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One of the most intelligent people I've ever known is a Dominican priest. Judging by standardized testing I might be able to qualify for Mensa. Or at least I'm above average.
First when it comes to my money going to religious groups I mostly give to religious charities that have three or four stars at "Charity Navigator" and that are devoted to helping the poor or disabled. The Church doesn't grab me and take my money. If they give some poor Colombian a wheelchair and it contains a prayer card or something with it he or she can always give the card away if it really offends him/her. The chair is still a benefit to him or her. Besides that if you've paid taxes in the last twenty years you've likely paid for arms deals to Third World dictators whose actions make most modern churches pale to insignificance.
Second "religion" encompasses many things and many religions highly value the intellect. Reason isn't everything to Catholics, but it's very important. The Quakers have a strong tradition of practical study. Judaism very much values study and scholarship. Baha'i emphasizes accepting everything science has to teach.
Third religions deal with issues of meaning, purpose, community/connection, continuity, and emotion. Intelligent people are often creative and can be reflective. Religions can offer answers that irreligion mostly doesn't even bother with at all. You may find those answers fallacious, but for some of it's better to have a satisfying answer than to just cross-our-fingers and hope science works everything out. Also intelligent people sometimes feel the need to be reminded that there is something far greater and more intelligent than ourselves. I could get "far more intelligent" just going to a forum for writers or scientists, but still it serves a purpose of getting beyond the self or the mundane.
The question of how religious believers reason interests me considerably.
It will not do to say that it is simply lack of intelligence. Some highly intelligent people are religious.
There is no simple answer, but I believe there are some signposts. Belief in religion and cults comes about, not through intelligence, but through an emotional response. It is further assisted through marketing from an early age.
There is also the question of specialization. It is well - known but far too often overlooked that someone who is an expert in atomic physics may know less about biblical archaeology than I do and so his 'authority' in that area would be spurious.
There is also the question that intelligence can be misused in propping up beliefs with clever but essentially spurious arguments.
There are also the myriad approaches from a purely intellectual decision that religion is neccesary, God or not, or that a sort of god is probable, religion or not.
I think if you dig a bit you will find the particular various reasons of someone who will not take the 'non - belief' position. It doesn't take much to push someone intelligent over the agnostic line from taking the evidence for a sortagod to accepting that a sort of 'god' is probable. There is, however, an apparent difficultly in getting someone who believes in even a very impersonal and deist - god to take the apparent technical stance of non - belief in what they do not know to be true. I can see the feeling of exchanging a perhaps very valuable and important belief for - it seems - nothing.
Moderator cut: calling out other members in derogatory way
They are all fallacious. Sorry. But they range from the preferential/speculative to the irrelevant and misunderstood. The difficulty seems to be getting people to think in the terms that make speculation unbelievable until proven rather than believable until disproven and what the laws of thermodynamics actually say, and, indeed everything from evolution to historical support for Jesus, rather than what the believers would like it to say.
The tendency to attach to religion imo is not about intelligence as much as it is about an individuals sense of personal security with their place in the universe. imo
I personally think that it's narcissistic for humans to think they, and they alone sit at the top of the "food chain" because they, and they alone were "made in God's image".
Ask yourself why some people are narcissists and I think will be the same answer as to why some people "need" religion.
Believing in utter nonsense with absolutely no evidence that even suggests, much less proves the existence of gods, devils, heaven or hell, is not a conclusion an intelligent person would arrive at.
Not intelligent? How do you explain then Dr. Ben Carson, renowned Neurosurgeon, who is also a Christian? I knew a member of my church who held a Th.D (Doctorate of Theology), the guy spoke seven different languages, but I guess he wasn't intelligent. How is your assertion, that no one who believes in God/religion is intelligent, any different then many of the ludicrous assertions that are made by the extreme religious zealots?
Already dealt with. One's ability to answer a set of quick, snappy questions that demonstrate one's mental flexibility or ability to think outside the usual box, is in no way a good indicator of one's ability to stand alone, against the cultural flow, and to take on the mysteries of this life absent a convenient (if illogical) crutch.
It does seem most likely that a strong belief in Christianity centers on a personal psychological need for an answer to any and all of life's persistent little questions. That no matter what happens, you'll have an all-inclusive answer. No problem too big or tall, no quandary too stifling, no atheist's rant too logical. As well, many seem to actually prefer the purely mystical solution, because it hints at some other-world, some alternate, glorious reality just out of reach of the naysayers, but promised to the faithful. A sort of candy-store reward, held just out of reach of you for now, but certainly permanently out of reach of the thug atheist crowds. Us. Me.
Quote:
Originally Posted by GrainOfSalt
Did Einstein believe in God?
Does anybody know?
No, he absolutely did not, though of course, his slightly ambiguous (to theists anyhow) commentary allows for their biased interpretation. He did not believe in the stated Christian God with all the obvious contradictions.
