# What’s the difference between being devoutly religious and delusional? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 10, 2018, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833 "2018-06-10T18:24:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/41 "2018-06-11T15:51:30Z")
> [@DavidwithanR](#): > > Do you sincerely believe that every single one of these people is illiterate and never went to school? I helped a friend by coming in to teach second grade science last year. I was a “scientist” (close enough anyhow) and answered questions and tried to get the kids excited. One of the questions was about how we got here, so I prepared something on human evolution. No way. My friend said that one of the parents, a 7th Day Adventist, said he would sue of evolution was even mentioned. And my friend who taught only one day a week didn’t need that aggravation. And I live in the Bay Area. Do you think kids in Alabama get much evolution? Anything in the book probably gets an eyeroll from most teachers. The little background they do get is outweighed by the crap from their preachers and Sunday School teachers. “Science is hard” says Fundie Barbie. > [@](#): > > The leading creationists see themselves manipulating numerous people, feeling powerful, and embezzling lots of money that was supposed to be for good causes. Not one leading creationist is sincere in his beliefs. Not a single one. I’m not sure creationist leaders are any more or less crooked than the average fundamentalist bigshot. But I think that lots of them can delude themselves, because otherwise their whole worldview of an inerrant Bible gets shattered. Look how many of them bray about sexual morality and still support the adulterer in chief. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/42 "2018-06-11T16:05:16Z")
> [@senoy](#): > > I disbelieve 419 scams because the people perpetrating them also disbelieve them. Which you only know because you know 419 scams are scams. Some sucker who falls for them doesn’t know that the scammer isn’t honest. Marjoe Gortner lost faith but was still a very successful preacher, convincing his audiences he was authentic. How does a member of the congregation know if the preacher is honest or dishonest? > [@](#): > > Again, I’m a pyrrhonist, so any argument regarding zeus or Odin is fair game for scepticism. Good, so you doubt Western religions also. So what’s the argument about, or is your doubt cultural bias also. > [@](#): > > Where we differ is that I feel arguments around science and engineering are also fair game for scepticism. I’m not sure that they ‘work’ the same way you think they do. I am am engineer and I can assure you that at least 75% of the time, the numbers do not match our observations. It is rare that I make a calculation and the real world hits it. That’s why we use tolerances. We assume that our explanation of reality is approximation. Regardless though, from a philosophical perspective, we don’t know that what we’re describing is real. What we know is that it produces outcomes that may or may not be desirable. > > We run into the evolutionary tiger problem. Natural selection does not require that our senses observe the world truely. They require that whichever way we observe the world confer a survival advantage. If observing the world incorrectly confers a survival advantage, then that’s what we would observe. And how would we even know since it’s our senses that we use to determine reality? Just before I retired I wrote and ran a system which collected and analyzed terabytes of data from microprocessor manufacturing. I know all about variations, I generated graphs for them every day. I know the limitations of measurements, especially when an internal temperature sensor reported a temp of - 273 degrees C. But limitations on accuracy and precision are far different from doubting the measurement completely. And of course the basic principles of semiconductor physics are tested for each of the billion transistors fabricated on a chip. ---
**Author:** ![Ashtura](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ashtura/32/2963_2.png) [@Ashtura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ashtura)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/43 "2018-06-11T16:12:06Z")
Superstition, which invariably leads to religion, is baked into human DNA. All major civilizations in recorded history have had it, and probably long before that, and that is no coincidence. I am not religious, and believe through progress we will eventually move away from that, but to call sincere religious belief “delusional” is very condescending imo. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/44 "2018-06-11T16:12:19Z")
> [@senoy](#): > > I disagree, especially in this context. I do agree that we have to act or at least we probably should. I also agree that we likely have to have some idea of what we believe reality to be. Where I disagree is that if someone else disagrees with our assessment it is due to some sort of mental defect. This privileges our own cultural view of reality. An example would be if I were in rural southern Africa and said, last night I saw my dead grandmother come into my room and tell me to be kind to my brother. For many of them, this would not be an extraordinary claim and might almost be banal. A westerner might instead claim that these visitations are mass hallucinations or psychological manifestations of guilt or some other physicalist jargon. It is basically telling me to deny my own senses because they don’t fit in with your culture’s dominant paradigm. That troubles me. While it may be true that accepting a physicalist worldview ‘works’ in the sense of producing technology or productivity or whatever you consider desirable, I’m not sure that it necessarily ‘works’ in the sense of describing some sort of objective truth. Our cultures dominant paradigm is privileged not because it comes from our culture but because it produces things like the computer you are reading this on. As an engineer you should be well aware of what accuracy means, and that knowing a measurement is accurate only to +/- 5% is far different than saying the measurement is worthless. I don’t know what the cultural assumptions of a voltmeter are, anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/45 "2018-06-11T16:25:28Z")
> [@Ashtura](#): > > Superstition, which invariably leads to religion, is baked into human DNA. All major civilizations in recorded history have had it, and probably long before that, and that is no coincidence. I am not religious, and believe through progress we will eventually move away from that, but to call sincere religious belief “delusional” is very condescending imo. Is calling _any_ sincerely held belief “delusional” very condescending, or is that reserved for just the religious beliefs? ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/46 "2018-06-11T17:05:23Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > Is calling _any_ sincerely held belief “delusional” very condescending, or is that reserved for just the religious beliefs? IMO, any, potentially. My understanding—and [Merriam-Webster](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/delusion) seems to back me up—is that “delusion” can be used in an informal, colloquial sense, where I think it’s safe to say that _all_ of us are deluded, about something, sometimes. But there’s also a more specific, formal, psychological sense. In this sense, being deluded is a lot more than just being wrong about something. It’s possible for a belief that God has spoken to you personally to be a delusion in this sense, but most sincerely held religious beliefs, whether or not they happen to be correct, would not. ---
