Category: News and Views
Alright, before the flame wars begin, this is an article that actually hit the news today, which I thought would be an interesting debate topic.
"A new review of 63 scientific studies stretching back over decades has concluded that religious people are less intelligent than non-believers.
A piece of University of Rochester analysis, led by Professor Miron Zuckerman, found “a reliable negative relation between intelligence and religiosity” in 53 out of 63 studies.
According to the study entitled, 'The Relation Between Intelligence and Religiosity: A Meta-Analysis and Some Proposed Explanations', published in the 'Personality and Social Psychology Review', even during early years the more intelligent a child is the more likely it would be to turn away from religion.
In old age above average intelligence people are less likely to believe, the researchers also found.
One of the studies used in Zuckerman's paper was a life-long analysis of the beliefs of 1,500 gifted children with with IQs over 135.
The study began in 1921 and continues today. Even in extreme old age the subjects had much lower levels of religious belief than the average population.
The review, which is the first systematic meta-analysis of the 63 studies conducted in between 1928 and 2012, showed that of the 63 studies, 53 showed a negative correlation between intelligence and religiosity, while 10 showed a positive one.
Only two studies showed significant positive correlations and significant negative correlations were seen in a total of 35 studies.
The authors of the review looked at each study independently, taking into account the quality of data collection, the size of the sample and the analysis methods used.
The three psychologists carrying out the review defined intelligence as the “ability to reason, plan, solve problems, think abstractly, comprehend complex ideas, learn quickly, and learn from experience”."
from: http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/local-national/uk/religious-people-are-less-intelligent-than-atheists-analysis-of-over-63-scientific-studies-stretching-back-over-decades-concludes-29493132.html
This is a really interesting thing to me. As a spiritual but not religious person with an IQ right below the cutoff mentioned in the article, it honestly doesn't surprise me. I don't think it's causation, but rather just correlation. If you're in a church with a strict religious doctrine, it forces you into a single way of thinking. I wonder how places of religious worship that are more relaxed about ideals compares to those who aren't. If you ask me, if someone tells you to believe something from day one, it closes your mind, and that ends up holding people up in the IQ department, I think. Just a couple thoughts.
I think the best thing to do would not be to go why what your told to believe, though. I think that's a big mistake that people make. As a Christian, I don't just believe in God because I'm told to believe that, but I wanted to do it because I felt that that was the right direction to go. As far as I can remember, I was never told to believe anything, but it was a choice I made.
Ok, fair point, now tell us why you felt it was the best path to go down?
I have an IQ of 145, and I'm not religious at all. I find this interesting though.
I don't know my exact IQ. II'm no genius, but when I was tested I do recall being told I was above average. Anyway, I'm agnostic leaning toward atheism...kind of, "If God is there, and shows himself, I won't ignore him, but I kind of doubt it".
This is interesting, actually, and I hope it doesn't start a flame war.
I want to ask a hopefully rhetorical question that heads Cody's advance off at the pass, however. Why do people smoke, play video games, own pets, have more children than they strictly need, and do all sorts of other things that aren't purely logical or functional? Even genius-level IQ's fall into these traps and do things they really don't need to do. I just want to squash the idea that intelligence lends itself inherently to better judgment-making, and want to stop someone being called a hypocrite for being an intelligent Christian by choice.
This human species of ours is so unique. Everyone has a different personality in some way, everyone has their own purpose in life, and everyone has their own traits. And because there are over 6 billion people on this earth, all unique in some way, wouldn't it be fair to say that God created a person to be different? Also, it's just not possible that we were created through the process of evolution, in my opinion, because if we were all created for a purpose, then there has to be a place we go to after this life to get rewarded for doing our jobs. It's not just a matter of believing in God because I want to avoid Hell or something like that. I truly believe that is the wrong way of thinking.
And I like to add to Sheph’s post.
What about all these doctors, scientist, Presidents, top religious leaders with DR. in their name?
How about some of the wealthiest people in the world?
Well, maybe not presidents. US ones that is. Lol.
They were all children once?
I don’t happen to know my IQ either, but due to me being a bodybuilder, I understand it should be low. Smile.
To Illumination:
I do feel that your premises and conclusions aren't matching up exactly, but I'm also not intending to call you stupid for that.
for instance, I wonder whether there's a link between individuality, God and reward in an afterlife. I don't see one.
I honestly think that the word "agnostic" is meaningless. You believe, or you don't. If you don't, you're an atheist. It's black and white.
I suppose by definition you're right. Either you believe or you don't.
However, I daresay that agnostic is a term for atheists who are open to the possibility of the divine, whatever that may be. It's a broad stroke which, in its essence, says, "No, I may not believe, but one day I might, and I am not beyond that capacity". Since being religious is not as simple as a material possession or a skin colour, being religious or not lends itself to a little more wiggle room. Do you call all lapsed Christians atheists because they do not fully believe? I wonder why there is any sort of quibbling on the meaning and/or tolerance of agnostics. Our minds simply aren't made up one way or another.
Two things, first, SW, you're wrong. Agnosticism deals in knowledge, atheism and theism deal in faith. Atheism is the dismissal of all god beliefs based on lack of evidence. Theism is the belief in god without proper evidence. Agnosticism is the acceptance that it is impossible for us to know conclusively whether there is or is not a god. Atheism and agnosticism are not mutually exclusive, nor are theism and agnosticism, or deism and agnosticism. Atheism, theism and deism are belief-based, agnosticism is knowledge based.
Now then, to illumination. You are making here what is called an argument from ignorance. You've made a few claims here. You claim we're all made for a purpose. You give no evidence for that though, so I dismiss that claim out of hand because its pointless. You claim that since we are all different, that its fair to say there's a god. To which I reply, we're all made with two legs, so its fair to say there's a tiny teapot orbiting the sun. Its a complete nonsequiter. What you're saying doesn't make sense.
But, for the sake of fun, lets assume you're idea is correct, and that god exists because we were all made differently. Now prove its your god and not one of the approximately 7,999 which exist in the world today.
Speaking from experience I can't say I've noticed a big difference in intellegence comparing the two. For many years I claimed to be Christian because it was the same belief as my family, but I honestly never truly believed that there was a God. From the time I decided to let go of the Christian beliefs and go with how I truly felt until now, I may know more, but it obviously isn't because I transitioned from Christianity since I didn't truly believe in it. Likewise, the people who I was involved with in churches and other religious groups, are hard to speak about as far as their intellegence, because the only things they spoke of had to do with God, Jesus Christ, and the Bible, along with other foundations of Christianity. It was the basis of these meetings. We didn't really go in to detail about other subjects. So to put it simply, I find the beliefs of intellegence relating to religion versus non-religion to be, well, an odd conclusion.
I don't see religion having absolutely anything to do with intelligence. Many factors of religion are rather silly and nonsensical. I don't mean to denegrate, but religion contradicts itself, you can't question a "loving God", if there's even a god. Whereas intelligence and logic give way to questions and finding logical reasons and evidence. So I don't think religious people are any more or less intelligent those of us who don't have religious beliefs
Cody, just a few things:
First of all, let's just set the record straight about agnosticism, atheism, theism and exclusivity. As someone else rightly pointed out, if you are in a state of belief, then you cannot simultaneously be in a state of unbelief. If you are in a state of unbelief, then you cannot be in a state of belief. Agnostics cannot truly sit on the fence in this particular parallel, because by suggesting that there is not enough evidence to believe, they are putting themselves in the camp of unbelievers, at least on a temporary basis. Functionally speaking, this renders moot all your talk of knowledge versus faith. The core of the matter is whether or not one believes; whatever their reasons, an agnosticism is admitting that there is not enough reason to believe, so by definition they do not believe.
