Binary Definitions of Sex Sound Simple. Biology Isn’t -

-Which is why legislatures should be careful about how they use it

A popular claim in current debates is that human sex is “binary” and can be defined purely by gamete size: Males produce small gametes (sperm). and Females produce large gametes (ova). In evolutionary biology, that distinction (anisogamy) explains why two reproductive strategies exist. At the level of species-level reproductive roles, it’s a clean and useful model.

But legislation does not operate at the level of abstract evolutionary theory. It operates at the level of individual citizens navigating society and herein lies the problem.

Gamete production is not directly observable in everyday life. Most people are not actively producing gametes at any given time. Some never do. Some no longer do. Some cannot. Some have differences of sexual development that complicate chromosomal or gonadal categories. A menopausal woman produces no ova. A teenage girl may not yet. An infertile woman may never have. None of that makes them socially or legally unintelligible as women so a definition that works in evolutionary biology does not automatically scale to public policy.

Policing a law requires operational criteria relying on observable or documentable traits. But observable traits in between humans overlap heavily. In fact in comparison with other species of great ape we show relatively little dimorphism; Height, shoulder width, voice pitch, muscularity, fat distribution, jawline shape, hairline and hair distribution all overlap to some degree due to underlying developmental and genetic processes which, like gamete production are not casually observable. These include; Hormone variation which also overlap between males and females and chromosomal exceptions (XX, XY, XXY, mosaic patterns) that can result in gonads that diverge from the karyotype. Biology is not being denied here it is being taken as seriously as it would need to be to consider making social legislation based on it.

Sex is a real biological category at the population level, if your focus is on population genetics, but at the margins, where law actually bites, human bodies do not present as neat binary switches so when legislation tries to enforce a strict binary definition based on reproductive roles, it faces an enforcement problem: someone must decide who counts and that is where the issue stops being theoretical.

If access to spaces is restricted on the basis of “biological sex,” then enforcement relies on visual assessment or documentation checks. Visual assessment disproportionately targets women who do not conform to narrow femininity norms; tall women, athletic women, butch lesbians, women with PCOS, women with naturally higher androgen levels, women with short hair, women with deep voices etc.

In other words, simplistic binary definitions do not just affect trans or intersex people. They create vulnerability for all women who sit at the edges of feminine presentation. Ironically, a policy intended to protect women may subject many women to suspicion.

This is not an argument that sex is meaningless. It is an argument that biological abstraction is not the same thing as administrable law. Good legislation should answer three questions: Can this rule be applied without invasive verification, what is the false positive rate and who bears the social cost of misclassification? If a rule cannot be enforced without humiliating "innocent" women, and we already have examples that it can't, it is not a well-designed rule.

I am not saying that conversations about who should have access to single sex spaces are invalid. Social and cultural concerns are also a thing, as are issues of fairness in physical sports, which I think are for the administrators to discuss with participants. But, evolutionary biology explains why two gamete types exist, it does not tell us how to police a bathroom door. Reducing human complexity to a "sex is binary" may feel clarifying, but when slogans become statutes, edge cases become people, and people deserve better than being reduced to their gamete size.

The Misleading Power of the “Genetic Code” Metaphor

 We often describe DNA as a code, a string of instructions telling organisms how to build themselves. But what if this metaphor has led us astray? What if DNA isn’t a code in any meaningful computational sense—but rather a set of thermodynamically stable chemical patterns that emerged from, and continue to reflect, the environments in which life originated.

