Theistic and atheistic influences on society

[questor]

Modest:

Morality is both learned and inherent. It's not an either / or situation.[/quote

So you think there is a morality gene? Has it been localized on the genome?

 

Are you only capable of seeing this as those people not having any morality? Or, can you see that they have a morality that is different from your own?

Killing, mutilation and practices that cause pain and/or disfigurement are not on my list of morals. If you want to consider these barbaric things that uncivilized people do as moral, we have no basis for discussion. This falls in the ''anything goes'' category. Would you like YOUR tribe to have this as their moral code?

[Moontanman]

Modest:

Morality is both learned and inherent. It's not an either / or situation.[/quote

So you think there is a morality gene? Has it been localized on the genome?

 

 

Killing, mutilation and practices that cause pain and/or disfigurement are not on my list of morals. If you want to consider these barbaric things that uncivilized people do as moral, we have no basis for discussion. This falls in the ''anything goes'' category. Would you like YOUR tribe to have this as their moral code?

 

 

Questor, exactly what is your moral code? What parts of it come from religion? Which religion? The old testament? If it wasn't for this religious threat of divine retribution would you have no problem with killing, raping, stealing and lying? It is important to understand where your moral code comes from and what it covers if this conversation is going to go any where at all.

[modest]

Modest, why don't you continue believing the way you do and let's move on? You have said nothing to change my mind, and obviously I have not persuaded you. No need to waste more time.

That's the idea, questor. You've been repeating these unsupported claims since post 3. For 4 weeks now you've been attacking the values of atheists and saying that all good morality comes from religion.

 

While you keep saying these things, everyone keeps refuting them with logical and reasoned posts. Meanwhile you offer no accompanying support for what you're saying, but just keep trolling your position. I would like very much if we wasted no more time on this, but if you keep pushing your misconceptions about the nature of religion and morality then I will continue critiquing it.

 

Anti-religionists always want to deny any good ever came from religion, even though they usually grew up in a religious atmosphere.

 

When you are unable to find any case of me denying any good came from religion, I'll accept your correction.

 

They concentrate on the failings of religion rather than seeing the larger positive benefits of the good parts.

I understand that you want to support religion because you feel like it's under attack by atheists. That's fine - I sometimes find myself supporting aspects of religion that are being denigrated by atheists. But, you have strayed into making false claims in your support of religion. Claiming that atheists are not altruistic or that good values come only from religion is completely wrong.

 

Morality is both learned and inherent. It's not an either / or situation.

So you think there is a morality gene? Has it been localized on the genome?

 

If you disagree with my statement that morality is both learned and inherent then present your reasons.

 

Are you only capable of seeing this as those people not having any morality? Or, can you see that they have a morality that is different from your own?

Killing, mutilation and practices that cause pain and/or disfigurement are not on my list of morals. If you want to consider these barbaric things that uncivilized people do as moral, we have no basis for discussion. This falls in the ''anything goes'' category. Would you like YOUR tribe to have this as their moral code?

If you have any support for your repeated claims that the 'uncivilized' world has no morality then please present it.

 

Keep in mind that your tactic here of giving examples such as: "Killing, mutilation and practices that cause pain and/or disfigurement" is not going to be productive for you. I can give pages of examples of western religious institutions killing, mutilating, and causing pain and disfigurement.

 

~modest

[questor]

Modest, this is getting beyond enjoyable. Let's make this the last. I'll give you the last words.

Inherent means inherited [genetic] -give me the research link on this statement..

Originally Posted by modest

Morality is both learned and inherent. It's not an either / or situation[/quote

 

''you've been attacking the values of atheists and saying that all good morality comes from religion.''

Wrong on the first sentence, right on the second.

 

''Originally Posted by questor

Anti-religionists always want to deny any good ever came from religion, even though they usually grew up in a religious atmosphere''

You're correct, I should have said.. most antireligionists I have conversed with

want to-------

 

'' I understand that you want to support religion because you feel like it's under attack by atheists. That's fine - I sometimes find myself supporting aspects of religion that are being denigrated by atheists. But, you have strayed into making false claims in your support of religion. Claiming that atheists are not altruistic or that good values come only from religion is completely wrong.''

