Once upon a time, some people on a road were stopped by a wall.
We didn’t mind. It was a good place to stop for a while, and as more people coming down the road stopped at the wall, a community grew at its foot. Most people enjoyed gathering together, so the wall seemed like a fortuitous event, a good reason to rest and celebrate and work together for a while.
The wall wasn’t impassable, of course. Some could still clamber over the pile and continue on their journey, but the wall was a little daunting, and the happy community was so tempting, and few bothered.
People being people, we couldn’t just leave the wall alone. Some started stacking the rocks, following rules laid down by clever people in the community that created a more stable, stronger wall. They built the wall taller and wider. They faced it with smooth sheets of stone to make it more attractive.
As the wall became more elaborate and more difficult to pass, the community grew. We didn’t consider this a bad result; that wall was most impressive, and if the journey was held up for a time, well, one could admire the wall, and also learn a little masonry. And the community was definitely a wonderful treasure — a little fractious and crowded, perhaps, and prone to crime and other vices of large gatherings of people, but that wasn’t the wall’s fault.
The wall was a dominating feature in the community, always there, always growing, and unsurprisingly, art erupted spontaneously. People expressed themselves on the wall; the wall was glorified and and made ever more beautiful in diverse ways, and in many styles, and for a long time, the only art was wall art.
The art was lovely, but was increasingly constrained—good art must respect the wall, not challenge it. The wall became a funnel for ideas, focusing them all on one subject, the wall itself.
Oddly enough, while the human difficulties of living in a crowded community behind the wall were never blamed on the wall, the human joy and skill and love of beauty that danced across it were entirely credited to the wall. People are funny that way.
The wall was worshipped.
The road was forgotten or ignored, and our community assumed the wall is our destination, not simply a convenient stop on a long journey. The wall is what we are all about.
Some few who managed to get over the wall still called back to the community.
“Come over, the road goes on!”
“Is there another wall over there that we can adore?” asked the people of the wall.
“No, just a long, long road to somewhere else.”
“Is it dangerous? Is it risky? Are there any little walls we can cling to?”
“I don’t know! There are certainly dangers, but there are also wonders! Come on!”
But the wall people refused.
More than refused; we built the wall higher and stronger, we topped it with razors, and we spread stories that the other side was a land of fire and torture, and that the road led only to death. And just to prove it, people who tried to cross the wall were set on fire, and killed, and we frightened everyone in the community so badly that we could even stop killing them and people still cowered in fear before the wall.
The wall was huge and powerful. It had grown to be symbol of art and beauty and hope and unity and terror and oppression and diversity and dreams and cruelty and kindness. It stood in our way, and echoed and amplified and personified the condition of that people camped in the shadow of the wall. Even people who wanted to continue on down the road had to respect the monstrous construction, and some even said we need to revere it, and let all the people in the community know that it’s all right to love a barrier that has loomed over them for thousands of years.
Some of us are looking up and beyond, though. We’re saying it certainly is an impressive piece of work, but … it’s still a wall.
We have a different answer.
I’m sorry, but this story doesn’t have an ending yet, and I don’t know how it will turn out. We’ve only just begun to tear down the wall.
The only way we’ll get past it is if more of us wake up to the fact that it is a wall, and it must be overcome. Some of you may prefer to build ramps over it, or tunnel under it, or find alternative routes around it; some of you may prefer dynamite. I don’t care what your strategy is, as long as more of us stop praising the wall and start treating it as an obstacle.
The jubilee will be held on the other side of the wall. Beyond that, who knows? But it will be exciting.
PZ, well done. This is actually rather touching.
Cute story, but maybe you could add some fuzzy bunnies to perk it up.
Nice story. Keep developing it. I could not help but see this eventually take shape as a metaphorical children’s story, replete with pictures. Maybe in the vein of Shel Silverstein book?
Well said, sir.
But given the lovely art on the wall, some of us are concerned that *dynamiting* the wall would be a great loss to humankind. Oh, we know it’s a wall: we’re all for going on down the road. But rather than tearing the wall down, how about taking it down carefully, piece by piece, to preserve the art on it, and rebuilding it parallel to the road, so that everyone can admire it as they travel past?
Great story, can’t wait to see how it turns out. Hope I can do my part to tear that wall down.
Go to it! I think the wall does belong in a museum, with some nice frames and tour guides explaining it. Just get it out of the way.
