Do aspies tend to be atheists?

[The Penitent Man]

I have always been an Aspie and I have never been an athiest. Never have I actively disbelieved in God, not even during my Buddhist years.

 

[jelpick]

I have a friend whose Aspie son loves to witness to his friends and boldly proclaim the gospel. One great thing about Aspies is they do not care what people think of them, so they are very bold witnesses for Christ.

 

[The Penitent Man]

I have a friend whose Aspie son loves to witness to his friends and boldly proclaim the gospel. One great thing about Aspies is they do not care what people think of them, so they are very bold witnesses for Christ.

Aspies who don't care about what others think of them are the ones with no theory of mind at all. I'm an Aspie and a pretty devout Catholic, but I care a great deal about what others think.

 

[Etsi]

I know a few of Aspies. One was a professor at a Christian college and is still a Christian. Another I personally wouldn't call a "Christian", but rather more into spirituality without a whole lot of specifics (difficult for me to explain), and attends a Baptist church. And one other is too young for me to say, as in I know he has not had the chance of really searching it out yet...but he loved crossing himself when I took him to church with me I don't know any atheist aspies personally.

 

[ContraMundum]

I suspect that the clergy of certain religions such as Judaism and Catholicism are full of aspies.

That would be me.

 

[ContraMundum]

Also about atheism and aspergers, I think aspies tend to be intellectuals, and think on their own, than in a group or religion. Which is good, because its a fact people are dumber in groups.

I'm not sure I've ever seen anything quite as insulting to intellectuals within the Church. Clearly, the communion of brilliant minds would be far more potent than the thoughts of one who did not consult with others.

Theology is known as the Queen of Sciences. It demands not only logic but also the high principles of truth and mystery and theology places truth and mystery above logic and theory. While theology uses logic, logic is not its goal, truth is. Good theologians can take two truths, which apparently contradict each other, and accept them both with the contradiction as well. Logic tends to sacrifice one of the truths in preference to the other, thereby impoverishing itself and becoming a half-truth. Until logicians return to their roots (theology, philosophy) they will continue to make a mess of things out there.

As for science, I tend to think science likes to overstate its own case and plea to authority far too often. Science is a great tool for understanding a small portion of what the natural world is, but its world view has become too small and too dismissive of that which it cannot test, measure or categorize. Thus it runs the danger of becoming an insular, circular logic loop which is far from sane. Without the truth and without the human spirit logic alone is dangerous.

As Chesterton put it- "The poet only asks to get his head into the heavens. It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens into his head. It is his head that splits."

 

[ContraMundum]

I was Christian for the better part of 15 years, but recently left the fold for reasons too numerous to detail in full-- I think my autistic traits played a large role in that, though. This came through most particularly when I read the Bible and teased it apart and saw a lot of contradictions within what was professed to be the inerrant word of God; praying for the guidance of the Holy Spirit availed nothing and really only served to confuse me even more. If we're supposed to interpret the Bible while guided by the Holy Spirit, then why doesn't EVERYBODY who reads the Bible with said guidance come up with exactly the same interpretation?

Simply put, you had a false notion of what being led by the Holy Spirit would do for you. The promise to be led by the Holy Spirit in matters of doctrine was given only to the Apostles- the Spirit was to "bring to remembrance" what Jesus had taught them in person. They recorded it, and we have received it and canonized it. Now, the Spirit can lead you back to those writings, but the Church is the custodian of its proper understanding. (No, not one denomination either). Scripture is hard work, not just prayer and notions. This is the way God intended it.

I realise the idea that "I have a Bible, I can know all things spiritual" is common, but it is an error. The scriptures merely give us enough information that we may have eternal life- not all the theological knowledge in the universe.

There was so much to it all that merely confused and bewildered me even more when I tried to examine it more closely... and not being able to tell 'God's presence' from my own brain messing with me certainly didn't help, either. Having very few filters by which to sort and understand various internal and external stimuli really messed me over in that area as well. I can hardly even tell what direction sounds are coming from much of the time, or figure out where my own emotions are coming from, or know when I'm actually hungry versus having a stomach ache, or just in general know what signals my body and mind are sending me... asking my already borked internal algorithm to sort out things of God on TOP of all that was just far too much and very nearly led to a catastrophic nervous breakdown. At least my senses could give me, with a fair degree of reliability, something that I could at least know was THERE...

If you had the basics right, all this confusion could have been avoided. Anyway, that's how I see it. I have been through what you went through and until I got the basics right, I was all over the place.

 

[ToHoldNothing]

As an aspie myself, I actually thought of this correlation myself and posted a thread elsewhere in Christianity and World Religion. But this makes better sense to post in. I thought to myself just now that I can't say anything more about aspies in relation to religion than that they are more prone to periods of skepticism or doubt of some degree or another. Beyond that, there are factors of environment and personal disposition to be considered that are more conducive to believing in one way or another. I consider myself an atheist in the nominal sense, what might be termed an implicit atheist. And I'm an aspie, but that doesn't mean that every aspie follows my lead so to speak. Environmentally, I'm surrounded by Christians, yet clearly I was not influenced to the point that I insisted that Christianity had to be true because of patterns.

