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Religion for a Galactic Civilization 2.0
Progress in spaceflight technology has halted at a level that is insufficient for colonization of the solar system, let alone for voyages to the stars. That grim fact was not obvious to me when I wrote the original version of this essay thirty years ago (Bainbridge 1982), but it is apparent now.
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Posted by D J Wray on 08/20 at 06:02 PM
Yes it appears that religion, or at least God, is wired into our brains. It also appears that there is a reason for everything. Surely the universe couldn't be so stupid as to make significant evolutionary changes in the wrong direction.
D J Wray
http://www.atotalawareness.com
Posted by Giulio Prisco on 08/21 at 04:22 AM
Religion for a Galactic Civilization 2.0 is one of those seminal articles which some readers love, other readers hate, but all readers find interesting and mind changing. I loved the strong statement at the beginning of the article, "we need a new definition of spaceflight that will energize investment and innovation. I suggest a return to the traditional view: The heavens are a sacred realm, that we should enter in order to transcend death.".
It may seem that the wildly transhumanist, cosmic approach of Bainbridge's Religion for a Galactic Civilization 2.0 is very different from the technoprogressive, down-to-earth approach of Treder's Meanwhile, People Are Dying, published on the IEET site a few days ago. But I think the two approaches are compatible, complementary and mutually reinforcing. Achieving Mike's vision will require working pragmatically in today's world in order to make it better day-by-day, while the prospect of Bill's Galactic Civilization can provide us, here and now, with the required energy,motivation and drive.
More thoughts (WIP):
http://cosmi2le.com/index.php?/site/bill_bainbridges_religion_for_a_galactic_civilization_2.0/
Posted by Clark Echols on 08/21 at 02:49 PM
Fascinating info! Thanks. You can update your info on Swedenborg. The General Church of the New Jerusalem continues to gain membership (although not at a pace to keep up with the world's population - yet!). Also, Swedenborg never started any kind of organization, although certainly cults were formed from his ideas. The General Church does not fit the definition of a cult by any measure. See newchurch.org
FWIW. Rev. Clark Echols
Posted by Hervé Musseau on 08/30 at 08:53 AM
Sure, what we need is new cults - more scientologists, more raelians, yay! (rolls eyes)
In addition, this essay is riddled with old, mostly obsolete sci-fi and science (overpopulation, anyone?). Its one redeeming quality is the reflection upon the possibility of a static future society (a possibility also listed by Nick Bostrom, although he basically rejects it as improbable).
Better read anything by Bostrom (or many other transhumanists).
Posted by PirateRo on 10/03 at 05:23 PM
ABSOLUTELY putting the cart before the horse and encouraging magic and superstition as if those concepts held the same weight as scientific ideas.
This entire article is UTTER NONSENSE.
Imagine perpetuating the failure that is religion into space! Outrageous! Disgusting! Intolerable and UNACCEPTABLE.
The answer does NOT exist in the Bronze Age. It is the LETTING GO of this nonsense that carries man forward.
Let GO of this UTTER NONSENSE.
Posted by SciEngResDev on 10/04 at 12:15 AM
State of mind reading this:
Whoa. (stunned, speechless)
Say what?! (incredulous, this has to be a joke)
gaaaAAH...! (exasperated)
My mind is apparently incompatible with and useless for the future since it's unable to process this kind of information in any more detail. Fortunately the future of civilization depends on some confused meme-soup we label religion as much as it depends on the sort of thinking evident in this essay.
Posted by Dr. P. Ziolo on 10/03 at 09:16 AM
This is one of the most perceptive articles I have come across deling with our future in space.
The step forwardn into permanent colonisation of space involves an evolutionary step greater than that taken by our distant amphibian ancestors from sea to land. Those who undertake this transition will willingly choose to renounce their own unique, human identities in order to transcend the collective limits of that identity.
Whether they will weep or exult in this transcendence will be their own affair.
The trouble with what I read in these postings is that there seems to be very little understanding of either the nature of 'science' and the nature of 'religion'.
The paradox is - it's today's conception of 'Science' that's 'doing the civilisation in', not religion.
If we are to create the powerful social movement Bainbridge proposes, the people comprising that movement will need to combine (to borrow metaphors from Frank Herbert's Dune) the computational skills of the Mentats, the engineering skills of the Bene Tleilax, the capacity for foresight of the Spacing Guild AND the understanding of the power of myth and prophecy exemplified by the Bene Gesserit...
Myth and prophect MUST sit down at the same round table as logic, statistics & engineering. Actually, they get on very well.
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