Tsunami theology

“The death of one person is a tragedy; the death of a thousand people is a statistic.” I don’t recall who first stated this essential truth about human nature. We may want to reject its implication that we are, as a species, essentially callous. But homo sapiens did not evolve in groups larger than 150 members: this is the maximum number of persons our neocortex allows us to have a personal social relationship with, in the sense of knowing them well and how they relate to us. Beyond that figure, our empathy is inevitably limited, even if we claim with specious spirituality to love all humankind. So the growing figure of 200,000-dead from the Asian tsunami is not a number we can truly grasp. The scale is too large, it does not seem real. This is why the news media, with its giant eye, gives us snapshots of individual loss: for only then can we briefly clasp hands with our brethren across the forgetful sea. And brethren they are, if only for now: because a natural disaster on such a scale tells us that, under Nature’s red claw, we are all joined in frailty.

For the existentialist, this is the tragedy of human life: that the universe is indifferent to our presence. Yet this interpretation is as irrational as its obverse: the strong anthropic principle which holds that the universe exists for us. The existentialist embraces a fundamental contradiction: he holds that if the universe has no purpose, then human life has no purpose. But the assumption here is the same as the teleologist’s: that purpose and meaning depend on an agency outside human grasp or power. But there is no logical argument that proves this. If the universe does have a purpose, it is unfathomable to us. But, as pattern-seeking and egoistic animals, we are impelled to find moral meaning in our existence. Yet the most effective pattern-finding device we have invented — science — implies that the universe’s order falls short of intentionality. A wave pattern fluxed and our universe, which may be one of many universes, came into existence 14 billion years ago.

Subatomic particles interacted, making light elements, and hydrogen nuclei fused, making stars, which made heavier elements and, eventually, planets. And on one planet we know of, carbon-based life began three-and-a-half billion years ago. The forces of mutation, genetic drift, and natural selection created ever more complicated organisms, eventually resulting in the most complex structure in the known universe: the human brain. In all this, a Creator is not a predicate. But the same human brain evolved to believe in gods and then, as that brain’s technological inventions created social groups larger than unaccommodated Nature would ever allow, the one God concept came to dominate the most powerful of these groups. This idea resolves certain contradictions, but creates others. And monotheism remains mostly a theological convenience: God is, in fact, still many gods. (A simple proof: all his attributes are absolute, yet he is both vengeful and merciful.) But the human brain has evolved to hold contradictory ideas simultaneously.

It is only through training and practice that we can be rigorously logical, for rationality, despite our conceit in labelling ourselves wise man, is not natural to the species. And, even with training, many men are rational only in specific areas and irrational in others. This is because both superstition and science have the same root: our inherent need to find patterns in everything. We look at clouds, and see faces and animals. Are these shapes really in those masses of water vapour, or are they in our brains? An earthquake of magnitude 9.0 triggers a tsunami which wipes out nearly 200,000 human beings within a space of hours. We understand the scientific cause: a shift in the planet’s tectonic plates creates a shock-wave which creates a water wave travelling at 200 miles per hour, rising to enormous height as the seabed becomes shallower. But, for most people, the scientific explanation is not enough. Human beings are teleologists: there must always be a “why” to accompany the “how”.

But the “why” in this case is more than irrational: it is often callous. So the evangelical preacher on the radio says that God is a just God but also a powerful god. But that absolute power can only be just if every man, woman and child killed had done evil acts sufficient to deserve death. The Christian fundamentalist writes a letter to the editor saying that many thousands of souls are now enjoying eternal bliss at God’s side: so her God, it seems, kills good people in a violent and painful manner. The Hindu fanatic talks about divine intervention, citing the few hundred people who escaped - coincidentally, mostly Hindus - thus betraying his ignorance of statistical probabilities even though he works for a lottery organisation. And the Indo rastawoman suggests the tsunami was the result of US experiment gone wrong: preferring paranoia to her superstitious beliefs about a benign natural order.

Yet, surprisingly enough, these voices have been relatively muted. I would like to think that this is because the rationalist mindset has become more influential, but I try not to fool myself. The true reason for the relative silence, I suspect, is the psychology of the Holocaust denier: the neo-Nazi who rejects all the evidence because a great man like Adolf Hitler could never have sanctioned such an undeniably atrocious act. Similarly, the believers in an omnipotent God cannot simultaneously trumpet His grace and absolve Him of responsibility for so many deaths: at least, not without looking like callous idiots.

So can rationality offer any succour in the face of such tragedy? Not after the fact, and not to those affected. But, if rationality ruled, there would have been an early warning system, and perhaps more people (not one little white girl) would have known what it meant when the tide rapidly receded. After the fact, rationality has only the cold comfort of statistics: that, because of technology, natural disasters now take relatively fewer lives than in the past. But there is one conclusion which rationality urges upon us, and which I find hopeful: that life’s purpose is what we make it.

E-mail: kbaldeosingh@hotmail.com
Website: www.caribscape.com/baldeosingh