Ironically, I was becoming quite inquisitive and questioning, at least on a personal level with my mother, in talking about religion and asking big questions. Admittedly, she wasn't able to quell my concerns and I eventually became a deist, but eventually it began to occur to me that even Deism had issues, though I realize now it was probably that having faith in something means primarily that you don't argue that it is able to be proven logically, since that would therefore negate the faith aspect in it. If anyone believes in God by arguments at all, they would have to admit that the arguments are uncertain and can be critiqued logically in various ways, even by allegedly devout Christians, like Immanuel kant, who I believe did not regard any argument for God as rationally certain, and he's considered one of the great rationalists anyway. I wonder if Kant was an Aspie, lol? He was pretty...strict about his philosophy and he could ramble on for very long sentences in his texts. Very logically minded. hm

 

[ToHoldNothing]

I have always been an Aspie and I have never been an athiest. Never have I actively disbelieved in God, not even during my Buddhist years.

I wonder where you get the notion that you would've been more prone to actively disbelieve in God as a buddhist. Buddhists don't actively disbelieve in God, at best they regard the concept and question of existence/nonexistence as unimportant, since any such entities would be regarded as still in the cycle of samsara. Just thought I'd inquire into that little issue, since, as you can see, I'm a Buddhist myself.

 

[jamiethesilent]

I have 6 friends. 5 Of whome have aspergers/HFA/Autism. 4 of them are athieists. The A fifth one belives there is a GOD.

 

[MattyD]

My experience with those with Asperger's ( I also have Asperger's) is that they do tend to lean towards being Atheists.

 

[ToHoldNothing]

My experience with those with Asperger's ( I also have Asperger's) is that they do tend to lean towards being Atheists.

Is there any particular factor that would make them lean towards being atheists? The logical/rational approach to things, the literal understanding of things that would preclude God in the worldview, or something else?

 

[MattyD]

Is there any particular factor that would make them lean towards being atheists? The logical/rational approach to things, the literal understanding of things that would preclude God in the worldview, or something else?

I believe that you are correct in what you stated: "The logical/rational approach to things, the literal understanding of things".

I am like this in regards to much in my life but I am somehow able to discern the "abstract" presence of God also, fortunately.

-Matty

 

[Sabertooth]

I believe that you are correct in what you stated: "The logical/rational approach to things, the literal understanding of things".

I am like this in regards to much in my life but I am somehow able to discern the "abstract" presence of God also, fortunately.

-Matty

That is God's Grace at work...!

 

[MattyD]

That is God's Grace at work...!

Yes, indeed (and I am thankful for this).

Matty

 

[ToHoldNothing]

I am like this in regards to much in my life but I am somehow able to discern the "abstract" presence of God also, fortunately.

Seems to me if all you see is an abstract God's presence, at best, you would be a Deist with Christian flavor to it. Not dissimilar from say, Thomas Jefferson and some others from the 17th and 18th centuries. Maybe that's just me. Or maybe you just phrased it wrong when you said you perceived the abstract presence of God...you know, as opposed to a concrete presence?

 

[ToHoldNothing]

I believe that you are correct in what you stated: "The logical/rational approach to things, the literal understanding of things".

They're kind of different in the exact approach. People can be logical/rational without necessarily being aspies. And people can take things literally as children in general, due to what their parents taught them and believe in God in that sense. If an Aspie is somehow more strictly logical, then that's onething. Though of course, there might be Aspies that tend towards evidential apologetics as christians, for example. And there might be those that take what they were taught in church literally and insist god must exist because of adherence to a pattern of sorts, one mightsay

 

[MattyD]

Seems to me if all you see is an abstract God's presence, at best, you would be a Deist with Christian flavor to it. Not dissimilar from say, Thomas Jefferson and some others from the 17th and 18th centuries. Maybe that's just me. Or maybe you just phrased it wrong when you said you perceived the abstract presence of God...you know, as opposed to a concrete presence?

"Abstract" versus "Concrete". As a human with a finite brain I cannot perceive God in actual concrete terms, only in a sense that one might call abstract or, rather, perceived within the mind/soul; Illumination, revelation, spirit.

Personally, I do see elements of God each day that might be defined as concrete, as "evidence", at least to my own mind.

 

[ToHoldNothing]

You seem to be defining concrete in such a way that there's no unequivocal evidence that you could say is God. Abstract would be implicit evidence of God, concrete would be explicit evidence, so to speak. This gets into a whole other area though, about demonstrations of God's existence versus a leap of faith in some fideistic sense that says reason is insufficient and unnecessary to a great extent for belief and conviction of God's existence

 

[MattyD]

You seem to be defining concrete in such a way that there's no unequivocal evidence that you could say is God. Abstract would be implicit evidence of God, concrete would be explicit evidence, so to speak. This gets into a whole other area though, about demonstrations of God's existence versus a leap of faith in some fideistic sense that says reason is insufficient and unnecessary to a great extent for belief and conviction of God's existence

Yes, reason is unnecessary and in a sense impossible when contemplating God. Although we have his "word" via the Bible, we do not possess empirical evidence.

Note, I believe heavily in science, physics, etc. I believe that the Big Bang was the mechanism that created our Universe. I believe in the evolution of Man from lower order mammals. But, I also believe in an entity that is responsible for all of the fore-mentioned forces and results.