List of Exhibits in The
Gallery Room 2
21. A classic lifestyle
22. Remember Me
23. Warm Our Hearts
24. By compassion humankind will be saved
*************************************************24. By compassion humankind will be saved
25. Gift to the remote
future people
26. Spiritual Direction in the Modern World
27. An epoch in the history of humankind
28. Happy-to-be-alive Exhibition
29. Tuesdays with Morrie
30. The Little Match Girl
31. No Title Required
32. Recovery from addiction
33. Flash of inspiration
34. The Future as the Presence of Shared Hope
35. The Iriomote Cat
36. I Am A Wolf Myself, After All
37. William Hamilton’s worries about the future
of the human genome
38. Good Samaritan
26. Spiritual Direction in the Modern World
27. An epoch in the history of humankind
28. Happy-to-be-alive Exhibition
29. Tuesdays with Morrie
30. The Little Match Girl
31. No Title Required
32. Recovery from addiction
33. Flash of inspiration
34. The Future as the Presence of Shared Hope
35. The Iriomote Cat
36. I Am A Wolf Myself, After All
37. William Hamilton’s worries about the future
of the human genome
38. Good Samaritan
39. John Calvin and
Sherlock Holmes
40. The Conversion of St. Paul
21. A classic lifestyle
Posted by T.T. and P. R. in October 2018
I love a classic
lifestyle,
succeeding from a
long distant past,
full with compassion,
everlasting ‘til a
long distant future.
Anonymous
 |
| Weijia Qi, 2018 ⓒ. Reprinted with permission by Ms. Weijia Qi. |
From a picture of a girl painted in 2018, a vivid image of a
person existing on some day in the future, say ten thousand years ahead, will
be perceived together with a verse by an anonymous poet. Future people who
prefer a classic lifestyle may be envisaged among a vast cultural diversity.
*********************************************************************************
*********************************************************************************
22. Remember Me
Posted by T. T. and P. R. in January 2019
Believers
of most religions and of none are deeply moved by the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. At that moment,
a thief, also crucified beside Jesus, prayed, “Jesus, remember me when you come
into your kingdom.” Jesus replied, “Today you will be in Paradise with me”
(Luke 23:42-43).
In
an ecumenical community in Taizé, France, a
short song shown below is sung repeatedly in the gathering for prayer.
Jesus, Remember Me
Text: Taizé Community, 1981. Music: Jacques Berthier, 1981. The note was
reprinted from ⓒTaize:
Ateliers et Presses de Taizé,
France, by
permission
Remote
future people will feel serious pain due to the self-centred activities of
present people. It seems inevitable that future people might feel the desire to
punish us. However, if we turn away from our selfish behaviour, and pray for forgiveness,
it may not be inconceivable that future people will remember us, forgive us,
and recover the whole humanly relations with us.
The
remote future cannot be a Paradise only by its existence. But, we can hope that
the remote future can be a real Paradise. It may be conceivable that future
people regret the past which resulted in serious damage to nature. They will be
tempted to create a better world by themselves ignoring the past. At that
moment, if they hear a voice of present people, repeating “Remember me”, they
will be moved by the passionate feeling of longing for the paradise in their
future.
*********************************************************************************
23. Warm Our Hearts
Posted by W. Q., P. R. and T. T. in January 2019
Posted by W. Q., P. R. and T. T. in January 2019
In response to the crisis of ‘Global Warming’, the Greenpeace movement has produced an inspiring catch-phrase to symbolise the
issues and encourage us to take meaningful action:
“Warm Our Hearts, Not Our Planet”
On the occasion of the Helsinki Summit in July, 2018, active members of
Greenpeace put two massive banners, displaying this message, on the Kallio Church bell tower, in Helsinki.
Motivated by this episode, Weijia Qi
created an original art work in which what needs to be done to stop the present
environmental crisis is nicely visualized.
ⓒWeijia Qi 2019
The picture shows that the heart is warmed by our hands, then, with this
‘change of heart’ we shut off all fires and burners which heat our Planet.
Finally, our Planet would be saved from the human-caused crisis by the efforts
of a great many people who are motivated by creative contributions such as Weijia’s
work here.
Future people will come to know all of the facts around this major crisis and will heartily appreciate present people's passionate hearts which will have saved our Planet from the critically endangered biosphere.
*********************************************************************************
*********************************************************************************
*********************************************************************************
Future people will come to know all of the facts around this major crisis and will heartily appreciate present people's passionate hearts which will have saved our Planet from the critically endangered biosphere.
*********************************************************************************
24. By compassion
humankind will be saved
Posted by T. T. and P. R. in February
2019
A post-graduate
Fellow, Yumi Kawakami, had been working as a volunteer in a hospice for terminal care. She found that some staff were working there purely altruistically, without expecting any
return. She wondered how a
person could be so altruistic, when humans are nothing more than animals having the selfish
gene. Then she decided to make this question her main research theme and finally she wrote her dissertation and got her Ph.D.