I did not say all atheists were not altruistic.. show me the quote

I did say that the morals that are the mainstay of our societal system came from or were part of religious teachings.

 

This claim needs backing up..

''If you have any support for your repeated claims that the 'uncivilized' world has no morality then please present it.

 

Keep in mind that your tactic here of giving examples such as: "Killing, mutilation and practices that cause pain and/or disfigurement" is not going to be productive for you. I can give pages of examples of western religious institutions killing, mutilating, and causing pain and disfigurement.''

We are talking about NOW, not years ago. You seem to have fogotten the definition of morals.

[modest]

Originally Posted by modest

Morality is both learned and inherent. It's not an either / or situation

Inherent means inherited [genetic]

-give me the research link on this statement..

 

There is a good article on the inherent nature of human morality by Steven Pinker, a professor of Psychology at Harvard University here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/magazine/13Psychology-t.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

 

''you've been attacking the values of atheists and saying that all good morality comes from religion.''

Wrong on the first sentence, right on the second.

You have accused atheists of doing nothing altruistic... in fact... I'll quote you:

I have never heard of atheists as a group doing anything altruistic

 

Anti-religionists always want to deny any good ever came from religion, even though they usually grew up in a religious atmosphere''

You're correct, I should have said.. most antireligionists I have conversed with

want to-------

That's ok. I'm sure you can find examples of others on this thread saying no good ever came from religion... yes?

 

'' I understand that you want to support religion because you feel like it's under attack by atheists. That's fine - I sometimes find myself supporting aspects of religion that are being denigrated by atheists. But, you have strayed into making false claims in your support of religion. Claiming that atheists are not altruistic or that good values come only from religion is completely wrong.''

I did not say all atheists were not altruistic.. show me the quote

 

Post 3 is a good example.

 

This claim needs backing up..

''If you have any support for your repeated claims that the 'uncivilized' world has no morality then please present it.

 

Keep in mind that your tactic here of giving examples such as: "Killing, mutilation and practices that cause pain and/or disfigurement" is not going to be productive for you. I can give pages of examples of western religious institutions killing, mutilating, and causing pain and disfigurement.''

We are talking about NOW, not years ago. You seem to have fogotten the definition of morals.

 

Yes, I was trying to explain before that morality changes over time because society and our knowledge of the world changes. What you consider religious morality most often comes from society. It takes religion some time to catch up.

 

Religion was still burning witches after society had concluded that women were not being possessed by the devil. Religion was condemning people for accurately describing the solar system after Galileo proved they were right. Southern baptist churches supported slavery long after the civil war. This is all good evidence that our morals mostly come from social conventions that change over time. Religion is informed by these social conventions and it echoes them. But, fundamentally, they are not religious morals.

 

Have you considered answering Moontanman's questions about what particular morals you believe in. I'd be willing to wager that very few of them are Judeo-Chrisian in *origin*.

 

~modest

[questor]

Modest, I gave you the last word, but some of your stuff was so egregious I have to reply.

If you're going to talk inherited traits do not use a layman as your source. The link does not discuss any genetic science and is no proof of any inherent traits.

''There is a good article on the inherent nature of human morality by Steven Pinker, a professor of Psychology at Harvard University here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/ma...=1&oref=slogin''

I see no science in this article.

 

Can you not see the difference in these sentences?

''You have accused atheists of doing nothing altruistic... in fact... I'll quote you:

Quote:

I have never heard of atheists as a group doing anything altruistic ''

 

I did not accuse, I said ''I have never heard''. This means I have not heard of altruism, it does not mean I accused them of never doing it. This means that it is possible they were altruistic, but I haven't heard of it.

 

''Religion was still burning witches after society had concluded that women were not being possessed by the devil. Religion was condemning people for accurately describing the solar system after Galileo proved they were right. Southern baptist churches supported slavery long after the civil war. This is all good evidence that our morals mostly come from social conventions that change over time. Religion is informed by these social conventions and it echoes them. But, fundamentally, they are not religious morals.''

 

Religion was not doing these things...people were doing these things. And why do you bring up incidents that occurred hundreds of years ago?

