# Resolved by Steven Landsburg: Nobody is Actually Religious. Discuss! **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 14, 2011, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043 "2011-07-14T19:02:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2011, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/21 "2011-07-14T23:07:11Z")
Landsburg seems to be under the impression that all religious people believe in hell? Not even all Christians believe in hell. I think that he’s probably right that a lot of people have some doubts. Saint Paul did. ("I believe. Help thou my unbelief.) Heaven knows Saint Paul wasn’t perfect. He wasn’t created to be. Neither were the rest of us. > [@](#): > > **Czarcasm** : Why don’t those who profess belief in an all-knowing deity behave as if they are under this kind of surveillance? I guess we do. But we do so as human beings, not as Incarnations of the Christ. Besides, I’m not so certain that God is concerned with some of the things that I was taught were sinful – swearing, a lustful mind, recreational refreshment, etc. And I’m not so sure what “all-knowing” means anyway. I don’t really buy into the idea that all of the hairs on my head are numbered. Such a God is too small. Maybe God is “all aware,” but not “all concerned.” “All loving” instead of “picky, picky, picky.” I don’t know. Yes, I am uncertain. That goes with the territory of having faith. Most of the time I feel fairly easy with it. ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2011, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/22 "2011-07-14T23:12:23Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > There is no necessary correlation between sincerity of belief and making major sacrifices for one’s faith. Otherwise, one would be forced to conclude that (say) historically, Jews are the greatest believers of all - not only do many of them go through endless trouble to keep kosher, historically they risked all sorts of unpleasantness simply in order to remain Jews - when they could easily have converted. Why would that be a faulty conclusion? G-d wants you to keep Kosher, you keep Kosher. God wants you to not work on the Sabbath, you don’t work on the Sabbath. The Catholics just roll back their requirements when it becomes too inconvenient for their adherents to follow, remember when they weren’t supposed to eat meat on Friday? Now that’s just during Lent. Muslims follow dietary laws, AND fast for an entire month AND pray several times a day. I think they give Jews a run for their money. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9fc348/32.png) [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Flying_Dutchman)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2011, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/23 "2011-07-14T23:43:04Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > My parents would probably forgive my actions, but i _still_ wouldn’t steal or lie _right in front of them_. If someone was filming your every move 24/365, how would you behave? > Why don’t those who profess belief in an all-knowing deity behave as if they are under this kind of surveillance? Exactly. Would Ted Haggard suck on that dick if his Dad was in the room ? How come he asks forgiveness only after he is caught…by people ? ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/24 "2011-07-15T00:00:02Z")
> [@Indistinguishable](#): > > I know I should eat better, procrastinate work less, quit wasting time on the Internet, exercise, etc., etc. I know these things will have consequences, sometimes minor, sometimes major. Yet my willpower is weak and I often fail to act in such a way as I know would lead to better outcomes in the long-run. It’s not that I don’t know my poor decisions will lead to poor outcomes, but all the same, I sometimes choose impulsive convenience over long-term planning. And then I feel guilty about it. But I keep making these poor decisions nonetheless… > > I imagine something similar happens with many religious people. But nothing is remotely on the same scale. If you eat too many cookies, you may get fat. It’s fixable, but even if you don’t, it just means your life will suck more. Pissing off God comes with the worst possible conceivable punishment - you cannot possibly get anything worse. Imagine horrible torture and fates for yourself and rate them on a scale from 1 to 10. Whatever your worst fate is - your ten - you could multiply it a billion fold and it would still be infinitesimally small compared to eternal punishment. So… maybe your will falters when you’re deciding whether to eat that cookie, even though you know you’re on a diet. If you knew 100% for sure that if you ate that cookie you’d be abducted, kept in a basement, gangraped daily while they slowly pulled your skin off bit by bit, and tortured as much as possible until you died, would you still eat that cookie? Now multiply that punishment by a billion billion billion and you still wouldn’t be near what a lot of people think God will do to you. If you truly believed that, are you going to eat that cookie? Well, people do. So it’s hard to believe that they truly believe those are the consequences. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/25 "2011-07-15T00:10:30Z")
