I have a question for you: Are you religious? Please raise your hand right now if you think of yourself as a religious person. Let's see, I'd say about three or four percent. I had no idea there were so many believers at a TED Conference. (Laughter) Okay, here's another question: Do you think of yourself as spiritual in any way, shape or form? Raise your hand. Okay, that's the majority.
Imam pitanje za vas: da li ste religiozni? Molim vas da sada podignete ruku ako smatrate da ste religiozna osoba. Da vidimo, rekao bih oko tri do četiri procenta. Nisam znao da ima toliko vernika na TED konferenciji. (Smeh) U redu, evo drugog pitanja: da li smatrate da ste duhovno biće na bilo koji način, u bilo kakvom obliku ili formi? Podignite ruku. U redu, to je većina.
My Talk today is about the main reason, or one of the main reasons, why most people consider themselves to be spiritual in some way, shape or form. My Talk today is about self-transcendence. It's just a basic fact about being human that sometimes the self seems to just melt away. And when that happens, the feeling is ecstatic and we reach for metaphors of up and down to explain these feelings. We talk about being uplifted or elevated.
Moj govor danas tiče se glavnog razloga, ili jednog od glavnih razloga, zašto većina ljudi smatra sebe duhovnim bićem u bilo kom obliku ili formi. Moj današnji govor je u vezi sa samo-transcendentnošću. To je jedna od osnovnih činjenica o ljudskim bićima, povremeni osećaj da se njihovo Ja gubi. I kada se to desi, osećaj je ekstatičan i tragamo za metaforama za uspon i pad kako bi objasnili ova osećanja. Govorimo kako smo uzdignuti ili kako lebdimo.
Now it's really hard to think about anything abstract like this without a good concrete metaphor. So here's the metaphor I'm offering today. Think about the mind as being like a house with many rooms, most of which we're very familiar with. But sometimes it's as though a doorway appears from out of nowhere and it opens onto a staircase. We climb the staircase and experience a state of altered consciousness.
Jako je teško razmišljati o bilo čemu tako apstraktnom kao što je ovo bez neke dobre, konkretne metafore. I evo metafore koju nudim danas. Razmišljajte o umu kao da ste u kući sa puno soba, u kojoj nam je većina tih soba vrlo poznata. Ali nekada izgleda kao da se pojavljuje neki prolaz niotkuda koji vodi ka stepenicama. Penjemo se tim stepenicama i doživljavamo stanje izmenjene svesti.
In 1902, the great American psychologist William James wrote about the many varieties of religious experience. He collected all kinds of case studies. He quoted the words of all kinds of people who'd had a variety of these experiences. One of the most exciting to me is this young man, Stephen Bradley, had an encounter, he thought, with Jesus in 1820. And here's what Bradley said about it.
1902. godine, veliki američki psiholog Viljem Džejms, pisao je o mnogim varijetetima religioznog iskustva. Prikupio je svakakve vrste studija. Citirao je reči različitih ljudi koji su imali neku vrstu ovih iskustava. Jedan od meni najuzbudljivijih je ovaj mladi čovek, Stiven Bredli, koji je mislio da je imao susret sa Isusom 1820. godine I evo šta je Bredli rekao o tome.
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(Video) Stephen Bradley: I thought I saw the savior in human shape for about one second in the room, with arms extended, appearing to say to me, "Come." The next day I rejoiced with trembling. My happiness was so great that I said I wanted to die. This world had no place in my affections. Previous to this time, I was very selfish and self-righteous. But now I desired the welfare of all mankind and could, with a feeling heart, forgive my worst enemies.
(Snimak) Stiven Bredli: Mislim da sam video spasitelja u ljudskom obliku na jedan sekund u sobi, raširenih ruku, kako se pojavljuje i govori mi: "Dođi." Sledećeg dana sam se tresao od radosti. Moja sreća je bila toliko velika da sam želeo da umrem. Ovaj svet nema dovoljno prostora za moja osećanja. Pre nego što mi se ovo desilo, bio sam veoma sebičan i pravičan samo prema sebi. Ali sada želim blagostanje celom čovečanstvu i mogao bih, od srca, da oprostim i najgorem neprijatelju.
