Think About This

Nan God, Religion, , ,

No_God

Consider …

If belief in a supernatural being had never happened or developed … thus requiring humans to rely only on themselves … how different to you think the world of today might be? 

Try to give some thought to this before you answer. Take yourself out of the mix (as a believer or as a non-believer) and see if you can imagine how the human race (not just your friends and neighbors) might live without a god (or gods) to call upon. 

Would people be more –or less– inclined to assist others in time of need? Would they step in to physically help during major catastrophes and/or emergencies (rather than simply feel sympathy)? Would the need to protect themselves and others against aggression become more or less dominant? Would humans be able to accept that sickness can and often does lead to death? And would death itself be accepted or feared?

And finally … after centuries of depending only on themselves, do you think humans would eventually mythologize some type of supernatural being? And if they did, would it be because they didn’t like having to face a cruel world on their own? Or would it be because there is an intrinsic trait/desire of humans to believe in and lean upon some type of imaginary super-being? 

P.S. I realize it’s a natural urge to primarily focus on the closing of a post, but to make it interesting, I hope you will offer some thoughts/opinions on the various questions I presented. Thx. 😊

95 thoughts on “Think About This”

  1. Re “If belief in a supernatural being had never happened or developed … thus requiring humans to rely only on themselves … how different to you think the world of today might be?”

    I can only comment on my own culture (U..). It seems to me that the vast majority of people go about their daily lives having very, very little god motivation. Everything we do is pragmatically motivated, e.g. take the kids to school, go to work, do the grocery shopping, mow the lawn, etc. I am not even sure that those who go to church on a regular basis are motivated by their god. There are all kinds of other possible motivations: wanting to be seen as a good person, social standing issues, prior commitments even if made by one’s family, etc.

    So, meh . . . I think. We would still be doing the same things for the same reasons. Now, if you had a job in the religion business, your life would be different but not all that different. You might have ended up being a teacher or a social worker, etc.

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  2. Nan, the closing paragraph of a post is where all the meat is 🙂
    Considering this as a thought experiment, we would do well by looking at countries that are predominantly atheistic. While most people would want to look in the direction of Europe, these will not do- it’s mostly reactive. I think we should look at China but even here they had clan or family gods. But for argument sake, we take China and see how the state is organized and we see instead of an all powerful god, we have an all powerful state [party] that is ever present in the life of the citizen. How have they responded to disasters? This would be most interesting. I am not sure I have any recent studies or reports on this but it would be very insightful.
    With no heaven and no hell to worry about and death with us always, I guess we would do well to live the best we could with our neighbors.

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    • I will dispute this dependency on the state, because we as citizens of a nation or other group are NEVER taught to be in charge of their (our) own lives. We are toid what to do and what to believe from our earliest days.
      If we were given the chance to be responsible for ourselves, those around us, and what we can do, the world might be a very diffrent place. Hopefulky a better one!

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    • China as an atheistic state is a VERY recent status in a Millenia-old culture and state. As recently as the 19th century, China underwent a brutal religious war that killed millions and millions of people (the Taiping Rebellion). In fact, I question whether you can find any state that is truly Atheistic as a longstanding cultural status. Even Denmark and Norway were theocratic states until recently.

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      • You could be right, Brian that there is no truly atheistic state. I did say that even those states that are a majority atheistic, their laws have been influenced by religion

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      • Brian, you’re missing the point. I’m not talking about things that are in place NOW … I’m questioning what the world would be like if religion/gods were NEVER part of humanity.

        Go back and re-read the post.

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  3. Going back into pre-history, humans did not understand enough about nature to understand thunder and lightning, or accidents, or catastrophes like famine or flood. They could not control their environments, only react to it. Had humans been able to understand, and control those environments there would be no need for gods.
    How different would the workd be? Impossible to tell. I won’t even try!

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      • Where did the idea of a god come from? Surely for the human NEED for SOMETHING “to explain things” which have no obvious, authoritative, or ‘from the horse’s mouth’ explanation ….and, in the absence of such, inventing explanations himself. It’s as simple as that, IMHO.

