Is religion inevitable for any conscious evolving species?

[The Great Zaganza]

I think Religion/Gods are part of the hacker instinct in all humans: we are always looking for shortcuts to avoid doing the actual work.
So why build an irrigation system when you can just bride a deity to bring rain for the low low price of an animal or virgin sacrifice.

as long as doing things is hard, people will delude themselves into wishing someone supernatural will do it for them.

 

[dann]

No. I think even for humans religion is something of an anomaly.

It is very obvious that it isn't. It has only slowly started to lose its grip on people in the more affluent societies where they lead fairly secure lives free from most diseases and other debilitating events.

Basically a small handful of monotheistic religions managed to parasite themselves onto major social/political/government advances.

Yes, monotheism is relatively new to the table and has been very successful for a couple of thousand years. Calling it a parasite explains absolutely nothing.

Honestly had the Christian/Muslim/Jewish religions not managed to follow the spice routes around the world I think the odds are good, not certain but good, that religion would have died off. The vague, less organized Earthy and ancestor worship religions would have faded quicker had they not had the Monotheism to really keep "religion" going.

It is not as if other religions were about to disappear and be replaced by science and common sense when monotheism took over. Miserable conditions, and there are more than enough of those, cause the need for religions. If they don't already exist, people invent them.

 

[dann]

I think Religion/Gods are part of the hacker instinct in all humans: we are always looking for shortcuts to avoid doing the actual work.
So why build an irrigation system when you can just bride a deity to bring rain for the low low price of an animal or virgin sacrifice.

as long as doing things is hard, people will delude themselves into wishing someone supernatural will do it for them.

Do you think that the children in Beslan invented the Harry Potter religion or resorted to established Christianity because they were too lazy to fight the Chechen rebels who had taken them hostage? Or is it possible that they did so because they were utterly helpless and scared?

the children in Beslan who were held hostage at a school by Chechen rebels:
Carat, 11: "I was hoping that Harry Potter would come. I remembered that he had a cloak that made him invisible and he would come and wrap me in it, and we'd be invisible and we'd escape."
Nine-year-old Laima draws pictures of what she saw when she was held hostage:
"I found a little cross on the gym's floor. I kept it on me for all of the three days. It helped me to survive."

What these children needed was to get the hell out of there! Once they were in safety, you could start telling them about the superstitions that people invent in uncomfortable situations that are out of their control.
What sick Africans need is health care, first and foremost. Once they have that, it makes sense to start telling them about the difference between medical doctors and witchdoctors. Only then will they actually benefit from knowing about the difference.

 

[Venom]

I once read some anthropology article that examined religious trends across the world and it appears monotheism is much more likely among nomadic pastoralists and they are usually more violent societies, while polytheism seems to be more common among societies based in the rainforest or in permanent settlements.

 

[HansMustermann]

Yes, monotheism is relatively new to the table and has been very successful for a couple of thousand years. Calling it a parasite explains absolutely nothing.

Depends on exactly what you define as monotheism, actually. From all the evidence we have, including literally thousands of written prayers from the Sumerians, everyone believing in exactly one god as the real thing was actually the overwhelming majority situation.

At it even makes sense too, if you think about it: Gods^* are a father figure. Nobody fancies themselves being the *ahem* son of a thousand fathers

Polytheism is actually the one that appears later, by the time you start dealing with ruling or allying with several cities, each worshiping a different god. Like, you have the city of Eridu which worships Enki, and Lagash which worships Ninurta, and Uruk which worshipped Nanna aka Sin, and Uruk which worships Inanna. (Actual cities and actual gods of those cities, btw.) And none of them is going to go "well, we were wrong to worship Inanna, we should worship Sin instead, if our new overlord worships Sin." So you invent whole pantheons where Inanna is actually the daughter of Sin, and Sin is subordinate to some other guy, and so on, so everyone can play along.

