Slashdot Mirror
Are the World's Religions Ready For ET?
Science_afficionado writes: At the current rate of discovery, astronomers will have identified more than a million exoplanets by the year 2045. That means, if life is at all common in the Milky Way, astronomers could soon detect it. Realization that the nature of the debate about life on other worlds is about to fundamentally change, lead Vanderbilt astronomer David Weintraub to begin thinking seriously about how people will react to such a discovery. He realized that people's reactions will be heavily influenced by their religious beliefs, so he decided to find out what theologians and leaders from the world's major religions have to say about the matter. The result is a book titled Religions and Extraterrestrial Life, published by Springer this month. He discovered that from Baptists to Buddhists, from Catholics to Mormons, from Islam to the Anglican Communion, religious views on alien life differ widely.
The /. hatred for religion is well known. Any discussion on this subject isn't going to go very well.
I fully expect to be modded down, but until that happens I would really like to ask: why post this here?
... is just to ban science and space exploration, heading this entire situation off entirely.
By the time ET's make contact with us, we'll have been raptured long ago. I think we're on for next week.
At the current rate of discovery, astronomers will have identified more than a million exoplanets by the year 2045. That means, if life is at all common in the Milky Way, astronomers could soon detect it.
Being able to detect planets and being able to detect life on those planets are 2 different things.
And the answer is "How many logical fallacies can you fit into a paragraph." *ding ding ding*
Perhaps "I'd like Trolling Slashdot for 1000", and the answer is "Mention Religion in a summary, more than one preferably"
No, discussing alien life is not "new" and no, this is not some interesting twist on the discussion. Claiming that "we are going to find alien life by XXXX date" is akin to claiming "the world is going to end by XXXX date". I don't believe in your tarot cards, your phrenology, or what ever else you claim gives you the power to see the future. We all know that the potential is there, but.. well you can read the definition of the word on your own.
You hopefully stopped reading when the guy correlates finding planets with finding life, knowing it was a troll.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
" He realized that people's reactions will be heavily influenced by their religious beliefs," Really?
The religious will do this because they can't distinguish between their god and an alien?
Even as an atheist, I'm insulted for the believers among us....
And yes, is this a slow news day, I guess.
"The greatest lesson in life is to know that even fools are right sometimes" - Winston Churchill
I'll listen very carefully. A civilization that has managed to get across the interstellar gulf alive, and chooses to tell us about some religion, well, I'll listen to them with full attention, and as open a mind as I can manage.
And I'll also listen very politely.
--PeterM
One thing to keep in mind when looking at those statistics is that Hinduism and atheism are compatible. Hinduism is a ritual complex, not a series of theological propositions that one must hold or else one can't be a Hindu. Many educated Indians believe that Hinduism is a environment within which they interact with their families and the society around them, while inside they believe that there is no supernatural.
christian theologists? but those guys working on these questions 1700 years ago worked it out wrong for current crop of christians.
now.. are christians ready for that the bible is not literal? some are, some are not. if they're biblical literalists(which is silly, if you read the fucking book) then yeah, aliens are a problem - however if you're a biblical literalist in the modern day then NOTHING is a problem. why is nothing a problem? because you can always invent ways around shit, from "god did it to test faith" to "before the flood animals were bigger, hence the dinosaur bones you can find in mountain ranges".
if you're religious enough you twist your observations to fit whatever you chose before making those observations.. I think it's a silly question to ask if the world religions are ready for ET when they're technically not ready to account for observations made on the earth even.
futhermore, those religions are mutually in disagreement with each other.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
C.S. Lewis, Anglican and actually closer to Catholicism in theology, wrote, from 1938-1945, a science fiction trilogy known as the Space Trilogy that explores alien races in the context of Christianity.
I first read the trilogy when I was an atheist, and it helped remove that particular hurdle in my later study of the world religions that lead to my conversion to Catholicism.
Hmm, I read those books while a christian and become atheist not long after.
Be seeing you...
We should thank secular values for keeping religion in check and forcing its reformation. BTW islam needs a deep reformation too ASAP if you didn't notice.
Oh really?! You must be either ignorant, republican, a troll, in bad faith or all of them. Bye troll.
Actually, none of the above. However, one has to take a pretty twisted view of history to ignore the shaping of Western society, for better or worse, because of religious influence. Doesn't make that influence right or wrong, but if you can't even admit its influence, then that speaks more to your own bias than to religion's.