The basics of our society are reflected in how we relate to and treat the children

The basics of our society are reflected in how we relate to and treat the children and the most vulnerable people within our society...

The natural expectations of every child,the biological mandate for healthy bonding that supports the child's growing awareness of self and the child's sense of autonomy as key elements in a healthy society....

This is my song about this:

The expectations of every child
To be held in love, all the time
To know safety with every touch
These are the ways we need, it's not so much...

These are the gifts,that life on earth is meant to bring

The expectations of every child,
Acceptance, gentle guidance with a smile,
Honest answers to their questions of life,
Space to grow, fully assured and bright.

The expectations of every child,
To find a safe place to learn in good time
So that the child knows and trusts the heart
Then grows the child in confidence, that is the art..

The expectation of every child,
To know the family, to feel the line
Of ancient stories, and harmonies
The child is born to know that she is free.

The expectation of every child,
To be respected all the time,
To be chosen with the highest love,
So honour the child you hold, that will be enough.....

These are the gifts that life on earth is meant to bring
Do you bring the gifts? Do we bring the gifts?

You can listen to it at this link, and it is available as a free download.

https://www.reverbnation.com/artist/song_details/1466786

I hope it strikes a chord with you all. For as adults we all share a responsibility to all the children.

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

Adulthood, Maturity, Traumatocracies and Power.

Here are some understandings and insights, supported by detailed scientific analysis and observed reality. about the world we live in that we all really do need to acknowledge.

The behaviour of Power is adverse and it is endangering all our lives, and the lives of our grandchildren and their children to come,  in a variety of ways - from war to wilful pollution, from enforced poverty to environmental degradation, the centralisation of power, the disenfranchisement of the grass roots population and much else besides. These are all outcomes of the way Power is mediated throughout the world. The behaviour of Power is a central issue, and in some ways it can be termed as the primary single issue, the one which binds them all. Power is being abused in both the personal and in the Societal. It is not acceptable in a mature relationship.

There is a reason why these adults are immature and engaged in Power Politics in ways that are adversely affecting so many, many adults and children across the world. The systems of Power we are living with are largely Traumatocracies. They are the outcomes of thousands of years of unresolved trauma, a form of PTSD behaviour patterning that has become solidified in Socialised Institutional Structures passed down from generation to generation.

There is a pathway towards resolving this trauma, and it starts with each and every parent, as each becomes aware of the situation and re-engineers their life with proven knowledge and experience based tools, to re-balance their lives, to come home to being more fully human, to seek to grow, to desire to mature and to become fully engaged with the situation in which one finds oneself. The biological reality is that all organisms tend towards optimal biological health, and this is a fundamental 'rule' of nature, and it is only when a pathology becomes chronic that this drive is thwarted 

"The "prenatal" in our title refers to the period of about nine months including conception and the whole of gestation, while "perinatal" refers to the very short but crucial period of hours involving labor, birth, and establishment of breastfeeding. We believe that both these prenatal and perinatal experiences are formative for both babies and parents, and tend to establish patterns of intimacy and sociality for life. At stake here is quality of life--the quality of personal relationships and the quality of society itself. Ultimately, we like to point out, "Womb ecology becomes world ecology."

from: http://www.birthpsychology.com

"Mission Statement: "Our vision is a world in which all children are treated with dignity, respect, understanding, and compassion. In such a world, every child can grow into adulthood with a generous capacity for love and trust. Our society has no more urgent task."                                      

from: http://www.naturalchild.org

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Thank you for reading this blog.

"Do what you love, it is your gift to universe."

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Is/was George Osborne Bush The Third Evil?

I was asked this question.

"Is George Bush Evil?"

Not really. And this does not let him off the hook. Not a bit of it.

I think there's enough evidence to suggest that Institutions, which are rigidly hierarchical, and violent, and are populated by people, whose actions according to the Instituition's rules, using powers accrued to the Institution, have an adverse affect on many other people, then all those people become to some degree Institutionalised, or conditioned, more or less 'adapted' to a sick society.

And that this can lead to individual. group and mass culturally accepted adverse behavioural issues, related to fear, power and control, which become 'normalised' in the eyes of those growing up into it. What his or her parents, siblings and extended family and community do, how they behave, is the model the child observes, which the biology has mandated as fundamentally empathic in nature.. It's common sense.

