Why the necessity of religion in our modern society?

May Allah have mercy with you all.Forgive me for the length of this topic but I wanted to include details to prevent it from being misunderstood.
I hope you will enjoy it dear reader.I am convinced that all the religion that exist in the world has been originally made to make us happy and works as a guideline for a social structure that is based upon true love and solidarity.
I am also highly convinced that true human nature is compassionate and caring, and not selfish and I dont solely draw that conclusion from religious studies within Islam, and other religions.When we look at the physical structure of humans we notice that feelings such as hatred, anxiety, selfishness( loneliness, wich is a following effect), competetiveness , amongst many others have a detrimental effect on our health and is the number one cause for heart problems and early death.
And there have been litterary hundreds of scientifical experiments that point to that aggressive behaviour isnt borned with and that when they do appear they are detrimental and destructive to our health.
Instead feelings such as love and commpassion and altruistic behaviours are more in coordinance with our physical structure.
Maybe the clearest statement about the new research was concluded in the Sevilla announcement about violence 1986 and was formulated and signed by twenty of the most succesfull scientists from all around the world.
In this overview, they of course stated that violence behaviours
occure, but consquently stated that it is scientifically incorrect
to state that we have a borned with tendency to wage wars or commit acts of violence.
This behaviour isnt genetically programmed in the human nature.
In short, there is nothing in our neuro-physiology that drives us.So if our fundamental character is compassionate and caring, then how can one explain all the conflicts and aggressive behaviours that do exist everywhere in our surroundings?Of course one cant reject the fact that conflicts and tensions actually does exist , and not just within an invidual but also within his family and surroundings.
However I remain steady in my position that human nature is compassionate and Ill try to explain why.When some people look back at the human history and they see that humans have been responsible for acts beyond forgiveness or when they compare us to other animals and they see that humans have been responsible for much more aggresiveness then other animals, some of them draw the conclusion that humans are selfish and egoistical and that altruistic bahaviours perhaps do appear but such feelings are fragile and synthetic and that if you just dig deep enough you will find an invidual that has an aggressive and selfish nature.
Or they perhaps state that altrustic behaviours and aggresiveness are both a part of our nature and that they coexist.
Still I am convinsed that compassion and love is the dominating feature of the human nature, hatred, aggression and violence of course do appear but I believe that they appear at a more shallow and superficial level and that they probably arise when our efforts to reach love and warmth are failed, they are not part of our true natur.So even if aggression do appear I belive that these conflicts havent necessary been made by the human nature but by the human intelligence - unbalanced human intellect and misuse of intelligence and fantasy.
When we look at the developent of humans we notice that we have a weaker physical structure than animals.
But thanks to human intellect we could use many tools and discover many methods to overcome the harsh environement that we lived in.
And after a while, when human society and environement became more complicated, our intelligence and learning abilities became more and more necessary so that we could survive the hard conditions nature required of us.
That is why I believe that human nature is fundamentally altruistic and compassionate and that intellect is a later developement, and if this intelligence is misused or without having its counter balance in altruism it can be very destructive, and lead to chaos.That is why religion exists ,it works as a counter weight to unbalanced intelligence as a way of giving place to the fundamental nature of altruism and true love in our society,(love that is not based upon the misconception that it merely exists because of our need to stay alive, but that it really is REAL )But lets for a moment consider a situation in a perhaps coming future: Evolution has after millions of years replaced completely our previous altruistic nature to merely intellectual nature.
If we cant feel a direct hindrance of injustice and aggressive behaviours, then WHAT is to stop the act from happening if not religion?
We cant look for "it(social structure)" in the rest of the animal kindom because the animals are driven by instincts(as I have stated in a previous post) and dont question what they do.
We however are mainly driven by our intelligence, and our altruistic nature has to a certain degree taken as an "allie" religion to prevent an unbalanced intellectual misconception and to establish a social order wich works for the benefit of all.With that stated, one has to also keep in mind that when human intelligence is combined with a kind an compassionate heart, all actions will be constructive.Sincerely Delshad
Ma`SalamSome points were taken from Dalai Lama`s book, Happiness, authored by Dr Howard C. Cutler but the mayor part is of it are mine own thoughts.[This message has been edited by Delshad, 11-11-2002][This message has been edited by Delshad, 11-12-2002]

Hi primordial Egg, thanks for the reply.Sure , here is the link http://www.unesco.org/human_rights/hrfv.htmBtw, wouldn`t you agree that insects, birds, primates, and all the other animals dont share the same way of upholding a social structure as we do.
That is, they dont question their motive because they CANT question their motives.
They perhaps even can think but they are not aware of themselves when they do it.
Hence we cannot just copy their way of maintaing a social structure because we cannot answer the question of why to maintain it.
Therefore I say that religion is still necessary in our modern society.
I hope I didnt understand your reply wrongly, if so, then let me knowSincerely Delshad[This message has been edited by Delshad, 11-11-2002]