What's newer is exclusive monotheism. I.e., being the kind of assh... err... hat (don't want to trigger the mods about that again) who'll go, "no, all your gods are false, you all are mistaken, only our Yahweh is the real deal."

In a sense it's actually a step back.


^* But it should also be mentioned that that only works about Gods or at least great ruler spirits. If it's animism where everything is a spirit or has a spirit, you can still have thousands of smaller spirits around naturally.

 

[HansMustermann]

BTW, just to make it clear, those prayers we found for every single Sumerian and Akadian God make it clear that people were pretty explicitly monotheistic in their own prayers even long AFTER polytheism was a thing. In fact, all the way until we get Marduk for everyone. Just, officially, when dealing with other people, they'd pretend that it's a real pantheon and all gods are real. Presumably so they don't have to brain each other over whose Slim Shady is the real Slim Shady. Err... I mean, whose god is the real god.

A lot of modern religious tolerance for other beliefs is actually relatively close to how that ancient "polytheism" worked.

Pretty much the only thing that exclusive monotheism brought (back) is the idea that, "no, screw you, I'm done pretending your god is real too. MY god gets angry if I don't kill you guys over your worshiping false gods"

 

[sphenisc]

BTW, just to make it clear, those prayers we found for every single Sumerian and Akadian God make it clear that people were pretty explicitly monotheistic in their own prayers even long AFTER polytheism was a thing. In fact, all the way until we get Marduk for everyone. Just, officially, when dealing with other people, they'd pretend that it's a real pantheon and all gods are real. Presumably so they don't have to brain each other over whose Slim Shady is the real Slim Shady. Err... I mean, whose god is the real god.

A lot of modern religious tolerance for other beliefs is actually relatively close to how that ancient "polytheism" worked.

Pretty much the only thing that exclusive monotheism brought (back) is the idea that, "no, screw you, I'm done pretending your god is real too. MY god gets angry if I don't kill you guys over your worshiping false gods"

Where, in modern religious tolerance, do people pretend that it's a real pantheon and all gods are real?

 

[HansMustermann]

Well, the closest would be the ones going some version of "we're all worshipping god, just under different names". That's pretty much how the Roman numina worked, or how previously they made Ishtar and Inanna be the same goddess.

 

[The Great Zaganza]

Do you think that the children in Beslan invented the Harry Potter religion or resorted to established Christianity because they were too lazy to fight the Chechen rebels who had taken them hostage? Or is it possible that they did so because they were utterly helpless and scared?

seems to me that you are making my point for me:

when things seem too hard to do (because they are or because you are lazy), you turn to religion in the hope that someone else will do things for you.

 

[Ziggurat]

Is religion (the belief into some concepts of supernatural forces or entities) an inevitable step or byproduct or even necessary in the evolution of any conscious species during the process of learning and becoming a more advanced society?

I tend to think it is almost inevitable.

I've put this topic into the science section, because it is not about the contents of any religion.

When dealing with aliens, I think we should use a broader and more generic definition of religion. For those purposes, I would define religion as a set of alogical (not necessarily illogical) shared beliefs that majorly affect the believers' values. Belief in a deity or other pervasive supernatural things can obviously qualify, but it's not limited to that.

I don't know if religion, even with this broader definition, is inevitable for intelligent social species. But I DO think that if we ever encounter interstellar space-faring intelligent species, they will be religious under this broader definition. I think that is inevitable, because I think only some kind of religion (of this broader definition) can sufficiently motivate a society to spend enough resources for something as difficult and resource-intensive as space travel when the direct payoff is so small.

 

[dann]

seems to me that you are making my point for me:

when things seem too hard to do (because they are or because you are lazy), you turn to religion in the hope that someone else will do things for you.

I am willing to believe that you came up with this idea because you were too lazy to think things through. However, a student who doesn't do his homework because it is too hard or he is too lazy doesn't usually turn to religion or come up with deities that will do the work for him.