JH: So note how Bradley's petty, moralistic self just dies on the way up the staircase. And on this higher level he becomes loving and forgiving. The world's many religions have found so many ways to help people climb the staircase. Some shut down the self using meditation. Others use psychedelic drugs. This is from a 16th century Aztec scroll showing a man about to eat a psilocybin mushroom and at the same moment get yanked up the staircase by a god. Others use dancing, spinning and circling to promote self-transcendence. But you don't need a religion to get you through the staircase. Lots of people find self-transcendence in nature. Others overcome their self at raves.
DžH: Primetite kako Bredlijevo sitno, moralističko Ja umire penjući se tim stepenicama. I na tom višem nivou on postaje biće koje voli i oprašta. Mnoge svetske religije su pronašle mnoge načine da pomognu ljudima da se popnu tim stepenicama. Neke ućutkuju Ja pomoću meditacije. Druge koriste psihodelične droge. Ovo je actečki svitak iz XVI veka koji pokazuje čoveka koji treba da pojede psihodeličnu pečurku i u istom momentu ga bog odvlači na stepenice. Drugi koriste igru, okretanje i vrćenje kako bi dostigli samo-transcendenciju. Ali nije vam potrebna religija da biste se popeli tim stepenicama. Mnogi ljudi nalaze samo-transcendenciju u prirodi. Drugi prevazilaze sebe na rejv žurkama.
But here's the weirdest place of all: war. So many books about war say the same thing, that nothing brings people together like war. And that bringing them together opens up the possibility of extraordinary self-transcendent experiences. I'm going to play for you an excerpt from this book by Glenn Gray. Gray was a soldier in the American army in World War II. And after the war he interviewed a lot of other soldiers and wrote about the experience of men in battle. Here's a key passage where he basically describes the staircase.
Ali postoji i najluđe mesto od svega ovoga: rat. Toliko knjiga o ratovima govori istu stvar, da ništa ne povezuje ljude kao rat. I to povezivanje otvara mogućnost za izvanredno iskustvo samo-transcendencije. Pustiću vam isečak iz ove knjige Glena Greja. Grej je bio vojnik američke vojske u Drugom Svetskom ratu. I posle rata intervjuisao je mnoge druge vojnike i pisao je o njihovim iskustvima u bici. Evo ključnog dela gde on u suštini opisuje one stepenice.
(Video) Glenn Gray: Many veterans will admit that the experience of communal effort in battle has been the high point of their lives. "I" passes insensibly into a "we," "my" becomes "our" and individual faith loses its central importance. I believe that it is nothing less than the assurance of immortality that makes self-sacrifice at these moments so relatively easy. I may fall, but I do not die, for that which is real in me goes forward and lives on in the comrades for whom I gave up my life.
(Snimak) Glen Grej: Mnogi će veterani priznati da je iskustvo zajedničkog napora u bici najznačajnija tačka u njihovim životima. "Ja" neprimetno prelazi u "mi", "moje" postaje "naše" i individualna vera gubi svoj centralni značaj. Verujem da to nije ništa manje od obećanja besmrtnosti koje dovodi do samo-žrtvovanja u tim momentima tako relativno lako. Možda ću pasti, ali neću umreti, jer ono što je stvarno u meni nastavlja dalje i živi u drugovima za koje sam dao svoj život.
JH: So what all of these cases have in common is that the self seems to thin out, or melt away, and it feels good, it feels really good, in a way totally unlike anything we feel in our normal lives. It feels somehow uplifting. This idea that we move up was central in the writing of the great French sociologist Emile Durkheim. Durkheim even called us Homo duplex, or two-level man. The lower level he called the level of the profane. Now profane is the opposite of sacred. It just means ordinary or common. And in our ordinary lives we exist as individuals. We want to satisfy our individual desires. We pursue our individual goals. But sometimes something happens that triggers a phase change. Individuals unite into a team, a movement or a nation, which is far more than the sum of its parts.
DžH: Ono što je zajedničko za sve ove slučajeve jeste to da Ja izgleda da bledi, da se topi, i osećaj je dobar, jako dobar, na način koji uopšte ne liči ni na šta što osećamo u svojim normalnim životima. Osećaj je nekako uzdižući. Ideja da se pokrećemo je centralna u delima velikog francuskog sociologa Emila Dirkema. Dirkem nas čak naziva Homo dupleks, ili čovek na dva nivoa. Niži nivo on naziva nivoom profanog. Profano je suprotno od svetog. Znači nešto što je obično ili zajedničko. I u našim svakodnevnim životima postojimo kao individue. Želimo da zadovoljimo svoje individualne želje. Težimo našim individualnim ciljevima. Ali nekada se desi nešto što okida promenu. Jedinke se ujedinjuju u timove, pokrete ili nacije, što je mnogo više od proste sume delova.
