A Rare Victory

[dbeachy1]

The patient can't pay anymore and the doctor stops treating the symptoms. Not a perfect analogy (there's no money involved in the transaction between God and man), but workable.

Basically, "You must believe in me --on pain of eternal torment-- because I've gone to great pains to make myself obvious. If you ignore the evidence, I won't protect you from yourself."

<soapbox>
Well, the difference is that a doctor wouldn't pull out a flamethrower and torture the patient over and over for days, weeks, years, centuries, millennia, ad infinitum just because the patient didn't pay attention to the right doctor.

When it comes to religions, there are hundreds (if not thousands) of different "doctors." Each "doctor" has his own "diagnosis" of "what is wrong with you and what you must do to 'get well', and more importantly, avoid a particular kind of eternal torment." Furthermore, as you grow up your parents, school, peers, or whomever are telling you about "the one TRUE doctor that you must listen to!" And if you don't listen to the right doctor, the "one true doctor" will torture you for all eternity because you weren't psychic enough to determine who the "right" doctor was despite being told by 99% of your peers that the other doctor was right. Does this sound like "justice?" Speaking personally (and I think this would apply to 99%+ of all humans) I am appalled at the idea of torturing anyone, even the world's worst criminal.

Take Japan, for example: only one percent of the population is Christian. Is that really their fault? Religious beliefs primarily propagate because people's parents and/or peers believe in them. When 99% of a country "believes in the wrong doctor," is it "just" to torture them for eternity because they didn't chose the doctor that only 1% of their peers believed in? How can we ascribe brutality (torture) to God when 99%+ of all the people on this planet could not stand to torture anybody, even for a few seconds, let alone millennia?

Growing up I was raised Christian, but after I read through the first part of the Old Testament I realized that there is no way that the "LORD" in the Old Testament could be God. There are many examples, but Deuteronomy 28:15-64 is one of the most brutal.

Anyway, I do believe in a Creator because of all the order I see in the Universe, but He could not be anything like any of Earth's religions purport. Many religions say, "Well, God MUST torture people to 'punish sin.'" Why would a supreme being "have" to do anything??? Who else is making these rules?

I consider myself "spiritual" but not "religious," if that makes any sense.
</soapbox>

OK, I'll get off my soapbox now.

 

[Urwumpe]

Growing up I was raised Christian, but after I read through the first part of the Old Testament I realized that there is no way that the "LORD" in the Old Testament could be God. There are many examples, but Deuteronomy 28:15-64 is one of the most brutal.

What does that tell us? The only difference between god and devil seems to be that the devil would have written much more on the good side and mentioned all bad stuff on a side note.

Yes, that is what you get when you let angry old man write your religious books. If there would be a judge for the case of love crimes by god, god would with these lines get about 500m minimum distance to you, loose the rights to see your common children and has to attend a therapy.

Which again, tells a lot about the person who had written it.

 

[jedidia]

A fact that Dawkins absolutely recognises and has said himself many times.

He did? it didn't sound like it to me, but I'll take your word for it. In that case, let's say that he was heavily misunderstood by alot of people.

In America, one of the most hated groups of people are the atheists. TGD has allowed many people to "come out" as an atheist and stand up to the persecution.

Now THIS opens a totaly different point of view to me. In europe, it's pretty much the other way round. I knew that it was different in America, but never aplied that fact to this situation. Seriously, I'm rather glad that the christian loby over here isn't any stronger. Some of their claims are ridicoulus indeed, and I know that they would just shove them through even against democracy, given the power... nothing really much changed since the middle ages *sigh*. Problem is, the other lobby is starting to pull the same, and are at times severely cutting on religious rights (not just the christian ones). For example as a teacher, you're not allowed to wear any religious symbols or have any of them in the classroom and similiar stuff. So to us, Dawkins attacks made the impression of "yeah, just go on that way and you'll successfully replace the constitutionary right for religious freedom by atheism as "state religion", and thus cutting out every opinion that doesn't fit your picture of the world. Which is about the same that has been done in the middle ages. now looking from the American perspective which you explained, his actions actually become alot more understandable to me. Thanks!

