Hi There is quite a bit written of course about atheists in the context of the science versus religion debates, in particular about the relatively secular nature of many scientists and how they might have gotten that way. Another possible consideration is how can one study the unique characteristics of religious people without contrasting them to non- or at least less- religious people, atheists in the extreme? So much of the psychological study of religiousness would be informative about non-religious people.
Take care Jim James M. Clark Professor of Psychology 204-786-9757 204-774-4134 Fax j.cl...@uwinnipeg.ca >>> Michael Palij <m...@nyu.edu> 03-Dec-11 7:43:07 PM >>> On Sat, 03 Dec 2011 12:27:40 -0800, Michael Sylvester wrote: |a Psychology of Atheism or would that issue be subsumed under the Psychology of |Religion? To Which John Kulig wrote on Sat, 03 Dec 2011 17:02:29 -0800: >I attended Div 36 (spirituality and religion) confefrence once and athiesm did >not surface as a topic .... A few points: (1) I'd wager that people interested in a psychology of atheism would be interested in it because they are interested in discrediting atheism as a system of belief. As it turns out, this is only half right. (2) Paul Vitz of NYU somewhere along the line became a "born again Catholic" and instead of focusing on experimental psychology began to focus on the psychology of religion. He has written on this topic and one of his books is "Faith of the Fartherless: The Psychology of Atheism" which is available on Amazon; see: http://www.amazon.com/Faith-Fatherless-Psychology-Paul-Vitz/dp/1890626252 I'll leave it to the interested reader to determine the intellectual quality of Vitz's work and the extent of influence of Vitz's work on the scientific psychological community. (3) Bob Altemeyer, who developed the Right Wing Authoritarianism (RWA) scale and did several decades of survey research on authoritarianism and its relationships to other variables, has also had an interest in the psychology of religion. He and Bruce Hunsberger wrote a book about atheism which is available on Amazon and one examine it here: http://www.amazon.com/Atheists-Groundbreaking-Study-Americas-Nonbelievers/dp/1591024137/ref=pd_sxp_f_pt I have more confidence in scientific research of Altemeyer but that might be because I'm familiar with his other work. (4) Given that atheists are relatively few in the U.S. right now, one might have to put in a lot of effort to do valid psychological research on them. This might be a topic of interest to some but one hopes that it is a scientific interest and not an ideological/political one. I'm sure there are more rich conservatives who would provide money for research showing that atheism is psychologically bad ("evil") than there are rich liberals who would provide money for research on the benefits of atheism. But this follows from my understanding of Altemeyer's research on authoritarianism. -Mike Palij New York University m...@nyu.edu --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: j.cl...@uwinnipeg.ca. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13251.645f86b5cec4da0a56ffea7a891720c9&n=T&l=tips&o=14607 or send a blank email to leave-14607-13251.645f86b5cec4da0a56ffea7a89172...@fsulist.frostburg.edu --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: arch...@jab.org. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=14612 or send a blank email to leave-14612-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
