I was not talking about strategic lying. It is true, however, that in many such cases strategic lying might be appropriate. This simply reveals more clearly the badness of Bound_up’s advice. As I said in another comment, it comes across as, “Abandon your tribe and come over to mine!”, and in fact that may be what he intends.
I was talking about using the word “God” to express whatever true elements there are in the idea, and abandoning the false elements, and being quite specific about this. This would not involve any lying, and if you are clear enough your tribe will know quite clearly that you disagree with them. Nonetheless, I assure you that people who believe in God will still feel better about this than if you simply say “God does not exist.” So as long as you are only speaking of real things, a person from such a tribe will not get any benefit from denying that God exists, unless he specifically wants to say that he is abandoning his tribe and joining another.
I was not talking about strategic lying. It is true, however, that in many such cases strategic lying might be appropriate. This simply reveals more clearly the badness of Bound_up’s advice. As I said in another comment, it comes across as, “Abandon your tribe and come over to mine!”, and in fact that may be what he intends.
I was talking about using the word “God” to express whatever true elements there are in the idea, and abandoning the false elements, and being quite specific about this. This would not involve any lying, and if you are clear enough your tribe will know quite clearly that you disagree with them. Nonetheless, I assure you that people who believe in God will still feel better about this than if you simply say “God does not exist.” So as long as you are only speaking of real things, a person from such a tribe will not get any benefit from denying that God exists, unless he specifically wants to say that he is abandoning his tribe and joining another.