1 . Scientific Method Yields Truth
Virtually
all mystical thought systems claim to represent Truth. But where does
Truth really come from, and what is the relationship with all of those
different mystical thought systems?
If you ignore the alleged
divine authorship of each holy book, and attribute the true authorship
to some theme and variation on "divine inspiration," the answer is that
each holy book which is the basis of a widely believed mystical thought
system is, itself, a product of rational thought. In a way, each such
holy book is a sort of a snapshot of the mystical beliefs which some
given group of people decided is true at some given point in time. For
example, when the Jewish Pentateuch was first set down on paper in
roughly 1200 b. c., it was simply a set of rules for life which
expressed a view on how to survive as a civilized people in that time.
The books of Buddha are similarly a set of rules of life for those who
would seek "enlightenment" by following the path of the Buddha. There
is a strong fundamentalist movement in the Islamic states which seeks
to have people adhere to only Islamic laws, which laws derive
themselves directly from the language of the Koran, as opposed to some
other source of civil law, such as a legislature.
The bottom line on this seems
to be that rational thought can produce either mystic thought systems
or scientific thought systems, and each calls itself "Truth."
But, if the source of all
"Truth" is rational thought, then of what validity is mystic thought,
which has no basis in scientific knowledge? The best answer seems to be
that "nature abhors a vacuum,"10
and one of the manifestations of this is that when mankind is incapable
of providing a scientific answer to a philosophical question that
confronts all people, mankind responds by using its rational thought
process to invent a mystical answer. In other words, if you can't find
an answer, then simply make one up that seems to fit all of the facts
which are presently known. At least you will have provided an answer to
the demanding populace, and maybe they will then let you alone long
enough to get some real thinking done.
Virtually all of the primitive
gods which we have studied began as beings which were associated with
some sort of natural phenomena. Throughout all of history, people have
had various Sun gods, Moon gods, fire gods, volcano gods, weather gods
of various types, and so forth. Each of these gods was invented in
order to create a mystical explanation for their associated natural
phenomena because the scientific explanation, which we know today, was
beyond the capabilities of the technology of the particular culture in
question. That much is easy for us to say, because it is always easy to
make fun of, and discard any rational basis for, the gods which are
revered by somebody else.
What becomes much more
difficult for us, and for many of us, thoroughly impossible, is to take
the next logical step and see our own religious system as merely yet
another attempt to explain away the unexplainable. We all contemplate
the question of: "what happens to people when they die?" Nobody knows
the real answer unless they die, and once they're dead, they can't
return to tell us the truth of the matter.11
Again, "nature abhors a vacuum," and so mankind invents an answer which
pleases: there is this really pleasant place where we go after death,
so long as we live according to the rules of our society. In other
words, the civil authorities have good reason to encourage belief in
certain religions because the believers in those religions tend to be
law abiding people. That sounds pretty rational, doesn't it? But isn't
the story of Heaven really just a grown-up version of Santa Claus?
Of course it is. But just as
kids are eager to believe in Santa Claus, until they are old enough to
pick up the clues to the real truth, each of us is eager to believe in
Heaven. No rational being wants to die; self preservation is really one
of our most basic instincts. Suicide is always viewed as a
psychological illness or an escape from a greater evil of unending
physical illness which will certainly lead to death.
Why can't we see the Truth for
ourselves? Well, for one reason, there aren't any super-adults living
in our households to give us hints that Heaven is no more real than is
Santa Claus, and there aren't any such super-adults to admit the Truth
once we begin to have suspicions about what the real Truth is. Besides,
it is all too comforting to those of us who are left behind by any
particular dear departed individual to console ourselves and one
another that said dear departed has gone on to a "better place," or is
"with God."
As rational thinkers, we each
know that we have the ability to think either Truth or a Lie. Only the
depraved among us seek to live a Lie, so the rational thinkers seek
Truth. But how do we discern the difference between a Lie and Truth?
Particularly, how do we draw this line when there is nobody around to
give us hints or tell us when we have found the "right" answer?
