Hmmm..
After replying to Shawn's post, ive thought about the issue a bit more. If indeed world peace was achieved, and to take it a step farther, discrimination and domestic violence and crime etc. were stopped, What then would become of Humanity?
What would we do then? For one must wonder, if humanity becomes completly unaccustomed to disruption of peace, would we soon lose all personal conflict as well. Perhaps arguing would become socially taboo. Competition may soon become illegal. To get to the point, humans might soon become even more fearful of conflict then they are now. This could have very important consequences.
Even as an athiest, I am not crude enought to suggest that there is no spiritualness to humanity. It is just not in a religious sense, or any sort of vodoo, or ghost nonsense. The spirit of man is indeed evident though, just as much as the spirit of animals. Horses most certainly possess spirit, which can indeed be broken. A man might have the spirit of an artist, and forever create. One might be a thinker, and forever analyze. There also exist free spirits, which live life fully and (ahem) freely. I could go on of course, but the point is that mankind has a spirit in it, which ignites our passions to become more than simply an animal.
To return to my earlier point; perhaps war is also a part of this spirit. The evidence would suggest it! for have humans ever been peaceful. Even without men to kill we go to war with ourselves over every manner of things. If we ignore any part of our spirit, we prevent ourselves from achieving any sort of noble existence. All society soon becomes impure. The spiritually wounded artist creates poorly, the leader, leads a wounded people without clear direction. The thinker is tortured mentally by the whited sepulche of his culture. Thus, I have to believe, that although war is terrible, does anyone truly believe that the human spirit has no dark side to it? The full spirit, the noble one, The voltaires, the achilles, the alexanders... one could never describe them as flawless.
What would we do then? For one must wonder, if humanity becomes completly unaccustomed to disruption of peace, would we soon lose all personal conflict as well. Perhaps arguing would become socially taboo. Competition may soon become illegal. To get to the point, humans might soon become even more fearful of conflict then they are now. This could have very important consequences.
Even as an athiest, I am not crude enought to suggest that there is no spiritualness to humanity. It is just not in a religious sense, or any sort of vodoo, or ghost nonsense. The spirit of man is indeed evident though, just as much as the spirit of animals. Horses most certainly possess spirit, which can indeed be broken. A man might have the spirit of an artist, and forever create. One might be a thinker, and forever analyze. There also exist free spirits, which live life fully and (ahem) freely. I could go on of course, but the point is that mankind has a spirit in it, which ignites our passions to become more than simply an animal.
To return to my earlier point; perhaps war is also a part of this spirit. The evidence would suggest it! for have humans ever been peaceful. Even without men to kill we go to war with ourselves over every manner of things. If we ignore any part of our spirit, we prevent ourselves from achieving any sort of noble existence. All society soon becomes impure. The spiritually wounded artist creates poorly, the leader, leads a wounded people without clear direction. The thinker is tortured mentally by the whited sepulche of his culture. Thus, I have to believe, that although war is terrible, does anyone truly believe that the human spirit has no dark side to it? The full spirit, the noble one, The voltaires, the achilles, the alexanders... one could never describe them as flawless.