what if.... no religion

[Whydoe]

Ok. For whatever reason, the human race is nearly whiped off the planet. There are only about 2000 people to re-populate the world. However, the 2000 people have no knowledge of any religion of any kind. They would be atheist only by default not by choice.
These people also have only a very basic understanding of science; the earth goes around the sun and so forth.
So.... after a few 100,000 years:
Do you think religion (of some form or another) would be generated and why? Would the world be a different place (aside from the initial lack of people) with the fact that a religion wouldn't come about?
With some religions, it would be true that everyone would be going to hell.

???

[Bone_Vulture]

Depends entirely on the type of apocalypse that wipes out the rest of the population first. If the survivors are advanced enough to understand the catastrophy rationally, I see no reason for religion to form later on. Adversely, if no scientific explanation was figured for the disaster, no doubt the people would try to rationalize it with an "angry god" mythology of some sort.

[Pae]

I think religion is just a form of emotional interpretation. So yes, I think religion in some form would come into existence.

[username]

Ok. For whatever reason, the human race is nearly whiped off the planet. There are only about 2000 people to re-populate the world. However, the 2000 people have no knowledge of any religion of any kind.

I view this as an unanswerable question because such a thing isn't even plausible. 2000 survivors with no knowledge of any religion whatsoever? Where would we find 2,000 such people?

Now, if the question were rephrased to 2,000 militant atheists survived, would religion develop? then we have something we can at least offer reasoned speculation toward.

Anyway, my own opinion is that is is extremely unlikely that anyone alive today, who isn't religious would ever go on to develop a diety based religion.

The diety based religions are old religions and they are a product of a different time. I think any 'new' religion would be much more humanistic and naturalistic rather than supernatural.

[AnotherSillyAlias]

I think religion is just a form of emotional interpretation. So yes, I think religion in some form would come into existence.

Yep, and the craftier buggers would announce that they were the spokespersons for god(s) involved in this new religion and if the faithful contribute just a small portion of their earnings they can be told how they will get to meet the god(s) when they die and live happily ever after.

Naturally the faithfull should show their faithfullness by not only contributing to the god(s) spokesperson(s) but should probably stone the unbelievers too.

[Pae]

Yep, and the craftier buggers would announce that they were the spokespersons for god(s) involved in this new religion and if the faithful contribute just a small portion of their earnings they can be told how they will get to meet the god(s) when they die and live happily ever after.

Naturally the faithfull should show their faithfullness by not only contributing to the god(s) spokesperson(s) but should probably stone the unbelievers too.

That's seems to be the way it works.

[Bone_Vulture]

Ultimately religion is crowd control. In this scenario, the interests of the original survivors' progeny would likely start to splinter several centuries after the apocalypse; some would like to live their own lives to the best of their abilities, while others would frantically stick to the master plan of rebuilding the civilization to its former glory. At this point, it'd be tempting to start backing up one's policies with mysticism; like telling how Earth was paradise before the disaster, and needs to be restored, or alternatively that the angry gods destroyed the old world for its sins, hoping that the survivors would build something different.

Factions would rise and form apart from each other, every leader rewriting the apocalypse history to fit their own ends. Objective truth would be destroyed in the end as these myths pass down the generations.

[Pauliesonne]

I thought somebody would have quoted the lyrics for John Lennon's Imagine by now!

[Bone_Vulture]

I thought somebody would have quoted the lyrics for John Lennon's Imagine by now!

Oh come on, that'd be cheap. And it wouldn't fit a damn doomsday scenario.

[Dancing David]

Ok. For whatever reason, the human race is nearly whiped off the planet. There are only about 2000 people to re-populate the world. However, the 2000 people have no knowledge of any religion of any kind. They would be atheist only by default not by choice.
These people also have only a very basic understanding of science; the earth goes around the sun and so forth.
So.... after a few 100,000 years:
Do you think religion (of some form or another) would be generated and why? Would the world be a different place (aside from the initial lack of people) with the fact that a religion wouldn't come about?
With some religions, it would be true that everyone would be going to hell.

???


I think that religion and spirituality are part of being human they are not inevitable, but they come about due to a number of factors.

1. The emotional intuitive part of human brains.
2.The hard facts of life.
3.The tremendous facts of life.

There are some universal in most human religion,
a. the interdependance of life
b. the inevitability of death
c. means of comfort and solace

[Dancing David]

Ultimately religion is crowd control.

It can be in sedentary agricultural societies, so what about it happening in low density and and non-sedentary societies. There are many examples of such in recent human history.

I agree that the prevailing political structures will generaly co-opt religion. When population rise to the level that 'petty chiefs' are replaced by political scavengers.

In this scenario, the interests of the original survivors' progeny would likely start to splinter several centuries after the apocalypse; some would like to live their own lives to the best of their abilities, while others would frantically stick to the master plan of rebuilding the civilization to its former glory. At this point, it'd be tempting to start backing up one's policies with mysticism; like telling how Earth was paradise before the disaster, and needs to be restored, or alternatively that the angry gods destroyed the old world for its sins, hoping that the survivors would build something different.

Very likely and part of it would be dying god myths.


Factions would rise and form apart from each other, every leader rewriting the apocalypse history to fit their own ends. Objective truth would be destroyed in the end as these myths pass down the generations.

