Blog 15 #man’s future
Having received various comments on my last extract from the Addendum to ‘Origin of Species’, including several concerning my views on the future of mankind, I am now adding a further extract, which explains as well as I can my thoughts for an ‘atheistic’ future. I know that these will not be accepted by a large proportion of believers, but I am outside the realms of argument and criticism now and merely put this forward as a subject for others to argue over:-
“…..However, as I have said, it is also true that man has rapidly evolved from his early primitive state, and is, compared to the other denizens of the earth, a much progressed creature. The instincts within him, acquired for his early survival and assurance, are now mostly redundant. I would suggest that, in order to utilize his newly developed dominance to its best potential, he should by now be abandoning them. It seems to me that, just as his savagery is no longer of use in a largely ordered world, so his superstitious inclinations are now a constraint on his awareness of reality. Indeed I would go further and say that a reliance on a supreme authority could well be a hindrance to man’s progress, since it encourages him to place the burden of salvation on God’s shoulders and not on his own. It exonerates him from responsibility.
But inherited mythology is a powerful thing. And this argument would seem a bleak philosophy to those who find consolation for the travails of life in the belief that there is a guiding purpose and an ultimate reward in heaven. Nevertheless there is a liberation in forsaking such concepts. Once freed from the constraints of historical ideologies man will be able to explore morality for its own sake, to seek individual fulfilment objectively, to grow old with acceptance. Then his appreciation of the glories of the universe, his knowledge of the remarkable way it works and develops, his ability to exploit its limitless powers, will so far eclipse his innumerable visions of paradise and mystically ordained structures that he will wonder at his early innocence. He will appreciate his contribution to the whole gigantic pattern, as a dying tree contributes to the fertility of the forest around it, and thus be free of his need for lone benediction.
I would offer an alternative philosophy. For me, it is the gradual progress of man, and far beyond man of the universe itself, through natural selection and towards an ultimate perfect self design, that is the only concept of heaven that is credible. One might say that God is the end, not the beginning.
The method of my own worship has been through biological research. Scientific exploration has been my fascination, my joy, and at times my demon. In that it is the only path reliably to discover and to exploit the truth, it is I believe man’s destiny.” C.D. 1859
