Analytic thinking can decrease religious belief

Besides ATARI all the way beyoch...
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Billy said:
Yesh, it seems the smarter you are, the more educated, the less religious. This is quite obvious.
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Statements like this one can hurt:

1. They show how narrow minded can be those who promote openmindess with staying against "intolerant" religions...
1. They are actually sign of arrogance of many intelligent men of the world who think that mind is mesaure of human worth...
 
Jana said:
Statements like this one can hurt:

1. They show how narrow minded can be those who promote openmindess with staying against "intolerant" religions...
1. They are actually sign of arrogance of many intelligent men of the world who think that mind is mesaure of human worth...
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Ohhhh I think you're giving them too much credit. ;) Everyone knows today's "skeptics" are trendy, bigoted, mindless, zombie followers that let others tell them what to think in exchange for a label and the delusion of not being teh dumb. ;)
 
@Apone 'that relies on mental shortcuts to yield fast and efficient responses' great description. Really, it is easier to say "God did this" when thinking of God as life itself, or the nature of the universe, or whatever causes all things to happen. So assigning a simple, easy, efficient label to what would be the nature of the universe is the first step towards understanding it and eventually becoming in harmony with it with both sides happy. Fairly high aspirations to become in synch with life itself? The simplicity is for the whole understanding, the details arent neglected in healthy people, religious or not.

The feel of this thread is funny "Ha ha! Them silly religious people, they're so dumb huh?" "Yeah man! So stupid they cant even think right!" It's like some people think religion is a disease or something, that because they're religious they must be fucking stupid "to believe in a magic man in the sky." You are fulfilling the same role the people before you filled, will you not use reason?
 
CindyLou said:
Ohhhh I think you're giving them too much credit. ;) Everyone knows today's "skeptics" are trendy, bigoted, mindless, zombie followers that let others tell them what to think in exchange for a label and the delusion of not being teh dumb. ;)
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Some of them for sure, there is no monopoly on mindless followers, well actually there is, Religion... but dumb people are in awe of intelligent things intelligent people say all around... I cant stand atheists who are atheists because its trendy and who know nothing of science. For the rest of us though, well we don't believe on belief, we simply pass that by accepting facts. Facts do not require belief.
 
Apone said:
I'm actually kind of disappointed that more believers don't participate in these kinds of threads… if I were religious I would think these types of discussions a perfect opportunity to re-evaluate my faith and think about why I believe what I do.
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Since when do the majority of religious people want to do that? Typically, as soon as the mere idea is mentioned the word "troll" gets thrown around. See posts earlier in the thread for proof of this. :P

All that said I completely agree. I'd like to see more serious discussion from their side as well. And by serious discussion I mean of course, not defensively snapping at the athiests/agnostics for asking "why?".
 
Today, Atheism is more a consecuence of materialism in consumerist society than an actual rebellion against religious opression. 90% of atheist i know are simple minded sheep. You cant compare the deepness of philosophical atheist like Marques de Sade with this morons. I consider myself an agnostic, i think that god may exist, or that maybe he doesnt.
 
Kmal said:
@Apone 'that relies on mental shortcuts to yield fast and efficient responses' great description. Really, it is easier to say "God did this" when thinking of God as life itself, or the nature of the universe, or whatever causes all things to happen. So assigning a simple, easy, efficient label to what would be the nature of the universe is the first step towards understanding it and eventually becoming in harmony with it with both sides happy. Fairly high aspirations to become in synch with life itself? The simplicity is for the whole understanding, the details arent neglected in healthy people, religious or not.

The feel of this thread is funny "Ha ha! Them silly religious people, they're so dumb huh?" "Yeah man! So stupid they cant even think right!" It's like some people think religion is a disease or something, that because they're religious they must be fucking stupid "to believe in a magic man in the sky." You are fulfilling the same role the people before you filled, will you not use reason?
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I don't think people who are spiritual and have faith are "dumb" by any means. I would be lying if I were to say I did not feel that way about "religion" though.

