The Founding Fathers on Religion
As the quotes on this page illustrate, the claim that America was founded on Christianity is a myth. Many of the Founding Fathers and Revolutionary War leaders were Deists, and upheld a firm separation of church and state.
Webster's New World Dictionary -- Third College Edition
Deism: (1) The belief in the existence of a God on purely rational grounds without reliance on revelation or authority; especially in the 17th and 18th centuries. (2) The doctrine that God created the world and its natural laws, but takes no further part in its functioning.
United States Constitution
The First Amendment
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion..."
Article VI, Section 3
"...no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States."
John Adams (the second President of the United States)
Adams signed the Treaty of Tripoli (June 7, 1797). Article 11 states:
"The government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion."
From a letter to Charles Cushing (October 19, 1756):
"Twenty times in the course of my late reading, have I been upon the point of breaking out, 'this would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it.'"
From a letter to Thomas Jefferson:
"I almost shudder at the thought of alluding to the most fatal example of the abuses of grief which the history of mankind has preserved -- the Cross. Consider what calamities that engine of grief has produced!"
Additional quotes from John Adams:
"Where do we find a precept in the Bible for Creeds, Confessions, Doctrines and Oaths, and whole carloads of trumpery that we find religion encumbered with in these days?"
"The Doctrine of the divinity of Jesus is made a convenient cover for absurdity."
"...Thirteen governments [of the original states] thus founded on the natural authority of the people alone, without a pretence of miracle or mystery, and which are destined to spread over the northern part of that whole quarter of the globe, are a great point gained in favor of the rights of mankind."
Thomas Jefferson (the third President of the United States)
Jefferson's interpretation of the first amendment in a letter to the Danbury Baptist Association (January 1, 1802):
"Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between church and State."
From Jefferson's biography:
"...an amendment was proposed by inserting the words, 'Jesus Christ...the holy author of our religion,' which was rejected 'By a great majority in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and the Mohammedan, the Hindoo and the Infidel of every denomination.'"
Jefferson's "The Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom":
"Our civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions, more than on our opinions in physics and geometry....The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg."
From Thomas Jefferson's Bible:
"The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the Supreme Being as his father, in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter."
Jefferson's Notes on Virginia:
"Reason and persuasion are the only practicable instruments. To make way for these free inquiry must be indulged; how can we wish others to indulge it while we refuse ourselves? But every state, says an inquisitor, has established some religion. No two, say I, have established the same. Is this a proof of the infallibility of establishments?"
Additional quotes from Thomas Jefferson:
"It is error alone which needs the support of government. Truth can stand by itself."
"They [the clergy] believe that any portion of power confided to me, will be exerted in opposition of their schemes. And they believe rightly: for I have sworn upon the alter of god eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man."
"I have examined all the known superstitions of the world, and I do not find in our particular superstition of Christianity one redeeming feature. They are all alike founded on fables and mythology. Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned. What has been the effect of this coercion? To make one half of the world fools and the other half hypocrites; to support roguery and error all over the earth."
"In every country and in every age the priest has been hostile to liberty; he is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own."
"Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded fear....Do not be frightened from this inquiry by any fear of its consequences. If it end in a belief that there is no God, you will find incitements to virtue on the comfort and pleasantness you feel in its exercise and in the love of others which it will procure for you."
"Christianity...[has become] the most perverted system that ever shone on man....Rogueries, absurdities and untruths were perpetrated upon the teachings of Jesus by a large band of dupes and importers led by Paul, the first great corrupter of the teaching of Jesus."
"...that our civil rights have no dependence on religious opinions, any more than our opinions in physics and geometry."
James Madison (the fourth President of the United States)
Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments:
"Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise....During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less, in all places, pride and indolence in the clergy; ignorance and servility in laity; in both, superstition, bigotry, and persecution."
Additional quote from James Madison:
"Religion and government will both exist in greater purity, the less they are mixed together."
Benjamin Franklin
From Franklin's autobiography, p. 66:
"My parents had given me betimes religious impressions, and I received from my infancy a pious education in the principles of Calvinism. But scarcely was I arrived at fifteen years of age, when, after having doubted in turn of different tenets, according as I found them combated in the different books that I read, I began to doubt of Revelation itself."
From Franklin's autobiography, p. 66:
"...Some books against Deism fell into my hands....It happened that they wrought an effect on me quite contrary to what was intended by them; for the arguments of the Deists, which were quote to be refuted, appeared to me much stronger than the refutations, in short, I soon became a thorough Deist."
Thomas Paine
From The Age of Reason, pp. 89:
"I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of....Each of those churches accuse the other of unbelief; and of my own part, I disbelieve them all."
From The Age of Reason:
"All natural institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian, or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit."
From The Age of Reason:
"The most detestable wickedness, the most horrid cruelties, and the greatest miseries that have afflicted the human race have had their origin in this thing called revelation, or revealed religion."
From The Age of Reason:
"What is it the Bible teaches us? -- rapine, cruelty, and murder."
From The Age of Reason:
"Loving of enemies is another dogma of feigned morality, and has beside no meaning....Those who preach the doctrine of loving their enemies are in general the greatest prosecutors, and they act consistently by so doing; for the doctrine is hypocritical, and it is natural that hypocrisy should act the reverse of what it preaches."
From The Age of Reason:
"The Bible was established altogether by the sword, and that in the worst use of it -- not to terrify but to extirpate."
Additional quote from Thomas Paine:
"It is the duty of every true Deist to vindicate the moral justice of God against the evils of the Bible."
Ethan Allen
From Religion of the American Enlightenment:
"Denominated a Deist, the reality of which I have never disputed, being conscious that I am no
Sunday, June 29, 2008
High IQ turns academics into atheists
Intelligence is a predictor of religious scepticism, a professor has argued. Rebecca Attwood reports
Belief in God is much lower among academics than among the general population because scholars have higher IQs, a controversial academic claimed this week.
In a forthcoming paper for the journal Intelligence, Richard Lynn, emeritus professor of psychology at the University of Ulster, will argue that there is a strong correlation between high IQ and lack of religious belief and that average intelligence predicts atheism rates across 137 countries.
In the paper, Professor Lynn - who has previously caused controversy with research linking intelligence to race and sex - says evidence points to lower proportions of people holding religious beliefs among "intellectual elites".
The paper - which was co-written with John Harvey, who does not report a university affiliation, and Helmuth Nyborg, of the University of Aarhus, Denmark - cites studies including a 1990s survey that found that only 7 per cent of members of the American National Academy of Sciences believed in God. A survey of fellows of the Royal Society found that only 3.3 per cent believed in God at a time when a poll reported that 68.5 per cent of the general UK population were believers.
Professor Lynn told Times Higher Education: "Why should fewer academics believe in God than the general population? I believe it is simply a matter of the IQ. Academics have higher IQs than the general population. Several Gallup poll studies of the general population have shown that those with higher IQs tend not to believe in God."
He said that most primary school children believed in God, but as they entered adolescence - and their intelligence increased - many began to have doubts and became agnostics.
He added that most Western countries had seen a decline of religious belief in the 20th century at the same time as their populations had become more intelligent.
Andy Wells, senior lecturer in psychology at the London School of Economics, said the existence of a correlation between IQ and religiosity did not mean there was a causal relationship between the two.
Gordon Lynch, director of the Centre for Religion and Contemporary Society at Birkbeck, University of London, said that any examination of the decline of religious belief needed to take into account a wide and complex range of social, economic and historical factors.
He added: "Linking religious belief and intelligence in this way could reflect a dangerous trend, developing a simplistic characterisation of religion as primitive, which - while we are trying to deal with very complex issues of religious and cultural pluralism - is perhaps not the most helpful response."
Alistair McFadyen, senior lecturer in Christian theology at the University of Leeds, said that Professor Lynn's arguments appeared to have "a slight tinge of intellectual elitism and Western cultural imperialism as well as an antireligious sentiment".
David Hardman, principal lecturer in learning development at London Metropolitan University, said: "It is very difficult to conduct true experiments that would explicate a causal relationship between IQ and religious belief. Nonetheless, there is evidence from other domains that higher levels of intelligence are associated with a greater ability - or perhaps willingness - to question and overturn strongly felt intuitions."
rebecca.attwood@tsleducation.com.
Thursday, June 26, 2008
George Washington and Religion
Washington gives us little in his writings to indicate his personal religious beliefs. As noted by Franklin Steiner in "The Religious Beliefs Of Our Presidents" (1936), Washington commented on sermons only twice. In his writings, he never referred to "Jesus Christ." He attended church rarely, and did not take communion - though Martha did, requiring the family carriage to return back to the church to get her later.
When trying to arrange for workmen in 1784 at Mount Vernon, Washington made clear that he would accept "Mohometans, Jews or Christians of any Sect, or they may be Atheists." Washington wrote Lafayette in 1787, "Being no bigot myself, I am disposed to indulge the professors of Christianity in the church that road to heaven which to them shall seem the most direct, plainest, easiest and least liable to exception."
Clear evidence of his personal theology is lacking, even on his deathbed when he died a "death of civility" without expressions of Christian hope. His failure to document beliefs in conventional dogma, such as a life after death, is a clue that he may not qualify as a conventional Christian. Instead, Washington may be closer to a "warm deist" than a standard Anglican in colonial Virginia.
