Would people still believe in God after we made contact with aliens?

[Scorbing]

Source: http://digg.com/news...act_with_aliens

Mike Wall just got back from the SETICon IIconference where he attended a panel discussion titled, "Would Discovering ET Destroy Earth's Religions?" The panel was comprised of SETI wonks Doug Vakoch and Seth Shostak, along with award-winning Canadian science fiction author Robert J. Sawyer.

Not surprisingly, they collectively agreed that contact with an extraterrestrial intelligence wouldn't do much to change people's religious beliefs -? and that we already have historical examples to prove it.

The connection between religious beliefs and the existence of aliens is an interesting one. It's rooted in a pair of traditional Judeo-Christian tenets: namely, the suggestions that humans are God's one-and-only at the center of all things, and that Creationism offers the most credible explanation for our existence. And as the SETICon panelists admit, both of these convictions have been steadily withering away as our scientific knowledge increases.

Writing in Space.com, Wall reflected on this sentiment:

The Bible, Koran and other sacred texts of the world's major religions stress God's special concern for humanity and for Earth. So the discovery of aliens ? microbes on Mars, say, or signals from an intelligent civilization in another solar system ? might seem threatening, by implying that we and our planet aren't all that special.

But our species has had plenty of time to get used to this idea. Nicolaus Copernicus made perhaps the first powerful case for it in 1543, when his seminal work "On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres" showed that Earth revolves around the sun, rather than the other way around.

"We haven't been the center of the universe for a while now ? four centuries," said panelist Seth Shostak, a senior astronomer at the SETI Institute.

Moreover, given all the recent discoveries of potentially habitable exoplanets, religious notions of human primacy continue to take a beating.

And as Wall correctly notes, even if we do make contact with extraterrestrials, religious folks are unlikely to flinch. Take the false discovery of canals on Mars in the early part of the 20th century, or the possible discovery of microbial life on Mars back in the 1990s. While these weren't proven, they still showed that religious values are entrenched in such a way that massive scientific discoveries will be either ignored outright by the faithful, or somehow made to fit existing beliefs.

Another potent example is Darwin's discovery of natural selection. Darwin's idea was particularly devastating to religions, because it offered a complete explanation for the origin of life. God is completely unnecessary for evolution to work -? that's what makes it such a powerful idea. Yet, over 150 years later, religions are still flourishing, a sign that it's going to take a lot more than a monumental discovery to quash religious sentiment. As Wall notes, "So rather than being shaken to its foundations by the confirmation of life on another planet or moon, organized religion may accept the news, adapt and move on."

Indeed, as Vakoch noted, Baptist theologian Dr. Ostrander would be prepared to make the mental switch:

Dr. Ostrander is adamantly opposed to evolution, and yet he has no problem with the idea of there being extraterrestrials. He says it's as if a couple has one child, and then they decide to have a second child. Is that second child any less special? So too if God decides to have life on our planet, and then another planet, and another planet. It doesn't make us less special.

Be sure to read Wall's entire account of the panel, where he also reflects on the opinions of Seth Shostak and Robert Sawyer.

[blade1269]

Yes we do....He is still greater.

[Detection]

tl,dr

But to answer the thread title Q, yes of course. It would be stupid to believe in God and not believe he could have created other species on other planets too.

[R1pper]

or you could ask a better question: would atheists to believe in god, if irrefutable Evidence is presented?

IMHO,i would say no.

[bj55555]

or you could ask a better question: would atheists to believe in god, if irrefutable Evidence is presented?

IMHO,i would say no.

Atheists would believe in the existence of whatever "thing" you provide irrefutable evidence of. Whether or not that thing is actually a deity, let alone YOUR particular "god", would still be subject to debate.

[Scorbing]

If God was God here on Earth, what makes people think he could not have been God somewhere else? The creation of life is the biggest mystery of all. One that we may never be able to figure out.

[Astra.Xtreme]

They would say god created the aliens and then would come up with a random story to try and justify it.

We see it all the time with religious people trying to debunk science by making up stories that aren't referenced anywhere in the bible (or other book of religion).

[a.mcdear]

I don't believe in the necessary existence of god in the first place, so no, proof of extra terrestrial life wouldn't necessarily change my personal beliefs in any significant way.

[limok]

If God was God here on Earth, what makes people think he could not have been God somewhere else? The creation of life is the biggest mystery of all. One that we may never be able to figure out.

God cannot be anthropomorphised no can he exist in creation otherwise he ceases to be God and if aliens make contact with us or vice versa people will still believe in God.