Thanks No problem quetzal, dont feel stressed.
I look forward to your reply.Sincerely Dilshad

Hi primordial egg Thanks for replying again.
I understand your views but there is a thing I want to explain from my standing point about your reply:"...That is to say, birds have v. different social structures to insects and they are both different from pack animals etc. Thus having a differet social structure in itself does not elevate humans into a higher status.
- primordial eggBy saying that humans have a different way of maintaing a social structure than the rest of the animals , doesnt necessarily make the rest of the animals socially inferior.
My point is that by having the ability to have a free will, and having the ability to decide our actions from a third perspective brings our social structure to another level, a level where the "right" thing to do isnt explainable by impulses but from a free choise.
That brings the social nature of humans to a different level, the self-awared level.Ps: Thanks for being willing to share your views about the book Sincerely Delshad

Hi Primordial Egg, thanks for replying once again Im afraid that I highly disagree with some of your statements.
I will now try to explain in my humble knowledge why:First of all, couldnt I by the same token suggest that some humans have through countless generations and evolutionary processes lost the ability to be religious?
That they in their despair has fabrictated an alternative mind that is more Atheistic suitable.
Of course I couldn`t , that would made me a walking sign where it is written Prejudist all over.Let me further explain my opinion, perhaps that link you refer to is outdated(It got especially scary when the author made the comment that a chineese mind doesnt function as a french!), I dont know, but I hope I will be able to clearify where I stand.Fistly, wouldnt you agree that the number one reason we humans have survived so succesfully is the brains ability to adapt to the environement.
There has been countless of experiments that show that the human brain is like a "hardware", that is made to fit as many "softwares" as possible , it should be able to change.
One experiment was made by avi karni and Leslie Underleider worked
like this:Several testpersons were instructed to perform some complicated finger movements for 4 weeks.
After that they examined that part that controlled the brains motorical movements and found that in the area that controlled the fingers, the neuron signal ways were almost twice as packed as previous.
That is, the brain can arrange different pathway and signals to be able to cooperate with the environement.This abilty the brain has is called plasticity and the brain "patterns" that this person has made will not be transferred in the genetical code to the next generation.
Indeed, if it were so then we can no longer call ourselves intelligent, intelligence is partially that you have a free will and not by being dependent upon and limited by previous stored data.If it were so then we humans would certainly not exist today as we know it, if we would have existed at all.
The truth is that this plasticity is what makes us succesfull, in example, if the brain worked as you said it is then the language for instance would not have evolved in the rate it does, and a person coming from Kurdistan ( wich I do) would have a hard time learning English , even if he was borned in London itselfSincerely DilshadMa`Salam

Hi primordial Forgive me if i have misunderstood you, one of my perhaps greatest weaknesses is that i draw conclusions all to fast, without seeing other possibilities to the meaning behind it.
In this case, the term meme seemed at a first glance to illustrate, in the specific conext i was reading, religous information that is derived from biological differences due to a social adaption in a religous environement.
However i soon realised that it was not the case, and that Dawkins introduced that term to label for example religous information that usually via the parents, are transcended to generation after generation and that it isnt biological but social.Coming to think of it, i share most of his and Dennetts views but there are some specific points that i wish to share with you.First of all, the very term "virus" that religous information has been given in this topic is not my concept of a true religion.
The term virus is associated with information that destroys or is uncompatible with another primary system.
This is hardly not the case with religion, wich is willingly embraced by 2-3 billion people all over the world ( i dont consider an unwilling practitioner religous )
What is also associated with viruses is that they are very different to remove, if not impossible.
But the huge religous changes wich different people through the centuries have had, does not emply this pattern.One thing i have been thinking about is the prejudism against religion that has even reached its way to intellectuals such as Dawkins and Dennett.
For the life of me I cant understand why they show such intolerance against religion and perhaps that the reason why relious intellectuals have felt that they have been forced to prove religion through scientific means.That to me is ridiculous , since science has nothing to do with religion, they are litterary to different realms and any attempt to prove one of them by means of the latter, will result in nothingness, and is a sign of weak faith or insecurity.Most of the criticism against religion in the western society has been because of christianitys constraint on scientifical progress during the medieval times , where everyone that argued against their worldview was called a "heretic" and was usually killed or oppressed.By the introduction of the theory of evolution, the scientific community , well how should i put it,avenged, Christianity( wich is a peaceful religion in its original concept) and made sure that it dissapeared from every scientific field (wich is good), but also indirectly labeled all relious people as followers of an old bizzare concept wich acts as a vicous poison and a virus to the people and has to get ridden of.This is were i strongly dissagree, because although religion hasent got its place in the science classes, its imprtance in the society should not be trivialized.It is religion , together with the altruistic nature we have left that acts like a counter-weight to a later developed unbalanced intellect.
You belive that religion is a disease, or virus that should be avoided.
I however belive that religion religion is the only nurture of the altrusistic spirit we have and its coordinace with the physical nature of human is harmonius.The philosophy of the survival of the fittest isnt applicable in our human society, because although (i have mentioned this in a previous topic) it isnt necessary by means of violence, the underlying message to society is that feelings such as love and compassion exist only because of our interest to stay alive, wich contradict the very essence of a social structure that is supposed to be in coordinance with our physical structure.That is why I stay firm in my position that the necessity of religion in our modern society is indeed needed, perhaps more now that ever.This is were my religous arguments end, because i do not wish to cross into the borders of science.Sincerely DelshadMa` Salam (Go in peace)

