Is the demise of religion a necessary prerequisite for human development?

Question

It seems to me that we cannot have a truly moral society while people are still motivated by an amoral worldview based on self-interest (the threat of punishment or hope of reward in an afterlife) rather than simply being decent as a matter of conscience. Is the decline of religion therefore an essential part of human development and progress?

Answer 1

Has the demise of religion in your own personal life, made you a "truly moral" and "decent" person?
Do you always consider the interest of others, ahead of your own personal "self-interest"?
It would be interesting to know the answer to these questions, before generalizing the experiment to all mankind.
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Answer 2

What seems to be is not what is. When a Society allows freedom of religion, that Society is a healthy one. When it disallows religious freedom then you see what you think that you are seeing from history (as you put it). With religious freedom we see an uplifting of the moral fabric of a Society, and when that Society 'throws God out' you see the degeneration of morally, such as we see today. We have 'thrown God out' and we are paying the price. No, we do not need an Amendment to the constitution on morality, we already have that, it is called Freedom Of Religion and the Free Exercise Thereof, another words it is the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America! Bring back the Constitution! We have not had a Constitutional Government sense 1913! That is 96 years! It is about time that we return to strict adherence to our Constitution.

Answer 3

I would respectfully disagree.

The human being is a naturally greedy creature motivated more by his own desires and wants than by the needs of society. An individual such as yourself is the exception to this principal because you have developed yourself to a level of understanding that being moral is good for the sake of society and not out of any fear of punishment or reward.

The majority of mankind is either unable or unwilling to do this irregardless of religion.

That is why religion developed in the first place. It was used as a tool to keep mankind in check by promising reward and punishment that way society could develop in the first place.

And our current law system developed out of that.

unfortunately their are still people that need a divine threat to say in line. I think it would be unwise to tamper with that.

Answer 4

Yes. While many people accept morals are separate from and usually in contradiction to religion, too many have some evolutionary problem of childish acceptance. I think as part of evolution there has been a strategy to do what you are told my your parents and believe them, this probably saved them from being eaten by predators in times past.

Now the converse is true, it assists those who prey on children by teaching them an ignorant world view. Many christians use their morals to cherry pick the bible for what is right and wrong,..( thanks to their secular values)....., so they display they have independent morals they just attribute the wrong source.

Religion is simply an accident of birth, it drew societies together, with their worship of many gods in the past. We know benefit from understanding the world more than ever before, we don't need these ancient customs that simply divide people for no good reason.

Death to religion I say! Move over the efforts to philosophy, science and humanity.

Answer 5

I once dared to hope that religion and all other superstitions would gradually wither and die, as people gained enough education to see these things for the pathetic, incoherent fairy tales that they are.

That was decades ago. Average IQ has gone up a few points and more books are being published than ever before -- and more people are praying in public and being vouchsafed visions of the Virgin Mary in a slice of burnt toast.

Not to mention the most spectacular act of religious devotion in recent history, namely September 11, 2001.

If this is how faith messes with our minds, then we absolutely cannot go on this way. We must choose whether we wish to be pious, or human.

Answer 6

I don't think it's a prerequisite but more of a natural consequence of human development. After all, our morals are instinctive. Most people still believe that morals are derived from the Bible and other religious texts (the proof of why they are not is too long to go into here). As society develops, people realise that it is much better to do something because you think it is right, than because you fear punishment from an omnipotent deity if you don't.

Answer 7

What manual did you draw your assumption from? The Humanist Manifesto? 1 or 2? I mean, your mode of "thinking" is straight out of both, so I will conclude that your question has absolutely no merit. Soviet Russia and China also had atheistic governments and over a seventy year period killed more of their own people than World Wars 1 &2 combined. Is this the "human progress and development" you have in mind?

Answer 8

Of course! Especially when christians in society want to impose their beliefs in schools & impede progress.

Teaching kids superstitions instead of history & skills they'd need to thrive in the real world.

I'm about to show my nerd colors, but in the star trek storyline the human race did not band together to explore the universe until after a major world war and letting go of the ancient religious practices. Once people abandoned all of those things that separated humanity they were able to get together and start exploring the universe.

Of course.... even if they drop religion tomorrow we won't get that far for a very long time. I wish i could be alive to see that day, though!

Answer 9

The Bible explains that false religion—which is given the symbolic name Babylon the Great—will come to an end.
The book of Revelation says: “A strong angel lifted up a stone like a great millstone and hurled it into the sea, saying: ‘Thus with a swift pitch will Babylon the great city be hurled down, and she will never be found again.’”—Revelation 18:21.

The disappearance of false religion, however, will not result in a godless world. On the contrary, Psalm 22:27 prophesies: “All the ends of the earth will remember and turn back to Jehovah. And all the families of the nations will bow down before you.” Just imagine a time when “all the families of the nations” will unite together in worshiping the one true God! Under the rule of God’s Kingdom, that remarkable promise will find glorious fulfillment. (Matthew 6:10) When that time comes, religion—true religion—will matter greatly.

Answer 10

I assume you are speaking of "peaceful" development ever occurring in our behavioral evolution. To that I say, it will never HAPPEN, and as for the decline of religion, that too will never HAPPEN. Know why? We are simply a pawn on a planet which MANIPULATES mankind by it's catastrophes, and even if mankind were to evolve to a state of tranquility with each other throughout the world SOMETHING will always upset it by all we can not predict. Poverty just does happen because people do not care, much of it is weather related and it is POVERTY which breeds discontented SOULS....