Faith of the Fatherless: The Psychology of Atheism

by Vitz, Paul C.

• ISBN13: 9781890626259
• ISBN10: 1890626252
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2000-04-01
• Publisher: Isi Books

Summary

Modern atheism originated in the irrational, psychological needs of a few prominent thinkers. Subjecting the apostles of atheism to the same psychological analysis with which they attempted to debunk religious belief, Vitz reveals the source of a psychological predisposition to atheism -- the absence of a good father. While psychology is not destiny, disappointment in one's earthly father frequently leads to a rejection of God.
-- Is atheism a mental disorder?
-- Is faith a crutch?
-- Who's dead -- God or Dad?

Author Biography

Paul C. Vitz, a professor of psychology at New York University, was an atheist until his late 30s. He earned his bachelor's degree at the University of Michigan and his Ph.D. at Stanford

Table of Contents

Preface	xi
Intense Atheism	3	(14)
The Projection Theory of Belief in God	6	(3)
Freud's Unacknowledged Theory of Unbelief	9	(6)
A New Theory of Atheism: The Defective Father Hypothesis	15	(2)
Atheists and Their Fathers	17	(41)
Dead Fathers	20	(14)
Friedrich Nietzsche	20	(5)
David Hume	25	(1)
Bertrand Russell	26	(2)
Jean-Paul Sartre	28	(3)
Albert Camus	31	(1)
Arthur Schopenhauer	32	(2)
Abusive and Weak Fathers	34	(17)
Thomas Hobbes	34	(2)
Jean Meslier	36	(2)
Voltaire	38	(2)
Jean d'Alembert	40	(2)
Baron d'Holbach	42	(1)
Ludwig Feuerbach	43	(1)
Samuel Butler	44	(3)
Sigmund Freud	47	(1)
H. G. Wells	48	(3)
Minor Atheists	51	(3)
John Toland	51	(2)
Richard Carlile	53	(1)
Robert Taylor	54	(1)
Contemporary Atheists	54	(4)
Madalyn Murray O'Hair	54	(1)
Albert Ellis	55	(3)
Theists and Their Fathers	58	(36)
Blaise Pascal	59	(1)
George Berkeley	60	(2)
Joseph Butler	62	(1)
Thomas Reid	62	(2)
Edmund Burke	64	(3)
Moses Mendelssohn	67	(2)
William Paley	69	(1)
William Wilberforce	69	(2)
Francois Rene de Chateaubriand	71	(1)
Friedrich Schleiermacher	72	(1)
John Henry Newman	73	(2)
Alexis de Tocqueville	75	(2)
Samuel Wilberforce	77	(1)
Soren Kierkegaard	78	(3)
Baron Friedrich von Hugel	81	(1)
G. K. Chesterton	82	(3)
Albert Schweitzer	85	(1)
Martin Buber	86	(2)
Karl Barth	88	(1)
Dietrich Bonhoeffer	89	(2)
Abraham Heschel	91	(3)
Extensions and Qualifications	94	(36)
Substitute Fathers	94	(10)
Don Bosco	95	(3)
Hilaire Belloc	98	(2)
Walker Percy	100	(4)
Political Atheists	104	(3)
Joseph Stalin	104	(1)
Adolf Hitler	105	(2)
Mao Zedong	107	(1)
The Atheist Father as a Positive Influence	107	(2)
Men and Women: Some Differences	109	(13)
Simone de Beauvoir	113	(3)
Ayn Rand	116	(2)
Jill Johnston	118	(2)
Kate Millett	120	(2)
Exceptions	122	(4)
Denis Diderot	122	(2)
Karl Marx	124	(2)
Other Psychologies of Unbelief	126	(4)
Superficial Atheism: A Personal Account	130	(9)
General Socialization	134	(1)
Specific Socialization	135	(1)
Personal Independence	136	(1)
Personal Convenience	136	(1)
Another Exemplary Case	137	(2)
Conclusions	139	(10)
Intelligence, Ambition, and Will	140	(3)
The Complete Model	143	(6)
Notes	149	(17)
Index	166