Searching for Truth
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SEARCHING FOR TRUTH John Scales Avery October 21, 2018 2 Contents 1 WHAT IS SCIENCE? 13 1.1 What is science? . 13 1.2 The blindness of science . 16 1.3 Is there a conflict between science and religion? . 18 1.4 Complementarity . 25 1.5 Right hand, left hand . 25 1.6 How are science and religion related to war? . 28 2 TRIBALISM 31 2.1 Ethology . 31 2.2 Population genetics . 36 2.3 Hope for the future . 38 2.4 Religion and ethnic identity . 38 2.5 Tribal markings; ethnicity; pseudospeciation . 39 2.6 Searching for human nature . 43 2.7 The evolution of cooperation . 48 3 TRIBALISM, NATIONALISM AND GENOCIDES 67 3.1 From tribalism to nationalism . 67 3.2 Lessons from the First World War . 68 3.3 The devil's dynamo . 70 3.4 Militarism's hostages . 75 3.5 Killing civilians . 78 3.6 Some examples of genocide . 80 3.7 Nuclear warfare as genocide . 82 3.8 What is to be done? . 83 4 THE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY OF SCIENTISTS 85 4.1 Modern war would be impossible without their help . 85 4.2 The threat of nuclear war . 87 4.3 Atoms for peace? . 95 4.4 An accident waiting to happen . 100 4.5 Nuclear weapons are criminal! Every war is a crime! . 105 3 4 CONTENTS 4.6 The task before us . 105 4.7 Organizations working for the abolition of nuclear weapons . 109 4.8 The Nuremberg Principles and individual responsibility . 112 5 SCIENCE FICTION? 123 5.1 Is \science fiction" self-contradictory? . 123 5.2 Mary Shelley's Frankenstein .......................... 124 5.3 Jules Verne . 127 5.4 H.G. Wells . 129 5.5 George Orwell . 131 5.6 Aldous Huxley . 137 5.7 A comparison between Orwell and Huxley . 141 5.8 How well did they predict civilization's 21st century crisis? . 142 6 CLIMATE CHANGE DENIAL 151 6.1 Adam Smith's invisible hand is at our throats . 151 6.2 Limits to growth and climate change . 156 6.3 Exponential growth . 159 6.4 The case for economic reform . 161 6.5 A human-initiated 6th geological extinction event . 163 6.6 Our duty to future generations . 165 6.7 The urgent need for renewable energy . 167 6.8 The United Nations Climate Summit . 178 6.9 Climate change means lifestyle change . 179 6.10 Will a disaster wake us up? . 181 6.11 Paris, India and coal . 182 6.12 Paris and the long-term future . 185 6.13 Climate change denial . 188 6.14 The fossil fuel industry's denial campaign . 188 6.15 Showing unsustainable lifestyles in mass media . 191 6.16 Humanity betrayed by the mass media . 191 7 THE MEDIA SABOTAGE PROGRESSIVE POLITICS 197 7.1 Restoring Democracy in the United States . 197 7.2 Europe needs to be independent . 198 7.3 Secrecy and democracy are incompatable . 201 7.4 Democracy and freedom of information . 205 7.5 Racism, colonialism and exceptionalism . 206 7.6 The agony of Iraq . 207 7.7 Attacks on Iran, past and present . 212 7.8 Some contributions of Islamic culture . 214 7.9 Politeness in multi-ethnic societies . 216 7.10 The 2016 US presidential election . 217 CONTENTS 5 7.11 Sabotaging Jeremy Corbyn . 228 8 THE MASS MEDIA HAVE BETRAYED US 233 8.1 The media are part of our educational system . 233 8.2 Humanity betrayed by the mass media . 238 8.3 The propaganda model of the mass media . 240 8.4 Institutional and cultural inertia . 240 8.5 Are we being driven like cattle? . 247 8.6 Ted Turner: \My Beef With Big Media" . 251 8.7 Truth versus power . 252 9 TRUTH-TELLERS WHO BECAME MARTYRS 259 9.1 Gordiano Bruno . 259 9.2 Galileo Galilei . 261 9.3 Mordechi Vanuno . 270 9.4 Edward Snowden . 272 9.5 Julian Assange . 277 9.6 Secrecy versus democracy . 278 9.7 Protecting whistleblowers . 280 10 THE ALTERNATIVE MEDIA 285 10.1 A few outstanding voices . 285 10.2 The Eqbal Ahmed Centre For Public Education . 300 10.3 The Danish Peace Academy . 304 10.4 List of progressive media websites . 306 11 REFORMED TEACHING OF HISTORY 325 11.1 The need for a new global ethic . 328 11.2 Some peace education initiatives in Denmark . 329 11.3 Culture, education and human solidarity . 337 11.4 History from the perspective of ordinary people . 341 12 NON-VIOLENT RESISTANCE 355 12.1 From tribalism to universal brotherhood . 355 12.2 Tolstoy . 357 12.3 Gandhi . 361 12.4 Martin Luther King, Jr. 366 12.5 The court of world public opinion . 368 12.6 Non-Violence . 369 12.7 We can unilaterally stop being nasty . 374 12.8 The fragility of our complex civilization . 375 6 CONTENTS A 9/11: WHAT IS THE TRUTH? 379 A.1 Is it a question of truth, or of identity? . 379 A.2 Beyond Misinformation ............................. 385 A.3 9/11 Unmasked ................................. 386 A.4 The arrogance of power . 388 A.5 Terrorism: a pseudothreat . 389 B THE STRUGGLE FOR INTERNET NUTRALITY 393 C HAROLD PINTER'S NOBEL LECTURE 399 D UNDERSTATEMENT OF EXISTENTIAL CLIMATE RISK 409 D.1 Introduction . 409 D.2 Existential Risk to Human Civilization . 412 E NOAM CHOMSKY'S LECTURE 415 Introduction This book is about our search for truth. How can we distinguish truth from falsehood in a world where government-controlled and corporation- controlled mass media use distractions, omissions, lies and propaganda to manipulate us? The superficiality of today’s television Social critic Neil Postman contrasted the futures predicted in Nineteen Eighty- Four and Brave New World in the foreword of his 1985 book “Amusing Our- selves to Death”. He wrote: “What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egotism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny ‘failed to take into account man’s almost infinite appetite for distractions.’ In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that our fear will ruin us. Huxley feared that our desire will ruin us. Niel Postman’s book, “Amusing Ourselves To Death; or Public Discourse in an Age of Show Business” (1985), had its origins at the Frankfurt Book Fair, where Postman was invited to join a panel discussing George Orwell’s “Nineteen Eighty-Four”. Postman said that our present situation was better predicted by Huxley’s “Brave New World”. Today, he maintained it is not fear that bars us from truth. Instead, truth is drowned in distractions and the pursuit of pleasure, by the public’s addiction to amusement. Postman sees television as the modern equivalent of Huxley’s pleasure- inducing drug, soma, and he maintains that that television, as a medium, is intrinsically superficial and unable to discuss serious issues. Looking at television as it is today, one must agree with him. 1 The wealth and power of the establishment The media are a battleground where reformers struggle for attention, but are defeated with great regularity by the wealth and power of.