After this work Yumi Kawakami’s interpretation of altruistic
behaviour is quite simple. Although her theory is not fully accepted yet in
academic circles, it seems reasonable, and it will lead to a clear-cut interpretation
for the essential matter of saving future people, which will be more significant
than an academic honour.
Her interpretation is well explained by the picture
below.
|
Ancient humans acquired culture and language, and then the strong
feature of compassion evolved uniquely among animals. Due to having strong
compassion, ancient humans would feel a story told to them as if it were an event
actually experienced by them, and thus they could have a defense against
dangers and thereby save their lives without having had experience of such
dangers before.
In the present era, again humankind will be saved if present
people respond to the signal from the dangerous objects which we have not yet encountered.
If we surely feel future people’s pain, with strong compassion we will not be able
to leave them in the terribly damaged environment.
*********************************************************************************
25. Gift to the remote
future people
Posted by T. T. and P. R. in April 2019
Marcel Mauss (1872-1950), a cultural anthropologist,
investigated many undeveloped tribes, and found that there were strict rules of
gift-to-return relationships, and he concluded that there is no such thing as a
free gift.
In modern societies, gift-to-return relationships still
exist in ordinary life. When we try to give a gift to remote future people, we
cannot expect any return from them. Such a gift will be seen as a free gift.
Thus, it seems reasonable that if we ignore giving to remote future people, we
will not be criticized.
However, it is obvious that we have already received great
many gifts from our ancestors, not only from human ancestors but also from a great
many biological species in the history of life. If we consider that the whole
environment including from the past to the future is the counterpart of our
receiving and giving, then to provide a return to be balanced with the received
gift will be regarded as our responsibility.
More than that, if we love future people sincerely, we will
be willing to gift them more than we will have received. Regrettably, we have
already consumed far too much of the natural resources, and seriously damaged
or destroyed whole swathes of nature so that we cannot
recover all that has been lost. Even so, if we can seriously change our
attitude to the needs of future people, dedicating gifts to such future people
in various ways, a strong bond between present and future people could be
established, and its outcome would be tremendous.
Further information
Mauss’es essay about this topic was first published in
French in 1950, and the first English translation, “The Gift”, was published in
1954 by Cohen & West. Its Routledge Classic version, first published in
2002 by Routledge, has a nice cover design imaging a gift.
*********************************************************************************
26. Spiritual Direction in
the Modern World
Posted by T. T. and P. R. in April 2019
From the earliest of times, the so-called ‘Ancients’ had a firm belief in the
concept and reality of evil; they seriously feared being attacked by evil, in
any of its guises. As a defense, they relied heavily on the ‘good spirit’ to protect themselves from
invasion by the ‘evil spirit’. It
appears that present generations, at least in the so-called developed nations,
no longer believe in evil and thus they have abandoned the notion of good spirits
being created in order to balance the power of evil spirits. Now, it seems that
the present world is unprotected from an evil attack.
Kenneth Leech (1939-2015), an Anglican priest, theologian,
and social activist, wrote a book entitled “Soul Friend”. In it, he emphasized his
view that there existed highly established traditions of systematic spiritual direction
in both Hindu and early and medieval Christian religions. He stressed the
importance of spiritual matters at the present time and in the future.
Although it is perhaps unrealistic to urge present people to
have a vivid image of evil (the devil, demon, or Satan), actually, the mental
world of present people is being almost fully occupied by some kind of evil
spirit. If an evil spirit dwells in a person’s soul, it could manipulate the person’s
thoughts, beliefs and actions, such that they become motivated to love only themselves
and to be indifferent to others, including future generations. To save this
evil-occupied soul, a good spirit must confront the evil spirit.
In our body, our immune system can defend us, very successfully,
from attack by many kinds of pathogen, and the immune mechanisms have been scientifically
clarified in detail. Unfortunately, scientific understanding of the soul is
still undeveloped so that we have to confront any evil spirit which dwells in
our soul without the reinforcements of scientific knowledge and power. Now our
Planet Earth is in danger from the environmental crisis; we might regard this as emerging from our
soul that has been occupied by an evil spirit. If so, we perhaps may save our
Planet by enforcing good spirits together with our soul friends.
Soul Friend by
Kenneth Leech was first published in 1977 with a sub-title of A study of Spirituality. The sub-title
was changed in a 1980 version to The
practice of Christian spirituality. In the revised version of 1994, it was again
changed to Spiritual Direction in the Modern World. In the New Revised
Edition in 2001, the subtitle remained unchanged. Leech would be satisfied with
this prophetic sub-title.
27. An epoch in the
history of humankind
Posted by T. T. and P. R. in May 2019
When humankind possessed strong artificial power sources, the
production of materials to meet the needs of living began to increase
explosively. This was the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, around 1750, which
created an epoch that will be the greatest human-caused global destruction in
the whole history of humankind.
