Atheists more religiously literate than religious people.

It makes sense. Reading and learning all these things about religion is what turns people off of it. The more you know, the more likely you are to be an athiest.

Absolutely true.
Being an atheist I know more about peoples religions then people.
People just want things to be simple I guess.

It reminds me one of my grandfather´s friend, scientist and atheist, who had a Bible. Some people were surprised, that how can he read a Bible?! He said, that how can he be atheist whithout knowing, what´s written in Bible? He had read it fully. I agree, if you want to deny something, then you have to know it very well.

Why are the unaffiliated, Atheists, Agnostics, and the nothing in particulars not added together? Unaffiliated and believing nothing in particular is Atheist / Agnostic. If you add their scores together, then Atheist / Agnostic were very average.

This title is very misleading. This actually shows, an Atheist / Agnostic who claims Atheism knows more about religion than an Atheist / Agnostic who doesn't. Wow, that's a shocker. You don't need a survey to know that.

You definitely can't use this survey to say, 'Atheists more religiously literate than religious people.'. It actually shows the exact opposite.

reply to post by addygrace


Because the unaffiliated and the nothing in particular aren't the same as atheists. For one thing, unaffiliated includes everyone who says, "Oh I believe in god, but not religion." Or, "I'm spiritual, not religious."

Here are some quotes from the surveys appendix

One goal of the study was to attain sufficient numbers of interviews with members of these groups to permit reliable analysis of their religious knowledge. Oversampling was necessary because these groups account for a relatively small share of the overall population. Jews and Mormons each comprise roughly 1.7% of U.S. adults, according to the Pew Forum’s 2007 U.S. Religious Landscape Survey, while atheists and agnostics combined account for about 4% of the adult population, meaning that most surveys – even those based on large samples – do not include enough interviews with members of these groups to permit analysis of their views and characteristics.

The survey included a total of 74 self-described atheists, by themselves too small a group for reliable statistical analysis, so those individuals were aggregated with the 138 agnostics for this analysis.

After reading those quotes, how could anyone come to the conclusion that "Atheists [are] more religiously literate than religious people.'?

reply to post by addygrace

Between atheists and agnostics they had 218 individuals to make sure they had enough individuals from that category of people. It makes the study more rigorous, not less.

Originally posted by Welfhard
reply to post by addygrace

 

Between atheists and agnostics they had 218 individuals to make sure they had enough individuals from that category of people. It makes the study more rigorous, not less.

Because there were so few people that claimed to be Atheist, they had to add the Agnostics to their category. Nowhere in the full report, do they give the totals for each, by themselves.

Other religious groups, including Muslims, Buddhists and
Hindus, participated in the survey and are included in the
estimates for the total population, though the survey did
not include enough interviews to report on these groups
separately.

It's odd, they did not add these other groups because they did not include enough interviews, yet they add the athiest to the agnostics, because they did not have enough interviews. They then claim this proves, "athiest are more religously literate than the religious.".

The title to this thread and titles through the media, claim this survey shows Atheists are religiously more literate, when clearly that's not the case. It's just an inflammatory title IMO.

reply to post by addygrace


Atheism and agnosticism are closer than most would think. The point that fewer people chose atheism over agnosticism is very telling about the nature of people's views on religion. As far as being more literate, then yes, the two groups combined would work as an accurate gauge.

reply to post by addygrace


I got 14 out of 15. How did you do?

reply to post by SorensDespair


It's very easy to be a gnostic atheist when man begins to describe God, to detail God.

reply to post by awake_and_aware


I'm sorry, did you mean gnostic, or agnostic atheist? I just want to be sure.
Thanks,

reply to post by addygrace

Because there were so few people that claimed to be Atheist, they had to add the Agnostics to their category.

They're effectively the same thing. Virtually all atheists are agnostic and vice-verse.

They then claim this proves, "athiest are more religously literate than the religious.".

Where does it say it proves anything? It's evidence, not proof - that's how science works.

reply to post by SorensDespair


13 out 15
It was harder than I expected.

The question about the Bible being used as a literary tool, was misleading, imo. I did get that one right. You get all of these headlines about the Bible and school not mixing, so that inference could easily lead to the wrong answer.

Some other poster mentioned the indoctrination angle. This is important.

regarding the fact atheists know more than "beleivers" about religious matters boils down to indocrtination.those who read more widley and know more about religion probably gathered the info as an adult,by themselves,without it being thought as the truth since childhood,.,Its not taught to them by a school or priest who say this is truth.They come at it neutrally,or with an open mind,possibly as adults,not unquestioning kids.

im sure if you were brought up in a strict religious school,community ,you know where to turn for the "truth",Your community,priest ,rabbi,whatever,the thought of questioning that belief and looking deeper dosent occour.wether it be to other religions for curiousity or more answers.For the fundamentalists theres a block in the logical thought process on debating religion,well theres no debate, for the average christian,muslim whatever,Id say they dont even know much about their own religious books without being told how to view them by a higher authorithy much less examine another,independantly..though I may be abit too harsh on that view,

Its not like ,say youre studying biology since you could talk,.Now your a biologist,The code of biologists dosent say mathematics is wrong,Do not practice its teachings. you dont have to live by certain rules to be or know of biology,also its provable hah .thats the wrong analagy.

religions are one truth,the main ones anyway."The only way".,unproven,taken as faith you cant accept all of them as truth if you consider yourself a true believer. If your a hardcore biologist,you live breath and # biology,your mind dosent tell you mathematics or chemistry is not real or factual.religion kinda stops your thought processes I guess. It limits your acceptance of new ideas unless they are in the context of your religion.