Durkheim called this level the level of the sacred because he believed that the function of religion was to unite people into a group, into a moral community. Durkheim believed that anything that unites us takes on an air of sacredness. And once people circle around some sacred object or value, they'll then work as a team and fight to defend it. Durkheim wrote about a set of intense collective emotions that accomplish this miracle of E pluribus unum, of making a group out of individuals. Think of the collective joy in Britain on the day World War II ended. Think of the collective anger in Tahrir Square, which brought down a dictator. And think of the collective grief in the United States that we all felt, that brought us all together, after 9/11.
Dirkem ovaj nivo naziva svetim jer veruje da funkcija religije jeste da ujedini ljude u grupu, u moralnu zajednicu. Dirkem je verovao da sve što nas ujedinjuje zauzima položaj svetog. I jednom kada ljudi obuhvate neki sveti objekat ili vrednost, oni će raditi kao tim i boriti se da to odbrane. Dirkem je pisao o nizu jakih zajedničkih osećanja koja postižu čudo "E pluribus unum" ("Jedan, od mnogih"), praveći grupu od pojedinaca. Pomislite na zajedničku radost u Britaniji na dan kada se Drugi svetski rat završio. Pomislite na zajednički bes na Gradskom trgu u Kairu, koji je oborio diktatora. I mislite na zajednički bol u Americi koji smo svi osetili, koji nas je zbližio, posle 11. septembra.
So let me summarize where we are. I'm saying that the capacity for self-transcendence is just a basic part of being human. I'm offering the metaphor of a staircase in the mind. I'm saying we are Homo duplex and this staircase takes us up from the profane level to the level of the sacred. When we climb that staircase, self-interest fades away, we become just much less self-interested, and we feel as though we are better, nobler and somehow uplifted.
I dozvolite da sumiram gde smo. Ja kažem da je sposobnost za samo-transcendenciju osnovni deo ljudskog bića. Nudim metaforu stepenica u umu. Kažem da smo Homo dupleks i da nas ove stepenice vode iz profanog na sveti nivo. Kada se popnemo tim stepenicama, lični interesi blede, postajemo manje orijentisani na sopstvene interese, i osećamo se kao da smo bolji, plemenitiji i nekako uzdignutiji.
So here's the million-dollar question for social scientists like me: Is the staircase a feature of our evolutionary design? Is it a product of natural selection, like our hands? Or is it a bug, a mistake in the system -- this religious stuff is just something that happens when the wires cross in the brain -- Jill has a stroke and she has this religious experience, it's just a mistake?
I evo pitanja za milion dolara za sociologe poput mene: Da li su stepenice odlika našeg evolutivnog dizajna? Da li su proizvod prirodne selekcije, kao što su naše šake? Ili je to uljez, greška u sistemu -- religija je samo nešto što se dešava kada se prespoje žice u našem mozgu -- Džil je imala moždani udar i imala je to religiozno iskustvo, da li je to samo greška?
Well many scientists who study religion take this view. The New Atheists, for example, argue that religion is a set of memes, sort of parasitic memes, that get inside our minds and make us do all kinds of crazy religious stuff, self-destructive stuff, like suicide bombing. And after all, how could it ever be good for us to lose ourselves? How could it ever be adaptive for any organism to overcome self-interest? Well let me show you.
Mnogi naučnici koji proučavaju religiju imaju takav stav. "Novi Ateisti", na primer, tvrde da je religija set mema, nekih parazitskih mema, koje prodiru u naš um i čine da radimo različite vrste religioznih stvari, samo-destruktivnih stvari, kao što su bombaši samoubice. I posle svega, kako bi ikada moglo biti dobro po nas da izgubimo sebe? Kako bi ikada bilo moguće da bude adaptivno za bilo koji organizam da prevaziđe lične interese? Pa dozvolite da vam pokažem.
In "The Descent of Man," Charles Darwin wrote a great deal about the evolution of morality -- where did it come from, why do we have it. Darwin noted that many of our virtues are of very little use to ourselves, but they're of great use to our groups. He wrote about the scenario in which two tribes of early humans would have come in contact and competition. He said, "If the one tribe included a great number of courageous, sympathetic and faithful members who are always ready to aid and defend each other, this tribe would succeed better and conquer the other." He went on to say that "Selfish and contentious people will not cohere, and without coherence nothing can be effected." In other words, Charles Darwin believed in group selection.
