SOURCE: "Pavlov's Religious Orientation," in Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Vol. 25, Summer, 1986, pp. 320-27.

In the following essay, Windholz demonstrates that Pavlov, although a professed atheist, advocated the tolerance of religion as part of his theory of higher nervous activity.

"Religion is the most basic and predictable human instinct" I. P. Pavlov.

In the post World War II era, Soviet anti-religious propaganda supported its position by describing Ivan P. Pavlov as a convinced atheist. As we shall see, in his personal belief, Pavlov was an atheist. But the propagandiste campaign distorted Pavlov's more complex stand on religion by ignoring his position on the tolerance of religious practices. Moreover, the Soviet anti-religious policy disregarded Pavlov's views on the function of religion in his theory of higher nervous activity.

A number of Soviet books have stressed Pavlov's atheism. In particular, J. W. Schorochowa (1956) contrasts Pavlov's materialistic theory of...