Theory of Evolution.

[El_Machinae]

The early appearance of life on Earth is also an apparent outlier. As well, the difficulty of seeding a distant planet with microbes is vastly lower than visiting and mucking with a primate to make bigger brains ...

Though, if 'distant microbe bombardment' happened, we'd expect life on other nearby planets too.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Humans seem to have a strong need to organize and explain (=storytelling?). Creation stories are all about organizing and explaining the unknown. Such tales, as well as other tales, provide a foundation for culture and social norms. The actual truth of the matter is less important than having the foundation.

I get organizing and explaining the unknown...but there seems a flaw in the system in that this need extends to the clearly unknowable with such fervor. The creation myths clearly qualify as 'well this is plainly made up of whole cloth' but they are among the most dearly held and desperately fought for.

 

[warpus]

Origin stories are important to people for many reasons. I think it must be partially a psychological thing. "This is how it all started", etc. I mean, for example, look at how important to Americans the war of independence is, in terms of national mythos.

There is also a lot of benefit in being someone who knows things, especially "big question" things. I'm talking about back when we were just tribes and maybe quasi/semi-organised nation states. I don't think it's surprising that virtually every school of thought, every culture, every religion, etc. ended up with a creation story. If you can't tell your people where everything came from, what good are you? Especially if all the other tribes in the region have their own answers? If your chief or shaman doesn't have an answer - he will be replaced by someone who does.

Just some thoughts.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Origin stories are important to people for many reasons. I think it must be partially a psychological thing. "This is how it all started", etc. I mean, for example, look at how important to Americans the war of independence is, in terms of national mythos.

There is also a lot of benefit in being someone who knows things, especially "big question" things. I'm talking about back when we were just tribes and maybe quasi/semi-organised nation states. I don't think it's surprising that virtually every school of thought, every culture, every religion, etc. ended up with a creation story. If you can't tell your people where everything came from, what good are you? Especially if all the other tribes in the region have their own answers? If your chief or shaman doesn't have an answer - he will be replaced by someone who does.

Just some thoughts.

And good thoughts they are.

So, bottom line...to be in charge one must make up an answer to an unanswerable question and then sell the idea that it is the real thing to the followers. No wonder humanity has apparently developed a genetic predisposition towards losing contact with reality by whatever means possible.

 

[Birdjaguar]

And good thoughts they are.

So, bottom line...to be in charge one must make up an answer to an unanswerable question and then sell the idea that it is the real thing to the followers. No wonder humanity has apparently developed a genetic predisposition towards losing contact with reality by whatever means possible.

I don't think that "to be in charge" one has to make up anything or that those who make stuff up get to be in charge.

I think it's that people respond positively to others who can bring "orderliness" (and purpose) to their lives. It begins at the one-to-one level, as well as, the family and community levels. As the number of people involved gets larger, the scope of the questions or the nature of the order expand also. Individuals typically like to be part of groups with common goals and purposes: churches, sports fans, political parties, clubs, teams, school groups, fan clubs, web sites, etc. Creation myths are just at the "high end" of the stories about how things began. Romulus and Remus are creation figures for Rome.

I think that the fervor attached to the "unknowable" answers is related to the importance of of those organizing principles to the rest of what is based on them. Often if the foundation of a system cracks, all the the rest will fall, so folks will cling mightily to those fundamental beliefs to preserve everything else.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

That's the point. You might get to be in charge of the booster club just because you are organized, know arcane team stats off the top of your head, etc. But to be big in charge (Buddha, Jesus, Mohammed, etc) ya gotta sell your answers to those big unanswerable high end questions...which are made up out of whole cloth since those questions are unanswerable.

Once you get them sold your position is unbreakable because, as you say, folks will cling mightily to those beliefs.

 

[Birdjaguar]

That's the point. You might get to be in charge of the booster club just because you are organized, know arcane team stats off the top of your head, etc. But to be big in charge (Buddha, Jesus, Mohammed, etc) ya gotta sell your answers to those big unanswerable high end questions...which are made up out of whole cloth since those questions are unanswerable.

Once you get them sold your position is unbreakable because, as you say, folks will cling mightily to those beliefs.

Yes, but it was not Jesus, Buddha or Mohamed that did most of the selling. That came later and was mostly done by people who never had contact with the original leader. And yet they believed enough to take "bold" action.

Now, if any of those, or other religious leaders, were actually divinely inspired, then the rise of their religion might well have had the force of god behind it and been inevitable even if not precisely true.

If any of those leaders were not divinely inspired, then the ideas expressed must have a great power that resonates with people easily. The "fact" that the questions are "unanswerable" only makes sense if one accepts as true that "reason is the only/best source of truth." The minute that one sets aside reason as the sole source of truth, then a seven day creation is just fine. For most people, for most of history, reason has never been the sole source of truth.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Good points. In sales there are many techniques that require splitting the deal. The inspired follower closing the "here are the answers that come from [insert prophet]" deal is actually in a much better position because he can defer objections. "I'm not clear on the answer to that question, as it never occurred to me to ask [insert prophet]" is not available to the actual prophet.

