I was wondering when you would get called in...
You're a bigot because, without reaching to some awfully question-begging definitions of "religion," this is not a fact
It is a fact, and I could easily call you a bigot for refusing to deal with the obvious correlation between highly religious activity and charitable acts, well being, happiness, longevity, etc. Does it bother you so much to think religion could possibly serve humanity in a positive sense?
Name-calling is easy, but actually dealing with the data is a bit harder, especially if you're already predisposed to bigotry towards anyone who believes in God. This is Dawkins' theme song. If you believe in God, then there is something wrong with you. Beastie in the past has shared these sentiments. It has to be a gene defect that evolution hasn't quite managed to get out of our systems. So atheists today are simply more evolved whereas religious people are adhereing to ancient mysticism that they have yet to abandon.
This is bigotry because that is completely unwarranted gibberish. It all began with various posts claiming "Religion is Dangerous", started mostly by JAK many months ago, but his ignorant rants (citing Dawkins and Hitches) were encouraged and supported by most atheists on this forum. They're not interested in any data that undermines it, and the fact that you would dare accuse anyone who would present contradicting data, a bigot, is just hilarious.
Obstinately holding to unreasonable, negative perceptions of a group of people - the non-religious in this case - is what bigotry is.
Oh you mean like Dawkins did? Or beastie does? Beastie wants to include anyone on the rolls of a Church a "religionist" just so she can exagerrate the percentages of whatever category she is trying to abuse. I am talking about the way the increase in religious activity effects the well-being and happiness of a person's life. Happier people promote a healthier society. This is a fact. Scientific studies have gone to prove the New Atheists are simply wrong when they maintain religion is inherently dangerous. Here is something I said a few months ago:
Rationalizations and cognitive biases exist in human minds with or without religion. I'm beginning to think that it is a neccesary part of who we are. Everyone does it in the context of whatever it is they are passionate about. Atheists I have found to be no different, though like religionists, you have the extreme and the more rational. Humans do this. If religion isn't the medium in which it is used, then maybe politics will be. Or maybe a passionate stalker will rationalize why it was OK to kill his victim. When you get down to it all, the real problem is human nature. Unless you're something other than human, it is hypocrisy to criticize others for doing it.
Beastie responded that the solution to this problem is "the scientific method and the rules of logic"!
What the hell? The scientific method is going to make society a better place for everyone? It is going to temper the passions of all humans? Religion does this for some people, but atheism does it for none. And it remains to be explained how the "scientific method" could even begin to do it.
That you also are interpreting data to reach totally unwarranted causal conclusions does not make the observant say, "Oh, he mustn't be a bigot."
Calling it unwarranted doesn't make it so, and comparing anything I say to racism is an intellectually bankrupt way to approach my argument.
This is just more rhetorical fluff that doesn't deal with any presented facts. Studies have been made to establish the positive effects religious activity/belief has on society as well as the happiness and well being of the individual. Now compare this to atheism, which does nothing for the individual or society, in any of these areas.
What you don't seem to understand is that I have always maintained that human nature is the problem, not belief or disbelief in any given system. It isn't atheism. When a person kills another, it is not atheism but human nature. Mass murderers kill for a wide variety of natural reasons. Atheism can do nothing to prevent someone from engaging in these natural states of mind, such as obssession, vengance, hate, depression, sociopathic etc. Religion can. It has an established track record of making bad people better. And when religion fails, people like you and beastie will be there to say they killed
because of their religion! That is bigotry. And Timothy McVeigh is a perfect example of this. How many times was he used as an example of Christianity promoting terrorism?
The heck? Because Gould off-hand mentioned about half of his colleagues being conventionally religious, that establishes that 50% of natural scientists would fail to categorize themselves as atheists?
No I didn't say that. Can
you not read? I said Gould's comments are not surprising because it goes along with what I already established in a previous thread. That less than 50% of scientists are atheists.
The data wildly varies based on what questions are asked, which leads to people cherry-picking their numbers. Among the hard sciences, the number of people who don't believe in God tend to be in low 60's. In biology it's higher, in chemistry it is lower. When you ask about people who categorize themselves as atheists, that number drops.
Yes, we already hashed this out on another thread. I presented findings from a couple of exhaustive surveys, whereas beastie relied on a rather tiny one and she insisted biologists pertain more to the question of deity than any other field of science!! How the hell she managed to conjure up that little piece of absurdity has never been explained. She asserts, therefore it is.
What the heck Kevin? She's not using that as representative of all scientists. She did not suggest 90% of all natural scientists are atheist. Can't you read?
This is what beastie posted:
The term "scientists" is too generic in this particular discussion, given the wide variety of topics scientists can study. More pertinent is the study of life itself - biology. A 1998 study showed that, out of the top biologists, those who are members of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), 95% are atheists.
What a joke. She found a survey dealing with mostly biologists in the line of Dawkins, and then declares this the "more pertinent." Why? Because one of their ring leaders has decided to wrote books slamming religion and theism?
The NAS just happens to be an elite group of scientists. Being a member is highly prestigious.
More accurately put, the NAS is a tiny group of scientists who are mostly biologists, and this includes followers of Dawkins' anti-religion dogma. It is no wonder that his militant form of atheism is gaining favor among his colleagues. NAS is another social venue by which his doctrine gets exposure, and acceptance is rewarded. I have already proved Dawkins attacks any scientist for daring to believe in God or daring to say anything remotely positive about religion.
It is quite fair to say that the NAS members are "top scientists."
The problem with beastie's argument is that she attacks me for using a survey which she said included just "any" scientist. She said it included dentists and park rangers. But she didn't pay any real attention to the article, because it provided a percentage figure for natural scientists as well, and that figure changed only slightly. This means my argument remained the same and she went on a rant for no reason. When I pointed this out she abandoned the argument.
There's only 2500 or so members in total, so a properly random sample of 260 would be massive. I'm not saying there aren't potential selection biases we might want to account for here, but boy did you take the wrong routes of attack.
You should pay closer attention to what has been said. All I did was state a fact that atheists like to exagerrate the percentage figures to suit their own agenda. They like to create this imaginary dichotomy between the deluded anti-science theist and the highly intelligent scientific-minded atheist. Beastie began the attacks by proving my point. It all started when I said: "From what I hear on this forum from the leading atheists, you'd expect only 10% of the scientific community to be theistic." Then beastie throws out the 95% figure from a tiny survey that included on a couple hundred respondents. When I throw out a survey of my own, she goes on a rampage accusing me of including just "any" kind of scientist! She had no clue what the hell she was talking about. By narrowing it down to natural sciences, my point still stands. Most natural scientists are not atheists. If what these New Atheists say is true, then why aren't they?
“All knowledge of reality starts from experience and ends in it...Propositions arrived at by purely logical means are completely empty as regards reality." - Albert Einstein