The Evolution of God

7/26/2013

In 2005, David Foster Wallace gave a speech for commencement at Kenyon College that started with this joke:

There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way who nods at them and says, 'Morning, boys. How's the water?' The two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes, 'What the hell is water?'

Talking about gods often feels like this to me. Either you're born into a family and community where God (capital G) is everywhere and you take His presence for granted (What's atheism?), or you've somehow managed by birth or by thought to come up for air and see a world with no evidence of any god (small g) and you wonder why believers sound so collectively insane. If it was 10 people talking about faeries, you'd just ignore them, but when it's a billion people who believe in Yahweh or Allah or Vishnu, you have to pay attention. The gulf between these religious and non-religious worldviews often feels so unbridgeable though - like the one between the fishes who cannot understand what the other one sees or does not see - that I often despair I'm just shouting into the abyss that lies between whenever I try to rationally or emotionally discuss this topic.

Nonetheless, the decision to accept or reject the 'a' in atheism is one of the fundamental choices that must be made to know thyself and define your philosophy about the universe and how you should act within it. And so, even with little hope of using a blog essay to convince anyone to actually change their beliefs (I have other ideas to work on that), I would like to note the facts I have come to accept on this point in question during the research I've conducted for my own personal Evolutionary Philosophy. Concerning God and Religion, I wrote these three points:

There is no conclusive evidence that a god exists. An examination of the evolution of religion clearly shows its origin and development by man. The first gods were invented and worshiped for their power to explain natural phenomena - primarily the sun, the moon, day and night, the seasons, and fertility. As science has explained more and more natural phenomena, the gods have grown less and less powerful.

There once were many European and Middle Eastern fertility goddesses and savior gods born of virgin births. (Roman pagan god Attis born of the virgin Nana, Greek pagan god Dionysus, Egyptian pagan god Osiris, Persian pagan god Mithra, Saxon mother goddess Eostre, Aphrodite from ancient Cyprus, Ashtoreth from ancient Israel, Astarte from ancient Greece, Demeter from Mycenae, Hathor from ancient Egypt, Ishtar from Assyria, Kali from India, Ostara a Norse Goddess of fertility. See here, here, and here.) These beliefs are a natural reaction to ignorance about the flowering of life season after season and generation after generation. They were consolidated by Rome into Christianity under the worship of Jesus and Mary. Ancient polytheistic mythologies evolved to monotheism because of the human quest for power and solidarity. The need to control one’s flock in order to get money and membership for survival means that other gods and priests cannot also be right. This is why early Christianity survived while the Gnostics went extinct. Christianity branched off into Islamism when Mohammed did not accept the word of Jesus as final, and splintered into other orthodox or protestant factions based on the strength of empires and fervor of heretics. Remaining pockets of paganism were swept up by Christianity and its descendants as Rome conquered Europe and Europe conquered the globe. Religion may have supported empires, but empires stamped religion for their purpose as well.

Eastern philosophies of Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, and Shintoism are separate from this evolution but have become non-theistic explorations into the best way to live. Unfortunately, “the way” that Eastern philosophies recommend leans too heavily towards detachment from desire, pain, suffering, and the world. Followed unerringly, this leads to stagnation for the person and the human race. Modern science and psychology teach us a better way. Flexible detachment, mature defense mechanisms, balanced goals, motivation, and progress; these are what make for the better way.

That's a brief overview of the history and evolution of the belief in gods that I have examined and used to confidently place my beliefs on the side of atheism. Next week, in the spirit of always cross-examining one's beliefs, I'll take a look at the historical arguments that have tried to persuade us all to join the camp of theism. In the meantime though, I'd love to hear what your thoughts on this are. Is any of this history new to you? What has persuaded you one way or the other as to the existence or non-existence of god? Is it even something rational, or is it just an emotional feeling?

