# What would be the Achilles heel of religion? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 10, 2011, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092 "2011-01-10T14:32:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/21 "2011-01-10T17:23:49Z")
It’s possible to falsify some specific religious beliefs (i.e. the literal historicity of creation myths), but “God” as such is not a scientific theory and makes no testable predictions. I would say that it’s possible to logically refute some specific _definitions_ of God. The PoE, for instance, logically refutes an omnimax God. ---
**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:** [January 10, 2011, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/22 "2011-01-10T17:32:40Z")
The true Achilles Heel of religion is self interest. Religion is wrong and it doesn’t work, and that makes following it a self destructive choice. Those who rely on science over religion tend to live longer and prosper more. In advanced cultures religion tends to be pushed to the side more and more because that’s how a society becomes prosperous and powerful. Even, yes, in America; religious as it is, religion is a far weaker and less omnipresent force than it was in the past. > [@Candyman74](#): > > There is an answer to the question; it is yes, he can microwave a burrito so hot that he himself could not eat it - and then he can proceed to eat it nevertheless while gesticulating rudely at the logic he is not bound by. > > It’s an answer. Not a very satisfactory one - “God is not bound by logic” - but it is an answer. The problem is that it is an answer that destroys itself and every other argument you can make (which is why the smarter believers just concede that God is bound by logic). Without logic, you have no basis for arguing anything at all. And “you can’t use logic to make claims about God because logic doesn’t apply to God” is itself an attempt to make a logical argument, which means it is a statement that declares its own worthlessness. In other words, the proper answer to claims that God is beyond logic is to say that the claimant has just announced that we can’t say anything meaningful on the subject and he should just shut up on the matter because he’s declared anything he might say to be meaningless. > [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > > [@Skammer](#): > > > > Somebody please explain to me why religous people should be concerned about the existence of aliens. I don’t get the problem, from a believer’s point of view. > > Just my guess but I think it has to do with human exceptionalism. > > God created Man in his own image. > > If a Little Green Man shows up that puts one of Christianity’s most basic premises in question. Eh, I was told as a boy that aliens are real, but since they aren’t made in God’s image they are either demons or the creations of Satan. ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/23 "2011-01-10T17:54:13Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Eh, I was told as a boy that aliens are real, but since they aren’t made in God’s image they are either demons or the creations of Satan. That’s silly. Giraffe’s aren’t made in God’s image either, but they are neither demons nor creatures of Satan. Besides, there’s also no reason to say there can’t be aliens who _are_ created in God’s image. ETA: there is also no reason to choose science “over” religion or vice-versa. There does not have to be a conflict. ---
**Author:** ![jinty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/dbc845/32.png) [@jinty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jinty)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/24 "2011-01-10T18:05:09Z")
> [@Mr.Kobayashi](#): > > Christianity would be invalidated if we somehow conclusively found Jesus’s body - “And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith.”. Although many Christians wouldn’t realise the significance or dismiss it instantly as a hoax. In similar vein, how about a time machine you could use to be present at the virgin birth/crucifixion/parting of the Red Sea/Christ’s miracles/10 plagues of Egypt/Moses coming down with the tablets/choose your favourite Biblical scene? If you’re a Christian, and were satisfied that said time machine was working properly & not a hoax (if, for example, you’d invented it yourself), and presuming you could dismiss any “[Sound of Thunder](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Sound_of_Thunder)”-like side-effects, and you saw that the above events either didn’t happen, or didn’t involve any supernatural elements, or indeed were hoaxes themselves, might that shake your faith? ---