I'm also going to take this moment to point out something else, since it's here. The previous paragraph is an excellent example of defending a deflection. Notice how the topic was about religious people and intelligence and, because of two earlier comments, it's temporarily turned into a hair-splitting contest about agnosticism? Also notice, Cody, how in your last post you descended to trying to point out logical fallacies in Christianity? That's deflection too, and it contains at least some confrontational elements not so very different from the more zealous religious people who by one means or another will browbeat their targets into conceding points. You don't have to come into every religious board and start trying to pick fights with a religion or its followers, any more than a man with a Bible or a guy wearing a turban ought to stop me on the street and insist on praying for my eyes. I think before you take another step in the direction you're going, you might want to stop and ask yourself where your oh-so-intelligent feet (or fingers, if you prefer) are leading you. That way lies both hypocrisy and obsolescence.
To put it more bluntly, I am sick to death of deflections killing topics, and I'm pointing out one particular culprit who seems to instigate it a great deal and with little purpose I can discern. Don't just spout the normal line about "that's how debate goes", and don't tell us that you have the right. That's invovlate. Of course you have the right. But reason is sometimes greater than right, and in this instance, as in so many others in the past, you lack reason.
Now, to address the point at hand:
Dolce, personally I feel many intelligent people do contradictory, dangerous and unwise things, yet it doesn't necessarily make them less intelligent. I think the thing with religion is simply that the greater your faith, the less you are naturally wont to question things, and oftentimes, people associate greater intelligence with a greater propensity to ask questions. To that, however, I will say that many many religious people have brilliant minds, and many atheists I've personally known are among the most thick-headed individuals I'd ever met. I believe there is wisdom in asking questions - the right ones, at least - but I also believe there is inherent strength of both mind and character in admitting that there are things that we do not, and perhaps cannot, know. I am honestly wondering at the basis for the studies, though, and the people who took them, since ironically enough it has been demonstrated that the taker of a survey usually exhibits some sort of bias, to the extent that results are often skewed. To wit, if a drug company does a survey on which pill has better pain relief, you'd better believe that more often than not, their product, if they have one, will show favourable results. Maybe a bunch of atheists engineered these studies. Maybe they didn't. It's food for thought, anyway.
I meant to point that as well, greg. Many people, intelligent or not, perform rather insane actions. Hence, As I mensioned in my previous post, religion does not define one's levil of intelligence.
I'm not buying this one at all. I've met many very intelligent religious people, and also many very stupid non-religious ones. Intelligence is based on many things, but I don't think one's religious belief or lack thereof is one of them. This study seems to have a strong bias to it, as most studies and surveys do.
SW, you're still wrong, and it only makes me laugh at you when you prove it in so many words. Go look up the difference between knowing and believing. Then flip open a dictionary and look up theism, atheism, deism and agnosticism. Then come back and say nothing since to put up a board post admitting I'm right would make you a hippocrit. Ok pumpkin, thanks, now step aside and let people who live this life talk for a bit.
As for the study, there are a lot of problems with it that any skeptic would be able to point out to you. They have a proportionally small sample group as compared to the billions of religious and nonreligious people over just the last century. The definition they give for intelligence is highly questionable. I could go on, but I think that points out enough flaws.
However, from a personal standpoint, I think religious people are delusional, and it makes it really hard to take anything they say seriously. I mean, Christians believe in a book that has a talking snake and a talking donkey. If you met someone who said they thought snow white and the seven dwarfs was a true story, you wouldn't believe them either. So while Christians may not be less intelligent, I do believe they are less intellectual. Subtle difference.
Looks like we feel the same about one another, Cody, which is fine by me. The difference is that I'll keep fairly close to discussion and will attempt to make germain arguments, while you will continue to tend toward personal attacks and derailment of boards for your own amusement.
You have not in fact dismissed or been able to disprove any argument I have made about agnosticism. If you are not a believer, then you are an unbeliever. This is pretty much set in stone. Thus, if you are not theistic, you are at least to some extent atheistic. Agnostics who say there isn't enough evidence to say there is, or is not, a god cannot sit on the fence in a literal sense. They may tend toward one side or another, but ultimately they sit in the camp of the unbeliever. Now please stop attempting to split hairs and make yourself look like you have anything meaningful to say when you clearly don't.
Oh for fuck's sake. Quit whining about being attacked already. You should know what you're getting into by now when you post on these boards.
Cody, I don't believe there needs to be any evidence whatsoever to back up the fact that we were all made for some kind of purpose. The fact that you want the evidence proves to me that you want to pick a fight about it, which I'm not willing to do. If you're not here for some kind of purpose, whether it be serving in the military or getting a PHD in Rocket Science, something's obviously wrong with the way you're thinking. Everyone has a purpose.
There doesn't need to be any evidence whatsoever, it, it, it, it just is! Yeah. Great logic there, Mister Einstein.
When people trot out all the old saws about us being here for a purpose, but that's all they'll say, a purpose but they do not expand on the nature of the purpose, I have to ask how they know for absolutely sure and what up and told them such a thing? What did they do or where did they go to get this special secret insight that the rest of us slobs ended up missing out on? In a similar groove, what about when people say that things happen for a reason. Sure, they are clueless as to exactly what the reason might be but they are sure convinced not only that a reason exists but it's a damn good one. Here's another one. There are no coincidences. Oh yeah? Why not!
Just so we're clear, I'm not whining about being attacked. I'm simply stating that attacking is counterproductive and that the continued tolerance of someone whose greatest MO seems to be the derailment of otherwise interesting topics seems sort of silly to me. That's all. I have thick skin and don't get insulted very easily.
Anyway, guys, we're turning this into a Christianity/religion vs. nonreligion thing again. I'm not saying the points aren't valid enough, or don't bear discussion, but does it have to be challenged at every turn? If my memory serves, Illumination came in here and basically said something about being fairly intelligent but being a Christian anyway. Nibbling at that isn't getting us anywhere, since not only does Illumination fail to represent a majority, but personal stances on who is or is not religious and why aren't getting us anyplace. Religious people are going to pull the "if you don't get it, there's something wrong" card, and your more vocal nonreligious people are going to pull the "oh wow, great logic there, buddy" card, and everything devolves.
Tempting as it may be to believe the results, the whole premise is pretty suspect. I mean, first, define intelligence? We all know people who come off as not very smart but after a bit you can really tell they are really quite clever in any number of ways.
All I can say is in my personal experience, the religious and intelligent usually hang out in politics and courts and the soft sciences. Their intelligence is not the engineer's intelligence to build things and create or the scientist's intelligence to discover and constantly probe and prove. Their version of prove is usually in a debate sense, where they prove by being the last one standing. That's a lot different than proof by evidence, repetitive trial and error, and all the other parts of the scientific method which have given you the developments of the past few hundred years.
Generally their intelligence, just like the psychology and social service people, is in starting with a foregone conclusion and then proving it out. That is very different than starting with a problem which needs to get a real solution, not a debate-based solution.
This is just my experience in life for better or worse.
But the survey is basically meaningless and I could probably get a soft sciences chick to help me draft one of those to prove you are intelligent because you eat Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream. After all, with Ben and Jerry's you have a ton of choices, new flavors, variety that is constantly changing and being added to. So you must operate in a unpredictable and changing environment.
Anyone wanta craft such a survey and make that one work? Lol.
I'm on the serious fence with most things, mainly sticking with for the sake of the wife and daughter. I'm a kindred spirit with Darwin on all things faith-based: He had his doubts and wasn't the devout atheist eithat both the fundamentalists and the antitheists would have you believe. But in a memoir he wrote he didn't want to spoil things for his wife and so he went along with her, so long as she lived.
