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I am no stranger to arguing atheistically. That said, however, I feel being pissed off when dragged into such arguing with my old friends in Croatia, intellec- tuals all over, who now, "liberated from the communist dictatorship", show profound religiosity. Interestingly enough, most of them are smart enough to know that they can not fool me with their true divine attachments, so they present their religiosity as a stewardship in the best interest of Croatian people. Two hypotheses are regularly put forward: (1) Catholic Church is essential for the Croatian identity; and (2) the role of religion in the moral values of society is irreplaceable. Let me, on this occasion, argue on the first hypothesis. Religion is a powerful force that has shaped history, some recent, yes. Along that line, the role of Catholic Church in the birth of the independent Croatian state is not to be denied. Unfortunately, I should say, because religion, nationalism, patriotism, all ‘isms’ for that matter, did and could play a positive role in a given historical period of a given place but they degrade basic human values: they all assume there are "others" somehow different from us, so watch out. [See, for instance, Patriotism and other mistakes by George Kateb (2006).] A stewardship is the assignment of the intellectual elite of any people, true, but stewardship into the future, not history. By drumming in the shadow of Catholic Church, my Croatian friends, intellectuals all over, are exposing their cowardliness or ignorance or both. Religion, as a social and societal power, could and should be replaced. Why is religion an apparently universal feature of humans and the cultures they create? From where comes our propensity to believe? Over the past two decades, psychology and cognitive neurosciences come with an evolutionary explanation of why human minds generate religious belief, why we generate specific types of believes, and why our minds are prone to accept and spread them. Religious beliefs are basic human social survival concepts with slight alternations - the alternations we should get rid off. From the evolutionary point of view, does religiosity contri- bute to the survival of genes promoting it? No, "religion itself need have no survival value; it is a by-product of psychological predispositions that have. Religiosity is not a separate function; it is integrated into the same brain networks used in social cognition. Religious belief is not unique: it engages well-known, ordinary, social brain circuits and mind mechanisms, and this mechanisms mediate the adaptive functions already described herein." [from Why we believe in god(s) by J. Anderson Thomson, Jr. (2011)] My Croatian friends may have an excuse: having religious belief is much easier than not having it - it requires so much less mental effort than making one’s own decisions. So, maybe, just maybe, my Croatian friends, intellectuals all over, are lazy but not ignorant. |
The nebula does not naturally appear with the colors shown - the tinting of the image is artificial. When it first appeared as NASA’s "astronomy photo of the day" on May 10, 2003, it generated a number of email chains designating it as the "Eye of God", with some claiming that seeing the image had resulted in miracles. The "Eye of God" image seems to have a life of its own as a religious figure. Beginning in 2003 and reappearing sporadically after that, the image "went viral" via email chains, as noted on the Internet hoax-debunking website Snopes.com. One such email, noted on the site, reads: "This photo is a very rare one, taken by NASA. It is called the Eye of God. This kind of event occurs once in 3000 years. This photo has done miracles in many lives. Make a wish ... you have looked into the eye of God. Surely you will see changes in your life within a day. Whether you believe it or not, don’t keep this email with you. Pass this to at least seven persons." Well, the "eye of god" appellation is coined by an admirer of the photo ... not something designated by NASA, and the nebula is visible all the time, not merely "once in the three thousand years". The nowadays designation of an artificially enhanced composite photograph of a nebula as the eye of a deity powerfully illustrates homo sapiens's propensity, need and ability, to create gods. |
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