Why Religion Fails to Deliver: From Blind Faith to Scientific Spirituality by Gregor Flock Foreword: The paper which you are about to read is a slightly updated version of my August 31 submission to the 2013 Sanders Prize in Philosophy of Religion competition. Due to not having had much time to write the version which I eventually submitted, I went for a more informal affair à la Sam Harris 2005, a nontheistic and antireligious but nevertheless pro-spiritual work whose general stance on religion and spirituality I largely share and that I will be quoting from profusely in this work. It is now a couple of months later, but I have decided to stick with a somewhat more casual style and approach and against making this into an overly sophisticated affair. The reason for this (besides being very busy with other projects) is that religious questions concern all of us – it does or in any event should make a big difference for us if Jahwe/God/Allah or some other divine beings or forces do or do not exist, or if we have a soul/consciousness and, if so, if it does or does not have a continued existence beyond the death of the physical body. As such, instead of scaring the more casual readers away with scholarly details of the academic discussion, I rather tried to cover a lot of ground and to connect a lot of fundamentally important dots within this article – something which, I believe, will make this work complex, thought-provoking and worthwhile enough for both a professional and a less-than-professional readership, independent of the reader's stance on religion, God, spirituality or science. Finally, in case you should disagree with the contents of this work and given that religion can be a touchy subject, please keep things peaceful and civil; opposition should be convinced by way of logical argument and not by way of stoning, burning or shooting them until they are dead, perhaps followed by the self-righteous claim that it was God's will that this be done, because distasteful things like that are no more than an expression of fear, hate, ignorance, insanity or of other imperfections of the mind and overall something that a spiritually enlightened being would never stoop to. That being said, I hope that you can enjoy the read and that you can take one or the other worthwhile bit of information out of this article. Also feel free to share or link this article with or to others for non-profit purposes such as studying or discussing. Vienna, 10th of October 2013 (minor updates: Oct. 18, 2013; Nov. 9, 2013) 1. Introduction Many have heard the saying that "God is good" or the Bible being referred to as "the Good Book." Given that these claims are coming from religion, their institutions and ultimately the people who follow religion, this essentially amounts to the claim that "Religion is good for us." But does religious faith really have an overall positive effect on humanity (both in terms of "humans" and in terms of "the quality of being human")? In this article I would like to show that, by and large and given the momentary stage of evolution of philosophy, science and humankind, the opposite is the case: One may have to concede that, at a much earlier point in our mental evolution, at a time when science was still rather underdeveloped, the concept of God still a theoretical necessity and when there were no such things as international laws, the UNO or a declaration of human rights governing human interaction on a big scale, theistic religion may have been a useful crutch for humankind in that its enforced belief systems allowed for some sort of unity and stability, which in turn allowed for a certain amount of human development. One also must not forget some of religion's positive direct effects, such as the introduction of a written moral or ethical In pragmatism and later Habermasian and Apelian discourse ethics there is a distinction between culturally derived and variant "values" and culturally independent, rationally derived and invariant "norms." In support of that distinction I would like to distinguish between value related "morals" or "morality" and norm related and much more important and aspirable "ethics" or "ethicity." and also legal code I regard the fields of morals, ethics and law as closely connected, for instance due to all three belonging to the normative family, or due to the idea of justice being both an inspiration for laws as well as a moral or ethical virtue. where before there perhaps was relative arbitrariness and unrefinedness in moral, ethical and legal decisions. These days though, after science has successfully extricated itself from religion and improved immensely over the centuries and after it has proven countless times to be much more useful and beneficial for human development than religion in its current state could ever hope to be, traditional religion is left behind as a relatively hollow shell; as a crutch that, after humankind has proceeded from crawling and hobbling to walking and running, should now better be discarded as the hopelessly outdated system that it is instead of being dragged along just because one cannot break with old habits and oftentimes not so smart traditions. In other words: The main hypothesis of this article is that traditional faith-based theistic religion needs to be dropped as the shiny but poisonous apple, as the harmful to deadly infection of the human mind that it is, and be substituted and cured with philosophy, science or other things that offer far better solutions than religion Of the five world religions, I will skip on Buddhism due to it, if properly implemented, not being a religion but rather a philosophy of life as well as a science of consciousness. I will also skip on Hinduism due to not having sufficient expertise to write about it. and without the latter's many negative side effects. The ensuing attack on religion will come in the form of two broadsides: First, I will highlight religion's near utter ignorance of tried and tested scientific or epistemological values, attitudes, norms or standards (cf. ch. 2). Secondly, I will attempt to show that, as a direct consequence of these shortcomings, religion does a worse job than science or philosophy at satisfying certain human or philosophical needs or desires, such as providing answers to the meaning of life or to the origins of (morality and) ethics (cf. ch. 3). The conclusion will be that, due to failing both in terms of epistemological or scientific values and methods and, consequently, also in terms of results, religion can by and large be abandoned. However, as a sort of reconciliation between science and one useful aspect of religion which is often neglected in science and which should be integrated into it, I will make an attempt at introducing something that I will call "scientific spirituality," i.e. scientifically sensible ways of researching and practicing human spirituality. In terms of literature, the first part of my attack on religion will be supported by quotations from the Quran (or Koran) and from the somewhat polemic but largely on point work of Sam Harris (2005). The main reason why I have chosen the Quran over the Bible is that, even though both feature essentially the same mind-poisoning nonsense, the nonsense that is written in the Bible and especially in the Old Testament is already fairly well-known among Western scholars, so it might be more worthwhile to shift our attention to the Quran and to develop an equal understanding of the equally nonsensical passages in that religious scripture. In chapter 3 and to support my second broadside on religion, I will use literature on the meaning of life, ethics (especially evolutionary ethics), the infinite regress, the cosmological argument, and thanatology (especially near death experiences). 2. The 'Holy Trinity of Science' There is something that, in allusion to the Holy Trinity of Christianity, one could perhaps call the "Holy Trinity of Science." By this I mean three tried and tested epistemic attitudes, values, norms or standards that are connected to empiricism, rationalism and fallibilism, at the core of anything worth calling science and whose employment has helped and will continue to help humanity evolve tremendously and in many ways. In the context of philosophy of religion that holy trinity of science is of particular relevance insofar as it provides answers to the questions of "[...] why do you disbelieve in the verses of Allah […]?" and "[...] why do you avert from the way of Allah those who believe, seeking to make it [seem] deviant […]?" (Quran 3:98 and 3:99): People no longer believe in God and religion and try to make other people turn away from that because a) they realize more and more the fundamental importance of embracing the above three epistemological or scientific values and because b) they also understand that religion largely fails to do so or even actively tries to work against those very important and beneficial values and norms and that, due to this comparatively unempirical, irrational and pseudoinfallible attitude or lack of anything worth calling a proper epistemological method, religion loses its appeal just as its claims or conclusions lose virtually all of their credibility. I would even go as far as to say that, overall, the picture that religion and its 'methods' yields in comparison to those of science could almost be called comical: In genuine science people gather and take a close look at data (the empirical attitude), they go to great pains of properly processing that data, of making valid inferences (the rational attitude) – and despite the conscientious employ of empirical and rational methods and their continuous refinement, genuine scientists are nevertheless willing to admit that they have been wrong, for instance if presented with new data or compelling arguments against their position (the fallibilistic attitude). Many a religious person, on the other hand, has the pronounced tendency to gloriously fail at all three points that wiser and more scientifically-minded persons would embrace: They typically do not care much about empirical data and the direction in which it is pointing, they are typically also largely unable to form logically valid arguments or inferences – and despite having hardly any legitimization for the following conviction due to not making sufficient use of empirical or rational methods, they often enough also think that they cannot possibly be wrong about God's existence or about their religion or creed being the 'bestest' and 'rightest' of all. Therein (in the ignorance of the epistemological values that are connected to empiricism, rationalism and fallibilism) lies the triple blindness of many religious-minded persons. To make sure that I have been understood: My criticism of religion applies first and foremost to its lack of epistemological or scientific values or methods; that its content is lacking is simply a result that and no more than a follow-up mistake, no more than a false conclusion that was based on false premises. Due to most of us being well-acquainted with the epistemological follies that one can encounter in the context of religion, some will perhaps perceive the following discussion as beating the proverbial and, at least from the point of view of more scientifically-minded individuals, already quite dead horse. For the purposes of this article, however, and also due to there still being billions of people who are by and large unaware of the epistemological mistakes that religion routinely has made and will keep on making if left to its own devices, it will be necessary to delve into religion's ignorance of epistemic values due to which the faithful are typically left in a state of epistemic triple blindness. 