Spirituality is a base instinct, and most people -need- to believe something. What ever fills that need, whether it's God, Allah, Buddha, Science or Spaghetti... They are all god if they fill that need for people.
I can appreciate spirituality.
People believing that they are the "true" believers is where the problem comes in, and unfortunately, most religions have that as a feature and not a bug.
To be so conceited... An omnipotent being would at least be smart enough to understand how regional culture works, and would present itself to everyone in ways that were culturally relevant. And a lot of religion started out very, very cool, but got changed and corrupted by whoever was ruling that part of the world.
We all believe in the same shit, just in different ways.
Also: There are far too many people in this world that are comfortable exploiting something so basic to being human.
/soapbox
This is pretty fluffy, and I guess that's nice, but religion is actually harmful. And as much as religion and science may both satisfy a similar desire to belong to something greater, I think it is dangerously misleading to suggest that the two are equivalent - even in this limited context.
People believing that they are the "true" believers is where the problem comes in
This is incredibly divisive, you're right, but ... you might be due to rewatch the film if you think there aren't foundational problems long before we get to sectarianism.
We all believe in the same shit, just in different ways.
You might have misunderstood me... I'm saying religion as an institution is harmful. I think we agree on that.
I'm not trying to say that religion is equivalent to science. I'm saying the believer of God and the believer of science are both drawing from the same place in their respective phyches. Its where we build our idea of what the world is, and our place in it.
What Wanda sees as a tornado sent by God, Debbie sees as the result of observable weather patterns. You can worry about who's right, or you can realize that they are both right from their own respective world views.
How is it divisive to say "people who's belief system specifically invalidates the beliefs of others kinda suck?" That idea is divisive by design, which is where we have the problem in religion.
The "same shit" I was referring to was the core need for belief. The comment was a plea for understanding, not a literal statement of fact...
Religion as a concept isn't harmful. It's a completely natural pairing of our need for spirituality and need for community. But it's as suceptiple to manipulation just as any other system in society. It takes a human willing to exploit it to make it harmful.
Replace species with civilization and intelligence with knowledge, then it fits.
Yes. You can't base it on the single species that actually made up religion
And "evolves" to "acquires."
Good to know that all of recorded human history has just been a phase. I mean, shit show that it has been.
I mean recorded history is like, what? 10,000 years? Meanwhile modern humans are about 160,000 years old.
A phase doesn't have to be a small thing, just something we eventually move past
Pound sign deep
Octothorpe amazing.
Ampersand inciteful
Human intelligence has not materially changed since the Advent of religion.
Human intelligence has not progressed since the Advent of atheism.
Human understanding and human culture have changed.
And most importantly, the tools we use today are nigh infinitely more powerful than before. Very little has done more for the collective intelligence on the planet than computers.
I wouldn't rule out that we've become smarter since then. Iirc the average IQ did increase over time. We may not have changed genetically, but many explanations think we can foster higher IQs in our modern environment compared to a 100 years ago.
You're referring to the Flynn effect. But the Flynn effect is a 20th century (post-WWII) phenomenon that describes an increase in the average intelligence test performance (and similar abilities like memory span). There are a number of explanations that have been proposed for this effect, the most convincing ones being improved nutrition and schooling. Either way, this effect does not apply on an evolutionary scale (or even a larger historical one) and it also represents a fairly narrow, gradual change rather than the broad, drastic change suggested in the OP. Also, in recent years, the Flynn effect appears to have reached a ceiling and is even reversing in some countries.
IQ is a bad measure for intelligence, and is constantly rising year over year.
IQ is a bullshit measurement made up by eugenicists to prove that white men are the best and does little more than measure learning.
I don't see how this could be true. It would be analogous to observing a species of bone-thin weaklings that becomes interested in body building over the course of a few hundred years, gaining more muscle mass on average with each passing year, and making the claim that the strength of this species has not changed. Maybe if one of the early weaklings decided to take up their own interest in body building, they may have reached a similar strength to that of their descendants (though even that is debatable since that specific individual wouldn't have access to all the training techniques and diets developed over the course of its species' future); however, it seems like an awkward interpretation to say therefore the strength of the species has not changed.
