Let's assume (for the sake of exploration) that there is something to this notion of God--or a "higher power", as its called. Could God be anything other than the concept we're traditionally used to, as in the "old man in the sky" perception? And in a way that appeals to logic and rationale? Interested to hear your thoughts on this.

Why should we?

What is explained by making said assumption?

Well, I think it's interesting that human beings are the only species (that we're aware of) that has this notion of a higher power, whatever form that may take. What's the reason for it? Our early ancestors who believed in it, were they on to something, or were they just batshit crazy? Is there a connection between belief in a higher power and our earliest ancestors who evolved to a point where they were able to conceptualize the notion?

ackmanben wrote:Is there a connection between belief in a higher power and our earliest ancestors who evolved to a point where they were able to conceptualize the notion?

You need to reword this sentence. It doesn't seem to form a coherent question as written.

Animals do not conceptualize the notion of a higher power, only humans do. We evolved from animals (I.e. non-human primates and so forth). Why do we have a concept of a higher power whereas those we evolved from do not? Are there good evolutionary reasons for being able to do so, or are human beings so smart that we're able to fool ourselves into thinking there's a higher power? Is there something within the evolutionary process that was meant for us to be able to conceptualize this notion? I hope that's a better way of rewording it. If not, let me know and I will do my best to reword it again.

I think that there are aspects of experience to which we assign the label 'god' as an explanatory word. In that sense, I don't think there is anything to the term. (EDIT: for example, god causes floods is fine to say but it tells you nothing about god. It is only an explanation when you ascribe a personal motive to that explanation and we've long since figured out how to model and predict floods that have no need to account for buttsex or wickedness.) But there are aspects of experience to which we assign the word which really doesn't fit the explanatory role. FOr example, it is sometimes a sort of a placeholder word for the mysterious aspects of existence that just simply are. Not mysterious in the sense that there is a mystery to solve but that the idea of a solution doesn't exactly apply. Some mathematicians take a platonist view of numbers, they are actually some sort of out there phenomenon. If mathematical entities are external to mind, then that seems like a sort of thing that has qualities for which the only word we've ever had is god, some sort of just otherness that may constitute some aspect of our universe. Another possible angle might be our complex relationship with ourselves. What Dennett or people in cognitive science might call the user illusion is an exceedingly complex notion, not least because it is a model of a model modeling. Where the reality in that loopy idea could possibly land might be something which we've traditionally folded into the word god. There are lots of other candidates, infinity is one, and I think they do tend to fall into some sort of category, but to strip out those bits from the bits that were explanatory and have already failed as explanatory models drastically changes what most people mean by the word god to the point that I'm not sure how to maintain utility without adding substantial confusion to the mix.

That's my thoughts on the matter anyway. I don't really have a problem with people believing in god if they keep the beliefs to vague areas outside the whole smiting and wrathing bits. In lots of ways I sympathize with the effort.

ackmanben wrote:Animals do not conceptualize the notion of a higher power, only humans do

Please demonstrate this.

ackmanben wrote:Well, I think it's interesting that human beings are the only species (that we're aware of) that has this notion of a higher power, whatever form that may take. What's the reason for it?

Our tendency to see everything as a form of cause and effect.

ackmanben wrote: Our early ancestors who believed in it, were they on to something, or were they just batshit crazy? Is there a connection between belief in a higher power and our earliest ancestors who evolved to a point where they were able to conceptualize the notion?

Just because people believe something does not mean there's a grain of truth in that belief.

ackmanben wrote:Is there something within the evolutionary process that was meant for us to be able to conceptualize this notion?

Evolution is not "meant" to produce any specific trait or adaptation. It's a process with no specific goals.

ackmanben wrote:Is there something within the evolutionary process that was meant for us to be able to conceptualize this notion......and then learned to ultimately reject it as nonsense.

F.I.F.Y

Aside from what Shrunk said, about the lack of purpose in evolution, you appear to have arbitrarily stopped the process of evolution at conceptualising god, rather than continuing past that point to the conclusion that results from the store of humanity's knowledge increasing and our critical thinking skills improving, so that we can reject God for being the incoherent nonsense that it is and also one that serves no useful purpose.

ackmanben wrote:Well, I think it's interesting that human beings are the only species (that we're aware of) that has this notion of a higher power, whatever form that may take.

I'm glad you said 'that we are aware of' because we have no way of knowing whether this is fact or not.

ackmanben wrote:What's the reason for it? Our early ancestors who believed in it, were they on to something, or were they just batshit crazy?

Neither. And that's a terribly simplistic way to attempt to explain the development of religious beliefs.

You could try reading this to gain a better understanding of how humans developed their ideas about your so-called 'higher power'.

But humans became different. They were born with advanced reasoning abilities and few instincts. They remained helpless for many years as their parents taught them the accumulated knowledge of the tribe. Each generation was able to build upon their parent's knowledge base to generate new techniques of coping, planning methods, tools, more cooperative social structures, etc. We advanced as a species by leaps and bounds. But our distant ancestors suffered great anxiety, because they felt helpless, insignificant, and insecure in the face of natural forces and their own finite life span. People do not like chronic anxiety. Some coping mechanism had to be developed......

Having developed self-consciousness in themselves, they may have assumed that the rest of the world was equally self-conscious. The began to believe that the rocks, mountains, rivers, sun, moon, trees, land animals, birds, etc. all contained vital powers, each animated by a spirit. Bishop Spong suggests that:

"Those animating spirits might be benevolent or demonic, but in either case they were assumed to be personal, to have selfhood, to be in charge of their particular area of life, to be capable of responding to human need and to be in possession of supernatural power." 5

Village chiefs, shamans and native healers played leadership roles in this religion. Human anxiety dissipated somewhat as our distant ancestors felt more in control of nature. Religion gave them assurance, confidence, and peace of mind.

