Yup, that's an excellent point. Religion invokes various kinds of altruism - often though not always limited to the in-group - and it clearly "works" in some se

Yup, that's an excellent point. Religion invokes various kinds of altruism - often though not always limited to the in-group - and it clearly "works" in some sense and has survived for millennia. I guess it's hard to recommend religion to someone on that basis though, because that is not the basis that religion recommends itself on. You can't become a Christian because you think (like Rodney Stark) that Christians are very helpful to each other. You can only be a Christian by accepting Christ as your personal saviour.