And why would you criticise them when you have contended that all people are inherently moral? Do you know of any religious teachings that advocate witch burning or slavery?

[Essay]

I didn't have time earlier, but....

This is about definitions and semantics, I fear; you both may be closer than you realize. ;)

 

But yes Questor, you seem to be taking a too simplistic view of genetics (vs. inherent).

I hate to harp on the concept of emergence, ...but morality is an emergent phenom....

 

Asking for evidence of a morality gene is like asking for any behavior gene. Even eye color is governed by an interaction of many genes, and when it comes to behavior and "inherent nature," the interplay of the panoply of genes leads to emergence of a "nature."

 

As I said earlier I think, morality seems to be evident in the mammalian order and especially in higher primates.

It is a product of the structure and function of the mammalian brain.

 

I'm trying to think of evidence, i.e. google "mirror neurons" or "ethology."

...this looked interesting:

UB - Hominid Paleo-ethology

...but not really relevant:

...how about:

Ethology - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Introduction to Ethology

Konrad Lorenz Institute for Ethology

 

~ :applause:

 

p.s. I think this is supposed to be about Modest's point that morals are learned, but morality is inherent....

[questor]

Essay, I see no reason to continue this discussion. I'm done . Read the thread and decide for yourself.

[modest]

Essay answered the inherited trait question very well, so I will refrain.

 

Religion was not doing these things...people were doing these things.... Do you know of any religious teachings that advocate witch burning or slavery?

 

Killing witches is advocated in the bible. There are 36 offenses that warrant killing the offender outlined from Genesis to Deuteronomy. Some of them such as not sacrificing to any God except the God of Abraham was correctly interpreted by puritans in America to justify killing "witches".

 

Slavery is advocated in the bible by Jesus. It can be found in the parable of the faithful servant.

 

So the answer is yes, I do know of religious teachings that advocate these things - the bible.

 

And why would you criticise them when you have contended that all people are inherently moral?

 

First off, I was using those examples to prove that morality changes over time and "religious" morality lags behind the social changes in morality. I wasn't criticizing anything.

 

Secondly, there is a big difference between saying morality is an inherent part of humanity (ie all people think some things are good and some are bad) and saying everyone is (or acts) morally. You are under the mistaken impression that atheists (of which I am one) think it's ok to do whatever feels good. That they all believe in making up their own personal morality that justifies whatever they want.

 

This is not the case, and if you honestly think this is my position after the lengths I've gone through to explain it then I wonder if you are capable of understanding what I'm saying at all.

 

Essay, I see no reason to continue this discussion. I'm done

 

If you develop your position to the point of being able to support it (or at least offer some kind of argument toward it) then I'd be interested in hearing it. But, if it's just going to the same trolling then I welcome its end.

 

~modest

[Moontanman]

One thing that's a plus for atheists is that children are much more likely to be molested in theistic households than atheistic ones.

[CraigD]

One thing that's a plus for atheists is that children are much more likely to be molested in theistic households than atheistic ones.

Better provide a source for this claim, MTM!

 

Though I suspect it’s true, I also suspect that, after controlling for factors such as education, income, marital status and alcohol, licit and illicit drug use, the correlation between religiosity and pedophilia won’t be significant. We must be careful not to confuse correlation with causation, or fail to note that extreme religiosity correlates strongly with poverty and lack of education, factors that are causes of various maladaptive behaviors.

[Moontanman]

Better provide a source for this claim, MTM!

 

Though I suspect it’s true, I also suspect that, after controlling for factors such as education, income, marital status and alcohol, licit and illicit drug use, the correlation between religiosity and pedophilia won’t be significant. We must be careful not to confuse correlation with causation, or fail to note that extreme religiosity correlates strongly with poverty and lack of education, factors that are causes of various maladaptive behaviors.

 

So I am being held to a higher standard than others on this list?

[CraigD]

So I am being held to a higher standard than others on this list?

Everyone’s required to back up his or her claims. Well-defined claims like

One thing that's a plus for atheists is that children are much more likely to be molested in theistic households than atheistic ones.

, which contradict the intuitive understanding of many readers, especially need to follow this rule.

