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Well, hello, Katarina ... congratulations for being yet another target set up on my firing range. *cracks knuckles*
(Yeah, I can have a dark sense of humor so don't go crazy half-cocked).
Quote:
Originally Posted by Katarina Witt
Seriously? You don't know 60-70 people in general? Anyone who has gone to school, work and belonged to even one or two organizations knows that many people. I don't know if I know 60-70 atheists, but I, as an older, suburban woman who is a practicing Christian know probably a dozen.
Yes, Katarina ... seriously. If I said it, then I meant it. And I stand behind it. Why? Because I wasn't talking about people you work with, say hello to, know by name ... might blab for a few minutes in the break room or whatever the hell. I'm talking about KNOWING them. Being friends with them. Talking to each other on a deeper level than banal trivialities said in a 5 minute conversation. Oh sure, if you want to start adding acquaintances, colleagues, people whose first name you just happen to know, the cashier you exchanged pleasantries with while bagging the groceries, and those people who you only talk to when you send them a Happy Birthday greeting on Facebook once a year, then, uh, yeah, I would know thousands of people.
But my assertion stands ... because most people have families and jobs and responsibilities that keep them fairly busy. Which means they don't have time to go hang out with 60 or 70 different people and maintain a solid friendship with all of them. As an example, I had a pretty good friend in college. We hung out together for 5 years. We did a lot of things together, he even trained me in Isshinryu karate for free at his dojo. Guess where he is now? He's a Jewish rabbi in Israel. Wha??? I hung out with him for 5 years and didn't even know he was Jewish much less active in his faith.
Which just goes to show you that KNOWING someone is a far cry different from ... knowing them, if you get my meaning.
Which is: I still find it nigh impossible that anyone would know 60 or 70 atheists and even KNOW that they're all atheists unless this person runs around asking random people, "Hey bud, what's your religion?" Aside from debating on forums like this one, just about every atheist I've ever met generally keeps his or her beliefs to themselves and don't like getting into religious arguments in the real world.
Which was my original damn point which, I guess, you missed.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Katarina Witt
Many have no clue about religion, including those who became atheist after being involved in religion as a child.
What a crock of nonsense -- an assertion said more to convince yourself than anyone else here. If you did HONEST research (no hanging out in those exclusively Christian sites, now) you'd find that atheists actually DO know more about religion than the average Christian ... generally speaking. Sure, there are some clueless atheists, but not many. Because most atheists BECAME atheists precisely BECAUSE they know and understand religion.
In other words, you're trying to put the cart before the horse saying that atheists became atheists before they understood the religion they were leaving ... and that is utter crap, to be blunt about it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Katarina Witt
As adults, there is no doubt that the religious give more to charity, and not just to religious charities, than the non-religious. Here are a few articles to support that position.
No.
And I explained why. Your premise, as well as the premise of the article, is unproven. Why? Mainly because I would argue MOST forms of charitable giving occur directly. In other words, I give something directly to the person who needs it.
I'm not here to argue that religious people don't give generously to their religious charity of choice. But there is NO data ... none ... zero ... on direct giving between individuals. Without that rather important piece of information, one cannot argue with any certitude that religious people are more generous and charitable.
And anyway, this wasn't even the major point that I made in my original post on this thread. My point, which is far more important than who gives what to charities and whether or not you can really know 60-70 people, is that the entire southern and midwest portion of America would think nothing of cancelling all of our governmental social programs and FORCE the poor, the destitute, the homeless, the elderly, and the disabled to line up hundreds if not thousands long for whatever meager resources a local church charity might have.
Because they think that ONLY charity should be available ... and for that reason, these states consistently strike down, battle against, and whine about ANY social program that keeps people from starving, wandering the streets, or dying from easily treatable medical conditions. Nope. Just the church and ONLY the church. Nothing else. And if the need is far greater than what the church can provide, tough. Too bad.
Which, to my mind, says more about the conservative Christian mentality than whether they donate some friggin' canned beans to the foodbank or gives some crappy winter coat from 1963 to some homeless guy.