2.1 The Empirical Attitude Tell a devout Christian that his wife is cheating on him, or that frozen yogurt can make a man invisible, and he is likely to require as much evidence as anyone else, and to be persuaded only to the extent that you give it. Tell him that the book he keeps by his bed was written by an invisible deity who will punish him with fire for eternity if he fails to accept its every incredible claim about the universe, and he seems to require no evidence whatsoever. (Harris 2005: 19) One of the most well-known disputes between those who subscribe to the scientific method and those who subscribe to the religious and I daresay "religulous" Cf. Bill Maher's documentary "Religulous" (2008). method of acquiring beliefs or knowledge concerns the age of the earth and the entire universe. The use of scientific methods tells us that the earth and the universe are older than four and, respectively, 13 billion earth years and that dinosaur bones at least make it into the two figure million range. Abrahamitic religions on the other hand generally tell us that the earth and the universe are younger than 10.000 years (based on ancestral chronicles in religious texts a host of religious scholars have tried to calculate the age of the earth, with many dating the time of its creation between 5500 B.C. and 4000 B.C.). The primary reason for why science can be regarded as the winner of this dispute is that, as opposed to religion, science does not ignore observable data such as radioactive decay, cosmic radiation or continental shifts and the genetic similarity of species from different continents, and when one does not ignore these and a lot of other observable data, one has little to no reason to assume that the earth, the universe and dinosaurs are younger than 10.000 years. From another point of view, this dispute can be regarded as the clash of testimonial evidence with empirical evidence: The calculations performed by religious scholars are based on testimonial evidence, whereas the scientific age of the earth is based on empirical evidence, with both answers formulated as hypotheses or theories that are supposed to correctly interpret the gathered data. To resolve this clash of two different kinds of evidence, if may be useful to imagine this being a legal case: One instance provides testimonial evidence that the accused A has or has not done X, whereas another instance provides empirical evidence to the contrary. The outcome here is fairly obvious, and for good reasons: If the empirical evidence is strong enough, such as there being a videotape that clearly shows A committing a certain crime X (and investigation of the videotape further reveals no signs of it having been tampered with just in order to frame A with the crime), then no testimonial evidence in the world will hold against this kind of empirical evidence; as a matter of fact it is rather likely that whoever has testifed contrary to strong empirical evidence would be well-advised to withdraw that testimony due to the threat of being accused and found guilty of perjury being imminent in this situation. I believe that this provides us with a very good analogy to the dispute between religion and science in respect to the age of the earth: Religion has given testimony that the earth is younger than 10.000 years. Science, however, has provided us with a variety of strong empirical evidence that the earth and the universe are a lot older than that, so as per the rule of "strong empirical evidence trumps testimonial evidence," religion's testimony based claims of the earth being younger than 10.000 years has no business whatsoever standing the way of science's observation based claims of the earth being older than four billion years. As Harris aptly put it: "This has always posed a special problem for religion, because every religion preaches the truth of propositions for which it has no evidence" (2005: 23). Perhaps another not too far-fetched example to get my point across: Imagine that you are leaving your house and that, shortly after having done so, you are unsure whether you have got your wallet, i.e. your ID, your driving licence and your money with you; let us also assume that you will be needing your wallet wherever it is that you are going. In this situation, is it more recommendable to a) "have faith" that you have your wallet with you, or to b) search your pockets in order to ensure that you are indeed carrying your wallet? I daresay that, in this situation, even religious-minded persons will pat their pockets in order to make sure that they are carrying their wallet, and I also daresay that, if they cannot find the wallet on themselves, they will not keep going and just "have faith" that the wallet will be there when needed. That – making use of empirical verification, confirmation, infirmation and falsification, especially when in doubt about something – is a wise thing to do, and even religious persons are generally capable of doing that. But then why not also display that wisdom when it comes to religion itself? All well-justified beliefs rest on observed or perceived data at some point or other, and the process of determining the age of the earth or the existence of God should be no exception to this, because if they are, then they are no longer empirically well-justified scientific beliefs, but rather empirically unfounded or empty and hence "blind" religious beliefs, beliefs or a way of thinking that will often enough cause people to get stuck in a dead end and, what is worse, that will not allow them to realize that this is the situation they are in. 2.2 The Rational Attitude If our polls are to be trusted, nearly 230 million Americans believe that a book showing neither unity of style nor internal consistency was authored by an omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent deity. A survey of Hindus, Muslims, and Jews around the world would surely yield similar results, revealing that we, as a species, have grown almost perfectly intoxicated by our myths. How is it that, in this one area of our lives, we have convinced ourselves that our beliefs about the world can float entirely free of reason and evidence? (Harris 2005: 17) It is a well-known fact that racketeering, i.e. creating a problem and then offering that problem's solution for a price, is organized crime's bread and butter around the world. Interestingly enough, the inner logic of religion has been and still is little different: First make people afraid of imaginary supernatural beings and artificially create (other) problems – for instance "original sin," the ingenious idea that we are all born sinful. Then present them with your solutions to these artificially created problems and profit. That, in essence, is how "religious racketeering" works, with fearmongering being the primary instrument of religious racketeering (think of how, even today, some try to sell natural catastrophes or diseases as God's punishment for various imagined transgressions against his will and how they then present their own opinion as that of God and as the one that should be followed). See www.rightwingwatch.org for regular and well-documented updates of rather incredible fear feeding nonsense that is being uttered in the name of religion in "God's own country," the U.S.A. Let us take a look at some verses of the third chapter or sura of the Quran as an excellent example for archetypical religious fearmongering (nonsurprisingly, the fearmongering starts very early to make people more ready to accept the later content): [...] fear Allah as He should be feared and do not die except as Muslims [in submission to Him]. (3:102) And fear the Fire, which has been prepared for the disbelievers. (3:131) And that Allah may […] destroy the disbelievers. (3:141) We will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve […]. (3:151) […] fear Me, if you are [indeed] believers. (3:175) Indeed, those who purchase disbelief [in exchange] for faith - never will they harm Allah at all, and for them is a painful punishment. (3:177) And if you believe and fear Him, then for you is a great reward. (3:179) […] fear Allah that you may be successful. (3:200) Now we may be programmed (by evolution) to submit to beings of greater power because a tendency to fight beings who could easily destroy those who challenge them is typically not a trait that promotes an individual's or species' chances of survival, meaning that whatever species exist now typically do not have that trait. Religion's timeless "fear God" theme therefore fits in well with our evolutionary programming of submitting to beings of greater power. Religion's two gigantic problems, however, are that no convincing empirical evidence for the existence of God has been brought forth so far (at least none that I am aware of), just as there is no longer any theoretical