He was complimentary to all groups and attended Quaker, German Reformed, and Roman Catholic services. In a world where religious differences often led to war, Washington was quite conscious of religious prejudice. However, he joked about it rather than exacerbated it. Washington once noted that he was unlikely to be affected by the German Reformed service he attended, because he did not understand a word of what was spoken.
Washington was an inclusive, "big tent" political leader seeking support from the large numbers of Anglicans, Baptists, Presbyterians, and Quakers in Virginia, and even more groups on a national level. He did not enhance his standing in some areas by advocating support for a particular theology, and certainly did not identify "wedge issues" based on religious differences. Instead, in late 1775, Washington banned the Protestant celebration of the Pope's Day (a traditional mocking of the Catholic leader) by the Continental Army. He deplored the sectarian strife in Ireland, and wished the debate over Patrick Henry's General Assessment bill would "die an easy death."
Washington was not anti-religion. Washington was not uninterested in religion. He was a military commander who struggled to motivate raw troops in the French and Indian War. He recognized that recruiting the militia in the western part of Virginia required accommodating the Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, Baptists, and Dutch Reformed members in officially-Anglican Virginia. He was aware that religious beliefs were a fundamental part of the lives of his peers and of his soldiers. He knew that a moral basis for the American Revolution and the creation of a new society would motivate Americans to support his initiatives - and he knew that he would receive more support if he avoided discriminating against specific religious beliefs.
In the Revolutionary War, Washington supported troops selecting their own chaplains (such as the Universalist John Murray) while trying to avoid the development of factions within the army. Religion offered him moral leverage to instill discipline, reduce theft, deter desertion, and minimize other rambunctious behaviors that upset local residents. It was logical for Washington to invoke the name of the Divine, but it may have been motivated more by a desire for improving life on earth rather than dealing with life after death.
Wahington understood the distinction between morality and religion, and between toleration of differences and full religious liberty. Washington's replies to messages from Jews and Swedenborgians showed he was not merely accepting the differences of religion, tolerating those who had not chosen the correct path. Instead, he endorsed what Jefferson would later define as a "wall of separation between church and state."
Washington used generic terms with his public requests for divine assistance, to the extent that his personal denomination must be classified as "unknown." That vagueness has not stopped Episcopalians, Presbyterians, and Unitarian Universalists from claiming him as a member, and has invited others to identity him as a Deist. Washington was a man dedicated to creating national unity, not an exclusionist seeking to identify and select those with correct beliefs for reward in this life or the next. It would have been inconsistent for him to seek to blend the westerners and the Tidewater residents, the Yankees from the north and the slave-owning planters from the South, into one national union - while at the same time supporting narrow religious tests for officeholders, or advocating the superiority of one religious sect over another.
The obelisk we call the Washington Monument is clad in white limestone. When illuminated at night, it glows white. It stands out from the dark background because of the artificial light we project on it; there is no natural light corning from the stone. If we projected a colored light, we'd see the tall Washington Monument as an object glowing with color. Similarly, many writers project onto Washington's life a set of religious beliefs - and see a reflection of what they project.
Mason Locke Weems manufactured stories to establish Washington as a pious Christian, a man who suceeded in part because he prayed for God's blessing. Weems was a parson, and his inaccuracies (including the moralistic "I can not tell a lie" tale about cutting down a cherry tree) have shaped the perspective of Washington for two centuries now. Many modern writers still repeat second-hand information of questionable reliability to describe Washington as a traditional Protestant. The individuals who describe Washington's life as one marked by prayer and steady attendance at church are often advocates of a religious perspective, proselytizing the perspective of a particular denomination or at least trying to shape American society so more people attend church regularly.
At times, they cite the generic proclamations issued as a public leader to portray Washington (or even Jefferson!) as a mainstream Christian, and to define the United States as a Christian Nation. Some of those who emphasize the personal faith - or faithlessness - of elected officials use it as a partisan issue. The Moral Majority led by Rev. Jerry Falwell was clearly allied with the Republican Party, and both Jimmy Carter and Pat Robertson used religion as part of his campaign for the presidency.
In modern America, many religious leaders consider personal salvation to be fundamental to the strength/survival of American society. The debate about the morality of elected officials has been intense since the realization that Lyndon Johnson lied about the status of war in Vietnam and subsequent Presidents have demonstrated publicly their own lapses, particularly Presidents Nixon and Clinton.
Those who attempt to project a religious theology upon Washington often seek to connect theological beliefs with civic benefits, assuming morality is based on religion. In contrast, Madison and others crafted a government that could succeed even if Americans were not angels, thanks to a balance of powers. Jefferson and other "natural law" theorists assumed that individuals in a mature society would follow a common set of ethical principles, independent of the different religious beliefs held by individuals.
Washington was a man focused throughout his life on gaining honor and respect. He acted in public settings with some personal distance, even coldness, to reduce the likelihood of some informality reducing the respect he sought from others. So it is likely that he would desire political leaders today to also earn respect through moral, virtuous behavior - even at some personal cost to their comfort level.
However, there is little in Washington's life to suggest he would support a political movement based primarily on a moral agenda. To make such a claim requires that we project a light upon the monument of Washington, then look at our own reflected light and claim its source to be Washington. The "myth of Washington" created during his life and shortly thereafter by Parson Weems is not static. Even today, Washington's life can be re-shaped when necessary to fulfill the agenda of a modern mythmaker...
Monday, June 23, 2008
Atheism better for America
STUDY SHOWS DEVOUT U.S. SUFFERS GREATER SOCIETAL ILLS THAN MORE SECULAR NATIONS
Occasionally we non-believers have our suspicions about the negative impact of religion on modern societies confirmed with statistical data and hard evidence; and when we do, we ought to shout it from the rooftops. However, this time the ring of truth for our oh-so-religious country has a decidedly dissonant tone.
It’s kind of hard to celebrate the fact that the U.S. has higher rates of murder, suicide, abortion, teen pregnancy, STD infection, and infant and juvenile mortality than other more secular nations like the U.K., France, Japan, and the Scandinavian countries. But those are the cold hard factoids according to a paper published in the Journal of Religion and Society based on several studies which have shown that “the least religious countries are the least dysfunctional,” based on the measuring sticks mentioned above.
So, essentially, it’s safe to conclude that despite the highly religious nature of this nation, such an atmosphere does not appear to be conducive to fostering the moral and ethical basis for a healthy society. And what a blow this ought to be for the godlovers across this land. But they will of course either choose to ignore or just happen to remain blissfully ignorant of these findings.
Social scientist and author of the paper Gregory Paul used a wide range of surveys including data from Gallup polls, the International Social Survey Program, and other research sources to obtain his conclusions.
It’s perhaps a good idea to close this post concerning the information presented in said study with some words from a related article in The Times UK and directly from the author himself of these conclusions:
Mr Paul delayed releasing the study until now because of Hurricane Katrina. He said that the evidence accumulated by a number of different studies suggested that religion might actually contribute to social ills. “I suspect that Europeans are increasingly repelled by the poor societal performance of the Christian states,” he added.
He said that most Western nations would become more religious only if the theory of evolution could be overturned and the existence of God scientifically proven. Likewise, the theory of evolution would not enjoy majority support in the US unless there was a marked decline in religious belief, Mr Paul said.
“The non-religious, pro-evolution democracies contradict the dictum that a society cannot enjoy good conditions unless most citizens ardently believe in a moral creator.
“The widely held fear that a Godless citizenry must experience societal disaster is therefore refuted.”
These conclusions and the conditions which led to them can, no doubt, be interpreted as a Pyrrhic victory for atheists in this country. One can hope, though, that the tide is turning in favor of secularism.
How do you think atheists should react to this information?
Saturday, June 21, 2008
The Battle of Kruger - Do you think animals are without feelings? Think again!
Saturday, May 17, 2008
45 years to deliver a letter
In 1963, William L Moore wrote a letter to Mississippi Gov.Ross Barnett opposing segregation
and planned to walk his message from Chattanooga, Tn to Jackson, Ms, on April 23, 1963 he was shot in the head twice and killed. Several attempts to deliver this letter has resulted in nearly 700 people being arrested and beaten, some prisoned and fed crushed glass in their food and hit with electric cattle prods... the letter never made it to it's destination.
On April 23, 2008 Ellen Johnson and myself walked the original letter ( given to us by Bill's widow) from Attalla, Alabama to Jackson, Mississippi, 320 miles in order to bring recognition to William Moore and all the Freedom walkers of 1963.
I would like to thank the very nice people and Police in Alabama and Mississippi, your concern for our safety was greatly appreciated. We have come a long way since 1963.
Thursday, May 15, 2008
10 myths—and 10 Truths—About Atheism
SEVERAL POLLS indicate that the term "atheism" has acquired such an extraordinary stigma in the United States that being an atheist is now a perfect impediment to a career in politics (in a way that being black, Muslim or homosexual is not). According to a recent Newsweek poll, only 37% of Americans would vote for an otherwise qualified atheist for president.
Atheists are often imagined to be intolerant, immoral, depressed, blind to the beauty of nature and dogmatically closed to evidence of the supernatural.
Even John Locke, one of the great patriarchs of the Enlightenment, believed that atheism was "not at all to be tolerated" because, he said, "promises, covenants and oaths, which are the bonds of human societies, can have no hold upon an atheist."