Same may be aid for Darwin, Hawking, Hitchens and Dawkins. All highly intelligent, but also denounced by many Christians, since they can't be easily refuted.
The more I talk to religious people - the more I think believing in a faith has nothing to do with intelligence and more to do with personality. I think some people need to believe in something greater than themselves.
Precisely. An abject, not-to-be-easily-dismissed Need To Believe, and along comes a more--or-less complete and ready-to-use belief system. And to boot; it's been accepted by millions of others, which, of course, surely must make it right, huh?
After all, we're not generally talking about intelligent and independent thinkers here, but followers, by definition.
Quote:
Originally Posted by HalfNelson
I never have. There are certain levels of education that simply cannot be reached without a certain level of intelligence. I chuckled at the notion by another poster that the church member I referenced with a Th.D and who spoke seven languages, might have gotten his degree from degrees dot com or a crackerjack box. No, this guy spent something like 12 years in post graduate study, at highly respected schools.
Quote:
Originally Posted by rifleman
You missed my point, HN! My point was that many theists come here with their lists of people with letters after their names, as if that proves anything special, much less isome superior intelligence. and, if you have such "proven" intelligence, and are also Christian, why then, Christianity must be right, huh? Is that how it goes in your head?
You can have true proven mental dexterity, but it's how you choose to use it that is so telling, HN.
I just find it intriguing that so many atheists take the same attitude twords religious people that they accuse religious people of taking twords them. Every religion (including atheism), has it's range of extremists, zealots, and ignorant adherents, but these religions also contain many who dialogue with people of other beliefs without the tone of condesention that seems so prevalent here.
Well, the now demonstrated difference is that when we atheists honestly debate, we present one or two or five points to be discussed, refuted or outright denied by theists. what do we always (and I mean, predictably, relentlessly, ALWAYS...) get in return? Bluffs, denials, insults, "change the subject, quickly!" diatribes, and re-parroting of already well-disproved but conveniently out-of-context ,quote-mined pseudo-factoids.
We do not ever get intellectual, honest types of responses. ("You know, you might just be right on this one point! So I'll go and consider it and get back to you with an honest answer!!")
And why not? Because the fervently religious, measurably intelligent or not, cannot ever give in, now can they? To allow a tiny corrosive point of philosophical rust ito start up in their mental body armor? No Way.
if you disagree that this is how Christians "argue" intellectually, pick any sensitive topic (Evolution, geology, dinosaurs, Noah's Ark, etc. etc.) and we'll agree to have just such an adjudicated discussion. Right here. First one to grab their marbles and run off, stomping their little feet, loses.
I'll provide irrefutible, unambiguous, incontrovertible proofs, and you can similarly refute each of them, solid point by solid point if possible. (no biblical quotes allowed, BTW, since that would be like me just pointing to any modern biology text and saying "But it says right here!")
Of course, only one of us can be right, and I have proofs.
No, he absolutely did not, though of course, his slightly ambiguous (to theists anyhow) commentary allows for their biased interpretation. He did not believe in the stated Christian God with all the obvious contradictions.
Albert Einstien didnt believe in the chrisitan form of god sure, but he did belive in god.
"I believe in Spinoza's God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with the fates and actions of human beings."
Albert Einstien
Its funny that i found this quote in a book written against god.
Also, the quote can be found on Spinozas wiki page if you look hard enough near the bottom.
Originally Posted by CrownVic95 Moderator cut: Off topic And atheists aren't?
If atheists aren't herd animals then explain to me why they often behave exactly like theists?
BTW do you really think that it is a sign of intelligence to call others stupid because they follow a religion? Isn't that not the same as the medieval Christians who believed that the non-Caucasian races can only be ignorant because they aren't Western (or Christian)?
I am a non-believer myself and I agree with you to some extent. Those atheist who make definitive "there is no God" claims are no different in their overall thought processes and those religious people who make the definitive opposite argument. Definitives should not be in the vocabulary of any intelligent person when it comes to the existence or non-existence of a higher power. No one has that answer and it would be nice if everyone would step off the soapbox and realize that.
Albert Einstien didnt believe in the chrisitan form of god sure, but he did belive in god.
"I believe in Spinoza's God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with the fates and actions of human beings."
Albert Einstien
Its funny that i found this quote in a book written against god.
Also, the quote can be found on Spinozas wiki page if you look hard enough near the bottom.
Einstein did not believe in a personal god, he makes that clear.
He asserts his admiration for the existence of everything and the order that can be revealed through science.
HUGE, HUGE difference from the made up crap politicians then aka organized religion put out there.
Einstein did not believe in god the way any organized religion describes "god".
I chuckled at the notion by another poster that the church member I referenced with a Th.D
A Th.D.................mmmmmmmmmmmm
Went in a believer and after 12 years of religious study came out a believer. Who'da thought.
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Moderator cut: Off topic And atheists aren't?
Isn't that not the same as the medieval Christians who believed that the non-Caucasian races can only be ignorant because they aren't Western (or Christian)?
