I took a walk on a magnificent starry night; there were no clouds. The moon’s light, which often covers up the stars with its bright glare, was absent as well. The stars were dancing in the sky, giving me a small view of the vastness of the universe. On the walk and subsequent star gazing venture, I reached many conclusions on humanity, life, and religion. Humans, as I’ve observed, have a huge ego problem. Humans are egotists in their view of their place on Earth. If asked, most people will consider themselves the superior species. In a way, that is true. We are considered the apex predator of our world, but that doesn’t necessarily make us better than any other species, nor does it make any other species less worthy. For example, a lion is commonly regarded as apex predator of the savanna, but does that diminish the abilities of an elephant, or a rhinoceros? It does not; therefore, humans have no right to consider themselves superior to other species and maltreat them just because evolution granted us a higher intelligence. Another example of how humans consider themselves superior to animals, is the fact that most major religions only deal with humans; they believe only humans have a soul, or even if animals have a soul, they don’t have an immortal soul. The very idea of a soul has been with humanity for centuries, but there is no evidence for a soul separate from the body. Consciousness has been debated to be a “soul” but that is a different matter from the religious perspective. The idea that you’re better than someone or something else is one of the main causes of strife in the world.

Human always want to be special, which brings me to my next issue of human egotism--religion. I might argue that Loki, from the movie The Avengers could be correct in stating that “It is the unspoken truth of humanity that you crave subjugation.” Is that not what we’ve always done? Monarchs, dictatorships, we always have to have a higher power for governance because humans at the present cannot live without strict guidelines with punishments. Even today a lot of us bow to a supposed god in whatever form, in the need of “salvation.” People often get morals from religion, and argue that without religion, there are no morals. My response is this: if you need religion to be moral, then you are not a moral person. People are indoctrinated at a very young age, allowing little room for personal growth. If you tell someone from birth that the sky is a huge blanket, then that is what they’re going to believe for a long time. This is similar to religion, as children are often “brainwashed” from a very young age. They are taught not to sympathize with the so-called wicked people destroyed in the Great Flood, mentioned in the Bible and a lot of other religions. Even today, 42% of Americans are creationists; the people that say that evolution and the Big Bang are false. They would rather believe that God did it, and only have evidence from a book written 2000 years ago by people that didn’t have much knowledge of science at all, than scientific theories. Science didn’t make up evolution. Evolution was theorized after observing changes in the world around us and after observing clues to the past. Religion starts with “facts” and tries to find evidence that these “facts” are correct. Then when religion is criticized, they attack the accuser. From Copernicus to Darwin, many scientists have been persecuted by religion, by simply drawing conclusions from observation. These people view theories as “guesses,” whereas in actuality a scientific theory is a well-substantiated explanation tested repeatedly and confirmed through observation/explanation, and derived from the scientific method. Personally, I am not atheist, nor am I a theist. I find the belief in a personal god, one that is obsessed with the doings of mankind, to be a childlike belief. They want to believe that humans are special, chosen beings by God to go to heaven or hell. The idea of eternal life is something that humans have obsessed over for centuries. If there were a heaven, I would think one would get bored eventually, and on the topic of hell, I find it monstrous that a God can torture people for the rest of time, simply based on the Bible’s version of right and wrong. Pascal’s wager states that you should “have faith” because you have nothing to lose if you are wrong, and everything to gain. This argument I find flawed, as you would lose many things in the life you are guaranteed. For example, you would lose 10% of your income (if you are part of a church), and certain rights that are restricted by religion. Plus, if you are praying to the wrong God, you will go to hell according to that particular religion’s holy book anyways. However, I am not arrogant enough to assert that there is no God, because no one can know. The sense of awe that I attribute to the universe and all of its laws and even more hidden mysteries, is enough for my spirituality. I do not know whether I would call that God, but I regard it with the same awe and wonder.  I recognize that there hidden mysteries in the universe that we do not understand, with our limited human perception, but I do not believe in a personal God. I sympathize mostly with Einstein on that regard. Maybe a higher intelligence did create the world, or maybe it was an accident. Coming off of that, I often wonder what the point of life is, discounting heaven, and I came to the conclusion that there is none that we have found yet. Think of it like eating your favorite dessert. You start eating, and enjoy it immensely, but no matter how long you want to keep eating it, it will be gone eventually. You can only enjoy it to the best you can before it is gone. It is distressing to see what society has done with religion anyways. Religion eats up so much donation money, but it does nothing useful with this money, Religion simply builds more temples/churches/mosques and makes statues. This doesn’t solve any of the world’s problems. Imagine if all the money used for churches and donations was used to feed the poor, help the environment, and better the people in the world. Honestly the Pope doesn’t need riches, or gold covered thrones, or a huge palace. There is no reason for treasures to be hidden from the rest of the world in the name of religion. Religion has been industrialized to make money for the people running religion. In my firm opinion, it would be far more beneficial to use that money to save the world. Humans should be exploring space, expanding science, expanding education, and saving our Earth, but instead we are too busy fighting over which religion is better. It is time to change the world we live in.