Omniscience, Preexistence, Doubt and Misdeeds

Abstract

ABSTRACT I consider three aspects of children’s thinking about religious phenomena. It displays intriguing parallels with their thinking about scientific phenomena; it has an impact on their moral behavior; and it is likely to impact their religious experience. Children’s gradual conceptual progress in the domain of religion resembles their conceptual progress in the domain science. These parallels suggest the disarming possibility that older children’s apparently more advanced thinking in the domain of science might be best interpreted, not as a gain in objectivity, but rather as an acceptance of the prevailing orthodoxy regarding the scientific issue in question. Nevertheless, despite these parallels between the two domains, children resemble their parents in expressing more confidence in the existence of scientific as compared religious phenomena. An increasingly plausible explanation for that differential confidence is that children hear adults take the existence of scientific phenomena for granted but hear them express occasional doubt regarding religious phenomena. With respect to moral behavior, children who show a better understanding of God’s special cognitive and observational abilities act more generously when left alone. Finally, recent work on adults’ religious experience suggests that it would be fruitful to look for links between children’s conceptualization of the boundedness and porosity of the mind (both the human and the supernatural mind) and the frequency and nature of their religious experience.