➘ This article’s content and the mention of “Steve” emerge from the comments section of the following article:

◉ The Game of Coherence: How Religions Perform “Rationality” Without Testing It

Religions often present themselves as rational systems. They speak the language of reason, coherence, and explanation. They claim internal consistency, offer emotional fruitfulness, and assert moral clarity. But if we inspect the foundations of these claims, we find that what is being called rationality is a closed-loop evaluation system based entirely on how well a belief fits within a worldview—not on how well it maps to reality.

To make this clear, consider a deliberately invented religion: Harmonia Eternalis.

---

◉ Harmonia Eternalis: A Fictional Yet Fully “Rational” Religion

Harmonia Eternalis is a system built to succeed by every internal standard typically cited by religious epistemologies like Steve’s. It is elegant, satisfying, internally coherent—and utterly insulated from empirical assessment.

Core Beliefs:

1. The universe is guided by a personal deity named Harmonia, whose nature is perfect balance.
2. Each human is born with a Resonance Faculty, enabling attunement to divine balance.
3. Salvation is achieved through sustained harmony, not doctrine or deeds.
4. Sacred texts are poetic and metaphorical, adjusting to emotional context.
5. Verification of truth lies in subjective harmony, not objective evidence.

Defenses Against Testing:

• Disconfirming evidence is deemed “disharmony” in the observer.
• All apparent contradictions are reframed as “hidden symmetries.”
• Outsiders are dismissed as “unattuned” rather than as counterexamples.
• The language of metaphor shields the system from falsification.

---

◉ The Imitation of Rationality: Steve’s “Which” Questions

Steve’s apologetic strategy mirrors what this fictional religion does. He frames epistemic justification not through falsifiable evidence, but through a series of “Which” questions:

1. Which belief integrates more coherently with the rest of our worldview?
2. Which has fewer unresolvable tensions?
3. Which fosters a consistent, morally flourishing life?
4. Which belief system best explains the totality of human experience—cognitive, moral, and relational?
5. Which belief system is most resilient to defeaters?

Each question is meaningful in a narrative or psychological sense, but none can adjudicate truth. All are tests of internal fit, not external verification. Harmonia Eternalis excels at all five. And so do countless other mutually exclusive religions—Islam, Mormonism, Advaita Vedanta, Zen Buddhism—each declaring rationality based on intra-system fluency.

---

◉ The Syllogism That Fools Us

To demonstrate how this sleight of hand works, Harmonia Eternalis might present the following syllogism:

P1: A belief system that produces maximal inner coherence, relational harmony, emotional stability, and existential satisfaction is most likely aligned with ultimate reality.
P2: Harmonia Eternalis produces maximal inner coherence, relational harmony, emotional stability, and existential satisfaction for those who are attuned to it.
Conclusion: Therefore, Harmonia Eternalis is most likely aligned with ultimate reality.

From within the system, this feels like a rational conclusion. But its first premise smuggles in a psychological criterion in place of a truth function. The second premise defines success in terms of subjective resonance, and anyone who disagrees is dismissed as out of tune. The conclusion is valid, but the argument never touches the external world. It is epistemically sterile.

---

◉ The Game They’re Not Playing

Religions like Harmonia Eternalis — and real-world analogues that lean heavily on coherence, personal transformation, and internal validation — are not playing the game of science. In science, belief is not justified by fit or flourishing but by evidence proportionality. A rational agent updates their degree of belief based on the strength and specificity of the relevant evidence.

This is the game that religions avoid by design. They act as if meeting the “Which” questions is sufficient, and then declare themselves rational. But coherence is cheap. Narrative fit is easy. Emotional effects are manipulable. None of these can serve as proxies for truth-testing.

---

◉ Final Reflection

Religious epistemologies that never exit the framework of internal justification can mimic the trappings of rationality while systematically shielding themselves from falsification. They excel at coherence, at resonance, at narrative appeal—and fail entirely at testing whether the faculties producing their beliefs actually track reality.

Calling that rationality is not just mistaken—it’s an equivocation. It performs the aesthetic of reason while ducking its only meaningful standard: Does this belief proportionately map to the evidence available?

Until that question is addressed, “rational religion” remains a semantic costume—well-tailored, perhaps, but empty of substance.

---