Now, in the early 21st century, we are at the middle
of this epoch. During a period of about 250 years from 1750, world population increased
by about ten times, which is way beyond the sustainable level of planet earth. It
will take around another 200 or 300 years to reduce world population to below
the sustainable level. As depicted below, the epoch lasting around 500 years
from the Industrial Revolution will be regarded as the period of the greatest
human-caused mass destruction. Although nature apparently looks fairly stable
now, various kinds of hidden destruction have been progressing to almost the
limit of human survival.
When the period of the great destruction has ended, all
human activities should hopefully be stabilized to below the sustainable level.
However, the whole world would remains in a ruined state. The beautiful nature
will have been mostly destroyed, the atmosphere and the oceans would be deeply
polluted, and the biosphere will have been shrunken almost to its worst level
of that just after the greatest mass extinction in the history of life. While
the time required to recover from such destruction will depend on the extent of
the destruction and the efforts made to achieve some kind of recovery, it will nevertheless
take more than several millenniums or much longer, even a million years.
It will be rather providential if humankind can actually survive
after the long period of time needed for an acceptable recovery, having to
endure a great many hardships and with
poor quality of life. What is important for us now is to imagine how future
people will look back at their history, including the epoch of the great
human-caused mass destruction. They will undoubtedly be critical of us and even
angry that we were the cause of the terrible epoch. They will accuse us of robbing them of the valuable
treasure of nature, despite the fact that we had the benefit of very high level
scientific and technological knowledge and discoveries. However, if they then find that
there had been at least some altruistic people who had try to stop the destruction
of the natural world on planet earth, to help future people and sacrificing their
own pleasure, they might, in turn, try to do the same for the people in further
distant future. Compassion over a great many generations could act as a strong motivation to help each other,
love each other, and unite each other into a tight bond.
*********************************************************************************
Posted by T.
T. and P. R. in June 2019
More than 50 years have passed since implantable cardiac
pacemakers were introduced to treat heart arrhythmias. Since then, many
patients having serious arrhythmias became alive again and recovered their
normal life, sustained by an implanted cardiac pacemaker. An Association, whose
members were patients having had an implanted cardiac pacemaker, was
established in Japan in 1970.
At some time, the President of the Association, Professor
Toshio Mitsui, suffered a serious haemorrhage from the intestine. After
enduring a critical state for several weeks, he finally recovered, returned to
his home, requested raw tuna and beer, enjoyed them both, and felt so happy to
be alive.
 |
| ©Toshio Mitsui (2017) |
After the current major environmental crisis, which has been
of our own making, people living in the future may well feel the reality of
being “happy-to-be-alive”, as they remember repeatedly being told of the human
history in which their distant ancestors destroyed nature down to the level
where the very existence of the human race had been endangered. The following
generations had to endure many painful hardships, for several millenniums or
even millions of years, merely to ensure the
survival of humankind. Then, once destroyed, nature gradually
recovered and, finally, the richness of
the biosphere returned up to the level it was before the Industrial Revolution.
People living in the remote future will surely recognize the
virtues and benefits of being alive, surrounded by the profound cultural
achievements sustained by advanced science and technology. They will also
recognize the importance of providing contributions to the people in the
further remote future. Actually, experiencing the happy-to-be-alive feeling is
not merely a personal episode for each individual, as it will become a
compassion among all generations including the past, present and future through
the whole lifetime of humankind.
*********************************************************************************
29. Tuesdays with
Morrie
Posted by T. T. and P. R. in June 2019
Morie Schwartz (1916-1995) was a Professor of sociology at
Brandeis University, Massachusetts. In his seventies, health problems appeared
and his illness was finally diagnosed as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).
The doctor told him that it is terminal and guessed that he had two years left.
With this news, Morrie thought deeply about how to live in the
remaining days of his life. He wrote many aphorisms about living near death; for
example, “Learn to forgive yourself and to forgive others”. He shared them with
his friends, and an article about his aphorisms appeared in the Boston Globe newspaper.
Then, the host of the popular TV show “Night-line”,
Ted Koppel, visited Morrie’s home for an interview, and Morrie then appeared on
this show.
A student of Morrie, Mitch Albom, happened to watch the
show. While he didn’t know about Morrie’s fatal illness, he called Morrie, and dashed
to his home immediately. Morrie accepted Mitch as his student once again, and
suggested that he should come on Tuesday. Thereafter, Mitch visited Morrie on
Tuesdays, fourteen times in all, till
just before his death. On every visit, Morrie and Mitch talked about various
topics of life. The most important thing in life, Morrie told to Mitch, was to
learn how to give out love, and how to let it come in.
At present, our world is almost the same as a patient
suffering from a fatal illness. To diagnose the illness correctly and try to
cure it is a very urgent matter. It will not be improbable that the time left
to our humankind is fairly short. However, present people do not think about how
to live in those precious days that remain. What is important is not the length
of the period but its quality. As Morrie said, we have to learn how to give out
love, and how to let it come in.
Morrie’s story above is taken from a nonfiction publication entitled
“Tuesdays with Morrie”, written by Mitch Albom and published by Broadway Books
in 1997. The book topped the New York Times Non-Fiction Bestsellers in 2000. If some readers
inspired by Morrie’s attitude facing a sentence of death, and then seriously
thought about their own attitude facing the end of the existence of humankind,
Mitch’s success as a bestselling writer will be a reasonable reward for his
contributions to future generations.
