Last edited Sun Jan 8, 2012, 12:30 PM - Edit history (1)
Those are the last seven words of the video. The encouragement to seek emotional involvement is no different from that offered by any clergyman in any house of worship anywhere. The practice of religion is just synchronized emotional involvement.
I dig that whole series. Quantum mechanics, string theory and all the rest are fascinating even though most of it just bounces off my forehead when I hear it. It makes sense in the broad strokes, but I have to take the nuts and bolts of it on faith. I simply don't have the time, equipment, training or inclination to reproduce the experiments. Those people with the white coats and Nobel prizes are, in a way, functioning as high priests or clergy for me. They offer me a window into the human experience that I would not get without their work.
Religious leaders do the same thing with our emotions. Or at least they're supposed to when they're not out making money, corrupting politics and molesting children. People have feelings that get into everything they do. If they didn't feel some sort of way about things like science and engineering they wouldn't do them. Religion was developed to help us understand why we do the things we do.
We've gotten pretty good at science since the enlightenment, but the practice of religion has either ossified or has been corrupted by wealth. It will have to be redesigned to be brought up to date with the world we live in.
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