Categoria: Idiomas

Does extraterrestrial life exist?

Leonardo BoffDeixe um comentário

NASA scientists have discovered a Trappist-1 star, 39 light years from the Earth, with seven rocky planets, three of which have possibilities of water and consequently of life. This discovery has raised again the question of the eventuality of extraterrestrial life.

Let us reflect on the theme, based on notable names in this area.

The Earth sciences and the knowledge coming from the new cosmology have accustomed us to putting all these questions in the framework of the great cosmic evolution. Everything is in a process of genesis, a condition for life to emerge.

Life is considered the most complex and mysterious reality of the universe. The fact is that near 3.8 billion years ago, in an ocean or primordial marsh, under the action of unimaginable tempests of rays and cosmic elements from the Sun, interacting with the geochemistry of the Earth, took to the extreme the complexity of inanimate forms. Suddenly the barrier was surpassed: about 20 amino acids and four phosphate basis were created. Like a great lightning bolt striking the sea or marsh the first living being emerged.

As a qualitative jump in our bent space-time, in a corner of our median galaxy, in a secondary sun, in a planet of quantité négligeable, of medium size, in the Earth, the great novelty emerged: life. The Earth went though 15 massive great extinctions but, as if it were a plague, life was never extinguished.

Let us quickly review the internal logic that permitted life to emerge. The matter and energy of the universe, as they continue their process of expansion, tend to become ever more complex. Each system is in a set of interactions, a dance of inter-exchange of matter and energy, in a permanent dialogue with their environment and always retaining information.

Biologists and biochemists, such as Ilya Prigogine (1977 chemistry Nobel laureate), affirm that there is a continuity between living and inert beings. We need not appeal to a transcendental or external principle to explain the appearance of life, as religions and classic cosmology often do. It is sufficient that the universal principle, including of life, (called the cosmogenetic principle), of complexity, of self-organizing and self-creation, would have been present in embryonic form in that smallest little point that had emerged from the Basic Energy, and later exploded. One of the best present day physicists, Amit Goswami, maintains the thesis that the universe is mathematically inconsistent without the existence of a supreme ordering principle, God. This is why, to him, the universe is self-conscious. (The self aware universe, 1998).

The Earth is not alone in having the privilege of life. According to Christian de Duve, biology 1974 Nobel laureate: «There are as many living planets in the universe as there are planets capable of generating and of sustaining life. A conservative estimate puts their number into the billions. Billions of biospheres ply the space with billions of planets channeling matter and energy in the creative processes of evolution. In any direction of space that we may look there is life (…). The universe is not an inert cosmos of physics, with a pinch of life as a precaution. The universe is life with the necessary structures surrounding it» (Vital Dust: Life as a Cosmic Imperative, 1996. Polvo vital: La vida como imperativo cósmico, Río de Janeiro, 1997, 383).

It is to astronomy’s credit that it has identified, in the millimeter fringe, a group of molecules in which can be found everything that is essential to start the process of biological synthesis. (Longair, M., The origins of our universe, Río de Janeiro, 1994, 65-66). Amino acids have been found in meteorites. These certainly are the eventual carriers of the archeo-bacteria of life. Probably there were several beginnings of life, many of them frustrated, until life was definitively established.

It is presumed that the most diverse forms of life come from only one original bacterium(Wilson, O. E., The diversity of life, 1994). With the mammals emerged a new quality of life: emotional sensibility and caring. Among the mammals, about some 70 million years ago, the primates stood out; then, some 35 million years ago, the superior primates, our genealogical grandparents, and some 17 million years ago, our predecessors, the hominids. About 8-10 million years ago the human being, the australopithecine, emerged in Africa. Finally, around 100 thousand years ago, there appeared the Homo sapiens-sapiens/demens-demens, of whom we are immediate inheritors (Hubert Reeves and others, The most beautiful story in the world, 1998).

