Sapiens, gods and God
I read three books in the last month (a long international flight with jet lag helped). It was a random selection but the succession of books was quite interesting reflecting back. Sapiens is about "our" history, a history of 200,000 years. History of God ("Evolution of God") is only 10,000 years old and "Looking for God" is relevant today - it is a search for a path for all of us to find on our own.
(You have to read the books and reflect yourself.)
As young adult, Carl Sagan's "Cosmos" book and TV serial was an eye opener. I still remember Sagan showing a calendar where if Big Bang happened on Jan 1, history of sapiens only represent the last 8 minutes and civilization has existed only in the last minute. It gives us a prospective of our relatively small history, a dust in the cosmic scale.
Homo Sapiens evolved in Africa around 200,000 years ago. The first migration happened around 100,000 years ago followed by the second wave of 70,000 and the last one around 50,000 years ago. In each of these migration steps, sapiens expanded from the Persian Crescent to Asia, Australia and finally to Americas and in the process rest of "Homo" species became extinct. Even Neanderthals who were considered stronger also lost to Homo Sapiens". Now, we the "Sapiens" are the lone survivor in this blue planet. Our future depend upon us.
The "Sapiens" book talk about three major revolutions which were of transformational; the cognitive revolution (~ 70,000 to 30,000 years ago), the agriculture revolution (~12,000 years ago) and finally the scientific revolution (~500 years ago). Our "brain" is the biggest asset (both good and bad). The cognitive evolution of our brain made the sapiens the winner developing skills for language, discovering fire and even learning to gossip - speak about fiction ... an important cognitive development (but we have taken that too far in modern times with social media). The Sapiens were living in small groups (less than 150) with most of their daily activity was around gathering foods until the next breakthrough came with Agricultural revolution. Now people settled in villages, discovered crops and were able to store grains for future. The ability to create fiction was a key developmental activity which led to group of people cooperating in believing a myth and this led evolution of imagined reality like gods or state (or corporation in modern day context). Slowly the small groups evolved into larger groups to an ordered civilization. The order started with economic goal and slowly to imperialism (kings) settled in. The first empire was Akkaadian Empire (2250 BC).
The history of gods and God is only less than 10,000 years old. "god" evolved as solution to a problems (sky god, fire god, fertility god) - note the small "g". Each tribe, vocation started with their own "god" and from there polytheistic religion started. The "Evolution of God" book starts to look at deeper the evolution of "god" - which started as a functional and how "God" came into picture. As civilization became bigger, it became apparent the need for one main "god" (most important one) and it was what the chief /king decided - the Egyptian civilization has followed that path. In that process, the kings used the imperial power in declaring themselves as "son of god" ("son of Ra - the sun god"). Also, the "god" the battle/war winner become the new main "god". This process continued in the Mesopotamia and Sumerian until one of the tribe became the winner and it developed into of "Abrahamic religion". The book only focuses on Abhrahamic religion and has few sprinkle references about Hinduism, Buddhism and other religions. Now three religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) had the same God - one universal God. Suddenly from a polytheistic society starts to move to a monotheistic and this was a huge transformation. But the problem was that each believe their version of "God" is the ultimate truth (or their scripture has the ultimate word of God) and this has led to wars for the last 2000 years and still continuing ... (what a pity!). During this process, one important development happened, "morality and spiritual truth" were ingrained to the religion, it was not the case in the prehistoric days. In any case, my goal is not to write summary of book .. I find it fascinating how "god/God" - a concept evolved over the last 5000+ years and why and how we have chained ourselves to "religion" and fighting over it.
The last book "Looking for God" was exactly what it starts with - a search. After the author lost his only daughter in a car accident, the author goes on a search to get answers few questions on God. Note the searcher decides to focus on Abrahamic religion because he is catholic and it was one way to narrow the search. However, the questions are relevant for any religion.
"If God is one God of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, whose side is he on?" Why do most religions believe they are right and others wrong ...
"Which of the thousands of scriptures are correct?"
"Why there are inconsistencies between religion .. "
"Does God exist within the creative mind of human beings?"
"Why were there so many philosophies and paths to enlightenment"
....
In the end one of the priest asks .. " .. for all we know, we may not have recognized the God if He has appeared to us". This led to the author thinking about the stranger who helped him during the auto accident - "Was he God?". In most places, the priests/Rabbi/... told the author that God exists because "It is written" in the scriptures and Faith (not "blind faith") is the path which helps them.
It has been a fascinating reading for me .. you have to read the books and make your own discovery. "If there is no God, it does not matter which path you take" or the corollary can be "Does it matter which path you take" ... Find your own path and reaching "God or a higher spiritual level" is a personal journey.
As a final thought, we "Sapiens" have lived only for a small time and in that time we have destroyed the balance of nature ... what nature used to take thousands of years to adapt now does not have that luxury. In 1700, the population was 250 million and now we are 7B and on route to 10B by 2030 .. that's huge growth and in the process we "sapiens" have been destroying the nature. Will we destroy ourselves? In book the author talks about "Intelligent design" - the way scientific revolution has taken shape .. Will the next child be designed by gene selection? Will the "sapiens" as a species end and will it be taken over by "Intelligent Design" species. In that happens, will the concept of "God" still exist?
