)I guess because, by nature, intellectuals, or pseudo-intellectuals, are inquisitive, skeptical, and forever searching rather than finding. They are also perhaps a bit too rational and not enough emotional. The word itself has become pejorative in connotation, equivalent to intolerant, arrogant and snobbish, and, to make matters worse, has often been associated with Jewish thinkers, as have the terms liberal, progressive, socialist, communist, and atheist.
I think some people have a skeptical, rational impulse ingrained in them. For roughly as long as there have been believers, there have been disbelievers. Believers have a different threshold for belief (isn’t that why we call it faith?) than agnostics or atheists, a different set of expectations–a wider range of vision–than (for example) an academic culture that makes a conscious effort to restrict itself to what is empirical. Not all of the academy his hostile to religion, but a certain modern impulse does prevail.
Maybe Lucifer isn’t as bright as you think he is and human genius deserves a bit more credit. (You know, as opposed to rallying the local peasants and accusing it of practicing witchcraft, heresy etc.)
i disagree.
:tiphat:
This response demonstrates a central problem to this thread: “Intellectual” has not been defined. After it has been defined, we may begin towards the answer to the OP’s question.
I don’t think there is a link between being intellectual in and of itself and disbelief. Numbers who believe or disbelieve are in constant flux, and at the moment we’re at a low, but this has not been the general rule.
Balance? I’ve noticed the intellectuals I am acquainted with seem to get to a point in their lives where they realize they need to nourish their souls the way they have been nourishing their minds.
In my experience it seems to depend at least somewhat on how the intellectual was raised. I’ve noticed the people I am acquainted with who were raised by people of faith tend to spend some time Agnostic or Atheist and then revert to their childhood faith or a similar faith later in life. Interestingly, I see this most frequently in those who are new parents and/or are in their 30’s-40’s. Those I know who weren’t raised in any faith tradition tend to investigate faith, but never fully embrace it.
I would reject the premise. Historically, far more (and far greater) “intellectuals” have been theists and atheists or agnostics. The problem here lies in our modern tendency to equate “intellectual” with the sciences. Empirical science demands methodical doubt (the opposite, in some ways, of Faith) and cannot address the reality (or unreality) of the supernatural, as it is intrinsically confined to the study of nature. Hubris leads many scientists into scientism, the self-referentially incoherent philosophy that all knowledge or all certain knowledge can only be attained through empirical science. Scientism goes hand in hand with naturalism and materialism, which, in turn, lead to atheism (or agnosticism). Thus, those “intellectuals” that follow this path will end up atheists not because it is the “smart” thing, but because their a priori assumptions demand it.
Good points.
There’s a lot of one-dimensional thinking that goes along with some of that.
I mean those people who travel in academic circles. College professors and students who are way above high in intelligence whose interests lie primarily in academia.