There is such an abundant wealth of information available on the internet that I often miss material which would otherwise have caught my attention and interest—like this one did, although its original date of publication was nearly a year ago now. I was following a considerable series of link trails this evening so I am uncertain about where I found this, but it may have been a link someone provided at the message board forums of the Stand Up! With Pete Dominick radio program on Sirius XM Radio (of which I am a volunteer staff member, incidentally, routinely updating the show’s web site with each day’s guest information).

In an article published last year (18 September 2008) in the Wall Street Journal, journalist Mollie Ziegler Hemingway wrote [1] about a Baylor University survey study released the day prior [2] whose results show, among other things, that non-religious people are more likely to believe in pseudoscience, cults and superstition than religious people. In contrast to what the New Atheists would have us believe, she says, their anti-religious campaign "might actually encourage new levels of mass superstition. And that’s not a conclusion to take on faith—it’s what the empirical data tell us."

The Gallup Organization, under contract to Baylor’s Institute for Studies of Religion, asked American adults a series of questions to gauge credulity. Do dreams foretell the future? Did ancient advanced civilizations such as Atlantis exist? Can places be haunted? Is it possible to communicate with the dead? Will creatures like Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster someday be discovered by science?

What the Baylor survey study discovered is that "traditional Christian religion greatly decreases credulity, as measured by beliefs in such things as dreams, Bigfoot, UFOs, haunted houses, communicating with the dead and astrology" (Stark, What Americans Really Believe, q.v. Ch. 15). In contrast to the popularity of gratuitous invective expressed by atheists, taking their cue from the likes of George Carlin and Bill Maher, that born-again Christian fundamentalists are especially credulous, the Baylor survey study results found the opposite to be the case—that conservative religious Americans are "far less likely to believe in the occult and paranormal" while more liberal believers and the non-religious are "far more likely" to believe in such things.

"This is not a new finding," Hemingway says, noting that more than twenty-five years ago in The Whys of a Philosophical Scrivener, [3]

skeptic and science writer Martin Gardner cited the decline of traditional religious belief among the better educated as one of the causes for an increase in pseudoscience, cults and superstition. He referenced a 1980 study published in the magazine Skeptical Inquirer that showed irreligious college students to be, by far, the most likely to embrace paranormal beliefs while born-again Christian college students were the least likely.

She closes her piece with a quote from a G.K. Chesterton story: "It’s the first effect of not believing in God that you lose your common sense" (The Oracle of the Dog, 1923). I could certainly supply anecdotal evidence from my own experiences with self-identified atheists and other non-religious people that is consistent with such findings (in addition to the fallacy-riddled diatribes from anti-theists), but it seems to be a matter of fact that the elimination of religion hardly guarantees that a more sophisticated rationality will result, never mind the extensive humanitarian benefits that would disappear. (How many Christian charities and relief agencies can be listed? There are thousands. Contrasting this, how many atheist charities and relief agencies can be listed? Point made.)

Following my train of thought as it continues along, I am reminded of an extraordinarily insightful book by bestselling author Chris Hedges entitled When Atheism Becomes Religion: America’s New Fundamentalists (2008, Amazon.com), which critiques the zealous mindset of the new atheists which rages against religion and faith as being every bit as delusional and dangerous as its radically religious counterpart, an exceptionally fitting bookend, as it were, to his New York Times bestseller American Fascists.

[1] Hemingway, Mollie Ziegler. "Look Who’s Irrational Now." Wall Street Journal. 18 Sep 2008: W13. Print. Available online at <http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122178219865054585.html> Accessed: 17 Aug 2009.

[2] Stark, Rodney, et al. What Americans Really Believe. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2008. Print. A synopsis is available online at <http://www.baylor.edu/pr/news.php?action=story&story=52815> Accessed: 17 Aug 2009.

Most Commented Posts