Read the books and form your own thinking. I have no expertise ..
====
Happy Navaratri festival to all of you!
Mahatma Gandhi's birthday was Oct 2.
As young adult, Carl Sagan's "Cosmos" book and TV serial was an eye opener. I still remember Sagan showing a calendar where if Big Bang happened on Jan 1, history of sapiens only represent the last 8 minutes and civilization has existed only in the last minute. It gives us a prospective of our relatively small history, a dust in the cosmic scale.
Homo Sapiens evolved in Africa around 200,000 years ago. The first migration happened around 100,000 years ago followed by the second wave of 70,000 and the last one around 50,000 years ago. In each of these migration steps, sapiens expanded from the Persian Crescent to Asia, Australia and finally to Americas and in the process rest of "Homo" species became extinct. Even Neanderthals who were considered stronger also lost to Homo Sapiens". Now, we the "Sapiens" are the lone survivor in this blue planet. Our future depend upon us.
The "Sapiens" book talk about three major revolutions which were of transformational; the cognitive revolution (~ 70,000 to 30,000 years ago), the agriculture revolution (~12,000 years ago) and finally the scientific revolution (~500 years ago). Our "brain" is the biggest asset (both good and bad). The cognitive evolution of our brain made the sapiens the winner developing skills for language, discovering fire and even learning to gossip - speak about fiction ... an important cognitive development (but we have taken that too far in modern times with social media). The Sapiens were living in small groups (less than 150) with most of their daily activity was around gathering foods until the next breakthrough came with Agricultural revolution. Now people settled in villages, discovered crops and were able to store grains for future. The ability to create fiction was a key developmental activity which led to group of people cooperating in believing a myth and this led evolution of imagined reality like gods or state (or corporation in modern day context). Slowly the small groups evolved into larger groups to an ordered civilization. The order started with economic goal and slowly to imperialism (kings) settled in. The first empire was Akkaadian Empire (2250 BC).
The history of gods and God is only less than 10,000 years old. "god" evolved as solution to a problems (sky god, fire god, fertility god) - note the small "g". Each tribe, vocation started with their own "god" and from there polytheistic religion started. The "Evolution of God" book starts to look at deeper the evolution of "god" - which started as a functional and how "God" came into picture. As civilization became bigger, it became apparent the need for one main "god" (most important one) and it was what the chief /king decided - the Egyptian civilization has followed that path. In that process, the kings used the imperial power in declaring themselves as "son of god" ("son of Ra - the sun god"). Also, the "god" the battle/war winner become the new main "god". This process continued in the Mesopotamia and Sumerian until one of the tribe became the winner and it developed into of "Abrahamic religion". The book only focuses on Abhrahamic religion and has few sprinkle references about Hinduism, Buddhism and other religions. Now three religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) had the same God - one universal God. Suddenly from a polytheistic society starts to move to a monotheistic and this was a huge transformation. But the problem was that each believe their version of "God" is the ultimate truth (or their scripture has the ultimate word of God) and this has led to wars for the last 2000 years and still continuing ... (what a pity!). During this process, one important development happened, "morality and spiritual truth" were ingrained to the religion, it was not the case in the prehistoric days. In any case, my goal is not to write summary of book .. I find it fascinating how "god/God" - a concept evolved over the last 5000+ years and why and how we have chained ourselves to "religion" and fighting over it.
The last book "Looking for God" was exactly what it starts with - a search. After the author lost his only daughter in a car accident, the author goes on a search to get answers few questions on God. Note the searcher decides to focus on Abrahamic religion because he is catholic and it was one way to narrow the search. However, the questions are relevant for any religion.
"If God is one God of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, whose side is he on?" Why do most religions believe they are right and others wrong ...
"Which of the thousands of scriptures are correct?"
"Why there are inconsistencies between religion .. "
"Does God exist within the creative mind of human beings?"
"Why were there so many philosophies and paths to enlightenment"
....
In the end one of the priest asks .. " .. for all we know, we may not have recognized the God if He has appeared to us". This led to the author thinking about the stranger who helped him during the auto accident - "Was he God?". In most places, the priests/Rabbi/... told the author that God exists because "It is written" in the scriptures and Faith (not "blind faith") is the path which helps them.
It has been a fascinating reading for me .. you have to read the books and make your own discovery. "If there is no God, it does not matter which path you take" or the corollary can be "Does it matter which path you take" ... Find your own path and reaching "God or a higher spiritual level" is a personal journey.
As a final thought, we "Sapiens" have lived only for a small time and in that time we have destroyed the balance of nature ... what nature used to take thousands of years to adapt now does not have that luxury. In 1700, the population was 250 million and now we are 7B and on route to 10B by 2030 .. that's huge growth and in the process we "sapiens" have been destroying the nature. Will we destroy ourselves? In book the author talks about "Intelligent design" - the way scientific revolution has taken shape .. Will the next child be designed by gene selection? Will the "sapiens" as a species end and will it be taken over by "Intelligent Design" species. In that happens, will the concept of "God" still exist?
Read the books and form your own thinking. I have no expertise ..
====
Happy Navaratri festival to all of you!
Mahatma Gandhi's birthday was Oct 2.
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