[ExI] Theological arguments

[William Flynn Wallace]

On Sat, Dec 12, 2015 at 12:25 PM, John Clark <johnkclark at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Fri, Dec 11, 2015 at 2:07 PM, Keith Henson <hkeithhenson at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> ​>​
>>  I tend to bypass theology for biology,particularly evolutionary
>> psychology and reply to theology questions
>> ​ ​
>> with the meta question, "Why do humans have religions at all?"
>>
>
> ​The world is a dangerous place so there would be an
> evolutionary
> ​ advantage for children to believe what their parents tell them about it.
> Most people don't have hallucinations but some do, and those that do will
> tell their children about it and they will accept it as a fact about the
> world as uncritically as the fact that it's dangerous to swim in that river
> because of the crocodiles. And when they grow up they will tell their
> children the same thing even if they have not had the hallucination​
> themselves. So the grandchildren will also believe that the
> hallucination
> ​ explains something important about the world, it must be true because
> mommy and daddy told me it's true. ​And so it goes.
>
>  John K Clark
>

​What is so difficult for me to understand is this:  we teach young
children about the tooth fairy, Santa, Easter bunny, and all sorts of
things in various cultures that they grow out of (a meaningless phrase,
that), coming to see fairly early that these are false. So why do they
believe anything the parents and wider culture believe?  One would think
that they are now prejudiced against the older generation's beliefs.
After all, they were lied to over and over.
bill w

>
>
>>
>>
>
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