Anyone with two functioning brain cells knows that the church could NEVER, not in a million years, truly meet the needs of the needy. I know this for a FACT because I was disabled in North Carolina and couldn't get ANY help from the government. So I languished for 4 years in horrible chronic pain that was so bad I considered suicide ... because a damn church charity won't, under any circumstances, hand out narcotic-based pain medications and that is what I needed. So I had to move all the way back to Pennsylvania where, within 6 months, received Medicaid and a pain management clinic and now, for the first time in YEARS, I can at least nominally function again.
Yeah, I had to move to a rather secular state with more liberal ideals ... because down south, you know, the BIBLE Belt, their policies almost drove me to kill myself.
So yeah ... I can speak from personal experience just how "charitable" conservative, fundamentalist, and evangelical Christians are.
Oh, and one other thing. I'm disabled. Even with pain medication, there are days when I'm bed-ridden due to pain. Explain to me this: What would happen to me if there was no disability program? Oh right, I would have to go begging at the church door. Assuming I could even GET there in my condition. They would make sure I wouldn't starve to death. Maybe give me a winter coat for the snowy season. But at the end of the day, I would still be sleeping in an alley. Because there's no way that a church, no matter how generous its congregation, is going to cough up enough money to keep me housed in an apartment no matter how lousy the place might be.
And yet, there is a HUGE population base that has succumbed to the right-wing propaganda designed to make even Christians not only hate the poor and blame them for our national woes, but to also be suspicious of them -- which is to say, they're all essentially scammers, according to many.
I know this, too, from over a decade debating in the political arena. The social policies in the Bible Belt speak for themselves.
Seriously? Your response is "Not"? Really? Where do you think we are? Elementary school? Sometimes it is better to remain silent rather than remove all doubt about how inconsequential is the perspective you're advocating.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Shirina
My point... is that the entire southern and midwest portion of America would think nothing of cancelling all of our governmental social programs and FORCE the poor, the destitute, the homeless, the elderly, and the disabled to line up hundreds if not thousands long for whatever meager resources a local church charity might have.
Or not have, as the case may be. The key would be a conversion to a system whereby the more affluent can more effectively lord their fruitful exploitation of their superior opportunities over those who have had lesser opportunities or lesser fortune in exploiting those opportunities. In other words, a reversion to a more brutal, barbaric, almost feudal form of society.
Some forms of religion flourish best in a lord-serf context. Independent religious belief, especially that which empowers those traditionally lorded over, such as women, minorities, and the poor, is recognized as one of the two biggest risks to the continuance of such religions. Indeed, a lot of fundamentalism in the United States is primed to exploit power structures, so they have a vested interest in resisting the long-term trend toward every increasing inclusion and fair access to opportunities.
Seriously? Your response is "Not"? Really? Where do you think we are? Elementary school? Sometimes it is better to remain silent rather than remove all doubt about how inconsequential is the perspective you're advocating.
Or not have, as the case may be. The key would be a conversion to a system whereby the more affluent can more effectively lord their fruitful exploitation of their superior opportunities over those who have had lesser opportunities or lesser fortune in exploiting those opportunities. In other words, a reversion to a more brutal, barbaric, almost feudal form of society.
Some forms of religion flourish best in a lord-serf context. Independent religious belief, especially that which empowers those traditionally lorded over, such as women, minorities, and the poor, is recognized as one of the two biggest risks to the continuance of such religions. Indeed, a lot of fundamentalism in the United States is primed to exploit power structures, so they have a vested interest in resisting the long-term trend toward every increasing inclusion and fair access to opportunities.
