REL GENRL If there is no God, why have people been worshiping such since the Dawn of Time?

http://www.acagle.net/ArchaeoBlog/

Archaeologists in Jordan have unearthed a 3,000-year-old Iron Age temple with a trove of figurines of ancient deities and circular clay vessels used for religious rituals, officials said Wednesday.

The head of the Jordanian Antiquities Department, Ziad al-Saad, said the sanctuary dates to the eighth century B.C. and was discovered at Khirbat ‘Ataroz near the town of Mabada, some 20 miles (32 kilometers) southwest of the capital Amman.

He said the complex boasts a main room that measures 388 square feet (36 square meters), as well as two antechambers and an open courtyard.

I have read that even the Neanderthals possibly had some idea of an afterlife. But I have never read how these very ancient peoples came up with such an idea.

I can think of many reasons.

The human mind tries to find cause and effect in any situation. If we see an effect, it will not be long before we seek the cause. When the cause is not easy to determine, we will often find one anyway.

Mortality sucks. It is not surprising that even primitive man would seek to find ways to cope with the concept. An afterlife is a pretty great way to do that.

Ego makes us want to believe that we are important. To imagine that we are simply inconsequential animals is not particularly satisfying (to most people anyway). Belief in a higher power and involvement in a greater plan helps us to feel that we have some greater purpose and significance.

Then, there is Ramachandran's "God Module" that seems to indicate that religious experience can be turned on or off as a matter of biochemistry. I have no idea what to make of that. Supposedly, religiosity could be viewed as a successful adaptation for complex social structure.

It is a really interesting topic that touches on an awful lot of what it means to be human.

And there is also the possibility of an 'after death' experience where the dead came back and told what they had seen. Through the years I have run across enough of this to think there is some validity to the phenomenon.

Romans 11:36 says:

http://jollyblogger.typepad.com/jollyblogger/2006/02/man_was_made_fo.html

For from him and through him and to him are all things.
To him be the glory forever! Amen.
The Holy Bible : New International Version. 1996, c1984 . Zondervan: Grand Rapids

"All things" have a Godward orientation. They came "from him," are proceeding "to him" and in between the "from" and the "to" they are moving "through" Him. In other words, He created us for Himself and is moving us toward Himself.

Colossians 1:16 says - "all things were created by him and for him."

Colossians 1:18 says - "so that in everything he might have the supremacy."

In other words, we were made for God and I believe we express that in worship. Further, as Chesterton is reported to have said:

When Man ceases to worship God he does not worship nothing but worships everything.

In other words, when man ceases to worship God he does not cease to worship. This can be backed up in Romans 1:21-25:

21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

The Holy Bible : New International Version. 1996, c1984 . Zondervan: Grand Rapids

For now I'll just note the parallel between verses 23 and 25. "They exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images . . . ," and "they exchanged the truth of God for a (the) and worshipped an served . . . " The important thing to notice is that worship is continually going on here.

After this Romans 1 goes into a lengthy description of sinful behaviors which are rooted in this exchange of worship and it's useful to point out that the rest of Romans 1 talks about many things which we today define as personality quirks, phychological functions and dysfunctions, and sociological conditions. Yet, the Bible defines these things as rooted in worship.

I am not saying that everyone is self-consciously aware that they are always worshipping, but I am saying these verses show that man is a worshipping being at root. Hope this is helpful.

Troke said:

...I have read that even the Neanderthals possibly had some idea of an afterlife. But I have never read how these very ancient peoples came up with such an idea.</b>

Click to expand...

Maybe stories passed down the generations from Adam & Eve?

Of course you have to believe that Adam and Eve were real to believe that. I figure people had to come from somewhere, and it's more believable that a mighty God created us than it is to think the entire universe along with everything in it, (including humans) just accidentally appeared out of some explosion of nothingness.

Troke, I think the "dying then coming back to life" experiences could be a solid reason for such belief. Everything and everyone had to come from something somewhere, and has to return to something somewhere.

dissimulo said:

I can think of many reasons.

