The knight in the big world of American TV series

Chapter 1967: Gods Are Not Fun (Please give me a monthly ticket!! Please subscribe!!! Please recomme

Chapter 1967: Gods Are Not Fun (Please give me a monthly ticket!! Please subscribe!!! Please recommend)

Speaking of the Pantheon, this thing is not an ordinary organization. It is also quite powerful in the universe, and has even absorbed many gods from other civilizations to join it! But the main body is still the hometown group from Earth, and even the hometown group on Earth absorbs foreign gods to strengthen itself.

This made the Pantheon extremely powerful.

Of course, there is also a problem here, that is, as long as a civilization develops to a certain level, it will naturally be less reverent towards gods... Just like the Earth, people used to be very reverent towards gods, but in modern times, strictly speaking, after the Industrial Revolution, the degree of reverence for gods has plummeted!

Of course, faith is faith and awe is awe, and the two cannot be confused.

Science is opposed to superstition, but not to faith. Faith is not superstition. Science and faith are complementary. Science relies on rationality, which is a powerful magic weapon for mankind. However, there is a vast field beyond rationality - irrational human nature, a human nature that is both good and evil and unknowable. It is like a vast dark universe where rationality has no room to display. Science has lit a bright light, but it may never be able to illuminate the dark universe of deep human nature. It is not easy to realize this level. Many sages in history have taken another path. Kant's objective morality led to Nietzsche's superman theory. Nietzsche's superman theory secularized the two metaphysical theoretical characteristics of "omniscience and omnipotence". The "omniscient and omnipotent God" entered the world and then became the foundation of Nazi thought... At the same time, Hume, the peak of natural empiricism, and the neoclassical and neoliberalism born under his influence became the biggest enemies of totalitarianism. Back to reality, most Chinese people always misunderstand faith as superstition. Chinese people have not had real faith for a long time and can only rely on power, which has led to the prevalence of pragmatism and egoism for thousands of years, which is directly related to this. There are many people in China who worship Buddha and burn incense, but there are very few true believers among them. Many superstitious people actually just worship "Buddha" or "God" as a powerful force in reality, hoping to get something in return.

This is a blasphemy against faith.

Faith is a profound recognition of the unknowability of human nature and the insignificance of human beings, and it is also a way to liberation. Faith is irrational. It "irrationally" builds an illusory barrier for the "good" part of human nature, and then "irrationally" makes this barrier indestructible in the hearts of believers, just like lighting another lamp that never goes out at the end of the dark universe of human nature. This lamp is lit together with the lamp of science to escort the boat of mankind. The "evil" of human nature often jumps out to extinguish this lamp, but always fails, just as ignorance often tries to extinguish the lamp of science, and always fails. If human beings only think about the above questions with scientific thinking, there is only one way, which is suicide, because faith gives meaning to life, and without faith, everything is meaningless and futile.

Of course, technology will inevitably weaken faith. The simplest example is that God created human beings.

This is something that everyone familiar with the Bible story knows. In fact, the initial question of not just God, but any belief in a deity will answer is how did humans come about?

People revere the Creator and believe that human beings come from gods.

This is basically the beginning of the myth.

But with the advancement of technology, this statement has been basically overturned, because humans were not created by God, but are the result of natural evolution.

This will inevitably lead to a conflict between faith and science.

Here is a famous example. In 1859, when Darwin's "Origin of Species" was published, it immediately set off a great uproar in the intellectual world. The creation view that people had believed in for thousands of years was subversively impacted. Conservative academics and religious people attacked Darwin's "heresy" but could not stop the spread of this revolution. When the storm finally landed in the United States across the ocean, it changed not only the academic process in the United States, but also the face of American higher education. When the theory of evolution arrived in the United States, the scientific and religious communities immediately responded to it in completely different ways. Today's scholars generally believe that American scientists accepted Darwin's theory of evolution in a very short period of time. Although the academic authority Louis Agassiz at the time refused to accept the theory of evolution and believed that it lacked basis, this did not stop his colleagues and students from enthusiastically supporting Darwin's ideas. As early as 1869, the American Philosophical Association awarded Darwin an honorary membership, which was equivalent to "official recognition", which was many years earlier than the official recognition of Darwin by European academic institutions. While support for Darwin was growing in the scientific community, opposition from the religious community was growing.

