The reality is quite the opposite. The history of ides is not a history of gradually discarding the assumption that it's all about us - rather, it's a history of building up and defending the assumption that it's all about us. Why? Because if there is no God, there is no ultimate being which we are accountable to. Although evolution doesn't have to lead to the conclusion that there is no God, we happily assume it does---because then we can all be our own gods, making up our own rules. Sure, we might not think the sun revolves around our world any more, but we are selfish in many many other (more subtle) ways.
Thats not really accurate. There is a difference between believing its "all about us" and believing "we can do whatever we want." They are in many ways counter to each other.
If what we do doesn't have any meaning (i.e. if no one is watching) then we might as well do anything we want. By discarding the idea of god, its true that we do tend to place ourselves as the highest beings in existence, but that doesn't mean we put ourselves at the center, we just discard the idea that there is a center.
Ok, agreed - discarding the centre doesn't necessitate that we put ourselves in that spot. What I would argue though is that by our human nature have a strong tenancy to put ourselves in the centre. We're not always blatantly selfish (or proud), but if we really look at ourselves, we're pretty good at it in lots of small ways.
> Although evolution doesn't have to lead to the conclusion that there is no God, we happily assume it does---because then we can all be our own gods, making up our own rules.
That's insulting, and (more importantly) it doesn't seem to have any factual backing. Got evidence? Because I don't know a single formerly-religious-person for whom that sort of thing was even a consideration.
And come on, everybody makes up their moral rules or inherits them from their community, or usually some combination of both. Some of them attribute the results to God, but the difference is minimal.
Comments
The reality is quite the opposite. The history of ides is not a history of gradually discarding the assumption that it's all about us - rather, it's a history of building up and defending the assumption that it's all about us. Why? Because if there is no God, there is no ultimate being which we are accountable to. Although evolution doesn't have to lead to the conclusion that there is no God, we happily assume it does---because then we can all be our own gods, making up our own rules. Sure, we might not think the sun revolves around our world any more, but we are selfish in many many other (more subtle) ways.
Thats not really accurate. There is a difference between believing its "all about us" and believing "we can do whatever we want." They are in many ways counter to each other.
If what we do doesn't have any meaning (i.e. if no one is watching) then we might as well do anything we want. By discarding the idea of god, its true that we do tend to place ourselves as the highest beings in existence, but that doesn't mean we put ourselves at the center, we just discard the idea that there is a center.
Ok, agreed - discarding the centre doesn't necessitate that we put ourselves in that spot. What I would argue though is that by our human nature have a strong tenancy to put ourselves in the centre. We're not always blatantly selfish (or proud), but if we really look at ourselves, we're pretty good at it in lots of small ways.
> Although evolution doesn't have to lead to the conclusion that there is no God, we happily assume it does---because then we can all be our own gods, making up our own rules.
That's insulting, and (more importantly) it doesn't seem to have any factual backing. Got evidence? Because I don't know a single formerly-religious-person for whom that sort of thing was even a consideration.
And come on, everybody makes up their moral rules or inherits them from their community, or usually some combination of both. Some of them attribute the results to God, but the difference is minimal.