Godless (58 page)

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Authors: Dan Barker

Tags: #Religion, #Atheism

BOOK: Godless
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When our ancestors, who carried those same genes, heard rumbling noises in the clouds, they couldn’t help picturing agency. They automatically assumed it was a large animal or person, like an angry father—a very large and potent agency—and they called it Zeus or Thor. When they felt earthquakes and saw volcanoes erupt, they “knew” it was a powerful mother. (Why was the sky male and the earth female? Maybe because the rain “impregnates” the soil?) The environment was imbued with “personality.” Natural forces and random processes of fertility and weather and all the jumble of unpredictable, frightening occurrences were automatically thought to be “agents” out there—gods, devils, angels, demons, ghosts, witches, orixás. This was not because there was any practical or immediate reason, but simply because we inherited the tendency to make that mistake for very good evolutionary reasons. Those who did not make that mistake were less likely to survive to become ancestors. Today, even though we still possess the instinct to err on the side of caution, we know that it is indeed a mistake we are making. (Most of us.)
 
However, evolution also needs variety. We can’t all be the same, otherwise something that wiped out one of us would wipe out all of us. That’s why we have sexual reproduction, with each sibling different from the parents and from each other, to increase the odds that some of our offspring will survive whatever pathogens, invaders or “acts of God” nature throws at us.
 
Thousands of physical and behavioral variations make all of us different. Some of us, by nature, are going to wake up in the middle of the night screaming more than others. Some of us are more likely than others to “detect agency”—to be religious. In my case, it seemed automatic: God existed without a doubt in my mind. In the case of Annie Laurie’s father, Paul Gaylor, it was the opposite. As a very small child, he knew that religious teachings were phony. At first he thought his parents and community were just faking it, then later he was convinced they were all crazy. The “Amazing” James Randi says it was the same with him: he never believed, not even as a small child. Most of us fall somewhere in the middle of that bell curve, and some more to one side than the other. This means that some of us have to work harder than others to overcome the natural tendency to assume a “presence” out there. Some people are so far to one side that if they also have mental health issues, they think
they
are God and we have to lock them up.
 
The other hypothesis that I find attractive is articulated by Richard Dawkins and seems to complement the agency detector. The human species evolved with two conflicting advantages: an upright structure and a large brain. As we stood erect the pelvis opening became smaller, making it even more difficult to give birth to an enlarging skull. As a result, Homo sapiens are born prematurely compared to other mammals, some of which stand up and walk into the forest when they are only minutes old. The human infant is half-baked, and needs at least a full year of complete dependency on its parents or adult community in order to have the slightest chance at survival. (Imagine leaving a month-old baby out in the woods.)
 
As the human child is growing and learning, it is crucial during the early years that it unquestioningly obey the instructions of the parents. It would do no good for the child to say, “I am skeptical about my Mom’s warning to stay out of the street. I’m going to try it for myself.” Our species would never get off the ground with such an attitude. None of us would live long enough to breed. Dawkins suggests that dependency on a father figure during childhood may be hard-wired into our genes, a necessary survival tactic of a premature primate. But as we mature, we eventually become parents ourselves with instincts and knowledge that we acquire on our own, as well as knowledge passed on to us from the previous generation. We then have less need for the care and protection of adults. (This may have been especially true during the first hundred thousand years or so of human existence, when the average life expectancy was only 25-30 years.) Yet even so, the tendency to “obey the parent” and “find comfort in the mother or the father” lingers on, and the length of time it lingers varies from person to person. Many of us grow up to adulthood still feeling a need for the security of the father figure. This need is a result of our prematurity and is a kind of longing for the simpler days of childhood when we did not have to think for ourselves.
 
Combine this longing for a dependent and sheltered childhood with both the tendency to detect agency in nature and the evolutionary advantage of variation, and you can see how the human mind would possess a variable tendency to naturally “reach out” to an external father or mother figure. Since in the past our parents died on average younger than they do today (due to much shorter life expectancy), and since we still needed them—indeed, we dreamed about dead ancestors—we created god(s) to fill that gap. God belief is a kind of delayed development. Again, there will be a variation in intensity of these tendencies among humans, as some will be more religious than others. But combine the tendency with cultural and social pressure and it is not difficult to see how belief is embraced and coddled. Getting rid of the “father-figure agency” is a part of maturing. It is a sign of mental health, and the only way to truly grow up.
 
The fact that we possess genes that were good for the survival of our ancestors does not mean our inherited instincts are naturally “good” for us today. They aren’t good or bad; they happened to be the fittest, and like it or not, they are what made us what we are today. Providing an evolutionary explanation for religion does not require that we submit to our superstitious nature. The same could be said about our tendencies toward sexism, racism and xenophobia, which we are trying to combat in the modern world. We have evolved a neocortex (where we get reason) on top of our animal instincts, and we can override those tendencies. Violence is also a part of our inheritance, and any one of us can act violently if we are pushed hard enough. (Some need less pushing than others.) We have these sharp canine teeth that were used to tear into the flesh of other living creatures, but we don’t need to use them for that. We now have a frontal lobe in the brain that stops us, that checks our instincts. Using judgment, we can stem racism, sexism and violence. Using reason, we can rise above religion.
 
Even though everything reduces to genetics, it doesn’t follow that love loses its meaning. I wrote a song in 2007, “inspired” (if I can borrow a word) by something Richard Dawkins wrote in
Unweaving the Rainbow
calling for an integration of art and science. It’s a love song, a jazz ballad that simply assumes the underlying fact of evolution.
 