Due to historical influences beyond our parents ability to avoid, we were born where we were born. No plan.

And in that situation this could happen to anyone.

Where we are born in this life is an accident of birth.

Fate, not that I subscribe to the idea, could not be so cruel to so many, for so long.

Our long gatherer-hunting-gardener history goes back 1.5 millions years minimum, probably way longer back in time... we don't really know.

As it happens, that history stands as a testimony to Homo Empathicus as a biologically sound organism.

Biologically speaking, not one of us was, at birth, expecting this Society - based on our biology, as in what our biology tells us we ought to be expecting for optimal health. Which is nature's way, after all.

Yet in a traumatising environment, and I see the Dominant Civilisation as a traumatising situation, one that is set in course and maintained by Power and Influence, where are the tools to prevent this cycle from being repeated? ..... for the benefit of all concerned?

It's not rocket science.

Judgements as to 'evil' I find to be self limiting. For me the criteria is 'does this action nourish the world in which it occurs?' Nature says 'does this work, in the present and in the future?' It's that kind of criteria ......

Without mitigating the human emotional realities of the trauma, this thought helps me to find for myself a balance. I understand the shock, rage, horror, revulsion .. the healthy feelings of a sensitive human being facing such adverse behaviour and outcomes. It hurts. It sears the psyche. Pain IS physical.

And yet I sense too that under the very personal as well as the Legal Institutional desire to punish, there is grief.

The ubiquitous urge for revenge, the hyper outrage, the almost religious judge-mentalism of peer pressure, where group identity is hardened, and which is fundamental to political strategy, all of these repeated patterns creates a protective skin, neural pathways habituated to that state, the need to control certain feelings (which contain key information which that person needs) masks amongst other things, a deep grief, loss, scars and fears ... and the urge to push it all away has to be strong, such is the pain of the grief. 

Making myths concrete serves to maintain this control.

That's not to say that the use of violence is not Institutionalised in Hierarchical Societies like ours in a quite conscious and intentional manner. Which is quite an 'evil' action to undertake....

It's all quite sad.

Especially with so much testimony to the natural intelligence and beauty of human birth, infancy and early development, so we KNOW what the natural happiness bench-mark is.

All the more reason, as a conscious adult, a mature human being to engage in looking for practical pathways through this life (a gift of nature) and through observing the lives of others, finding those actions and behaviours and other material realities that nurture that empathic nature our biology mandates.

That's a long game.With regard to people who engage in extremes of abuse through which they harm other people, children, communities, etc... there are aspects of the range of learned manipulative behaviours which are well developed in such harming people, as survival tools are generally, and in the case of abusive people, manipulation is the key tool to maintain control and mask the outcomes of the behaviour, with an inner coldness, outer charm/warmth and many more subtle characteristics. 

ALL these qualities are so at odds with the human biological mandate - homo empathicus - as to be biologically dysfunctional. What baby is born, with this in mind? None!

And the results when harming people like that organise, or build a structure, that structure will reflect their psychology, and if it is institutionalised, it makes the illusion that psychology as being the 'best' psychology more 'concrete', set in stone, so to speak.

Some folk call it '"The way it is.'" and they sigh. It does seem immense. Of course it does. It is.

The larger the organisation, empire the more people whose lives are affected in ways that disrupt the natural development of the natural human biological mandate - homo empathicus - . The more real it's self created myths, the wars they fight for peace, the stronger it's grip on the psyche of those who have no choice but to try to live through it.

The myths aren't real, of course. The myths are lies, and so the 'proof' is manufactured, war is intentional, business like and the cycles of violence continue. Institutionalised. Institutionalising all who come under it's sway.

Institutionalisation is a process that is, in and of itself, dehumanising. It's the de-humani-fication of interpersonal relationships, where everything is a matter of 'form'. Not so much formalities, as life limited by objectification, the key ingredient in Corporate Ideology.

An object is a 'thing', which can be manipulated, as cheaply as possible, so as to generate an outcome that profits the manipulator's boss. His or her owner. An object can also be discarded, Expendable. Fodder. 

Statistics and registers  can be used to turn people into 'things', separate objects, which are then manipulated and used by different factions to make spurious, and often opposing generalisations about how best to organise 'things', (without reference to the pathways the 'things' themselves might self organise, naturally .....). 

And whenever a faction is in Power, they impose their psychology on the people.

