Your guess and our fate

There must be a distinction between knowledge and a guess. The traditional answer, dating back to at least Plato, is that knowledge requires some justification whereas a guess does not. Without a good justification for your religious beliefs, your faith is really just a guess.

Under normal circumstances, I would applaud that someone made a guess that I would not. There is no harm to me. I might learn from their mistakes or successes.

But many religious guesses come with other consequences -- most notably the commandment to go forth and multiply while you subdue the land. This will lead to environmental destruction and over population.

Unlike other creatures, we can choose to curb our own growth. Or Nature will check it with famine, disease, etc.

Rationalism, Materialism, Environmentalism

Studying philosophy is an attempt to be rational about life. Many people use magical thinking to solve the question of how to live. Magical thinking halts inquiry, whereas rational thinking requires it. Peirce wrote that the first principle of logic is “Do not block the way of inquiry.” That is the motto of the rational.

I believe that rationality leads to materialism – the belief that the physical world is everything there is to the world. The alternative is the belief in the supernatural – the belief that there is something beyond this mere physical world. Most believers in the supernatural (from Plato on) have also believed that this heavenly beyond world is also better and more valuable than this polluted and fallen mess. This allows them to pollute and pillage this world and feel confident that a better world exists in the skies. By contrast, the rational person must realize that this planet Earth is our only possible home in a hostile universe. Rationality leads to materialism, which leads to environmentalism.