*********************************************************************************
30. The Little Match Girl
Posted by T. T. and P. R. in July 2019
The Little Match Girl is a famous story by Hans Christian
Andersen (1805-1875). In the evening of the last day of the year, it was
terribly cold. A poor little girl had to stand in the street to sell matches,
but no one had bought any. She lost her slippers and had to stand there in bare
feet. She sat down under the eaves of a house and struck one of the matches. To
her surprise, she then saw a stove with hot fire burning. She struck a second
match, and saw a roast goose on a table. She lit another match, and saw a
Christmas tree with many candles which rose up and became stars in the sky, but
one candle fell down. She remembered her grandmother who told her that when a
star falls, a soul goes up to heaven. She then lit all of the remaining matches.
Then the grandmother appeared. Taking the little girl in her arms, she flew up
high in the sky to heaven where there was no cold, no hunger and no sorrow. On the
next morning, the first dawn in the New Year, the little girl was found leaning
against the side of the house , frozen to death, but with a smile upon her
lips.
This is a sad story of a poor little girl. But, many readers
may feel compassion for the girl as if it is their own experience. Some readers
may also associate with poor and homeless people who must spend bitterly cold
days and nights without warmth or food. This should warn us all that the rich
nature surrounding us is in danger from human caused destruction and pollution,
so that future people will most likely have to live in terribly poor
environments. This means that the misery depicted in The Little Match Girl
story will have spread around the world,
and will eventually cover the whole of our precious planet.
However, the latter half of the story is a declaration of
spiritual victory. The girl’s dead grandmother appeared in her soul and brought
her to heaven where there is no misery to hurt her. To make sure that the
victory is not imaginary but is reality, the author added the phrase “... with
a smile upon her lips”. It means that the little girl actually felt eased with
her beloved grandmother. In contrast with the explosive spreading of misery in
modern world, the spiritual force tends to shrink in the civilized society
where science and technology fully occupy the human mind. If this situation
continues into the future, then human survival is vulnerable.
To save our Planet, recognition of spirituality will be
required. If all present people try to satisfy their own mind only by
materialistic richness, the desire for possession will spread endlessly until
our environment becomes in danger. Thus, if the human race can survive till the
remote future, they will satisfy their own life with minimal possessions and rich
spirituality. To achieve that, the present era may be a pivotal moment of
cultural transition in which human progression changes its direction towards a
safer and brilliant way. The Little Match Girl would be a prophetic text
which guided humans to the right way.
*********************************************************************************
*********************************************************************************
31. No Title Required
Posted by T. T. and P. R. in July 2019
In present societies, the holding of titles can benefit each
title holder. In a company, the head of a section may carry the title of Section
Manager, whilst the head of the company may
have the title of President, or Chief
Executive Officer; clearly elevated above a Manager. Each of these titles can
carry the benefit for the title holder that
fulfils the requirements necessary simply to do business. In sports the winner
of a title match will be a Champion. In a less prestigious game, perhaps just a
local one, some kind of title will be given to the winner. In academic circles,
a title is advantageous when seeking promotion or a better job and it also help
significantly when competing for large research grants.
When competing with many brilliant title holders, a person
having no title is likely to fade away and be forgotten. But, a sensible poet
saw that each moment of each person looks brilliant as it is, regardless of whether
or not they held some kind of title. A Polish poet, Wisława Szymborska (1923-2012), a
Nobel Prize Laureate for Literature, wrote a poem, No Title Required. In that, an insignificant event of sitting under
a tree beside a river is depicted as a moment of full of richness and unique existence,
so that it is no one else’s.
The last verse of the poem is:
When I see such things I’m no
longer sure
that what‘s important
is more important than what’s
not.
(Translated by Clare
Cavanagh and Stanisław Barańczak)
At first glance, these three-lines seem logically tricky.
However, the embarrassment may be caused by a prejudice that the importance of
a person is measurable by a one-dimensional scale. Actually, the importance of
a person is not measurable even by a multi-dimensional scale, such as a school
report. It is likely that there may be a fatal prejudice in the present culture
which may hurt a great many innocent persons.
In our present world, titles are seen as protective walls
which benefit persons inside to enjoy a respected life. If all walls created by
titles are removed in the remote future, every person can fully enjoy their own
respectful life without being guarded by walls. Then, a world where No Title Required will be reality.
*********************************************************************************
32. Recovery from addiction
Posted by T. T. and P. R. in October 2019
Michael de Ridder is a German physician who once worked in
the emergency centre of a hospital situated in a district of Berlin where many
alcoholics and drug addicts lived. In Germany, even in the 1980s, alcoholics
and drug addicts were regarded as unwanted people so that hospitals only
focussed on treatment that would get
them to quit their addiction. On one occasion, Dr. de Ridder had an opportunity
to visit a hospital in London, and he was seriously impressed by the fact that
all of the addicted patients were respected as individual persons.