Thanks for replying.I understand your views and I dont think there is anything I can add that can make you change your mind.
My beliefs, no matter how clear I hold them, will not be able to convince another human being if he has no faith.
But I highly respect your opinion and as long you have your morals and are compassionate then may Allah have mercy with you and let you have a good life Perhaps I could just add my view about your question before I go.
Your question was that..As an example of what I mean, lets take the first cause argument (used by many religious adherents) for God.

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1) Everything is caused by an external agent
2) The universe is a thing
3) Therefore the universe must have been caused by an external agent (God).

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But you're never supposed to substitute "God" for universe in the above argument. Why? This doesn't make sense to me - we're supposed to use this logic to arrive at a God, and this disapply it to God itself. Which is it? (Incidentally I think this argument is flawed because premise 1 is untrue).As I have understood the dilemma is that since nothing has been noticed that has no preceding cause(I am not mentioning forces such as gravity beacuse even though we cannot explain what the cause is we see that the force is correlate to the matter and without the matter there is no gravity, thats a "cause"), even the universe has to have had a preceding cause.
If you belived that the universe itself was caused by another Universe then you are in my view just relocating the problem.Thereby.
Every event must have a cause, and each cause must in turn have its own cause, and so forth. Hence, there must either be an infinite regress of causes or there must be a starting point or first cause. I reject the notion of an infinite regress and insist that there must be a first cause, and the first cause must be Allah(god), the only uncaused being.
Another form of this argument is based on the concept of a prime-mover. This is the Aristotelian form of the argument also propounded by Averroes. The premise being that, every motion must be caused by another motion, and the earlier motion must in turn be a result of another motion and so on. The conclusion thus follows that there must be an initial prime-mover, a mover that could cause motion without any other mover.However, I can never and will never use this argument to "convince" anyone (im sure you will already as you read it come up with a flaw in this argument ) , about religion because thereby I would only make an argument from incredulity and that is not the reason to be religous(religion as a social concept perhaps could be discussed , but not when it comes down to a faith issue.)Sincerely Delshad

Hi primordial.I just wanted to mention that logics is what makes me to ponder upon the existence of Allah (god), but faith is what makes me accept it.Therefore, having faith isn`t that I choose to believe because its good for me.
Faith is that I have made a choise, and that choice came fom the realisation that I cant answer the question, nor that anyone will ever answer the question, and that the questions still stands but is beyond the comprehension of material intellect.
(That does not mean that I will stop ponder and search upon whatever truth I can find but I will have my faith upon Allah with me on my journey Well, if you do not wish to add somethin I thank you beforehand for an excellent conversation Primordial Egg, it has been a very interesting experience for me, thanks.
...and weather you beileve it or not may Allah`s mercy be upon you Sincerely Delshad[This message has been edited by Delshad, 11-13-2002]

Well, you could probably blame my altruistic spririt for that and I apologize, (wished to give forgiven a helping hand )I realise that I had told you I wouldn`t use that argument to convince another, and I still stand by it.
However, there isn`t anything wrong with correcting a question and adding a few things into it.
You see, although the question isn`t a proof of a divine existence
one cannot just dismiss the question as being uncompatible with math.
Where the math stops, logics continue.However , coming to think of it, I really have made up myself some double-standards, in one reply I state that religion should not be mixed or proven by science, and in the next topic I do, I must be confusing you, and I apologize once again.
I better keep my words.Sincerely Delshad