 

[sackett]

How many honest to pete monotheists are there? Christianists and Muslimoids all believe in Satan, and in angels and jdinns and demons. Jews mostly credit Satan too, and those who don't still set a place for Gabriel -- or whoever, I don't have my notes here -- at Passover. All those b'lievers may class their Yehooavow as the one true only deity, but, standing off at this distance, I merely note their folklore, and I certainly don't accept it.

Other cults teem with gods n demons n sperrits n whatall. Just favoring one over the others and praying to him on a brick is hardly exclusive monotheism.

Over the millenia, gods rise and fall, often turning into, yessir, demons, angels, spirits, and the habit of nailing a horseshoe over the door.

For decades now, we've seen fools trying to revive (or reinvent?) defunct gods, with some success. I'm inclined to think that pure-quill monotheism can never satisfy anybody's religious cravings, because it's so goddamn boring. It explains everything with the ringing of one dull bell: GODDIDIT. Even so-called simple folk can't stay satisfied with that. Our minds swarm with questions, fantasies, and conjectures. We want the supernatural to be at least as varied -- and as strangely beautiful -- as the world we inhabit.

But, and this is what may eventually save us from religion, as we learn more about the world and the universe, the more satisfying they become because we know so little but now we can find out. After all, those innumerable supernatural explanations were never really adequate, hence their continual proliferation.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Monotheism is generally more a case of just arbitrarily

As said Christians with Jesus, the Trinity, Mary (especially the Catholics), and the Saints requiring miracles are polytheistic in everything but name.

Believing in a big "G" and a bunch of little "g"s is monotheism technically at most.

 

[Venom]

How many honest to pete monotheists are there? Christianists and Muslimoids all believe in Satan, and in angels and jdinns and demons. Jews mostly credit Satan too, and those who don't still set a place for Gabriel -- or whoever, I don't have my notes here -- at Passover. All those b'lievers may class their Yehooavow as the one true only deity, but, standing off at this distance, I merely note their folklore, and I certainly don't accept it.

Other cults teem with gods n demons n sperrits n whatall. Just favoring one over the others and praying to him on a brick is hardly exclusive monotheism.

Over the millenia, gods rise and fall, often turning into, yessir, demons, angels, spirits, and the habit of nailing a horseshoe over the door.

There's truth to this, but it's not exactly difficult for modern observers to be monotheist. Perhaps it was more difficult in the past due to the confluence of annoying details you mentioned. The satan was God's prosecutor, angels are messengers, though Satan's since been turned into what almost amounts to God's evil twin by centuries of Pietist propaganda. Mainstream believers today seem comfortable relegating the prominent godly figures to lower spiritual beings and allegorizing everyone else a peg below them.

That's quite different from what the ancient Israelites believed, many who actually did favor one god over the others, because he served almost as their heavenly governor for their region. We can see vestiges of this in the texts of course.

 

[HansMustermann]

I am willing to believe that you came up with this idea because you were too lazy to think things through. However, a student who doesn't do his homework because it is too hard or he is too lazy doesn't usually turn to religion or come up with deities that will do the work for him.

NANI?! You've never seen students go to pray or light a candle or something before an exam? And I'm getting the impression that in Japan (though it's not really equivalent, as it's literally the farthest possible from monotheism and it's one of the least religious countries) that's pretty much half the business that shrines make. People who haven't bothered to go to a shrine since the last festival or new year, whichever was last, suddenly decide it can't hurt to chuck a coin and ask the spirits for help before an exam. Not that it's the only one, though. In a study in India, at least one of them even referred to going to the temple before an exam as "bribing" a god.

And even without religion, a lot come up with other superstitions, a lot of them about exams. Stuff ranging always using their lucky pencil (or an exact same model from the same brand) for an exam, to outright wearing magic talismans or fortune telling or little rituals to 'ward off evil' (questions on the exam.)

