Do you believe those who are religious

[Toobluntt]

have lower intelligence, in general because they believe in a God, than non believers/non religious people?

I ask because I saw a comment as such on another thread in AIBU, and it's something I've heard/read before, that some people (obviously non-believers) question the intelligence of those who believe in God, or follow an organised religion.

I am not saying this is what I believe, I'm just genuinely interested to know if this is a commonly held view, or not, and if so, why you think this way.

No

i know of a few people who quote Richard Dawkins that faith is a form of mental illness and then pat themselves on the back for being so intellectual

Interestingly they have complete faith in Richard Dawkins he has a cult type following

Convoluted nonsense doesn’t need to be matched like for like in order to be defined, especially not for the benefit of group-thinkers who feel repeated regurgitation thereof adequately validates their argument.

@MaybeRevisitYourWipingT3chnique writes ".....the basic scientific principle that something cannot come from nothing .........."

The more I watch nature programmes I am in awe of the wonders of nature. The tiny details of a creature or plant that make all the difference to their existence.

I have no answer.

Tell me, is @KarstRegion working you with their foot or is it just the groupthink kicking back in?

‘Convoluted’? If you struggle to understand the methodology and/or definitions of intelligence or religiosity etc used in the (enormous numbers of) studies, maybe just admit that, rather than lashing out and dismissing a vast amount of peer-reviewed research carried out by different institutions in different countries as ‘some clown’s’ concocted discrediting theory’.

You get that all theories are ‘concocted’, right? That’s the point of a theory. You evolve a research question and collect data and analyse it to see if results bear out your question or not.

Your lashing out suggests you take this research as a personal attack on your worldview.

@TooBigForMyBoots - re "Theists question and justify their belief in their God."

All religious people have questioned and somehow justified the existence of God without a shred of proof? Where is you evidence for this conviction?

It is not even just the question of whether or not a watchmaker God may have created our universe. I doubt all religious people question their belief in all aspects of their religion. Some of the more tenuous bits of many religions would not stand the test of even the slightest inspection.

Take Transubstantiation, a core belief of Catholicism. The first time I heard about this from an otherwise reasonable Catholic friend, I thought she was joking. No, it seems she and all her Catholic friends believe that in the priest's hand bread literally changes into the flesh of a man dead and decayed for over 2,000 years, and the wine changes into the same corps's long-gone blood. Not as symbols, not as metaphors, but a real change.

It seems to me that they have never questioned Transubstantiation. If some have questioned it and found it acceptable, then I would indeed wonder how intelligent they can possibly be.

@TooBigForMyBoots - re "It's your belief that you are objective about everything that I am asking about."

I don't believe that and I don't find it amusing that you are bringing down the intellectual level of this discussion by trying such a cheap trick.

No doubt I was not objective about the cuteness of my DC as toddlers, but that is not the subject of this thread. My exact words were that I have no beliefs or convictions that I can't explain the rational basis for.

The absence of belief is not a belief. This is often touted against non-believers like, "You say God doesn't exist and that's a belief, too!" - but for most of us it is just that we are not convinced by your God hypothesis. You know, the one about a Creator that then expects certain behaviors and sends you to hell for eternal suffering if you don't obey. And that simply because it makes no sense and you have no proof whatsoever.

And that even before the convoluted magical story that starts with a married virgin (?) impregnated by a spirit (?) giving birth to God himself (?) because said God needs to die a torturous, horrific death in order to forgive humanity (???) whom he says he created in his image in the first place...

@shouldntbeonhereagain - I am not angry at all, not with you or anyone else on here. If I were any calmer I would be sleeping

What do I think of someone who believes that a man and his family built a gigantic wooden boat, collected and housed 2 of every animal in the world, from Antarctica to Africa, from Kangaroos to British Adders, for over a month and those two of every animal repopulated the entire Earth themselves? Seems legit and I can't see why I would think any less of the intelligence of anyone who believes it.

Lashing out? Calm down.

We live in a world full of theories and models and the “studies” used to serve the narrative with which they are propagated. Try looking around you at the state of the world and ask yourself where the value is in any of them.

Your suggestion that I am “lashing out” by laughing at the idea of so much time, effort and money going into trying to prove stupidity says a lot more about you than it does me.

I don't think you know what a meta-analysis is. It is merely a statistical, quantitive analysis of a large number of studies in a field, and the only purpose is to see the common ground of those studies.

It doesn't start with a hypothesis, it is not the half-baked idea of "some clown" since the methodology and calculations are peer-reviewed, and it is not "convoluted" at least for those of us with a minimum understanding of statistics.

