There's studies into this. It's midnight, so my recall isn't at it's best, but it has a lot to do with our self awareness. Our brains are capable of forming simulations of other people and abstract concepts. So when we think of someone, the brain plays that person inside the head. Or from the example I heard, if we imagine playing tennis, our brains would stimulate regions that play tennis. Another finding is that when we remember memories, our neurons create new connections as if we were experiencing it again but differently. I think that's a fundamental insight but I'm too sleepy to elaborate. When a loved one passes away, they are gone, but the grieving brain differs. Our social rituals in handling death and bereavement follow that mentality. Otherwise we'd throw dead bodies in heaps and move on. So there are good explainations of why we have the ability to make things up, but it doesn't really prove or deny anything. The question isn't a matter of whether it made any sense to make up a fictitious God but rather how our brains our wired. Writing this reply alone, I've had to replace "mind" with "brain" to dismiss the implicit notion of duality (it's very natural to do it). For your point, the mentioned framework didn't begin with Jewish culture. The Jews borrowed it from a previous culture and so on. Our writing, language, and art were stolen, crafted, and borrowed from past civilizations. Shakespeare wouldn't exist without Chaucer. Paul's outreach to other civs played upon the natural progression and similarities that drove their cultures. He himself was educated enough to be influenced by their best aspects as well. I think some articles were posted on here about our brain's inability to grasp with randomness and it's inclination towards patterns. You asked why Asians have kept a lot of superstitions. It hasn't produced a net negative result for the 6,000 plus years of cultural existence. So you could say that there is a Godly influence nudging us to progress. Or you could say that religion is a cultural remnant driving upon a yet to be explained but influencial portion of our brain that manages to live on through relevance in its ability to help us cope with the unpredictable. I think neither are productive answers. Human potential should be based upon the idea that limits and definitions should be broken. Defining and limiting are are things religion/cultural history and science can do very well if abused.
I think the issues you raise here might be the next logical step in this discussion. Is there one god or more than one? Are different religions really mutually exclusive? These are not easy questions. W.r.t. my personal beliefs, I’m pretty confident I know the answer to the first question, but I’m not at all confident about the second.
Because belief in science simply meets the psychological requirements of religion in another guise. 1) Most people who believe in science do so on faith. 99.999% of people who believe in evolution for example, cannot explain the mechanisms under which evolution operates. Most people dont even understand what evolution is and think it means the fittest organisms survive... when in fact evolution simply says that as environments change so do organisms. People who rely on religion do so on faith in the person delivering the message: their minister, priest, imam etc. They are in no position to objectively test or verify their assertions. People who rely on science for "answers" typically do so simply on the word of people in whom they have been taught to trust: scientists and professors. It's not like the average atheist is in a position to independently verify anything... they trust scientists when they say the universe is X billion years old or that humans evolved in Africa or whatever. They've simply replaced one belief system based on authority (based on what society says is valid) with another. Obviously I'm not saying that science and religion have equal validity... but the many things that Atheists believe as a matter of faith are in fact based on authority like religion. 2) Science can't really provide any answers, only more questions. Even answers such as "how did the Earth come to being?" can't be answered with certainty. 25 years ago, the idea that the moon was formed from part of the Earth or that life came to Earth from the stars via comets were preposterous. Yet today those are 2 dominant theories. In another 20 years those theories will either be obsolete or have significant revisions. Hard science such as physics cannot answer basic questions. Science such as anthropology or sociology aren't real science that can be tested but merely inference and "our best information/guess at this time." In those fields the only truism is that "we dont know everything about anything" and the truth is that "everything we now believe will be obsolete at some point." 3) Atheists dont have the tools that religious people have. Religion, whether true or false all have significant energy devoted to channeling and controlling constructive social behavior. Beyond that, all religions have a component of motivation and inspiration. Human beings need some sort of social structure under which to be productive. Generally people with belief systems are happier, more adjusted to society and more motivated to be part of a community. Personally atheists, if TRUE atheists who admit that we have no answers and that nothing has any meaning beyond what we as humans attribute to them have my props. Most supposed atheists are simply agnostics, who actually hold onto the tropes of religion under another guise... for example believing that evolution creates superior beings over time (like some scientific hand of God giving direction to the human race) or look to science for some sort of answers about HUMAN moral questions on how we should live or what to think of some topic (such as "normalcy" of homosexuality, the viability of racial differences or even something like male propensity towards promiscuity/monogamy). Basically transferring questions about identity, morality and behavior from a religious source to a "scientific" one. So yeah as you can guess I basically believe religion is false but it's the most important facet holding society together. If all you ****ers were true atheists the world would fall apart. The direction that the world is taking is everyone is becoming a sort of soft agnostic where we look to science for the answers on social questions but that's basically a less constructive version of science-based religion (without all the checks, rituals and things that actually contribute to the running of society and keep ppl sedated and cooperative with each other)
I don't know why you'd expect unintelligent creatures to have a belief in anything, let alone a god. The point is to provide answers. 1000s of years ago people didn't have the breadth of scientific knowledge we now enjoy, so they had to come up with much simpler answers to questions like "Why does it rain" or "Why does the sun come up periodically" or "what do all those shiny dots in the sky mean?" We are inclined to look for meaning and purpose in the patterns that we observe, and we naturally reason that this meaning/purpose derives from some sort of intelligent authority operating behind the scenes. The alternative would be that there is no ultimate meaning/purpose/cause, and that idea does not sit well with us. Our mode of reasoning about the world has served us well as a species on the whole, but it does frequently lead us to false answers (e.g. there is some hidden meaning behind the arrangement of stars, or a terrible storm is indicative of an angry god, or the sun comes up in the morning because the Sun god is waking up, etc.). It certainly is wasteful of time and resources. Many things are. But there are, nevertheless, advantages as you already conceded in your first sentence ("I agree that there are advantages to a shared belief system").
