How long would it take....

@Eva,

Quote:

I was really sorry to hear about all the pain your father caused you. Nobody should have to go through that at any age, much less at 3 or 4. (Want me to say a prayer that he'll pay for it? Evil or Very Mad )

I must admit, I was delighted when my father died (of old age, basically) 3 or 4 years ago.

My sister and I always swore we'd dance on his grave when he died; however, sis and I fell out some 15 yrs ago. She's still not speaking to me.

This is irrelevant, but sis and I have not spoken for these 15 yrs because, mostly, she owes me over $2,000.

I've finally, I'm happy to say, forgiven my Ma for her considerable faults (mostly failing to protect us from our father, way back when).

Three of her 5 children are dead, and she has no grandchildren; my one surviving sister has refused any contact with her for over 15 yrs now.

I feel certain she (Mom) expected many grandchildren, but she failed to take into account our upbringing. With 5 children, she has no grandchildren.

In my opinion, she has paid for her "sins."

At any rate, I now have a good, if removed, relationship with my mother.

My one remaining sister has been "gone" for these 15 yrs now; it's ironic to me that my mother now thinks very well of me, her only surviving child, when I was her least-favorite, growing up. I should have been a Boy, yet I was the 4th girl. At the time, this was Bad.

It's all pathetic, in my opinion. My sole virtue has been... survival.

At any rate, what does this have to do with this thread? Well I prayed as hard as any human being has, when I was a child, to save me from my own father. My prayers were neither heard nor answered.

When I went to "nursery school" (Catholic) when I was 3 yrs old and was told, "God is like your Father," I was horrified and frightened by this idea.

I suppose I never really got over that. No God ever answered my child's innocent prayers. He certainly never answered my later prayers, to keep me out of the Psych Ward and make me emotionally well.

As far as I can tell, it was only the (very expensive) 10 yrs of weekly therapy that made me well. "God" has been entirely absent in my life.

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@BorisKitten,

I'm hearing you, BK, as others are.

Back when I can rassle my wits.

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@BorisKitten,

Quote:

As far as I can tell, it was only the (very expensive) 10 yrs of weekly therapy that made me well. "God" has been entirely absent in my life.

You don't give yourself nearly enough credit, BK. It was your determination to survive, get well, that pulled you through .... with help from the medical profession. More power to you!
I am mightily impressed & completely understand your "position" on God in the circumstances you found yourself in.

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@chai2,

Quote:

but in my scenerio the survivors aren't ignorant savages.

This is what you wrote:

chai2 wrote:

hypothetical situation.

a catastrophy happens that leaves only small colonies of people alive on this planet. located at various areas of the world. basically all media/print/art are also destroyed.

I wrote of ignorant savages because i was speaking of one generation to intellectual melt-down and the rise of religion. No, the survivors aren't ignorant savages, but their children will be.

1 Reply

@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

Quote:
but in my scenerio the survivors aren't ignorant savages.

This is what you wrote:

chai2 wrote:
hypothetical situation.

a catastrophy happens that leaves only small colonies of people alive on this planet. located at various areas of the world. basically all media/print/art are also destroyed.

I wrote of ignorant savages because i was speaking of one generation to intellectual melt-down and the rise of religion. No, the survivors aren't ignorant savages, but their children will be.

I basically agree with Setanta. Will these small colonies have the resources to pass on scientific knowledge to their children (since media/print/art has been destroyed)? If not, it will be easy for the next generation to believe that gods are responsible for most occurences.

1 Reply

@wandeljw,

I agree also.

I think that the first generation would try so hard to preserve Knowledge and Science that they would take on religious connotations in a couple of generations at most. <Paging Hari Seldon ...>

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@msolga,

msolga wrote:

Quote:
As far as I can tell, it was only the (very expensive) 10 yrs of weekly therapy that made me well. "God" has been entirely absent in my life.

You don't give yourself nearly enough credit, BK. It was your determination to survive, get well, that pulled you through .... with help from the medical profession. More power to you!
I am mightily impressed & completely understand your "position" on God in the circumstances you found yourself in.

Sorry it's taken me awhile to get back online.

