The Holy Cosmos: The New Religion of Space Exploration

[cbayer]

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/03/the-holy-cosmos-the-new-religion-of-space-exploration/255136/

MAR 29 2012, 7:05 AM ET 11
Carl Sagan and Neil deGrasse Tyson are high priests, astronauts are like saints that ascend into heaven, and extraterrestrials are as gods -- benevolent, wise, and capable of manipulating space and time.

by Ross Andersen





Think about how you feel when you see the Earth from space or the Apollo astronauts walking on the moon. These images are achievements of science, sure, but they also have a religious feel to them; they tug at something deeper than engineering, something sublime. When viewed as a whole, space exploration has a lot in common with religion. It offers us a salvation narrative, for instance, whereby we put our faith in technology in order to be delivered to new worlds. Its priests, figures like Neil deGrasse Tyson, extoll its virtues in what sound like sermons. In its iconography, astronauts are like saints that ascend into heaven and extraterrestrials are like gods---benevolent, kind, wise, capable of manipulating space and time.

This idea of seeing space exploration as a religion has a long history, dating back to the Russians of the early twentieth century, many of whom self-identified as "Cosmists." From there it migrated to German rocket scientists like Werner von Braun, who took his ideas about space travel to America after the Second World War. Americans were slow to warm to space exploration. They saw it as a fantasy, but that changed as Americans began to regard technology with a new reverence in the postwar period. Today Americans are the most fervent Cosmists on the planet, even if manned space exploration seems to have stalled for the time being.

Albert Harrison, a professor of psychology at U.C. Davis, has been working on the psychology of space exploration since the 1970's, when he did research for NASA about the psychological effects of long-term space travel. Harrison was kind enough to send me a chapter of his forthcoming book about Cosmism, and the complex psychological motivations that underlie space exploration. What follows is our conversation about the past, present and future of space exploration as a religious quest.

In what ways does Cosmism resemble a religion?

Harrison: Well, the roots of this extend back to antiquity in early notions of sky gods and that sort of thing; it's telling, for instance, that the polytheistic gods of yesteryear lent their names to planets. In the modern era, Cosmism is generally thought to have originated with early twentieth century Russians. There are a couple different ways that you see the religious aspects of Cosmism. One place you see it is in the tremendous faith that both Russians and Americans have in technology; specifically, the idea that technology can solve the problems of humanity, and that we need to leave Earth to create a better society, to find, in some sense, perfection in space. You see this idea over and over when space exploration is discussed, the idea that we can leave behind the problems that plague society here on Earth and we create these wonderful new societies in space. There's a general resemblance in this thinking to religious views of heaven, and in particular notions of salvation.

more at link

[Sinistrous]

1. Codswallop.

[GopperStopper2680]

2. Cosmism?

Worshipping the Universe? May as well worship idols.

[immoderate]

3. Sort of in the same way that eating hamburgers is a religion...

I'm sure that some researcher has approached it in that way. One of the tricks of academics is to map the jargon of one discipline onto the operations of another.

I recall a professor of educational technology describing the priestly vs the prophetic approach to understanding computers. Turns out his master's was in divinity. And he did the mapping trick for his PhD. Beware the error of reductionism.


--imm

[longship]

4. Let's coin new words so we can portray science as religion

Cosmism, the practitioners of which we can call cosmists. And, of course, the origin of this religion is conveniently the Soviet Union. Might as well cut to the chase and call them communists, a convenient rhetorical neighbor.

Neil deGrasse Tyson is a cosmologist, one who studies the universe, the cosmos. He is a scientist, not a priest. Yes! He advocates for science education in space technologies. But as the head of the fucking Hayden Planitarium at the American Museum of Natural History that's kind of his job description.

The author's straw man arguments are telling. Who is claiming future humans' perfection in space? Certainly not Tyson. Or even Sagan.

People have transformative experiences which do not originate in religion. Science is one of those disciplines which can provide such numinous experiences. Art, music, and others can likewise do this. That doesn't mean that it has to be religious. To characterize it as such is wrong on all levels.

Tyson is speaking with passion, as do I, about science. But to characterize it the way the author does, using loaded religious rhetoric, is rubbish. Science is not a belief, it's a methodology which is not, nor will it ever be, static. The method evolves as we all learn more about nature. Nature is the final arbiter, not any belief. Those who do not understand these facts, or who dislike science, will probably continue to characterize it as something like faith. That's utter rubbish.

[bananas]

9. It's not a new word at all, and the origin really is Russia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_cosmism

Russian cosmism


The cover of the book "The Will of the Universe. Intellect Unknown. Mind and Passions" by Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, 1928

Russian cosmism was a philosophical and cultural movement that emerged in Russia in the early 20th century. It entailed a broad theory of natural philosophy, combining elements of religion and ethics with a history and philosophy of the origin, evolution and future existence of the cosmos and humankind. It combined elements from both Eastern and Western philosophic traditions as well as from the Russian Orthodox Church.

Cosmism was one of the influences on Proletkult, and after the October Revolution, the term came to be applied to "the poetry of such writers as Mikhail Gerasimov and Vladimir Kirillov...: emotional paeans to physical labor, machines, and the collective of industrial workers ... organized around the image of the universal 'Proletarian,' who strides forth from the earth to conquer planets and stars."[1] This form of cosmism, along with the writings of Nikolai Fyodorov, was a strong influence on Andrei Platonov.

