dartagnan wrote:You speak as though one thing has nothing to do with the other.
You're taking it for granted that religiosity causes the desired qualities on question rather than other obvious avenues of potential explanation that are discussed in the field you are getting your data from. For instance, people who attend Church more frequently might simply already be more socially stable. I bet if you looked at people who regularly attend, say, PTA meetings you'll find higher scores on these traits across the board. Or, and this shouldn't be hard to get, that social activity in a community makes people happier, have longer lifespans, etc. Regular attendance of Church is one means by which this is gained. This, again, wouldn't be related to religiosity per se. That's why I quoted a study that showed that depression actually correlates positively with how religious you are, but negatively with how often you attend Church. At least in that case, it's obvious what you are taking for granted is false. That's because you aren't drawing careful, scientifically responsible conclusions here. You are writing polemic by playing fast and loose with the data. You are doing this in an effort that says something quite negative about the non-religious, hence the bigotry charge. I actually don't care if religion resulted in more moral behavior. I don't think that makes a good case for it's desirability or acceptablity as a noble lie like - I don't know - some Straussian neoconservatives do. I just don't think you have that case.
Now that my friend, is bigotry. The weird thing about it is that you guys are completely oblivious to the fact that you are being bigots. You literally believe others are mentally deficient in some sense, simply because they believe something you do not.
Yes, and it is bigoted nonsense that Einstein didn't agree with. Acording to Einstein, our perceptions of God is feeble and imperfect, but we do perceive his existence. You simply assume that belief in deity is unwarranted just because you feel no reason to believe. That is the epitome of bigotry.
Well, I believe it because I think
nobody has a reason to believe, much like other common beliefs I also hold as unreasonable - like alien abductions. It's not bigotry because my view is perfectly reasonable. If I'm a bigot for thinking belief in dieties is unreasonable, then I guess my response is to laugh at you. I think that no more bigoted than regarding belief in
Mormonism unreasonable. But I think you aptly demonstrate the attitude behind many LDS at places like FAIR who take such a view as
in of itself offensive - an attitude you used to be sympathetic to. Of course, you haven't changed much from your Mormon apologist self. You've just dropped the Mormon part and kept the rest regarding conservative theistic apologetics. Perhaps this is an exercise for you in faith-loss. I don't know.
Do I think a lack of belief in unicorns can make a person better? Sure, in the limited sense that it helps them have one less irrational belief. Good for them. I think it is better than not to be reasonable. You may not, but I'd be careful before calling such rationalism bigotry.
Wrong. I said nothing about religious people being "better off morally." I simply said religion provides a service to society that atheism cannot. This is an established fact that you unwittingly agreed with above. Don't take your frustration out on me.
You've gone further. You've stated that the non-religious lack what religion provides. You call religion a
requisite inhibitor. Surely you understand what your own words mean. Hence the negative implication.
Of course it can, but I already said that didn't I? Religion can be misused the same way politics or any other passionate belief system can be misused. But if I misuse a sewing machine by trying to connect my brother's hands together, does that mean sewing machines are inherently dangerous, and serve no benefit to society? Of course not.
You are, again, aware that the argument for the dangerousness of religion lies in it being irrational, right? This analogy doesn't transfer over. Religion isn't a tool to make people better. It's a tool to make people better or worse. The argument that religion makes people better requires more than simply saying it can be used for good or ill. It requires one to conclude it actually makes people better on balance. And it has to do that because of something inherent about religion, as opposed to all the things that are found in religions but are logically independent of them and also accessible to the secular.
You're going down an argument you can't win. The fact that the Old Testament can be interpreted that way, doesn't change the fact that it isn't interpreted that way.
Uh, I would still imagine a large chunk of the faithful are in reality Ok with genocides that were allegedly ordered by God as reported in the Bible. They just aren't as apt to translate that into the acceptablity of other proposed genocides, at least not for the last few decades. For those who don't interpret the Bible that way, they're interpretations don't bear much relationship to the text. But, again, that's neither here nor there. I was just showing that what a religion prevents depends on the content of that religion. The Bible just happened to record some very stark examples.
Dawkins is a bigot. This is a demonstrable fact. If he is highly respected among academia, then that speak only poorly of academia. Academia is another social construct like any other, where some people become more popular, their ideas become more accepted, and acceptance of said ideas effects the professional status of all adherents.
Dawkins could be a bigot. That doesn't change the fact that his work as a scientist enjoys a great deal of respect from scientists. James Watson is blatantly a bigot, but doesn't prevent him from also being among the scientific elite for that whole structure of DNA thing. You tried to dismiss the NAS inappropriately.
You need to work on your comprehension. She used the NAS because 1) it provided the highest percentage figure known to man, and 2) she said they were mostly biologists. For beastie, biology is "more pertinent" to the question of deity. That's what she said. How she arrives to this conclusion, remains to be seen. She won't answer the question.
She picked the NAS example because it was taken to better represent "top scientists." She said so herself. Looks like I'm a little ahead in my reading comprehension skills.
And being an atheist has its professional benefits. This is a fact. AGain you keep ignoring the examples I provided which prove Dawkins is really out to convert everyone to his line of thinking, and he will use any cheap tactic he can to belittle any scientist who dares to disagree. He is turning his corner of academia into his own little church, where he is a prophet of sorts using pseudo-science (memes, selfish genes!, etc) to woo his disciples.
The "selfish gene" viewpoint is a dominant view within evolutionary biology. It is legitimately disputed, but it's not pseudo-scientific. The "selfish gene" just refers to the notion that natural selection works on the differential survival values of individual genes. In other words, genes are the fundamental unit of selection. Memes, on the other hand, are fringish. Of course, his scientific respectability comes from the former, not the latter. You really need to stop learning about evolutionary biology from creationist websites.
Academic science is influenced by a cabal of atheist elites who can systematically provide professional benefits for unbelief, but how dare you suggest atheism is prevalent among top scientists?
I was just point out what you claimed she suggested is not what she suggested.
Yes she did. She said quite clearly that biology is more pertinent to the question of deity: "More pertinent is the study of life itself - biology."
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Way to change the subject. You said, "
Of course this makes perfect sense since the more accurate survey information indicates that atheism isn't nearly as popular among natural scientists as beastie humorously suggested (90%!)." I pointed out this is false. You changed the subject. Presumably the next step is for you to write an even more epic post continuing to sidestep the issue.