14 Comments

Kirsten

7/26/2013 02:24:25 pm

Hi Ed, following Tanya’s recommendation on Facebook ☺ I am keen to take on the challenge you pose (I loved philosophy in school but don’t have time for it – so sad…). As an atheist I would clearly agree with your thoughts, however I am unsatisfied by it because it’s too simple for us as atheists to say “there is no evidence of God, therefore God isn’t”. I know that plenty of philosophical thought has been expended on proving or disproving God but given that according to religion’s own logic God is (apart from odd, questionable miracles) not to manifest itself, the whole question / prove feels wrong to me.
Clearly, as a social scientist I am foremost interested in the consequences of religion, how religion is used to create divisions but also, more positively, shapes society. So, for once I agree with Marx who said that “religion is opium for the masses” and this is, I think, the main problem with religion, which you hinted at when you said that “The need to control one’s flock in order to get money and membership for survival means that other gods and priests cannot also be right”. Religion is a psycho-social condition. It fulfills the same function for the individual as you describe for atheism (“Flexible detachment, mature defense mechanisms, balanced goals, motivation, and progress”), except that the adjectives have different connotations – ‘flexible’, ‘mature’ etc. are all ideas that we attach to rational, liberal, ‘modern’ ideas but this contains a lot of assumption about the superiority of atheism without us providing evidence for its superiority.
Religion intends – in an ideal way – to achieve psychological stability and social harmony. This is, of course, an ideal type. Clearly, religion is used and abused for the purposes of cementing power but also to create group cohesion, be that locally or as global as the ‘umma’. I think the important question here is not so much whether God exists or how God is disproven to exist but how religion becomes the opium of the masses and what the consequences are for human survival. Max Weber’s sociology of religion (if you haven’t read it or made it past the Protestant Ethic, I definitely recommend the whole work, esp. the part on Eastern religions) really helps to understand how religion – or thinking about one’s place in the world and God – creates very different societies. If you are talking about evolution, shouldn’t the question also be what is that society that is a higher form (if we accept that evolution is weeding out towards an end-point – very Fukuyama-ish, sorry!)? Is it one that can be partly religious as long as the common denominator is one of acceptance of difference and peaceful coexistence based on ‘maturity’, ‘flexibility’ etc. , or is atheism the only solution (that atheists should promote?). John Gray posed a similar question about Liberalism and whether acceptance of difference is proper Liberalism or whether Liberalism must be accepted everywhere…
As a hard case: What does it mean for the evolution of human-kind and its thinking in the face of a religion that considers the sacrifice of self and others in the name of God in a post-industrial/post-modern world (not medieval!) as holy? Will one religion ‘win’ over the other, i.e. will one adjust to the other or will one be ‘conquered’ and what will everybody’s opium be? Can this opium lead to survival or do we all just take an overdose? ☺

Secondly, a bit unrelated but no less important: if one accepts that God is a social construction, one can also not accept that there is difference between genders and races other than those that are natural, e.g. women give birth, white people burn easier in the sun (simple stuff…). Back to the old liberals: one is born as human and therefore is – fullstop!

NB: you forgot to include Judaism as a mono-theistic religion. Your account suggests that paganism developed into Christianity, and then there was Christianity and Islam. ☺
NB: the academic in me grumbles because I don’t see a bibliography – I would love to know what has influenced your thinking… ☺ ☺

@EdGibney link

7/28/2013 09:54:24 am

Thanks for clicking over and then sharing so many thoughts, Kirsten. You can indulge in your interest in philosophy quite easily by liking my EvPhil facebook page or signing up for my weekly blog posts. It'd be great to continue hearing from you. I'll try to respond to your points in order of easiest to most difficult. :-)

Judaism. Yes, definitely that should be included in the transition from polytheism to monotheism before Jesus emerged from that group under pressure and spawned Christianity. I'll definitely include that in the next revision of EvPhil. This is exactly why I'm sharing it now!

Speaking of that, the "first draft" nature of this website and philosophy precludes me from taking the time to log hundreds of citations. Free yourself from that academic burden! :-) I list books in the "My Evolution" section that have influenced me the most, I do point to scholars or scientists where really necessary, I do link to *here* *here* and *here* above for sources on that list of arcane gods, but otherwise, I expect facts and arguments to be debated on their own merit rather than devolve into a "his citation says - her citation says" kind of back and forth. On this particular post, my summation of the evolution of religions is pieced together from trips to religious and pagan sites around the world, an intense Catholic upbringing followed by years of searching through other religions, some research into early Christianity (Gnostic Gospels by E. Pagels comes to mind), and studies of systems thinking (particularly The Fifth Discipline by P. Senge) and evolutionary processes. Hope that calms some of your grumbles. I'm always interested in hearing about other sources that would add to or rebut my own statements.

Now for the topic at hand. Regarding proof and disproof, it is impossible to prove a negative (in this case, since the domain in question is the entire history and prehistory of the universe and we can't know everything that that contains) so you might notice that I didn't actually say that "God doesn't exist." You cannot say that with 100% certainty, so I don't. As with any idea that seeks acceptance though, the burden of proof is not on the disbeliever, it is on the proponent of the idea. In the case of gods, the theists have never made a satisfactory proof. This is well pointed out by Richard Dawkins and his famous flying spaghetti monster god. You don't believe in that god, or millions of other possible ones, so why believe in the Christian god, Islamic god, Hindu god, etc., etc.? To spend time discussing a god who can't or won't manifest itself is a complete waste of time - and that's not the kind of God most religions define as their god anyway. But they have no proof for their Gods. End of story. End of that story anyway.

The social history and implications of religion are still fascinating and important. I do discuss Marx (http://is.gd/fhvzO6) and Weber (http://is.gd/ribC06) in my sections on the Survival of the Fittest Philosophers. At the rate I'm going now, I should blog about them sometime next spring. Short version - I agree with what you say about them. For more, stay tuned!

