Religous impulses -- the quest for insight into the wider framework we seem to sense at play but have no genuine words for -- is not the problem.

Embedding fixed ideas and antiquated superstitions into people's minds as an "answer" backed with great authority or great peer pressure is very much the problem.

Fixed ideas are the downfall of the species. They are the antithesis of clear-eyed curiousity and intelligent exploration in all spheres, whether physical or metaphysical.

The notion that the infinite force of consciousness which is said to have brought all existence into play, from quasars and clusters to quarks and bosons is, at one and the same time, curiously fascinated by the garments chosen by women in Afghanistan or what little children do with their peepees in Ohio, is patently ridickledockle.

A