Monday, February 27, 2006
I'm Losing My Religion
The BSG writers seem to enjoy flipping common conceptions on their ear. What we typically think about religion, especially, gets decidedly unexpected treatment in the new series. Who would have thought that a machine intelligence could seek justification for its actions through belief in a unitarian god? Or that a pantheistic culture would be able to rise to such technological heights?
I think it's fair to say that there are three distinct views on religiosity in the BSG universe: evangelism, fundamentalism, and tolerance. The evangelists are the Cylon, with their (well, six's) frequent references to the conversion of humanity (specifically, Gaius Baltar) to their monotheistic worship of the "one, true god." The fundamentalists and tolerants are represented by humanity, mainly by the Gemonese in the former and everybody else the latter. Undeniably, the most interesting are the Cylon, so I'll focus on their spirituality.
The Cylon are almost the avenging angels of their faith. I imagine that they felt, if "feeling" is a meaningful term, highly persecuted by their human creators. A particular group that is singled out of society for oppression often turns to religion to act as a glue for the collective to sustain them through solidarity and hope. The belief system allows the group to turn the particular aspects that cause it to be tortured by a culture into praiseworthy attributes in their deities' eyes.
It makes sense that the Cylon might develop a faith that is the antithesis of the pervading doctrines in the culture that victimized them... but why would a machine intelligence develop a faith in the first place? I think it's interesting to consider a few questions:
Did the Cylon come to their belief before or after the human models were developed?
The new series reduces the role of the mechanistic Cylons (the insurgents' "bullet-heads") to mere shock troops, soaks useful for simple tasks only. Do the mechanicals participate in the monotheism professed by the human models? I get the impression that this isn't the case - modern BSG silverbacks are truly robots, without the motivation that even infused the original series tin cans. Does this mean that the human models are the only deep-thinking force behind the Cylon culture?
As faiths have done here on Earth for millennia, newer, expansionistic religions tend to overwhelm and push out older, more tolerant beliefs. Younger theology tends to include a strain of developing black-and-white comparisons that can be used to separate out people of the faith from the general population. It's that "besiged" mentality again. This is playing itself out in the BSG universe as well, with humanity continuing what was already an ancient religion/culture (Hellenism) for more than two thousand years, being pushed aside by the Cylon.
During that time, it seems that humanity became very comfortable with the various worship of the twelve deities. Some of the cultures seem open and practically secular (Caprica), while some have tenaciously clung to their beliefs and developed their faith into a blueprint for a rigid, theocratic society (Gemonon). This variety and tolerance is a hallmark of highly developed, older religions. Are the writers trying to draw this striking contrast between human culture and the Cylon culture?
The last episode (#218: Downloaded) definitely upends some of the moral rectitude with which the Cylon justify their genocide. There are more questions asked than answered, unfortunately. For example, if the Cylon actions are in direct contravention of their religious precepts... then what is providing the prod and justification to keep their plans in motion?
And, Sharon's final words make me wonder if there isn't some other entity within the Cylon that is using religion as a rallying cry and rationale for "unspeakable acts". If so... what is this entity?
In closing, I'll say that the writers have challenged themselves to make sense of this spiritual soup pot they've stirred. While these faiths add new dimensions and layers of meaning to the stories, making it all seem organic and inevitable will be quite a feat. I hope they have it in them!
Good hunting.
I think it's fair to say that there are three distinct views on religiosity in the BSG universe: evangelism, fundamentalism, and tolerance. The evangelists are the Cylon, with their (well, six's) frequent references to the conversion of humanity (specifically, Gaius Baltar) to their monotheistic worship of the "one, true god." The fundamentalists and tolerants are represented by humanity, mainly by the Gemonese in the former and everybody else the latter. Undeniably, the most interesting are the Cylon, so I'll focus on their spirituality.
The Cylon are almost the avenging angels of their faith. I imagine that they felt, if "feeling" is a meaningful term, highly persecuted by their human creators. A particular group that is singled out of society for oppression often turns to religion to act as a glue for the collective to sustain them through solidarity and hope. The belief system allows the group to turn the particular aspects that cause it to be tortured by a culture into praiseworthy attributes in their deities' eyes.
It makes sense that the Cylon might develop a faith that is the antithesis of the pervading doctrines in the culture that victimized them... but why would a machine intelligence develop a faith in the first place? I think it's interesting to consider a few questions:
Did the Cylon come to their belief before or after the human models were developed?
The new series reduces the role of the mechanistic Cylons (the insurgents' "bullet-heads") to mere shock troops, soaks useful for simple tasks only. Do the mechanicals participate in the monotheism professed by the human models? I get the impression that this isn't the case - modern BSG silverbacks are truly robots, without the motivation that even infused the original series tin cans. Does this mean that the human models are the only deep-thinking force behind the Cylon culture?
