Can we have a scientific talk about the origin of religion please!

According to darwin, all humans were once monkeys/apes. Personally, I don't buy that, not one bit. Also taking into consideration how we "came from Africa", there is not much to do beside connecting the dots.

1. The first people believed in religion and gods, and people just kept teaching each other down the generation. As people evolved from monkey or animals, they traveled across the continents, keeping faith.

2. People existed and lived in Africa long before the continents split. People/our ancestors feared the splitting, and eventually spread. Some who went east, west, north and south. Eventually when the continents parted ways, people stayed there, and faith was passed down generations.

3. Scientifically speaking, humans out of desperation create a figure in which they put their faith, which results in calmness. The brain creates this figure automatically when emotion such as desperation, fear or last hope.

4. Unscientifically speaking, aliens came to each of the continents and were flashy and whatnot, and people believed in them.

5. God created humans to worship him.

You can choose one of the five, but not one of them is 100%, as the past is history, and history has been rewritten hundreds, if not ten thousands of times.

if you're after origins, you won't find that. History has been rewritten thousands of times.

When USA launched a war against Iraq they destroyed Iraq's Sumerian history research constitution, and looted all tablets, even the administrative tablets.

Why? Is it because in Iraq researchers finally figured how to translate as well as found some historic tablets?

You'll never find what you're looking for, and if you do, trust me it's not the truth. Go back to the past then

i read a lots about babylonion religion recently and thats why i started this thread. i already know a lot about it but i needed some unbiased input to get a objective opinion about it. that's why i want Veeky Forumss opinion.

thanks for the hint about hinduism religion, i will get into that next. sounds interesting.

the question i really wanted answered is how could ancient religions be so advanced about certain things (maryan calendar/ stonehendge)? they knowed more things about astrology and math then people 2000 years later. the maryan calender is still more accurate then our gregorian calender today. why?

i'm really interested in the babylonions since they where the first advanced kingdom we know about. the first written language, the first laws, the first kingdomship, the first religion etc.
the babylonians were the first at almost everything and i want to know what gave them the knowledge to be so advanced at the time.

i agree with you since we have proof that even the bible was rewritten many times in some parts. and i agree that i will never find the origins of religion since then the people didn't even had a shared written language.

but this doesn't stop me from searching for the truth!

meh do what you want.

btw sounds like you could make a good archaeologist c:

in essence, what we know today as religion is the science of the times before science was a thing.

religions usually have an exoteric doctrine for the masses and an esoteric one resorted for the initiates who use it to stratify the social order in a way they see fit.

on the exoteric level religions are made to enchant people into a certain state of mind and value system that works to the benefit of the ones implementing it. in ancient times when humans were less advanced religion was critical in getting people to do things en masse in order to develop civilizations and increase human prosperity.

on the esoteric level religions were closely bound with the heavenly bodies and the patterns involved in the passage of time. the appearance of certain stars, planets, phases of the moon, marked certain phenomena that occurred in nature. think of the seasons, flooding of rivers, climate patterns, migration patterns, agriculture. many festivals within cultures either marked these natural events or ascribed historical events to certain stars or constellations to commemorate them. the priestly orders were composed of stargazers and astrologers who studied the stars and facilitated shrouded stories for the masses to identify with and venerate. this is how cultures were able to maintain group identities and work cooperatively long-term in large numbers.

think of the origins of the ways we keep time in the west today. why are there 7 days in a week? 30 days in a month? 12 months in a year? 360 degrees in a circle? these measures are tied to the science of the ancients. there's a reason why the sumerian numbering system was a sexagesimal one. 7 is important because there are 7 moving bodies that were visible. 30 is rounded from the number of days it takes to complete a full lunar cycle. 12 because there are roughly 12 lunar cycles in a year. etc. etc.

>People observed miracles
>People speculated and conjectured on who caused them
>???
>Religion

begone thou lousy me-me

>I think polytheism has greater potential for developing science and research because it offers a way of thinking different

What the fuck are you going on about? That's like saying council rule is better for science than a single leader. It's irrelevant as they aren't the ones doing the science.

>or allowing contrary points of view. monotheism just explains everything from within itself and leaves no rooms for questioning what is beyond the common explanation. . monotheism does not facilitate dialogue as much as polytheism.

Have you ever studied religion at all? There's tons of debate and questioning that goes on inside monotheistic religions and by those that study them. If anything it's polytheism that stifles debate. If you don't like how God A is described, make up a God B that's the way you like it. There's no right or wrong answer or anything to debate, everyone has their own personal God just to their own liking. Monotheism removes this and forces everyone to come to an agreement in a logically constant manner stirring up reasoned debate.

I wasn't meming. That's obviously how all religions (that aren't based on another religion) started in early humanity.

>if not outright plagiarised like the book of Genesis which is nearly a word for word copy of a much older Babylonian story.

Don't speak out of your ass. There's similarities but the epic of Gilgamesh and other stories are not "word for word copy" of Genesis. You can go down to any library and read them yourself. One could even argue that you can't fully understand Genesis unless you do so otherwise you won't be able to pick up the places where they are using similar stories to emphasize difference between the early Hebrew's world view and their neighbors.

>Honestly there's nothing interesting in the desert religions

Seeing the impact they have had on human history, I would strongly disagree. Didn't anyone ever tell you that you have to check your emotional baggage at the door before you start studying something or it's going to cloud your judgement. Don't project whatever shit you went through in childhood on all near east religions. It's childish.

>and history has been rewritten hundreds, if not ten thousands of times.

So what you're saying is all of history is bullshit? Like the holocaust never happened? And white people never invented math and science or anything for that matter but stole it from blacks?

