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President Camacho 
Sophomore
Joined: 12 Apr 2008
Posts: 257
Gender: 
Location: Miami, Fl
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 Posted: Tue Jun 10, 2008 11:13 am Post subject:
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By making a stronger argument for cultural materialism in an entertaining and popular book, Harris is setting the stage for mass education and debate. He's promoting his theory rather than defending it.
If anything, cultural materialism should be considered. Cost/benefit is a great way to find out why people (most of the time) do things. There are exceptions to every rule but that doesn't mean that it shouldn't be applied because of a few statistical outliers. No, I think cultural materialism has significant weight, although it is not the only motive why people do what they do.
Penelope, most of the topics in this book are rather controversial and make for great discussion. Abortion, infanticide, cannibalism, and male dominance are just a few examples. You can give your opinion  |
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Penelope
Stupendously Brilliant
Silver Contributor
Joined: 02 Oct 2007
Posts: 702
Gender: 
Location: Cheshire, England
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| Posted: Tue Jun 10, 2008 11:46 am Post subject:
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Ophelia said:-
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| Crickey! I've lost my post (the choice of expletive is because I am reading PG Wodehouse on the side). |
I would suggest you keep reading PGW (on the side) Ophelia..... 
Sorry, your post was a few posts ago.....
Today, because of my posts to Chris and Mr. P...I have been thinking about the Biblical story of Elisha (or it might be Elijah) with the Prophets of Ba'al. They both built alters with wooden kindling......and both prayed to their own God....to send fire from heaven to light their fires.
In the Bible....the prophets of Ba'al prayed and suplicated....and got no response and Elijah or Elisha....prayed, and God sent fire and lit his alter.
Now....God must have been an man in those days....because if she had been a woman she would have said.......
Will you all stop squabbling......or I will bang your heads together....you will all go to your own rooms....and there will be no 'fire from heaven' for any of you....AND no tea!!!!
Pres. C - This is my opinion....  |
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Ophelia
Beyond Awesome
Fiction Moderator
Book Discussion Leader
Joined: 25 Nov 2007
Posts: 1194
Gender:
Location: France
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| Posted: Tue Jun 10, 2008 3:30 pm Post subject:
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Camacho wrote:
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| By making a stronger argument for cultural materialism in an entertaining and popular book, Harris is setting the stage for mass education and debate. He's promoting his theory rather than defending it. |
That's a good argument, and it is well put. How can I go on objecting after that? I'll make a note to memorize the last sentence in case I can pass it off as my own in another discussion. |
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President Camacho
Sophomore
Joined: 12 Apr 2008
Posts: 257
Gender:
Location: Miami, Fl
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| Posted: Tue Jun 10, 2008 3:32 pm Post subject:
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| That's probably what I did... sometimes things like that get stuck in my head and I use it as my own. I'm not claiming it. Did you say it already? I'm going to go back through and read all the posts. |
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Ophelia
Beyond Awesome
Fiction Moderator
Book Discussion Leader
Joined: 25 Nov 2007
Posts: 1194
Gender:
Location: France
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| Posted: Tue Jun 10, 2008 3:37 pm Post subject:
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| There was no irony in my last post, I just meant it was neat phrasing in reference to Harris's book, not that I had written or seen this before. |
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Chris OConnor
Rhodes Scholar
BookTalk.org Owner
Joined: 20 Oct 2000
Posts: 6849
Gender:
Location: Florida
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| Posted: Fri Jun 13, 2008 1:25 am Post subject:
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I cannot fathom how some people can see the "COPY TO CLIPBOARD" button and some can't, but there is still a method you can and should employ to copy your post to your clipboard prior to clicking submit.
Click Control-A to select all text in the window
Click Control-C to copy it to your clipboard
Then click Submit. If after submitting your post it is somehow lost you can rest assured it is still on your clipboard. Just get back to the screen where you can enter your reply and...
Click Control-V to paste your post into the window.
Now click submit again. |
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Ophelia
Beyond Awesome
Fiction Moderator
Book Discussion Leader
Joined: 25 Nov 2007
Posts: 1194
Gender:
Location: France
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| Posted: Fri Jun 13, 2008 2:49 am Post subject:
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Thanks Chris.
I've just checked this method and it worked. |
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Ophelia
Beyond Awesome
Fiction Moderator
Book Discussion Leader
Joined: 25 Nov 2007
Posts: 1194
Gender:
Location: France
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| Posted: Fri Jun 13, 2008 9:35 am Post subject: Empire
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Empire: the last pages of chapter 10 give interesting explanations as to why empires are created and how they work.
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The earliest kings, such as Sigurd the Generous, cultivated the image of then "Great Provider" (..)
Continuous generosity in the face of rapid population growth demanded continued extension into new territories and the progressive absorption of additional masses of peasant producers. (...)
