Anthropomorphize

(yay big words are fun)

Anecdote:

So I was out smoking this afternoon and the wind was blowing snow off the roof on to the "bus stop" smoking area.

I joked, "Great, more snow."

Someone says, "Yeah, Nature doesn't like the snow here, so it's putting it over here."

So he anthropomorphize the wind and the snow as some sort of being called Nature and was giving it human qualities. Basically, without realizing it, he made something naturally occurring event into a human-like being that has thoughts and deeds and desires of its own.

I have noticed that I tend to do that a lot as well. I imagine when I see an old rusted out car on the side of the road as being sad that it is no longer being used for its original purpose. Just slowly decaying and dying with no one to care about it any more.

I gave the car feelings and emotions, without realizing it. Until now of course. :)

So what am I trying to say?

Well first off, humans are very, very selfish. We are so anthrocentric that all things revolve around us. We are damaging the earth, we need to help dying species, we imagine there is an all powerful being directing our little existences for a grand purpose.

The ancient Greeks took this to a big extreme. All things natural were given a deity to watch over it. They were jealous gods and goddesses and had a direct effect on the world and the people.

That hasn't changed much. Now it is some all powerful being, either God, Allah, Yahweh, The Goddess, or any number of theistic tendencies.

Things we try to understand and can't are given the monicker of godhood. If we are unable to understand then, being so anthrocentric, give it human qualities so we can try to grapple with understanding.

Science, for the most part, is not like this. But in situations where we don't understand something or understand it limitedly, a new religion is formed based on limited evidence or inability to experiment.

No one knows the true nature of light, we just experiment and try to figure it out. Is it a particle or wave? It has qualities of both depending on how the experiment goes.

What is the speed of gravity? It is taken for granted that it acts, for all intents and purposes, instantaneously. But General Relativity prevents anything from happening faster than the speed of light. So which is right? Depends on what religious camp you are in.

So to wrap this post up, think of all the things that exist, all the forces and ideas that are out there and see if you, or anyone, anthropomorphizes it.

Is there a way for us to figure out the real truth or are we so limited in scope that we cannot get past out anthrocentrism?