It's insane!

It can be VERY cruel and harmful.

Until someone says "Does it really have to be this way?"

And tries to answer it, through diligent yet not too onerous study, honesty and with an open mind and heart, and a healthy respect for scepticism.

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

Nurturant Biology

 'Natural Humans Beings' is one thing. Adapted to Oxytocin. Peace.

'Conditioned/traumatised Human Beings' is another thing. Adapted to Cortisol. Stress.

Each will give up a different emergent Societal Modality.

Or a spectrum of Societal Modes,

Egalitarian, Empathic towards ever more Hierarchially Violent.

Natural Humans Beings is one thing. Adapted to Oxytocin. Mother Child bonding.

Conditioned/traumatised Human Beings is another thing. Adapted to Cortisol. Stress. Indoctrination, War.

Nature undoubtedly tends towards resolution of problems. Oxytocin. Dopamine. Serotonin.

It's in our nature. It takes time.

The wounds are deep, and everywhere.

I TRUST the innate biology of myself, of all of us,
 
it has immense wisdom, bio-logic.
 
The natural self healing, the natural flow towards maturity and nurturing .....

is in everything alive! Or is alive in everything ....

...and

rather than instructions or explicit directions, 

I have found that supportive discourse does help the individual 

to make his or her own pathway, 

using their own inner resources 

and receiving those they may find on the path,

through meeting brothers, sisters, one's recognised family of life

... and seeing all paths connected,

as each path is itself interwoven with all life,

thus there is plenty enough for all to thrive.

And we ARE in it together.









Kindest regards

Corneilius

Nature is Nurturant, and in constant communication..

All of Nature is in communication,  all of what is alive is intelligent and in general all living organisms are engaged in nurturant behaviour, that is nurturing each other. We are aature, more than we are the illusion of ‘civilised’ which we are taught to believe in, which we internalise through the many ways of social conditioning of this culture.

This short video explores some of this concept - nurturant communication - in relation to trees, fungi and forests. There is plenty more evidence of this to be found across the globe, where scientists and others have been engaged in honest exploration.

Our human biology is mandated towards empathy - trust is the default mode of the social being - a form of empathy which is at core an ability to sense the content of the other, because we are experienced. We experience ourselves, and that informs how we respond to the other, in terms of meeting biological needs, in terms of appropriate nurturant behaviour.

This ability is founded on the experience of self empathy - the ability to sense one's own being at all levels and to accurately reflect this outwards = honesty, transparency, congruency. 

Of course this is a skill set learned by the healthy child in the loving embrace of healthy parents, in a health egalitarian mode society. It is not a genetically pre-programmed behavioural dynamic. We learn this.

In recognising the preciousness to me of my life, of my lived experience I recognise that in others, not merely as an intellectual exercise, but as a lived and felt visceral experiential. 

Thus hunting and eating animals, or eating plants can be understood to be part of the processes of life nurturing life for all life, and that these processes can be respected for what they are. Gratitude for the gift of sustenance informs the Natural Hunter, cruelty is generally avoided, and with that respect for the hunted and their particular community, as well as their place in the community of all life.

Hunting is not about dominance, it is not about hierarchy. To interpret natural hunting as such is to project the taught (and internalised) concepts of the 'civilised' onto nature.

The reason the 'civilised' teach this projection with such force is to underpin their error, to make their error seem otherwise and to remove from view any evidence that there is a way of life that emerges from Nature that is empathy based.

Empathy is the experience that Power fears the most, because it can bind people together as they seek to liberate themselves, it can inform people as to the humanity of those Power calls 'the enemy' and it can also inform people as to the psychology of those who hold Power, exposing their frailties and inadequacies in ways that those seeking liberation can utilise.

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

NATURAL CHILD, NATURAL SOCIETY : A presentation

‎

NATURAL CHILD, NATURAL SOCIETY

A Talk given on May 23rd 20122 @ Inspiring Minds Forum,  Mango Landin', London

1. The Psychology of any emergent or given Society/Community/Family is both revealed, and perpetuated, in how that group treats it's children, and especially it's most vulnerable people... address that and you can change the whole society. Failure to address this where it is toxic ensures it's continuation.  Eg: Aboriginal Residential Schools were intentionally designed to alter Aboriginal Society forever. Compulsory Schooling has the same purpose.   John Taylor Gatto “Underground History of American Education” www.johntaylorgatto.com

2. Adolf Hitler, Saddam Hussein, Josef Stalin, Pol Pot, David Cameron, George Osborne, George Bush, Richard Nixon, Tony Blair etc  : What happened to these people when they were ‘in utero’, at birth, when they were babies, infants, toddlers, children, teenagers…. that they turned out like they have? This is a crucial question for each of us and for our culture. Alice Miller “For Your Own Good” http://www.nospank.net/fyog.htm

3. The disruption of the biologically mandated child-mother bonding process sets up a chain of events, leading to emergent violence. Attachment ‘theory’ research on primates.
   
