Hypothetically speaking

[I'mConvinced]

When you wake tomorrow the world, in it's entirety, will be devoid of all cultural history and identity. No memories or information relating to religion, nationality, race or conflicts past or present will exist. 

Everything else will be as normal and your knowledge and experience are in tact, minus the meanings created by the above. 

The question I have is this; given our current understanding of the world, would we recreate religion, something similar or something else entirely? 

We would certainly ask the same questions about existence and science hasn't got the answers...but now we would have to accept that we don't have the 'truth' available to us. So would people accept someone just making something new up?

Maybe God would send another messenger to fill in the gap? 

What would happen to morality? Would society survive? What do you think might happen?

 

[DebDandelion]

Interesting topic. Had the discussion today. All humanity circles towards each other at some point. When these bodies collide they don't become one, cause we all have our own ideas. So you will find splinter groups....and in those groups more groups. 

iMO, we might not have exactly the same issues as now...but issues we as humanity shall find...find to divide us (again)

It is , IMO , human nature that divides us.

 

 

 

[Space Commander Travis]

12 minutes ago, I'mConvinced said:

When you wake tomorrow the world, in it's entirety, will be devoid of all cultural history and identity. No memories or information relating to religion, nationality, race or conflicts past or present will exist. 

I think that's a quite normal day in the Trump Administration. 

[danydandan]

Some people hold some scientific beliefs like a religion. So prehaps a religion could be born from science. Assuming in your thought experiment we still have all the scientific understanding we have now. Our current model of the universe explains how we got here, that includes the big bang and evolution and everything in-between. So the only question left would by why and what happened before the big bang.

[+Not A Rockstar]

Wonderful topic!

My first reaction was to think that surely this would give us a leg up on advancement and hopes for peace, but, then I thought a bit more about it and suspect we would give rise to more splintered ideas and explanations for why things are and end up going to war all over again to work out how the different ideologies are going to interact or not. 

No matter what anyone says, I think moralities are inherent to people and conditional on circumstance for the most part. 

I will ponder this some more. It is an interesting exercise. Thank you.

[I'mConvinced]

1 minute ago, danydandan said:

Some people hold some scientific beliefs like a religion. So prehaps a religion could be born from science. Assuming in your thought experiment we still have all the scientific understanding we have now. Our current model of the universe explains how we got here, that includes the big bang and evolution and everything in-between. So the only question left would by why and what happened before the big bang.

It's certainly possible but to derive a religion from science is to defeat it's purpose.

In the immediate aftermath do you think society would crumble? What is the glue that binds us?

[Davros of Skaro]

"Clown, hobo, ballet dancer, bagpiper, and an Army Major—a collection of question marks. Five improbable entities stuck together into a pit of darkness. No logic, no reason, no explanation; just a prolonged nightmare in which fear, loneliness, and the unexplainable walk hand in hand through the shadows. In a moment, we'll start collecting clues as to the whys, the whats, and the wheres. We will not end the nightmare, we'll only explain it—because this is the Twilight Zone."

[I'mConvinced]

9 minutes ago, danydandan said:

Assuming in your thought experiment we still have all the scientific understanding we have now.

Yes we would. Sorry forgot to answer that part.

[danydandan]

3 minutes ago, I'mConvinced said:

It's certainly possible but to derive a religion from science is to defeat it's purpose.

In the immediate aftermath do you think society would crumble? What is the glue that binds us?

It's certainly isn't religion. Religion has divided people for centuries.

[danydandan]

2 minutes ago, danydandan said:

It's certainly isn't religion. Religion has divided people for centuries.

For example at how scientific people can be religious, look at how people treated Isaac Newton like he was infallible.

Some people treat Evolution like it's a religion and have not even read Darwin's book. There is a lot of blind faith and argument from authority in science unfortunately.

[+Not A Rockstar]

11 minutes ago, I'mConvinced said:

 What is the glue that binds us?