When you have people like Kent Hovind claiming that "scientists believe that humans evolved from bananas", that is either extreme stupidity, or malicious intent to deceive.

that is disturbing indeed. I'd say it's not malicous intent to deceive, but rather a defense mechanism. When you belive that you shouldn't believe in some things, ignorance is indeed the first choice of the subconcious. A whole world-view is not something given up easily, as prooved some of dawkins followers too. I remember a quote "Even if the last bit of evolution theory was proven wrong, I would still believe it!" This, clearly, is religion, not science. Now while it doesn't change the fact that evolution is a viable theory, It shows how far people will go to defend something they based a part of their identity on.
I had a rough time in my youth and a long time afterwards in which I tried to get a clear view of the driving motivations of my live. I found stuff I never thought was possible. And It wasn't easy to let go most of it, because alot of my identity was based on it. So in orther to fix them, I had to agree to become someone else. That's a pretty scary move, I can tell you, especially because you don't know how you're going to end up, or even worse, you know where you're ging to end up and don't like the thought at all.
So I see this popular polemism against evolution as a stance for personal identity. Just that it's not clear to those who do it. We all have minor areas where we do this without noticing, by the way.

he gave me negative rep and informed me that I was a demon possessed pervert bound for hell.

I'm sorry for that and ashamed. I hope you can one day forgive us for such treatements. Hell, I hope God will forgive us for such bull****! :sorry:

Growing up I was raised Christian, but after I read through the first part of the Old Testament I realized that there is no way that the "LORD" in the Old Testament could be God. There are many examples, but Deuteronomy 28:15-64 is one of the most brutal.

Now this would lead to a clearly theological discussion, and a rather long one. However, I have one suggestion to offer: Dispite this being written in the Bible, I found no evidence in the rest of the book that it was ever applied by God... Except if you look at it on the long run (people context, not individual context). Then the destruction of Jerusalem could be seen as the aplication of this threat. However, reading the Prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah, we get a nice picture of the moral dilemma God was in while doing this. Torn apart between love and anger, doing everything to get his people back in a peacefull way...

 

[Ghostrider]

Not only is he an athiest, but he dresses in the black turtleneck-and-sport coat style of a New York elite liberal type.

Darn, I've got to change wardrobe. Don't want to be mistaken for a NY elite liberal type.

 

[bujin]

I remember a quote "Even if the last bit of evolution theory was proven wrong, I would still believe it!" This, clearly, is religion, not science. Now while it doesn't change the fact that evolution is a viable theory, It shows how far people will go to defend something they based a part of their identity on.

:huh:

Who on earth said that? Whoever it is, clearly isn't a scientist!

No real scientist would ever claim to carry on believing in a theory that has been disproved, and that's what sets science apart from religion.

But evolution hasn't been disproven yet. No-one has found one of JBS Haldane's "fossil rabbits in the precambrian", or anything else that really puts the theory in any doubt.

 

[GregBurch]

You mention how the religious people see skeptics as "arrogant" and wonder about that. I consider myself to be on the skeptical side, but I have to admit that skeptics and athiests do come off as looking arrogant sometimes, even if it isn't their intent.

Understanding this phenomenon is very, very important, and something to which I devote quite a bit of thought. I do think I’ve hit at least a major element of the explanation for it in the post from my blog I quoted above.

Consider this: With only a few (but important) exceptions, prior to the Enlightenment, the idea of “arrogance” in connection with religious conviction would have been an unusual notion to human beings. “Knowledge” of the tribe’s god or gods was placed into the minds of people from birth, and reinforced at every point in life by customs that impacted every aspect of life, from birth to death. For most of human existence, the vast majority of human beings never, or at least rarely, encountered other human beings who were not members of their own small group, who worshipped the same gods and shared essentially all of the same views about the world. The gods were what they were, and that was that. You can’t be “arrogant” about a difference in thought when there isn’t any difference.

A crucial exception were our cultural grandparents, the Greeks and Romans. In our own cultural lineage, they were the first people who both had significant intercultural experience on a broad basis, and left a trace in our own minds. For them, religion was a very practical thing, and also something with “soft edges” that blended into philosophy and art and life in a rather “gentle” way. What we would call today “religious tolerance” came pretty naturally to them. And, interestingly, one of the key elements of their reaction to the monotheistic religions of first the Jews and then the Christians was their feeling that these people were “arrogant” in the exclusive claims they made about their deity and doctrines.

