Scientifically Deconstructing World War III as an Effective Political Tool:
One other important thing has changed since I wrote the last book.
World War III began on Sunday, July 16th, 2006.
Suddenly, my story got a lot easier to tell.
When Newt Gingrich announced on national television that he intended to urge Congress to react to the increasing world-wide armed opposition America is facing and declare World War III, he raised the stakes in the struggle between religious fundamentalist lunatics and everyone else to its highest point yet.
The Republicans’ strongest supporters are eagerly awaiting the final battle for the fate of the world, and so are most of America’s worst enemies. When Mr. Gingrich announced his intentions and his intentions would be easy to carry out, he threatened everyone the United States would declare World War III against. Now those people could be expected to react accordingly even before the declaration was made official. As a result of those people reacting to the unofficial declaration of World War III, the official declaration would be that much easier to make. Mr. Gingrich was trying to write a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Luckily, I saw this coming years ago, and was already waiting for it. Mr. Gingrich seemed to think that declaring World War III was the most dramatic thing anyone could ever do. Unfortunately for him, it’s only the second most dramatic thing anyone could do. And I’ve already done the first.
By simple virtue of their membership in the Homo sapiens species, everyone on Earth is guaranteed (or at least, can be expected) to want to survive, be safe, feel safe, have relationships, have sex, have families, make friends, be respected, feel good, use their abilities to make lives for themselves, and use their abilities as much as possible to make lives for themselves.
That sounds like basic common sense to many people. The difference between being able to predict these things scientifically based on human evolution and being able to observe them in any other way is that by being able to predict them scientifically a person can see that they apply to every single person on Earth without exception. (Or technically, there could be some people some of these things don’t apply to as a result of rare genetic mutations, and some people who are affected by all of these things but don’t act upon some of them, but for all intents and purposes, all of these are characteristics of the species Homo sapiens.)
From a humanitarian standpoint, the scientists have discovered a universal language of humanity that allows anyone, from any part of the world, to talk to anyone else, from any other part of the world, about things that both people are guaranteed to feel are important.
From an organizational standpoint, the scientists have discovered a set of rules that everyone agreed to follow at the moment they joined the Homo sapiens species. To anyone who understands that set of rules, it’s clear to see that no group of people can remain a cooperative group indefinitely by trying to force any of its members to break those rules. Any social structure, from a romantic partnership up to the global community, that denies some of its members basic opportunities to make their lives feel complete forces those people to fight back against the social structure.
From a personal empowerment standpoint, this is a working understanding of the science that allows people to use statistical predictions to control other people’s behavior. People are naturally attracted to things that make them feel good and avoid things that make them feel bad. Currently, this science is a resource that’s controlled by a small group of people (such as advertisers and politicians), who use it to control other people’s behavior by creating conditions that make people feel either good or bad. If that same understanding of human behavior was spread to everyone, then everyone could understand the origins of their own good and bad feelings, and find ways to satisfy them on their own.
From a legal standpoint, these universal evolutionary laws are a Universal Bill of Human Rights, which wasn’t written by any person, which doesn’t depend on anyone to enforce, which applies equally to everyone, and which no one can change or corrupt. This Evolutionary Bill of Human Rights consists of all the basic things Homo sapiens are guaranteed to need to feel like their lives are complete. Any social structure that attempts to deny these things to any of its people oppresses it people by definition. This Evolutionary Bill of Human Rights is enforced by the simple fact that any time people’s Evolutionary Human Rights are violated, those people will resist (even if only indirectly) with the ultimate result that the society will be destabilized.
From a political standpoint, that set of evolutionary laws is the Constitution of the Human Race, because it is the set of laws that all human behavior revolves around. Virtually every functional community in the modern world has some form of constitution that spells out what each of its members can expect from the others. These universal evolutionary laws are the Constitution of the global community of the 21st century. As with the Evolutionary Bill of Human Rights, the Constitution of the Human Race was not written by anyone, does not depend on anyone to enforce, applies equally to everyone, and is impossible for anyone to change, escape, or corrupt.
With an understanding of these universal evolutionary laws, citizens can prevent government officials from denying they exist. Under a secular government, citizens equipped with an understanding of evolutionary laws can prevent anyone from pretending they shouldn’t be recognized in court or public schools, and can hold political leaders accountable for knowing them.
The Bible has been successful as a foundation for a civilization because it’s a reference book to life and a story of the world. Every civilization on Earth has a reference source to life and a story of the world. My reference book to life is a new story of the world that scientists, artists, philosophers, religious leaders, and progressive activists from all over the world have been trying to help tell for decades.
So in protest of intelligent design, Christian fundamentalism, President Bush, and the prospects of Armageddon being used as a political tool, I took out my copyright on the alternate title The Third Testament©.
Then I recorded the entire book as an audio book and posted it on my website for free download. Now that the scientists have done all they’ve done to discover a universal understanding of humanity, I’m seeing to it that it gets distributed universally to humanity.
Since religious fundamentalists want an ultimate duel for the fate of the world, that’s exactly what I’m giving them—only I’m giving it to them on my terms, before they can start it on their own terms. If I show everyone how to recognize what they have in common with everyone else in the world and how they can overcome their differences, then everyone else can bring about Peace on Earth in spite of the religious fundamentalists. Then the only way for the religious fundamentalists to get the battle of Armageddon they so desperately want would be by starting it themselves. And I think the Bible is pretty specific about whose side the people who start the battle of Armageddon are on…
I’ve met a lot of moderate Christians and other progressively-minded religious people who are trying to oppose religious fundamentalism and integrate their religions with modern science, who don’t even realize—yet—just how much science exists to support their beliefs that people can and should get along with each other and work toward Peace on Earth. Jesus, Mohammed, Moses, Lao Tzu, the Buddha, Dekanawidah, and every other great leader in history has done the exact same job: Teach Homo sapiens how to build functional civilizations by using intellect and force of will to consider the long-term effects of their actions before acting upon their immediate feelings.
Every civilization that has ever survived but didn’t have a single great leader has survived because multiple leaders figured out how to do the same job collectively. If scientists are finally figuring out how to do on a global scale what all those leaders taught their followers to do, it would seem that the final phase of an important process has been reached. That would seem to imply that we’d better pay attention and figure out how to complete it.
Simultaneously, I’m proving it is possible for one book to serve as the foundation for a peaceful, sustainable global civilization, just like the Christian fundamentalists thought—but it’s not the book they’ve been using. Or at least, not the way they’ve been using it. The Old Testament, the New Testament, the Koran, the Tao Te Ching, and every other book that has ever served as the foundation for a religion essentially is just a different version of the same book: a book that builds upon what a certain group of Homo sapiens already understood about the world to teach them how to build functional communities. So many great leaders have figured out the exact same trick over the course of history that all there was left for me to do was to imitate it.
The progress of science depends on people knowing the right questions to ask and daring to ask them. To this point, Christian fundamentalists have done a lot to prevent both of those things from happening. But if I dare to challenge religious fundamentalism in a way no one imagined possible, then if, for instance, concerned parents listen to the book and then ask their children’s biology teachers to listen to it and tell them whether or not I know what I’m talking about, then people are daring to ask the right questions. Problem solved.
If a lot of college students listen to the book and hear how much use evolution can be in civil rights and preventing the draft from being reinstated, and then start asking their human sciences professors whether or not I know what I’m talking about, they’re bound to attract a lot of support for evolution.
Even if the only people I can reach are rebellious teenagers who are too young to vote but are old enough to see they’re inheriting a world full of problems they never voted for, and they come listen to the book just because it infuriates so many adults who are causing the problems in the first place, and they start asking their biology teachers whether or not I know what I’m talking about, I still give them everything they need to counter-hijack their futures back from the Christian fundamentalists all by themselves.
In short, any problem that religious fundamentalists choose to create in order to win a political advantage by promising to solve, evolutionary science already offers an easier, more practical, and more humane solution for, which now includes their attempting to start the battle of Armageddon. If they want to try to summon the Second Coming of Christ by starting the final battle for the fate of the world, they’ll have no one but themselves to blame if a lot of their opponents start reading a book called The Third Testament© to learn how to stop them.
I am able to out maneuver the religious fundamentalists at every step because I speak the universal language of human evolution, while they confine their perspectives on the world to ancient religious dogmas. Now I’m teaching that universal language to anyone who wants to learn it. Regardless of whether the Christian fundamentalists choose to stick to the evolution versus intelligent design debate, or declare World War III, or anything in between, anyone who learns the universal language of humanity will be equipped to solve the problems the religious fundamentalists are creating better than the religious fundamentalists themselves can solve them. Anyone who speaks the universal language of humanity will be able to find solutions that everyone in the world can potentially agree with and feel like cooperating with, rather than confining their potential supporters to a specific group of people who follow an ancient religious tradition.
Within three days of my posting my audio book on my site, about a hundred other people were posting it on their websites. That was in April of 2006. By this point, there’s no way to tell how many copies people have made, or where they all are.
I never put a gun to any Christian fundamentalists’ heads and told them to try to win elections by starting World War III. They made that decision of their own free will. It’s not my fault if their new political strategy turns into the biggest joke in history.