Refuting the "Geography" Argument from non-believers (if you were born in...then you would be a ....)

[dostoyevskyfan]

I’d like to deconstruct an argument that I frequently encounter commonly put forth by non-religious people for the purpose of invalidating a belief system. I call it the “geography argument”. If I am unsuccessful at an outright refutation, I believe I can severely weaken the argument by taking a rational and logical approach to its implications. For the purposes of this thread, imagine this is taking place in a formal academic or professional setting such as a court of law. Please divorce all emotions from this common disagreement and try to respond logically. Constructive feedback from both sides of the table is always greatly appreciated.

The structure of the “argument” goes something like this: If you were born in…(insert country here)…then you would be a……(insert religious belief system here)

The “prosecution” usually stops their line of reasoning at this point, but there are implications left unsaid
The “defense” usually admits, “Yes, you are correct.”
At which point the prosecution says “No further questions your honor” and departs feeling victorious and even justified as if they have actually proved anything at all and weren’t just spewing illogical nonsense.

Now let’s examine the logical structure. In short, it’s:

1. If X, then Y (to be distinguished from the IF AND ONLY IF structure of argumentation).
2. NOT X
3. NOT Y
4. Therefore NOT Q and NOT Y (assume Q = Roman Catholicism, in my case at least)
   -Please note that #4 is usually unsaid and implied. Also note that I had exceptional difficulty trying to formalize this due to the fact that I think it’s incoherent to begin with. If there are any experienced logicians out there, please feel free to correct my errors.

To make the reality of this tomfoolery more evident, I will select a specific example (the world’s second greatest persecutor of Christians outshined only by the secular country, North Korea) to concretize my points.

If you were born in Saudi Arabia, then you would be a Muslim. Therefore your belief in Roman Catholicism is an arbitrary byproduct of the location of your birth.

 

[dostoyevskyfan]

Here are the logical implications and assumptions of the above argument. If I can show that there is at least one case to the contrary for each assumption, then it will severely weaken the argument:

1. All people born in Saudi Arabia are Muslim.
   (I don’t know if this is actually the case, but 3% of people in Saudi Arabia aren’t Muslim so it’s highly likely that there is at least one person who was born in Saudi Arabia who is not a Muslim.)
2. All people born in Saudi Arabia believe all the core tenants of the religion of Islam.
   (In the case of this particular assumption, I would challenge the definition of “Muslim”. If it is the case that there is at least one person who was born in Saudi Arabia and is forced to go worship at a Mosque against his or her will [or restricted in sexuality, diet, clothing or forced to fast or pray] while internally maintaining that the core tenants of Islam are false, then I would argue that such a person is technically an atheist who is a casualty of the culture they were born into; since to exist in Saudi Arabia and not practice Sharia Law, or publicly practice a religion other than Islam, is not allowed and could result in severe physical punishment, such as lashings, and even imprisonment. Although, I admit, this would be difficult to prove in the court of law. )
3. Absolute religious liberty [the freedom to choose a religion or not to practice a religion at all] exists in Saudi Arabia.
   (This is clearly false. Forced conversion to Islam is actually permitted in certain circumstances.)
4. There are absolutely no people who were born in Saudi Arabia who privately practice a religion other than Islam. (Another hard one to prove. Christians are actually allowed to privately practice their religion in Saudi Arabia, yet they are not allowed to own a copy of the Bible, a Crucifix, or any religious non-islamic item and they are still subject to Sharia Law.)
5. People who were born in Saudi Arabia don’t travel to other countries where they may gain exposure to other religions and possibly convert.
6. There is NOT at LEAST ONE technologically savvy person who was born in Saudi Arabia and is currently living there who is capable of circumventing the government’s censorship of the internet, thereby allowing him or her to gain exposure to other religions and think critically about the religion of Islam, which may lead to a covert conversion.
7. People don’t choose their beliefs. (I think this is the main implication of the argument. Correct me if I am wrong. I am a soft-determinist like St.Augustine, but I could see a hard scientific determinist [Someone like B.F. Skinner], or someone who openly denies the existence of free will, raise a serious objection here.)
8. Most people do not convert to other religions because they want to appease their parents or culture. They are afraid of the repercussions, which may include the fear being ostracized by their friends, family, culture, or physical/legal punishments. (This is usually true, but there is at least one instance where it can be shown to be false—ie the thousands of Christians who died for their faith starting with when Nero “played the fiddle while rome burned” and scapegoatted them, and ending with the Edict of Milan in 313AD, or the Christians executed in Saudi Arabia or North Korea.)
9. All religions are equally valid and all religious belief or non-belief is arbitrary. (Essentially this implication is that life has no objective meaning; jumping off of a 60 story building in a superman costume has just as much justification as not jumping off of a 60 story building in a superman costume. Likewise, atheism has just as much justification as theism. This implication obviously poses a problem for someone who wishes to invalidate Roman Catholicism.)