   The flow is as follows: if the child is not related to in ways that nurture self-empathy, then the development of a loss of self-empathy occurs. With that loss comes a loss of empathy for others, a sense of disconnection is felt and with that comes more fear, compounding the fear the trauma generated.
   
   The compounded, layered fear leads directly to a perceived (often unconscious) need to control others and to control the environment.
   
   As all natural organisms are autonomous, self directing growing beings, so too they will resist, to one degree or another, efforts to control them. That resistance generates the use of violence or coercion to impose or retain that control.
   
   In human family or society, if this pattern starts, and is not resolved, then each successive generation will impose that control, and those who hold Power will seek to enhance it, learning as time passes, and the children will grow up in an environment that they will 'adapt' to, the situation demanding the internalisation of that psychological need to control. Anthropology – James Prescott - http://www.violence.de/prescott/bulletin/article.html
   
   
4. What baby/child/person would not be angry, confused or frightened at not experiencing the experientials our biology has mandated? Think of the child left to cry him/her self to sleep in a room away from his or her parents, to scream and cry until finally exhaustion brings sleep. Is this not a common practice in our culture? What of the resignation, the suppression of that rage, the loss of self empathy which ensues from that suppression which is a common outcome of such a practice? Adrenaline, Cortisol vs Oxytocin
   
   Thus the need to control then gets transmitted through the structure of that family or society and over time becomes codified, normalised, embedded, institutionalised. Empire, Hierarchically Violent Societies.

             SOME PERTINENT QUESTIONS

5.  Why has neither the general public nor the secular authorities not moved to confront the Vatican on it’s record of child abuse within it’s Organisation? Linkage of Hierarchical Power Systems.
6. What does this tell us about our Society? Psychological core or root.
7. Why has natural birthing been replaced with ever increasing utilisation of ‘ceasarian section’ as an elective procedure, as a matter of choice? http://www.birthpsychology.com
8. What does coercion of children speak of?   Insecurity, mistrust, fear.
9. Why is Society left out of the therapeutic process? http://www.davidsmail.info/talk01a.htm

Social-Behavioral Characteristics Of Affectionate/Nurturant And Non-Affectionate/Non-Nurturant Primitive Cultures by James W. Prescott

http://www.violence.de/prescott/letters/Social-Behavioral_Characteristics.pdf

James W. Prescott is a developmental neuropsychologist and a cross-cultural psychologist who received his doctorate in psychology from McGill University, Montreal, P.Q. Canada. He served as Assistant Head, Physiological Psychology Branch, Office of Naval Research (1963-1966); as Health Scientist Administrator, Developmental Behavioral Biology Program, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, NIH (1966-1980); and President, Maryland Psychological Association (1970-1971). He was the recipient of the "Outstanding Contributions To Psychology Award, Maryland Psychological Association (1977); the CINE GOLDEN EAGLE AWARD for his contributions, as Scientific Director, to the award winning Time-Life film, "Rock A Bye Baby" (1971); and has given expert testimony on the origins of human violence, particularly domestic violence, before the Senate of Canada; the U.S. Congress; and many other legislative and professional organizations.