I'm certainly curious to note what will happen when artificial intelligence and not bias does any sorts of translation of the original documents, and I frankly cannot get past the genocides and stonings of the Jewish Bible or Christian Old Testaments. If you think you can, have yourself a religious experience by watching a stoning on Youtube. It's pretty enlightening. Look up Lapidation on Wikipedia while you're at it so you can learn precisely how they die. Then ask yourself why a deity in the bronze age would need to use stoning as a mechanism for lightweight crimes when he could have certainly done it quickly with a sword thrust. This isn't anything loving by any stretch, and the ill-reputed Mao Tsetung, pol pott, or Stalin could not have come up with something so horrid were they to have tried.
Does that make me more or less intelligent? Depends on who you ask. I feel mainly comfortable sticking to things that are actually here, and where genocide exists here I am not its supporter no matter what deity or Buddha or Wicca or whatever brand of woo happens to be behind it. I understand supermajority religions to be the property of the State and Supermajorities like Christianity and Islam and Judaism would not exist today were the politicians not behind them, nor the banks financing them. They're misguided if they think all this financing comes from a good heart though: Pay day always comes and they will all aeither compromise and go with big business or they will get replaced by a newer model. That is precisely what happens when you're up for sale.
That said, perhaps those in the thick of it really are quite intelligent. They certainly know on what side the bread gets buttered and it doesn't matter what one we're talking about. State religions in practical usefulness to the State are rather indistinguishable from one another, whether it was Thor's Hammer of Old, the Catholic church of the middle ages, or Fundamentalist Christianity today. They're all agents for the elite, and they all get to be replaced when the newer model comes along, and they all knowingly signed up for it.
The real only unintelligent thing they do is whine when the inevitable happens, the same inevitable that happened to their predecessor when they first ascended for their time in the sun.
I will argue on this case no more. I've said about all I need to say on this matter, and whether or not you guys call mean idiot for believing what I do is up to you. I won't cry. We have our agreements and disagreements, so let's keep it at that level. Now, as the for the original point, I have a friend who was one of the valedictorians in our class, and she is a devout Christian. So I would say that intelligence has nothing at all to do with a set of beliefs. The study mentioned earlier seems to be more of a biased, perhaps even a hypothetical, study.
Michael, you have nothing more to say, cause you aren't able to explain things further. you think we need to be content with your explanation that everyone has a purpose...and why? if you're so sure of that fact, why can't you tell us more?
Because you choose to argue about it, and you won't respect anyone else's beliefs except for yours. And don't give me this I'll respect it if you give me more evidence or explanations. It's not going to work. So for lack of a better phrase, shut up.
we're asking you to defend your point, Michael. the fact you choose to see that as arguing, simply cause similar discussions have been had numerous times before, is silly.
it's obvious you can't stand it when people don't just blindly follow what you say, but if you can't explain why you believe what you do to people who don't subscribe to your beliefs, you shouldn't expect to be taken seriously.
I think Leo raised a good question about intellegence itself. I'd go out on a limb here and assume most of you like me really don't have the motivation to open a dictionary and look up what intellegence itself means, therefore we're just going off of what we think to be intellegent or not. I may not believe in God or any other reason and I may go as far as to say that there is no such thing as a God, and all religions are more of a false hope. But this is what I believe, just as Michael and others believe that there is a God. It's not as though we all judge like this:, you converse with a person on a bus on your way to a meeting. The topic of religion comes up, and you come to find out that this person is a Christian. In shock, you say to this person, you believe in God? You unintellegent dumb ass, there is no God!
This is my basic belief of the argument that religious people are not as intellegent as us who do not have a religious standing. It is silly. And if you truly believe this, then I guess you are more intellegent than the Doctor who just so happens to be a Christian who may perform a life saving operation on you. You are more intellegent than the man who built your house who may be religious, more intellegent than a person with a PHD who may be religious. Doesn't it sound ridiculous?
Actually, Chelsea, you're the pot-stirrer here. Obviously Illumination is backing down and not attempting to convince you of anything, yet you are the one constantly seeking evidence. You challenge, you nip, you force people into positions where they must either bow out or defend, yet they are not doing that to you. This stance is not the mark of either intelligence or freedom of thought; it is no more or less than a symbol of antagonism. Admittedly, you are by and large less guilty than others, but here, at this point, I'm calling a spade a spade. Illumination is bowing out because in matters of faith vs. lack of faith, both sides are going to be immovable. I say kudos for having the sense not to start throwing brick walls around.
I'd also like to say that I think Leo's post here was quite a good one. I've been having doubts about this supposed group of studies ever since the topic was started up. Mind you, there were multiple studies that were apparently collected to render more believable data, but we still don't know exactly who performed the studies in the first place, nor do we know who tallied up the results.
Ryan, your last post had some point to it as well. Personally, I don't care how intelligent I am in comparison to other people, since intelligence is, as stated, very difficult to quantify. If it is nothing more or less than IQ, and if the numbers haven't been fudged, then there might be a little basis for conclusion...until you realize that IQ tests themselves might be tools designed to isolate the sort of thought not embodied in organized religion. Hard to say for sure.
Greg, unlike you, I don't believe that challenging people in the ways I do, is a bad thing.
if no one is forced to be encouraged to think differently, think about why they hold the beliefs they do, realize there are other perspectives besides theirs that they could learn a lot from, or realize that sharing their opinions, rather than backing down, as so many on here do when I challenge them, then what is there to gain?
Actually, if any of you would bother to do any reading, you'd know exactly what intelligence means in this instance. They say exactly what they are calling intelligence in the study. They outline it, right there in black and white. Not hard to find. The only problem is that their definition of intelligence is, by necessity, restrictive, and this opens the study up to ridicule from that angle.
For once I have to agree with SW here, but not in a way he's gonna like. Illumination shouldn't have to talk on this board. In fact, they should have shut up in the first place. If you're not going to be willing to have your opinions tested by those you expose them too, then shut up. Say nothing, you're pointless and a waste of space and time. And to relate this back to the topic so SW's panties don't get bunched around his balls, and to spare me from listening to him whining anymore, its this mindset of invulnerability which makes me think that religious people are less intelligent, or at least less intelligent in the instance of opinion-based exchange.
Now, simply because I have this addiction to making people look stupid when they are, and pointing out things that are wrong, here, have a look at this http://www.diffen.com/difference/Agnostic_vs_Atheisp
and this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Az4LKnQ9hu8
Now shut up and stop whining about us not sticking strictly to the frickin' script. Its a public forum, I can talk about waffles if I damn well want to.
I honestly think that those of you who are constantly seeking evidence and are unwilling to back down and respect other people for what they believe are the dumbest people around. But it may be a while before you actually realize that, so enjoy this debate while you can. I'd rather be called an idiot for a nonbeliever for believing in God, than to be called an idiot by God because I did not believe in Him. There is ample evidence that God exists. He has used people, the Bible, and science to try and make Himself known. But we don't even have to have that evidence. It's by faith that we believe in God, and faith is the substance, or grabbing a hold, of things hoped for that have never been seen. It's like putting your faith into sitting on a chair and hoping it won't break. You don't need evidence to prove that the chair you sit on won't break, you just sit on it. It's the same with our beliefs in God. Either you believe in Him or you don't.