As faiths have done here on Earth for millennia, newer, expansionistic religions tend to overwhelm and push out older, more tolerant beliefs. Younger theology tends to include a strain of developing black-and-white comparisons that can be used to separate out people of the faith from the general population. It's that "besiged" mentality again. This is playing itself out in the BSG universe as well, with humanity continuing what was already an ancient religion/culture (Hellenism) for more than two thousand years, being pushed aside by the Cylon.
During that time, it seems that humanity became very comfortable with the various worship of the twelve deities. Some of the cultures seem open and practically secular (Caprica), while some have tenaciously clung to their beliefs and developed their faith into a blueprint for a rigid, theocratic society (Gemonon). This variety and tolerance is a hallmark of highly developed, older religions. Are the writers trying to draw this striking contrast between human culture and the Cylon culture?
The last episode (#218: Downloaded) definitely upends some of the moral rectitude with which the Cylon justify their genocide. There are more questions asked than answered, unfortunately. For example, if the Cylon actions are in direct contravention of their religious precepts... then what is providing the prod and justification to keep their plans in motion?
And, Sharon's final words make me wonder if there isn't some other entity within the Cylon that is using religion as a rallying cry and rationale for "unspeakable acts". If so... what is this entity?
In closing, I'll say that the writers have challenged themselves to make sense of this spiritual soup pot they've stirred. While these faiths add new dimensions and layers of meaning to the stories, making it all seem organic and inevitable will be quite a feat. I hope they have it in them!
Good hunting.
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Thoughts Regarding “I’m Losing My Religion”:
A lot of current BSG fans seem to habitually equivocate the Lords of Kobol straight across to their Olympian counterparts with the logical next step (a pretty small step), that the colonial religion is more or less equivalent to an early Hellenistic pantheism. At first glance, this doesn’t seem to be too far off-base, however I think that the problems intrinsic to this point of view are manifold and beg addressing. Okay, um, well maybe they don’t beg for it, but they do for me because I find this kinda shit interesting.
I’m going to tee-off by digressing a wee bit, I promise to try and keep it brief…
When I was a younger lad, I went through a period where I thought that pre-christian European religious thought was way-cool and somehow more “genuine” or appropriate or “noble” for individuals of European descent. For me then, the particular flavour of paganism became the Tuetono-Nordic one given that I’m a square-skulled blue-eyed blondie knuckle-dragger. So anyway, in the vain attempt to get involved with all of this, I start reading this piece of fiction called “Rhinegold” which was a current authors attempt to retell the Seigfried/Sigurd vs. Fafnir story using the modern vernacular.
I couldn’t finish it.
It wasn’t that it was written poorly, it was that I couldn’t identify with any of the characters nor could I find it in myself to see any of them sympathetically. I kept asking myself “Where are the good guys? I know that I’m supposed to think of this dude and this chick and, oh yeah, that guy over there as the good guys but, argh, damnit, they don’t seem good to me.”
It took awhile to figure out what was wrong; what was causing this disconnect. It came to me when I realized that most all of the pagan European mythologies and religious practices struck me in much same way. I already knew that I didn’t like Siegfried and I didn’t like Woden/Odin. Then I found out that I didn’t give a rat’s ass for Achilles or Oddyseus and Zeus or the Titans or Cu Chulain and Dagda or the Morrigan or the pre-Vedantic conceptions of Indra and Agni either. All of these Gods and heroes in these myths struck me as violent, treacherous, vain, vengeful, ruthless, and frankly, anti-social.
In a nutshell, the problem was that the civilization and paradigm that I was born into is completely different sociologically, technologically, materially, and philosophically, then the one that gave birth to these old faiths and legends. My idea of what is “good” is fundamentally different. My civilization values social values more. Peace, justice, mercy, love…the things that allow large groups of folks to live and work together efficiently.
Our religion and concepts of morality reflect our society and our understanding of the universe//ability to control that universe…and vice versa. For more on this, if you’re interested, take a look at Thorstein Veblen’s book: Theory of the Leisure Class. Veblen isn’t on the level of a Marx or a Weber or a Durkheim but he is considered one of the big-shot fathers of modern sociology. The book is small, less than 225 pages if memory serves. For a person with a good vocabulary, it’s an easy read. When I say “good vocabulary”, I’m not talking about the kind of vocabulary needed to understand someone like Kant or worse, Hegel nor am I talking about the esoteric and exclusionary crap that’s so often spewed by post-modernist academics who only care about talking to each other and not to us lesser mortals who are only smart enough to understand the New Yorker or read websites like edge.org or artsandlettersdaily.com.