The album “The Wall” has taken on a Nth new meaning. Again.
Never thought I’d hear you sing We don’t need no education …
I love the allegory.
Of course, no history of humankind’s relationship to the wall is complete without some accounting for that human movement called Communism, and its razing of the wall, only to build a wall very much like it a few steps beyond.
hehehe For Dawkinss birthday I dedicated one of my favorite song lyrics to him:
‘Some say you’re trouble, boy
Just because you like to destroy
All the things that bring the idiots joy
Well, what’s wrong with a little destruction?’
(Its ironic because this song is supposedly about Jesus, lol!)
Awesome post. Thank you.
Very well done. This may well be the greatest story that has ever been written in all of history throughout time.
I don’t think so. Jack Black isn’t in this one, and there are no guitars.
PZ: Take comment #3 seriously. This WOULD make a beautiful children’s book. And I know just the fella to illustrate it. He’s talented, and he’s had his own personal struggle to get beyond the walls in his life. Why not kick the idea around with:
http://www.ozcot.com/drawing.htm
BTW, I still find the wall to be beautiful, and inspiring, and personally meaningful. But it’s no substitute for the road. Perhaps you could call the book ‘The Road’ and have one of the characters say something to that effect. It’s a beautiful idea. You should pursue that suggestion. Supportively…SH
I am left wondering if you paid attention to the beginning of the story. By setting the wall aside the road, there would remain a few community leaders who would insist on a new detour running head on into the wall.
Wow, brilliant. I wonder what that would sound like as a short youtube video …. (muses thoughtfully)
Then let them. The road itself will continue, and then the can be admired.
Religion has done good things, and to simply blanket it all as terrible is to throw the baby out with the bath water. The unfortunate part is that many atheists would then celebrate the loss of the baby.
Anyways, I love the metaphor, and I agree very much with it.
Great story!
But somewhere, right now, people are building new (huge) walls!!
See the “security wall” in Israel.
Thanks Scott, I’d welcome any opportunity to participate with some of my skills in such an endeavor, especially with PZ. You never know how such things will turn out when translating something into another medium. Look at the work my old teammate/mentor from the eighties and nineties, Tom Sito contributed to Flock of Dodos, whose characters took on a life of their own (I’ve been looking for an excuse to blow his horn for him on these pages). The work of Gerald Scarfe casts a long shadow too.
Personally, I’m impressed with the potential offered by the documentary approach PZ has taken in this post. Fantasy can never be quite as grotesque as real life.
Beautiful. I’m going to print that out and keep it with me. I might forward it to my mother, who to this day still can’t fathom the fact that I haven’t gone to church in over 15 years and occasionally hints at various obligations I have regarding my daughter and assorted sacraments.
Now I can just tell her: “Mom, your granddaughter and I are over the wall”
Clearly, PZ has never studied Carney’s masterwork on masonry, or O’Brien’s profound treatises on tuckpointing.
I second (or third, or whatever) the childrens’ book idea.
Brilliantly written, thanks for that!
Excellent story — it reminds me of Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave.”
Right idea. Wrong song.
All alone, or in twos,
The ones who really love you
Walk up and down outside the wall.
Some hand in hand
And some gathered together in bands.
The bleeding hearts and artists
Make their stand.
And when they’ve given you their all
Some stagger and fall, after all it’s not easy
Banging your heart against some mad bugger’s wall.
It is an excellent children’s story! I would recommend simpler images than suggested in #14, however. The story has very difficult ideas in it, so illustrations should be simple. I would purchase this as a book.
I always thought this might be a better children’s story. But sure, just call me, Ken.
Building on comment #23 rather than repositioning the wall parallel to the road, make a tunnel out of it.
Maybe we can start the PZ Myers-Richard Dawkins Children’s Book Series.
Or would that be considered too ‘militant’?
Perhaps you could add a few bits about how some people wrote grafitti on the wall one night, and the next day other people passed the word that if you read The Words On The Wall your life would be blessed?
…or that some people talk to The Wall and sometimes The Wall answers!
Just for completeness.
Profoundly moving, PZ. I do hope you consider a children’s book.
I don’t know that an ‘ending’ is needed. Perhaps the kind of bright and thoughtful child who would enjoy this book would also enjoy creating his/her own way through or over or around the wall. I think of myself at 9 or 10, and what daydreams this sort of thing would have triggered….
