This is a continuation of a discussion started in a diary yesterday. It is a discussion based on the ideas in a trilogy of novels: Ishmael, The Story of B and My Ishmael, by Daniel Quinn.
First, thanks to all for your participation. I found it quite entertaining. And I’m glad a number of you did as well. You are a wonderful group of people.
Yesterday, we covered some of the first steps that Ishmael’s student covered in the first book. We examined our own “creation myth,” the story of the big-bang and evolution and everything. It was very well told by a number of commentators. I don’t want to play favorites. Can’t have a teacher’s pet. But there were some remarkably well written and thoughtful accounts for how we came to be here.
I’d start today by sharing one of my favorite passages of the first book. After the student proudly explains our creation myth, and declares that it ultimately resulted in mankind and all the wonders of modern civilization, Ishmael tells a story. It is the story of an anthropologist who lived on Earth 500 million years ago. The earth was basically a rock. And water. Vertebrates were still a long way off into the future. But the anthropologist was happy to come across a floating blob in the primordial soup. Someone to study.
He greeted the creature politely and was greeted in kind, and soon the two of them were good friends. The anthropologist explained as well as he could that he was a student of life-styles and customs, and begged his new friend for information of this sort which was readily forthcoming. “And now,” he said at last, “I’d like to get on tape in your own words some of the stories you tell among yourselves.”
“Stories?” the other asked.
“You know, like your creation myth, if you have one.”
“What is a creation myth?” the creature asked.
“Oh, you know,” the anthropologist replied, “the fanciful tale you tell your children about the origins of the world.”
Well, at this, the creature drew itself up indignantly — at least as well as a squishy blob can do — and replied that his people had no such fanciful tale.
“You have no account of creation then?”
“Certainly we have an account of creation,” the other snapped. “But it is definitely not a myth.”
“Oh, certainly not,” the anthropologist said, remembering his training at last. “I’ll be terribly grateful if you share it with me.”
“Very well,” the creature said. “But I want you to understand, that, like you, we are a strictly rational people, who accept nothing that is not based on observation, logic, and the scientific method.”
At which point, the blob creature launches into a story very similar to what we discussed yesterday. The universe. The stars. The solar system. The planets. And on to life appearing.
“But then, after a billion years or so, life appeared.”
“Excuse me,” the anthropologist said. “You say that life appeared. Where did that happen, according to your myth — I mean, according to your scientific account.”
The creature seemed baffled by the question and turned a pale lavender. “Do you mean in what precise spot?”
“No. I mean, did this happen on the land or in the sea?”
“Land?” the other asked. “What is land?”
“Oh, you know,” he said, waving toward the shore, “the expanse of dirt and rocks that begins over there.”
The creature turned a deeper shade of lavender and said, “I can’t imagine what you’re gibbering about. The dirt and rocks over there are simply the lip of the vast bowl that holds the sea.”
“Oh yes,” the anthropologist said, “I see what you mean. Quite. Go on.”
And the blob goes on. Explaining in detail the steps of evolution. Ending thus.
“But finally,” the creature said, turning quite pink with pride as he came to the climax of his story, “but finally jellyfish appeared!“
Neatly making a point that many of our perceptive commentators made yesterday. Humankind is not the climax of all creation. Not the end of evolution. We are a mere jellyfish to something yet to come, should our line continue to evolve. It is an important shift in perspective for many. To let go of the idea that Homo sapiens were created to rule the world. That we are the end of a process. We are a part of an ongoing process.
Two other points of interest I’d put out there for discussion today, should anyone have time to kill on a Friday.
The first is an interesting point that Quinn uses as a jumping off point for ideas to come. He looks back to the Agricultural Revolution in the fertile crescent, as it is explained in our cultural history — a revolution that also arose at other place, I understand. And he asks, simply this. Why do we call the time before this revolution, pre-history? Why are the millions of years of hominid existence, and the hundreds of thousands of years of Homo called pre-history? What is the dividing line? What made those bands of hunters and gatherers and herders and light-agriculturalists, who had settled most of the world, unworthy of the term “history?” I’d love to hear your answers on this point. I could tell you what Ishmael would say (I think), but I’d love to hear your untainted thoughts.