Life is not the fruit of chance (contrary to Jacques Monod, Chance and necessity, 1979). Biochemists and molecular biologists have shown (thanks to random number generating computers), the mathematical impossibility of simple and pure chance. For the amino acids and the two thousand underlying encimas to come close enough together to form a living cell would take billions and billions of years, much more than the 13.7 billion year actual age of the universe.

The so-called chance is expression of our ignorance. We estimate that ascending evolution will produce more and more life, even extraterrestrial.

Leonardo BoffT heologian-Philosopher, of the Earthcharter Commission

Free translation from the Spanish sent by
Melina Alfaro, alfaro_melina@yahoo.com.ar.
Done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.

Trump is violating the first virtue of world society

Leonardo Boff2 Comentários

The United States has always distinguished itself for being an extremely hospitable country, because, except for the original Native Nations, practically all of the Northamerican population is derived from immigrants. The same happened in Brazil, which received representatives of at least 60 different peoples.
The democratic spirit and respect for religious differences are enshrined in the Constitution of the United States. Now comes a President, Donald Trump, who has broken a long Northamerican tradition: the respect for religious differences; by rejecting the Moslem population, especially people coming from Syria, and the traditional hospitality for the various types of people who came or are coming to the United States.

In his last book, “Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch”, the philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) proposed a world republic, (Weltrepublik), fundamentally based on two principles: hospitality and respect for human rights.

For Kant, hospitality, (he uses the Latin expression, “die Hospitalität”), is the first virtue of this world republic, because «all of humanity lives on the Earth, and all, without exception, have the right to live on her and to visit her places and peoples; the Earth belongs to everyone in common». Hospitality is a right and the duty of all.

The second principle consists of the human rights that Kant considers «the apple of God’s eyes» or «the most sacred that God gave the Earth». Respecting them make possible the birth of a community of peace and security that puts a definitive end «to the infamous belligerency».

This hospitality is being denied in Europe to thousands of refugees who are fleeing the wars sponsored by peoples from the West. This same hospitality is consciously and explicitly being rejected by Donald Trump to thousands and even millions of foreign “illegal” workers.

In this context is worth remembering one of the most beautiful myths of Greek culture, the hospitality offered by an elderly couple – Filemon and Baucis – to two divinities: Jupiter, the supreme god of Greece, and his companion, the god Hermes.

The myth goes that Jupiter and Hermes disguised themselves as miserable wanderers, in order to test how much hospitality still remained on Earth. They were rejected by all, everywhere they went.

But one late afternoon, very hungry and tired, they were warmly welcomed by this elderly couple, who washed their feet, offered them food and a bed where they could rest. These acts of hospitality moved the gods.

When Jupiter and Hermes were getting ready to rest, taking off their rags, they decided to reveal their true divine nature. In an instant they transformed the humble shack into an splendid temple. Frightened, the kind elderly couple prostrated themselves on the ground in reverence.

The divinities told them to make a request, which would be promptly granted.

As if they had already agreed, Filemon and Baucis said that they would want to continue receiving pilgrims in the temple, and that at the end of life, the two, after such a long life of love, would like to die together.

And they were heard. One day, when they were seated at the courtyard, waiting for the pilgrims, suddenly Filemon saw that the body of Baucis was filled with flowering foliage and that his own body was also covered with green leaves.

They barely had time to say good bye to each other. Filemon was transformed into an enormous Oak tree, and Baucis into a luxuriant Linden. Their crowns and branches intertwined in the heights. And thus, embracing, they remain together forever. The elders of that region, now part of Northern Turkey, always repeat the lesson: those who welcome the foreigner, welcome God.

Hospitality is a test of how much humanism, compassion and solidarity exist in a society. Behind each refugee coming to Europe and each immigrant to the United States is an ocean of suffering and anguish, and also of hope of better days to come. Rejection is particularly humiliating, because it gives immigrants and refugees the impression that they are worthless, that they are not even considered to be human.

The refugees go to Europe because for more than two centuries, the Europeans were in their countries. They took over power, imposed different customs and exploited their wealth. Now that the refugees are in such great need, they are simply rejected.

