What if Science Could Prove that Gods Didn't Exist

For starters, I am writing this blog post at 3 AM after waking up at 1:30 and not being able to go back to sleep.  It may not be as coherent as it is in my head, and I couldn't think of way to accurate capture all of my thoughts.  I also think that if I really dove into all of my thoughts on this subject, I would be writing for a very long time and no one would read that novel.  With that said, enjoy this thought experiment.

Imagine that tomorrow, the world awoke to the headline "Scientists Prove There is No Such Thing as 'God.'"    What would happen?  Well, atheist might throw one hell of a party, but in reality, would anything change?  And to be clear, I am not just talking about God with a capital-G here, I mean any deity that is praised the world over, from Allah to Zeus and everything in between.

For starters, you would have those who didn't get the news due to censorship or lack of connection to the outside world.  For them, nothing would change at first.  Of those that do get the news, here are some of the ways people may react.

1. Label the scientists who made the discovery as heretics and continue believing their religion.  They may also promote that schools "teach the controversy"
2. Denial - IT NEVER HAPPENED!
3. React violently to such an affront to their religion of choice and attack either those scientists directly or science in general
4. Accept the science but remain connected to their religion out of tradition, comfort, or kinship
5. Have a crisis of faith and not know what to believe.
6. Just not give a shit
7. Go absolutely crazy because "Nothing we do in this life matters anymore because there isn't a God and no afterlife" - Come on, you know some would react that way
8. Consider it a test of their faith and dig into their beliefs even longer - "The dinosaur bones were put there to test our belief"

Much like science proved the Earth was round, and revolved around the Sun, it would take some time for this type of discovery to gain wide-spread acceptance among those who were believers.  I mean, we still have people who don't believe in evolution, or vaccinations. Even atheist might be a bit skeptical at first because having scientist make such a discovery, and then have someone find a flaw in their work, would only drive people to religion more.  

As the acceptance grew, religion-based regimes may begin to topple, which then may lead to serious power struggle conflicts in the middle east that erupt into all out war as the number of people who still believe in a higher power begins to fall but they cling bitterly to those beliefs because they were the source of their power and control.  The lack of afterlife consequences for their actions might be enough of a factor to push some people over the edge from controlled to chaotic. Those who are still devout believers might also start to react more violently to their religion being stripped away from them.  

So, in reality, I think we would be just as fucked then as we are now.  We would still have those who believe in religion, although their numbers would be smaller.  We would still have those that react violently to anything that is against those beliefs.  There would be tons of money thrown into research by religious organizations trying to overturn the scientists' findings.  The only hope would be that we could weather the shitstorm of the initial discovery and eventually come to accept the findings as facts, although it would take generations to do so, and there still would be holdouts.  

So, what would you do if you saw that headline plastered on every major news outlet tomorrow? I, for one, would probably call out of work that day because I would want to stay away from the crazy and watch it all unfold from the comfort of my living room.

Believe what you want, but leave me out of it

Forward: This is post 1 of 2 that I said I had in mind for writing during my Christmas break. I waited to write this to avoid putting myself into the type of situation I am telling people to leave me out of. This isn't directed at any one person, it is directed at everyone that tries to cram beliefs down my throat.

I don't care if you give praise to God, Allah, Buddha, Vishnu, Ra, or Mickey Mouse. As long as your beliefs don't affect me, I don't care (I'll get into this later). You could believe that your toaster commands you to hop around on one foot everyday for all I care, just don't lose your balance and fall into me. I do care when you come knocking on my door telling me I am a horrible person for not believing in X and that I will burn in hell if I don't immediately repent and follow YOUR way of thinking.

You are welcome to write blog posts, status updates, tweets, newsletters, or billboards about your beliefs. I might not read them, much like many people will choose not to read this. The fact that people won't choose to read this means I will have to tell them next time they try to preach to me that I don't want to hear it, so I would prefer they read this now, but it is their right not to read this. What crosses the line, at least for me, is sending me articles about how important it is for me to have X in my life. Saying that I must go to church. Telling me that I must believe in X or I am a horrible human being.

Personally, I am somewhere between agnostic and atheist, but before people jump down my throat about being the devil spawn: 1 - see above and 2 - how am I affecting you? I am not one of those people who feels like I need to waste the time of the Supreme Court debating whether "under God" should be in the Pledge of Allegiance. Do I think it belongs there? No. Nor does "In God We Trust" belong on our money. Those words being there doesn't affect me enough for me to care. So how do my beliefs about that affect you?

I keep saying "it doesn't affect me I don't care," but what do I consider affecting me? Well, here is a rough idea. If your beliefs say that you should kill me because I don't believe in your beliefs, that is something that affects me and then I will want to hit you over the head with a stick to either knock some sense into you, or give you amnesia so you forget that part. If your beliefs say alcohol is forbidden and you try to pass a law outlawing it, that affects me. If you decide to forever avoid me because I have a drink, that is fine with me, because obviously your beliefs are very important to you and odds are you would start preaching at some point. (That last point isn't directed at anyone running for election, or anyone I know...unless one of them starts acting that way). If you think alcohol is forbidden, but think that is your personally belief and choose to exercise that restriction on yourself and not get preachy if I have a drink, then we will probably get along.

I am tolerant of some religious influence on the policy of our country because I know it is impossible to separate people's religion from their personal views, but most of those influences are things make us civilized, that were put into religions early on to drive civilization in it's current direction. But when things start going all "the bible says" in the process of writing a law, then I get annoyed.

I wrote this while I was awake in the VERY early morning hours after not much sleep, but I think it captures most of my thoughts. With that, I will just hit "Publish post" and be on my way. I have TWO more posts planned now (the original other post I had, and a post about PR due to an on-going PR nightmare for a game accessory manufacturer) but I will get to those when the mood strikes me.