(June 8, 2011 at 4:58 pm)Zenith Wrote:(June 5, 2011 at 3:23 pm)Cinjin Cain Wrote: I don't believe that new religions will keep coming about. Yes, currently new religions have sprung up, but they are not taking hold the way they did 2, 3, 4000 years ago. Mankind is slowly wising up. Eventually, I truly believe that religion will die off and the miniscule amount of cults that pop their little heads up here and there will never have any lasting affect on the whole of humanity.
But we got a long way to go.
Well, they might not call themselves "religions" but still there are possibilities - and really, if a few decades a new religion was born, is it really impossible to appear a new one after a century?
as about "the minuscule amount of cults" - you see, the same were both Christianity and Islam. But there were factors that influenced their spreading: politics & warfare. You only need to get those people of those cults as leaders of the country (president, etc.) and they will struggle to enlighten the world with their new 'philosophies'.
And... do you really think the majority of people - even atheists - are too smart to be 'caught' by something? There are stupidities like Zeitgeist, reptilians, even zodiac, things that tell you that you can do impossible things by sending energies into the universe, mother nature & eastern influences (hindu/budism), which, if covered by the label "SCIENCE" (even if most of what they say cannot be proven, and thus, practically unscientific), it has a strong effect on people. And it has a MUCH GREATER influence if it appears on TV and 'preached' by some important figures: the "spirit of the crowd" issue - the mob follows what it sees to be the fashion, the majority, and its leaders. So if you get some personalities that preach it, you make it popular (publish it on TV and other stuff to appear as the "accepted" version), use the words "science" and "scientific" extensively throughout the video, and label it as a "scientific discovery/explanation/whatever" people will all bow down to it and consider it "the truth finally divulged" or something.
Like I said. Little religions and cults will probably always stick their little heads up for the rest of time, but there is no structured religion that has come about in the modern world that has taken hold anywhere even close to the way Christianity took hold 2000 years ago. And that's my whole point. I'm not so stupid as to think that future generations won't think up another ludicrous god, what I am saying, that I think you're missing - is that we have the proof that humanity is slowly wising up. Scientology is NOT sweeping the globe. The Davidian Compound in Waco did not have an effect on the faith of even the neighboring city. If we can destroy Christianity and Islam in the next 500 years, we have a real chance at becoming an entire planet of MOSTLY enlightened people.
It is possible. The disease of religion can be cured.