THE ORIGIN OF RELIGION - BEN'S BLOG

Proof of the non existence of God?

10/3/2021

Having been brought up in a protestant world, I often wondered why our neighbours went to a different protestant church. Our minister, when questioned, would indicate that ‘their’ church was wrong on the interpretation of the Bible and that ‘ours’ was the correct interpretation.

I went to Christian schools and bible studies were a big part of my life. During my twenties (more than 50 years ago), I started to wonder why there were so many Christian churches: Roman Catholic, Latin Catholics, Eastern Orthodox Catholics, CFC Catholics (Catholics for Choice), Protestant Adventists, Anglicans, Baptists, Reformed, Lutherans, Methodists, Pentecostals, Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Unitarians, and others, not to mention many non-denominational churches. The variety of Christian belief is stunning to consider. So, if you are a Christian, which “kind” of Christian are you and to which ‘correct’ church do you belong?

Among Christians there is a belief that God speaks to humans through the bible and uses, for example, ministers, priests, pastors and rabbis, who explain that their opinion is the will of God and therefore they assume the earthly authority of their heavenly father. Doesn’t it make you wonder why God speaks differently to all those diverse denominations? It is a wonder how God keeps it all straight in his mind. He must take great care to speak to each congregation differently, emphasizing one thing with one church and a subtly different one to the church next door. (BTW, Islam has the same problem: Sunnis, Shiites, Fatimids, Almoravids, and more).

The only thing which would make sense, if there was a god, is to ensure that his spokesmen all conveyed the same message. The fact that so many different churches have different opinions and approaches to the rituals and disciplines of their brand of worship indicates they are all man-made concepts and therefore do not indicate the existence of the kind of god as depicted in the religions which are practiced. What do you say?

INTELLIGENCE AND DELUSIONS

8/1/2021

Why is it that many non-believers find it difficult to understand how highly intelligent people can believe in the supernatural (external to the natural world), whether it is religion, astrology or other similar phenomena, when there is no empirical evidence for it. I ask you to not comment unless you are willing to read the entire post.

Let’s start with the well known IQ (Intelligence Quotient) bell curve which shows the distribution of IQ in the population using a two-dimensional comparison. The horizontal x-axis shows the IQ level from left to right with 100 representing the mean (not the average) and the y-axis showing the frequency (the number of people at that IQ level).
The Stanford-Binet 5th edition IQ test describes IQ scores below 70 as representative of individuals who are impaired or intellectually disabled while 133+ is regarded as superior IQ.

Binet indicates that about 2% of the population scores below 70 while Levine & Marks classifies those with IQ ratings from 50 to74 as “morons” and those with scores between 25 and 49 are “imbeciles” and those with scores from 0-24 are described as “idiots.”

Why the above explanation? Well, if we assume that IQ is inherited, I propose that other personal characteristics, such as empathy, love, belief (of various sorts), delusions (of various sorts) and skepticism, are similarly inherited. However, such proclivities differ from person to person.

Let’s look at the distribution of delusion. The tendency for delusions is wide spread through the population. Many people believe in the supernatural, astrology and occult phenomena and millions believe that Trump won the 2020 election. Since we are all delusional to some degree, we’ll look where we fit on the IQ curve presented earlier. We might find skeptics on the one end and highly deluded individuals on the opposite end of the x-axis. We assume that there is a point where the degree of distance from the norm (the mid-point of the x-axis) becomes a clinical delusion.

Since there is no correlation of the bell curves for IQ and for the degree of delusion, it is possible that one can be highly intelligent on the IQ curve and also strongly delusional on the delusion curve. This seems to answer the question posed in the first paragraph.
I scored 128 on one test and 141 on another, suggesting that IQ tests are not accurate but are little more than approximations. I would probably score close to the skeptical side of the proposed delusional scale.
I hope to get a great response and if you like this post, please SHARE.

CONSCIOUSNESS AND SELF-AWARENESS

6/13/2021

The understanding of consciousness is the hard problem in neuro-science, since as of now, we have no comprehension of how it is produced in the brain or that it is not a material brain function but it is a universal fundamental and an ubiquitous feature of the universe or an act of God.

