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Statistics is not my area of expertise. I've passed one course in statistics, and only by rote memorization of concepts which really don't match my default thought processes. I'm more a qualitative rather than quantitative data thinker. But it seems to me that there is some sort of a relationship between religious people and non-religious. While there may be exceptions, isn't it accurate to suggest that the brighter someone is, the less religious they are apt to be?
This suggestion can anger people but logically, if it is true, why don't the religious surrender to logic and abandon their nonsensical views? Not likely.
One way to evaluate intelligence is use of language. What appears evident, to me, is the religious tend to use language less effectively: more errors in spelling, usage, logic, grammar, historical references. Less broad knowledge base, which occurs because the general reading is less broad. And there are a number of common errors which are revealing markers: to/too, your/you're, calling symphonies "songs" (music references), misplaced quotation marks. I would maintain that people who read a lot don't make these kinds of errors.
Statistics is not my area of expertise. I've passed one course in statistics, and only by rote memorization of concepts which really don't match my default thought processes. I'm more a qualitative rather than quantitative data thinker. But it seems to me that there is some sort of a relationship between religious people and non-religious. While there may be exceptions, isn't it accurate to suggest that the brighter someone is, the less religious they are apt to be?
This suggestion can anger people but logically, if it is true, why don't the religious surrender to logic and abandon their nonsensical views? Not likely.
One way to evaluate intelligence is use of language. What appears evident, to me, is the religious tend to use language less effectively: more errors in spelling, usage, logic, grammar, historical references. Less broad knowledge base, which occurs because the general reading is less broad. And there are a number of common errors which are revealing markers: to/too, your/you're, calling symphonies "songs" (music references), misplaced quotation marks. I would maintain that people who read a lot don't make these kinds of errors.
Am I off base here?
Yes, I think so. You are calling me a moron and assuming, wrongly, that I "don't read a lot" because I am not an atheist. Even as a child growing up in a strict religious home, I read voraciously and far past the level of most my age.
I hate to burst your self-aggrandizing bubble, but not only can I spell and use punctuation correctly, I've actually had writing published and been paid for it. I'm living on a tidy pension earned after a 37-year career editing and producing engineering-related documents, even though I don't have an engineering degree, or any degree for that matter, and I work part-time and am well paid for what I do by some highly intelligent people--who are Muslims. Imagine that.
Yet I believe there is something that connects us all, something larger than that which we can easily touch, feel, or see, and I think that because of my own experiences. I can't say I have the ability to define it, and I have no desire to try to persuade others who don't believe in such a concept to think as I do.
Trust me, my feelings aren't hurt over your flawed opinion, because I'm an adult and have lived long enough to know that people who think like you exist in all aspects of society. However, your post seemed to beg for a reply, and I thought I'd oblige.
It seems to me that your knowledge of religious people outside of the stereotypical fundamentalist type is extremely limited, and I find it amusing that your way of thinking is the mirror image of the self-righteous religious person who thinks they have all the answers and everyone else just isn't as smart as they are.
Yes, I think so. You are calling me a moron and assuming, wrongly, that I "don't read a lot" because I am not an atheist. Even as a child growing up in a strict religious home, I read voraciously and far past the level of most my age.
I hate to burst your self-aggrandizing bubble, but not only can I spell and use punctuation correctly, I've actually had writing published and been paid for it. I'm living on a tidy pension earned after a 37-year career editing and producing engineering-related documents, even though I don't have an engineering degree, or any degree for that matter, and I work part-time and am well paid for what I do by some highly intelligent people--who are Muslims. Imagine that.
Yet I believe there is something that connects us all, something larger than that which we can easily touch, feel, or see, and I think that because of my own experiences. I can't say I have the ability to define it, and I have no desire to try to persuade others who don't believe in such a concept to think as I do.
Trust me, my feelings aren't hurt over your flawed opinion, because I'm an adult and have lived long enough to know that people who think like you exist in all aspects of society. However, your post seemed to beg for a reply, and I thought I'd oblige.