And the second point which I find very interesting in the book, is Ishmael’s explanation of a particular “creation myth” belonging to monotheists in our culture. Specifically, the story of Cain and Abel in Genesis. A very basic telling of the story (please understand that this is the best version that a high priest of Flying Spaghetti Monsterism can give on short notice):
Cain, a farmer, made a sacrifice of grain to God. And God was not pleased. But Abel, a shepherd, made a sacrifice of livestock to God. And God was pleased.
Cain, being very jealous, rose up and smote Abel, letting Abel’s blood run into the soil. And God marked Cain and sent him out into exile.
Ishmael’s question. Is there any rational explanation for this story? Did it ever make any sense to the people of the one god, who lived near the fertile crescent, near the time of the Agricultural Revolution?
That’s it for today. I’ll throw some of Ishmael’s thoughts on these topics, as best I might guess them, in the comments. Enjoy.
Well, I can only speak from the viewpoint of someone who has learned ‘History’ through the American education system. So this may not hold true with those from other countries, but I suspect most of it does.
I think that there are 2 main reasons. The first is that we don’t necessarily have a lot to work with from the standpoint of observable evidence. There are no written records, there are no ancient structures to give us some clue as to what life was like back then.
The second has more to do with the civilization-centric nature of what we call ‘History’ and the general arrogance of humans. History as we study it mostly has to do with who built what, who destroyed what, who invaded who, etc. It is our way of congratulating ourselves on how far we’ve come.
Before the agricultural revolution and because of the lack of population centers, it was not possible to accumulate the vast amounts of wealth that drive these events in our ‘History’.
And let’s face it, people nowadays just aren’t that interested in reading a chapter about the first time Gronk figured out that he could make a hole with a stick, put a seed in it, and wait for a tomato vine to grow.
I can’t personally disagree with your answer. It is similar to the way I would answer the question (only a bit better, I guess).
And I honestly can’t think of how to get you to where Ishmael is, in his thinking on this, through the Socratic method. So I’ll just lay out his basic thought.
There are a number of premises. Not premises that he would puts out in any straight forward manner. But premises which I glean directly from the books, or from my own understanding of them. So, you or I or anyone might argue with some of these premises. But if the premises can ultimately be accepted (by refinement, etc.), then his conclusions follow — opening up quite a new frame of reference on things — not unlike the jellyfish story.
Premises:
These premises set the scene for the natural clash between the one culture that decided to “settle down” and “till the land” and the thousands of other tribes which were living as creatures of evolutionary biology. Each tribe had its own culture. Systems which had evolved and continued to exist due to success within the ecosystem. Thousands of different cultural solutions to the problems posed by each microclimate where a given tribe lived.
And Ishmael leads the reader on a recreated idea of what it must have been like for the other people. The indigenous peoples of each region. The Leavers. As they were invaded by the neighboring “Tak.” A tribe which had abandoned the principles which had allowed all life to basically co-exist since time began. The “Tak” would say something like, we need this land. The Leavers in the region would say differing things:
“Okay, do what you want, just leave us alone.” (Resulting in their land being appropriated by the new permaculture — ending their sustainable huting and gathering opportunities).
“Okay, we’ll join you, even though we think it is kind of stupid that you work all day to grow food, when you could simply travel around like us and eat the food that is already growing.” (Resulting in a conquered culture that basically appropriated by “Tak” culture in a generation or two — not unlike what happened with some native tribes who settled on reservations peacably). This reminds me of a New York Times article on the front page about a month ago where a native tribe came out of the forest to settle down — classic — I’ll try to link it.
“We would never stop our way of life. Our culture is sacred.” (Think the Native Americans who fought — the technological and population advantage eventually overwhelmed them in a generation or two).
