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I saw an interesting, related theory in an ecology book I read recently. Most native peoples were very in tune withe the earth (Pagan Europe, Native American tr

I saw an interesting, related theory in an ecology book I read recently. Most native peoples were very in tune withe the earth (Pagan Europe, Native American tribes, Hindu India, Tribal Africa, Aboriginal Australia, etc). The rise of Abrahamic religion, with man as the most important creature on the planet and everything on earth created for man, is a factor for why we "dominate" the earth.

bpizzi 8y ago
Or maybe the starting point is that sapiens' DNA really is shaped for ruling. That sapiens mostly preferred 'Abrahamic religion' to others is then a consequence to this starting point.
- krapp 8y ago
  >That sapiens mostly preferred 'Abrahamic religion' to others is then a consequence to this starting point. Sapiens didn't mostly prefer Abrahamic religion. Judaism didn't proselytize as far as I'm aware, and Christianity and Islam converted many cultures and people by force (although not exclusively.) And you're not considering the widespread preference for Buddhist and animist religions, which over time likely equal if not surpass the Abrahamic faiths... although to be fair those also sometimes were spread by force as well.
  - bpizzi 8y ago
    > And you're not considering the widespread preference for Buddhist and animist religion [...] Actually I'm not considering anything, I was just pointing that the theory in the parent's book could be reversed.
mtts 8y ago
The Chinese don't follow an Abrahamic religion and yet they've built huge urban empires. It's unlikely this is a factor.
- devmunchies 8y ago
  It could be a factor everywhere else I mentioned, though. This is a logical fallacy.
  - simplify 8y ago
    Which fallacy? I don't understand.
    - devmunchies 8y ago
      Person A got cancer from smoking, but person B got cancer from exposure to chemicals so smoking likely doesn't cause cancer. Its the same argument.
      - mtts 8y ago
        I think I meant it more in the sense of "smoking causes cancer and so does exposure to chemicals so it's not the smoking or the chemicals that we need to look at but something they both have in common." I may not have made that clear enough, however.
  - yukonbound 8y ago
    Abrahamic Religions arrived perhaps too recently. The records we have of ancient civilizations show that they successfully dominated their environments already, and certainly accomplished amazing things.
- pnongrata 8y ago
  Also, the Incas, Mayas and Aztecs.
mikeash 8y ago
I’d say the Earth was fairly well dominated by the time Abrahamic religion started to become mainstream around 300AD.
- Symmetry 8y ago
  Axial[1] religion might have something to do with which societies succeeded later, but that isn't the same thing as Abrahamic and is all about a later phenomenon. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axial_Age https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axial_Age
  - mikeash 8y ago
    This sort of thing really makes me wish we had high-fidelity simulations of human societies we could do experiments with. And then comes the fear that we’re in one.
krapp 8y ago
>Most native peoples were very in tune withe the earth (Pagan Europe, Native American tribes, Hindu India, Tribal Africa, Aboriginal Australia, etc). The reason there were so many bison in the US when the settlers arrived is that the native Americans had already hunted the rest of the megafauna to extinction. While I think there is a kernel of truth to your comment, I also think the premise that primitive people's were more "in tune" with nature than their Western counterparts in some deep cultural or spiritual sense is a revisionist myth predicated on the "noble savage" archetype. The truth is more likely that being "in tune" with nature was simply a matter of survival for such people. Obviously, if your culture survives primarily on deer, you don't kill all of the deer. But primitive people were quite capable of destroying or harming their environment, as long as they could survive it, just not as capable as more advanced societies.
- nikofeyn 8y ago
  > The reason there were so many bison in the US when the settlers arrived is that the native Americans had already hunted the rest of the megafauna to extinction. do you have a good source that details the evidence of this? and what megafauna were killed off? i tried searching and from what i found, it isn't anywhere as close to clear cut as you state it. i even saw an article debunking the "overkill hypothesis" which claimed some scientists did some dating studies and showed that in a region of north america the large animals died off before native americans arrived. of course that could be false, but it just doesn't seem so clear as you state it.
- pokeymcsnatch 8y ago
  The theory of natives wiping out American megafauna is well-disputed. It was probably a combination of factors (possibly including hunting). The idea of primitive people being more in tune with the earth doesn't have to go hand-in-hand with the "noble savage" romanticization. There's evidence that North America was essentially a well-managed game reserve. For people that didn't have much in the ways of truly domesticated livestock, it makes sense that they worked towards food security in a different way than societies that had cattle and pigs. By necessity, they would have had to develop practical and efficient methods for managing their food source. So sure, they were probably much more in tune with nature their contemporary Europeans or modern Americans, if "in tune" means having the know-how to bend and shape the natural world for their benefit.
maxxxxx 8y ago
I think this is a little simplified but I honestly believe that if the bible didn't contain the phrase "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth" the world may be a better place.

