tossing out change

I've written that people frequently—and perhaps strategically—don't respond to the actual statements made by those who discarded their supernatural beliefs; instead they simply respond to what they guess or wish we'd say. So it's fair for me in turn to put a spotlight on the favorite words of followers of supernatural beliefs. Permanence is an underlying pattern of many of these words: "forever", "never", "timeless", "faithful", "always", "never-ending", "everlasting", "enduring", "solid", "unceasingly", "unfailing" (and "unchanging", needless to say). 

Once someone has shaken off this mindset, its weaknesses stand out. The sort of perfect permanence expressed by these words starts to appear so plainly unrealistic. The more that people have examined the universe in depth, the more apparent it is that change itself is fundamental. From the largest collections of matter to the smallest, individual energy fields and particles don't remain in the same positions. Even massive stars and black holes are predicted to go through different phases. Mountains erode. Atmospheric gas concentrations shift. Although important quantities are conserved at specific scales, conservation isn't a rule against change. It's for restricting the changes that can possibly coexist.

Someone might laugh and retort that they're still who they've always been. But this is an illusion: human bodies replace individual cells constantly (and also, er, accumulate wrinkles and spots and such). Work is necessary for anything to stay the same. A thing that doesn't appear to change a lot is generally going through changes of maintenance and repair to reverse changes of decay. Like a person on a treadmill, it's running to hold position. Similar metaphorical truths apply to relationship commitments and personalities. People do change over time in how they think and behave, and their goals and preferences can too. Commitments between people are repeated recommitments as they choose to persist regardless of changes in circumstances and personalities. 

To demand that something never change is to refuse to face something as it really is over time. I'd say that it's beneficial to acknowledge one's own honest reactions about change, whether the reactions are positive or negative. But there is a point at which clinging too much to the past or trying to resurrect it is a waste of the finite time and resources someone has in the present. 

Change is central and inescapable. So how is it that followers of supernatural beliefs can confidently proclaim that the very real beings and otherworldly realms in their beliefs absolutely never change? From the vantage point of someone on the outside looking in, the claim doesn't seem right. Its characteristics are like a flashing red warning light. Questions are raised. What are these beings and realms made of? What are the different rules of motion and composition and why are the rules so different? How do the different rules fit into or violate the rules of everything else that's real? And to return to the main point, how is that these rules work without change being fundamental?

Of course, there are well-known things that don't change: concepts and information created and communicated by minds. Mathematical definitions. Written stories and songs (that have been accurately copied and stored). Theoretical abstractions. It's true that some groups of followers are more than willing to agree that the contents of their beliefs exist purely as historical myths that are useful as inspiring metaphors. And some cerebral followers might be willing to state that the contents of their beliefs are no more than the stark conclusions or axioms of a philosophical logical system. 

However, this comparison isn't a workable solution for many common followers. The more that they say that their preferred deities are as timeless as an integer or a catchy tune, the more that they're placing their deities directly next to human creations...which are understood and preserved through human mental efforts. After all, a supernatural concept can indeed be timeless because, well, a concept can be whatever someone imagines it to be. 

It doesn't help their case that they regularly gather to insist to themselves and each other that the objects of their beliefs have timeless qualities. If these objects are intrinsically timeless, then outsiders have good reason to wonder why people clearly pour so much mental effort into reinforcing the idea. It's almost as if the timelessness of the concepts is a reflection or projection of the unending craving for timelessness and not a discovered independent reality...