Even though the open-mindedness of our Greco-Roman ancestors left some traces deep in the “machine code” of our “cultural operating system” to be revived in the Renaissance and then that came to full flower in the Enlightenment, from the time of Constantine on, the notion of religion as universal, unitary and exclusive once again took hold of our minds. Thus, the contemporary revulsion against religious skepticism felt by Christians and Muslims against modern expressions of rational thought, experienced as a perception of “arrogance,” is, at an emotional level, a primitive feeling of threat to the tribe.

I think this explains your observations:

Take Mike Schermer, for instance. I have read Schermer's book Why People Believe Wierd Things, and while I think he goes out of his way to not be offensive to people who believe in God, he still has a self-assured attitude about himself, which may be viewed as arrogance by those who feel threatened by him.

It's the "feeling threatened" part which I think is what does it. While we'd like to think of humans as rational beings who can easily change horses in mid-stream when new evidence and facts arise, the fact is that a man who has invested much of his life into his faith and the defense of it has accepted certain views of the world around him which are hard to break. He has decided that he is on the road to a brighter future and that the future is threatened by those who thwart him.

If you've ever seen Schermer on a TV interview he conveys the image of a religious fundamentalist's worst nightmare. Not only is he an athiest, but he dresses in the black turtleneck-and-sport coat style of a New York elite liberal type.

Actually, I like to think of myself as the fundamentalist’s worst nightmare. My political philosophy is usually misunderstood as “conservative” (actually, I’m just an armed libertarian who knows that the power of the state still has to be used to defend civilization from savages, and that socialism is the candy-coated road to serfdom), I behave and dress like the ancient member of “the Establishment” that I am, I have little but disdain for contemporary academics in the humanities, I’m as polite as I can be, and I’m better versed in religious lore and theology than the average Christian.

Humans are not as rational as we'd like. I think we've evolved defense mechanisms that lead us to defend whatever idea it is we've hitched our hopes to and invested our time in.

How right you are! We evolved powerful brains, and then the culture-software to run it at increasingly potent levels. During the first 100,000 years of this evolutionary pathway, religion was a powerful “anti-virus” program that made sure that the tribe’s operating systems and specific applications would run with minimal interference from “foreign code.”

There’s a new operating system called the scientific method. It’s more compatible with a broad range of applications that just won’t run on the old OS, and has strong virus protection built into the basic OS machine code. Unfortunately, it requires constant user interaction and effort, because by its nature, it’s constantly being updated. When this new OS was first developed, the people who developed and first adopted it had very high hopes that it would change the world – and it has. Thus you are reading these words on a computer screen connected to a global information network, and I am still alive to be writing them.

But it turns out that the hardware we’re still stuck with has elements of hard-coded, evolved instinct to tribalism that is infected with the exclusionary religious software. It keeps reasserting itself. Most people simply don’t want to put out the effort required to run the new scientific OS. For instance, in the new OS, you have to consciously load ethical software, and manually run it in many situations in which the old OS provided automatic results. It turns out that the majority of users don’t like this feature of the new OS – in fact, they hate it. They like the automatic moral results produced by version 1.0, and see that some people who have run early versions of the new OS have generated some pretty bad moral output. They think this is a problem with the new OS and the new applications that run on it, rather than with the users.

It’s taken me a long time to realize this, and the realization hasn’t been pleasant for me. I’ve come to conclude that, with the current “legacy hardware” with which we are cursed, the scientific method will never have anything but a tiny slice of “market share” in the human OS market – the marketplace of ideas. This was OK in earlier times because, as I have written elsewhere, it was possible for those who had upgraded to live in relative peace and to produce the incredible results the new way of thinking produced, to be enjoyed by everyone, regardless of whether they had the new operating system or not. But that’s changing. And not for the better.

GB, THHotA

 

[Urwumpe]

The question is: How can you find something, which rejects the current theory of evolution? Is the theory of evolution falsifiable?

The old theory of Evolution has one of it's predictions already verified - with the discovery of DNA - almost 100 years later.

