Chapter 7: Supernatural Conspiracies
"It's not supernatural if it exists in the natural world,
if it takes place in nature. It's natural. It's just not understood."
-Guy Lyon-Playfair
Chapter 7:Supernatural Conspiracies
This chapter will address a different kind of truth suppression. In fact, as opposed to a conscious effort to hide the truth and install a malicious purpose, this will focus on providing an alternative explanation to two major misconceptions of the English language and western culture.
The first is Supernaturalism.
The second is Mythology.
The following will provide an argument that the terms Supernatural and Mythological are misleading and do not represent their definitions in an accurate manner. This will continue into a discussion that will show how the skewed and inaccurate definitions have affected western culture in an unproductive, confusing, and impractical manner.
1) The Supernatural / Supernaturalism
The term supernatural has a literal meaning of something that is above nature. It is trying to state the existence of something, whatever it may be, that exists above or outside the laws of nature.
The greatest flaw with this type of term is that nature refers to collection of all the processes in existence. When people hear the term nature they often associate it with the forests, the mountains, or the animals walking in the meadow. Even while typing this, the image of greenery and intense vegetation comes to mind. However, nature is a much greater and term that is also associated with the creation of stars, planets, and the Big Bang Theory.
It is also safe to say that human life lives in the natural world. Something is not supernatural if it exists. Instead, it is an additional part of nature that has not been explored yet. To say that something is above or not associated with the collection of all processes in existence is to deny its existence it self.
Challenge 1: When someone uses the term supernatural, they are making the assumption that what they are describing does not exist.
Example: Ghosts. If we die and turn into ghosts, how is that supernatural? In fact, it is not. The explanation was just provided. A person is alive. Then, they die. Then, they take on an Earthly form of the afterlife as a ghost. Nothing about that sequence can be above the laws of nature because it describes actions that are taking place in the natural world and explanations are provided.
Challenge 2: It is not supernatural, if it exists in the natural world. It is misunderstood.
If any of the processes described as supernatural were verifiable under scientific study and accepted with certifiable proof, they would not be labeled as supernatural. This reiterates challenge number one. Once someone begins to refer to something as supernatural, they are making the assumption that it does not exist.
This is very important as this term is often used by individuals who are promoting a cause which they label as supernatural themselves. Everyone from ghost hunters, to students of vampire folklore, to the religious community use the term supernatural. They are in need of a new term.
2) Mythology / Mythological
Terms such as Mythology and Mythological fail to understand the usage of allegory, metaphor, inspirational sayings, illustration of concept, and other literary devices that are used to communicate a message.
Mythology contains the word myth. It is trying to say that mythology is false; however, something is not false if it has truth in it.
Challenge 1: It is not mythological if it deals with something that exists in the natural world.
Example: Persephone ate seven seeds from a pomegranate, and must stay with Hades in the underworld for seven months a year. This causes sadness for Persephone's mother Demeter. While Demeter is sad, the colder weather and seasons come.
The fact is, the seasons do change. In the Northern Hemisphere, it does get colder in the winter and hotter in the summer. That part is not a myth, nor is it mythological.
It is not mythological if it is connected to the real world. Instead, it is a communicate device used
by human expressionists to convey a message
Challenge 2: What so-called mythology represents is the human process of projecting character traits onto nature and existing processes. This done is all throughout human history and literature. There are the light examples of Mark Twain referring to the Mississippi River as "The Mighty Mississippi," Grandpa Simpson dressed up as "Old Man Winter," or broader cases of "Mother Earth and Father Sun," the entire notion of the "Earth Mother Goddess" is sometimes lumped in with the discussion on mythology, but that is a gross misinterpretation and skewed perception of the message that is trying to be conveyed.
Was humanity not born on the Earth? Are the Earth and Sun not necessary and in many ways responsible for human life? The answers are yes. The type of thinking that that is a mythological statement misrepresents what it is trying to say.
Whether it is Greek Mythology, Roman, Egyptian, Native American, or from any corner of the world. Instead, of mythological, any part of these spiritual traditions should not go overlooked only because they are connected to spirituality.
Instead of mythological, they are connected to the existing natural world in many different ways. They are illustrations of concepts. The concepts are real and scientific, and the illustrations are communicative devices to share the message.
Conclusion:
The usage of the terms Supernatural and Mythology created a skewed and distorted perspective on the concepts of naturalism, literature, spirituality, cultural diversity, and folklore. They distort the meaning of human understanding as they do not reflect the truest state of human expression and diversity of thought. Furthermore, they do not give human understanding enough credit. The concepts, which they try to discredit are alive and well in the natural world. The value found in material labeled as supernatural and mythological is a suppression of truth.