As a Structural Engineer, I have to deal with things like this.
So, I’ve carried out a survey of this wall, analyzed its stability, and declare that it’s a dangerous structure.
The owners should now demolish it, or face the consequences.
The album “The Wall” has taken on a Nth new meaning. Again.
Heh, as I was reading this I dumped the playlist I was listening to and opened up my Pink Floyd dir. Looks like other people had the same idea.
I see no reason why dynamite should threaten the art, outside of the metaphor anyways. It already is safely ensconced in museums, and in the eyes of most beholders, the craftsmanship and beauty of religious art remains, even when the religious tradition it sprang from is revealed to be a dried up husk and a barrier.
There is nothing in religious tradition that cannot be found, at a better price, within secular inter-personal love and community. The baby has already been taken out of the bath, dried off, and re-diapered — so why hold onto the dingy bathwater at all?
My wall’s better than your wall.
Needs more squid.
Brilliant. I think this is exactly the kind of communication that would be effective for the general public. I don’t mean allegories, I mean that you can get all the important ideas across without using big words, and you can make it FUN.
I’m not very comfortable using this particular story as an example, because it’s about atheism and not science. I realize science NEEDS more details and technical words. However, you didn’t mention any logical fallacies, argue against pascal’s wager, call anyone irrational, etc. You made the point you were trying to make by how you told the story, AND you made it fun to read.
I am a mom of three children. My husband and I are doing our best to raise our kids to be critical thinkers who can recognize a fairy tale of any form for what it is… But we have been amazed at how little there is out there in the way of storybooks for young children that give them a secular view of religion in our society. I’ve looked in vain in Barnes & Noble for the equivalent of “Atheism for Your Young Child” but I’m guessing that I am wasting my time. I love this story of yours. Should you indeed decide to publish it as a children’s book, I will not only buy a copy, but I will buy several to give to friends, relatives, and even one to donate to our local library. Please seriously consider the suggestions here to publish it… preferably before my kids grow up!
I agree, PZ, Planet of the Hats affords more Seusesque opportunities.
Our first business will be to supervise the making of fables and legends, rejecting all which are unsatisfactory; and we shall induce nurses and mothers to tell their children only those which we have approved. –Plato “The Republic”
Heh. I wrote my reply, submitted it, and THEN remembered I was looking at the other (hat) story, not the one posted today.
PZ, I think this is an excellent example of framing. Granted, it’s about moral and religious issues and not directly scientific ones, but that doesn’t make the scientific frame impossible to achieve. I’d use The Lorax as an example. Maybe I’m still a horrid consumer and not much of an ecologist, but it _did_ change my world view.
I’m going to apologize for this next comment, because it’s maybe a little mean. I didn’t think you wrote this. I was expecting an attribution, to find that this was an old story.
It really is impressive. Get it published. Maybe have it be the first in a line of books aimed at minds that are still, necessarily, open. (In fact, I’d love to help with such a project, in whatever capacity I could. I may be an aspiring novelist, but I’d never even considered kid’s books before.)
Wonderful storey, unfortunately my geologists eye has colored my perceptions. Figure 1. clearly shows that the wall we recently emplaced. The landslide is likely still active, probably episodic. So now that we have finally constructed our bypass, what will be the reaction of the masses, when with much sound and fury (and dust and destruction) the WALL reappears?
Come on now stop tearing down the wall! you are pissing people off. We have to start in another way, and get people on our side. Those hammering against the wall are just fuelling those who are burning those who climb it. First we should preteind to worship the wall and then maybe very slowly we can subtly suggest that maybe, it is just possible there is something on the other side.
No apologies to Chris Mooney.
People throughout history have build walls, therefore building walls is part of the human condition.
Science cannot explain how the wall got there in the first place.
If I can conceive of a wall, wouldn’t an actual wall be even more wall-like?
Clearly PZ does not have the capacity to understand walls.
Loved the text. May I translate it to German and post on my blog?
A children’s book might not be the only way to go about teaching kids to think critically.
My parents did it by putting a collection of books on science, history, and social studies in front of me, and supplemented it with a good dictionary. Natural curiosity took care of the rest. :P
Lovely. I wouldn’t add much more in, though – too much detail would bog down the simplicity of it. I’d buy it.
“If I can conceive of a wall, wouldn’t an actual wall be even more wall-like?”
Sonja, that made me laugh out loud. Thanks.
