Innocent 'till proven guilty

About thirty years ago I was born in a multi-ethnic city somewhere in the Netherlands, where I had not been exposed to religion for the first part of my life. And though the first friends I had as a kid were Turkish and Moroccan children, their religion was a completely unknown thing to me. Neither were other religions. This I still consider as the age of innocence, being completely free of cultural memes, and seeing people for who they are.

Then at the age of seven, we moved to another part of town, where I had to attend a christian school, since it was close by. I didn't want to go, but I'm sure glad I went to a christian school. Otherwise I would never have become the furious realist that I am today. Because, at this school, the most fantastic stories were being told. About people wandering in a desert the size of New York City for forty years, guys walking on water, a mythical garden, and very questionable theories about the origins of life, the universe and everything. Adams rib, people turning into salt, it's all too crazy to believe. And yet, a huge amount of people walking the face of our fair planet believe these fairy tales were and are reality. Then there are folks who don't believe everything they're told. These folks want evidence, proof of what really goes on in this galaxy and its inhabitants. These people are atheïsts, and they don't have to believe in gods. They know that gods are fiction. I'm one of those people.

Hadn't it been for scientists like Einstein, Newton, Galileo, Van Leeuwenhoek, and so many I forget, religion would probably still be the way of life for all of us. But thankfully humans are curious by nature, and science has always existed. In the darker ages scientists were called magicians or sorcerers, because they practiced experiments that were against the teachings of the bible. And those who were against god had to be killed. That's why the middle ages lasted longer than they should have. The catholic church banned everything out that did not have to do with the bible. Many foreign cultures suffered under the catholic reign of the medieval world. Cultures that did have something to contribute, like the Inca's, were totally destroyed in the name of the 'loving' god of the christians. The crusades were no different. Europeans seeing it as their 'duty' to rid the holy land of those 'evil' Muslims. The same goes on today, by the way, I mean, the crusades haven't stopped. The so-called 'holy land' is still a reason for religious idiots all over the world, to keep on fighting and destroying humanity.

Einstein theory of relativity, on the other hand, is a piece of art. It is however not a final theory, but only a tool in the great theoretical box of science. Einstein's theories set astronomy on the right track, as they predicted the existence of black holes, for example. Black holes were something never heard of before, especially in the time of Galileo Galilei. He stated that the earth was not flat and not the center of the galaxy, which was the common belief in those days. Hadn't it been for catholicism, the good man could have propagated his work, and we could have been living on Mars by the end of the nineteenth century. All knowledge leads to more questions, and to more knowledge.

If the theories of Edward Witten are true, and I have the funny feeling the good man is on the right track, then the scientific community finally has another point in reasoning against the existence of a god. The M-Theory (from 'mystery theory'), or string theory, is a revolutionary one. I'll try to explain, though that's a hard job. It requires a bit of imagination, creativity, and logic, and so far not many people can understand or visualize the idea.

Basic principle is that the universe is built up from strings that vibrate with different frequencies. These strings are so small, it's hard to visualize. They are the size of a rubber band in our normal universe, but the universe has to be reduced in size to the size of an atom. If the rubber band is 'shrunk' in the same relative ratio, you might get an idea of the size of a string.

These strings have different frequencies of vibrating, and the way they vibrate determines whether they form matter or energy. They vibrate (and thus we live) in an eleven dimensional universe. There are the 'normal' dimensions everybody knows (four of them, space and time), and there are dimensions that cannot strictly be called dimensions, but are actually the way certain strings behave. To put it short, strings are the the basis of everything. There are no different types of fundamental particles, there's only strings, which form the sub fundamental, the soup from which both matter and energy are formed.

Since Anthony van Leeuwenhoek started experimenting with the first microscopes, medical science has progressed to the level we know today. But even he had a hard time convincing the common people that the diseases they suffered were not caused by gods or devils. People just could not believe that tiny creatures inside our bodies have the ability to kill and cure. Yet even today there are people in this world who believe gods can help them. Even in the modern western society. In the USA you can find churches where believers handle snakes, they dance around holding the poisonous creatures, convinced that god protects them. Others don't get their children vaccinated, because 'god protects them', and might something happen to the poor kid, it must be god's will. How ignorant can they be? After all that has been proven over the years, and medical science that proves it's worth everyday, how can someone still have faith in some fictional character. But, sadly, faith healers and other charlatans are still growing in numbers, whether they're appointed by some church or self-proclaimed, and unfortunately, the ranks of their followers are increasing in size as well.

Most people have heard of the Big Bang theory. Some of them question the validity of the theory, as it would not answer the question of what there was before this universe was born.

Well, to give an answer to that: there was no time, so there is no before. The Big Bang was not some kind of explosion, it was a birth. A birth of all we know, and more. The huge amount of energy that emerged from that 'point', caused time and space to curve. The speed of the Bang, caused time to go in a non-linear way, so that there's no way in telling whether time went forward or backward at that 'moment'. It could be that time mirrors itself, when matter is dense enough, as would happen in a Black Hole .If our universe has a black hole for a center, it's possible for time to stand still or move backwards inside that center. Then it could be that the universe produces and destroys itself over a period of time, while time itself moves back and forth, thus creating both a Big Bang and Big Crunch, which are the same in that perspective.
 
 

The Ultimate Antichrist Car

 

The real antichrist car, owned by me!

Ultimately, when putting all theories known at the moment together, one could come to the conclusion there is no god. It is just impossible. Women weren't created from man's rib, burning bushes can't talk, people can't walk on water, and heaven and hell are just other names for freedom and oppression. No one has ever risen from the dead, except for on Haïti, where Bokors, or witch doctors use tetrototoxin, extracted from blowfish, to zombify people. This toxin has recently been discovered by medical science as a very strong anesthetic. It has the property to make the victim appear dead, though his/her vital signs are at an extremely low level. These people were buried within 24 hours, after which they would 'wake up' with severe brain damage. This is however the only type of resurrection acknowledged in history.

So, what can we say about god and religion that hasn't been said before? It's fake, a hoax, a great joke. God is fiction, invented by mankind to fulfill certain spiritual needs. But when faith is replaced by knowledge, isn't it time to let go of the idea of a god that created us? We live in an age of information, of evolving ideas, and the global village is too small to let thousands of god cause any more mayhem. It's been enough. Mankind should wake up and embrace science.

It's our only real chance of survival.

After all, it's a small planet we live on. We all have to find our way in life without harming others and ourselves. Thus far we are not doing a great job. My only hope for mankind is that someday everybody will see the truth as we see it. With an open mind, free of cultural and religious memes, mankind can accomplish anything.
 

Life's a silly ball game. Play by your own rules.