'Can' is a Weasel Word like maybe or perhaps, and doesn't really show anything. The computer in front of you 'can' blow up or someone drive a car through your living room, yet neither statement really indicates probability.
But my dear chap, it is you who is weaseling the word. They have shown that in their experiments at least, analytic thought
doesdecrease religiosity. You can see perfectly well that those are in fact the results they've got. And then
you weasel the word "can" by suggesting that when they say "can" they might be talking about some bare and remote future possibility, rather than something that they've watched happening. If there's a mustelid round here, it's you.
It's all circumstantial and depends to what extent one's religious belief or faith was founded on conviction from honest examination of the evidence as opposed to brainwashed ignorance.
But not, perhaps, in the way that you suppose. For example, no amount of analytical thinking alone will change your asinine opinions about hominid fossils as recently expressed in the age correlations thread --- precisely because they were formed, not on the basis of lazy thinking about the facts, but on the basis of complete ignorance of the facts. Analytic thought needs some material to work with. It is precisely "brainwashed ignorance" which will successfully defeat analytic thought.
It will, therefore, be just those religious people who have made some effort at honesty who will be made less religious by thinking more.
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