Religion as Plague
Just when we thought that religion, like smallpox, had been conquered and locked away safely in a vault, it has been released by fundamentalist terrorists of all kinds, and in new virulent forms, once again threatens the well-being of the world. I used to think that the major problem with religious belief and conservation was the injunction in the Bible that man was to dominate the beasts. Dominate the world. I now think that while that remains a problem, and a serious one, an equally damaging proposition, increasingly evident both in America and elsewhere, is the rise and rise of fundamentalism that denies the reality of evolution.
This refusal to recognise the reality of common origins of the life forms on this perhaps unique planet, of our close relationship to not just the apes but to all mammals, and our slightly more distant relationship to other vertebrates, and ultimately to all other animals, results in an attitude, a state of mind, in which all those other life forms can be extinguished. It is an attitude not unlike that which led to ethnic cleansing in Yugoslavia. It also results in a state of mind in which human life is only a waiting period to go to heaven, so that what happens to the earth while the chosen are waiting is really of not even casual interest.
It may also result in the belief that there is ultimately nothing that humans can do to damage the earth since god is in charge as a kind of maintenance engineer. In America and increasingly in other western countries there is a return to beliefs in the chain of being. God, it was believed, had created a complete hierarchy, fixed forever. It began with god at the apex, who was represented (and ‘anointed by god’) on Earth by the King, then down through the aristocracy in various grades and the church hierarchy running in parallel, then through freemen and down to peasants and serfs. From there the hierarchy ran through animal species starting with the more complex and ending with animals like worms. All was fixed in place immovably.
Having largely got rid of kings as rulers though, the conservatives in the society were concerned that the rest of the hierarchy, in which they had favoured places, might also be questioned. Real democracy and relative equality might take over as a human idea. If you were near the top of the hierarchy these dangerous possibilities had to be nipped in the bud and they have been. In Australia the debate over a Republic revealed the continuation of a belief in a divinely appointed figure to lead the country. In America, lacking someone with the title of king, the President, or at least Republican presidents, have increasingly taken on all the trappings of divine rule. It has the advantage that mere mortals in the media or among the populace cannot question their activities. In other countries even more clear cut theocracies have arisen again. One of the areas in which rulers cannot be questioned is of course the environment.
A religious belief which relies on evolution not having occurred is like a religious belief that relies on the sun revolving around the earth, or on thunder and lightning being the result of gods fighting, or on Spring coming only after a virgin is sacrificed.
There is another point. If children are receiving such a poor education that they are taught to believe in creation and not taught evolutionary biology, then they will become the kind of poorly educated adults who don’t understand what is happening to the world around them. There isn’t time now for the kind of fundamentalism that produces mass ill education. Nor is there time for the kind of media that sends uninformed junior reporters out on ‘mother nature’ stories, or which treats all animal stories as jokes. The public in general receives its adult education from the media, and it is being very poorly served. People can’t vote or make life decisions without full information and understanding about environmental effects.
Fundamentalist religion also brings with it a feeling that with everything created 6000 years ago it is no big deal if some or even all are lost. A sense of the immense time that has taken to evolve both individual species and their ecological communities must surely make you pause before wantonly destroying something that is literally irreplaceable.
Furthermore if there is no time depth to the ecology of the Earth, if what we see now is what was created 6000 years ago, then there is nothing that can be learnt from past extinction events like the massive losses of species in Pleistocene times, the loss of the dinosaurs, the loss of the giant mammals. To the people who have ‘museums’ in which humans and dinosaurs coexist, and who interpret the history of the Grand Canyon in a biblical time scale, there were no extinction events (except of course the flood that led to Noah’s Ark, perhaps one of the silliest of all the silly biblical beliefs about the history of the environment), no climatic changes. Not only can these people learn nothing from the past, they cannot therefore imagine a different future.
Finally understanding an ecosystem and the way it works involves a state of mind which can see the interconnections between things and knows that in the time since life was established on Earth there is no beginning and end to ecosystems. Nor do they have prime movers or first causes – a natural ecosystem is a self-sustaining system. Recognising that this is the way the world works would be difficult for those who believe that there is a supreme being who set everything in motion and keeps it in motion, and can be asked to set aside reality to suit the needs of a particular human individual.
In the religious mind humans in general have been set above the animal world by god as a totally separate creation. The attitude would be I guess that we could lose the whole of the natural world and it wouldn’t matter, all that matters is that there would remain a bunch of humans (the ones with the correct religious beliefs obviously) on the ball of rock serving god and waiting for heaven. Environmental actions might be taken by religious people, but they would be taken from a sense of duty rather in the way that one might serve on a soup kitchen.