Being religious and believing in a specific god and/or faith/philosophy are not mutually exclusive. At least in my opinion.
 
Yeah, this doesn't surprise me at all. The person I am when I read newspaper columns would laugh at the person I am at synagogue.
 
Jill Hives said:
I don't think people who are spiritual and have faith are "dumb" by any means. I would be lying if I were to say I did not feel that way about "religion" though.

Being religious and believing in a specific god and/or faith/philosophy are not mutually exclusive. At least in my opinion.
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Religion has been stigmatized and made dogmatic to those who condemn the dogma in a laughable irony. Indeed, it looks as if religion is tainted, but that is only a guise for religion and spirituality are true and what it seen is the lie. Being religious can be a social thing, to be with the strong and the safe, but to only be associated with them in public and do evil in private is an age old practice that people have been doing for many generations and now you are aware of it? Then let not history repeat itself on you if you should truly use reason.
 
Apone said:
I'm actually kind of disappointed that more believers don't participate in these kinds of threads… if I were religious I would think these types of discussions a perfect opportunity to re-evaluate my faith and think about why I believe what I do.
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Because nothing I will say won't make you to reconsider your attitude. I will only get nervous because of "you cute naive belivers" attitude. Why should I do that to myself?:)
What make you think that you or whatever any of you might say could make me to reevalute my faith. We are not talking about elections! Only life can put one into place of rethinking these kind of attitudes...
 
Apone said:
It is sort of a limited article on the study… but I don't think that intuitive thought refers only to faith. There are other intuitive concepts that reason can't address-- the first one that pops to mind is awe, which to me seems completely outside of reason and yet undeniably integral to the human experience… it's something that's plentiful in your childhood and that a lot of people lose touch with later in life-- I've actually been struggling to reconnect with my sense of awe by traveling… but no matter what you do, it's just not there unless you're willing to let go.

If you ask me, the only time you actually run into trouble is when you try to articulate or explain the intuitive leaps that your mind makes… sometimes things just are what they are and they lose their impact if you try to connect them to something else… so with that in mind I guess it would make sense that reason would detract from, dilute and confuse those experiences-- and I wouldn't say that reason never plays a role in people drawing ridiculous unfounded connections between miraculous events that simply are, and their own belief systems, sometimes for better but mostly for the worse.

To be honest, I don't think I know enough about the difference between intuitive and analytic thought… I'm not sure that drawing connections between religious concepts/figures/rules and miraculous events doesn't require a bare minimum of critical judgment in order to 'connect the dots'… I mean, you do sort of have to discern between Bible passages or the personalities of your deities, and your conclusion does sort of follow from those sorts of connections. But maybe I'm looking at it all the wrong way?

I'm actually kind of disappointed that more believers don't participate in these kinds of threads… if I were religious I would think these types of discussions a perfect opportunity to re-evaluate my faith and think about why I believe what I do.
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I am thinking that belief (i.e., religious belief) and reason are similar concepts in the sense that they are exercised by human beings to explain awe-eliciting things and unknown (and as yet unquantifiable) things.

To venture to question the assumptions that I have developed within my thinking may require that I utilize some degree of reason or some other system of thought that I have personalized (whether this be my personally nuanced version of a belief system or the wholesale acceptance of a contained system that has already been conceived of).

One of the objections that may be raised about religious belief is that some postures, attitudes, or approaches leave no space for mystery, the unknown, or new questions. And, ironically, such postures may leave no room for the "miraculous" or "divine", let alone an optimal appreciation for such.
 