U "Poreklu čoveka", Čarls Darvin je veliki deo posvetio pisanju o evoluciji moralnosti -- odakle potiče i zašto je imamo. Darvin je primetio da mnoge od naših vrlina imaju malo koristi po nas same, ali su od velike koristi za našu grupu. Pisao je o scenariju u kom bi dva plemena prvobitnih ljudi došla u kontakt i takmičenje. Rekao je: "Ako bi jedno pleme sadržalo veliki broj hrabrih, saosećajnih i vernih članova koji su uvek spremni da pomognu i brane jedni druge, to pleme bi uspelo bolje i pobedilo bi drugo". Rekao je čak i da se "Sebični i svadljivi ljudi neće povezati, a bez povezanosti ništa se ne može postići". Drugim rečima, Čarls Darvin je verovao u grupnu selekciju.
Now this idea has been very controversial for the last 40 years, but it's about to make a major comeback this year, especially after E.O. Wilson's book comes out in April, making a very strong case that we, and several other species, are products of group selection. But really the way to think about this is as multilevel selection.
Ova ideja je bila veoma kontroverzna poslednjih 40 godina, ali je na putu da se u velikom stilu vrati na scenu ove godine, naročito posle knjige E. O. Vilsona koja izlazi u aprilu, iznoseći veoma jak dokaz da smo mi, i nekoliko drugih vrsta, proizvod grupne selekcije. Ali zaista, način da se misli o ovome je kao o selekciji na više nivoa.
So look at it this way: You've got competition going on within groups and across groups. So here's a group of guys on a college crew team. Within this team there's competition. There are guys competing with each other. The slowest rowers, the weakest rowers, are going to get cut from the team. And only a few of these guys are going to go on in the sport. Maybe one of them will make it to the Olympics. So within the team, their interests are actually pitted against each other. And sometimes it would be advantageous for one of these guys to try to sabotage the other guys. Maybe he'll badmouth his chief rival to the coach. But while that competition is going on within the boat, this competition is going on across boats. And once you put these guys in a boat competing with another boat, now they've got no choice but to cooperate because they're all in the same boat. They can only win if they all pull together as a team. I mean, these things sound trite, but they are deep evolutionary truths.
Pogledajte ovako: Imate takmičenje koje se odvija unutar grupa i među grupama. I evo grupe momaka na koledžu u timu veslača. Unutar ovog tima postoji takmičenje. Tu su momci koji se takmiče jedni protiv drugih. Najsporiji veslači, najslabiji veslači biće izbačeni iz tima. I samo nekolicina ovih veslača će nastaviti sa ovim sportom. Možda će jedan od njih dogurati do Olimpijade. Tako unutar ovog tima, njihovi interesi su zapravo usmereni protiv ostalih. I nekad bi to bila prednost za nekog od momaka da proba da sabotira ostale. Možda će ogovarati svog glavnog rivala kod trenera. Ali dok traje takmičenje unutar čamca, ovo takmičenje se odvija između više čamaca. I jednom kad stavite ove momke u čamac da se takmiče protiv drugog čamca, oni onda neće imati izbora izuzev da sarađuju jer su svi zajedno u istom čamcu. Mogu pobediti jedino ako nastupe zajedno kao tim. Mislim, ove stvari deluju banalno, ali one su duboke evolutivne istine.
The main argument against group selection has always been that, well sure, it would be nice to have a group of cooperators, but as soon as you have a group of cooperators, they're just going to get taken over by free-riders, individuals that are going to exploit the hard work of the others. Let me illustrate this for you. Suppose we've got a group of little organisms -- they can be bacteria, they can be hamsters; it doesn't matter what -- and let's suppose that this little group here, they evolved to be cooperative. Well that's great. They graze, they defend each other, they work together, they generate wealth. And as you'll see in this simulation, as they interact they gain points, as it were, they grow, and when they've doubled in size, you'll see them split, and that's how they reproduce and the population grows.
