Post by chris on Jan 24, 2011 5:25:59 GMT -5
Where to start?
I guess the first question is: 'which god and religion are we talking about?' There are so many, in such variety, with so many different versions of god-hood and truth that it is hard to separate them.
How can we separate one religion from another? Should they be treated in order of the number of followers they have? Or maybe the eldest gets seniority over its younger brethren? It is hard to say, and as with most things to do with religion, almost impossible to apply logic to.
What does the fact that there are so many gods and religions in the world tell us about gods and religions? Let's look a little deeper.
As with other traditions such as music or myths: religions and gods are utterly dependent upon their originating culture for their defining characteristics.
Each religious tradition is flavoured by the people giving rise to it, and if that religion or god enters a new culture it changes, adopting characteristics associated with its new followers. A good example of this would be to follow the changes in Buddhism as it moved from India to Tibet, China and Japan. Even now, as Buddhism rises in popularity in the west it changes, adopting a newer "western" flavour.
(it is worth pointing out the difference between religion and philosophy here. I am making no arguments against the philosophies taught by Buddha or Jesus or anyone else, just the belief-systems and organised religions that have grown up around them.)
Back to the question, what does the number and variety of religions and gods tell us? Most obviously it tells us that it is a part of being a human civlisation to create a faith or two (in the same way that music and myths are created) at some stage of development. That these religions and gods cling on for so long shows that they serve some ongoing process.
All religions have a life-span, unless they reinvent themselves utterly as times change, but then they risk losing their integrity and relevance - and so bring about their own demise. What is their purpose while they exist? These gods bring several "benefits" that ensure their ongoing worship.
1) Sense of community. Just visit a nearby church or temple to see what I mean. Also, in most countries the celebrations and holidays coincide with religious events.
2) Gives power to those who want it. Priests, church elders, rabbis, imams, padres, witch-doctors, born-again healers.... they all get something from their position within their faith, with precious few misguided individuals who are in it for the benefit of their fellow human beings.
3) Fosters stability within society. a unified religion can create a more compliant and unified population - something governments crave as it makes their job easier. Divided religions can have the opposite effect of course.
4) Makes decisions for those incapable of doing so for themselves. Unsure whether murder is wrong? If you've got the right religious book it will give you the answer. Want to know if you should sleep with your neighbours wife? Again there is a book for you with the answer. Want to know if its OK to stone your own child to death for being naughty? The bible says 'yes', so go ahead my friend!
5) Belief itself can cause the placebo effect, and create good feelings and effects. At times it may even help healing, but only if the level of delusion is so high that the positive thoughts are believed utterly. It's all about training the mind in the end, ask the Buddhist monks who have changed the medical condition of their brain through meditation.
As prayer has no measurable affect, miracles have never been performed in any way that could be measured or verified, and no god has yet revealed him/her/itself, we only have the benefits to human kind on earth to judge the worth of religion.
Looking at the above list of benefits it is obvious that there are other, less non-sensical, less harmful, less ignorance-promoting ways to achieve these effects.
Sport, historical achievements and other shared events could fulfill the function of creating a sense of community and fostering unity. Power can be achieved through political and financial means. Real books, written by real people, and a decent education can help those incapable of making decisions for themselves. The placebo effect could be reproduced in a million different ways from fake drugs to meditation.
So why keep religion? In a rational society it would only serve as a curiosity - a quaint old custom to be trotted out at public events.
Why get rid of gods and religion, you might ask, what harm is it doing?
Well, put simply, the majority of religious beliefs have the following negative characteristics in common with each other:
1) Promotes ignorance - by teaching to believe something just because it is written and some other people believe it as well makes "truth" subject to a popularity contest. This can lead to the continuation of erroneous ideas, and causes some human minds that may have grown to become brilliant and benefit the entire human race to become stagnant and repulsive, unable to change or come up with original ideas.
2) Provides a tool for corruption - more so than money or politics, religion is believed and trusted even in the face of contradictory evidence, thereby making it perfect to be abused and perverted by those who would wish to use it for their own purposes.
3) Divides the human race - while political and racial differences gradually melt away as the human race unifies and the world becomes smaller, religious differences are intensified as they different faiths 'fight' each other for believers. Having believers is the very oxygen that faiths need to survive, and so the fight can become bloody and intense. Again the corrupt can use faith as a perfect tool to incite violence - much easier to use than money or political differences.
4) Holds the human race back from seriously beneficial scientific advances - by denying the obvious facts of the universe around us, religion influences the direction of scientific and medical research, as well as actively fighting against scientific understanding in some areas. Also, as stated previously, religious thought can swallow up minds that could've become world-savingly brilliant.
All of these points I've made are very general, talking about religion as an idea, rather than any specific faiths. The individual faiths are worth discussing, but not here. I'm sure that many would point out the largest faiths in the world as requiring special attention... surely they are the true faiths, as the majority believe them? Well, no. Ideas that become widespread are not always true. The truth of our existence and the universe is not a popularity contest, where the one that is believed by most automatically becomes the truth. When the abrahamic-faiths lose all but a handful of follows each and some new ideology is dominant, does that then mean the abrahamic ideas are no longer true? No. They never were true.
Religion is a fashion, a fad, a harmful, hurtful ignorance that we are slow to recognise... but we are recognising it now, and its days are numbered.
I don't seek to beat my religious fellows, I don't look to defeat, attack or kill those who have faith. I seek merely to cure them so that they can become the fully-functioning human beings they were born to be.
