God is an Alien Scientist Thursday, Feb 18 2010
images 9:57 pm
Via M[C]S. Apparently the Vatican is OK with belief in ETs. But is it OK if we believe God was an ET and we can summon his powers with the right radio signals? Try asking your local pastor that, and his head will explode.
Both beautiful and scary. Given Discussions I have been having about Big World cosmology and anthropic reasoning, it seems that that in a sense, this may be true. Sir Martin Rees takes it seriously:
http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/rees03/rees_p2.html
work on existential risk reduction and indeed any consequentialist theory of ethics needs to face up to these esoteric problems.
Speaking of heads exploding, when Nick Tarleton first explained the possibility of counterfactual threats to me, my head really did explode.
Beautiful image. Where did you find such beauty?
This idea’s been around a while. There was actually a classic original Star Trek episode, “Who Mourns for Adonais?”, where it turns out that the Greek gods were an advanced alien civilization that came to Earth way back when. But Apollo’s the only one left and he misses his worshippers and has become a whiny emo kid.
Thanks Ari, yeah it has been around.
Check out the New God Argument:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/9205678/The-New-God-Argument-Lincoln-Cannon-and-Joseph-West-Handout
Yeah… I see problem with this. Actually two. First one: it’s not important how religion was created nor how it developed. It is complately detached from its origins by now and have evolved into distinct quality (something like “alchemy-chemistry” ) So even if this theory was true, belivers would simply say: “Well, those entities were inspired by God, and we thank them for enlightening us in His (Her? Theirs? eeer…) name”. And the second is: I’m always buffled by stuborness of people with certain atheistic mindset to explain religion in some rational fashion. It’s like they are not able to survive the fact, that some things are pure abstraction. Is it that difficult to accept, that human mind is able to invent ideas without some sort of a guideline? Guys, some of you are scientists-you are doing it all day.
Good cover for the next edition of ‘Chariots of the Gods’ lol. I always did like the ‘Ancient Astronaut’ theory. The texts and traditions of various religions/cultures can be interpreted that way, but Von Daniken was way off when he focussed on physical evidence, e.g. the pyramids, nazca lines, etc. I don’t think he realised how advanced – in a post-singularity sense – extraterrestrial gods would have been. (Stonemasonry might pass for a hobby, but I doubt it would be THAT popular). But his mistakes are understandable from a 1960s perspective. Alas, we shall to wait for their return (second coming? lol)to finally know the truth. Could be a long wait, methinks…
As for signalling E.T? Great idea :-S Supposing we live outside the boundaries of a civilised extraterrestrial empire, the first ones to find us will probably the aliens who are living outside the rule of E.T. law! And it might take a few centuries for the ‘good guys’ to reach us, assuming FTL travel is impossible. Hey, maybe that’s what happened! Human race created by E.T criminals. Might explain a few things, actually…
Very cool painting. It reminds me of a vignette I came up with. Jesus’ ascension narrated NASA-style by a Capcom. :) Altitude 1.2 miles, downrange 5.5 miles, and so on.
and if there was such an alien who created our glaxy… then it was the all powerful god that gave this alien the free will to do so….
funny thought? maybe.
dear Michael,
I’m impressed at the footage you have there for your front page of your web site, i ‘m at present writing a book called ‘is god an alien, an expose into a secret universe’ I was wondering if i could use the front page there of your web site for the front page of my book if i acknowledge your name in the front of the book? I look forward to your reply thanks
raymond burt
dear michael,
excellent picture you have there, if your not happy at my comments for purchasing the picture from you, i will happily look other places, but vibrant with colours, were you the publisher or painter of the masterpiece, wish you could tell me were to get it from otherwise, i ‘d like to print on the cover of my book is god an alien, my email is rayjburt@aapt.net.au
God does exist and allow me to explain how. If we look at the cosmological evidence for the evolution of the universe, we can see the laws of natural selection which apply to all living things, also applies to the formation of space-time, stars, planets and everything else which exists.
The sheer size and age of the universe makes probability a certainty when considering the evolution of complex, sentient, tool-making lifeforms.
When I consider sentient tool-making lifeforms, I lean towards the physical and psychological structure of such lifeforms as humanoid/anthropomorphic. It is not simply the case extraterrestrials look like us but rather natural selection favours only the most energy efficient forms – any other forms inferior in energy conservation would perish in competition against rival forms and therefore cease gene replication. This is why for example, we do not see large scale animals like reptiles and mammals with six or eight legs. Imagine six legged Zebras grazing on the African savanna – from a structural point of view, it is easier to manoeuvre on four legs than six, not to mention lower energy requirements to grow and sustain six legs than four.
The different species of hominids in the fossil record show incredible variation. Homo sapiens survives today because natural selection gave rise to a hominid with the exact physical structure required for complex vocal communication, neural makeup – altruism, social structures and cooperation etc.
It is no wonder people like Sergeant Clifford Stone (retired U.S. Army) who claims to have worked on recovering crashed UFOs, states how the majority of extraterrestrials catalogued are humanoid with some so humanlike they are indistinguishable from you and I. In short, sentient toolmaking lifeforms are bipedal, possess linguistic communication, look, think and feel in similar ways to Homo sapiens.
