New Theory: Why More Intelligent People Tend to be Less Religious

[Sunstone]

I would think an intelligent person would know how to spell intelligent in the title of a thread??

Thanks for the heads up.

 

[Sunstone]

This ridiculous thread is based on the mistaken hypothesis that intelligent people are superior to less intelligent or normal intelligence people....

Nothing in the OP nor in the article says that intelligent people are superior to less intelligent people in any way but intelligence. So how could the thread be based on that notion, when that notion is not even mentioned?

 

[Lyndon]

Thanks for the heads up.

Wasn't trying to get personal but this is a thread about intelligence where intelligent has been mispelled!!

 

[Lyndon]

Nothing in the OP nor in the article says that intelligent people are superior to less intelligent people in any way but intelligence. So how could the thread be based on that notion, when that notion is not even mentioned?

It goes without saying.........

 

[Sunstone]

Wasn't trying to get personal but this is a thread about intelligence where intelligent has been mispelled!!

Dude, I've easily posted over 1,000 threads in my 13 years on RF. I have misspelled a word in a title perhaps once a year. Give it a rest!

 

[Sunstone]

It goes without saying.........

Oh? What else that isn't in the OP or article "goes without saying"?

 

[Lyndon]

Oh? What else that isn't in the OP or article "goes without saying"?

The implication is if you are intelligent, you wouldn't believe in God, and believing in God is a function of being stupid. Really this is a good example of atheist proselytizing that I brought up in my now deleted thread.

 

[Sunstone]

The implication is if you are intelligent, you wouldn't believe in God, and believing in God is a function of being stupid.

Since when has correlation proven causation?

 

[Lyndon]

Since when has correlation proven causation?

Since when is your survey any more accurate than the ones predicting Hillary would be president??

 

[Valjean]

I think many of the atheists are part of the "last winner" generation, in that they need to feel smarter, special, and unique even when they're basic as all hell or simply as dumb as anyone else.

I don't think most atheists are that invested in their atheism, MM. It's not part of their ego-identity and they don't use it as a status marker.

The generations before us were devote religious people for the most part, and they have done more than any recent generation.

Religion held sway for thousands of years, and mankind achieved squat.
Intellectual and technological progress proceeded at a snail's pace, sometimes even went into reverse, as when Roman paganism gave way to Christianity.
It was only when people began questioning the religious assumptions underlying the social order, often at great personal hazard, that human achievement really took off.

Your beliefs don't indicate your IQ, nor does the stuff you memorize. Most people simply memorize the talking points of something and since it sounds good just go along. To argue that makes someone smarter than someone else is silly.

But that's the point. The article proposes the opposite.Those who just go along with what sounds good are the dummies. It's those who question, investigate and analyze who are "smarter."

Most religions can only touch base with their own constituents, but the message of atheism was clear and did not feel like it warranted biased pretenses.

What is this clear message of atheism? Isn't atheism the epistemic default; the blank slate we're born with?

In any case, I don't believe that everybody has this "instinctual religiosity" you so claim. Many people are happy without religion and find value in life in other ways. My own "instinctual religiosity" flickers from time to time, but never to the point to become wholly renounced and entrenched into one particular belief preset. Faith nor doubt is completely instinctual; they both have to be introduced to us before we could to our conclusion.

No, we're born atheists, but with varying degrees of innate apophenia, overcaution, princess Alice effect, &c, that pave the way for religious indoctrination.

Regarding point 1, that religiosity is rooted in instinct, it seems a problematic issue. At least from my own experience, it's something that's taught from a very young age. I don't think I felt any religious "instinct." Many of my instincts probably pulled me in a direction contrary to what religions teach.

"Religious instinct," I think, isn't so much an innate religiosity but, rather, a cluster of psychological characteristics that pave the way, or confer a predilection for, the development of religious belief.

 

[Sunstone]

Since when is your survey any more accurate than the ones predicting Hillary would be president??

Now you're just reaching.

