Welcome to a problem-identifying node of the Pandeism index!!
Not long ago, a
promoter of one particular
brand of
theism sought to persuade me that his brand was the right one by posing the query, what if the
figure central to his
faith had never been born? Firing off a list of
human achievements he claimed to have been
influenced or
inspired by this central figure, my would-be-
converter waxed poetic on how, but for the
existence of this historic religious personage, man would lack
artistic and
architectural and
musical and
literary creations done in his
honour, and done by
adherants to the faith for which he stood; and that man would equally have failed to achieve sundry
social and
political and
economic capacities claimed to draw inspiration from the figure's promoted faith.
And my response? Well, "what if
Heraclides had never been born?"
"What? Who's that?"
Heraclides, known as well as Heraclides Ponticus (or Heraclides of
Pontus). The fourth century
BC Greek philosopher who introduced the
notion that
Planet Earth spins upon an
axis. For, you see, the
butterfly effect teaches us, had he never been born, then both for lack of his great
insight and for lack of his utterly typical and
pedestrian acts and perhaps those of his
progeny, events in
history would have tumbled out differently all over the place. Our modern music, art, architecture, literature, economy, and all of society would just as likely present drastic and unpredictable differences as if the never-born person were most any other person who had engaged in any human
interaction, up to and including the central figures of worldly religions.
But it can with equal
assurance be noted that some degree of
conflation exists with the
proposition that the absence of any one person would especially effect the
evolution of scientific knowledge (or indeed, of any branch of human achievement). Principles such as the
theory of relativity, architectural achievements brought on by advances in understanding of materials and structural methodology, perhaps even musical and artistic principles, as well -- all would almost certainly have been discovered or developed by someone eventually. And who knows, perhaps some different course of history flowing from the absence of this person or that would have opened a new path and brought about the
acceleration of some revolutionary discovery.
And though historic figures have often served as the focal point for the dedication of great musical pieces, it is silly to suppose that, absent one historic figure, there would not have been great composers speaking to other muses. Composers compose to the instrument, and the scientific advances allowing for new musical instruments enabling new forms would have occurred no matter which historic individuals had preceded them. Verily, had the world lacked for Heraclides, perhaps some other thinker would have stepped up to fill that void and achieve those insights (though surely not to fulfill all the mundane acts); and for any religious figure who might not have existed, it is just as probable that another person would have taken their place, espoused their
philosophy, been
deified by their followers. And O, but for the sweet music which we will never know, for it has never come to be created because of our accidents of history!!