Darwins theory is a bit antique, when remembering that modern knowledge about genetics filled already many holes in his theory:

1. Species have great fertility. They have more offspring than can grow to adulthood.
2. Populations remain roughly the same size, with small changes.
3. Food resources are limited, but are relatively stable over time.
4. An implicit struggle for survival ensues.
5. In sexually reproducing species, generally no two individuals are identical.
6. Some of these variations directly impact the ability of an individual to survive in a given environment.
7. Much of this variation is inheritable.
8. Individuals less suited to the environment are less likely to survive and less likely to reproduce, while individuals more suited to the environment are more likely to survive and more likely to reproduce.
9. The individuals that survive are most likely to leave their inheritable traits to future generations.
10. This slowly effected process results in populations that adapt to the environment over time, and ultimately, after interminable generations, these variations accumulate to form new varieties, and ultimately, new species.

Nothing more - just observations (1-7) and a tiny theory why it could be like that and two predictions what will happen according to that.

Sorry, but even a fossil rabbit in the precambrian would not destroy Darwins theory and his predictions. It would look strange and would make scientists very busy finding an explanation for that (Most likely a student joke from the class of 3008).

Important is: Points 1-7 are fullfilled (three rabbit's in the precambrian would not be enough as their population size will very likely increase or drop by at least 33%, because they where eaten by large amphibians ) and the other points are not.

If points 1-7 are not fullfilled, you are not talking about a species subject to the theory of evolution. Now the question is, does such a species exist? Yes it does. It is called "Boeing manager". Sorry, bad joke.

 

[jedidia]

Who on earth said that? Whoever it is, clearly isn't a scientist!

No real scientist would ever claim to carry on believing in a theory that has been disproved, and that's what sets science apart from religion.

Yes. And things in europe (western, that is... in eastern europe they have other problems...) tend to go that way. Don't get me wrong, I don't say it's all the fault of academics. It's majorly politics. But since they allways push science in behalf of their ideology in the same way that christians push the Bible in behalf of their faith, christians are developing an increasing hostility towards science. And what they would need most for securing their threatend position is a victory against science on it's own ground. Which they simply will not be able to get. This is probably the reason for so many strange attempts to falsify evolution, even against the recommandation of the Apostel Paul to NOT get involved in discussions about the beginning of the world. In the end it's not evolution people in europe are fighting about, it's majorly about ideology. And evolution has become the hinge.

But evolution hasn't been disproven yet. No-one has found one of JBS Haldane's "fossil rabbits in the precambrian", or anything else that really puts the theory in any doubt.

No. Nor will it ever be, I think. It will still change in its details, especially on the microbiological level, where not much research has been done yet. But it's general concept will remain teh same.

There's ONE argument however that came to my mind lately. It really is purely rethorical, not scientific, but it made me think a bit:
As far as I know there has been no proof found on Macroevolution (at least 5 years ago when I bothered with that stuff), while there are tons of them on Microevolution. Making the conclusion based on this observation, that Macroevolution is the way one species evolved out of another, is very logical and reasonable.
The problem is: Every complex system we have buildt had to be carefully designed by somebody. Hence, the conclusion that, since every complex system we know of has been designed by somebody, the universe too has an engineer, is logical and reasonable, and on a rethoric level equally viable as the assumption of Macroevolution. This is the basic thought behind "Intelligent Design".
The difference is, from a scientific point of view, that we might find evidence for Macroevolution, while we are very unlikely to find proof for the engineer.
Allthough I agree with that assumption, from a neutral point of view I would have to say that until proof for either Macroevolution or the designer is found, both of these assumption have the same basis of viability, which is nothing but logic argument.
So Inteligent Design is more like a philosophical argument for combining the picture of an evolving World after the plan of a creator. It's a pitty some mistook it for science and used it to wage a flame war, but the argument still stands, and unless adequate proof for Macroevolution is found, has the same viability on a purely logical basis.

 

[simonpro]

I never see what the problem with relígion is. If people want to believe there's a god up there somewhere then fair play to them. If it helps them put up with people dying, or lets them face their own death with more courage then that's great.
Same goes for people who aren't religious, if they're happy believing that there's nothing after death, or there's no superbeing out there somewhere then that's just dandy.

What bugs me is when people from either camp start trying to tell the other group what to think. This goes for both creationists and evolutionists. Is it really that big a deal if someone doesn't believe that we all came from monkeys? Does it really affect their daily lives if they don't want to think they're related to something we keep in the zoo? I know for a fact it doesn't affect mine.

in one sentence: There's more important things to bother about in life than if everyone thinks the same as you about religion.

 

[pattersoncr]

It is indeed possible that the Internet has merely served as the world's most efficient bull**** amplifier.

