Is Mormon discussion more of a anti Mormon forum

[_The CCC]

Neither religion nor anti-religion is a measurable mental illness. That is a not so nice game played by both sides.
SEE https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/hi ... eople-play

[_DrW]

Neither religion nor anti-religion is a measurable mental illness. That is a not so nice game played by both sides.
SEE https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/hi ... eople-play

CCC,

It's no game. It is a well accepted scientific finding reproduced in any number of studies. Neither of the papers cited made the claim that religion is a measure mental illness - nor did I.

What the papers stated, and what I quoted, is that the delusional ideation associated with certain types of psychosis, and with disorders such as schizotypal personality disorder, cannot be differentiated from the unfounded beliefs of many religionists.

According to one of the papers cited, when presented with outlandish and clearly false assertions, religionists in the study agreed with such assertions at a rate indistinguishable from that of the mental patients in the study.

These kinds of outcomes have been reported in any number of studies. Bottom line is that committed religionists are highly likely to believe things that are simply not true (and obviously so to rational people).

I personally know of no peer reviewed studies, involving matched cohorts of believers (religionists) and non-believers (atheists & agnostics), wherein the non-believers exhibited delusional ideation, or agreed with outlandish and unfounded assertions, to an extent that was even close to that of the believers.

If you know of such a study, please post a reference or citation.
___________________

ETA: I failed to see what the Psychology Today article you cited on displacement has to do with the subject at hand. If your point was related to the author's book on the Psychology of Self Deception, perhaps you could comment further.

[_honorentheos]

...secularists on this board, in the main, are not trying to disprove religious belief. They mainly question the faith-based assertions of others, and point to evidence that such assertions are contrary to the facts.

I first began reading David Hume, quoted in your signature, between the period I would have considered myself firmly believing that the LDS Church was God's restored organization with priesthood authority, etc., etc., to when I came to the conclusion religious institutions and their teachings about God did not square with the evidence. I came to appreciate the discussion he had with his readers over the nature of inquiry but especially over doubt. He makes a great case for skeptisim, particularly in An Enquiry Into Human Understanding, and more particularly towards concepts such as the philosophical ideas of Descartes which rely on bedrock axioms upon which reason must be grounded before it can proceed. It seems if Hume were to take up argument in this thread, he might not choose to attack one side over the other for their positions so much as broadly question the grounds from which all are proceeding.

If we were to follow in the tradition of Hume, we'd probably agree we are on the most sure footing when we avoid overly general arguments, when we narrowly focus on comparisions between evidence and claims, and generally avoid making a religion of our own axiomatic beliefs.

This secularist sees many occasions of people on this board making a religion of their lack of religion. We should be more cautious of this, in my opinion. I think Hume would agree, and the quote in your signature line, brought forward to our more secular but technologically apocolyptic age where religion isn't synonymous with politic or national identity, may be better stated, "the mistakes of ideological certitude are dangerous".

Hume seems to have viewed the misunderstanding of skepticism as central to the problems of religion as well as philosophy and "natural philosophy" or science. I think he was onto something there.

[_DrW]

...secularists on this board, in the main, are not trying to disprove religious belief. They mainly question the faith-based assertions of others, and point to evidence that such assertions are contrary to the facts.

I first began reading David Hume, quoted in your signature, between the period I would have considered myself firmly believing that the LDS Church was God's restored organization with priesthood authority, etc., etc., to when I came to the conclusion religious institutions and their teachings about God did not square with the evidence. I came to appreciate the discussion he had with his readers over the nature of inquiry but especially over doubt. He makes a great case for skeptisim, particularly in An Enquiry Into Human Understanding, and more particularly towards concepts such as the philosophical ideas of Descartes which rely on bedrock axioms upon which reason must be grounded before it can proceed. It seems if Hume were to take up argument in this thread, he might not choose to attack one side over the other for their positions so much as broadly question the grounds from which all are proceeding.

If we were to follow in the tradition of Hume, we'd probably agree we are on the most sure footing when we avoid overly general arguments, when we narrowly focus on comparisions between evidence and claims, and generally avoid making a religion of our own axiomatic beliefs.

This secularist sees many occasions of people on this board making a religion of their lack of religion. We should be more cautious of this, in my opinion. I think Hume would agree, and the quote in your signature line, brought forward to our more secular but technologically apocolyptic age where religion isn't synonymous with politic or national identity, may be better stated, "the mistakes of ideological certitude are dangerous".