Re "group thinkers" - That description surely more closely fits adherents of a religion who all believe the same story and recite the same lines from the same book, than individuals from different backgrounds who question said story in their own different ways

I am glad you are not angry. You definitely present someone who is. You must know though, so if indeed the case, the only conclusion I can then draw from your posts is that you are extremely rude! You have presented your argument in a highly reductive way, which results in a lack of progression in the conversation. Regarding some of the content of your responses to posts from @TooBigForMyBoots : @CoteDAzur you seem to be labouring under the misapprehension that a dogmatic interpretation of some aspects of the Roman Catholic tradition constitute 'religious belief'. You have given yourself permission to been continually irritated on this thread by people using anecdotal evidence 'my cousin is religious and intelligent" etc to defend their position in the face of your favourite 'meta- analyses'. It is surprising therefore, that you don't seem aware that you are doing the same thing here. By conflating a particular subset of beliefs, taken from an extreme position in one denomination of one world faith and using it to demonstrate how people of faith are not intelligent. Again, I refer you to some general reading around the reality, nature and diversity of faith. The original question was about the relationship between two concepts: religious belief and intelligence. Whatever you say, it is clear to anyone who wishes to see it, that these are both culturally determined and received concepts; both are interpreted and understood subjectively. Neither of these terms, despite your protestations to the contrary, is an objective fact. You may find that confronting, but I suggest that is exactly where this debate really begins. I have previously posted you a link to a publication designed to unpack this idea, but you have chosen not to engage.In order to discuss the relationship of these two concepts in any meaningful way, it is imperative that you interrogate those terms. Untill you are prepared to do that, you cannot expect to be taken seriously.

You really don’t understand research questions or data collection and analysis.

@CoteDAzur Your understanding of Christian Theology is unfortunately very flawed and your tone is offensive (and I am not even a Christian!) Please hold yourself to the same standards you ask of other people and attempt to establish an accurate picture of the ideas you are trying to discuss.
Your misunderstandings in relation to what you consider Christian belief are representative of a mindset which remains blind to many of the nuances of human history.
Some understanding of how you, yourself are also product of a particular historical environment, might be enlightening. It is always beneficial to inform yourself, or at least have the humility to accept you have things to learn. Every generation is responding to their own traditions and drawing their own 'truths'. "Married Virgin" suits your argument because it allows you to ridicule. It also demonstrates your lack of understanding about the cultural context of the gospel narrative. These are exactly the sort of ideas which are open to interpretation and are not easily defined or contained within a scientific study. That does not make them less valid or less pertinent to the question. Everyone is a product of their environment, you are no exception. The way you express yourself and the lens you put on the world, is subject to the same factors as every human being ever. You can't escape your own subjectively, however uncomfortable that makes you feel.
Mary and Joseph were not married, or even engaged, when Jesus was conceived, they were betrothed. To Modern readers do not note the distinction in the translation, but in ancient Jewish culture, that distinction meant everything. There were two steps to marriage, the first being the betrothal, or 'erusin' a formal committment to marriage.

Statistical data being collected to support a theory, everything starts with an idea, on a relationship between religiosity and intellect is more indicative of the mental capacity of the peers getting carried along by process and groupthink while marking each others homework than it does about the cognitive abilities of the subjects of that data.

I don't think you can see the irony in that.

Again, you don’t understand how research or academic peer-reviewing works.

I understand that it can be abused, manipulated and misrepresented to serve narrative and agenda.

It happens in politics, televised political debates and dead-end internet discussions all the time.

I definitely know how patronising, condescending irrelevance works as a means to "play to the gallery".

...and that's before it's used a second time.

How many of the studies have you actually read, before coming out with this defensive farrago, which appears to be based on nothing more than a deeply-entrenched desire for the findings of all of this research to be Completely Without Validity?

Look, even read the Wiki entry on the topic, which will give you some links to individual studies and give a superficial overview of how many meta-analyses and updates of the research have, far from ‘peers getting carried along by process and groupthink and marking each other’s homework’ constituted professionals pointing out issues with the initial studies, like the fact that most concentrate on Christians in developed countries, and reevaluating them.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religiosity_and_intelligence

You’ve invented a particularly flimsy straw man, based on what looks awfully like fear of what a considerable of research suggests may be true. Anyway, why do you care if your belief system correlates with a lower IQ in a number of studies? From your POV, you’re cherished by a deity who sees the fall of every sparrow and has promised you eternal life.

Tell me, is @KarstRegion working you with their foot or is it just the groupthink kicking back in?

@srailfonaidraug Nobody is 'working me with their foot' nor am I being influenced by any 'groupthink'

I am simply using my own brain to think.

I am truly baffled by your ignorance and unwillingness to be open minded and think critically about some of the assertions you're making here.

I do have to question how grown adults can place their whole religious faith in something that has not been seen/proven, and especially so if they believe the narrative that earth was created by this other worldly being in 5 days. I'm not religious, but appreciate that there will be lots of religious people who are more intelligent than me and many who aren't.

I, on the other hand, am not even the slightest bit baffled by your blatant disingenuousness throughout this thread.

Who on earth are you to call on me to self-audit? Go back and read yourself.

Ok, I’m not going to respond to you further, @srailfonaidraug. You’re clearly not very well, and your faith, whatever benefits it might bring, doesn’t appear to be bringing much happiness or peace of mind.

You're not going to respond to me further... but only after you've left another straw man, but wearing a white coat this time eh?

Off you shuffle then, back under your bridge.