And so the culture of the “TAK” spread outward. One tribe at a time. Until, in our modern age, we are one culture at our base. The culture of “totalitarian agriculture” as Ishmael calls it. A culture completely out of tune with the laws of sustainable life on the planet. Not culture devoloped in harmony with evolutionary biology. But one based on growth. Which gives a 10,000 year appearance of ascendancy. But ultimately threatens the existence of countless species. A culture that has overrun 99.x% of all the other cultures that had evolved and lasted millions of years. One solution that does not work long-term. Overwhelming thousands of solutions that did work long-term.
That’s really 75% of the first book, I think. Ishmael convincing the student that he is the total product of one unsustainable cultural world view.
Here is the NYT’s article, though it is already archived:
leaving the forest life behind.
I think we actually use the word ‘prehistoric’ as a demarcation of the point when writing was invented. The invention of writing made the work of ordinary folk and historians more permanent and available ‘straight from the horses mouth’ for generations in the future far removed from the writer, thus providing for ‘historical’ examination.
As for ‘pre-historic’ taking on a pejorative meaning, I think that is a relatively modern invention, and perhaps something of a ‘construct’ or device to be used in the context of the larger lesson of the book(s) you are describing, which I have not read. So, in the spirit of debate, I’ll accept the device, but the idea that older societies are unworthy is one which I still can’t indulge in. I have a sense that each successive iteration of complexity and growth in human organizations had its own hurdles, and the humans of each era are worthy of accolades for having gotten over or around those hurdles. (Except for this nagging feeling I have that industrialization is terribly wrong in some very important ways. Thoreau was one of my earliest heroes and still holds his place in my personal westerners hall of fame.)
As for the Cain and Able story, I think that something has been lost in the translation through the years, and that it is impossible to nail any exact meaning to it. Speculation leads me to think that maybe, if the goat was fed with grain, that it consumed/contained more grain than the ‘lesser’ sacrifice. Or perhaps the practice of animal husbandry was considered a more difficult and time consuming labor. Perhaps the goat sacrificed was the leading stud for a new breed of more meaty goats and the grain was just plain old ordinary wheat? If any of these are true, then it would stand to reason that the myth implies that more complex sacrifices were perceived to be more valued by the entity to which the sacrifices were made. Or it might be so simple as to be the ‘blood sacrifice’ thing that is repugnant to me. The living blood sacrifice has a deep history throughout many of our ancient and modern cultures, and I can’t understand it at all. Perhaps because I’ve always taken care not to ‘needlessly’ spill the blood of any creature. Maybe it is because the precious fluid is considered to be the incarnation of the deity within each of us and the letting of it is the escape back to deity, for which the deity is supposedly pleased?
Further, if it is true that complexity is valued in and of itself, then that would provide the link between the two examples you have chosen.
Thanks for the thoughts Blueneck. I think I’ve bitten off more than I can chew, in terms of carrying on a Socratic discourse on this topic.
But as for the demarcation of pre-history/history, I’ve laid out Ishmael’s basic perspective in my response to ejmw above. I think you and ejmw both have a reasoned view of it. But I do find Ishmael’s thesis appealing.
And I’m glad you took a crack at the Cain and Abel part of the diary. It gives me a chance to explore Ishmael’s explanation, which was one of the most mindblowing things about the book, to m.
I think you came up with some great explanations. Far beyond my own attempts. I remember reading that story (my daddy was a Baptist and my momma a Methodist by birth — though I had next to no religious education, I was exposed to the good book) the first time, as a child, and thinking WTF? What kind of God would do this. Made no sense to me. Never really did. I’ve never heard any credible explanation of the tale.
Enter Quinn. Who was a devout Catholic much of his young life, and attended a Trappist monastery where he was an apostate under Thomas Merton (very briefly).
