JARED DIAMOND: Human religion
is implausible to the extreme.
But there is this
question of why
all societies have religion.
I'm placing myself
in the frame of mind
of a visitor from the Andromeda
Nebula, who comes to Earth--
SHADI BARTSCH-ZIMMER:
Very specific, yes.
JARED DIAMOND: --and
encounters on Earth
these creatures who believe
that the universe was
created by something
that then created humans
in his/her image.
Now, to the visitors from
the Andromeda Nebula,
that's extremely
amusing, because there
are 3,000 trillion trillion
other planets with lifeforms.
And some of those
lifeforms surely
are less advanced than
us, and some of them
are more advanced than us.
If there is a being with an
interest in the human species,
the being had
better be interested
in the species on those
3,000 trillion trillion
other planets, which means
also that if the creator has
moral standards for each
of the seven billion humans
today, that creator is going
to be very busy dealing
with the seven
billion individuals
of each of the 3,000 trillion
trillion other planets.
SHADI BARTSCH-ZIMMER: If all
societies have religion,
is it fair to extrapolate from
that to suggest that maybe all
the aliens have religion too?
In other words, is it
something about being
human that causes us to
generate religious belief?
And why do you think the
aliens wouldn't have it too?
What if they came to
Earth and they said, well,
their god looks a little
bit different from ours,
but we know there is one?
JARED DIAMOND: Maybe the
aliens do have religion.
But I have enough problems
dealing with human religion
that I've not arrived
at the point of thinking
of alien religion.
But religion is a huge consumer
of emotion and effort and time
and resources of a society.
SHADI BARTSCH-ZIMMER: And it
builds communities as well, right?
JARED DIAMOND: It
builds communities.
But if it didn't
bring benefits, why
haven't atheist societies
taken over the world,
atheist societies that are not
wasting 1/4 of their resources
on something that
brings no benefit.
There must be benefit.
SHADI BARTSCH-ZIMMER: That's
a fascinating question.
JARED DIAMOND: And
that's the question.
What are the benefits that--
if we adopt the perspective
of an Andromedan
and say, this is all
a fiction, but it's
a fiction that brings
benefits, what are the benefits
that religion brings?
SHADI BARTSCH-ZIMMER:
You're taking
essentially an
evolutionary stance
on the question of religion.
JARED DIAMOND: That's right.
SHADI BARTSCH-ZIMMER: It enables
some to thrive and others
not to, if they don't have it.
JARED DIAMOND: Exactly.
I'm asking why human religion
evolved, because it had to.
It's not that one day,
3400 BC, a pharaoh
figured out that in order to
get his subjects to obey him,
he would erect a pyramid
and design a religion,
tell them that he had a pipeline
to the gods, defying the gods.
And the result was religion.
No, religion must
have evolved probably
over the last 70,000 years.
I would ask my
audience to explain,
why if Jared Diamond
is correct that there
is life on 3,000 trillion
trillion other planets out
there, why have we not yet
been visited by flying saucers?
SHADI BARTSCH-ZIMMER: And
do you think we have?
JARED DIAMOND: No.
SHADI BARTSCH-ZIMMER: OK.
JARED DIAMOND: I'm
confident we haven't.
[LAUGHTER]