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          • I would not go as far as everything beyond their understanding was automatically attributed to an invisible being or beings that came to be known as “god(s),” but all it took was one thing like thunder being the angry voice of an unseen monster to start the process, and it grew from there. An invisible being explains a lot of things in the natural world when you have absolutely no knowledge of the science. Even a wind, which people could feel but not see, could be explained as the breath of such an invisible being!

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      • I doubt that in our present state of intelligence, it would be possible to create a god. As mrmuse and rawgod noted, ignorance is the basis of religion. It’s natural to want answers to our questions and fears. What religion does is give us answers without any basis in fact and then demand we do not question their answers; thus, religion takes control of the narrative.

        I don’t doubt that society would be much more advanced had we not been bridled by religion and the notion that we have to appease some god we can never understand, as each priest may have a different answer to the same question.

        We can have confidence that scientists, with facts and figures for every theory, will eventually come up with the right answers, and welcome our questions.

        Remember Ann Druyan’s comment, “Science is the only practice that rewards you for proving them wrong.” (Or words to that effect.)

        Somewhere around 300 BCE, Lucretius declared all things, including us, are made of atoms, and now we are beginning to catch up to him. Carl Sagan declared that we are made of ‘stardust.’ I will take his answers over any priest or pope.

        Nuff said for now.

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        • “Religion” is the outcome of belief in a god. I’m asking what would be the state of humans if a belief in a supernatural entity had never come to pass.

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          • I did not intend for that earlier comment to be a response to your post. That requires a little more work and I just don’t have the energy right now.

            I think about this and have thought about it a lot. Trying to think about what civilization would look like without religion sort of forces us to consider what we/I feel religion has done, good and evil, to society. I always think we would be more civil, more emotionally and intellectually developed, and our technology would be much more advanced.

            In general, we would be pretty much the same. We are descended from those early forms of homo that struggled to survive as brute beasts. Our genes came down to us prepared to survive by any means. Before gods were invented, we found ways to kill and enslave each other. (We can’t just out of hand blame religion for everything.)

            That said, I think that without gods and devils to take credit for our good and evil acts, we would have been more measured in our behavior. Nobler. Tolerant. Less fearful of the unknown. We would not have a need for ‘others’ to blame for our failures or vent some unreasonable fear or hatred. Our failures would be a reason for critical thought, not condemnation. Philosophers and scientists would not have to always have their thoughts lead to proof of gods to be published. Free thought would be, indeed, free thought.

            But we will never see such a society now because we have had that influence.

            You should have a good response from those who think about this, and I hope I get to read them all.
            Thanx

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      • Fear of the unknown, to start. Have you ever eead The Source by James A. Michener? He tells the story of an archaeologixal dig in Israel, and uses the artifacts they uncover to trace the history of religion from its roots. It is fiction, but I think there is more truth in it than even Michener could pretend to know.
        To ne, the word god, whatever the first language was that invented it, was just a throwaway word, something to impress the masses with — and a way for weak men to avoid going on scary hunts. Because they could “talk” to the gods they elevated themselves to positions of importance in the clan. The first few practitioners knew it was a lie, but their descendents took it seriously. And this is still motivatoo for preachers today. They don’t want to have to take risks, so they tell everyone how imporyant they are…

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        • Your perspective that early humans came up with the idea of god(s) to elevate themselves may have some merit. But I continue to seek an answer for the core of my post. What would humans be today if the idea of a god had never been conceived?

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          • Not one I am willing to entertain. As a rule I do not like thought experiments. When I want “What ifs” I turn to Science Fiction. To the best of my knowledge no author has ever tackled “What if no religion, ever?”

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          • Interestingly, for being someone who doesn’t like thought experiments, you’ve shared several “thoughts” on this post — the subject of which is essentially nothing more than a “thought experiment. 😁

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          • Just answering your replies… I think a lot if things, and sometimes thought experiments intrigue me even though I don’t like them, but aside from what I said at the beginning about where ideas of gods possibly csme from, I have not answered the question you have repeatedly asked.
            I have read a few other people’s thoughts, but for the most part I have not read nany this time around.

