Meta-study shows religious people are less intelligent

[cailin maith]

What do you mean? Are you suggesting faith is about choosing to believe something that you don't actually think is true?

No, I think I quoted the wrong bit.

Having faith (for me) is believing in what I have been told and whats in the bible. How would I be able to prove it's all true. I can't.... but I still believe it

[Board Game Geek]

But isn't that what faith is all about?

Not at all.

As far as I understand it, faith is about "belief, a strong convinction or feeling, a gut instinct, etc".

Imagine that I'm a visitor to this planet, and the concept of "Religion" and "God" is completely unknown to me.

We meet for a coffee and you explain about "God" and the rest of the story.

I listen with intent and ask you to provide solid evidence for me to assess.

It's not for me to say you are wrong, after all, I'm a visitor to this world and I don't know.

It's down to you to provide evidence to support your claim.

If you cannot, then how am I supposed to make a decision on the validity of the information ? I cannot can I ?

[Moscow Mule]

According to your "argument" I could say:

"Anyone got any evidence to prove God (that Muslim fundamentalists believe in ) desn't exist that hasn't been generated in their heads?

Do a bit of research Sas, it's al the same God, just different prophets.

What I find amazing is that people who existed a couple of thousand years ago still have a following - how charismatic must they have been?

[cailin maith]

Not at all.

As far as I understand it, faith is about "belief, a strong convinction or feeling, a gut instinct, etc".

Imagine that I'm a visitor to this planet, and the concept of "Religion" and "God" is completely unknown to me.

We meet for a coffee and you explain about "God" and the rest of the story.

I listen with intent and ask you to provide solid evidence for me to assess.

It's not for me to say you are wrong, after all, I'm a visitor to this world and I don't know.

It's down to you to provide evidence to support your claim.

But thats just your opinion.

You say "It's down to you to provide evidence to support your claim" - it's my faith, so why should I have to provide you with evidence. I'm not asking you to believe. I am asking for you to accept my beliefs.

[Moscow Mule]

Not at all.

As far as I understand it, faith is about "belief, a strong convinction or feeling, a gut instinct, etc".

Imagine that I'm a visitor to this planet, and the concept of "Religion" and "God" is completely unknown to me.

We meet for a coffee and you explain about "God" and the rest of the story.

I listen with intent and ask you to provide solid evidence for me to assess.

It's not for me to say you are wrong, after all, I'm a visitor to this world and I don't know.

It's down to you to provide evidence to support your claim.

I could show you primary evidence that Jesus existed. What I can't do is give you primary evidence of what he said.

[sasguru]

It's funny how "believers" always tie themselves in knots. It's really simple:

1. I have seen no evidence that God (as a supernatural being) exists.
2. I know many people believe in various "Gods" depending on culture.

Therefore I conclude that these various beliefs in "God/s" are artefacts of human culture and history.

I also conclude that as humans develop, and better explanations are discovered for natural phenomena, that it is likely such beliefs will become less and less prevalent, as has been seen in Western Europe.

Humans as a whole are currently still in a child-like stage of development.

[sasguru]

Do a bit of research Sas, it's al the same God, just different prophets.

What I find amazing is that people who existed a couple of thousand years ago still have a following - how charismatic must they have been?

What about the Hindus who are 1/5th of the population?
They have a pantheon of Gods.

[Mich the Tester]

No, I think I quoted the wrong bit.

Having faith (for me) is believing in what I have been told and whats in the bible. How would I be able to prove it's all true. I can't.... but I still believe it

Ah, you see, I'm very selective about believing what I've been told. I'm a tester, and a Geology student, and an amateur astronomer, so skepticism comes in handy. I can't simply go with believing something that someone told me if I think I have a reason to question it. That doesn't mean that what I've been told is nonsense, or that I simply disbelieve everything anyone ever tells me, which would be impractical; it just means that I can't really hold to a belief in something which I suspect cannot be proven by me or anyone else.

There are still plenty of things that science can't explain. We can't explain what happened in the first planck unit of time the universe's history, which is perhaps the most interesting bit, but I'll leave that to particle phycisists and cosmologists who are much brainier than me. We can't reliably or accurately predict volcanic eruptions or earthquakes, but hopefully in future I can play my tiny little part in helping to do a better job. This is what makes science worthwhile for me; the search for knowledge that we don't yet have. Quite where all this search for knowledge will lead us is unknown to me, but it's exciting to be part of it.

[Ruprect]

Do a bit of research Sas, it's al the same God, just different prophets.

Oh that's ok then. Are the hindu's wrong then?* What about the ancient greeks?

edit * dang, beaten to it

[deano]

The religious do tend to get quite angry in these types of threads...

Oh I'm not angry. None of what has been said will shake my faith at all. That's why it's called "faith".

You may think that makes me unthinking or unquestioning. Far from it. I agree with all the scientific discoveries such as The Big Bang, Evolutionary Theory and Relativity and quantum physics. Yep. All spot on. But I also refuse to limit my own concept of God, nor my own intellectual horizon to that narrow spectrum, and I also like to apply my curiosity to other areas that both reinforce and challenge my faith.

However the atheists do like to pretend they are some kind of radical, intellectual chic. But when pressed most of them haven't really got much of anything to back up their claims.

For interesting reading that reinforces my faith I could point out the the analysis of archeological finds in the Levant, and the mathematical doctine of statistical textual analysis as applied to many pieces of historical physical evidence, do add some scientific weight to not only the existence of Jesus Christ, but to his acts and the acts of the Apostles. But then any truly thinking atheist would have looked up this stuff already and would have taken the debate down this line.

Truly great thinkers however, have got some game. I don't pretend to know Marx's analysis of Hegelian philosphy in detail, but I have at least read it. The fact that he banned religion under Communism is enough for me to know he and I are not on the same side, but at least he went beyond the superficial and made a reasoned argument for the non-existence of God as part of his Dialectic Materialist philosophy. And if he can't make me give up my religion, then this little debate wont.