God? Or No God?

i say just relax

One of the great ongoing battles in the modern era is the question of God. Is there a God or isn’t there?

A good part of modern intellectual thought has been “atheist,” meaning analyzing the world on the assumption that there is no God.

The atheist belief system is centered on Darwin’s theory of evolution, that

that species evolve over generations through a process of natural selection, where organisms with heritable traits better suited to their environment are more likely to survive and reproduce.

The point is that Darwinian theory doesn’t need God.

Chaps like Vox Day spend a lot of time proving that Darwin must be wrong. And now scientists are agreeing that, when you look at the organization of life, especially down in the DNA, it is so complex and interwoven that the simple idea of Darwinian natural selection doesn’t seem to be necessary and sufficient to explain the development of life. And especially the origin of life.

I am pretty relaxed about all this. In my world view, humans knowledge has always come up against a brick wall, and we have tended to say that, on the other side of the brick wall is God. And since we can’t see over the brick wall we can’t figure out what God is up to.

No problem. I think that every human society — since when, do you think? — has had some idea of a creator God and some sort of creation myth, and various stories and myths and epics that tell the story of the world in the olden time.

I am reading a delicious book about Alexandria. Now, a ways south of Alexandria along the Nile there is a well and on Midsummers Day the sun shines pretty well straight down the well. But at Alexandria, on Midsummers Day, this chap set up a stick and noted that the sun was not overhead. What could explain the difference? Hey, what if the world were round? Then, he did a calculation and came up with the diameter of the Earth assuming it was round. This was about 200 BC.

Right now, scientists are worried that the Big Bang was not the origin of the universe, but just another Bang in a series of Bangs in the Multiverse. No problem. For me, the Big Bang is a creation myth, and in due course it will be replaced by another creation myth. In the Bible, God created the Earth in six days, and rested on the seventh. All across the world, humans have come up with different creation myths. And there will be more.

I am a strong believer in creation myths. They tell you a lot about the society that created the creation myth.

The Greek gods?

Greek gods are powerful, anthropomorphic deities inhabiting Mount Olympus, embodying natural forces and human traits like jealousy, love, and rage. They are not perfect, but rather immortal, superhuman entities controlling aspects of existence[.]

It’s interesting that when we get to Zoroaster, we have now have one good god and one bad god. And with Christianity we have one good God and the bad god has been taken care of. We will leave the modern secular gods from Marx to Lenin to Hitler for future generations who, experts agreed a century ago, would shortly create Heaven on Earth.

I wonder what the next God will be, and what the next creation myth will be. It could be interesting. For the young generation.

But my point is to suggest that we don’t get too excited about God or no-God, about whether the universe is 14 billion years old or just in a 14 billion year phase since the last Bang. Let’s not get too worried about whether life could have created itself or whether it needed a God to do it.

We all want to know how the world was created, and how everything works, and what comes next.

But I say: relax, sports fans. Seattle won the Super Bowl last Sunday, and some other team will probably win next year.

And if you want to think about “life, the universe, everything” I’d suggest checking out Shakespeare here. Because that guy sure knew a thing or two. Especially for the son of a glovemaker.