Here is what Quinn’s character, Ishmael said about this biblical story:
Actually, he goes back to Adam and the creation and the fall of man. Too complex for the non-religious like me. But basically, his spin was that it was a tale made up by a neighboring tribe of the “Tak.” The story of Adam and the fall. The neighboring tribe could only explain the “Tak” behavior as them having tried to eat from the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. A fruit of the gods. The gods ate the fruit to have knowledge of good and evil. To know what should live and what should die. Sometimes the Lion eats, and the hare must die, and the grass lives. Sometimes the Lion goes hungry, and the hare lives, and eats the grass. Sometimes the Lion dies, the hare dies, and feeds the grass. All things have their time. According to the wisdom of the gods. And even the tribal people had their time. There must have been famine. Child death. Hard times. The way of life. The way their own population was controlled so that they could sustain their tribe on the land they inhabited.
But the neighboring tribe, seeing the rampaging “Tak,” can only believe that their new enemies have eaten from the tree of knowledge, albeit imperfectly. Because they cannot gain the knowledge of the gods. They can only think they have. So they believe they have the power to know who should live and who should die. To manipulate the environment. To kill the pests that might interfere with their new permaculture. To kill off the other predators that might compete for food and life itself. To subjugate or kill other tribes. So the Adam story of the fall and exile from Eden was the story of these crazy “Tak” people getting bounced from the garden of plenty (the relatively leisurely life of the hunter-gather cultures of the time — when we look at modern studies, many anthropologists sugges that these “primitive” tribesmen can spend only a fraction of the hours of labor that is spent by “civilized” people.
And to continue the story. Cain (the farmer) offers a gift to the gods, who reject it — because those crazy “Tak” farmers were the bad guys. And Abel (the roaming shepherd) offers his gift, and is loved by the gods — because the story is told from the point of view of the tribe about to be conquered, or recently conquered. And this infuriates the farmer. Who rises up and slays the tribal people (symbolic of the slaughter of their entire culture). And the farmer is marked by the gods as evil and exiled (the worst possible fate for a tribal people).
It is a story told by a tribe conquered by the tribe of “Tak.” A tribe with only an oral tradition. Adopted by the rampaging conqueror, as a story of their own. Ultimate ending up in the very first book of this culture’s creation myth — if somewhat confusingly written.
I’ll admit, beyond the simple beauty of the explanation, there is nothing to suggest its truth. But it sure does ring true with my understanding of the world.
What do you think?
Wow, that explanation surely puts some meat on the bones of the seemingly inexplicable (to me at least) Cain and Able story!
And, as good stories do, it rings with some truth…
I’m notoriously difficult to lead, being a skeptic who is even skeptical of skeptics, so I like to think that even Socrates himself would have some trouble with me. In the spirit of being difficult I would like to impose some questions here.
Is Ishmael unabashedly embracing a zero growth, no technological advancement position? Or is he even slightly sympathetic to technology?
I see the problems as defined so far, but harkening back to my own creation myth, I do think that the universe is driving toward something through us. Perhaps my thinking is flawed by my cultural background, as Ishmael might suggest, but I can’t deny the invention of telescopes and trains and modern medicine in order to espouse a Bedouin existence. It seems that in the vast evolution of the universe and our part in it, increasing complexities and increasing capabilities for universe-gazing are part of the scheme of things. And that in this progression, our destruction of some of our resources through utilization and transformation is inevitable.
Where I do have a problem is with the wholesale and needless destruction of resources. The Earth is a finite place, and a completely shortsighted view of the values of those resources is dangerous to the continuing efforts of the universe to examine itself in this particular location. It can’t be that we are supposed to kill ourselves off, I don’t think, if we are to continue down the path toward increasing complexity and knowledge. On the other hand, perhaps our killing ourselves off will leave a record of warning for another type of sentient being in the future who will then learn our lesson vicariously, and not repeat it.
I guess my bottom line is that I can’t get my mind and heart around the idea that all ‘taking’ is de facto wrong. I would prefer that a balance be established wherein we could at least guarantee ourselves a few more tens of thousands of years to figure out how to get off this planet and into the wider universe before we run ourselves out of Earth-contained sustainability. In the final analysis, being alive to wander the universe seems more important to me than having a completely pristine and healthy home planet. But, then again, wanderlust is my middle name, so to speak.