It's in grand part based on a human psychological bias/instinct called the internal "Theory of a Just World" in which it is supposed that everyone deserves what they get, that way you don't have to worry about anyone else but yourself and your family if they are that important to you. It is usually just a rationalization that minimizes a large group of people's cognitive dissonance about their knowledge of suffering and natural sympathetic feelings vs. their own unwillingness or inability to help everyone in the world that they possibly could. It is very useful for their own happiness because most people have a bias for dwelling on negativity which can cause depression. There are a lot of psychological studies on these sorts of things. For example there is a study that shows that there is a general human bias for clinging even more to an identity-defining group (religion/politics) and becoming more zealous for it if shown evidence and facts that speak against the beloved group.
It's in grand part based on a human psychological bias/instinct called the internal "Theory of a Just World" in which it is supposed that everyone deserves what they get, that way you don't have to worry about anyone else but yourself and your family if they are that important to you. It is usually just a rationalization that minimizes a large group of people's cognitive dissonance about their knowledge of suffering and natural sympathetic feelings vs. their own unwillingness or inability to help everyone in the world that they possibly could. It is very useful for their own happiness because most people have a bias for dwelling on negativity which can cause depression. There are a lot of psychological studies on these sorts of things. For example there is a study that shows that there is a general human bias for clinging even more to an identity-defining group (religion/politics) and becoming more zealous for it if shown evidence and facts that speak against the beloved group.
Oh, for Pity's sake! This study was conducted on kids ages 5-12! Very few, especially at the lower ages, are there yet.
Oh, for Pity's sake! This study was conducted on kids ages 5-12! Very few, especially at the lower ages, are there yet.
That is right, this particular study was about children, and some people (religious or otherwise) think that childhood shapes a person's life, especially since IQ is supposedly set by ~12 on average.
But I personally think the study merely shows that current religions are largely fomenting self-righteousness and selfishness in the kids that they indoctrinate weekly or biweekly (or M-F in religious private school or daily at home). I'm sure some religious projects actually teach children to be thoroughly skeptical, better aware, and more in-tune with the societies around them... but the study shows that is not the case for most of them but for most secular projects that the nonreligious are exposed to M-F in secular schools (or daily at home) are teaching more along those lines (with less percentage fomenting self-rigteousness and selfishness).
Still, capitalism is often strictly about competition and selfishness can sometimes help or sometimes hurt success so it depends which sorts of social educations are better in democratic-republic social-capitalist societies. Further still, there are some people who believe strongly that diversity is key for success, and want a good balance of self-righteous/selfish people coexisting with humble/altruistic people.
The other studies I mentioned aren't about children, but they are probably mostly about young adults. You'd have to search for them to find out.
But I personally think the study merely shows that current religions are largely fomenting self-righteousness and selfishness in the kids that they indoctrinate weekly or biweekly (or M-F in religious private school or daily at home).
And perhaps people can overcome that indoctrination as they get older, but the point is that the indoctrination leads to the imbalance. The study is not comparing altruism between children of religious homes and atheist adults, but rather is saying that children of religious homes are less altruistic as compared to children of atheistic homes.
Well, hello, Katarina ... congratulations for being yet another target set up on my firing range. *cracks knuckles*
(Yeah, I can have a dark sense of humor so don't go crazy half-cocked).
Well, that is certainly an incentive to want to talk to you, not! (Sorry bUU if you don't like that kind of response.) I hope the mods see this. It certainly seems to be against the spirit of CD, to want to fire at somebody, even figuratively. However, I'll play, a little.
Yes, Katarina ... seriously. If I said it, then I meant it. And I stand behind it. Why? Because I wasn't talking about people you work with, say hello to, know by name ... might blab for a few minutes in the break room or whatever the hell. I'm talking about KNOWING them. Being friends with them. Talking to each other on a deeper level than banal trivialities said in a 5 minute conversation. Oh sure, if you want to start adding acquaintances, colleagues, people whose first name you just happen to know, the cashier you exchanged pleasantries with while bagging the groceries, and those people who you only talk to when you send them a Happy Birthday greeting on Facebook once a year, then, uh, yeah, I would know thousands of people.