necessity to postulate the existence of God: In ancient times people often thought that diseases, thunderstorms, natural catastrophes or the movement of celestial objects are the doing of gods or other supernatural forces See for instance Quran 3:190: "[…] the alternation of the night and the day are signs for those of understanding." , and given how underdeveloped science was back then, it is no surprise that people looked to the supernatural for an explanation of many phenomena, meaning that, back then, gods were a theoretical necessity. Nowadays and as evidenced by, for instance, the explanatory supremacy of the theory of evolution over the theory of creation or by other scientific and supreme explanations for the occurrences of diseases, lightning, natural catastrophes or the movement of celestial objects, there is no longer any need to assume the existence of gods in order to come up with good or actually far better explanations for observed phenomena, meaning that, on top of the lack of empirical evidence of gods, gods are also no longer a theoretical necessity. So then what is there left to be afraid of? Fear always was, is and will be used to manipulate people and especially the less well-educated and more gullible among them, and the 'prophet' Mohammed would seem to have been little different from, for instance, today's worse politicians in that he also fuelled the people's fears in order to better control them and to make them do what he wanted them to do (either for the greater good or for personal gain); that is one thing that we can be certain of regarding past events, and we can also regard it as certain that this fearmongering has contributed to the "success" (cf. sura 3, verse 200) of Mohammed who made it from goatherder to (allegedly) God's voice on earth, something that no doubt amounts to a high rise in the social hierarchy. Whether making people afraid of supernatural beings also contributes to their "success," however, that is an entirely different question. I and many other 'evil disbelievers' at least find it not too unlikely that the 'good believers' just might be the used and abused but unfortunately by and large clueless victims of an outdated but culturally still deeply ingrained belief system that promotes fear, hate and ignorance and, overall, mental dysfunctionality Cf. Harris 2005, 25: "Religious faith represents so uncompromising a misuse of the power of our minds that it forms a kind of perverse, cultural singularity—a vanishing point beyond which rational discourse proves impossible.", including the occasional belief that one has the godly sanction to hurt and kill other human beings – something that I and many others would most certainly not call a "success" by any stretch of the imagination. Therefore why not a different kind of "success"; why not a triumph of wisdom and reason over this kind of religious foolishness and irrationality? Instead of artificially creating problems and then offering "religulous" solutions for them, why not stop artificially creating those problems – such as homosexuality allegedly being a sin – in the first place? How about no longer making and keeping people afraid, weak-minded and dependent on priests, prophets and (more likely than not) imaginary gods for their 'salvation,' and instead giving them the means to do so by themselves? How about no longer telling them what to think (via the good old method of "do that or else incur the wrath of God") and instead teaching them how to think, how to exercise their mental faculties for their own good and the good of others, for instance in the way Buddha did, without any fearmongering or magico-mystical hocus pocus? It would appear to be a sad truth that, in its current form and among other functions, religion is an instrument of dumbing down people due to the constant fearmongering and other aspects of religion undermining and destroying rational and scientific thinking. It is primarily for that reason that the people who are in power generally 'love' and support it: Religion helps with keeping the masses dumbed down, helps with keeping the people's attempts at mental and spiritual growth stuck in a relative dead end, and this in turn makes it easier for those in power to control the masses and to stay in power by pulling off the same cheap tricks again and again. Wladimir Putin's and the Russian justice system's response towards the Pussy Riot protest group provides us with a great example of such a cheap trick: Opponents to Putin's system have been put in jail under the pretense of protection of religion. Another cheap trick was successfully executed in the USA where a certain president, despite displaying his great incompetence for all the world to see in his first term of office, got voted into his second term of office after the voters had been made successfully afraid of external threats of "terrorism," the cheap joker card of politics, despite the true dangers to that country coming from somewhere else entirely (namely from its irresponsible and out-of-control banking system or, even more generally, from its politics and politicians, i.e. the public sector, getting swallowed by profit and greed driven big business). Another cheap but in certain circles still successful trick is the promise to have 70-something virgins at your beck and call later on, in the afterlife, as a very big "maybe," if one does something as utterly absurd as blowing oneself up with explosives in this life in a bunch of civilians. The extremely faulty and dangerous "If one does something in the name of God, how could that possibly be wrong?!" kind of reasoning responsible for this is however not limited to suicide bombers, because there are, for instance, very strong indications that the previously hinted at former US president was also thinking along the lines of traditional religious lunatics, and there is also plenty of evidence that current US politics is run by people with the same mental handicap, the same religion induced epistemic blindness. I would even go as far as to claim parallels between dictatorship and religion due to religion also promoting the kind of mindset that dictators would want to see in their followers: Blind obedience to and jaw drapping awe of the one top dog, mindless jubilant agreement for whatever it is that the "great leader" decrees or does next, either by himself or, in the case of religion, by way of self-proclaimed 'prophets.' There has been an inflation of self-proclaimed but less successful and hence less well known messiahs, prophets and holy men at all ages. For a list of more recent self-proclaimed reincarnations of Jesus alone, see en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_claimed_to_be_Jesus (accessed Aug. 21, 2013). The site also provides links to lists of self-proclaimed 'wondermen' and the occasional 'wonderwoman' of different religious beliefs. So then why continue with religion when that always includes continuing with irrational and (also because of that) harmful nonsense such as fearmongering and religious racketeering? To conclude this chapter, perhaps another analogy. I think that most of us, believers or not, will agree that kids having conversations with imaginary invisible friends is a sign of immaturity, but that it is still ok for kids as it is something that will eventually grow out of. I also think that most of us will have good reasons for thinking that adults doing the same thing is a little bit more disconcerting, especially when these invisible friends or "voices" tell them to harm themselves or others. Yet when hundreds or even thousands of adults are packed in a building, praying and singing praise to their 'invisible friend in the skies,' holding monologues to that being and asking favors of it – such as helping them to destroy and kill other people who worship the same being, but whose grievous sin is to go about it in a somewhat different manner –, and when billions of adults have done or do that worldwide, then adults talking to and receiving orders from 'invisible friends' is all of a sudden supposed to be a sign of perfect rationality and sanity? Some may seem to think that when a large enough number of people is doing something, then that is bound to be alright, but it is not; that is just an argumentum ad populum, groupthink or herd/mob mentality at work, and just like theft or murder are not all of a sudden ethically "ok" or "alright" simply due to a large enough number of people stealing and killing, being irrational or outright insane is not "ok" or "alright" either simply because a large number of other people are irrational or insane in the same manner – and no, irrationality or insanity carrying religion's stamp of approval does not change a thing about it still being irrational or insane (as in "not healthy"). Once again, and despite the author most likely having written this with a different intention in mind, the Quran provides us with a fitting and for a change scientifically and philosophically highly approvable quotation in this respect: "And what is the life of this world except the enjoyment of delusion" (3:185). The only thing that religious-minded people now have to embrace is the notion that this also applies to their own minds and not just to the minds of 'evil disbelievers' who, in that respect, actually might be doing a lot better than the 'good believers.' 