But there _is_ a modern religion based on universal principles.
More precisely, on universal computers.
According to the Great Programmer Religion, the Great Programmer wrote a
very short program that computes all computable universes. One of them
is ours.
Some disciples of this religion find it plausible because the short
program is the simplest explanation of all observations.
Others find it increasingly plausible because our own, currently
quite primitive virtual realities are getting more sophisticated all
the time. We observe a speed-up factor of 10^6 every 20 years, possibly
10^30 in the ongoing century. More and more people, especially kids, are
in regular contact with virtual realities, and to them the new religion
may seem just like a natural extrapolation.
Juergen Schmidhuber
http://www.idsia.ch/~juergen/
http://www.idsia.ch/~juergen/toesv2/
http://www.idsia.ch/~juergen/everything/html.html
> From: "K. S. Ryan" <ksr9569.domain.name.hidden>
> Date: Fri, 28 Sep 2001 15:15:45
>
> Religion is a system of beliefs describing our place in the cosmos.
>
> Tha basic premise of all religions is that we are best when we act in
> accordance with universal principles.
>
> Prophets describe our place in the cosmos by explaining universal
> principles.
>
> Fundamentalists of all sorts are in conflict with the modern world because
> universal principles are increasingly scientific, secular, and physically
> practical.
>
> Old school religions are losing market share to the modern world.
> But the modern world does not offer a unified system of beleif describing
> our place in the universe. Contemporary truths are not packaged as a whole,
> as a spiritual intellectual-emotional raison d'etre. Thus, while educated
> modern worlders may not be convinced by old school religious beliefs, there
> is not a modern unified system to replace them. Because we are human, we
> think a lot, and need to know what the individual means to the whole. What
> is our place in the cosmos? That is the question. And there is turbulance.
Received on Fri Sep 28 2001 - 08:58:57 PDT