 

You’ll also notice the many blue boxes that appear next to your name, indicating that you’re one of the most respected member of hypography, compared to the red boxes next to the names of others in this thread, indicating that they are little respected. You’ve shown an ability to meet a high standard, so, unlike some who have not, I and others expect you to continue meeting it when it's important to do so.

 

This thread has a lot of very low quality posts. Rather than considering this license to abandon our rules and standards, I think it should prompt us to extra effort to uphold them.

 

Also, this is an interesting, unobvious claim, for which I and other serious readers would honestly like to see supporting evidence. I suspect, but am far from sure, that it is supported by evidence, so backing it up is especially important.

[Moontanman]

One thing that's a plus for atheists is that children are much more likely to be molested in theistic households than atheistic ones.

 

I made this sensational claim to point out what I consider to be an attack on the basis of this forum. I have been here long enough to be quite fond of this forum. I throughly enjoy discussing a wide range of subjects and listening to intelligent arguments that either support or deny any and all claims. Lately I've seen the very rules we rely on being flaunted by people who have no use what so ever for evidence especially if it doesn't support their version of the truth. I see misdirection, innuendo, obfuscation, bull **** and out right lies being used to confuse and direct these conversations in directions that have noting to do with truth, evidence or even information. Anything seems to go as long as the agenda of the person involved is served. I expect this silly stuff from ignorant people who don't know better but lately these tactics have been used by other wise intelligent people to further an agenda of politics, religion, and anti-science. Yes, my post was totally nothing but scandalous slander, bull ****, and innuendo It is also almost certainly true. Do I know that atheists are less likely to molest their children? Of course not, I didn't say that, I said that children were less likely to be molested in atheist house holds than in theistic house holds. This is as I pointed out total bull **** it is also true. How is this possible? through the tactics currently being used in many posts to further an agenda of creationism, politics, and anti-science. there are so few atheistic house holds that it is certainly true that if even every atheistic house hold molested children they would still be less than the theistic house holds where this takes place. it is much more difficult to prove claims wrong than is it to prove them correct. when some one makes these sensational claims via innuendos and obfuscation we should respond as we would when out right lies are are being used. Anything less denigrates the entire forum.

[InfiniteNow]

One thing that's a plus for atheists is that children are much more likely to be molested in theistic households than atheistic ones.

Better provide a source for this claim, MTM!

 

Though I suspect it’s true...

 

Indeed, it seems to be:

 

 

SpringerLink - Journal Article

Religious Affiliations Among Adult Sexual Offenders

This article examines associations between self-reported religious affiliations and official offense histories among 111 incarcerated adult male sexual offenders. Four categories of religiosity were devised according to self-reported continuities and discontinuities in life-course religious affiliations: atheists, dropouts, converts, and stayers. ANCOVAs indicated that stayers (

those who maintained religious involvement from childhood to adulthood) had more sexual offense convictions, more victims, and younger victims, than other groups

. Results challenge assumptions that religious involvement should, as with other crime, serve to deter sexual offending behavior. Results are discussed in terms of social control and situational theories of crime.

 

 

I also appreciated Moonman's comments about the simple numbers involved here, how there are more religious people in general, and hence more crimes by said religious people. Something like 80-90% of the country self-identifies with some sort of religion, so it's not surprising that religious are more involved with sexual crimes against children.

 

However, with that said, many religious teachings attempt to directly suppress our natural sexual urges, and that inhibition tends to lead to more acts committed in order to release those urges. It's like holding a balloon full of air under the water. The harder you press it down, the more forcefully and unexpectedly it pops back to the surface.

 

Further, all one must do is recall the issues with Catholic priests and child molestation to bring into perspective the significant anchoring effect religiosity has on this data.

 

 

Finding data like this is part of the reason why I have so many of those blue boxes to which Craig referred above. :shrug:

[Essay]

INow!

I just took Moontanman's comment as rhetorical hyperbole; simply meant, even if not completely correct, to point out that religious folks don't have a lock on morality.

But I was motivated to do a bit of web surfing too. You've got a more relevant answer, but I ran across some curious stuff.