The fundamental principle guiding all successful imperial expansion is that those who submit to "the great provider" will not be eaten -literally or figuratively- but in fact their lives will be improved and their diets improved. |
So, the justification given for further conquests may well be "the glory of Rome", but the expansionist power needs to feed the common people at home, give something to the conquered, and also provide for the leaders who help the conqueror, since the nation state has now evolved into a complicated structure with princes and noblemen (or their equivalent) surrounding the emperor. I've always been amazed by the fact that empires were always extending: what was due to folie de grandeur and what was due to the necessityof providing food and estates to the people back home?
Of course sometimes there are less costly ways of providing for the nobles. I remember reading with great amusement that Czar Peter the Great, who reigned from 1682 to 1725, had run into a severe problem. The only way Peter and the previous czars knew how to thank a nobleman was to give him vast tracts of lands. Apparently even the whole of Russia was not enough for this after a while, and the czar was in a predicament. But Peter was a clever, enlightened monarch, who travelled far and wide to study what was done in European courts (often incognito) and pick the brains of other kings. He discovered that other kings were giving their noble subjects ... medals, which cost nothing, didn't feed anybody but provided great satisfaction to the receiver. Peter went back to Russia, created several orders, gave out medals, which had tremendous success-- it seemed that noblemen quite forgot to ask for lands as they basked in the honour of receiving decorations. |
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President Camacho
Sophomore
Joined: 12 Apr 2008
Posts: 257
Gender:
Location: Miami, Fl
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| Posted: Fri Jun 13, 2008 1:27 pm Post subject:
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That's interesting! lol
My last boss actually gathered us together and asked us - what would you guys prefer... money or kudos? Kudos being like pats on the back or medals (if you aren't familiar with the word). We looked at him like he was insane.
I remember commenting after the discussion to a co-worker that I'd be happy to accept kudos instead of money as soon as the supermarket starts accepting them as payment too.
Great job stocking the shelves with groceries!! Oh, is this bag full of fruits and vegetables for me? Thanks!
I want to learn more about these traps. That's the joy of becoming educated. Knowledge really is power as long as one chooses to use it and keep pragmatic.
I just got done reading chapters 13 and 14. The hydraulic trap theory chapter really left a lot up for grabs. To explain why civilizations were more despotic when there was a heavy reliance for agricultural productivity on massive public works needs far more than 15 pages to cover. Especially when you end it how Harris ended the chapter. A fear of government and power is apparent in this book.
The origin of capitalism was also kind of a stretch, I think. |
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Ophelia
Beyond Awesome
Fiction Moderator
Book Discussion Leader
Joined: 25 Nov 2007
Posts: 1194
Gender:
Location: France
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| Posted: Sat Jun 14, 2008 11:46 am Post subject:
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Chapter 12: the origin of the sacred cow, the highlight of the book.
I'll start with Camacho's account of the chapter, which is very much to the point (I note that Camacho gave as the equivalent in American culture: the car).
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Chapter 12
It only makes sense that a person would favor something that was beneficial and spurn something that wasn't. This is the argument Harris has adopted to show his readers why India and China has preferential treatment of very specific animals.
The ecology of a region plays a salient role in deciding which animals receive this preferential treatment and why during times of population explosion and limited food supply (largely due to unsustainable farming practices).
India has more farm-able land than China, making an animal able to help with farming a beneficial thing to have around, much like cars today for the average American. We pay to feed our cars gasoline. Even though we could sell our cars and make money, we won't sell because then we couldn't get to work the following day and make more money. This is what the Hindus were trying to teach their followers. The brilliant thing is that Harris relays that this probably happened naturally without much help from the religion. Farmers, during times of drought (sometimes lasting 12 years) that gave into the temptation of eating their cattle were unable to continue farming when the rains returned. |
Yes, Harris makes a very good argument here-- I'm really glad I've read this, I've been doing a lot of thinking about this.
This raises many questions, but my first thought was to remeber my years of practising yogha, which I took very seriously. I still think it's a great art, and there is some very good thinking and wisdom behind it. Our teachers made frequent allusions to India and the yogic tradition being much more sensible than the way we did things in the west, and I still think this can be argued. Now in my mind, and also because I was told it was so, those sensible practises, and the way to wisdom, were linked to vegetarianism-- I'm not a vegetarian myself, but I could become one easily. I had no clear-cut categories, but after the definite dreadful behaviour and wasteful consumption in the west, the yoghis and the vegetarians were the better people to me. This was also due to the fact that being vegetarian is less wasteful-- unless steaks have an attraction to you (not much of an attraction in my case, I'll eat them on occasion but I don't buy any) being vegetarian is a much better way of sharing resources (Camacho, do I hear you say you don't want to share? )
So there: I'm not saying that everything has come tumbling down with Harris's book, but some more of my illusions about some humans being wiser than others have been lost , and the book made me laugh. Harris's hypothesis is that the taboo against eating beef, later extended for some Hindus to not eating meat at all, has no religious or philosophical grounds. It was not created by wise yoghis but by pragmatic people: if the farmer killed his oxen during a drought, he would be unable to raise a crop when the rains came. It follows that once that particular agricultural problem had been solved the taboo was no longer needed. |
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