Reply #47: Things we'd like to be true and producing knowledge

[Meshuga]

"Religion does not involve believing things that you’d like to be true."

Both true and not true, obviously depending on the religion and the religious person. For some people, they can't help it but believe in whatever they were taught to believe. For others, they use religion as a prescription that helps them follow a path that closely matches the way they believe things ought to be.


"Religion can too produce knowledge."

Science is the way of knowing the truth about the universe. A religion can only teach subjective truths that are useful to its followers. And these subjective truths are useful to a religious person in the same way that values taught in the secular society are useful to its people. Some people see a set of religious values and teachings as a good guide so they follow it. While others don't find the same values useful therefore they don't follow the religion or a religion.

Asking what "knowledge" religion has provided that is not derivable from secular reason is a question one would expect from a person who has no use for religion. Especially when responding to a religious person who is trying to sell his/her religion as the universal guidance or recipe. But what happens when a religious person sees his/her religion as "an" answer as opposed to "the" answer? In this case what matters (in my opinion) is what is being taught as opposed to the places where the religion borrowed its "knowledge" from.

A religion becomes problematic (in my opinion) when it refuses to evolve with its society. When it fails or refuses to advance by not borrowing what is good from its environment. Or worse, religious groups become a serious problem when they begin to regress. My perception is that there is a strong movement towards regression at the moment regarding religion and that is a scary thing.