Frankly, I am very glad to hear your father is gone, BorisKitten. It never ceases to amaze me how much hell abusers can put people through. They can do so much damage in such a small amount of time, and it takes years or lifetimes to deal with. I'm glad he's no longer capable of inflicting more pain on you or anyone else.

I've dealt with abuse, too, although it was different from yours. And I remember praying as long and hard as humanly possible for a miraculous rescue, too. Who wouldn't! But it didn't happen for me, either...at least, not in the time or the way I hoped for. Looking back now, I realize it did happen for me, though. The people and the circumstances I needed for recovery did appear later at a time when I could handle them.

I think we're both lucky we survived and deserve a lot of credit for our recoveries. But in my case, I can look back and see that resources amazingly appeared at the right time to enable that recovery.

BTW, a lot of believers have a problem with referring to God as "Father," because let's face it, there are a lot of bad fathers out there. In fact, some churches have minimized if not eliminated those old patriarchal cultural references because of reactions just like you described. It probably made a lot of sense to describe God that way thousands of years ago...not so much today when a good percentage of children don't even have a father figure in their lives to relate it to, much less a good example. To me, God doesn't have a gender at all.

But I certainly understand your rejection of God and religion. Especially considering what you've been through. I'm so glad you made it through!!!

1 Reply

@Eva,

Hello Dear Eva, I never would have guessed you, too suffered from such things. You seem so very well-adjusted to me.

I'm very glad to hear at least some churches are getting rid of this "God as Father" idea. Had they NOT stressed this so much when I was a child, I might have (who knows?) eventually become a believer.

But in my case I went to Catholic School for many years, and was frequently and severely punished (by nuns) for my complete lack of belief. I really hope Catholic Schools are kinder now, 40 years later.

Unlike others, I never did come to believe in any sort of Higher Power. Later helpful situations only seemed to come about when I (frantically) sought them out, and paid rather a lot of money for them (years of therapy).

Maybe that's why I think Chai2's theoretical world might not, ever, develop religion... because I did not.

And maybe I'm just more inclined to think humans can be morally correct creatures with no religion at all, like my husband and myself.

I'm still frequently horrified to find myself much kinder, more honest, more generous, and more "morally upright" than many US Christians.

Maybe I've just been unfortunate to meet the worst of US Christians; I rather hope so, actually.

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@msolga,

Quote:

You don't give yourself nearly enough credit, BK. It was your determination to survive, get well, that pulled you through .... with help from the medical profession. More power to you!
I am mightily impressed & completely understand your "position" on God in the circumstances you found yourself in.

I see I accidentally missed replying to your post, msolga!

Here in the US, I have found others much more tolerant of my Atheist position than they were 20 or even 10 years ago.

Mostly, however, I stay out of any conversation regarding religion of any sort. I just don't go there.

It's odd for me to reply to a post like this, but I certainly noticed that I'm just about the only person who has a different view. May as well state that view, eh?

Thank you, msolga, for your supportive comments.

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@BorisKitten,

Quote:

But in my case I went to Catholic School for many years, and was frequently and severely punished (by nuns) for my complete lack of belief.

Most sensible people would have believed to avoid severe punishment. One can always secretly lack belief. Why did you express your unbelief when you were going to be severely punished? Had you been goading the nuns. You were punished for persistently expressing your unbelief and not for your having unbelief.

The nuns might have said that their school was a female version of Full Metal Jacket intended to prepare young ladies for the vicissitudes of life. One could look at the biographies of their students and compare them to biographies of similar students of other schools. A nice sociology project.

1 Reply

@spendius,

<Laughing>... You're absolutely correct, Spendius! A smarter person would have lied when asked belief-questions.

My only excuse is that I was very young. I started Pre-Kindergarten when I was 3.

Unfortunately I attended this same Catholic School through the 3rd grade (this was a small school in a small town).

The nuns apparently spoke with one another about what an evil unbeliever I was. I recall one new nun-teacher saying, on the first day of my new school year "Oh, I've HEARD about you."

When I started 4th grade we moved out-of-state and I was placed in public schools.

I still remember how very surprised I was to find that, not only was I exceedingly well-behaved and polite (for public school), I was actually an excellent student.

What a complete reversal public school was for me! The School Superintendent singled me out as an example of an excellent student.

Of course I was very confused by it all at the time!