There are basically two ways
to know the Truth. The first is scientific method, and the second is
Faith. We know that scientific method produces all of the Truth which
we find useful in our every day lives. Empirically, we have grown to
trust scientific method because it produces so many useful results.12
On the other hand, Faith is fickle. It may be useful for a while, to
fill in the vacuum of our thoughts, but sooner or later, it fails us,
usually in a time of great need. Furthermore, when it comes into
conflict with science, its usefulness evaporates.13
We are presently living
through one of the great debates between Science and Faith, which is
taking the form of the dispute over the teaching of Creationism and/or
Evolution in our schools. To a scientifically trained people, this
debate seems nonsensical. Faith MUST yield to science.14
Nonetheless, the debate rages on, because Faith is nothing if not
strength in the face of adversity. The ignorant scream that they are
being denied their religious freedom, when they are, in fact, merely
choosing to stick their heads in the sand and ignore scientific
evidence.
It is clear that Faith does
not provide real Truth, but only a simulacrum of Truth. A rational
being must discard Faith as a source of Truth, and rely solely upon
scientific method. To do otherwise is to enslave our minds with
mysticism.
2 . Mystic Thought Yields Slavery
The
handmaiden of any system of mystic thought is intolerance for any other
system of thought, mystic or otherwise. Thus, the enemies of mystic
thought are Tolerance and Truth. Both will tend to devalue the mystic
thought system.
Even in those rare cases where
you have a mystical thought system which preaches tolerance, the act of
adopting an attitude of tolerance will allow intolerant minority sects
to flourish, thus gradually increasing the overall level of intolerance
in the society as a whole. We see this pattern today in both India
(with Hinduism) and the United States (with Protestantism) today.
But the fundamental nature of
any mystical thought system is that the head mystic dreams up this
system of thought, which must then be adhered to without question by
all subsequent believers, "or else!" While the usual threat of "or
else" is some sort of punishment inflicted after death, once the
mystics are in power, history clearly shows that they do not hesitate
to inflict "divine retribution" in the here and now (i. e.,
Hypatia, the Inquisition, etc.).
What all mystical thought
systems amount to is a form of slavery. You either believe
wholeheartedly in the mystical thought system, which makes you a slave
to the chief mystic, or you do not. The consequences for any
unbelievers are many and varied. Some can initiate schisms, thereby
starting their own mystic thought systems. This is what principally
occurred during the Reformation, when a series of clerics formed their
own Protestant denominations out of their utter revulsion at what the
Roman Catholic Church had become over the centuries. Others can simply
change their affiliation, moving from one religious denomination to
another. But when an intolerant mystical thought system is also in
control of the civil government, the fate of unbelievers can be
tremendously cruel. The story of Shadrach in the furnace of Babylon is
a case in point. Shadrach had a choice: either renounce his God,
thereby enslaving himself to the Babylonian Gods, or else die in the
furnace, thereby illustrating his slavery to his own mystical thought
system (and also martyring himself in the process).
The bottom line on mystical
thought systems is that to adhere to one enslaves you to those who
founded and control that mystical thought system. If you seek to become
a believer, you seek to take on the load of all of the baggage which
accompanies the entire mystical thought system, including all of the
obligations associated therewith.
Thus, most Christian sects
require you to worship on Sunday and contribute a ten percent tithe, or
some similar concept. Each has a set of rules for how to live your
life, which rules are strangely silent about goals and objectives,
other than to achieve the right to live in Heaven after you die.
However, the many sects of Christianity are distinguished by a
multitude of differing opinions on even these most basic obligations.
The Seventh Day Adventists worship on Saturday; most "modern day"
churches have abandoned tithing as a requirement, holding it up as an
example for the most committed to follow; and there are many variations
on how one becomes entitled to go to Heaven after death.
If you choose any of the other
major religions, you are enslaving yourself to a different set of
beliefs, but you are no less a slave for so long as you seek to be a
believer. More and more religions are involving themselves in political
action, requiring their believers to slavishly vote or otherwise act to
enforce the will of those in control of the religion or mystical belief
system.15
But each religion is fundamentally based on Faith,16
and as we saw above, Faith is a discredited method for achieving
knowledge of the Truth. Only scientific method yields real knowledge of
the Truth, and there is no aspect of science which naturally requires a
person to go against his or her own will to slavishly support a group
joined only by Faith. The laws of science need no policemen. If someone
figures out a way to "break" the speed law defined by Einstein's Theory
of Relativity,17
that person will be a great hero for all mankind, not some sort of
cosmic "criminal." If we rely upon our "Faith" that the law cannot be
broken, we would persecute any who even try. But if we allow free
scientific inquiry to prevail, avoiding a slavish devotion to Faith,
then greatness may be achieved.
3 . Thus, "The Truth Shall Make You Free"
Where
this discussion has arrived is the conclusion that Faith is only useful
for filling in gaps in our knowledge which we cannot presently fill by
using scientific method. Once we have recognized that fundamental
Truth, the conclusion presents itself: "Faith" is simply another way of
saying "I don't know, but it seems to work."
