A question that has haunted me all my life

[Dave Skummie]

How is it that every ancient isolated culture invented everything from languages to gods. If this is true, Then only two possible explanations can come from this that I can see. 1. If there is a real god then I'd say this god created a method to communicate. That would make all gods true and worshiping any would take you to the same spot at the end. 2. The simple psychology of ruling in man has created a need to worship something greater. This would mean all gods were made up by the psychological design of the human brain. If anyone has number 3. I'd be very interested. Thank you for your time. Dave

[marco]

2. The simple psychology of ruling in man has created a need to worship something greater. This would mean all gods were made up by the psychological design of the human brain.

Man hunts. He looks for signs of what he wants. He interprets the footprints of animals and finds where they are. He can reason. He hears a loud noise in the sky with no visible cause. So he assumes some great spirit voiced the noise. It is NOT a need to worship but a liking for explanations. Across the centuries man has used this love of search to produce wonders, without God's aid. When man finds he is mistaken, he educates himself. Many people today do not believe thunder is God's voice. That is progress.

[dio9]

[Replying to post 36 by Clownboat]

don't bother sending me links . I don't read them.

If you can put it into your own words I will try to poke holes in it.

[Justin108]

[Replying to post 36 by Clownboat]

don't bother sending me links . I don't read them.

If you can put it into your own words I will try to poke holes in it.

In post 30, you dismiss Clownboat's position as "just an opinion", and when Clownboat backs his opinion with sources, you dismiss the sources because you don't read links. What do you want from him? Opinions aren't enough and backed up resources aren't either, so what exactly is it you want?

its wide spread probably because its true

Superstitious beliefs are also widespread. Are they also true?

Your opinion my friend is the minority position.

Are you of the opinion that the amount of people that believe something has any influence on whether or not it is true? This sounds like an appeal to popularity to me.

excuse me your reference is a Barrett? never heard of him. you comparing him to Buddha Lao Tzu Jesus and Krishna?

Is there any reason that he shouldn't? Do you believe that Jesus and Buddha knew more about human psychology than Professor Justin Barrett? Do you even believe that Krishna existed?

Give me something better than Jesus could.

And what did Jesus give?

Are you saying the majority of historic humanity for thousands of years is not evidence of the inclination instilled in humanity to seek a relationship with a higher power is hogwash? And some unknown writer from Psychology today is right? Please get real.

Can you perhaps offer a better rebuttal than "please get real"?

[Clownboat]

[Replying to post 36 by Clownboat]

don't bother sending me links . I don't read them.

If you can put it into your own words I will try to poke holes in it.

Well, that is one way to keep your head in the sand.
I trust the readers are more dedicated to gathering knowledge.

Copied and pasted from post 25 of this thread:
"Why, for example, is belief in invisible, supernatural agents - such as ghosts, angels, dead ancestors, and gods - so widespread?

Barrett suggests we have evolved to be overly sensitive to agency. We evolved in an environment containing many agents - family members, friends, rivals, predators, prey, and so on. Spotting and understanding other agents helps us survive and reproduce. So we evolved to be sensitive to them - oversensitive in fact. Hear a rustle in the bushes behind you and you instinctively spin round, looking for an agent. Most times, there's no one there - just the wind in the leaves. But, in the environment in which we evolved, on those few occasions when there was an agent present, detecting it might well save your life. Far better to avoid several imaginary predators than be eaten by a real one. Thus evolution will select for an inheritable tendency to not just detect - but over detect - agency."
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/be ... le-believe...

(There is more on this, but I would hate for you to have to click a link and do some work).

[Kenisaw]

In other words, while a tendency to attribute false positives in those five or ten seconds it takes to glance at a rustle in the bushes is highly probable, extrapolating that to some ingrained tendency for long-term attribution of agency is dubious at best - I would say that on the contrary, if anything the available evidence suggests that in longer timeframes we are all too easily inclined to disattribute agency, or at least dissociate ourselves from its implications, where it actually does exist!

Just the opposite. The formation of ONE answer to a lot of unknowns is much easier mentally. The five or ten seconds to glance at a rustle in the bushes, the source of lightning and thunder, the sudden sickness of a loved one, all these things and more can be easily dumped onto the "unknown". The "unknown" turns into something that resembles people in some way, but is also more powerful YET can be tamed by sacrifice and prayer.

You have to remember, the human brain is hard wired for patter recognition. It's an obvious survival tool, spotting that leopard in the trees waiting to make you its lunch for example. Problem is that our brains are so hard wired for it that we see patterns that don't really exist, all the time. People see faces in clouds for instance. It's a well known characteristic of human brains. Our mental need to assign values to random events is the most plausible answer for why things like gods and Yeti and ghosts and dragons are common across time and space.

[William]

How is it that every ancient isolated culture invented everything from languages to gods. If this is true, Then only two possible explanations can come from this that I can see. 1. If there is a real god then I'd say this god created a method to communicate. That would make all gods true and worshiping any would take you to the same spot at the end. 2. The simple psychology of ruling in man has created a need to worship something greater. This would mean all gods were made up by the psychological design of the human brain. If anyone has number 3. I'd be very interested. Thank you for your time. Dave

Greetings Dave

My own understanding of GOD is closely related to Panpsychism which defines the idea of GOD as Consciousness and in relation to this universe, understands that there is no place within the universe where consciousness is absent.

Thus the 'method to communicate' is consciousness itself, not so much a creation of a GOD (true or otherwise) but simply something GOD is able to do because that is what consciousness does.

In relation to form, the stuff of the universe, these create a means of stifling clear (or true) communication so when consciousness occupies form, its true nature is distorted through the form.

