why should we reject dogma?

Why do objects fall to the earth when dropped? and why do moving objects stop? is the earth standing on a turtle’s back? do you fall off when you get close to the ‘edge’ of the earth? 

In the previous millennium, these questions have been correctly answered beyond a reasonable doubt. but prior to this, what was the prevalent belief? well, Aristotle had answered the first two questions by saying that objects yearn to be reunited with the earth. and so when an object is taken away from the surface of the earth, it misses the earth, and yearns to return and does so. Aristotle also said that when an object is moving, eventually it will get tired. and it will stop running because it is tired. well we now know that these two answers are incorrect. thanks to newton and the scientific revolution. people will no longer accept something without reasonable proof. 

It is easy to see why people accepted the philosopher’s explanations. they were highly intellectual and thus they had a reputation for being wise, and they started a train of thought that has eventually changed the whole world. and so they are authorities in the field of thought. the greek philosophers believed that everything in the world could be discerned entirely by pure thought. they believed that just by thinking, one could come to comprehend everything in the Universe. Now, this in itself is not bad, but then they totally forbade experimental work. to Aristotle it was not Elite and there was no Utilitarian need for philosophy. so their musings about the physical world were not meant to be verified only to appeal to the thought. but it was amazing how these guys came to conclusions. there is the story of socrates and a slave. where socrates drew a diagram similar to Pythagoras theorem. and then called the slave, who had no knowledge of mathematics, and started asking him questions only and the slave answered these questions and thereby deduced Pythagoras theorem. C^2 = a^2 + b^2. and then socrates concluded that since this man had answered this question of this profound mathematical concept all by himself, then the man must have known this mathematical formula in a previous life. and just like that socrates ‘proved’ re-incarnation! 

These were the kind of thoughts and proofs that fueled the greek minds, and although they were highly intellectual people, remember that we are talking of a time before christ. their knowledge was limited, and a lot of speculations were treated as facts because they seemed reasonable enough. there were also philosophers of other aspects, other than the physical world. for example, philosophers on religion (theologists) who engaged in thinking about the spiritual world. and they came about answers as well. These guys (and other philosophers) had ideas that were propagated and then became the basis of knowledge for centuries. until the scientific revolution. when everything had to be redefined. and we had to know what was fact, from what was just a Philosopher’s over-thinking. within a comparably short time of this scientific revolution. the world has seen tremendous progress, insights upon insights and man kind has redefined what it means to be human. 

Sadly, the same has not applied to religion. because like philosophy which had a caveat that stopped people from doing experimental work to confirm claims, religion also has a caveat that stops people from discovering where it could be wrong; faith. so in religion, whatever an authority has said, faith attempts to stop us from doubting it, let alone checking if its correct. more so, it attempts to stop us from even admitting that it might be wrong. when we know this to be the case. A lot of people when faced with this dilemma dissociate from it altogether and focus on their religion’s holy book’s text, forgetting that these were also written by men, the religious Aristotle and plato of their times. 

Now there are questions that we also would love to learn the answer. does God really exist? what happens when we die? why should we be kind as opposed to wicked? can we really appeal to good forces to better our living situation? the answers to these questions which we have, just like the answers given by Socrates and Aristotle in their day, could be correct, as well as very wrong. (my money is on wrong though). However people have blatantly refused to investigate them. what makes faith worse is that faith is the direct opposite of reason. well, almost. and then faith itself has another string attached. if you flirt with the idea of even leaving it for a minute. you are going to burn in fire for eternity. now this is the reason why a lot of people would not even dare to. but just like falling off when you get to the edge of the earth was the most reasonable thing that came to a philosopher's mind. do you not think that the idea that in death, good people get rewarded and bad people get punished would have being the most reasonable thing that came to the mind of a theologist?

Since the scientific revolution overthrew the philosophy of the physical world. none such has overthrown the philosophy of the spiritual world yet and as such we still accept the thinking of these men as truth, and in some cases their writings have become the standard by which we live our lives.. but i think that just the way the investigation of the physical world has brought us a tremendous amount of progress, an investigation of the spiritual world would bring us profound peace, sense of purpose, serenity and harmony amongst many other things. and for this reason i implore everyone to be critical and refuse to allow the basis of your acceptance be just because of who said it. 

Happy Sunday.