2.3 The Fallibilist Attitude Our situation is this: most of the people in this world believe that the Creator of the universe has written a book. We have the misfortune of having many such books on hand, each making an exclusive claim as to its infallibility. (Harris 2005: 13) The incorrigibility of religious foolishness, delusion, irrationality and insanity is largely owed to one factor, and that is the notion that one cannot possibly be wrong about one's religious beliefs. The argument or thought process that leads religious people to believe this is relatively easy to reconstruct: The first premise is the assumption that there is an omniscient and infallible being called Jahwe, God, Allah, etc. The second premise features the transmission of that being's infallible knowledge to us humans via revelations, prophets, holy scriptures, etc. The conclusion is that now, we too, infallibly know that the thusly gained religious beliefs cannot possibly be wrong (they after all came from an omniscient and infallible being). As usual, one could quickly dismiss the claim of religion stating some infallibly true things by attacking premise one, i.e. by pointing out that there is neither enough empirical evidence nor theoretical necessity for God's existence, and that the above conclusion of religious lore containing infallible godly knowledge is therefore completely unjustified. This is probably how most nontheists would go about the rebuttal of believers' claims of having infallible knowledge. But what if, due to successful indoctrination, one should be of the unshakable faith that there is an omniscient and infallible God and that the holy scriptures contain that being's infallible knowledge? In that case one can still attack the transmission premise in order to dissuade believers from thinking that their religious beliefs are infallibly true and that they can stone other people to death and whatnot because of that. The opening that one has here is that the revelations and divine messages did not come directly from God (for instance appearing as a 1000 foot tall being of energy, producing effects that cannot be produced with human technology), but only indirectly, via humans who claimed they were speaking for God. So even if there should be an infallible God, what speaks against religious lore containing infallible knowledge would be the possibility of transmission error at various stages: Perhaps the prophets did not quite get what infallible God was trying to tell them, or perhaps we did not quite get what the prophets were trying to tell us, for instance due to later generations wrongly interpreting the original texts or due to certain events only having been written down many years later, after they had passed through many mouths and ears, being more off with each new telling. Beyond the possibility of transmission error and even if there should be an omniscient and infallible God, there are at least two other possibilities why religious content may not be as infallible as believers think it is. The second possibility is that whoever claimed that he or she was speaking for God might have been delusional or insane in that respect (cf. for instance the Jerusalem syndrome, a psychosis of a religious nature), with the third possibility being that such a person may simply have been lying for the greater good (pretending that God ordained it in order to make people adopt a back then superior moral and legal system) and perhaps also just a little bit for personal gain. Either way, religion's claims of infallibility and absolute certainty typically fail to convince minds who no longer fall victim to primitive and fearmongering "believe it or else" rhetorics. Let us again take a look at passages from the Quran as an example for why religion's claims of infallibility do not have a sound basis: This is the Book about which there is no doubt […]. (2:2) The second sura and essentially the entire Quran (the first sura consists of only seven introductory verses, and the first verse of the second sura is again of an introductory nature) begins with the blunt claim that nothing in the Quran can be doubted. But why should any proposition p be exempt from doubt after the shallow statement of "p cannot be doubted"? When someone says "I cannot possibly be wrong about p," that is typically only an indication of that person believing or wanting others to believe that he or she cannot possibly be wrong about p, but it is not any sort of proof, guarantee or valid argument for that person indeed being infallibly right about p. The same applies to sura 2 verse 2 of the Quran: Whoever said or wrote that proposition perhaps genuinely thought and certainly wanted others to believe that there can be no doubt about the Quran, but bluntly and forcibly stating that simply does not make it so. The rhetorics continue in the same illogical way, for instance by adding some cheap ad hominem defamation of those who might be of a different opinion ("deceivers," "diseased," "liers," "corrupters," "fools"), followed by once again bluntly claiming that "unquestionably" whoever said or wrote what is written in the Quran could not possibly have made any sort of mistake (such as, for instance, engaging in primitive browbeating and not even bothering to draw up proper arguments): They [think to] deceive Allah and those who believe, but they deceive not except themselves and perceive [it] not. (2:9) In their hearts is disease, so Allah has increased their disease; and for them is a painful punishment because they [habitually] used to lie. (2:10) And when it is said to them, "Do not cause corruption on the earth," they say, "We are but reformers." (2:11) Unquestionably, it is they who are the corrupters, but they perceive [it] not. (2:12) And when it is said to them, "Believe as the people have believed," they say, "Should we believe as the foolish have believed?" Unquestionably, it is they who are the foolish, but they know [it] not. (2:13) But to repeat it once again: Simply adding affirmations such as "unquestionably" or "of course" to a proposition p does not make p unquestionably or infallibly true or exempt from doubt, and the usual religious fearmongering and finger-wagging (e.g. 2:24 "[...] fear the Fire, whose fuel is men and stones, prepared for the disbelievers") does not change anything about that. In the minds of those who were successfully brainwashed, intimidated and dumbed down by religion the picture will most likely be a different one however, and in the following lies the great irony of the situation: A scientific mind does not fall for cheap religious fearmongering due to having learned the importance of sticking with the empirical and the rational attitude, but despite using tried and tested epistemic methods a scientist still considers herself fallible in her beliefs. So despite being very convinced that the biblical God does not exist due to available data and scientific theories generally not pointing in that direction, one would be well-advised to leave open the possibility that one could be wrong about this in ways one does not yet comprehend. Many religious minds, on the other hand, are much more susceptible to religious rhetorics and fearmongering due to widespread indoctrination from childhood onwards and due to not yet having grasped the importance of the empirical and the rational attitude, but despite not adhering to these reliable epistemic norms, many believers will nevertheless suffer from the delusion that their religious beliefs cannot possibly be wrong. That, in essence, is what constitutes the epistemological and methodological triple blindness of religion. 3. We Can't Get No Satisfaction After having discussed religion's lack of satisfactory methods I will now move on to five knowledge-related human desires for whose satisfaction people also look(ed) to religion, but which religion, due to not adhering to epistemic values and due to not using proper epistemic methods, by and large failed to answer in a satisfactory manner, at least from a more critical and scientifically enlightened point of view. The main and quite sufficient argument against all the God-based answers of religion is the "not enough empirical evidence, no theoretical necessity" summary argument against God's existence that was already presented in chapter 2.2, but since I also want to show why philosophy and science generally do a better job than religion in providing satisfaction, onwards to that comparison. 3.1 The Meaning of Life When one contemplates one's own existence, the existence of living beings or even existence in general, a big question that can easily impose itself on such a contemplating mind is the question of whether there is any ultimate point to any of this, or whether, in the bigger picture, existence is by and large pointless and that, in the end, nothing really matters and one can essentially do as one pleases because it is all rather inconsequential and irrelevant anyway. Nihilism in the context of the meaning of life typically has something rather unsatisfying or even highly disconcerting to it, and religions around the world came up with essentially the same antithesis to this kind of nihilism: "The meaning of life lies in serving God A/B/C/... by way of following the holy scriptures, commandments, prophets, etc." Life, as such, would have a predetermined purpose that is derived from God, and given that humans create things for certain purposes and that, in religion, various gods are typically regarded as the creators of the universe and humans, one can easily understand why humans arrived at the conclusion that those creator gods are the sources of the meaning or, more specifically, of a predetermined purpose in life. Millenia later philosophy and science have gone through a massive evolution and kicked religion from its throne, at least in educated and scientifically thinking parts of the Western world. Nevertheless and despite attempts to do so, philosophy has still not come up with a clear answer to the big question of the meaning of life (cf. Metz 2013a: ch. 3.2) or can hardly be bothered to even deal with it (cf. Metz 2002: 811). That would appear to be one of the main selling points of God and religion, because in those theistic belief systems a very clear and in certain circles still widely accepted general answer to the meaning of life exists. However, as with many answers that theistic religion has to offer, the "obeying and serving God" answer to the question of life's meaning is plagued by the same fundamental problem, and that is not only the lack of empirical verification or confirmation, but also the lack of theoretical necessity of God's existence as a being: In ancient times, when people had not yet developed that many empirically and rationally based theories and "gods/God" still was the ultimate explanation for pretty much everything and hence a great theoretical necessity or gap-filler, people of course also turned to the gods/God in their attempts to answer the meaning of life. These days though it is once again no longer necessary or even highly inappropriate to adhere to the old theistic theory, because now there also exist far better anti- or nontheistic (i.e. an agnostic or atheist) theories of the meaning of life (cf. Metz 2002, 2003, 2013a, 2013b for a list of names of those who have done work in that respect). The champion among those nontheistic theories, at least as far as my knowledge of such theories is concerned, would appear to be the one formulated by Thomas W. Campbell: "The evolution of our individuated unit of consciousness is the point of our existence" (2007: 399; see pp. 222-25 or 441 for further elaboration). In my opinion there are at least three compelling reasons for that nomination: Campbell's meaning of life fits in with the very powerful and widely accepted theory of evolution and even manages to bring it to the level of consciousness, which, given that virtually all proposed meanings of life pertain to the immaterial or nonphysical, or that there are strong reasons for nonphysicalism trumping physicalism (cf. ch. 3.5), is exceedingly on point. Secondly, Campbell's meaning of life is not just a subjective or variant pseudomeaning of life but an (intersubjectively or objectively) invariant one, i.e. one that is the same for everyone – and thus one that is capable of uniting people under a common and extremely worthy goal, one that will not result in argueing, fighting or killing over which subjective meaning of life is better or 'holier' than all the others. Thirdly and despite occasional claims of impossibility (cf. Metz 2013a: ch. 3.2), Campbell also managed to cut down the meaning of life to a singular principle or rule out of which a great many positive effects follow, thus also succeeding at coming up with a very elegant and easy to understand solution. As such and from the nontheistic point of view, traditional religion's meaning of life ("Obey and serve God – or else") would at least appear to have been right in that it also turned people's attention away from the physical realm and towards the mental or "spiritual" realm in their search for meaning; in that respect theistic and nontheistic theories of the meaning of life clearly concur with each other, and there may also be more specific overlappings in that both theistic and nontheistic theories often are about ethically right actions, love, compassion, peacefulness or other overall beneficial values, virtues, norms and the like. But when there is neither enough empirical evidence for God's existence nor, given the evolution of science and philosophy, any more need to theoretical necessity to postulate God's existence, it would be highly illogical and absurd to still believe that the meaning of life should lie in obeying and serving a God that is highly likely to exist as no more than various overlapping concepts in individual human minds. 3.2 Moral and Ethical Origins and Motivation Many people of religious faith would still seem to believe that, if one is a nontheist or of the 'wrong' faith, then one also must also be a bad or at least not that good of a person. One of the main reasons for that conclusion is the assumption that morals or ethics derives from God and the thereupon based inference that, if one is not God abiding (in the right way), then one cannot be a good person or at least not as good as someone who is God abiding (in the right way). As usual – and this applies to all of religion's suboptimally satisfied human desires that are presented in chapter 3 –, one could collapse these and other God-based claims of religion via the "not enough empirical evidence, no theoretical necessity" argument against God's existence. But due to the fact that this, like pretty much everything else, is not 100% certain, but mostly because one has not really determined the origin of morals or ethics and the motivation for acting morally or ethically by these negative claims, we will have to dig a little bit deeper. The first stop in our respective journey will be passage 10a in Plato's piety-related dialogue Euthyphro where Socrates confronts Euthyphro, who has previously (re)defined piousness as "what all the gods love" and impiousness as "what all the gods hate," with the question of whether the pious is loved by the gods because it is pious, or whether the pious is pious because it is loved by the gods. In other words, and if one substitutes "pious" with "ethical" and "gods" with "God": Under the condition that God exists, does God determine what is ethical (i.e. more ethical than unethical) and what is unethical (i.e. more unethical than ethical), or does even God have no say in this matter? For someone of religious faith who regards God as the creator and source of everything in existence, the conclusion that God has also determined what is good and what it bad would in many cases be no more than a deductively inferred and rather trivial truth. The fundamental problem with this line of thought, however, is that it only ever was people saying that God commanded or proclaimed this or that; i.e. there never was a scientifically credible occurrence of God itself appearing and doing the direct talking to a large number of people and in such a way that made it abundantly clear that this – and religious content as a whole – could not possibly have been the doing and invention of humans. Instead, when superhuman beings allegedly make their appearance, for some strange reason this typically only ever happens to one person in some very remote or lonely place – Moses alone on Mount Sinai visited by God (Exodus 24), Jesus alone in the Judaean Desert visited by the Devil (Matthew 4; Mark 1; Luke 4), Mohammed alone in the cave Hira on Jabal al-Nour ("mountain of light") visited by the archangel Jibril ("Gabriel") – and without being abundantly clear that actual events could not possibly have been otherwise, i.e. of a more mundane and natural sort. Then what could have happened if, as opposed to religious beliefs, Moses, Jesus or Mohammed were not guided or instructed by supernatural forces? In my opinion and as already hinted at in chapter 2.2, it is easily imaginable that these men were simply rather thoughtful and strong-willed persons who, like other visionaries, had some good (and occasionally some not so good For a not so good idea see for instance sura 4, verse 15, which makes women the "guilty" party even when they get raped: "Those who commit unlawful sexual intercourse of your women - bring against them four [witnesses] from among you. And if they testify, confine the guilty (sic!) women to houses until death takes them or Allah ordains for them [another] way." ) ideas about how to improve society. Yet how to get people to embrace these new ideas? Back then the highest instance was not reason or conscience but the gods/God, so it is not overly surprising that, either because these 'prophets' believed it themselves or because they realized that it would drastically increase their chances to implement the improvements they had in mind, the weight of God's authority came to rest behind their voices. To illustrate the importance of having God on your side by way of a thought experiment, imagine Moses coming down from Mount Sinai after 40 or whatever number of days with the ten commandments hewn in stone (cf. Exodus chs. 19-24), but, instead of saying they have been given to him by God and that the Israelites are supposed to follow these commandments or else incur the wrath of God, he just told them that he thought really hard about rules that would improve living conditions, that he wrote the ten in his view most important ones down, and that he now sincerely hopes that the Israelites will follow these rules. When comparing these two options, is it not easily imaginable that the first way of trying to establish a moral, ethical and legal code would be met with more success than the second one, especially when facing comparatively fearful and gullible people who are not trained in scientific thinking and who would most likely expect this code to somehow be connected to gods/God anyway? And, quite similarly, could Jesus and Mohammed have implemented the changes they wanted to implement by stating that their moral, ethical and legal code was of their own making and not of a supernatural origin? I think one has to agree that Moses' and Jesus' and Mohammed's ideas could hardly have become as popular as they have become without the backing of a God, so given the "not enough empirical evidence, no theoretical necessity" argument which strongly infirms or even falsifies the claim of God's existence as a being and given that the following is still done today, it does not seem too unlikely that back then various 'prophets' also threw the weight of God behind their voices in order to get the attention and the followership that they wanted for their ideas and perhaps also for themselves. But if ethical right and wrong (including justice and injustice) does not come from God, then what are the origins of (morality and) ethicity and from what does the motivation for acting in such a way arise? I think that, due to the timeless quality of his work, it is still possible to let John Stuart Mill answer the latter question (I took the liberty of interpreting "sanction" as motivation): Those sanctions are either external or internal. Of the external sanctions it is not necessary to speak at any length. They are, the hope of favour and the fear of displeasure from our fellow creatures or from the Ruler of the Universe […]. (Mill 1863: 39) Nonsurprisingly, Mill is highly consequentialist or practically-minded in his nomination of the motivators for acting morally and ethically: Anticipated friendly or pleasurable as well as hostile or painful reactions from other beings. There are at least four good reasons for basing external moral motivation on consequentialist considerations of "pleasure or pain" and "friend or foe" as administers of the former. (1) The Golden Rule Cf. Wattles (1996) or Trapp (1998). of "Do (not do) unto others what you (do not) wish to have done unto yourself," which is probably the most widely applied and accepted moral or ethical standard worldwide and which also clearly plays a big role in external moral and ethical motivation (see for instance point 4), requires an understanding of (in the wider sense) 'pleasure' and 'pain' and of friend and foe in order to apply it. (2) Pleasure and pain as well as friend and foe motivated behaviour