The Need to Evolve

[Sheldon]

No, not at all, what has subjective perception of an objective fact, or a belief that is demonstrably wrong, to do with the objective truth? People are confident the earth is flat, others are confident that it is round, do you really imagine it's confidence that remotely determines truth? That's just asinine sorry. And none of that remotely addresses my point at all, even more bizarre? You seem to be quoting my post now, but posting non-sequiturs to express what you believe?

My larger point is that what we consider objective evidence doesn't just drop from the sky marked "objective." We judge it to be objective, based on criteria which we find trustworthy. It may or may not be trustworthy in the long run, but we do the best we can. 

The criteria we set for credulity is of course a subjective choice, but the criteria itself need not be so, that all beliefs are to some extent subjective, does not mean they are equally subjective, if you think objective evidence is more reliable than subjective then it follows the more objective the evidence the more reliable it is. 

Testing which is more reliable is easy, as luckily all the heavy lifting has been done, the successes amassed in a very short time by science demonstrate it is by far the most reliable method (so far) for understanding objective reality, it's not the only method, it is the most successful and therefore the most reliable. It follows then that if less reliable or successful methods are at odds with what is quantifiably the best, and we care that what we believe is true, then we would use that best or most reliable method. 

Beyond that we can see that those methods (science) are designed to remove as much subjectivity as is possible, so again it follows that the more objective the evidence is, the more reliable it is. 

So lets recap:

1. Someone made a claim about spirituality.
2. I asked that person to define what they meant by spiritual, and what objective evidence if any, they could demonstrate that it existed, outside of the human mind. 
3. You cited human emotions (happiness for example) as existing and suggested we cannot objectively evidence this. 
4. Since there is no objective evidence that emotions can exist outside the human mind, this isn't really relevant. Though it's worth noting most people instantly understand what we mean by happy, whereas spiritual means many different things to different people, it is vague poorly defined, and thus objective markers would be much harder to pin down, all else aside. 
5. I already accept that abstract ideas exist in the human mind. 
6. I also accept that people hold subjective religious beliefs, and that they gain succour from them, and are emotionally invested in them. I have little reason to doubt that the emotions produced are real, but have no objective reason to believe this tells me anything about the veracity of the beliefs. 

One last word, some beliefs better reflect objective reality, they are demonstrably more reliable than others, it follows then, that beliefs can vary along a scale from purely subjective(the least reliable) to objective irrefutable fact (the most reliable), none of that of course was meant to suggest anything is or can be immutable, that is a claim I have seen made by religions and the religious many times, to me it indicates only a closed mind, to say one holds a belief that cannot ever be changed or be wrong. 

To admit that an irrefutable fact must remain tentative in the light of new evidence is merely to say one  is open minded, as science does, it does not in any way suggest the fact is unreliable or even remotely likely to change.