That was more than 300 years ago. But in the United States today, little seems to have changed. A remarkable 87% of the population claims "never to doubt" the existence of God; fewer than 10% identify themselves as atheists — and their reputation appears to be deteriorating.
Given that we know that atheists are often among the most intelligent and scientifically literate people in any society, it seems important to deflate the myths that prevent them from playing a larger role in our national discourse.
1) Atheists believe that life is meaningless.
On the contrary, religious people often worry that life is meaningless and imagine that it can only be redeemed by the promise of eternal happiness beyond the grave. Atheists tend to be quite sure that life is precious. Life is imbued with meaning by being really and fully lived. Our relationships with those we love are meaningful now; they need not last forever to be made so. Atheists tend to find this fear of meaninglessness … well … meaningless.
2) Atheism is responsible for the greatest crimes in human history.
People of faith often claim that the crimes of Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot were the inevitable product of unbelief. The problem with fascism and communism, however, is not that they are too critical of religion; the problem is that they are too much like religions. Such regimes are dogmatic to the core and generally give rise to personality cults that are indistinguishable from cults of religious hero worship. Auschwitz, the gulag and the killing fields were not examples of what happens when human beings reject religious dogma; they are examples of political, racial and nationalistic dogma run amok. There is no society in human history that ever suffered because its people became too reasonable.
3) Atheism is dogmatic.
Jews, Christians and Muslims claim that their scriptures are so prescient of humanity's needs that they could only have been written under the direction of an omniscient deity. An atheist is simply a person who has considered this claim, read the books and found the claim to be ridiculous. One doesn't have to take anything on faith, or be otherwise dogmatic, to reject unjustified religious beliefs. As the historian Stephen Henry Roberts (1901-71) once said: "I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours."
4) Atheists think everything in the universe arose by chance.
No one knows why the universe came into being. In fact, it is not entirely clear that we can coherently speak about the "beginning" or "creation" of the universe at all, as these ideas invoke the concept of time, and here we are talking about the origin of space-time itself.
The notion that atheists believe that everything was created by chance is also regularly thrown up as a criticism of Darwinian evolution. As Richard Dawkins explains in his marvelous book, "The God Delusion," this represents an utter misunderstanding of evolutionary theory. Although we don't know precisely how the Earth's early chemistry begat biology, we know that the diversity and complexity we see in the living world is not a product of mere chance. Evolution is a combination of chance mutation and natural selection. Darwin arrived at the phrase "natural selection" by analogy to the "artificial selection" performed by breeders of livestock. In both cases, selection exerts a highly non-random effect on the development of any species.
5) Atheism has no connection to science.
Although it is possible to be a scientist and still believe in God — as some scientists seem to manage it — there is no question that an engagement with scientific thinking tends to erode, rather than support, religious faith. Taking the U.S. population as an example: Most polls show that about 90% of the general public believes in a personal God; yet 93% of the members of the National Academy of Sciences do not. This suggests that there are few modes of thinking less congenial to religious faith than science is.
6) Atheists are arrogant.
When scientists don't know something — like why the universe came into being or how the first self-replicating molecules formed — they admit it. Pretending to know things one doesn't know is a profound liability in science. And yet it is the life-blood of faith-based religion. One of the monumental ironies of religious discourse can be found in the frequency with which people of faith praise themselves for their humility, while claiming to know facts about cosmology, chemistry and biology that no scientist knows. When considering questions about the nature of the cosmos and our place within it, atheists tend to draw their opinions from science. This isn't arrogance; it is intellectual honesty.
7) Atheists are closed to spiritual experience.
There is nothing that prevents an atheist from experiencing love, ecstasy, rapture and awe; atheists can value these experiences and seek them regularly. What atheists don't tend to do is make unjustified (and unjustifiable) claims about the nature of reality on the basis of such experiences. There is no question that some Christians have transformed their lives for the better by reading the Bible and praying to Jesus. What does this prove? It proves that certain disciplines of attention and codes of conduct can have a profound effect upon the human mind. Do the positive experiences of Christians suggest that Jesus is the sole savior of humanity? Not even remotely — because Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims and even atheists regularly have similar experiences.
There is, in fact, not a Christian on this Earth who can be certain that Jesus even wore a beard, much less that he was born of a virgin or rose from the dead. These are just not the sort of claims that spiritual experience can authenticate.
8) Atheists believe that there is nothing beyond human life and human understanding.
Atheists are free to admit the limits of human understanding in a way that religious people are not. It is obvious that we do not fully understand the universe; but it is even more obvious that neither the Bible nor the Koran reflects our best understanding of it. We do not know whether there is complex life elsewhere in the cosmos, but there might be. If there is, such beings could have developed an understanding of nature's laws that vastly exceeds our own. Atheists can freely entertain such possibilities. They also can admit that if brilliant extraterrestrials exist, the contents of the Bible and the Koran will be even less impressive to them than they are to human atheists.
From the atheist point of view, the world's religions utterly trivialize the real beauty and immensity of the universe. One doesn't have to accept anything on insufficient evidence to make such an observation.
9) Atheists ignore the fact that religion is extremely beneficial to society.
Those who emphasize the good effects of religion never seem to realize that such effects fail to demonstrate the truth of any religious doctrine. This is why we have terms such as "wishful thinking" and "self-deception." There is a profound distinction between a consoling delusion and the truth.
In any case, the good effects of religion can surely be disputed. In most cases, it seems that religion gives people bad reasons to behave well, when good reasons are actually available. Ask yourself, which is more moral, helping the poor out of concern for their suffering, or doing so because you think the creator of the universe wants you to do it, will reward you for doing it or will punish you for not doing it?
10) Atheism provides no basis for morality.
If a person doesn't already understand that cruelty is wrong, he won't discover this by reading the Bible or the Koran — as these books are bursting with celebrations of cruelty, both human and divine. We do not get our morality from religion. We decide what is good in our good books by recourse to moral intuitions that are (at some level) hard-wired in us and that have been refined by thousands of years of thinking about the causes and possibilities of human happiness.
We have made considerable moral progress over the years, and we didn't make this progress by reading the Bible or the Koran more closely. Both books condone the practice of slavery — and yet every civilized human being now recognizes that slavery is an abomination. Whatever is good in scripture — like the golden rule — can be valued for its ethical wisdom without our believing that it was handed down to us by the creator of the universe.
The Origins of Human Morality (Such As It Is)
From: Enlightenment 2.0
Someone recently asked about my view on the origin of human morality, so I am re-posting this old blog.
"In sixteenth-century Paris, a popular form of entertainment was cat-burning, in which a cat was hoisted in a sling on a stage and slowly lowered into a fire. According to historian Norman Davies, "[T]he spectators, including kings and queens, shrieked with laughter as the animals, howling with pain, were singed, roasted, and finally carbonized." [Steven Pinker – "The History of Violence"]
The Nobler Savage
Morality is not an exact science. The line between moral and immoral behavior is often hazy and curved, as illustrated by the utter lack of agreement among humans on many moral issues. Why are we unsure of whether abortion is acceptable? Why is embryonic stem cell research not a crystal clear issue? We have no consensus on homosexuality or pre-marital sex. Why are we not in universal agreement on all (some would ask ANY) moral questions?
The answer is simple: our sense of morality, like every other evolutionary trait, is a work in progress. And it always will be.
But the good news is: it's improving.
Steven Pinker, Johnstone Family Professor in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University and former professor in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at MIT, summarizes his lecture entitled "The History of Violence" with evidence that the morality of our behavior is evolving for the better, and that we are probably living in the most peaceful moment of our species' time on earth:
Conventional history has long shown that, in many ways, we have been getting kinder and gentler. Cruelty as entertainment, human sacrifice to indulge superstition, slavery as a labor-saving device, conquest as the mission statement of government, genocide as a means of acquiring real estate, torture and mutilation as routine punishment, the death penalty for misdemeanors and differences of opinion, assassination as the mechanism of political succession, rape as the spoils of war, pogroms as outlets for frustration, homicide as the major form of conflict resolution—all were unexceptionable features of life for most of human history. But, today, they are rare to nonexistent in the West, far less common elsewhere than they used to be, concealed when they do occur, and widely condemned when they are brought to light.
The idea that we are indeed living in the most peaceful age of human history may be hard to swallow if you watch the news. But now that social scientists have started to count the bodies from different historical periods, they have discovered a somewhat unintuitive fact: we are becoming nobler. The proportion of prehistoric skeletons with ax marks and embedded arrowheads, and the proportion of men in a contemporary foraging tribe who die at the hands of other men, suggest that pre-state societies were far more violent than our own.
"According to anthropologists like Lawrence Keeley, Stephen LeBlanc, Phillip Walker, and Bruce Knauft, these factors combine to yield population-wide rates of death in tribal warfare that dwarf those of modern times. If the wars of the twentieth century had killed the same proportion of the population that die in the wars of a typical tribal society, there would have been two billion deaths, not 100 million." [Steven Pinker – "The History of Violence"]
Conventional history further demonstrates the fact that our sense of morality is not only increasing – it is widening beyond our species. Today in the largely secular West, we have far more humane societies and animal shelters than cat-burning arenas. (Geez – I hope we don't have ANY cat-burning arenas, but I don't want to assume.) And our growing number of vegans, vegetarians and animal rights organizations is heartening during a time that the religious right is telling us that modernity has somehow corrupted the noble savage.