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      • The first chimp??? who pointed up to the sky and said “He told me to tell you to give me your share”. Russ Cohle, True Detective, Season One

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  4. The world would inevitably be different as in literal events of history would be different. Not better, not worse necessarily. Just different.

    Likewise, it is difficult to tell how much religion and belief in God has had on morality and our ideas of right and wrong. So my best guess is that I think people would still be moral and help people within their in-groups (assist them), but it’s hard to say what specific form and elements this morality would take. In other words, I suspect there would probably be some different ideas of what is or isn’t moral in the first place.

    In terms of human aggression, I do think people would still have in-groups and out-groups since we have plenty of evidence from psychology that humans form them at fairly minimal levels, on arbitrary grounds, and outside the context of religion and politics. Basically people would still form social groups and still see certain people as Others who don’t share their values, beliefs, inferior to them, or are outright enemies. Likewise, there are plenty of example of conflicts where religion is absent or at least not a major factor.

    I think humans in general would still fear death. Intimate conversations with the nonbelievers in my life have all revealed they are afraid to die.

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    • Non-believers are afraid to die? In my estimation you have that backwards. Most believers are afraid to die, which is why they believe.
      I am a non-believer — I have no fear of death. If life ends, sobeit. If life goes on, then my spirit or whatever you might want to call it will enter the next phase no matter what I believe in this phase. It will be as it will be, IF it will be at all.

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      • Here is what I said: “I think humans in general would still fear death. Intimate conversations with the nonbelievers in my life have all revealed they are afraid to die.”

        Notice what I actually said was Humans in general are afraid to die. This, of course, means certain individuals may not be. Then I said conversations with some of the atheists I have known personally such as my wife and my brother have revealed that they are afraid to die.

        Yes, there is some research that has found a U-shaped relationship between death anxiety and religious belief. Basically atheists (or at least the atheists most certain that there is no God) had the least anxiety over death, but contra your claim this same exact study found the most religious also had the least amount of death anxiety. It was people in the middle that had the most death anxiety.

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        • I won’t dispute your words, but I will dispute the parameters and definitions used in the studies. But for that I would need to talk to the researchers. Peace to you.

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      • I will be 60 years old. My life is fine, some things good, some things bad. But given the forthcoming climate apocalypse, the possibility of economic and social collapse, the reality I have no children that I would miss…I do not fear death. (I fear disease and pain, but that is different entirely)

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        • Fearing dying, as in how I might die, is a whole different matter. Instant dying is okay, but I would not like a lingering death.
          But in the end, death is death, so any pain will end.

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        • Brian, again … your comment has nothing to do with the topic of the post. I appreciate that your life is good, but please try to stick with the post topic. Thx. 🙂

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  5. Man ‘invented’ “belief in a supernatural being,” therefore what believers really have is a belief in a belief. History has proven than human beings can be convinced to believe in anyone, from Jesus and Buddha to Hitler and Trump….and, once a belief sets in, (relatively) few are those who are open to considering that they may have been taken in. For better or worse, human beings do what human beings do, and “If God has created us in His image, we have more than returned the compliment .” –Voltaire

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  7. I think it goes back very early to caveman days and when bad weather or some catastrophic event happened. Man had a fear of the things he couldn’t explain or why some things happened to them, but not others, gave way to feelings of unfairness. And man has a propensity for blaming others and therefore he invented the gods or beings that can’t be seen, but maybe favors could be curried from them with the appropriate behavior…and the story ran from there…

    Old James Michener book, “The Source” is a good one to read on this.

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    • therefore he invented the gods — but where did the idea of god or gods come from? Simply because something is unknown, does it automatically suggest supernatural beings?

      (I will look into Michener’s book, but I’m really horrible about sitting down to read anymore.)

