Who Benefits from Spiritualism?

1. Individual Humans (Psychological Benefit)

These are people who personally benefit from spiritual beliefs—emotionally, existentially, or behaviourally. Spirituality may serve to:

· Soothe existential anxiety (about death, suffering, meaninglessness)

· Provide a sense of purpose or identity

· Offer comfort in hardship (e.g., illness, loss, injustice)

· Facilitate moral or ethical guidance

· Create a perceived connection to something greater than oneself (cosmos, community, divine)

In this sense, almost all humans are potential beneficiaries at different life stages. Spirituality here functions like emotional scaffolding or a coping mechanism.

2. Communal or Social Benefit

Spirituality can also serve a functional role in maintaining social order, cohesion, and shared identity.

Who benefits?

· Communities that are unified by shared belief systems

· Tribal or cultural groups that encode norms and values through myth or ritual

· Societies managing conflict through moral frameworks or ritualized forgiveness

This can help:

· Regulate behaviour through shared ethics

· Foster trust among group members

· Provide group solidarity and reduce fear of the unknown

Spirituality acts as a cultural glue—especially in pre-scientific societies.

3. Institutional or Elite Benefit

Here, we enter the realm of power dynamics. Some humans leverage spirituality not just for comfort or meaning, but for control, status, or authority.

Who benefits?

· Priests, shamans, oracles — who hold symbolic power as intermediaries with the divine

· Kings or emperors — who claim divine right or legitimacy through spiritual narratives

· Religious institutions — which accrue wealth, land, and influence

· Political leaders — who use religion to justify policy or war

In this view, spirituality can become a tool of governance or manipulation—an artifact not just of belief but of institutional engineering.

Summary Table

Level	Beneficiaries	Nature of Benefit
Individual	Anyone facing uncertainty, loss, or fear	Psychological comfort, meaning, coping
Social	Communities or societies	Cohesion, shared norms, conflict resolution
Institutional	Elites, clergy, rulers	Power, authority, control, legitimacy

Final Thought

If spirituality is an artificial human construct, it's a powerful and adaptive one, potentially benefitting everyone in different ways—but disproportionately benefiting those who understand how to shape, preserve, or control the artifact for their own ends.

Who Benefits from Naturalism?

1. Individuals Seeking Rational Autonomy

These are people who value:

· Critical thinking

· Evidence-based belief systems

· Freedom from dogma or superstition

They benefit by:

· Making life choices based on reason and empirical evidence

· Avoiding manipulation by supernatural claims

· Taking personal responsibility for ethics, meaning, and purpose

Key beneficiaries:
Scientists, sceptics, ancient Indian Charvakas, secular humanists, atheists, agnostics, and anyone disillusioned with institutionalized religion.

2. Scientific and Technological Communities

Naturalism (the ancient Greek: physis) is the foundation of the scientific method. Without assuming that nature is coherent, law-governed, and observable, science wouldn’t function.

Who benefits?

· Researchers and engineers (advancing medicine, tech, physics, etc.)

· Educators and students in STEM fields

· Innovators and entrepreneurs leveraging scientific knowledge

Benefit:
Predictive power, practical utility, and continual progress in understanding and manipulating the world.

3. Societies Rooted in Secular Institutions

Naturalism supports:

· Secular governance (separation of church and state)

· Evidence-based policy-making (healthcare, climate, education)

· Democratic pluralism, where laws aren't based on spiritual, meaning supra-natural inferences or doctrines

Who benefits?

· Citizens in pluralistic, democratic societies

· Minority groups no longer bound by majority religious norms

· Legal systems free from supernatural influence

4. The Independent Autonomous

People who seek secular local survival rules—expedient practical reasoning—rather than divine command or cosmic judgment.

Benefit:
Rules based systems rooted in the survival imperative, possibly in empathy, social contract, and consequence rather than punishment/reward in an afterlife.

Summary Table

Level	Beneficiaries	Nature of Benefit
Individual	Rational thinkers, sceptics, secular people	Intellectual autonomy, freedom from dogma, moral agency
Scientific	Scientists, educators, tech innovators	Predictive knowledge, material progress
Social	Democratic societies, minorities, institutions	Secular governance, policy rooted in evidence

Key Contrast with Spiritualism

Spiritualism	Naturalism
Offers emotional comfort and meaning to the immature	Offers intellectual clarity and autonomy to the mature
Favors collective belief and ritual	Favors individual reasoning and inquiry
Benefits institutional authorities	Benefits scientific and democratic systems
Tends toward absolutes and transcendence	Tends toward provisional, testable outcomes-as-truths

Final Thought

In short, naturalism benefits those, meaning mature, because coherent, hence quantised adults who seek understanding through observation and logic. Naturalism thrives where open inquiry and scepticism are allowed. It does not offer the emotional balm (meaning external salvation) that spirituality might, but it offers (saving) powerful (salvation) tools for navigating and reshaping personal reality—tools that empower both individuals and complex aggregates of humans, namely cultures.

The druid’s post-spiritual naturalism

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