I was heading out for my first duty station overseas alone and stuck by weather in a foreign airport full of hundreds of folks who spoke other languages. Not lost, I knew where to go and when I would be able to board my flight, but it was a bit weird to be so alone and not. People turned and looked at my uniform with various reactions. The US uniform is not universally liked out there. Younger people rarely experience being alone in this sense.

I looked around and spotted a British Troop, in his uniform by himself and gravitated to him and we chatted and enjoyed an hour socializing until our separate flights parted us.

I would say it is our similarities that bind us and the more extreme the differences outside, the more fundamentally we dig down to find the first commonality to define our "group".

[Guyver]

If I were to awake tomorrow, with no religion, cultural heritage or history....I would not immediately think of a God or Gods...

But if I were to go for a drive, and observe people on the roadways, I would immediately come to the conclusion that people are basically aholes.  That would be my first point of knowledge.  That, and coffee in the mornings is good.

[intoyoulikeatrain]

3 hours ago, DebDandelion said:

It is , IMO , human nature that divides us.

 

 

 

[XenoFish]

Maybe people will remember they are people and a part of this thing called humanity (optimism out of the way)

Or they'll devolve into a chaotic mass with no directional motivation other than hysteria (pessimism out of the way)

I don't think much will change honestly. Just a few things that were a part of peoples lives are no longer there. Thus they will seek some new time filler. 

[Davros of Skaro]

Either it would make the opiod epidemic into a global pandemic, or we have to build way more science museums to hold the overflow?

[I'mConvinced]

I've got a feeling someone would come up with a kind of twisted mystical technobabble and use the baffling nature of modern science to convince the masses of some new thing to worship.

Hmm, the name would be important of course, needs lots of Energy, some Quantum, Science, Technology and if I now shoehorn Understanding in there we have our new religion...

QUEST

Quantum Understanding of Energy as Science and Technology.

So we can all go on a QUEST together! 

God I'm such a nerd 

Edited April 8, 2018 by I'mConvinced
You'll never know...

[White-Coyote]

4 hours ago, I'mConvinced said:

When you wake tomorrow the world, in it's entirety, will be devoid of all cultural history and identity. No memories or information relating to religion, nationality, race or conflicts past or present will exist. 

Everything else will be as normal and your knowledge and experience are in tact, minus the meanings created by the above. 

The question I have is this; given our current understanding of the world, would we recreate religion, something similar or something else entirely? 

We would certainly ask the same questions about existence and science hasn't got the answers...but now we would have to accept that we don't have the 'truth' available to us. So would people accept someone just making something new up?

Maybe God would send another messenger to fill in the gap? 

What would happen to morality? Would society survive? What do you think might happen?

 

 

Maybe it DID happen and we don't know it because we can't remember it.

[I'mConvinced]

3 hours ago, Not A Rockstar said:

I would say it is our similarities that bind us and the more extreme the differences outside, the more fundamentally we dig down to find the first commonality to define our "group".

It's a great thought. What then might happen if, having removed all cultural bias, we could all be given a shared experience? Something common to all of mankind, a celebration of sorts maybe, that could bind people at a more fundamental level. 

And to be honest who cares if it works, what a shin dig that would be!

[Likely Guy]

5 hours ago, I'mConvinced said:

When you wake tomorrow the world, in it's entirety, will be devoid of all cultural history and identity. No memories or information relating to religion, nationality, race or conflicts past or present will exist. 

Everything else will be as normal and your knowledge and experience are in tact, minus the meanings created by the above. 

The question I have is this; given our current understanding of the world, would we recreate religion, something similar or something else entirely? 

We would certainly ask the same questions about existence and science hasn't got the answers...but now we would have to accept that we don't have the 'truth' available to us. So would people accept someone just making something new up?

Maybe God would send another messenger to fill in the gap? 

What would happen to morality? Would society survive? What do you think might happen?

 

Excellent question!

No, I don't think that religion would be reinvented to refill the answers to the mysterious question(s). As long as science wasn't wiped out, however we'd probably reinvent it to the next level.

That said, I'm not in favour of some forms of free-form science (genetics especially and the ethics of uncontrolled Artificial Intelligence*). We need some form of societal checks and balances. I'd personally prefer that we'd study the humanities to provide that, rather than religion though.