Excellent thoughts blueneck. You touch on so many things. Some responses.
Ishmael is an incredibly open-minded character. Very little judgment in the gorilla. Although he is definitely sarcastic and slightly acerbic at times. So he is not railing against advancement per se. In fact he often suggests that the solutions for us will be new solutions going forward with the world as it is. He openly says he is not advocating a return to primitive tribalism. I think a favorite phrase, might be there is no one solution. And another, I’m not here to give solutions, but to get you to open your eyes. To the idea that the entire culture that you’ve accepted as the way things has to be is flawed ab initio. That there are many ways. But that you cannot continue to live outside the laws of sustainable life — or the laws of limited competition as he calls them.
A very non-judgmental gorilla. With the ability to make some look at human existence from a new perspective.
Another maddening aspect of the books is a lack of a plan. He isn’t teaching a plan (and the cynic in me says that is because he doesn’t know the plan — insists that change will come not from some new plan, but from a shifting consciousness. When enough of us understand our place within the community of life — at least that’s my take on it).
Saw Steven Hawking pitching his desire to get the hell of this planet last week. I think that is the dream of those who believe in technology and growth. We will leave this place. We can escape the laws of life on this planet and leave it behind like an outhouse.
While I hope that we can do this one day (I’m an optimist), I hope that by the time we do do it, we have also learned how to live sustainably again. For whatever worlds we visit in the future and for the remidiation of our own.
I’ll up the ante on your optimism. Outhouses, once abandoned, decay back into the elements which compose them. I’ve seen a nice big oak tree growing where an old outhouse once stood.
Yeah. That is the ultimate optimism in my view. The thought that even as we might blindly try, and ruin the environment for ourselves, we cannot kill life on this planet. Something will follow.
Although it might be possible for us to totally sterilize our planet, I think that’s an unlikely outcome.
>Consider
the alliance
ships and plants
The take-for-granted bloom
of our roadsides
Queen Anne’s Lace
Black Eyed Susans
rode the sea
‘Specimens graciously passed
between warring fleets’
And when an old boat rots ashore
itself once living plant
it sprouts
–Lorine Niedecker, fr. Harpsichord & Salt Fish
~~~~~~~
Far reach
of sand
A man
bends to unspect
a shell
Himself
part coral
and mud
clam
–LN again, fr. North Central
I read Hawkings’ remarks as contemporary embodiment of the expansionist frontier psyche we were talking about yesterday through Olson.
I agree. Good context for these remarks. I’m not immune from the “living-large” ethos of America. So a part of me hopes Hawking is right.
Yea, it’s falling into that trap of experiencing the world as boundless space (literally, in this case) to expand into. Deeply embedded in the western/American psyche. The Ultimate Frontier.
rhymes with:
“Le’s jes’ roun’ up
all that nuk-le-ar waste
shove it in a rocket
& shoot’er inta space”
(sorry, this convo is resonating in weird ways with a piece I’ve kicked around in my mind sometime but will likely never write on the western shoshone & yucca mtn)
You know what I always say: If a beautiful name like shoshone is bouncing around in your head begging to be set free in written form, you must write it.
Cain & Abel – Abel sacrificed the life of another being and his brother sacrificed Abel’s life. I guess you can call it a sacrifice, but sometimes its just murdur.
Pre-history was before the warrior culture. Humans lived together in peace. Sharing with and helping each other in a matriarchal society. Nobody bothers to write down what the women are doing. Useless women’s studies stuff.
Yeah, I know. But that’s my version.
Women are still being ignored. Are they not. Even now in our “civilized” culture. Heck. Even in the progressive blogosphere.
I must say, I think if a matriarchal society ruled the day, that we would be a better place.
I’ve written out Ishmael’s take on Cain & Abel in response to blueneck. I find it quite entertaining. It rings true to me. But I’m interested to here others thoughts on the matter.
Thanks for comments Alice.
Our concepts of history & pre-history are closely related to those of literate & pre-literate.
