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Mystical experiences are due to psychic disorders.

From Wikidebates
This argument is used in the debate : Does God exist?.
This argument is an objection to : Mystical experiences attest to the presence of God.

Summary 

Quotes 

« You say you've personally met God? Well, some people have met a pink elephant, but that probably doesn't impress you. Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper, distinctly heard the voice of Jesus telling him to kill women, and was locked up for life. George W. Bush says God told him to invade Iraq (too bad God didn't see fit to teach him through revelation that there were no weapons of mass destruction). In asylums, people think they're Napoleon or Charlie Chaplin, or that the whole world is conspiring against them, or that they can put their thoughts into other people's heads. We smile at them, but we don't take their deeply held beliefs seriously, mainly because few people share them. Religious experiences are different only in that there are many people who affirm them. »

Richard Dawkins, To put an end to God, Robert Laffont, Paris, 2008

References 

Justifications 

Objections 

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