>assuming that religious practices are bunk is a pretty damn effective heuristic.
Only if naively only count goals as stated by the religion itself, and only first order effects.
(E.g. if one examines whether there's really a heaven people go to, as opposed to examining whether the thought of such a place existing providing great psychological and personal benefit to the believer -- among tons of other similar things, I'm not even touching upon the impact on society, ethics, etc).
Only if naively only count goals as stated by the religion itself, and only first order effects.
(E.g. if one examines whether there's really a heaven people go to, as opposed to examining whether the thought of such a place existing providing great psychological and personal benefit to the believer -- among tons of other similar things, I'm not even touching upon the impact on society, ethics, etc).