But my assertion stands ... because most people have families and jobs and responsibilities that keep them fairly busy. Which means they don't have time to go hang out with 60 or 70 different people and maintain a solid friendship with all of them. As an example, I had a pretty good friend in college. We hung out together for 5 years. We did a lot of things together, he even trained me in Isshinryu karate for free at his dojo. Guess where he is now? He's a Jewish rabbi in Israel. Wha??? I hung out with him for 5 years and didn't even know he was Jewish much less active in his faith.
Which just goes to show you that KNOWING someone is a far cry different from ... knowing them, if you get my meaning.
Which is: I still find it nigh impossible that anyone would know 60 or 70 atheists and even KNOW that they're all atheists unless this person runs around asking random people, "Hey bud, what's your religion?" Aside from debating on forums like this one, just about every atheist I've ever met generally keeps his or her beliefs to themselves and don't like getting into religious arguments in the real world.
Which was my original damn point which, I guess, you missed.
Good grief, keep up with the digs! I can think of 12 atheists I know right off the bat: the next-door neighbors on the east (3), the backyard neighbors to the north (4), my son-in-law and his family (4), and my other daughter's finace (1).
What a crock of nonsense -- an assertion said more to convince yourself than anyone else here. If you did HONEST research (no hanging out in those exclusively Christian sites, now) you'd find that atheists actually DO know more about religion than the average Christian ... generally speaking. Sure, there are some clueless atheists, but not many. Because most atheists BECAME atheists precisely BECAUSE they know and understand religion.
In other words, you're trying to put the cart before the horse saying that atheists became atheists before they understood the religion they were leaving ... and that is utter crap, to be blunt about it.
Another keyboard psychologist. Look you and bUU, if I feel I need psychological help, I will seek out someone competent, and I can assure you it will be neither of you. Heck, I don't hang out in those exclusively Christian sites. I can't stand most of them. Many if not most atheists I have talked to have no clue what the Bible really says; they believe all the myths and "urban legends" about religion, e.g. that ALL religions forbid card playing, dancing, drinking, birth control, homesexuality, premarital sex, you name it.
No.
And I explained why. Your premise, as well as the premise of the article, is unproven. Why? Mainly because I would argue MOST forms of charitable giving occur directly. In other words, I give something directly to the person who needs it.
You didn't read the article, did you?
I'm not here to argue that religious people don't give generously to their religious charity of choice. But there is NO data ... none ... zero ... on direct giving between individuals. Without that rather important piece of information, one cannot argue with any certitude that religious people are more generous and charitable.
And anyway, this wasn't even the major point that I made in my original post on this thread. My point, which is far more important than who gives what to charities and whether or not you can really know 60-70 people, is that the entire southern and midwest portion of America would think nothing of cancelling all of our governmental social programs and FORCE the poor, the destitute, the homeless, the elderly, and the disabled to line up hundreds if not thousands long for whatever meager resources a local church charity might have.
What a bigoted statement! Not to mention, I nor anyone else in this thread ever suggested that church run charity should take care of all needs.
Because they think that ONLY charity should be available ... and for that reason, these states consistently strike down, battle against, and whine about ANY social program that keeps people from starving, wandering the streets, or dying from easily treatable medical conditions. Nope. Just the church and ONLY the church. Nothing else. And if the need is far greater than what the church can provide, tough. Too bad.
More bigotry.
Which, to my mind, says more about the conservative Christian mentality than whether they donate some friggin' canned beans to the foodbank or gives some crappy winter coat from 1963 to some homeless guy.
Anyone with two functioning brain cells knows that the church could NEVER, not in a million years, truly meet the needs of the needy. I know this for a FACT because I was disabled in North Carolina and couldn't get ANY help from the government. So I languished for 4 years in horrible chronic pain that was so bad I considered suicide ... because a damn church charity won't, under any circumstances, hand out narcotic-based pain medications and that is what I needed. So I had to move all the way back to Pennsylvania where, within 6 months, received Medicaid and a pain management clinic and now, for the first time in YEARS, I can at least nominally function again.