After he came back from London, he tried to introduce to his
own hospital the practice of using a respectful manner when treating
drug-addicted patients. Although there were many difficulties, his enthusiastic
attitude moved his colleagues and hospital managers, such that the hospital
gradually adapted its whole approach to these patients. There was even an
arrangement whereby a doctor and a nurse agreed to be bused around the area to
treat all patients who, for whatever reason, did not come to the hospital.
One day a young drug addicted patient, Dieter W., was
standing at the bus stop with crutches to support him. He was a heavy addict,
using heroin, cocaine, and alcohol, and he had been arrested many times by the
police for drug trafficking. He got onto the bus, and showed a fist-sized
abscess in the inguinal region that had been produced by frequent needling of
veins for heroin injections. Dr. de Ridder had tried many times to persuade him
to have surgery, and finally managed to bring him to the hospital.
Many years later, Dieter once again came to the emergency
room. He showed his injured thumb to Dr. de Ridder. “Doc ... I am Dieter ... I
came here not for heroin ... I have been clean like a newborn cat for two years
now ... Can you believe it? ... I’m caring for elderly people in the Worker’s
Welfare.” After minor surgery of the thumb, Dr. de Ridder brought him to a
cafeteria. Dieter talked only a little. “Always ill ... I stole purses from old
women for the next drug ... I hated myself ... Doc ... It was harder than the
hardest ‘cold turkey’ ... I took methadone for a while but I’ve reduced it. Now
I only take seizures!” Dr. de Ridder gave him his card with his phone number.
In our present world, it is almost as if we have what might
be considered as ‘pseudo-patients’ who have become addicted to the many
culturally-created comforts of daily life, which are similar to the chemically induced comforts of drugs. The
degree of comfort produced by a drug diminishes
progressively when used repeatedly, and thus the amount of drug being
taken has to be increased and an addiction is thereby created. Similarly, once
addicted to cultural comforts, one cannot quit them, and will do any manner to
get more comforts even stealing natural resources from future generations.
It is often said
“Once an addict, always an addict”. But, this is not necessarily true
and Dieter W. demonstrated this fact. He recovered from heavy drug addiction
largely by himself. Dr. de Ridder did not cure him, but his respectful attitude
towards him probably served as a vital factor that was in part responsible for
the miraculous return by Dieter from his serious addicted state. Our world is
not hopelessly lost, even when all previous efforts to cure the ‘cultural addicts’
appear to have failed. We can still have hope in the mental power and
sensibility that definitely exists in people everywhere around the world.
Further information:
• The above
story was based on a monograph; Michael de Ridder, Welche Medizin wollen wir?,
Deutsche Verlags Anstalt, München, 2015.
• Special thanks to Prof. Munehiro Shimada, MD
and Prof. Wolfgang Roland Ade, for introducing the above monograph and
providing cordial help in the translation of the referred parts.
• Cordial
thanks to Prof. Michael de Ridder, MD, for permitting the use of the contents
in the above monograph in our piece of
writing to be posted to the website entitled “Love Future Neighbours”.
*********************************************************************************
33. Flash of
inspiration
Posted by T. T. and
P. R. in November 2019
It has been told many times that Isaac Newton discovered
gravity when he saw a falling apple. Whether or not this is true, it might lead
to a belief that only a genius can have such a ‘flash of inspiration’. On the
contrary, ordinary people may suddenly come up with new ideas, which could be
similar to a flash of inspiration from a genius, even though the resulting idea
is usually not more than a piece of imagination.
If a flash of inspiration is a common feature of ordinary
people, it may not be the nature just of specially gifted people but, instead,
an intrinsic nature of any individual human. More than that, it may be possible
to assume that animals other than humans can also have such a flash of
inspiration as an intrinsic nature.
At this moment, a flash of inspiration suddenly came to me
that this reasoning might apply not only in animals having a highly evolved
brain, but animals having a primitive brain may also have a nature similar to
the ‘flash of inspiration’. This idea was not a result of inductive thinking
but was the fruit of imagination unexpectedly emerging in my poor brain!
Such an imagined idea that the flash of inspiration can
exist in primitive brains may provide hope that it may also exist at least in
mentally disabled persons due to congenital brain defects, developmental
disorders, brain damage, and dementia, even though difficulties arise in
communication by language. This could mean that all natural brains work in a
similar way to a genius brain but
perhaps only at a very basic level.
At present, scientific understanding of the mind is still
rudimentary, but it will develop significantly in the hundreds of years ahead,
so that people living in the remote future will be able to have a perfect
understanding of how the mind works. Then, they could be convinced that the
basic nature of the mind, such as the ‘flash of inspiration’ must exist in all
minds among all species having a mind. Thus, all of our ancestors and
descendants may have the mind in common at the very basic nature.
We can imagine future people who are looking back at us from
a distance, and they are eagerly wishing for signs of a ‘flash of inspiration’
from us, by which the existence of human future can be secured. And at the same
time, they earnestly hope for our joyous imagination, that we can surely
contribute to the distant future people. If such a scenario becomes a reality,
the outcome must be far above the discovery of gravity.