also makes sense from an evolutionary point of view, because in terms of survival it was and is important to understand what beings are (potential) friends or enemies and hence (possible) sources of 'pleasure' or 'pain.' (3) These external sanctions are essentially the same for both believers and disbelievers, with the difference being that the first group also includes God among the beings which can dole out great pleasure or pain, so for the believers it is also God who must be befriended or at least appeased. (4) Even utter psychopaths or ruthless criminals, i.e. human beings who are by and large devoid of the following internal sanctions of morality and ethicity, will at least resort to externally motivated moral or ethical behaviour as that will allow them to get 'pleasure' through 'friends' (for instance continued cooperation with partners in crime and access to loot one could otherwise not acquire) just as it will allow them to avoid 'pain' through 'enemies' (for instance by showing one's best behaviour towards a perhaps hated party so as not to get harmed by that or by a third party). The instance that Mill regarded as the internal moral or ethical motivator is not much of a surprise either, and almost all of us will be well-acquainted with it by way of personal experience: The internal sanctions of duty, whatever our standards of duty may be, is one and the same–a feeling in our own mind; a pain, more or less intense, attendant on violation of duty, which in properly cultivated moral nature rises […] (Mill 1863: 40) […] a mass of feeling which must be broken through in order to do what violates our standard of right, and which, if we do nevertheless violate that standard, will probably have to be encountered afterwards in the form of remorse. Whatever theory we have of the nature or origin of conscience, this is what essentially constitutes it. The ultimate sanction, therefore, of all morality (external motives apart) being a subjective feeling in our minds […]–the conscientious feelings of mankind. (Mill 1863: 41) In other words: It is our very much natural conscience, i.e. vaguely but fittingly "a feeling in our own mind," through which we are internally motivated to act morally or ethically right. As per the differentiation between morals and ethics, I also feel the need to differentiate between a moral and an ethical conscience: A moral conscience is primarily owed to enculturalization, i.e. to subconsciously soaking up what one does and does not do in a certain culture, and the motivation for acting on it and committing morally right acts could be described as virtue-based and in particular as blindly deontological (think of how those who became enculturized with religion often blindly follow its rules, without giving the why or the consequences much thought). A higher ethical conscience on the other hand is primarily owed to empathy with other beings and to rational thinking, and the motivation for committing ethically right acts could again be described as virtue-based but in particular as consequentialist (it is not so much about conforming to rules, but more about whether actions and rules have more good or more bad consequences). To give an illustratory example: Someone whose moral or cultural conscience is more dominant might for instance be in favor of circumcision due to this act being an important ritual or tradition in their culture and due to all being well as long as one follows whatever cultural rules there might be. Someone whose ethical or rational conscience is more dominant may however very well be against circumcision, especially against female genital mutilation the way it is still practiced in parts of Africa, due to being empathic with the persons who suffer from this practice and due to being rational about it, i.e. due to realizing that being the master of one's own body and having intact instead of mutilated sexual organs is overall more important than mindlessly conforming to every single rule of the culture that one was born into. With Mill's work or philosophy in general doing an excellent job of providing us with entirely naturalistic explanations for external and internal moral and ethical motivation since, at the very latest, the second half of the 19th century, that is one more good reason for saying goodbye to God and religion. The situation is no different for the origins of morals and ethics: It must have proven to be an evolutionary advantage to act morally and ethically right, i.e. to cooperate with and be helpful towards each other in some respects instead of everyone fighting for themselves and against everyone all the time, and that is why humans and other species now have morals or ethics as a code or system of cooperation and coexistence (cf. for instance the Golden Rule). As such, morals and ethics were not created by a supernatural instance; instead they would seem to have evolved naturally (cf. Huxley 1893: 31; Balz 1926; Wilson 1975: 3, 175; Ruse 1986, 1990, 1999, 2010, 2012: ch. 6; Joyce 2006; Carruthers & James 2008; Allchin 2009), with their evolution continueing as I write or as you read these lines. 3.3 Stopping the Infinite Regress According to the principle of sufficient reason (PSR) or, which may be regarded as the same in some interpretations, the principle of causality (PC), everything must have an antecedent reason or cause. This also extends to the antecedent, and their antecedents and those preceding them, and before long, we are off into an either logical (reason) or ontological/metaphysical (cause) but in any event undesirable infinite regress (cf. Gratton 1994, 2007; Maurin 2007, 2013; Wieland 2011, 2012, 2013). To put a stop to the continuous re-referencing people looked for an Aristotelean unmoved mover, a source or creator of everything, and in the minds of many people that ultimate or first cause, that Platonean demiurge, is God. The argument or rather argument type for this hypothesis is called the cosmological argument. Current supporters of this argument are Craig (1979, 1980, 1984, 1990, 1991, 1993, 1997, 1999, 2001, 2002, 2006, 2008, 2011); Gale & Pruss (1999); Pruss (2004); Koons (1997, 2001, 2013) or Goldschmidt (2011). Notable opponents are or have been Mackie (1982), Grünbaum (1994), Smith (1988, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994a, 1994b, 1996, 1999, 2008) and Oppy (1991, 1995, 1999, 2000, 2002, 2004, 2009a, 2009b, 2010a, 2010b). For an overview over both sides' arguments and opinions see Reichenbach 2013. Craig (1979: 388; 1980: 282) distinguishes between three types of cosmological arguments – the time-related "kalām" argument, a causality-related Thomist one, and a PSR-related Leibnizian one –, but since the infinite regress can strike in all three areas or rather because those three areas cannot really be separated in practice, I will ignore that distinction and engage in a uniform or holistic treatment of the infinite regress and the cosmological argument. Not very surprisingly and in line with my previous nontheistic argumentation, I do not support the theistic cosmological argument, but not so much on grounds of nontheism, but for the very simple reason that postulating God's existence achieves nothing whatsoever in respect to countering the infinite regress (except perhaps postponing it to the next unknown antecedent). To quote from Raymond D. Bradley: Suppose someone thinks the explanation as to why anything at all exists is that God made things exist. Then the God-hypothesis, when thus invoked, simply adds to the burden of explanation. On pain of infinite regress, we cannot explain why anything at all exists by invoking the existence of still another entity (God). For then that entity's existence calls for explanation. In other words: The cosmological argument would seem to fail because, just as with any other things and based on the apparent exceptionlessness of the PSR or the PC, here one can also ask "And what was before God?" or, for that matter, "And what was the antecedent to the antecedent of God?". If the PSR or the PC holds and if one stays in linear (as opposed to circular) reasoning or causality, the regress would indeed seem to be infinite or only 'ending' where our explanations end. To put a stop to the infinite regress and to prevent inquiry about the antecedent to God, the absurd and counterintuitive and I daresay "counterempirical" concept of causa sui was invented and attributed to God. But the idea that something is created or, which is even more absurd, creates itself out of nothing (a combination of the two absurd concepts of causa sui and creatio ex nihilo) runs completely against the PSR and the PC and against, I presume, all of our experience. Bringing the concept of an out of nothing self-caused God into play therefore achieves nothing whatsover, except perhaps showing that desperate needs (how to escape the infinite regress) sometimes make people resort to desperate and in this case and from my point of view rather nonsensical measures. The same can also be said for attempts to escape the infinite regress via postulates that God (or the universe, etc.) is "eternal" or "just there," because due to the omnipresence of the PC and the PSR here we may once ask "What has caused God or the universe to be eternal or just there?" Causality and rationality via the PC and the PSR would seem to trump or override any attempts to put a stop to the problem of infinite regress via the concept of God, and this is yet another reason why, as claimed before, the concept of God is anything but a theoretical necessity. However, to be fair to religion and the theists, I have to admit that science and nontheists would not seem to be any better off in this respect, because the Big Bang Theory is just as good or bad a ways of putting an end to the infinite regress as the God Theory in that one is once again intuitively justified in asking "And what was before the Big Bang?" or, in case one finds or receives an answer to this, "And what was before this antecedent to the Big Bang?". Oppy (2002, 2010b) and in particular Smith (1988, 1994a, 1994b, 1999, 2008) make repeated cases for an "uncaused" or a "self-caused" beginning of the universe, but, in the light of the fact that we have yet to observe something to begin existing uncaused or due to the magic of causa sui, my preliminary conclusion on this matter is that these nontheistic attempts to work around the infinite regress would appear to feature just as much speculation and nonsense as the theistic ones (not to forget that the claim that there are no causes for something can easily be countered by pointing to human fallibility and limitations of knowledge and the possibility that one has not yet found the causes or erred in some way or other). Due to somewhat of a PC/PSR über alles ("above all") approach and short of pragmatic ends to the threat of infinite regress – our knowledge or imagination running dry, needing to leave tried and tested methods in order to continue but opting against that, or breaking off the thought process in sheer frustration –, I would therefore regard the infinite regress in respect to the beginning of the universe as something that we cannot work around at the moment. The in my opinion most honest and accurate answer to the ultimate beginning of the universe for both the theistic and the nontheistic side would therefore seem to be "We do not really know and perhaps/probably never will," perhaps added by "[…] and now let please deal with those problems where, given the means we currently have, our efforts will lead to more than just speculative results." 