Theweirdtophat
Well-Known Member
The only religion I can think of aside from some pagan groups, that are animistic as well as polytheistic are Shintoists. Generally nature worshippers tend to me animistic, but are all shamans animistic as well?
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question for animists
- Thread starter Theweirdtophat
- Start date
We can be of any theistic conception. My beliefs on the nature of deity aren't as easy to pin as monotheistic or polytheistic. It's a sort of combination of both. We are One but the One has chosen to manifest Itself in multiplicity or the appearance thereof.It's a good answer really.Are animists usually just animists or can they be polytheistic as well?
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I'm sure they can be, as Q noted above in response to your post. As for me, I believe there are "spirits." However, I am totally agnostic on the question of deities, especially "universal" ones. The presence of spirits does not indicate anything about the presence of deity, for me. I'm just respectful of spirits. Especially those I need something from, or whom I figure can harm me or do something good for me, or who seem to need something from me.It's a good answer really.
I haven't done a lot of reading on Shinto, but it certainly seems to me to be a bit more developed than most animistic belief structures. But then, the evidence suggests that most animistic cultures don't have a separate religion, as we do in the West. The "religion" of most indigenous peoples seems to be incorporated fully into all aspects of life--animism is a way of life, not a religion per se. At least, that's how I'm trying to practice it. Most indigenous peoples of Asia, Africa, the Americas, Australia and Oceania tend to be at least partially animistic in their beliefs and practices. Some have elaborate pantheons, others have very simple or none at all. There's a lot of variety.
The issue of shamans and shamanism is another topic entirely. Technically, shamans are only in certain Siberian cultures, but many cultures around the world have healers of various sorts, some of whom deal with the community's relationship with gods or other big spirits. There are also singers, dancers, drummers, herbalists, spirit healers...a lot of different categories of specialists who one might turn to for assistance in having luck in the hunt, with having lots of healthy children, with curing disease, with finding wisdom, and so on.
It's a good answer really.
Animists can be of any theistic leaning really. It has no bearing on ones deity concept.
I consider myself a Polytheistic-Animist (of sorts)
Runewolf1973
Materialism/Animism
Everything is animated or animate. Some things are just more animated than others. Life is nothing more than a term we apply to those most highly animated forms of matter.
Runewolf1973
Materialism/Animism
It's either all life, or no life at all. Since life is a term used to describe only specific forms bearing certain characteristics, it makes more sense to say that there is no life at all. There are only different forms of matter which exhibit varying degrees of complexity and animation. The more highly animated something is, the more easy it is for us to look at it as life. I believe artificial intelligence is absolutely possible. It is just a matter of complexity. That's all life is...complex animations.
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Politesse
Amor Vincit Omnia
And yet --- complexity, though subjective, is not hard to find in the world! Indeed, it seems to be an enduring property of the world that the better you understand a thing, the more complicated you believe it to be. We only think a subject is simple when we have not studied it yet. The whole world is deeper than it is wide. So I favor "all is life". Life is not a property that "a thing" can hold or not hold, it is a base property of the universe that is present in everything.
Runewolf1973
Materialism/Animism
I don't see life as being a property or a substance, rather it is a classification we humans give to certain forms bearing certain characteristics. A rock does not possess the same characteristics that a plant or animal does, so it cannot be called life, but it is animated. Everything is animated by the Fundamental Forces or Fundamental Interactions of nature. The only thing that makes a rock different from a plant or animal is the complexity (or lack thereof) in the way it interacts with it's environment, but it does interact, everything interacts. I also don't believe that consciousness is the ground of all being. Consciousness is nothing more than another form of complex interaction. That's just the way I see things. There is no life, there is only interaction in varying degrees of complexity.
An interesting perspective. however, I have questions/observations, not that I necessarily wish to discuss in detail (and I'm certainly not interested in a debate, because I think your reasoning is sound), but they form as reactions of your points to my own point of view.
1) Why must life be either/or? Why can it not be a matter of degree? Or a set of partial options? Personally, I see no reason to establish an excluded middle between the nonliving and the living.
2) What we today consider life in our "advanced" state of science is not how people have always and universally viewed life. Our science and our current definitions may say there are only certain forms, bearing certain characteristics, but why can't we redefine "life" so that we do not have to look at as either/or?
3) Complexity, I think, doesn't require much clarification (although it might). But what does "animation" really mean? How would we measure it? Can it be boiled down to a simple measure of energy use or pass-through? Is it motion, and motion alone?
4) If we created a grid, with the X axis going from simple to highly complex and the y axis from minimal or no animation to highly animated (and both of these could be qualitative or quantitative), we could then plot various objects and phenomena based on these two criteria. A third axis could be added, including for example, size or mass. I think such an exercise might show that there is less clarity of distinction between life and non-life.
Runewolf1973
Materialism/Animism
Science would not agree with someone who says "everything is life". However, science would have to agree if someone were to say that "everything is animated". Everything, all matter is animated (having motion or movement) by the Fundamental Forces. Not everything is life, but everything has within it the potential to achieve that highly animated state we call life.
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Runewolf1973
Materialism/Animism
"All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particle of an atom to vibration and holds this most minute solar system of the atom together". Max Planck
You see? All physicists are at the very core animists, they just maybe don't realize it.
You see? All physicists are at the very core animists, they just maybe don't realize it.
Oh, I agree, but I have also run into people who won't agree that "everything is animated." Things may have physical and energetic properties, but life comes across as something special. They are apparently afraid that admitting that things are animated in some way might make them too close to living. But these have also been people who make a big distinction between humans and all other life.
lol!
A couple of the individuals I mentioned in the other post are physicists, and they are animatedly anti animism. Perhaps they doth protest too much?
Runewolf1973
Materialism/Animism
this is one of the issues I have with Graham Harvey, whom I quote below. His Animist Manifesto beings with "All that exists, lives." Having read his stuff, and other writings of the "new" animism, I get what he's saying. But convincing almost anyone of the Western scientific or religious mindset that all aspects of the universe are living and alive is a battle I don't want to go through. I've had enough trouble just going the "energetic" route.
Runewolf1973
Materialism/Animism
lol!
The thing is, to say that "All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force..." is really no different than what animists would say... "everything that exists is animated by unseen forces of nature". I believe our early animistic ancestors were not so driven by the "supernatural" as we think, rather they were driven by that which was observable in nature....patterns, cycles, movement, changes. They were observers and interpreters of nature. That is what science does. Despite being the oldest form of belief, I believe that animism is the way of the future.
Amen, Sister/Brother!
(sorry, don't know anything about you)Natural/supernatural seems to be one of the modern, western ideas that really doesn't show up in indigenous cultures. One of the concepts I'm trying to remove from my own vocabulary and mindset as I continue on my animistic path.