NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #31/NN_1992_31.iso/spool/alt/atheism/24551

Text File | 1992-12-30 | 2.0 KB | 45 lines

Newsgroups: alt.atheism
Path: sparky!uunet!munnari.oz.au!bruce.cs.monash.edu.au!monu6!yoyo.cc.monash.edu.au!darice
From: [e-mail] (Fred Rice)
Subject: Re: I.Q. & Brains
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Sender: [e-mail] (Usenet system)
Organization: Monash University, Melb., Australia.
References: <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]>
Date: Wed, 30 Dec 1992 06:20:57 GMT
Lines: 33

In <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Fred Rice) writes:

>>1) Ignorance.  Intelligence does not imply correct information.
>>2) Compartmented personality.  The scientist and the prayer-maker never meet.
>>3) Knavery.  The statement of belief is a sham to serve another purpose.
>>4) Fear of censure by friends and family.
>>5) Delusions or insanity.

>While you may consider these possible reasons, there are plenty of
>further possible reasons.

>You forget about the possibility of a religious experience or
>mystic experience specific to the person who experiences it.  Such an
>experience may give a specific individual the rational reasons to be
>religious.  However, such a person's reasons, while rational to him/her,
>cannot be sensibly challenged by others as they have not had the same
>experience as s/he did.

Also, another reason an intelligent person may be "religious" (I do not
necessarily mean Christian, but religious in a general sense) is
because s/he is comfortable with, say, a belief
in a God, and with a lack of evidence for or against such a
belief, chooses the belief that is most comfortable to him/her.  I
personally see no problem with this reason for religiosity, as it is
simply a personal choice in what one is comfortable with in a situation
where there is no evidence either for or against a particular position.

(I know some will shout "Occam's Razor", but this does not make the
above reason for religiosity either wrong or illogical.)

 Fred Rice
 [e-mail]