SOCIETAL CHARACTERISTICS

HIGH AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

1. Martrilineal

2. Polygyny has low incidence

3. Women's status not inferior

4. Low avoidance of In-Laws

5. Low incidence of Mother-Child households

6. Small community size

7. Low societal complexity

8. Large extended family

9. Wives are not purchased

10. Slavery absent

11. Grand-parental authority over parents is absent

12. Subsistence is primarily by food gathering

13. Low class stratification

14. Political integration at community and family level

15. Metal working is absent

INFANT/CHILD CHARACTERISTICS

HIGH AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

16. High infant physical affection

17. Low infant physical pain

18. High infant indulgence

19. High reduction of infant needs

20. Immediate reduction of infant needs

21. Low infant/child crying

22. Prolonged breast-feeding over 21/z years

23. Low child anxiety over performance of responsible behavior

24. Low child anxiety over performance of obedient behavior

25. High smiling, laughter, humor

26. Low anxiety over transition: infancy/childhood

27. High number of food taboos during pregnancy

28. Abortion permitted

29. Strength of desire for children is low

SEXUAL BEHAVIORAL CHARACTERISTICS

HIGH AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

30. Premarital coitus permitted

31. Extramarital coitus permitted

32. Post-partum sex taboo less than one month

33. Sex disability absent

34. Castration anxiety is low

35. Low sex anxiety

36. Narcissicism is low

37. Low exhibitionistic dancing

SOCIETAL CHARACTERISTICS

LOW AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

1. Patrilineal

2. Polygyny has high incidence

3. Women's status inferior

4. High avoidance of In-Laws

5. High incidence of Mother-Child households

6. High community size

7. High societal complexity

8. Small extended family

9. Wives are purchased

10. Slavery present

11. Grand-parental authority over parents is present

12. Subsistence is primarily by food production

13. High class stratification

14. Political integration at state level

15. Metal working is present

INFANT/CHILD CHARACTERISTICS

LOW AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

16. Low infant physical affection

17. High infant physical pain

18. Low infant indulgence

19. Low reduction of infant needs

20. Delayed reduction of infant needs

21. High infant/child crying

22. Breast-feeding less than 21/a years

23. High child anxiety over performance of responsible behavior

24. High child anxiety over performance of obedient behavior

25. Low smiling, laughter, humor

26. High anxiety over transition: infancy/childhood

27. Low or no food taboos during pregnancy

28. Abortion highly punished

29. Strength of desire for children is high

SEXUAL BEHAVIORAL CHARACTERISTICS

LOW AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

30. Premarital coitus punished

31. Extramarital coitus punished

32. Post-partum sex taboo greater than one month

33. Sex disability present

34. Castration anxiety is high

35. High sex anxiety

36. Narcissism is high

37. High exhibitionistic dancing

WAR/VIOLENCE/CRIME CHARACTERISTICS

HIGH AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

38. Low adult physical violence

39. Low or no warfare

40. Low military glory

41. Bellicosity is low

42. Low or absent killing, torture, mutilation

43. Low personal crime

44. Incidence of theft is low

WAR/VIOLENCE/CRIME CHARACTERISTICS

LOW AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

38. High adult physical violence

39. High warfare

40. Military glory emphasized

41. Bellicositiy is extreme

42. High killing, torture, mutilation

43. High personal crime

44. Incidence of theft is high

JUSTICE/RELIGIOUS/SUPERNATURAL CHARACTERISTICS

HIGH AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

45. High God is mainly absent

46. Low or no religious activity

47. Superordinate justice absent

48. Supernatural are benevolent

49. Fear of humans rather than fear of supernatural

50. Belief in reincarnation absent

51. Low ascetecism in mourning

52. Witchcraft low or absent

53. Religious specialists are part-time

NOTE: The above social-behavioral characteristics of primitive cultures have been derived from: R.B. Textor (1967) A Cross-Cultural Summary, HRAF Press New Haven.

JUSTICE/RELIGIOUS/SUPERNATURAL CHARACTERISTICS

LOW AFFECTIONATE/NURTURANT CULTURES

45. High God is present

46. High religious activity

47. Superordinate justice present

48. Supernatural are aggressive

49. Fear of supernatural rather than fear of humans

50. Belief in reincarnation present

51. High ascetecism in mourning

52. Witchcraft highly present

53. Religious specialists are full time

Matrilineal cultures are those where inheritance follows the female line; Polygynous cultures are those where men have several wives and is a measure of sexual exploitation and control of women by men; High desire for children is a measure that reflects exploitation of children: high value of male and female fertility; and use of children as economic resource, thus, its linkage with abortion being punished. Presence of a Supernatural (High God) with high religious activity in low affectionate/nurturant cultures reflects the need for "divine love" when human love is absent or significantly diminished. Similarity, God is made unto the image and likeness of man — violent cultures have violent Gods; peaceful cultures have peaceful/benevolent Gods.