I guess the first question is: 'which god and religion are we talking about?' There are so many, in such variety, with so many different versions of god-hood and truth that it is hard to separate them.
How can we separate one religion from another? Should they be treated in order of the number of followers they have? Or maybe the eldest gets seniority over its younger brethren? It is hard to say, and as with most things to do with religion, almost impossible to apply logic to.
What does the fact that there are so many gods and religions in the world tell us about gods and religions? Let's look a little deeper.
As with other traditions such as music or myths: religions and gods are utterly dependent upon their originating culture for their defining characteristics.
Each religious tradition is flavoured by the people giving rise to it, and if that religion or god enters a new culture it changes, adopting characteristics associated with its new followers. A good example of this would be to follow the changes in Buddhism as it moved from India to Tibet, China and Japan. Even now, as Buddhism rises in popularity in the west it changes, adopting a newer "western" flavour.
(it is worth pointing out the difference between religion and philosophy here. I am making no arguments against the philosophies taught by Buddha or Jesus or anyone else, just the belief-systems and organised religions that have grown up around them.)
Back to the question, what does the number and variety of religions and gods tell us? Most obviously it tells us that it is a part of being a human civlisation to create a faith or two (in the same way that music and myths are created) at some stage of development. That these religions and gods cling on for so long shows that they serve some ongoing process.
All religions have a life-span, unless they reinvent themselves utterly as times change, but then they risk losing their integrity and relevance - and so bring about their own demise. What is their purpose while they exist? These gods bring several "benefits" that ensure their ongoing worship.
1) Sense of community. Just visit a nearby church or temple to see what I mean. Also, in most countries the celebrations and holidays coincide with religious events.
2) Gives power to those who want it. Priests, church elders, rabbis, imams, padres, witch-doctors, born-again healers.... they all get something from their position within their faith, with precious few misguided individuals who are in it for the benefit of their fellow human beings.
3) Fosters stability within society. a unified religion can create a more compliant and unified population - something governments crave as it makes their job easier. Divided religions can have the opposite effect of course.
4) Makes decisions for those incapable of doing so for themselves. Unsure whether murder is wrong? If you've got the right religious book it will give you the answer. Want to know if you should sleep with your neighbours wife? Again there is a book for you with the answer. Want to know if its OK to stone your own child to death for being naughty? The bible says 'yes', so go ahead my friend!
5) Belief itself can cause the placebo effect, and create good feelings and effects. At times it may even help healing, but only if the level of delusion is so high that the positive thoughts are believed utterly. It's all about training the mind in the end, ask the Buddhist monks who have changed the medical condition of their brain through meditation.
As prayer has no measurable affect, miracles have never been performed in any way that could be measured or verified, and no god has yet revealed him/her/itself, we only have the benefits to human kind on earth to judge the worth of religion.
Looking at the above list of benefits it is obvious that there are other, less non-sensical, less harmful, less ignorance-promoting ways to achieve these effects.
Sport, historical achievements and other shared events could fulfill the function of creating a sense of community and fostering unity. Power can be achieved through political and financial means. Real books, written by real people, and a decent education can help those incapable of making decisions for themselves. The placebo effect could be reproduced in a million different ways from fake drugs to meditation.
So why keep religion? In a rational society it would only serve as a curiosity - a quaint old custom to be trotted out at public events.
Why get rid of gods and religion, you might ask, what harm is it doing?
Well, put simply, the majority of religious beliefs have the following negative characteristics in common with each other:
1) Promotes ignorance - by teaching to believe something just because it is written and some other people believe it as well makes "truth" subject to a popularity contest. This can lead to the continuation of erroneous ideas, and causes some human minds that may have grown to become brilliant and benefit the entire human race to become stagnant and repulsive, unable to change or come up with original ideas.
2) Provides a tool for corruption - more so than money or politics, religion is believed and trusted even in the face of contradictory evidence, thereby making it perfect to be abused and perverted by those who would wish to use it for their own purposes.
3) Divides the human race - while political and racial differences gradually melt away as the human race unifies and the world becomes smaller, religious differences are intensified as they different faiths 'fight' each other for believers. Having believers is the very oxygen that faiths need to survive, and so the fight can become bloody and intense. Again the corrupt can use faith as a perfect tool to incite violence - much easier to use than money or political differences.
4) Holds the human race back from seriously beneficial scientific advances - by denying the obvious facts of the universe around us, religion influences the direction of scientific and medical research, as well as actively fighting against scientific understanding in some areas. Also, as stated previously, religious thought can swallow up minds that could've become world-savingly brilliant.
All of these points I've made are very general, talking about religion as an idea, rather than any specific faiths. The individual faiths are worth discussing, but not here. I'm sure that many would point out the largest faiths in the world as requiring special attention... surely they are the true faiths, as the majority believe them? Well, no. Ideas that become widespread are not always true. The truth of our existence and the universe is not a popularity contest, where the one that is believed by most automatically becomes the truth. When the abrahamic-faiths lose all but a handful of follows each and some new ideology is dominant, does that then mean the abrahamic ideas are no longer true? No. They never were true.
Religion is a fashion, a fad, a harmful, hurtful ignorance that we are slow to recognise... but we are recognising it now, and its days are numbered.
I don't seek to beat my religious fellows, I don't look to defeat, attack or kill those who have faith. I seek merely to cure them so that they can become the fully-functioning human beings they were born to be.