So, yeah, sad to say, students too come up with some kind of magical force that compensates in some way or another for their not studying enough

 

[HansMustermann]

When dealing with aliens, I think we should use a broader and more generic definition of religion. For those purposes, I would define religion as a set of alogical (not necessarily illogical) shared beliefs that majorly affect the believers' values. Belief in a deity or other pervasive supernatural things can obviously qualify, but it's not limited to that.

I don't know if religion, even with this broader definition, is inevitable for intelligent social species. But I DO think that if we ever encounter interstellar space-faring intelligent species, they will be religious under this broader definition. I think that is inevitable, because I think only some kind of religion (of this broader definition) can sufficiently motivate a society to spend enough resources for something as difficult and resource-intensive as space travel when the direct payoff is so small.

I'm generally not a fan of these extension exercises, in which anything can be argued to be a religion, just because one or two elements kinda work like those in a religion, and ignoring the other elements that don't work that way or are missing entirely. The chief problem being just that: that you can do that to argue that anything is a religion.

I mean watch me prove that anime is a religion

- protagonists who come back from the dead
- it has some fanatical zealots
- ... and missionaries
- it has its share of holy wars, including over minute deviations from the Holy canon or interpretations thereof
- ... not to mention the whole bloody schism over subbed vs dubbed
- some people will surround themselves with effigies of their favourite *ahem* religious figures and symbols, or even wear such to school (or take them to bed, even)
- it has its holy dates, sites and pilgrimages
- it requires weekly attendance
- it can impart valuable lessons
- it has been historically ok with harems

The problem at that point is that if it covers everything, it becomes effectively meaningless. It's like if I argued that every mammal is a cat, then "I saw a cat" doesn't actually tell you much any more. Is it the kind that meows, or the kind of 'cat' that goes MOO? Is it even the land type, or one of the kinds that swim in the ocean?

 

[HansMustermann]

Oh right, and apparently the Russian Orthodox church is throwing a whole fit over religious anime pictures. Hey, if an actual church calls you heresy, it must mean something, right?

https://peru21.pe/mundo/rusia-polem...os-anime-arte-u-ofensa-462590-noticia/?foto=1

(Even if you don't understand the text, the images are hilarious.)

 

[Ziggurat]

I'm generally not a fan of these extension exercises, in which anything can be argued to be a religion, just because one or two elements kinda work like those in a religion, and ignoring the other elements that don't work that way or are missing entirely. The chief problem being just that: that you can do that to argue that anything is a religion.

I mean watch me prove that anime is a religion

Most of your bullet points have absolutely nothing to do with my definition. Some of them are particularly bad criteria to consider when dealing with aliens. What possible relevance do the significance of holy dates and sites have to us? Some of them are also not at all peculiar to religion and shouldn't be considered as such, like the stories that impart lessons. Using storytelling to impart lessons has nothing intrinsically connected to the supernatural (the OP's definition), to deities (a more traditional definition) or to shared alogical beliefs (my definition). We use stories to impart lessons because that's how our brains work. The difference between religious uses and non-religious uses is entirely about what lessons are being imparted. GI Joe cartoons that teach you not to put water on a grease fire, or My Little Pony cartoons that teach you to be nice to the shy kid aren't religious, under any of these definitions. So you're really stretching to try to fit anime into a definition of religion, you aren't even trying to use mine, and no, most stuff most certainly doesn't qualify.

And when it comes to aliens, the specifics of their religious beliefs aren't going to matter much to us anyways, what's going to matter to us is how it makes them behave. For example, are they driven to take over every inhabitable world they encounter? Do they sterilize local life to make way for their own? Do they wage war against other intelligent species? Do they leave other intelligent species alone? The answer is that it's going to depend upon what their values are. If they are religious in a more traditional sense (a belief in deities), that's obviously going to make a big difference. But my point in using the definition I used is that it doesn't matter if they're driven by a belief in some deity, or if they're just driven by some other shared philosophy that might have nothing to do with the supernatural. The effects are going to be the same. They may be hostile or friendly to us with no regard to the logical costs or benefits of that status, based on whatever those beliefs are. This is different than if they only acted on their logical self-interest. You can predict a lot about a logical actor's actions based on logic, but you cannot predict the actions of an alogical actor

And my point is that we should EXPECT aliens to have some set of deeply held alogical beliefs, which means they will fall into the latter category, not the former.