That old greco-roman pre-christian stuff evolved in a pre-civic only semi-agrarian warrior mindset where nature was something to be feared in it’s seeming arbitrariness and ability to bring suffering and death down on hapless men. The growth of cities and of literacy and the numbers of people who actually had time to think and reflect vs. work and fight and breed and die was where our need for and sanctification of very social values like love and justice and peace and all of that come from.
So…back to BSG and religion:
The colonials groove on this seeming pantheistic religion that borrows from to some extent from Hellenistic myth. Fine. Dandy.
But colonial society is urban and technologically more advanced than even ours is. In fact, before the Cylon wars, it was more advanced yet and only took a self imposed step backwards in a lot of areas as a defensive measure and aesthetic/ethical reaction to the events of the Cylon wars.
Oh, just as a side note…what the hell does “Cylon” mean? Why were the Cylons called Cylons? Did the Cylons name themselves that or did the colonials call the Cylons “Cylon”. Did this name come around before, during or after the first Cylon war? In TOS, the Cylons got their name from the alien race that built them and that they subsequently exterminated. In TNS, this explanation won’t suffice.
Anyway, back to business. I DON’T think that the Lords of Kobol their names and relationships notwithstanding, can easily be equated to the Olympian pantheon. The gods of Olympus have/had the nature that they did because the Greeks were looking at nature and human nature cynically and fearfully because they didn’t understand and couldn’t control either one and because the concept of these Gods came about before the first Greek cities et al. By contrast, the Lords of Kobol were conceived of by a exceedingly civic and technologic civilization that had learned to utterly control nature and travel interstellar distances with ease etc. Further, if certain as of yet unspecified characteristics of colonial settlement and star-systems are to be taken as a given, then all twelve of the colonies were in the same single stellar system or at most, star-cluster which strongly suggests that the colonials, given time and resources, could radically terraform planets in just about any way they chose. These are not the sort of people who need Gods as embodiments of pitiless and capricious nature. This notion is born out by evidence shown so far in the show. Revealed colonial religious practice seems to show the Lords of Kobol as primarily concerned with the cultivation and protection of the human soul and dignity. The Lords of Kobol are thought to care for and love humans. Nobody shown yet seems to give a shit about whether these gods and goddesses could rain lightening down form the heavens or could give birth to stars or anything else like that.
Over and over again, we see the Colonials engage in religious practice in public and in private and in all boils down to something like this;
“Lords of Kobol who I believe love and cherish me/us, I/we are afraid for my/our lives/souls/civilization, please protect me/us or at least shelter my/our souls in death.”
These are not gods who destroy cities for the desecretion of temples or rape mortal women to produce demi-gods or any other such nonsense. I am so very thankful to date that I’ve never heard any colonial up to and including the any Gemonese colonial pray to the Lords of Kobol beseeching them to take vengeance upon the Cylons in any way. So say we all.
It’s interesting to me, Muser, that you see the Cylon religion as essentially antithetical to that of the Colonial one. Cosmologicaly, it does seem so, but I’d say, especially given #6’s continuing emphasis that “God is Love” that this isn’t the case, at least not entirely.
Cylon religion postulates a God that is a lot more involved teleologically with the affairs of mortals than the Lords of Kobol SEEM to be. The Cylons seem to have a semitic/linear view of history vs. the colonial cyclical indo-aryan view of history. The Cylons see a point to it all whereas I’m not sure if the colonials do, we need more data.
Cylon metaphysics and cosmology are at odds with their colonial counterparts while I’d bet that their ethics and epistemology are quite similar. To know how similar Cylon and Colonial aesthetics seem to be, we need only look at how the “homo cylonus” has designed its models and clothed itself to say nothing of the Boomer’s Ithacan Elephants etc. to see an almost total 100% equivalence or sameness.
As an aside, but since you wondered chicken and egg style about Cylon religion, I speculate thusly: Given that “homo cylonus” didn’t appear in the colonies until two years before the holocaust, I believe (I do not know) that the “human models” to be more idiomatic weren’t developed until VERY recently and actually represent what the Cylons believe to be their crowning technologically and maybe religious achievement and were many years in the making. I think that the original Cylons (who may very well still be governing toaster society) are ghosts in the machine now and no longer choose to incorporate in robotic bodies. Given all of this, I’d wager that Cylon religious beliefs came before, not after, the birth of homo cylonus.