It is important to realize that no consensus exists of the source of this first religion

ackmanben wrote:Is there a connection between belief in a higher power and our earliest ancestors who evolved to a point where they were able to conceptualize the notion?

As others have pointed out, this question does not make much sense.

Not all humans accept the notion, and some never have.

Disbelieve it or not, ancient history suggests that atheism is as natural to humans as religion

“Rather than making judgements based on scientific reason, these early atheists were making what seem to be universal objections about the paradoxical nature of religion – the fact that it asks you to accept things that aren’t intuitively there in your world. The fact that this was happening thousands of years ago suggests that forms of disbelief can exist in all cultures, and probably always have.”

ackmanben wrote:What's the reason for it? Our early ancestors who believed in it, were they on to something, or were they just batshit crazy? Is there a connection between belief in a higher power and our earliest ancestors who evolved to a point where they were able to conceptualize the notion?

Well, then the deity you identify is 'conceptualizing'. Otherwise, our ancestors were just a bunch of pig-ignorant goat-roasters who lacked even a germ theory of disease, and told weird stories about shit they didn't have the slightest clue how to investigate.

To their credit, the goat-roasters weren't ignorant on the subject of goat roasting and that is quite a fine thing to pass down to future generations.

Having noted that Bishop Spong featured quite often (quoted as saying some things which seemed like rubbish to me) in the article I linked, I read a bit more about him.

Spong acknowledges that his writings evoke great support and great condemnation simultaneously from differing segments of the Christian church.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Shelby_Spong

And then, at the end of the article, we find this

Bishop Spong argues that there is another response to the loss in belief in a personal theistic God. He suggests that belief in a non-theistic God can continue -- a God with the following descriptions:

Love is God.

God is in each individual.

God "is a symbol of that which is immortal, invisible, timeless."

"God is Being -- the reality underlying everything that is."

But he suggests that a number of historical Christian beliefs and practices must be dropped -- or at least be totally redefined. These include:

God as a personal deity -- supernatural or otherwise.

The virgin birth.

The incarnation.

The atonement.

The "fall" of Adam and Eve.

Original sin.

The miracles of Jesus.

The resurrection of Jesus.

The ascension of Jesus to Heaven.

The Trinity.

Prayer.

He admits that Christianity might not be able to make the transition from a theistic to a non-theistic God. It might be destroyed by the changes required.

Did someone mention bat-shit crazy? But I think I like him.

BWE wrote:But there are aspects of experience to which we assign the word which really doesn't fit the explanatory role. FOr example, it is sometimes a sort of a placeholder word for the mysterious aspects of existence that just simply are. Not mysterious in the sense that there is a mystery to solve but that the idea of a solution doesn't exactly apply.

But that's not really what people originally used the concept for; otherwise the old stories wouldn't be about an entity that controlled everything or poly-entities that each had their own area to control. That's not about simply accepting the way things are, unless you can't accept the way things are except that they're being fed you by something more powerful than you are. That isn't what I would call 'acceptance'. Acceptance is just accepting the way things are and not trying to explain them with funny (or worse, just plain ignorant) stories. But, some people like bad poetry, and that can't be helped. Some of them run greeting card shops with side shelves of gnome knick-knacks, and actually make a living at it.

ackmanben wrote:Why do we have a concept of a higher power whereas those we evolved from do not?

Why dignify this by calling it a 'concept'? Why not just call it a dumb-ass fucking story? If you're spooked by such stories, chalk it up to an over-active imagination, and not to the sheer magnificence of your 'conceptualizations'. Get a second opinion. A little imagination is not a bad thing, but there is such a thing as too much of it.

Sendraks wrote:To their credit, the goat-roasters weren't ignorant on the subject of goat roasting and that is quite a fine thing to pass down to future generations.

Which GOAT roaster was Greatest Of All Time? This is along the lines of a celebrity roast. Bring your fava beans, and a nice Chianti. Or, just wafers and wine.

Cito di Pense wrote:Which GOAT roaster was Greatest Of All Time? This is along the lines of a celebrity roast. Bring your fava beans, and a nice Chianti. Or, just wafers and wine.

A good question, especially if said roaster is still alive today and one is seeking that greatest of all goat roasts.

Sadly, history is decidedly scant on detail regarding the identities of the great goat roasters of antiquity.

Cito di Pense wrote:

Sendraks wrote:To their credit, the goat-roasters weren't ignorant on the subject of goat roasting and that is quite a fine thing to pass down to future generations.

Which GOAT roaster was Greatest Of All Time? This is along the lines of a celebrity roast. Bring your fava beans, and a nice Chianti. Or, just wafers and wine.

That would have been Weber, the Assyrian God of Charcoal. He still receives burnt offerings to this very day.

Gods are based on the need to deny the existence of higher powers. That there exist things in the universe which simply happen of their own accord, that nobody has any control over. Gravity, earthquakes, fires, famine, disease, these things happen without rime or reason. Unless you decide, no, I can't accept nobody has any control over these things, there must be some super humans who do, who find manipulating volcanic eruptions as trivial as we'd find cooking or making clothes. And once you have decided that everything is ultimately run by humans (albeit much bigger humans than us), well, all of a sudden, no natural phenomenon is out of our control. Because all these things only happen when humans want them to, and humans can be persuaded or reasoned with, we can now alter these things if only we can find out how to convince the super-humans in charge of them to change their minds. There are now simply no natural forces which are beyond human control. No higher powers, it's just people all the way up.