This blog needs an [allegory] tag for this, Planet of the Hats, the libertarian with the sock puppet, and Doors (and any others I’ve missed and future ones).
I think someone had the correct corollary earlier, that of the Berlin Wall. This is much more the historian’s view of the matter, I’ll admit, but it has relevance.
The Wall will be taken down by a multitude of means, but many will preserve the best parts (the finer art, the more poetic words, and other representatives of all the aspects of what it had been) and put them in a museum (located by the Road, of course) so that travelers can stop and appreciate all that the Wall once was. Of course, like any good museum, it will show every aspect of the Wall; the beauty of what humans did upon it’s surface, the courage of those who climbed it, and the ugliness of what was wrought before its feet. Then most people will be able to both appreciate the Wall for what it was and understand why it had to be destroyed.
That’s my own addition to the allegorical stew. I like the story very much as well, PZ and do think it would make a good children’s book. I feel obliged, however, to point out J.R.R. Tolkin’s words on allegory:
“I have heartily detested allegory in all its forms since I first became old and wary enough to detect it.”
There’s a recently published children’s book by an Irish writer about a boy who comes to a much less metaphorical barrier:
‘The Boy in the Striped Pajamas’
http://www.amazon.com/Boy-Striped-Pajamas-John-Boyne/dp/0385751060
I recommend it.
Great post. Not much else to say about it.
You know, I don’t like walls very much either.
Wonderful allegory. I think it’s worth noting that humanity doesn’t just divide up into those who set up camp at the base of the wall and those who cross it to continue down the road. The mystics and pagans and individual seekers of other sorts just wander off into the wilderness and find their own paths. Some of them even wander back to the road, or at least within sight of it. Some of them head off into the Forests of Woo and get lost forever. But generally, I find I have a lot more respect for the wanderers than for those who camp at the base of the wall, even though I myself much prefer the company of my fellow road-followers.
Good one, PZ.
Heretic! What it needs, of course, is a squid.
Very nicely done, PZ.
I think this needs to be tweaked a bit. How about:
Some religious people have done very good things. Unfortunately, religion itself is a parasitic cuckoo that steals the resources of compassion and reason, the true children in the nest of humanity. The cuckoo must go!
The unfortunate part is that many believers violently insist on training healthy children to behave like cuckoos.
http://cjiministry.blogspot.com/
PZ – quite the way to start a godless sunday morning. Good on you! It made my morning.
Above is a link to a blog that I have ‘somehow’ initiated a debate of sorts with; he reasoned that the bible proves everything, and I reasoned otehrwise. If you need to parch your neurons, check it out. It is a rather feeble attempt to share information and more likened to a copy-paste fiend who has an online bible version. However, there is the most recent post that initiated this comment, and it links nicely to this blog/post.
Apparently there is PROOF in the bible that we did not come from a monkey. Hmm…where to start with that one.
anywho, PZ, thanks for the sunday morning cheer.
Together, knowledge will tear down the wall. Piece by piece, if need be.
To my mind, there is no wall. There’s just a story about a wall that’s been passed on for generations upon generations. It’s the very first story that just about every child hears, told so many times and so insistently that even though no one can actually see the wall or even touch the wall, everyone knows it’s there. (Except for the people who don’t know it’s there, but they’re crazy and dangerous and not really people at all.)
Who was it who first told the wall story? We can’t really say, but it probably started out as a story to make scared people feel less scared, because all walls – even imaginary ones – are obscurely comforting. They keep bad things out. They give you a space all your own. They tell you where you’re supposed to be in the world.
But more importantly, the story of the wall started to be convenient, at least for the people who were happy where they were. When it looked like the people who worked hard to keep them happy but maybe weren’t so happy themselves were thinking about going elsewhere, all the happy people had to do was say “Uh-uh-uh. Where do you think you’re going? Remember, there’s a wall.”
Of course, even the people who were happy where they were sometimes moved the wall themselves, just a little, when no one else was looking. Sometimes they did it because the unhappy people were pushing at them especially hard. Sometimes they did it because they just wanted more room in their backyards. The important thing is, they never admitted that they did it, and no one could prove it, because after all there was no wall to begin with.