 

[dostoyevskyfan]

1. All people who practice religion are mindless zombies [even those who exist in a country with government restrictions on religion] who are wholly incapable of having doubts about or questioning their own beliefs which may lead to a rejection of target beliefs.

I suppose those are all of the implications of the argument I can think of for now. If can think of more or believe I am in error please say so in your post. This is yet another tactic used by the Catholic opposition to try to appeal to some sort “common sense” and through a trick of rhetoric, hide the fact that it’s just “nonsense”. The argument is presented with the appearance of a tautology when in fact, it’s just flawed logic. It is an irrelevant hypothetical scenario much like you would encounter in “lifeboat ethics”. The fact remains that I was NOT born in Saudi Arabia and I am NOT Muslim. So….who cares? If I was, I would probably move to America.

My final question for people who use this argument is this. Would you ever use the following analogous statements in an argument?

If you were born into poverty, then you would be poor.
If you were born on the Moon, then you would not be a democrat.
If you were born by a giraffe, then you would have a long neck.
If you were born by a man, then you would not exist.

 

[scottm]

Please note that #4 is usually unsaid and implied. Also note that I had exceptional difficulty trying to formalize this due to the fact that I think it’s incoherent to begin with. If there are any experienced logicians out there, please feel free to correct my errors.

I think it’s more like this, with first variable being location and the second being religion:

Most A are B.
You are A and B.
Few A are D.
But most C are D.
Few C are B.

Therefore, location and religion are highly correlated.

 

[dostoyevskyfan]

I think it’s more like this, with first variable being location and the second being religion:

Most A are B.
You are A and B.
Few A are D.
But most C are D.
Few C are B.

Therefore, location and religion are highly correlated.

Your formulation isn’t any more valid in my estimation in that the premises do not make use of a valid coherent deduction using Aristotelian logic [compared to: 1.all men are mortal. 2. Socrates is a man 3. Therefore Socrates is mortal.], and the conclusion does not seem to be very useful when employed in the enterprise of attacking the veracity of a religious belief. Remember: the whole point of the argument is to discredit a belief in God. Your conclusion is starkly different from: 6. Therefore God does not exist. or 6. Therefore belief in God is unwarranted.

Sure you could say:
1.Most americans are Christian (53%?)
2. I am American and Christian.
3. Few Americans are Muslim.
4. Most Saudis are Muslim.
5. Few Saudis are Christian.

What’s the conclusion again? The premises are just unconnected statements of fact. There’s no argument here…

To further complicate things, I don’t consider non-Catholics “Christian”. There are around 38,000 different denominations of Christianity. By the law of non-contradiction, they cannot all be correct. Either just one has it right, or they are all wrong. Only 25% of the 53% of Americans who identify themselves as “Christian” are Catholic.

Therefore, you have a false premise.

1 is false. Most Americans are NOT catholic.

Lastly if you ever see popular atheists who actually use this argument vocalize it, they never formulate it like you have here…

 

[scottm]

Remember: the whole point of the argument is to discredit a belief in God. Your conclusion is starkly different from: 6. Therefore God does not exist. or 6. Therefore belief in God is unwarranted.

Maybe your atheist friends are different than mine. My atheist friends don’t use this argument specifically to conclude “God does not exist.” They use it to undermine the doctrine that nobody gets to heaven except by invoking, specifically, the name of Jesus. The punch line of my atheist friends is that if I had been born in Saudi Arabia or Indonesia to Islamic parents and grandparents, then I would have grown up Islamic. And I’d be talking about Mohammad instead of Jesus. By blind fate I was born in the USA to a family of Christians rather than in Saudi Arabia or some such place, to a family of Moslems, and THAT is why I am a Christian instead of a Moslem (so the argument goes).

That’s the geography argument.

To further complicate things, I don’t consider non-Catholics “Christian”. There are around 38,000 different denominations of Christianity. By the law of non-contradiction, they cannot all be correct. Either just one has it right, or they are all wrong. Only 25% of the 53% of Americans who identify themselves as “Christian” are Catholic.