There is a grain of truth in oral histories, and populations have story telling needs beyond the political, we are discussing very low density society here, your staements seem to reflect a sedentary society with storage technologies.

[Dancing David]

Yep, and the craftier buggers would announce that they were the spokespersons for god(s) involved in this new religion and if the faithful contribute just a small portion of their earnings they can be told how they will get to meet the god(s) when they die and live happily ever after.

That is most likely to happen in high density and sedentary populations.
In non-agricultural societies, the 'petty chiefs' are political leaders in a semi-democratic sense, they rule with the consent of the governed and usualy undergo ritual torture to earn the privilege.
In such societies the role of religion is more varied, there are shamans and healers and sages.


Naturally the faithfull should show their faithfullness by not only contributing to the god(s) spokesperson(s) but should probably stone the unbelievers too.

That is going to be the primary societal sanction, in low density societies there are two punishments, death and eath with extenuatin circumastances.
In the first the perpetrator is killed out right, in the second they are banished for a time period and if they survive they are re-intergrated.

[Xeriar]

There is no memory of the last catastrophe that knocked us down to ~2,000 people in myth. The best we have is an analysis of general trends that began about 30 thousand years ago.

[Belz...]

Do you think religion (of some form or another) would be generated and why? Would the world be a different place (aside from the initial lack of people) with the fact that a religion wouldn't come about?
With some religions, it would be true that everyone would be going to hell.

Depending on the character of those 2000 people... hummm...

I don't think we can escape the grim fact that religion would probably rise again. On the plus side, however, it'd be a completely NEW form of stupidity.

[Bone_Vulture]

Depending on the character of those 2000 people... hummm...

I don't think we can escape the grim fact that religion would probably rise again. On the plus side, however, it'd be a completely NEW form of stupidity.

Combining that to the science factor - even today, we have people who fanatically favor fiction over fact. So I'd say that in the scenario, reformation of religion would statistically be an inevitability.

[Solus]

I need to do more research but last I heard "religion" is actually a part of brain the brain the capicity for it that is. It's human nature to want answers. Relgion is the easiest way. I mean imagine the earliest humans in this huge world it's terrfiying to them beyond comphersion. WHY WHY! Like children we are afarid fears need to be explained away.

In your imagined community, religion would pop up again trust me :) Human nature. At least some cults would come up at mimimum that's a near dead certainly.

[Solus]

I need to do more research but last I heard "religion" is actually a part of the brain. It's human nature to want answers. Relgion is the easiest way. I mean imagine the earliest humans in this huge world it's terrfiying to them beyond comphersion. WHY WHY! Like children we are afarid fears need to be explained away.

In your imagined community, religion would pop up again trust me :) Human nature. At least some cults would come up at mimimum that's a near dead certainly.

[HeyLeroy]

Ultimately religion is crowd control. (snip).

Yes, I think religion in some form would sprout, due to the lack of scientific knowledge.

The tribal elder(s) would need some explanations for things. Too many "I dunno's" would cause them to lose face.

Villager: What's that blindingly bright thingie up there in the sky?

Elder: I dunno.

Villager whispers to other villager: He's not much of a leader. I think we should take 'im out...

vs

Villager: What's that blindingly bright thingie up there in the sky?

Elder: That's our creator. He put me in charge.

Villager: Jeesh, what do I gotta do not to p!ss him off?

Elder: Do what I say. By the way, where's your daughter?

[neutrino_cannon]

The list of social constructs defined as religion is paraphyletic, to use the nearest availible analogous term. Not all religions serve the same social purpose, and I think it therefore foolish to classify them all as the same thing, if indeed it isn't supreme foolishness to reify the concept in the first place.

[c4ts]

Someone with a good imagination, and maybe a little bit of mental illness, is going to start a religion.

[LawnOven]

Depends on what you mean by religion I guess.

The short answer, in my opinion, is yes. The situation you describe used to happen all the time in days before cell phones air place and computers. Certain groups of people could remain isolated for serveral generations...

And I can't think of a single case where an anthropologist has come across a religionless society.

A typical Anthropological explanation for "the-supernatural" is that it is humankinds attempt at knowing, and controlling the unknown. Makes sense to me anyways.

And an organized religion is that, and a rule set all in one.

It's a good way of organizing people, and cannot be argued against. If the question "why" is asked, the answer is simply "because god said so".

So um, yes.

[LawnOven]

Depends on what you mean by religion I guess.

The short answer, in my opinion, is yes. The situation you describe used to happen all the time in days before cell phones air place and computers. Certain groups of people could remain isolated for serveral generations...

And I can't think of a single case where an anthropologist has come across a religionless society.

A typical Anthropological explanation for "the-supernatural" is that it is humankinds attempt at knowing, and controlling the unknown. Makes sense to me anyways.

And an organized religion is that, and a rule set all in one.

It's a good way of organizing people, and cannot be argued against. If the question "why" is asked, the answer is simply "because god said so".

So um, yes.

[3point14]

In Clarke's novel 'Songs of Distant Earth' (if memory serves correctly) he describes a society where religion has been deliberately removed. It is, however a very technological one. Don't know how relevant this is, but I thought I'd mention it. He seems to think this would be a good thing - I'm inclined to agree with him.