Problems

Question 1

Physiological Challenges

Answer 1

• there could be something happening in your body to make you have a religious experience
• e.g. St Paul’s conversion / brain tumour

Counter: there is no evidence that every person who has had a religious experience was suffering from an illness

Question 2

Psychological Challenges

Answer 2

• Freud thought that religious experiences are the product of the mind
• e.g. mental illness
• thought that religion meets people’s psychological needs, wishful thinking
• scientists today still understand very little about the relationship between the mind and body

Question 3

Sociological Challenges

Answer 3

• construct of society (where you live/grow up)
• Karl Marx said religion is a form of “alienation” from one’s true self
• said that it is a form of control of people in society to prevent them from making their own decisions

Counter: Marx could not accept that for many people religion is more than a comfort, it is a relationship with God

Question 4

Chemicals

Answer 4

Mind altering chemicals:

e. g. St Francis Xavier’s diet was deficient in Vitamin B - it could be argued that the ‘heavenly visions’ he had were simply hallucinations
- alcohol

Question 5

Other minds

Answer 5

we can never truly know what someone else thinks

Question 6

Sincerity

Answer 6

They may be sincere but mistaken

Question 7

David Hume

Answer 7

believed that people add details when they tell their own tales, so after repetition, the teller remembers what they said rather than what they experienced - mistrust in memories