There is a big difference. An atheist may believe in a particular scientific theory without understanding it, based on the (very reasonable) assumption that there does exist evidence for it that he just has not gotten around to studying first-hand. If the atheist was to learn that this supposed evidence was actually fabricated and does not exist, then he should abandon his belief in the theory. Faith is believing in something even when no evidence for it exists. Your comparison does not really hold, because ministers/priests/imams have no more evidence of the existence of god than any other person. That evidence simply is not there; faith doesn't require it. That simply isn't true. Science can answers questions like: "If I add this chemical to this other chemical, what sort of compound will result." This is useful information, and it helps to provide greater understanding of the world around us. Surely, you agree that science has advanced our understanding of nature significantly over the last several hundred years. There is much we do not understand, granted. But there is quite a lot we do understand far more than we used to. I think this could be true. Not sure, but it sounds plausible.
I don't know about that, some animals have shown some strange abilities to sense things we can’t. Just the other day I read an article about a lady taking in a stray cat, which at night would purr and touch her head, the lady out of curiosity went to a doctor to check things out. They ended up finding a tumour. There are numerous stories about animals sensing natural disasters as well, while elephants are known to pay respect to their dead, strange stuff. Anyway haven’t read any posts before this, just thought I’d throw in my two cents...
You’re describing things that do happen, but it’s not clear that anything is being made up here. We’re remembering things, and there are probably reasons for that, but it’s not clear that any radically different situations or beings are being mentally created in this scenario. Well, part of the question is, why would our brains be wired this way? If they did evolve this way, then why? What benefit would there be to evolving a way of thinking that causes us to make up elaborate fantasies that waste our time and resources? I’m necessarily thinking about any kind of religious or spiritual framework. Look at corporate culture, for example. People generally understand that it is beneficial to work within a framework for the common good. Think of concepts like being a team player, or taking one for the team, as examples. I don’t really know to what extent superstitions exist in Asian cultures. The common belief is that they are more prevalent, but maybe that’s just the stereotype. Do you know anything more about this? I think it’s difficult to think of a scenario where religion might be a cultural remnant. Why would we have made up religion in the first place when something akin to corporate culture seems like it would have been the best and most efficient framework? What would be the point in adding the extra layer of a fictitious god and religion? How would that benefit us?
I’m not sure that I do, but if they don’t and we do then where did that belief come from? It would be something that we developed, that evolved within us, and then question then is why? Why would we develop this belief system if it isn’t based on something real and it doesn’t benefit us? Yes, a shared framework of understanding is beneficial to us, but we don’t need a god and religion to have a shared framework of understanding. A non religious or spiritual framework built on practical considerations relating to the common good seems like the obvious way to go. As far as unanswered questions go, there are still many we don’t know the answer to. What is gravity, for example? We know how it works and how it affects our lives, and that’s the bulk of what we need to know to get by and even prosper. Yes, our curiosity leads us to want to know more, and perhaps some day our scientists will learn something about gravity that we can use to advance our species even further, and that would certainly be advantageous to us. That would be a payoff of the curiosity, but making up a fictitious god and a fake religion doesn’t help us. That would only divert our energy and resources. Our curiosity and will to understand only benefit us if they produce real answers that we can use to improve our chances of survival and to help us prosper. Survival of the fittest suggests that we will develop abilities and tendencies that make us more fit. Yes, our mode of reasoning about the world does frequently lead us to false answers, but they tend not to last, because they’re not true and they don’t benefit us in the end. I agree that astrology is an interesting example to look at, and it could well be a good example of what you’re talking about. If it’s not true, however, then it’s not going to benefit the people who believe in it, at least in general and over the long term, and from my knowledge that appears to be the case. Not many highly successful people I know of believe in astrology. It does seem to hang around on the fringes, however, which is a curious thing. I think it would be useful to look into it further, but I’m not all that familiar with it offhand.