A country in which religious beliefs teach humans that they have no kinship with other animals, no linkages with the rest of the natural world through evolution and ecology, is also dysfunctional. Conservation of the environment has to be the result of people feeling that kinship with the world they evolved into, not one in which a few species (the deserving ones) are saved in zoos and the rest of the ecosystem destroyed. Such a strategy may work in the short term, just as putting people in workhouses works in the short term, but we urgently need approaches for both society and the environment that work in the long term. Religion is preventing the development of such approaches, not because of the belief that humans have dominion over the natural world, as important as that fallacy is, but because of the belief that humans are separate from the natural world. Religious beliefs in this area align with the ideology of economic rationalism, both blind faiths need to be left behind, and quickly.
If you define superstition as a belief not based on reason or knowledge (and that is a dictionary definition), then atheism is anything BUT “living the superstition-free life.”
There is certainly no “reason” or “knowledge” that would lead any rationally reasoning person to come to the conclusion that a creator/designer does not exist. Reason most definitely dictates that one does and it requires an unreasonable approach to our existence to believe otherwise. Thus, the atheist is a very superstitious person living a “faith-based” life believing life came from non-life and order came from disorder; requires a lot more faith than I have for sure!.
Yes – I suspect you may be one of those people for whom black is white and up is down Eric. It is hard to see how your belief could be more back to front. But thanks for dropping by, come again.
If there is such a being as a Creator, who created the Creator?
Hi Sam, welcome to blog, hope you will come often.
Your question has always been such a good one that creationists have not only not answered it but not understood it!
I’ve always wondered the same thing, but never come up with a suitable answer!
Eric, you respond admirably against a headstrong foe. And “foe” is certainly how he situates himself. This is not a friendly guy!
I was wanting to ask you, Eric, a question, but couldn’t find your email. Don’t know if you’ll get this, but my email is tanyakhughes@yahoo.com. Drop me a note if you would.
Not really sure I understand your response. But just to clarify, my world is one where black is always black, white’s always white, and up’s always up. It’s a simple matter of objective and observable truth/fact. It’s the same world where life only comes from life and design reasonably indicates a designer.
Eric, a reasoned approach would be that until falsified, the null hypothesis stands. You, and your fellow theists, have posited a creator god hypothesis, therefore the null hypothesis must be that there is no creator god. Theists have failed to falsify the null hypothesis. Evidence, Eric, evidence.
Mr. Snyder, why do you call your magic-wand-waving fairy a designer? Wouldn’t it be more honest to call it a magic fairy?
Sir, you believe in magic. Are you sure you want to call your childish fantasies rational?
I agree, let’s look at true evidence which refutes the null hypothesis that there is no creator/designer.
I think you would agree that the “simple” cell is a pretty amazing piece of complexity what with its ability to replicate, synthesize, metabolize, etc. The cell is designed to perform all these tasks and more. Something this complex doesn’t just appear out of nowhere. Neither does it evolve from inorganic material.
So, the alternate hypothesis contends that design (the cell) indicates a designer. The null hypothesis that no designer exists must be nullified or refuted.
The very existence of design demands a designer, hence refuting the null hypothesis.
I know this is a futile suggestion Eric, but you could actually try reading some biological science.
No futility at all; please direct me toward the area of biological science you feel I’m ignorant of. I’m happy to learn. But, back on topic, I think I did adequately refute the null hypothesis.
You are ignorant in all areas of biological science – find some introductory books, they will also give you some idea of how evolution works.
So which “cell” are you talking about Eric? Perhaps a nerve or a liver cell in a human body eh? How about a human skin cell or a red blood cell? How about a bacterium, a virus, an amoeba, an algal cell, a yeast, the cells of a sponge, or stromatolite, slime moulds, volvox, fungal cells, flatworms? What about the traces of cells in the early rocks?
Why on earth do you think that the varied cells of the human body, the mouse body, the reptile, amphibian, bird, dinosaur, fish, arthropod, mollusc, flowering plant bodies, the products of hundreds of millions of years of gradual evolution and specialisation, tell you anything about the first cells that evolved?
A little learning together with fundamentalist religion and an “infallible” set of mythological writings by bronze age pastoralists at various times several thousand years ago (before Aristotle) and assembled into an imaginary “book” by a religious conference 1500 years ago, are clearly a dangerous combination when it comes to common sense in the twenty first century.
I repeat, go and learn some modern science Eric, come back when you have something sensible to say.
On another subject, your position “atheists don’t blow up planes or anything else” would likely be contested by anyone living in Ukraine under Stalin or China under Mao.