It is worth rescuing the value and the urgency of hospitality, present as something sacred in all human cultures. We must reinvent ourselves as hospitalarian beings, so as to be worthy in the eyes of the millions of refugees and immigrants in the whole world.

Leonardo Boff Theologian-Philosopher and Member of the Earthcharter Commission
Free translation from the Spanish sent by
Melina Alfaro, alfaro_melina@yahoo.com.ar.
Done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.

Trump: a new historical phase?

Leonardo Boff5 Comentários

For years we have seen, some in all parts of the world, the ascendance of a conservative way of thinking and of movements that defined themselves as rightists, seeking a society where order prevailed over liberty, traditional values over modern ones and the supremacy of authority over democratic liberties.

This phenomenon derives from many factors, but principally from the erosion of the shared values that gave society cohesion and a sense of collective coexistence. The predominance of the capitalist culture which extolled individualism, unlimited accumulation of material goods and above all, competition, left little space for cooperation. It contaminated virtually all of humanity, creating an ethical-spiritual confusion with no sense of belonging to a single humanity that inhabited a Common Home. There emerged what Bauman calls the liquid society, where nothing is solid. To this must be added the post modern spirit of every thing goes, anything is OK, where nothing is important except to accomplish each individual’s objectives, according to his/her preferences.

Facing this dilution of guiding stars its dialectic opposite arose: the search for security, order, authority, clear norms and well defined paths. This type of vision is found in conservatism, the political, ethical and religious right. It is just one step away from Nazi-Fascism, as in Hitler’s Germany, Mussolini’s Italy, Portugal’s Salazar and Spain’s Franco.

These tendencies have been gaining social and political strength in Europe, Latin America and the United States. The judicial-parliamentarian class coup that deposed President Dilma Rousseff was molded by this conservative and rightist spirit. What followed was the implantation of clearly rightist politics, against the people, that deny social rights and is retrograde in cultural terms.

But that conservative tendency has reached its clearest fulfillment in the central power of the world system, the United States, as seen in the election of Donald Trump as its President. In the United States, conservatism and rightist politics express themselves without metaphors, in shameless, and even harsh, forms.

In his first actions as President, Trump began undoing the social accomplishments of Barack Obama. His clearest characteristics are nationalism, patriotism, conservatism and isolationism.

Trump’s inaugural address is terrifying: “from now on a new vision will rule our land. From this moment on, it’s going to be America first”. The “first” here must be understood as “only the United States will matter”. With evident arrogance Trump radicalized his vision at the end of his speech: ”Together we will make America strong again. We will make America prosperous again. We will make America proud again. We will make America secure again. And together we will make America great again”.

Underlying these words is the ideology of the “manifest destiny”, of the exceptionality of the United States, always present in the previous Presidents, even in Obama. This is to say that the United States has a unique and divine mission in the world, to carry her values of rights, of private property and of liberal democracy to all humanity.

The world does not exist for Donald Trump. And if it exists, is seen in a negative form. Trump breaks the ties of solidarity with traditional allies, such as the European Union and leaves each country free for eventual ventures against their historical adversaries, opening the way to the expansionism of regional powers, including eventual lethal wars.

We can expect anything from Trump’s personality. Used to shady dealings such as, in general terms, the real estate New York business, without political experience, he can unleash hugely threatening crises for the rest of humanity, as for example, an eventual war with China or North Korea, where the use of nuclear weapons would not be excluded.

Trump’s personality shows deviant psychological characteristics, narcissistic and with an overblown ego, bigger than his own country.

The phrase that scares us is this: “from this day forward, a new vision will govern our land”. I do not know if he is thinking only of the United States or of the planet Earth. Probably to him the two are the same. If that were true, we would have to pray that the worst for the future of the civilization does not come to pass.