Unfortunately, human history has been rife with one huge obstacle that has constantly riddled the otherwise straightish line of moral progress with zigzags and spikes of horrible atrocities. That obstacle, of course, is religion.
Bertrand Russell briefly explains "Why I am Not a Christian":
You find as you look around the world that every single bit of progress of humane feeling, every improvement in the criminal law, every step toward the diminution of war, every step toward better treatment of the colored races, or ever mitigation of slavery, every moral progress that there has been in the world, has been consistently opposed by the organized churches of the world. I say quite deliberately that the Christian religion, as organized in its churches, has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world.
Man has often invented gods who spoke for him, who confirmed all his opinions and prejudices. Before the dawn of the Age of Reason in the early 17th century, our theretofore improving evolutionary sense of morality in the West had been regularly circumvented by the belief that gods wanted us to kill each other, and that they appreciated human and animal sacrifices. Even today, we have gods who hate homosexuals and apostates. In the East, we still see crusades between warring sects.
But once again, empathy and reason seem to be prevailing, as god stories are facing extinction. And the few religions that remain in the western world have been forced by secular modernity to evolve to be more in line with human morality. The age-old axiom holds true: religion improves as people believe it less.
"The point is, ladies and gentleman, that [evolving morality] -- for lack of a better word -- is good. [Evolving morality] is right. [Evolving morality] works. [Evolving morality] clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit." {Michael Douglas – "Wall Street"}
Is it perfect? Heck no. What is? But it's the best we've got, and it's gotten us this far. Our evolutionary spirit is based on random mutations – how perfectly on-target should we expect our moral aim to be? If morals are based on evolution – both biological and cultural – our lack of timeless universal agreement on so many moral issues makes perfect sense, and our agreement increases over time.
God as the Source of Our Morality
But what would we expect if God gave us our sense of morality? Wouldn't we expect the answers to all moral questions to be timeless and innately clear to us? If God has specific rules of right and wrong for all our behaviors, and if our knowledge of those rules depends on an innate understanding implanted in us by God, and if our behavior is important enough to God that He may damn us for eternity for our actions, I think we should all expect a universal sense of right and wrong that could not be confused or improved. There should be no place for reason, philosophy or evolution. With free will, we would still have the ability to do the selfish/wrong thing, but we should never have any doubt of an action's inherent morality in any situation. Otherwise, how unfair to judge us by our actions, much less our thoughts!
The Bible as the Source of Our Morality
And what about The Bible? At best, The Bible is a perfect example of how our morals evolve. Christians, how often have you had to excuse the atrocities of the Old Testament with "Well, that was a different time" or "That was before Jesus."? There was clear evolution of morality between the writing and compiling of the Old Testament and of the New. Even at the time the Christian Bible was compiled, slavery and subjugation of women were still culturally common, and they are both sanctioned in The New Testament. But today, our two leading candidates for the next presidency of the most powerful nation on Earth are a woman and a black man! I'd call that moral progress. And I'd call it evolution.
At worst, The Bible's moral messages are extremely confusing. When we consider the simple and undeniable fact that The Bible has been used to sanction – AND TO CONDEMN – just about every questionable action since its compilation, it seems quite clear that it is not a reliable – or even a coherent – guide to moral behavior. Enough said.
Then what IS the source of our sense of morality? The following historical narrative is my simple model answer that question. (really boring)
The Origin of Morality in Social Species
Among Earth's earliest advanced life forms, we see the first signs of a genetic sense of empathy, as mothers with the genetic instinct to nurture their young were the only to survive and evolve. In these primitive species, this form of empathy was directed exclusively toward immediate offspring, and no empathy was expressed toward mates or toward any other individuals.
But as competition for territory and food grew, survival depended on banding together in small groups. Like today, the earliest primary tribal unit was likely the family of blood relatives, but blood relation was not imperative at that point. A sense of cooperation and justice became intrinsic to family life as members were forced to defend territory and to fight for food together. Thus, the genetic sense of empathy in individuals of successful families had to widen to cover each other. In families with individuals with less empathetic genes, the more selfish individuals dominated, the selfish genes spread, cooperation and trust evolved away, soon followed by the family itself. The vast majority of families fell into this category. Conversely, the few families with individuals with the most empathetic genes nurtured and protected each other and shared food, thus ensuring their territorial dominance and survival advantage.
With time and inbreeding, a strong genetic sense of empathy necessarily became a common – though not necessarily a dominant – trait. And within these genetically empathetic families, the first altruistic memes spread as family members passed cooperative habits of sharing and justice to each other and to their offspring. Certainly, there were selfish traits within the families, and those selfish traits surely expressed themselves in selfish behavior – probably much more often than in altruistic behavior – but the underlying greater and widened sense of empathy and cooperation than in the competition was necessarily the single most important deciding survival factor.
This trend continued as tribes grew and wrestled with their competing and conflicting genes and memes; the most altruistic tribes with the strongest and widest genetic sense of empathy and cultural sense of cooperation were always the ones to survive and evolve; the rest died out.
This simple scenario is not only a plausible description of the genetic and cultural rise of morality in our tribal ancestors – it was naturally inevitable, as it was surely required for survival and evolution. We see this cooperative tendency continue throughout all social species today, from ant to human. Occam would approve.
The Evolution of Human Morality
But if empathy has become a strong trait in humans over many millions of years of evolution, why do people do rotten things? When we ask that question, it shows that we really expect too much of evolution; evidence shows that we are improving, but perfection is impossible. Many maladaptive traits – dyslexia, high blood pressure, selfishness, etc. – survive evolution in packets. As long as strong advantageous genetic traits like empathy are enough to keep the tribe thriving, negative and neutral traits will be inevitable. Maladaptive traits tend to evolve away through time, but there are always new negative mutations to figuratively replace the old.
And it's often more complicated than even that. Moral issues are not always a simple matter of our selfish genes and memes battling with our empathetic genes and memes. When new moral questions – embryonic stem cell research, for example – arise, there's not always a simple right/wrong answer. This is where our philosophical sense of reason plays a part, and this is why morality is often such a struggle for us. We have to weigh all the potential advantages and all the potential suffering that could be caused by a specific action, for ourselves and for those for whom we feel empathy. (See early Greek philosophy for lessons on how to think, re-think and over-think the morality of our decisions and not come to any agreement.)
Our decisions become behaviors. As we grow, we judge our own actions and those of others by that same combination of empathy and reason, and patterns gradually emerge. The more clearly a specific behavior relates to our genetic sense of empathy, the more widely the rightness or wrongness of the behavior will spread memetically, and the more widely we will have agreement on its morality.
Our "moral imperatives" – specific actions that are almost universally considered to be absolutely good or absolutely bad in all situations – are the easiest for us to judge. Murder and theft are good examples of universally forbidden moral imperative memes that have likely been with us for millions of years. Rape and adultery, forbidden moral imperatives that have arisen with the evolution of cultural memes like romance and the committed relationship, are much newer memes. (In other species – and surely in our ancestors – romance and committed relationships are rare or non-existent, so rape and adultery are non-issues; in fact, they favor survivability and have for hundreds of millions of years!)
For every other issue, it's a slow process as we reason through our decisions and judge the results of our actions. Many philosophical issues – like intent versus result, for example – are not settled to our universal satisfaction even today, but like every other aspect of our morality, they are evolving toward universal agreement.
The Future of Human Morality
What's next in our moral evolution? I suspect that the way we treat many animals will change. In particular, I think that the way we raise chickens and veal calves will be among the first to evolve into something more humane as our sense of empathy widens to include animals that taste good to us but are not traditionally kept as pets. Eventually, I suspect that we may stop eating other animals altogether.
I think that we will continue to be more tolerant of different races, of different sexual orientations and of different beliefs. And I suspect that we will abandon divisive mythology. (Daniel Dennett proposed that within 25 years, the Vatican may be known as the European Museum of Roman Catholicism and Mecca could become Disney's Magical Kingdom of Allah!)
Conclusion:
Our ever-improving but always imperfect sense of morality is exactly what we would expect if it is a natural, evolving genetic/memetic trait – a product of empathy and reason. But is far from what we would expect if planted in us by God. And finally, our current sense of morality has surpassed that demonstrated by The Bible, which perfectly exemplifies the less evolved sense of morality of its time and place.
Monday, April 28, 2008
The Catholic Church - No child's behind left
This article appeared in the Observer on Sunday August 17 2003 . It was last updated at 01:27 on August 17 2003. The Vatican instructed Catholic bishops around the world to cover up cases of sexual abuse or risk being thrown out of the Church.
The Observer has obtained a 40-year-old confidential document from the secret Vatican archive which lawyers are calling a 'blueprint for deception and concealment'. One British lawyer acting for Church child abuse victims has described it as 'explosive'.
The 69-page Latin document bearing the seal of Pope John XXIII was sent to every bishop in the world. The instructions outline a policy of 'strictest' secrecy in dealing with allegations of sexual abuse and threatens those who speak out with excommunication.
They also call for the victim to take an oath of secrecy at the time of making a complaint to Church officials. It states that the instructions are to 'be diligently stored in the secret archives of the Curia [Vatican] as strictly confidential. Nor is it to be published nor added to with any commentaries.'