Wow, I can just say history has been rewritten and justify anything man! You can't know nuffin!

I want to look at why OP is such a faggot from a scientific perspective.

>in essence, what we know today as religion is the science of the times before science was a thing.

No, this is just a modern strawman. Metaphysics has never been a substitute for physics.

>in essence, what we know today as magic is the science of the times before science was a thing.

ftfy

>I'm really interested in the babylonions since they where the first advanced kingdom we know about. The first written language, the first [recorded] laws, the first [recorded] kingdomship, the first [recorded] religion etc.

Careful with your words mate.

Some people were scared. They drew together for comfort. One of them said, "Maybe someone will save us." Another asked, "But, who?" The first replied, desperately, "Who knows? Some powerful invisible almighty person. Let's just hope."

A third person chimes in craftily, "Yes, it's true! I know of this invisible person. He speaks to me. He says he will save you if you worship him and obey all his commands."

"But how will we know what his commands are?"

"Don't worry, I'll tell you... Ahh, he wants you to build him a house and bring him valuables. I'll live there with him as his servant and spokesman, and write his book of rules you must all follow. Then you'll be safe, and never die, and be happy forever."

Thus belongs to Veeky Forums by but I'll answer.
It was either aliens or people that made up some shit to explain stuff like the origin of the universe etc.
Theres a big difference between pagans and monotheistic religions though.
And that's basically what makes catholicism (maybe an exception could be made for Eastern orthidoxy) a true religion, inspired by the love of God and not some deities that could be mad with us just because we didn't sacrifice x amount of people. Reason why the Portuguese and Spanish were able to evangelise south America and Africa fast as fuck.
But this really doesnt belong here.

>believing in the holocaust
Good goy... I mean good boy.

Back to /pol/, Tardo.

>browses Veeky Forums
>expected any other answer
Back to r/antifa faggot

>Metaphysics has never been a substitute for physics.

Taoism described calculus 1600 years before it was formalized mathematically. In Taoist phenomenology there are two basic modes of consciousness, Being and Doing. The Being mode of consciousness is "being in the present moment," which mindfulness meditation cultivates. In this mode past and future are not experienced, only a singular ever-present moment and instantaneous change in that moment. The Doing mode of consciousness is the mode of thinking, planning, anticipating, and remembering, instead of a singular moment there are a plurality of moments, with the linear dimension of time being cumulative change of instantaneous moments.

The fundamental theorem of calculus describes our phenomenological experience as these two different reference frames of moment and change, and this is the essence of yin and yang with all superstition removed. In the yang Being mode the self is not experienced, which is why in Eastern religions the ego is considered an illusion. Meanwhile in Western philosophy which emphacizes the doing mode, the self is often considered the most real of all experienced (I think, therefore I am.) This also corresponds to presentist and eternalist philosophies of time, and also analogical thinking (simultaneous parallel relationships between structure) and logical thinking (serial cumulative consequence.) Here's a description of the basics of Taoist philosophy:

>>The term Dao means a road, and is often translated as “the Way.” This is because sometimes dao is used as a nominative (that is, “the dao”) and other times as a verb (i.e. daoing). Dao is the process of reality itself, the way things come together, while still transforming. All this reflects the deep seated Chinese belief that change is the most basic character of things. In the Yi jing (Classic of Change) the patterns of this change are symbolized by figures standing for 64 relations of correlative forces and known as the hexagrams. Dao is the alteration of these forces, most often simply stated as yin and yang. The Xici is a commentary on the Yi jing formed in about the same period as the DDJ. It takes the taiji (Great Ultimate) as the source of correlative change and associates it with the dao. The contrast is not between what things are or that something is or is not, but between chaos (hundun) and the way reality is ordering (de). Yet, reality is not ordering into one unified whole. It is the 10,000 things (wanwu). There is the dao but not “the World” or “the cosmos” in a Western sense.

Coming together (cumulative change) and still transforming (instantaneous change.) Change is the most basic character of things (Calculus, the study of change, would naturally describe the most basic nature of phenomenological experience.) The taiji is the fundamental theorem of calculus, which shows formally that instantaneous and cumulative change are inverses of each other, correlatives of the same nature of change.

This provides a potential framework where metaphysics, physical science, and phenomenological experience can all be unified via the association of the already rigorously formalized concepts of calculus. The future of science and philosophy is a unification of generally Eastern and Western schools of thought as a scientific Taoism grounded in phenomenological experience and utilizing Western analytical technology.

That kind of shit is just grasping at straws to insinuate that there is some sort of connection.

You could get 100 people to sit in a circle and smoke some weed then talk about the origins of life.
Say one person just comes up with an idea and 2000 years later we somehow find the meaning of life to be true.

Some asshat like you in 2000 years is going to go "hey these guys used to sit around smoking weed and tapped into some divine knowledge when the reality is someone just got high and guessed right.

The problem here is your trying to insinuate that Taoism had some sort of inspiration or that the developers knew something special.

They just made a guess that ended up coinciding to some extent to a truth about the world. Don't be a dumbass.

>That kind of shit is just grasping at straws to insinuate that there is some sort of connection.

The connection is right there, clear as anything. This gives no support to any supernatural claims, in fact it takes the superstition out of Taoism. Taoist philosophy isn't based on divine revelation as in Christianity, but examination of perception. The inspiration came from examining phenomenological experience, much like Descartes and the early European Enlightenment philosophers did, but came to very different conclusions based on what aspect of phenomenological experience was dominant in their world view. The point is that Taoist phenomenology is the most promising potential avenue to unify metaphysics and physics.

The closest answer I know of is Julian Jaynes' theory of the breakdown of the bicameral mind. It is well researched but rather controversial.