Ok Michael, I have a few questions for you. First and foremost, why do you say that the people who are constently seeking evidence are the dumbest people around, given the fact that you can't provide evidence or defend your beliefs? I'm sure we're not trying one bit to change one another's beliefs, but backing off does not grant any respect for beliefs that you yourself can't defend. So I suggest that you either answer the questions that are posed to you, admit there are no answers to them and not post if you are unwilling to defend your "faith". Because with that you manifest lack of confidence in what you believe. So with that said, I have another question. How can faith in God be compared with sitting in a chair that you think won't break? That's totally idiotic because chairs break, even though you never know when, because we've sat on chairs, whereas noone has ever sceen god. Acording to the bible, god is all powerful, perfect and the personification of pure love. How is that so, when the bible which was written by imperfect men, has many stories of cruel things this loving god did to humanitty? Of course he used people, as you stated, and then, punished them for their sins after using them.
I meant to finish the post, but I decided to post again to avoid rewriting it in case this logged me out. Back to the faith topic, You don't know when the chair will break, but, flash news, things wear out after using them for a period of time. And we know this why? Because there are many chairs that have broken unexpectidly, however, as I mentioned in my previous post, noone has ever sceen this one almighty god, known the loving god nor can I believe or have faith in a god that hasn't even come. And respect is earned, so beliefs that can't be defended cannot by any means be respected.
Oh my god, I think I just fell in love. Someone who understands the difference between intelligent trust and religious faith.
I don't need to add anything, cuz that post was perfect, but I will anyway. I don't respect your beliefs because your beliefs are the idiotic delusions and recorded frauds of a primitive bronze age desert tribe of goat herders. Then, you have the audacity to teach those moronic psychotic ramblings to children, and try to force them into the laws of the country I live in. Then, tell me I'm going to hell for not believing in him.
Also, you just made paskal's wager illumination. I doubt you knew you did, cuz they don't teach logic and critical thinking in sunday school, but you did. Look it up, and then look up the thousands of different ways to dispute it. I'll give you one here, "I said earlier there are approximately 8,000 gods in this world, how do you know the one you worship is the right one?"
There's one point you folks are missing. It's the bit where Illumination is basically saying "I'm not trying to change your mind". I also happened to interpret the bit about seeking evidence a little differently, and perhaps erroneously.
Here's the great part about personal beliefs. They don't need to be justified. Illumination gets this, and many of the more gung-ho atheists here do not. The funny parallel is that if a fundamentalist Christian did what some of the atheists here are doing, they'd be run off - and rightly so, I personally think - for being too aggressive.
Look. I'm not saying I think Christianity, as a construct, makes sense. I personally think it does not, and like many other people here so far, I kinda need evidence if I'm going to accept something that fundamentally huge and world-changing. However, I'm not going to call someone an idiot, or deride their chosen dogma, if it is doing me no harm. Here, it clearly isn't. I am also wise enough to accept that there are a lot of questions that we, as a race, simply do not have answers for. I feel that "god is the answer" falls inside the realm of "too convenient to be plausible", but I fully admit there are many things, supernatural and otherwise, that fall outside my scope of understanding. Nothing is gained by bullying or by attempting to prove the validity of your stance simply by someone else's unwillingness to force their own point of view down your throat. I do not agree with the suppositions made by Illumination, by and large, but I think it's good that he has not at any point suggested that others ought to follow blindly.
By my way of seeing it, any utterly devoted atheist is making precisely the same mistake as any utterly devoted religious person. They are convinced that their way is the only way, and while atheism may be able to take the "if we can't prove it, it's not real" approach, there are an awful lot of things in the world which frankly cannot be proven either way. Keeping this at least vaguely on topic, then, I would not be surprised to see a study which, for many of the same reasons, marked devout atheists as lacking in intelligence the same way the devoutly religious are.
SW, I'm not suggesting that I'm write, or that my way is the only way. I'm also not trying to force what I believe down anyone's throat. The big difference, though, is that I don't just make a statement, and when challenged, back off. Because Not everyone will or can understand why I believe what I do, but I don't just say, it's like that because someone said so and so, I'm not a sheep. Noone is bullying, attacking or any such thing. But if everything in the world can't be proven anyway, and we as a rase cannot provide answers to everything, why try to proove someone or something that noone has presence? I'm not saying that illumination is trying to tell us to believe in god blindly, but many other religious people do, not only christians. And the sad fact is that if you don't believe what some do, and challinge their beliefs, they either back off, or say they'll pray for you, and we don't do that with them. So there.
Dolce, I see what you're saying...and I'm not saying "don't ever ever challenge if it comes up". I'm more saying that some people will state what they do or how they do it without wishing to be challenged, and in being challenged should not be looked down upon if they choose not to rise to the bait. You, yourself, aren't saying or doing anything I think terribly unreasonable...and you're right, some religious people will do exactly as you suggest and sort of pity the rest of us unenlightened fools. Let them do it, but I don't want to see it. Heh.
You know what the funny part about it is? I've been defending my faith this whole time. I'm not going to shove my beliefs down your throats, so I expect the same in return. I think that the reason that some people seek so much evidence to prove a case is because they are insecure about their own beliefs. However, I can share some personal experiences that may translate as a small amount of evidence, but I'm not going to sit here and argue with you guys about who's right and who's wrong. I'm not going to waste my time talking about this to you guys if you can't work up the courage to respect my beliefs, as well as other Christians' beliefs, on this thread.
So here's some personal experience. I accepted Christ as my Savior when I was 14. I have already stated why I felt that I needed to come to Jesus, but He has blessed me so much in many ways. I've had several prayers answered, I've been blessed with technology that is necessary for my daily living, and I've been blessed with friends who always encourage me in my faith. I have seen the Lord work in so many areas with so many people. I have seen people make a 180-degree turn in their lives because I or someone else told them about Jesus Christ.
Am I forcing you guys to believe? Not at all, I'm simply encouraging you and telling you about Jesus, so that you guys can make your decisions as to what you believe. And just to be clear, God doesn't send people to Hell for not believing in Him. You bring that trouble upon yourself. It's your decisions that reflect on how things are going to turn out. So whether or not your happy with the stuff I've talked about, I hope you guys think about the fact that I'm not forcing anybody to believe, nor am I shoving my beliefs down people's throats. My job as a Christian is to share the Word, so that's what I'm doing. You are responsible for your own life and the decisions you make.
I'd also like to add, that it's not fair that religions are based on fear and that this loving god of gods condemns hell for those who act wrongly. I say this because we're all imperfect, we all make mistakes, some more atrocious than others, but how would I know that if I'm honest and respectful and don't harm anyone I won't go to hell, when their have been catholick priests, for example, who've raped little children? I don't go around preaching about the end or salvation or about the return of the mesiah for fear I'll go to hell, because I live for this life, and not the next, which quite frankly, noone knows about accept that they'll end up in the grave or creamated, and if we leave a mark in the world, we'll be remembered throughout many generations to come. So I don't see how we're more or less intelligent than those religious people.
Oh, wait! You must have applyed for the technology, you qualified, and thus receved what you need, because you fulfilled the requirements necesary to be entitled to it. Lets say you didn't qualify, for one reason or another, there would've been other ways to obtain your equipment, but it would have not miraculously been in your hands because you prayed. If not, none of us would be in need of one thing or another. Also, true friendships are nurtured every day, so if your friends are true, you work to maintain a healthy friendship with them. Just sayin. Oh, sorry! it's not just hell, it's armagedon, or the gehena. anything else?
Maybe he's a member of a cargo cult and the technology just fell from the sky.
You guys are completely missing the point. Oh well, live and let live.
Illumination, I'll say politely what others before me have said not so politely. I respect your faith even if I do not understand it, but I wonder how you are drawing your conclusions.