 

[HansMustermann]

My point is that there's no need to start calling every ideology, superstition, delusion, wishful thinking, or whatever a religion.

 

[Ziggurat]

My point is that there's no need to start calling every ideology, superstition, delusion, wishful thinking, or whatever a religion.

Why not? If it's shared by most of a society, if it strongly affects behavior, why isn't it deserving of that title?

 

[HansMustermann]

Because it's like in my example with deciding to call every mammal a cat, just because a lot of stuff is after all the same. You then lose all the information associated with how a subset differs from the parent set.

 

[Ziggurat]

Because it's like in my example with deciding to call every mammal a cat, just because a lot of stuff is after all the same. You then lose all the information associated with how a subset differs from the parent set.

Except the ifs involved matter a hell of a lot, and actually disqualify most things.

 

[ynot]

How many honest to pete monotheists are there? Christianists and Muslimoids all believe in Satan, and in angels and jdinns and demons. Jews mostly credit Satan too, and those who don't still set a place for Gabriel -- or whoever, I don't have my notes here -- at Passover. All those b'lievers may class their Yehooavow as the one true only deity, but, standing off at this distance, I merely note their folklore, and I certainly don't accept it.

Other cults teem with gods n demons n sperrits n whatall. Just favoring one over the others and praying to him on a brick is hardly exclusive monotheism.

Over the millenia, gods rise and fall, often turning into, yessir, demons, angels, spirits, and the habit of nailing a horseshoe over the door.

For decades now, we've seen fools trying to revive (or reinvent?) defunct gods, with some success. I'm inclined to think that pure-quill monotheism can never satisfy anybody's religious cravings, because it's so goddamn boring. It explains everything with the ringing of one dull bell: GODDIDIT. Even so-called simple folk can't stay satisfied with that. Our minds swarm with questions, fantasies, and conjectures. We want the supernatural to be at least as varied -- and as strangely beautiful -- as the world we inhabit.

But, and this is what may eventually save us from religion, as we learn more about the world and the universe, the more satisfying they become because we know so little but now we can find out. After all, those innumerable supernatural explanations were never really adequate, hence their continual proliferation.

Well said!

 

[HansMustermann]

Congratsm, you just discovered my whole bloody point about religion vs the parent set of beliefs which aren't logical. Including such stuff like the big "if" that actual religions include some kind of cosmic Santa that dispenses rewards and punishments for being good.

You're doing the exact same that you correctly notice is wrong with my example: you're ignoring all those extra "ifs" that go into what is actually a religion, just like I'm ignoring the extra "ifs" between just a mammal and specifically a cat.


Plus, just going by whatever isn't logical and is believed enough to influence what a society does, IS getting the absurd result of making hundreds of such behaviours somehow be overlapping religions.

E.g., probably the most widespread illogical belief at least in the West, but really it's present worldwide, is basically "we have to do SOMETHING." As in, we can't do nothing about X, ergo any random idiocy we can come up with is better than doing nothing. And it's influencing society to the point where even wars have been started because you can't just do NOTHING. But there's no logic supporting that, and plenty of counter-examples, including from game theory and actual history. E.g., not being ok to just do nothing lead to the crushing defeat at Cannae.

Does that make it a religion? How? What other "ifs" does it check, other than just not being based in sound logic?

E.g., a LOT of people believe the gambler's fallacy. (Basically that I'm due a big win soon at the slot machines because I lost 200$ in a row so far.) It's not logical, but it's not a religion. No matter how much of the society actually believes it and acts upon it. Which in fact is a lot, or casinos (or for that matter EA's lootboxes) wouldn't be making nearly as much money. But it isn't a religion because it lacks the element that I'm somehow owed that win because of being otherwise good or devout, or any other crucial attributes of actual religions.