Many ideas of the Russian cosmists were later developed by those in the transhumanist movement.

<snip>

Representatives

Among the major representatives of Russian cosmism was Nikolai Fyodorovich Fyodorov (1828—1903), an advocate of radical life extension by means of scientific methods, human immortality and resurrection of dead people.

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky (1857—1935) was the first pioneer of theoretical space exploration and cosmonautics. In 1903, he published Изслѣдованіе міровыхъ пространствъ реактивными приборами (The Exploration of Cosmic Space by Means of Reactive Devices [Rockets]), the first serious scientific work on space travel. Tsiolkovsky believed that colonizing space would lead to the perfection of the human race, with immortality and a carefree existence. He also developed ideas of the "animated atom" (panpsychism), and "radiant mankind".

Other cosmists included Vladimir Vernadsky (1863—1945), who developed the notion of noosphere, and Alexander Chizhevsky (1897—1964), pioneer of "heliobiology" (study of the sun’s effect on biology).[2][3][4] A minor planet, 3113 Chizhevskij (discovered by Soviet astronomer Nikolai Stepanovich Chernykh in 1978) is named after him.[5]

<snip>

[Jim__]

10. Your citation describes it as a philosophical and cultural movement.

The OP implies that it's a religious movement:

This idea of seeing space exploration as a religion has a long history, dating back to the Russians of the early twentieth century, many of whom self-identified as "Cosmists."

Maybe the difference is only semantics.

[longship]

11. Thank you, Jim

You saved me some digital ink by not having to respond to bananas with just what you said. Maybe bananas just didn't understand my post?

Thx.

[bananas]

12. The OP wasn't "coining new words so we can portray science as religion"

I was responding to what longship wrote in post #4:

Let's coin new words so we can portray science as religion

Cosmism, the practitioners of which we can call cosmists. And, of course, the origin of this religion is conveniently the Soviet Union. Might as well cut to the chase and call them communists, a convenient rhetorical neighbor.

<snip>

There are a number of errors in just that snippet:

First, "cosmism" isn't a new word.
Second, the OP isn't portraying science as religion, the OP is talking about a particular subculture.
Third, cosmism predates the Soviet Union.
Fourth, longship's comment "Might as well cut to the chase and call them communists" is just bizarre rhetoric which completely mischaracterizes the OP.


Jim, regarding your comment "Maybe the difference is only semantics", I wasn't even addressing as to whether or not cosmism could be viewed as a religion, I was simply addressing the factual errors in post #4:
1. "Cosmism" is not a newly coined word.
2. The OP isn't portraying science as religion.
3. Cosmism predates the Soviet Union.
4. "Cosmism" isn't "communism".

Undoubtedly there are more errors in his post, please don't assume the above list is exhaustive.

[Jim__]

13. I just thought the contrast in the use of the word was interesting.

I didn't intend it as a criticism.

[bananas]

16. Thanks for clarifying.

I don't think Harrison is saying that Boeing and SpaceX could convince the IRS that they are Cosmist churches and therefore don't have to pay taxes.

I do think the comparisons with religion are interesting.

[Humanist_Activist]

5. When humans first stepped out of Africa, was that a religious quest?

No, of course not, it was a search for resources and food, and yes, even just curiousity, we were only the latest wave of many different hominid species that left Africa over the course of a million years or so.

I also don't understand this "faith" in technology, technology, i.e. tools have served us well for the past, I don't know, 2 million years or so, when our first hominid ancestor smashed a rock against bones of a carcass to get at the marrow, to their descendents that chipped one rock from another to create a sharp edge to butcher full carcasses, to the first hominids to discover how to harness the power of fire, and used fire hardened spears to hunt actively, and their descendents to creating stone tipped spears, bows, arrows, and other tools to make life easier.

We also have a drive to explore, we always have, one of the first things babies do when they gain any type of mobility is get into things they aren't supposed to, and do it repeatedly. They experiment, they explore, they are curious, its as natural to humans as breathing, or eating. The fact is that space exploration is nothing more than us trying to find the next frontier.

[pokerfan]

6. If science is religion

then I guess it should no longer be taught in public schools. Right?

[bananas]

7. "Last question---are you a Cosmist? Harrison: Yes, I think so."

Last question---are you a Cosmist?

Harrison: Yes, I think so. For me, I see space as an opportunity, a tough opportunity, a challenging opportunity, but an opportunity nonetheless. I see SETI, both in its present and future manifestations, as a valuable activity, and I identify more and more with the cosmos the more I learn about it. We're going to have some neat technologies in the future and there are going to be some extraordinary discoveries as a result. If I had one magic wish, it would be to come back every five hundred years just to see how things are going for humanity out in space.

Interesting article, thanks.

[Speck Tater]

8. I saw Neil Armstrong's face in a piece of burnt toast! nt

[Odin2005]

14. Luddite horseshit.

[skepticscott]

15. What, more of the same bullshit?

What is it with trying to portray science as a religion or a belief system? Conflating the meanings of "faith" in order to imply that "faith" in technology (i.e. confidence based on past achievement and performance) is the same as religious "faith" (i.e. belief in the absence of evidence, or in the face of contradictory evidence) is only one idiotic flaw in this cesspool.

You really should be ashamed to even post this kind of hogwash.