The human mind tries to find cause and effect in any situation. If we see an effect, it will not be long before we seek the cause. When the cause is not easy to determine, we will often find one anyway.

Mortality sucks. It is not surprising that even primitive man would seek to find ways to cope with the concept. An afterlife is a pretty great way to do that.

Ego makes us want to believe that we are important. To imagine that we are simply inconsequential animals is not particularly satisfying (to most people anyway). Belief in a higher power and involvement in a greater plan helps us to feel that we have some greater purpose and significance.

Then, there is Ramachandran's "God Module" that seems to indicate that religious experience can be turned on or off as a matter of biochemistry. I have no idea what to make of that. Supposedly, religiosity could be viewed as a successful adaptation for complex social structure.

It is a really interesting topic that touches on an awful lot of what it means to be human.

Click to expand...

Well stated IMO, Diss.

As a former member of a very conservative (fundamentalist) Christian church...I have struggled for the last two years with this question.

For me it has come down to this...

There may or may not be a God. So not my problem.

An afterlife makes absolutely no sense to me. So I quit worrying about it.

I can be a bit skitzo on the issue...had a great time at the 8-28 rally over the weekend...

So, while I don't know or care if God is real or not...I do like listening to folks posit ideas on both sides of the divide (ah, minus biblical "proof" that is...use my writing to prove my validity just because I say so?...not a good model for debate me thinks, and I'm certinally no expert!)

But I really appreciated how Diss brought out these thoughts.

J

I decided years ago that the evidence is inconclusive. As humans, we see what we want to see--what we believe.

For me, I believe there is a God because I want to. Simple as that. If it turns out I am wrong when I die, what difference does it make? If it turns out there is a God, it might make one hell of a difference had I not believed.

I think people choose to believe there is no God because they do not want absolute values, let along responsibility for their actions and beliefs.

I agree with you, Dissimulo, as far as you went. But I think your description applies more to the believers than the purveyors of religion.

Religion is now and always has been an industry that provides jobs and, sometimes, great wealth and/or great power to the top leaders who convince others that they are blessed in some special way or have some knowledge in which you can share only if you buy/believe/join.

I am not bashing anybody's personal faith at all. Personal faith is completely different from organized religion.

Organized religion of all stripes is a business. Some are better for a larger number of people, and some are worse for all except a small inner circle, but all are businesses at their core. They are usually organized in a structure quite similar to the modern large corporation with an executive branch that directs a middle management branch who directs a worker/patron branch that support the first two levels. These last, workers and patrons, are interchangeable in that the workers are also patrons or believers in the doctrine of the executive. Deviations from the doctrine of the excutive results in termination/excommunication/censure/shunning or whatever punishment is deemed by the two upper branches.

This is my personal opinion only based upon many, many years of reading and researching and attending many churches in more than one denomination/religion, all of which I have now rejected in favor of a strong, much studied and self-directed personal faith. I pray that everyone finds the peace and acceptance that I have found, but it was a long struggle to overcome my childhood conditioning and get to that peace. Unfortunately, I cannot package and send it out on request but I can pray about it and I will.

lectrickitty said:

Troke, I think the "dying then coming back to life" experiences could be a solid reason for such belief. Everything and everyone had to come from something somewhere, and has to return to something somewhere.

Click to expand...

Seeing a dead person's spirit/ghost can pretty much solidify one's belief in the afterlife too.

Mrs.Cw

Delta said:

I decided years ago that the evidence is inconclusive. As humans, we see what we want to see--what we believe.

For me, I believe there is a God because I want to. Simple as that. If it turns out I am wrong when I die, what difference does it make? If it turns out there is a God, it might make one hell of a difference had I not believed.

I think people choose to believe there is no God because they do not want absolute values, let along responsibility for their actions and beliefs.

Click to expand...

Good points.

You do come across as a little "fire escapish" (is that a word?)

