Religion and intelligence

11 year old Akshay Rajagopal of Nebraska won the NatGeo top prize in the geography bee today.

From Cbsnews.com:

Cochabamba is the third-largest conurbation in what country?

Your answer might be, "Huh?" But 11-year-old Akshay Rajagopal answered "Bolivia" to clinch the 20th annual National Geographic Bee on Wednesday.

A conurbation is a large, densely populated urban area - and Cochabamba is the third-largest one in the South American country.

Akshay's correct answer capped a two-day event in which he got every question right. A sixth-grader at Lux Middle School in Lincoln, Neb., he won a $25,000 scholarship.

Along the way, Akshay answered questions that included the westernmost Asian national capital (Ankara in Turkey), the country where Makossa is a popular type of music (Cameroon), and the location of Tillya Tepe (it's in Afghanistan).

"Some of them were hard but others were OK," Akshay said as he held an oversized check. "I think I was just lucky."

As he blitzed the competition, his family looked on from the front of the auditorium at the National Geographic Society headquarters in Washington. He boned up for several months by studying geography DVDs and textbooks.

"He's been interested in geography since he was 5," said his mother, Suchitra Srinivas.

"It was just sheer elation," Vijay Rajagopal, told CBS New correspondent Thalia Assuras about how he was feeling after his son's triumph. "Pure joy, I guess... being very proud."

One student from every U.S. state and territory, along with a student from a military family, took part in the competition run by National Geographic. Akshay was the youngest of the 10 finalists, all boys.

"Jeopardy!" host Alex Trebek, who has moderated the bee for all 20 years, called it the "national annual humiliation," exposing that a group of middle schoolers has vastly more knowledge of geography than most of the nation.



Okay, so I'm going to make an assumption that this kid might be Hindu. That means he would be a religious person. Now I could be wrong about this. He might be from an atheist family. But let's just say for argument's sake that he is religious. That would make him one very smart Hindu boy.

The establishment today wants the world to embrace this idea that people with religious backgrounds are somehow less intelligent than "freethinkers" or basically those that have "woken up and let go of all of their religious crutches."

Many of the great atheist thinkers quoted and promoted today are white Americans or Europeans. I know there are many that are not, but the big ones promoted today are. Just look at this video on youtube to see my point. It won an award from Harvard and received praise from their scholars:



(If you go to the youtube website and look in the description box for this video, the creator has admitted that some of the individuals he featured he later found out are not atheists. He has not corrected the video and reloaded it, and it doesn't appear that anyone from Harvard will be challenging him to do so.)

When I did work study for the University way back when as an undergrad, I had the opportunity to fit caps and gowns for the PhD and JD candidates during a spring semester. Now the majority of those graduates were of Indian and Middle Eastern descent. Let's also just say for argument's sake that many of these people were Muslim or Hindu as well. I'm not basing any of this blog entry on any actual data, it's all just speculation, so please keep this in mind.

When asked directly, I've been told by some atheists that all humans evolved equally despite many comments to the contrary. It seems to me then, based on what I've been told, that they would accept most other humans, even religious ones, no matter what deity (s) they worship, as highly intelligent and capable of reason, logic and advanced critical thinking.

But I'm not a smart atheist, so I could be completely wrong on this.

However, I'm still left with a dilemma. Even after they admit that we have evolved equally, many still say that religion is a crutch, that we're hurting society and holding everyone back with our intellectual stupidity. Just look within society to see the proof. So which viewpoint is the correct one? I guess some clarification is necessary to distinguish which category those of us that are religious fall into, the plain delusional and stupid category or the intelligent and respectful category. (I think it ultimately depends on which religion you follow and the one they are most comfortable with you belonging to.)

I'm very, very confused on this. Maybe someone can explain it to me.

On the surface, it appears that in their blind glee to rid the world of Christianity, atheists are "forgetting" about the intelligent Muslims, Hindus and Buddhists out there that are also devoutly religious. I also make another observation. They quote a lot of elitist white Americans and Europeans for their cause without giving any credit to multi-national thinkers, according to the above video that has won an award from Harvard University.

It just seems flawed on all sides to me.