Thus, if there is some answer
which scientific method cannot presently provide, the Truth is best
served by simply stating: "I don't know."18
If pressed, we might answer truthfully that, while science is presently
incapable of providing an answer to the particular question that is
bothersome, our knowledge is expanding every day at a truly prodigious
rate, and thus there is no reason to believe that we will not
eventually find out the Truth. In the meantime, we should not be overly
concerned about what lurks within these gaps in our knowledge.
Empirically, intelligent mankind has existed for many thousands of
years, and our predecessors for many millions of years, without the
answers to those particular questions, and thus we have no reason to
fear that which we presently do not know.
As Carl Sagan points out in
the last episode of his Cosmos television series, all that we have
discovered about our Universe to date shows that we live in a Universe
of strict cause and effect relationships. Things simply do not happen
for no good reason at all. There is no arbitrary and capricious force
acting anywhere in the known Universe. If we do not know the "Why?" of
some particular event, this is due to our lack of scientific knowledge,
ability, or inquiry on that subject. Thus, there are no true "acts of
God" in our Universe. No God causes earthquakes, fires, floods, and so
forth, and particularly, no God causes these things particularly to
bedevil some identifiable person or group of people.
Increasingly, people are
discovering how little difference there is between many so-called
"mainstream" religions, such as Christianity, and numerous so-called
"cults," including many nature worship religions, and even witchcraft.
All religions are the great enemies of science, and vice versa.
Religion teaches that events have supernatural causes and effects,
while science teaches that there are NO supernatural causes or effects. They cannot both be right; one of them MUST
be wrong. You must either believe that science reaches the results it
does due to delusions planted by the gods, and that those delusions
reconcile the results of science with the mystical beliefs of the
religions, or else you must believe that only science produces Truth,
and religions are filled with delusions. In other words, you must
choose to believe in either "Science" or "Faith." Even though many have
tried (and pretty much failed) over the ages, in the here-and-now, you
really cannot believe in both.
This is the true conflict in
our here and now: there is nothing which occurs in the affairs of
mankind which does not occur as a consequence of identifiable causes
and effects. Thus, there is no need for "Faith" to cause or prevent the
occurrence of any such event(s). We are therefore free to discard
"Faith" as a necessary component of our belief system.
Discarding Faith frees science
to pursue Truth. Discarding mystic thought frees mankind to develop
rational rules for life, based upon scientific principles, which will
allow mankind to live in peace for long periods of time.19
Discarding both frees mankind from preconceived thought patterns which
have no basis in Truth, and which thus enslave each of us to the ill
conceived notions of our predecessors.
Once we focus on using
scientific method to find Truth, discarding our religious prejudices as
part of the bargain, then mankind will be truly free, thus fulfilling
the alleged prophesy of Jesus: "you shall know the truth, and the truth
shall make you free."20
10 See: Benedict [Baruch] de Spinoza (1632-1677), Ethics, 1677, Part I, proposition, 15:note.
11 At least there is no convincing scientific evidence of any such returns. Reincarnation is a subject for a significant amount of controlled scientific study.
12 I would assert that any failures to produce useful results have been due to a failure to properly follow scientific method for a given end result, as opposed to a failure of scientific method itself.
13 The Roman Catholic Church oppressed many scientists for their science, including Galileo.
14 As our scientific capabilities expand, the need for Faith contracts. There is less and less of the unknowable which must be "filled in" by Faith alone. Evolution is a scientific fact.
15 I speak here not only of our own Christian Coalition, but also of the fundamentalist Islamic movements which press for Islamic law governments, and any other similar movements. The Orthodox Jews strongly influenced the 1996 election in Israel, and religious parties gained seats.
16 Even the word "Faith" is also the name of what it means to be a religion. A "religion" is a "Faith." Thus, the terms are nearly synonymous, at least in this context.
17 No object may be accelerated beyond the speed of light relative to any other object. This law is self enforcing because, as the relative speed of the object increases, so does the mass, and thus any given force which accelerates the object has less of an effect on the relative speed of the object. This occurs because speed is directly proportional to the accelerating force which is acting on the object, but inversely proportional to the mass of the object being accelerated.
18 For religious subjects, the name of this belief system is "agnosticism."
19 Most wars have some substantial origin in religious intolerance. Think of Bosnia, for example.
