Seems this discussion is degrading into name-calling.

I challenge the idea that a belief in God is some sort of "virus" or "mental disorder", that West and Keiran are suggesting.
Obviously it serves their disgust for religiosity quite well though.

The reductio ad absurdum of that proposition is that any belief in the unreal, unknown or unproven might arise from the same affliction.
This would then mean that every human being probably suffers from it, including West and Keiran with their belief in the "ego", an unproven and potentially unreal abstraction from Freuds theory of mental structure.

Actually, there could be a gold mine to be tapped here if a concensus is reached and we conclude that it is necessary to "treat" these people diagnosed with "Goditis" or "GDD (god delusion disorder)" (I can hear the "cha-ching" from the drug companies already). Maybe it's best to catch it early when "Santa Syndrome" is observed in children - the onset of GDD. Or better still, if we can isolate the "deus dependency" gene we can probably eradicate the disposition to it altogether. I expect some hefty government grants for scientists in that field would be necessary to get the research underway.

Sorry Philo either you can prove bthe soul exists otherswise you are making it up. The same goes for god , either you can prove god exists or you make god up. If you have not got proof then what is the source of your knowledge. The fact that Christians and other superstitious cult adherents talk about god without a single shred of evidence of their proposed fallacies means god does not exist , the soul does not exist.
We can debate that the origianal descrption of the soul in the yods was the regard the living for the dead , but that is not what you or any other occultist is claiming , you are claiming a ghost like consciousness which is pure fantasy to support an ego with a mortality crisis.

The soul, spirit god are all part of voodoo mumbo jumbo dungeons and dragons fantasy game playing and nobody who does not believe in spiritual drivel is denying reality. It is those who indulge in god belief who deny reality and so have no understanding , no comprehension of reality. There is no omnipresent magician to discover , no magic to be evoked by ritual , no supernatural truth.
To believe in god is to literally be off with the fairies.

If you wish to be taken seriously then help yourself by proving god , magic and the soul exists and they are everything you claim them to be.

Donnie,

If you look back on earlier posts, it is noted that the [primitive] Limbic System seems play a role in religionism. The [higher] Neocortex might suggest belief in god to be irrational but the posit is the more primitive [survival] system clicks-in and overrides the "thinking" part of the brain. This position is different to Freud within the Ego is the executive system moderating between the Id [or It] and the Superego.

If we were to try a cure a "religious state" via brain surgery, the correction is likely damage vital survival mechanisms. Thus, it is more logical to have the religionist "indwell" [Polanyi] in the rational sciences and histographies and essentially be de-programmed.

Greenfield [neorscientist] notes that excessive networking occurs in obsessive compulsive neurosis, wherein, blocking the reuptake of Seritonin is indicated. Herein, education [above], implemented by an SSR Inhibitor could be indicated to treat Religionism.

Moreover, as Dawkins el al. note, there is biological evolution and cultural evolution. In regard to the a bird species might a knew "note" in a song that is latter carried into the future by members of the species. Likewise, Shamanism and its consort Religionism, can be a culturally adopted [product of ecology (Triandis)] -- once upon a time - carried forward into a society's future, beyond its used-by date. Recall, there were priesthoods and temples [read churches] before the Old Testiment, wherein, these instruments were anthro-organisational enties.

Belief in God delusional? No, such a belief could rationally beheld as hypothetical construct. Maintaining the belief in god based on
our knowledge of the Religions in History, against overwhelming scientific and histograpghical evidence must sail close to the use of defense mechanisms seen in delusional states.

Errata: "held", "neuroscientist".

Lakatos, and, less directly, Kuhn would posit that disciplines should protect core beliefs. Herein, it would be rational to maintain a belief in the geocentric universe, "in the first instance", given the need for significant proof to replace an entrenched "paradigm" [Kuhn].

In this way, perhaps, it was "once" reasonable to hold-on to the idea that the Earth is the centre of the universe, of the Earth was created in 4,004 BCE, that a person called ascended from the Middle East into [3-D] Space. [descended from the othe side of the Earth?]Similarly, in the twentieth century, Einstein was relunctant to accept QM. But, the resistance must not remain forever.

Likewise, to believe in a god, AS POSITED BY THE RELIGIONS, in the face of secular science/knowledge is not apposite. The [anthropological] history of theology presents too sound an alternative.

Accordingly, one could rationally maintain:

(a) Not to believe in a god(s). Absolute impossibility.

(b) At most, believe in god as a degraded heuristic, an improbability, not an impossibility. [me]. Accept a scientific paradigm, but test the null hypthesis [by all available means]. [Basically, god does not exist, but listen to counter-arguments.]

(c) God exists; by different to the accounts of the religions.

I put it to Sells and this Forum, that the Religionist posit was not irrational in 1607, but it is irrational 2007. This is how we strike a balance between new knowledge discovery [theocrasia are invented] and throwing out the baby with the bath water [contemporary science is all-knowing].

Sells and non-Catholics,

- Do you believe the Sun fell towards the Earth at Fatima?

O.

From an antitheist point of view what I believe makes no difference to the sun.

Oliver,
A nicely posted argument (if not a little heavy on the appeal to authority).

"Herein, education [above], implemented by an SSR Inhibitor could be indicated to treat Religionism"
Using drugs and "re-education" sounds oddly like brainwashing, although i am sure you didn't mean it that way.

Man's former and contemporary religious doctrines and establishments may be past their use-by date, as you suggest, and we may indeed evolve beyond their function. But it does not follow that a belief in God or gods, which could translate to any belief in the metaphysical - adopted by man to answer existential questions - is also irrational, or immature, or that it arises from some sort of mental failing.
Anthropology shows a long, winding and perhaps unfruitful path that Man has tread in search of these answers and the various points he has stopped or tripped over along the way. But it does not prove that such endeavour will be futile or should lead to the ultra-materialist notion, nor does science and technology prove this. You yourself have settled on 3 rational standpoints which almost covers the spectrum anyway (atheist, agnostic, theist - albeit non-mainstream).
I think it is important to differentiate between the institutions that man puts in place and the underlying motive that they serve and judge them exclusively.
I do not believe a motive for greater (potentially spritual) awareness and/or existance is irrational. Maybe some of the results of this are and the ideas some have accepted as true are, but not the motive.