**Author:** ![Ashtura](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ashtura/32/2963_2.png) [@Ashtura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ashtura)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/47 "2018-06-11T17:48:17Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > Is calling _any_ sincerely held belief “delusional” very condescending, or is that reserved for just the religious beliefs? To me? Any. Any that is based on superstition. Delusional connotes mental disorders, and I think more people are superstitious (subcategory: religious), than not. It is perfectly natural. ---
**Author:** ![DavidwithanR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3bc359/32.png) [@DavidwithanR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DavidwithanR)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/48 "2018-06-11T18:05:09Z")
> [@Ashtura](#): > > Superstition, which invariably leads to religion, is baked into human DNA. All major civilizations in recorded history have had it, and probably long before that, and that is no coincidence. I am not religious, and believe through progress we will eventually move away from that, but to call sincere religious belief “delusional” is very condescending imo. A lot of religious belief isn’t sincere, though. For example, everyone in America does know that creationism is false as an explanation of history. Yet some people claim to believe it anyway. Claiming to believe something that you know for certain is not true, is not sincere. ---
**Author:** ![Ashtura](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ashtura/32/2963_2.png) [@Ashtura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ashtura)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/49 "2018-06-11T18:07:01Z")
> [@DavidwithanR](#): > > A lot of religious belief isn’t sincere, though. > > For example, everyone in America does know that creationism is false as an explanation of history. Yet some people claim to believe it anyway. Claiming to believe something that you know for certain is not true, is not sincere. Everyone in America?? Cite? ---
**Author:** ![DavidwithanR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3bc359/32.png) [@DavidwithanR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DavidwithanR)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/50 "2018-06-11T18:57:01Z")
> [@Ashtura](#): > > Everyone in America?? Cite? There may be exceptions - people who can’t read, people who have been prevented from reading, people who are mentally incompetent - but the evidence is there for all to examine. Unless Big-Brother-like suppression of the truth in the Evil Belt is actually broadly denying access to people who want to know. ---
**Author:** ![DavidwithanR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3bc359/32.png) [@DavidwithanR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DavidwithanR)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/51 "2018-06-11T19:01:21Z")
(Schools are still required to teach the truth alongside the religion, aren’t they? Everyone goes to school, right?) ---
**Author:** ![gytalf2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ac91a4/32.png) [@gytalf2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gytalf2000)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/52 "2018-06-11T19:07:50Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > To be fair, you can also be cynical, and claim devout religiousness in order to gain the impunity that religious beliefs hold, gain power over others who are delusional believers, and gain vast material wealth (tax free) by fleecing those who believe that giving to you is giving to god. > > They are not delusional, just assholes. Good point! ---
**Author:** ![DavidwithanR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3bc359/32.png) [@DavidwithanR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DavidwithanR)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/53 "2018-06-11T19:15:03Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > To be fair, you can also be cynical, and claim devout religiousness in order to gain the impunity that religious beliefs hold… This is the case not just with leaders, but with huge numbers of “ordinary Christians” all over the USA. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/54 "2018-06-11T19:20:25Z")
> [@DavidwithanR](#): > > (Schools are still required to teach the truth alongside the religion, aren’t they? Everyone goes to school, right?) And if they teach something in school, everyone knows it must be true, right? ---
**Author:** ![DavidwithanR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3bc359/32.png) [@DavidwithanR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DavidwithanR)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/55 "2018-06-11T19:21:09Z")
The solution IMO is a small, simple new law: “In all matters brought before any court, religious belief is no defense.” ---
**Author:** ![DavidwithanR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3bc359/32.png) [@DavidwithanR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DavidwithanR)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/56 "2018-06-11T19:22:31Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > And if they teach something in school, everyone knows it must be true, right? No. Disingenuousness is a big problem all over, I see. ---
**Author:** ![DavidwithanR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3bc359/32.png) [@DavidwithanR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DavidwithanR)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/57 "2018-06-11T19:25:09Z")
Look, this is a very simple matter of evidence versus bullshit, exactly what this whole board exists for. You’re not telling me… Wait, are you? ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/58 "2018-06-11T19:28:47Z")
> [@DavidwithanR](#): > > Look, this is a very simple matter of evidence versus bullshit, exactly what this whole board exists for. You’re not telling me… Wait, are you? Wel, to be fair - there are many, many examples of “facts” that were taught in school and believed by the scientific establishment for many years that turned out not to be correct. So, just because their is evidence that supports a hypothesis, that doesn’t mean it’s correct. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/59 "2018-06-11T19:39:53Z")
> [@beowulff](#): > > Wel, to be fair - there are many, many examples of “facts” that were taught in school and believed by the scientific establishment for many years that turned out not to be correct. So, just because their is evidence that supports a hypothesis, that doesn’t mean it’s correct. To be even more fair, there is a difference between new evidence correcting old evidence, and refusing any evidence that interferes with the narrative you are trying to indoctrinate people with. ---
**Author:** ![nelliebly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nelliebly/32/5422_2.png) [@nelliebly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nelliebly)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2018, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833/60 "2018-06-11T20:29:03Z")
> [@DavidwithanR](#): > > The solution IMO is a small, simple new law: “In all matters brought before any court, religious belief is no defense.” Just to clarify, is it OK with you if religious belief is the complaint, not the defense? Even if you believe religion is bullshit, you don’t really want laws that, say, ban Muslims from entering the US, right? Or denying Quakers conscientious objector status? You simply don’t want people to use religious beliefs as a defense against charges of discrimination, murder, or anything else. Is that accurate? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-the-difference-between-being-devoutly-religious-and-delusional/815833.md?page=4)