As the CBS sitcom says It all started with a big bang.
Faith has played a very important role in the development of human civilization. Faith has provided humans with a moral code which is very critical for a successful society. The major caveat with the moral code is that it is a function of time.It needs to amended and updated over time.Faith while preaching the moral code has failed to preach the caveat which according to me has resulted in a lot of issues.
When a country creates its constitution, the makers make provisions for amendments so that when the situation warrants and there is enough evidence they can change and keep the constitution relevant. Science does the same, but faith has failed to upgrade with the pace of change we are experiencing. It tries to fight opponents with intimidation and fear.
Much of the human population believed that earth was the center of the universe just a couple of millennia ago. And there was nothing wrong with that because no one presented a convincing and verifiable evidence against it then. But then many smart and brave minds presented their counter-evidence against this assumption. Faith tried to squash these great and brave minds, many of them paid the price by facing extreme hardships just to tell truth with evidence. Faith never supported and encouraged evidence-based innovation which it thought was always a threat to its rule and influence.
But science and evidence-based critical thinking persisted and we are currently reaping the benefit of the brave sacrifices of those great brave men and women whose discoveries serve human civilization far more than any faith. Becuase of science and technology we were able to eradicate many diseases, increase our life expectancy considerably, make us more safer, healthy, feed this enormous human population, improve connectivity and transportation considerably. The benefits are many and tangible. Just as an example of the first plane was invented in 1909 and we have already sent people or moon and planning to send people to Mars.
There is one thing that I wonder about God. Let say that God somehow created this universe. Now let's consider some facts that we see know for sure. Our galaxy contains billions of stars and there are billions of planets and satellites in our galaxy. There are billions of galaxies in the universe and apart from the small blue pale dot (as Carl Sagan beautifully put it), humans cannot exist anywhere in this vast expanse. Almost everything out there is trying to kill us. So god built a pretty inhospitable universe for us.Alternatively, God didn't make the universe for us, we just came into existence because of the rules of physics, chemistry, and biology that god created. Considering the size of the universe it is was bound to happen statistically.
Now let's look at the planet we live in. We share this planet with many species but we are currently the most powerful. We have successfully obliterated many species from the face of the Earth.Still, we have strived as species, we are growing in number, our life expectancy is increasing, we are more comfortable, healthier and wealthier than ever before. Based on this observation we can assume that God only cares about the well being of humans not how we treat any other of its creation. Now if God is all good and powerful as almost all the faiths in the world preach, why at any time in history, God could not unite all the humans into one religion. There are currently more than hundreds of religions in the world and many have different versions of Gods and the way of life preached by God. Humans have killed each other innumerable times to protect and establish their version of God over someone else's God.
This leaves me to infer that, God is either not all-powerful or not all good (we also keep on changing the definition of good).Another possible explanation is that God doesn't care what happens on this small planet is one obscure corner of the universe. Gods job was to give us tools and it is up to us to figure out the rest.
The only way to create a relevant moral code is to explain to the people the reasoning behind the moral code and inculcate the idea of logical and empirical thinking in every decision of our life. We will have to explain to people that our thinking should always be forward-looking and encourage learning from the mistakes and lessons from the past. Unlike how faith preached today, by holding on to the teaching of the past even though the evidence overwhelmingly suggests otherwise.
As a matter of fact, the current trend is tilted more towards critical thinking than any other time. Around 1.1 B people in the world identify themselves as non-religious which is a really good sign. We have a promising future, because of the effort, hard work and sacrifices of many great and brave minds. We might even become an interplanetary species in the near future which is an exciting prospect.
There is nothing wrong with having a faith and practicing it, the thing that causes the issue when people starting enforcing their faith and beliefs on others. This has been the biggest dispute of the human civilization
“Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't.”- Mark Twain.
The statement from the great Mark Twain stands the test of time everywhere. Same can be said about the universe we live in. The more we know and discover about the Universe the more we realize how less we know about the universe. For many centuries we as humans have tried to bridge the gap between what we know and what we don't by creating the mystical or supernatural.Faith has played a very important role in the development of human civilization. Faith has provided humans with a moral code which is very critical for a successful society. The major caveat with the moral code is that it is a function of time.It needs to amended and updated over time.Faith while preaching the moral code has failed to preach the caveat which according to me has resulted in a lot of issues.
When a country creates its constitution, the makers make provisions for amendments so that when the situation warrants and there is enough evidence they can change and keep the constitution relevant. Science does the same, but faith has failed to upgrade with the pace of change we are experiencing. It tries to fight opponents with intimidation and fear.
Much of the human population believed that earth was the center of the universe just a couple of millennia ago. And there was nothing wrong with that because no one presented a convincing and verifiable evidence against it then. But then many smart and brave minds presented their counter-evidence against this assumption. Faith tried to squash these great and brave minds, many of them paid the price by facing extreme hardships just to tell truth with evidence. Faith never supported and encouraged evidence-based innovation which it thought was always a threat to its rule and influence.
But science and evidence-based critical thinking persisted and we are currently reaping the benefit of the brave sacrifices of those great brave men and women whose discoveries serve human civilization far more than any faith. Becuase of science and technology we were able to eradicate many diseases, increase our life expectancy considerably, make us more safer, healthy, feed this enormous human population, improve connectivity and transportation considerably. The benefits are many and tangible. Just as an example of the first plane was invented in 1909 and we have already sent people or moon and planning to send people to Mars.
There is one thing that I wonder about God. Let say that God somehow created this universe. Now let's consider some facts that we see know for sure. Our galaxy contains billions of stars and there are billions of planets and satellites in our galaxy. There are billions of galaxies in the universe and apart from the small blue pale dot (as Carl Sagan beautifully put it), humans cannot exist anywhere in this vast expanse. Almost everything out there is trying to kill us. So god built a pretty inhospitable universe for us.Alternatively, God didn't make the universe for us, we just came into existence because of the rules of physics, chemistry, and biology that god created. Considering the size of the universe it is was bound to happen statistically.
Now let's look at the planet we live in. We share this planet with many species but we are currently the most powerful. We have successfully obliterated many species from the face of the Earth.Still, we have strived as species, we are growing in number, our life expectancy is increasing, we are more comfortable, healthier and wealthier than ever before. Based on this observation we can assume that God only cares about the well being of humans not how we treat any other of its creation. Now if God is all good and powerful as almost all the faiths in the world preach, why at any time in history, God could not unite all the humans into one religion. There are currently more than hundreds of religions in the world and many have different versions of Gods and the way of life preached by God. Humans have killed each other innumerable times to protect and establish their version of God over someone else's God.
This leaves me to infer that, God is either not all-powerful or not all good (we also keep on changing the definition of good).Another possible explanation is that God doesn't care what happens on this small planet is one obscure corner of the universe. Gods job was to give us tools and it is up to us to figure out the rest.
The only way to create a relevant moral code is to explain to the people the reasoning behind the moral code and inculcate the idea of logical and empirical thinking in every decision of our life. We will have to explain to people that our thinking should always be forward-looking and encourage learning from the mistakes and lessons from the past. Unlike how faith preached today, by holding on to the teaching of the past even though the evidence overwhelmingly suggests otherwise.
As a matter of fact, the current trend is tilted more towards critical thinking than any other time. Around 1.1 B people in the world identify themselves as non-religious which is a really good sign. We have a promising future, because of the effort, hard work and sacrifices of many great and brave minds. We might even become an interplanetary species in the near future which is an exciting prospect.
There is nothing wrong with having a faith and practicing it, the thing that causes the issue when people starting enforcing their faith and beliefs on others. This has been the biggest dispute of the human civilization
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