Absolutely beautiful Greg. I think that just became my new sig.

 

[Urwumpe]

Macroevolution is no different form to microevolution - it is just a different scale of evolution. The only people, who ever made a strict definition what macroevolution should be, are actually creationists - the original scientific definition of macroevolution was just a statistical construct, which in fact just showed that many small changes can result in a big one (The original title of the paper coining Macroevolution and Microevolution was "Variability and Variation")

What creationists always deny in their works, is the concept that two groups of a species can adapt to different habitats. That example is the most basic example of how macro-evolution works. That kind of change in the habitat can already happen when a species spreads out over a continent. Or it can have geological reasons, etc.

The next they deny then is, countrary to scientific evidence, that these two groups might become genetically so different, that they are no longer one species according to Mayr and ironically the book Moses (The bible can be quite visionary in it's innocence...), which means, mixed pairs of both are no longer capable of successful reproduction.

So, it just took us 5000 years from the story of Noah, over many arrogant definitions of a species by the plain desire to discover a new one to Mayr, who defined that a species is a population, which is capable of reproduction.

 

[jedidia]

which means, mixed pairs of both are no longer capable of successful reproduction.

Quite a nice definition indeed, allthough I didn't hear it before. Thanks.

The next they deny then is, countrary to scientific evidence, that these two groups might become genetically so different, that they are no longer one species according to Mayr and ironically the book Moses

That is exactly the kind of evidence I never came around (then again, I didn't do too much research on the topic). Got any links about it?

Also, do you know by accident which scripture you are reffering to?

Is it really that big a deal if someone doesn't believe that we all came from monkeys? Does it really affect their daily lives if they don't want to think they're related to something we keep in the zoo? I know for a fact it doesn't affect mine.

Neither does it affect mine. The problem is, this struggle is majorly about control over the educational system, and therewith the ideology taught to our kids (I think this is the central point in europe as well as in the U.S.). Since everyone thinks the other one is going to screw up his kids (and therewith the whole society), they are not willing to just drop the matter...

 

[GregBurch]

I never see what the problem with relígion is. If people want to believe there's a god up there somewhere then fair play to them. If it helps them put up with people dying, or lets them face their own death with more courage then that's great.
Same goes for people who aren't religious, if they're happy believing that there's nothing after death, or there's no superbeing out there somewhere then that's just dandy.

What bugs me is when people from either camp start trying to tell the other group what to think. This goes for both creationists and evolutionists. Is it really that big a deal if someone doesn't believe that we all came from monkeys? Does it really affect their daily lives if they don't want to think they're related to something we keep in the zoo? I know for a fact it doesn't affect mine.

in one sentence: There's more important things to bother about in life than if everyone thinks the same as you about religion.

This was the way things were for what, to those of us in the liberal West, may seem like a long time, but in fact, in the over-all sweep of history was just a very short and unrepresentative period. For most of humankind's existence, failure to observe the proper respect for the local gods has been a very bad thing. viz. Socrates.

There are those -- myself included -- that think we've just about run out this period in history when science and religion have maintained an uneasy truce.

So that it's absolutely clear, I really don't care what any particular person believes. If they want to think that the universe is a videogame designed by a peevish megalomaniac -- or that the Flying Spaghetti Monster is the One True Lord -- have at it. And be utterly free to preach the One True Way -- including, AT YOUR EXPENSE, to fill your children's heads with the Truth.

The problem is when these superstitions intrude into the public sphere in the form of law. In western Europe it has been easy to be complacent for over 100 years on this score. Theocracy was in retreat on every front in Europe in that time. But the time's ARE changing.

 

[simonpro]

And be utterly free to preach the One True Way -- including, AT YOUR EXPENSE, to fill your children's heads with the Truth.

They're free to fill my children's heads with whatever garbage they want (assuming I had any), as I'd hope my children are clever enough to know garbage from non-garbage. Of course I'd point them in the direction of whatever it is that I believe in too.
They're not free to do it at my expense though, I get very annoyed when religious groups try to promote their ideas using my money. Luckily here we have a little box on our tax returns that enables us to donate money to the religious types. If I don't tick it then they don't get any of my taxes.

The problem is when these superstitions intrude into the public sphere in the form of law. In western Europe it has been easy to be complacent for over 100 years on this score. Theocracy was in retreat on every front in Europe in that time. But the time's ARE changing.