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      • Well…it depends on your definition of “gods”. My understanding is that early humans were polytheistic animists. EVERYTHING had some kind of “spirit” force inherent in it. These were not really modern gods per se. And this belief came about, I understand, because of innate human need to assign agency, purpose, yes blame, for events and situations. Hence, animistic religions. Gods developed with hierarchical societies that needed to justify why the king or priest is important. This is probably a simplistic account, so take it for what its worth!

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    • If I had known you had brought up The Source already I might not have. But it is my goto book on the creation of religion.
      Fear of the unknown necessitated the invention of soneone or somethong to blame. I wnoleheartedly agree, Mary!

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    • Our minds “could not” grasp reality, before science made it humdrum. But the idea of religion is now so ingrained into some of us that is ascendent — because religion was invented before science. Overlooking, of course, that reality was here before either. Reality has not changed, just our understanding of it has.

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      • Excellent point and make believe is full of the throes of good and evil, violence and sacrifice….whereas science is boring to many and beyond their grasp, as well and reality …a whole other level

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  9. This is a great question, Nan.
    Off the top of my head, I think that the idea of an omnipotent being is much on the order of “Santa won’t bring you presents if you’re bad…”, and many people strongly believe that ‘being good” is vital to their emotional health and safety. For me, God and the idea of heaven is, these days, a fairy tale for adults. No slam there, this is a personal feeling.
    Most believe in something: fairies, leprechauns, gods, angels, ghosts, vampires, tv evangelists…I think the idea of something supernatural got started when someone looked up at the night sky and saw a star, moving. Or began to wonder why it was dark sometimes and light other times. Or why people suddenly stopped moving. We are always searching for answers to mysteries, and the mind reels at the idea of primitive man trying to understand the why of everything…gods probably came into being to explain all the events they had no words for.
    Death scares the blazes out of many people, and having a god to focus on probably calms them as they age. It’s the fear of what comes next. When you don’t know the answer, you find someone who does, 0r say they do. Deities are the rudder we steer by. 5

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    • gods probably came into being to explain all the events they had no words for. Many continue to bring up how gods came about, but I’m asking how would things be different if the idea of “god” had never happened or developed.

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      • First thought, chaos. I doubt if we would have evolved mentally and emotionally to where we are now, without a belief in something More than we were. And a belief in a deity might have come from the leaders of the tribes, as a way of control. Without that external invisible control, humans would have no reason to behave as anything more than angry chimpanzees.

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  10. As a bit of a historian, I hate alternative histories, because they tend to fixate to on some singular issue and forget, that culture and historical events are the sum of billions of movers.

    Belief in supernatural agency appears as an easy solution to explain the uknown, the painful reality and to controll others. People are perfectly able to come up with other solutions to those issues, but after the fact it is very hard to define what it all would have been like. It is almost easier to predic future. Most people are not interrested in the affairs of gods, or even if they adhere to the existance of some, do not follow through the logic, as if those gods really existed. Gods may serve as excuses for what we want, but appear rarely as anything else. If they were not invented other excuses would have been invented. On the other hand, perhaps less bullshit, exploitation and abuse would have been possible to feed as easily, as acceptable to masses of people. Further more, I think most religious people are aware of this, at least when they look at other religions, than their own. Wich gives me hope considering the future.

    I certainly do not think there is any inristic desire to believe in gods or the supernatural, as I have never experienced anything such. There is plenty of evidence though, that such beliefs are cultural constructs.

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    • I like this: “If they were not invented other excuses would have been invented.” IMO, that pretty much sums up what’s behind the early human’s superstitious beliefs that “something” had to be the cause for things they didn’t understand.

      I also strongly agree with your comment about the lack of intrinsic desire. Belief in god –ANY god– is completely the result of society.