[Noir Angel]

Of course they will, delusion is delusion. Although to me the finding of other life just as intelligent as us would undemine the whole "humans are my most important creation" crap that most religions teach.

[Calum Veteran]

They believe in their god even though there is evidence that dinosaurs existed, so I imagine this case would result in the same. After all, none of the popular holy books account for dinosaurs (to my knowledge).

or you could ask a better question: would atheists to believe in god, if irrefutable Evidence is presented?

IMHO,i would say no.

I would believe that the god exists, if it is proven it does. But I wouldn't support, worship, or follow the god if it supported most of what any of the popular holy books state it believes, and I wouldn't worship it anyway even if it's a nice god. If the god is nice, nothing bad would happen to me for not worshipping it ;)

[Nihilus]

If they can still believe in god after we discover evolution, and fail to believe in evolution, then they can believe anything.

[Rippleman]

or you could ask a better question: would atheists to believe in god, if irrefutable Evidence is presented?

IMHO,i would say no.

You are totally wrong. We are not against god, just imaginary things. All atheists would believe if there was proof. Silly boy.

[theyarecomingforyou]

or you could ask a better question: would atheists to believe in god, if irrefutable Evidence is presented?

Theism is based upon the rejection of common sense and science, the belief in something that cannot be proven. Atheism / agnosticism is based upon the notion that there is no evidence to support the existence of a God. There's no denying that some would deny the existence of a God even if there was overwhelming proof but in general atheists would accept overwhelming evidence that supports the existence of a God.

The reality is that religion flies in the face of common sense. Fossil records disprove the written word of the Bible, yet that has done nothing to alter the beliefs of Christians - rather than being taken literally the Bible is instead treated as an allegorical account of existence. The discovery of aliens would do absolutely nothing to alter the beliefs of the theistic. You only have to look at modern conspiracy theories - like the birther movement or denial of climate change - to explain the creation and proliferation of religion, yet still the majority of the Earth's population is in denial.

[Co-ords]

Ever thought that aliens could be a decoy to let us think that God doesn't exist? Satan is the master of deception... why all the movies lately about aliens? Why are we being brainwashed by the media to accept that aliens exist? If something does expose itself, we will all have our guard down to accept whatever it is... not a nutter here, trying to be serious

[Noir Angel]

Ever thought that aliens could be a decoy to let us think that God doesn't exist? Satan is the master of deception... why all the movies lately about aliens? Why are we being brainwashed by the media to accept that aliens exist? If something does expose itself, we will all have our guard down to accept whatever it is... not a nutter here, trying to be serious

Maybe the NWO and Illuminati are planting brain control chips in our heads to pervert us from the obvious truth of God. I mean the bible proclaims itself to be the word of god, and we know the bible is the word of God because the bible tells us that it's the word of God. I mean how could one not follow such flawless logic, there's NO WAY people could have a legitimate reason to doubt that!

:laugh:

[DrakeN2k]

Bible 3.0 change log

+ Added support for alien creation

+ Tweak back story to support alien creation

[techbeck]

It is said that God created the heavens and the skies,so yes...people will still believe.

[majortom1981]

I would say this would invalidate the 3 major religions BUT you could still beleive in god

[giantpotato]

A more interesting question is, what if an alien makes contact and bring recordings from 2000 years ago showing the technology they used that people mistook for miracles? Would religious people just say it's just tricking us by using space-photoshop, or continue to worship it as god?

[Dick Montage]

My relationship with My God would not be changed, if anything strengthened!

[Bryan R.]

Ever thought that aliens could be a decoy to let us think that God doesn't exist? Satan is the master of deception... why all the movies lately about aliens? Why are we being brainwashed by the media to accept that aliens exist? If something does expose itself, we will all have our guard down to accept whatever it is... not a nutter here, trying to be serious

Ever thought that God is just a decoy that hinders human evolution of mind? Not a nutter here, trying to be serious.

[ahhell]

Ever thought that aliens could be a decoy to let us think that God doesn't exist? Satan is the master of deception... why all the movies lately about aliens? Why are we being brainwashed by the media to accept that aliens exist? If something does expose itself, we will all have our guard down to accept whatever it is... not a nutter here, trying to be serious

Wow.

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

if alien contact was ever made, religious people would just morph their beliefs to fit what they want to believe, as they do and have always done.

"yeah, so what, aliens exist? the Bible is still true for earth! and there's a single passage in some book of the bible that says something about non-earth entities, so that proves it!"

[Astra.Xtreme]

Ever thought that God is just decoy that hinders human evolution of mind? Not a nutter here, trying to be serious.

Sounds reasonable to me. :yes: