I will take the liberty of expressing some of my opinions about some issues in this thread.
I will start with the notion that Razab propounded about individuals' inherent tendency to stay theist or atheist. Let me extend this notion a little bit.
It is very much possible that the religious stance one is going to maintain through all over the rest of his/her life, may well be affected, to an extent, by the way an invidiual genetically is. An illustration may be of two individuals, one being of submissive kind and not very adventurous, while the other is self-assured and rather inquisitive. We know very well that the mind setup doesn't wholly depend upon the genetics, but also on how he was brought up. But here, we just consider the part that genetics play in here. Assuming that both of them have gone through intellectual excercise on theosophy at same extent (not very exhaustive of course, cause we don't have any idea about what an exhaustive philosophizing is. If we knew, there won't have been any confusion and conflict about all this. But we know that almost every people happen to excersize intellectually, to different extents), we may probably assume that the earlier one will have less propensity of going to the atheistic direction. Well, that is only a part of the whole picture.
Here is my extended hypothesis: An individual, when young, is fed with some information by its surround (learning, that is) about "truth". This information may well be of a one-dimensional nature (unadulterated religion, forthright atheism or just absence of either) or a concoction of both. Note that, this is a time, when one also undergoes the formation of one's personal character (let's call our relevant part of it as the mental orientation), essentially formed on top of, or overridding (partially of course, if at all) what one was bequeathed in one's genes. After a certain period of time, at a specific stage of intellectual growth (which may well vary for different individuals), being instigated by different stimulants (incurred by one's self, fellow arguers or preachers (of all kind) from different school of thoughts), one starts to rationalize with the intelligence and information at one's disposal, of course under the influence of the previously coined "mental orientation". Now here is the important part: this is now when someone shapes one's "inherent characteristics" mentioned by Razab. Once one shapes up it may really become unyielding and quite obdurate. Afterwards, usually, whatever arguments, debates or studies one goes through, is invested mainly in bolstering one's stand (or left to "check-out later" folder virtually forever).
Interestingly, as an theist, it is kind of risky for Razab to come to such notion. Because this precludes the idea of divine intervention, which, in turn, conflicts with some religious paradigm, e.g. Islam.
Let's analyze one nature of the ongoing debate. First of all, there are actually three sides of this debate. The main division is between the theists and atheists. Among theists, there are religious and non-religious theists. Let's call them RT (Religious Theist), NRT (Non-Religious Theist) and AT (Atheist) respectively.
The RTs need not bother about the distinction between NRTs and ATs. It is all the same for them. Becuase they only need to defend their religion. NRTs fight with the RTs by proving the incongruity of the specific religious systems that this RT is attached to.
The difference between NRTs and AT pertains to belief. the NRTs just happen to believe in a creator. So their fight is mainly about proving or disproving the 'by chance' theory of creation.
The fight between RTs and the others can really become interesting. Because there are plenty of text to chew on. But nevertheless, this debate is going to be perpetual anyway. Following is the reason.
Firstly, religious books are "supposed" to be recondite and multifaceted (though there are contrary verses to this very assumption, I will refer later). So, you can interpret many of the verses almost at will to satisfy the demands at hand. Which is one of the reasons why bringing up the science-quran bond is funny, as well as risky on the part of RTs. If one wants to justify quran/bible by science, what would have happened when science had different facts in its hand than now? There is an interesting pattern here. RTs have always been at conflict (often sanguinary) with science whenever a finding of science isn't accepted in unanimous fashion. And whenever some finding grounds firmer (theory to law blah blah), the divine books always have the maleability to reshuffle and re-organize the explanations so as to adapt with the new status quo. Whether the theory of evolution will be promoted to law or not is irrelevant. Because divine books will be re-explained to adapt with that.
Someone in this thread asked about factual errors in Quran. To begin with, a text cannot contain facts if it may spawn several meanings for a single statement. In other words, an apparent factual error may always be transcended to a profound metaphor. The problem with RTs is that, they cannot stay consistent about their approach to divine books. Also I have seen lots of RTs saying: "I see that this doesn't make any sense now, but I strongly believe that somewhere sometime I will find an explanation". In the meantime, they withheld taking any decision with what information and rationalization they have in there hand. In fact this way is so convenient that it lets one to maintain this state of mind very comfortably forever. Razab's notion explains the reason for that. I will present some "factual error" in quran anyway, if that doesn't break any of the the forum rules. Before doing that, let us look at this verses:
44.58: Verily, We have made this (Qur'an) easy, in thy tongue, in order that they may give heed.
54.17: And We have indeed made the Qur'an easy to understand and remember: then is there any that will receive admonition?
Now let's look at the following verses:
18.86: "Until, when he reached the setting of the sun, he found it set in a spring of murky water: Near it he found a People: We said: "O Zul-qarnain! (thou hast authority,) either to punish them, or to treat them with kindness."
86.5-7:"Now let man but think from what he is created! He is created from a drop emitted-Proceeding from between the backbone and the ribs:"
16.69: "...There cometh forth from their (bees) bellies a drink divers of hues, wherein is healing for mankind... "
16.15: "And He hath cast into the earth firm hills that it quake not with you, and streams and roads that ye may find a way. "
Sun doesn't set in a spring, neither sperm nor semen comes from between backbone and ribs and honey isn't formed in bee's belly. The one about the hills is more interesting. It has recently been discovered that the crust is thicker under the mountains than elsewhere. So, it is being interpreted that mountains should be considered as a stabiliser to the earth. This is an over-generalisation, since all the volcanoes are mountains, and volcanic eruptions generate stronger of the earthequakes. Also, hills or not to be found in everywhere so as to be beneficial to the whole mankind in general.
Anyway, these are some verses that bears positive factual errors. There are whole lot of verses, those are erroneously incomplete. But the ommissions of information was just too obvious for the state of knowledge at that time, which are now being claimed by islamic RTs to be profound. There are examples aplenty and doing some google will do. I will just mention a classic example (I have found it classic since when I was kid, not sure whether anyone else finds it classic, or not).
21.33: And He it is Who created the night and the day, and the sun and the moon. They float, each in an orbit.
1400 hundred years ago, this verse didn't have any mystery in it, since the idea was that sun and moon both travels around the earth. It was so obvious that there was not even a mention of Earth. Later when it was discovered that rather Earth is the one that travels around the sun, things became kinda murky, some Islamic RTs even suggested to keep mum about it (whic is, btw, supposed to be the way to handle something when you don't know about it, according to some Islamic scholars). Later, when it was further discovered that the sun itself has an orbit centering the center of Milkyway, the verse regained life and the obvious ommissin of earth in the verse became intentional and thus profound.
Another related verse:
36.40: It is not permitted to the Sun to catch up the Moon, nor can the Night outstrip the Day: Each (just) swims along in (its own) orbit (according to Law).
This one made good sense with the contemporary state of knowledge at that time. But as for now, either it may be looked at as a jumbled up pieces of information, or a poetic verse, or a highly recondite metaphor.
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