bpizzi 8y ago

Or maybe the starting point is that sapiens' DNA really is shaped for ruling. That sapiens mostly preferred 'Abrahamic religion' to others is then a consequence to this starting point.

krapp 8y ago
>That sapiens mostly preferred 'Abrahamic religion' to others is then a consequence to this starting point. Sapiens didn't mostly prefer Abrahamic religion. Judaism didn't proselytize as far as I'm aware, and Christianity and Islam converted many cultures and people by force (although not exclusively.) And you're not considering the widespread preference for Buddhist and animist religions, which over time likely equal if not surpass the Abrahamic faiths... although to be fair those also sometimes were spread by force as well.
- bpizzi 8y ago
  > And you're not considering the widespread preference for Buddhist and animist religion [...] Actually I'm not considering anything, I was just pointing that the theory in the parent's book could be reversed.

mtts 8y ago

The Chinese don't follow an Abrahamic religion and yet they've built huge urban empires. It's unlikely this is a factor.

devmunchies 8y ago
It could be a factor everywhere else I mentioned, though. This is a logical fallacy.
- simplify 8y ago
  Which fallacy? I don't understand.
  - devmunchies 8y ago
    Person A got cancer from smoking, but person B got cancer from exposure to chemicals so smoking likely doesn't cause cancer. Its the same argument.
    - mtts 8y ago
      I think I meant it more in the sense of "smoking causes cancer and so does exposure to chemicals so it's not the smoking or the chemicals that we need to look at but something they both have in common." I may not have made that clear enough, however.
- yukonbound 8y ago
  Abrahamic Religions arrived perhaps too recently. The records we have of ancient civilizations show that they successfully dominated their environments already, and certainly accomplished amazing things.
pnongrata 8y ago
Also, the Incas, Mayas and Aztecs.

mikeash 8y ago

I’d say the Earth was fairly well dominated by the time Abrahamic religion started to become mainstream around 300AD.

Symmetry 8y ago
Axial[1] religion might have something to do with which societies succeeded later, but that isn't the same thing as Abrahamic and is all about a later phenomenon. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axial_Age https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axial_Age
- mikeash 8y ago
  This sort of thing really makes me wish we had high-fidelity simulations of human societies we could do experiments with. And then comes the fear that we’re in one.

krapp 8y ago

>Most native peoples were very in tune withe the earth (Pagan Europe, Native American tribes, Hindu India, Tribal Africa, Aboriginal Australia, etc). The reason there were so many bison in the US when the settlers arrived is that the native Americans had already hunted the rest of the megafauna to extinction. While I think there is a kernel of truth to your comment, I also think the premise that primitive people's were more "in tune" with nature than their Western counterparts in some deep cultural or spiritual sense is a revisionist myth predicated on the "noble savage" archetype. The truth is more likely that being "in tune" with nature was simply a matter of survival for such people. Obviously, if your culture survives primarily on deer, you don't kill all of the deer. But primitive people were quite capable of destroying or harming their environment, as long as they could survive it, just not as capable as more advanced societies.

nikofeyn 8y ago
> The reason there were so many bison in the US when the settlers arrived is that the native Americans had already hunted the rest of the megafauna to extinction. do you have a good source that details the evidence of this? and what megafauna were killed off? i tried searching and from what i found, it isn't anywhere as close to clear cut as you state it. i even saw an article debunking the "overkill hypothesis" which claimed some scientists did some dating studies and showed that in a region of north america the large animals died off before native americans arrived. of course that could be false, but it just doesn't seem so clear as you state it.
pokeymcsnatch 8y ago
The theory of natives wiping out American megafauna is well-disputed. It was probably a combination of factors (possibly including hunting). The idea of primitive people being more in tune with the earth doesn't have to go hand-in-hand with the "noble savage" romanticization. There's evidence that North America was essentially a well-managed game reserve. For people that didn't have much in the ways of truly domesticated livestock, it makes sense that they worked towards food security in a different way than societies that had cattle and pigs. By necessity, they would have had to develop practical and efficient methods for managing their food source. So sure, they were probably much more in tune with nature their contemporary Europeans or modern Americans, if "in tune" means having the know-how to bend and shape the natural world for their benefit.

maxxxxx 8y ago

I think this is a little simplified but I honestly believe that if the bible didn't contain the phrase "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth" the world may be a better place.