Once in while, some starry-eyed lunatic would come along and say, “Can’t you see? There is no wall. Let’s keep on walking.” Most people didn’t like to listen to this kind of talk, because if it was true, that meant they and their parents and their parents’ parents had spent their entire lives in the same unhappy place for no good reason. And as for the people who did listen . . . more often than not, very bad things happened to them before they could walk past the place where the wall was supposed to be. Which, to most people’s minds, just proved that there was a wall, or even if there wasn’t, there might as well be.
But those of us who know better? We don’t need to tear anything down, because there’s nothing to be torn down. We just need to keep walking forward.
Kurage:
“there is no wall, we just need to keep walking forward”
I agree with your position somewhat; however, the issue of a ‘wall’ pertains to those who will maintain that there is one with or without it actually being there . And when those who stand face to face with a fake ‘wall’, it is the rest of society who suffers (nature, really). SO, while it is positively correct that WE need to keep walking, there will always be a crowd at the wall until it gets torn down. Someone has to tear it down and let the flood of reality wake them up.
Your points are very relevant and true, though. I am not completely against what you wrote, I just think that a more altruistic approach would be to tear down the wall so others can walk by it and not revel in its apparent duty as a barrier.
All glory be to THE WALL. Praise THE WALL. THE WALL rules! I hope someday everyone will bow down to the glory that is THE WALL…
Great piece. Just out of curiosity, how long did that piece ferment before it burst into a blog post?
Thought provoking. Blessedly or damnably thought provoking, depending on one’s view.
“I am left wondering if you paid attention to the beginning of the story. By setting the wall aside the road, there would remain a few community leaders who would insist on a new detour running head on into the wall.”
And they’re free to do that. If people want to live at the foot of the wall, that’s entirely their business and none of my own. The problems comes when they try to stop other people from going over the wall (by force if necessary); when they brutalize and oppress and even kill each other over which bit of the wall is the real one; and when they teach their children that they’ll be burned and tortured if they ever cross the wall, or even question whether there’s anything on the other side. If they don’t do any of those things, then as far as I’m concerned they can live anywhere they want.
This is truly beautiful, PZ. I’m sending it to all my atheist friends and family who have kids. And I agree with the chorus — make it into a book, and I’ll personally buy half a dozen copies.
I feel that perhaps there should be an “Emperor’s Clothes” kind of twist to this story, with a small child pointing to The Wall and saying, “There seems to be a door/some kind of opening in the wall,” and have the wise elders poo-poo the child by denying the opening exists, certain that The Wall is still perfect, without flaw.
My 2 cents…
And lo! Meanwhile, on the other side of the wall, there had gathered another crowd. These did mutter things amongst themselves, tossing things upon the wall – empty snack food wrappers, slinky toys, sealing wax, and other fancy stuff.
Overhead flew the birds of the air; many of these were Buddhists, but not necessarily.
Aneta, you are babbling.
Maybe we need an oscillation overthruster. (Sorry, just was at a Buckaroo Banzai-watching party last night.) :)
On the other side of the wall, though, there are still many who only feel comfortable with a wall nearby. They build their wall parallel to the road, and cheerfully assert that their wall and the road are compatible.
Those further along the road roll their eyes, and think that if these parallelists knew what they were doing, they’d abandon the wall – and that if they aren’t careful, they’ll introduce bends into these parallel walls that will at some point block the road. Again.
There are also those still behind the original wall, who hate the parallelists as much as they hate those who ignore the wall.
there’s nothing wrong with walls, they give shelter. The problem is when people make the wall into something more than it is, or make it into something that no longer provides shelter or a canvas for beauty, but as an obstacle.
If people want their wall that’s fine, as long as they don’t use it to keep other people from progressing down the road. Individuals have the right to be as ignorant, inexperienced or illogical as they like. On the other hand, some may genuinely find that they prefer the wall to anything else they’d see on the road. All along the road I suspect there will be things people stop at, people get bogged down by, whether they’re beautiful animals or flowers, walls, or a movement to tear down the wall… people will stop, people will focus their lives on that, and that will have the potential to become their barrier.
Pink Floyd would be proud. You are obviously not “Another Brick in the Wall.”
The wall can’t help but hold humanity back. That’s what walls do.
Why choose between this and planet of the hats for a book? I vote you do both
Man, woman, child, ALL are up against the WALL OF SCIENCE!
Brilliant, PZ! I’d buy the book.
Instead of a Wall, perhaps a Round Room where we are in constant search of a corner in which to piss…when there’s a perfectly good bathroom down the hall.