Remarkable Eric, you have all the cliches at your fingertips.
Cliches? I miss your point. History clearly illustrates that not all atheists subscribe to your non-violent philosophy.
Whatever Stalin and Mao were doing had little to do with atheism (other than a recognition that the religions of both countries, as today in your country, were major factors in retaining the ruling classes in power and the peasants poor) and everything to do with political and economic beliefs. In contrast the millions of deaths that the religious have inflicted on each other and on non-believers are entirely related to religion and nothing to do with trying to improve the lot of human kind. Go read some real history Eric.
I’m starting to like you.
Glad you dropped by Robyn. Come again soon.
Of course I don’t agree with your accusation that I’m ignorant of all areas of biological science. One thing I did learn in my first high school biology class was that abiogenesis/spontaneous generation pretty much was disproven by Francesco Redi in the mid 1600′s. And that since then, most scientists are convinced that mice don’t come from straw, frogs from mud, or maggots from meat. That much I do understand about evolution.
Redi is strange choice to base your scientific knowledge on. At the time the ignorance about biology of the living world, except for observations on domestic plants and animals, was almost total, and relied on the error filled work of Aristotle some 1900 years earlier. Redi, to his eternal credit, was one of the first people we see as an experimental scientist. People were puzzled, in these days before refrigeration or even proper storage of food, as to why meat rotted away while being attacked by small “worms” which were not seen at other times and about which nothing else was known. The idea therefore was that these creatures arose spontaneously during the rotting process and were just a natural part of it. For some reason Redi wasn’t convinced about this and set out some experiments (as we would now say).
What he found was that the maggots were produced (I guess either from eggs or as live maggots, it varies between these fly species) by several species of flies, and that the maggots (as we would say now) were the larvae of these flies, changed into pupae, and then these hatched into adults, a life cycle completely unknown previously. If you covered the meat the flies couldn’t get in so no maggots. Brilliant.
Redi was of course a religious man, few people knew better at the time, and part of his aim was to show that life didn’t keep on being “created”, as spontaneous generation would require, but had just been created the once, as in Genesis. However you could also interpret his work to show that complex animals weren’t created at all!
But in any case, why you would think that the obvious (to us) conclusion that complex animals don’t arise from nothing today has anything to do with the origins of very simple first life forms several billions of years ago, in radically different conditions of geography, geology, chemistry, temperature and climate, is beyond me and all the scientists who lived after Redi.
Hi David,
I can’t imagine why you would think Redi was a “strange choice.” It was his work that first disproved abiogenesis. I think Redi is a great choice because he discovered the foundational truth that life does not come from “non-life.” With that truth in mind, it’s pretty difficult to support the opinion that life came from rocks.
Of course, I don’t “base my scientific knowledge” on Redi. I simply think he’s a great place to start. Additionally, I believe his conclusions still stand. I have no knowledge of his religious convictions or any of his efforts to prove anything about Genesis; not saying you’re wrong I’m just not aware of this.
I do disagree that there were “radically different conditions” of geology or chemistry billions of year ago. I believe the periodic table was pretty much the same then as now with the exception of the short-lived elements since the advent of accelarators. Inorganic elements and chemicals will not produce organic “life” today and they didn’t then. Changes in climate, temperature and geography don’t make a difference. Redi was right.
Eric, you haven’t falsified the null hypothesis. You’ve simply asserted there is design and therefore a designer. You haven’t provided evidence for design. You state complexity needs a designer. Such a designer would also be complex therefore, by your logic, must also require a designer. So who created the creator?
Hi Declan, the original hypothesis posited was (according to you) there is a creator (designer) god. The null would then be there is no creator (designer) god. The scientifically observable (evidence) fact that there is creation/design refutes the null. Doesn’t repeatable and verifiable observation of design count as evidence? By the measurable, repeatable, and verifiable means of the scientific method, design (apart from human intervention) exists.
You have now posited a second and new hypothesis wherein complex design demands a complex designer. The new null is there is no complex designer of the designer. Refute the null.
Eric, repeatedly asserting there is design is not evidence for design. “The scientifically observable (evidence) fact that there is creation/design refutes the null.” Design is not a fact and repeating your assertion without supporting evidence does not make it so. “By the measurable, repeatable, and verifiable means of the scientific method, design (apart from human intervention) exists.” Perhaps you could post links to peer-reviewed scientific papers that show design. “You have now posited a second and new hypothesis wherein complex design demands a complex designer.” On the contrary, it is you who suggest design needs a designer – “So, the alternate hypothesis contends that design (the cell) indicates a designer” and “The very existence of design demands a designer”. I’m merely following your argument to it’s conclusion – an infinite parade of increasingly complex designers. I’m sure you agree that is a preposterous suggestion.
