Subscription: $15 / year Membership: $15/year All correspondence to: Editor: Duane Bates All correspondence to: P. O. Box 1744 Greenville, SC 29602 July, 2008

The Voice of Sanity THE NEWSLETTER OF THE UPSTATE S.C. SECULAR HUMANISTS Visit our web-site for current and back-issues at: www.uscsh.org e-mail: secularhmnst@aol.com

BIOLOGY TEACHERS. CREATIONISM AND INTELLIGENT DESIGN

A recent poll published in the Public Library of Science Biology reports that 12% of high school biology teachers present creationism as a valid alternative to evolution. (Link below) Twenty five percent of biology teaches devote classroom time to both creationism and Intelligent Design. The good news is that 42% teach creationism and Intelligent Design as scientifically unsound and 50% feel both are inappropriate for a science classroom.

Perhaps, given the current state of public school politics and the number of Americans that believe in the literal interpretation of the Bible, we should be surprised that the number of teachers teaching creationism and ID are not even higher. We also have to take into consideration that in too many communities in the US biology teachers are under great pressure to present these two “theories” as equal to Darwin’s evolution. The pressure to be politically correct on the issue of creationism and ID is very intense and comes from the school board, the school administration, the community at large and even the student themselves.

The arguments between creationism, ID and evolution are unlikely to diminish any time in the near future, but perhaps if there is a change in the White House in November and Democrats increase their margin of control in Congress we can hope that real science will prevail in our public schools.

http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/05/one-in-eight-hi.html

THERE MUST BE BLOOD TO GET A PURPLE HEART

In WWI they called it “shell shocked”, in WWII it was called “combat fatigue. In Vietnam it was “the thousand yard stare”, but it is as old as human warfare. Now that we have learned a great deal more about the human psyche we call it by a more precise name: post traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD.

The growing number of non-physical injuries, classified as PTSD, resulting from the Iraqi war, combined with our rapidly expanding understanding of how fragile the human mind is to stress and violence, is uncovering a whole dimension of the cost of war. Even today, more than thirty years after the end of the Vietnam war, thousands of veterans of that war are either homeless, drug and/or addicted to drugs and alcohol or quietly suffering from the mental and emotional injuries resulting from the months and years of living in a life or death situation and viewing horrific injuries to their comrades or trying to live with the deaths they personally caused.

My neighbor is a good example. He is a Vietnam vet and was wounded during his tour of duty. He came home, joined the local police force and was shot in the line of duty. He is now retired and is an emotionally damaged alcoholic who still suffers from depression and guilt because he had to kill 13 year-old Viet Cong during a firefight. He had no choice, it was either kill or be killed, but it still haunts him, and, I suspect, the cause of his alcoholism.

A few years ago I saw an interview with a retired Special Forces officer who also served in Vietnam. He told of his first battle when he saw a Viet Cong crawling toward his team’s position carrying a large explosive charge that would have killed him and his fellow soldiers. Without hesitation he raised his rifle and shot the Viet Cong through the head, killing him instantly, saving himself and his team. Thirty years later as he is describing the action for a video interview he bursts into tears as he reveals that he had never fully understood until that precise moment what a bullet would do to a person’s head, literally blowing it to pieces.

This is a highly trained, dedicated professional soldier who believed in what he was fighting for, and, thirty years later, he still has such a strong emotional reaction to retelling the story that he cannot stop himself from bursting into years.

There is a story in my mother’s family about a relative that was a Union soldier during the Civil war, a war that took over 600,000 lives when our population was much smaller. When he came home from that war, he purchased a small plot of land in the remote part of the county, built a cabin, and lived out his life as a hermit.

PTSD is real and lasting and is not limited to our men and women who are fighting a war. PTSD can result from any life event that threatens the life or welfare of yourself or others, or from be forced to live in highly stressful and dangerous conditions. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manuel of Mental Disorders (DSM) states that the prevalence of PTSD in at-risk individuals such as combat veterans, person who have experienced a major natural disaster or criminal violence to be between 3% and 58%.

As a society our recognition of PTSD is very selective. We easily extend a helping hand and understanding to victims of severe domestic violence, rape victims, children who are victims of sexual or emotional abuse, but soldiers who suffer the same damage fighting for our nation are expected to be super human and endure months or years of extreme stress and danger without any harm to their mental health. We need to think of our brains as being run by an operating system like our computers. When humans are exposed to extremely threatening conditions like front-line soldiers, their operating systems get re-programmed in a manner that cannot be easily reprogrammed back to their previous condition. Physical wounds heal faster and more completely than psychic ones. As individuals we react differently to the damage, so some are severely affected while others “suck it up” (hide the damage inside) and get on with their lives. Soldiers of every nation are expected to be physically and mentally tough and to be able to endure combat conditions, but the reality is quite different.

Mental health professionals know the abuse of alcohol and drugs and other dysfunctional behaviors are ways in which mental and emotionally damaged humans “self-medicate”, trying to cope with feelings and thoughts that are frightening and confusing. It is time for our nation and our government to recognize PTSD as a valid war injury and treat and care for the injured accordingly. The Purple Heart has been awarded to injured soldiers since George Washington was President, and while I think it would justified to award it to soldiers who have PTSD, it is much more important to provide the long-term care and counseling these soldiers need.

WHO DO YOU TRUST?

