Kenny wrote:Kurieuo wrote:Kenny wrote:Kenny wrote:Kurieuo wrote:I mentioned several years ago, that science provides evidence for there being no real Atheists. In fact, my main line of response against Atheism being accepted as the default position one begins life with, and really by that Antony Flew only ever meant a weak form of Atheism more resembling Agnosticism, nonetheless I believe Theism is the default position because such is what we're naturally wired with and is exhibited as we develop from babes into children.
This isn't my opinion, but rather numerous scientific studies demonstrate such is the case.
If scientific studies demonstrate humans are hardwired to believe in God, why do you suppose science is the one field of study that has more Atheists in it than anything else?
Kurieuo wrote: There are no true Atheists, that's what scientific studies suggests, and you are free to look up the ones presented in the YouTube video if you find this challenging to your lack of belief.
Hey! If it’s on youtube, it must be true right? (LOL)
The delivery method matters little to the content itself. You can freely ignore the scientific papers shown, names mentioned of those leading the studies and the like due to the "YouTube factor", but I sincerely doubt they are fabricated.
Okay; I finally looked at the entire video. The video is one that promotes theism. They show some studies that show religious belief is natural, but nowhere in the Video does it present scientific papers, or anything connected to science that says Atheism is delusional or does not exist. Only the Author of the video make this claim when voicing his opinion.
Ken
Yes,
Inspiring Philosophy is Theistic, even Christian, so...??
Edit: Had to double read your words, but what you say isn't entirely true. Yes, studies show religious belief is natural. If God belief is our natural predisposition, if ALL people hold deep convictions of concepts to do with God, then an Atheistic stance goes against what your natural human inclination is. You must therefore convince yourself that God doesn't exist, indeed delude yourself against deeply held concepts: "
Self-delusion is the act of deceiving one's self."
Here I'll ask you a question. How do you define your Atheism: 1) Lack of belief in God, or 2) Belief that God doesn't exist? If you answer with Option 1, like many self-identifying Atheists today commonly answer, making such statements like, "
God wouldn't even register in your mind except that Theists force their beliefs onto you." Clearly, scientific studies suggest you are deluding yourself since rooted in your human nature are deep seated "religious" concepts.
I haven't dug into all the papers and people presented to see how forceful a conclusion they take it to, whether they connect to logical dots through to this natural conclusion. Since many presented are Atheistic, they'd probably not want to venture there, right?
The first scientist presented is Jesse Bering, a psychological scientist who by no means identifies as Theist but rather is clearly Atheist. Bering is the really the first person quoted in the video, a quote taken from his peer reviewed article,
Atheism is only skin deep: Geertz and Markússon rely mistakenly on sociodemographic data as meaningful indicators of underlying cognition:
- "Cognitive scientists of religion and evolutionary theorists alike have been increasingly arguing in recent years that religion is "natural" in the sense of being motived by core, evolved psyhological intutions."
He is author of
The God Instinct, a book which
- "explores how people's everyday thoughts, behaviours and emotions betray an innate tendency to reason as though God were deeply invested in their public lives and secret affairs. In this entertaining and thought-provoking book, Jesse Bering unravels the evolutionary mystery of why we grapple for meaning, purpose and destiny in life. He argues that God is not merely an idea to be entertained or discarded based on the evidence. Nor is God a cultural invention, an existential band-aid, an opiate of the masses. Instead, Bering proposes, God is a way of thinking."
In
an article he wrote for The Guardian, Bering writes:
- In general, recent findings in the cognitive sciences cast considerable doubt on the everyday atheist's assumption that religion can be explained by a simple "wish fulfilment" theory – that we believe because we wish it to be true. I do not think this type of generic explanation is entirely intellectually bankrupt but I do think it is perfectly circular. Why does ours species need to feel like there is something bigger out there or to have a sense of purpose and so on to begin with? Do other animals have these same existential needs? If not, why don't they?
These are not just aimless psychological musings. Many scientists believe human beings evolved a suite of cognitive traits that are more or less unique to our species. This does not make us "better" than other animals but only different. And one of these uniquely human traits, commonly referred to as "theory of mind", is at the heart of every profound existential question you could ever hope to ask: What happens when we die? What is the meaning of life? Why do bad things happen to good people?
....
Is God a human instinct? It is instinctive for us to seek a grand, moralistic mind that is not there. God is the default stance. And as I describe in The God Instinct, the illusion of God solved a very specific evolutionary problem for our ancestors – that of reputation-harming (and thus gene-compromising) gossip. By inhibiting selfish behaviours that they feared would be punished by supernatural agents, our ancestors would have promoted their prosocial reputations among actual people. But unlike any previous generation, we are now in a position to correct that wayward stance through an informed understanding of why we sense a mental presence that never was. (bold emphasis mine)
Next mentioned and presented are some studies by Dr Justin Barrett, who is from the University of Oxford’s Centre for Anthropology and Mind, and has published numerous studies. A quick Google turns up one Oxford University study he helped run which found that '
human thought processes were "rooted" to religious concepts.':
- The co-director of the project, Professor Roger Trigg, from the University of Oxford, said the research showed that religion was “not just something for a peculiar few to do on Sundays instead of playing golf”.
“We have gathered a body of evidence that suggests that religion is a common fact of human nature across different societies,” he said.
“This suggests that attempts to suppress religion are likely to be short-lived as human thought seems to be rooted to religious concepts, such as the existence of supernatural agents or gods, and the possibility of an afterlife or pre-life.” (Belief in God is part of human nature - Oxford study)
I see it all the time. Atheists may resist, may not recognise in their absolute detestation of "god", even as they use lowercase to highlight their disdain for God they don't believe in while using an uppercase for Zeus who is harmless... such may not recognise it, yet I clearly discern it. 