3.4 Comfort and Security The fourth reason why many people subscribe to God and religion is that it gives them comfort and security: As demonstrated in chapter 3.3, we used to be and to are large degree still are quite lacking in knowledge. Especially as individuals, we also used to be and to a large degree still are relatively powerless against accidents, disease, natural catastrophes or other forms of ill fortune striking. So what better ally to have than an omniscient and omnipotent God?! From an evolutionary point of view, it makes sense for us to strive for knowledge and other power because it is typically a lack of those things that makes it harder for us to survive (not knowing how to deal with other animals or humans or being otherwise powerless in the face of a raging wildfire typically does not bode well for an individual's chances of survival). On the other hand, we cannot always get what, in our desire for power and knowledge. The irrational but psychologically very satisfactory solution: The invention of the world's very first 'superheros' as a projection and way of living out our fantasies of having infinite knowledge and power. That way, we can live under the very comforting and reassuring delusion that, even though we do not understand a lot of things and are still powerless in a lot of respects, there is an omniscient and omnipotent being that one can pray and bring sacrifices to, and that just might (and note how a typical believer's thoughts moves along the lines of the Golden Rule here) impart one's superhuman knowledge, powers or just favors of being lucky or healthy in return. Now imagine that 'evil disbelievers' like Dawkins, Dennet, Hitchens, Harris or also myself come along, exclaiming that such a being most likely does not exist (due to there being not enough evidence and neither theoretical necessity for it). It should be relatively easy to understand that the feeling of comfort and security, the peace of mind and the holding at bay of existential fears that believer's manage by way of their God-illusion, would get absolutely shattered if they were to accept that claim. With a prioritization of "feeling good" over "being reasonable" – something that all of us have done or are doing in one way or other –, we therefore arrive at the explanations for why believers hold on to their religious beliefs despite those beliefs making no sense, for why they fight scientific progress, or why they kill progressive nontheists (because doing that is the easy but foolish way out of cognitive dissonance). But do we really have to rely on religious poison in order to feel of comforted and secure? Do we really need that kind of 'outsourcing' that leaves adults in a quasi childlike mental state of dependence on their imaginary "father in the heavens," unable to solve their problems or to evolve their minds until the point where they can do so on their own, not realizing that there is a very good chance that God (or his angels or patron saints) doing their job is about as likely as the Spaghettimonster, the Invisible Pink Unicorn or Superman coming to their rescue? Once again we do not need those religulous solutions, because once again it is science and philosophy that do a way better job at keeping us comfortable and secure, with our fears at bay, and the following chapter will be a demonstration of how science can conquer perhaps even the greatest of all human fears, namely the fear of death. 3.5 Spirituality Up until this point, it was religion's numerous mistakes that were put on display. Science, however, is not entirely fault-free either, and the highly noteworthy thing here is that science makes mistakes in the same way as religion, namely by brainwashing people with certain credos or paradigms and by ignoring empirical evidence to the contrary. One of the most prominent examples for this is science's credo of (materialism or) physicalism: Most scientists consider themselves physicalists; this means, among other things, that they believe that our mental and spiritual lives are wholly dependent upon the workings of our brains. On this account, when the brain dies, the stream of our being must come to an end. Once the lamps of neural activity have been extinguished, there will be nothing left to survive. Indeed, many scientists purvey this conviction as though it were itself a special sacrament, conferring intellectual integrity upon any man, woman, or child who is man enough to swallow it. […] The idea that brains produce consciousness is little more than an article of faith among scientists at present, and there are many reasons to believe that the methods of science will be insufficient to either prove or disprove it. (Harris 2005: 208) It has to be admitted that "Bolstered by the undeniable successes of three centuries of purely physical research, many philosophers and scientists now reject Descartes' separation of mind and body, spirit and matter, as the concession to Christian piety that it surely was […]" (Harris 2005: 207), and the same of course also applies to the rejection of Berkeley's idealism. Yet, when one has good reasons to believe that others have adopted nonphysicalism for the wrong reasons (i.e. due to being subjected to religious brainwashing from childhood onwards), does this already mean that nonphysicalism must be wrong? Surely not. The rather evident mistake that many scientists and philosophers of the physicalist persuasion would seem to have made – and I have to admit that I myself also fell victicm to this fallacy in the past –, is a case of throwing the baby (nonphysicalism, and furthermore also spirituality) out with the bathwater (religion). But the very much justified rejection of religion and its lack of proper epistemic methods does not logically entail the general rejection of nonphysicalism or the general inappropriateness of practicing spirituality; it only entails that going about it in the "believe it or else" way of religion was the wrong way, not that nonphysicalism cannot possibly be the case and that all talk of spirituality is gibberish. Now that an opening for spirituality has been created, what is to be understood by this term or concept? It is relatively safe to say that spirituality is inextricably linked to the 'soul' or the 'spirit,' or to use more scientific terms, to the mind or to consciousness. Furthermore, it is also relatively safe to say that spiritual experiences have some sort of (positive or deep) effect on people's consciousness and that spiritual practice is about triggering those spiritual experiences. This brings us to the two question of what kind of phenomenal content is typically associated with spiritual experiences and what kind of methods or starting conditions one needs in order for those experiences to happen. I will start with the latter question due to it being easy to answer via a passage from someone who has done a lot of research in that respect, but also because the general answer to this question will still be relatively easy to accept: […] the spiritual journey. The techniques and circumstances that can activate these [...] involve psychedelic substances, sensory isolation or overload, sonic and photic driving, hypnosis, monotonous chanting and rhythmic dancing, sleep deprivation, fasting, various techniques of meditation and spiritual practice. On occasion some pathological states will have a similar effect; this is true for severe emotional and physical stress, exhausting diseases, intoxications, and certain injuries and accidents. (Grof & Halifax 1978: 182) So far, so undramatic. That, however, may change when I draw the reader's attention to those kinds of extreme "physical stress" and "injuries and accidents" experiences which are known as NDEs (near death experiences; cf. Moody 1975) and which, if reports and personal accounts of them are true, often feature profound and lifechanging spiritual experiences known as (O)OBEs (out of body experiences). The importance of researching those experiences cannot be stressed enough, because if true – and many researchers into this topic say that they are Cf. for instance Noyes 1971, 1972, 1980; Moody 1975, 1977; Grof & Halifax 1978; Greyson 1981, 1982, 1983a, 1983b, 1985, 1991, 1992, 1992-93, 1998, 2006; Sabom 1982, 1998; Küng 1982/1984; Van Lommel et al 2001; Van Lommel 2006 or Dell'Olio 2010. Also see the NDERF (near death experience research foundation) at nderf.org for thousands of accounts of NDEs. –, this would amount to no less than a gigantic philosophical, religious and scientific paradigm shift: (1) Physicalism would essentially be dead and buried for good, (2) one would have very strong empirical evidence for the immortality of the soul/consciousness, (3) one would make a big leap ahead in respect to solving the problem of personal identity, and (4) one could perhaps even gain empirical evidence for the existence of a godlike and other, from our limited point of view, 'supernatural' but perhaps quite natural beings, not