Are Atheists Mentally Ill

The article basically makes a few claims:

quote:

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A vast body of research, amassed over recent decades, shows that religious belief is physically and psychologically beneficial — to a remarkable degree.

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The vast body of research includes:
-In 2004, scholars at UCLA revealed that college students involved in religious activities are likely to have better mental health
-In 2006, population researchers at the University of Texas discovered that the more often you go to church, the longer you live
-In 2006, researchers at Duke University in America discovered that religious people have stronger immune systems than the irreligious. They also established that churchgoers have lower blood pressure.
-In 2009, a team of Harvard psychologists discovered that believers who checked into hospital with broken hips reported less depression, had shorter hospital stays, and could hobble further when they left hospital — as compared to their similarly crippled but heathen fellow-sufferers.
-In the last few years scientists have revealed that believers, compared to non-believers, have better outcomes from breast cancer, coronary disease, mental illness, Aids, and rheumatoid arthritis
-Believers get better results from IVF
-Believers report greater levels of happiness, are less likely to commit suicide, and cope with stressful events much better
-Believers have more kids.
-Believers are less likely to smoke, drink or take drugs.
-Religious people are nicer (They give more money to charity than atheists)The response that immediately comes to my mind:"The fact that a believer is happier than a sceptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one. The happiness of credulity is a cheap and dangerous quality."
-- George Bernard Shaw

No, I don't think it's necessary unless anyone actually wants to side with the blog.If everything in the blog was valid, I think it may actually point towards some sort of objective evidence for "believing" over "not-believing."But I would guess that there are many things here at work:
-some points will simply be incorrect/wrong
-some points will be hand-picked to be misleading when the work was never confirmed (or worse, repeated but not confirmed or even over-turned)
-no mention as to how belief in Christianity does vs. belief in anything else (like love or even another religion)
-the author has bad breath and looks like a bit of a dink

Yes, I agree.
You're right.Even if the prayers of believers were always answered... this would not be objective evidence "for God."
It would be objective evidence that prayers from believers are answered.Maybe Satan actually answers the prayers... or maybe fairies.
Or, maybe there still isn't any external being at all and prayers are answered as some sort of inherent property of the universe we have yet to understand correctly.Just saying... it would be an interesting pathway for further investigation It's sort of like saying "If God exists, then water will drain downhill."
--just because the stated requirements are met, doesn't mean the statement is valid. There needs to be a logical (rational/reasonable) connection between the if/then statement in order to be valid."If God exists, then prayers will be answered" seems a lot more reasonable than "If God exists, then water will drain downhill"... but such an if/then statement doesn't show any connection between the two halves. Actual investigation and evidence is required in order to link answered prayers directly to God instead of just a single statement. For one, some evidence that God actually exists before attributing functions to Him would help out.

Actually, I re-read this statement.
And, technically, I'm right.You're assuming that being "factually accurate" about the belief was an intended goal when that is not necessarily derived from my statement.
My statement could have been implying that the data was objective evidence for "believing" over "not-believing" in the pursuit of goals such as "being happier" or "having more children" or other things that were specifically tested for. This would be regardless of the fact of the belief being accurate or not.If you want to be happier, or have more children... this would be objective evidence that you should be a believer.This assumes a few strange things:
-the claims made in the blog are valid (this seems trivially incorrect)
-all people are the same/you react the same way "the average person" reacts to the tested situations (personally, I feel rather unique...)
-"being a believer" is a simple choice (I'm not sure that's always possible...)
-probably some more stuff that makes it seem rather silly to think about it this way. But hey, as long as I'm technically correctEdited by Stile, :

For sure.
I'm not denying that my brain took quite an abstract turn into left field. It does that sometimes. I'm supposed to get it looked at. As you explained, it's quite possible that you can get your happiness from valuing and determining the truth.
"Happiness" is such a vague and subjective term anyway. The amount of happiness you feel from the exact same event can vary with the simple passage of time.
Let alone trying to measure "the amount" of happiness...
It's almost silly to talk about objective evidence regarding an "empirical" study involving subjective happiness. It borders on being an oxymoron.
It requires strict definitions that may not apply to any other situation anyway. Or... we could just wait 'til tomorrow when they'll remember they're persecuted and being a Christian is harder than being an atheist. Study refuted. Hopefully one day we'll realize that people are just... people.

Your reply doesn't seem to have anything to do with the quote you focused on.

quote:

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"The fact that a believer is happier than a sceptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one. The happiness of credulity is a cheap and dangerous quality."

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The quote makes two points:
1. Simply being happy doesn't make someone a better person.
2. A whole bunch of people who are happy and say that they are happier because of God... doesn't make God exist. Too many to count.
The purpose to one's life doesn't even have to be personal. Sure. I'd never argue otherwise.
The quote is simply saying that your happiness due to your belief doesn't imply that God exists.
But your happiness is certainly real, and certainly as deserved as anyone else's.

Yes, that's technically true. But just wrong.
The context of the quote is that it is a rebuttal of an argument:Believer -> God exists. That's why Christians are happier than atheists... it's proof that God exists!
George Bernard Shaw -> The fact that a believer is happier than a sceptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one. The happiness of credulity is a cheap and dangerous quality.Notice how the quote says "...no more to the point..."
"The point" being discussed is whether or not God exists.

Just because it makes you happy... or could make someone else happy doesn't mean it does.You're in the "there's no such thing as an unselfish good-deed" fallacy.Just because you can think of a reason why an action could have been selfish... doesn't mean that is the reason why the action was taken. Therefore, the action could have been taken for unselfish reasons.In the same vein...Just because you can think of a reason why someone's action might make them happy... doesn't mean that is the reason why the action was taken. Therefore, the action could have been taken for non-happy reasons.Or:Just because someone gains some amount of happiness following their purpose to life... doesn't mean that their purpose to life definitely is to gain happiness.

From the conclusion of the blog this thread is about (2nd last paragraph):

quote:

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the evidence today implies that atheism is a form of mental illness... one crucial reason why believers are happier — religious people have all their faculties intact, they are fully functioning humans

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"The fact that a believer is happier than a sceptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one. The happiness of credulity is a cheap and dangerous quality."
-- George Bernard Shaw...seems to flow pretty well to me.Like I said to you in Message 43, there are two points that this quote makes:1. Simply being happy doesn't make someone a better person.
2. A whole bunch of people who are happy and say that they are happier because of God... doesn't make God exist.The blog seems to be saying that religious believers are happier and equates this with them being "fully functioning humans."
The quote from George pretty much rebuts this entire blog's conclusion and adds a bit of humour to boot.

I don't think it does.I have a bit of time, so I'll try to go through this again. Here is the quote:

quote:

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"The fact that a believer is happier than a sceptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one. The happiness of credulity is a cheap and dangerous quality."

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You replied to it asking why you shouldn't be able to be happy believing in God just because it makes you happy.I replied to you saying that's not a problem.
I then attempted to explain the quote for you, saying that the quote makes two points:1. Simply being happy doesn't make someone a better person.
2. A whole bunch of people who are happy and say that they are happier because of God... doesn't make God exist.The first point is germane to the blog and the thread, that's why it's listed first. (You eventually requested extreme clarification, given to you in Message 61).
The second point is just another point that the quote makes. I was explaining the quote to you, so I thought it would be nice to... explain the quote to you.Then you latched onto the 2nd point in your Message 46, as if it was the only point, and started asking questions about how the 2nd point is derived from the quote at all.
I replied to this and showed you how the 2nd point is another main factor to the quote in Message 51Now, you ask this: I think you've gotten a bit confused to the contexts of what you've been asking about. I'll try to clarify things for you some more with a few helpful notes:The 2nd point isn't important to the article, but it is important to the quote.
The 2nd point was explained in more detail to you because you asked how it was connected to the quote at all.
The 1st point of the quote explains how the quote makes sense as a reply to the article in the first place.
The 1st point was explained in more detail to you because you asked how the quote was connected to the article.So, the answer to your question is:I don't think the article does claim that happiness in the belief in a deity is evidence for that deity's existence.
And the reason we just talked so much about it, was because you were asking how that 2nd point was connected to the quote. I answered you, and it seems like you got confused and thought I was telling you how that 2nd point was connected to the article.