------------------------

BIOLOGY

WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENS IN NATURE AS A WHOLE?

FALSE LOGIC OF THE ‘EXCEPTION’?

H.ORMONES - THE HEART AS  HORMONAL REGULATOR, OCYTOCIN, ADNERALINE, CORTISOL, DISRUPTION OF NATURAL STRESS MECHANISMS

THE HEART AS A COGNITIVE ORGAN OF PERCEPTION – HOW THIS WORKS, BIOLOGICAL EMPATHY.

ADAPTATION AS A LEARNING PROCESS:  NOT ‘HIT AND MISS’, NOT ‘RANDOM’, BUT EXTREMELY PRECISE.

NEUROPLASTICITY – WHAT DOES THAT TELL US ABOUT ‘ADAPTATION’?

BEHAVIOUR

TRAUMA CYCLES AND BEHAVIOURS – COPING AND RECOVERY.

SOCIETAL BEHAVIOUR PATTERNS – HOW THEY EVOLVE.

INTERGENERATIONAL TRAUMA PATTERNS – WHY THEY PERSIST.

INSTITUTIONALISATION – GLORIFICATION OF WAR, POWER, HATRED, PROPERTY.

ANTHROPOLOGY

BIOLOGICAL EMPATHY – PARENTING, MEMORY OF CHILDHOOD, EXPERIENCE OF CARING IN EMPATHIC ABORIGINAL SOCIETIES, BACTERIA, EMPATHY AS A BODY-SENSORY EXPERIENCE,

WHY ARE WE DIFFERENT? WHAT ARE WE DOING AND WHY ARE WE DOING IT?

CHILD ‘REARING’ – POISONOUS PEDAGOGY, ELITE PRACTICE.

TRADING ON PARENTS FEARS – WHAT ARE THOSE FEARS?

JAMES PRESCOTT’S WORK WITH JOHN BOLWBY,AND BEYOND …

RESURGENCE IN ABORIGINAL MOTHERING, LANGUAGE AND CULTURE.

SOLUTIONS

PARENTING – TRUST IN OUR BIOLOGICAL MANDATE.

IF PARENTS CAN UNDERSTAND THE SITUATION THEY ARE PLACED IN AND HOW IT CAN HARM THEIR CHILDREN, WILL THEY ACT ON WHAT THEY KNOW?

WILL THEY ACT CONSTRUCTIVELY OR DESTRUCTIVELY?

COMMUNITY – HOW NATURE FUNCTIONS.

UNDERSTANDING THE SITUATION WE ARE IN – AVOIDING THE COMFORT OF CONSPIRACY THEORIES, FANTASY OR IDEOLOGICAL SOLUTIONS, STICKING TO RELIABLE PROOFS.

EMPATHY AND SELF EMPATHY IN SELF GOVERNANCE.

RAISING CHILDREN WHO WILL RESPOND RATHER THAN REACT.

REALISM : START WITH SELF, EXTEND OUTWARDS LOCALLY.

TIME AND PROCESS, NATURE AS A CUE, AND AS A SOURCE OF CLUES.

CONFRONTING ‘RECEIVED WISDOM’ WITH DATA, EXPERIENCE, EMPATHY.

NOTE : Another component of the heart-brain communication system was provided by researchers studying the hormonal system. The heart was reclassified as an endocrine gland when, in 1983, a hormone produced and released by the heart called atrial natriuretic factor (ANF) was isolated.

This hormone exerts its effect on the blood vessels, on the kidneys, the adrenal glands, and on a large number of regulatory regions in the brain. It was also found that the heart contains a cell type known as 'intrinsic cardiac adrenergic'' (ICA) cells. Theses cells release noradrenaline and dopamine neurotransmitters, once thought to be produced only by neurons in the CNS.

More recently, it was discovered that the heart also secretes oxytocin, commonly referred to as the 'love' or bonding hormone. In addition to its functions in childbirth and lactation, recent evidence indicates that this hormone is also involved in cognition, tolerance, adaptation, complex sexual and maternal behaviours, learning social cues and the establishment of enduring pair bonds. Concentrations of oxytocin in the heart were found to be as high as those found in the brain.

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

How could I NOT love ALL the children equally

ANY ADULT WHO DOES NOT immediately ACT effectively and with force and clear intent to STOP AN ABUSER OF CHILDREN is the abusers friend, and the child's enemy. They are enemies of healthy community.

