However effective religions claim to be, they are too varied, inconsistent, arbitrary and self-concerned to be much help to anyone. Morals vary from tribe to tribe and century to century, continent to continent.
Nature—hence science—is ONE: reassuringly consistent and affirmable, and indifferent to cultures and eras. Immutably the same for all time, to all creatures and things. Morals for humans can be deduced from the practices of all creatures. Save one. Humankind, with its fine complex brain, is paradoxically incapable of objective moralizing.
Nature is trustworthy. Science is imperturbable and universal. Religion is corrupt by its very nature, which is the nature of the wayward and vain human. It dictates relative truths, which it insists with passion and violence are the only truths. The only Way. Hindu, Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Taoist, Hebrew and Druid. Only Atheists and religious Jews seem not to proselytize. The others cannot peacefully accept difference. The result is chaos of the spirit and universal conflict.
To look to such troubled dogmas for morals is at the very least illogical, and at worst disastrous. All religions contradict one another, less or more. Nature is never contradictory. Nature is never uncertain.
What we call nature’s uncertainties is not uncertainty at all. Humans learn nature’s laws gradually, so we are always only partially aware, and so only partially certain. The nature of humans is to keep discovering what is and always has been consistent in nature. Nature is solid, unchanging, reliable. As long as we observe carefully and stay open to new information, we can follow nature; always adding to our understanding of its complex and perfect operations.
Morals and ethics are evident in nature. The closer we can imitate them in our societies, the closer are we to nature and its perfections.
But religions not only ignore nature’s laws, they arrogantly claim supremacy over those larger forces. They elevate humans to a position above all other creatures, and the planet itself. The result is universal chaos, all the evidence shows. Except in nature untouched by humankind.
We call chaos in nature by that name only when we do not yet see the order. Order is nature’s realm. Nature shows us integration and harmony. Disruption is humankind’s activity. Interference and restructuring drive us. Religions encourage humans to disrupt. They ought to be teaching submission and co-operation. They ought to be preaching harmony and acceptance of forces greater by far than our will. Nature’s order and truths are clear. They ought to inspire in us humility and ambition.
Humility that recognizes our smallness, and ambition to be worthy of our place in the grand order. And the simple wisdom that self-serving religions only drive us away from our purpose, which is to honor and follow nature, which is all-serving, all-nurturing, all-accepting and all-powerful.
Choose religion and you choose discord and pride. Choose nature, and you chose harmony and humility. And peace.