Is Religious Belief Irrational?

[LazyGun]

Interesting article, recently published

From the article
"Supernatural beliefs might not make sense, but they endure because they're so emotionally satisfying"

Sounds about right to me.
Have a read, see what you think :)

http://www.salon.com/2013/01/13/jared_diamond_its_irrational_to_be_religious/

[chakka35]

Khandro, if you would like to start a separate thread on that I'll start the ball rolling with 'No'.

[joko]

woofgang, those are fairly harmless things though and they dont cause misery and suffering to millions

its irrational to believe if the tooth fairy - but as its harmless its accepted as a nice little thing to say to make kids feel better when they lose a tooth

[woofgang]

joko now we are back to the difference between a belief in god and organised religion which as I said, in my opinion is often crazier than a box of crazy things from the planet crazy. My post was intended to defend irrationality per se and not organised religion.

[keyplus90]

////Of course there are many things which our present knowledge cannot explain by using the powerful tool of reason. To which the only attitude should be 'we don't know yet and we may never know'.////

There are so many things in this world that are known to one person but not to another. Does that mean believing in that is irrational? Perhaps that person made abetter effort to know about that. Or perhaps God just gave him/her the knowledge you and me do not have.“ We do not know” and “It does not exist” are two different things.

[naomi24]

Keyplus,

1. //There are so many things in this world that are known to one person but not to another.//

Fact.

2.//Perhaps that person made abetter effort to know about that. //

Fact.

3.//Or perhaps God just gave him/her the knowledge you and me do not have.//

Since evidence for God is non-existent, that one has to be filed under ‘Irrational’.

//“ We do not know” and “It does not exist” are two different things.//

Fact.

Not a bad effort, but number 3 illustrates that your logic is still slightly awry. MTH.

[Khandro]

v_e; Yes, there must be madness in preferring reason to happiness.

[LazyGun]

I see you have reposted your query as a seperate question khandro - worth its own post, i think....

Thanks for the responses, folks. As Naomi was puzzled, so was I. I do not think you can equate the irrationality associated with a belief in a creator, designer and intercessory god, with say, choosing a favourite colour, or falling in love, or choosing a particular brand of iphone.

Whilst the processes that inform falling in love may not be immediately comprehensible to the conscious mind, that does not necessarily make the process of falling in love irrational. Similarly with choosing a colour, often informed by instinct - but that instinct in turn is based upon something,some experience, some association that you do not even recognise on a conscious level.

This is a very different thought process from rejecting the science, say, about the age of the earth, or the evidence for evolution. Its very different from recognising that the foundation of much of the "truth" proposed by those here who come to preach or evangelise stems from a literal interpretation of the bible, in itself an irrational act, given what we know about the history of the bible.

To state myth as fact takes a level of irrationality way beyond such trivial decisions as a favourite colour, in my opinion, and I do not actually think the process of "falling in love" is irrational.

There also seems to be a sort of inference that a level of irrationality is a requirement in order to experience joy, or the true beauty of objects, nature or people, but I would reject that also.

Interesting responses though :)

[chakka35]

khandro, by what convoluted thinking (I obviously cannot call it reason) do you assume that reason cannot ally with happiness. I am a man of reason and am extremely happy and fulfilled. Please explain.

And are you going to start that separate thread as I suggested?

[naomi24]

Chakka, he's started a separate thread.

http://www.theanswerbank.co.uk/Society-and-Culture/Religion-and-Spirituality/Question1207288.html

[mikey4444]

Of course its irrational ! If you said that you believed in fairies, dragons, or elves, would you expect other people to call you rational ?

Don't get me wrong....its entirely up to you what you believe in. Some people even think that the earth is flat ! See this ::::

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_Earth_Society

Irrational is defined by the dictionary as " Not consistent with, or using reason " If I re-wrote the dictionary, I would add "or common sense" to that definition.

All religion is the irrational belief in illogical circumstances. For example, rational people don't believe that the moon is made of green cheese, just because they weren't on the Apollo 11 mission. After all, not many people were ! They don't believe it because it would be daft to do so, and open them up to ridicule from everybody.

Why does this topic come up time and time again on AB ? The world is in a dreadful state at the moment...look what is happening in Syria for one.

Shouldn't we be discussing important issues rather than arguing how many fairies can sit on a pinhead ?

Exacerbated of Tunbridge Wells

[LazyGun]

Thanks for your contribution, exasperated from Tunbridge. :)

I posted this article in the first place because I was browsing the Salon, the online news magazine, and this article caught my eye. It can often be difficult to understand how otherwise rational people can have such a faith, so any article that explores why that might be contributes to the debate, which of course is what this sub-forum is all about!

Of course there are more important things going on in the world at the moment - but where does it say we can only talk about one issue at a time? I am sure you can multitask and devote time and thought to more than one issue, however important or petty that issue might be....

[Khandro]

'Exacerbated of Tunbridge Wells'; //look what is happening in Syria for one.
Shouldn't we be discussing important issues//
I'm afraid that not one of us can resolve the problems of Syria, but you can address your own spiritual path to some effect if you have the inclination.

[mikey4444]

I don't !

I am quite happy being rational, logical and inclined towards common sense !

Now can we talk about something important please ?

[naomi24]

Mikey, if you thought about the negative impact that religion has on this world – not least the on-going troubles in the Middle East - you would realise it is an extremely important subject that should not be ignored. You are not precluded from discussing the politics of Syria, but this section is not intended for that.

[chakka35]

Thanks, naomi. Have been unavoidably diverted onto less important things like health and so on. I'll try to catch up on his new thread.

[naomi24]

Chakka, nothing serious I hope?