If you can help me I’ll be very grateful. Could use answer by Thursday morning, if you can.
I’m not sure whether this references a book. Probably not. So I’m leaving this question here, rather than Cafe Society…
Do you recall an exchange, perhaps part of a debate, of Russell with a bishop, which went badly for the latter?
Russell was told at one point that he simply didn’t understand because he didn’t have the religious background, was a lifelong atheist, or words to that effect.
He replied that he actually had a very religious upbringing, and added that he wondered whether the bishop had any early grounding in skepticism. Or some such biting response.
I haven’t been able to find the bit of dialogue anywhere.
I found a transcript of the debate and a quick scan didn’t show any similar exchange (it also appears to be on Youtube.) And to be frank, it’d be rather surprising for Copleston to advance that sort of argument to begin with. He would have understood Russell’s argumentative position almost as well as Russell did himself, and known full well that it didn’t depend on any deficiency of childhood experiences.