(Let us remember that the concept of "God" has no place in the attempt to model Reality "objectively," independently of the Subjective Model, especially using the rules of logic and the rules of evidence, that ultimately give us the scientific methods.)

The concept of "God" is one way of organizing one's Subjective Model, and thus impacting one's subjective experience, for the purpose of optimizing one's quality of life and ability to function, including being able to make the world a better place for others. It generally entails some concept of superiority and/or perfection, and it is a manifestation of our ability to have aspirations, to look beyond our present achievements to something valued even more highly. Having the subjective experience of the "presence" of God is often accompanied by the feeling of approval and/or disapproval in addition to the feeling of being under some sort of supervision by someone who cares what we do.

One can imagine that these feelings are an extension (re-experiencing) of similar feelings we have had as very young (and also not so young) children toward those who have parented us. There is at least the possibility that the experience most of us have had in relationship to actual parents, that is, the states of mind (states of the brain) that our parents have induced in us repeatedly, at times become reproduced in the absence of a person, just as they may later be reproduced in relationship to a leader or a psychotherapist, or perhaps (though not so much anymore) in relationship to another species. We are talking about a "state of mind" that may exist independently of one's immediate situation.

I believe this aspect of spirituality can be good or bad. For instance, if the states of mind associated with feeling the "presence of God" are primarily negative (causing irrational guilt, inferiority, self-loathing, etc.) or are primarily such as to cause the individual to feel approved of for behavior that causes PSDED, then, according to my values, that spirituality would be bad. But my observation is that some individuals do indeed have a better quality of life and contribute more to making the world a better place by virtue of the feeling of having a "relationship with God." And my impression is that such individuals are more likely to experience "God" as loving and understanding, rather than angry, judgmental, and punitive.

And there is the suggestion that good spirituality may tend to result in part from good parenting, by which I mean parenting that is successful in producing good self-esteem and productive citizenship. And my own (controversial) opinion is that such an outcome is most likely to result from non-punitive child rearing assisted by intensive training in child rearing in general, that is based upon methods that do not purposely induce pain or other discomfort in children as a way to bring about change in behavior.

And we therefore need, I believe, to be aware that as we rear our children, we are molding their spirituality, their basic ways of experiencing "the other," especially the supervising "other," resulting in how they will be experiencing others in their lives and also how they will be experiencing their "gods," if they have them. As stated, I personally believe in child rearing that does not punish, but instead skillfully rewards, teaches, and models for identification. I believe that children should never purposely be made to feel bad, or to feel bad about themselves. I believe, contrary to what almost everyone else believes, that we can indeed rear children successfully in this manner, if we are properly trained (because such child rearing does not come naturally). Children are going to have much to feel bad about anyway, because of the way life is, with all of its unpredictability and risks and accidents, but we need to be their allies and coaches in their difficult process of adapting to a frequently painful world. I would predict that children who are reared non-punitively will have as their God a loving, understanding, encouraging God that wants us to treat each other well.

So this raises the general question as to whether we should be concerned about the development of spirituality in other people. On the one hand, as I have said, spirituality is a very individual thing, with lots of ways of manifesting itself, but perhaps we can also learn from each other. And that seems to be what is happening, as people specifically involve themselves in various spiritual practices under the supervision of others and/or make a point of listening to and understanding the spirituality of others. So how we develop our spirituality may be an important question, and it would be the kind of question that our religions should be of help with, making use of the findings of science with regard to the correlations between various kinds of spirituality and the various indicators of quality of life (for the individual and for society).

But one important overall conclusion, it seems to me, is that we should not be critical of (and even kill) individuals because they do not have a God or gods, or the right God. Instead, we should recognize that there are all sorts of ways of "being spiritual" in a good sense, and that what counts is how the individual's spirituality affects how he or she treats himself or herself and others. Atheists and theists should feel comfortable sharing their ways of arriving at how to live life, and thereby learn some things from each other.

There is a specific issue that is to a fair extent related to the concept of a deity, namely, the concept of an "afterlife."

It is obvious that many, many people achieve enormous comfort from the belief that there is an afterlife. But there are also many people who do not feel the necessity of such belief in order to feel as okay as possible about ultimate death. And there are also many people who suffer more because of having the belief that there is an afterlife, because of what they believe it will probably be like, especially if believed determined by an unempathic, judgmental, punitive, wrathful deity.

It is well-recognized, I believe, that if there is no afterlife, then a person who has believed that there is one will be no worse off.

Within the Physical Model, there is no place for an "afterlife," especially since "life" does not mean "consciousness" in that Model.

So, in general, we have been considering the likelihood that we can optimize our spirituality.

For an individual to organize his or her Subjective Model such as to greatly increase his or her quality of life and ability therefore to make the world around him or her a better place seems sensible. But, as noted, the details of that organization are important. So to the extent that an individual or a group believes that there is "some choice as to what to believe," that is, how to live within one's Subjective Model, it makes sense to give such options substantial thought.

And again, I believe a person who does indeed attempt such organization of his or her Subjective Model, should not be criticized simply because his or her way is different than the way some other persons organize their Subjective Models. What should be important, instead, is what kind of person the person is, how he or she treats self and others, and contributes to making the world a better place.

So, for instance, the "belief in an afterlife," in and of itself, should be a matter of personal choice, with the recognition by everyone that this particular "belief" says nothing at all about the goodness of that person, nor should the presence or absence of a "belief in an afterlife," in and of itself, be maintained as a requirement for social acceptability.