A Thought Experiment With Your Religious Friends

I am reading several books right now (I have them all listed in the left sidebar). One is called The God Virus and I just started it the other day. On page 18, Darrel W. Ray describes an experiment. I think I've heard of it before, but I thought I'd share it with you because it shows how religion attacks the critical thinking skills of the mind. As Mr. Ray says, it leaves the skill intact for other religions but disables critical thinking about one's own religion. It really is like a virus of the mind.

Here's the experiment as explained in the book:
You have a serious conversation with a deeply christian friend. Your friend is intelligent, well educated and knowledgeable. You agree to record the session. The topic is islam. During the session, you discuss that mohammed was a self-appointed prophet and that he claimed he talked to allah and the angels. He wrote a book that he claimed was infallible, and he flew from Jerusalem to heaven on a horse.

During the conversation, you agree that mohammed was probably delusional to think he could talk to god. You agree that the koran was clearly written by mohammed and not allah. It is ludicrous for him to claim that he is the last prophet and that all others are false. Neither you nor your friend can believe that he flew to heaven, let alone on a horse. It all sounds too crazy, and you both agree it is difficult to see how someone could believe such a religion. At the end of the conversation, you say that muslims did not choose their religion; they were born into it. Anyone who was exposed to both christianity and islam would see that christianity is the true religion.

Over the next few days, you transcribe the recording onto paper. Then you change all references to mohammed and make them jesus. Now the document reads something like this:

During the conversation, you both agree that jesus was probably delusional to think he could talk to jehovah. The bible was clearly written by men and not jehovah. You both agree it is ludicrous for jesus to claim that he is the last prophet and that all later ones are false. Neither of you can believe that he rose from the dead, nor flew to heaven. It all sounds too crazy, and it is difficult to see how someone could believe such a religion. At the end of the conversation, you both agree that christians did not choose their religion; they were born into it. Anyone who was exposed to both christianity and islam would see that islam is the true religion.


Now, tell your friend, "I made a transcript of our conversation about islam and would like to go over it with you." As you read it, watch her reaction. How does she respond to each statement? How soon does she get defensive? How quickly does she start making elaborate arguments that have no more factual basis than the first conversation? If you persist in this line of parallel reasoning, how long before she gets angry or breaks off the conversation? Could this conversation damage your friendship?

You can do this experiment with other prophetic religions. For example, substitute Joseph Smith for mormonism or moses for judaism.

Have you ever tried an experiment like this? Have you ever questioned your friend's religion? Did it damage your friendship? Or a family member? Does that person still talk to you? How far did your religious friend go to make excuses and explain away his religion in the face of reality?

11 comments:

  1. This post has been linked for the HOT5 Daily 1/23/2010, at The Unreligious Right

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  2. It's ironic how they never have a problem criticizing, even outright mocking, the beliefs of others. Yet if anybody questions or criticizes their beliefs they whip out the Persecution Card.

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  3. I have used an alternate version of this, but people just retreat and say "But my religion is different. Mine's real."

    My version is a retelling of the extermination of the Amalekites, replacing Saul with an ancient Chinese general, and jehovah with some random chinese deity.

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  4. Exactly. It's mind-numbingly frustrating.

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  5. I think that's the point of the exercise. That people get defensive if cornered with such silly things like "reality". They can't shake their own beliefs. They are infected with the god virus. Or so goes the premise of the book, from what I have read so far.

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  6. "Have you ever tried an experiment like this? Have you ever questioned your friend’s religion? Did it damage your friendship? Or a family member? Does that person still talk to you? How far did your religious friend go to make excuses and explain away his religion in the face of reality?"

    I had a good friend, who was a moderate christian, with a father that was extreme-christian. I'm a true atheist. We started discussing about religion, the beginning of the universe etc. We always said: You can't make me into a believer and i can''t make you into an atheist. But at a point he started to doubt some aspects of christianity. However this did not lead to him to leave his faith, instead he became so confused, because of the almost 20 years of indoctrination, he left to another part of the country a born again christian.
    Now he probably thinks that the period in which he questioned god was a test of Him....
    What i learned from this is that ppl can't easily make a 180 degrees turn in their opinion/believes.

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  7. Thanks for sharing this, Mr. Holland. I agree, changing your belief system is not easy, even for small steps, in my opinion. But huge changes I think are rare.
    We protect our beliefs. When they are challenged we get really defensive and maybe even attack to do anything to validate our view of the world.
    I think it takes a rare person to investigate a different world view in and change the way they think and believe.

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  8. I knew a guy for three years before I found out he was a Christian. We were in an Italian restaurant or some such at some point with a few friends and I don't recall how the subject turned to religion, but I jokingly said something about Jesus having had very large wooden shoes. I think it may actually have been him who turned the conversation toward religion (by making fun of Islam), but I don't recall the specifics. At any rate hes fairly derogatory of Islam. It ended up with having to apologize for not having enough respect for his sensitivities and promising to avoid it from then on. I don't really know what's going on with him religiously now.

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  9. Funny how you had to apologize, Frans. After all he had no respect for islam. Why are his beliefs so special and sacred? If your situation happened to me, I would hope I'd stand up for reality and facts and say that no, I don't have to walk on eggshells for someone's beliefs.

    You can be friends and like a person, even respect him, all without respecting his crazy beliefs.

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  10. My apologies for the missing apostrophes. I was using VNC (remote desktop) at the time which must have stripped them somehow.

    Anyhow, I agree that his beliefs aren't particularly sacred as compared to anybody else's (or my lack of them), but it wasn't worth causing a rift in our group of friends for me. Also I wasn't the main cause of his distress, that was another friend of mine who was saying more "provocative" things, although again, I don't recall what they were precisely (all of this transpired back in '06 or maybe '07). He didn't actually voice his concerns while the Christian belief "bashing" conversation was going on (as far as I recall it were fairly innocent jokes regarding a few nonsensical things in the Bible & to a lesser extent other religious texts), but sent an e-mail the day after.

    The combined apology also included the note that we thought it was somewhat hypocritical and that we thought he should have said something at the time and that we wouldn't promise not to say anything anti-God/Christian, but we'd try to keep it in mind. He more or less ignored the hypocrisy part as far as I can tell, but he considered it sufficient otherwise. I guess he realized he couldn't stick to a hard-line interpretation while still being around people he could otherwise get along with just fine.

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  11. Thanks for more detail. It makes more sense now. It sounds like you handled it all with finesse. :)

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