For instance, you say that you were blessed with the technology you have. Well, I suppose you could say that God may have made mankind intelligent enough to create it, and may then have given mankind the little nudge it needed to set up the system which allowed you to get it...but it looks like you're making just a bit of a leap here in purely logical terms by attributing your good fortune to God, rather than to the technology itself, to the people who made it, or to the system which enabled you to get it. All of those things may at their root have been God-inspired, but they also may not have been. In essence, what I'm asking is this: on what do you base your faith that good things come from God? Where do the good acts of people fall in there?
You don't have to answer, and I want you to understand that this is not a "prove it or you're wrong" scenario. I am honestly curious. I've had many an interesting talk with religious people of many persuasions, and it always seems to come back to this.
And here, folks, is where I bring it back. Unless there's an answer waiting in left field to blow me away, I think there's one very easily isolated root of difference in thought. Atheists, even many agnostics (in short, those who do not believe) are hesitant to ascribe any good or bad thing to a force they cannot put to words or context. Intelligence, as often defined in an IQ test and such, is the ability to problem-solve, think rationally and act under pressure, all in context. It's not just a matter of how many big words you know or how fast you can talk, or how viciously you can argue. It's really about how much you will accept at face value without analysis (as in, the more you do this, the easier you are to lead, the easier it is to confuse you by supposition, etc). People who are more prone to take things at face value are more apt to make connected assumptions about things, and although we all do this, it often runs counter to logic and, by extension, intelligence. Logic is not intelligence in itself, but it is an integral part. Religion, by its nature, asks you to accept a whole lot of things you can't prove...not just the existence of God, but lots of dogmatic elements which are essential to the working of the religion. You do these things, oftentimes, because you are taught to accept logically unsound but circular (and thus self-satisfying) chains of reasoning. They wrap unanswered questions up neatly, and in the extreme they may make us feel safe and secure in the knowledge that the unknown lies with God, and need not trouble us. I read a quote once, and it went something like, "Religion, not faith, is man's way of trying to control what he cannot hope to understand". I stand by it.
So...yeah, that's a bit of a ramble, but my point is hopefully clear enough. Mass reasoning of a collective body lends itself to trigger thinking, acceptance, doing what you're told, and by the time you are old or experienced enough to have doubts, it's sometimes too late. In essence, here is what I want to say. The pursuit of truth and facts may not be utterly central to the human existence, but I do not believe it should be shied from or muffled by self-congratulation and new-age rhetoric either.
Bear one last thing in mind, please. This thing I hae remarked upon is a tendency, and not an absolute. There are many brilliant minds who are more than capable of strong and independent thought who are still religious for reasons of their own, and they should not be derided as such. Sheep are easily led, and religion breeds sheep, but faith, as a separate concept, need not be assailed on the same grounds.
I wonder if there are people who are genetically wired for faith as it were. Maybe it had an evolutionary purpose at one point. For some of us, we've never really taken things without question, and don't really fall for the Bernaise-style testimonials as were mentioned earlier. But countless people do, be they on about a religion or a product or even an alternative herb that is supposed to react like Ponce De Leone's Fountain of Youth.
I tend to agree with Shepherdwolf, it's a moot debate. If you're not wired for faith like them, they cannot convince you to just trust and all. And if you are, then you may not be able to step back and critically analyze the situation like us.
Maybe it's extreme of me to say it's genetic, but I have seen people who bought the whole thing, and in true Bernaise-style have convinced themselves they thought it up or came to it themselves. Then from the same family you have people who are capable of critical analysis.
Maybe it's not genetic, maybe epigenetic. Anyway I think some are wired to understand their world that way, and have even gotten quite put off when I gave practical explanations for how something happened. To me, I thrive where the practical and concrete and knowable exist, and some people thrive where they can ascribe what they don't know to an unseen force. I've been doing a bit of reading on the religious experience, and it seems some people have a sensitivity that causes them to perceive their world that way. It's not either shallow, or somehow holier or better, it's just biology.
Though my view is quite unpopular with either the religious types or those atheists who want to argue with them.
I realize now there's quite a bit of diversity in the atheist community, as we see on here even with the likes of Chelsea and Cody and others. It used to be when I was younger, it was the religious who were the most outspoken and the atheists, with whom I mainly associated, were the rational lot, the ones capable of being above the fray. This I have always personally striven for and admired in some people.
It's not beating around the bush: it's acknowledging that there are some fights you will never win, and some people who simply choose not to be rational. Hence I never discuss some of this stuff with some of my relatives. I personally can't take the deceptive tactics, which Cody referred to when he mentioned the faith vs. intelligent trust situation. But the religious have arguments that are full of this sort of thing.
Some claim the dinosaurs were even planted by their deity as a test to see if people like myself would abandon rationalism and pragmatism and get in line. When I was younger I thought that was a funny idea, a bit like a cartoon. Now that idea positively makes me sick. I hate, absolutely hate, treachery of any kind.
If you really want to know what "side" you're on, I'll show you:
Tonight, when you get home and turn on the news, and a report came on announcing that a religious group was genociding an entire quadrant of one of the continents, killing men, women and children, what would you think? What would you think of them, their leader, or any source that set them to doing this? And next up, there's someone who hunts down a girl, says he loves her, pursues her. There's a plan she may or may not fully realize, where he promises everything to her, after all is properly taken care of of course and she bear the brunt of things where she is. But if she doesn't declare herself to him, he locks her in a cage and torments her for the rest of time. What would you think of that situation?
This is what it is to step back and imagine you're looking at the most popular states-sponsored religious text we have, at least the translations we have.
It is this level of stepping back which not everyone can do, and I don't know whether this makes those of us who do any better or worse. I think millions of Christians would be at the same time horrified at the aboe news accounts while assenting to them having happened millennia ago. Some of this is understandable: nobody weeps for someone who died hundreds of years ago. The genocides of the Old Testament or Ghengis Khan are not making anybody sad today. Similar genocides by Adolph Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pott have made many people sad, because people know those people today. Ironically, religious people were often outspoken against the current genocides while supportive of at least the old testament invasions with some kinds of lawyerly mumbo jumbo.
But to properly declare oneself a devoted follower, one would have to rejoice at the prospects of the above news accounts. This I have not said in offline life, to be honest. Part of "being me," to coin what people say now, is consideration and staying above the fray, remaining the rock steady rational one in a world that is amassed by chaos and turmoil. To me, the highest point of being human is the ability to stay above the fray while the pack of lemmings feeds and carries on and throws their pooh. I'm not always very good at it but this is my effort.
Oh and one final point on the religious issue: I was a translator for the U.S. government back in the 1980s. Now we hear these religious people talk about how words and contexts were not translated "roperly" and even provide descriptions. These mistakes I am hearing about would have gotten me fired and in serious trouble when working for the Feds, even if it was something as simple as a conversation that was translated.
Things like the plural versus singular "you" are fully translatable into English, by adding a word. I have heard of many of these instances over the years now and have even tried my hand at reading some of the texts in Spanish, the only other language I can not-so-fluently-anymore read just about anything in. I frequently read sites on the Internet in it just to try and keep a semblance of it. Anyway there are serious differences.
All I know is as an engineer, when we document things, we are very careful to make sure you will understand it as a user. I know immediately you will remember all the manuals that were confusing. But most of the time? It was a part of it that was confusing, and your standard of expectation is really high from us, and should be. There are way too many gaps and way too many economic and political interests vested to really get a pure analysis of the situation.
You know how upset you get when you find out that a health recommendation came from a particular industry who would profit from it? The dairy industry did this, the grain industry did this. I don't care what brand of woo we're talking about here, it's got serious political investments. Some brands of woo are simply more invested and hence more controlled than others.
I am still personally curious to see what will happen when Google's AI translates the most original of some of these texts, especially if there have been deliberate edits throughout time. And we can assume there have been: all documents get edited.
