If an intelligent life form from another planet were to land on Earth, how would it affect religous folks? ET showing up in a shuttlecraft would seem to establish either that all that stuff in Genesis didn’t happen, or if it did, wasn’t really necessary after the bit about creating the heavens and earth(s). Discounting the whole “God was a Spaceman” theory, does Xtian dogma depend on humans being alone in the universe?
I don’t think it would negate God, but it would likely contradict parts of the Bible. It depends on whether you interpret the Bible literally or not. As far as the Bible goes, this is not a big deal, since it contradicts itself here and there anyway.
The fundies would freak out. I was told as a child that aliens were impossible, and UFOs were flown by demons. It’s the whole “man is created in God’s image” thing; nonhuman aliens are either nonexistent or Satanic. For that matter, a YEC would have serious issues with a civilization with history going back, say, 10,000 years, or worse a 10,000 year old alien. I recall Carl Sagan commenting on all the hostility he got from fundies over Contact.
Less crazy religions would by disturbed, but they’d manage to ignore any implications or facts that violated their religious views. More importantly, they probably wouldn’t try anything crazy like killing the aliens; the fundies probably would try.
Except for some poetic passages in Job, the Bible has practically nothing to say about the universe beyond Earth’s atmosphere. It doesn’t say ETs exist, it doesn’t say they don’t. If they do, religious folks can just say the same God made us and them.
But they might get into a quandary over the questions of whether sentient ETs have souls, and, if so, whether they are born in original sin, and, if so, whether they need Christianity to be saved.
Didn’t Jesus mention having other flocks to tend? That *could *mean on other worlds, couldn’t it? It has been a lont time since I have read the NT, so maybe I am misremembering.
Robert J. Sawyer wrote a book called Calculating God in which aliens land and visit the Royal Ontario Museum (far-fetched enough for ya?). The ET asks for the head paleontologist. After some discussion, ET lets slip something that indicates belief in God. Paleontologist says, “I don’t believe in God.” ET says, “Are you sure you are the chief paleontologist?” Turns out ETs are convinced of God’s existence due, in part, to their discovery of a 5th fundamental force that clinches the idea.
I assume the OP presumes that the ETs would say, “What is this God of which you speak?” But what if they said, “Wow Christ died for your sins only 2000 years ago? Lucky!”
…or better: what if ETs looked like the Flying Spaghetti Monster and was confounded by droves of ardent worshippers?
Not to mention God actually showing up, to shield Earth from an artificial supernova.
I think Der Trihs has a good take on what the various flavours of the respective religious traditions would likely have to say to this event.
Followed quickly, as per Brain Glutton by the debate on whether they should be preached to. Of course, then we may also have to worry about being pestered at home by aliens wanting to share with us the great blessing that Qxafgon has brought to their life…
“Bible’s broken; contradictions, false logistics. Doesn’t make sense.” – River Tam
It has been aptly demonstrated that religious belief can be quite flexible in the integration of new understanding of the natural world. Prior to the Coprenican Revolution, the Earth was assumed to be the center of the universe and all other bodies orbited about it; this wasn’t just a naive assumption but Church doctrine, and yet, no religion (other than the occasional irrationality of lunatic sects) would even consider this to be true. Similarly, before Darwin’s publication of The Origin Of Species, the Genesis account of creation was almost universally accepted in the Western world. No more than a decade after the book entered the public discourse, strict Creationism was relegated to the status of a metaphor, or at best a compression or misrepresentation of creation, save for some die-hard Fundamentalists.
And as Ghanima notes, the Bible is full of inherent contradictions, including various takes on certain major incidents (including Genesis) in Rashomon-like fashion. Anybody willing to accept that “on faith” can either accept that other aberations or will block them out with an extra-strong SEP field; it certainly works for the Later Day Saints. (And while my biblical knowledge is admittedly kind of weak, I can’t think of any literal prohibition against extraterrestrial life anywhere in the Bible proper.)
God survives just fine in the gaps. And when you shine a light and look in deeper, He just keeps retreating. It’s a very convenient game.
Stranger
“Religious folks” ≠ “christians”.
I’m theistic and I assume there if life elsewhere, and that life emergent is a normal characteristic of the universe.
No, extraterrestrial life wouldn’t negate God.
Nor would the Golden Rule be less binding on intelligent Martians than it is on humans.
Wouldn’t everybody freak out, regardless of religious leanings?
Not really. Some people won’t care. Some people will be fascinated. Some will look it as an opportunity to grab advantage and nothing else. Some will be moderately interested.
More importantly, the fundies will stay freaked out; most people will settle down as soon as ( if ) the aliens prove themselves friendly.
i think if we are ever visited by aliens we should act really crazy and bizzare. and serve them poop to eat because they wouldnt know that its poop and not our food.
I’ve always wondered whether Jesus would have needed to do an interplanetary tour of the cosmos, dying on every world where life had developed?
That would suck - think of the commuting alone…
Grim
To me it doesn’t, I just can’t see how it would - even if they were interdimentional and came from another universe, or just was living on Mars all this time and got tired of our rovers driving around and wanted to return them, still it has no bearing on the existance of God.
Ray Bradbury’s story THE MAN and poem CHRISTUS APOLLO deal with that.
SEP = Somebody Else’s Problem.
As for the OP, it wouldn’t have one whit of an effect on my religion either way; it would neither strengthen nor weaken it. And, it bears repeating, “Religious folks” ≠ “christians”.