The document, which has been confirmed as genuine by the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales, is called 'Crimine solicitationies', which translates as 'instruction on proceeding in cases of solicitation'.
It focuses on sexual abuse initiated as part of the confessional relationship between a priest and a member of his congregation. But the instructions also cover what it calls the 'worst crime', described as an obscene act perpetrated by a cleric with 'youths of either sex or with brute animals (bestiality)'.
Bishops are instructed to pursue these cases 'in the most secretive way... restrained by a perpetual silence... and everyone... is to observe the strictest secret which is commonly regarded as a secret of the Holy Office... under the penalty of excommunication'.
Texan lawyer Daniel Shea uncovered the document as part of his work for victims of abuse from Catholic priests in the US. He has handed it over to US authorities, urging them to launch a federal investigation into the clergy's alleged cover-up of sexual abuse.
He said: 'These instructions went out to every bishop around the globe and would certainly have applied in Britain. It proves there was an international conspiracy by the Church to hush up sexual abuse issues. It is a devious attempt to conceal criminal conduct and is a blueprint for deception and concealment.'
British lawyer Richard Scorer, who acts for children abused by Catholic priests in the UK, echoes this view and has described the document as 'explosive'.
He said: 'We always suspected that the Catholic Church systematically covered up abuse and tried to silence victims. This document appears to prove it. Threatening excommunication to anybody who speaks out shows the lengths the most senior figures in the Vatican were prepared to go to prevent the information getting out to the public domain.'
Scorer pointed out that as the documents dates back to 1962 it rides roughshod over the Catholic Church's claim that the issue of sexual abuse was a modern phenomenon.
He claims the discovery of the document will raise fresh questions about the actions of Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, the head of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales.
Murphy-O'Connor has been accused of covering up allegations of child abuse when he was Bishop of Arundel and Brighton. Instead of reporting to the police allegations of abuse against Michael Hill, a priest in his charge, he moved him to another position where he was later convicted for abusing nine children.
Although Murphy-O'Connor has apologised publicly for his mistake, Scorer claims the secret Vatican document raises the question about whether his failure to report Hill was due to him following this instruction from Rome.
Scorer, who acts for some of Hill's victims, said: 'I want to know whether Murphy-O'Connor knew of these Vatican instructions and, if so, did he apply it. If not, can he tell us why not?'
A spokesman for the Catholic Church denied that the secret Vatican orders were part of any organised cover-up and claims lawyers are taking the document 'out of context' and 'distorting it'.
He said: 'This document is about the Church's internal disciplinary procedures should a priest be accused of using confession to solicit sex. It does not forbid victims to report civil crimes. The confidentiality talked about is aimed to protect the accused as applies in court procedures today. It also takes into consideration the special nature of the secrecy involved in the act of confession.' He also said that in 1983 the Catholic Church in England and Wales introduced its own code dealing with sexual abuse, which would have superseded the 1962 instructions. Asked whether Murphy-O'Connor was aware of the Vatican edict, he replied: 'He's never mentioned it to me.'
Lawyers point to a letter the Vatican sent to bishops in May 2001 clearly stating the 1962 instruction was in force until then. The letter is signed by Cardinal Ratzinger, the most powerful man in Rome beside the Pope and who heads the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith - the office which ran the Inquisition in the Middle Ages.
Rev Thomas Doyle, a US Air Force chaplain in Germany and a specialist in Church law, has studied the document&183; He told The Observer: 'It is certainly an indication of the pathological obsession with secrecy in the Catholic Church, but in itself it is not a smoking gun.
'If, however, this document actually has been the foundation of a continuous policy to cover clergy crimes at all costs, then we have quite another issue. There are too many authenticated reports of victims having been seriously intimidated into silence by Church authorities to assert that such intimidation is the exception and not the norm.
'If this document has been used as a justification for this intimidation then we possibly have what some commentators have alleged, namely, a blueprint for a cover-up. This is obviously a big "if" which requires concrete proof.'
Additional research by Jason Rodrigues
...and a little something else
Thursday, April 24, 2008
10 Questions Christians Must Answer
If you are an educated Christian, I would like to talk with you today about an important and interesting question. Have you ever thought about using your college education to think about your faith? Your life and your career demand that you behave and act rationally. Let’s apply your critical thinking skills as we discuss 10 simple questions about your religion.
Here is an example of the kind of thing I am talking about: As a Christian, you believe in the power of prayer. According to a recent poll, 3 out of 4 doctors believe that God is performing medical miracles on earth right now. Most Christians believe that God is curing cancers, healing diseases, reversing the effects of poisons and so on.
So here is question 1: Why won’t God heal amputees?
It’s a simple question, isn’t it? We all know that amputated legs do not spontaneously regenerate in response to prayer. Amputees get no miracles from God.
If you are an intelligent person, you have to admit that it’s an interesting question On the one hand, you believe that God answers prayers and performs miracles. On the other hand, you know that God completely ignores amputees when they pray for miracles.
How do you deal with this discrepancy? As an intelligent person, you have to deal with it, because it makes no sense. In order to handle it, notice that you have to create some kind of rationalization. You have to invent an excuse on God’s behalf to explain this strange fact of life. You might say, "well, God must have some kind of special plan for amputees." So you invent your excuse, whatever it is, and then you stop thinking about it because it is uncomfortable.
Here is another example. As a Christian, you believe that God cares about you and answers your prayers.
So the second question is: Why are there so many starving people in our world?
Look out at our world and notice that millions of children are dying of starvation. It really is horrific. Why would God be worried about you getting a raise, while at the same time ignoring the prayers of these desperate, innocent little children? It really doesn’t make any sense, does it? Why would a loving god do this?
To explain it, you have to come up with some sort of very strange excuse for God. Like, "God wants these children to suffer and die for some divine, mysterious reason." Then you push it out of your mind because it absolutely does not fit with your view of a loving, caring God.
Third question: Why does God demand the death of so many innocent people in the Bible? Look up these verses:
- Exodus 35:2 – God demands that we kill everyone who works on the Sabbath day.
- Deuteronomy 21:18-21 – God demands that we kill disobedient teenagers.
- Leviticus 20:13 – God demands the death of homosexuals.
- Deuteronomy 22:13-21 – God demands that we kill girls who are not virgins when they marry.
And so on… There are lots of verses like these.
It doesn’t make any sense, does it? Why would a loving God want us to murder our fellow human beings over such trivial matters? Just because you work on the wrong day of the week, you must die? That makes no sense, does it? In fact, if you think about it, you realize that it is insane. So you create some kind of rationalization to explain these verses.
Question 4: Why does the Bible contain so much anti-scientific nonsense? You have a college degree, so you know what I’m talking about. You know how science works. You happily use the products of science every day: your car, your cell phone, your microwave oven, your TV, your computer. These are all products of the scientific process. You know that science is incredibly important to our economy and to our lives.
But there is a problem. As an educated person you know that the Bible contains all sorts of information that is total nonsense from a scientific perspective.
- God did not create the world in 6 days 6,000 years ago like the Bible says.
- There was never a worldwide flood that covered Mt. Everest like the Bible says.
- Jonah did not live inside a fish’s stomach for three days like the Bible says.
- God did not create Adam from a handful of dust like the Bible says.
These stories are all nonsense. Why would an all-knowing God write nonsense? It makes no sense, does it? So you create some type of very strange excuse to try to explain why the Bible contains total nonsense.
Question 5: Why is God such a huge proponent of slavery in the Bible? Look up these Bible verses:
- Exodus 21:20-21 – God says that it is OK to own slaves, and it is also OK to beat them.
- Colossians 3:22-24 – Slaves need to obey their masters.
- Ephesians 6:5 – Slaves need to obey their masters just as they would obey Christ.
- 1 Peter 2:18 – Slaves need to obey their masters, even if their masters are harsh .
And so on…
And why do all intelligent people abhor slavery and make it completely illegal? You have to come up with some kind of weird rationalization to explain it.
Question 6: Why do bad things happen to good people? That makes no sense. You have created an exotic excuse on God’s behalf to rationalize it.
Question 7: Why didn’t any of Jesus’ miracles in the Bible leave behind any evidence? It’s very strange, isn’t it? You have created an excuse to rationalize it.
Question 8: How do we explain the fact that Jesus has never appeared to you? Jesus is all-powerful and timeless, but if you pray for Jesus to appear, nothing happens. You have to create a weird rationalization to deal with this discrepancy.
Question 9 – Why would Jesus want you to eat his body and drink his blood? It sounds totally grotesque, doesn’t it? Why would al all-powerful God want you to do something that, in any other context, sounds like a disgusting, cannibalistic, satanic ritual?
And finally, Question 10 – Why do Christians get divorced at the same rate as non-Christians? Christians get married in front of God and their Christian friends, all of whom are praying to God for the marriage to succeed. And then they say, "What God has put together, let no man put asunder." God is all-powerful, so if God has put two people together that should seal the deal, right? Yet Christians get divorced at the same rate as everyone else. To explain this, you have to create some convoluted rationalization.
So, we have looked at 10 fascinating questions. In order to believe in God, you have had to create all sorts of strange rationalizations and excuses. If you are an intelligent, college-educated person, all of these excuses and rationalizations probably make you uncomfortable. If you think about it honestly, using the critical thinking skills that you learned in college, you have to admit that your answers to these questions make no sense at all.