E.g., a LOT of people believe in the sunken cost fallacy. And it affects their behaviour. But that doesn't make it a religion.

Etc.

The moment you erase all those ifs and just being not logical and having enough adherents is the only criterion, you've just made ALL those religions. Which doesn't serve any purpose, other than muddying the terms.

 

[JoeMorgue]

My point is that there's no need to start calling every ideology, superstition, delusion, wishful thinking, or whatever a religion.

Is this your first religious discussion on this board?

The religious apologist side will make 100% sure nothing being discussed actually resembles real world religion in any manner.

If they call everything a religion, you will never be able to form a reasonable criticism of anything. That's the point.

 

[HansMustermann]

Is this your first religious discussion on this board?

The religious apologist side will make 100% sure nothing being discussed actually resembles real world religion in any manner.

If they call everything a religion, you will never be able to form a reasonable criticism of anything. That's the point.

Well, that IS actually my problem, when I see even non-religious and otherwise rational people like Ziggurat arguing the same 'every wide-spread belief is a religion' canard.

It's annoying enough to see the religious apologists working hard to blur the lines and make it all a big equivocation pot, but at least I can see why they're doing that. In this case I can't even see what purpose it serves. The same "when we meet aliens they'll probably have their own beliefs that aren't logical" information is conveyed even without calling it a religion.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Well, that IS actually my problem, when I see even non-religious and otherwise rational people like Ziggurat arguing the same 'every wide-spread belief is a religion' canard.

It's annoying enough to see the religious apologists working hard to blur the lines and make it all a big equivocation pot, but at least I can see why they're doing that. In this case I can't even see what purpose it serves. The same "when we meet aliens they'll probably have their own beliefs that aren't logical" information is conveyed even without calling it a religion.

Well I don't know how much more "there's no way to stop them and nothing can be done about it" can be established as a fact.

 

[HansMustermann]

Well I don't know how much more "there's no way to stop them and nothing can be done about it" can be established as a fact.

Eehhh... as if that will stop me from getting annoyed anyway

 

[Ziggurat]

Well, that IS actually my problem, when I see even non-religious and otherwise rational people like Ziggurat arguing the same 'every wide-spread belief is a religion' canard.

That's not at all what I'm arguing. That's your straw man representation of what I'm arguing.

 

[HansMustermann]

Ok, so what have I missed there? Because to me it looks like you're genuinely arguing that if an alogical belief is affecting enough of a society, then it's a (kind of) religion. What fine point did I miss?

 

[Ulf Nereng]

I think religion is inevitable as soon as a species has members intelligent enough to scam their fellows.

 

[llwyd]

Too little data. But it is certainly plausible that science and rationality won't develope first, that there will be an empty space for explanations of the physical world that superstition and religion will fill in lieau of anything better.

 

[dann]

NANI?! You've never seen students go to pray or light a candle or something before an exam? And I'm getting the impression that in Japan (though it's not really equivalent, as it's literally the farthest possible from monotheism and it's one of the least religious countries) that's pretty much half the business that shrines make. People who haven't bothered to go to a shrine since the last festival or new year, whichever was last, suddenly decide it can't hurt to chuck a coin and ask the spirits for help before an exam. Not that it's the only one, though. In a study in India, at least one of them even referred to going to the temple before an exam as "bribing" a god.

And even without religion, a lot come up with other superstitions, a lot of them about exams. Stuff ranging always using their lucky pencil (or an exact same model from the same brand) for an exam, to outright wearing magic talismans or fortune telling or little rituals to 'ward off evil' (questions on the exam.)

So, yeah, sad to say, students too come up with some kind of magical force that compensates in some way or another for their not studying enough

No, I've never seen a student light candles for anything other than hygge, but in spite of being baptized as a Catholic, I live in a country where candles aren't associated with religion.
Superstitions, however, yes, and I would never claim that students never resort to superstition.

