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In reply to the discussion: Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from Godhood.. [View all]trotsky
(49,533 posts)4. The word "sufficiently" is key here.
Like your person from the Middle Ages example, a flashlight would be sufficiently advanced enough to convince primitive humans of godhood. Or a lighter.
What would it take today? Seeing miracles could possibly be attributed to holograms, or advanced matter manipulation. Maybe they have force fields, etc. Just our awareness of technology and the progress of our own species (knowing that there was a time that today's tech would look like magic) might be enough to always have at least a little doubt about whether something was a god.
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Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from Godhood.. [View all]
Fumesucker
Feb 2015
OP
I wrongly attributed TLQ to Clarke in the OP and then edited when it was pointed out to me..
Fumesucker
Feb 2015
#22
In Childhood's End some idiot tried to fire a nuke at the alien guardians, and promptly disappeared.
leveymg
Feb 2015
#7
I think this feeds into an evolutionary defense mechanism; our predisposition to faith.
AtheistCrusader
Feb 2015
#9
He wrote quite a bit of stuff that's not in that subgenre, I don't read fantasy either any more
Fumesucker
Feb 2015
#25