Some critics of Darwin have shortened the process of human evolution, saying that humans evolved from "various cute carrots"; others believe that Darwin's proposal that humans' ancestors were apes, not God, is a great insult to humanity. Although these comments seem absurd, they cannot be simply attributed to ignorance. In fact, religious forces have spared no effort to attack the theory of evolution, not so much out of ignorance, but more out of fear.

So what are religious people afraid of?

In general, they fear two things: the loss of faith and the destruction of moral restraint. Since evolution involves the evolution of the entire nature and human society, sacred and ideal goals seem to be driven out of the stage of people's lives. Darwinism completely denies the predestination of God's creation of all things, and therefore all values ​​and morals based on it will collapse. Therefore, from the 19s and 80s to the early s, religious forces tried their best to strangle the spread of evolution in American colleges and universities, and even used threats and attacks when necessary. The religious conference warned the university board of directors, and the board of directors asked the president to refuse to hire teachers who agreed with evolution. They used pulpits and religious publications as positions to force colleges and teachers to comply with regulations and correct their mistakes. A confrontation between new and old ideas is bound to become a struggle to defend the college.

However, this confrontation did not turn into a head-on confrontation. The strong influence of the church on the college did cause a lot of difficulties for the college, but the attitude of religious forces against evolution was not consistent. There was a large gray area between orthodoxy and heresy. The ambiguity of the church's attitude was caused by many factors. There was no unified Christian church in the United States. The acceptance of evolution by various denominations was different; the closeness between different colleges and churches was also different; in addition, the attitude of the church also depended on the determination and ability of scholars or presidents to defend their academic reputation. In this unpredictable environment, scholars often could not figure out the safe boundaries of academia and the scope of orthodox ideas, and always "accidentally" crossed the boundaries. As a result, many moderate evolutionists became the first victims. Let's first look at the situation in the most conservative seminaries. In 1857, Columbia Presbyterian Theological Seminary in South Carolina hired the conservative James Woodrow as a professor of natural sciences.

Professor Woodrow has always been committed to reconciling the contradiction between science and theology, but the emergence of evolution has put his work in a difficult position. The board of directors began to suspect that Woodrow accepted the idea of ​​evolution and asked him to publicly explain his position. Although Woodrow cleverly used the Bible to dispel the board's doubts, the church still seized a tiny "loophole" in his argument and forced the board to dismiss him. The explanation given by the church was that although Woodrow's interpretation did not violate the Bible, it conflicted with the Presbyterian interpretation. Of course, Woodrow's incident only showed the fear of new ideas in the most conservative seminaries at the time. In contrast, in the more enlightened Eastern colleges, the relationship between science and religion was much more harmonious, and the idea of ​​evolution was more easily accepted by the college. In the list of Yale University faculty in 1880, there were several evolutionists; and Harvard University at the same time, under the leadership of President Charles Eliot, was becoming the base camp of evolution.

But even within these schools there was an area of ​​conflicting ideas. Although this area was equally blurred, the chaplains and deans of the colleges worked hard to maintain the boundaries. Whenever a conflict occurred, they declared: "Evolution ends here."

But artificial control does not work. Once evolution is allowed into universities, it is difficult to block and prohibit it. The Porter-Sumner incident at Yale University in the late 19th century is a clear example.

Porter was the president of Yale University. He hired the "heretical" Professor Sumner in 1872 despite opposition from religious forces. But in 1879, Porter asked Sumner to stop using British thinker Spencer's "Sociological Studies" as a textbook, which triggered a conflict between the two sides.

Spencer introduced evolution into the study of human society and pioneered the so-called "social Darwinism". Porter did not oppose the teaching of evolution in the field of natural science, but opposed evolution in the field of sociology. This position surprised Sumner, who believed that Porter opposed everything modern in the field of education. So Sumner and Porter started a war of words, and the result was a draw. The board of directors, knowing that Sumner had the support of the faculty and public opinion, finally refused his resignation, and Sumner also made some concessions. However, in the long run, Sumner actually won. He became a role model for other Yale professors and gave them the confidence and courage to pursue the truth. The suppression of evolution scholars by religious forces lasted at least until the 19s. Some newly established secular schools centered on scientific research were not even spared. For example, Cornell University and Johns Hopkins University had refused to hire scholars whose religious ideas were not orthodox, and Cornell Vice President was even fired by the board of directors for sympathizing with "heresies". However, all these incidents that undermined the harmony and stability within the college also aroused backlash from all parties.

