Essay:Why religion?

The essay on the left was written by Rational Thinker, the right is my commentary/responses. It is my attempt to argue that "religion is NOT bullshit."

The essay:	My commentary
There are a number of reasons for rejecting religion.	There are a number of reasons for accepting religion.
Anti-intellectual All religions have in common that they are faith based. People are taught to believe claims from some ancient text or self-proclaimed spiritual leader, instead of relying on their own senses, evidence and critical thinking. Indeed, as Christopher Hitchens said: "What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence."	Anti-intellectual Fundamentalists have in common that they are faith based. There are several pagan religions, and non-extreme versions of religions, that have nearly nothing to do with faith. Reform Judaism and Protestant Christianity are some examples. A prominent Reform Jewish prayer book says to "look to one's mind, there you shall find God." This is not faith, this is authority trying to get you to think. An ancient text that goes against common sense in modern times, but not in ancient times. All of that stuff in the Bible felt pretty commonsensical to the ancients, else they would not have followed it in the face of the Greek and Roman religions. The essay claims that "all religions follow faith," and then refers to a self-proclaimed spritual leader (Jesus Christ, presumably, or Moses), whose names are only known in Abrahamic ones. Don't take an established quote as truth. There are many arguments with this quote, as are there with the quote "Religion is the opium of the people" by Karl Marx.
Anti-scientific Some religions try to appear "science-friendly" by avoiding statements that clash too obviously with modern science. This however only obscures the fact that the very concept of "faith" is inherently anti-scientific and cannot be tested by using the scientific method. As all religions rely, at some point, on faith it is easy to show that they are not scientific. A key test of whether or not a hypothesis is scientific is the question of falsifiability. What evidence would the hypothesis' supporters accept as being able to falsify the hypothesis? By definition, as religions are based on faith and not evidence, no evidence can be presented which would persuade a religion's followers it is wrong - and consequently no religion can be scientific.	Anti-scientific The scientific method cannot explain all things. There are people who devoted their entire lives to the fields of metaphysics and ontology. Religion is another way of answering people's metaphysical and ontological questions. Therefore, religion is anti-scientific in that sense, but that is not an argument against it.
Cosmic nonsense The "cosmic argument" is an ill-conceived attempt at "proving" the existence of god (whatever the definition) by suggesting that the universe must have some from "somewhere", or that something must have existed "before". It is obvious however that this argument is based on a Newtonian model of the universe which we now know to be false. Causality is clearly time related, but time does not exist independently of the universe. Rather, spacetime is the universe. So asking what was before the beginning of the universe is asking what was before time, which makes no sense. As Hawking famously put it, it's like asking what's north of the North Pole. It's an ill-posed question.	Cosmic nonsense The Big Bang is an easy counterexample. The argument described here can be interpreted as merely referring to the Big Bang, and the quantum fluctuations and/or foam that began it. The "first cause" argument is easily arguable, but there are more realistic first causes that can be described as not being random, only caused by God.
Creation The very concept of creation depends on time. Something that did not exist before a given point in time comes to existence through the act of creation and exists from that time on. The universe clearly cannot have been created in this sense, because the universe is spacetime and thus there is no time outside of the universe itself.	Creation This matter is not for science to decide, and to pretend otherwise is silly and intellectually dishonest. Ask an astronomer what is "outside the universe itself," and they'll say "that's a nonsense question." It's for philosophers to argue about, not of astronomy or any science. The argument that nothing exists outside the universe is easily proven false: Statement: Nothing exists outside the universe. Simplification: Nothing exists somewhere. Simplification: Nothing exists. Which we know is false.
God vs. religion It seems to be clear that a God in the sense of a miracle-working, interventionist deity does not exist, as no evidence of his miracle working interventionist activity can be found. In this case absence of evidence is evidence of absence. Obviously it cannot be excluded that some kind of "god" (whatever that is supposed to be) exists outside of our universe. But even if this were the case, it follows from basic scientific principles like the conservation of energy, that such a "god" cannot interact with the physical world in any way. In particular, he cannot write books, nor can he put thoughts (which consist of electric currents in the brain) into people's heads. This shows that, whether or not god exists, religion is wrong.	God vs. religion The essay takes a logical process and goes to the conclusion that "religion is wrong." This leap of faith is unclear, but I presume it means that since there is not evidence of divine intervention, it does not exist, which is an established argument. By Occam's Razor, this argument is most likely right, but it is not 100% right. The Fermi Paradox is used well here: aliens could be so unlike humans that we do not notice them. God may be playing in another "dimension," or "plane." We don't know, and there is but one universal truth: causality. God might just cause scientifically measurable things.
Soul is some type of music, but some people believe it to be some kind of spiritual thingie that every human is supposed to have, and which is supposed to survive when his physical body dies. But since this thing is non-physical, it again cannot interact with the physical world without violating basic science. So we have the same situation as with "god": a "soul" could hypothetically exists, but it can have no connection with the physical world.	Soul Whether or not a human has a soul is debatable, but since science cannot measure it, we don't know whether religion is right or wrong on this one. People should just believe that which makes them happier in this sense. Oblivion or afterlife, it's not measurable.
NOMA There are some attempts to "justify" religion by saying that it has no scientific implications. This is called NOMA and it is wrong on many levels. First of all, as we have seen above, any assumption that "god" or the "soul" could have a bearing on the physical world, would be clearly within the scope of science. Furthermore the supporters of NOMA seem quite coy about where the NOMA line should be drawn. Religious beliefs are the basis of creationism, intelligent design and theistic evolution. While many NOMA advocates would happily attack creationism they sometimes hold the NOMA shield up to defend other (their own) religious beliefs - a position which could seem a little intellectually dishonest.	NOMA Non-overlapping magisteria is a well-established concept. It is an alternative. However, I have no problem with this point, except that it is not an attack upon religion, only various religious thinkers and people, not an argument that "religion is bullshit."
Morality One of the things which many religions claim to possess is the authority to give eternal moral (or ethical) guidance to their followers. However, the fact that religious beliefs have frequently been important factors in causing or exacerbating divisions between peoples - sometimes even resulting in warfare - rather devalues religion's claim to the moral high ground. Furthermore, it is quite clear that religion's ethical advice is not eternal, as many religions' ethics evolve with society. This is clearly not a bad thing, but it removes religion's ability claim absolute moral standards or to pontificate for all time about morality.	Morality There is much argument, justified argument, over the origin of morals, and their effectiveness. However, religion is merely a vessel by which morals have survived for so long, via things like the Ten Commandments, etc. This attack is justified.
Respect Finally we have the suggestion that religious ideas should, for some reason, deserve a special measure of respect not given to, say, Homeopathy. (The concept of NOMA, mentioned above, is part of this.) But why should religion deserve this special status of being "respected"? If religions can make a forceful, rational intelligent case then they would be respected for that. If they are unable to present a forceful, rational intelligent case, then whatever respect they get should be based on their failure to do so. We are also sometimes told that we should respect religion because some intelligent people believe in it. This is simply repetition of the argument from authority fallacy, and may be dismissed without further concern.	Respect This point, I agree with it, has nothing to do with "why religion is bullshit." See NOMA.