It's not an impossible hypothetical - lots of people were once Christian and then decided they aren't any more - and it's not feigned sympathy. I truly feel sorry for someone who has to cling to a strange and obsolete theory of the world because they're afraid that if they don't, they'll turn into a monster.
FWIW, in addition to a rational basis, I think that quite a bit of morality is 'hard-wired'. The incest taboo is an example. Brothers and sisters almost never want to have sexual relations, even in the absence of a moral code forbidding it. There's just a natural revulsion to it. Likewise, we have a natural and very sensitive cognitive facility for detecting cheating, and an equivalent dread of being caught. Steven Pinker in 'How the mind works', has an excellent discussion of our internal ethical compass and how it evolved in order to make reciprocal altruism possible.
So, oddly enough, I have a higher opinion of you than you have of yourself. I'm sure that even if you were a 'rabid atheist' like myself, you would probably behave pretty much as ethically as you do now. There are certainly bad people in the world, but there's precious little evidence a religion ever made a bad person good.
to a strange and obsolete theory of the world
To which theory or belief do you refer???
What a vivid imagination you have. Do you teach creative writing?? Because I thought you were a science prof who dealt with facts and not fantasy....
And morality is 'hard-wired' by whom? How can an impartial, random evolution, hard wire any set of standards?
No.......actually, if I weren't a Christian, I would have an entirely different set of standards. My human nature is geared towards theft, lying, cheating, temper tantrums and fighting. It is only through the grace of God that I behave in a moral manner. "Religion" makes a whole lot of bad people 'good'........including me.
One could argue that in the absence of coersion, organized religions are made up of self-selected people.