On the contrary, in fact: It is one of my favourite examples of how people are prone to turn to magical thinking when they find themselves in a situation where they are (more or less) impotent, a situation they don't control. Exams are supposed to be a test of your skills in a certain field, but we all know that much depends on luck. Exams don't test all your knowledge, and there are usually some subjects that you have studied more and understand better than others. This makes people want to control the situation beyond what preparing for the exams can give them, thus the 'lucky' teddybear or sweater (whatever). There is no 'studying enough'!
It is no wonder that nightmares about exams may haunt people for the rest of their lives:

If you've had "the dream" related to school, you know exactly what it is.

This is the dream where it is the day of a final exam, and you realize that you forgot you were taking the course and therefore had not attended any of the classes, did not do the reading, and you certainly are not prepared for today's test. Other variations include your having attended some of the classes, perhaps at the beginning of the semester, and then you just forgot about the class until the day of the final. It was not intentional, but somehow, it just happened.
Recurring Final Exam Dream? - Of course, you forgot you were taking this course. (Psychology Today, Sep. 7, 2009)

The same thing goes for sports: You may have spent years preparing for an event, but you have no control of the competition.
Unless you solve the problem the Tonya Harding way ...

 

[dann]

I think religion is inevitable as soon as a species has members intelligent enough to scam their fellows.

You are scamming yourself if you reduce believing to being something that a preacher simply invents in order to control others. If those others did not want (or even need) to believe, they couldn't be duped by the priests, gurus, psychics or other scammers.
Don't let James Randi have lived in vain!

The ability to think includes the ability to come up with weird ideas, and you don't need another person to supply you with those.

 

[dann]

Too little data. But it is certainly plausible that science and rationality won't develope first, that there will be an empty space for explanations of the physical world that superstition and religion will fill in lieau of anything better.

Your idea rests on the implicit premise that people are on the search for the truth and only happen to believe in gods because nobody has come up with a better explanation yet, but better explanations do exist, and it obviously hasn't stopped people from believing in weird things instead.

 

[dann]

My point is that there's no need to start calling every ideology, superstition, delusion, wishful thinking, or whatever a religion.

Agreed. 'The election was stolen', for instance, is not a religion.

 

[dellarte]

define "religion"

I think religion is inevitable as soon as a species has members intelligent enough to scam their fellows.

Religion is the Opium of the people.

 

[LarryS]

As long as a species can stumble upon hallucinogenics or any other mechanism for experiencing unbounded joy, or a strong sense of flouriishing - then Yes that species has an opportunity to develop religion(s). Otherwise - No.

 

[Roboramma]

Ok, so what have I missed there? Because to me it looks like you're genuinely arguing that if an alogical belief is affecting enough of a society, then it's a (kind of) religion. What fine point did I miss?

That when it comes to interacting with an alien species, the important aspect of religion is that it's an alogical system of beliefs that will affect their values, and thus our ability to predict their actions. And further that this will be true whether or not that alogical belief system conforms to other aspects of religion.

That's basically all he's saying, yet you've managed to interact with him while also completely ignoring his only point, and somehow assuming he's trying to argue something unrelated to that point.

 

[HansMustermann]

That when it comes to interacting with an alien species, the important aspect of religion is that it's an alogical system of beliefs that will affect their values, and thus our ability to predict their actions. And further that this will be true whether or not that alogical belief system conforms to other aspects of religion.

That's basically all he's saying, yet you've managed to interact with him while also completely ignoring his only point, and somehow assuming he's trying to argue something unrelated to that point.

None of that needs or justifies calling it a religion if it's not one. If "this will be true whether or not that alogical belief system conforms to other aspects of religion" then you don't need to redefine religion for it. It's that simple.

And I still don't see how that means I got anything wrong there. You're essentially only telling me, "Oh, but that canard wasn't the point per se, but about a different point", not that said canard wasn't there. But... so what?