For tens of thousands of years, our ancestors and we have been observing thing in common. Beside from all the difference in culture, race, region, sex, age, and time, we have been watching one same thing, the night sky. We have been watching the stars, thinking about them, admiring them, writing poems on them, measuring their positions, making the map of stars, and making stories about them. Without any conclusive evidence, I believe religion have its root within, or at least a significant relation with, the stars and the sky. Most of religions believe in going up to the sky, to the heaven after death. Many of them created a myth in which god has made, or been holding the sky.
It seems quite logical to believe that our ancestors thought a lot about the sky and the stars, and some of them made a conclusion: god. Stars are surely mysterious existence and in the entire history of human race, it has been a really short time since we discovered that stars are a sphere of burning materials like helium and hydrogen. It also has been a really short time ever since we discovered that stars are so far away, that even light needs millions of years to reach them. This discovery makes a lot of difference. Before, human believed in god, the sky, and the star. Now, we know what they are. We are beginning to find out what universe is. Now when we see the night sky, we don’t, at least we shouldn’t, believe in the alleged god, heaven, or stories of giants holding the sky with their shoulders. We can see how extensive the universe is, how old it is, how deep it is, and how magnificent and religious it is. When we keep staring at the stars and the hollow, deep space between them, we can feel that we are just tiny existence living on a planet placed at a small point of a solar system, which is again at a rural corner of a galactic system. Even that galaxy is just one member of the universe. With this firm evidence, we can conclude through a logical process that there is something great, something big and mighty. Religion assents that the greatness looks like human being, and has “his” will, but it is never true; we never saw it, never took a picture of it, never heard any word from it, and never talked with it. We just barely recognized it. Religion says that we are special, we are chosen, and the god protects us, but it is vanity and conceit; we are just one species living on one planet of on solar system of one galactic system of the universe. We are just a member, a “newbie” in this universe who just began to haul the first cry of a new born baby.
Knowing the greatness of universe can teach us all the good things that religion does, such as morality and modesty, while keeping us away from all the errors and failures of religion. We live on this tiny “pale blue dot” as Carl Sagan said, and we can see no difference on that point; we can never separate a “dot.” We are that small, compact, and fundamentally equal community, but we seem to hate each other a lot. We hate different cultures, different faith, and any difference in any other aspects that makes us uncomfortable. Religions claim unity, but each of them claims that the center of such unity must be itself. Science says that we are already united; we live on same planet, receive same sun light, see same stars, have almost the same DNA -99.7% identical- and we all use our brain in the same way to think, pray, and love. Like there is no reason to commit suicide, we have no reason to fight against each other.
The other facet of science is that it can make changes and it can change itself. Science requires evidence, and with that evidence we make logical conclusions. When we find any fallacy in those evidence or logic, we say that the conclusion is wrong, and we try to find another fact and to make another logic, which would be presumably better. This is what religion does not have. Religion says that we must believe because we believe. They believe in god, which only exists based on their belief. Then there are only two options: following the infinite cycle of logic, or deny everything. A man in religion chooses the first option; however, we should not. We never saw a waterwheel moving forward; it only rotates at the same place, and never makes any progress. Only when we break the axis of the waterwheel, even though it won’t be easy, the wheel will land on the ground and begin to move forward. Religion is stick to a solid axis, and it only rotates in the air for nothing. Science on the other hand has an imaginary axis, which moves along as the waterwheel moves forward. We never saw the imaginary axis with our bare eyes, but we know the moving axis, the greatness of the universe, exists, and through science we try to understand what it is.
I’m not urging that religion is a complete failure of human culture. Religion is the basic belief of human from basic process of thinking. It was a necessary step for us to progress to the next step; now it is time for us to move on to the next paradigm. Charles Dawkins said that god is “a logical failure,” but I believe that god is a part of the logical process, in which we human try to find what we are, where we are living, and how we must live. Now that we found god is not sufficient to give the answers, we must proceed forward to the next part of the logical process: science.
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