![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.wizardwalk.com\/images\/humanbook.gif\" "\\"Human\\"")
There are a couple reasons I felt compelled to write such a post.\u00a0 Firstly, I’m reading quite an interesting psychology book called Human: The Science Behind What Makes Us Unique<\/a>![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.assoc-amazon.com\/e\/ir?t=wizardwalk-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0060892889\")
by Michael S. Gazzaniga.\u00a0 It’s filled with many interesting psychology … uh … things.\u00a0 For example, it seems the emotion of disgust is a purely human trait, and it is possible for humans with certain brain injuries to be incapable of knowing it.\u00a0 Can you imagine not being able to see anything as disgusting?\u00a0 Also, it made me question what I said in my last post, that emotional suffering comes from wanting.\u00a0 I think that, like physical pain, some emotional pain can just be automatic, such as fear or sadness; they can be born from things we don’t consciously control.\u00a0 I guess you could say they still come from wanting; they still come from the brain wanting the environment to be different.\u00a0 But it’s not really always so much a conscious wanting.\u00a0 One could also say that suffering serves the purpose of physical survival, so why do we always try to find spiritual meaning in it all?\u00a0 I guess that’s a whole different topic…<\/p>\nAnyway, the second reason was that I was browsing Neil Gaiman’s blog<\/a>, and he wrote this:<\/p>\n Picked up my copy of New Scientist<\/em> over breakfast this morning (which, along with Fortean Times<\/em>, is my favourite publication) and found myself puzzling over an article that began<\/a><\/p>\n That a complex mind is required for religion may explain why faith is unique to humans.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Which left me amazed and potentially delighted that journalists at New Scientist<\/em> had succeeded in interspecies communication to the point of being certain that dolphins and whales have no belief in things deeper than themselves, that ants do not imagine a supreme colony at the centre of everything, and that my cats only believe in what they can see, smell, hunt and rub up against (except for Pod, of course, who when much younger would react in horror, with full fur-up, to invisible things), and that there are no Buddhist Pigs, Monkeys or whatever-the-hell Sandy was.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n So I think both Gaiman and New Scientist<\/em> have some truth; I guess they are differing a bit in what they mean by “faith”.\u00a0 Very interesting… I had not thought of such things before.<\/p>\n So… that’s that.\u00a0 The book I’m reading and Gaiman’s blog post there made me want to write a much longer blathering about psychology and religion, but what I just wrote is enough… for now at least.\u00a0 It’ll give my subconscious something to think about while I’m not.<\/p>\n In other news, my short story No One Was Abendsen<\/em> goes out to critiquers in the Critters Workshop<\/a> this week, so I look forward to getting some more feedback.\u00a0 (Mr. Sawczak<\/a> <\/strong>was kind enough to provide some very helpful feedback earlier.\u00a0 Thank you again!)\u00a0 So by the end of next week I should be ready to write a final draft and start sending it out to magazines.\u00a0 (I can sometimes be a perfectionist, so I like to say I never really finish a work, I just stop working on it so I can move on.\u00a0 So, after my final draft, I don’t get any more critiques no matter what so as not to waste time trying to make it perfect for anyone in particular including myself.\u00a0 Some people send their stories through Critters multiple times, but I must move on!\u00a0 It’ll never be perfect.)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.wizardwalk.com\/images\/dolphin.gif\" "\\"evil")
<\/a>I wasn’t sure what to make of Gaiman’s post… I hadn’t really considered the idea that non-humans might have religious feelings.\u00a0 It just seems rather… absurd.\u00a0 But then again, I guess it depends on how you define religion.\u00a0 We humans tend to believe in a difference between right and wrong.\u00a0 Why wouldn’t animals?\u00a0 It’s needed for the survival of the individual and of the species.\u00a0 I would think it would be part of their psychology.\u00a0 I guess my puzzle is… where is and what is the nature of the link between believing in a difference between right and wrong and religion?\u00a0 I’ve met many an atheist who think religion is not just stupid, it’s evil<\/em>.\u00a0 But that seems like a religious statement in and of itself; the word “evil” presupposes the existence of an objective right and wrong.\u00a0 How can anyone truly be atheist while believing in an objective difference between right and wrong?\u00a0 Wouldn’t true atheism just lead to moral relativism?\u00a0 Or should psychology by itself lead to moral relativism?\u00a0 But if atheists who believe in an objective difference between right and wrong are really<\/em> religious, then wouldn’t animals also be religious, in a very fundemental way?<\/p>\n