Anyway enough of my somewhat confused and probably somewhat confusing ramblings.
thank you, thank you, thank you, Cody.
I'd just like to say here and now, that I'm glad to have met such an outspoken atheist as yourself, who, at any chance, doesn't hesitate to critique people's idiotic religious beliefs for the idiocy that they are.
I'm glad that, through you, I've learned the value in calling things exactly as I see them, whether it's religion, or something else entirely.
like you, I think SW's view that we should just shut up, and respect beliefs we don't understand, is beyond ridiculous.
I'll take it further, by saying that people who believe as he does, are a large part of the reason why society is so unwilling to understand atheism.
people like him are saying we should just keep quiet, and live and let live, despite the fact children in schools are endoctrinated with religious claptrap, told to pray to God that their cancer will get better, rather than being encouraged to trust in medical professionals to give them proper care, or being encouraged to believe that they can hope for the best all on their own.
if we didn't have people like you or myself to challenge these things, the world would be worse off, for sure.
Guess what, Chelsea? What you've just done is take a variant on the fundamentalist Christian stance and shout it from this particular rooftop.
It doesn't matter if you think you're right. They think they're right too.
It doesn't matter if you feel you have logic on your side. They feel they have God on their side, and for what it's worth, lots of wars have been fought about God but none have been fought about reason, to my understanding, so that should tell you which is the stronger motivator.
Let me put this to you without any bark on it, since that's how you prefer it. Being an atheist is absolutely okay. It's nothing to dance around and nothing to apologize for. However, something that ought to be apologized for, especially given your vitriol on the subject, is the hypocrisy embodied in your stance. You would be offended, outraged even, if a Christian came up to you and started foaming at the mouth, yet what have you done here? That last post, if it speaks your views clearly, tells me this: "Hi. I'm an atheist who will not hesitate to push my atheistic views down the throats of all who oppose me. I am righteous, I am correct, and this entitles me to throw my weight around."
Congratulations. You, and everyone who does likewise, are now exactly what you hate.
You're a fundamentalist.
Now, with that appraisal out of the way, I'd like to clear something up:
1. If someone's opinions, feelings or actions are doing you harm, by all means get the harm to stop if you can.
2. If you are offended by religion of any kind, it's perfectly fine to not only say so but to keep it at arm's length with you.
3. When you label me as a person who wants everyone to shut up and deal with a flawed system, you're misunderstanding grossly the things I've been saying, and it is at this point that I strongly suggest you read what I say more carefully. At the absolute worst, I am suggesting that if someone's personal opinion is doing you harm, don't cut them up about it, no matter how right you think you are. To do so invites a zealot to do the same to you some fine day.
4. This topic was not about atheism vs. Christianity at its core, and this is not the first topic that has been derailed by atheists in similar fashion. Have you got something to protect? Are you feeling a little possessive or squeamish because your lack of faith and religion aren't doing what you think they ought to do? Funny...I'm an agnostic leaning more toward atheism and I have absolutely no problem with Christians or anyone else, so long as they respect me enough not to badger me. I haven't yet seen a case of any non-Christians being badgered here, so I think the atheist response has been far out of context, which is the whole reason I spoke up in the first place.
And last but not least:
5. Most decent people respect one another, even if they think someone else's view on something is silly or meaningless. Filtering does not mean forced censorship. The sooner the more self-righteous among you get that particular message, the more welcoming a place these boards will become. I'm sick and tired of people who do no harm being shut out, run off or otherwise bullied by a vocally strong minority, and if I have to hold up a mirror, metaphorically speaking, to make you see the double standard you're adopting in your own misguided defense, then that's just what I'll do.
Now, for pity's sake let's stop this, and either get back to true discussion or let this topic die, as it may well deserve to by this point.
Sorry, there's a typo in my last post I need to address.
I meant to say that if a person's personal opinion is not doing you harm, don't cut them up about it. I figure you probably knew what I meant, but I wanted to be sure.
This is going to sound almost elitist, and I honestly don't mean it to. I really don't. Nothing I'm about to say is the fault of anyone involved, but its a fact, and I believe it should be addressed.
SW, you are Canadian, you live in Canada. As an atheist, you live in an entirely different world than Chelsea, who lives and texas, and I, who lives in florida. You would not be able to comprehend how vicious our lives are, because you don't experience it. I used to live very close to Canada, in a place with a very similar culture. There was no harsh religious dogma there, or very little of it. Its not like that for us.
For Chelsea, she lives in a state where the board of education refuses to purchase text books for their over five million schoolchildren unless those books contain information about intelligent design. That, in turn, makes it so school in a majority of the other states are forced to buy those same books because they're all the publishing companies will publish. You don't have that problem in Canada. I know, I have friends who are school teachers in Canada.
Me, I live in a state where being an atheist precludes you from having a large social circle. Unless you go to church, and often the right church, you won't have any friends, and dating is practically out of the question. Its bad enough that we literally have organizations for atheists to gather in secret so that they can have people to talk to, and the meeting places of those organizations are frequently vandalized. We have sexual laws on the books in florida, which are enforced, which are religious in context.
So when you tell us that people aren't shoving their religion down our throats, we vehemently respond to you, yes they are. Now, illumination might not be doing it directly, but he's propogating, and you're propogating the idea of atheists respecting the Christian religion that, in our case, is literally destroying our lives. I could fill this entire board post with things I've lost to my atheism, and that's before I started being as outspoken as I am now. Just by not going to church, I've lost more than I can tell you here.
So, I want you to understand that before you say we're being hippocrits. We're not being hippocrits. I personally welcome christians to engage me, and notice I never once told illumination not to share his opinion until after he refused to defend it. He's welcome to share it, invited to, and he's welcome to rip into my beliefs. That's why I put them out here. Do it, cut them down if you can.
So when you say that SW, when you criticize us, remember, you don't live in the same world we do, and I'm glad you never will have to. I'd never wish this on you.
Cody, I'm sorry, but I feel that, once again, you're missing the point.
You're right about one thing, and one only. I do not live in that sort of harsh set of circumstances. And that's as far as you being right goes.
I understand that you are repressed, treated badly, forced to be inferior by the Christian religion that is entrenched where you live. I sympathize, even if I cannot truly empathize. However, absolutely none of this is Illumination's fault, nor is it the direct fault of anyone else, Christian or otherwise, on these boards. To come on here as Chelsea did and basically shove atheism across in the manner she has is hypocritical, pure and simple. There is no excuse, no counterargument, no justification possible. If she would get upset by a Christian being so forthright and judgmental, as it seems she would (and as it seems to me that you're contending you would be as well), then there is no reason to propagate the same standard. Illumination, and the other people you meet here, are adherents of the religion; they do not make its laws, they do not stand in positions of power to persecute you, and are thus not deserving of your ire.
I suggest that if you want to fight battles about your beliefs, go do it in a place where you won't just upset the innocent. This is the worst kind of hypocrisy in my eyes. I would understand it if it was okay for Christians to come around and badmouth you, treat you badly, but it's clearly not. You're trying to explain or excuse bad behavior by saying it was aggravated, and then you go and aggravate someone who isn't even an aggressor. Good thinking.
I respect greatly the person who will fight for what they believe. I greatly pity the person who sees battle at every juncture and who must platform against the blameless in order to feel meaningful or important.
For whatever it's worth, I wish those in worse positions than I the very best of luck in your battle of oppression. I don't think that's in any way right, and I wish it would stop. You know the old adage, though...wish in one hand, spit in the other, see which one fills first? It applies here. Action will probably be the only hope of any reprieve, but action as it has been espoused on these boards has, as I previously said, simply made you into a caricature of the very figures you are trying to demonize.
