I meant that when our parents taught us things like "stealing is wrong", they could have POSSIBLY gotten that ideal from highly religous people generations back the family tree.
I agree, goverments can definitely form without religion. the question is at what speed?Ooh, that's a dangerous argument. You're pretty close to implying that people can't have moral standards without religion, which (trust me) is not where you want to go.
Close one indeed! I don't think you need religion to do anything :)Regardless of how governments and societies did form, there's no reason I know of that they couldn't have formed without religion. The mere fact (if it is a fact) that early governments formed around religions only implies that governments can form around religions, not that they can't form not around religions.