Belief Systems that Provide a False Sense of Control or Safety

 Some examples of stress-relieving beliefs with longterm tragic consequences:

• Dominionism - The idea that whatever we do to the planet is OK since our tribal god created it for cosmically special us
• Prometheanism - The falsely utopian idea that the model of understanding nature in mechanical terms that is used in reductionist science allows us to predict and control everything and order it to our ends
• Newageism - The idea that we can be in complete control of our destiny through right thinking and feeling.

What each of these has in common is that it answers the very understandable fear of natural contingencies and one way or another emphasizes the human capacity to control natural circumstances or ignore them without consequence. More importantly, each of these views sanctifies a sense of entitlement to manipulate things to our own ends, without actually specifying any worthwhile ends. That puts us on a cynical hamster wheel to nowhere.

Beliefs like these might have been useful in the past to sustain optimism and creative momentum. But we're now so ramped up that we've lost sight of the optimism, overlook the beyond-human natural, and fail to develop a healthy reverence for nature and the mystery of existence. We now in need of new guiding narratives rooted in a real and grounded relationship to the world.

The world is giving us a reality check.