Consciousness makes us self-aware, that is how an individual consciously knows and understands one’s own character, motives and desires. When waking up from a deep dreamless sleep one’s memory instantly informs us who we are. Memories are constantly recorded in our material brain. They are not always accurate and false memories can be created, they can also be changed or wiped out through accidents, disease, or mental problems but is the only information we have about our “self”. We found out that memory is totally dependent on the material brain by examining brain-damaged patients (Studies by Paul Broca), people suffering from mental illness, babies born with mental deficiencies and by observing the slow deterioration of awareness in patients suffering of Alzheimer’s disease. Rene Descartes’ Cogito, ergo sum (I think, therefore I am), links self-awareness directly to the material brain as well.

When we contemplate that consciousness is separate from the material brain, as in mind-body duality, or is an independent feature of universe, as in panpsychism and that the brain needs this external force to create the self -awareness, we must realize this phenomena needs the information of the memory stored in the material brain to create one’s “self”. The obvious conclusion is that when the material brain is destroyed or died, so is the self-awareness no matter whether one looks at any definition of consciousness, ruling out any afterlife awareness.
I have seen some “philosophies” who deny the logical conclusion by arguing that this awareness is somehow recorded in a soul which therefore contains the information (data) to become aware after death.
I see some real problems with that, what about babies, brain damaged people, mental illness, retardation, Alzheimers’ victims and so on. I have seen some “explanations” which are obviously not very logical such as babies grow up in heaven and all mental deficiencies are repaired, everyone will be obtaining a lifetime equivalent of mid-thirties. If you have a logical explanation about the above mentioned dilemmas please let me know.

This is not a reason or attempt to deny the existence any God or religion, nor any of the philosophies regarding consciousness or even the existence or not, of heaven or hell. It is simply pointing out that the current knowledge shows that individual self-awareness after death, is unlikely.

Consciousness

5/1/2021

Elizabeth Dawber has described the current progress on neuroscience research regarding the use of Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI). Dawber’s research tries to shed light on a very difficult problem in science. She writes that, perhaps, science will advance to the point where one of the following three theories will be shown to be the best reflection of reality. According to this philosophy, new mysterianism, commonly known simply as ‘mysterianism,’ is a philosophical position that proposes that the ‘hard problem’ of consciousness cannot be resolved by humans. Specifically, the unsolvable problem is how to explain “qualia.” MRI is one tool that may shed more light on the hard problem.

PHYSICALISM
With the help of MRI, we can tell where the brain activity appears when we are sad or happy. Neurotransmitters (chemicals) can be artificially introduced to produce emotions or stimulate parts of the brain to produce these neurotransmitters. This leads to the suggestion that there are interactions between neurons and their connections which underlie consciousness. It is still not clear how the interactions of these brain parts lead to consciousness but this theory is based on observation of the correlation between emotions and the activities of the brain.

DUALISM
This theory holds that, if the brain does not produce consciousness, then there must be an agent, external to the physical brain, that interacts with the brain to produce conscious experience. This approach infers that consciousness and the physical body are separate entities. Dualists claim that, when someone experiences enlightenment or psychedelic trips or mediation, such experiences indicate that there must be another realm beyond the physical world. Dualism suggests that we live in two worlds, one physical and the other non-physical.

PANPSYCHISM
Panpsychism claims that consciousness is a fundamental feature of the physical world and varies in particles depending on the complexity of the organism. In panpsychism, every material thing, however small, has an element of individual consciousness. Even those things that are not normally considered to be ‘living’ have some element of consciousness. Panpsychism attributes ‘more’ consciousness to more complex physical entities. Thus, humans are ‘more’ conscious than dogs, dogs are more conscious than their associated fleas and fleas are more conscious than the viruses they carry. Panpsychism attempts to “explain away” the phenomenon of consciousness.

CONCLUSION
The principle of Occam’s Razor (attributed to William of Occam) purports that, when attempting to explain any phenomena, no more assumptions should be applied than are necessary. In recognition of this principle, I would favour physicalism as it is the most simple and logical explanation. Physicalism leads to the conclusion that the material brain creates consciousness. I hope that further research will conclusively confirm that physicalism offers the best path toward an understanding of consciousness.

Dualism must first demonstrate that a supernatural, non-physical realm must exist, in order for the philosophy to make sense. Sadly, scientific evidence focuses on physical evidence. Humans have yet to devise any sort of technology that might demonstrate the existence of non-physical phenomena. Even an MRI machine that can identify minute interactions in living brains ultimately uses material forms of evidence.