I will say that when I'm in a "there is no God" mood...I'm NOT looking to destroy my values or responsibilities. In my case this mood is brought about by "christians" not being too nice...or by my engineering mind getting carried away with "facts"...but like you said, inconclusive via "facts" as we see them.

I would rather there be a good, kind and loving creator than not....

I would say, any creator that will burn people in some "hell" forever, well, he/she can start burning now, cause I'll never love that sadistic monster.


J

All science is based upon the Law of Causality. Our very rationality is based upon that. Rather than trying to dismiss it as an aberration or adaptation of the human psyche, why not say that we are simply hard wired for such.

The total amount of energy and mass in the universe is constant. i.e can not be created or destroyed.- 1st Law of thermo. From my readings it is apparent that if you take all the star dust in our 15 billion light year universe and give it the 5 billion years needed for our life to come up, it still falls woefully short in any probability function even to form a single cell never mind a human.

Also we are in the ' information' age. since at the very beginnings, there was just hydrogen and energy, where did all this 'information' come from which is by the way neither mass nor energy ?

Troke's title says it all. Humans are hard wired to believe in God, just as we are able to think rationally, live altruistically etc.

rh

Robin Hood said:

All science is based upon the Law of Causality. Our very rationality is based upon that. Rather than trying to dismiss it as an aberration or adaptation of the human psyche, why not say that we are simply hard wired for such.

Click to expand...

"He has also set eternity in the hearts of men"

You are right on; it is part of being the Human creation.

Robin Hood said:

All science is based upon the Law of Causality. Our very rationality is based upon that. Rather than trying to dismiss it as an aberration or adaptation of the human psyche, why not say that we are simply hard wired for such.

Click to expand...

I'm not saying there is anything wrong with employing causality in our understanding of the world, but rather that it does not always serve us well when we have limited information. Science is, in part, a method of imposing some discipline to prevent us from running amok with unfounded applications of causality.

Robin Hood said:

The total amount of energy and mass in the universe is constant. i.e can not be created or destroyed.- 1st Law of thermo. From my readings it is apparent that if you take all the star dust in our 15 billion light year universe and give it the 5 billion years needed for our life to come up, it still falls woefully short in any probability function even to form a single cell never mind a human.

Click to expand...

While I am skeptical that we have the information necessary to derive useful probability functions for the development of life, I think the Evolution FAQ has a pretty good response to this general idea:
http://www.evolutionfaq.com/articles/probability-life

Robin Hood said:

Also we are in the ' information' age. since at the very beginnings, there was just hydrogen and energy, where did all this 'information' come from which is by the way neither mass nor energy ?

Click to expand...

I don't know... There are some increasingly compelling arguments that matter and energy may both reduce to nothing more than information and that the information age is the only age there has ever been.

Robin Hood said:

Troke's title says it all. Humans are hard wired to believe in God, just as we are able to think rationally, live altruistically etc.

Click to expand...

And yet, some of us don't. That is where things get interesting.

I'm not saying there is anything wrong with employing causality in our understanding of the world, but rather that it does not always serve us well when we have limited information. Science is, in part, a method of imposing some discipline to prevent us from running amok with unfounded applications of causality.

Click to expand...

dissimulo

I would say that causality is the only basis for rationality. If there is no rationality in the universe then all talking and discussion is gibberish and meaningless, something which all humans abhor.

While I am skeptical that we have the information necessary to derive useful probability functions for the development of life, I think the Evolution FAQ has a pretty good response to this general idea:

Click to expand...

dissimulo

Well again from several sources I find that there are about 10^100 atoms/ universe - outside of dark matter theory if it is now in or out. Astrophysicist Dr. Hugh Ross has quoted a 1/ 10^84,000 just to get a single cell working from scratch through collision theory. I think you need a lot more faith than I do that all this happened by mere chance.

I don't know... There are some increasingly compelling arguments that matter and energy may both reduce to nothing more than information and that the information age is the only age there has ever been.