In closing, it seems fairly well established at this point, that Cylon ethics are social, modern, and almost entirely compatible with their Colonial counterparts and the various flavours of real-world monotheism. It’s totally obvious that their genocide is indeed in direct contravention with their religious precepts. The fans all know it which is why the various forums out their resound with cries of “civil war” and “schism” and the like. We all see it coming… How the chips will all wind up falling will probably occupy a shit-load of Season 3’s screen time and promises to be quite the roller coaster. Frak yeah, man!
with courtesy,
MH
A lot of current BSG fans seem to habitually equivocate the Lords of Kobol straight across to their Olympian counterparts with the logical next step (a pretty small step), that the colonial religion is more or less equivalent to an early Hellenistic pantheism. At first glance, this doesn’t seem to be too far off-base, however I think that the problems intrinsic to this point of view are manifold and beg addressing. Okay, um, well maybe they don’t beg for it, but they do for me because I find this kinda shit interesting.
I’m going to tee-off by digressing a wee bit, I promise to try and keep it brief…
When I was a younger lad, I went through a period where I thought that pre-christian European religious thought was way-cool and somehow more “genuine” or appropriate or “noble” for individuals of European descent. For me then, the particular flavour of paganism became the Tuetono-Nordic one given that I’m a square-skulled blue-eyed blondie knuckle-dragger. So anyway, in the vain attempt to get involved with all of this, I start reading this piece of fiction called “Rhinegold” which was a current authors attempt to retell the Seigfried/Sigurd vs. Fafnir story using the modern vernacular.
I couldn’t finish it.
It wasn’t that it was written poorly, it was that I couldn’t identify with any of the characters nor could I find it in myself to see any of them sympathetically. I kept asking myself “Where are the good guys? I know that I’m supposed to think of this dude and this chick and, oh yeah, that guy over there as the good guys but, argh, damnit, they don’t seem good to me.”
It took awhile to figure out what was wrong; what was causing this disconnect. It came to me when I realized that most all of the pagan European mythologies and religious practices struck me in much same way. I already knew that I didn’t like Siegfried and I didn’t like Woden/Odin. Then I found out that I didn’t give a rat’s ass for Achilles or Oddyseus and Zeus or the Titans or Cu Chulain and Dagda or the Morrigan or the pre-Vedantic conceptions of Indra and Agni either. All of these Gods and heroes in these myths struck me as violent, treacherous, vain, vengeful, ruthless, and frankly, anti-social.
In a nutshell, the problem was that the civilization and paradigm that I was born into is completely different sociologically, technologically, materially, and philosophically, then the one that gave birth to these old faiths and legends. My idea of what is “good” is fundamentally different. My civilization values social values more. Peace, justice, mercy, love…the things that allow large groups of folks to live and work together efficiently.
Our religion and concepts of morality reflect our society and our understanding of the universe//ability to control that universe…and vice versa. For more on this, if you’re interested, take a look at Thorstein Veblen’s book: Theory of the Leisure Class. Veblen isn’t on the level of a Marx or a Weber or a Durkheim but he is considered one of the big-shot fathers of modern sociology. The book is small, less than 225 pages if memory serves. For a person with a good vocabulary, it’s an easy read. When I say “good vocabulary”, I’m not talking about the kind of vocabulary needed to understand someone like Kant or worse, Hegel nor am I talking about the esoteric and exclusionary crap that’s so often spewed by post-modernist academics who only care about talking to each other and not to us lesser mortals who are only smart enough to understand the New Yorker or read websites like edge.org or artsandlettersdaily.com.
That old greco-roman pre-christian stuff evolved in a pre-civic only semi-agrarian warrior mindset where nature was something to be feared in it’s seeming arbitrariness and ability to bring suffering and death down on hapless men. The growth of cities and of literacy and the numbers of people who actually had time to think and reflect vs. work and fight and breed and die was where our need for and sanctification of very social values like love and justice and peace and all of that come from.
So…back to BSG and religion:
The colonials groove on this seeming pantheistic religion that borrows from to some extent from Hellenistic myth. Fine. Dandy.
But colonial society is urban and technologically more advanced than even ours is. In fact, before the Cylon wars, it was more advanced yet and only took a self imposed step backwards in a lot of areas as a defensive measure and aesthetic/ethical reaction to the events of the Cylon wars.
Oh, just as a side note…what the hell does “Cylon” mean? Why were the Cylons called Cylons? Did the Cylons name themselves that or did the colonials call the Cylons “Cylon”. Did this name come around before, during or after the first Cylon war? In TOS, the Cylons got their name from the alien race that built them and that they subsequently exterminated. In TNS, this explanation won’t suffice.