Now, let me show you something remarkable. What if you instead assume that God is imaginary? A funny thing happens: the answers to every one of these questions make complete sense. Just look at all ten questions as an intelligent person:
1) Why won’t God heal amputees? Because God is imaginary, and he doesn’t answer any prayers. Every "answered prayer" is actually a coincidence. All scientific evidence supports this conclusion.
2) Why are there so many starving people in our world? Because God is imaginary, and he is therefore unable to answer their prayers.
3) Why does God demand the death of so many innocent people in the Bible? Because God is imaginary, and the Bible was written by ridiculous, ruthless men rather than any sort of loving being.
4) Why does the Bible contain so much anti-scientific nonsense? Ditto. Primitive men wrote the bible, not an all-knowing being.
5) Why is God such a huge proponent of slavery? Ditto.
6) Why do bad things happen to good people? Because God is imaginary and bad things happen at the same statistical rates to everyone.
7) Why didn’t any of Jesus’ miracles in the Bible leave behind any evidence? Because God is imaginary, and Jesus’ miracles are myths.
8) How do we explain the fact that Jesus has never appeared to you? Because God is imaginary.
9) Why would Jesus want you to eat his body and drink his blood? Because God is imaginary, and this bizarre ritual came from a pagan religion.
10) Why do Christians get divorced at the same rate as non-Christians? Because God is imaginary.
Do you see what has happened here? When we assume that God exists, the answers to these ten questions make absolutely no sense. But if we assume that God is imaginary, our world makes complete sense.
It’s interesting, isn’t it? Actually, it’s more than interesting – it is incredibly important.
Our world only makes sense when we understand that God is imaginary.
This is how intelligent, rational people know that God is imaginary.
When you use your brain, and when you think logically about your religious faith, you can reach only one possible conclusion: the "god" that you have heard about since you were an infant is completely imaginary. You have to willfully discard rationality, and accept hundreds of bizarre rationalizations to believe in your "god."
Now, let me ask you one last question: Why should you care? What difference does it make if people want to believe in a "god", even if he is imaginary?
It matters because people who believe in imaginary beings are delusional.
It matters because people who talk to imaginary beings are delusional.
It matters because people who believe in imaginary superstitions like prayer are delusional.
It’s that simple, and that obvious. Your religious beliefs hurt you personally and hurt us as a species because they are delusional. The belief in any "god" is complete nonsense.
You are a smart person. It is time for you to use your intelligence to free yourself from these delusions. It is time for you to begin thinking like a rational human being, rather than clinging to imaginary friends and childhood fantasies.
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Intelligent People Tend To Be More Secular.
Myth: Intelligent people tend to be more religious.
Fact: Intelligent people tend to be more secular.
Summary
The broad consensus of research shows that people with higher IQs tend to be less religious, not more so.
Argument
Is it more logical to be a Christian? Is religion the natural choice of a smart person familiar with more of the evidence? Not according to a broad consensus of studies on IQ and religiosity. These studies have consistently found that the lower the IQ score, the more likely a person is to be religious.
To place these studies in perspective, it is helpful to know the general religious attitudes of Americans today. According to a February 1995 Gallup poll, 96 percent of all Americans believe in God, and 88 percent affirm the importance of religion. However, the degree of religiosity within this group varies considerably. Only 35 percent can be classified as "religious," using a definition that requires them to consider religion important and attend religious services at least once a week. And a March 1994 Gallup poll found that only 20 percent of all Americans belong to that politically active group known as "Christian conservatives."
The following is a review of several studies of IQ and religiosity, paraphrased and summarized from Burnham Beckwith's article, "The Effect of Intelligence on Religious Faith," Free Inquiry, Spring 1986: (1)
STUDIES OF STUDENTS
1. Thomas Howells, 1927
Study of 461 students showed religiously conservative students "are, in general, relatively inferior in intellectual ability."
2. Hilding Carlsojn, 1933
Study of 215 students showed that "there is a tendency for the more intelligent undergraduate to be sympathetic toward… atheism."
3. Abraham Franzblau, 1934
Confirming Howells and Carlson, tested 354 Jewish children, aged 10-16. Found a negative correlation between religiosity and IQ as measured by the Terman intelligence test.
4. Thomas Symington, 1935
Tested 400 young people in colleges and church groups. He reported, "There is a constant positive relation in all the groups between liberal religious thinking and mental ability… There is also a constant positive relation between liberal scores and intelligence…"
5. Vernon Jones, 1938
Tested 381 students, concluding "a slight tendency for intelligence and liberal attitudes to go together."
6. A. R. Gilliland, 1940
At variance with all other studies, found "little or no relationship between intelligence and attitude toward god."
7. Donald Gragg, 1942
Reported an inverse correlation between 100 ACE freshman test scores and Thurstone "reality of god" scores.
8. Brown and Love, 1951
At the University of Denver, tested 613 male and female students. The mean test scores of non-believers was 119 points, and for believers it was 100. The non-believers ranked in the 80th percentile, and believers in the 50th. Their findings "strongly corroborate those of Howells."
9. Michael Argyle, 1958
Concluded that "although intelligent children grasp religious concepts earlier, they are also the first to doubt the truth of religion, and intelligent students are much less likely to accept orthodox beliefs."
10. Jeffrey Hadden, 1963
Found no correlation between intelligence and grades. This was an anomalous finding, since GPA corresponds closely with intelligence. Other factors may have influenced the results at the University of Wisconsin.
11. Young, Dustin and Holtzman, 1966
Average religiosity decreased as GPA rose.
12. James Trent, 1967
Polled 1400 college seniors. Found little difference, but high-ability students in his sample group were over-represented.
13. C. Plant and E. Minium, 1967
The more intelligent students were less religious, both before entering college and after 2 years of college.
14. Robert Wuthnow, 1978
Of 532 students, 37 percent of Christians, 58 percent of apostates, and 53 percent of non-religious scored above average on SATs.
15. Hastings and Hoge, 1967, 1974
Polled 200 college students and found no significant correlations.
16. Norman Poythress, 1975
Mean SATs for strongly antireligious (1148), moderately anti-religious (1119), slightly antireligious (1108), and religious (1022).
17. Wiebe and Fleck, 1980
Studied 158 male and female Canadian university students. They reported "nonreligious S's tended to be strongly intelligent" and "more intelligent than religious S's."
STUDENT BODY COMPARISONS
1. Rose Goldsen, 1952
Percentage of students who believe in a divine god: Harvard 30; UCLA 32; Dartmouth 35; Yale 36; Cornell 42; Wayne 43; Weslyan 43; Michigan 45; Fisk 60; Texas 62; North Carolina 68.
2. National Review Study, 1970
Percentage of students who believe in a Spirit or Divine God: Reed 15; Brandeis 25; Sarah Lawrence 28; Williams 36; Stanford 41; Boston U. 41; Yale 42; Howard 47; Indiana 57; Davidson 59; S. Carolina 65; Marquette 77.
3. Caplovitz and Sherrow, 1977
Apostasy rates rose continuously from 5 percent in "low" ranked schools to 17 percent in "high" ranked schools.
4. Niemi, Ross, and Alexander, 1978
In elite schools, organized religion was judged important by only 26 percent of their students, compared with 44 percent of all students.
STUDIES OF VERY-HIGH IQ GROUPS
1. Terman, 1959
Studied group with IQ's over 140. Of men, 10 percent held strong religious belief, of women 18 percent. Sixty-two percent of men and 57 percent of women claimed "little religious inclination" while 28 percent of the men and 23 percent of the women claimed it was "not at all important."
2. Warren and Heist, 1960
Found no differences among National Merit Scholars. Results may have been effected by the fact that NM scholars are not selected on the basis of intelligence or grades alone, but also on "leadership" and such like.
3. Southern and Plant, 1968
Studied 42 male and 30 female members of Mensa. Mensa members were much less religious in belief than the typical American college alumnus or adult.
STUDIES Of SCIENTISTS
1. William S. Ament, 1927
C. C. Little, president of the University of Michigan, checked persons listed in Who's Who in America: "Unitarians, Episcopalians, Congregationalists, Universalists, and Presbyterians [who are less religious] are… far more numerous in Who's Who than would be expected on the basis of the population which they form. Baptists, Methodists, and Catholics are distinctly less numerous."
Ament confirmed Little's conclusion. He noted that Unitarians, the least religious, were more than 40 times as numerous in Who's Who as in the U.S. population.
2. Lehman and Witty, 1931
Identified 1189 scientists found in both Who's Who (1927) and American Men of Science (1927). Only 25 percent of those listed in the latter and 50 percent of those in the former reported their religious denomination, despite the specific request to do so, under the heading of "religious denomination (if any)." Well over 90 percent of the general population claims religious affiliation. The figure of 25 percent suggests far less religiosity among scientists.
Unitarians were 81.4 times as numerous among eminent scientists as non-Unitarians.
3. Kelley and Fisk, 1951
Found a negative (-.39) correlation between the strength of religious values and research competence. [How these were measured is unknown.]
4. Ann Roe, 1953
Interviewed 64 "eminent scientists, nearly all members of the prestigious National Academy of Sciences or the American Philosophical Society. She reported that, while nearly all of them had religious parents and had attended Sunday school, 'now only three of these men are seriously active in church. A few others attend upon occasion, or even give some financial support to a church which they do not attend… All the others have long since dismissed religion as any guide to them, and the church plays no part in their lives… A few are militantly atheistic, but most are just not interested.'"