I don’t think you can tear down the wall. Attempting to do so will only inspire those who worship it to build it stronger and higher.
I think what you have to do is go beyond the wall, and show by example that you can have wonder and joy and excitement without the wall.
There will always be those who need the wall – the best we can hope for is to free some of the people who aren’t strong enough to get over it by themselves.
When the wall is finally dismantled and used for paving the superhighway through the place where the town used to stand, I plan to set up a little concession next to the two or three hundred meters of surviving wall that we didn’t knock down because we wanted to remember what the wall looked like long after we stopped cowering in fear of it, and I’m going to sell little samples of the wall to tourists at an exhorbitant markup. I’ll call it Pieces Of The One True Wall. Should be a good business for my retirement years.
Odd…
Everyone mentions the “Wall” (Berlin/Wailing/China etc)
and the “Road”, and even JRRT gets a mention, but no quote from “Bilbo”?
The verses that begin:
The Road goes ever on/ far from the door where it began/
and I must follow, with eager feet/ to where many paths and errnds meet …
etc.
I’ve just noticed comment #61 ….
A DOOR in the wall?
Please, not a small green one, easily overlooked, that only appears to be there some of the time, and can’t always be opened?
Leading to a: secret graden/wood-between-the-worlds/beyond the fields we know/a toyshop/eldritch dimensions/ DISCWORLD(?)
We don’t need no thought control
Very nice. I’d love to see the book…
Adding an Emperor’s New Clothes angle adds an unnecessary layer of metaphor. The story is the metaphor! The metaphor relies the wall being real. In real life, the wall is metaphorical but its effects are real. The story works as written.
Yeah… we sure did.
The story continued a bit longer though:
Even the architects of the past felt forced to discuss the road.
Some argued that the wall, being a wall, could never be moved.
But some others said that the wall and the road could be conciliated. But it would not do to touch the painted and glorified pieces of the real wall. The wall worshipers would never admit to that.
Instead the wall appeasers spoke of pieces of the wall, completely without art and fancy. “Now”, they thought, “these pieces would look innocent enough to be used by both wall worshipers and road builders. Surely they must make excellent pavement.”
They forgot to ask the road builders of course. If they had, they would never have proposed such a torturous scheme. The road builders knew that imagination wasn’t the same as the real thing.
And indeed, when the appeasers lured people to cater to the artless imaginations there was no form or substance, nothing to stand on.
The road builders shrugged their shoulders, turned their backs on the architects of old and proceeded to pave the road to the future with real stone.
…
…
…
Btw, this was a nice answer to N&M’s stonewalling…, ehrm, framing of things.
The story continued a bit longer though:
Even the architects of the past felt forced to discuss the road.
Some argued that the wall, being a wall, could never be moved.
But some others said that the wall and the road could be conciliated. But it would not do to touch the painted and glorified pieces of the real wall. The wall worshipers would never admit to that.
Instead the wall appeasers spoke of pieces of the wall, completely without art and fancy. “Now”, they thought, “these pieces would look innocent enough to be used by both wall worshipers and road builders. Surely they must make excellent pavement.”
They forgot to ask the road builders of course. If they had, they would never have proposed such a torturous scheme. The road builders knew that imagination wasn’t the same as the real thing.
And indeed, when the appeasers lured people to cater to the artless imaginations there was no form or substance, nothing to stand on.
The road builders shrugged their shoulders, turned their backs on the architects of old and proceeded to pave the road to the future with real stone.
…
…
…
Btw, this was a nice answer to N&M’s stonewalling…, ehrm, framing of things.
Hey, do I have permission to translate this and post on local forum? :)
G. Tingey: you do realize what sort of person wrote LOTR don’t you? And what “the road” signifies for that sort?
Thank you, this is inspiring.
In answer to M. Kremer – yes.
I still have almost all of JRRT’s work, as it is great writing, and a wonderful set od=f stories, even though he was a committed RC, and it has been shown that LoTR is entirely congruent with standard catholic theology.
G. Tingey:
Since I’m the one who mentioned Tolkin, I’ll have to call you to task for misquoting the old professor of Anglo-Saxon. I know this poem well indeed (I used the second verse it in my father’s eulogy) and it runs like this:
The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with weary feet,
Until it joins some larger way,
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.
The Road goes ever on and on
Out from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
Let others follow it who can!
