Would the World be Better off Without Religion?

What Deleuze calls "desiring machines" concerns something wholly different from the mechanical: the "becoming-machine." In what does this becoming consist? To many an obsessional neurotic, the fear of flying has a very concrete image: one is haunted by the thought of how many parts of such an immensely complicated machine as a modern plane have to function smoothly in order for the plane to remain in the air - one small lever breaks somewhere, and the plane may very well spiral downwards... One often relates in the same way towards one's own body: how many small things have to run smoothly for me to stay alive? - a tiny clot of blood in a vein, and I die. When one starts to think how many things can go wrong, one cannot but experience total and overwhelming panic. The Deleuzian »schizo,« on the other hand, merrily identifies with this infinitely complex machine which is our body: he experiences this impersonal machine as his highest assertion, rejoicing in its constant tickling. As Deleuze emphasizes, what we get here is not the relationship of a metaphor (the old boring topic of "machines replacing humans"), but that of metamorphosis, of the "becoming-machine" of a man. It is here that the "reductionist" project goes wrong: the problem is not how to reduce mind to neuronal "material" processes (to replace the language of mind by the language of brain processes, to translate the first one into the second one), but, rather, to grasp how mind can emerge only through being embedded in the network of social relations and material supplements. In other words, the true problem is not "How, if at all, could machines IMITATE the human mind?," but, "How does the very identity of human mind rely on external mechanical supplements? How does it incorporate machines?"

Humanity is competitive by nature. They would have found other reasons to war.

Humanity is competitive by nature. They would have found other reasons to war.

Lethal Aggression in Mobile Forager Bands and Implications for the Origins of War

Ancient Warriors or Murderers?

Some have suggested that the human predilection for war is ancient, perhaps dating back to the emergence of our species, while others maintain that evidence for such early warring is scant. Past studies that looked at nomadic foraging bands as models of early humans and their potential for conflict concluded that war is in our blood. Fry and Söderberg (p. 270), however, reexamined the standard cross-cultural sample, the main repository for behavioral data on forage bands, and found little evidence for large-scale conflicts or wars. Instead, the majority of incidences of lethal aggression in these societies were homicides driven by a variety of factors relevant at the individual or family scale.

Gotta admit though, you can't deny its effectiveness at getting lots and lot of people to hate, oppress and murder the "right" people. Even after the believers split into groups, it still inspires them all to hate each other.

Thou shalt not kill. Edit: Except for....

My brother died (really) and if I had to marry his widow and father a child by her, I'd jump from a skyscraper first. Ugg.

Also "ugg."

Back when I was still trying to stay in church, I went to try out a Methodist church. The preacher said in his sermon that if you miss one Sunday at church, you'll go to hell. I figured I'd already missed so many that I was done for by that reasoning, so I said "**** it" and never went back.