In the opening scene of Homer’s The Odyssey, Zeus complains to his favored daughter Athena that mortals love to blame the gods for their problems, when they themselves are the source of most of their troubles.  “Lo, how men blame the gods! From us, they say, spring troubles. But through their own perversity, and more than is their due, they meet with sorrow,” cries the lord of Olympus. Mankind, through its own folly, obsessions, impulses, and fallibility, wreaked havoc on itself. From personal