Let them a journey new begin,
But I at last with weary feet
Will turn towards the lighted inn,
My evening-rest and sleep to meet.
Of course, these two halves of the poem are separated in LOTR, with the first in The Fellowship of the Ring and the second in The Return of the King.
I mention this in part because I simplified Tolkien in my own quote (though I excuse myself by saying I was doing it from memory, not having the book to hand) of his foreword to LOTR. Here it is correctly and extended a bit since the rest has relevance for what comes next:
I’m not really sure we can tie the Tolkien image of the Road as it runs through many of his works (though by no means all) to our own PZ’s allegorical use here. Remember, Tolkien cautioned in the same introduction that LOTR had no “inner meaning or ‘message'”. It was a story for its own sake, built of his own studies of Anglo-Saxon and Norse epic and mythology. If you really want to know where Tolkien is coming from as a writer, then read On Fairy-Story. True, he was unrepentantly Christian (and Catholic) but that does not limit his insight on the utility and place of story in human society and the discovery of knowledge. I that sense, I don’t think he’d disapprove of PZ’s allegory out of hand, but would ask “does it get us closer to a truth about ourselves and our world?” In that regard, I’d say that it does.
Michael:
This is the reason I’m going to have to differ with you on the symbolism of the Road in Tolkien. I can tell you’re leading up to the idea of his Christianity, etc. and the Road as metaphor for Christian iconography and the redemptive tale. But I think that those who insist on this for Tolkien don’t really understand him very well and certainly not in the terms that I’ve outlined above. He tried to deal in human universals, in the nature of what we are as thinking creatures; indeed it is the essential element of his popularity still, that he spoke of human constants, not religious doctrine.
I hope to be at that jubilee with you, sir.
Now I have the perfect item to send to those people who send me all of that “inspirational” spam. Thank you, sir.
“I know you’re out there. I can feel you now. I know that you’re afraid… you’re afraid of us. You’re afraid of change. I don’t know the future. I didn’t come here to tell you how this is going to end. I came here to tell you how it’s going to begin. I’m going to hang up this phone, and then I’m going to show these people what you don’t want them to see. I’m going to show them a world without you. A world without rules and controls, without borders or boundaries. A world where anything is possible. Where we go from there is a choice I leave to you. ”
Nice work, PZ.
Stwriley: I take your point that LOTR is not an allegory. At the same time, in “On Fairy Stories” (yes, I’ve read it), Tolkien’s theme is “sub-creation,” where this presupposes a non-sub-creation by a non-sub-creator that the artist imitates in creating a fictitious world.
But for the rest, and leaving Tolkien aside, I suppose I was struck by how often metaphors of path, way, road, are used to describe God and religion themselves. And how that use of the metaphors is so at odds with PZ’s use of the image of the wall. I want to say that if God or religion function as walls, yes indeed, tear them down. They are a false God and a false religion. But be prepared to be surprised by the road.
Everything we know about the universe and everything about how we know what we know tells us that no god-thing exists in any way he has been conceived on earth. I may be surprised by what we find out down the road, but I’ll be happy to have left gods behind. They only hold us back.
Sorry, that should have been “no god-thing exists in any way it has been conceived on earth.”
PZ, this is great! I want to translate this story of yours for my kid and maybe others. If interested, please send me an e-mail for details.
PZ, this is great! I want to translate this story of yours for my kid and maybe others. If interested, please send me an e-mail for details.
A few people have asked about translating this. Go ahead! Just drop me a line and send me a copy.
Just beginning? I think we began oveer 400 years ago.
It’s been going slowly, hasn’t?
TAW: Somehow I am reminded of Doug Hofstadter’s technique in Gödël, Escher, Bach. Maybe this piece of PZ’s could be the “whimisical” chapter in a book written in that “whimisical alternates with ‘more serious'” style.
Stwriley: Notice though, that JRRT doesn’t given an argument, at least there. So we just have dueling preferences …
Nice story- great metaphor, but I don’t think the wall needs to be torn down, apparantly some people need it to feel secure. Why not just add a door- one without a lock, so that those who dare can pass freely from one side to the other?
PZ, any chance of making a book with these best-of posts? I would certainly buy it.
No wonder atheists can’t produce great art–their natural impulse is to destroy it. Just go around the wall and let people make their own choices. Or are you trying to say that atheism requires absolute adherence to its dogmas by ALL people?