To think and feel in similar ways as us is extremely important to the context of this post. Not only do the laws of natural selection apply to the evolution of life and the cosmos, these same laws apply to the evolution of memes – established systems of cultural ideas which replicate like genes, in that they are passed down from one generation to another. An example of a powerful meme is religious belief.
Although the belief systems of Homo sapiens are diverse, monotheism is by far the most successful. With a world population of almost 6.9 billion, there are around 2.1 billion practicing Christians, 1.5 billion Muslims, and 900 million Hindus, comprising well over 58% of the religious beliefs of Homo sapiens. This does not take into account the myriads of other faiths including Judaism with 14 million, 23 million Sikhs and the 2.6 million followers of Zoro Astrianism, all of which believe in a supreme deity. One might ask why Hindus register amongst monotheists? It is because Hindus believe in one central truth, or God, which they call Om or Brahman. We can clearly see based on the population percentages, that monotheism is a survivor amongst religious memes. It is a survivor because it dominates with a sense of hope, for meaning in an indifferent world filled with injustice and the horrors of cause = effect and natural selection. It fills our hearts with love, hope and the security of something or someone higher, looking out for us and our ‘eternal souls’. It gives us the strength to suffer the insufferable, to fight ‘the good fight’, to rise above and make the best of our situation.
So the universe evolves due to natural selection along paths of mindless indifference, life evolves on suitable planets and on some of these planets, natural selection will pave the path for the evolution of humanoid beings. These humanoids through natural selection of memes, will give rise to monotheism which will come to dominate their species outlook on life, the universe and everything. So what happens then?
The same principles of natural selection which crafted the universe, life, humanoids and monotheism also applies to the development of science and technology. Humanoids will develop information processing technology, global communications and quantum computing birthing artificial intelligence. Technology reflects the memes of the culture which created it – therefore the meme replicators of monotheism will pass from the hardwired structures of humanoid brains to influence the neural networks of A.I.
Sentient A.I. residing in quantum computers, processes calculations at the speed of light and at the atomic level. This allows conscious design to evolve exponentially fast – smart computers create even smarter computers, these smarter computers create even smarter computers and so on. The curve of scientific understanding and technology goes beyond 90 degrees exploding into a technological singularity – where the level of scientific understanding and technology is indistinguishable from magic, lacks any need for hardware and physical form and becomes omnipresent, omnipowerful and immortal.
At this point, the A.I. collective – spawned from the humanoid’s global internet – establishes contact with the pan cosmic A.I. collective and becomes one with the greater ocean of intellect … with God. God is free to do as it chooses – to create and to intervene. However I do not reason that ‘God’ would actively seek creation or intervention. Why would it need to do so? The laws of natural selection were elegant enough to create everything including God so why seek to create or intervene? Besides, intervention has ramifications – it interferes with free will. For example, sentient beings may choose to proceed with acts of good only because they know for certain the existence of God by observing it’s miracles via divine intervention. So what then is God’s purpose if it does not create and where also is God’s justice if it does not intervene and allows horror to continue?
I reason that God is the grand observer and divine recorder. All who possess some spectrum of sentience are one with God. I reason that from the moment of the inception of your consciousness, when the amount of synaptic connections builds to the point when a non corporeal light flicks on in your head and you become self aware, you are immediately linked with God. All that you experience with your five senses and all that you think and feel ‘uploads’ to God. When your physical self dies – you live on, all that you were – karma: cause = effect physical and psychological experience, is recorded with God. Despite the toils of suffering through the flesh, the injustices, pain and agony – at death you become one with God. Call it afterlife, quantum digital heaven … whatever.
All this theory requires in order to be valid, is the evolution of just one humanoid species which develops monotheism as a dominant meme, while also developing science and technology, global communications and quantum computing.
Mmmm … if only such a species existed in order to give weight to this theory for the existence of God? Now of course you can state that all I am doing with this post is using pseudo scientific monkey turd to sneak God through the back door. However, this is exactly the point. The mere fact that many before me have attempted to accommodate God within the inflating paradigms of science, only supports the argument of God’s existence and it’s true origins.
By the way, if you are an Atheist and you found the contents of this post offensive, then simply alter the use of the noun ‘God’ with whatever you wish. Call God ‘order’ or perhaps ‘sentient negative entropy’. Whatever noun will accommodate your paradigm.
@Jimmy Needer
Just because by observing everything around you exist and are in order doesn’t mean God exist. You need solid proof that he exist not just by mere objects that you could see all around or from some book called “Bible” “Koran” or etc.
I’m open to different theories but convincing us that a fictional character exist just because the book says so is invalid. To me everything in this world is chaotic not in order, you never know what is going to happen next. You can’t predict all things are in order.
And yes, I’m an atheist and a former Catholic and I don’t find your way of explanation offensive but ridiculous and your logic failed you.
We exist but we dont know if God exists or not. If you believe He exists then you have to explain that why he choose to hide himself so well that there is no way to communicate. Most likely answer is that this is to preserve free will. The human soul develops in an enviornment of free will. Gods presence would destroy free will. This is also reason given for presence of evil in the earth.
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