Religion is a Delusion/Mental Illness

[Salacious B. Crumb]

Religion isn't technically a mental illness, but there is a definite likelihood of it becoming one, when practiced by radical, gullible, close-minded people.

People are suggestible.  If the culture you are a part of endorses certain ideas, it's easy for you to endorse them as well.  It's a social phenomenon, not a mental illness.  This is why "culturally accepted beliefs" are excluded from diagnosis as a mental disorder.  I have a history of delusions, being schizoaffective, and religious beliefs are not in the same ballpark.  Humans are capable of extreme behaviors under the power of suggestion, that doesn't make them mentally ill.  You debase the experience of those with real mental illness and muddy the picture of people without it.  

Mental illness diagnoses are designed to group people who might respond to specific treatment together to aid treatment.  Religious people are not in need of treatment for mental illness, and so the whole concept of a mental illness diagnosis for them is fundamentally flawed.  It's an overreaction to the dissonance between what you believe and they believe.  Your beliefs about what is 'rational' don't justify psychologizing people just because you don't share their viewpoint on the rationality of belief, even extreme belief.  Extreme beliefs may be unwise, but they aren't per se an illness.

This is an interesting topic. Thanks for the incite, and I'm for your suffering. This previous quote I made: "People will pray to jesus to heal their kid from a life-threatening curable illness without seeking medical attention, or they might stop looking for a job because they have all the faith in the world that god will bring them food and pay their bills."  I understand you would consider this extreme belief. I don't think you would call this Delusional Disorder, but could you call this delusional behavior or delusional thinking? From what I understand it to be, having delusions, is having strong/fixed beliefs, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. You can also be completely normal, with the exception of this type thinking.

[Dystopia]

The problem with some atheists is that they seem to think not believing in gods makes them scientifically literate when apparently it really doesn't. Even if we concluded that believing in god is objectively irrational that is only one small characteristic, everyone has delusions and we are all prone to it.

[robvalue]

I've heard a fair number of theists who state they do regularly see and hear things which I would class as delusions, ie. things I wouldn't also see if I was next to them.

There's three options as far as I can see:

1- They really are seeing/hearing these things
2- They have convinced themselves they are seeing/hearing them, even though part of them knows they're really not
3- They are making it up

In the case of 1, unless they really are experiencing some paranormal phenomena, would people agree their religious experiences are bordering on delusion? If so, how would it compare with actual hallucinations through mental illness?

I try hard to understand the theist point of view. It's difficult for me, having never been one, and having virtually none to talk to in real life. (I know many would gladly swap positions!) I'm always open to insight. (Not so much to plain insults.)

[Angrboda]

From what I understand it to be, having delusions, is having strong/fixed beliefs, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

I would say not, because from their point of view, the evidence to the contrary is not overwhelming; their culture supplies them with positive reasons for belief. More than that, I'd say it's a difference in nuance. I knew my beliefs were delusional, yet I couldn't challenge or alter them. Religious extremists may be inflexible, but their beliefs aren't 'fixed' in the same sense. My beliefs were fixed because my brain hardware was malfunctioning; an extreme believer is inflexible because the totality of their experience tells them it's reasonable. It's a difference between believing for flawed reasons, and believing for no reasons at all.

[Pyrrho]

From a psychiatrist's perspective, religion can be considered a delusion or illness (The God Delusion). This is why many religions are anti-psychiatry (Scientology is very anti-psychiatry). Hearing voices (God, angels, or demons) is a symptom of psychosis in mental illness. Speaking in tongues? Exorcisms? Religious delusions are common among the mentally ill and as we know the "sane" too. There is a book called the Three Christs of Ypsilanti about three schizophrenic patients that thought they were Jesus. Prayer is trying to talk to "God." Anyone that talks to God needs an antipsychotic and a mood stabilizer. I should know, part of my bipolar when I am manic is religiosity and obsession over existence of God, religion, the meaning of life and death. When I am stable, I am more rational and atheist in my thinking.

http://www.bible.ca/psychiatry/psychiatr...hrenic.htm

I'm not a psychologist, just got a little BA in it, but being religious isn't diagnosable as a mental illness. Some schizophrenics sometimes hear religiously-themed voices or suffer from religion-oriented disorganized thinking; but their illness is schizophrenia, not religion, nor is it caused by religion.

Speaking in tongues is eccentric, not a mental illness. When they do it in the checkout line at the supermarket, it may be time to start talking about mental illness.

Your personal experience with prayer and bipolar disorder does not  mean other people who pray have a disorder, and it certainly doesn't  mean that anti-psychotics or mood stabilizers are  needed in their cases.

People are social animals and it is normal for us to act to fit into the groups to which we belong and believe what the people we care about and admire have shown us they believe since before we could talk. Religion isn't a mental illness, it's fundamentally an idea. It can be a dangerous one, but unless a person really does suffer from a mental illness as well, their religion is just an opinion ultimately based on other people having the same opinion. It's not a sickness, it's just not rationally grounded. Lots of things people believe aren't rationally grounded, it's almost impossible to not have such beliefs without realizing it.

Before 1973, the American Psychiatric Association classified homosexuality as a mental illness.  In 1973, they no longer classified homosexuality as a mental illness.  Nothing changed about homosexuality itself.  What changed were societal attitudes toward homosexuality.

What makes something a mental illness is its level of social acceptability.  

Religion in not considered to be a mental illness because it is socially acceptable.  Otherwise, it would be a mental illness.

[Angrboda]

Before 1973, the American Psychiatric Association classified homosexuality as a mental illness.  In 1973, they no longer classified homosexuality as a mental illness.  Nothing changed about homosexuality itself.  What changed were societal attitudes toward homosexuality.

What makes something a mental illness is its level of social acceptability.  

Religion in not considered to be a mental illness because it is socially acceptable.  Otherwise, it would be a mental illness.

Bullshit. This is a hasty generalization. Simply because some mental illness diagnoses may be the product of cultural prejudices does not justify the conclusion that they all are, nor its corollary that religion would be classified as a mental illness if it weren't socially acceptable. People believe all sorts of weird things, from alien abduction to contrails, without that belief rising to the category of mental illness.

[Pyrrho]

Before 1973, the American Psychiatric Association classified homosexuality as a mental illness.  In 1973, they no longer classified homosexuality as a mental illness.  Nothing changed about homosexuality itself.  What changed were societal attitudes toward homosexuality.

What makes something a mental illness is its level of social acceptability.  

Religion in not considered to be a mental illness because it is socially acceptable.  Otherwise, it would be a mental illness.

Bullshit.  This is a hasty generalization.  Simply because some mental illness diagnoses may be the product of cultural prejudices does not justify the conclusion that they all are, nor its corollary that religion would be classified as a mental illness if it weren't socially acceptable.  People believe all sorts of weird things, from alien abduction to contrails, without that belief rising to the category of mental illness.

Whether a particular mental process, or set of processes, are labeled "mental illness" or not is a function of attitude towards those thought processes.  It is not like finding a virus and saying, aha, there is the problem!  It is that some thoughts, or sets of thoughts, are judged to be sufficiently different from what is judged to be good that they are given that particular label.  It is a value judgement about a state of affairs, not an objective analysis of the state of affairs.

[Cyberman]

Yeah, if religion wasn't a recognized social construct it would seem very strange for someone to claim a guy in the sky was talking in his head who had the power of life, death, and eternal reward or punishment.

As Sam Harris wrote in Letter To A Christian Nation, "The president of the United States has claimed, on more than one occasion, to be in dialogue with God. If he said that he was talking to God through his hairdryer, this would precipitate a national emergency. I fail to see how the addition of a hairdryer makes the claim more ridiculous or offensive."

[Angrboda]

Bullshit.  This is a hasty generalization.  Simply because some mental illness diagnoses may be the product of cultural prejudices does not justify the conclusion that they all are, nor its corollary that religion would be classified as a mental illness if it weren't socially acceptable.  People believe all sorts of weird things, from alien abduction to contrails, without that belief rising to the category of mental illness.

Whether a particular mental process, or set of processes, are labeled "mental illness" or not is a function of attitude towards those thought processes.  It is not like finding a virus and saying, aha, there is the problem!  It is that some thoughts, or sets of thoughts, are judged to be sufficiently different from what is judged to be good that they are given that particular label.  It is a value judgement about a state of affairs, not an objective analysis of the state of affairs.

With all due respect, I don't think you know what you're talking about. Name three diagnoses that fit the pattern you are claiming.

[Pyrrho]

Whether a particular mental process, or set of processes, are labeled "mental illness" or not is a function of attitude towards those thought processes.  It is not like finding a virus and saying, aha, there is the problem!  It is that some thoughts, or sets of thoughts, are judged to be sufficiently different from what is judged to be good that they are given that particular label.  It is a value judgement about a state of affairs, not an objective analysis of the state of affairs.

With all due respect, I don't think you know what you're talking about.  Name three diagnoses that fit the pattern you are claiming.

The very definition of "mental illness" ties it to social norms:

A mental disorder, also called a mental illness or psychiatric disorder, is a mental or behavioral pattern or anomaly that causes either suffering or an impaired ability to function in ordinary life (disability), and which is not a developmental or social norm.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_disorder

"Impaired ability to function in ordinary life" means that one has a problem with dealing with the society in which one lives.  And what will be incompatible with ordinary functioning in a society is largely a matter of the society in which one lives.

As for the claim that religion would be a mental illness if it were not socially accepted, think about someone claiming to have an invisible friend, with magically abilities, who was a guide to the person's life, affecting their social interactions with others, with seemingly arbitrary prohibitions and arbitrary required conduct.  If that were not common and a social norm, it would be fucking crazy.