Hume seems to have viewed the misunderstanding of skepticism as central to the problems of religion as well as philosophy and "natural philosophy" or science. I think he was onto something there.

Honor,

You know that I respect your point of view and greatly appreciate your generally even handed and philosophical approach and comments regarding the kinds of issues discussed on MDB.

That being said, we can apparently agree David Hume represented great wisdom in his day. I would claim that when he noted that mistakes in religion are dangerous, he was onto something.

One of the mistakes associated with religion is the operant conditioning that occurs as a result of often highly repetitive religious practice and ritual in many of the more fundamentalist sects (okay, denominations - including Mormonism).

As noted upthread, scientific studies have shown again and again that, as a cohort, such religionists -especially those with less education - are highly prone to believing assertions for which there is no evidence or which are demonstrably and blatantly false, especially when such assertions are made by someone within the same or similar community.

As a contemporary real world example, here is a short list of ridiculous assertions that such individuals can be convinced are true, or at least highly credible.

I am going to build a wall along the US-Mexican border costing tens of billions of dollars and the Mexicans are going to pay for it.

My administration will provide health care that will be more comprehensive, cover more people, and be less expensive than the ACA. Everyone in America is going to have health care.

For those who make the excuse that all presidential candidates lie to get elected, there is plenty of post election evidence that delusional ideation is still effective with a large segment of the population.

President Barack Obama ordered a federal phone line wire tap of Trump Tower.

I could go on. You get the point. Who are these people?

As several studies and innumerable polls have shown, the segment of the US population that can be most reliably counted upon to accept and promote such delusional assertions are Evangelical Christians.

The fact that Utah (often referred to as the "reddest of red states") went overwhelmingly for Trump in the last election is pretty much QED for this assertion as far as the Mormons (and hence most of the believers who show up on this board) are concerned.

As to the danger involved here - I can think of nothing more dangerous than a a mentally unbalanced and often delusional (titular) leader of the free world, elected and supported by a just as often delusional minority of the population.

[_honorentheos]

As noted upthread, scientific studies have shown again and again that, as a cohort, such religionists are highly prone to believing assertions for which there is no evidence or which are demonstrably and blatantly false, especially when such assertions are made by someone within the same or similar community.

The thing is, everyone is prone to beliefs independent of evidence, particularly when they are reinforced by in group dynamics.

Where I take issue is the move from something almost tautological (people who believe things on faith are prone to believing things without empirical evidence) to assertions that there is some form of correlation between clinically diagnosed cases of mental illness and having religious beliefs or attitudes that exhibit delusional ideation.

If you were to look into the Peters Delusions Inventory that you cited where those with religious beliefs showed comparable scores but without the symptoms of schizophrenia, the information they are looking for relates to the content of one’s thinking. So, for example -

The 21-item version of the Peters et al. Delusions Inventory (PDI-21) is a commonly used tool to measure delusional ideation in the normal population. Two recent principal component analyses have concluded that the PDI-21 has a seven-factor structure. Although these studies found identical factors associated with religiosity and grandiosity, the items loading on the remaining five factors, and hence the interpretation of these, differed.

or, when discussing the need for a broad population-based test like a short form of the PDI-40:

The two questionnaires available to measure delusions, however, both have limitations. The items on the Magical Ideation Scale (Mgl; Eckblad and Chapman 1986) sample a mixture of first rank symptoms, which are rarely endorsed in the general population (Eaton et al. 1991), and of superstitious beliefs, which, in contrast, are so common that they can hardly be regarded as delusional (Cox and Cowling 1989). Indeed, Peters et al. (1999b) found that the Mgl was only just significantly higher in floridly deluded than in healthy individuals.

When interpreting the results, and the difference between the "yes/no" answers to the question compared to the scaled 1-5 responses regarding distress, preoccupation, and conviction for those questions answered "yes" -

Taken together, these findings imply that the divisions between normal and delusional thinking, or between delusions and other types of pathological thinking, may be rather blurred. Furthermore, they support our previous claims (Peters et al. 1999a, 19996) that the analysis of the dimensions of distress, preoccupation, and conviction may be more revealing than the content of belief alone for placing an individual on the continuum from health to psychopathology.

Looked at in detail, it isn’t surprising that religious people would answer questions like, “Do you feel you have a special purpose in life?” or, “Do you believe in the power of witchcraft, voodoo or the occult?” with a “yes” but then show their lives aren’t being negatively impacted by these beliefs through the remaining scaling questions asked as follow-up. That's essentially what the studies you cited showed.