Click to expand...

dissimulo

I can't by this. 2nd Law of thermo now comes into play. Where is the 'information' to form the blood cells etc in the proto universe's hydrogen 1S orbitals? here were no blood cell information in such atoms 12 billion years ago. As far as energy is concerned, to gain 'information' it must be specified, quantized and directed. One can throw nuclear bombs all over the place and all one gets is destruction, not new info.

and yet, some of us don't. That is where things get interesting.

Click to expand...

dissimulo


I agree. Each of us must be convinced in his/her own mind. But there is nothing 'irrational' in believing that God exists. When I was agnostic for quite a few years , I only wanted to find out the 'truth' of such. The problem today is that some no longer believe that there is such a thing as truth. If there is no such thing as truth, then there is no such thing as rationality. If the universe has no rational basis, then all its sheer madness and anything one does has no ultimate meaning. yet such contradicts one of the primary basis drives in all humans in all cultures - that ones life has meaning and purpose.

rh

..........

I think Troke is just out trolling again,



but what the hey,


first off, you really have to have the tinest grasp of 'archeology'. Just about EVERYTHING they dig up is attributed to a "deity". So, you got some neighbor making clay statues of his neighbor, whom he has the hots for, and 4,000 years later someone digs it up, and bingo, IT's A GOD!!!!!!


Stupid.


Second, Diss has some good points, part of our wiring NEEDS understanding.



Third, and the most important, to me anyway, post on here is this:


Seeing a dead person's spirit/ghost can pretty much solidify one's belief in the afterlife too.



There is absolutely NOTHING like direct, personal experience.



At the very least it let's you know this universe is a much stranger place than some are willing to accept.



Here is a pic of a potential goddess and god 3000 years from now:


.

"...I think Troke is just out trolling again, .."

Heh. Sorry, but I am the Forum's Stealth Troll. So I do it with stealth, not blatantly like this.

I really was curious and got some interesting answers.

Whenever new knowledge would come to me (after I asked of course), my second request is always, "ok, prove it!"

The answers always come but only if you are really open to it and they never come in ways you expect.

But, the most important thing I ever discovered is there is no way you can argue what you've discovered and been shown, to others.

Everyone has to prove it to themselves. Everyone has different experiences.

It is amusing (and concerning) to me how some just "know" to a perfect certainty that there is, or is not, a God.

It seems to me, the consensus among thinking adults is that some things, like God, cannot be proven, NOR disproven.

So, I wonder, what is the basis for the arrogance of "I know"....when we all know you can't possibly "know"...

Maybe if we would say "Believe" instead of know? Or trust? Or faith? I like those words. They are not so definitive as "know", and allow a little wiggle for folks on the fence maybe?

I guess the way we use words is important...not throwing any stones since I'm a horrid offender...just sayin.

So, in this spirit, I will try to plainly state what I believe.

I believe there is a God. I believe some of the bible is likely to be true. I also believe Genesis was not meant to convey fact, but rather to give simple people a basis to start a relationship with God. I also believe most all organized religion is a danger to my liberty and safety. And I believe a lack of morality is equally dangerous.

So, I have no "pat" answers for anyone here...I do not take this subject lightly and appreciate reasoned and logical responses (without religous texts).

J

Jeff Allen said:

It is amusing (and concerning) to me how some just "know" to a perfect certainty that there is, or is not, a God.

It seems to me, the consensus among thinking adults is that some things, like God, cannot be proven, NOR disproven.

So, I wonder, what is the basis for the arrogance of "I know"....when we all know you can't possibly "know"...

Maybe if we would say "Believe" instead of know? Or trust? Or faith? I like those words. They are not so definitive as "know", and allow a little wiggle for folks on the fence maybe?

I guess the way we use words is important...not throwing any stones since I'm a horrid offender...just sayin.

So, in this spirit, I will try to plainly state what I believe.

