Re: Dawkins on the purpose of evolution & life...
Why the need for a God?
My answer to this is as follows. God exists as space filler. And the space I'm referring to is the "gap" in our current knowledge and understanding about our environment and how it operates.
Curiosity is a trait in humans selected for naturally. Those humans, or human ancestors, that were curious enough to explore and wander and become geographically isolated from the rest of the complacent and non-curious social group from which they came had an increased probability of surviving catastrophes that would typically wipe out the entire group. I hope this is making sense. Being curious and wondering about how things work or why they don't work is of benefit to the human organism for a zillion reasons. This trait has been passed down genetically and is now a defining difference between humans and the "lower" animals. We're explorers and wanderers and wonderers.
But this curiosity can also cause us a great deal of frustration. Some questions aren't so simple to answer, despite the burning curiosity and quest for understanding we may possess. Our desire to know matched with the fact that we don't know leaves a vacuum or gap that is demanding to be filled. It actually hurts our heads not to understand.
I'm hoping this analogy is making sense. This is how I view the whole God subject. Our brains or better yet "minds" are like a semi-permeable membrane. If the pressure on the outside of our heads is greater than the pressure on the inside something is going to pass through the membrane and enter the area of lower pressure. The vacuum MUST be filled as per the laws of physics.
Educated minds have less of a vacuum, or a higher pressure, as they understand life and how it operates, to some extent, and are less prone to have unwanted information pushing its way into their weak or gullible brains. Ignorant people have a big empty head
(that sounds so mean) so the pressure is too great and eventually that vacuum will be filled by an implosion of nonsense information. The end result is the ignorant person suddenly feels the pressure in their mind lighten up as it reaches equilibrium with the outside of the head. The naturally selected for desire to know and understand has been quenched, even though it was quenched with bunk, so the pain of not knowing is alleviated and they can go about their lives in peace and relative bliss.
The intelligent person or critical thinker has far less of a vacuum (more knowledge) AND a stronger cell membrane (critical thinking skills and intelligence) so their minds are guarded against an inflow of space filler and nonsense information. They are able to sit tight even when NOT knowing the answers to certain questions. They recognize their own ignorance and their own naturally selected for curiosity, but refuse to be duped into allowing garbage to pass from the region of high pressure (societal influences and ignorant superstitious irrational non-answers) to the region of low pressure (the areas in their brains where unanswered questions reside). They allow unanswered questions to sit there awaiting processing and eventual answers. The ignorant person who allowed garbage to flow into their head stops being as curious, stops wandering and stops wondering.
Just think...it is 1:00 pm and I'm 100% sober. I cannot believe I just typed what I typed, but I do think it is a fairly valid analogy.
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