That’s nice. My favorite flavor of ice cream is vanilla. But you were trying to speak of objective things, and objectively Baptists and Lutherans are Christians, and it’s a fact that when people call radio talk shows they (the callers) often use the term “Christian” to mean “Protestants.” They call Catholics Catholics, and they call Protestants Christians. That’s a fact of talk radio. Take it up with them.

 

[dostoyevskyfan]

Maybe your atheist friends are different than mine. My atheist friends don’t use this argument specifically to conclude “God does not exist.” They use it to undermine the doctrine that nobody gets to heaven except by invoking, specifically, the name of Jesus. The punch line of my atheist friends is that if I had been born in Saudi Arabia or Indonesia to Islamic parents and grandparents, then I would have grown up Islamic. And I’d be talking about Mohammad instead of Jesus. By blind fate I was born in the USA to a family of Christians rather than in Saudi Arabia or some such place, to a family of Moslems, and THAT is why I am a Christian instead of a Moslem (so the argument goes).

That’s the geography argument.

That’s your friends’ version of the geography argument. My atheist friends hate talking about religion with me because it pisses them off so we avoid the subject.

I can summarize your friends’ conclusion as follows:

Blind fate determines your religious convictions.

But that statement is heavily loaded with implications which I have refuted in my second post. It may in fact be true and isn’t necessarily inconsistent with the parable of the sower in the new testament. But either way it doesn’t invalidate my belief in Catholicism.

Ironically, if they are correct, they confirm the words of Jesus Christ.

 

[LilyM]

Put it this way - in my immediate family we have my grandmother, who was raised Orthodox but converted to Catholicism when she married my grandfather - through her own conviction rather than any sort of compulsion, although in those days some women did feel compelled to convert if their husbands were of another faith.

Then out of myself and four siblings, all raised in exactly the same devoutly Catholic household, only three of us have stayed practicing the faith to speak of, one is new-agey, married outside the Catholic church and is verging on hostile to the Catholic faith.

The other will attend, at least when the rest of us are around, but describes herself by the fashionable but meaningless phrase ‘spiritual, not religious’ and wouldn’t call herself Catholic.

And I, although devoutly Catholic now, had many years where I practiced the faith very little and became interested in other faiths. I think the other three have had similar periods during their 20s as well.

So the underlying assumption that if you were raised in a certain faith you will neither drift away from it temporarily nor permanently reject it nor adopt other faith practices is just plain wrong if experience is anything to go by.

 

[scottm]

How many of your family members went Islam? Or Hindu? Or Witch Doctor? And which person in the jungle village of witch doctors went Islam, or Lutheran?

Few to zero, and this because of correlations that are self-evident. The geography argument is about correlations. Everyone in your family knows about Jesus because they were born into that type of family in that type of culture. I’ll bet none of them know about voodoo or Islam or whatever, because that’s not where they were born.

For example, did you watch Mel Gibson’s “Apocalypto” movie? How many of those Mayan people were Catholics, huh? Turn it around. How many priests do we have in the USA today practicing the same Mayan religion depicted in that movie?

For example, had you been born in Rome around the year 5 or 10 or 20 BC you would have grown up in a family of Zeus worshippers. You’d be talking about Zeus right now instead of talking about Jesus. The geography argument recognizes this self-evident correlation between one’s religion and one’s birth place/time, and concludes that Jesus is not the exclusive doorway to heaven.

The second post of the thread does not address this correlation either.

 

[Hypatia]

It seems to me that the heart of the argument is not specific to religion and is essentially correct: we are inculturated into our values, similar to the way we learn a language. The “virtues” are taught and practiced until they become habit.

 

[LilyM]

How many of your family members went Islam? Or Hindu? Or Witch Doctor? And which person in the jungle village of witch doctors went Islam, or Lutheran?

Few to zero, and this because of correlations that are self-evident. The geography argument is about correlations. Everyone in your family knows about Jesus because they were born into that type of family in that type of culture. I’ll bet none of them know about voodoo or Islam or whatever, because that’s not where they were born.

For example, did you watch Mel Gibson’s “Apocalypto” movie? How many of those Mayan people were Catholics, huh? Turn it around. How many priests do we have in the USA today practicing the same Mayan religion depicted in that movie?