The part of panpsychism that I like, is its view that consciousness is a fundamental feature of all life in the physical world. Dogs and fleas are self-aware, as many animals are. The lowly earthworm, if prodded with a sharp needle (in laboratory conditions; don’t try this at home), react. Panpsychists use this as evidence that consciousness, awareness, even bacteria act in ways that suit their environment. Even plants, as reported lately in Scientific American, have developed intriguing insect defending mechanisms, some by wrinkling their leaves so they are harder to walk on while others exchange gases to protect the plant from pathogens. Brassica, the genus of plants that includes cabbage and mustard, kill of patches of their own leaves where butterflies have laid eggs. Some kind of simple consciousness or awareness might be at play here. The problem with panpsychism is determining the ‘cut-off’ between entities that exhibit consciousness and those that do not. Where do we draw the line?

The purpose of consciousness and awareness, in all living matter, is to connect associate living entities with all other life forms on earth, or perhaps in the universe, enabling life to develop and survive. Since the ‘higher’ consciousness and awareness depends on material brains, individual consciousness dies with the death of the original organism. This conclusion is obvious to me. But the question of what is meant by reference to ‘higher’ and ‘more’ complex organisms remains.

DO UNTO OTHERS

2/7/2021

The Golden Rule is a very ancient “moral” statement. The earliest recorded mention of it, reflecting the ancient goddess Ma’at (pronounced ‘may-et’), around 2000 B.C., is most likely not the oldest version. It possibly is a “moral’ tradition dating back to a time before writing was invented.

The concept appears in all major world traditions: Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Judaism, Christianity, Zoroastrianism and still others. A form of the Golden Rule is fond in almost every culture.

The idea to treat others as you would like to be treated is, when examined closely, a very selfish concept which probably found its origin in the distant past when it was realized that, if one wanted to live peacefully in the tribe, it would be a very useful concept. All tribal rules, including localized concepts of morality, could stem from that concept, which is all compassing and does not rely on any “god” to be enforced but rather through the local tribe’s concept of morality.

The variations in the different traditions are obviously similar. Some traditions include:
“What you hate to be done to you do not do to another” (Egyptian)
“Do not do to others what you know has hurt yourself” (Tamil)
“One should never do something to others that one would regard as an injury to oneself (Sanskrit)
“Avoid doing what you would blame others for doing” (Ancient Greece)
“Treat your inferior as you wish your superior would treat you” (Ancient Rome)
“What you do not wish for yourself do not to others” (Confucianism)

This one “moral” seems to be the base upon which all other tribal rules were built. It was necessary to enforce the concept. This rule applied to everyone, theist or atheist. It has arisen during human evolution as a concept that has been very beneficial to the only hominid genotype which skirted extinction. The rule seems to still be applied in modern human societies. Humanism has also adopted the “Do Unto Others” concept as applicable to all humankind. For versions of the Golden Rule, not a single one of these versions requires a god or any similar supernatural entity.

ABIOGENESIS

12/27/2020

With the start of the New Year, it is a great time to contemplate another important start, that of abiogenesis: the start of life from non-life.
The position of many theists, even those who realize evolution is a fact confirmed by evidence, is that it cannot be just a chance occurrence because the odds are so fantastically great that the universe in not old enough for that to have happened, when accounting for the laws of nature as we know them. The transition from non-living to living organisms, in earth’s history, is assumed to not be a singular event. Abiogenesis is not controversial among scientists.Theists state that the only possible way that life could have been created must be the work of a supernatural being.

Researchers from the University of Duisburg-Essen, in Germany, have recreated the inhospitable, severe environment and the geochemical conditions, deep in the earth’s crust, approximately 3.8 billion years ago. They created bubble-like structures of the pre-biological conditions which survived the harsh environment. Such vesicles might have become stable enough to come to the surface during geyser eruptions, geologist Ulrich Schreibers stated.

The research paper is still under peer review and we will be looking for further development. Scientists are coming closer and closer to proof that abiogenesis is possible and that the results are reproducible. Pressure, geochemical conditions and nature’s laws created the precursors of life in the early earth. It is likely that there are many locations on many planets where the same environment exists. Therefore, in my humble opinion, the transition of non-life to life is not an impossible occurrence by chance, at improbable odds, as many people think, but that it is an inevitable result of the geochemical environment and the laws of nature in many places in the universe. I further contend that we will eventually find life elsewhere, even in our own solar system, and that on far away planets life has evolved. To what extent we will probably never know because of the size of the universe.

Intelligent Design?

