Does ATS prove how religion is man made? I think so.

Well I think one thing we can all learn from this site is how religion was "invented".

If you just read the threads here, it is easy to parallel different concepts and their followers to the begining of religion.

For instance, lets look at the US government as a mystical God. People attribute all kinds of powers to the God, Uncle Sam. The Uncle Sam God can create tornado's, earthquakes, climate change, etc with its magical HAARP wand.

The Uncle Sam God has magical planes, and free energy, and keeps aliens in jars for its amusement. Of course, our God doesn't let us know, but somehow we seem to know. WTF?

The Uncle Sam God can solve all of our problems if we just "let go and let God." If we just stop trying to control our own lives, our government God can save us all, well except if we are a sinner and disagree with its approach then we must meet His wrath.

Or

The Alien Gods. The Alien Gods can destroy us and appear out of nowhere. They mutilate our animals as sacrifice, have sex with our women to produce a God race, etc... They are our friends when we are all alone.

See my point is that we have a large segment of people on ATS and in the world who want to attribute natural occurences or man made objects or to their own fantasy creatures. We do this because we aren't smart enough to understand how certain things work so we create a GOD figure to attribute thest things to. Maybe it gives us a sense of control.

We are just like early man who didn't understand lightning, floods, earthquakes, droughts, tornados, etc and thought it was Gods wrath. It seems our brains have evolved very little overtime and we still want to create new Gods to explain what we cannot.

So if you ask me one thing I learned on ATS then I will tell you, I found ATS to be a sociological experiment that proved how man formed Gods by attributing what he couldn't understand to a mythical figure be it the US Government, Aliens, Secret Societies, Big Foot, etc...


[edit on 28-2-2010 by Mr Sunchine]

OR.......

perhaps there are those of us on ATS who have experienced something different, who are searching for something more, and have, as yet, no words to qualify our search.

In my opinion, and its just an opinion, my personal search for a god implies that there is something waiting to be found.

Don't know what it will be, but most of the fun is in the searching!

reply to post by smyleegrl


Well thanks for your reply and I hope you find whatever it is that you are searching for or that at the very least your search brings you much joy.

You hit on an interesting this though. Maybe what you describe as feeling like there is something there to be found is what drives us to make up new explanations for events. That search to find a reason in our minds as opposed to picking up a book and realizing that Earth has had earthquakes longer than man has existed, and that Chile is a well known place for frequent and large earth quakes.

That search or that need to find new makes us want to think the US government has a magical machine that can fire off earthquakes at will. God knows there is no easier way to amuse our evil leaders than creating earth quakes in third world countries and then paying part of the bill to clean up the mess.

For instance people who think HAARP created an earthquake in Haiti so we could drill for oil. Don't you think we could have just bribed and propped up the right leader who would have let us suck that place dry of oil without all the death and destruction?

reply to post by Mr Sunchine

Well I think one thing we can all learn from this site is how religion was "invented".

No...ATS has given many the opportunity to discuss and debate this topic, but to say this site has proven that religion is invented is asinine...


And, if anyone - especially yourself OP - has come to that decision because of ATS threads, shame on them...the opinion of members here are at times quite profound and at other times, quite shallow.


Taking something away from a thread that can contribute to making a decision makes sense to me, but to have your own beliefs validated from it seems less than dilegent - and sad.


Good luck...


2nd edit to add: Upon further review - I find myself more in agreement with you - I jumped-the-gun IMO and shall take the 'he who does not finish reading threads before replying' label for the moment - good OP.
Hopefully my original post still makes sense, but it really doesn't apply to your OP in the way I laid it out.






[edit on 2/28/2010 by happygolucky]

linkreply to post by Mr Sunchine


I think you would really enjoy this link. Someone put a lot of research into the whether or not the search for god is an evoloutionary trait.

And I agree, I do think people feel more at control with their lives or themselves when they can clearly see a cause/effect relationship. Earthquakes all over the world? That's scary. But if we can pin it on the evil earthquake making machines in the hands of the horrible American government.....well, that calms our fears somewhat. Maybe the same with god?

reply to post by smyleegrl

I do think people feel more at control with their lives or themselves when they can clearly see a cause/effect relationship. Earthquakes all over the world? That's scary. But if we can pin it on the evil earthquake making machines in the hands of the horrible American government.....well, that calms our fears somewhat. Maybe the same with god?

I agree and it seems that it may be a built in coping mechanism for humans. They get scared by something they cannot control then they attribute it to a God they created and therefore can control.

It is at least an interesting concept.

reply to post by happygolucky


I see your point in a way and thanks for posting. However, do we not see new Gods created here almost on a daily basis.

The most recent God I remember being created on here is the God of the Moving Continents and his brother the God of Not Dead Celebrities.