Glavni argument protiv grupne selekcije oduvek je bilo da, pa naravno, bilo bi sjajno da imamo grupu saradnika, ali čim imate grupu saradnika, njih će preuzeti slobodni jahači, pojedinci koji će iskoristiti težak rad drugih. Dajte da vam ilustrujem ovo. Pretpostavimo da imamo grupu malih organizama -- mogu biti bakterije, hrčci; nije važno šta -- i pretpostavimo da je ova mala grupa ovde evoluirala da bude kooperativna. Pa to je sjajno. Oni grabe, oni brane jedni druge, rade zajedno, stvaraju dobrobit. I kao što ćete videti u ovoj simulaciji, kako stupaju u interakciju oni zarađuju poene, oni rastu, i udvostručuju veličinu, videćete i kako se potom dele, i tako se razmnožavaju i populacija raste.
But suppose then that one of them mutates. There's a mutation in the gene and one of them mutates to follow a selfish strategy. It takes advantage of the others. And so when a green interacts with a blue, you'll see the green gets larger and the blue gets smaller. So here's how things play out. We start with just one green, and as it interacts it gains wealth or points or food. And in short order, the cooperators are done for. The free-riders have taken over. If a group cannot solve the free-rider problem then it cannot reap the benefits of cooperation and group selection cannot get started.
Ali pretpostavimo da onda jedan od njih mutira. Postoji mutacija u genu i jedan od njih mutira kako bi pratio sebičnu strategiju. Iskorišćava ostale. Pa tako kada je zelena u interakciji sa plavom, videćete da se zelena uvećava a plava se smanjuje. Evo kako se stvari odigravaju. Počeli smo samo sa jednom zelenom, i kako ona stupa u interakciju postiže zaradu ili dobija poene ili hranu. I ukratko, kooperativci su izrađeni. Slobodni jahači su preuzeli. Ako grupa ne može da reši problem slobodnih jahača onda ne može ubrati plodove saradnje i grupna selekcija ne može započeti.
But there are solutions to the free-rider problem. It's not that hard a problem. In fact, nature has solved it many, many times. And nature's favorite solution is to put everyone in the same boat. For example, why is it that the mitochondria in every cell has its own DNA, totally separate from the DNA in the nucleus? It's because they used to be separate free-living bacteria and they came together and became a superorganism. Somehow or other -- maybe one swallowed another; we'll never know exactly why -- but once they got a membrane around them, they were all in the same membrane, now all the wealth-created division of labor, all the greatness created by cooperation, stays locked inside the membrane and we've got a superorganism.
Ali postoji rešenje za problem slobodnih jahača. To i nije toliko težak problem. Zapravo, priroda ga je rešila mnogo, mnogo puta. I omiljeno rešenje prirode jeste da gurne svakog u isti čamac. Na primer, zašto mitohondrija u svakoj ćeliji ima sopstvenu DNK, potpuno odvojenu od DNK jedra? To je zato što je ona bila samostalna slobodno-živeća bakterija a potom su se sjedinili i postali superorganizam. Ovako ili onako -- možda je jedan progutao drugog; nikada nećemo znati tačno zašto -- ali jednom kada je nastala membrana oko njih, bili su svi u okviru iste membrane, sada svaka podela rada u cilju dobiti sva dobrobit nastala saradnjom, ostaje zatvorena unutar membrane i imamo superorganizam.
And now let's rerun the simulation putting one of these superorganisms into a population of free-riders, of defectors, of cheaters and look what happens. A superorganism can basically take what it wants. It's so big and powerful and efficient that it can take resources from the greens, from the defectors, the cheaters. And pretty soon the whole population is actually composed of these new superorganisms. What I've shown you here is sometimes called a major transition in evolutionary history. Darwin's laws don't change, but now there's a new kind of player on the field and things begin to look very different.
I hajde da ponovimo simulaciju gde ćemo staviti jednog od ovih superorganizama u populaciju slobodnih jahača, ili dezertera, ili varalica i pogledajmo šta se dešava. Superorganizam može praktično uzeti šta god zaželi. Toliko je velik i moćan i efikasan da može uzeti resurse od zelenih, od dezertera, od varalica. I vrlo uskoro će čitava populacija biti sačinjena upravo od tih novih superorganizama. Ono šta sam ja pokazao ovde je nešto što se ponekad naziva velika promena u evolutivnoj istoriji. Darvinovi zakoni se ne menjaju, ali sada postoji nova vrsta igrača na terenu i stvari počinju da izgledaju veoma drugačije.
