Religions

I've never rank-ordered the major world religions on how appealing they are to me. Maybe I'll do that after finishing Stephen Prothero's "God is Not One," a book I've blogged about here and here.Prothero's clear descriptions of Islam, Christianity, Judaism, et.al. are helping me to better understand what turns me on, and off, about them. There's something to like in every religion, even if only a little (so far, Islam is my least favorite).This morning I finished the chapter on Judaism. I've always been intrigued by this religion, in large part because, as Prothero points out, Jews are exceedingly brilliant…

After putting up my post about Muslims in Pakistan going batshit crazy over a Facebook page that celebrates Everybody Draw Muhammed Day!, I got to thinking about how religious believers would be considered certifiably insane (or at least seriously out of touch with reality) if society didn't look upon collective delusions more favorably than individual wacked-out'ness.I mean, let's imagine that there aren't any religions on Earth. So...no unproven metaphysical dogmas. No faith-based theologies. No imagined heavens/hells, astral planes, or soul-traveling destinations. No hypothesized divine beings with miraculous powers. No hidden system of godly rewards and punishments. But people still have…

Why and how do religious believers choose to accept a particular faith out of the many choices available to them? (4200 is one estimate)Great question. Here's an ever better one: What makes someone confident that the religion they've chosen is true, while all the other religions are false?John W. Loftus examines these issues in a book he edited, "The Christian Delusion." The first chapter I read was by Loftus, "The Outsider Test for Faith Revisited." He used to be a minister, until his deconversion.I loved the chapter. It lays out problems with religious belief that I've been aware of for…

Humans are social creatures. We are drawn toward conforming with what other people are doing. Being a "lone wolf" usually is less comfortable than being part of a group. Sometimes herd-like behavior pays off. It surely did for our ancestors, or evolution wouldn't have produced such powerful pressures to go along and get along in us. If a saber-toothed tiger is attacking, running off by yourself likely isn't the favored survival strategy. Safety in numbers is the watchword in such situations. But not in others, as Shankar Vedantam shows in an intriguing chapter of "The Hidden Brain,"  a book I've…

It's strange that religiosity is so often associated with humility, selflessness, and lack of ego. Actually, the religious impulse is highly egotistical, as William James makes clear in his classic book, "The Varieties of Religious Experience."The pivot round which the religious life, as we have traced it, revolves, is the interest of the individual in his private personal destiny. Religion, in short, is a monumental chapter in the history of human egotism.There's nothing wrong with this. We just need to remember that human nature is part and parcel of religious belief. People turn to religion in much the same way…

After reading a fascinating article in Newsweek about how antidepressants appear to be no more effective than a placebo, I got to wondering whether religions operate the same way.Patients on a placebo improved about 75 percent as much as those on drugs. Put another way, three quarters of the benefit from antidepressants seems to be a placebo effect.When people believe that a placebo -- a sham medical intervention -- is an effective treatment, that belief often is self-fulfilling. Meaning, they get better because they believed they should get better.How this happens is largely a mystery. But there are some promising…

Recently I attended a memorial service for my sister. She died about a month ago. I was sad the day I learned the news, but had largely come to terms with her death. I didn't expect the service to be a laugh-fest, but its rather gloomy nature surprised me. Religion seemingly was to blame. My sister wasn't at all religious, but the memorial service was held at a funeral chapel that reeked of religiosity. Walking in with my wife and brother-in-law, we were met by the black-suited proprietor who gravely, so to speak, said: "I'm so sorry for the pain…

Daniel Dennett has a nice piece in the Washington Post about not allowing religious believers to be a protected class — immune from the consequences of their bizarre beliefs.

When I was young, drunk drivers tended to be excused because, after all, they were drunk! Today, happily, we hold them doubly culpable for any misdeeds they commit while under the influence.

I look forward to the day when violence done under the influence of religious passion is considered more dishonorable, more shameful, than crimes of avarice, and is punished accordingly, and religious leaders who incite such acts are regarded with the same contempt that we reserve for bartenders who send dangerously disabled people out onto the highways.

I also liked how Dennett wants pastors who spout unscientific crap from the pulpit to be held accountable for their dishonesty.

(I'm unsure if the Post allows access to the piece for those who haven't registered on their site, so I'll copy it into a continuation to this post.)

Over on my other blog, HinesSight, I wrote a 2008 post that chastised a Portland talk show host: "Atheism isn't a religion, Thom Hartmann."Usually I agree with Portland's Thom Hartmann, Air America's progressive talk show host. But this morning he kept saying that atheism is a religion – that not believing in God is a belief system. That's ridiculous. It shows that no matter how smart and articulate Hartmann is, he's got some blind spots. Those logic-obscurers likely stem from his Christianity. I approvingly quoted from a right on piece cleverly titled "Religion of Atheism: if atheism is religion, 'albino'…