I saw a link to this article on the CNN Twitter feed. I’d suggest reading it, but I’ll just jump into it:
Evolutionary psychologist Satoshi Kanazawa at the the London School of Economics and Political Science correlated data on [political, religious and sexual] behaviors with IQ from a large national U.S. sample and found that, on average, people who identified as liberal and atheist had higher IQs.
Well, this is going to make for some fun conversations on campus. I just hope that it doesn’t turn into an a dicto simpliciter fallacy in conversations which would go something like:
Well, you know that more intelligent people tend to be atheists. I am an atheist and therefore I must be more intelligent than you.
Honestly, I already see this argument in conversations all the time. Even as you read the comments on the article you come across statements like:
If you believe in fairy tales please deduct 10 points from your I.Q. Thank You.
As a liberal, vegetarian athiest who has witnessed the rise of the Republican-sponsored Tea Party movement and Sarah Palin, I have to agree with these findings. ; )
Even more disturbing is that the people who don’t like the findings are also making that (il)logical jump:
Then I guess the Founding fathers were complete idiots with single digit IQ’s.
I have been blessed with an average iq of 171 and I am extremely conservative, believe strongly in God and disagree at nearly all ends on the results of their study…
In reality, I’m not at all disturbed by these findings. For one, I know my IQ score and while I’m not a tool enough to brag about it I’ve not been found “wanting,” and I am sure that I apply intelligence to my faith and into understanding it and understanding the arguments for it. Also, this is something that Paul predicted more than 1,900 years ago.
Romans 1:22 Claiming to be wise, the became fools.
The verse does not say that intelligent people are not intelligent. Also, it doesn’t say that they have lost their intelligence, or that they will all of a sudden lose whatever knowledge or ideas they have. What it is saying is that people choose to honor God or not when they see glimpses of Him. We’ve all glimpsed the transcendent and we decide whether or not we want to look into it or attempt to explain it away. This is what the Bible calls “foolish.” One of the researcher’s statements from the CNN article even claims that it’s a choice:
Bailey also said that these preferences may stem from a desire to show superiority or elitism, which also has to do with IQ. In fact, aligning oneself with “unconventional” philosophies such as liberalism or atheism may be “ways to communicate to everyone that you’re pretty smart,” he said.
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Romans 1:22…agreed, but how about in other words….claiming to be wise or claiming to know the answer because one has done all the “correct” research or investigation filters all information through their HUMAN brain. It is human centered. Of course the conclusion of “me centered thinking” is going to be ME!
How about Isaiah 47:10 “You have trusted in your wickedness and have said, ‘No one sees me.’ Your wisdom and knowledge mislead you when you say to yourself, ‘I am, and there is none besides me.’”
It is when one explains God away with their own “intellect” that they become a god in their own mind. Most of the time, without even realizing the amount of pride that they had to possess to even do this. (You don’t have to be a Christian to understand self-centeredness.) Sounds like a particular fallen angel we know of. I believe this is a spirit of the anti-Christ. Likely something Paul was predicting. Typically though, it seems like people just want something to disbelieve. All of my thought processes bring me back to God, not because I’m not intellectual but because I use my intellect as a test for my faith, not as a test for further intellect. After any test of my faith, I cannot deny any of the experiences I have had BECAUSE OF MY FAITH. That leads me to believe that FAITH doesn’t change reality….it creates a new one that works in tandem with the reality we live in. I went a little far but good word!