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  11. To the main question of the OP.
    How would we have turned out without Yahweh/ gods?
    With due respect, rely is possibly not the best word here as more often than not gods were used as an excuse to do so many things.
    Be that as it may.
    We would likely be more advanced as a species.
    Consider what was happening before Islam got its claws in the scholars/ scholarship in the Middle East. De Grasse Tyson explains this in his inimitable fashion.
    Worth scratching around You tube.
    There would likely be a lot more curiosity and more cooperation and a lot less racism.
    Any number of wars would not have occured simply because there were no gods to fight over.
    Communism as we saw with Stalin would not likely have happened.
    And there would not have been the Holocaust or Apartheid either.

    And that’s just off the top of my head.
    In short, we would have been better.

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    • Why do you mention Yahweh? He was conceived much, much later in human history.

      I do agree that human advancement –especially since the genesis of BIBLE religion– has been handicapped by belief in a supernatural entity.

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      • From modern man’s perspective Yahweh was the culmination of all preceding gods.
        His exploits and what was done / continues to be done in his name have shaped humanity more than any other known deity.

        But I understand your point.

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        • I am a bit concerned that Arnold ‘liked’ my comment.
          In case there is any doubt, I consider Yahweh worship a blight in humanity and the things done in its name are by and large vile.
          Hope that clears up any misunderstanding?

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  12. I honestly wonder if we would have evolved to the extent we do.

    Think about what a belief in god or the supernatural or any kind of religion means. It involves being willing to think of some explanation of how the world is the way it is, something beyond the immediate practical concerns of how to find food and reproduce and not die. It involves weaving elaborate myths and rituals, creating temples and votive objects and carved idols and art and music and all those things. In short, it requires imagination and creativity and some limited reasoning powers only modern humans (as far as we know) possess. Our ancestors having had yet to come up with philosophy, critical thinking and the scientific method, had to think of some way of explaining and appeasing the forces of nature beyond their direct control. Religion and superstition and magic were simply crude ways of doing what we can now do with science and secular ethics. Maybe.

    There is also the possibility that religion and shared beliefs acted as a sort of “social glue” to hold societies together, bringing a sense of shared identity and purpose. You can’t have advanced civilizations, reaching beyond the normal ties of kinship and community that small bands or tribes would have in the early days of our existence. What advantages a single, all powerful, universal god has over polytheism, remain to be seen, though.

    Could we develop all that without a belief in god(s)? Maybe. Maybe not. Who knows.

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    • Hi thelyniezian! Thank you for stopping by and, most of all, leaving such a thoughtful comment.

      Your last question is thought-provoking. Personally, I think we would have reached far beyond what we are today without belief in a supernatural entity. IMO, belief in god(s) has greatly stifled the advancement of humans. And unfortunately, I think it’s going to get worse.

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  13. Humans wouldn’t be human without gods. In other words, the object – some god in your question – is a projection of how the human brain works when we don’t have good information. Rather than remain uncertain until we tentatively know something, our brains switch gears and we project a belief and then infuse this belief with supply side confidence! Any projected notion or object will do.

    So to ask how how belief in the ‘supernatural’ (a grab bag term for the ‘mysterious’) if never raised would change people assumes the object is what possesses influence. Well, human actions possess influence, but I don’t think the object of belief does; I think the verb – the willingness to believe without good evidence from reality to support that belief – is what possesses pernicious influence and I don’t see how we can get around this basic way humans think without altering humanity itself.

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    • If we taught children to believe with assumed confidence in themselves as a process – an action, a work-in-progress – rather than a being – a noun, a completed work – then I think would bend the moral arc faster and to greater effect with far more empathy and mutual support and love of life as an adventure we can say Yes to undertaking than the rising tide of doom and gloom and depression and shallowness and hopelessness we find growing today.

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  14. …see if you can imagine how the human race (not just your friends and neighbors) might live without a god (or gods) to call upon.

    This is extremely simple: then EVERYONE would be FORCED to take ownership of their own behavior, their own reactions, or their own inactions and laziness, not putting forth the required effort to find a POSITIVE solution to a problem.

    This isn’t rocket science people. And THIS is why I loathe, despise religion.

    It repeatedly enables ‘placing the blame or shortcoming on some external entity.’ THAT is a recipe for horrible DE-evolution. Period. Full stop.

