V. A world without religion, good, bad, neutral? E. If you could live and be healthy without sleeping or eating/drinking, which would you cut out of your life?
(V is a tough one. There's a lot to religion, and a lot to its effects on people, and I could literally write an entire essay on this if I wanted to (which I kind of do), but I will spare you here and just give you the basics.
First of all, religion is something that can be used either for great good or great evil. Lots of things are that way, especially belief systems. Inherently, I believe that most major systems of religion are good at their cores. Unfortunately, humans are doing what humans do and are soiling and corrupting things as the generations go along. Even long ago, though, religion was being used as an excuse for all sorts of atrocity. There are tons of wars through the ages that were caused or prompted or fueled by religion or "divine right", but I'll just go with the major example, the Crusades. I'm pretty sure one of the Ten Commandments involved not killing people at all. It's not just Christianity, of course. Humans tend to be hypocrites. That's all there is to it. So, if religion didn't exist, religious wars wouldn't have happened. Right?
Not quite. First and foremost, humans destroy each other ruthlessly whether religion is involved or not, because that's just how we are. Secondly, though, I've also seen religion do great things. A lot of charities and non-profit groups were founded by religious groups in the name of serving (insert deity here), and they do a lot of good in the world. The Red Cross, if I remember correctly, among others. Religion is also a spectacular moral compass on a personal level, and it keeps a lot of people out of trouble and gives them hope when times are tough. If religion didn't exist, I'm sure suicide rates would be higher, along with theft and possibly murder and other awful things as well.
Without religion, we'd lose a lot of good things as well as a lot of bad things. I can't say what the outcome would be, either way. That was a long-winded way of explaining it, but in a word, I'll say my answer is: it's impossible to discern.
Wow. That was an essay after all. Sorry.
E is much simpler and more straightforward to answer (I can hear your collective sigh of relief after the above debacle. You're welcome.). I would live without eating or drinking. The reason?
It doesn't cost me anything to sleep.)
