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Not to derail the conversation, but, question: What impact would the undeniable discovery of alien life have on organized religion? Would theists abandon their

by matt1 18y ago

Not to derail the conversation, but, question: What impact would the undeniable discovery of alien life have on organized religion? Would theists abandon their beliefs en masse or would they find a way of explaining the new discoveries with their existing doctrine?

dimitar 18y ago
What would that contradict?
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DanielBMarkham 18y ago
Creationism -- the belief that some deity created all we see -- wouldn't have a problem with life on other planets. We see them. What kind of creation would only involve certain planets or creatures? ID -- the belief that our perceptions can either be of completely natural artifacts or artifacts created as a result of an external intelligent agent -- also not implicated. Interestingly enough, there may be a counter-movement here: if intelligent life were discovered, arguments could then begin to be made that some sort of intelligent agent had some play in our cultural/geological history. That would be new. This religion-vs-alien life question has been going around since the 1950s, at least. What a lot of people forget is that most major organized religions have been adapting to situations like this since their beginnings. Christianity, for instance, thought of the "world" as basically Eurasia for hundreds of years. People in Africa and the Americas were not considered fully "human" until fairly recently. That meant, for all intents and purposes, that places like the New World were 1) far away and almost impossible to reach, and 2) not part of the normal world, and 3) inhabited by creatures that were somewhat intelligent but not completely human. Religions, especially successful ones, adapt. I would be extremely surprised to see any impact at all. The more you study it, the more of a non-issue it is.
- kaptainlange 18y ago
  My early childhood religion always taught me that man was special, so I think there would be an impact if we were to find intelligent life elsewhere. In fact, I feel like that idea that man is so special is used as an argument against evolution. They use the 'disgust' of hearing that humans could be related to modern day apes, and thus is not so special. As you said, religion would have to adapt, but that is an impact. I'm more curious what path they would take. As you said, they could deny them full privileges of being sentient...that is they are less than human. Or they could accept them as being on the same level, but that would require a small alteration to their beliefs.
  - DanielBMarkham 18y ago
    Worst-case for religion, I guess, would be the discovery of obviously super-intelligent beings who claim that belief in God is an evolutionary defect. Seems to me that Judaism is a major world religion that applies for Jewish people, although there are many kinds of people in the world. Christianity is a religion of mankind, hence the need to dehumanize native peoples. The logical progression would be that Christianity would simply follow the lead of Judaism, i.e., Christianity is just for men. Of course, that's a big-picture, long-range guess. One of the reasons Christianity is so resilient is that there are so many versions. What would happen would be a thousand different possible ways forward. Most wouldn't last 200 years. A few would succeed. The "man is special" disgust with coming from monkeys thing is just a limited reaction to Darwinism. It's already dying off. Within another 300-500 years it'll be completely gone. There were similar reactions against Copernicus.
ensignavenger 18y ago
While it is not a "core doctrine", my religion (LDS.org) teaches that God has populated other planets- a discovery of life on other planets would only affirm our faith.

by matt1 18y ago

dimitar 18y ago

What would that contradict?

deleted 18y ago
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DanielBMarkham 18y ago

Creationism -- the belief that some deity created all we see -- wouldn't have a problem with life on other planets. We see them. What kind of creation would only involve certain planets or creatures? ID -- the belief that our perceptions can either be of completely natural artifacts or artifacts created as a result of an external intelligent agent -- also not implicated. Interestingly enough, there may be a counter-movement here: if intelligent life were discovered, arguments could then begin to be made that some sort of intelligent agent had some play in our cultural/geological history. That would be new. This religion-vs-alien life question has been going around since the 1950s, at least. What a lot of people forget is that most major organized religions have been adapting to situations like this since their beginnings. Christianity, for instance, thought of the "world" as basically Eurasia for hundreds of years. People in Africa and the Americas were not considered fully "human" until fairly recently. That meant, for all intents and purposes, that places like the New World were 1) far away and almost impossible to reach, and 2) not part of the normal world, and 3) inhabited by creatures that were somewhat intelligent but not completely human. Religions, especially successful ones, adapt. I would be extremely surprised to see any impact at all. The more you study it, the more of a non-issue it is.

kaptainlange 18y ago
My early childhood religion always taught me that man was special, so I think there would be an impact if we were to find intelligent life elsewhere. In fact, I feel like that idea that man is so special is used as an argument against evolution. They use the 'disgust' of hearing that humans could be related to modern day apes, and thus is not so special. As you said, religion would have to adapt, but that is an impact. I'm more curious what path they would take. As you said, they could deny them full privileges of being sentient...that is they are less than human. Or they could accept them as being on the same level, but that would require a small alteration to their beliefs.
- DanielBMarkham 18y ago
  Worst-case for religion, I guess, would be the discovery of obviously super-intelligent beings who claim that belief in God is an evolutionary defect. Seems to me that Judaism is a major world religion that applies for Jewish people, although there are many kinds of people in the world. Christianity is a religion of mankind, hence the need to dehumanize native peoples. The logical progression would be that Christianity would simply follow the lead of Judaism, i.e., Christianity is just for men. Of course, that's a big-picture, long-range guess. One of the reasons Christianity is so resilient is that there are so many versions. What would happen would be a thousand different possible ways forward. Most wouldn't last 200 years. A few would succeed. The "man is special" disgust with coming from monkeys thing is just a limited reaction to Darwinism. It's already dying off. Within another 300-500 years it'll be completely gone. There were similar reactions against Copernicus.

ensignavenger 18y ago

While it is not a "core doctrine", my religion (LDS.org) teaches that God has populated other planets- a discovery of life on other planets would only affirm our faith.