The Suwa Shrine can be traced back 500 years and is believed to be the ancient dwelling place of three kami spirits, the sacred gods of the Shinto faith.
One of my later visits to the Valley was made in the autumn of 1907 with the late William Keith, the artist. The leaf-colors were then ripe, and the great godlike rocks in repose seemed to glow with life.
What they mean by big gods is gods that know everything about what people do and what they're really thinking and why they do it, and care that humans treat each other well.
Located in Ujitachi in Mie, Japan, the Ise Grand Shrine was founded around 4 B.C. Since then, it has been dedicated to Amaterasu Omikami, the Shinto goddess of the sun and universe.
And for your robotics nerds, he's the dude who invented ROS, which is the open source software used by basically anyone who wants to build anything robotic.