People Are Born with Religious Belief Argues New Book

Delirium

People Are Born with Religious Belief Argues New Book

[..]Justin Barrett’s argument in his new book, Born Believers: The Science of Children’s Religious Belief. Kids aren’t blank slates upon which we inscribe our religious or irreligious convictions. Rather, they arrive in the world with a strong, cognitively driven propensity for religious belief “preinstalled”—and, as in Anna’s case, it can be difficult to shake.

At first glance, it seems like the sort of books atheists and secularists everywhere would want to commit to memory. After all, Barrett, a psychologist at Fuller Theological Seminary who has dedicated his career to untangling the cognitive underpinnings of religious belief (his earlier book, Why Would Anyone Believe in God?, is an excellent primer on the subject), argues forcefully and convincingly that when it comes to kids’ brains, the deck is stacked against atheism. Children come into this world predisposed toward believing in supernatural entities—their “minds are naturally tuned up to believe in gods generally, and perhaps God in particular.” Drawing from a wide array of studies and experiments, including his own, Barrett shows that kids don’t need to be indoctrinated into religion, because their hardwiring all but guarantees that they will be believers, of a sort, whether or not their parents want them to be.

From the atheist perspective, this leads to some potentially fruitful arguments: we are led toward religious beliefs not because they are true, but by outdated components of our cognitive architecture, by evolutionary accidents that may no longer serve a purpose.

I wonder did all the kids fall into distinct religious categories of their parents when taking part in the experiments or were there a lot children who didn't have the same religious outlook as their parents?

And did they all fall into the recognised religions of the world, or were there kids who essentially created their own hybrid to explain things?

nozzferrahhtoo

I would be surprised if on reading the book he was actually arguing what the title of the link claims he is, that children are born with the beliefs of a religion installed.

Likely what he is arguing is that children are born very much prone to the kind of thought which LEADS to religious beliefs and he would get no argument from me on that. I have long expressed the same view on these forums.

There are many evolutionary attributes of humans that leave them prone to the religious way of thinking.

There are also interesting thought processes in children such as their tendency to talk about the dead as if they are still there. Having watched the death of a cartoon character for instance most kids say "no" when you ask them if the character is hungry any more. However if you ask them what the character "wants" they have all kinds of answers showing they still think of the character in the present real tense rather than past and gone.

All this is very different to saying they are born with religious belief however. Though as I said I would need to read the book to see what exactly the author is claiming... this is just what I expect he will turn out to be saying.

A useful analogy would be how silly it would be to write a whole book about the aspects of the human condition that leave us prone to getting the Common Cold. Or more precisely how the common cold has evolved to take advantage of aspects of the human condition.

Probably an interesting book if you are interested in that kind of thing, but clearly a bad title for an article about that book would be "People are born with the Common Cold Argues new Book".

I certainly agree with the core premise of the article and probably the book though. We are a species that very much seems born predisposed to the kind of thinking that leads one to being religious.

Delirium

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

I would be surprised if on reading the book he was actually arguing what the title of the link claims he is, that children are born with the beliefs of a religion installed.

I'm really going to have to put disclaimers into my OPs when I copy-paste a title from an article :P

From the article.

A controversial new book contends that we are all born predisposed to religious belief.

So the title is misleading considering what the article actually says.

nozzferrahhtoo

Oh sorry I got that too, I was just focusing on how bad a title it is. Article titles usually are but they are rarely titled by the author. Same with book titles actually so we should rarely blame the author for those.

Dawkins, Blackmore, Dennett and more have all explored or mentioned the idea we are predisposed to religious belief. I tend to agree and see many ways we are.

There are, of course, those who think that this constitutes evidence for a god. If part of our brain does something then that must be what it is "for" and hence the target of that utility must be real. So if we are predisposed to think there is a god, then there must be.

All this tells me really is that those without evidence for a proposition really will scrap it from anywhere.

Zamboni

I wouldn't be surprised if we are born predisposed to religious belief.

The most important thing about this idea though is;
Whether this is true or not, it has absolutely no bearing on the truth of any religion.

RichieC

Room in hospitals for Atheists only:

ShooterSF

I don't see the issue here. We're born predisposed to lots of silly things, confirmation bias and such. That's why we have an educational system to teach people to overcome faulty instincts...

lynski

this is an interesting topic for me, might even try to find the time to read the book.
I have a 5 yr old, 3 yr old and baby. (My 5 yr old goes to an ET school.)
They have no concept of god/heaven/hell/sin/etc
When we talk about religion or religious topic it is always in the context of 'some people believe' or 'in some peoples culture' or 'they believe their god says'
The oldest has said to me he does not believe in god but might believe in jesus because the man in the church at grandda's funeral talked about him.
He is also the child that at 4 told me that he did not think santa was real, just a story like god and bob the builder.
There may be a religious inclination in us all, but if they constructs are not given to a child, they do not 'develop' on their own, in my experience so far.
If is a changing and evolving process though, as being raised in the 'irish catholic' tradition things come up all the time that we have to think about for the first time and form new ways of teaching our children.