**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:** [January 10, 2011, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/25 "2011-01-10T18:09:07Z")
> [@Skammer](#): > > That’s silly. Giraffe’s aren’t made in God’s image either, but they are neither demons nor creatures of Satan. You expect good thinking from believers? Of course it’s silly, that didn’t keep them from claiming that UFOs are real and Satanic in origin. > [@Skammer](#): > > ETA: there is also no reason to choose science “over” religion or vice-versa. There does not have to be a conflict. Yes there does. Science undermines religion by its nature, while religion is hostile to everything but itself and is self destructive. ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/26 "2011-01-10T18:42:31Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Yes there does. Science undermines religion by its nature, while religion is hostile to everything but itself and is self destructive. Yeah, I’m familiar with your schtick. ---
**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:** [January 10, 2011, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/27 "2011-01-10T18:50:03Z")
> [@Skammer](#): > > Yeah, I’m familiar with your schtick. Familiarity doesn’t make me wrong, nor does the baseless assertion that religion and science can get along become any more true no matter how many times people say it. And in fact I consider it an attempt to get around my point that the best antidote to religion is self interest; it is an attempt to avoid the question of if you have to choose between religion and science , which do you choose? Claiming that they can coexist despite them being poison to each other for centuries means you can avoid answering that question. ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/28 "2011-01-10T18:52:22Z")
That’d be baptism. ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/29 "2011-01-10T19:10:05Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Familiarity doesn’t make me wrong, nor does the baseless assertion that religion and science can get along become any more true no matter how many times people say it. And in fact I consider it an attempt to get around my point that the best antidote to religion is self interest; it is an attempt to avoid the question of if you have to choose between religion and science , which do you choose? Claiming that they can coexist despite them being poison to each other for centuries means you can avoid answering that question. You’re the one making baseless assertions; I can produce a list as long as my arm of religious scientists and I don’t even have to leave the 20th century. As far as your claim that “the best anitdote to religion is self interest,” I’m not trying to get around it, I’m ignoring it as obvious trolling. ETA: By “religious scientists” I don’t mean pseudo-science like Creation Science, I mean mainstream academic scientists. ---
**Author:** ![Yumblie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/76d3ee/32.png) [@Yumblie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yumblie)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/30 "2011-01-10T19:18:19Z")
> [@automagic](#): > > Every scientific theory is only one piece of evidence away from being disproved. For example, if a mammalian fossil were to be conclusively dated to being hundreds of millions of years old or if a hominid fossil were to be found to be in the same strata as an ancient dinosaur it would throw evolution on its head. So far all the evidence points to the current theory of evolution to be true. While this is true in some sense, I think this is misleading. Finding a mammal fossil more than 200 million years old would certainly contradict evolutionary theory as it is, but it doesn’t magically nullify all the other evidence. The theory of evolution would have to be majorly overhauled to account for the new find, but it would still have to take into account all the other evidence from before. Just like if someone were to discover that objects of different masses actually do fall at different rates, it wouldn’t mean that suddenly things can fall up. Science is not a house of cards that can collapse at any moment, it just constantly requires corrections. In a sense, religion is almost the same way. Religion has been evolving to keep itself relevant over the years. The world used to be 6,000 years old, humans created out of dirt, and various other impossible things, but scientific advances over the years have shown them to not be true, so instead the Bible is taken figuratively instead of literally. For the most part, religious people will continue to find ways to rationalize belief in the supernatural, like moon hoaxers will continue to believe the Apollo landings never happened despite all evidence that contradicts their belief. ---
