Is this right way to implement Abort, Retry and Ignore activity pattern?

Does a non-religious person have a brain that has different neuronal activity or synaptic structure than that of a religious person?

• Background Julian Jaynes asserted in his book [1] that a belief in the presence of an almighty God is a vestige of a period in human history where a part of a person's mind was "speaking" to him and ordering him.Jaynes compared a person of ancient times to a schizophrenic person in modern times who can hear a voice but does'nt know where it is coming from. "According to Jaynes, ancient people in the bicameral state of mind would have experienced the world in a manner that has some similarities to that of a schizophrenic. Rather than making conscious evaluations in novel or unexpected situations, the person would hallucinate a voice or "god" giving admonitory advice or commands and obey without question: one would not be at all conscious of one's own thought processes per se. In ancient times, Jaynes noted, gods were generally much more numerous and much more anthropomorphic than in modern times, and speculates that this was because each bicameral person had their own "god" who reflected their own desires and experiences.He also noted that in ancient societies the corpses of the dead were often treated as though still alive (being seated, dressed and even fed) and argued that the dead bodies were presumed to be still living and the source of auditory hallucinations. This adaptation to the village communities of 100 individuals or more formed the core of religion. Unlike today's hallucinations, the voices of ancient times were structured by cultural norms to produce a seamlessly functioning society. In Ancient Greek culture there is often mention of the Logos which is a very similar concept. It was a type of guiding voice that was heard as from a seemingly external source. Jaynes inferred that these "voices" came from the right brain counterparts of the  left brain language centres—specifically, the counterparts to Wernicke's area and Broca's area. These regions are somewhat dormant in the right brains of most modern humans, but Jaynes noted that some studies show that auditory hallucinations correspond to increased activity in these areas of the brain." - Wikipedia [2] "The astonishing consistency from Egypt to Peru, from Ur to Yucatan, wherever civilization arose, of death practices and idolatry, of divine government and hallucinated voices, are all witness to the idea of a different mentality from our own"-Pg 202 in his book [1] Furthermore he also went on to say that during about 1500 - 1000 BC, there was a decline of this so called "bicameral" mind and a slow progression of human mind into the subjective conscious mind that we can experience today. As this happened the gods suddenly started to vanish from the bicameral kingdoms. "The attempted reformation of Judaism by Jesus can be construed as a necessarily new religion for conscious men rather than bicameral men. Behavior now must be changed from within the new consciousness rather than the Mosaic laws carving behavior from without."-Pg 318 in his book. [2] Question Now assuming that Julian Jaynes is right ( most studies point to the validity of his claims in regard to increased activity in the right hemispheral lobe during auditory hallucinations) - then do people who have no religious thoughts at all or even a desire to believe in an afterlife or supernatural have a brain in which all the activity from the right hemispheral lobes is discarded entirely by the logical left brain? Or conversely do religious people feel this divine presence they talk about as a result of activity from their evolved right brains which can no longer directly "speak" to them but still produce signals powerful enough to make them feel the presence of an admonitory being. The fact that the brain reorganizes its synapses in response to learning activities such as music or bicycling has already been established by modern neuroscience.Would it be then fair to extrapolate that such a reorganization of neural activity occurs as a person grows up and chooses to acknowledge a presence of a "God" in his life or he chooses to completely ignore any such thoughts (which according to Jaynes are manifestations of his right brain). That would explain why Theists and Atheists fail to understand each other so fundamentally. To a Theist then, a godlike presence would be so fundamental to his consciousness that he would only wonder how an Atheist can not acknowledge that.Telling a Theist that god does not exist would be equivalent to telling him that he himself does not exist. If the question does not make sense to you then I urge you to read the book [1] or at least the wikipedia entry [2]. References The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind.- Jaynes, Julian. (1976) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicameralism_(psychology)

• Answer:

  I think the reason why atheists and religious persons don't understand each other can also be sought in the typical psychological phenomenon of cognitive dissonance. Because the question of the existence of God is so fundamental to someones view of self and the world, it's probably such a heavy change of mind that the dissonance that presents itself when the existence of God is questioned, or brought up, that we rather stay to our old believes than to change our whole image. In the social psychology an important motivation of behavior and cognitive thinking is done to maintain an positive self image. Imagine that you have been wrong for so many years on something so important. That would ruin your self image. I think this is the same reason why some many people continue to proceed on the same way, even when they know by heart, they are not on the right track. Because confessing your on the wrong tracks all that time, hurts more than to continue. Like someone wrote: two persons drive to their destination, but they take a wrong turn. So the man says to the wife: Shall I drive slower?