* I explicitly typed that out for you ...

@Vlad the Mighty  Who is this Al guy, anyways?

[jmccr8]

Hmm well if everything else stayed the same then I would likely wake up and go to work. Does make you wonder what we would then be talking about here though as a large part of the forum would have just disappeared.

jmccr8

[Davros of Skaro]

1 hour ago, I'mConvinced said:

I've got a feeling someone would come up with a kind of twisted mystical technobabble and use the baffling nature of modern science to convince the masses of some new thing to worship.

Hmm, the name would be important of course, needs lots of Energy, some Quantum, Science, Technology and if I now shoehorn Understanding in there we have our new religion...

QUEST

Quantum Understanding of Energy as Science and Technology.

So we can all go on a QUEST together! 

God I'm such a nerd 

Then this meme would exist in your hypothetical universe. 

[Grandpa Greenman]

Well if we had our knowledge, we would still have philosophy,  ethics, and logic.  I think we would end up with something akin Tao or Buddhism.  We might even be a space faring race, if we hadn't been held back by religious dogma.  IMO.    

[Mr Walker]

12 hours ago, I'mConvinced said:

When you wake tomorrow the world, in it's entirety, will be devoid of all cultural history and identity. No memories or information relating to religion, nationality, race or conflicts past or present will exist. 

Everything else will be as normal and your knowledge and experience are in tact, minus the meanings created by the above. 

The question I have is this; given our current understanding of the world, would we recreate religion, something similar or something else entirely? 

We would certainly ask the same questions about existence and science hasn't got the answers...but now we would have to accept that we don't have the 'truth' available to us. So would people accept someone just making something new up?

Maybe God would send another messenger to fill in the gap? 

What would happen to morality? Would society survive? What do you think might happen?

 

Cant untie memories like this  You cant have factual knowldge without the cultural context it is embedded within. But if it did happen things would be much worse   Every lesson we have learned would be lost.

whites would attack blacks,  nations would launch nuclear attacks on each other,  men would seek to dominate women, the rich would enslave the poor 

And yes the first thoughts of almost everyone would be questions to which they no longer had any answers and so each would seek to reconstruct an internal answer Like minded individuals would band together and oppose difernt minded individuals 

This assume all written records art music and other cultural forms relating to  identity  are expunged  all videos etc as well as all memory. What happens to rap music or jazz  or  country and western if we have to remove knowledge of its roots and origins, How do we interpret anything like music or art without an historical understanding ? How do we explain the racial diversity in a city without any background knowledge of how it occurred.   why should we obey laws we no longer have any memory about the reasons and purposes and values  on which the y were established. 

   

[Mr Walker]

5 hours ago, Grandpa Greenman said:

Well if we had our knowledge, we would still have philosophy,  ethics, and logic.  I think we would end up with something akin Tao or Buddhism.  We might even be a space faring race, if we hadn't been held back by religious dogma.  IMO.    

Not so sure.  To remove knowledge  of all religious and spiritual experiences it could well be necessary to remove all knowledge  of philosophy morality ethics etc  Relgion and philosophy are intertwined and co evolved cognitive processes. i dont think you could separate them  . 

[I'mConvinced]

2 hours ago, Mr Walker said:

Cant untie memories like this  You cant have factual knowldge without the cultural context it is embedded within.

Hypothetical.

2 hours ago, Mr Walker said:

whites would attack blacks,  nations would launch nuclear attacks on each other,  men would seek to dominate women, the rich would enslave the poor

Why? This makes no sense to me. The reasons why we don't blow ourselves up with nukes are not religious or cultural in the slightest.

This statement makes me question what is in your mind, if you feel the only thing stopping you from doing such things is a higher power...

2 hours ago, Mr Walker said:

why should we obey laws we no longer have any memory about the reasons and purposes and values  on which the y were established. 

You still need a society, people don't just turn into murderers and rapists if you remove their faith. I don't see why this would be different.

I don't follow the laws of my society because of the history of them.