Abstracting gods from natural elements is the first step toward dominating nature

Evidence

In place of the local spirits and demons there appeared heaven and its hierarchy; in place of the invocations of the magician and the tribe the distinct gradation of sacrifice and the labor of the unfree mediated through the word of command. The Olympic deities are no longer directly identical with elements, but signify them. In Homer, Zeus represents the sky and the weather, Apollo controls the sun, and Helios and Eos are already shifting to an allegorical function. The gods are distinguished from material elements as their quintessential concepts. From now on, being divides into the logos (which with the progress of philosophy contracts to the monad, to a mere point of reference), and into the mass of all things and creatures without. This single distinction between existence proper and reality engulfs all others. Without regard to distinctions, the world becomes subject to man. — Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment, 36

Categorization

• DEFINE: Explains how the logos/nature split that grounds Enlightenment abstraction originates in mythic allegorization.
• DEEPTHINKING: The move from ‘identical with elements’ to ‘signifying them’ as the origin of instrumental reason is dense and paradigm-shifting.
• XREF: connects to: Building the panopticon produces God as an emergent architectural byproduct — Jeremy Bentham, The Panopticon Writings, 65; Rational self-preservation conquers nature only by imitating nature’s own rigidity — Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment, 63

Broader Connections

• Building the panopticon produces God as an emergent architectural byproduct #expands (0.72) — Jeremy Bentham, The Panopticon Writings, 65
• Rational self-preservation conquers nature only by imitating nature’s own rigidity #complicates (0.72) — Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment, 63