In modern biology, we tend to think of information as flowing from genes to the world, Crick’s ‘Central Dogma’: DNA as a kind of internal map or software that gets executed. But early replicators didn’t begin as messengers—they were more like imprints. Their structure, behaviour, and persistence were dictated by the external conditions they were embedded in. In this light, the earliest biological ‘information’ flowed from the environment to the replicator.
The environment didn’t just “influence” replicators—it effectively sculpted them. Replicators that matched the energy landscape persisted; those that didn’t fell apart.
What we call “genetic information” may be better understood as a condensed memory of successful interactions with the environment. That memory isn’t symbolic—it’s thermodynamic. Replicators that persisted were those that could harness energy gradients in stable, reproducible ways. In this sense, DNA is less like software and more like a fossilised energy pattern. Jeremy England’s demonstration that systems evolve toward states that dissipate energy more effectively seems to me to be a good indicator that early replicators were following this constraint. The Code Metaphor Isn’t useless, but It’s Limiting. Although the order of bases functions as a kind of mapping system—A means “this,” T means “that",this interpretive layer depends on a complex translation apparatus (tRNAs, ribosomes, enzymes) that didn’t exist at life’s origin. The code isn’t inherent to DNA—it’s context-dependent, shaped by co-evolved molecular machinery. Without the cell, DNA is inert. The code is in the system, not the strand.
Instead of thinking of early replicators as codes or blueprints, we might think of them as thermodynamic witnesses—molecular forms that managed to persist in a sea of chaos, not because they “knew” how, but because they fit the flow of energy in their surroundings. They didn’t store information so much as embody it.
Of course 4 billion years on we are confronted with a complicated enclosed molecular system that from our perspective looks like a set of instructions akin to a program. But essentially it’s still chemicals doing what chemicals do in thermodynamic systems that are maintained far from equilibrium. The string of bases in DNA is still meaningless until something inherent in the environment is relevant. If life began not with instructions but with interactions—if information emerged from the way matter flowed and settled under energy constraints—then maybe the metaphor we need isn’t “code,” but "resonance". The genome isn’t a script—it’s a survivor of a thermodynamic past.

Which is True. Christianity or Atheism?- An odd debate...

I've been invited to take part in a debate at the University of Kent with the above premise... I have composed my opening statement for the event so thought I'd share it here.

It may have crossed your minds, because it has mine,  that the terms of this debate are a little odd. Normally when you pitch one thing against another there is some implied equivalence between them even if they are antithetical to each other. But Atheism and Christianity are not at all the same sort of thing. True, they both have something to say about belief in some kind of deity but there I think the similarity ends.

Christianity after all is more than just belief that a deity exists. For one thing it posits a particular kind of god with an interest in and expectations of the human race but also it has acquired throughout its two thousand year history a creed (well several actually) and inculcated itself into the cultural narrative of the western world to such an extraordinary extent that its influence pervades practically every aspect of society.

Atheism however is really nothing more than an ontological opinion. That gods do not exist.

I’m not intending to be provocative when I say gods (plural) because despite whatever ecumenical sentiments proponents of the worlds religions express there are many concepts of god, some of them mutually exclusive and all to some degree incompatible in the way they are supposed to interact with the world. And that’s if they do interact. Some definitions of god are deistic, creator gods yes, but the kind that retire immediately they light the blue touch paper.

So usually if somebody asks me if I believe in God my first response is usually “what do you mean by God?”

Given the usual theistic responses I will then go on to say “no, I don’t believe in that god” because after all I am an A-Theist. Give god an attitude, or claim to know what it wants or insist on your personal relationship with it then I’m pretty sure it doesn’t exist.

Sophisticated theologians like Paul Tillich, Alvin Plantinga and David Bentley Hart will tell you that this is a naive concept of god. They will talk of a “ground of being”, god as the “prime mover” or particularly in Hart’s case as “being , consciousness and bliss”.

Well, maybe but for one thing that’s not the sort of god the average theist believes in and for another it’s hard to determine whether reality would be any different with or without it. Since they are unfalsifiable most Atheists I know remain agnostic about those types of god, as they do about deistic ones although there are good philosophical reasons to assume they also don’t exist.

So, the headline premise for tonight is “Which is True, Christianity or Atheism?” From an atheist point of view this is an easy proposition. There is, and has never been, objective evidence for the existence of any god from any religion and so the burden of proof is not on the atheist to prove that gods don’t exist. Since there is no empirical evidence of them the default assumption is, or should be, that there aren’t any. If it can’t be proved that there are -  then the Christian God disappears along with all the others.

But Christianity has another problem  because it’s not enough to establish the one thing atheism rejects. It also has to establish the truth of the  narrative peculiar to its understanding of god. At a bare minimum evidence God’s incarnation in the person of Jesus Christ, and his crucifixion and ascension for the salvation of human kind.

Then,  if you want to go on to argue for the literal and fundamentalist truth of Christianity you’ve also got to prove, against the overwhelming weight of empirical evidence, for the inerrancy of Judeo-Christian scripture.

But let’s hold that thought for now…

Thus far I’ve made no positive claims for atheism, and I may not make that many. In the meantime I can tell you what it’s not – It’s not a worldview, certainly not a religion and only in a vague sense is it a belief. I say that because atheists are rarely walking around consciously disbelieving in gods or especially, actively believing no gods exist. It’s a question that only arises when we’re confronted by the presumption of others that they do.

