Human society has underpinned morals above utility to advance and maintain cohesiveness, which is the ultimate utility. Beauty and beliefs (religions, politics, morals) unite humans.
The West believes in redemption, in the chance to be saved, as do Hindus - but very differently: the West through the human, Hindus through the supernatural.
Change happens through people, their ideas and their leadership, creating philosophical, religious and political movements.
Not trusting elites, Gods or institutions leads to only believing in markets, the loudest voices and people each for themselves: nihilism
Life comes from life itself, therefore God comes as life.
Art is like religion and ideologies, beyond the strictly useful and tangible, helping us making sense of life.
Technology and science as a new religion is too abstract for most people who crave spiritual inspiration.
With AI and gene editing we are potentially playing God so we might as well ask ourselves, "what species do we want to create?"
Technology allows us to play God. Regardless if good or bad, it’s in front of us. Not addressing it is dangerous and we would be missing the greatest opportunity we have.
Beliefs and knowledge are contingent, including "truths" and God.
Our children, our cultures and our spiritual musings give us life beyond our own.
Might there be Life energy (positive) and Death energy (negative)? Both are necessary. Humans are trying to rationalize or neutralize the Death energy through reason, social rituals (including religion), withdrawal (Buddhism) and mysticism.
Art and religion have the same origin, manifested in narratives. Both are emotional acts of imagination. Which arose first? Consciousness before! Human consciousness engenders religious feelings and artistic needs.
Science’s advantages are change and improvement. Religion has the advantage of explaining the unexplained. You could say that science works on reality as truth and that religion works on what is beyond reality as truth. Both are dedicated to making sense of life.
Even if one is deeply non-religious and intellectually rigorous, isn’t the quest for the spiritual a necessary path as part of our life’s journey?
The inexplainable gives meaning, not the known.
The power of ideas: they shape us and our cultures. Religious commandments, laws, constitutions - they all come in the form of spiritual traditions, emanating from stories and a written narrative, from philosophical speculation and scientific discoveries.
As shown by the Bible, Confucian thinking, evolution, and evidenced by our having children, we think of life and prospects of humanity in generational terms - always a parent and a child. Is AI our ultimate offspring?
Religion and classic philosophy are there to calm down. Modernity encourages risk and nervousness.
Humans have worshiped and found meaning first in nature, then God and rituals, and now in technology as our ultimate mastery of the world. Where from here, when technology questions the future role of humans and who the master is?
The Bible demonstrates the power of ideas. Any spiritual book does.
Often, over time, religions are about steering society more than about spirituality.
The death of Jesus and the resurrection means that there is only life - what makes Jesus’s death so special is that he is reborn into life. Life replaces death.
We can’t prove God, but can we explain the world without? Since that question is unanswerable, what about just having faith for the sake of faith, without objectifying it? Faith in life itself, faith in the universe.
The spiritual is the feeling of connection to a greater and aspirational form. A compelling act of imagination.
The devil believes hell is heaven - ideologies create their realities.
We are made.
Life is a creation and creation is life.
Yet, there is no Maker.