*********************************************************************************
34. The Future as the
Presence of Shared Hope
Posted by T. T. and P. R. in January
2020.
On one occasion, my wife suggested to me that we should drop
into a small Christian bookstore, near a mission school where she attended and
taught. In the store, I found a used book entitled “The Future as the Presence
of Shared Hope” published in 1968. I bought it, on impulse, just by being
attracted by its title. On thumbing through its content I found it to be
entirely on theology, which is a completely
unfamiliar field for me. Nevertheless, I decided to read it, because I was attracted by the fact
that both Christian and Judaic theologians had contributed to it and that they had tried to seek a shared hope
in the future even though their individual hopes towards the future were
different.
Both Christianity and Judaism have a belief of the past in
that is common with The Old Testament. However, Christianity emerged as the
belief of The New Testament, which tells us that Jesus Christ mediates
everything toward the future in contrast with Judaism where God alone
intervenes into everything throughout, from the whole of the past to the whole
of the future. These kinds of differences in hopes for the future may exist
between different beliefs or between theisms and atheisms in the present world.
Thus, to realize peaceful coexistence of people having different hopes for the
future, seeking “The Presence of Shared Hope” will have to be an essential
postulate.
A German theologian, Jürgen Moltmann, has played a major
role In this book,. I could learn some facts about him in Wikipedia; he was
born in 1926, became a soldier in the German army, captured by the British army
at the front line, sent to camps as a prisoner of war, and met Christians in
prison. He once lost all hope to live, but recovered hope to live in the
Christian faith. He became a theologian, and wrote “Theology of Hope” in 1967,
and many other books of theology thereafter.
Recently, Moltmann wrote “The Spirit of Hope - Theology for a World in Peril”, which was
published at the end of 2019. Although its contents remain in the sphere of
Christian theology, his arguments will be acceptable to those in wider fields.
For example, he wrote that “In Christian hope, future is more important than
the past and awaiting is greater than remembering”. The latter part of this
statement may be acceptable among other beliefs or in atheistic views. If that
is true, it could be a “shared hope” among almost all people in common in
the future, so that the statement “The Future as the Presence of Shared Hope”
could become a reality.
This whole episode was started just from a casual event of
dropping into a small book store, but then, the final destination was the shared hope. At a glance, the future is indefinite because it can be
affected even by a tiny occasional event. But, there may exist another force
which allows a fluctuating future to converge into a rigid shape. The force may
be assumed as the intervention of a fundamental existence. Theist will regard
it as the deity. Atheist will regard it as the humanity. If the force can be
rephrased as the spirit, the title of Maltmann’s book “The Spirit of Hope” will
be suggestive for both; theists and atheists.
*********************************************************************************
Posted by T. T. and P. R. in April
2020
The Iriomote cat is a critically endangered species, living exclusively on the Japanese island of
Iriomote. The island has an area of only some 300 km2, with most parts covered in thick greenery, like a
jungle in the tropical zone. Also living there are very many other animals,
constituting a unique ecosystem in which the Iriomote cat occupies the top of
the food chain. Although many zoologists have investigated the wild life of the
Iriomote cat, the details are not yet fully known.
A biologist and medical scientist, Prof. Naoki Suzuki, attempted
to observe the natural wild life of Iriomote cats by using robot cameras which
can sense an object and take pictures automatically. Prior to introducing this
technique, he learned as much as he could about the living habits of the Iriomote
cat in detail from residents, and he also investigated by himself, spending many
years on the island. He found that one habit of the cat is that they look into all
of the hollows of tree trunks in order
to find food or to utilise it as a nest. To try to capture this, he placed a robot
camera inside a hollow, and succeeded in getting nice pictures of a cat looking
into a hollow, as seen here.
Photograph:
Naoki Suzuki ⓒ. Reprinted with permission by Professor Naoki Suzuki.
|
In 2017 Naoki Suzuki published a book entitled Island of Miracles – Animals of Iriomote
island from Seibundo-Shinkosha. It contains very many photographs of
Iriomote cats and other animals. In the last chapter, entitled The future of the Island of Miracles, he
wrote that “The future of this island lies not in the hands of the animals ... but in the hands of our human beings.”
Our Planet Earth is almost an island of miracles. Until
fairly recently, it contained rich ecosystems which had evolved uniquely on this
Planet. Now, humans have become widespread
throughout the planet and therefore are having a more dominant influence on every
aspect of nature, both positive and negative. Thus the future of this island does
indeed lay in the hands of humans. However, the human race is now almost becoming
a critically endangered species. It seems that humans are not clever enough to
secure their own existence for millions of years ahead. We have to remove our
prejudice of being at the top of an ecosystem and we should recognize our lack
of wisdom to preserve our own nature.