Anyway, back to business. I DON’T think that the Lords of Kobol their names and relationships notwithstanding, can easily be equated to the Olympian pantheon. The gods of Olympus have/had the nature that they did because the Greeks were looking at nature and human nature cynically and fearfully because they didn’t understand and couldn’t control either one and because the concept of these Gods came about before the first Greek cities et al. By contrast, the Lords of Kobol were conceived of by a exceedingly civic and technologic civilization that had learned to utterly control nature and travel interstellar distances with ease etc. Further, if certain as of yet unspecified characteristics of colonial settlement and star-systems are to be taken as a given, then all twelve of the colonies were in the same single stellar system or at most, star-cluster which strongly suggests that the colonials, given time and resources, could radically terraform planets in just about any way they chose. These are not the sort of people who need Gods as embodiments of pitiless and capricious nature. This notion is born out by evidence shown so far in the show. Revealed colonial religious practice seems to show the Lords of Kobol as primarily concerned with the cultivation and protection of the human soul and dignity. The Lords of Kobol are thought to care for and love humans. Nobody shown yet seems to give a shit about whether these gods and goddesses could rain lightening down form the heavens or could give birth to stars or anything else like that.
Over and over again, we see the Colonials engage in religious practice in public and in private and in all boils down to something like this;
“Lords of Kobol who I believe love and cherish me/us, I/we are afraid for my/our lives/souls/civilization, please protect me/us or at least shelter my/our souls in death.”
These are not gods who destroy cities for the desecretion of temples or rape mortal women to produce demi-gods or any other such nonsense. I am so very thankful to date that I’ve never heard any colonial up to and including the any Gemonese colonial pray to the Lords of Kobol beseeching them to take vengeance upon the Cylons in any way. So say we all.
It’s interesting to me, Muser, that you see the Cylon religion as essentially antithetical to that of the Colonial one. Cosmologicaly, it does seem so, but I’d say, especially given #6’s continuing emphasis that “God is Love” that this isn’t the case, at least not entirely.
Cylon religion postulates a God that is a lot more involved teleologically with the affairs of mortals than the Lords of Kobol SEEM to be. The Cylons seem to have a semitic/linear view of history vs. the colonial cyclical indo-aryan view of history. The Cylons see a point to it all whereas I’m not sure if the colonials do, we need more data.
Cylon metaphysics and cosmology are at odds with their colonial counterparts while I’d bet that their ethics and epistemology are quite similar. To know how similar Cylon and Colonial aesthetics seem to be, we need only look at how the “homo cylonus” has designed its models and clothed itself to say nothing of the Boomer’s Ithacan Elephants etc. to see an almost total 100% equivalence or sameness.
As an aside, but since you wondered chicken and egg style about Cylon religion, I speculate thusly: Given that “homo cylonus” didn’t appear in the colonies until two years before the holocaust, I believe (I do not know) that the “human models” to be more idiomatic weren’t developed until VERY recently and actually represent what the Cylons believe to be their crowning technologically and maybe religious achievement and were many years in the making. I think that the original Cylons (who may very well still be governing toaster society) are ghosts in the machine now and no longer choose to incorporate in robotic bodies. Given all of this, I’d wager that Cylon religious beliefs came before, not after, the birth of homo cylonus.
In closing, it seems fairly well established at this point, that Cylon ethics are social, modern, and almost entirely compatible with their Colonial counterparts and the various flavours of real-world monotheism. It’s totally obvious that their genocide is indeed in direct contravention with their religious precepts. The fans all know it which is why the various forums out their resound with cries of “civil war” and “schism” and the like. We all see it coming… How the chips will all wind up falling will probably occupy a shit-load of Season 3’s screen time and promises to be quite the roller coaster. Frak yeah, man!
with courtesy,
MH
# posted by 
: 12:43 PM
: 12:43 PM
First off, nice rant, dude! Good vamp. BTW, my introduction to Nordic mythology was through Wagner (Der Ring des Niebelungen).
I see what you mean about the mere superficial resemblance between Greek and BSG deities. I agree that BSG has appropriated the names, their outward appearances, and a few of their more benign characteristics, but BSG's gods have little in common with their Greek counterparts. It appears to me that the gods really aren't dealt with in their individual incarnations, but rather as a homogenous whole who add up to a touchy-feely godhead, not unlike the Christian God. "The Lords of Kobol" is essentially a codeword for a kind, loving entity that has little relevance to the colonial's contemporary society.
You bring up an interesting point about the state of Kobolian civilization at the time they developed their belief systems. When *did* this happen, I wonder? I find some of the timelines difficult. For example, the exodus of the thirteen tribes was around 2,000 years ago, if I recall correctly. This "Pythia" they keep referring to mentions something about going off in "sky chariots" and the like. Spaceships? If they were hoving off their homeworld *2000* years prior, they must have been pretty advanced even back then.
