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Nah, if religious belief helps group cohesion in such a way that we get societies that overall increase the likelihood of survival, then the truth of said relig

Nah, if religious belief helps group cohesion in such a way that we get societies that overall increase the likelihood of survival, then the truth of said religion is irrelevant. Religions themselves are to some degree affected by their own evolutionary pressures. The views on missionary work, procreation and possibly also military all will effect the group of people that adhere to the religion, and if they lead to a higher survival/birth-rate then the religion itself will also win against alternatives. The truth of its dogma isn’t really relevant for this factor (unless we start considering interventionist deities, but that’s a different discussion entirely, as the above would apply across shared value/belief systems without the need for interventionism)

skissane 4y ago
> Nah, if religious belief helps group cohesion in such a way that we get societies that overall increase the likelihood of survival, then the truth of said religion is irrelevant. Would you still endorse the same statement if one replaced “religious” with something else, say “philosophical”? Also, is that saying “the truth of a belief is irrelevant, so long as it has pragmatic benefits”? But, doesn’t that undermine one of the key arguments for the truth of scientific claims - the pragmatic technological benefits of their acceptance?
- woodruffw 4y ago
  The person you’re responding to is making a positive claim, not a normative one: from the anthropological perspective, religions solve coordination problems. That doesn’t mean we ought to solve coordination problems with religion, it just means that it has a moderately successful track record. See above re: fundamental misunderstanding of truth in science.
- einherjae 4y ago
  Not quite sure where you’re going with the religion vs philosophy question, in the context of my statements the only real difference would be removing any threat of divine intervention, which itself may have some effect on the how well groups align with their shared beliefs. Read like that then yes, I would agree that the statement would apply for philosophy, but weaker. As for your original post, you make a jump to stating that evolution would prefer truth, but that’s not a given simply from the fact that we perceive our world in such a way that we consider evolution. Evolution as we understand it is without intent, and only “prefers” that which in the long run yields further offspring. A point I was trying to make was that the truthfulness of for instance religiosity doesn’t impact whether or not it has an effect on “fitness”. A religion can be entirely false, and yet contain memes that make its adherents’ genes procreate more successfully.

skissane 4y ago

> Nah, if religious belief helps group cohesion in such a way that we get societies that overall increase the likelihood of survival, then the truth of said religion is irrelevant. Would you still endorse the same statement if one replaced “religious” with something else, say “philosophical”? Also, is that saying “the truth of a belief is irrelevant, so long as it has pragmatic benefits”? But, doesn’t that undermine one of the key arguments for the truth of scientific claims - the pragmatic technological benefits of their acceptance?

woodruffw 4y ago
The person you’re responding to is making a positive claim, not a normative one: from the anthropological perspective, religions solve coordination problems. That doesn’t mean we ought to solve coordination problems with religion, it just means that it has a moderately successful track record. See above re: fundamental misunderstanding of truth in science.
einherjae 4y ago
Not quite sure where you’re going with the religion vs philosophy question, in the context of my statements the only real difference would be removing any threat of divine intervention, which itself may have some effect on the how well groups align with their shared beliefs. Read like that then yes, I would agree that the statement would apply for philosophy, but weaker. As for your original post, you make a jump to stating that evolution would prefer truth, but that’s not a given simply from the fact that we perceive our world in such a way that we consider evolution. Evolution as we understand it is without intent, and only “prefers” that which in the long run yields further offspring. A point I was trying to make was that the truthfulness of for instance religiosity doesn’t impact whether or not it has an effect on “fitness”. A religion can be entirely false, and yet contain memes that make its adherents’ genes procreate more successfully.