There is in the 'lynch mob' also those who wish to use the Church as a way of avoiding looking at how the State treats children, how Society misinforms parents as to their proper relationships towards children, especially towards ALL children, not just 'their own children' .. for example mothers letting their children enlist in the Military ...

I recall looking at my daughter and welling up with a fierce love for her, and having an insight which said "I love you, and loving you as I do, how could I NOT love ALL the children equally, and I still recognise and know the deep personal connection I have with my daughter is special, but not separate".

At that moment my entire world changed forever. In that moment I became truly adult.

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe

'Evolutionary' Origins of Religion: a trauma model

*the use of the tem 'evolutionary' is entirely satrical in the context of this essay. Religion and evolvution are two mutually exclusive dynamics..

My own view regarding Evolution and Religion (The Evolutionary Origins of Religion) emerges from my own life experience and from my readings of the work of John Bolwby, James Prescott , Alice Miller, Robert Sapolsky, Judith Herman, Allan Schore and many, many others who have explored the psychology of the biological mandate towards empathy,  (and the disruption of that biological mandate) which is based on the lived experience of self empathy from within the womb, through infancy and onwards throughout life.

 Joseph Chilton Pearce suggests in his research that self empathy, awareness of self, starts within the womb.

Self awareness and awareness of other exists in a pre-verbal reality that is experienced, in such manner that the material and social meaning of the experience is known to the experiencer: this is called direct or experiential cognition.

Others have described what is called  Liminal Consciousness a silent, non verbal full spectrum reality cognition that is shared within a group,  usually groups that are what we can call pre-conquest egalitarian cultures.

"When similar child nurture was later seen spawning similar consciousness in isolated enclaves elsewhere, it became clear that a type of mentality very different from world norms today existed widely in prehistory. Such mentality emerges from a sociosensual nurture common to such peoples but shunned in Westernized societies"

Prescott's  research has found an emergent pattern of Social Behaviour amongst Societies where the natural child-mother bonding processes are disrupted, of increased Religiosity, Hierarchy and Institutionalized Violence all of which exist in proportion to the levels of disruption to the child-mother bonding processes.

Furthermore he was able to link disruption of the adolescent exploration of sexuality to the emergence of these Societal traits.

All of these experientials are embodied lived experiences, that is to say they are experienced and known primarily through the body, the senses and are biologically mandated as vitally  important life learning processes.

This 'disruption' could be called the Trauma model of the Evolutionary Origins of Religion.

David Chamberlain has written :

"From the second month of pregnancy, experiments and observations reveal an active prenate with a rapidly developing sensory system permitting exquisite sensitivity and responsiveness. Long before the development of advanced brain structures, prenates are seen interacting with each other and learning from experience. They seem especially interested in the larger environment provided by mother and father, and react to individual voices, stories, music, and even simple interaction games with parents. The quality of the uterine environment is determined principally by parents.

The opportunities for parents to form a relationship with the baby in the womb are significant and remarkable. This contrasts sharply with the previous view that prenates did not have the capacity to interact, remember, learn, or put meaning to their experiences"

It is quite obvious that those with innate or natural self empathy intact know or can better better, at a visceral pre-verbal level, how to relate to others, to meet their own and others needs, because they sense the other in intimate ways associated with their own sense of self empathy. They are more perceptive and more responsive to information contained within the other because they can more fully sense themselves.

Conversely, those whose natural self empathy has been somehow damaged have greater difficulty in relating to others, and require a set of external guidelines to manage their relationships.

This is the thrust of the work of Heinz Kohut

The resolution of the issue of damaged self-empathy would lead towards a spiritual or personally rational 'inner' motivated outlook, rather than religious 'externally driven' or societally rationalised outlook on life. Prescott's research demonstrates that where these key experientials are not disrupted, a more egalitarian societal behaviour emerges.

In terms of evolution, and of well being, it is clear that empathy, founded on experienced self-empathy is a crucially vital socialising characteristic, because it enables a visceral understanding of the world within, and of the world in which a human being is living, an almost direct perception of the value and meaning of life, and a grasping of the value of others lives to those others, and in particular the lives of other organisms that are the food we eat. This is the basis for the oft quoted respect many Aboriginal societies afford the creatures and plants within their environments, upon which they are dependent for food, medicine and other materials.

