Okay, hear me out. Sure, this text just isn’t solely going to talk positively concerning the Grownup Swim present Rick and Morty, however it’ll illustrate how the present, notably the sixth episode of Season Two (“The Ricks Should Be Loopy”) really argues for the existence of God. Now, I’m not naive to the feelings of its creators, Dan Harmon and Justin Roiland—who might or might not determine as atheists themselves (Harmon no less than appears open to the numinous world)—nor to its characters’ pathos relating to God. The final contempt for God displayed by Rick, a stand-in for philosophical materialism and scientism, seems to be seen positively since he’s the brash anti-hero of the present. Nonetheless, one who pays consideration will see how emotionally and existentially bankrupt this philosophy leaves Rick, regardless of his devotion to the “fact” of his place. This doesn’t disprove these positions, however it definitely just isn’t a powerful argument for his or her desirability.
If in case you have not seen this episode, or any episodes, of Rick and Morty, here’s a temporary synopsis. The battery for Rick’s spaceship just isn’t offering energy, so Rick and Morty are shrunk all the way down to go inside and “repair” it. After they enter the battery, we discover out that what has been powering it’s a tiny group that Rick has created, which he calls a “Micro-verse.” The inhabitants of this Micro-verse have been conditioned to consider their goal is to maneuver a rudimentary pedal, which is what generates energy for the battery. They see Rick as a god as a result of he created them and gave them goal, not questioning the triviality of mentioned goal. Morty, in fact, objects to this case, referring to it as “slavery however with further steps.”
The episode appears to current the notion of God as only a greater model of Rick, and all of us as simply dwelling in our personal Micro/Mini/Teeny-verse.
Rick discovers the rationale everybody has stopped pedaling and due to this fact stopped powering his battery. There has emerged inside this group its personal model of Rick, a scientist named Zeep, who has created his personal battery that’s powered by (you guessed it) its personal smaller group known as the “Mini-verse.” Now Rick, Morty, and Zeep all journey to this Mini-verse the place they encounter one other model of Rick/Zeep named Kyle. They uncover that Kyle is on the verge of making his personal “Teeny-verse,” which is able to quickly be the supply of energy for his or her group, persevering with the chain of obsolescence.
At first look, this seems to be a scathing indictment towards God (which is probably going the writers’ intentions). It appears to current the notion of God as only a greater model of Rick, and all of us as simply dwelling in our personal Micro/Mini/Teeny-verse. Whereas this may need rhetorical enchantment as a result of it’s dramatized and consists of jokes, it really doesn’t make any argument towards God’s existence. At most, it argues towards God’s goodness, as a result of it presents our goal in life as trivial, just like the inhabitants of the varied verses from the episode. The shortage of significance just isn’t confirmed within the episode both, since proving a unfavorable (like lack of that means) is just about unimaginable, and the way one values that means is solely subjective. It does, nevertheless, current two associated concepts—that God is merely a “greater being” and that meaning-in-life is silly—in a memorable means that may play nicely into one’s affirmation bias.
Sarcastically, the motion between these verses and the truth that all of them are designed with a goal, presents two classical examples of arguments for God’s existence, as articulated by certainly one of Christianity’s best lecturers, Thomas Aquinas. Within the first of his well-known “5 methods” for God’s existence present in his Summa Theologiae (half I, query 2, article 3), he provides what is named “the best way of movement.”
Ultimately, there has to be one thing exterior of nature itself to account for the motion inside nature.
That is really a re-fashioning of Aristotle’s argument from movement, which states that any object in movement needed to have been moved by one thing exterior of it. Every earlier mover requires extra energy to maneuver the entire objects after them, much like what we noticed in Rick and Morty, the place every battery powered the group above it. So as to get the “final” object, the one most modern to us, there must be a primary object that began the sequence, one which was not moved by something earlier than it. This Unmoved Mover would should be omnipotent, or all-powerful, as a result of it’s shifting every little thing after it. Classical theists, together with Christians, would name this all-powerful Being “God.”
Though the joke of the episode is that the communities maintain getting smaller and smaller, this can not go on indefinitely or there would by no means have been the “essential” group. With out Rick, the “first mover” on this sequence, there couldn’t have been the subsequent and the subsequent. It took extra energy to construct the preliminary battery in order that the battery may energy a small a part of that world, Rick’s spaceship. Even when they continued touring all the way down to smaller and smaller communities (insert one more synonym for “small” right here), it nonetheless took the First Mover to begin the sequence. If Rick was the pseudo-god to his Micro-verse, then would it not not work in the other way and get greater? If Rick was good sufficient to design his battery, wouldn’t it take One thing even smarter to design the world that created Rick? Ultimately, there has to be one thing exterior of nature itself to account for the motion inside nature. This One thing must be above nature, or supernatural: i.e. God.
If God beloved humanity a lot that he freely selected to share in that humanity, then that isn’t a God who determines functions calmly.
The second argument this episode presents is Aquinas’s fifth means, typically known as the argument from design or goal. This argument states that every little thing inside nature acts in the direction of a designed finish. We see this in dwelling issues that act in the direction of vitamin and procreation, in addition to in non-living issues which have to be moved by one thing clever from the skin. Simply as in logic, if one thing applies to each half inside a gaggle, one can apply that precept to the group as a complete; so too is the case with nature. If every little thing inside nature acts in the direction of an finish or goal, then nature as a complete acts in the direction of an finish or goal. If it have to be directed in the direction of that goal by one thing exterior of it, then that which directs nature have to be exterior of nature. The phrase for that is supernatural, and this classical theists and Christians would name God.
Because the episode exhibits, one can take problem with the perceived triviality of a goal. The true goal of those smaller communities is hidden from the inhabitants exactly as a result of Rick and the others know this revelation would result in their abandonment of the work. Nonetheless, this doesn’t disprove design or goal as such. Sure, it’s good to really feel one has a deeper goal; Christianity, by uniting one to Christ by means of His Physique, the Church (cf. Col. 1:18), can fairly instill this in an individual, however whether or not one feels it or not doesn’t undermine the truth of design or goal in nature.
Humanity’s goal comes from God as a result of humanity was created in God’s “picture and likeness” (Gen. 1:26). Perhaps the traditional pagan conception of the gods noticed humanity as their servants and play issues, however to undertaking that onto the Christian understanding of God exhibits a deep misunderstanding of Christianity and says extra concerning the individual than about God. If God beloved humanity a lot that he freely selected to share in that humanity, even when it meant ache and dying (see Phil. 2:6), then that isn’t a God who determines functions calmly, particularly of these with whom He shares a nature.
I do know, I do know, it’s a foolish tv present, however fiction has all the time been a car for proposing and interesting with the deepest questions of life and actuality itself. It’s why this outlet exists and why gallons of ink have been spilled on the tales which have grabbed humanity’s consideration for ages. As evidenced by many different episodes of the present, Harmon and Roiland take questions of actuality, storytelling, and philosophy significantly. We should always have interaction with these questions significantly as nicely.