Hi Declan, I concede the absence of peer reviewed papers supporting design. And, I don’t have any problem with the whole peer review process. But, you must admit, there is considerable bias in the scientific community to consider design as anything other than bad science. This is at least a partial explanation for the absence. Also, scientists don’t “poll” for verification. Historically, any ideas going contrary to contemporary science are traditionally excluded from consideration by current thought.
I do, however, disagree with you discounting observation as supporting evidence. Observation is evidence and the first step of the scientific method. I observe the cell and how it functions. Functionality indicates design. Observing design is supporting evidence (not conclusive evidence, but certainly supporting) no matter how strongly you oppose it.
And, you did bring a second hypothesis into the discussion.
Eric, I don’t discount observation as a valid, indeed essential, part of the scientific process. My problem is with your assertion that there is design. That isn’t an observation, it’s a subjective interpretation of an observation. “Functionality indicates design” – again, an unsubstantiated assertion.
“But, you must admit, there is considerable bias in the scientific community to consider design as anything other than bad science.” Perhaps because it is bad science, devoid of supporting evidence, contradicted by well supported theory. Contrary ideas are not excluded by ‘tradition’, they are excluded because of the lack of supporting evidence. In fact, ‘excluded’ is the wrong word. They are simply not developed by following scientists because of the paucity of evidence.
Again, I haven’t introduced a second hypothesis, I was merely following your ‘design needs a designer’ argument to its logical conclusion. Actually, I don’t have a problem with ‘design needs a designer’. It would appear to be an a priori statement. However, you haven’t provided evidence for design yet.
Eric, about Redi you state,”It was his work that first disproved abiogenesis.” Aristotelian abiogenesis, yes. Abiogenesis per se, no. Contemporary abiogenesis theories do not predict complex organisms will arise spontaneously. “it’s pretty difficult to support the opinion that life came from rocks” – whose opinion would that be? I don’t know anyone who has said anything as simplistic as that.
“I do disagree that there were “radically different conditions” of geology or chemistry billions of year ago…Changes in climate, temperature and geography don’t make a difference.” Really? Are you really suggesting life that has evolved to survive in conditions of today could survive on the earth of 3.5 billion years ago? That’s a bold claim, if that’s what you are claiming. Perhaps you can provide some supporting evidence for it.
Hi David, Yes, I was vague about a “simple cell.” I was referring to an early cell much before animal or human cells. Let’s confine it to whichever cell you think was the first cell, a primitive cell.
When human DNA is a 99%+ match to chimp DNA, I think we can draw some reasonable conclusions about how single cell creatures compare to early single cell creatures. We can compare contemporary plant cells with ancient plant cells. Sponges are a good example, they’re quite old and yet very complex organisms as well as not a lot different from today’s sponge. So, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to look at today’s cells (primitive organisms) and draw conclusions about the past. You fault me for that while doing it yourself to support your argument.
I’m not discussing any of this in the light of any “mythological” writings; I reject all mythology as having benefit for discovering truth. And, I’ve never taken an insulting tone with any of your comments. But you obviously have difficulty conducting a civil debate using 21st century common sense. So, if you prefer, I will refrain from any further comment.
David, I have read “real” history (contrary to your accusations) and the multiplied millions killed by atheistic systems are documented facts as compared to your emotional rant about the religious deaths that are pretty difficult to quantify.
I will leave you to your warm cocoon of close minded blind faith and not challenge you with any more real world knowledge.
Undoubtedly the regimes under Stalin, Pol Pot and others killed many millions of people. They did so, however, because Stalin and Pol Pot were megalomaniacal, homocidal sociopaths, not because they were atheists. The Crusades and Arab Conquests, for example, were expressly religiously motivated.
Hi Declan, I will most certainly defer to your formal training in matters scientific, but you are absolutely wrong about the Crusades being “expressly religiously motivated.” The Crusades were as much about halting the complete European takeover by Islamic armies as anything religious.
Along with Stalin and Pol Pot, don’t forget Mao. There’s pretty solid evidence for 200 million + murders. I don’t share your conviction that their atheism had nothing to do with the murders they were responsible for committing.
Again, I do not condemn “atheists” as murderers but “atheism” has certainly been at the root of some of society’s greatest acts of evil.