And heck, no, I never goaded any nuns. I was FAR to frightened of them. Those big black habits, the rulers, the paddles... yikes!

In retrospect, those nuns seemed to be very angry, even hateful people.

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@BorisKitten,

BorisKitten wrote:

Hello Dear Eva, I never would have guessed you, too suffered from such things. You seem so very well-adjusted to me....

Would you mind if I print this out and show it to my husband?!

Seriously, what sanity I have is hard won. One of the great equalizers of middle age is that by the midpoint of our lives, MOST of us have been through some variation of hell. For those of us who went through ours at younger ages than most, it's quite a relief to know we finally have company.

Quote:

But in my case I went to Catholic School for many years, and was frequently and severely punished (by nuns) for my complete lack of belief. I really hope Catholic Schools are kinder now, 40 years later....

They have to be. Most of them in my part of the U.S. (Oklahoma/Texas) admit 30-40% non-Catholic students. And corporal punishment is no longer in vogue.

Quote:

Maybe that's why I think Chai2's theoretical world might not, ever, develop religion... because I did not....

You have a point. But I still think they would. Religion is a basic trait of human civilization. There are countless variations, of course, but all societies develop belief systems to try to make sense of the world and their place in it.

Quote:

...And maybe I'm just more inclined to think humans can be morally correct creatures with no religion at all, like my husband and myself.

I'm still frequently horrified to find myself much kinder, more honest, more generous, and more "morally upright" than many US Christians.

Maybe I've just been unfortunate to meet the worst of US Christians; I rather hope so, actually.

You'll get no argument from me there! Of course there are millions of good people who aren't religious at all. My father was one. And religious people are often their own (and others') worst enemies. Sometimes I console myself by thinking how much worse some of them might be if they WEREN'T in church! I've been disillusioned many times, and I have to remind myself that, after all, my faith isn't in the people.

To be perfectly fair though, I have also known some wonderful people who have been very good to me, even when they didn't know me. They are still out there, so try not to give up on all of us, okay?

1 Reply

@Eva,

SO much good news in one post, Eva.

Feel free to spread my post/words anywhere you think they might be helpful...

Extending this invitation to others as well. I Think we need all the Good we can spread, right now.

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Yes, we do!

Thanks for this conversation, BK. It's really nice to be able to just talk about these things without feeling attacked by people who disagree with me. What a relief!

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@Eva,

what? I'm i've missed an opportunity to disagree with Eva. damn!!!!!

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This thread has too many replies for me to read and consider them all. Sorry. I have read a few pages, and everybody seems thoughtful and in touch. My feeling is, it would not take long for some form of religious thought to emerge. I have always leaned to Jung's notion that human instinct still exists and that it expresses itself in the form of myths. In this scenario, the churches grab onto the myths and label them as their own. It takes very little for people to see things in a mystic or religious way. The religions that get built are like anything else in life; they have potential for bad or good, depending on the minds involved. Some of the best folks I ever knew have been deeply religious. Some of the biggest crooks have been, too. I am tolerant of everybody, so long as their actions are honorable.

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@dyslexia,

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@edgarblythe,

edgarblythe wrote:

...I am tolerant of everybody, so long as their actions are honorable.

<nods> Tolerance is a good thing.

If there's one thing I simply cannot tolerate, it's intolerant people. Cool

1 Reply

@chai2,

Evolution has programmed our brains to favor superstition, so I don't think it would take long at all.

http://mindfulhack.blogspot.com/2008/09/evolutionary-psychology.html

Quote:

Foster and a University of Helsinki colleague Hanna Kokko sought to model superstition in mathematical language, using a definition that could apply to animals and bacteria as well as humans, and found that "As long as the cost of believing a superstition is less than the cost of missing a real association, superstitious beliefs will be favoured."

The problem is that the quality described in the New Scientist article as "superstition" is more commonly called "prudence" (= avoiding foreseeable risks).

...

Some very interesting details in the article, if you're into that kind of stuff.

1 Reply

@Eva,

Eva wrote:

edgarblythe wrote:
...I am tolerant of everybody, so long as their actions are honorable.

<nods> Tolerance is a good thing.

If there's one thing I simply cannot tolerate, it's intolerant people.

yeah I really hate bigots. (please note irony)

0 Replies

How long would it take....

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