to forget (5) the immensely positive effects for humankind. Let us start with the phenomenological aspects of NDEs according to one of their research pioneers: In coining the term near-death experience, Moody identified fifteen elements that seemed to recur in NDE reports: ineffability, hearing oneself pronounced dead, feelings of peace, hearing unusual noises, seeing a dark tunnel, being out of the body, meeting spiritual beings, encountering a bright light or “being of light,” panoramic life review, a realm where all knowledge exists, cities of light, a realm of bewildered spirits, supernatural rescue, border or limit, and coming back into the body (Moody 1975). He later (1977) added four recurrent aftereffects: frustration upon relating the experience to others, broadened or deepened appreciation of life, elimination of fear of death, and corroboration of out-of-body visions. […] He warned that his list was intended as a rough theoretical model rather than a fixed definition (1977). (Greyson 2006: 394-95) Greyson reports that there are four common features to NDEs and that "many experiences are dominated by one or more components" (2006: 395): The first, cognitive features reflecting changes in thought processes, includes distortions in the sense of time, acceleration of thought processes, a life review or panoramic memory, and a sense of revelation or sudden understanding. [...] The second component, affective features reflecting changes in emotional state, includes a sense of peace and well-being, feelings of joy, a sense of cosmic unity, and an encounter with a brilliant light that seems to radiate unconditional love. [...] The third component, paranormal features reflecting apparent psychic phenomena, includes extraordinarily vivid physical sensations, apparent extrasensory perception, precognitive visions, and a sense of being out of the physical body. [...] The fourth component, transcendental features reflecting apparent otherworldly phenomena, includes apparent travel to a mystical or unearthly realm or dimension, an encounter with a mystical being or presence, visible spirits of deceased or religious figures, and a border beyond which one cannot return to earthly life. (Greyson 2006: 395-96) I can imagine that scientists from the hardliner physicalist camp will be quick to decry this enterprise as nonsense due to it defying their holy and in this case physicalist beliefs, but "Such an enterprise becomes irrational only when people begin making claims about the world that cannot be supported by empirical evidence" (Harris 2005: 210). In terms of empirical evidence the problem is that NDEs cannot be observed by more than one person as they would always seem to be privy to the one individual that is experiencing them. On the other hand there are easily tens of thousands of well-documented cases of NDEs from around the world, their content independent of cultural views or age, those affected experiencing and knowing things that cannot be explained from a physicalist background, uniformly describing those experiences as real and not just as a figment of their imagination. Therefore – and unless someone wants to start a huge conspiration theory about the heineous attempts of 'evil' nonphysicalists to undermine 'good' physicalism in addition to calling the many researchers of NDEs and the people who have experienced them and whose lifes have undergone very noticeable and positive changes liers – I think that we do have a very strong call for regarding the reports and contents of NDEs as real. As mentioned before, this would be the ultimate death-blow to physicalism: People who, on account of being pronounced clinically dead by a team of medical doctors, simply have no business continuing their existence according to the physicalist worldview. But their existence and perception of the world continues, and many NDEers are also able to prove that by giving detailed accounts of what happened while they were dead and before coming back into their bodies. Those and many other from my point of view highly credible aspects of NDEs (1) prove physicalism to be "dead wrong," (2) give very strong support to the immortality of the soul/consciousness (whether of the natural or supernatural sort will remain to be seen), and (3) allow the problem of personal identity to be solved in terms of "I am an 'individuated unit of immortal consciousness' The term IUOC (individuated unit of consciousness) derives from Campbell (2007). that momentarily inhabits a physical body and that will go to other places after this physical body stops working." As for where of why (4) a denomination free God is allowed to come into the picture: Because there are some remarkable parallels between certain religious descriptions of God and the in the context of NDEs common reports of "encounter with a brilliant light that seems to radiate unconditional love" or "encounter with a mystical being or presence." This is also intuitively confirmed by many of those who have had such experiences in their NDEs, because they often describe that light or presence as that of God. However, I would strictly advise against regarding that as confirmation of the existence of the God of the Torah, Bible or Quran, also because that way the whole religious nonsense will just start all over. I rather think that, what has happened in these cases, is that NDEers made contact with a "higher being" of a nonphysical nature, but that it was only their enculturalization due to which they incorrectly identified this being as "Jahwe," "God," or "Allah," just as, millenia earlier, they would have incorrectly identified this presence as that of "Zeus" or "Baal" or whatever their culture had going in terms of gods back then. Excerpts from the post-NDE impressions of one Patsy D ("I went to church the next Sunday and couldn't even sit through the service. I wanted to stand up and tell everyone that this was all wrong […]") or one Patrick L ("I intensely dislike any discussions about God because I don't feel any human being on this planet knows what God is or is not") from the NDERF homepage would therefore seem to convey the right, in the sense of "culturally undiluted" and "rational" picture. Overall though, NDEs could be interpreted to support claims of there being a religion unaffiliated God; I at least think that it is not too improbable that, at some point and as opposed to what I wrote in chapter 3.4, the notion of God could also have been created by people encountering that mystical light or presence during NDEs. As such, there just might be empirical evidence for the existence of a being or presence that has a remarkable resemblance with the positive aspects of God ("God is love," not hate or wrath). This slowly allows us to answer what spirituality is all about and (5) why these experiences are good for us. Spiritual experiences, at least those of the thanatological and NDE sort, would seem to allow for a dramatic and possibly life-changing increase of our knowledge about this world, for a radical shift in our perspective: Complete transcendence of our fear of death (many NDEers actually reported that they did not want to come back into their bodies), contact with higher beings or at least beings of a benign and (to us) mystical nature, or the revelation of a much greater nonphysical reality that would seem to await our individuated unit of consciousness after the death of the physical body but which one can perhaps also enter before that, if accounts of willfully induced OOBEs are to be believed. In other words: This is not the utterly lame hollow rituals weekend spirituality of religion, and it is neither the lame spirituality of naturalists such as Dawkins or Dennett; this is something huge, something lifechanging, and something that is way too important to be ignored by science and philosophy and to be left in the incompetent hands of religion. My recommendation for those with a research or personal interest in spirituality therefore is: Forget about religion and go for this sort of scientifically based thanatological spirituality. 4. Conclusion […] the entire project of religion seems perfectly backward. It cannot survive the changes that have come over us—culturally, technologically, and even ethically. (Harris 2005: 22) As many a delusional religious preacher has claimed, the end times are a-coming, but not for the world. Instead, they are coming for religion and the scientific credo of physicalism, and come they must if human mental progress on a large scale is to be made, because those two, but especially the former, have been standing in the way of human mental evolution for way too long. Religion's proponents may have claimed that, without the biblical God and religion, there can be no meaning of life, no morality or ethicity, no putting a stop to the infinite regress, no warm and cozy feeling of being secure and protected, and, perhaps above all, no spirituality, thus making people dependent on religion in respect to the satisfaction of their needs. But as I have hoped to have shown in chapter 3, science and philosophy do a way better job of providing answers and satisfaction in these areas, and, despite still very widespread tendencies of physicalism in both of them, they somewhat ironically even fare better in showing humans what spirituality is or should be all about. So with the competition doing a better job at satisfying our needs and desires, there is no longer any need to feed ourselves and others the unempirical, irrational and pseudoinfallible mental poison called "religion." But what about religion practiced in moderation, what about tolerance towards those of different beliefs or traditions? In those respects I again have to side with Harris (2005: 18-19): "The doors leading out of scriptural literalism do not open from the inside. The moderation we see among nonfundamentalists is not some sign that faith itself has evolved; it is, rather, the product of the many hammer blows of modernity that have exposed certain tenets of faith to doubt." Religion practiced in moderation is definitely not a sign that religion can go hand in hand with reason, science or modernity due to all of this indeed being "incompatible with scripture" (ibid, p. 19). 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