Shermer wrote: “Yes, some religions are better than others, and some are worse. How can we tell the difference? Here’s a test: if I am not a member of your religion, or if I don’t believe in your God—indeed if I don’t belong to any religion or believe in any gods—will my liberties or my life be taken away from me? If your answer is “no,” then your religion is better than any religion who encourages or insists that it’s members deprive nonbelievers of life or liberty.”
I agree with the thrust of this statement.
But I would say that this criterion indicates if some practitioners of some religions at a certain time in history are more evolved, more sophisticated, more enlightened, perhaps even more or less civilized than others, rather than that some religions are better or worse.
V. V. Raman
January7. 2010
Spurts of Thought 