And whom do you need and want to trust you? Trust, the feeling of physical, emotional and psychological safety that is very important to humans is so deeply embedded in our psyches that we seldom use the specific word in our daily lives, and when we do it is usually in the context of conflict or anger. When trust is freely given and received between two humans, husband and wife, child and parent, lovers, friends or co-workers, there is a strong, but very fragile, bond of mutual respect and care, a conscious decision to place others needs above your own and the expectation of the same being returned to you.

The epitome of trust is usually imaged as the bond between mother and infant. The offspring of all mammals require the full attention and care of their parents to ensure their, and ultimately the species, survival. Humans are social creatures that evolved in small groups where group and individual success and survival required a high level of trust and cooperation, since as individuals, we do not possess the speed, strength or the sheer killing power of the animals who were our primary predators during the early days of human societies. Only by using our intelligence and pooling our resources were we able to become the dominant species on the planet.

Today we live in a world of 6.5 billion humans where virtually every aspect of our lives is becoming globally integrated while our individual emotional structure remains essentially the same as our distant ancestors. As we become more and more dependent on people and groups that we do not, and never will, know personally, the issue of who to trust and not trust becomes critical in our personal, social, business and political lives. A number of surveys of the level of trust of Americans over the years have indicated that the trust we have in our elected political leaders, those who arguably have the greatest impact on our lives, hovers at the lowest end of the trust scale just above used car salesmen.

The June 2008 issue of Scientific American has a very interesting article entitled “The Neurobiology of Trust” that examines the role of the hormone/neurotransmitter oxytocin (oxy-toe-sin) in creating trust in humans at the individual and group level. A link to the full article is posted below. A definition and explanation of the function of oxytocin from the Wikipedia is as follows:

Oxytocin is a mammalian hormone that also acts as a neurotransmitter in the brain.

In humans, oxytocin is thought to be released during hugging, touching, and orgasm in both sexes. In the brain, oxytocin is involved in social recognition and bonding, and may be involved in the formation of trust between people and generosity.

In women, it is released in large amounts after distension of the cervix and vagina during labor, and after stimulation of the nipples, facilitating birth and breastfeeding, respectively.

Oxytocin is produced by both men and women during the act of hugging, touching and during orgasm, but in men the effect of ocytocin is offset or negated by their testosterone levels, perhaps explaining the relactance of men to “cuddle” after making love. The SciAmer article also explores the possibility that defects in the neuroreceptosrs on brain neurons in some persons brains prevent the utilization of oxytocin, resulting in sociopathic behaviors or damage to interpersonal relationships because there is no receprocity of trust. This is another example of how our brain chemistry contributes to the composition of human nature and influences our behaviors.

The article also examines the issue of trust at the national level, finding that a good predictor of lack of trust in an nation is the level of poverty, with countries that have higher levels of povery having lower levels of trust. I have also posted below a link to the Wikipedia article on Abraham Maslow, an American psychologist, who developed a hierarchy of human needs. Maslow’s hierarchy on needs postulates that humans have a acending series of needs from the most basic, such as air, water, food and warmth, through safety, living and belonging and esteem to the highest level, which he labeled as self actualization.

Citizens of twenty-nine countries were asked one simple question: do you think most psople can be trusted? The top two nations, Denmank and Norway, had postive responces at the roughly 65% level. These are highly socialzed countires with small populations, low levels of ethnic diversity where the basic needs of life and community have been achieved. The next two nations, with postive responces in the 50% range, are China and Iran, nations quite unlike Denmark and Norway. Historical and cultural factors may account fot the relatively high rate of trust in China and Iran. China with it’s cultural emphasis on the family unit and Iran’s key role in the history of the Middle East and it’s religious unity playing a key role.

The US postive responce rate is about 35%, lower than even the much poorer countries of India and Egypt, so factors other than poverty are clearly playing important roles in the perception of trust. At the bottom of the trust ratings were the countries of South Africa, Romania, the Philippines, Uganda and Brazil, with postive responces at 10% or below. Some of the lack of trust can be traced to another very old and very natural human emotion, xenophobia, the fear of people who are different from us.

In my career as a therapist I worked almost exclusively with individuals and families at the lowest socio-economic levels. In general, they had very low trust levels at both the micro and macro levels. Families were usually dysfunctioal to a large degress and the most common emotional states were depression, frustration and hopelessness. While they had enough air and water, two of Maslow’s basic human needs, hunger and cold were not uncommon, as was no employment or underemployment. As the result of not having even the most basic levels of their needs unmet, they could not expect or dream of achiieveing any of Maslow’s higher levels of personal fullfillment, a major loss of human potential, productivity and happiness.

Like so many things in life, the best way to get trust is to give trust, at least until you find out if your efforts are being reflected back. The 1975 Seals and Crofts hit “Get Closer”, one of my favorites, details the whole principal of getting what you what out of a relationship by giving what you want, freely and wholly, to the other person first.

So, 1.who do you trust and 2. whom do you need and want to trust you and 3. what are you doing to increase the level of trust in your personal relationships?

The most important question for the world that comes out of this article is: can we improve our level of trust at all levels, in our personal lives, work lives and as a nations? And, perhaps even more importantly, what will the world be like in the future if we fail to increase the level of trust between people and nations?

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=the-neurobiology-of-trust

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow's_hierarchy_of_needs

MEETING CALENDAR

July: No meetings scheduled

August 9^th: Brunch at a place and time to be announced.

August 24^th: Regular Monthly meeting at a place and time to be announced