I also recognize that there is an absurdity in suggesting that power can be accessed by answering unanswerable questions. Obviously that makes the questions not unanswerable. I was stretching into some territory of 'even if divinely inspired, of all the information such divinity might impart a creation myth seems way out there'. I personally operate from a position more in the 'if I meet the divine and ask about creation I expect to be asked what possible use I could make of such information and divinely laughed at'. You have gotten across that this is my personal bias and doesn't mean that the answers would not be made available by some other idea of the divine.

I guess at root the creation question is unanswerable for me because I just don't care, but in future I will be more careful to keep in mind that that is not a widespread view. Thanks.

 

[warpus]

And good thoughts they are.

So, bottom line...to be in charge one must make up an answer to an unanswerable question and then sell the idea that it is the real thing to the followers

Well, no, I don't think so, my post wasn't meant to be a guide on how to do it - but rather an observation that attempts to explain at least some of the phenomenon. There is always cultural and/or religious baggage, as well as other considerations, if you want to be in charge of a society or tribe or whatever, you need to understand their social conventions and have leverage, so that you can move the chess pieces of their society and end up on top. You can gain that leverage in many ways, what I describe are only some of them. And it's "not quite that simple", you need to sort of also be at the right place, at the right time, with the right things to say.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Well, no, I don't think so, my post wasn't meant to be a guide on how to do it - but rather an observation that attempts to explain at least some of the phenomenon. There is always cultural and/or religious baggage, as well as other considerations, if you want to be in charge of a society or tribe or whatever, you need to understand their social conventions and have leverage, so that you can move the chess pieces of their society and end up on top. You can gain that leverage in many ways, what I describe are only some of them. And it's "not quite that simple", you need to sort of also be at the right place, at the right time, with the right things to say.

I was actually looking at it from a more general perspective. Sort of "how has this happened" rather than specifically "how can I do it". That pretty much removes the 'right place, right time' obstacle since making it general only requires that someone be there. My observation was that the guy who comes up with these unfathomable answers and successfully pitches them is the guy who has ended up on top. They obviously did some other stuff too, but that seems a large part of getting on top and staying on top.

 

[classical_hero]

The early appearance of life on Earth is also an apparent outlier. As well, the difficulty of seeding a distant planet with microbes is vastly lower than visiting and mucking with a primate to make bigger brains ...

Though, if 'distant microbe bombardment' happened, we'd expect life on other nearby planets too.

For this scenario to happen you need a thinner atmosphere so that the meteor won't burn up in the atmosphere, but a thin atmosphere mean not enough ozone to protect the life from harmful radiation for the sun and elsewhere in the universe. Bit f a catch 22 situation.

 

[Plotinus]

For this scenario to happen you need a thinner atmosphere so that the meteor won't burn up in the atmosphere, but a thin atmosphere mean not enough ozone to protect the life from harmful radiation for the sun and elsewhere in the universe. Bit f a catch 22 situation.

But meteorites do land on Earth now, even with the atmosphere we've currently got.

 

[El_Machinae]

For this scenario to happen you need a thinner atmosphere so that the meteor won't burn up in the atmosphere, but a thin atmosphere mean not enough ozone to protect the life from harmful radiation for the sun and elsewhere in the universe. Bit f a catch 22 situation.

Well, if it's an alien intervention, then the landing system can be designed to be more robust than the meteorite you're describing. You're right, though. There's a balance potential panspermia models on that front. Would a deep-water microbe require the same level of ozone?

 

[Timsup2nothin]

For this scenario to happen you need a thinner atmosphere so that the meteor won't burn up in the atmosphere, but a thin atmosphere mean not enough ozone to protect the life from harmful radiation for the sun and elsewhere in the universe. Bit f a catch 22 situation.

If you are using microbe seeding you are counting on radiation to provide the mutation rates that will turn your microbes into significant life over time. Drop the microbes through a thick atmosphere and at the end of the day all you get is microbes.

 

[trader/warrior]

It's interesting to wonder about how the origins of religion might have happened.

Thinking back to the pre-cities nomadic societies it's notable that in large part the only sites that remain fixed places of activity over very large timespans are monumental or otherwise religious in nature. I think in nomadic society or early tribal societies constantly in flux, remaining in a place well known by people all around you, you could become a hub of communication for large areas between different mobile groups. A merchant of knowledge, and possibly the first simply general merchants as well by virtue of remaining fixed rather than the later properties of these things to be in the domain of the few with long distance links and mobility. This would obviously give you huge power over that society, but how do you wield it? And how can you strengthen that power? At this time people were nomadic for a reason, human populations couldn't easily be sustained while remaining in one place, so these people needed something special beyond the very real advantages they could give a society as a whole to attract the individual to select just them to give support.

I think that is where early religion and the construction of monumental structures come in. Aided by a certain innate leaning towards mysticism and desire to answer the unanswerable I suppose. Simple competition as well, if some shaman in the next valley over claims to have gained knowledge of Life, the Universe and Everything and is able to perform magical feats you might want to come up with something like that as well to keep attracting people.