But, being an atheist does tend to lead to other conclusions about how the world might be.

Almost by definition Atheists are philosophical naturalists, understanding the world through an empirical lens and a broadly defined scientific method. This tends, although not infallibly, to mean that they reject all supernatural explanations of anything along with pseudo-scientific concepts such as homeopathy for example.

Atheism has no political allegiances although atheists on the whole tend to the socially liberal. But you can find them all across the political spectrum from Socialist to Libertarians. Ayn Rand for example was famously atheist.

Atheism has no creed or scripture (No, we don’t walk around clutching copies of “The God Delusion”) Consequently you may think that atheists have no “moral compass” nothing for the individual atheist to hang their ethics on. But in fact they have exactly the same source that religion does, at least for the fundamental principles, which is our shared human nature.

In contrast to the Abrahamic faiths which see humans as fallen from some mythical state of grace, atheists understand we are an evolved highly pro-social species with natural drives to be cooperative, maintain our personal reputations and be empathetic to others. We already possess within us the basis of morality and the more our circle of concern has expanded due to the growth of society the more refined those instincts have become. [# Steven Pinker: The better Angels of Our Nature]

Yes, In pursuit of Sustenance, Security and Sex we’re also capable of acts of cruelty and selfishness but ultimately we need each other. This isn’t a soppy appeal to Rousseau but a fact of our social nature. Moral norms become established as a result of society in general and would emerge with or without religion.

Another thing that Atheism isn’t – an ideology. Nobody campaigns for atheism, no armies march with a capital ‘A’ on their banners, nobody engages in terrorist acts or blows themselves up in the name of atheism. No atheist ever called for the death of an atheist “apostate” or as far as I know disowned a child for daring to be religious.

You will hear people say that atheist regimes have been the most repressive and violent regimes the world has seen but the reality is atheism has nothing to do with the usual examples they cite. Communist Russia under Stalin was exactly that, Communist. Stalin supressed religion because it was a threat to Communism not because he was ideologically wedded to atheism. It’s not even clear if he was personally an atheist. Mao suppressed religion for similar reasons and Pol-Pot set himself up as a god in his own right. Suggestions that Hitler was an atheist and that Nazism was godless are so laughable it is extraordinary the myth persists, perhaps the desire of the Catholic Church to disown their complicity with both has something to do with it.

This is not to suggest that individual atheists can’t be evil, they are as capable of it as anybody is but atheism won’t be their raison d’etre. In fact if you want to find a reason for evil it will be in the dogmatic pursuit of some ideology, it will be done by someone who thinks they are acting for a higher cause a higher power or some ultimate benefit that will outweigh the immediate harm.

Physicist Steven Weinberg famously said “With or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil - that takes religion.”

I would suggest that there are also political ideologies that could be substituted for religion in that quote. Religion can’t be blamed for everything - but atheism  is not such an ideology and indeed, in my view,  not ideological at all.

There have been attempts to construct an “atheist movement” that have largely failed. Richard Dawkins, evolutionary biologist and author of “The God Delusion” says “Organizing atheists is a bit like herding cats; They are on the whole too intelligent and independent minded to lend themselves to being herded.”

I’ve met Dawkins who does have an unfortunate arrogant streak and I think he could have left out the claim to excessive intelligence  (although there is some correlation between academic qualifications and atheism it’s really only strong in sciences where you might expect to find more atheists anyway), but what is objectively true is that atheism is not by itself a vehicle that builds communities. Ideas such as Atheism plus and Atheism 2.0 have come and gone as mainly on-line fads.

The “Atheist Church” founded in 2013 by Sanderson Jones and Pippa Evans enjoys some success with some 55 regular venues around the world offering a guaranteed god-free community experience. I’ve attended a couple and they’re fun and informative taking  their cue from the Christian format (if it ain’t broke don’t fix it) but using entirely non-religious music and readings. I’m not sure it constitutes a movement but it serves a human need for society without any necessity for gods.