5. Francis Bello, 1954
Interviewed or questionnaired 107 nonindustrial scientists under the age of 40 judged by senior colleagues to be outstanding. Of the 87 responses, 45 percent claimed to be "agnostic or atheistic" and an additional 22 percent claimed no religious affiliation. For 20 most eminent, "the proportion who are now a-religious is considerably higher than in the entire survey group."
6. Jack Chambers, 1964
Questionnaired 740 US psychologists and chemists. He reported, "The highly creative men… significantly more often show either no preference for a particular religion or little or no interest in religion." Found that the most eminent psychologists showed 40 percent no preference, 16 percent for the most eminent chemists.
7. Vaughan, Smith, and Sjoberg, 1965
Polled 850 US physicists, zoologists, chemical engineers, and geologists listed in American Men of Science (1955) on church membership, and attendance patterns, and belief in afterlife. Of the 642 replies, 38.5 percent did not believe in an afterlife, whereas 31.8 percent did. Belief in immortality was less common among major university staff than among those employed by business, government, or minor universities. The Gallup poll taken about this time showed that two-thirds of the U.S. population believed in an afterlife, so scientists were far less religious than the typical adult.
Conclusion
The consensus here is clear: more intelligent people tend not to believe in religion. And this observation is given added force when you consider that the above studies span a broad range of time, subjects and methodologies, and yet arrive at the same conclusion.
This is the result even when the researchers are Christian conservatives themselves. One such researcher is George Gallup. Here are the results of a Fall 1995 Gallup poll:
Percentage of respondents who agreed with the following statements:
Religion is Religion can
"very important "answer all or most
Respondents in their life" of today's problems"
------------------------------------------------------------
Attended college 53 percent 58 percent
No college 63 65
Income over $50,000 48 56
$30,000 - $50,000 56 62
$20,000 - $30,000 56 60
Under $20,000 66 66
Why does this correlation exist? The first answer that comes to mind is that religious beliefs tend to be more illogical or incoherent than secular beliefs, and intelligent people tend to recognize that more quickly. But this explanation will surely be rejected by religious people, who will seek other explanations and rationalizations.
A possible counter-argument is that intelligent people tend to be more successful than others. The lure of worldly success and materialism draws many of these intellectually gifted individuals away from God. After all, who needs God when you (apparently) are making it on your own?
However, this argument does not withstand closer scrutiny. Most of the studies outlined above describe the religious attitudes of students, who have yet to enter the working world, much less succeed in it. Some might then argue that the most intelligent students are nonetheless succeeding in school. But "success" in school (for those who may have forgotten!) is more measured in terms of popularity, sports, physical attractiveness, personality, clothes, etc. Grades are but one of many measures of success in a young person's life -- one that is increasingly becoming less important, as many social critics point out.
The simplest and most parsimonious explanation is that religion is a set of logical and factual claims, and those with the most logic and facts at their disposal are rejecting it largely on those grounds.
Endnotes:
1. I am indebted to Jim Tims ( jftims@borg.com ) for summarizing this article. I have edited his summary for space reasons. Those wishing to see the original text are encouraged to read "The Effect of Intelligence on Religious Faith," Free Inquiry, Spring 1986.
Sunday, February 24, 2008
The Real Difference Between Us
Christian beliefs vs. atheist beliefs
| Gods that Christians don't believe in | Gods that atheists don't believe in |
| Aesir Agasaya Agdistis Ah chuy kak Ah cun can Ah hulneb Ah puch Ahulane Ahura mazda Aine Airmid Aizen-myoo Aji-suki-taka-hi-kone Akea Alberich Ama-no-minaka-nushi Ama-tsu-mara Amaethon Amaterasu Amatsu Amatsu-kami Ame-no-mi-kumari Ame-no-wakahiko Amidaam-no-tanabata-hime An Anahita Anat Anath Andhrimnir Andraste Andvari Angrboda Angus og Ankt Annapurna Anouke Anshar Anu Aphrodite Apollo Apsu Apukohai Arawn Aray Ares Arianrhod Artemis Artio Asclepius Asherah Ashur Astarte Astrild Athena Athirat Athtart Atla Atlas Audhumla Ba'al hadad Baal Baal-hammon Baalat Babd catha Bacchus Badb Baku Balder Balor Balrama Bast Ba xian Beg-tse Bel Belatu-cadros Bellona Belobog Benten Benzai-ten Bergelmir Berstuk Bes Beyla Bhuvaneshwari Bimbogami Binzuru-sonja Bishamon Bixia yuanjin Blodeuwedd Borghild Bosatsu Bragi Brahma Bran Branwen Brighid Brigit Bris Brono Buddha Bugid y aiba Buluc chabtan Burijas Butsu Bylgia Camalus Camaxtli Camulus Cariocienus Caswallawn Ceres Ceridwen Cernunnos Cerridwen Cerunnos Chac Chalchiuhtlicue Charun Chemosh Cheng-huang Chien-shin Chimata-no-kami Chup-kamui Crnobog Cupid Cybele Cyhiraeth Dagda Dagon Dagon Dagur Daibosatsu Daikoku Dainichi Damkina Danu Davlin Dawn Dazbog Demeter Dev Dewi Dhanwantari Dhumavati Diana Diancecht Di cang Dionysus Disen Don Donar Dosojin Dozoku-shin Druantia Durga Dylan Dziewona Ea Ebisu Eir Ekchuah Ekibiogami El Elaine El elyon Elli Emma-o Enki Enlil Enyalius Enyo Eos Epona Ereskigal Erra Eshara Eshmun Farbauti Faunus Fenrir Flidais Flins Flora Forseti Freya Freyr Frigg Fudo Fujin Fukurokuju Funadama Futsu-nushi-no-kami Gaia Gama Ganesha Ganga Garuda Gauri Geb Gefion Gekka-o Geong si Gerd Giobhniu Gu Guan-di Gun Gwydion Gwynn ap nudd Hachiman Hades Hadur Hai Haniyasu-hiko Haniyasu-hime Hanuman Hathor Haulili Haya-ji Heimdall Hel Helios Heng-o Hephaestus Hera Hermes Hermod Hestia Hiaka Hiiakawawahilani Hinakuluiau Hiruko Hod Hoderi Holler Hoori Hors Horus Hoso-no-kami Hotei Hsi-wang-mu Huitzilopochtli Hygeia Ictinike Ida-ten Idun Ika-zuchi-no-kami Iki-ryo Inanna Inari Indra Inti Irmin Ishtar Isis Isora Ixtab Izanagi Izanaki Izanami Janus Jarilo Jarovit Jinushigami Jizo Jord Jormungand Juichimen Juno Jupiter Jurojin Juthrbog Juturna Kagutsuchi Kalaipahoa Kali Kaluannuunohonionio Kamado-gami Kamapua'a Kami-kaze Kaminari Kamohoali'i Kamooalii Kanaloa Kanayama-hiko Kanayama-hime Kane Kane-hekili Kapo Kapohoikahiola Karewit Kari Kartikeya Karttikeya Kathirat Kaupe Kawa-no-kami Kenro-ji-jin Keoahikamakaua Keuakepo Khepri Ki Kiha Kingu Kinich ahau Kishar Kishi-bojin Kishijoten Kishimo-jin Ko-no-hana Kojin Koleamoku Korrawi Koshin Kothar Koya-no-myoin Krishna Ku Kuahana Kukailimoku Kukaoo Kukulcan Kukunochi-no-kami Kuni-toko-tachi Kura-okami Kurma Kuula Kvasir Laamaomao Labraid Lada Lado Laga Laka Lakakane Lakshmi Laran Lares Libintia Lie Liza Llyr Lofn Loki Lono Lonomakua Lotan Lugh Luna Macha Maeve Magna mater Magni Mahulu Maia Manannan Mani Manua Marduk