The thing you're failing to notice, or at least to include in your post SW, is the manner in which we judged illumination. Look back at the first thing I said to him in post 3. I didn't say, "No, you're wrong, you're stupid, go suck an egg you moronic twit". Didn't say that. But what did I actually say. I said, and I'm paraphrasing slightly, "Ok, now what's your evidence." I said that multiple times over the course of these boards. So for you to say I don't welcome judgement as equally as I've handed it out is plain wrong.
But, to be completely fair, and to illuminate all confusion, I'll do this. I am Cody, I discard all beliefs in all gods at all times for lack of evidence. I feel the dogmatic following of these beliefs is harmful to children and adults, society and humanity in general. I feel religion is a delusion which people cling to to make themselves feel better. I believe that, in the instance of religion only, believing it as true makes you an idiot. I believe there are few practices worse than basing political votes, or law making practices on a book most people haven't read, and even fewer understand, but which has been proven faulse repeatedly in numerous different ways. I feel religion is repressive to minorities, the impoverished, the underprivelleged and women. I feel it increases bigotry and misunderstandings between people and cultures. I think it dulls the mind of humanity and celebrates stupidity as a virtue.
These are my beliefs, I invite each and every one of you who read them to rip them apart in any manner you see fit. I ask for and expect no mercy, for I will give none in return. If you ask for evidence, I will provide evidence. If you ask for outlining, I will provide outlining. If you ask for details, I will provide details.
I give my permission for anyone who wishes to copy and paste this in to any format they wish. Create a new board post and ask for whatever you want, I'll come and engage you there. Respond here if you want to. Send me a private message if you feel it should be a private conversation. However and wherever you wish to engage, I will engage. I invite you to do so as hard and as brutally as you possibly can.
I warn you now though, as conceited as it sounds, I'm right, and you won't win.
Bear in mind, Cody, that my vehemence in the last couple of posts was mostly in response to both Chelsea's last post, and to your defense of it.
You, in particular, haven't been all that bad on this board, with the possible exception of a post where you started slamming Christianity for no particular reason and with no particular goal evident.
All I ask you to remember is this:
1. Not every board concerning religion is an invitation for you (or anyone at all) to slam religion;
2. There really are good Christians, even if the folks in power in certain places do bad things that hurt people and subscribe to belief systems that may stunt or warp the natural course of things;
3. Most importantly, even if you cannot approach religion with an open mind, at least approach people with an open mind. I strongly suspect that most people are not interested in trying to convince you they're right, and the few who decide to go against that and force the issue deserve, by and large, what they get. Basically, try not to let religion colour your view of people. In this particular thread, Illumination didn't strike me as particularly threatening, and he even tried playing nice and backing off to avoid an argument, but even that was somehow wrong.
Anyway, this is getting terribly wearisome.
Ah, I see what you're taking issue with. Let me make something clear. I'm not defending Chelsea. Chelsea doesn't need me to defend her. She's perfectly capable of defending herself. Often I don't even agree with Chelsea. If you want to take issue with Chelsea, you'll have to take issue with her specifically. I'm defending atheists and those of us who call for evidence of claims.
You know reading all this jumble and the study itself. I am a bit torn between thoughts. I used to believe that every religious person was an idiot.
Reason: I used to be Christian when I was a young girl. Over and over I was dragged to church so I would stay in remission from my cancer, and will receive my sight back. That obviously didn't happen, which led me to believe that god didn't love me. Then what truly opened my eyes was when I actually listened to what the pasture would ask for. Money, every sunday, "please sisters and brothers donate today, our fence has broken down, or our air condission has broken down, with your help we can make this church of god go up, let that satan rot, with gods money we can build it up again."
And guess when was the fence ever built right back up again, ten months later. When was the air finally done, no more fans? That didn't happen until a year later.
My sisters talk about the nice cars these people drove, the pasture and his family, nice clothes, the son went to Harvard. I felt scammed, betrayed.
So I felt they were all the same.
I to this day still don't believe in a God, But many. That Is my own belief, but my thing is here, I am not an idiot, and I am religious. Though I am not part of an orthodox religion. I am still religious. So what makes an idiot of a religious type?
I'll give my opinion": someone who walks blindly and does not account for many of the reasons of their footsteps on the path of believing.
If you believe only because a penny fell into your lap from the sky, I find that luck, not holy power.
Greg, you're mistaken. I'm perfectly willing and able to defend myself without Cody's help, thank you very much.
and, I know this will surprise the crap out of you, but I, just like Cody, am every bit willing to engage people. that's why I've been so hard on people on these boards, trying to get them to talk about why they believe what they do.
you can call it whatever you want, try to make me out to be something/someone I'm not, but despite your low opinion of me, I'd never, ever wish you to go through anything like what I or Cody have to, being atheists.
it destroys lives and families, gets in the way of otherwise awesome friendships, and no one, whether they've experienced it themselves or not, should minimize those facts.
so, perhaps try to have some compassion yourself, instead of barking up a tree that, quite frankly, you know nothing about.
Chelsea,
I have plenty of both compassion and sympathy for the oppressed, and this includes atheists. Being somewhere in the area between agnosticism and atheism myself, but growing up in a bit more open culture, I do not know firsthand the troubles you deal with. I know -of them, but I don't live them. I feel for you, I really do. However, I don't see that as license to attack other people, particularly if those other people are themselves, individually, doing you no harm.
If you object to Christians, or anyone else, preaching at you, then you are either making an exception for yourself when you preach atheism or you're somehow convinced that you're not preaching. Sometimes you don't, but when I called you out, I honestly felt you were. Embracing a double standard isn't going to help you any. If I knew, say, a blind person who grew up under harsh conditions who then treated the sighted with particular disdain, my sympathy would wane in a tearing hurry.
Here's the way I see it. When you're in harsh conditions, you have three courses of action:
1. Rail against it, venting your spleen on any and all targets. This is indiscriminate, counterproductive and in the long run makes you seem like you have a lot in common with your oppressors.
2. Put your head down and say nothing. You will never earn much this way, but this is the option for those not brave enough to do things themselves.
3. Best of all, in my opinion, pick your freaking battles. Seriously. Fight back where it will do some honest good, rather than just opening your mouth and sicking up all your bitterness and repression. Would you take it out on a cashier at the MacDonald's on Main Street because the cook at the MacDonalds on King Street burnt your fries? Hell no.
You sue for compassion and sympathy, but do very little to help your cause. Perhaps a little less bitterness and a slightly curbed appetite, as far as lunching on idiots is concerned, would lend itself to better results.
I find the study pretty interesting, but kind of bull for the reasons already mentioned. I think anyone who believes in anything, whether it's religiously motivated or not, is kind of moronic. And yeah so I guess that's kind of weird for me to say because I'm rather religious myself, but I do have my own evidence for my faith, which has definitely been tested a few times. I'm fairly certain my brand of evidence will convince you all as effectively as Michael's, seeing as it's rather similar, and also rather personal so I don't much feel like sharing (sorry.) But anyways, I'm Roman Catholic, I pray every single night, and I go to Church (almost) every Sunday, and I think I'm rather intelligent? I don't really talk about my religion that much, though, so perhaps that sets me apart from others a bit. Also I know a devout Catholic whose IQ is something ridiculous, although IQ didn't appear to be the central definition of intelligence in this particular study. Anyway, there's tons of other examples of intelligent religious folk, and likewise moronic non-religious folk. Interesting to consider, though.
I didn't post my previous with any intent to cause more drama, create tension or anything of the sort, I just put it out there because it meshed with the study, though I do agree its a bit flawed.