The appearance of script writing — the dividing line between oral & literate cultures — makes the concept of history possible. Memory & what is thought to be ‘the same,’ ‘identical,’ are radically changed with the appearance of the written word. One can now know more than one can recall (which is why mnemonics are such a prominent feature of oral cultures). It makes possible author-ity.
Walter Ong, in Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word dates various independently developed scripts: Mesopotamian cuneiform (3500 BC), Egyptian hieroglyphics (3000 BC), Minoan or Mycenean ‘Liner B’ (1200 BC), Indus Valley script (3000-2400 BC), Chinese script (1500 BC), Mayan script (AD 50), Aztec script (Ad 1400).
We have fascinating documents from the transition: the Bible, Homer & Hesiod, Gilgamesh, Inanna, the Popul Vuh. The oral poetic traditions of these tales contain historical materials, but are not history as we recognize it today. The Illiad though, was history to the Greeks & the early Greek historians emulated it.
Eric A. Havelock suggests in his work (Preface to Plato, The Muse Learns to Write) that the invention of the phonetic alphabet (developed by the Greeks from a Semitic one that had no true vowels) was the crucial event in the transformation of the word from spoken to written. A transformation that, in adding a visual dimension to the aural, caused a revolutionary change in consciousness itself. It’s been suggested that the fully phonetic alphabet favors left-brain activity, encouraging abstract, analytic thought.
Ong writes: “Without writing, the literate mind would not and could not think as it does, not only when engaged in writing but normally even when it is composing its thoughts in oral form. More than any other single invention, writing has transformed human consciousness.” (p. 78)
Two other writers on related subjects to mention, & I’ll shush: Jack Goody’s The Interface between the Written and the Oral and Marshall McLuhan’s The Gutenberg Galaxy and The Medium is the Massage.
Excellent additions to the topic. Beyond my ability to integrate into the whole Ishmael topic.
I think he did have a similar discussion with his student. And pooh-poohed the idea that man is alone in his ability to communicate. He recognized man as having this gift, but insisted that it was not totally unique, and that the gifted species might have an even higher obligation to be a caretaker of the web of life around him.
I
I find your reference to Havelock’s thoughts very interesting. I have often wondered what was so special about the Greeks. Almost everything that we think of as Western thought or Western civilization started with the Greeks or was somehow profoundly influenced by them. I can see I’ll have to read Havelock’s book.
The wiki page cited above has a pretty good overview of Havelock’s writing. PtoP is pretty dense academic work. Ong’s book is short & a pretty easy read, but not at all lighweight. He summarizes & carries on some of the implication’s of H’s work.
It’s quite a rich field.
I have always understood the dividing line between history and prehistory to be the very pragmatic and yet very profound consequence of the development of writing. Before writing the only way to preserve the memories of the past was oral tradition, stories handed down from one story-teller to the next. Always subject to the vagaries of individual memory and the tendency to interpret or reinterpret information as the perspective of the people and the story-tellers changed over time. We’ve all been entertained by the garbling of messages in the game of post office. Surely the myths and legends of preliterate peoples, passed down orally over generations, changed with the telling over time as well.
With the invention of writing, it became possible to record events and memories more or less verbatim and preserve them with at least some greater accuracy. Still, I think it is a mistake on our part to assume that what has happened since the invention of writing, the parts recorded and passed down more or less verbatim to us, are the only important parts and that conversely everything that went on before is somehow unimportant or at least much, much less important.
I had forgotten about the Cain and Able story. I remember that was one of those gear-shifting points in Quinn’s book, one of those points where I began to see things from a different perspective. But I don’t remember the details of his explanation. I can see I need to read the books again.
I just don’t recall how he addressed, if at all, the point about writing being a distinguishing feature between history and pre-history. It is a good point. I’ve got no ready answer for it.
Yes. The Cain and Abel story was definitely the catch for me. And the stuff about the fall.
I’m not sure Quinn made that distinction in so many words. That’s what I’ve always thought of as the conventional wisdom on the difference between history and prehistory.