I believe there is a God. I believe some of the bible is likely to be true. I also believe Genesis was not meant to convey fact, but rather to give simple people a basis to start a relationship with God. I also believe most all organized religion is a danger to my liberty and safety. And I believe a lack of morality is equally dangerous.

So, I have no "pat" answers for anyone here...I do not take this subject lightly and appreciate reasoned and logical responses (without religous texts).

J

Click to expand...

Don't know why but I feel inspired to say here; "Those who have faith will be blessed", so I'll go with that.

I've often wondered about organized religion too Jeff. I've come to the conclusion that because all organized religions are run by men, none can be absolutely perfect because they will ultimately reflect the faults of mankind. However, we wouldn't know much about morality if it weren't for the teachings of organized religion. Without those teachings we'd be as morally bankrupt as an Amazonian headhunter living on animalistic instinct. Even though organized religions may be imperfect, they do serve a purpose for the greater good, giving due credit to God. We may not understand everything there is to know, but like pieces of a puzzle we can put the pieces of the evidence together to get an outline of the bigger overall picture. The missing pieces just have to be filled in with faith.

Mrs.Cw

...

Robin Hood said:

I would say that causality is the only basis for rationality. If there is no rationality in the universe then all talking and discussion is gibberish and meaningless, something which all humans abhor.

Click to expand...

Again, I am not saying that it is not rational; just that it is not foolproof. It is the old, "when all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail." Unfortunately, sometimes we hit not the nail, but our thumbs.

Robin Hood said:

Well again from several sources I find that there are about 10^100 atoms/ universe - outside of dark matter theory if it is now in or out. Astrophysicist Dr. Hugh Ross has quoted a 1/ 10^84,000 just to get a single cell working from scratch through collision theory. I think you need a lot more faith than I do that all this happened by mere chance.

Click to expand...

Did you read the link I supplied? It really does address this. In general, these calculations only make sense if one is intentionally misunderstanding the evolutionary path from short self-replicating molecules, to larger molecules, and finally to living systems. I don't think there is anyone out there who proposes that a living cell spontaneously arose directly from inorganic compounds.

Ross seems to deal specifically with the formation of intelligent life. Here is some critique on his methods:
http://skeptico.blogs.com/skeptico/2006/01/hugh_ross.html

Robin Hood said:

I can't by this. 2nd Law of thermo now comes into play. Where is the 'information' to form the blood cells etc in the proto universe's hydrogen 1S orbitals? here were no blood cell information in such atoms 12 billion years ago. As far as energy is concerned, to gain 'information' it must be specified, quantized and directed. One can throw nuclear bombs all over the place and all one gets is destruction, not new info.

Click to expand...

I'm not saying that there is information in the form of blueprints by which the universe can build biological systems. I'm saying that the matter and energy of the system may ultimately be nothing more than information themselves. Really, I'm just throwing it out as a possibility. I am not a physicist and this stuff rapidly goes over my head. I'd have to do quite a bit more research to have a substantive debate on this point.

Robin Hood said:

I agree. Each of us must be convinced in his/her own mind. But there is nothing 'irrational' in believing that God exists. When I was agnostic for quite a few years , I only wanted to find out the 'truth' of such. The problem today is that some no longer believe that there is such a thing as truth. If there is no such thing as truth, then there is no such thing as rationality. If the universe has no rational basis, then all its sheer madness and anything one does has no ultimate meaning. yet such contradicts one of the primary basis drives in all humans in all cultures - that ones life has meaning and purpose.

Click to expand...

Whether or not it is rational to believe in God depends entirely on what sort of system of evidence evaluation you employ. As the philosophy of science has long since failed to produce a system that allows us to reduce science to a matter of purely deductive logic, we have had to settle for practical but imperfect ways of knowing. While there is probably truth, our limited interface with the universe will probably prevent us from knowing it. We strive to get a closer, clearer picture, but will probably never be able to get the perspective necessary to understand everything.