I do wonder if some people are just hard wired to believe or not, as well. mainly because i've been struggling with this one for as long as I remember going to church as a kid. I was really thinking about what they told me and it just didn't add up in my eyes. not to be offensive, but I felt like people were telling me that 2 plus 0 equals 20, just because you believe it does. God loves everyone, yet he orders people stoned, orders the complete extermination of populations of people, just because they don't believe in him, orders that the men rape and pillage, sets in place rules for slavery rather than outlawing it, kills peoples first born children, sends new borns to hell, just because they are not baptized, breaks up families in the name of following his cause as advocated by jesus, etc, etc, etc, etc... then you've got the problem of there being multiple conflicting accounts of different stories told in the bible, and on, and on, and on, it goes. I attempted to question, to understand, and was told that my curiosity would send me to hell, that I was just a kid, and should know better than to ask questions of my elders about god..... I just can't make sense of it, on a factual, emotional, rational, logical or reasonable level.
sometimes I defend my belief, sometimes I just realize people are to stuck in their ways to here you out, because they're trying to defend the core of what they have based their life around. Both things are acceptable at some points in time.
I agree with cody though, being an atheist in the south sucks balls. you're hated, feared, completely misunderstood. many people I knew back in texas would rather their daughter get in a relationship with someone of another race than me, simply because I don't believe. They'd rather deal with the blasphemy in their eyes of a gay christian than deal with me... they'd rather hire an incompetent worker, have their children taught by sub standard yet religious teachers, or be represented by idiotic yet religious politicians than let an openly atheistic person take on any of these rolls. not to play the oh, pity me card, but discrimination against atheists is just as bad as discrimination against christians, Jews, gay people, and people of other races in some parts of this country. But because over 90 percent of the country is religious, its not a problem for them.
After being spat on, called a child of the devil, being told that my blindness was a punishment from god, etc... Sometimes i'll admit, I do have the urge to stand up, and fight back, even if i'm just correcting the misinformation spread about atheists, or giving someone another look threw a different way of viewing the world if like me, they can't come to grips with religions...
lastly,
if you just believe because of Pascal's wager, and use that as the main argument for trying to convert me, I have no respect for your religious beliefs at all. You're a coward and an idiot who isn't even being true to yourself. If I were god, I think i'd be more offended that people claim to believe out of fear, than people haven't seen proof, and thus can't understand. then again, god is vengeful and wrathful, and jealous. Ironically things christians are told not to be.
that's the key word, Greg. *you* felt I was acting a certain way. that doesn't mean you're right, though.
I do choose my battles, and although you clearly don't think this is one I should choose to fight the way I do, I'll continue doing so till such time that I'm unable to speak, write, or otherwise defend my position.
oh, and for the record, I don't want you to pity me. as much as I hate living in such a conservatively oriented town as this, I'm grateful for the backbone it has helped me learn to have.
Be that as it may. I will continue to call a spade a spade, as it were.
Stormwing, thank you for bringing some more rationality to the topic. I wasn't raised religious, but when I was old enough to start wondering about it, those sorts of questions you just posed are the sort I asked myself, and were ultimately what made me back away from religion. They're too big, too daunting, and they don't have satisfactory answers. For me personally, the "Jesus sacrificed himself" catch-all argument may explain a few things, but it doesn't preclude questions.
Now, here's something interesting. Maybe I just missed this, but I'm sort of curious to know where this study took place, and whether other religions were represented fairly as well. This whole topic, damn near, has been focused on Christianity, it being the dominant religion in Western society and all...but what about the Jews? The Hindus? The Buddhists? I bring this up, actually, because both in my reading and in my personal experience, I find that a lot of Eastern society, with the exception being Islam, isn't nearly as up in arms about this as we are. They aren't nearly so aggressive and, as I saw at least, they're also very interested in knowing why. Buddhism in particular encourages people to question, to seek not only inner peace but also oneness, completion, and those things simply will not be found without searching and questioning. I'm wondering how much of these studies concerned Eastern society, because I have a sneaking suspicion this was American, British, Canadian and probably not a hell of a lot more...a demographic that is far and away Christian-dominated, as far as religions go. It is my personal belief that the study may not have been as conclusive if Buddhism, Hinduism and some other Eastern religions had been well-represented. Or hey, maybe I'm completely mistaken. Either way, it's something to wonder about.
I commend Chelsea and Cody for being so out-spoken about what they believe. I'm quite different, though. Those who know me know how quiet I am in general, and it seems like you two have a lot more crap to put up with as a result of being vocal about Atheism. I've accepted that that's how I am. My reasoning is because I have seen there is, 99 times out of 100, no chance that you can sway a brick wall in any sort of religion versus non-religion debate. I don't find that investing energy in to something so hot and strongly opinionated subject is worth the time and frustration. I don't find it to be my duty to battle tooth and nail, perhaps because religion has caused hard ache and disappointment in my life as well despite being from the North. I believe we are all humans and we die, and there is no such thing as an Afterlife, Spirit after death, or anything more than a dead body left to decompose. And for that reason, I have to spend as much time as I can enjoying life, learning, succeeding and screwing up occasionally, and enhancing my intellegence.
I don't wanna decompose, cremate me and pour my ground up bone fragments into someone's coffee grounds.
Forest Gump, I commend you on knowing who you are and sticking to that. You are right that you probably aren't going to sway the person you're talking to.
However, there are reasons to fight battles like these. First, I've heard time and time again of people who were quiet atheists, not willing to face their family. Then they read posts like these and were given encouragement by it. So in fighting these people, we give encouragement to those silent atheists who are being forced into denial by their families.
Plus, look at those things I talked about me and Chelsea go through, they aren't just problems in the south. Seven states in America still prevent atheists from holding office, and they aren't all in the south. Faith healing is a common practice in northern states. Its just that, in the south, your personal life is more attacked. I encourage you to get angry about the things going on in your life, and fight back against them.
also, Ryan, as Cody said earlier, think about how you wanna be treated.
would you rather people pussy foot around, or do you want the truth, uncut, whether you like it, or even agree with it?
I, like Cody, don't like when people pussy foot around, for any reason whatsoever. that's why I treat everyone the same way, and a large reason why I keep coming back time and time again.
This topic has made me think along the lines of my family, because as far as I know every person in my family is religious, at least the people who are closest in blood are. I've wasted a lot of time trying to think of what to say/how to say it, but that only makes it seem harder than it is. No matter how I tell them I know at least one or a few of them will take it the wrong way, but I've got to do it sooner rather than later. Chelsea you're right, the truth will get me farther and I usually live up to that, but I've put this off so I can't say I've completely gone with it.
Perhaps the reason why I haven't been as vocal as many is the way I grew up, and my thought process of how I had to protect myself and live. You've heard of those people who keep their mouths shut because of the fear of being ridiculed or hurt. I've gotten past that for the most part, but I guess this case proves not completely yet.
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Sorry about that, my Internet was acting up so I copied and pasted what I said, and it kept saying blank blank when I tried to fix it so sorry for the mistakes. I also wanted to say as she all ready knows, Chelsea had an influence on me when it comes to religion. She asked questions about it, those of which I couldn't honestly answer because when it comes to Christianity, God's word is the way and there doesn't have to be an explanation other than just rewording what was said. This made me think and come to terms with how I truly felt. If it wasn't for her out-spoken, strong well rounded opinion on this matter, who knows if I would still be struggling to hang on to something that would give me more confusion. I have come to this conclusion based on conversation and thinking along with my own true beliefs, not because someone wanted to make me believe a certain thing, or because I felt that this was an acceptable belief of society.
I highly recommend looking on youtube for debates about atheism. I especially like Christopher hitchins. He's a little high brow, but he is absolutely fearless. Its who I base my own style on. It really helps make you more courageous.