**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:** [January 10, 2011, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/31 "2011-01-10T19:36:56Z")
> [@Skammer](#): > > You’re the one making baseless assertions; I can produce a list as long as my arm of religious scientists and I don’t even have to leave the 20th century. Just because they can compartmentalize enough to more-or-less function doesn’t mean they aren’t handicapped. You aren’t going to find a significant number of top scientists (since religion is a scientific handicap) or biologists who are theists. If you are determined enough you can run a marathon with a nail though your foot; that doesn’t mean that hammering nails though your foot is harmless to your performance. > [@Skammer](#): > > As far as your claim that “the best anitdote to religion is self interest,” I’m not trying to get around it, I’m ignoring it as obvious trolling. Ah, there’s a standard line. Atheists _can’t_ genuinely believe that atheism is the better position to take, they have to be motivated by malice or something. It’s barely a step up from the claim that atheists don’t _actually_ exist because “everyone _really_ knows that there is a God” and self proclaimed atheists are just lying about it. ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/32 "2011-01-10T19:54:10Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Just because they can compartmentalize enough to more-or-less function doesn’t mean they aren’t handicapped. You aren’t going to find a significant number of top scientists (since religion is a scientific handicap) or biologists who are theists. If you are determined enough you can run a marathon with a nail though your foot; that doesn’t mean that hammering nails though your foot is harmless to your performance. You keep telling yourself that if it helps. > [@](#): > > Ah, there’s a standard line. Atheists _can’t_ genuinely believe that atheism is the better position to take, they have to be motivated by malice or something. It’s barely a step up from the claim that atheists don’t _actually_ exist because “everyone _really_ knows that there is a God” and self proclaimed atheists are just lying about it. I said nothing remotely of the sort. I believe you (and most atheists) honestly do not believe. I am also quite sure that most atheists are not motivated by malice, although I am reluctant to include you in that group based on your posts here. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/33 "2011-01-10T20:01:49Z")
> [@Yumblie](#): > > In a sense, religion is almost the same way. Religion has been evolving to keep itself relevant over the years. The world used to be 6,000 years old, humans created out of dirt, and various other impossible things, but scientific advances over the years have shown them to not be true, so instead the Bible is taken figuratively instead of literally. For the most part, religious people will continue to find ways to rationalize belief in the supernatural, like moon hoaxers will continue to believe the Apollo landings never happened despite all evidence that contradicts their belief. The difference between science and religion is that science begins with the premise that any statement can be wrong, while religion begins with the premise that at least some of its tenets are inspired by a perfect and infallible deity. Science tells us how to determine if a hypothesis is supported or falsified. Religion, when it has to, retreats from parts of the Bible being true, but is unable to tell us a way of determining if other parts are true or not. Saying the Bible should be taken totally figuratively is fine, but then it becomes no more than a work of fiction. We all know that if the bones of Jesus, nails and all, were dug up, Christianity would immediately decide that the resurrection was spiritual, not physical, and go on its merry way. ---
**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:** [January 10, 2011, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/34 "2011-01-10T20:03:26Z")
> [@Skammer](#): > > You keep telling yourself that if it helps. It’s the truth whether you like it or not. ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/35 "2011-01-10T20:10:54Z")
Here, DT, I’ll provide a cite. I can’t quote the book directly but here is part of a description of [Science vs. Religion: What Scientists Really Think](http://www.oup.com/us/catalog/general/subject/ReligionTheology/SociologyofReligion/?view=usa&ci=9780195392982) by sociologist Elaine Howard Ecklund and published by Oxford University Press. > [@](#): > > That the longstanding antagonism between science and religion is irreconcilable has been taken for granted. And in the wake of recent controversies over teaching intelligent design and the ethics of stem-cell research, the divide seems as unbridgeable as ever. > > In Science vs. Religion , Elaine Howard Ecklund investigates this unexamined assumption in the first systematic study of what scientists actually think and feel about religion. In the course of her research, Ecklund surveyed nearly 1,700 scientists and interviewed 275 of them. She finds that most of what we believe about the faith lives of elite scientists is wrong. Nearly 50 percent of them are religious. Many others are what she calls “spiritual entrepreneurs,” seeking creative ways to work with the tensions between science and faith outside the constraints of traditional religion. The book centers around vivid portraits of 10 representative men and women working in the natural and social sciences at top American research universities. Ecklund’s respondents run the gamut from Margaret, a chemist who teaches a Sunday-school class, to Arik, a physicist who chose not to believe in God well before he decided to become a scientist. Only a small minority are actively hostile to religion. So about half of the 1700 scientists polled self-identify as “religious” and even more who describe themselves as “spiritual.” So forgive me if I put more stock in studies like this than in your unsupported hostile assertions. ETA: Here’s a better summary of the findings, a post by the author on Huffington Post: [What Scientists Think About Religion | HuffPost Religion](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/elaine-howard-ecklund-phd/the-contours-of-what-scie_b_611905.html) ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/36 "2011-01-10T20:11:09Z")