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  15. Maybe there is reason to have laws that protect “us” from “them”, but this artificially stable environment will implode and now to the direction of evolution, religion or not.

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  16. I reread your post Nan, and the varied comments suggest we do indeed have God (or a supernatural being) stamped upon our DNA/doings. I think most of us being unable to pinpoint your questions shows that Something’s under our skin.

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    • Yes, something… called biology. We extend our perceptions outwards and try to figure out what’s there. If we encounter something that shows some element of agency – particularly movement – then the way we understand it is by switching places (using empathy, as in taking the Other’s place) and then considering what OUR intentions might be to ‘explain’ the agency we may have detected. We even have a dedicated neural net to do just this (mirror cells). That’s our biology assuming agency and this is plain throughout history that all humans do this. So ‘god’ – just like all supernatural claims – is a natural explanation for agency we presume might or does exist but don’t understand. This is the sense that ‘something’ is under our skin. But, again, it’s not the object, the noun, God, that is revealed by doing projection; it is our inherited biology actively trying to ‘reveal’ what’s out there… by assumption, assertion, and projection. It’s a process, a verb, an action. That’s why all such ‘gods’ supposedly ‘revealed’ are so full of humanity.

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        • So I don’t think there’s any way to avoid all kinds of faith-based belief (projecting confidence that the projection itself is a separate and real) unless we adhere to relying on reality rather than our beliefs to provide us with independent verification. In other words, we shouldn’t presume the rustle in the tall grass is a tiger and real because we believe it is but hold the projected explanation as a possibility, one among many, and err on the side of caution. The possibility of some omnipotent omnipresent god acting on the personal level (whispering in our personal ears and loving us unconditionally while our lives are filled with suffering, so to speak) is extremely low when no remarkable evidence from reality offers us anything to bolster this projected belief. Acting on unsubstantiated beliefs like this as if real and true and virtuous is a source of delusion when reality doesn’t back it up but is disregarded to keep the belief secure from independent verification. So it’s not god or gods that is the problem; it is believing with high confidence that is the problem unacceptable in every other area of life as a vice… except religion! That’s the red flag. And it is an innate way to think. Belief like this is part of our evolutionary roots. But we don’t have to act on it any more than we give free rein to our various appetites because we inherit them.

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  17. I also think that no matter how or when man became a thinking critter, someone would have invented a deity. It seems to be in our nature to need one. As i said, without a deity (in any culture) there would be chaos. We quite possibly are only beginning to mature past the point of needing a deity to tell us what to do.

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    • I disagree. I believe it’s an assumption we make because this is what we have been exposed to over the centuries. And, in actuality, chaos is essentially what we have now — and much of it can be traced back to the gods that have been invented.

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  18. Ah subjective reality. To me this Jesus Christ God-man is as burning coals, not a whisperer. Should I NOT act on him? nor tell you the house is afire? Most of us drown him out yet then revive him to curse. I think that’s inherited too.

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    • Arnold, please stop preaching. Just for once in your Christian lifetime, try to take yourself out of the box and use your imagination. Most of my readers do NOT need to be reminded of your beliefs in a supernatural entity. Besides, the entire purpose behind my post is a WHAT-IF?

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        • I consider you are preaching also.
          If you had evidence of your god man then you could present this and it would be understandable why you might be inclined to tell us the house is “afire”.
          However, until that point arrives every comment you make is with the aim of proselytising in one form or another.
          Under the circumstances that is not only disingenious but disrespectful.

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          • When someone suggests a no-God world l put my 2¢ in. And rather than proselytize, I present. I surely don’t think I’m disrespectful; persistent maybe.

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          • Well, it can be asserted with little fear of contradiction your “presentation” is worth no more than 2c.
            Furthermore, as you are so thoroughly Indoctrinated into the cult of Christianity how do you honestly consider you are able to offer a single critical or objective thought / argument regarding the topic of Nan’s post?

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          • I think God is under our skin, part of our makeup. And so believe world and religious history is ongoing evidence for mostly doing without Him. Honestly.