Hope it's okay to post this much crap at once. It's all just copied off the web, and not meant to prove anything; but just to be scanned by folks for anything of interest.

...begin scanning now:

 

Cookie Absent

National Survey of the Sexual Trauma Experiences of Catholic Nuns

!!!

0-0

 

http://journals.tums.ac.ir/upload_files/pdf/433.pdf

"Child Abuse in the Family: An Analytical Study"

Although child abuse and misbehaviour can be found among all types of families and social classes(8) with different socio-economic status, it is more practised in lower social classes, as it is shown in the present study. This study revealed that the frequency of child abuse among families with no strong religious beliefs is higher, but there was no significant relation between religious status of family and emotional, and doubtful sexual abuse of children(6). There is more evidence about the relationship between social isolation/interaction and child abuse or child neglect. Studies have pointed out that among families with no considerable social relations and interactions, the rates of child abuse are higher (11).

0-0

 

ScienceDirect - Child Abuse & Neglect : The “geography” of child maltreatment in Israel: Findings from a national data set of cases reported to the social services

Child Abuse & Neglect: Volume 30, Issue 9, September 2006, Pages 991-1003; doi:10.1016/j.chiabu.2006.02.014

"The “geography” of child maltreatment in Israel: Findings from a national data set of cases reported to the social services"

The rate of reported cases of child maltreatment was 17.8 per 1,000 children in Israel in 2000. The rates varied, however, among different localities. They were lower in Arab localities (9 per 1,000 children) than in the Jewish ones (20 per 1,000), higher in large cities and other socioeconomic affluent localities (19 per 1,000), and varied according to the geographic area.

....

...the state should better develop policies and services that encourage reporting of child maltreatment among the Arab and ultraorthodox populations and in smaller or socioeconomic disadvantaged localities. Furthermore, the social services must build a bridge to the minority populations in Israel, developing their trust in these services and increasing their propensity to use them.

Religion and religiosity

Arab localities were predominantly a combination of Muslims, Christian, and Druze Arabs. Among the Jewish localities, the study differentiated populations by degree of religiosity, as indicated by the presence of a large portion of ultraorthodox residents. Although unable to classify the localities by the exact portion of its ultraorthodox population (due to definition and measurement issues), the study did identify the localities with a large portion (>15% of the child population) of ultraorthodox residents (Ben-Arieh et al., 2000). Thus, we were able to classify the localities as either including large portions of ultraorthodox Jews or not.

 

The next step was to analyze the distribution among reported cases by type of maltreatment, gender, and age group as rates of reported cases per 1,000 children in the appropriate population group. Demographic data for this portion of the study were from Ben-Arieh et al., 2000 In: A. Ben-Arieh, Y. Zionit and Z. Binstock-Rivlin, Editors, Children in Israel—An annual statistical abstract, Center for Research and Public Education, National Council for the Child, Jerusalem (2000).Ben-Arieh et al. (2000). Different rates were compared in a pair-wise method. Based on Newcombe (1998), we have employed an unconditional method for setting confidence intervals for the difference between pairs of rates, using the following formula:

....

Table 3 presents the numbers and rates of reported cases of child maltreatment by the various characteristics of the localities described above. The rate of reported cases of child maltreatment is significantly lower in Arab localities than in the Jewish and mixed localities (Z12 is 47.53 and 32.89, respectively). The Jewish localities had a higher rate of reported child maltreatment cases than the nationwide rate (Z12 = 13.56). One question that arises from these data is whether this gap reflects differences in actual rates of child maltreatment across nationality lines or simply a gap in reporting. We discuss this more later.

Table 3.

Reported child maltreatment in 2000 by localities characteristics

....

Furthermore, several studies found that minorities make far less use of available social services than do majority groups (Sue & Sue, 1990; Sue, Zane, & Young, 1994), an observation also found to be valid among Arabs in Israel (Fenison, Popper, & Handelsman, 1990). The Arab population of Israel is a minority with a history of national and religious conflict with the majority of Israeli society. Social service personnel are perceived not only as “outsiders” but also as representatives of the Jewish state. Haj-Yahia (2000), for example, found that Arab women strongly resist applying to social services and are even more opposed to seeking legal aid or reporting to the police cases of domestic violence and wife abuse.

