Well and good. That issue does matter. So do many other issues such as womens' rights, LGBT+ rights, proper science education in schools (i.e., no creationism), etc.
Now I ask you: what is the empirical evidence that religion is the actual causal force behind such irrational thinking, and not something else, say, neophobia?
Just to verify, I don't think I've ever claimed that complex systems are driven by single causal forces. But I do claim that religious doctrine is often the sole common factor tying together beliefs and behaviors across many generations, locales, and cultures. Also, for thousands of years we've heard the religious declare that they do what they do "in the name of" their religion. Is it soft bigotry on our parts to disbelieve them?
After all, your hypothetical is not something that's certain to happen. After all, where in either Christianity or Islam inherent is there an unambiguous statement that blastocysts have souls?
Again, we hear from Christians that stem cell research goes against their faith. Who am I to tell them that they are misinterpreting their own faith?
....I'd also like to see those studies on things demonstrated to cause cognitive draining, but largely for completely different reasons. lol
The Zeigarnik effect is pretty google-able. But to summarize, back in the 1920s (I think), Zeigarnik did studies that indicated that incomplete activities are better remembered than complete ones. E.g. waiters remembered customer's orders until they were fulfilled. In other words, the brain puts effort into keeping current those things that are unresolved.
More recently cognitive scientists have determined that most (if not all) cognitive processes draw from the same store of glucose in the brain. So, for example, something as seemingly innocuous as "having a little willpower" drains brain glucose.
My claim puts those two findings together: Usually if you have a religious worldview, you have to constantly filter what the world presents you through this worldview. When presented with a situation, you must ask yourself "what does the scripture say about this, if anything?". This filtering can never be resolved, it is ongoing.
Similarly, if you have a critical thinking worldview, you will filter what the world presents to you. You might ask yourself "Is this new thing consistent with what I've learned about how the world works?". This is also an ongoing process.
If you are a religious person who ALSO employs critical thinking, you are supporting two sets of filters (a cognitive drain), AND you must resolve those situations in which the two worldviews conflict (a very expensive cognitive operation.)
So the Christian Parkinson's disease researcher is constrained from using stem cell research based on dogma, while simultaneously her critical thinking functions argue that stem research could further her work.
This might seem like an unusual case in the West, although we see millions of Christian parents spending lots of cognitive resources fighting against science curricula. Now zoom over to Pakistan or Afghanistan. These folks are aware of the outside world and most of them probably want a better life for their families. But again, their dogma - which is in conflict with modernity - constrains, confuses and depletes them cognitively.
How about a Christian healthcare worker in AIDS-torn Africa? She knows scientifically that condoms would reduce the spread of the disease, but her pope tells her that condoms are counter to her dogma.
One might argue that such cognitive drains are apart of normal life, and of course such drains are inevitable. But the reality is that cognitive resources are sparse and easily depleted. Extra cognitive load can make the difference between learning a complex new idea and being confused. The best teachers understand the importance of this idea and do everything they can in their teaching to reduce cognitive drains. (Google "intrinsic cognitive load" and "extrinsic cognitive load".)