> [@SenorBeef](#): > > So… maybe your will falters when you’re deciding whether to eat that cookie, even though you know you’re on a diet. If you knew 100% for sure that if you ate that cookie you’d be abducted, kept in a basement, gangraped daily while they slowly pulled your skin off bit by bit, and tortured as much as possible until you died, would you still eat that cookie? Now multiply that punishment by a billion billion billion and you still wouldn’t be near what a lot of people think God will do to you. If you truly believed that, are you going to eat that cookie? Well, people do. So it’s hard to believe that they truly believe those are the consequences. But I don’t think most people believe that if they do the sin-equivalent of eating a cookie that means for certain that they will go to hell. They think the going to hell part is a risk but not certain. “If I have sex with this person, I have a greater risk of contracting AIDS” is more equivalent. Not that contracting AIDS is exactly like Hell, but NOTHING is exactly like Hell and I don’t think most of us can really imagine a Hell-like Hell. We’re constrained by the limits of our imaginations, not necessarily by our beliefs. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/26 "2011-07-15T00:15:26Z")
Well, even a 1% chance of going to infinite punishment should still be infinitely scary. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/27 "2011-07-15T00:18:26Z")
> [@SenorBeef](#): > > Well, even a 1% chance of going to infinite punishment should still be infinitely scary. I don’t think the average person grasps infinity. Not even close. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/28 "2011-07-15T00:20:03Z")
That may be so. But in regards to the topic of discussion, how much of religious thought can you just gloss over and not really give any thought to before you’re no longer considered truly religious and not really meaningfully connected to those beliefs? ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/29 "2011-07-15T00:27:10Z")
> [@SenorBeef](#): > > That may be so. But in regards to the topic of discussion, how much of religious thought can you just gloss over and not really give any thought to before you’re no longer considered truly religious and not really meaningfully connected to those beliefs? People are terrible at risk assessment and put their children at risk, say, driving them to school because they are afraid of the much lower risk of them being molested on the school bus. Do you say from that fact that people don’t really truly love their kids or do you say from that fact that people really truly don’t understand risk? Because I’m in the latter camp. Now, you can say people are fools for doing X, but I think when you start saying that because they do X it means they really don’t believe in God or the like, it needs more evidence than just “But that’d be dumb!” ---
**Author:** ![The\_Hamster\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@The\_Hamster\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hamster_King)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/30 "2011-07-15T00:28:25Z")
I agree that most people who believe in religion don’t act in ways that are logically consistent with their belief. But that’s because human beings are not inherently logically consistent. We naturally come up with provisional explanations for immediate situations. As long as those explanations allow us to muddle through, most of us don’t spend much time trying to reconcile them all with a unified large-scale logically consistent model of the universe. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/31 "2011-07-15T00:34:24Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > My parents would probably forgive my actions, but i _still_ wouldn’t steal or lie _right in front of them_. If someone was filming your every move 24/365, how would you behave? > Why don’t those who profess belief in an all-knowing deity behave as if they are under this kind of surveillance? Because they can see another person in the room with them. They might believe God is aware of everything but his presence is like a hidden camera - they can pretend he isn’t there if they want to. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/32 "2011-07-15T00:38:27Z")
And God is imaginary, so will conveniently agree with any rationalizations they make up for their behavior. When they tell themselves that “surely God will agree that doing this was necessary” or “surely God will forgive me”, God isn’t going to show up and contradict them. I also think that there quite a few people who buy it all, and live severely warped lives as a result. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/33 "2011-07-15T00:44:15Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > And God is imaginary, so will conveniently agree with any rationalizations they make up for their behavior. When they tell themselves that “surely God will agree that doing this was necessary” or “surely God will forgive me”, God isn’t going to show up and contradict them. I can agree to that. Not that they believe God is imaginary, but obviously God’s actions in the world, for even the most active believer, are largely a matter of interpretation and belief. And when people CAN find a way to excuse or justify the behavior they want to engage in, many people WILL find a way. Now I want ice cream. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/34 "2011-07-15T00:55:43Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > I can agree to that. Not that they believe God is imaginary, but obviously God’s actions in the world, for even the most active believer, are largely a matter of interpretation and belief. To clarify: I wasn’t trying to claim that _they_ thought that God is imaginary. Just that since he _is_ imaginary, he isn’t going to show up to disagree with their excuses. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/35 "2011-07-15T00:59:22Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > To clarify: I wasn’t trying to claim that _they_ thought that God is imaginary. Just that since he _is_ imaginary, he isn’t going to show up to disagree with their excuses. Sorry, yes. I understood what you meant. I agreed clumsily. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/36 "2011-07-15T01:02:01Z")