It seems to me that your knowledge of religious people outside of the stereotypical fundamentalist type is extremely limited, and I find it amusing that your way of thinking is the mirror image of the self-righteous religious person who thinks they have all the answers and everyone else just isn't as smart as they are.
No, it has nothing to do with you and I'm sorry you think it does. For one thing, you don't exhibit any of the errors I complain of.
I think the amount of reading (and what read) one does has much to do with a person's skill with syntax. On the exJW site I go to we joke about our lack of sentence structure and spelling errors. Then again, most of us grew up reading Watchtower publications which are designed to indoctrinate under the guise of education. We were instructed to see things such as "Asprin: Are you taking too much?" as the pinnacle of Godly knowledge. A person adapts to the environment I guess to what they think is normal. Outside reading was either squeezed out by time constraints or vilified as worldly and wasteful.
I enjoyed looking up some of the authors you mentioned on another thread. I wasn't exposed to such things and my attitude toward reading carried over from childhood. I have to tell you though, that Russel quote you shared came across and dickish.
Yes, I think so. You are calling me a moron and assuming, wrongly, that I "don't read a lot" because I am not an atheist.
I see nothing in the OP That does any of that though.
The OP is discussing a statistical correlate in a large group. When one discusses a statistical correlate in a large group then they are not making any specific comment about any specific person. You are jumping to take offense and manufacture insult where none existed. This is simply not the function or implication of statistics.
The simple fact is that studies have indeed suggested a negative correlation between education and intelligence - and religiosity. That is a simple statistic about quite large groups of people. That does _not_ however mean any random individual from that group is stupid or uneducated.
Quite the opposite in fact as possibly one of the brightest minds in our history - Newton - believed some complete nonsense for example. Religious nonsense and other nonsense too. It would be a fools errand to try and portray him as either unintelligent or uneducated. Further while the levels of deistic and theistic belief is significantly lower in the scientific community by far - it is still quite a way from Zero too!
However I use the word "Suggested" with care above there as it is far from conclusive. Both religiosity and intelligence are nebulous terms and we rarely agree when writing or interpreting such studies as to what we actually mean by them. For example many of the studies do not move to differentiate between religious belief and religious practice. And the studies that do show a different level of negative education and intelligence between the two groups. Such studies also tend to use IQ - a measure that seems more and more often to be falling out of use or favor.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Mightyqueen801
Yet I believe there is something that connects us all
I believe in things that connect us all too. Just nothing from a religious narrative. The human condition itself connects us all for example. Sentience and consciousness connect us all. Shared goals and dreams and desires for our path in life too. Shared experience of things like rearing families and having children. Shared narratives. Many things.
Strip them all away and I am not sure what is left and what else you might think connects us all. But I somewhat suspect that it will turn out to be a mix of elements like the ones I list here.
I hear a lot about the personal experiences of the religious - which you also refer to from yourself here too. And I have spent many many hours sitting with religious people who describe those experiences - and I have yet to hear a single - not just many but a single - theist explain or describe an experience to me that I myself have not had too - either directly the same or very similar indeed.
So while a lot of theists reach for their personal experiences as the trait that defines the separation between us - often suggesting I can never understand their faith or position without sharing their experience - more and more often in life I come to the conclusion it is not a difference in experience at all but a difference in how we parse those experiences through narratives after the fact. And their assumption I have not shared their experience and am therefore precluded from seeing the world as they do - is a very false assumption.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Mightyqueen801
I find it amusing that your way of thinking is the mirror image of the self-righteous religious person who thinks they have all the answers and everyone else just isn't as smart as they are.
Actually I suspect the opposite is the case much of the time. The late Christopher Hitchens once defined being educated as the moment you realize how much it is you still do not know. As you say there are self-righteous religious people who think they have all the answers.
My own experience with atheists - especially the smart and educated ones - is of a group of people who realize they hardly have any of the answers. They admit their ignorance and that of our species and work to alleviate it. And in the interim they do not simply make stuff up to fill the holes.
