ATHEISTS ONLY

@FBM,

So... what's idea here? We can lobotomize people so they stop believing in God?

@FBM,

Quote:

Scientists reduce belief in God by shutting down the brain’s medial frontal cortex

Yes, interesting.
So are they saying that atheism is the result of a lack of brain function? I guess I couldn't argue with that.

2 Replies

@Leadfoot,

Hey Plumbium Ped, I was pondering why you were the main poster in the atheist only thread. And it made me think of Peter Cook's satan in Bedazzled

[George climbs up on a London postbox.]
George Spiggott: I'm God. This is my throne, see? All around me are the cherubim, seraphim, continually crying 'Holy, holy, holy'. the angels, archangels, that sort of thing. Now you be me, Lucifer, the loveliet angel of them all.
Stanley Moon: What do I do?
George Spiggott: Well, sort of dance around praising me, mainly...
Stanley Moon: What sort of things do I say?
George Spiggott: Anything that comes into your head that's nice - how beautiful I am, how wise I am, how handsome...that sort of thing. Come on, start dancing.
Stanley Moon: You're wise!, You're beautiful! You're handsome!
George Spiggott: Thank you very much.
Stanley Moon: The universe! What a wonderful idea - take my hat off to you!
George Spiggott: Thank you.
Stanley Moon: Trees - terrific! Water - another good one!
George Spiggott: That was a good one...
Stanley Moon: Yes! Sex - top marks!
George Spiggott: Now make it more personal... a bit more fulsome please. Come on.
Stanley Moon: Immortal... invisible... you're handsome... you're glorious... you're the most beautiful person in the WORLD!
[Stanley performs a headstand, removes his hat and wipes his brow.]
Stanley Moon: Here, I'm getting a bit bored with this. Can't we change places?
George Spiggott: That's exactly how I felt.

0 Replies

@Leadfoot,

Leadfoot wrote:

Quote:
Scientists reduce belief in God by shutting down the brain’s medial frontal cortex
Yes, interesting.
So are they saying that atheism is the result of a lack of brain function? I guess I couldn't argue with that.

More like theistic tendencies are the result of mundane brain activity, rather than acutal invisible friends in the sky.

1 Reply

@Olivier5,

Olivier5 wrote:

So... what's idea here? We can lobotomize people so they stop believing in God?

Not seeing the connection to the article I posted.

1 Reply

@Setanta,

Quote:

If not in physical form, then what, intellectual form, or moral form? Hinge's criticisms would stand--the god of your scripture is a nasty, murderous, capricious and arbitrary icon of cruelty and indifference.

Interesting reversal. You're saying God must be all those things since humans are? And I suppose atheists are the exception to that rule?

There is a reason why humans are sometimes associated with those characteristics, but being created in God's image is not it.

1 Reply

@FBM,

I don't see how the article connects with anything, really. What does it say? That there is a ideology center in the brain?

1 Reply

@Olivier5,

Olivier5 wrote:

I don't see how the article connects with anything, really. What does it say? That there is a ideology center in the brain?

In regard to belief, the article is saying that it looks to be a result of activity in the brain's medial frontal cortex. It doesn't mention ideology.

1 Reply

@InfraBlue,

The article does speak of ideology a lot.

Quote:

Dr Izuma, from the University’s Department of Psychology, said: “People often turn to ideology when they are confronted by problems. We wanted to find out whether a brain region that is linked with solving concrete problems, like deciding how to move one’s body to overcome an obstacle, is also involved in solving abstract problems addressed by ideology.”

This interest in the brain basis of ideology led the team to focus on religion and nationalism.

Dr Izuma added: “We decided to remind people of death because previous research has shown that people turn to religion for comfort in the face of death. As expected, we found that when we experimentally turned down the posterior medial frontal cortex, people were less inclined to reach for comforting religious ideas despite having been reminded of death.”

The investigators asked participants to respond to both negative and positive emotional aspects of religion and of nationalism. Specifically, they rated belief in the Devil, demons, and Hell, in addition to God, angels, and heaven. All potential participants were pre-screened to make sure that they held religious convictions before beginning the experiment.

With regard to nationalistic ideology, the participants read two essays ostensibly written by recent immigrants. One essay was extremely complimentary toward the United States, and the other essay was extremely critical.

The implication is that people with their posterior medial frontal cortex lobotomized should be less inclined to religiosity and nationalism.

I bet they'd be less inclined to quite a few other things...

1 Reply

@Olivier5,

Yeah, you're right. I only read the excerpt.

I don't see lobotomies implicated at all, though.

1 Reply

@Leadfoot,

No, i wasn't saying that, you loon. I'm saying your god is all those things because it's written in your loony scripture.

0 Replies

@FBM,

I thought that maybe they'd found the location of irrationally held beliefs. Racism is as based on fact as theism, I guess.

0 Replies

With the "God Helmet" we can turn gods on, with magnets we can turn them off again. So we know that gods exist in the mind, but what evidence is there that they exist outside it?

0 Replies

@InfraBlue,

Indeed, the lobotomy is my conclusion. But the idea is not too far fetched: historically the idea of lobotomy came from the erroneous idea that particular mental capabilities and functions were located in particular places of the brain (phrenology).

http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/uncyclopedia/images/9/9f/Phrenology.png/revision/latest?cb=20051031034024

From that idea, it followed that one way to treat some severe mental disorders was to cut out from the brain those lobes that were believed to be dysfunctional. This led many doctors to mutilate the brain of thousands of patients in the hope that they could cure them, in effect making legumes out of them.

Because of this sad historical background of cognitive science, I am reluctant to give credit to any study that locates any mental capability in a particular region of the brain. We need IMO to give to the brain credit for being a network, a huge, hugely complex, intertwined and malleable network, not a set of discrete pieces or "centers" operating independently from one another.

1 Reply

Religious snake oil salesman . . . great work if you can get it.

0 Replies

@FBM,

Was that a parody or is that guy really that crazy?

2 Replies

@rosborne979,

I'm not 100% sure, to be honest. If it's a parody or a Poe, he's been doing it with a straight face for a long time.

0 Replies

@rosborne979,

Quote:

Was that a parody or is that guy really that crazy?

That guy was a paragon of rationality compared to a lot of what is out there. I'm still amazed that any human being can drift so far from reality. I keep meaning to research whether this is a new trend or has been around for ages.

1 Reply

@Leadfoot,

Oh man, the irony is killer here.

It's been around forever, Bubba, you don't need to do any research. Just look at the history of organized religion.

1 Reply

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