As to the continued evolution of religions and societies, I do see them falling away to the worldview provided by science and (my brand of) philosophy for psychological stability and social harmony, as you put it. What we know about surviving and thriving in an empty uncaring universe is (very probably) all that we *can* have so eventually the rest will be pared away. That can only happen once and for all when science and philosophy progress to meet the needs of human psyches perplexed with existential questions though. Once that happens (and my next novel explores a possibility of what that might start to look like), our needs and desires for more elaborate but untenable opiates will subside. It has for more and more us already, which I will talk about when I respond to Andrej's post below.

Thanks again for sharing. Clearly we have more to talk about over drinks than just university politics and gossip! ;-)

Andrej

7/27/2013 10:36:01 am

I don't really care whether or not God or gods exist. I would figure they would have bigger fish to fry whether or not I was a good person or not. Since there is no evidence that she/they exist (outside of faith) and no evidence she/they don't exist, it seems like a bit of a difficult thing argument to make, though it seems to take up a lot of time at universities and bars...

I am more interested in secularism because that is the more important thing for peoples' lives. I will link a recent article that states that none/atheism is up to 20% in the US and shockingly enough just 9% of conservatives and 40% of liberals identify as none/atheist. There are lots of reasons for it in the article, but the intolerance of organized religion is the driving factor. The other telling thing is that these people are not searching for a religion, they are happy who they are.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/13/religion-america-decline-low-no-affiliation-report_n_2867626.html

Another interesting phenomena is that Ireland is "losing its religion" faster than any country except oddly Vietnam. Throw in sex scandals and the authority of the Roman Catholic church is at an all-time low and probably sinking.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/republic-of-ireland-abandoning-religion-faster-than-almost-every-other-country-in-the-world-8022439.html

When the US elects more and more high level politicians who don't feel the need to be faux-Christians and swear on bibles but instead vow to actually work for all people, then actual progress can occur. Until then we are stuck with the religious right and left following a 2000 year old book with random rules in it.

@EdGibney link

7/28/2013 10:08:42 am

Couldn't agree more, Andrej. The growth of "nones" is an exciting thing for all the atheist bloggers out there. Most of the nones seem to be of the "spiritual but not religious" persuasion, but that tends to just be a few months of actual study and introspection away from being an agnostic / atheist. I too am well past that fight and am leaving it to the thousands of people who still want to spend time debating it. I'm moving on to the more important task of studying and create a secular philosophy that examines the world we actually live in and gathers the best solutions to our problems - existential or everyday. If we can build that, they will come. At least the open minded nones will. And once we get enough of them cooperating and thriving under this worldview, then the game will be changed. The once Evolutionary Stable System of "religion for all" will crumble and be replaced.

Gerald McLaughlin

7/27/2013 04:23:40 pm

No literate person or educated family after Hume should be anything but an atheist. Late-comers, perhaps after Nietzsche.

@EdGibney link

7/28/2013 10:16:32 am

True, Gerald. But I really empathize with the advice I read in Love's Executioner by the existential psychiatrist (and great novelist of When Nietzsche Wept) Irvin Yalom when he said:

"In general, it’s best not to undermine a defense (mechanism) unless it is creating more problems than solutions, and unless one has something better to offer in its stead."

Some of us, for one reason or another, are much more able to live in a universe without gods. Just telling the religious to suck it up and let go of their reliance on fairy tales hasn't really worked all that well. We have to create something better for them to jump to instead. Thanks for your support in doing just that!

Simon L

7/28/2013 06:07:22 am

Good post. As someone who is not particularly well read on the history and development of religion, I find these potted histories to be quite informative. I think I am like most people in that I am not hugely informed on the issue, but having been through my own spiritual journey in life, I feel able to talk about religion confidently. Today I am a biologist and ecologist so have long since concluded that theism is not compatible with what I and much of humanity now knows to be true, I favour evidence-based argument over faith and belief so have rejected my own early ideas of God.

My own journey has been somewhat complicated, moving backwards and forwards between theism and atheism. I was raised a Catholic and spent most of my youth in Catholic school, attending church, going to church youth clubs and summer programmes, all of the typical things Catholic families do. My parish priests were good men, committed to improving their local community, there was nothing sinister or odd about them so I still hold my Catholic upbringing in high regard. As a child I enjoyed the explanations of how the world was created, the morals and values the Church instilled, it made sense to me! The great thing about religion is that is does provide young children with answers to the big questions in a way that is palatable and useful, however many people accept this early years learning as truth and never explore any further, which is a shame as we don’t usually adopt the same approach to literacy, numeracy or the myriad other subjects we explore through education.

