Bow Down to the Flugenschmaltz

The setting:   Present day

The place:  a remote village detached from civilization and the modern world since it’s inception

The subjects:   Villagers who have never encountered anything or anyone from beyond their borders.

Imagine there is a large community of people living somewhere on earth today, who have never had

any contact with the rest of the world.  They’ve seen no evidence of our existence, and have developed in a vacuum over centuries.  They have developed their own cultures, morals, and traditions.   The only contact they have ever had with outside tribes happened centuries ago and some of the core beliefs that they have settled upon to maintain order in their society and make sense of the world around them came from a group of tribes whom they encountered long ago who introduced the concept of “Flugenschmaltz”, which would translate roughly in vernacular and definition to “god”.

Now imagine that someone from your neighborhood covertly infiltrated their village, undetected, and left a few artifacts of the modern age, for these villagers to find.    Let’s say that these items were:

The internal workings of a space shuttle engine;

A chocolate soufflé;

A raw CPU wafer die

None of these items would have any indication that they were made by humans, no writing of any kind.   They have no frame of reference for ANY component of ANY of these items.

How long before one of them declares that these items are the work of the mighty

Flugenschmaltz?   How long before someone attributes these wonderfully complex and delicious items to The Father, the Son, and the Flugenschmaltz?

Probably not long at all.   We’re driven to accommodate the unfamiliar into our paradigm of existence and understanding by the only information we have available, so you could easily grant these underdeveloped cave dwellers the benefit of the doubt based solely on that.

Now, move your attention to your neighbors, to people you know, to the people that your kids go to school with.   Move your attention to the throngs of people flocking to temples of worship any day of the week.   Ask among them until you find someone who still believes that the "heavens and earth" are created, driven, and maintained by a mystical invisible being who demands homage, attention, obedience, and the like, while doling out eternal punishment for those who do not fit the bill.

And these are people to whom ALL of the data and information about what we KNOW about the world today is readily available.  These are the people to whom you entrust the care and education of your CHILDREN, FFS!!!

In fact, if you cataloged all of the epiphanies which we've enjoyed through
the fruits of our labor over the past 3,000 years and took an account of all of those things to which we attributed the cause or origin of to lie with "god", which we now know DEFINITIVELY the actual origin, cause and existence of, it would fill stadiums upon stadiums with printed material.

Yet we STILL have people who attribute the cause, origin, and intent of routine things to the "invisible man in the sky" and his mythical son that he slaughtered to appease our blood lust.   And yet we STILL give them the "benefit of the doubt" rather than trying to educate them in the basic knowledge of the workings of our world and our universe.

I, for one, refuse to take seriously, the folly of any individual who chooses to ignore concrete proven information which outlines how the universe operates and refuse to allow them to inculcate my children with their nonsense.  I will grant them no quarter, will concede nothing to them, will never relent, as they detain us in the fantasy which was bred in our underdeveloped brains in an effort to keep us from being eaten by larger mammals.   Their fantasy has no useful purpose in this world today and they must be educated, by force, in fact, if necessary.   I will shove useful information into their brainholes with the implement of my choosing.  Whether or not they survive the encounter is nothing more than evolution at it's finest.   

That's all.  Just had to get this off my chest for today.

Ugh.