We might now ask, how will future people look back into our
life habits? They will look at us suspiciously, almost in the same way as the
Iriomote cat in the above picture. They will undoubtedly know of their own historical
background, in that their very existence, together with the existence of their
environment, had lain in the hands of past people, especially in the hands of people
living in 21st century.
*********************************************************************************
36. I Am A Wolf Myself, After All
Posted by T. T. and P. R. in May 2020
A
comic writer and illustrator, Maki Sasaki, wrote a children’s book entitled I Am A
Wolf Myself, After All. The Japanese wolf is actually an extinct
species. But, in the story, a young male wolf has survived and remains. He
strolled around several communities where there were various animals, looking
for children that were like him, but could not find any. Finally, he decided to
live alone, feeling insecure, somewhat ironically. The image below is the cover
of the book.
The cover of Maki Sasaki I Am A Wolf Myself, After
All, Fukuinkan Shoten, 1973.
If an individual human from the remote future were to visit
us here, in the present, she or he will be regarded by us as an alien, and they
will inevitably be isolated from our present human society. This future human
will observe our society, and no doubt will soon discover the fact that present
humans only enjoy their lives with others who are also living at the present
time. After searching endlessly for some friends to live together with, the
future human will have found no possibilities to live among the present human
society in the present world.
If humans do survive until the remote future, they will be our descendants who are genetically
and culturally closely related to us. They will live on the same planet earth
as we do. They will breathe the same air as us and consume the same natural
resources. They will keep many cultural resources in common with us. However,
we always neglect them and we are always indifferent to their very existence.
We seldom try to send any message to them. We don’t prepare any single gift for
them. We don’t try to share our possessions with them.
However, if we repent for our present-centred lifestyle and
seriously worry about the future human, we can have hope for the future. Now,
we must avoid extinction of the humankind. Our gift to the future human is to
give them the opportunity of birth and we can give such a big gift as this to
the people in the remote future. We can imagine their joyful smiles. Comedy
writers will no doubt create magnificent stories including those from the remote
past to the remote future, with clever illustrations which will amuse people in
all generations.
******************************************************************************
37. William Hamilton’s
worries about the future
of the human genome
Posted by T.T. and
P.R. in May 2020
William D. Hamilton (1936-2000) was a significant
evolutionary biologist who received the Kyoto Prize in 1993. He gave much thought to the future of the
human genome and, in particular, he was seriously worried about the progressive
degradation of humankind in the distant future due to the accumulation of
deleterious mutations. Curiously, many evolutionary biologists at that time did
not think this was a serious possibility and, therefore he was sometimes
regarded as a pessimist.
A genome which characterizes a species is not perfectly
stable but instead it varies through a series of mutations as it passes from
one generation to the next. Most mutations cause adverse effects on the
survival of the specie, but they are mostly removed by natural selection in the
wild environment. However, modern medicine tends to keep alive those humans
having deleterious mutations, so that the process of natural selection is
weekend or even eliminated. Thus, by the accumulation of deleterious mutations,
degradation of humankind can indeed occur after many generations, as Hamilton
had warned.
Recently, another biologist, Gert Korthof, investigated
Hamilton’s arguments on the degradation of the human genome in the future, and
he wrote an extensive review, now available
in a website entitled William Hamilton’s worries about the future of the
human genome (first published 2011, updated 2017). He discussed the particular
problem posed by Hamilton, and he searched for possible solutions based on the
use of modern technologies considering many detail. finally, he concluded that
we cannot correct the accumulation of deleterious mutations by technological
fixes.
Korthof’s conclusion states that the continual advances in
medical care aimed at maintaining the welfare of present humans inevitably
undermines the welfare of future humans
due to the accumulation of deleterious mutations. If we genuinely hope to gift
a healthy genome to future humans, we will have to make sacrifices in our lives
to the same extent as occurs by natural selection. In order to achieve that,
present humans should be purely altruistic, ‘as a lover who sacrifices their
own life to save their beloved’.
It is not only in the accumulation of deleterious mutations
that the fate of future humans may be adversely influenced by the activities of
present humans. Indeed, although it is mostly not acknowledged by present
people, their culturally achieved welfare is often gained at the cost of future
people.
Our humankind is now massively challenged by the dilemma of
needing to choose either to benefit all individuals or whole generations in the
future.
*******************************************************************
38. Good Samaritan
Posted by T.T. and
P.R. in July 2020
The Good
Samaritan (Luke 10:30-35) is probably the most widely known parable from Jesus.
There was a traveller on his way from Jerusalem to Jericho. He was attacked by
robbers, lost everything, and was left half dead. A priest and a Levite came
along, but they merely looked at him and then just walked away. A Samaritan
came upon the traveller and took care of his wounds. Then, he put the man on
his donkey, took him to an inn, and asked the innkeeper to take care of the
wounded traveller, agreeing to pay everything himself.
In the
world of the mind, the parable can be extended in a time scale from the present
to a remote future. Suppose a person in the remote future were to be attacked
by people from the present time, with many valuable items, such as the beautiful
nature with its rich resources, were to be stolen, and he was left half dead.