I doubt they've come to earth (maybe... but luckily water kills them?) But, I do think there are probably other species out there. It always seemed egotistical to think otherwise, but maybe we are special snowflakes afterall!
<< Genesis 1:27 >> thus spake thegary (©2010) man created god in his own image, in the image of man he created him
Richard Dawkins once said the it was possible that aliens seeded life on earth. but its not possible that an almighty creator did.
I live in Canada and I'm muslim, and I can tell you here it's people who believe in God who get laughed at. Only immigrants and minorithies believe in god here(and there's a lot of immigrants here trust me) while 80% white-canadians don't believe in religion. Maybe it isn't the same in Ontario but here in Quebec it's like that.
Canada is bigger than just Ontario and Quebec. W.r.t. Quebec, however, there has been a big backlash there against the Catholic church in recent decades.
Yes, probably because the Catholic Church had so much power over the people in Quebec from the Britain Empire to 1950. It's like people escaped from something when the state splitted religion and politics.
I believe life exists on other planets. I have very serious doubts that any aliens have ever visited earth. It's not a possibility I consider when I hear about UFOs.
Belief in astrology was fairly universal until science came up with much better explanations for the motions of stars/planets in the last 500 years. But there is still much that science does not have firm answers for -- e.g. what happens in the after life? So we hang on to our belief in the supernatural, because we don't like not having answers to fundamental questions (in addition to other things like having beliefs instilled in us at a young age and societal pressure).
I'm getting a lot of equivocation here. I'm not asking whether you believe there is life on other planets. Do you believe UFOs are real? What about ghosts? Just saying...
Social animals though seem to devote a lot of time to things that don't seem to have a specific evolutionary advantage and behaviors that aren't rational. As another poster noted though elephants behave ritualistic behavior, so do apes, wolves and even crows. Anyway though accepting that animals don't have religion wouldn't that punch a hole though in the idea that deities actually exist and play a role in existence? Wouldn't an all powerful deity make its presence known through religion to other beings as much as humans if all of creation is its purview? Again though you have to consider that seperation of church and state is a new concept. By appealing to a higher power a leader instills legitimacy onto his rule. For instance The Mandate of Heaven, the Divine Right of Kings, and etc.. In societies where there was a very limited understanding of the world religious power was a tool for social control as the religion controlled knowledge while the king controlled temporal power. Tying the two together assured cohesion of the state and the rule of the king. In that sense religion was completely necessary for the functioning of society. Leaving that aside though and considering that religion is unnecessary for survival of society or Evolution. Consider though how many ideas that we know aren't true are popular or activities that don't add to survival are practiced. For example we know that Star Trek isn't true but that doesn't stop many people from being obsessed with it and doing things like collecting Star Trek paraphenalia. Based upon the standard you are applying here fiction and collecting things for the sake of collecting them would've been weeded out evolutionarily yet if anything we see those practices getting even more popular. Also consider that even among animals there are many activities that don't appear to lend an immediate Evolutionary advantage. For example many animals practice homosexuality and we all know that doesn't lead procreation. For that matter why do humans, apes and dolphins enjoy or even need sex during times when females aren't fertile? Sex uses up resources that could be used for other things. In regard to religious belief you seem to be jumping to a conclusion that this must indicate the existence of some higher power since why else would so many people have religion when ignoring that religion isn't unusual in this regard. There are many practices that humans and other animals do that don't automatically lead to an evolutionary advantage or are true. Your argument that because so many people believe in religion and engage in religious practice that is evidence it is true. Just looking at evidence you could say that because there are so many Trekkies that is evidence Star Trek is true. One more note on Evolution. Evolution isn't an efficient agent so just because something doesn't give an adaptive or competitive advantage doesn't mean it will be weeded out by Evolution. FOr instance we have an appendix which doesn't do anything other than getting inflamed like any other organ, it doesn't do any harm. It is at most neutral and there is no advantage to either having or not having an appendix. As I said earlier I think rationality leads to spirituality because as thinking beings we question existence. Whether there is something more than that I don't know. I'm willing to accept the idea that there is something beyond the physical and our existence isn't limited to that but as I have said repeatedly I don't think that is a scientific question. Further I don't think just saying that a lot of people believe in the supernatural is proof but I don't think proof is necessary. That is faith and as such isn't dependent on empiracal proof.