Yeah, I had to move to a rather secular state with more liberal ideals ... because down south, you know, the BIBLE Belt, their policies almost drove me to kill myself.
So yeah ... I can speak from personal experience just how "charitable" conservative, fundamentalist, and evangelical Christians are.
Why couldn't you get medicaid in N. Carolina? I'm curious. I'm also sorry for your problems. I don't know of any charities, church based or other (though I don't know of any other) that hand out pain meds. They have to be prescribed and the patient has to be evaluated. So you moved to Pennsylbama, a rather secular state you say, with the same percentages of church-goers as midwestern states Michigan, Ohio, Illinois, North Dakota, and Iowa and the southern state Florida; a higher percentage of church goers than midwestern states South Dakota, Minnesota and Wisconsin, and the southern state of Maryland. Church attendance statistics, state by state
Oh, and one other thing. I'm disabled. Even with pain medication, there are days when I'm bed-ridden due to pain. Explain to me this: What would happen to me if there was no disability program? Oh right, I would have to go begging at the church door. Assuming I could even GET there in my condition. They would make sure I wouldn't starve to death. Maybe give me a winter coat for the snowy season. But at the end of the day, I would still be sleeping in an alley. Because there's no way that a church, no matter how generous its congregation, is going to cough up enough money to keep me housed in an apartment no matter how lousy the place might be.
And yet, there is a HUGE population base that has succumbed to the right-wing propaganda designed to make even Christians not only hate the poor and blame them for our national woes, but to also be suspicious of them -- which is to say, they're all essentially scammers, according to many.
I know this, too, from over a decade debating in the political arena. The social policies in the Bible Belt speak for themselves.
Originally Posted by Continuum
We cannot lump up all religions on this topic and end up with such a conclusion.
Quote:
Originally Posted by bUU
This is factually untrue. There is nothing that prevents single-variable studies. We actually can legitimately lump up all religions together and end up with a legitimate and valid conclusion.
What you seem to be saying is that you want more detail, perhaps in the interest of shifting the negative aspects of the conclusion away from a sub-population you want to somehow protect from criticism.
The nature of scientific study is to gain more insight into details with additional research, but that doesn't belie conclusions that don't provide such details. Science doesn't start at the most micro level and works sideways; it starts at the top and works down.
Based on the above, your logic, critical and rational thinking competence is low.
Suggest you update yourself on the Philosophy of Concepts and Logic 101.
Note just because there is a large percentage of whites in the world, one cannot jump to the conclusion 'all humans are white.' It is same with seeing a percentage of blacks and yellow-reds and not making them as universals. It is a logical fallacy to generalize from a partial to the general.
The above principle is applicable to every physical variable.
It is the same when some religions are self-centered & selfish [re children and adults] but one cannot jump to the conclusion All religions are selfish as with the OP.
Note most religions are theistic but it is wrong to assert 'Religions are theistic' because there are a few religions that are non-theistic, e.g. Buddhism, Jainism, etc.
Based on the above, your logic, critical and rational thinking competence is low.
Either that or you simply don't have a reasonable response to what I wrote, and so you thought it was smart to post a personal attack instead. It wasn't.
You were wrong. You said that there could not be single-variable studies. There can be and are. And they are valid and legitimate, even when their conclusions make you feel bad.
How about you apologize for your personal attack, and then respond to my comment in a respectful and worthwhile manner?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Continuum
Suggest you update yourself on the Philosophy of Concepts and Logic 101.
I actually taught courses in logic when I was working for the university. Yes, that was about forty years ago, the rules of logic don't change.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Continuum
Note just because there is a large percentage of whites in the world, one cannot jump to the conclusion 'all humans are white.'
That's correct, but if you think that statement is analogous to the study, then you evidently didn't read the study. Rather, I suspect you simply are grasping at straws to come up with a rationalization for attacking the results of a study just because you don't like the results. One of the most fundamental things that people who wish to be logical thinkers need to learn is to accept the results of the logic even when they don't like them. Logical inference has nothing to do with defending a personal preference.