> [@Skammer](#): > > Somebody please explain to me why religous people should be concerned about the existence of aliens. I don’t get the problem, from a believer’s point of view. Speaking as a Catholic… I don’t see what would be so awful or so faith-challenging in the discovbery of intelligent life on other planets. If anything, I would argue that everything Jesus said is as applicable to a Wookiee or a Vulcan as it is to me. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/37 "2011-01-10T20:24:45Z")
> [@Skammer](#): > > Nothing in Christianity posits that God could not have created another race of beings in his image, elsewhere in the universe. This seems like a total non-issue. That wouldn’t be an issue, I agree. What would be an issue is if the advanced aliens say “God? What God? Oh, that is a belief we gave up thousands of years ago, and all the advanced races we’ve visited have also. You’ll grow out of it, just as your children grow out of a belief in your Santa Claus.” I think the reason that alien races in sf don’t share human religions in the vast majority of cases isn’t because all sf writers are atheists (though many are) but because the idea is clearly absurd. ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/38 "2011-01-10T20:33:44Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > That wouldn’t be an issue, I agree. What would be an issue is if the advanced aliens say “God? What God? Oh, that is a belief we gave up thousands of years ago, and all the advanced races we’ve visited have also. You’ll grow out of it, just as your children grow out of a belief in your Santa Claus.” Oh, God, an entire race of [personal reference redacted]?:eek: Seriously though, that’s not much different than what many people say today. I think the religious response would be that these aliens are mistaken about God’s non-existence. > [@](#): > > I think the reason that alien races in sf don’t share human religions in the vast majority of cases isn’t because all sf writers are atheists (though many are) but because the idea is clearly absurd. Well, it would be absurd if they believed in a Jesus born in Bethlehem under the Romans who was crucified, died and buried for the salvation of mankind (alienkind?). But if God created another race of beings in his image, any number of things could have happened. Maybe they never experienced a “Fall” like we did. If they did, perhaps the second person of the Trinity became one of them as he became one of us. Maybe God deals/dealt with their race in a completely different, unimaginable way. C.S. Lewis explores some of these ideas in his Space Trilogy (_Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra,_ and _That Hideous Strength_). ETA: took out reference to another poster. ---
**Author:** ![Superfluous\_Parentheses](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8edcca/32.png) [@Superfluous\_Parentheses](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superfluous_Parentheses)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/39 "2011-01-10T20:42:31Z")
The Achilles heel of religion is and always has been that it’s just plain _made up_. What that means is not that the idea of some deistic-style god can be proven to be false, it means that all predictions about (the behavior of) a personal god as far as they relate to the living world can be, and pretty much all have already been, proven false. There is no testable place to hide left for a personal god. And there hasn’t been for at least the last 50 to 150 years. ---
**Author:** ![Superfluous\_Parentheses](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8edcca/32.png) [@Superfluous\_Parentheses](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superfluous_Parentheses)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2011, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092/40 "2011-01-10T20:49:56Z")
> [@astorian](#): > > Speaking as a Catholic… I don’t see what would be so awful or so faith-challenging in the discovbery of intelligent life on other planets. > > If anything, I would argue that everything Jesus said is as applicable to a Wookiee or a Vulcan as it is to me. Now this might make a good other thread, but why doesn’t what Jesus supposedly said apply to gorillas or fungi? From a Catholic perspective I mean - that is: Jesus IS God. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-be-the-achilles-heel-of-religion/567092.md?page=3)