I would say yes to personal atheism or agnosticism but not necessarily public atheism, in this time in society. Politicians, for example, may not truly believe, but it's best for their campaign to pretend to be believers.

It should but if it doesn't you have to question their intellect.

I think if you're indoctrinated young enough, then you use might your intelligence to try and justify your beliefs to a certain degree. I certainly know of many highly intelligent people who are extremely religious. This is why churches try and get us young.

There's certainly a correlation but there's also some very intelligent believers and not so smart atheists. Also not clear if there's causation here. Does religiosity impede intelligence, perhaps by providing a one size fits all answer for everything that can dull curiously, does intelligence impede religiosity through questioning of doctrine and the ability to find other answers. Or is there a third common cause (e.g. cultural) which affects both. Could be that multiple factors affecting this correlation.

It can, providing that the person does not have his or her reasoning clouded by excessive commitment to political and/or religious ideologies.

Duuuuh. Idunno! I'll ask the lord.

This would seem to suggest that being an atheist means one is also intelligent. This is not necessarily the case. I have met non-believers who are quite unintelligent; some who have arrived at their disbelief through irrational (and often unintelligent) conclusions.

Nope ...met some doozies on athiest sites

There are various kinds of intelligence, but there does seem to be a correlation for atheism and high IQ. But is Atheism a glorious pinnacle of intellectual achievement? Once you have said those hallowed words, “I withhold belief in god or gods because there is no evidence and now the burden of proof is on you”, does that mean you have risen to the top and achieved the ultimate? In other words, is there anything beyond atheism?

There are many examples of very intelligent people who were deeply religious, including almost all the founders of modern physics. So the answer is no, not always.

The Koran calls a mandate for higher learnings though certain sects are against it.
Had it not been for that we may not be where we are today.
Religion today is probably less religion and just more of a glee club of sorts where people can feel they belong to something as we gather here and do the same.

If one is lucky, it does.

Ha!

Yes ofcourse cause everyone else is so dumb to follow the bullshit religion and godly stuff

Not necessarily ... But reflection does.

If you are a seeker, you'll be most interested in metahistory.org, the work of John Lamb Lash and his "Not in HIS Image". Cheers !

Perhaps one has to differentiate between being a believer in something divine and just belonging to a religious congregation, perhaps in the way that someone has a nationality without having any patriotic feeling. Giordano Bruno, Gregor Mendel and Georges Lemaitre are prominent examples of people who were professionally religious without being mentally incapacitated by their religious mandate.

not at all

Nope. Look at the least intelligent atheists and they all think they're smarter than every theist solely based on their beliefs. They have no understanding that indoctrination can hit any of us.

Could you further define intelligence? It's a bit broad as a term.

I have a super smart friend who is somehow a young earth presuppositional Calvinist. Blows my mind, but he is convinced the rest of us are blinded to the truth.

Most scientists are atheist or agnostic. People with higher level of education tend to be liberal. Just sayin...

I think anyone who carefully examines the natural world, especially scientifically, is going to come to the conclusion that there is no Abrahamic God. That doesn’t even require a particularly high level of intelligence, merely a capacity for independent thought.

Everyone is born an atheist, to return to atheism requires one to overcome brainwashing, conditioning and indoctrination.
To achieve this requires knowledge, intuition/instinct and a competing ideology

Intelligence plus the ability to think critically about the world

Awareness does...