For example, had you been born in Rome around the year 5 or 10 or 20 BC you would have grown up in a family of Zeus worshippers. You’d be talking about Zeus right now instead of talking about Jesus. The geography argument recognizes this self-evident correlation between one’s religion and one’s birth place/time, and concludes that Jesus is not the exclusive doorway to heaven.

The second post of the thread does not address this correlation either.

Actually Romans worshipped Jupiter, Zeus was a Greek not a Roman god. And what of it? Most of those Greeks or Romans are the forebears of Christians - their children and grandchildren in huge numbers abandoned the faith they were raised in, the faith their cultures were founded upon.

And yes, many of those Mayan people (or their descendants) DID turn Catholic when the Spanish arrived - those same convert Mayans are the ancestors of today’s Mexicans. So did much of the population of South America, in fact.

That very conversion - the adoption en masse of a faith contrary to their raising - is the reason why the Ancient Greek and Roman worship didn’t survive in Europe, and why Mayan and indigenous South American faiths haven’t survived very well, while in their place Christianity, particularly Catholicism, has flourished. And it is a powerful argument against the idea that one mindlessly sticks to the faith one was raised in.

And my new-agey sibling does practice reiki, based on Eastern religious and philosophical ideas, among other things, so yes that sibling has adopted faith practices not of our family’s culture. Lots of westerners, culturally completely alien to Buddhism, have converted to it nonetheless.

 

[scottm]

It seems to me that the heart of the argument is not specific to religion and is essentially correct: we are inculturated into our values, similar to the way we learn a language. The “virtues” are taught and practiced until they become habit.

Yes, that is it.

LilyM:

Actually Romans worshipped Jupiter, Zeus was a Greek not a Roman god. And what of it?

You can’t be serious. Jupiter, Zeus, whatever – if you had been born then, you absolutely positively as sure as ice is cold would NOT have been a Catholic. Full stop, done deal. But today nobody worships Jupiter/Zeus. Nobody. At all.

Born in the past ----> Jupiter in Italy or the Mayan religion in Mexico, but not Christian
Born now ----> Christian instead of Jupiter or Mayan

Religion depends upon the luck of birth. That’s the argument.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

This is called the genetic fallacy. Professional philosophers reject it out of hand.

 

[LilyM]

Yes, that is it.

You can’t be serious. Jupiter, Zeus, whatever – if you had been born then, you absolutely positively as sure as ice is cold would NOT have been a Catholic. Full stop, done deal. But today nobody worships Jupiter/Zeus. Nobody. At all.

Born in the past ----> Jupiter in Italy or the Mayan religion in Mexico, but not Christian
Born now ----> Christian instead of Jupiter or Mayan

Religion depends upon the luck of birth. That’s the argument.

And that argument is bunk. If it depended on the luck of birth, it wouldn’t be only those pre-Christian generations of Mayans and Italians that would have stayed worshipping Jupiter or the Mayan gods. More importantly, so would their children, their children’s children and succeeding generations on to our day. Because they would’ve raised their children and grandchildren in the faith, so by the logic of ‘luck of birth’ their children would’ve remained in it and so would succeeding generations - none of whose ‘luck of birth’ would be any different.

Not a one of them, not a one of their children or children’s children or later descendants, would’ve converted - not to Christianity or to anything else. And yet we know the contrary, we know for a fact that many millions whose ‘luck of birth’ was entirely pagan in fact converted to Christianity.

Jesus’ own ‘luck of birth’ was Jewish, as was Peter’s and Paul’s. If anything depended on ‘luck of birth’ they would’ve stayed orthodox Jews and not had any thoughts of Christ being divine, or of non-Jews potentially being saved, or of a ‘New’ covenant/testament, or any of the distinctively Christian beliefs and practices. Or at least they would’ve quickly dismissed them as heinous blasphemies like the Sanhedrin did.

 

[Prophesy]

While this answer is trite, the fact that a person is having this discussion with a person of a different faith (or lack thereof), I believe, takes credit away from the argument. If it were true that a person had a faith based solely on location, then it would be less common to see an atheist (or even to reply that there is a large amount of disbelief in popular culture and the non-believer is only a believer because of this (which should be recognized as being equally foolish)).

Christianity, is a global religion, and the places that a non-believer would point to for growing up in a different faith (i.e. Saudi Arabia) have cultures which are hostile to conversion. It is safe to presume that a person will grow up practicing their parent’s religion for a number of years, but this doesn’t guarantee it will be continued once a person reaches adulthood (which could be likened to the non-believer’s childhood, whether they kept their parents disbelief or withdrew from their parent’s religion). This can be evidenced by the number of exemplars who carry the banner of the Tiber swim team.