People don't know their geography or cannot keep score on who is dead and who isn't in Hollywood, suddenly create a concept that because they are the center of all knowledge and being in the universe that we have a multiple timeline God who is just screwing with us by creating different realities.

You have to admit that it is kind of amusing to watch in action. There is like a new God a week all based on peoples own ignorance and then wanting to attribute their ignorance to some form of magic.

[edit on 28-2-2010 by Mr Sunchine]

The word "proves" is a bit too strong. I would suggest: "illustrates." "Intentionality" is a word cognitive scientists use to describe the "hard wired" tendency of the human brain to project human motivation onto external phenomena. It works really well in social situations because human beings and "higher" animals do have motivation for their behavior and this faculty allows us to respond more or less appropriately. Unfortunately, when left unchecked by critical reasoning, it can lead to strange conclusions, eg; projecting volition on inanimate objects. "Where are my car keys HIDING?" It can also project intentionality onto clearly random events: "There is an earthquake THEREFORE someone must have caused it." And yes, intentionality (IMHO) is the root of mythology and most religious belief... even if that mythology or religion incorporates "scientific" terminology.

Wow !

The possibilty

I just post a similar thread including yours.

My believe is Yes it can tell you what is discussable.
Claiming it's fals No !

A believe is truth only the reason why can be false.

Great question !

reply to post by Mr Sunchine


Not really *with the safe assumption you are using the silly atheist lump definition*, but you just proved masterfully that people will find "proof" for anything in anything they wish to.

[edit on 28-2-2010 by Watcher-In-The-Shadows]

Given that all religions depend on a bit of faith, in the absence of empirical evidence, for the belief of a "truth"; then yes. Many examples can be seen here on ATS such as 9/11, UFO's, Aliens, Cryptozoology, etc.

It could be said that belief in any Conspiracy Theory is in fact a form of religion to the devoted. It could even be argued that ATS shares some commonality with a cult insomuch that we have leaders and followers with relatively few skeptics among the membership and staff. That and amount of devoted time the ATS consumes in a person's life.

ATS only 'proves' one thing - people like to flap their gums.

People like to have their opinions heard.

If every opinion on ATS, by the fact that it's on ATS meant it was PROOF of that opinion... God help us...

peace

reply to post by happygolucky

No...ATS has given many the opportunity to discuss and debate this topic, but to say this site has proven that religion is invented is asinine...

Happy
For fear of offending you, I simply can not say anything suggesting that
a soul exists with'in us all. So I will stop short of the greater compliment
and offer only that your posts are always evident that you" have soul "my
friend.

In my opinion, religion answers the questions that science can not. It is human nature to search out the truth, to uncover as much as possible, and continually ask the questions: how did we get here and why are we here?

Religion provides answers to these questions and provides comfort to those that are not at all comfortable with the answer: We're working on it....

Science has proven, at least to me, that there is a creator. Not necessarily God, Allah, etc., but a creator that is capable of intelligent design.

Evolution only answers what happens once life already existed. And how we have evolved from simple life forms into what we are today.

However, if one were to study the method in which DNA is written -- which is needed in order to tell cells what to do, such as replicate, divide, etc. -- one will see that is is not a random order of coding that simply "found each other". It would be akin to taking 100,000 scrabble tiles and dropping them on a table and having them form a complete 50-page text. Can't be done. And without cells dividing, there can be no evolution.

Further, if you were to study a flagellum, you would realize that it is a very intricate machine -- yes, machine -- that when any of the parts are removed does not function at all. If you see a motor lying on the side of the road, you don't think: how odd, all of these parts found each other and managed to arrange each other in a way to make it work. No, instead you think: someone built that machine. Why? Intelligent Design.

Lastly, even if you take the entire universe back to the original super nova, planet, sun, star, etc. -- someone or something had to put it there. In order to have a big bang, you need at least two objects to bang into each other. Matter can not create itself. Nor does it materialize out of nothingness.

Enter: religion.

you are aware in depth i congratulate you, lets fake having a conversation as deep ones while everything is moving according to a sense, we can sit and chat even in real depth true, why not? it cannot go all to abstractions ends wholeness senses forms, if we are aware as true awareness of it we can move in forms of whole set in forms but still talk stable there saying how all is nonsense, and the only true positive sense is us being positive moving to become an absolute source of what we are aware being positive about, i think this was always my point

the fact that there is truth life which is the abstraction of absolute reality from its sources awareness life, that truth regulating itself alone in void as free, it doesnt mean that we cannot talk and chat, on the contrary it means that we can
it is like truth as the source of absolute reality always is telling us i dont need you there, you are not part of what i do, i do it for abstractions that i manage alone to be able always to do absolute reality i am, now that i know it sorry but i do it, having nothing to say to you you can do that too for you or you can choose something else as being negative berk, it is not my concern sorry bye

