No neurological research suggests that the ideational content of things
like ecstatic experience is a part of our neurological make-up, and it's
entirely possible to have ecstatic experiences that have no theistic content.

Children believe in all sorts of magical things, but if left to their own
devices--and I swear we never discussed this when he was a child--as they
acquire other explanations for phenomena the magic tends to fall away.
Rather like cultures at large, which is why there are so many more atheists
now than there were in say 1200. God becomes less and less an inevitable
concept.

At one point Carlos announced to me that he believed in two gods: Jesus
Christ and the God of Thunder. He was 6 years old. I thought that was
great--natural theology. But it turned out that Christ had only entered his
life because his then best friend was from a believing Catholoc family and
Carlos wanted to be like him, and the God of Thunder was a character in a
TV show.

Which gets to the next issue. Joan and I truly didn't try to influence
Carlos' theological thinking--it in fact rarely came up. But he was
certainly surrounded by the society at large and by people other than us,
including Joan's family, which remains Catholic, and he went to a Quaker
school. We even had a Christmas tree each year. There was also a creche,
but when I explained to Carlos that I had a hard time with it he had no
problem at all with its removal. To him the little statues were something
like action figures, no more no less. He also had the tooth fairy, etc.,
but grew up quite happy not believing in a god.

Finally, of course, no child reared in a human environment can be a pure
test case, which sort of makes arguing from observation of children moot.

Einstein wasn't "all those scientists," which is why other scientists are
rarely trotted out as examples.

Mark




At 11:08 AM 3/9/2004 +1100, Alison Croggon wrote:
>On 9/3/04 10:58 AM, "Mark Weiss" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> > Something like: a belief in god is taught, but must be willed to be
> > maintained. Atheism need not be taught or willed.
>
>Actually, Mark, I don't think this is true. Belief in God (or Gods) in any
>society seems to predate any sort of scepticism: and from my observation
>children will make up gods if left to themselves (who is Father Christmas or
>the Tooth Fairy? And I'm not being facetious here - they form part of
>childish belief structures in most western homes, even where Mass isn't a
>regular occurrence). How can you say your son wasn't "taught" not to
>believe in God in his upbringing, since any child absorbs the beliefs of
>those around him or her?
>
>There is also that recent neurological research which suggests that things
>like ecstatic religious experiences are part of our neurological make-up -
>don't quiz me on this as it's not at my fingertips -
>
>I think Peter was introducing something more interesting than the
>anthropomorphic God we tend to think about when the subject is introduced,
>and something that isn't about explanatory values in the sense I think you
>mean. And what about all those scientists, like Einstein, who found that
>their increasing knowledge made disbelief a question rather than a
>certainty?
>
>Best
>
>A
>
>Alison Croggon
>
>Editor, Masthead
>http://www.masthead.net.au
>
>Home page
>http://www.alisoncroggon.com
>
>Blog
>http://alisoncroggon.blogspot.com