> [@Snowboarder\_Bo](#): > > This doesn’t do much to bolster your claim, you know: Actually, it does. > [@](#): > > Results from a series of multilevel analyses indicate that church attendance (the frequency of attending religious services) has significant inverse effects on nondrug illegal activities, drug use, and drug selling among disadvantaged youths. > [@](#): > > Not sure what you think this proves since it’s about charitable giving and volunteering, not “better outcomes”. I think it proves you don’t read very closely. The claim being refuted is that “there is no evidence religious people are better behaved than irreligious people”, which is false. Charitable giving is better behavior. Hence the cite. Same for the rest. Try reading a little before you post. > [@](#): > > Do you even read these things before you start posting links? Better than you did, apparently. > [@Der Trihs](#): > > I also think that there quite a few people who buy it all, and live severely warped lives as a result. I think there are quite a few people who hate everything and everyone, and live severely warped lives as a result. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![marshmallow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@marshmallow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/marshmallow)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/37 "2011-07-15T02:21:04Z")
Man is not a rational animal, he is a rationalizing animal. – Heinlein I’m sure a possibly significant minority of religious people just coast along to go along with the wider culture and their family/friends. But all of them? That’s a little silly. That’s a bottom up conspiracy across every country on earth, throughout all of history. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/38 "2011-07-15T03:19:32Z")
To oversimplify: Landsburg’s thesis is: Christianity promises great rewards for the good and horrible punishments for the bad. In theory, everyone want the rewards and everyone fears the punishments. So, IF people really believed in Christianity, they’d live virtuous lives. Many don’t. Ergo, they can’t possibly REALLY believe in what they claim to believe. I think this is silly and I’ll illustrate why with an analogy I’ve used before: 1. Does _ **anybody** _ want to get cancer? Of course not. So naturally, since _ **nobody** _ wants to die of cancer, absolutely \*\*\*nobody \*\*\*smokes cigarettes, right? 2. Do you know anybody who _ **wants** _ to have a heart attack and die at 45? Didn’t think so. So, naturally, _ **everybody** _ eats healthy foods and is at the gym working out every morning, right? 3. Do you know anybody who wants to get AIDS? I sure don’t. So, it follows that there are absolutely no gay men out there engaging in anal sex without condoms, right? See, we don’t have to look at religion to find people doing things that fly in the face of what they profess to believe. MILLIONS of people who claim to believe that cigarettes cause cancer still light up. MILLIONS of people who say that obesity causes heart attacks are themselves obese. Every day, gay men who profess to believe that unprotected sex can result in a fatal disease are, nonetheless, engaging in unprotected sex. Does Landsburg conclude that people DON’T really believe smoking, obesity and unprotected anal sex are dangerous? Don’t be silly. People DO believe those things can be fatal, and choose to indulge in them anyway. Why? Because cancer and death SEEM a long way off, but smoking a cigarette would feel good RIGHT NOW. A heart attack seems like a distant possibility, but a Whopper with Cheese would taste really good RIGHT NOW. Sexually transmitted diseases are a scary abstract possibility, but sex would feel good RIGHT NOW! It’s no different with religion. We mortals get caught up in our immediate wants, and we readily forget things that are important to us. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/39 "2011-07-15T03:25:50Z")
Your risk/reward is again way out of whack, not even within a million orders of magnitude. Are you willing to make a tradeoff that by eating badly you might die a few years earlier? Some people will, some people won’t. Are you willing to make a tradeoff that if you steal something, you will suffer the worst punishment you could possibly imagine times a trillion billion million zillion? People can say “well, I don’t want cancer, but it’s a less pressing issue to me than quitting smoking would be” and make a rational decision to keep smoking. I don’t think anyone in their right mind could possibly make a rational decision to commit any sin if they know the guaranteed cost is the most horrible fate that’s so bad no one can even grasp how bad it is. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2011, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043/40 "2011-07-15T04:00:23Z")
> [@SenorBeef](#): > > Your risk/reward is again way out of whack, not even within a million orders of magnitude. > > Are you willing to make a tradeoff that by eating badly you might die a few years earlier? Some people will, some people won’t. > > Are you willing to make a tradeoff that if you steal something, you will suffer the worst punishment you could possibly imagine times a trillion billion million zillion? > > People can say “well, I don’t want cancer, but it’s a less pressing issue to me than quitting smoking would be” and make a rational decision to keep smoking. I don’t think anyone in their right mind could possibly make a rational decision to commit any sin if they know the guaranteed cost is the most horrible fate that’s so bad no one can even grasp how bad it is. There is no “guaranteed cost” when people believe God is choosing who to send to Hell. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-by-steven-landsburg-nobody-is-actually-religious-discuss/589043.md?page=3)