As for meaning and purpose, even if the structure of the universe is rational, that does not necessarily imply that there is either. I believe the universe is rational, as we can clearly depend on its orderly function (so far). However, that gives me no confidence at all that there is any sort of purpose or meaning for humans or for any other thing that exists.

You walk into room and find 1,000 books just randomly tossed about in a huge pile in the middle of the room. You come back 3 days later, and to your amazement you find 5 bookshelves, each with 200 books neatly organized and alphabetized, and perfectly lined up on each shelf.

Could that ever happen randomly? Could a dog have come in there and done it? No, it took someone of intelligence to put those books in order.

Now, look at your body. You have 2 hands, each with 5 fingers. You have 2 feet, each with 10 toes. You have 2 arms, 2 legs, 2 eyes, 2 ears, etc. Do you honestly believe that happened randomly? Or is it more likely someone with intelligence put order to your body?

There is order in our universe. Something of intelligence had to create it that way. There's just no way all this happened by accident. It takes intelligence to create order out of chaos.

As a plant grows, it takes elements from the air and the soil and builds an orderly structure. Does it require intelligence?

One predictable response would be that the plant does not require intelligence, but that the creator of the plant required intelligence. That implies that it is not the process of increasing local orderliness that requires intelligence, but the creation of a system where energy can be used to produce order.

However, if the system that allows for the allocation of energy and entropy (the universe), was not created, but is part of a structure that exists backward and forward infinitely in time, then a creator may not be required.

If there is no God, why have people been worshiping such since the Dawn of Time?

Click to expand...

The question is absurd. Action does not create truth. If it did, then all religions would be true. The fact that people worship does not prove the presence of or validate the existence of a deity.

On the other hand, a creation is proof of a creator.

I personally believe there is a God.

I have read that even the Neanderthals possibly had some idea of an afterlife. But I have never read how these very ancient peoples came up with such an idea.

Click to expand...

Why does everyone always insinuate that Neanderthals were mentally inferior? Where is the evidence of this?

Did you read the link I supplied? It really does address this. In general, these calculations only make sense if one is intentionally misunderstanding the evolutionary path from short self-replicating molecules, to larger molecules, and finally to living systems. I don't think there is anyone out there who proposes that a living cell spontaneously arose directly from inorganic compounds.

Click to expand...

dissimulo

Yep I read it. I still have two problems with it. First no one is saying that the cell just popped out from one gigantic atomic collision. Ross never alludes to such. He systematically goes through current scientific data and offers a model that makes more sense in comparison to the evolutionary model. 2nd- Chemical kinetics is not favorable to the stability of such pre-biotic molecules for staying intact for anywhere near the length of time that evolutionist propose. The idea of a primordial soup is pretty much debunked even among the evolutionist. The evolutionist have not solved bio-genesis.

When I talk to my atheist bio brain friends, they are mute on bio genesis and simply shrug their shoulders and say. It happened. That response is not rational to me.

'm not saying that there is information in the form of blueprints by which the universe can build biological systems. I'm saying that the matter and energy of the system may ultimately be nothing more than information themselves. Really, I'm just throwing it out as a possibility. I am not a physicist and this stuff rapidly goes over my head. I'd have to do quite a bit more research to have a substantive debate on this point.

Click to expand...

dissimulo

You lose me here. It just doesn't make sense to me that somehow the simple bonds in inorganic molecules continue to arrange themselves so that information that supposedly is inherent within these simple molecules or atoms, now show forth in complex life.

rh

Even indigenous people believed there was a God or Supreme Being of some sort. God is whatever one wants.....

Shamans used "magic mushrooms" and various plants to visit another dimension and came back to tell others of their experiences. In Tibet, the same things happened and is memoralized by minstrels as trips by "deloks". Today, NDE report similar things so what is seen is entirely non-denominational and related more to cultural beliefs of an individual than "who is right and who is wrong".

The most important thing is to be the best person possible regardless of how you grew up. Beliefs are secondary.....