Man created god in his own image...

looksee

Most religions have a god or gods created in man's image and, like the Creation discussion going on over in Christianity, people have devoted their lives to thinking about and discussing it. And people have been happy to sponsor other people to do all this thinking.

These arguments become fabulously complex and detailed, based on interpretations of bits of old writings that are long since lost. They are the grown-up version of the creative narratives and rules that children use in imaginative play.

Throughout history religion has been used for control, for power, for wealth and prestige. It has been used as a vehicle for war, genocide, torture, and life style rules that sometimes make sense, but just as easily make no sense at all. It is not so much surprising that some people make a living out of creating and applying these rules, as that other people accept them willingly.

So what is it in the human psych that, even now, needs to accept these complex scenarios, and more importantly, why are people willing to not only abide by, but believe the convoluted conclusions that other people come to?

Into The Blue

Fear of nothing after death/never seeing loved ones again.

El_Duderino 09

looksee wrote:

So what is it in the human psych that, even now, needs to accept these complex scenarios, and more importantly, why are people willing to not only abide by, but believe the convoluted conclusions that other people come to?

Interesting question.

I'd say it's because we are a social species who live in hierarchical societies. We have political leaders either through our choice in elections, or by a leader taking lower by force. We tend to question authority and that's a problem for a political leader. We question their policies and test them against reality.

Clever / sneaky people have realised that they can take political power and avoid being subject to scrutiny if they claim they are acting on behalf of a god. It works because their claims are not based in reality so they can't be tested. It also works on the principal that people are more likely to believe a big lie than a small lie - because we are predisposed to live in hierarchical societies.

Kings used this principal of infallibility because they were chosen by god, until relatively recently. Once in power, a leader can use untestable claims about gods, but the threat of punishment for opposing the king/god, is very testable.

We're sophisticated apes, OP. We can do some really interesting things with technology but we still share some basic traits with out primate cousins.

looksee

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Interesting question.
We're sophisticated apes, OP. We can do some really interesting things with technology but we still share some basic traits with out primate cousins.

I agree with most of your answer El Duderino, but, on the last point, apes don't have gods? The biggest, strongest ape rules his own clan by force, they don't, as far as I know, philosophize about it.

El_Duderino 09

You're right that apes don't philosophize or ask questions about it but we do. The massive overlap is in being a social species with hierarchical society. We have the capacity to ask questions and would you believe it, someone came up with an answer that can't be questioned or tested, ' god put me in charge and he has a special punishment for people who question him/me'.

Knex*

In its essence, I think worship, be in Sun worshiping, God worshiping, etc, is in itself, stemmed from a survival instinct. The same instinct that causes you to jump when you see an unfamiliar shadow in the corner of your eye, and your brain goes into overdrive for a moment and puts you on high alert. In modern society, 99 times out of a 100, we'll look and see that its something trivial. A bag of rubbish, rather than an animal waiting to attack, or something.

Without this instinct, the human race wouldn't have gotten very far before the days of cities, enclosures, and the ability to secure themselves away from the wild. You need to jump the 10 times in order to survive the wolf the one time it isn't your imagination setting you off.

From a religious stand point, historically you see prayer and sacrifice to Gods in order to gain favourable circumstance. Be it a God of war, simply wanting good weather, or even praying to St Anthony to help you find your car keys. I think this follows a similar logic to the above. Furthermore, its trying to put a control, or a reasoning, behind something that they couldn't understand.

Nowadays, we have far more knowledge and answers, and we can find out to a large degree, pretty much how everything works. Modern science makes it very easy not to have to turn to "God did it" logic.

Ultimately, I think habit, tradition, and comfort, are the main reasons we see religion still active today. However, its definitely in its decline in the modern world. The rise of the internet and the access to knowledge and information is seeing to that.

I'm not sure that it will ever fully go, but I certainly do believe that a far more secular Western World is very much on the horizon.

Samaris

Agreed with Knex, really.

Humans are a curious race, and like to find out the answers to things. The biggest question then is "why am I thinking" and/or "why am I?" which is a question that can't be easily answered by looking around at the world. Maybe if we knew back when we started formulating religions about evolution, etc., we wouldn't have felt that need.

On top of that, there's that civilisation started in regions that were very dependent on monsoon seasons and wet/dry seasonal variation. Taking the most obvious example of an ancient civilisation that depended on it, Egypt on the Nile. Their seasons were decided based on the Nile's flooding - Akhet (flood), Peret (growth), Shemu (harvest). A poor flood meant starvation, and it was fairly unpredictable. So it would be natural to "ask" the Nile for a good flood, to pray to it, and to make bargains with it (sacrifices, rituals). Then, of course, to give names and personality to the "thing" that was being prayed to. If the Nile didn't flood, it must be "our" fault for not being grateful/respectful/worshipful enough. it's easier than to think that at any time the Nile might not flood and the population would go hungry. It's a feeling of having some control over their lives, not being utterly dependent on chance. There's other concepts that we have - such as "fairness" - that are heavily dependent on the feeling of some sort of control. The frustration of a farmer that sees his farmland starved due to a poor Akhet, knowing that this will lead to his family starving and yet having to waste seed on it and put in all the work in hope that something will come of it - well, can see how he'd want to think there was someone he could pray to - or blame! It certainly wouldn't seem "fair".