There is of course Humanism, which does tick all the boxes atheism doesn’t. Humanist are atheists, with a utilitarian ethical worldview that values human flourishing , diversity and happiness, Of course not all atheists are Humanists. I am, and most atheists I associate with are and it is a strong and growing movement. The cohesive factor is not so much atheism as our shared human values and Humanists are pretty reliably socially and community minded. Many people in the general population who class themselves as “nones”, that is having no particular religious affiliation have values that align with Humanism and in the UK they represent around 52% of the population.

So atheism, a mere ontological opinion about the universe we inhabit, does not preclude any of the things we all  value about the human condition. Human competency, Human imagination, Human responsibility and human values are part of our shared evolutionary heritage and in my view overpopulating the universe with supernatural deities only diminishes rather than celebrates that awesome fact.

On reading "Signature in the Cell"

I was recently prompted to read outside of my methodological naturalist’s bubble and delve into Stephen C Meyer’s argument for intelligent design “Signature in the Cell: DNA and the evidence for Intelligent Design” . As a general principle if you want to argue against the misconceptions people hold it is not always enough to have mere facts at your disposal, it helps also to mine the source of their misunderstanding and the plausible quasi-scientific arguments of the likes of Meyer and Michael Behe are fundamental to those who would argue against naturalist theories of the origin of life.

The first thing to say about Meyer is that he is an extremely well qualified philosopher of science and there is very little in Signature in the Cell insofar as it relates to the actual molecular biology of DNA and its role in protein synthesis that I would argue with. In fact the opening chapters would make quite a good undergraduate primer on the subject. He correctly points out that a modern living cell is an incredibly complex machine of interrelated systems capable of transcribing information from the genetic code held in DNA and translating it into large functionally specific molecules such as proteins. He also, and equally correctly, observes that many of these proteins are necessary for the very processes of translation and transcription that the cell relies on to create them, in particular Ribosomes , the RNA / Protein complex that “stitches” amino acids together to make other proteins.
This interrelatedness and complexity forms one plank of his assertion that naturalistic processes cannot be responsible for the origin of life since even a minimally functional cell could not arise without a DNA code and the code could not be translated without specific decoding machinery. Then for further support he argues that there is no known mechanism by which a specific and information rich system can arise by chance alone. All such other know systems; computer code, written language etcetera have an intelligent source: us.

From these he builds a long and rather repetitive argument using abductive reasoning to draw an inference to the best explanation for the origin of life and specifically the information carried by DNA. He cites a number of statistical reasons why chemical theories of the origin of life are impossible, why chance cannot produce specified information and debunks the RNA world hypothesis as a precursor to a full blown DNA code. By systematically eliminating all possible natural explanations for life he seeks to establish that intelligent design is the only possible alternative. However, many of the assumptions he makes to suggest that a naturalistic origin of life is impossible are in my view flawed.

For example there is no necessity for a “minimally functional cell” to arise in one fell swoop and there is no necessity either for replication and metabolism to arise simultaneously or in the same place. There are credible metabolism first scenarios in which thermodynamically favourable conditions can allow spontaneous simple metabolic cycles to emerge. It has been postulated that alkaline hydrothermal vents would have been one such favourable environment. Meyer also insists there are no fundamental forces of nature driving systems to self-organise and increase in complexity but in the last couple of years Jeremy England at MIT has developed a thermodynamic theory that suggests entropy actually favours organised and replicating structures as they are more efficient at energy dispersal. Combinations of replicators and metabolisers allows for the possibility of some kind of biological bootstrapping.

Meyer makes something of a schoolboy error when he argues that the active sites that confer the catalytic specificity to enzymes are so specific that a single amino acid out of place would render them useless. This is something like the classic anti evolution argument of “what use is half an eye?” The answer of course is more use than none as long as it performs the function to some extent. This is true of enzymes as long as they are more efficient at facilitating a particular chemical reaction than would be the case if they were absent, then natural selection will do the rest. In fact it is not even correct to say that enzymes are so constrained. In his book “The arrival of the Fittest” evolutionary biologist Andreas Wagner concludes that no enzyme is really that special, in fact there are usually an astronomical number of alternatives that work and, interestingly, functional intermediates that allow for enzymes to mutate. He also demonstrates similar functional redundancies in the genetic code itself which added together make the probability of specific information bearing molecules arising randomly much greater than Meyer would have us believe.