This is similar to the situation we find ourselves regarding intelligence in the human species. Humans gain intelligence by exercising their brains and engaging in mental activity, and humans today are far more occupied by these activities than our ancestors were. This, in my view, makes it accurate to claim that human intelligence has changed significantly since the advent of religion. Individual capacity for intelligence may not have changed much, but the intelligence of humans as a whole has changed.
Note that my argument does not conclude that human knowledge or understanding has changed over time. These attributes certainly have changed - I'm sure not many would doubt that. It also doesn't conclude that every modern human is more intelligent than every ancient human. Instead, it concludes that human intelligence as a whole has changed as a result of changes in our culture that influence us to spend more time training our intelligence than our ancestors.
I don't see how this could be true.
And even if it were possible, are we smart enough to meaningfully assess and quantify the differences? What if the blueprint is missing a layer?
If you haven't already read it, I think you might really appreciate "Other Minds" by Peter Godfrey-Smith.
To use your analogy: intelligence is not the size of your muscles, it is the amount of muscle you can have. Just like intelligence the total amount of muscle your body can support is bounded maximally by your genetics. When you bulk up and become stronger you don't increase your quantity of muscle, you change the quality of it. Body building does not create new muscle cells, it rearranges them into stronger configurations.
Similarly learning and intelligence. Intelligence is not changed by learning, learning is your ability to exercise your intelligence. Learning is the strength to intelligence's muscle cell number.
Genetically very little has changed for humans since the Advent of organized religion, which was only 11000 years ago. There have been no major selective pressures and while humans are not in a steady state (obviously) they are still very slow to change.
Humans from 11k years ago would be most likely indistinguishable from the rest of us today genetically.
What is "human intelligence as a whole"? I think this is not a good concept.
It is practically impossible to differentiate from knowledge and culture, that simply amassed, as populations grew. Furthermore we know full well that mass pschology does not result in smarter decisions, but often terribly worse ones. Finally we are seeing the same mistakes being made a hundred, fivehundred, one thousand years and before. So as a species we didnt learn from past mistakes, instead we raised the stakes by creating an ever complex society whose failures have grave consequences for humanity as a whole.
Also in zhe context of religion and spirituality we have lost connection with many core truths that were understood by socieites wrongfully claimed to be "primitive". Many native people had or have social, spiritual and political structures that worked well to preserve a necessary balance in society and with their environment. Preserving what is nourishing them and rejecting the deadly race for power and wealth that has shaped the global world.
We might be more technologically advanced, but it is not a representation of greater intelligence, as we are too stupid to use this to the benefit of society and the individuals therein.
Sadly, the only way I can imagine to obtain experimental confirmation of this hypothesis would be unworkable.
It would be necessary to take a population of infants, raise them in strict isolation and teach them nothing of religion, carefully excluding anything that even hints at the concept, while giving them the scientific method and lots of understanding of reality otherwise. Then allow them to develop their own civilization and monitor them for several centuries to see if the concept ever emerges.
I always figured that religion arose from the natural inclination of the human brain to look for order in chaos (and it's then exploited by those with power as a means of controlling people). Since there will always be circumstances outside our control, I would expect people to at the very least have superstitions, if not full-blown religion, no matter how much scientific knowledge they have. Until the fundamental nature of the human brain changes, at least.
What other guy said, there could be biological predisposition to religion. Many experts believe that it is a natural anti-depressant.
This is pure conjecture, but to me religion has always felt like an extension of parentage and hierarchy. You start off with your parents as your "ultimate superiors" (they decide for you, teach you etc.). At some point you learn that they are also part of a similar framework, with society and the state as their "ultimate superiors". Gods and so on would then be the next step, the superior to all superiors.
This would explain the "natural anti-depressant" - an intact family gives us feelings of safety, protection, and other positive things. An intact society does the same. It seems logical that religion would do the same on an even larger level.
Does anyone know of counter-examples? E.g. religions with gods viewed as below the individual, or religions that don't claim to be the framework in which everything else lives?
It wouldn't rule out biological predisposition to religion.