Leonardo Boff Theologian-Philosopher  and of the Earthcharter Commission

 

The God of Brazil is Moloch, who devours his children

Leonardo Boff1 comentário

t is said that God is Brazilian. It is not the God of tenderness or the humble, but the Moloch of the Canaanite and Phoenicians, who devours his children. We are one of the most unequal, unjust and violent countries in the world. Theologically, we live in a situation of social and structural sin, contrary to God’s design. It is enough to consider what happened in the jails of Manaus, Rondonia and Roraima. Is pure barbarity: the fury beheads, pierces the eyes and destroys the heart.
There is not just violence in Brazil. We are grounded in violent socio-historic structures, based on the genocide of the Indigenous, humiliating colonialism and inhumane slavery. And these structures cannot be overcome without first overcoming this dreadful tradition.

How to do that? It is a challenge that demands a colossal transformation of our social relationships. Is this still possible or are we condemned to be a pariah country? I see it as possible, on condition of following, among other things, these two paths developed by the base: the creation of a people, beginning with the social movements, and the installation of a social-democracy, grounded in the people.

The creation of a people: those who colonized us did not come to create a nation, but to found a commercial enterprise, become wealthy fast, make themselves hidalgos (children of something…), return to Portugal and enjoy themselves with their accumulated wealth.

They first conquered the Native peoples and then they brought Black slaves from Africa to do the labor. A human mass was created, dominated, humiliated, and despised by the elites, even in our times.

Apart from some earlier revolts, there was a historic change beginning in the 1930s. Unions and the most varied social movements emerged. At the heart of the movements were conscious social actors, critics, with a will to modify the social reality and of create the seeds of a more participatory and democratic society.

The development of these associations generated the Brazilian popular movement. It is turning the mass into an organized people, one that did not exist before as a people, but that now is being born. It forces the political society to listen, and negotiate, and in this way to diminish the levels of structural violence.

The creation of a social-democracy with a popular base: we have a representative democracy, but one of very low intensity, filled with political vices and corruption, where the representatives are generally elected by the large enterprises, whose interests they represent.

But as a counterweight, due to popular organizing, there already have been created popular political parties and segments of progressive parties, including the liberal-bourgeois, or, traditionally from the left, parties that promote profound reforms in society and seek to conquer State power, be it municipal, state or federal.

This participatory democracy is fundamentally seated on these four legs, like a table:

– participation, the broadest possible, of everybody, upwards from the base, in such a way that everyone may consider himself or herself an active citizen;

– equality, resulting from the degree of participation. Equality gives the citizens greater opportunities to live better. In the face of the existing inequalities, social solidarity must be strengthened;

– respect for differences of every type; that is why a democratic society must be pluralist, multi-ethnic, respectful of all religions and with various forms of communal resources.

– the valuing of human subjectivity; the human being is not only a social actor, the human being is a person, with his/her own world vision, who cultivates values of cooperation and solidarity that humanize institutions and social structures.

Moreover, this table is on a base, without which it can not stand: a new relationship with Nature and with the Earth, our Common Home, as Pope Francis emphasizes in his ecological encyclical letter. In other words, this democracy must incorporate the ecological moment, based on different paradigm. The current paradigm, centered on power and domination, in function of unlimited accumulation, has encountered an insuperable barrier: the limits of the Earth and of her renewable and non renewable goods and services. A limited Earth cannot support unlimited growth. By surpassing these limits, we are now witnessing global warming and the extreme events experienced in this year of 2017, with snow falling in almost all of Europe: which has not happened for one hundred years.

The ever increasing consciousness of these limits, forces us to think of a new paradigm of production, consumption, and sharing of the scarce resources among humans and also with the community of life (the flora and fauna that are also created by the Earth and need their nutrients). Here is where the values enter of caring, co-responsibility and solidarity of all with all, without which the project will never prosper.

From these premises we can hope to overcome our violent social structures.

The alternative is to toy with change, so that nothing actually changes.

Leonardo Boff Theologian-Philosopher and of Earthcharter Commission

Free translation from the Spanish sent by
Melina Alfaro, alfaro_melina@yahoo.com.ar.
Done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.