill-informed faction on a school board, aided by a national public interest law firm eager to find a constitutional test case on ID, who in combination drove the Board to adopt an imprudent and ultimately unconstitutional policy. The breathtaking inanity of the Board’s decision is evident when considered against the factual backdrop which has now been fully revealed through this trial. The students, parents, and teachers of the Dover Area School District deserved better than to be dragged into this legal maelstrom, with its resulting utter waste of monetary and personal resources.

To preserve the separation of church and state mandated by the, we will enter an order permanently enjoining Defendants from maintaining the ID Policy in any school within the Dover Area School District, from requiring teachers to denigrate or disparage the scientific theory of evolution, and from requiring teachers to refer to a religious, alternative theory known as ID. We will also issue a declaratory judgment that Plaintiffs’ rights under the Constitutions of the United States and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania have been violated by Defendants’ actions.
~Judge Jones/Kitzmiller vs. Dover Area School District

More from DailyKos, Questionable Authority (hat tip:Elia Diodati)
Read the entire entry.

Cognitive Dissonance

The Skeptic's Dictionary on Cognitive Dissonance (how people reconcile contradictory thoughts):

"Cognitive dissonance has been called "the mind controller's best friend"... Marian Keech was the leader of a UFO cult in the 1950s. She claimed to get messages from extraterrestrials, known as The Guardians, through automatic writing. Like the Heaven's Gate folks forty years later, Keech and her followers, known as The Seekers or The Brotherhood of the Seven Rays, were waiting to be picked up by flying saucers. In Keech's prophecy, her group of eleven was to be saved just before the earth was to be destroyed by a massive flood on December 21, 1954. When it became evident that there would be no flood and the Guardians weren't stopping by to pick them up, Keech

became elated. She said she'd just received a telepathic message from the Guardians saying that her group of believers had spread so much light with their unflagging faith that God had spared the world from the cataclysm (Levine 2003: 206).

More important, the Seekers didn't abandon her. Most became more devoted after the failed prophecy. (Only two left the cult when the world didn't end.) "Most disciples not only stayed but, having made that decision, were now even more convinced than before that Keech had been right all along....Being wrong turned them into true believers (ibid.)." Some people will go to bizarre lengths to avoid inconsistency between their cherished beliefs and the facts. But why do people interpret the same evidence in contrary ways?

The Seekers would not have waited for the flying saucer if they thought it might not come. So, when it didn't come, one would think that a competent thinker would have seen this as falsifying Keech's claim that it would come. However, the incompetent thinkers were rendered incompetent by their devotion to Keech. Their belief that a flying saucer would pick them up was based on faith, not evidence. Likewise, their belief that the failure of the prophesy shouldn't count against their belief was another act of faith. With this kind of irrational thinking, it may seem pointless to produce evidence to try to persuade people of the error of their ways."

The power is in the post, not in the deity

One popular argument used by non-theologians when they engage in theodicy (reconciling an omnibenevolent and omnipotent god with a world full of suffering) is that nobody can question their god, since he can do anything he wants and is answerable to no one. Genocide, babies with Down's Syndrome or Tsunamis - failure to stop any of these does not impugn on the moral character of their god. This god could castrate his devotees (or rape them, for the female ones), tear them limb from limb, tie their intestines to a tree and throw them off a cliff (but alas, not to their doom, for they would come back to life in a Sisyphean manner), and they would be praising him as they plunged. He could send the whole human race to burn in hell for all eternity and his worshippers would still be chanting his praises while roasting in sulphur and brimstone.

The problem with this deceptively convincing argument is that it ignores the question of the definition of "good". An omnipotent and omnibenevolent god can do anything, and he will be acclaimed as being good. If an entity cannot be wrong - is incapable of being wrong - we would label it "amoral" - neither moral or immoral, incapable of being either right or, more relevantly in this case, wrong. A rock, for example, is amoral since it has no will (let alone free will) and thus cannot be held accountable for its actions. To acclaim as good an entity which is incapable of being judged immoral is to make a mockery of the concept of morality (if not to make it an unintelligible concept), and indeed that of divine will, since this god will be incapable by definition of doing something wrong; if somebody cheats and obtains answers to a test and then gets full marks, he would not have achieved anything by any objective measure.

Subscribing to a notion of morality being dependent on a god's ever changing whims (as opposed to an objective moral code that even this god can and has to be held to) in fact condemns us to the ultimate form of moral relativism - what is good can change at any one time depending on what the omnibenevolent god does. Some might counter that some gods have moral codes that do not change with time, but that would render null and void the earlier fudge about whatever gods do being automatically branded as good. Furthermore, a look at the Bible and Christian history puts paid to this argument, at least for the Christian god, for it is clear that moral standards have changed dramaticaly with time. What's worse - the Biblical god does not even abide by his own moral standards.

We might then ask why the Christian devil Satan is so reviled. It is because he does evil things, we are told. Yet, even if the Christian god did evil things, by definition he would be acclaimed as good. Presumably, even if a reasonable man judged that Satan did good things like prolonging lives, reducing suffering, ending pestilence and preventing famines, and the Christian god engaged in evil activities like infanticide, genocide, introducing the Ebola virus to the world, we would have to pronounce the former evil and the latter good. The concepts of "good" and "evil" would cease to have any real meaning. The two entities could even be switched (the former god would now be Satan, and the former Satan be god) and the old god would now be denounced and the old Satan be lauded. What would be worshipped, then, would be the Christian god's post, rather than any of his intrinsic attributes, at least according to the "god can do anything he wants" argument. In that case, anyone could be put in the Christian god's post, even any Tom, Dick or Harry on the street, and he would be lauded as being good. For that matter, a monkey, a computer or even a rock could do the same job, and would accrue the same privileges.

How do we really know that the Christian god is good? We just have to take his word for it (or rather, the word of his spokesmen).

A Christian once told me to judge any religion by its fruits. I suppose the same will have to be said of the Christian god, even if rotten, maggot-ridden fruit is wolved down with relish by his worshippers.

***

Someone: look, you might as well take a look at biblical representation of satan. he didn't start off being the Ultimate Bad Guy
look at his evolution from genesis to job

Me: well this is the fundie representation of him
and I think only fundies use the "god can do no wrong" argument
some liberals even accept that the bible is not 100% true!!!