In relation to forms which are able to channel consciousness, such as the human form, the distortion is intensified through the consciousness within the form experiencing the form and identifying with the form as being the form, rather than in truth, being the consciousness within the form and this contributes to the confusion evident in relation to human beings attempting to communicate truth to each other.

So all ideas of GODs are not true because of the distortion in understanding we generally have in relation to being within biological forms which are separate from each other - the consciousness in its pure state is from the same source, but is distorted giving the illusion that we are all individual pockets of consciousness disconnected from one another, and this is why groups of similar/like-minded individuals form, and cultures, politics, religions become organised into said groups.

In relation to groups in which GOD ideas are prevalent, these tend to have truths and even similar ideas which leak through pertaining to the true nature of GOD but are insufficient as devices which can liberate humans from their chosen/preferred belief systems regarding the true nature of GOD because they are created primarily from the position of identifying with the form rather than with consciousness, and cannot transmit truthfulness in any manner which is liberating because of that.

The same actually applies in relation to non religious organised groups, for the same reasons.

"Getting to the same spot in the end" is relative. Consciousness never actually leaves itself...it simply forgets itself as part of the process of experiencing form, and even when on death of the form, consciousness is freed, it still carries a snapshot of its experience and tends to continue thinking of itself as the form it once occupied.

This is not necessarily a problem, because the experience is data is useful, but the reintegration of the individual consciousness back into the One consciousness (the true GOD) can proceed indefinitely and indeed the individual can experience other things which also add to the data of experience, but eventually the individual will understand that he/she/it is part of GOD rather than separate, and has always been part of GOD rather than separate - but believed otherwise...either that GOD did not exist, or that GOD was a particular entity (the belief created through the illusion of separatism) but most not being able to come to the awareness that GOD and they were the same thing in different forms.

The 'need to worship' comes from the illusion of separatism and in light of understanding that we as individual consciousnesses in form and that Consciousness is the same thing regardless of form, to worship GOD (Consciousness) is a type of self worship - a vainglorious thing in that light.

However, if the need for worship is understood to be nurturing and respectful to all things conscious, then this would reflect an inner understanding which is gifted outwards into the world of form being experienced, and would honor the true GOD for that...and create a peaceful conclusion in relation to the affairs of humankind.

The human brain is part of the overall human instrument and allows for consciousness within said instrument to manipulate its environment intelligently, but it is up to the consciousness occupying said instrument to be wise about that.

Cheers

W

What I think about consciousness in relation to this reality.

[Dave Skummie]

Hello everyone and thank you for responding to my post. I've been busy and not able to logon for any significant time for a while.I have read the replies that everyone has written and would just like to say I think of this subject a great deal. When I look at this subject I don't look at the particulars rather then the overall view. Religion is a very old subject and I think one has to put themselves into the environment of when it was created and to be very non-biased. I think you need to view it as an alien as you have no part of this that you were just an observer.I think that is very crucial. So putting yourself back to the creation of the text we need to ask some basic questions like what was the literacy rate of the average person. How many gods were created with no writings or documentation at all. The people of these community where they slaves or were they under a dictatorship or were they a fleeing group ending up in isolation. Knowing the condition of the society that first wrote the text of their particular God is probably one of the most crucial factors. And that's only if that particular God got started with text imagine if your history is depended on prior generations teaching the next generation. I think in a few hundred years the story would be completely different. Remember the whole point of my question is not about a practicing God but a God that is in the state of being created and the ultimate answer of why. I understand some very important questions can't be answered like what was the influential rate. This is very important, we can see how influence works and our society from the weak to the radical. I think one of the strongest definitions is when Jim Jones got almost a thousand people to commit suicide. Imagine a mommy doing that to her baby. This is the power that one has to make another believe, it is an art and has been used for thousands of years. I can't possibly see how my question can be answered in the writings of one of these gods. I am basically asking how and why did all of these writings come about. We know some real basic things like a lot of these writings have similarities and many of these similarities are used in many of the writings. The December 25 virgin birth scenario has been usedseveral times for instance. Even before the Christianity doctrine was written. But the basic question is thousands of gods have been created why. It could be a communication link to that particular society and it could be that each society is so different from the other that a God gave that society the ability to create but to do it through their vision.This is where speculation comes in. It may be nice to speculate but I don't think it holds too much in science and credibility. But as far as me yes I believe in scenario two I believe in evolution and that the universe is billions of years old but all in all it would be nice to think that scenario one was real. I just have the worst time thinking that a God would throw three quarters of what it created down the trash because they were given the wrong text their community was given the wrong text. It just seems so ill logical. Thank you all for your time. Dave

[dio9]

[Replying to post 43 by Justin108]

Yes I believe the amount of people who believe makes every action moral or immoral. Morality like beliefs have been handed down by the ancients. Morality like belief is set by traditionally accepted action. Different paths lead to the same place , it matters not what path you are on, the top of the mountain is the same for everyone. Everybody wants happiness .

[Justin108]

[Replying to post 43 by Justin108]

Yes I believe the amount of people who believe makes every action moral or immoral. Morality like beliefs have been handed down by the ancients. Morality like belief is set by traditionally accepted action. Different paths lead to the same place , it matters not what path you are on, the top of the mountain is the same for everyone. Everybody wants happiness .

What question are you even answering?

Here are the questions I asked:

1. Superstitious beliefs are also widespread. Are they also true?

2. Are you of the opinion that the amount of people that believe something has any influence on whether or not it is true?

3. Do you believe that Jesus and Buddha knew more about human psychology than Professor Justin Barrett? Do you even believe that Krishna existed?

Give me something better than Jesus could.

4. What did Jesus give?

Now instead of answering an imaginary question I never asked, can you perhaps answer the questions I did ask? To avoid confusion, I numbered the questions for you. When answering, just specify which question it is you are addressing.

[dio9]

1, no
2, yes
3, yes
please excuse the double post