10/27/2020

Intelligent Design

When discussing the existence of God, the theists often express the opinion that the existence of God is obvious. Just look around you, they say, look at the magnificent structure of the universe, the beauty of nature, and the fine tuning of the natural forces, fine tuned to make life possible. In fact, a small deviation from the values of the fundamental forces would make life impossible, therefore, there must be an intelligent designer. They express astonishment that non-theists do not see that a supernatural power must exist.

To the unbelievers, their observations of reality come to the opposite conclusion. They often express astonishment, when the facts are observed, that someone would think that God is perfect instead of incompetent, especially when we look closely at the life-forms around us.

Looking at nature, we find many flaws in plants and animals currently occupying the planet. We also know, through archaeology and paleontology, that over 90% of the species which have ever lived are extinct. Those species, in many cases, could not adapt to changes in the earth’s climate.

Humans are at the top of the food chain. Viruses and bacteria attack all life forms and many species still show vestiges from previous forms, such as in the human tailbone, indicating that only by changing and adaptation do species survive. We are still evolving. Evolution never stops and most random changes are not viable unless, by chance, they fit the changing environment.

Disasters and diseases are part of life. The universe is 99.9% hostile to life. Life on earth could be wiped out by chance if an errant large meteorite hit this small little vulnerable rock circling around the sun which will itself eventually destroy this tiny planet.

Theists often point to the complexity of the human eye. They assert that the human eye could not have evolved without an intelligent designer. However, when we look at all of the various forms and structures of eyes across a myriad of species, we find all sorts of structures from very simple light detecting patches to complicated insect eyes which evolved in totally different ways, exposing how the random processes of evolution work. Only useful adaptions, out of many, will survive for a while.

Another argument Theists like to mention is that the random electrical and chemical events needed to form the first self-replicating molecule are highly improbable and would need to overcome such enormous odds that the universe is not old enough for such events to happen. This indicates the misunderstanding of odds. We can observe that lotteries, with millions of odds, have winners every few weeks. You could win tomorrow! It doesn’t take millions of draws to produce a winner and certainly a universe with “zillions” of “draws” every femto-second could have more than one winner, although we are sure of only one winner, since we are here. Help from a divine entity is not required.

For all the above reasons and through observing nature, life is actually full of design imperfections which indicate random development rather than intelligent design. We won the lottery so make the best of it.

Evolution Revisited

10/3/2020

Atheists and other non-believers in supernatural phenomena are not the only ones who have accepted the reality of evolution. Many Christians and other theists have realized that the observable facts and findings constantly reaffirm, refine and correct the scientific conclusions and the picture has become clearer and clearer. Many Christians understand that the Bible is to be taken metaphorically, not literally, and they realize that the “days” in Genesis metaphorically and symbolically indicate a “period of time.” They also understand that each metaphorical “day” covers a period of time that is far longer than 24 hours. Evolution is accepted by 98% of scientists and by many theists.
The human writers of the biblical texts had no conception of the geologic history of the earth or the enormous length of time required for our planet to form. The best that they could do was to apply a period of time that they could observe (a "day") to their ancient theology. They lacked any conception of science and, thus, evolution.
The debate is long over, except for a small group of “young creationists” who have developed an alternate “science” to “prove” that the earth is less than 10,000 years old, a pseudo science which has been thoroughly debunked. According to this pseudo science, no star in the observable universe could then be farther away than 10,000 light years. Real science tells us that is not the case.
I suggest that we ignore these “young earth creationist” arguments by reminding creationists that their “science” has been proven to be in conflict with real, observable facts. We attempt to limit debate between theists who claim that evolution is God’s way to create life and non-believers’ assertion that the laws of nature provide the best, and most accurate, explanation of the origin of life.
I wrote this post to assert that any debate about the veracity of evolution is over. Because evolutionary biology is an established fact and that it forms the basis for modern science and modern living, the only remaining debate is whether evolution is God’s way or nature’s way to reproduce life.