Billy said:
Albert Einstein was an atheist... please do not propagate this lie.
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It is possible to be spiritual and not religious- there is a difference, and in many of Albert Einstein's quotes you can tell that although he might not be religious, he was spiritual. Many scientists and rational thinkers throughout history were also spiritual. Being completely materialistic doesn't allow people to gain certain elevated perspectives, just as in the sense that someone who is dogmatically religious isn't aware of other possibilities for how they might exist within the universe. It is important to transcend the duality of limited existence, and to recognize how other people might have other perspectives. Most, if not all, great thinkers were able to distinguish their higher self from their ego, and detach themselves from their identity in order to gain that perspective which made their thoughts so incredibly valuable.

More educated people are less likely to need authority figures, whereas undifferentiated people do. People who are able to detach from their ego construct can recognize when they are wrong, because they haven't put everything into it. People with a very rigid ego construct cannot admit they are wrong, because then they would have nothing left. Typically more educated people don't need labels- they have transcended labels, and realize that some things could be true, some things could be false, but that there is more grey than black and white when it comes to problems in the world. Hence uneducated people tend to rely more on that binary logic of "I'm a Christian, you are not", "I am atheist, you are not".

Albert Einstein quotes:

"Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind."

"God does not care about our mathematical difficulties. He integrates empirically."

"Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods."

"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed."

"A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeeded be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death."

"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed."


Billy, in regards to your comments, I would not necessarily call Einstein an atheist, I don't think that Einstein would appreciate that kind of label. I wish more people would remember that there is more to life than binary logic.
 
That's all from me at this thread, folks.
Knowing oneself is part of knowing God better. Part of wisdom. Being here and discussing all that psychology stuff and similar actually make all members of this forum my helpers to wisdom. Not knowledge, but wisdom. It is not the same thing.
 
jupiterswoon said:
It is possible to be spiritual and not religious- there is a difference, and in many of Albert Einstein's quotes you can tell that although he might not be religious, he was spiritual. Many scientists and rational thinkers throughout history were also spiritual. Being completely materialistic doesn't allow people to gain certain elevated perspectives, just as in the sense that someone who is dogmatically religious isn't aware of other possibilities for how they might exist within the universe. It is important to transcend the duality of limited existence, and to recognize how other people might have other perspectives. Most, if not all, great thinkers were able to distinguish their higher self from their ego, and detach themselves from their identity in order to gain that perspective which made their thoughts so incredibly valuable.

More educated people are less likely to need authority figures, whereas undifferentiated people do. People who are able to detach from their ego construct can recognize when they are wrong, because they haven't put everything into it. People with a very rigid ego construct cannot admit they are wrong, because then they would have nothing left. Typically more educated people don't need labels- they have transcended labels, and realize that some things could be true, some things could be false, but that there is more grey than black and white when it comes to problems in the world. Hence uneducated people tend to rely more on that binary logic of "I'm a Christian, you are not", "I am atheist, you are not".

Albert Einstein quotes:

"Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind."

"God does not care about our mathematical difficulties. He integrates empirically."

"Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods."

"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed."

"A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeeded be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death."

"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed."


Billy, in regards to your comments, I would not necessarily call Einstein an atheist, I don't think that Einstein would appreciate that kind of label. I wish more people would remember that there is more to life than binary logic.
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He spent years talking down his usage of thew word God. A sense of Awe for the awesomeness of nature may evoke the same feelings as people who are spiritual but he was most certainly not spiritual or religious. He only didnt like the label atheist because of the baggage that came with it. He did not believe in a creator, nor did he believe in any form of God. You are perpetrating a myth.
 
Billy said:
He spent years talking down his usage of thew word God. A sense of Awe for the awesomeness of nature may evoke the same feelings as people who are spiritual but he was most certainly not spiritual or religious. He only didnt like the label atheist because of the baggage that came with it. He did not believe in a creator, nor did he believe in any form of God. You are perpetrating a myth.
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Link some books or articles that corroborate your idea and I will look into it. I'm open to read up on it. It had better be something that he himself wrote though, because I won't trust just any source online.

I believe in awe of the universe, and energy, and I don't believe in God, and I don't call myself an atheist.

He might have been using the word God, because there is not another word that can describe what he is talking about.
 
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