I agree with you that the classical Greek gods required a pre-civilization culture as their progenitor - contemporary society is way too self-confident for that amount of capriciousness. So, either Kobolian society is *very*, *very* old (5,000 years?) and their religion sturdy, or we really should give up on equating the Kobolian deities with the same-named Greek ones. Fine with me.
That aside...
Cylon religion, as is true of most Cylon-related concepts in BSG, is more interesting than the Colonial's. However, I'm still wondering why a machine intelligence would need an overarching concept like a singular god. Of course, we can't really conceive of a true machine intelligence because we've never seen one. It's probably more useful to completely eschew the "tin can" view of the Cylons from TOS and focus completely on the humanoid models. #6 herself dismisses "those models" (toasters) and seems to indicate that they don't have true self-awareness.
So, if Cylons are basically cyborgs (humans with tons of upgrades), then we're talking more about an internecine conflict than a cross-species one. *That* makes it easier to stomach a full-fledged religious belief like the one the Cylons hold. I was about to say that puts the war in a religious light... but the Colonial's religion is so tepid that they can't keep up their side of the bargain. The Cylons seem to religiously motivated. While #6 goes on and on about God's love and desire for the good of all people, she does make it plain that their god can be plenty vengeful, too.
In fact, I get the distinct impression that the Cylon religion, like Christianity, to be honest, encompasses some pretty schizophrenic ideas. "Children must kill their parents" and "God is Love." What does love have to do with killing your parents? I'm not sure that the writers are doing the best job of setting up any future intra-Cylon schism. I definitely felt the menace in #6 when she told Gaius that god was disappointed with him - she wasn't just telling him that to shoot the breeze. The Cylon god is, as you say, must more directly connected into daily activity. (Well, that's usually true of young religions.)
The beneath-the-surface parallels you make between the Cylon and Colonial religions are interesting. That does make sense, that the writers are setting the two societies up for integration by continually emphasizing the commonality between the two cultures.
BTW, I'm not sure I totally agree with you in your analysis of why the Cylons created the human models, but that's for a later posting.
Good stuff, dude. Thanks for writing.
I see what you mean about the mere superficial resemblance between Greek and BSG deities. I agree that BSG has appropriated the names, their outward appearances, and a few of their more benign characteristics, but BSG's gods have little in common with their Greek counterparts. It appears to me that the gods really aren't dealt with in their individual incarnations, but rather as a homogenous whole who add up to a touchy-feely godhead, not unlike the Christian God. "The Lords of Kobol" is essentially a codeword for a kind, loving entity that has little relevance to the colonial's contemporary society.
You bring up an interesting point about the state of Kobolian civilization at the time they developed their belief systems. When *did* this happen, I wonder? I find some of the timelines difficult. For example, the exodus of the thirteen tribes was around 2,000 years ago, if I recall correctly. This "Pythia" they keep referring to mentions something about going off in "sky chariots" and the like. Spaceships? If they were hoving off their homeworld *2000* years prior, they must have been pretty advanced even back then.
I agree with you that the classical Greek gods required a pre-civilization culture as their progenitor - contemporary society is way too self-confident for that amount of capriciousness. So, either Kobolian society is *very*, *very* old (5,000 years?) and their religion sturdy, or we really should give up on equating the Kobolian deities with the same-named Greek ones. Fine with me.
That aside...
Cylon religion, as is true of most Cylon-related concepts in BSG, is more interesting than the Colonial's. However, I'm still wondering why a machine intelligence would need an overarching concept like a singular god. Of course, we can't really conceive of a true machine intelligence because we've never seen one. It's probably more useful to completely eschew the "tin can" view of the Cylons from TOS and focus completely on the humanoid models. #6 herself dismisses "those models" (toasters) and seems to indicate that they don't have true self-awareness.
So, if Cylons are basically cyborgs (humans with tons of upgrades), then we're talking more about an internecine conflict than a cross-species one. *That* makes it easier to stomach a full-fledged religious belief like the one the Cylons hold. I was about to say that puts the war in a religious light... but the Colonial's religion is so tepid that they can't keep up their side of the bargain. The Cylons seem to religiously motivated. While #6 goes on and on about God's love and desire for the good of all people, she does make it plain that their god can be plenty vengeful, too.
In fact, I get the distinct impression that the Cylon religion, like Christianity, to be honest, encompasses some pretty schizophrenic ideas. "Children must kill their parents" and "God is Love." What does love have to do with killing your parents? I'm not sure that the writers are doing the best job of setting up any future intra-Cylon schism. I definitely felt the menace in #6 when she told Gaius that god was disappointed with him - she wasn't just telling him that to shoot the breeze. The Cylon god is, as you say, must more directly connected into daily activity. (Well, that's usually true of young religions.)