Previously, the principals played the role of "rebels", but they were too easy to succumb to the board of directors or religious groups, so the burden of resistance now fell on the teachers. Some of them turned to the media, some to the courts, and some, like Sumner, turned to their peers. The dissatisfaction of the teachers was now gathering into a movement. In the struggle, the status of teachers was also improved. Since teachers were employed by the board of directors, they had to obey the decisions of the board of directors. However, the mistakes made by the board of directors in the process of opposing evolution weakened their previous prestige. Their wavering attitude towards evolution was unreasonable to the professors. At the same time, one result of the crisis of evolution was that it united a group of like-minded scholars and teachers, and various academic groups were established, gradually becoming a new force that could compete with the board of directors and even replace the board of directors. In addition, the behavior of combating evolution also aroused great resentment among the public.

The dismissal of Winchell, a professor at Vanderbilt University known for his mild piety, as a "rebellious thinker" sparked a liberal backlash against religious forces. Popular Science condemned the university's actions and compared Winchell to Galileo. Public anger was hard to contain because, in this new era of enlightenment, any suppression of reason meant regression; and in this era of social progress, regression was a serious crime. Before the evolution crisis, enlightened people had criticized the control of church finances and management of colleges. Now, people regarded the church as an enemy of scientific development and social progress.

Therefore, they are not against religion, but against religion's interference in the secular knowledge field. In other words, evolutionists criticize theocracy. Specifically, there are two dimensions: one is from the perspective of scientific expertise, and the other involves scientific ethics.

Before Darwin, the clergy actually paid attention to scientific issues, because they were inspired by the spirit of Protestantism and needed to use science to maintain the orthodoxy of their doctrines. However, the irreconcilability of evolution theory and orthodox thought gradually made the clergy who opposed evolution theory lose their qualifications to engage in scientific research. The "Popular Science Monthly" of that year wrote that the clergy were just popular science writers and "completely did not understand the spirit of scientific research." This argument soon became a consensus, and with the introduction of the academic spirit and methods of German universities, American scientists finally monopolized the field of science. Under such circumstances, the ethical discussion of science also broke the traditional dogmatic moral values. People are no longer willing to use labels such as "atheism" or "theism" or the character of researchers to judge science, but believe that the evaluation of scientific research should only evaluate the scientific research itself.

However, this inevitably weakened the control of religion over the world again. It even shook the foundation of the gods' rule over the world! Since then, people's attitude towards gods has become more and more indifferent, because the birth of mankind has nothing to do with gods! Although faith still exists, faith is just faith, not worship of gods! They cannot be confused!

So generally speaking, the planets ruled by the gods of the Pantheon generally have poor science, and can even be said to be primitive. After all, when the vast majority of people no longer fear the gods, the control of the gods will be greatly weakened.

Although this would cause those planets to become backward and primitive, the problem is that for the Protoss, this is precisely the best situation, which means that they will always be in a dominant position.

Therefore, not only will the gods not help believers acquire knowledge, but they will also, like the Vatican, constantly suppress advanced ideas and scientific sprouts.

This also caused that most of the planets controlled by the Pantheon were still in primitive society, and at most they could only reach the feudal society. Although the Pantheon controlled many planets and civilizations, its strength in the universe was not very strong. This was also the reason why the gods formed the Pantheon... If they didn't stick together, they might be captured by some advanced civilizations and used as experimental subjects!

As a member of the Earth's fellow countrymen, although Asgard is not very keen on the affairs of the Pantheon, he is also a member of it.

And the "God-killer" Gol was actually a victim of this system. If a planet is too prosperous, it will inevitably produce many ideas, which will affect the status of the gods on each planet. So when a planet begins to show signs, the gods will take action... Of course, this is also related to the way each god clan acts.

Some gods are more open-minded and will handle problems more gently.

But some gods... the pantheon that God Lap belongs to is a relatively barbaric and unreasonable god. The planet of Ger was a prosperous planet before the disaster. They had already moved from a slave society to a feudal society, but this pantheon did not like such progress. They hoped that the people under their rule would maintain their primitive lifestyle.

Then a century-long drought came, interrupting the progress of civilization.

As for how many people died... the gods didn't care. In their eyes, believers were just leeks. No matter how much harm they did, new ones would grow after a while!

So... don't think that gods are good things!

Gel's killing of the Protoss was not unjust! These guys were not good people at all!

If it was just this, Thor would not get involved in such a thing... After all, Asgard is not the kind of god who needs believers, they live well on their own. In fact, Asgard's presence in the Pantheon has always been weak, and most of the time they are too lazy to pay attention.

But this time it’s different, trouble has come to Asgard!