Really the best way to refute this argument is a nice sit down conversation with the non-believer about the origins of the beliefs of both parties.

-Prophecy

 

[wanstronian]

This argument is just a probabilistic generalisation, and the probability varies depending on the geographic region and the characteristic being ascribed.

To say, “If you were born in Saudi Arabia, you would be a muslim” is just plain wrong, and easily falsifiable.

However, it’s fair to say that if you’re born in Saudi Arabia, you’re probably born to native Muslim parents, and will probably be brought up in a Muslim culture, and will probably adopt most if not all of the tenets of that culture, so you’ll probably be a Muslim. Ditto for other highly religious cultures. In that sense, it’s a valid argument for why theists shouldn’t be so adamant that their religion is the right one and all others are wrong. If you had been brought up in different circumstances, your beliefs would probably be different to what they are, based purely on cultural observation.

I would say that a more accurate statement would be that one’s religion is an arbitrary by-product of one’s upbringing, environment, and innate gullibility, rather than of a specific birth location.

 

[Sante]

How convenient for the theist poster to leave out the word “probably”. Changes the argument doesn’t it?

 

[GEddie]

This argument actually played a role in my faith life, as I lived my childhood in an international community overseas, and knew other children who were Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist, Protestant, Catholic and one from an atheist family. I saw that these kids were basically kids, differing primarily in where born. This convinced me at the time that religions are basically the same and a function of where (and to whom) one is born.

One problem with this is that except for such places as Iran and Saudi Arabia, every locale has religious minorities. Many born in England are not Protestant; many born in Ireland are not Catholic; many born in Israel are not Jewish. So in most of the world, religion is not fully determined by where one is born. You would need to modify the statement to "If you were born in X, and/or to parents professing the religion of X…"

The problem with even this revised statement is that it holds only in childhood, when one is basically in the religion of one’s parents. Once “grown up”, people can and do change religions. This is one area where youthful rebelliousness may sometimes be useful; it leads each generation to do their own spiritual searching; which everybody needs to do at some point.

Because the statement, even to the extent it is true, holds only in childhood, it is not a valid attack on religious beliefs held by nonchildren.

ICXC NIKA.

 

[GEddie]

My final question for people who use this argument is this. Would you ever use the following analogous statements in an argument?

If you were born into poverty, then you would be poor.

No, because it is not a true statement, inasmuch as people can and do get out of poverty; in fact, that is one of the core American beliefs, that anybody can do so.

If you were born on the Moon, then you would not be a democrat.

True but not useful. Someone born on the moon (at this point in history) would not be a human being. Since Democrats are by implication, human beings, this is just a truism.

If you were born by a giraffe, then you would have a long neck.

Same as above. Giraffes only birth giraffes, which are long-necked, by definition. So true, but trivial.

If you were born by a man, then you would not exist.

Same as above, except there is a contradiction, as men are by definition incapable of birthing anybody. So the premise is impossible and therefore useless.

ICXC NIKA

 

[dostoyevskyfan]

This argument is just a probabilistic generalisation, and the probability varies depending on the geographic region and the characteristic being ascribed.

To say, “If you were born in Saudi Arabia, you would be a muslim” is just plain wrong, and easily falsifiable.

However, it’s fair to say that if you’re born in Saudi Arabia, you’re probably born to native Muslim parents, and will probably be brought up in a Muslim culture, and will probably adopt most if not all of the tenets of that culture, so you’ll probably be a Muslim. Ditto for other highly religious cultures. In that sense, it’s a valid argument for why theists shouldn’t be so adamant that their religion is the right one and all others are wrong. If you had been brought up in different circumstances, your beliefs would probably be different to what they are, based purely on cultural observation.

I would say that a more accurate statement would be that one’s religion is an arbitrary by-product of one’s upbringing, environment, and innate gullibility, rather than of a specific birth location.

OK.

If you were born in Germany in the 1920’s, you would probably be a Nazi.
Therefore the reason you are not a Nazi is your upbringing, environment, and innate gullibility.

If you were born in South Carolina in the early 1800’s, you would probably own slaves and be racist.
Therefore the reason you do not own slaves and are not racist is your upbringing, environment, and innate gullibility.

If you were born significantly underweight in Sparta at the time of Leonidas I, then you would probably have been left outside of the city to die.
Therefore you have no good reason to be alive.