JuliusCaesar

A more usual claim is that we are somehow born with some kind of spiritual drive, but Reiss denies this.

The other claim is that we have a drive to seek explanations or causations or links for or between events, and that is more plausible. Generally, people come up with 'intuitive' or 'magical' explanations if they don't know the correct reason...but once they know the actual reason, they cease with the magical one. Unless of course they are invested in the original one for whatever reason.....

Hotblack Desiato

koth wrote: »

Barrett, a psychologist at Fuller Theological Seminary

Religious Guy Writes Pseudoscience Book Promoting Religion Shocker.

Spot of Borg

We are born not knowing or believing anything. An open slate. We are predisposed to learning and believing what we learn. This is why some children believe in "santa clause" until they grow out of it. We aren't predisposed to believing anything specific though.

Only my opinion.

Spot

Peregrinus

ninja900 wrote: »

Religious Guy Writes Pseudoscience Book Promoting Religion Shocker.

How is this promoting religion? The implication is that people who have religious beliefs have them because they are behaviourally compelled to, not because they are compelled by reason or evidence.

robindch

Spot of Borg wrote: »

We are born not knowing or believing anything. An open slate.

Not true. Have a read of just about anything by Stephen Pinker, or even his book The Blank Slate.

Sofaspud

lynski wrote: »

He is also the child that at 4 told me that he did not think santa was real, just a story like god and bob the builder.

This is a point I'm very interested in. I think the concept of Santa really helps children believe in the idea of God. They're taught, cutely, about this mythical character that they can never see that can see everything they do, rewards them if they're good and punishes them if they're bad.
This makes it so much easier to get them to believe in God, which is basically Santa for grown-ups.

I don't think kids are born with a predisposition towards believing in gods, but are simply more gullible as their only way of learning about the world is through what they're told.

zico10

lynski wrote: »

He is also the child that at 4 told me that he did not think santa was real, just a story like god and bob the builder.

Did you give him presents and pretend they were from Santa? If you did, you either did a poor job covering it up or you had a very intuitive 4 year old. Speaking personally I was fooled by the Santa story for a lot longer than 4 years, as I imagine were the majority of other posters here.

Spot of Borg

robindch wrote: »

Not true. Have a read of just about anything by Stephen Pinker, or even his book The Blank Slate.

Well. What a convincing argument you put forth. I guess I will have to go out and spend $35 on a book. So my opinion is "not true". Whodda thunkit.

Spot

robindch

Spot of Borg wrote: »

I guess I will have to go out and spend $35 on a book.

You don't need to. It's available from £1.40 from the UK:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-listing/014027605X/ref=sr_1_1_olp?ie=UTF8&qid=1333708956&sr=8-1&condition=used

Spot of Borg wrote: »

Well. What a convincing argument you put forth. So my opinion is "not true". Whodda thunkit.

The sarcasm isn't necessary. The "blank slate" idea is not supported by modern research for a variety of complex reasons. If you're interested in following this idea up, then it's probably worth a separate thread, so feel free to start one.

MagicMarker

Coincidentally, I read the first few chapter's of Pinker's book last night (kindle sample) and it seems like a heavy read! So much to take in!

lynski

zico10 wrote: »

Did you give him presents and pretend they were from Santa? If you did, you either did a poor job covering it up or you had a very intuitive 4 year old. Speaking personally I was fooled by the Santa story for a lot longer than 4 years, as I imagine were the majority of other posters here.

we have maintained the santa myth as i felt it was too far a leap to take in this society, i did not want then to be too far from the norm. but it was a struggle. I am not sure he 'really' believes, but he is happy to play along. we dont make a huge deal of it tho and we have our own norms (big pressies from mom and dad, little ones and books from the big man, and we have to pay for all)
I am waiting for the little sister to have a guess, she is the one who asked why all chimneys were not built big enough for santa
we have, however, knocked the easter bunny on the head; we have told them that there is no easter bunny, just stories like bob the builder, etc. cant be doing with that sh1t.

Spot of Borg

robindch wrote: »

You don't need to. It's available from £1.40 from the UK:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-listing/014027605X/ref=sr_1_1_olp?ie=UTF8&qid=1333708956&sr=8-1&condition=used

The sarcasm isn't necessary. The "blank slate" idea is not supported by modern research for a variety of complex reasons. If you're interested in following this idea up, then it's probably worth a separate thread, so feel free to start one.

Yes. The sarcasm was necessary and I dont see why I should start another thread just to disagree with you.

The idea of brains being predisposed to religious beliefs has been debunked. The same areas of the brain that are active in religious ppl are also active in non-believers when discussing science or any other factual information.

You quoted that 1 line of mine out of context. I said that children are predisposed to learning. Most kids that grow up with magical thinking learn that unicorns and fairies aren't real from their peers. In religious cultures children dont get this information so get stuck in this particular magical thinking because it is accepted by the majority of the ppl the child is exposed to.

Spot