“It’s Only Natural”
by Dan Barker
 
Thanks to Galileo
for showing us our humble place in outer space.
And thanks to Mister Darwin
for showing us the origin of the human race.
Which means that our precious romance
Is mainly the product of chance,
And these feelings of love so frenetic
Are just genetic.
It’s only natural that I would want you.
It’s only natural that you want me.
A million years of evolution had its way,
So we can blame it on our parents’ DNA.
I move instinctively in your direction.
Somehow you signal me to turn and see.
You will always be my natural selection,
As a voluntary choice, naturally.
 
 
“Isn’t atheism just another religion?” No, it isn’t. Atheism has no creeds, rituals, holy book, absolute moral code, origin myth, sacred spaces or shrines. It has no sin, divine judgment, forbidden words, prayer, worship, prophecy, group privileges or anointed “holy” leaders. Atheists don’t believe in a transcendent world or supernatural afterlife. Most important, there is no orthodoxy in atheism. We don’t have to think or act alike. Allowing for differences of opinion is a sign of health.
Montreal Gazette
cartoonist Terry Mosher drew an editorial cartoon that said: “Here’s a headline we never see: Agnostics slaughter Atheists!”
 
“What about hope? What about salvation? If atheism is not a religion, what do atheists have to look forward to? Is there an atheist salvation?” In many religious traditions, “salvation” is a deliverance from danger, disease and death. Most believers see this alliterative trio of troubles in both natural and supernatural ways. Danger can arise from an occupying conqueror, or from the threat to morality and order by evil spirits or devils. Disease and death can be feared both physically and spiritually. Atheists, with the same human desires and fears, also care about deliverance, but only as
natural
concerns. We see deliverance coming, if it is to come at all, in the real world, from our own human efforts.
 
Sometimes no deliverance is needed at all. The New Testament Jesus reportedly said, “They that are whole have no need of a physician, but they that are sick” (Matthew 9:12). We atheists consider ourselves whole, thank you. We are not sick. We don’t need the doctor. Suppose you were convicted of a horrible crime and sentenced to life in prison, but after a few years behind bars you are surprised to hear you are being released. This “salvation” would be a wonderful experience. But which would make you feel better: learning you were released because you were pardoned by the good graces of the governor, or because you were found to be innocent of the crime? Which would give you more dignity?
 
We atheists possess “salvation” not because we are released from a sentence, but because we don’t deserve the punishment in the first place. We have committed no “sin.” Sin is a religious concept, and in some religions salvation is the deliverance from the “wages of sin”—which is death or eternal punishment. Sin has been defined as “missing the mark” of God’s expectations or holiness, or “offending God,” so it follows that since there is no god, there is no sin, therefore no need of salvation. How much respect should you have for a doctor who cuts you with a knife in order to sell you a bandage? Only those who consider themselves sinners need this kind of deliverance—it is a religious solution to a religious problem.
 
If salvation is the cure, then atheism is the prevention.
 
Canadian physician Dr. Marian Sherman, a prominent atheist from Victoria, B.C., in an article titled “What Makes an Atheist Tick?” in the September 11, 1965, issue of the
Toronto Star Weekly
, is quoted as saying:
 
“Humanism seeks the fullest development of the human being... Humanists acknowledge no Supreme Being and we approach all life from the point of view of science and reason. Ours is not a coldly clinical view, for we believe that if human beings will but practice love of one another and use their wonderful faculty of speech, we can make a better world, happy for all. But there must be no dogma.”
 
When asked about death, Dr. Sherman replied: “It is the end of the organism. All we can hope is that we have found some sort of happiness in this life and that we have left the world as a little better place.”
 
Those with a negative view of human nature might seek help in solving problems from outside humanity. But those with a positive view of human nature—a true hope—will work for “salvation” from within the human race, using the tools of reason and kindness.
 
If you want to be a good, kind person, then be a good, kind person.
 
If salvation is the freedom from sin, then we atheists already have it. If salvation is deliverance from oppression and disease in the real world, then there is work to do. In this ongoing effort to make our planet a better place—to have true peace on earth—we atheists and humanists are happy to work shoulder-to-shoulder with the truly good religious people who also strive for a future with less violence and more understanding.
 
Selected Bibliography
 
This is a partial list of writings I found useful (in all, or in part) in writing this book. I include it here as a convenience for readers who want to study further.
 
Why I Am an Atheist
 
Angeles, Peter, ed.
Critiques of God.
New York: Prometheus Books, 1976.
 
Angier, Natalie. “Confessions of a Lonely Atheist.”
The New York Times Magazine
, January 14, 2001.
 
Antony, Louise M., ed.
Philosophers Without Gods: Meditations on Atheism and the Secular Life.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.
 
Avalos, Hector.
¿Se Puede Saber si Dios Existe?
(Can We Know If God Exists?) New York: Prometheus Books, 2003.
 
Davies, Paul.
Cosmic Jackpot: Why Our Universe Is Just Right for Life.
New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2007.
 
Dawkins, Richard.
The God Delusion.
Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2006.
 
Edis, Taner.
The Ghost in the Universe: God in Light of Modern Science.
New York: Prometheus, 2002.
 
Edis, Taner.
Science and Nonbelief.
New York: Prometheus Books, 2008.

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