It gets worse for Meyer when you consider that as things stand we only have one working model for how life is organised, life on earth. For all we know there could be many ways, with alternative molecules and alternative codes for complex evolving systems to arise. Like a Texas sharpshooter he has drawn a bulls eye around one object out of many and made a miracle out of the fact he’s hit it. Should we ever discover extra-terrestrial life with the same familiar genetic code that would be a real argument against random processes and would bolster the case for intelligent intervention but personally I would bet against it.

A parable that Meyer returns to several times goes like this…

"Imagine a team of researchers who set out to explore a string of remote islands near Antarctica. After many days at sea, they arrive on an icy, windswept shore. Shouldering their packs, the team hikes inland and eventually takes shelter from the bitter cold in a cave. There, by the light of a small campfire built to cook their freeze-dried rations, they notice a curious series of wedgelike markings vaguely reminiscent of Sumerian cuneiform. It occurs to them that perhaps these scratches in the rock constitute some sort of written language, but dating techniques reveal that the markings are more than five hundred thousand years old…"

He concludes that in this situation once all of the other possible natural causes for the information rich markings are exhausted the researchers would reasonably conclude that an intelligent agent was responsible even though the marks predate writing by many millennia. He then equates this with the information rich genetic code and having (he believes) eliminated natural explanations arrives at the same conclusion. But, these two situations are not equivalent. For one thing markings in a cave would show evidence of tool use. The form and disposition of the rock would indicate whether it had been chiselled with bone, stone or metal implements for example and the marks would have had a predetermined meaning. DNA however is both the medium and the message; there are no fingerprints on it to suggest what mechanism was employed by an intelligent designer to forge a molecule that is self-replicating, prone to mutations and contains multiple redundancies in translation. It’s as if the researchers came across rock markings with no evidence of how they were made, which highlights one of the philosophical problems with the whole book. Meyers argument to a best explanation is really no explanation at all. There is no attempt to explain how the designer achieved this feat of molecular engineering, nor why it bothered. Meyer is of course a Christian so for him the answers would be theological, although he is at pains to tell us that intelligent design says nothing about the nature of the designer only that there must be one.

If, as many religiously motivated people are, you were predisposed to distrust naturalistic explanations for the origins of life this book would be convincing. It’s plausible, so if you were not scientifically literate or up to speed with the latest research into biological origins it could easily confirm your preconceptions. But approached sceptically there are many holes and logical non-sequiturs hiding in the narrative particularly in the latter sections where Meyer attempts to defend intelligent design as proper science. But it’s not enough to posit a cause that itself has no explanation. It’s a philosophical dead end unless you can define who or what the intelligent designer was or at least identify a line of enquiry that may expose it. Meyer denies it at length but it’s hard to distinguish “signature in the cell from any other god of the gaps argument.

Is slavery "abhorrent" in Islam?

It's been a while since BBC's Thought for the Day has motivated me to blog about it, but a recent contribution (link above) by Sughra Ahmed, the current president of The Islamic Society of Britain was such a blatant example of scriptural cherry picking that I can’t let it pass without comment.

Muslim Slave Trader

The piece was ostensibly about modern slavery, a very real problem that Prime Minister Theresa May has recently highlighted as a priority for national attention by setting up a cabinet task-force, and Ahmed opens with this thought

” Slavery is a phenomenon I think of as something from long ago and a history I’m ashamed of.”

I waited for the admission that many religions, including Islam, had condoned slavery and that would be the source of her “shame”. But no…

“Slavery has also been a challenge for religious traditions and we know this through the example of prophets and religious texts. Prophet Muhammad, for example, put himself at risk when he freed those who were enslaved by people of the time. It was commonplace for powerful men to own slaves, in fact it was seen as a sign of wealth and stature in their communities. The story of Muhammad freeing the slave Bilal is the most famous and was a clear demonstration to those of the time, and those who read the story today, that slavery is abhorrent in Islam.”

“Slavery is abhorrent in Islam…”. Really? Lets test this glib assertion, based as it is on one cherry picked story about the African slave Bilal Ibn Rabah against several other Quranic verses and Hadiths.

Quran (33:50) - "O Prophet! We have made lawful to thee thy wives to whom thou hast paid their dowers; and those (slaves) whom thy right hand possesses out of the prisoners of war whom Allah has assigned to thee"

Bukhari (52:255) -Volume 4, Book 52, Number 255: The Prophet said, "Three persons will get their reward twice. (One is) a person who has a slave girl and he educates her properly and teaches her good manners properly (without violence) and then manumits and marries her. Such a person will get a double reward. (Another is) a believer from the people of the scriptures who has been a true believer and then he believes in the Prophet (Muhammad). Such a person will get a double reward. (The third is) a slave who observes Allah's Rights and Obligations and is sincere to his master."

