Religion
In reply to the discussion: Why not deal seriously with those of us who see science and religion as equal? [View all]moobu2
(4,822 posts)religion functioned as a form of science for most of human civilization. I mean, for most of our existence as a species, anytime someone wanted to know why something was happening, like seasons changing, earthquakes shaking everything or rain falling or whatever, they always asked a priest. I think of religion in terms of a type of protoscience. Early people just didn't know what caused almost anything around them. They didn't know about plate tectonics for instance or planetary motion and Solar system physics, evolutionary biology or what caused anything really. People just made stuff up the best they could to explain physical phenomena and religion served that purpose and out of a very strong human need to have an explanation for everything it developed and evolved into what it is today.
To me religion is to science what alchemy was to chemistry or astrology was to astronomy.