Originally posted by Devil King
Because we die.
I think you may have hit the nail on the head there. Maybe people are worried about dieing and that being "it, end, finito" so much they need to believe that there is something afterwards. This is probably enhanced by some religions scaring their followers (or not yet followers) with such nasty ideas like Hell.
Fear could be a key reason actually, people were probably scared by events like floods, eclipses, thunder storms etc and therefore decided to worship these woefully things.
Religion is also an easy way out, because lets face it what we humans know is not worth knowing in comparison to what probably is, especially when you consider the vastness of space. So a "oh God made it all problem solved, time to drink some beer and have fun" approach would seem appealing.
Originally posted by Bicnarok
I think you may have hit the nail on the head there. Maybe people are worried about dieing and that being "it, end, finito" so much they need to believe that there is something afterwards. This is probably enhanced by some religions scaring their followers (or not yet followers) with such nasty ideas like Hell.Fear could be a key reason actually, people were probably scared by events like floods, eclipses, thunder storms etc and therefore decided to worship these woefully things.
Religion is also an easy way out, because lets face it what we humans know is not worth knowing in comparison to what probably is, especially when you consider the vastness of space. So a "oh God made it all problem solved, time to drink some beer and have fun" approach would seem appealing.
Yes, religion is often an easy way out, so it is probably pretty easy to convince a civilization of confused or frightened people that it exists. But I tend to think that the kings and rulers of the ancient civilizations needed religion more then the people did. Social power requires a certain degree of cooperation out of most of the society...you can't keep power using raw fear for very long (historically speaking). So rulers united with religion to add an element of stability into their rule (i.e., the Mandate of Heaven...)
Originally posted by Bicnarok
But why do people and lets face it theres a lot of them, need something to worship. It can´t just be the influence of some book like the Bible or Koran, as ages ago there weren´t any books.Did someone some day just decide to worship something because he was having a bad day, and it caught on?
Or is it built into our genes, DNA in some way that we think there´s something else above us.
maybe it was genetically engineered by some alien bio engineers to keep us down.
Yes, a lot of it is genetic. Not all of it, course. But a good chunk. Here's why:
A creature who is genetically inclined to be trusting will tend to do better than an inherently skeptical child. This is because parents and elders have more accumulated survival knowledge...and the other method would need trial and errors that would result in massive amounts of lives lost. Not a good survival strategy. So we're naturally credulous, both from a lack of knowledge (not realizing the speed Santa would need to travel to reach every house, for instance) and also from a genetic survival standpoint.
This works its way into religion. At some point myths becomes dogmas, and children are taught to believe in certain religious beliefs. By an large, they accept them...which is why if your parents are a certain religion, the vast majority of children are the same religion...at least until adulthood. We are trusting, and believe what we're told. Most times this is advantageous ("don't touch fire"😉 but it has certain side-affects which piggy-back their way onto the tendency ("Allah wants us to kill the heathens"😉.
See Michael Shermer's "Why People Believe Weird Things" or Richard Dawkins' "Unweaving the Rainbow" for more on this.
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There are of course other contributing factors, many of which have been mentioned in this thread.
Originally posted by Bicnarok
This of course raises another question, would society break down if there were no religion?In a "If I´m not a good boy I´ll be punished" sort of way
If so then religion is an important part of the foundation of humanity.
No, it wouldn't. One, that interpretation assumes that religion keeps "evil" at bay....oftentimes it is the perpetrator. Two, it also assumes that the "good" that religion causes would go away. The good exists within people, not the institutions.
Beyond that, societal standards and law enforcement are more responsible for social morality than organized religion.
Society would change if there were no religion. There's no doubt of that. But the slippery slope arguments that we'd devolve into chaos seem irresponsible and unfounded to me.
the world would not dissolve if everyone turned into atheists. simply put god does not completely influence morals. people mistakinly assume all of their morals are taken from their belief in god. are you saying if we didnt believe in god we would kill people? maybe in your world, not in mine. simply because we are afraid of punishment and it has no point. not because god shakes a finger at you from thousands of years ago, but because its wrong.