Bukhari Volume 3, Book 41, Number 598: Narrated Jabir: A man manumitted a slave and he had no other property than that, so the Prophet cancelled the manumission (and sold the slave for him). No'aim bin Al-Nahham bought the slave from him.

These and other examples can be found here .

The best you can say about Islam from a scriptural point of view is that it sees manumitting slaves as a nice thing to do that will likely get you brownie points with Allah (who,as we know, rewards good Muslim men with 72 perpetually virginal sex slaves in heaven) but it certainly doesn’t see it as a priority and by no means is slavery portrayed as “abhorrent”. Like the old testament a thousand years earlier the Quran accepts slavery as a normal part of the human condition and fundamentalists today are convinced they are justified in taking sex slaves from among their enemies.

It does no justice to the victims of modern slavery or any favour to Islam in the west to deny the reality of what scripture teaches. Both the Quran and the bible are flawed texts with little moral authority when read without eisegesis, cherry picking and fallacious appeal to historical context. In the same way they promote discrimination, misogyny and intolerance they condone slavery in clear unambiguous language and Sughra Ahmed’s broadcast seems more an exercise in propaganda for Islam than a genuine attempt to discuss the problem in the modern era.

Accommodating Religious Practice

The Joint Council for Qualifications, which represents UK exam boards has recently announced that heavily subscribed GCSE and A level exams will be held a week earlier this year to accommodate Muslim children who may be observing Ramadan and fasting during the main exam period.

This strikes me as a correct and humanistic thing to do primarily because the children and young people affected are at an age when personal, peer and parental pressure to conform will be very strong and their capacity to make well informed pragmatic choices about religion and religious practice may not be fully developed. The system should protect children from their own and their parent’s follies at this critical stage in their education so far as is practicable given fasting is a known and obvious risk factor for reduced performance in this growing minority.

This is not, to my way of thinking, about “creeping sharia” or religious privilege but about maximising the potential of a future generation of productive individuals. But…

…as a society we should be wary about giving the signal that religious practice, that’s any religious practice of any faith tradition, is an inevitable consequence of belonging to a religion. Religion and the practice of it is always a choice in a secular democracy and should not be unquestioningly pandered to in the same way we should accommodate race, gender or disability. Adult believers ought to be expected to accept the consequences of their decisions to impair their performance, career choices, health and opportunities by practicing their religion if that is the result.

It could be argued that as a formerly Christian country, British Christians are privileged in that national holidays are arranged around their festivals and this is true at least to the extent that the pagan and agricultural cycles they usurped still mark the rhythms of this country’s life. But it would make no difference to minority faiths if those holiday seasons were based on any arbitrary calendar that ignored their own traditions and just as Hindu or Muslim countries would not alter their calendars to accommodate Christians there is no reason for the UK to do so.

So, good on the exam boards for helping Muslim children maximise their potential with this small concession that will not adversely impact other children as long as they plan their revision to the timetable given (which they should be doing anyway). But let’s beware of making this a wider principle by privileging religious beliefs with a status they do not merit.

Related Post

Religion as a Hypothesis

My friend Rob has a “niggle” with the quote from Greta Christina at the top of this blog which says

"Religion is a hypothesis about the world: the hypothesis that things are the way they are, at least in part, because of supernatural entities or forces acting on the natural world. And there's no good reason to treat it any differently from any other hypothesis. Which includes pointing out its flaws and inconsistencies, asking its adherents to back it up with solid evidence, making jokes about it when it's just being silly, offering arguments and evidence for our own competing hypotheses...and trying to persuade people out of it if we think it's mistaken. It's persuasion. It's the marketplace of ideas. Why should religion get a free ride"

He doesn’t have a problem with the substantive intent of the quote, which is to point out that religion should not be privileged or protected from criticism, but disagrees with the specific premise that religion is a hypothesis. Like many philosophical debates a lot of this comes down to semantics. If Greta has said religion is a conjecture, an opinion or an idea about the world her intent would have still been clear and to the extent that hypothesis and even theory are used colloquially it seems to me to be largely uncontentious. However it is true that hypothesis has, within science at any rate, a specific meaning. The OED takes as its primary definition

A supposition or proposed explanation made on the basis of limited evidence as a starting point for further investigation

and as such needs to be open to falsification. Also, it should be said that Greta does not say a hypothesis is all that makes up religion. In fact when asked her response was

"Sigh…I didn't say religions were ONLY a hypothesis. Yes, it has historical resonance, cultural importance, etc. The point is that the thing religions specifically center on -- namely, a belief in supernatural entities or forces with an effect on the natural world -- is a hypothesis. And yes, as such, this hypothesis should be able to be subjected to scrutiny and questioning just like any other, and should not be afforded any special respect or protection.”