The beneath-the-surface parallels you make between the Cylon and Colonial religions are interesting. That does make sense, that the writers are setting the two societies up for integration by continually emphasizing the commonality between the two cultures.
BTW, I'm not sure I totally agree with you in your analysis of why the Cylons created the human models, but that's for a later posting.
Good stuff, dude. Thanks for writing.
Ooh, damn, meaty post...I have to think a bit more about your betrayal post and respond to that before I get back to this. :)
MH
MH
# posted by : 12:45 PM
: 12:45 PM
Muser,
I've dumped this on you because we got to speculating a bit about how human/kobol civilization progressed and evolved and how this may have affected their legends and religion. This is all sort of a tangental but you might find it interesting (at least to laugh at) nonetheless. Without further ado...
MH’s Non-Canonical Exceedingly Tentative and Speculative BSG Timeline:
ANCIENT SUPER DISTANT PAST:
-Humankind evolves on Earth.
-Civilizations form.
-Civilizations grow in size and advance in technological capability.
-Man conquers aging and most disease.
-FTL travel is discovered. Human galactic diaspora begins. Humans terraform and colonize Kobol.
SUPER DISTANT PAST:
-A series of cataclysms (possibly metaphysical in nature) occur on Earth. The dispersed colonies are left without logistical and cultural support of the mother-world. The Kobol colony’s technological level moves backwards to the late medieval//early renasiance era. Much knowledge is lost.
500-600 years pass…
DISTANT PAST:
-Kobol has become completely populated and has regained a level of knowledge and civilization that characterized the original Kobol colony. Including FTL, immortality, AI, nanotechnology, etc. etc.
-Science continues to reveal the ultimate nature of the universe. Collaboration between science and mysticism produces a human physical transcendence of some sort thus giving birth a group of “super-humans” who myth names the Lords of Kobol. (sorta like Arthur C. Clarke’s David Bowman or something.)
-Humans from Kobol return to Earth. It’s vacant. Earth is recolonized.
100-500 years pass, maybe more, I don’t know…During this time, the population that returned to Earth in possession of all the knowledge and science of Kobol also rediscovers secrets long forgotten on Earth. They transcend or something like that and “shuck their mortal coils”. Maybe they become like the Lords of Kobol, maybe more. In any case, Earth again regains her virginity and becomes vacant and full of nothing but ruins and the lushness of nature.
COLONIAL MYTHIC PERIOD:
-The events discussed in the Book of Pythia transpire.
-Kobol civilization collapses immediately after the establishment of the 12 colonies. The colonies are left without logistic and cultural support from Kobol and immediately regress into a very similar cultural, scientific and technological dark age very similar to the one the Kobol endured after the collapse of Earth’s nascent galactic civilization.
COLONIAL HISTORY:
-2000 (+/-) years of recorded Colonial history pass. The Colonies start and remain disunited. The collapse and the passage of time warp knowledge and myth. The facts surrounding the location of Earth and the actual history of humankind are distorted and forgotten. Colonial civilization progresses very slowly in fits and starts.
-The events of the first Cylon war unite the Colonies under a single government.
-40 years pass…
BSG HISTORY:
-The Cylons return and eliminate colonial civilization on the 12 colonies as depicted in TNS.
My thought about the TNS intellectual property is that it will run for 100 episodes or maybe a handful more than that, long enough in any case to go into syndication. With a dozen 1st season episodes, 20 2nd season episodes and 20 subsequent season episodes, the show should reach the 100 marker halfway through its fifth season. I think that the empty and vacant Earth will be reached at the end of the fourth season. I think it also possible that a major story arc that spans both the third and fourth seasons may be a Cylon religious civil war. At least in the beginning, there would be the faction of Homo Cylonus that wishes to diversify themselves, become psychologically identical to humanity, and to intermingle peacefully with humanity and the orthodox Homo Cylonus that wishes to remain as-is. I don’t as of yet have a strong opinion of how this conflict will turn out. Maybe the Caprica Six/Sharon/Peace/Love faction will win, maybe they’ll lose. All of this could play out in many different ways with excellent story potential.
I think that the final season will deal with the uncovering of Earth’s secrets, the arrival of one or more the Cylon factions at Earth and the final conflicts between the colonials and the Cylons.
