Games God Plays 2.0

Does this happen with you, that sometimes when you think about something really intensely, that thing or related things manifest themselves! It is possible that this is just the tricks that our mind plays. When we focus our brain in one specific direction, our brain starts noticing related things, which to us appear as if have manifested themselves, while they have always been there. I am sure you remember how you started noticing all the new cars on the road, when you were contemplating buying one for yourself.

The latest that this happened to me was about the time that I was juggling this idea of “existence” in my head. I was in my favorite book store and there on the shelf, I saw this book, exclusively placed for my attention. “The Varieties Of Scientific Experiences – A Personal View Of The Search For God” by Carl Sagan. I had never heard of this book. In fact what was surprising and amusing to me was the title. It was so explicit as if inviting me to open and read it. It of course helped that the author is very well known scientist and one of my favorite science book authors.

So what did I find in the book? Well, some more interesting ideas about God. We think of God as someone who is omnipotent, omniscient, compassionate, who created the universe, is responsive to our prayers, intervenes in human affairs and so on.

Imagine that there were some definitive proof that there is someone who has some but not all these properties. What if there is a being who is the creator, but is indifferent to our prayers? What if this creator does not even know about our existence? What if this being is omnipotent but not omniscient or vice versa. What if, he understood consequences of all his actions but was unable to do many things, so he is condemned to his own creation where desired ends could not be accomplished. Much like a chain reaction that has gone out of control!

Consider all the possibilities; worlds without gods; gods without worlds; gods that are made by preexisting gods; gods that were always here; gods that never die; gods that do die; gods that die more than once; different degree of divine intervention in human affairs; zero; one or many prophets; zero, one of many saviors; zero, one or many resurrections; zero, one or many gods. And related questions about sacrament, religious mutilation, and scarification, baptism, monastic orders, ascetic expectations, the presence or absence of an afterlife, days to eat fish, days not to eat fish, days to eat only sweet, how many afterlives you have coming to you, justice in this world or the next world or no world at all, reincarnation, human sacrifice, temple prostitution, jihads and so forth.

As science advances, there seems to be less and less for God to do. It’s a big universe, of course, so He is profitably employed in many places. But what has clearly been happening is that evolving before our eyes has been a God of the Gaps; that is, whatever it is we can’t explain lately is attributed to God. And then after a while, we explain it, and so that’s no longer God’s realm.

We have so humanified God that we have even extrapolated all our weaknesses on him. We have placed God at a higher level in power and moral hierarchy, but not of intelligence! We have bound him by our own mental limitations! Physically, we picture him with nostrils, breathing oxygen, thus banishing him from airless worlds! We have him with a navel, appendix and all other vestigial organs in our body, making Him an inefficient machine.

How about the start, if any, and about the end, if any? Possibilities that exist – God might have no beginning but might have an end. Or, God might have a beginning but no end. Or, God might have no beginning and no end!

Another interesting idea related to “existence” that I picked from Richard Dawkin’s book “The Selfish Gene”. It is not our existence as an individual or even as a species that is important, as we are just tools used by something else for its survival and propagation. That something is called Gene. It is after all a Gene that replicates itself and moves from one generation to another. Everything else is left behind and gets destroyed.

We as complex organisms are just “survival machines” for Genes. Genes over many hundreds of millions of years have evolved these complex bodies that help them survive longer. Genes manipulate the survival machines and program them such that the survival machines have the best chances of producing as many offsprings as possible, thus enabling Genes to thrive from one generation to the next.