What a crock of nonsense -- an assertion said more to convince yourself than anyone else here. If you did HONEST research (no hanging out in those exclusively Christian sites, now) you'd find that atheists actually DO know more about religion than the average Christian ... generally speaking. Sure, there are some clueless atheists, but not many. Because most atheists BECAME atheists precisely BECAUSE they know and understand religion.
If you did honest research, you would dig and find out that these studies proclaiming atheists are more knowledgeable about Christianity than Christians is not really telling the whole truth here. Most of the questions where atheists rank higher had nothing to do with the Bible or the Christian faith. When it came to topics specifically on the Bible, evangelists beat atheists.
Quote:
White evangelical Protestants answer an average of 17.6 religious knowledge questions correctly. Though white evangelicals have lower scores than Jews and atheists/agnostics overall, they do significantly better on questions about the Bible. White evangelicals correctly answer an average of 5.1 out of seven Bible questions, compared with 4.4 among atheists and agnostics and 4.3 among Jews.
I'm not here to argue that religious people don't give generously to their religious charity of choice. But there is NO data ... none ... zero ... on direct giving between individuals. Without that rather important piece of information, one cannot argue with any certitude that religious people are more generous and charitable.
How would you even measure direct individual giving? Now you are talking about everyone's personal life journey. Why does is that the only measurment of charity that you will accept? If I give a portion of my income to the Red Cross, that's still a sacrifice.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Shirina
And anyway, this wasn't even the major point that I made in my original post on this thread. My point, which is far more important than who gives what to charities and whether or not you can really know 60-70 people, is that the entire southern and midwest portion of America would think nothing of cancelling all of our governmental social programs and FORCE the poor, the destitute, the homeless, the elderly, and the disabled to line up hundreds if not thousands long for whatever meager resources a local church charity might have.
Christians believe it's our duty to take care of the poor, elderly, disabled and needy. What most people in the South DON'T like is this whole robbing Peter to pay Paul government take over of hard earned money. Did you consider for a moment that many of the states in the south are poor states? The middle class struggles to get by and many people live pay check to pay check with nothing left for savings. In order to pay for these social programs, the government can take a whopping 15% federal tax and 10% state for single taxpayers. That's 25% of your income that you can't put into savings and you can't give towards charities. On top of that, many Christians here feel that it is their Biblical duty to give a tithe to the church so now we are talking about 35%. I know people who have to now work two jobs to make it. OTOH, the government is very inefficient with social programs. Sure, they put up a barrier to get in, but once you are in, you're set for life. Doesn't matter if your condition improves, you'll still get that paycheck. If hard working citizens had more disposable income, I have no doubt that you would see a great increase in charitable giving. Instead, the government is driving the middle class to poverty. I certainly believe that we need to take care of the needy, but I don't think Jesus taught to do it to such extremes that it makes us destitute and needy as well.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Shirina
Oh, and one other thing. I'm disabled. Even with pain medication, there are days when I'm bed-ridden due to pain. Explain to me this: What would happen to me if there was no disability program? Oh right, I would have to go begging at the church door. Assuming I could even GET there in my condition. They would make sure I wouldn't starve to death. Maybe give me a winter coat for the snowy season. But at the end of the day, I would still be sleeping in an alley. Because there's no way that a church, no matter how generous its congregation, is going to cough up enough money to keep me housed in an apartment no matter how lousy the place might be.
How do you know this to be true? I can speak from personal experience that churches do go as far as providing food, housing and employment for those who are in need. But it does require at least one thing on your part. You have to ask. Swallow your pride and tell us you need help and I can't imagine a church that would just throw you back on the alley and turn a blind eye. God's people go out there way to help.
I can remember one instance where my father was bed ridden in a hospital for a week having major bypass surgery. In addition to the church visiting and praying for him, the youth gave up their free time and spent an entire day mowing his yard and raking leaves. That's the face of Christian charity.
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