Margawse Marisha-ten Marowit Mars Maru Marzanna Matangi Math ap mathowny Matka gabia Matka ziemia Maui Mawaya-no-kami Maya Mebd Medb Melqart Menhit Menthu Mentu Mercury Mextli Mider Mikaboshi Milu Miming Mimir Minerva Miro Mithras Mixcoatl Miyazu-hime Moaalii Modi Mokosh Mokualii Moloch Monju-bosatsu Mooaleo Morrigan Mot Mummu Murukan Musubi-no-kami Myrrdin Nacon Nai-no-kami Naka-yama-tsu-mi Nammu Nanaja Nanna Nanse Neith Nemain Nemesis Nephthys Neptune Nergal Niamh Nikko-bosatsu Ninazu Ninhurzag Ninigi-no-mikoto Nintu Ninurta Njord Nominosukune Norns Nott Nut Nyorai Oanomochi Odin Ogoun Ohkuninushi Oho-yama Ohonamochi Ohyamatsumi Okuni-nushi Ops Orgelmir Oro Osiris Ostara Ouli Owatatsumi Oyamatsumi Pales Pan Papa Parvati Pele Perperuna Persephone Perun Phaethon Phoebe Phoebus apollo Pilumnus Pluto Podaga Poliahu Pomona Porewit Poseidon Proserpine Puea Qadeshtu Quetzalcoatl Radegast Raiden Ram Rama Ran Re Resef Reshep Resheph Rhea Rod Rugiviet Ryo-wo Sabazius Sae-no-kami Saga Sakhmet Sambo-kojin Samulayo Sarasvati Sarutahiko ohkami Saturn Segomo Selene Sengen Septu Seshat Seth Seti Shachar Shaka Shakti Shalim Shamash Shamayim Shapsu Shemesh Shen yi Shichi fujukin Shinda Shine-tsu-hiko Shiva Shoden Shoki Shu Si-wang-mu Siebog Sif Simargl Sin Sirona Sita Siwa Sjofn Skadi Sleipnir Sol Stribog Suijin Suitengu Sukuna-biko Surya Susanoh Susanowa Svantetit Svarog Svetovid Svetovit Syn Takami-musubi Takemikadzuchi Taki-tsu-hiko Tatsuta-hime Tawaret Tefnut Tehwom Tenjin Teutates Tezcatlipoca Thanatos The zorya Thor Tiamat Tlaloc Tonatiuh Toyo-uke-bime Toyouke-omikami Triglav Tsuki-yumi Tu Tu matauenga Turris Tyche Tyr Uba Uga-jin Uga-no-mitama Ukanipo Ukemochi Ulaulekeahi Uli Ull Utu Uzume Vali Valkyries Vamana Vanir Var Veles Venus Vertumnus Vesta Vidar Vishnu Volturnus Vulcan Wakahiru-me Wata-tsu-mi Wepwawet Wurukatte Xipe Xi wang-mu Xochipilli Xochiquetzal Yabune Yam Yam-nahar Yama-no-kami Yamato Yarikh Ymir Yu-huang Yuki-onna Yum kimil Zababa Zana Zedek Zeus Zirnitra Zislbog Zizilia Zroya | Aesir Agasaya Agdistis Ah chuy kak Ah cun can Ah hulneb Ah puch Ahulane Ahura mazda Aine Airmid Aizen-myoo Aji-suki-taka-hi-kone Akea Alberich Ama-no-minaka-nushi Ama-tsu-mara Amaethon Amaterasu Amatsu Amatsu-kami Ame-no-mi-kumari Ame-no-wakahiko Amidaam-no-tanabata-hime An Anahita Anat Anath Andhrimnir Andraste Andvari Angrboda Angus og Ankt Annapurna Anouke Anshar Anu Aphrodite Apollo Apsu Apukohai Arawn Aray Ares Arianrhod Artemis Artio Asclepius Asherah Ashur Astarte Astrild Athena Athirat Athtart Atla Atlas Audhumla Ba'al hadad Baal Baal-hammon Baalat Babd catha Bacchus Badb Baku Balder Balor Balrama Bast Ba xian Beg-tse Bel Belatu-cadros Bellona Belobog Benten Benzai-ten Bergelmir Berstuk Bes Beyla Bhuvaneshwari Bimbogami Binzuru-sonja Bishamon Bixia yuanjin Blodeuwedd Borghild Bosatsu Bragi Brahma Bran Branwen Brighid Brigit Bris Brono Buddha Bugid y aiba Buluc chabtan Burijas Butsu Bylgia Camalus Camaxtli Camulus Cariocienus Caswallawn Ceres Ceridwen Cernunnos Cerridwen Cerunnos Chac Chalchiuhtlicue Charun Chemosh Cheng-huang Chien-shin Chimata-no-kami Chup-kamui Crnobog Cupid Cybele Cyhiraeth Dagda Dagon Dagon Dagur Daibosatsu Daikoku Dainichi Damkina Danu Davlin Dawn Dazbog Demeter Dev Dewi Dhanwantari Dhumavati Diana Diancecht Di cang Dionysus Disen Don Donar Dosojin Dozoku-shin Druantia Durga Dylan Dziewona Ea Ebisu Eir Ekchuah Ekibiogami El Elaine El elyon Elli Emma-o Enki Enlil Enyalius Enyo Eos Epona Ereskigal Erra Eshara Eshmun Farbauti Faunus Fenrir Flidais Flins Flora Forseti Freya Freyr Frigg Fudo Fujin Fukurokuju Funadama Futsu-nushi-no-kami Gaia Gama Ganesha Ganga Garuda Gauri Geb Gefion Gekka-o Geong si Gerd Giobhniu Gu Guan-di Gun Gwydion Gwynn ap nudd Hachiman Hades Hadur Hai Haniyasu-hiko Haniyasu-hime Hanuman Hathor Haulili Haya-ji Heimdall Hel Helios Heng-o Hephaestus Hera Hermes Hermod Hestia Hiaka Hiiakawawahilani Hinakuluiau Hiruko Hod Hoderi Holler Hoori Hors Horus Hoso-no-kami Hotei Hsi-wang-mu Huitzilopochtli Hygeia Ictinike Ida-ten Idun Ika-zuchi-no-kami Iki-ryo Inanna Inari Indra Inti Irmin Ishtar Isis Isora Ixtab Izanagi Izanaki Izanami Janus Jarilo Jarovit Jinushigami Jizo Jord Jormungand Juichimen Juno Jupiter Jurojin Juthrbog Juturna Kagutsuchi Kalaipahoa Kali Kaluannuunohonionio Kamado-gami Kamapua'a Kami-kaze Kaminari Kamohoali'i Kamooalii Kanaloa Kanayama-hiko Kanayama-hime Kane Kane-hekili Kapo Kapohoikahiola Karewit Kari Kartikeya Karttikeya Kathirat Kaupe Kawa-no-kami Kenro-ji-jin Keoahikamakaua Keuakepo Khepri Ki Kiha Kingu Kinich ahau Kishar Kishi-bojin Kishijoten Kishimo-jin Ko-no-hana Kojin Koleamoku Korrawi Koshin Kothar Koya-no-myoin Krishna Ku Kuahana Kukailimoku Kukaoo Kukulcan Kukunochi-no-kami Kuni-toko-tachi Kura-okami Kurma Kuula Kvasir Laamaomao Labraid Lada Lado Laga Laka Lakakane Lakshmi Laran Lares Libintia Lie Liza Llyr Lofn Loki Lono Lonomakua Lotan Lugh Luna Macha Maeve Magna mater Magni Mahulu Maia Manannan Mani Manua Marduk Margawse Marisha-ten Marowit Mars Maru Marzanna Matangi Math ap mathowny Matka gabia Matka ziemia Maui Mawaya-no-kami Maya Mebd Medb Melqart Menhit Menthu Mentu Mercury Mextli Mider Mikaboshi Milu Miming Mimir Minerva Miro Mithras Mixcoatl Miyazu-hime Moaalii Modi Mokosh Mokualii Moloch Monju-bosatsu Mooaleo Morrigan Mot Mummu Murukan Musubi-no-kami Myrrdin Nacon Nai-no-kami Naka-yama-tsu-mi Nammu Nanaja Nanna Nanse Neith Nemain Nemesis Nephthys Neptune Nergal Niamh Nikko-bosatsu Ninazu Ninhurzag Ninigi-no-mikoto Nintu Ninurta Njord Nominosukune Norns Nott Nut Nyorai Oanomochi Odin Ogoun Ohkuninushi Oho-yama Ohonamochi Ohyamatsumi Okuni-nushi Ops Orgelmir Oro Osiris Ostara Ouli Owatatsumi Oyamatsumi Pales Pan Papa Parvati Pele Perperuna Persephone Perun Phaethon Phoebe Phoebus apollo Pilumnus Pluto Podaga Poliahu Pomona Porewit Poseidon Proserpine Puea Qadeshtu Quetzalcoatl Radegast Raiden Ram Rama Ran Re Resef Reshep Resheph Rhea Rod Rugiviet Ryo-wo Sabazius Sae-no-kami Saga Sakhmet Sambo-kojin Samulayo Sarasvati Sarutahiko ohkami Saturn Segomo Selene Sengen Septu Seshat Seth Seti Shachar Shaka Shakti Shalim Shamash Shamayim Shapsu Shemesh Shen yi Shichi fujukin Shinda Shine-tsu-hiko Shiva Shoden Shoki Shu Si-wang-mu Siebog Sif Simargl Sin Sirona Sita Siwa Sjofn Skadi Sleipnir Sol Stribog Suijin Suitengu Sukuna-biko Surya Susanoh Susanowa Svantetit Svarog Svetovid Svetovit Syn Takami-musubi Takemikadzuchi Taki-tsu-hiko Tatsuta-hime Tawaret Tefnut Tehwom Tenjin Teutates Tezcatlipoca Thanatos The zorya Thor Tiamat Tlaloc Tonatiuh Toyo-uke-bime Toyouke-omikami Triglav Tsuki-yumi Tu Tu matauenga Turris Tyche Tyr Uba Uga-jin Uga-no-mitama Ukanipo Ukemochi Ulaulekeahi Uli Ull Utu Uzume Vali Valkyries Vamana Vanir Var Veles Venus Vertumnus Vesta Vidar Vishnu Volturnus Vulcan Wakahiru-me Wata-tsu-mi Wepwawet Wurukatte Xipe Xi wang-mu Xochipilli Xochiquetzal Yabune Yam Yam-nahar Yama-no-kami Yamato Yarikh Ymir Yu-huang Yuki-onna Yum kimil Zababa Zana Zedek Zeus Zirnitra Zislbog Zizilia Zroya Yahweh |
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