What do you think about religion?

Religion is an attempt to supernaturalize the human experience.

Naturalistic worldviews and indigenous cosmologies tend to consider life as something cyclical. We live as part of the environment and our death is often seen as giving life to other things which can in turn give life to us. Such is the circle of life.

Agriculture changed all that. It was no longer the case that the environment was something we belonged to as suddenly everything belonged to us. Humans decided what animals were food and even what animals could eat food. Humans suddenly decided who should live and who should die and invariably humans chose to only allow those who directly benefited humans to live and saw the rest as competitors who should die. Actually, let me clarify. Humans didn't decide to live like this as evident by the number of indigenous tribes still around who clearly do not share this attitude like the Kalahari Bushmen or the Piraha of the Amazon. Only one tribe started to live this way, a particular group of Anatolian farmers who lived about 10,000 years ago in the Fertile Crescent.

Also living nearby at the time was a group of Semitic shepherds who watched these Anatolians with great interest. "That's insane," they said, "how can they have such knowledge of good and evil of who should live and who should die? This is the knowledge of the gods! Surely they will die for this land is a paradise and takes care of us as we have always lived as one with the forests. They can't do this forever by destroying the forests because the forest is what feeds us all."

Agriculture allows for a food surplus which will always result in an increased population which requires territory expansion allowing for more food production in an ever increasing cycle. This also meant the Anatolians eventually began to pressure the Semites and as you can imagine, there were many incidents of the farmers killing the shepherds. In fact, the same story repeated itself all over the world as the agriculturalists expanded their reign by killing or assimilating any other tribe along its path. Cain is still killing Abel even today.

There is only one thing that could justify this behaviour by these agriculturalists, many of whom clearly saw the destruction they were causing. The only way they could possibly have the authority to do this was from the authority of authorities -- the most authoritative entity imaginable, the creator of everything. Read Genesis 1 again. This story is not about how everything was created, if it was, it would have been more detailed and, you know, correct. It was all about establishing the authority because by Gen 1:28 that entity is giving us the authority or command even to take over the world. This is not something indigenous peoples even consider.

Living in complete disregard for the environment left its toll on the psyche of the agriculturalists. No longer did they see themselves as part of the cycle, they saw themselves as separate from it and more temporal. If they weren't part of the cycle, the only value is in eternity. Compare the Green Man to Jesus. The Green Man dies and is born again year after year with the seasons representing the cyclical nature of life and death. Jesus died once and was raised again once and only once so we could live forever in heaven! Thus changing a cyclical worldview into a linear one. Believing they'd live forever is the only consolation for living in a way so destructive to the environment.

And that is why religion is so bad. By supernaturalizing the human experience, they can't possible consider and value humanity's place within the natural environment.

Adam and Eve and the Agricultural Revolution

http://www.noonespecial.ca/adam-and-eve/

Feel free to ask any questions.

I don't really like religion. It brings about wars, hatred, and disputes...and while none of that is intentional, it is definitely the source of it.

I don't think eternal life is about to happen anytime soon, though I'd like to think that our 'life' doesn't completely black out when we die (wishful thinking after reading His Dark Materials trilogy).

Eternity??? *Snorts* Nooooo.

Why do we think Greek Mythology is just a myth, but the bible is real? That could very well be a story as well.

I don't know how some people believe in this without hesitation or without thinking about it.

Religion creates some awkwardness with me; like today at lunch, we had a talk about Jesus and everyone (well, almost everyone) agreed that: "Oh, yes. Jesus is perfectly real! He's amazing!"

And I pretty much sat there, thinking: "Not this again."

But I love my friends, whether they are religious or not.

By the way....Harry Potter is NOT evil.

I think I, like all humans will not be around for eternity. People often want to believe in some form of afterlife because the idea of never seeing the people they love ever again and no longer existing is too frightening for them.

I believe that eternity and the afterlife is definitely real. My religion teaches me about being good in this world so that eternal bliss can be yours in the afterlife :-)

Religion is just the politics of control offering the lie of immortality to the mortal for their cash and their obedience.

Eternity may or may not exist, but nothing lives for ever, especially dead people.

sure i believe in eternity, especially coz am a Muslim.. look, not all people believe in these stuff coz they don't have faith that's why sometimes it's difficult to convince someone of religion, it's something you believe from within and these spiritual people are blessed with this great faith...i found that out coz before Allah granted me the blesing of faith i was totally confused but after that i became totally convinced and belived that nt anyone is granted this blessing only the serious people who want to be like that..hope i helped and plz no offensive replies if you are not religious :)

Religion is not real. There is no higher being. God is for people to blame their mistakes on. The bible could have been written by anyone. How is it harder to believe that some mythical god dude exists, than that one doesn't? People's gullibility astounds me.

It's never been a part of my life. For most people it's fine. For many it's an excuse to hate.

eternity is absolutely to going to be in this life...it's on the other world.

Only fossilization will bring me eternity.