At 09:18 AM 11/26/2002 -0800, Andrew McGuigan wrote: >What if the truth *is* that there are really god(s)? >Certainly it makes sense to write about that >possibility as any other. > >Also, it seems we had some kind of religion for what, >5000 years? (Egyptians being 3000 B.C. I believe) So >why not in the far future? > To say, "there has always been religion" and leave it at that is like saying, "there has always been interest in numbers," as if our understanding of mathematics has not progressed in the last five thousand years. This would lead to the conclusion that any place you put your finger on the time line of man's knowledge of mathematics is as valid as any other; we can thus throw out logarithms, the square root of -1, all of calculous, &tc &tc. Man's religious beliefs have changed over the millennia. In my opinion, an examination of these changes would lead to the conclusion that the gods have been shrinking. Those areas where the supernatural is required for understanding have gotten smaller and smaller. The idea that they might vanish entirely in the not-to-distant future doesn't seem farfetched to me. On the other hand, it might be that the devil is making me say this. >--- David Dyer-Bennet <dd-b at dd-b.net> wrote: > > "Matt Bogen" <mbogen at stagnito.com> writes: > > > > > Seems to me that humans, no matter where they have > > evolved, have worshipped > > > something - whether animist spirits, ancestors, or > > creating a polytheist or > > > monotheist system. Humans want some explanation > > for what's out there, > > > something beyond our immediate tactile knowledge. > > And no matter how far out > > > in space humans go, these influences will follow - > > whether individual > > > characters believe them or not - because they are > > human. Alien races have > > > their own problems to deal with. :) > > > > But eventually we will learn to look for our > > explanations in ways more > > likely to produce the truth. > >