James Prescott outlined in some detail the societal behavioural characteristics to be found within a spectrum or bandwidth of societies, ranging from empathic egalitarian through to totalitarian hierarchical societies, and traced the emergence of these characteristics to the disruption or nurturing of two crucial empathic experiential learning points in the life of a human being.

From an evolutionary viewpoint, Imposed Hierarchical Religion can be seen as an evolutionary mismatch.

That is to say that whilst spirituality of some form is probably innate, and that perhaps the natural wonder so many experience (especially small children)  when we allow ourselves to simply gaze at nature and allow nature into us, is an expression of this, and that this wonder tends towards assisting in the development of nurturing relationships.

Whereas Religiosity is learned, and tends towards exclusive yet low-urturant relationships primarily with those who share the same religious viewpoints, and at the same time, religiosity  tends towards aversion of the other and or fear of other viewpoints. The history of sectarianism within religions and ideologies is all too often bloody and brutal evidence of this.

In evolutionary terms this means the person or society who is subject to imposed religiosity, or indeed ideology, (which is almost always imposed through the agency of Institutionalised Power) will be less willing to co-operate with the 'other' or to recognise it's own interdependency with all of life, and this therefore increases the likelihood of sustained behaviours that damage the environment, which inevitably reduces it's long term survival possibilities. The evidence for this lies all around us.

I have traced a path way of disruption, based on my understanding of Trauma and PTSD, which leads to the excessive control and violence associated with Institutionalised Power Religions, with Lateral Violence, Abusive Family dynamics, and much else besides.


a basic outline : loss of  self empathy due to trauma -> loss of empathy for others -> sense of disconnection from what nurtures -> compounds fear associated with trauma -> leads to excessive desire for control of self, others, environment -> leads to violence to control self, others, environment

To survive a trauma event often requires that a person undergoing the trauma suppresses his or her feelings in order to survive. This would also apply to a community that is being traumatised. If, post trauma, that person or community is unable to resolve those suppressed feelings, the suppression remains, and children born to that person or community will grow up with that suppression as part of their psychology. Such suppression leads to a disruption of self-empathy, because it leads to shutting down certain feelings or groups of feelings.

The loss of self-empathy leads to a loss of empathy for others, which can also be described as a loss of empathy for all that nurtures one, or a sense of disconnection from all that nurtures one. This will generate fear, which compounds the fear associated with the trauma, and leads directly to a sensed need to control the people, environment or world around one in order to have certain perceived needs met.

When any autonomous organism is subjected to external control, it will resist, and this is where violence is utilised, to break that resistance. That violence can be physical or psychological. It can be immediate and final or long term and sustained.

Naturally enough, a community or family that has been traumatised, and has been unable to resolve the feelings suppressed, will pass that on to the next generation. As each successive generation 'evolves' evolves they will inject that psychology into the structures they create around their system, structures that will become core beliefs, attitudes and over time Institutionalised patterns of permitted behaviour.

If a child somehow retains some of his or her original natural autonomy, which is a core biological and evolutionary trait, then violence, both physical and psychological, will be permitted to be utilised against that child to break the child, to show the child who is master. This is the basis for what is called 'Poisonous Pedagogy' which has a long and well documented history in Europe.

Recent calls from UK Government Ministers and Teachers Unions for more Power to control children in schools reveals that this is still an active paradigm within the UK - the 21st Century is still Governed by Mediaeval and Victorian attitudes. David Cameron's call that children ought to 'stand up when an adult enters the class room' is very revealing, though he himself is totally unaware of what he is revealing.

Likewise the Catholic Pope's record on dealing with widespread child abuse within Catholicism, and the stance of so many Catholics in protecting both the Pope and the Institution of The Vatican.

Baroness Varsi, a UK 'Muslim' Peer, visited the Pope recently, and made no comment whatsoever on the issues facing the Vatican. Because those same issues are pertinent to ALL Governance as we know it today.




Evolution of life on Earth is more about interdependency, co-operation, mutualism, nurture than it is about competition, mere survival, hierarchical or linear growth. Religiosity is clearly of the latter stream, and is an evolutionary mismatch. The same can be said of ideology, nationalism, sexism, racism. That many people have been questioning these latter attitudes for so long, in a climate of almost constant oppression and denial, speaks to the innate power of our natural biological mandate towards self empathy and empathy for others.


Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe