24 June 1999, 823 words
Immortality may well be the most pernicious idea ever conceived by the human mind. It was also inevitable. The evolution of human nature made it so. The first step was spoken language. As human beings began speaking, they would soon have noticed how a concrete thing (an object) was represented by a sound (a word) and that this word itself represented something real yet intangible (an abstraction). Thus was born the concept of the Mind.
Given our psychology, which is rooted in biology, the concept of immortality was a logical step. First, the survival instinct is programmed into our genes. Second, all we know of ourselves is our Ego. Put the two together, and a belief that the ego survives physical extinction was inevitable. Thus was born the concept of the Soul.
Of course, homo sapiens is an extremely pragmatic creature. So while it was all very well to believe that one's soul might survive, such faith didn't stop human beings from attending assiduously to their biological immortality - i.e. having children so that their genes would be passed on.
As the human mind and human society became more complex, religion and its attendant rituals naturally kept pace. I suspect that our prehistoric ancestors were never as certain about immortality as so many people are today. Primitive religions tend to have powerful gods, but not omnipotent ones. Omnipotence appears to be a relatively modern concept. This may be so because primitive peoples do not require much from their gods: good hunting and good weather will pretty much do it. But as human beings began mastering their environment, through better weapons and better tools and better agriculture, they began to desire even more power. That is also part of human nature. And if your god is omnipotent and you can perform rituals or say words which may persuade that god to grant your desires, then you share in that omnipotence.
But even then, humans remained pragmatic. Survival was always our basic axiom. But it was no longer a simple biological issue. Even when our foremost concern was individual survival, parents would still sacrifice themselves to protect their offspring. In other words, genetic survival supersedes bodily survival. In modern times, we have people who will die for religious or political causes: in other words, for those persons, survival of the Mind supersedes both physical and genetic survival.
It is at this point that immortality became a pernicious concept. For one thing that profoundly shocked me during the recent "debates" on capital punishment was the casual manner in which pundits and pastors and their followers talked about the executions. And I realized that, in these people's minds, no one was really being killed. After all, the dead men were either going to reincarnate or, if they repented, their souls were going to Heaven. It is very easy to treat life casually if you are certain of such things; and it reminded me that it is those who believe they know, instead of knowing they believe, who have been responsible for nearly all of the world's atrocities.
Perhaps this is also why public figures - all God-fearing citizens, of course - never seem concerned about how history will portray them after they are dead. But I read about the Incas, who had a class of wise men called amautas whose duty it was to preserve their history and legends. The chronicler Cieza de Leon, writing in the mid-16th century after the Spanish Conquest, says, "It was the custom among the Incas that the king, as soon as he died, should be mourned with much lamentation...When these ceremonies were over, the oldest people of the country discussed the life and acts of the recently deceased king, considering whether he had done good for the country and what battles he had gained over the country's enemies. Having settled these questions...they decided whether [he] had been so fortunate as to merit praise and fame and to deserve that his memory should be ever preserved. They then called for the great quiposcamayos, who preserve the records and understand how to give an account of the events that occur in the kingdom. Next they communicated with those who were most expert in rhetoric and the use of words [and instructed them] what to say concerning the deceased lord."
So everybody may want to consider this possibility: suppose we are not immortal and all that we really leave behind are our relationships, our reputations and our deeds? And public persons might especially want to consider this: who are the quiposcamayos whose accounts about them will be read or watched by future generations?
I can give two guarantees. One, it won't be the hired hacks, either of politicians or ethnic organizations, who will determine how our history or biographies are written. And two, most of those persons who are prominent now will be only footnotes in the future.
Copyright ©1999 Kevin Baldeosingh