‘God is not just for the stupid’
The Christian think tank Theos has attacked a report from Ulster University that claims that the “intellectual elite” of Britain is atheist.
Professor Richard Lynn, Ulster University’s emeritus professor of psychology, said that more members of the “intellectual elite” considered themselves to be atheists than the national average.
But Paul Woolley, director of the think-tank Theos, said: “Religion is a complex phenomenon and Professor Lynn’s explanation is simplistic. He has recycled the long-disproven thesis of inevitable secularisation.
“Academia had a religious origin - the first universities were originally established by the Church, and some of the finest academics in the world today, not to mention some of the greatest minds in history, are deeply religious.
“The research fails to take account of a variety of cultural factors that would affect the outcome of opinion polls and surveys, and makes a series of unproven assumptions, not least that a high level of education is synonymous to a high IQ.”
Professor Lynn is well known for controversial statements on eugenics, particularly the links between IQ and race.
Dr David King, co-ordinator of watchdog group, Human Genetics Alert, said: “We find Richard Lynn’s claims that some human beings are inherently superior to others repugnant.”
According to the report the decline in religious observance over the past century was directly linked to a rise in average intelligence.
[Source]
[From me]
Humm.. I may be stupid but I’m smart enough to ask God to control my life. I examined the evidence and realized it takes more faith to not believe in God then to accept He exists.
What do you think?
One of my favorite quotes is by the author, J. Budziszewski, a philosophy professor at the University of Texas. He was an atheist when he joined them but became a Christian. You have to know that they hated that!
“Though it always comes as a surprise to intellectuals, there are some forms of stupidity that you must be highly intelligent and educated to commit. God keeps them in His arsenal to pull down mulish pride, and I discovered them all.”
Any correlation of the words in bold to the “Brites” is purely deliberate.
Neil’s last blog post..Happy Father’s Day!
As someone who works in academia, it is not hard to see why so many “intellectuals” do not believe in God. I am in the social sciences, and if you can’t quantify it, measure it, and run statistical tests on it, it must not exist. I think we would all agree that it is difficult to quantify, measure, and test God.
Not to mention, good tests must be falsifiable and replicable. Again, how do we falsify God?
A lot of academics apply their professional theoretical testing standards to God, and come to the conclusion that God must not exist because their scientific tests don’t prove Him to be true.
It is sad really. And even more sad is the fact that they teach their students to think the same way.
Unfortunately, these “intellectuals” are missing the point of God.
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Good points, Michael. They are making a category error, and they often do it deliberately. If God created the physical universe and everything in it (and He did
), then He would be outside scientific testing. Also, spiritual things are by definition not material, so scientific testing - which is for material things - would not apply.
Just ask the “science only” folks if they can prove empirically that we should only trust empirical testing. They’ll go in circles.
Also, ask them if they have personally replicated every experiement they rely upon or if they trust the judgment of others at times. It demonstrates that we all rely on trustworthy witnesses every day, so it is logical for Christians to rely on the Bible when it is demonstrated to be trustworthy.
Neil’s last blog post..Happy Father’s Day!
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