Y0u Are Alone

8/10/2020

I am relaxing on my favorite lawn-chair enjoying the breezy, sunny, summer weather in the cool shade of an oak tree and quaffing a cool beer. A little squirrel is carefully approaching, ready to flee if I make a move. I absorb the environment through my five senses which connect me to reality. It suddenly occurs to me that I am the only person in the whole universe who observes these immediate surroundings. Just me! Isn’t that miraculous?
My senses are recording the sounds, the smells, the landscape, the temperature, and the taste of the beer and my brain organizes all this information to create not only a picture in my mind but also to create a feeling of peace and contentment, just for me alone.
I will never know how another person, when experiencing a similar set of conditions, would perceive this scene. The grass reflects a certain frequency of light that we all call green, but I will never know how another brain interprets that same frequency. Perhaps my “green” is “red” for someone else? What about smell and taste? Are they the same for everybody? Obviously, they are not, because we have different likes and dislikes. But there is no way to know. Emotionally, we also differ in our reactions to similar situations.
Yes, we are unique and alone. We cannot read the thoughts of others. We can guess their thoughts by observing body language but we cannot ever be certain to know what another person thinks. I know that some magicians pretend that they can read minds and some people believe in extrasensory perception (ESP) but, over a hundred years of serious research in ESP and meta-physics, the results have been fruitless. Even money rewards, such as James Randi’s one million dollars if scientific evidence could be shown to verify ESP, have never been claimed.
Yes, you are alone. Observe through your senses what it is like to be alive. That experience is different from person to person and you will never know how other brains construct the environment that we call the reality in which we live. Although we are alone, that does not mean that we are necessarily lonely. Enjoy your life as much as you can; it is the only one you will ever get.

Mass Delusions

6/1/2020

MASS DELUSIONS
I know I am going to get dumped upon but I will take the chance that enough people will at least think about it. I want to make a distinction between clinical and common delusions. In this post, will not be talking about "clinical delusion" which is associated with mental disease. I am writing about a different and even more devastating delusion which is "mass delusion."
I have written about delusional people before and I have written that religion is, itself, a delusion. The comments that I have received have rejected the assertion that religion is a delusion and point to the absurdity of such an assertion by noting that the majority of the world's population would be mentally ill (or, at least, deluded) if religion was found to be a delusion. I am not saying that most people in the world are clinical delusional, but I am saying that we have inherited a tendency to accept delusions because we have a capacity to imagine anything as illustrated by the imaginative creations of Superman and Harry Potter. When these imaginations are believed to be real, they become delusions.
The strength of delusion-beliefs (DB)vary from person to person, from skeptics to ultra-believers, distributed on a bell-curve which is similar to the intelligence bell-curve but not correlated to it. A person with a very high intelligence quotient (IQ) can be anywhere on the DB curve. Here we have the juxtaposition of delusion and intelligence. What I always wondered at is how very intelligent persons, high on the IQ curve, leaders in biology, for example, defend creation stories over evolution. Does it depend on their inherited positions on the delusion-belief bell-curve?
So we are all subject to delusional-beliefs and everyone fits somewhere on the bell-curve. Many conspiracies theories, as examples of delusions, have a great deal of support in the population. Most conspiracy theories have little effect but some can cost lives. You only have to look at the millions who think that President D. Trump, no matter what he does, is doing a great job. Trump has called COVID-19 a plot by Democrats to........... well, here it is not clear at all what the strategy or intentions of Democrats might be. What might be the actual end-game for the Democrats to introduce a global pandemic? Can Democrats also be blamed for the emergence of COVID-19 in China? If so, then is this what is intended by the Texas County GOP Chair who recently incited a gathering to take off masks and hug each other. If Democrats have a plot to kill millions with a virus, then are the Republicans complicit in the plot by instructing adherents to remove their masks, thus promoting the spread of the Democrat's deadly plague? It is difficult to see which of them, Democrats or Republicans, are to blame for COVID-19. Or was it a joint effort: Democrats introduced COVID-19 after consultations with a secret laboratory in China and have co-opted Republicans to help them spread COVID-19 by getting ordinary citizens to remove their face masks at Republican Trump-promoting rallies? Asserting a political rationale to the spread of COVID-19 is a double-edged sword. Is it possible to see any positive, well-intended and well-considered plot by one party or another to kill thousands of Americans or, alternatively, is it possible to suggest that both Republican and Democrats wish to promote COVID-19 to kill fellow citizens? If so, why? Or is this yet another example of the illogical delusion-beliefs carelessly promoted by individuals who have abandoned all vestiges of critical thinking?
So it is obvious that many millions of people are susceptible to delusions and since delusions are very persistent and hard to overcome, we will have to be resolute to fight this inherited tribal instinct, as we fight other ones which are obsolete in the modern world, such as rape and tribal genocide, because we are the only tribe left in the world.
We survived the Neanderthals and Denisovans. Now we will have to adapt to survive.