{"id":592,"date":"2008-02-21T13:15:00","date_gmt":"2008-02-21T12:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/02\/2-million-quid-down-the-tube.html"},"modified":"2014-11-14T05:44:45","modified_gmt":"2014-11-14T04:44:45","slug":"2-million-quid-down-tube","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/02\/2-million-quid-down-tube.html","title":{"rendered":"2 million quid down the tube…"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

The University of Oxford\u2019s Ian Ramsey Centre for Science and Religion<\/a> has been handed a cool \u00a32 million for a 3-year, cross-cultural study into why some people believe in god. A fascinating topic, but unfortunately there\u2019s something slightly fishy about the motivation of the lead researchers, according to quotes in The Tech Herald<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Justin Barrett, a psychologist and leading member of the research team, said to the Church of England Newspaper that he believed there is strong evidence that belief in God is a natural thing in humans. \u201cWe are interested in exploring exactly in what sense belief in God is natural<\/span>,\u201d he said. \u201cWe think there is more on the nature side than a lot of people suppose.\u201d<\/p>\n

Roger Trigg, acting director of the centre, [asked] \u201cThere are a lot of issues. What is it that is innate in human nature to believe in God, whether it is gods or something superhuman or supernatural? \u2026 One implication that comes from this is that religion is the default position<\/span>, and atheism is perhaps more in need of explanation,\u201d he said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Well, there\u2019s nothing like knowing the answer to the question before you begin \u2013 it saves a lot of time and bother! But what, exactly, is the evidence that people default to religion?<\/p>\n

For sure, kids tend to believe what their parents tell them. And if all they ever hear is Christianity, or Islam, or Judaism, then that\u2019s what they\u2019ll grow up believing. But offer them some options, and the picture is quite different.<\/span><\/p>\n

For example, Voas & Crockett<\/a> showed in 2005 that, of British kids brought up in a family in which only 1 parent was religious, just 30% end up religious themselves. Which would tend to suggest that the default state, in the absence of indoctrination, is atheism. Incidentally, even when both parents are religious, only 55% of their children are. When both parents are non-religious, 90% of their children follow suit. So children quite happily grow up without a belief in god when placed in a society that offers them a choice.<\/p>\n

For sure, many of the psychological illusions that underpin religious belief are built in \u2013 simply a result of the fact that our brains process information with an emphasis on making quick decisions, rather than accurate ones. For example, it appears that we are programmed to try to find a causes for the things we see \u2013 and so tend to see causes even when there aren\u2019t any (Rossano 2006<\/a>).<\/p>\n

But a predilection for anthropomorphisation,<\/a> and for wrongly attributing causes, is a long way from \u2018religion\u2019. Religion, after all, is a complex edifice usually built around a specific social structure and set of beliefs. There\u2019s no evidence that I know of that this is innate \u2013 unless you count Lord of the Flies<\/a> and other pop culture as evidence!<\/p>\n

Refs:<\/span><\/p>\n

Voas, Crockett. Religion in Britain: Neither Believing nor Belonging. Sociology, Vol. 39, No. 1, 11-28 (2005)<\/a>
Rossano. The Religious Mind and the Evolution of Religion. Review of General Psychology 2006, Vol. 10, No. 4, 346\u2013364<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The University of Oxford\u2019s Ian Ramsey Centre for Science and Religion has been handed a cool \u00a32 million for a 3-year, cross-cultural study into why some people believe in god. A fascinating topic, but unfortunately there\u2019s something slightly fishy about the motivation of the lead researchers, according to quotes in The Tech Herald: Justin Barrett, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2091,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-592","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n2 million quid down the tube...<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The University of Oxford's Ian Ramsey Centre for Science and Religion has been handed a cool \u00a32 million for a 3-year, cross-cultural study into why some\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/epiphenom\/2008\/02\/2-million-quid-down-tube.html\" 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