Religion Predates Science and Often Ignores It Still [View all]

During the Bronze Age and Early Iron Age, human beings did not understand even the basic things. For example, at the time the Bible was written, people had some idea, from observation, that both a male and female were required to create a new life. They hadn't a clue about how that worked, however.

"Sperm were first observed in 1677 by Antonie van Leeuwenhoek using a microscope, he described them as being animalcules (little animals), probably due to his belief in preformationism, which thought that each sperm contained a fully formed but small human."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sperm

Even in 1677, the human or mammalian ovum was not known. The first person to see a sperm cell thought it contained everything needed for the next generation to be created. It wasn't until the 20th century that the human ovum was discovered:

"Karl Ernst von Baer discovered the mammalian ovum in 1827, and Edgar Allen discovered the human ovum in 1928. The fusion of spermatozoa with ova (of a starfish) was observed by Oskar Hertwig in 1876."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egg_cell

What does this have to do with religion? Well, religion, in general, is pre-scientific. In various scriptures, fanciful descriptions of the origins of things appear, because nobody knew any better. Humans did not understand much of anything about our planet, ourselves, and our universe until science was able to provide more accurate information.

And yet, billions of people still rely on Bronze Age and Early Iron Age documents to understand things. They still follow rules and give credit to ideas that were written before humans understood much of anything about themselves or their surroundings. They still behave as if reproduction is some sort of magical event. People study those ancient writings on a regular basis, but avoid learning the facts.

Such ignorance leads us astray, again and again. Such reliance on the words of people who had very little knowledge with which to work still governs many of us today.

How does that make any sense at all? Why are we stuck in the Iron Age in so many ways? Why do we allow "faith" in old documents to keep us from learning the truth about so many things? Good questions...