 

The conservative and traditional nature of the Arab community in Israel (Al-Haj, 1987 and Haj-Yahia, 1995) is also a likely contributing factor. Such communities are known to have lower reporting rates and a tendency to avoid involving “outsiders” in their internal issues (Haj-Yahia, 1995 M.M. Haj-Yahia, Toward culturally sensitive intervention with Arab families in Israel, Contemporary Family Therapy 17 (1995), pp. 429–447.

 

The ultraorthodox Jewish population, too, is far more conservative than the general population of Israel. As such, cultural arguments for lower reporting rates are likely to apply (Friedman, 1991). In fact, the reporting rates between areas with large populations of ultraorthodox Jew, such as in the occupied territories, are similarly low. The reporting rate in the occupied territories is 13.4/1,000, and in Jerusalem, also with a large ultraorthodox population, it is 12.3. Furthermore, the ultraorthodox separate themselves from the formal State of Israel in various respects. Like the Arab population, they perceive social service personnel not only as outsiders but also as representatives of the state and have developed their own institutions accordingly, including social services....

 

"Child maltreatment in the “children of the nineties”: A cohort study of risk factors"

Child Abuse & Neglect, Volume 30, Issue 5, May 2006, Pages 497-522

This study supports previous research in the field demonstrating that a wide range of factors in the parental background, socio-economic and family environments affect the risk of child maltreatment. By combining factors within a comprehensive ecological framework, we have demonstrated that the strongest risks are from socio-economic deprivation and from factors in the parents’ own background and that parental background factors are largely, but not entirely, mediated through their impact on socio-economic factors.

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"Disgust, scrupulosity and conservative attitudes about sex: Evidence for a mediational model of homophobia"

Journal of Research in Personality, Volume 42, Issue 5, October 2008, Pages 1364-1369

In the present study, core disgust predicted negative attitudes toward homosexuals even after controlling for contamination fear. The effect of core disgust on negative attitudes toward homosexuals was indirect, partially mediated by conservative sexual attitudes and religiosity. The effects of religious principles on negative attitudes toward homosexuals were indirect, via conservative sexual beliefs. These results establish a link between disgust and negative attitudes towards homosexuals that is not fully accounted for by contamination concerns, but rather is partially accounted for by conservative sexual ideology and religiosity.

0-0

 

"The effects of religious contextual norms, structural constraints, and personal religiosity on abortion decisions"

Social Science Research, Volume 37, Issue 2, June 2008, Pages 657-672

Researchers have established that individual religiosity influences abortion attitudes, and that abortion attitudes, in turn, shape abortion restrictions and access. Less clear is whether religion and abortion structural constraints influence abortion decisions. This study examines the several individual, contextual, and structural factors that could shape the abortion decisions of women who conceive before marriage. Special attention is given to the importance of academic aspirations and structural constraints, in contrast to religious beliefs and county religious context, for making an abortion decision. Hierarchical modeling techniques and two waves of data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health) are employed. Neither generic religiosity nor conservative Protestant religious context appear to influence women’s abortion decisions. Conversely, young women’s abortion decisions are shaped by academic ambition, identification with a conservative Protestant denomination, proximity to an abortion clinic and the level of public abortion funding in their county of residence.

0-0

 

"Compliance of Ultra-Orthodox and secular pedestrians with traffic lights in Ultra-Orthodox and secular locations"

Accident Analysis & Prevention, In Press, Corrected Proof, Available online 2 September 2008

Orthodox and secular pedestrians in neighboring Ultra-Orthodox and secular cities. Using an observation grid designed specially for this study, the pedestrians were observed at two crosswalks – one in an Ultra-Orthodox city and one in a secular city – as far as similar traffic parameters, using a logistic regression. The tendency to cross on a red light was assessed as a function of estimated age, gender, religiosity, location (religious/secular), the duration of the red light, the number of vehicles crossing and the number of pedestrians waiting at the curb. Ultra-Orthodox pedestrians committed more violations than secular pedestrians did, and there were more road violations in the Ultra-Orthodox location than there were in the secular location. Fewer traffic violations were committed by “local” pedestrians (Ultra-Orthodox pedestrians in the Ultra-Orthodox location and secular pedestrians in the secular location) than by “foreigners” (Ultra-Orthodox pedestrians in the secular location and secular pedestrians in the Ultra-Orthodox location). The odds of crossing on a red light decreased as a function of both the number of people waiting at the curb and the number of vehicles. Consistent with previous research, males crossed on red much more than females did, regardless of religiosity and location. Our discussion focuses on theoretical and practical explanations of the findings.