Eric, I’m not suggesting the Crusdaes were exclusively religiously motivated. Like most geo-political events they were multifaceted. Religion was, however, a major motivation. The were often called by the Pope, all but one was endorsed by the Pope. They’re primary objective was reclaiming the Holy Lands for Christianity, or in the case of the Northern Crusades, to Christianise the Baltic pagans. Religion was at the very core of the Crusades.
I think the question is whether or not atheism was the rationale behind the attrocities carried out by Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao. I don’t think it was. They had established quasi-religious personality cults centred on themselves. They were ‘atheist’ only because they could not tolerate any dilution of loyalty or obedience of the people and religions represented just such a dilution. They were megalomaniacs who constructed the architecture of control, unlike megalomaniacal religious leaders who took advantage of an existing architecture of control. This is an entirely subjective debate though. We can’t hope fully to understand the motives of these people. I think we can agree they were violent sociopaths.
But Stalin, Pol Pot, and Mao’s disregard for human life, I would guess, had a lot to do with a lack of any belief in human life being sacred or special, which had a lot to do with a lack of religious sense. The thing is, these regimes killed orders of magnitude more people than the Crusades. Comparing them to the Crusades is comparing bowling balls with oranges.
Ok, Tanya, this is the “not friendly guy”. You are a guest here, and welcome, but mind your manners.
I set high standards for what I write on my blog, and I expect high standards from my commenters. That is I expect you to think for yourself, not repeat evangelical rubbish you’ve been told. This stuff about Stalin and so on (at least you had the sense to leave Hitler out) being “killer atheists” has been said thousands of times and answered thousands of times. I have no intention of going through it all in detail again – do some reading.
But because I’m a nice fellow, let me summarise. Most wars have little to do with religion – they are caused, directly or indirectly, by greed or need for resources. Both World wars, Korea, Vietnam were unrelated to religion. In addition just as what Hitler did had nothing to do with him being highly religious, nor did what Stalin and Pol Pot did have anything to do with their “atheism”.
But beyond those resource wars there have been many, from before the Crusades to present day, where people slaughter each other purely because of religious differences. You don’t see atheists going to war or indulging in ethnic cleansing because of differences in atheist belief. You do see catholics killing protestants, different protestants killing each other, muslims and christians slaughtering each other, different muslim sects killing each other ferociously, hindus and muslims and christians hacking each other to pieces, etc etc etc. In all those the reason for the killing is religion, and over the last few thousand years it must have accounted for many millions of people. So don’t go telling this athest about how much the religious value human life.
And how dare you accuse atheists of not valuing human life. How dare you. Go meet some atheists.
Come again. Do some browsing around what I write. You might learn something.
Oh and by the way I don’t include links from people I don’t know and have no reason to trust. Guess I’m a bit headstrong.
Yes Declan, on that point we can definitely agree. It’s been an interesting and challenging discussion with you and I appreciate your civil tone even in disagreement.
David, are you telling me that you don’t think there have been any violent atheists? Do atheists never go “bat-shit crazy”? Really? I remind you, at least, of all the wars fought in the last century in the name of atheist ideologies. These were very large in terms of how many people were killed.
Tanya, which wars of the previous century were fought in the name of atheism?
On your previous post, as an atheist I can certainly agree that human life isn’t sacred. However, I profoundly disagree that it isn’t special. As an atheist I cherish life precisely because it’s the only one we get. Life is special. I suggest that if you believe there is an afterlife you are more likely to consider people to be expendable than if you believe this life is all we’ve got. Stalin, Mao, Pot et al did what they did because they were violent sociopaths, not because they were atheists.
Not too many atheists blow themselves up believing there is somewhere else for their bits to go afterwards!
Each to their own favourite God.
I confess that when I want a God, I turn to the irascible red-bearded Thor: not because he is perfect or all-powerful; but because he is forgivable for his imperfect moments. What is more, the books about him are more readable than the dusty old tomes of the Tora, Bible, Koran, –.
As for stimulating my neurons and synaps about life, its components, its development and origins: on the one hand there is the philosophy embodied in Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life; on the other is the material so cogently put together by Mary White in her 2003 book Earth Alive (Rosenberg Publishing).
She won’t understand the concept of “other gods” any more than no gods, but nice try Colin.
Ooh! A dead post resurrected! It’s a miracle!
Reading some of the comments, I’m reminded of the officer in ‘Good Morning, Vietnam’ who will never ‘get it’: ‘In my heart, Sir, I know I’m funny’.
Dismissed.
Naughty Gruffbutt!
I know, I know…
It stems from my insecurity over being a strange purple blobby thing with spindly limbs
I would so fly that airline.
Hullo there twitterfriend, welcome!