So... This is based on all the species we know, who practice religion right?
Right.
When your idea is so good you gotta bring in the big ghost to sell it
I like to think that, in a world before law enforcement, religion is a way clever people trick strong people into not killing them and taking all their stuff.
What is law enforcement and when has it ever not been a threat to have someone come knock your teeth in if you piss off enough or the wrong person?
I think the more likely answer is indeed in the picture: baby's first philosophy. There is a lot of wisdom and behavior grooming in it, but I'd argue the reason is the other way around: It was to try and tell leaders and fathers (in patriarchy, anyways) how to not get their teeth kicked in and how to teach and deal with bad people.
It's an instruction set that has been combined with simple history telling, and then corrupted by thousands of years of dogma and constant revision from the selfish and rich.
It's silly to anchor your moral axioms in systems that require obedience to authority or belief without evidence, and that is the only true difference between philosophy and religion.
I'm talking more than just getting your teeth knocked in. I'm talking getting murdered, your wife getting raped, and your property getting stolen. With no state protection, what is to prevent that from happening?
In the same way that the threat of future punishment by getting thrown in jail stops people from doing those things now, the threat of punishment by God or Gods would serve the same purpose.
It was actually the other way, religion was the ideological superstructure for the first class societies and states forming. Originally, as observed in the ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia religion gain power as communities were formed around common labour and consumption. The first organised cults were the fertility and agriculture gods, first temples were granaries and the priestly class started as granary managers, and that position allowed them to gather and increase their power. Especially visible in case of Mesopotamia where those origins stayed visible way into the written history period.
That is, religion was justification for the strong to become stronger and rule over weaker, and a way for rich to trick poor into not killing them and not taking stuff that was stolen back. Note that even thousands years later even nominally secular state power still had supernatural justification, divine right, mandate of heavens and so on.
You are thinking wrong tho. Religion started out as a benign thing that has been twisted by authorities later on to justify their actions.
Don't be an edgelord giving us a bad name
I'm not saying it wasn't benign. It was a way to protect the average person from raiders.
Religion is the best way to propagate ideas over a long span of time. It's not a great way, but nothing beats it yet.
There is no proof that humanity will ever transition out of that phase. Just because science advances doesn’t mean that religious people will stop existing. There is a sucker born every minute. Unless we start enforcing eugenics in the future and breed out stupidity, people will keep searching for answers trough religion.
Unless we start enforcing eugenics
cool cool let's start with you
I’m not for eugenics, I just worded it wrongly
Smart people aren't immune to stupid ideas. Eugenics is always a bad idea.
Can you tell us what the religion gene is and why it so often doesn't pass from parent to child?
Ah yes, this man has EVOLVED beyond the intelligence of past species. He is not just educated, evolution has gained him superior intelligence!
Praise evolution! Glory to the Homo Atheismus! They might look the same as every religious human but they are actually a different species!
Does this sub come with bandages?
this man has EVOLVED beyond the intelligence of past species. He is not just educated, evolution has gained him superior intelligence!
Yes, exactly. This is exactly what's happened. Humans are far more intelligent than any other species on earth.
They might look the same as every religious human but they are actually a different species!
You've missed the entire point of the post. Religion is a symptom of not being intelligent enough as a species to get past simple answers to hard questions. Atheists aren't more enlightened like you're implying, just that atheism is the next step in human intelligence that not everyone has made or will make for a thousand years. As a whole, humans are still an incredibly young species.
What if the intelligent species have gone extinct because they were so socially good and giving, that they sacrificed themselves when they reached the epitome of religious intelligence.... ?
And whatever's leftover from those that are still surviving are the ones that are yet to go over that phase, and they are all but sheeps at the moment (ones that pray to false idols, or follow other religious figures to guide them, without much critical thinking)?
Those are the ones that were leftover, are the ones that hunted the mammoths to extinction, and have driven other animals and plants species to extinction due selfishness.
What if good, intelligent, and sensible people are becoming more and more scarce due to their new profound knowledge that they have acquired.
Maybe I'm biased because I liked certain people so much (Mr. Rogers, RIP) 😅