It was not until my teenage years I began to question the idea of God, as do many. I felt the simplistic explanations of the natural world and its creation, the descriptions of the afterlife, the idea that humans were the pinnacle of creation was unsatisfying. I was becoming increasingly curious about the evolution and interconnectedness of the natural world, the wonder of all forms of life from the single cell to complex mammals. Suddenly that sense of awe and wonder that God had once inspired was instead coming from knowledge of how things ACTUALLY work. I started to feel the beauty of the world was in the natural order that it had established in itself, the state of equilibrium, the push/pull of evolution, this was truly amazing. This idea that the Universe was put together by some guy, like a big complex Lego set, seemed naïve and ugly. God was out, science was in.

I gradually began to accept that I was an atheist, until I concluded my first year of undergraduate study and my Grandfather died. He was the first big loss I had experienced and suddenly I felt the need to pray, to be part of the Church community again and to do anything I could to keep the idea of him alive. Around that time I happened to be roommates with a guy who was very involved in a local evangelical Church. He invited me along and I quickly became receptive to their ideas, they were so welcoming, calm and pleasant. Their lives seemed ordered and had meaning. This was totally at odds with everything I had experienced over the previous 12 months, the shock and disorientation of dealing with the death of loved one, leaving the family home for University, the alcohol, partying, drugs and sex that were all par for the course as an undergrad. So I tagged along to a few Sunday services, spent some time in reading groups and even began to explore Christianity though a structured course. I genuinely felt I could have become part of this community until, in the latter stages of the course, I was asked to reject the Catholic Church and all of its teachings and to be baptised in the new Church. I declined, left and never returned. It had been a 4-5 month foray back into theism but in the end it had seemed ugly and not like I remembered. I went back to church as I was looking for that unconditional acceptance and community I remembered as a child, instead I felt I was on the outside looking in. Religion was a club and I had the wrong membership card.

I naturally drifted away from Christianity again, resuming my studies in biology no doubt helped. However the foray back into the Church had given me time to reflect on the idea of a belief system, the idea of fundamental truths which we observe and live by. This is what I felt I was lacking. Moving into my 20s I was bored of questioning and challenging everything, I wanted to lay down some ideas that I would live by and to find answers to those big questions that the Catholic Church had answered for me as a child. Who are we? Why are we here? What are we doing? I’m not going to say that I have the answers, I’m guessing like others, I constantly refine my answers to these questions. But I increasingly I am accepting of my atheism and I find the answers I need in nature, the environment and through observing living things, in all of their wonderful complexity. For me life is God. Why? Because life is everywhere, life exists in us all a

Simon L.

7/28/2013 06:11:44 am

Last paragraph continued:

But increasingly I am accepting of my atheism and I find the answers I need in nature, the environment and through observing living things, in all of their wonderful complexity. For me life is God. Why? Because life is everywhere, life exists in us all and life is everything we have. Without life, we are dust.

PS. I have spent far longer writing this comment than you might expect, but I have never sat down and taken a couple of hours to reflect on the evolution of my belief system before, nor have I really thought about how my journey through religion to becoming an atheist has played out. It has been a really useful and rewarding experience.

@EdGibney link

7/28/2013 10:35:21 am

At the risk of expressing very un-British-like emotions, that was a beautiful story, Simon. It rings familiar from my own Catholic upbringing full of loving family members and well-meaning priests and nuns, followed by years of drifting away from the bond that held that community together, if not from the love I felt within it. I'm very touched that my work here has provided you an opportunity to explore and share your own similar journey. Would that more of us did that, we could build a new and better-grounded community of non-believers.

Now let's not speak of this again the next time we go and get a pint. I'm really keen on figuring out this whole Life in the UK thing. ;-)

Andrej

7/29/2013 04:18:24 pm

As the old saying goes, "God gave us one mouth and two ears, but ten fingers, so he must have really wanted us to poke people."

Andrej

8/1/2013 07:10:27 pm

Scientology has been in the news lately, something about issuing a scathing response to someone who left the "religion." First off that doesn't seem like something a religion would do, but whatever. In the text they defend themselves and their founder "a former science fiction writer." Pretty much all religions are bad science fiction when you think about it, not just Scientology. Benevolent, mysterious, scary, capricious, and downright mean spiritual beings floating in the clouds and coming down to earth with a bunch of rules and promises, kinda the definition of all religions. Scientology takes it a bit further, like a scientific Buddhism...

@EdGibney link

8/2/2013 03:01:04 am

Religion as pre-sci-fi or non-sci-fi. I can get behind that categorization.

Andrej

8/2/2013 03:48:17 pm

Oh ye of little faith.....the true cross is found....

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/01/jesus-cross-found-archaeology_n_3691938.html

@EdGibney link

8/3/2013 06:51:37 am

The better picture we get of the historical man Jesus, the more obvious it becomes that he was just that - a man.

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