Religion is about control and gathering a loyal and obedient following,with people who look to certain leaders for the one truth. they will not encourage their layfolk looking into other religions,at least not without being told how to interpret them and which piece of that religion to focus on.

No offence to any religious people,I just read my post back and it seems an anti religion rant,Im just thinking about why the poll turned out like it did and am talking in general terms.

Originally posted by Welfhard
reply to post by addygrace

 

Because there were so few people that claimed to be Atheist, they had to add the Agnostics to their category.

They're effectively the same thing. Virtually all atheists are agnostic and vice-verse.

They then claim this proves, "athiest are more religously literate than the religious.".

Where does it say it proves anything? It's evidence, not proof - that's how science works.

I want to point out, this is evidence of nothing. How they chose the Catholics, Christians, and the Nothing in Particulars was different than how they chose the Jews, Mormons, Atheists, and Agnostics. They say they did this because of sample size. If that was the case, why didn't they add the Muslims, Buddhists and
Hindus. Why weren't they oversampled and added to give the whole picture. IMO, these two facts point to a premeditated idea they wanted to convey. I mean if all of these groups; Jews, Mormons, Atheists, Agnostics, Muslims, Buddhists and Hindus did not have a large enough sample size, why only oversample Jews, Mormons, Atheists, and Agnostics.

I find it very odd, the 4 groups that outperformed the rest of the participants were the 4 where oversampling was conducted. Not only did they outperform them, they outperformed them by a little over 8%. +/-8.5% was the margin of error for these 4 groups.

On ATS we should "Deny Ignorance". This is a perfect chance to do that, but I think we may see this thread continue the "Atheists are smarter than the rest of the world" propaganda.

Originally posted by Angrybadger
Some other poster mentioned the indoctrination angle. This is important.

regarding the fact atheists know more than "beleivers" about religious matters boils down to indocrtination.those who read more widley and know more about religion probably gathered the info as an adult,by themselves,without it being thought as the truth since childhood,.,Its not taught to them by a school or priest who say this is truth.They come at it neutrally,or with an open mind,possibly as adults,not unquestioning kids.

im sure if you were brought up in a strict religious school,community ,you know where to turn for the "truth",Your community,priest ,rabbi,whatever,the thought of questioning that belief and looking deeper dosent occour.wether it be to other religions for curiousity or more answers.For the fundamentalists theres a block in the logical thought process on debating religion,well theres no debate, for the average christian,muslim whatever,Id say they dont even know much about their own religious books without being told how to view them by a higher authorithy much less examine another,independantly..though I may be abit too harsh on that view,

Its not like ,say youre studying biology since you could talk,.Now your a biologist,The code of biologists dosent say mathematics is wrong,Do not practice its teachings. you dont have to live by certain rules to be or know of biology,also its provable hah .thats the wrong analagy.

religions are one truth,the main ones anyway."The only way".,unproven,taken as faith you cant accept all of them as truth if you consider yourself a true believer. If your a hardcore biologist,you live breath and # biology,your mind dosent tell you mathematics or chemistry is not real or factual.religion kinda stops your thought processes I guess. It limits your acceptance of new ideas unless they are in the context of your religion.

Religion is about control and gathering a loyal and obedient following,with people who look to certain leaders for the one truth. they will not encourage their layfolk looking into other religions,at least not without being told how to interpret them and which piece of that religion to focus on.

No offence to any religious people,I just read my post back and it seems an anti religion rant,Im just thinking about why the poll turned out like it did and am talking in general terms.

edit on 18-4-2011 by Angrybadger because: (no reason given)

This totally discounts Atheists, who were raised atheist. This totally discounts Atheists who base their idea on a simple opinion; I'm athiest because I don't believe in God. Not all Atheist come to the conclusion about God, based on anything religous. They just simply don't believe in God.

Originally posted by Welfhard
reply to post by addygrace

 

Between atheists and agnostics they had 218 individuals to make sure they had enough individuals from that category of people. It makes the study more rigorous, not less.

No, they used oversampling. Not only that, they did the picking and choosing of who would be oversampled.

reply to post by SorensDespair


GNOSTIC was what i meant.

I'm agnostic in regards to the source of reality - i.e. We don't have evidence to suggest it was created or whether it is infinite etc.

I'm gnostic in regards to an omnipotent God, and man's details of God so far, as we don't have knowledge of the source of creation, no man can make a claim to the "detail" of God - That's when it is very easy to be a gnostic Atheist.

I don't think any human so far, knows what is beyond the big bang, what is behind this reality, what binds the universe together etc. - SO when someone claims they know, and without evidence... I will be very skeptical.

reply to post by SantaClaus


ya man, no doubt the athiest's are more brainy coz they need to think about it soooo much.

all ya need is faith and it don't take brains for that.

just heart.