It reminds me of a funny bumper sticker that was described to me once by another user of this forum. The sticker on the car said "Militant agnostic - I dont know and YOUR DONT EITHER!".
I find it amusing therefore that time and again I see atheists come into a conversation saying "We have no evidence for that" "We have no answers for that" "We do not know that" only to have a theist turn on them accusing them of thinking they know it all or have all the answers - when in fact every word and action from them in the conversation to that point was the _exact_ opposite of the accusation.
When someone comes out with a string of things we do not know and understand - only to be accused of thinking they know it all - communication has broken somewhere in the conversation.
Yes, I think so. You are calling me a moron and assuming, wrongly, that I "don't read a lot" because I am not an atheist. Even as a child growing up in a strict religious home, I read voraciously and far past the level of most my age.
I hate to burst your self-aggrandizing bubble, but not only can I spell and use punctuation correctly, I've actually had writing published and been paid for it. I'm living on a tidy pension earned after a 37-year career editing and producing engineering-related documents, even though I don't have an engineering degree, or any degree for that matter, and I work part-time and am well paid for what I do by some highly intelligent people--who are Muslims. Imagine that.
Yet I believe there is something that connects us all, something larger than that which we can easily touch, feel, or see, and I think that because of my own experiences. I can't say I have the ability to define it, and I have no desire to try to persuade others who don't believe in such a concept to think as I do.
Trust me, my feelings aren't hurt over your flawed opinion, because I'm an adult and have lived long enough to know that people who think like you exist in all aspects of society. However, your post seemed to beg for a reply, and I thought I'd oblige.
It seems to me that your knowledge of religious people outside of the stereotypical fundamentalist type is extremely limited, and I find it amusing that your way of thinking is the mirror image of the self-righteous religious person who thinks they have all the answers and everyone else just isn't as smart as they are.
I think you're reading more into this than Kara put into it.
As with two groups of almost any type of person, there will be the bulk of members, and then there will be members outside the mainstream. I didn't read her post as meaning "all individuals".
No, it has nothing to do with you and I'm sorry you think it does. For one thing, you don't exhibit any of the errors I complain of.
That distinguishes you as one of the exceptions.
In fairness, your thread title does say "conservative religious views", and that is not me.
I do know some conservative religious folks, though, who don't fit that description, either. My mother would be one. She is 90 years old, never finished high school, and yet she can give me a run for my money at a game of Scrabble. She reads, always has, and his herself a a pretty solid writer. While she's softened some of her more conservative religious views as a result of living and learning, she would still probably fall under that category with her overall basic Christian beliefs. Another childhood friend, an intelligent, educated woman in a significant management position in her firm took up with a Bible-type church about 25 years ago, and holds firm to literalist beliefs.
By the way, the point of my post was not that I was taking it personally, but rather the Mighty Queen's same old song and dance about not making judgments of individuals based on some group or category to which they can be assigned. It's more work to assess people as individuals and so much easier to throw 'em all into the same pot, isn't it?
I think the amount of reading (and what read) one does has much to do with a person's skill with syntax. On the exJW site I go to we joke about our lack of sentence structure and spelling errors. Then again, most of us grew up reading Watchtower publications which are designed to indoctrinate under the guise of education. We were instructed to see things such as "Asprin: Are you taking too much?" as the pinnacle of Godly knowledge. A person adapts to the environment I guess to what they think is normal. Outside reading was either squeezed out by time constraints or vilified as worldly and wasteful.
I enjoyed looking up some of the authors you mentioned on another thread. I wasn't exposed to such things and my attitude toward reading carried over from childhood. I have to tell you though, that Russel quote you shared came across and dickish.
Alex Trebek once said that on Jeopardy when a person with only a high school education won. The people who read do the best on the show, regardless of level of education.
One of my favorite quotes ever:
"Strange as it may seem, no amount of learning can cure stupidity, and formal education positively fortifies it."
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