Now this transition was not a one-time freak of nature that just happened with some bacteria. It happened again about 120 or a 140 million years ago when some solitary wasps began creating little simple, primitive nests, or hives. Once several wasps were all together in the same hive, they had no choice but to cooperate, because pretty soon they were locked into competition with other hives. And the most cohesive hives won, just as Darwin said.
Ova promena nije crna ovca prirode koja se desila jednom i nikad više koja se desila sa nekim bakterijama. Ona se dešava ponovo pre oko 120 ili 140 miliona godina kada su neke solitarne ose počele da kreiraju mala, jednostavna, primitivna gnezda, ili košnice. Jednom kada se nekoliko osa našlo u istoj košnici, nisu imale drugog izbora osim da sarađuju, jer su vrlo brzo bile uključene u takmičenje protiv drugih košnica. I najsložnije košnice su pobedile, baš kao što je Darvin rekao.
These early wasps gave rise to the bees and the ants that have covered the world and changed the biosphere. And it happened again, even more spectacularly, in the last half-million years when our own ancestors became cultural creatures, they came together around a hearth or a campfire, they divided labor, they began painting their bodies, they spoke their own dialects, and eventually they worshiped their own gods. Once they were all in the same tribe, they could keep the benefits of cooperation locked inside. And they unlocked the most powerful force ever known on this planet, which is human cooperation -- a force for construction and destruction.
Ove rane ose podstakle su razvoj pčela i mrava koji su prekrili svet i promenili biosferu. I dešava se i dalje, spektakularnije, poslednjih pola miliona godina kada su naši preci postali bića kulture, i okupili se oko ognjišta ili logorske vatre, podelili posao, počeli da oslikavaju svoja tela, govorili sopstvenim dijalektom, i najzad počeli da obožavaju svoje bogove. Nekada su svi bili deo istog plemena, mogli su ubirati plodove saradnje zatvoreni unutar njega. I oslobodili su najsnažniju silu ikada spoznatu na ovoj planeti, a to je ljudska saradnja -- snaga konstrukcije i destrukcije.
Of course, human groups are nowhere near as cohesive as beehives. Human groups may look like hives for brief moments, but they tend to then break apart. We're not locked into cooperation the way bees and ants are. In fact, often, as we've seen happen in a lot of the Arab Spring revolts, often those divisions are along religious lines. Nonetheless, when people do come together and put themselves all into the same movement, they can move mountains.
Naravno, ljudske grupe nisu ni blizu povezane kao što su to košnice. Ljudske grupe mogu izgledati kao košnice na kratko, ali onda imaju tendenciju da se raspadnu. Nismo zatvoreni u saradnju na načini na koji su to pčele i mravi. Zapravo, često, kao što smo videli da se dešavalo u revolucijama Arapskog proleća, često su ti razlazi uporedni sa religijskim pravcima. Pa ipak, kada se ljudi udruže i postanu deo zajedničkog pokreta, mogu pomerati planine.
Look at the people in these photos I've been showing you. Do you think they're there pursuing their self-interest? Or are they pursuing communal interest, which requires them to lose themselves and become simply a part of a whole?
Pogledajte ljude na ovim slikama koje vam pokazujem. Mislite li da oni tamo jure sopstvene interese? Ili da jure zajedničke interese, koji od njih zahtevaju da izgube sebe i prosto postanu deo celine?
Okay, so that was my Talk delivered in the standard TED way. And now I'm going to give the whole Talk over again in three minutes in a more full-spectrum sort of way.
U redu, to bi bio moj govor isporučen na standardni TED način. A sada ću da održim čitav govor ponovo u tri minuta u punom spektrumu.
(Music)
(Muzika)
(Video) Jonathan Haidt: We humans have many varieties of religious experience, as William James explained. One of the most common is climbing the secret staircase and losing ourselves. The staircase takes us from the experience of life as profane or ordinary upwards to the experience of life as sacred, or deeply interconnected. We are Homo duplex, as Durkheim explained. And we are Homo duplex because we evolved by multilevel selection, as Darwin explained. I can't be certain if the staircase is an adaptation rather than a bug, but if it is an adaptation, then the implications are profound. If it is an adaptation, then we evolved to be religious.