Then some bystanders were to pass by, but no one took care of the injured
person. Although the injured future traveller earnestly longs for someone to
come along to help him, a rescuer just like the Good Samaritan, the end is
still uncertain.
Our
planet Earth is now in danger from the attack by robbers. Most of the valuable
property that should belong to remote future people is being stolen by present
people. To save planet Earth, a rescuer must appear as soon as possible. They
should do everything necessary solely for the future people without expecting
any return, just like the Good Samaritan. Only by the love for future
neighbours can such a purely altruistic deed become a reality.
Although
a Good Samaritan who loves future people seldom appears in a sermon in a
Christian church, the Good Samaritan story can be interpreted as a reality of
saving future people regardless of their beliefs or whether they are theist or atheists,
so that anyone who wants to care for future sufferers will accept the Good
Samaritan story. By such a simple mental exercise, the Good Samaritan story as
a parable in a specific religion will turn into a common cultural legacy,
accepted by anyone who earnestly hopes for contentment in future generations.
***************************************************************
39. John Calvin and Sherlock Holmes
Posted by T.T. and P.R. in September 2020
John Calvin is the religious reformer who lived in the 16 century. Although the Copernican theory of the heliocentric universe appeared in Calvin’s lifetime, he never abandoned the belief of the Biblical geocentric universe. He preached that only God can govern the motion of all the stars that revolve around us in a day, moving with tremendous velocity and maintaining a beautiful harmony with no collisions [1].
In the story of A Study in Scarlet, Dr. Watson happened to meet Sherlock Holmes, and they decided to share rooms in a London dwelling. Watson found that Holmes’ enthusiasm for certain studies was remarkable, and yet he was ignorant of others, such as the Copernican Theory. He argued that, “If we went round the moon it would not make a pennyworth of difference to my work.“
Although the above observations seem to be somewhat unusual, they still suggest a fact that a person can spend a rich life without having even a very basic scientific knowledge. In the present world, the complete volume of basic knowledge is tremendous, and everything has to be included in the obligatory education curriculum so that each person has to bear a heavy load, sacrificing even the best period of life.
As a result of the continued cultural progress and expansion, the amount of basic knowledge will inevitably increase in the future. If the present style of education is continued, the total amount of basic knowledge will become unbearably voluminous. Thus, future people will have to reduce the amount of obligatory knowledge, so that even a very basic knowledge, such as the composition of the solar system, will have to be removed from elementary textbooks. At the same time, everyone will be recommended to reserve a vast vacant space in the brain where truly vital knowledge can be stored instead of useless basic knowledge.
Then, future people will be released from old-style education which structures every brain into a uniform shape. In the remote future, everyone has the right of lacking common sense, believing that superstition is not criticized and relying on science is not obligatory. Imagination and reality can be dwelling together in each person. The life style of Calvin or Holmes is not regarded as unusual.
[1]. Randall C. Zachman, Reconsidering John Calvin, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge UK, 2012.
***************************************************************
40. The Conversion of St. Paul
Posted by T.T. and P.R. in October 2020
Paul the Apostle, or simply St. Paul, initially followed the
traditional Hebrew faith but became an apostle of Jesus Christ through
conversion. Before this conversion, he persecuted some of the early disciples
of Jesus. He was on the way from Jerusalem to Damascus to carry out further
persecutions, when Jesus appeared to him in a bright light. Paul was converted
by this event and he became one of the most important figures of the Apostolic
age. Thereafter he enthusiastically taught the Christian faith and wrote many
epistles which have formed the largest part of the New Testament.
When Abraham Lincoln was elected as President of the United
States of America, he had an enemy; Edwin Stanton. He hated Lincoln and ran the
bitterest of campaigns throughout the election process. But, in selecting
members of cabinet, surprisingly, Lincoln chose Stanton to be the Secretary of
War. Lincoln’s action had the effect of ‘converting’ Stanton, who
subsequently dedicated his full support
to Lincoln’s politics, and he led the Unionists to victory in the Civil War.
President Donald Trump has been opposing worldwide
environmental movements. He has been consistently arguing for a sceptical view
of global warming. Then, he announced the withdrawal of the U.S. from the Paris
agreement on climatic change mitigation, for which more than 190 nations and
governments had already signed. However, it will still be possible to ‘convert’
him if many people worldwide genuinely appeal to his better side, and if people
will truly pray and hope for his conversion to dedicate himself to save our
Planet. If this is achieved, he will be
regarded as a real hero, his name will remain and have prominence in history,
and future people will love him with a fullness of admiration.
The conversion of St. Paul will not need to be interpreted
as a transcendental event, but it might be regarded as a fundamental aspect of
human nature. Although conversion will be difficult when the subject adheres
tightly to go in one fixed direction, after conversion, they will go into the
other direction more firmly and passionately.
The pictures produced by Weijia depict so clearly, firstly, what planet Earth could offer, by way of peace and harmony in an ideal environment and, secondly, how we might warm people's hearts to think of future generations. This is what is needed to motivate us all.
ReplyDeleteZepto