These are all my fuzzy ideas and not at all based on hard scientific knowledge of course, but if it is like this, I would say that the emergence of these religious structures could be called more of a start of civilization than the first cities or villages, an idea some people seem not to like for some reason.

Well that (bolded) is not necessarily true.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunter-gatherer

(On the richness and amount of free time in the life of hunter-gatherers)

From a lot of what I've heard Hunter-gatherers do seem in some ways to lead a "rich" lifestyle compared to early agricultural societies, however I also often hear their bones generally point to rather extreme physiques with heavy wear and other health problems from the hard lifestyle compared to later agricultural peoples. I think the truth has to be somewhere in between with very different pros and cons between them when people were "making the switch" so to speak.

 

[Birdjaguar]

It's interesting to wonder about how the origins of religion might have happened.

Thinking back to the pre-cities nomadic societies it's notable that in large part the only sites that remain fixed places of activity over very large timespans are monumental or otherwise religious in nature. I think in nomadic society or early tribal societies constantly in flux, remaining in a place well known by people all around you, you could become a hub of communication for large areas between different mobile groups. A merchant of knowledge, and possibly the first simply general merchants as well by virtue of remaining fixed rather than the later properties of these things to be in the domain of the few with long distance links and mobility. This would obviously give you huge power over that society, but how do you wield it? And how can you strengthen that power? At this time people were nomadic for a reason, human populations couldn't easily be sustained while remaining in one place, so these people needed something special beyond the very real advantages they could give a society as a whole to attract the individual to select just them to give support.

I think that is where early religion and the construction of monumental structures come in. Aided by a certain innate leaning towards mysticism and desire to answer the unanswerable I suppose. Simple competition as well, if some shaman in the next valley over claims to have gained knowledge of Life, the Universe and Everything and is able to perform magical feats you might want to come up with something like that as well to keep attracting people.

These are all my fuzzy ideas and not at all based on hard scientific knowledge of course, but if it is like this, I would say that the emergence of these religious structures could be called more of a start of civilization than the first cities or villages, an idea some people seem not to like for some reason.

Define religion first. The answers will vary with what you mean. If you define it as "seeking answers to the hows and whys of existence", then you will get a different answer than if you you define it as "an organized group of believers with a leader".

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Define religion first. The answers will vary with what you mean. If you define it as "seeking answers to the hows and whys of existence", then you will get a different answer than if you you define it as "an organized group of believers with a leader".

Both of which are interesting answers to an interesting question, even though they are two different questions.

 

[trader/warrior]

Define religion first. The answers will vary with what you mean. If you define it as "seeking answers to the hows and whys of existence", then you will get a different answer than if you you define it as "an organized group of believers with a leader".

I realised this while I was typing it, hence why I rather awkwardly shoehorned in the sentence:

Aided by a certain innate leaning towards mysticism and desire to answer the unanswerable I suppose.

But tbh I think "spirituality" is a better word for these urges to give meaning and structure to existence, my guess on the origin of this spirituality would be the evolutionary pressures towards intelligence and learning, Humans assume they can figure things out. This spirituality probably been around for at least as long as language. The concept of religion to me has rather more specific connotations, although I can't for the life of me come up with a good set of them to properly define exactly what I think religion is.

I don't think "seeking answers to the hows and whys of existence" is a very defining property of religion, a lot of people might say the same things are defining properties of philosophy and science. And do religion as we know them really focus much on the deep questions? To me most of them seem to rush past this with little detail so they can get to the preaching and moral lessons.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

I think "spirituality" is a better word for these urges to give meaning and structure to existence

I can go with that, if I am allowed to define 'mysticism' as the counterforce that allows recognition that not everything in existence can be assigned meaning and structure, or needs it. Getting that meaning and structure generator to back down and stop trying to be the one man band in the show is the challenge. I don't think mysticism is an innate leaning, by the way, at least not in my experience.

 

[Birdjaguar]

I realised this while I was typing it, hence why I rather awkwardly shoehorned in the sentence:

But tbh I think "spirituality" is a better word for these urges to give meaning and structure to existence, my guess on the origin of this spirituality would be the evolutionary pressures towards intelligence and learning, Humans assume they can figure things out. This spirituality probably been around for at least as long as language. The concept of religion to me has rather more specific connotations, although I can't for the life of me come up with a good set of them to properly define exactly what I think religion is.

I don't think "seeking answers to the hows and whys of existence" is a very defining property of religion, a lot of people might say the same things are defining properties of philosophy and science. And do religion as we know them really focus much on the deep questions? To me most of them seem to rush past this with little detail so they can get to the preaching and moral lessons.

I would put the beginning of spirituality (including mysticism) at the point when life became self aware. Evolution seems to have some sort of bias/leaning/tendency towards complexity. And while simple life continues to thrive, so does an increasing complexity. Self awareness is the first step in the who am I? Why am I here? chain.

I can go with that, if I am allowed to define 'mysticism' as the counterforce that allows recognition that not everything in existence can be assigned meaning and structure, or needs it. Getting that meaning and structure generator to back down and stop trying to be the one man band in the show is the challenge. I don't think mysticism is an innate leaning, by the way, at least not in my experience.