A hollywood movie will be made that shows the final resolution of the storyline wherein the Lords of Earth and of Kobol return to bring peace between the humans and their Cylon children and some sort of synthesis between the two peoples. The Lords will also reveal to the humans and the Cylons that there are many other human civilizations spread throughout the galaxy and their locations will be revealed. Finally, I think that the Lords of Earth and Kobol, will be beseeched by the Cylon leadership for definitive answers as to the ultimate nature of the universe and the existence and nature of God. They will either refuse to answer at all OR their answers will be as tantalizing as they are woefully inadequate.
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I've dumped this on you because we got to speculating a bit about how human/kobol civilization progressed and evolved and how this may have affected their legends and religion. This is all sort of a tangental but you might find it interesting (at least to laugh at) nonetheless. Without further ado...
MH’s Non-Canonical Exceedingly Tentative and Speculative BSG Timeline:
ANCIENT SUPER DISTANT PAST:
-Humankind evolves on Earth.
-Civilizations form.
-Civilizations grow in size and advance in technological capability.
-Man conquers aging and most disease.
-FTL travel is discovered. Human galactic diaspora begins. Humans terraform and colonize Kobol.
SUPER DISTANT PAST:
-A series of cataclysms (possibly metaphysical in nature) occur on Earth. The dispersed colonies are left without logistical and cultural support of the mother-world. The Kobol colony’s technological level moves backwards to the late medieval//early renasiance era. Much knowledge is lost.
500-600 years pass…
DISTANT PAST:
-Kobol has become completely populated and has regained a level of knowledge and civilization that characterized the original Kobol colony. Including FTL, immortality, AI, nanotechnology, etc. etc.
-Science continues to reveal the ultimate nature of the universe. Collaboration between science and mysticism produces a human physical transcendence of some sort thus giving birth a group of “super-humans” who myth names the Lords of Kobol. (sorta like Arthur C. Clarke’s David Bowman or something.)
-Humans from Kobol return to Earth. It’s vacant. Earth is recolonized.
100-500 years pass, maybe more, I don’t know…During this time, the population that returned to Earth in possession of all the knowledge and science of Kobol also rediscovers secrets long forgotten on Earth. They transcend or something like that and “shuck their mortal coils”. Maybe they become like the Lords of Kobol, maybe more. In any case, Earth again regains her virginity and becomes vacant and full of nothing but ruins and the lushness of nature.
COLONIAL MYTHIC PERIOD:
-The events discussed in the Book of Pythia transpire.
-Kobol civilization collapses immediately after the establishment of the 12 colonies. The colonies are left without logistic and cultural support from Kobol and immediately regress into a very similar cultural, scientific and technological dark age very similar to the one the Kobol endured after the collapse of Earth’s nascent galactic civilization.
COLONIAL HISTORY:
-2000 (+/-) years of recorded Colonial history pass. The Colonies start and remain disunited. The collapse and the passage of time warp knowledge and myth. The facts surrounding the location of Earth and the actual history of humankind are distorted and forgotten. Colonial civilization progresses very slowly in fits and starts.
-The events of the first Cylon war unite the Colonies under a single government.
-40 years pass…
BSG HISTORY:
-The Cylons return and eliminate colonial civilization on the 12 colonies as depicted in TNS.
My thought about the TNS intellectual property is that it will run for 100 episodes or maybe a handful more than that, long enough in any case to go into syndication. With a dozen 1st season episodes, 20 2nd season episodes and 20 subsequent season episodes, the show should reach the 100 marker halfway through its fifth season. I think that the empty and vacant Earth will be reached at the end of the fourth season. I think it also possible that a major story arc that spans both the third and fourth seasons may be a Cylon religious civil war. At least in the beginning, there would be the faction of Homo Cylonus that wishes to diversify themselves, become psychologically identical to humanity, and to intermingle peacefully with humanity and the orthodox Homo Cylonus that wishes to remain as-is. I don’t as of yet have a strong opinion of how this conflict will turn out. Maybe the Caprica Six/Sharon/Peace/Love faction will win, maybe they’ll lose. All of this could play out in many different ways with excellent story potential.
I think that the final season will deal with the uncovering of Earth’s secrets, the arrival of one or more the Cylon factions at Earth and the final conflicts between the colonials and the Cylons.
A hollywood movie will be made that shows the final resolution of the storyline wherein the Lords of Earth and of Kobol return to bring peace between the humans and their Cylon children and some sort of synthesis between the two peoples. The Lords will also reveal to the humans and the Cylons that there are many other human civilizations spread throughout the galaxy and their locations will be revealed. Finally, I think that the Lords of Earth and Kobol, will be beseeched by the Cylon leadership for definitive answers as to the ultimate nature of the universe and the existence and nature of God. They will either refuse to answer at all OR their answers will be as tantalizing as they are woefully inadequate.
# posted by : 7:25 PM
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