0-0

 

"Visual attentional capture predicts belief in a meaningful world"

Cortex, In Press, Corrected Proof, Available online 10 July 2008

Here we show that the automatic, involuntary process of attentional capture is predictive of beliefs that are typically considered as much more complex and higher-level. Whereas some beliefs are well supported by evidence, others, such as the belief that coincidences occur for a reason, are not. We argue that the tendency to assign meaning to coincidences is a byproduct of an adaptive system that creates and maintains cognitive schemata, and automatically directs attention to violations of a currently active schema. Earlier studies have shown that, within subjects, attentional capture increases with schema strength. Yet, between-subjects effects could exist too: whereas each of us has schemata of various strengths, most likely different individuals are differently inclined to maintain strong or weak ones. Since schemata can be interpreted as beliefs, we predict more attentional capture for subjects with stronger beliefs than for subjects with weaker ones. We measured visual attentional capture in a reaction time experiment, and correlated it with scores on questionnaires about religious and other beliefs and about meaningfulness and surprisingness of coincidences. We found that visual attentional capture predicts a belief in meaningfulness of coincidences, and that this belief mediates a relationship between visual attentional capture and religiosity. Remarkably, strong believers were more disturbed by schema violations than weak believers, and yet appeared less aware of the disrupting events. We conclude that (a) religious people have a stronger belief in meaningfulness of coincidences, indicative of a more general tendency to maintain strong schemata, and that (:shrug: this belief leads them to suppress, ignore, or forget information that has demonstrably captured their attention, but happens to be inconsistent with their schemata.

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"The intelligence–religiosity nexus: A representative study of white adolescent Americans"

Intelligence, In Press, Corrected Proof, Available online 16 September 2008

The present study examined whether IQ relates systematically to denomination and income within the framework of the g nexus, using representative data from the National Longitudinal Study of Youth (NLSY97). Atheists score 1.95 IQ points higher than Agnostics, 3.82 points higher than Liberal persuasions, and 5.89 IQ points higher than Dogmatic persuasions. Denominations differ significantly in IQ and income. Religiosity declines between ages 12 to 17. It is suggested that IQ makes an individual likely to gravitate toward a denomination and level of achievement that best fit his or hers particular level of cognitive complexity. Ontogenetically speaking this means that contemporary denominations are rank ordered by largely hereditary variations in brain efficiency (i.e. IQ). In terms of evolution, modern Atheists are reacting rationally to cognitive and emotional challenges, whereas Liberals and, in particular Dogmatics, still rely on ancient, pre-rational, supernatural and wishful thinking.

0-0

 

Well that's enough of the liberal elite "ivory-tower" attacks on religiosity.

 

~

[modest]

"Atheist vs. Theist" is not an appropriate dichotomy when looking at rates of child molestation or any criminal action. It would be inappropriate to attempt to use data to suggest atheists are more or less ethically inclined on this issue than theists.

 

We are not talking about social groups of people that would show an identifiable pattern of social behavior. Atheists don't get together and socialize somewhere. They don't have a common background that would make them classifiable in this way. All they have in common is a philosophical position on one issue - and that is no basis for statements that would attempt to characterize the group's morality or ethics, much less their propensity for some specific criminal act.

 

Theists are also not a single monolithic group. Grouping together Baptists, Hindus, and Jews along with so many others and deducing anything specific about their criminology is ridiculous. These are all different kinds of individuals with very different geographic, sociological, and economic demographics. I would agree with Moontanman that these arguments show more about the person making the argument and their tactics than it does about the groups being compared.

 

~modest