Yep, times are definately changing: Religion in general is on the retreat now. Church/Mosque/Whatever attendances back home have fallen 22% in the last 5 years.

 

[GregBurch]

Yep, times are definately changing: Religion in general is on the retreat now. Church/Mosque/Whatever attendances back home have fallen 22% in the last 5 years.

Yep -- this explains the police protection required for those Danes who made the mistake of drawing pictures of one particularly kindly religious figure.

 

[Urwumpe]

Also, do you know by accident which scripture you are reffering to?

The famous story of Noah, where he took only two of each kind on his ark.

Neither does it affect mine. The problem is, this struggle is majorly about control over the educational system, and therewith the ideology taught to our kids (I think this is the central point in europe as well as in the U.S.). Since everyone thinks the other one is going to screw up his kids (and therewith the whole society), they are not willing to just drop the matter...

I have no problem if religion is taught at school, as long as two rules are followed:

- It is labeled as religion and does not attempt to replace the scientific subjects. There is still a spiritual aspect of the facts that make science. Only because we know how things behave and can predict them, that does not make them less magical.
- The kids or their parents are free to choose which religious subject their kids attend, without sanctions even if the kids change the subject, including the right of the kid to choose it's own faith over the decision of it's parents. Going to hell for attending the wrong course is not allowed to be taught.

The kids are often smarter than their parents, it is just bad when parents are allowed to make them more stupid as they are themselves.

Yep -- this explains the police protection required for those Danes who made the mistake of drawing pictures of one particularly kindly religious figure.

Hey, the drawings had even been more respectful and funny as many middle eastern main stream drawings of Christians and Jews. And these people don't need police protection yet.

 

[Andy44]

I never see what the problem with relígion is. If people want to believe there's a god up there somewhere then fair play to them. If it helps them put up with people dying, or lets them face their own death with more courage then that's great.
Same goes for people who aren't religious, if they're happy believing that there's nothing after death, or there's no superbeing out there somewhere then that's just dandy.

What bugs me is when people from either camp start trying to tell the other group what to think. This goes for both creationists and evolutionists. Is it really that big a deal if someone doesn't believe that we all came from monkeys? Does it really affect their daily lives if they don't want to think they're related to something we keep in the zoo? I know for a fact it doesn't affect mine.

in one sentence: There's more important things to bother about in life than if everyone thinks the same as you about religion.

That is pretty much the view of the people who wrote the 1st Ammendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Unfortunately, while government in the U.S. is prohibited from establishing a state religion, the fact that public schools are run by the government means that government can't avoid being involved in these arguments, since the battle between ID/creationism and evolutionism is not a science debate, but a religious one.

So perhaps if schools were all private, it would be possible to realize your idea of live and let live, but I wonder. Greg seems to think that the "live and let live" environment fostered by the Enlightenment may be coming to a close. Didn't Heinlein predict that the US would become a religious dictatorship at some point?

 

[jedidia]

Yep, times are definately changing: Religion in general is on the retreat now. Church/Mosque/Whatever attendances back home have fallen 22% in the last 5 years.

Well, that aplies to the west, where the church has finally lost most of its power base. It is however not true for most parts of the rest of the world, where religion is in advance quite drastically. No matter which religions, by the way. all are registering a drastic worldwide increase in numbers. This is of course also due to population growth, but it's not only that.
You should not forgett that there still are quite a few Theocrasies in the world.

The famous story of Noah, where he took only two of each kind on his ark.

Never looked at it like that. But makes tons of sense. :lol:

 

[Urwumpe]

Didn't Heinlein predict that the US would become a religious dictatorship at some point?

I would say, many people having arabian or japanese names would ask: It is not already one?

And even worse - it is not even a Christian one. If you invert all what stands in the US constitution, you might get an understanding how the religious conservative elites in the USA think... I don't want to imagine to which god these guys pray before going to sleep. Most likely Bell-Shamharoth.

 

[GregBurch]

Didn't Heinlein predict that the US would become a religious dictatorship at some point?

Yes, and of all the Golden Age writers, he was the one with the best grasp of history and political philosophy. All the others pretty much just transplanted 1950s America into a technologically-enhanced future. Heinlein had a much deeper realization that times change and cultures evolve.