(Snimak) Džonatan Hajt: Mi ljudi imamo puno varijeteta religijskog iskustva, kao što je Viljem Džejms objasnio. Jedan od najuobičajenijih je penjanje tajnim stepenicama i gubitak sebe. Stepenice nas vode od životnog iskustva koje je profano ili obično do iskustava koja su sveta, ili duboko povezana. Mi smo Homo dupleks, kao što je Dirkem objasnio. I mi smo Homo dupleks jer smo evoluirali selekcijom na više nivoa, kao što je Darvin objasnio. Ne mogu biti siguran da su stepenice adaptacija a ne greška, ali ako su adaptacija, onda su posledice duboke. Ako je to adaptacija, onda smo evoluirali da budemo religiozni.
I don't mean that we evolved to join gigantic organized religions. Those things came along too recently. I mean that we evolved to see sacredness all around us and to join with others into teams and circle around sacred objects, people and ideas. This is why politics is so tribal. Politics is partly profane, it's partly about self-interest, but politics is also about sacredness. It's about joining with others to pursue moral ideas. It's about the eternal struggle between good and evil, and we all believe we're on the good team.
Ne mislim da smo evoluirali da stvorimo ogromne organizovane religije. Te stvari su došle skorije. Mislim da smo evoluirali da vidimo svetost svuda oko nas i da se udružujemo sa ostalima u timove i kružimo oko svetih objekata, ljudi i ideja. Zato je politika toliko plemenska. Politike su delom profane, delimično u vezi sa ličnim interesima, ali politike su takođe i u vezi sa svetim. Radi se o ujedinjenju sa drugima kako bi se tragalo za moralnim idejama. Ona je u vezi sa večnom borbom između dobra i zla, i mi uvek verujemo da smo u dobrom timu.
And most importantly, if the staircase is real, it explains the persistent undercurrent of dissatisfaction in modern life. Because human beings are, to some extent, hivish creatures like bees. We're bees. We busted out of the hive during the Enlightenment. We broke down the old institutions and brought liberty to the oppressed. We unleashed Earth-changing creativity and generated vast wealth and comfort.
I najvažnije, ako su stepenice stvarne, onda one objašnjavaju konstantno nezadovoljstvo savremenim životom. Jer su ljudska bića, u izvesnoj meri, bića košnica, kao pčele. Mi smo pčele. Razbili smo košnicu tokom Prosvetiteljstva. Razbili smo stare institucije i doneli slobodu potlačenima. Oslobodili smo kreativnost koja menja svet i stvorili ogromno bogatstvo i komfor.
Nowadays we fly around like individual bees exulting in our freedom. But sometimes we wonder: Is this all there is? What should I do with my life? What's missing? What's missing is that we are Homo duplex, but modern, secular society was built to satisfy our lower, profane selves. It's really comfortable down here on the lower level. Come, have a seat in my home entertainment center.
Danas letimo unaokolo kao samostalne pčele i uživamo u svojoj slobodi. Ali nekada se zapitamo: da li je ovo sve što postoji? Šta da radim sa svojim životom? Šta nedostaje? Ono što nedostaje je u vezi sa tim da smo mi Homo dupleks, ali moderno, sekularno društvo je izgrađeno da zadovolji naše niže, profane delove sopstva. Vrlo je udobno ovde dole na tom nižem nivou. Dođite, sedite u moj kućni centar zabave.
One great challenge of modern life is to find the staircase amid all the clutter and then to do something good and noble once you climb to the top. I see this desire in my students at the University of Virginia. They all want to find a cause or calling that they can throw themselves into. They're all searching for their staircase. And that gives me hope because people are not purely selfish.
Veliki izazov savremenom životu jeste da pronađe stepenice usred sve gungule i da potom uradi nešto dobro i plemenito jednom kada se popnete do vrha. Vidim tu želju kod mojih studenata na Univerzitetu u Virdžiniji. Svi oni žele da pronađu svrhu ili poziv čemu se mogu prepustiti. Svi tragaju za svojim stepenicama. I to mi daje nadu da ljudi nisu potpuno sebični.
Most people long to overcome pettiness and become part of something larger. And this explains the extraordinary resonance of this simple metaphor conjured up nearly 400 years ago. "No man is an island entire of itself. Every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main."
Većina ljudi žudi da prevaziđe površnost i postane deo nečeg većeg. I ovo objašnjava izvanrednu rezonancu ove jednostavne metafore opisane pre skoro 400 godina. "Nijedan čovek nije ostrvo potpuno prepušteno sebi. Svaki čovek je deo kontinenta, deo celine."
JH: Thank you.
DžH: Hvala vam.
(Applause)
(Aplauz)