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          • Gods are part of our evolution. We cannot escape this fact.
            When the thunder struck and the volcano blew its top it must be something or likely some one responsible.
            This was because primitive man had no concept of science as we understand it.
            But we have no need to cling to such nonsense.

            It is unfortunate, however there are still plenty of people whose outlook continues to be religiously fear-based and rather primitive.

            Educate children about all religion rather than indoctrinate them into a specific religious cult, such as what happened to you with Christianity, and within a few generations our children will regard the type of idiotic and, quite frankly, vile beliefs you spew forth with little more than mild amusement.

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          • No, Arnold, “God” is not “under our skin.” It’s BELIEF in “God” that’s the culprit. Without it I’m quite certain the world would be in an entirely different (and better) place.

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    • In reference to your first sentence, most religious DO have a god — and I think you would agree that the most widespread religion, Christianity, is totally based on a god. So doesn’t it seem rather logical to discuss the two together?

      I’m not sure what connection the publication has to the topic of this post. Perhaps you could elaborate?

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      • Hi, Nan!

        The article to which I linked was written by an anthropologist who thinks religion may have originated alongside metaphor as language developed…so religion may be an integral part of what makes us human.

        As a student of religion, I wouldn’t say that belief in a deity/deities is the opposite of relying on oneself/other humans. Many religions insist that being there for/taking care of other people is required in addition to worship to a god or gods. Evangelical Christianity unfortunately finds those particular teachings ascribed to Jesus inconvenient and ignores them.

        Be well, friend!

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        • Religious belief is really just a version of linguistic metaphor and therefore integral to being human? Oh, that’s rich!

          Umm… I don’t think most religious folk would take too kindly to calling their most cherished religious beliefs IN something very real, present, and powerful to the believer as merely a stand in for some linguistic metaphor. I mean, seriously. Maybe check with the Taliban or an ISIS mullah and see how this insight floats their religious boats (peace be upon their waters). Let’s see if your head remains attached… metaphorically speaking, let us hope.

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          • “I don’t think most religious folk would take too kindly to calling their most cherished religious beliefs IN something very real, present, and powerful to the believer as merely a stand in for some linguistic metaphor.

            I didn’t say – or intend to imply – that religious beliefs are stand-ins for linguistic metaphors. The theory is that religion may have originated alongside metaphor as language developed.

            To put it very simplistically: perhaps someone observed sunshine and said something like, “The sun shines.” In the Proto-Indo-European language, the word for “shining” was also the name of the sky god, suggesting to some linguists (and to at least one anthropologist) that “shining” was both a noun and a metaphor, which led to understanding of the sun as a being with agency, i.e, a deity.

            I suppose a creationist might even be able to see the hand of their particular deity in this origin. Whether this theory “floats” the “religious boats” of an extremist of whatever persuasion doesn’t affect me at all. As for me, my religion is compatible with science and I found this theory interesting.

            Peace be to you, whatever your guiding light.

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          • Language is used to communicate. The most direct use is sound with object. It is necessary the object predate the sound. The religious notion of adducing god from language is at best exactly backwards because it’s a subject without an object in reality. There’s no way a communicative language would bring about, so to speak, a god; it makes linguistic sense to impose a god on language and then develop new terminology just as unrelated to the real world as possible to describe it (ie metaphysics).

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  20. We are possibly the only species that requires a written, spoken, practiced code of behavior imposed upon us from “outside’. Animals do what is needed to survive, to evolve, to improve their environment in some way to make it livable. They sometimes have complex and complicated sets of rules (wolf packs come to mind) that are built into their survival.

    I don’t think there was ever a real God. If there was, it would have been the same for everyone in every country. Some cultures have multiple gods and goddesses, some have one or two.

    We invent the god we need to survive. Without it, it would indeed be chaos, and we would not have gotten this far.

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    • Personally, I don’t think there would be any more chaos without a god than there is with a god. In fact, perhaps less since many past wars were instigated by religion. And it plays a major role in today’s unrest as well.

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