Eamon pointed out the source of the rather…harsh description of atheists that Michael Nugent quoted in his address to the constitutional convention in Ireland. It’s by Sean Thomas last August 14th in the Torygraph.
He starts with the science of theists are better.
A vast body of research, amassed over recent decades, shows that religious belief is physically and psychologically beneficial – to a remarkable degree.
Mental health – blood pressure – recovery from broken hips – more children – coping with stress – more happy – less suicidal – ALL THE THINGS.
What’s more, these benefits are visible even if you adjust for the fact that believers are less likely to smoke, drink or take drugs. And let’s not forget that religious people are nicer. They certainly give more money to charity than atheists, who are, according to the very latest survey, the meanest of all.
So which is the smart party, here? Is it the atheists, who live short, selfish, stunted little lives – often childless – before they approach hopeless death in despair, and their worthless corpses are chucked in a trench (or, if they are wrong, they go to Hell)? Or is it the believers, who live longer, happier, healthier, more generous lives, and who have more kids, and who go to their quietus with ritual dignity, expecting to be greeted by a smiling and benevolent God?
Obviously, it’s the believers who are smarter. Anyone who thinks otherwise is mentally ill.
Well, in that case, it must be time to round us all up.
And I mean that literally: the evidence today implies that atheism is a form of mental illness. And this is because science is showing that the human mind is hard-wired for faith: we have, as a species, evolved to believe, which is one crucial reason why believers are happier – religious people have all their faculties intact, they are fully functioning humans.
Therefore, being an atheist – lacking the vital faculty of faith – should be seen as an affliction, and a tragic deficiency: something akin to blindness. Which makes Richard Dawkins the intellectual equivalent of an amputee, furiously waving his stumps in the air, boasting that he has no hands.
Tags: atheism, Richard Dawkins
All that, just to end up with yet another Telegraph bashing of Dawkins. As is well apparent I’m very annoyed with Dawkins myself, but stupid arbitrary bullying like that might be the one thing that could make me more sympathetic to him.