[Jyqm]

Originally Posted by amber

This was a good post. That is an interesting dichotomy of the human psyche. While reading it, I also thought of something else. Does science really fail to provide logic and order that religion does provide? I would say no.

Well, as the science-and-religion-can-coexist proponents like to say: "Science answer the how; religion answers the why." Which is true. The question, though, ironically enough, is why do we need a why?

I tend to ask: Why not?

Religion mainly requires that you have faith in something you never see, and this thing, not you and everything else, are responsible for what happens in the world. And it requires only that you learn a set of rules which ARE based on judgement rather than unbiased openness to all knowledge, and the freedom to explore such knowlege.

I think most humans are nearly incapable at this time of accepting that kind of responsibility, and incapable of accepting their own true nature, and that they may actually be the ones controlling their lives, to a large degree responsible for their own destinies. It's hard to think that. It may be painful.

Absolutely! Have you read Nietzsche? That strikes me as a very Uebermensch line of thinking. One of Nietzsche's big ideas was completely throwing away and rejecting all of the external moral codes you've ever been taught and coming to grips with that true nature by opening yourself to all knowledge - and then constructing your own moral code from yourself, which celebrates yourself rather than denigrating yourself as a sinner or a lesser being who needs to submit to a higher authority to be kept in line.

But yes, most people are incapable of taking that kind of responsibility for themselves. And some of the ones who think they are capable of it end up becoming the Hitlers of the world...

Anyway, great post, very thought provoking.

And yourself as well!