I think we ought to not be in the business of engaging in a propaganda war with religion. We ought to guard against our own biases and be all the more skeptical of reports that seem to strongly favor our currently held beliefs. Because, like your examples show, THAT is where the danger really seems to lie. We become much more willing to excuse all ventures into the ethically gray areas when we can justify our actions based on how the person or persons on the receiving side are deserving of whatever it is they are getting. And we may find ourselves eventually stepping out of the gray but not into white.

Are we that different from Trump and his supporters when we too would define those with whom we disagree, like those with religious views, as “other”? I disagree strongly with anything that takes us down the road of dehumanizing one another.

It's about principle, not about position. My principle is in favor of skepticism and the urge for good evidence taken with a grain of caution and a healthy dose of genuine concern for one's fellows.

[Guest]

Are we that different from Trump and his supporters when we too would define those with whom we disagree, like those with religious views, as “other”? I disagree strongly with anything that takes us down the road of dehumanizing one another.

It's about principle, not about position. My principle is in favor of skepticism and the urge for good evidence taken with a grain of caution and a healthy dose of genuine concern for one's fellows.

While I cannot disagree with much of what you wrote in response, some of your statements seem bit over the top, especially those suggesting that my remarks were somehow dehumanizing of others. I've seen 'dehumanizing' my friend - and my comments weren't it.

I was raised in a largely Mormon farming community. We all worked hard, lived very frugally, and we got by. I know what it's like to live on what you can grow. My father was a locally well-known arch conservative. He once broke up what he considered a left wing demonstration on the University of Washington campus with a truck load of honeybees.

Most of my extended family is Mormon. I do not consider them as 'other'. Growing up as Mormons, we all believed things that were ridiculous and patently untrue. Some of us eventually learned enough to know better. Some never did.

However, I do consider their gullibility, especially when it comes to belief in patently false statements by LDS Church leaders and especially certain conservative or pseudo-conservative politicians, to be dangerous.

And I would have no problem in sending each and every one of them a copy of my post above.

[_honorentheos]

Fair enough. I don't think it was unwarranted to raise the concern given the subject matter and direction. It's a slippery slope to start suggesting classes of people are running parallel with those meeting clinically defined criteria for having mental illness, and if I was over the top in making the case I'm ok with that.

[_DrW]

Fair enough. I don't think it was unwarranted to raise the concern given the subject matter and direction. It's a slippery slope to start suggesting classes of people are running parallel with those meeting clinically defined criteria for having mental illness, and if I was over the top in making the case I'm ok with that.

No problem in raising a concern. I would simply point out, again, that there is plenty of scientific literature to back up the parallel - slippery slope or not.

At this point I think we differ mainly on semantics - with the possible exception of Donald Trump. The Orange One is certifiable NPD and occasionally exhibits florid delusions.

[_Choyo Chagas]

Donald Trump
The Orange One

wumo (http://wumo.com/wumo) are our prophet
they prophesied donald ben years ago

......

its yellow colour looks very good on TV




please don't forget its stronger cupidity credibility (grabbing pussies) ...

[_The CCC]

It's no game. It is a well accepted scientific finding reproduced in any number of studies. Neither of the papers cited made the claim that religion is a measure mental illness - nor did I.

What the papers stated, and what I quoted, is that the delusional ideation associated with certain types of psychosis, and with disorders such as schizotypal personality disorder, cannot be differentiated from the unfounded beliefs of many religionists.

According to one of the papers cited, when presented with outlandish and clearly false assertions, religionists in the study agreed with such assertions at a rate indistinguishable from that of the mental patients in the study.

These kinds of outcomes have been reported in any number of studies. Bottom line is that committed religionists are highly likely to believe things that are simply not true (and obviously so to rational people).

I personally know of no peer reviewed studies, involving matched cohorts of believers (religionists) and non-believers (atheists & agnostics), wherein the non-believers exhibited delusional ideation, or agreed with outlandish and unfounded assertions, to an extent that was even close to that of the believers.

If you know of such a study, please post a reference or citation.
___________________

ETA: I failed to see what the Psychology Today article you cited on displacement has to do with the subject at hand. If your point was related to the author's book on the Psychology of Self Deception, perhaps you could comment further.

I was using displacement as an example of a not so fun game. To the issue at hand SEE https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/re ... l-disorder