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By John Kennedy
While it is tempting to think of state power as being maintained by sheer force, it still needs a “theological” justification, be it secular or religious. The US state is no exception.
Reminds me of Europa Universalis, the computer game. In the game, "Legitimacy" is literally a mechanic that needs to be maintained, which explains why you need casus belli to start wars, why you need to respect elections and religious traditions, etc. Very cool game
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That game's been on my Steam wishlist for about a decade, but I've never played it. That sounds like a really cool mechanism.
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Political theology reminds me somewhat of scientism. The religious belief in science as the absolute arbiter of reality. The church did this stuff until the Enlightenment when their “stock’ went down. Now the church is mostly disregarded and science is “god”. Soon, science as “god” will fall and science as an endeavor will rise again.
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I agree. The issue is that once something is considered above reproach, it will become corrupted and used to manipulate people.
It's self-correcting in the long run, but irritating and destructive in the short run.
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Irritating in the short run is an understatement. Once you cannot question something, you know the people involved are ruling you. I think there is going to be a lot of suffering coming down the pike because of scientism (boy, do I get tired of this damn spell-checker, it is as bad as fact-checkers). The sooner scientism goes the better for humanity.
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