The further back you go, to the polytheistic religions, the more one sees very specific personalities being ascribed to various gods, "good" and "cruel". How else to explain doing everything right and things still going wrong?

Finally, you have big, random, utterly inexplicable events. Earthquakes, volcanos, massive storms, the Nile turning red. Without knowledge of plate tectonics or red algae, there's certainly a need to ascribe it to something supernatural - and to attempt to appease whatever caused it to prevent it happening again.

One final comment is that we all know the story of Noah and the ark; but many other cultures have a similar myth, including China, Malaysia, Africa, Mesoamerica, Ancient Ireland (Lebor Gabála Érenn), various North American Indian groups, it appears in the epic of Gilgamesh, the earliest known writings we have, from ancient Babylon...etcetera. We're a story-telling people, and pass down histories through oral as well as written tradition, often with a need to explain the how and why. It's not unlikely that there really -was- a massive flood that filtered through various peoples over the centuries, and each ascribed both the "punishment" and the miraculous survival of their own ancestors to gods, friendly or otherwise.

Dr Turk Turkelton

If man created God in his own image some of the early Hindus must have been big into incest.

Shrap

looksee wrote: »

So what is it in the human psych that, even now, needs to accept these complex scenarios, and more importantly, why are people willing to not only abide by, but believe the convoluted conclusions that other people come to?

Very interesting question and doesn't just apply to religion. Have you ever been to an art exhibition, or read a review of a work of art where the "expert" seems to be pulling some bullsh1t notions out of thin air? I know I have. Not only that, but I've also been the artist required to provide some bullsh1t thesis for my work to be put forward for exhibition, because seemingly the work isn't enough by itself. As my ex (a brilliant landscape painter) once said...."If I'd have been able to write this crap, I'd have been a writer, not a painter". Which is why we need "experts" apparently.

I haven't answered your question at all, but I'm asking the same one in wondering WHY we humans need to have something interpreted for us by others (who have no difficulty in making up something to suit the mood), instead of making our own interpretations? Could it be that we always want an answer? We don't like being left with questions? That not knowing makes us feel small and insignificant?

As an artist, questions are all I ever give anyone. I had already decided that my next exhibition will be called "We have questions", and there would be no word of explanation about any of it :P

El_Duderino 09

Shrap wrote:

I haven't answered your question at all, but I'm asking the same one in wondering WHY we humans need to have something interpreted for us by others (who have no difficulty in making up something to suit the mood), instead of making our own interpretations? Could it be that we always want an answer? We don't like being left with questions? That not knowing makes us feel small and insignificant?

Cos sharing information can be really useful.

Samaris

I went off a bit onto the whole 'why do we believe in something' rather than 'why do we believe what other people say we should believe/interpret' there. Mulling this again, and I think it is still connected. I wonder if there's something in that we evolved to be thinkers rather than for strength or agility like other species? So not only did the curious and interpretive survive and breed (interpretive rather than JUST curious, perhaps, it doesn't enhance one's survival to be -too- curious about what lives in that den maybe!), but it was respected too. Someone is really good at interpreting what weather signals mean but attributes it to something supernatural because they don't know why exactly it happens. The rest of the tribe reckons "Well, s/he was right about needing to get that harvest in before the storm arrives, maybe s/he really does have a connection to the beyond" and reinforces whatever the explanation given was. The newly-respected shaman passes on his or her knowledge to a successor, perhaps with some added dancing around a fire or wearing the skin of a hunted animal or eating some of those very interesting mushrooms or drinking reindeer urine (which can carry hallucinogens when the reindeer go eating magic mushrooms, as they are rather inclined to do)...etcetera. Also worth noting that some of these things become bound to the shaman - no-one else is allowed to drink the urine or else the lesser shamans drink the first shaman's urine (yes, that was a thing), and have to work their way up to the source. We humans like stories and atmosphere and rituals. It's no surprise that the gods we create like them too!

This may well come down to "the best bull****ter wins", but there is an element of "in good faith" too it, in that the shaman entirely believes the messages that they are passing on and so believes in the rituals surrounding it rather than just their own interpretations of the sky and land around them.