it is in void so we cant tell the truth being responsable of anything and it is in void that truth set positive drives all free

it is like when the first absolute reality was really alive truth of its abstractions were clear as existing and then went to realize its own free life as its source of those abstractions truth, so wake up every drives say hey you are free now to go do your absolute reality urself come on hops, yaya all is done already figured it all out, go figure it for yourself u cant sit here u bother the sense u must evolve to path or out go create with gods, oups out

i hope that you are taking my storytale seriously because iam enjoying sharing it with you, so the point of awareness sense was a must in void, we all as the first god were forced to move and act self aware as true ones absolute ourselves sources

it was not possible to stay there anymore just positive drive living of its affilitation to absolute reality objective life, that absolute reality freedom life was of its truth awareness and life reality was set to awareness truth and not to positive drives anymore like before

so here all the mess start, imagine waoo the invasions of positive drives migrations to awareness life pretenses

i saw depth means in what you said because of this point,

awareness life as living true is the love reality of always superiority certainty existing, the reality that it is directly related to what is always superior moving of intelligence certainty free moves evolutions, that reality is very stable then as certain absolute living one

what loves what always evolve is always then a reality anywhere since all is of certainty evolutions

so you dont have to evolve you just have as awareness living to love that so to understand the bases of certainty free existance evolutions and then to be stable like you want to define your own stable living reality as its source absolutely, so you would be that joy in making what you really enjoy, but you can be the joy free life that invent what enjoys as long as it is a reality with truth drives to superiority always, it is your right then to stay and define your reality as you want

now that reasoning wasnt the awareness life wills, gods were more proned to think their joys of using abstractions life freedom to gain all the joys possible to invent their positions realities, they saw the opportunities of creations always, to stay close to knowledge of truth latests news and invent then their pleasurable states inerties as well as the rewards of realizing fake images of those means realiteis life sense

that is the problem we face now in this time, you have a lot of awareness living of means opportunities creations for positive realities
and we have of course as other extreme different identity, awareness living of meaning itself being positive certain absolute reality

and we have what is there in the middle, but right and wrong is clear

it is ok to not be a positive sense absolutely awareness, it is ok to not understand how the principle base of being aware is the awareness of objective reality freely living itself, before being awareness state as out of it then yourself free opinion and realisation of relation to

all this is ok for not being at any point related to, but it cant be ok that awareness base would be the knowledge exploitation wills of truth freedom life as the source of inventions wealth free realiteis

i mean wrong is superiority alone that become absolute wrong wich is the definition of evil life opposition to truth
absolute right is love alone

right awareness life is love superiority in general

superiority alone, say how an awareness is nothing there at the begining but the realisation of superiority opportunity from full gains to identity as awareness self from, while aware that objective superiority is itself life freedom alone, so there cant be allegations of being related to really

and there where gods bother someone like me of what they prosper the idea that people love them so it is normal to mean sharing realities with them

love alone, is so many people that are right livings by simply enjoying being positive themselves without any means or abstractions
as awareness they are simply the geniun drive being true as acting a source of positive reality wherever that is

that is why superiority as drives absolutely means lead always to identify itself realtiy as superior and not love, and there where truth trap them

when those positive drives originally moved for their awareness about superiority freedom exploitations they had to identify themselves identities of something while moving in truth fields knowledge means to do, so since they dont love superiority itself then they create the concept of being superior loving superiority of themselves lives

and here where they were kicked out of truth abstractions like positive drives from the begining that arent supposed to follow the path truth of awareness life

of course you can say that i am inventing all that and somewhere maybe it is true but it makes sense how all who are wrong are always thinking themselves being superior and act for prooving it and through that sense

truth is very difficult to explain because it is absolute evolutions always and realities expansions in strange ways that the old is abstractly held absolutely, but you can understand what it means absolute concept
it means it is the same reality from any point of objectively perceived of objective intelligence, but the source of that absolute reality of course is not the same one since it is itself and no source making it

the issue of the soul is interesting to understand too,

the soul is never the living awareness but the soul seen of the living awareness can be a hint of its roots awareness as the essential awareness to objective absolute reality perspective free opportunity reactions means, as someone else that died of course but related to you from where you belong to same awareness base as positive drive certain for sure

but the living awareness is always what it realized as positive definitive reality from the concept of its absolute source living

reply to post by Mr Sunchine


That is an interesting interpretation of God in relation to government. I have thought like that before. Any leader or idle in a sense kind of takes the role of God or Christ.

Some people relate God to imagination so in that sense our man made conspiracies are connecting us to God.

I think that our visions and ideas of God are man made, but God itself is something beyond man's comprehension and there for he may apply fantasy themes to it.

[edit on 28-2-2010 by Crapsghetti]