 

[Sunstone]

"Religious instinct," I think, isn't so much an innate religiosity but, rather, a cluster of psychological characteristics that pave the way, or confer a predilection for, the development of religious belief.

Precisely.

What Twins Reveal About The Science Of Faith

See also the work of Steven Pinker, Scott Atran, Stephen Gould, etc.

 

[The Holy Bottom Burp]

Yeah, I don't think this sort of headline grabbing "research" helps explain anything. There are so many different factors that could skew the outcome, like religious people in poorer nations don't get the same educational opportunities as those from wealthier nations for example, and religion tends to flourish where there is poverty. Also, in some religious cultures, your educational opportunities may be curtailed if you female for example, so there goes another large chunk of people who make up the religious groups.There are more questions than answers basically, but hey if researchers want to get a bit of publicity they are not shy about making the odd unwarranted claim right?

 

[DavidFirth]

I don't care much about how intelligent people think I am. I just care about the truth.

 

[Valjean]

A weight of studies over the years have found a negative correlation between intelligence and religiosity. But if that's the case, then why is it so? A new theory proposes that the reason more intelligent people tend to be less religious is because (1) religiosity is rooted in instinct, and (2) more intelligent people are able to overcome their instinctual religiosity relatively more often than less intelligent people.

Source: The reason why atheists are more intelligent

What do you make of the theory?

I don't know that this is a new theory. Human psychology, no less than human anatomy, is a product of natural selection. I'd be surprised if none of the previous researchers had not tied this to evolutionary psychology.

 

[Brickjectivity]

Intelligent people cause reform. They can act in the extreme by rejecting religion, or they can steer a little. Sometimes they get out and push. It all depends, but the result is they reform it.

 

[Brickjectivity]

Also, sometimes they are strapped to the grill and driven home like a prize buck.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

The implication is if you are intelligent, you wouldn't believe in God, and believing in God is a function of being stupid.

No, that isn't the implication. Here's what it actually is:

- less intelligent people will be more guided by instinct, which will tend to guide them to religion.

- more intelligent people will be less guided by instinct. What they are guided by instead could guide them to religion or not, but it will guide them to religion at a lower rate than instinct would.

 

[bobhikes]

A weight of studies over the years have found a negative correlation between intelligence and religiosity. But if that's the case, then why is it so? A new theory proposes that the reason more intelligent people tend to be less religious is because (1) religiosity is rooted in instinct, and (2) more intelligent people are able to overcome their instinctual religiosity relatively more often than less intelligent people.

Source: The reason why atheists are more intelligent

What do you make of the theory?


At the risk of pointing out the obvious: Just because there is a well established negative correlation between intelligence and religiosity does not mean that all religious people are dumb and all non-religious people are smart, or that all religious people are dumber than all non-religious people. Second, the focus of this discussion should be the notions that (1) religiosity is instinctual and (2) relatively high intelligence allows people to more readily overcome instincts. If you wish to discuss the negative correlation between religiosity and intelligence, get your own thread.

Define Intelligent people.

 

[A Vestigial Mote]

Intelligence is just another attribute to have more or less of... it doesn't make anyone objectively "better" necessarily. In specific instances, having this attribute in abundance might serve you well toward some meaningful goal - like survival - but there are other circumstances where strength or speed are the better suited. Hell, there are even circumstances where ignorance is what is going to get you through a trial.

So, anyone displaying high amounts of butt-hurtedness over the OP's attempt to report what may simply be a factual correlation in examined study data is probably only feeling that way because they are hyper-sensitive to being called "stupid."

Just stop and think - what if the study findings were, instead, that religious people tended to speak in a higher decibel range? Would there be any outcry over this? Would anyone feel slighted or insulted by this finding? What if it stated that religious people were the ones who were more intelligent? I would imagine a fair number of those currently complaining would quickly turn to gloating once the numbers worked out in their favor.

Ask yourself - why is this of such great significance? I can assure you it isn't. It is of as mmuch significance as studying which camp eats more pistachios.