So to what extent if any can religion be said to be a scientific hypothesis open to falsification and to what extent would religion retain relevance at all should any part of it be proved false? According to Rob religion cannot be falsified on its own terms.

”[…] I would say that religion is *not* an hypothesis (in the same way that *science* and philosophical naturalism are not hypotheses) as evidence cannot be adduced one way or the other. Furthermore, no one comes to religious belief by considering the so-called empirical claims of religion. All religions are self-contained metaphysical systems which resist in their own terms any falsification on empirical grounds.”

But do we have to accept religion on its own terms? True, if allowed to get away with their own apologetics religions immunise themselves against disproof. Christianity has had two thousand years of practice making God’s intent, ability and mode of operation in the world as inscrutable to investigation as possible and Islam built apophasis into itself from the outset but from an empirical point of view prayer (for example) either works at some statistical level of significance or it doesn’t. If it doesn’t we are entitled to conclude that either the deity it is aimed at doesn’t exist or at any rate does not perform as expected by the petitioner. Rob says

”In one of our FB exchanges you certainly said that issues like petitionary prayer and miracles are where religion intersects with the empirical and so provide us with the ability to evaluate religious claims. If prayer fails and there is no evidence for miracles then, if I understand you correctly, the whole edifice falls for all the assertions of religion are logically founded on the truth of the basic claims---like the claim that there is a supernatural being who is *causing* things to happen in the world.”

Here I think Rob is inferring too much. That we can say with a reasonable amount of certainty that miracles and prayer are un-evidenced is only to say that these particular claims of religion do not need to be taken seriously by non-believers. It does not prove that gods do not exist but may suggest the believer may be mistaken about the attitude of the particular god being petitioned. The hypothesis that gods can be swayed by prayer to intervene is falsified and that particular claim should rationally be rejected.
Whether the “whole edifice” of religion should fall based on this depends very much on the store individual believers put on particular claims. I agree that not everyone “comes to religious belief by considering the so-called empirical claims of religion” but some do surely. Does an adult converting either from a religion of birth or from previous agnosticism really ignore the supernatural premise behind their new belief? I doubt it.
For many believers religion is a heuristic device. Shorthand; for moral behaviour, cultural identity and normative values and for these people no amount of hypothesis testing is going to dent their faith, largely because from their point of view it’s irrelevant. But people do lose their religion after putting all their faith in unanswered prayer. They may still believe in a god: Just not one that cares about them.
If you spend a great deal of time, as both Rob and I do, thinking and reading about religion it is easy to become convinced that religious belief is typified by theologians who understand the sophistication and complexity it has evolved over the millennia but a short trawl through Christian blog sites, particularly those found in the US, should be enough to disabuse anyone of the notion that a significant number of the faithful aren’t literalists. This kind of belief is so specific and so rooted in empirically testable claims that to suggest it is not a hypothesis seems to me to be perverse. The six day creation, a global flood, the exodus from Egypt are all factual claims and have all been debunked by cosmology, geology and archaeology. None of that happened and the only way that this kind of belief can be maintained is by denying any agency to science at all which is what many do (while still using smartphones). If these people had to confront their cognitive dissonance by tackling their religion head on I doubt they would retreat into the “self-contained metaphysical system” of question begging that modern theology offers. They would have to abandon their religion wholesale which is why they rarely admit the scientific evidence.
So yes, religion is in part a hypothesis and can in part be falsified even if this depends on the particular truth claims of the specific religions and the extent to which these are held to be truths by individual believers. Religion and religious belief can transcend the empirical by substituting literalism for allegory and understanding ritual as culture not magic and to the extent that some have done this they are impervious to scientific enquiry, although how far they can do this and still be legitimately called a religion may be a discussion for another day.