The human race as a whole seem to be becoming more civilised....

[mackthefork]

towards each other in many ways especially in the West, and in Europe in particular, at the same time society is becoming more and more secular. Personally I think there is a strong relationship between the two, I think this is supported by the fact that Islamic states have some very cruel practices against criminals and often just normal people who do not agree with the way things are bring run (crushed rebellions etc). I also think that there is a religious undertone to politics in the US, and I believe this is partly to do with why the death penalty has not yet been abolished, anyway not to dwell on that prisons in the US are much worse (subjective I know, they do a job) than prison in Western Europe in particular.

Love to hear from atheists, christians, or anyone else, as to what you think of this, keep it polite if you can, so am I right or is this a purely coincidental thing happening on account of something else I'm not thinking of.

Regards Mack

[RJT]

Mack,

Hmm, why not take a field trip thru the Chunnel and see for yourself. From the news accounts, it doesn’t sound like secular France is too civilized now-a- days.

I do agree that the death penalty is ridiculous.

RJT

[mackthefork]

[ QUOTE ]
Mack,

Hmm, why not take a field trip thru the Chunnel and see for yourself. From the news accounts, it doesn’t sound like secular France is too civilized now-a- days.

I do agree that the death penalty is ridiculous.

RJT

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah you are right about France, are they not actively legislating against symbols of faith though? I am definitely not in favour of that, I think they really dropped the ball when they came up with that idea.

Mack

How are we more civilized? More people are dying every day then ever before (averaged over a period of 100 years).

[jthegreat]

Is that relative to total world population? The world population has tripled in the last 100 years, hasn't it?

Certainly; but world population is no measure of civilization. Democracies (and secular states) have committed (or supported) attrocities. Hilter was elected to the Reichstag and he commited genocide on an unprecedented scale. Stalin's Russia was a secular state and he killed untold TENS of MILLIONS. The elected U.S. government is reponsible for the encouragment of wars (Iran vs Iraq of the 80's) the outright destruction of a society (Nicauraga) and worse crimes. Meh.

[Darryl_P]

Yes I think there is a correlation but I think the main driving force is the average standard of living which is at all-time highs in the west. If people have more money, they're more comfy and less aggressive. They're also more obese which (I believe) has been scientifically shown to be inversely correlated with aggression.

Trouble is, though, (and I'm generally considered nuts for this belief) that it's all an illusion because it's based on unbacked paper currency and enormous debt. The world economy is a giant pyramid scheme getting precariously close to its breaking point. When it collapses, we'll yet again experience all the nasty stuff from days of old, but with our fancier toys it'll probably be uglier than ever.

For some supporting material on my economic theory I recommend doing a search on "Ferdinand Lips". He's an expert on gold and financial markets and has some interesting insights on the future of the world economy.