Religion: the Failed Narrative: Clashing Religious Doctrine and the Threat of Nuclear Terrorism

By Richard C. Johnson

God emerges like a hologram in our consciousness and is falsely presented as the champion who will save us from death. Science, with its focused methodology, tells the true story.

God is the main character in religion, but he is a figment of the imagination. Humans experience consciousness like amnesia victims: We dont know where we came from or why we are here, and we fantasize that we keep on living after our bodies physically die. Thus humanity turns to religion, a powerful source of consolation and comfort. Science, however, offers some more concrete answers.

Author Richard C. Johnson argues that God emerges as an adjunct of human consciousness, where he is conjured up in response to the isolation engendered by self-awareness. Huge conflict results, Johnson explains, because claims about God are made from doctrine rather than observation. The result of these conflicts has consistently been war. In an age of nuclear weapons and terrorism, religious conflict must be deconstructed by honest discussion. Johnson explores this seemingly impossible task and proposes methods by which it can be accomplished.

In Religion: The Failed Narrative, Johnson convinces us that irrational religion cannot guide us and that only rational science has proven to be a capable leader.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Jan 13, 2011
• ISBN: 9781450276382

Richard C. Johnson

RICHARD C . JOHNSON earned a doctorate in chemistry and has spent four decades as a researcher and laboratory business owner. He was raised Protestant and converted to Catholicism in marriage. His religious and scientific backgrounds combine to give him a special vantage point to view our troubled world. Johnson resides in Tucson, Arizona.

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RELIGION

the failed narrative

Clashing Religious Doctrine and the Threat of Nuclear Terrorism

Richard C. Johnson

iUniverse, Inc.

Bloomington

RELIGIONthe failed narrative

Copyright © 2011 by Richard C. Johnson

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ISBN: 978-1-4502-7637-5 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4502-7638-2 (ebook)

Printed in the United States of America

iUniverse rev. date: 01/10/2011

For my amazing children …

Eric

Karin

Alex

Contents

Preface

Acknowledgments

Introduction

1. God Emerges: Consciousness Deified

2. Religion Becomes a Franchise

3. Science Is Thwarted by Religion

4. Conflict Reigns

5. Religion: The Failed Narrative

6. Do Interfaith Dialogues Help?

7. The Powerball Wager

8. Mormonism: A Case Study

9. Faith and Reason Are Not Soul Mates

10. God and the Neutrino

11. Islam

12. Resolving the Conflict and Moving On

Endnotes

Preface

Stephen Jay Gould, the noted Harvard paleontologist and science writer, was an opponent of creationism yet deferred to religion with his offering in the late 1990s that science and religion were distinct fields or non-overlapping magisteria (NOMA) whose authorities were not qualified to comment on each other’s realm. I do not agree with this view.

I have been interested in science and religion my whole life. I earned a doctorate in chemistry and later spent nearly six postgraduate years honing a specialty in organic synthesis. Most of these years were spent at the University of Chicago, where I benefited through interaction with some of the best minds in the business. In a parallel life, I bobbed in and out of religion, for I was raised a Protestant and converted to Catholicism in marriage. I have had a special vantage point to experience these so-called non-overlapping magisteria in action. My view is that rational science is the narrative that will guide us forward. Irrational religion is a failed narrative.

Observation is the backbone of science. Two observations I made before I wrote this book were as follows: (1) Claims about God as a causal agent are always wrong, and (2) God is assumed, at least in the three Abrahamic religions, to be a person or personlike concept.

People assert that God has been the force behind apocalyptic events, such as floods and earthquakes. Ultimately, such occurrences are explained by forces of nature. God has been evoked as the designer of the universe, but science provides an explanation (e.g., evolution) that supplants this claim. In science, an incorrect hypothesis is discarded in favor of one that correctly explains a phenomenon. In the absence of observation, we should discontinue employing the God-narrative.

Scripture says, God created man in his image; in the divine image he created him (Genesis 1:27). Science suggests that the horse and cart are reversed. Discoveries in information science indicate that consciousness is an evolved trait that allows humans to experience self as a sensation and to identify this trait in others. Thus, it is our nature to rely on self, using our survival instinct to personify a creation force. This notion has been elaborated by organized religion as doctrine.

In my view, God exists only as an adjunct to consciousness and as a mechanism I refer to as a hologram. In effect, we create God as an illusion without even being aware of it—a comfort and defense response. This God-as-a-hologram mechanism engenders conflict, which has initiated wars throughout history.

A God narrative has been central to most cultures: he created us, gives us purpose, and provides an afterlife. This is the song of religion, but it is off-key.

In Religion: The Failed Narrative, I elaborate on these ideas in five chapters. In subsequent chapters, I explore how the God-as-a-hologram hypothesis can operate without conflict, exposing the contradictions wrought by religion.

We are at a point in our history when religious conflict threatens our existence, when nuclear annihilation could realistically stem from religion-born violence. To avert this catastrophe, we must act—the sooner the better.

Acknowledgments

This book began as a series of articles written in early 2008. I was convinced that if religion was compared as a hypothesis alongside the development of ideas in science in the 1800s, there would be a ready exposure of religion as a scheme of wild guesses.

In January 2009, I decided to rewrite the articles as chapters of a book. I owe a debt of gratitude to my wife, Miriam, for her unfailing support of the effort. My children Eric, Karin, and Alex have been a huge reservoir of inspiration.

I want to especially thank Sheila Wilensky, who took on the task of editing my manuscript. She worked faithfully for a year, smoothing prose, offering valuable suggestions, discussing concepts, and helping streamline the writing, hopefully with the result of presenting difficult ideas in a straightforward manner.

Other people read the manuscript or parts and offered important feedback. In gratitude, I mention the following: Allen Veaner, Jim Larsen, Janet Kuhn, Dan