I dunno, I appreciate that all that above may well be rubbish too, and it's certainly very simplistic, but maybe there's something in it.

looksee

Samaris wrote: »

I went off a bit onto the whole 'why do we believe in something' rather than 'why do we believe what other people say we should believe/interpret' there. Mulling this again, and I think it is still connected. I wonder if there's something in that we evolved to be thinkers rather than for strength or agility like other species? So not only did the curious and interpretive survive and breed (interpretive rather than JUST curious, perhaps, it doesn't enhance one's survival to be -too- curious about what lives in that den maybe!), but it was respected too. Someone is really good at interpreting what weather signals mean but attributes it to something supernatural because they don't know why exactly it happens. The rest of the tribe reckons "Well, s/he was right about needing to get that harvest in before the storm arrives, maybe s/he really does have a connection to the beyond" and reinforces whatever the explanation given was. The newly-respected shaman passes on his or her knowledge to a successor, perhaps with some added dancing around a fire or wearing the skin of a hunted animal or eating some of those very interesting mushrooms or drinking reindeer urine (which can carry hallucinogens when the reindeer go eating magic mushrooms, as they are rather inclined to do)...etcetera. Also worth noting that some of these things become bound to the shaman - no-one else is allowed to drink the urine or else the lesser shamans drink the first shaman's urine (yes, that was a thing), and have to work their way up to the source. We humans like stories and atmosphere and rituals. It's no surprise that the gods we create like them too!

This may well come down to "the best bull****ter wins", but there is an element of "in good faith" too it, in that the shaman entirely believes the messages that they are passing on and so believes in the rituals surrounding it rather than just their own interpretations of the sky and land around them.

I dunno, I appreciate that all that above may well be rubbish too, and it's certainly very simplistic, but maybe there's something in it.

Lol, this is a pisstake isn't it! Sorry

Yes, some interesting points there!

I also agree with Shrap and te stuff about artists, the 'experts' really do come up with some outrageous rubbish in describing art, I think they have a collection of words and phrases that are just randomly assembled,

"The artist brings the viewer face to face with their own preconceived hierarchy of cultural values and assumptions of artistic worth, Each mirror imaginatively propels its viewer forward into the seemingly infinite progression of possible reproductions that the artist's practice engenders, whilst simultaneously pulling them backwards in a quest for the 'original' source or referent that underlines Levine's oeuvre."

but people will demonstrate their superiority by defending this nonsense as though it means something.

Samaris

As a matter of interest, how many of us took part enthusiastically in English class in school, including all the interpretative stuff and then once in a while risked the teacher's wrath by suggesting that the author used "bright" because it rhymed with "night", dammit, and no other reason?

looksee

Right! I was failed in an essay once because I expressed the view that the poem

'I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree
A tree who's hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth's sweet-flowing breast ...etc'

was doggerel. I did argue my case, but I was told something along the lines of 'it wasn't for the likes of me to criticise a published poet'. I rest my case!

Nodin

looksee wrote: »

Right! I was failed in an essay once because I expressed the view that the poem

'I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree
A tree who's hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth's sweet-flowing breast ...etc'

was doggerel. I did argue my case, but I was told something along the lines of 'it wasn't for the likes of me to criticise a published poet'. I rest my case!

.....that sounds like the kind of thing said with "ye wee pup ye" at the end and emphasised with a clatter.

antiskeptic

Shrap wrote: »

Very interesting question and doesn't just apply to religion. Have you ever been to an art exhibition, or read a review of a work of art where the "expert" seems to be pulling some bullsh1t notions out of thin air? I know I have.

Reminds me of a great TV sting a good few years back. Passersby pulled off the street by the TV crew into a yard and given canvasses and paint to have at it with. A complete fest of fun - including one woman cycling a bike through the mud and paint and over her canvas

Canvasses then cropped, framed off and placed in a posh gallery where the cream of art criticism hauled in to view. An "up and coming" artist was laid on for the event.

To be fair, a few of the folk were straight out with their criticism (caught by hidden cam), even if they didn't quite see it was utter horse****. A large middle section went with the flow nodding appreciation and pointing out some good bits - but keeping their guard up. A few however, amongst them one notable critic, were simply oozing praise.

I wonder does the world of scientific peer review work like that too?

robindch

antiskeptic wrote: »

I wonder does the world of scientific peer review work like that too?

No, that's religion you're thinking of :rolleyes:

antiskeptic

robindch wrote: »

No, that's religion you're thinking of :rolleyes:

What? You reckon researchers sucking on the tit of big pharma arrive at neutral conclusions?

Now that's what I call a belief system

robindch

antiskeptic wrote: »

You reckon researchers sucking on the tit of big pharma arrive at neutral conclusions?

If you want a serious discussion about this topic, then a new thread would be a good place to have it - grounded in fact via something like Ben Goldacre's excellent book [http://www.amazon.com/Bad-Pharma-How-Medicine-Broken/dp/000749808X]Bad Pharma[/url].

If, on the other hand, you want to have a schoolyard tit-for-tat, then I'm sure we can all have a laugh dissing and discussing chemtrails, the moon hoax, homeopathy, the flat Earth, William Lane Craig, Donald Trump and so on! :rolleyes: