Why Isn't The Belief In God Considered Mental Illness?

If I walk around and declare myself the reincarnation of Napoleon Bonaparte I would be described as insane or mentally unstable. On the other hand if I go around having conversations with an imaginary friend named Jesus who I claim to speak with through prayer or communion in describing myself as chosen by him for whatever reason that’s considered societally permissible to the point of normal.

Why is any belief in god(s) not considered mental illness? Why isn’t religion defined as organized shitzophrenia?

Why does religion and a belief in god get a free pass in the psychiatric community?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpTDAow4XU8[/youtube]

Because religion follows laws

Laws? Curious statement.

Having laws means there are many bodies to control. That means majorities, that means by standards, the majority cannot be mentally ill. This is a belief about laws held by the majority of humans. If there is a crapload believing in Santa then they must be sane. If a crapload believe in gods, then they must be sane . It is just a belief of sanity because of laws.

So, while religion is an existential grand delusion causing collective delusion because it is useful for controlling entire populations, it is given a free pass? Yeah, I can agree with that. nods

Joker, mental illness isn’t like a real illness. It’s not a bacteria or a virus or some kind of infection that exists as part of a person’s biology. It’s just a set of statistical categories and quotas. So a certain amount of people have to be “mentally ill” and they decide what makes one “mentally ill” by looking at what different people believe and sorting them out into categories of people who they can use for experiments with drugs without creating too much political pressure.

I mean this is pretty basic stuff.

I don’t believe in mental illness either. I am just wondering for sake of presumption that if mental illness is real why religion or the belief in god doesn’t fit the criteria standards.

What’s the difference between a religious person and an individual with schizophrenia?

The difference in where they fit into the statistical categories that determine who gets to be the subject of experiments and who doesn’t. There aren’t enough people who are schizophrenic to form a big group and make a difference in anything, so they’re fucked. If you start trying to make religious people do something they don’t want to do, then they might start a war and murder millions of people like they’ve done so many times in the past.

@op

what if they exist though? What makes you so certain that the infinite reality cannot contain such things as God, or the gods/deities and whathaveyou? They are not physical but nothing about our physicality describes what we are.

They cannot affect causality even if they do exist in some sense, however, at the base of existence causality stops being linear, and cannot work on a 1:1 basis due to improbability. Its the same question for us imho, are we affecting or merely witnesses to the world? If we are affecting, and we are something other than normal physics [mind in metaposition], then something else equally non-physical [like a god] can be affecting in the same way.

Both of which are indirect affectations.

_

So, how is religion not an organized group of schizophrenics? For the sake of presumption within this thread of course.

Are you missing the point on purpose?

There are too many of them. They have too much power to be turned into subjects of experiments.


The short answer is there are too many people who believe in him

Meet Jean, she has an imaginary friend named Sarah that she claims is real.

Why is her friend Sarah any less real than a god entity?

Agreed, and if a majority of human beings can be categorized as being heavily delusional I think that right there says quite a bit for our species as a whole.

I made a thread about this a long time ago…

viewtopic.php?f=5&t=187641

Mental illness is not about what you believe, but why you are believing it because that is what de3termines how you behave with it.

The thread raises questions.
Does the fact that a child has an imaginary friend prove that the child is schizo? Not necessarily.
I provide for my cat Thai food and water, shelter, a bathroom and affection. He responds with affection as if I am his god. Isn’t this taking care of necessities how most people see God?
I’ve had undeniable God experiences. Does this mean I’m somehow crazy? It’s faulty logic to compare the God experience with the extravagances of religious intolerance.

I think the main reasons are the mystery of existence and the freedom of interpretation.

Especially today, we have so many possible interpretations of religious texts, that we literally don’t know what people originally believed. Our society has gone through paradigm-changes so complete that we think completely differently to the way people used to think. As a result, the religion of today is open to a vast array of possible meanings – who is to say what is feasible?

The whole concept of life on a rock on the edge of the universe is crazy, but that is the way it appears to us. Because of our sentient abilities, we need theories to stop becoming dazed and batty, and if you think that religious theories are wilder than scientific ones, then you haven’t informed yourself thoroughly. Scientific theories tend to bracket out the mystery of existence with a sentient mind, leaving a gap for lack of explanation. It is this gap that we all try to bridge with some idea that we often haven’t really thought through to the end.

Religion uses symbol, metaphor, myth and analogy to bridge that gap, which was originally far wider than our gap today. But that doesn’t mean that it is any more unhinged than the theories non-religious people have in their minds. What is disturbing, and has been for some time, is the fact that religion has become fanaticised, and fundamentalists reduce the scope of interpretation to their own rendering of the “truth”, threatening all others with the fires of hell at the least.

This behaviour is bizarre, but it seems to show how desperate people are for something that will bridge the gap of unknowing. The fact that there is widespread depression and distress in our society shows that other people show their desperation in other ways. In some ways, it is questionable to ridicule moderate religionists for their acceptance of religious ideas, since they use these ideas to cope with that gap, with the least of social tribulation. For many there is no alternative, if they are to find relief and contentment in their lives.

If we are to question religious concepts, we need to know what function they have in peoples lives and ask ourselves whether there is an alternative. We have to bear in mind that we are all very different in our general outlook, depending on our background and education, so it isn’t feasible to think up some simple solution and demand that all take the same pill.