. . . would a world entirely bereft of any sort of faith in God fall into despair and also stagnate? I’m thinking if there really is a God, he can’t do too much, or people would get dependent on him. And if he did nothing, they’d lose hope. I’m thinking he’d have to use a light touch, like a guy who burns down a bar for the insurance money, if he makes it look like an electrical thing – done right, people wouldn’t be sure God has done anything at all.
Odd analogy. I’m not sure why it popped into my head.
Perhaps comparable to being a King…or, say, a billionaire who lives in a small, poor town… You have tremendous power…but, as you say, have to use it lightly…
There would inevitably be some resentment, when bad things happen that the god (or God) could have prevented. Little by little, people would fall into (human!) habits of complaint, disaffection, criticism. It would be hard to maintain the kind of religious enthusiasm that promotes worship.
If it were known for certain that there were no gods, no spirits, no souls, no afterlife, no miracles, no magic…I think that society would not change much. The priestly class would be unemployed, but would probably adapt well as insurance salesmen… People would still play the Lottery, and, while they wouldn’t pray to God to let them win, would still have unreasonable expectations and faulty estimates of the real probabilities.
Even if all magic were disproved, “magical thinking” would still be prevalent; it seems to be hard-wired into our brains.
That would depend entirely on the nature of the god in question. A god that commands everyone to kneel and worship him while avoiding new thoughts or who sits and does nothing would have a different effect than one that gives everyone a direct brain-to-god link and access to limited divine power.
For the sake of argument, let’s say it’s like Eywa in Avatar, since this discussion that brought my current question to mind. People in that thread seem to agree that the Na’vi constitute a stagnant society, in part because they already have all the answers about their God(dess).
ETA: and even Eywa seems to have an explicit non-intervention policy, IIRC.
Exercising my privilege of a one time self-bestowed courtesy bump. A rule I made up, because that’s the way I roll.
I’m genuinely curious though if any serious, or semi-serious philosophers beyond Sir Bender Bending Rodríguez have advanced this theory as to why we seem to be hardwired to believe in a God so conspicuously absent from our world most of the time.
Heck, if we get to the point where we have unlimited access to information, unlimited access to energy and unlimited access to creation (i.e. everyone has internet, a Mr. Fusion and replicator)… who cares if God exists or not?
Really? The science magazines are all-a-twitter about medical advances that may lead to immortality. I figure anyone who lives til 2050 has a good chance of living on indefinitely afterward.
But, really, what would happen in the society depends entirely on the nature of the god-entity and the degree to which it intervenes in human affairs. If it is some kind of Eywa and all it did was, say, prevent huge natural disasters like earthquakes and hurricanes and whatnot, I figure humans would just carry on as we do now, with perhaps even more people living in California and Japan and Indonesia and the Caribbean and such, where the weather is nice and nature won’t turn on you.
Longer answer: There are plenty of atheists in the world. Despair is not our defining characteristic. People who believe that this is the only life we get are at least as inclined as believers to make the most of life, and arguably have even more motive to do so. Atheism is not nihilism.
Building a better life for oneself and one’s descendants is in no way dependent on a belief in god. All it takes is caring about life and family – traits completely based in our own humanity. Carpe diem is the kind of sentiment one expects from a person who believes life is a finite, one-time deal for each of us. It’s also the kind of sentiment that causes people to build something that will outlast them. (Related comic)
You’re kidding me. Because atheists are a minority, you are going to assume that an atheistic society would be defined by despair and stagnation? Based on what reasoning?
The fact that neither you nor I can come up with an example of an atheistic society means that we have no direct evidence one way or the other regarding your assertion. I have illustrated (very briefly) why an atheist viewpoint would not tend toward doom and gloom an nihilism. I’d really like to hear your reasoning that leads you to believe it would.
Well, by your own admission (I think?) every society that has ever existed has had belief in some sort of god or gods playing a role. I’m not sure what would happen if a society were utterly removed from all reference to spiritual belief, or whether that’d be possible in the first place since it seems to come down to individual attitude and experience. But it’s a moot point: even official repression of all religion has never lasted more than one human lifetime as far as I know. That’s why it seems to me that there’s something hard wired that calls for some sort of belief. Whether the beliefs people come up with to fill that hole arise from their own heads or not may be a separate question.
If it’s a moot point because you believe an atheist society is impossible, why include it as the corollary in your OP? If you really don’t want to discuss that scenario, just don’t bring it up.
Humans lived for thousands of years before they began to believe in A God. Goddesses were worshiped first.(At least that is what I have read many years ago.)
Speculative and hard to prove or disprove. Anyway, as mentioned above, there seems to be a hardwired urge to identify patterns of cause and effect that has resulted in some sort of religious or magical thinking in every recorded society.
Like some above said, in the case of the knowable god(s) it would depend on the nature of the deity/ies. Do the gods tell you that what they’re giving you is everything you need and you should seek no more? Or do they tell you you have the task to build paradise in this world and if you excel at it during this lifetime you can progress to your own next level of theosis? Is the God capable of everything and anything everywhere, always and at once, or is he constrained, more of a Batman type who can do great things IF he’s prepared?
IMO neither the certainty of existence of the divine nor the certainty of its nonexistence would alter the likelihood for progress or stagnation, after all, throughout history there has been both stagnation and progress in societies that devoutly believe, and I’ve met both driven and lazy atheists.
AIUI, the OP question is about a universe in which the existence of god(s) is a known, verified fact vs. one in which the NONexistence thereof is a known, verified fact; as opposed to ours in which it’s (so far) unfalsifiable. If you are posing that even in Case 1, teachings would most likely still be based on doctrines originating in the human clergy and not come from the (real, existing, verified) god(s), how conducive is that universe to “progress” would still depend on what are the teachings.
Existence is varified,but not a supreme being that some call God. That is why it is called faith or belief. It is the desire of many to want there to be a supreme being who they can depend on,and that is their right,belief is a personal thing, and if it doesn’t harm others it can be a help to a person to get through life, but that shouldn’t be forced on others who think differently any more than none belief…to each his/her own!