Atheist, Agnostic, or Religious?

[myk]

Creaphis said:
Well, it's the nature of certain religious people to shove their ideas down throats, and, obviously and unfortunately, it's the most vocal portion that gets the most airtime. This gives us observers the impression that religious people are nutjobs in general.

And the same thing happens on the other side. If what religious people, even moderate or tolerant ones, see of atheists is their campaigns against religion, they get the impression all atheists ever do is rant against God and criticize religious people. When they aren't killing fetuses or having gay sex, that is :p

[geekmarine]

Bah, half this country believes in young-Earth Creationism - which frankly, I think is utterly insane, and that's far from a vocal minority. But even then, as stupid as I think it is, it wouldn't bother me if people wouldn't keep trying to force that into the classrooms. My problem isn't that the vocal minority won't shut up, it's that they have the numbers and the power to occasionally force their crap through government institutions like our schools (if not outright making religion-based laws).

[Zoost]

[Kyka]

Don't forget that both Martin Luther King and Mother Theresa were deeply religious. It's a pity there aren't more religious people like these, for whom belief in God actually equates to doing something profoundly good in the world, rather than thinking that faith in God means now you have a licence to insult peoples intelligence and beliefs.


For the record, I am not religious at all, but I do believe in God. Which is funny, coz I don't have much faith generally in the sort of people who believe in God. The fact that there are many rational, intelligent people on this thread who don't, is actually fine with me.

[Gez]

Kyka said:

Don't forget that both Martin Luther King and Mother Theresa were deeply religious.

Mother Theresa has been quite a controversial figure, actually.

[Sharessa]

geekmarine said:

Bah, half this country believes in young-Earth Creationism - which frankly, I think is utterly insane, and that's far from a vocal minority. But even then, as stupid as I think it is, it wouldn't bother me if people wouldn't keep trying to force that into the classrooms. My problem isn't that the vocal minority won't shut up, it's that they have the numbers and the power to occasionally force their crap through government institutions like our schools (if not outright making religion-based laws).

Half of the country? Really? I think I've met all of 2 people in my entire life that actually believed that, and they were ridiculed for it.

[Kyka]

Gez said:

Mother Theresa has been quite a controversial figure, actually.

Very true. As was Martin Luther King himself. You could even argue that anyone who has ever done anything great is controversial by default.

[geekmarine]

Danarchy said:

Half of the country? Really? I think I've met all of 2 people in my entire life that actually believed that, and they were ridiculed for it.

I shit you not, nearly half the country believes in young-Earth creationism.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/21814/Evolution-Creationism-Intelligent-Design.aspx

[Creaphis]

Kyka said:

Very true. As was Martin Luther King himself. You could even argue that anyone who has ever done anything great is controversial by default.

Another interesting point about Mother Teresa is this one.

geekmarine said:

I shit you not, nearly half the country believes in young-Earth creationism.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/21814/Evolution-Creationism-Intelligent-Design.aspx

Hm. I'd like to point out that that young-Earth creationism includes many more beliefs than "God created man in present form," and the poll doesn't seem to say who was polled, but... yeah. That doesn't look too good.

[GreyGhost]

One thing I noticed in that Gallup poll is that the atheist opinion is the only one exibiting an upward trend - it also says I'm part of a noisy minority. I can live with that. :-)

Statistics are like talking parrots - you can train them to say whatever you like.

[Creaphis]

Another thought that came to my mind afterward is that, in the subject of religious belief, there are many who will claim the more conservative/religious beliefs because they think that they're the "right" answers. A religious heritage will teach you that, even if you don't fully believe a certain piece of doctrine, you're supposed to. This makes people likely to claim those beliefs to a pollster instead of making the uncomfortable admission that no, I'm not really that sure anymore that the world was made in a week by some dude.

GreyGhost said:

One thing I noticed in that Gallup poll is that the atheist opinion is the only one exibiting an upward trend - it also says I'm part of a noisy minority. I can live with that. :-)

This may be causing some blowback from the religious: I noticed in another poll on that site that belief in the devil is also increasing, presumably to ensure hell is properly accommodated for this wave of heathens.

[Sharessa]

geekmarine said:

I shit you not, nearly half the country believes in young-Earth creationism.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/21814/Evolution-Creationism-Intelligent-Design.aspx

Must all be red staters or something.

[Sharessa]

Hate to double post, but I'm too tired to bother merging these.

GreyGhost said:

Statistics are like talking parrots - you can train them to say whatever you like.

Too true. The fact is that polls don't really give an accurate sampling of everyone. Pollsters tend to use a personal bias when selecting people to poll, if possible. For some reason, I must not seem like a very surveyable person, because I've never actually been asked any questions by pollsters in person even though I've been around them fairly often. I've literally had people sitting to the left and right of me polled before while being skipped over. Don't know what it is about me, but they just avoid me.

By phone, they can't really judge you by appearance, and I'm fairly sure they just pick the numbers randomly, probably from some kind of big list, so there's not much bias from their side there. But still, you can end up disqualifying yourself from the polls. Take the above poll, for instance. They probably started with something like "we'd like to ask you a few questions for a survey about your religious views". Someone who is very quiet about their religious views might just opt out of it, being too shy or humble to want to talk about it. On the other hand, a born-again will say it loud and say it proud.

Also, there's the whole question of weather someone is willing or able to do a phone poll anyway. There have been times I've declined doing polls just because I was too busy at the time (at least once literally as I was about to walk out the door). Some people just can't be bothered, not wanting to take out any time from playing WoW to do it or whatever. And then people who are away from home a lot won't even be there to answer the phone. If you think about it, the people who will be taking polls will tend to be the more talkative, more bored, and possibly more lonely people out there. Not sure which way exactly that would skew polls, but I'm sure it does to a certain degree.

So yeah, never trust polls 100%. Comparing a bunch on the same subject taken by different polling organizations is the only way to get a good picture, and not necessarily very accurately.

[fraggle]

Kyka said:

Don't forget that both Martin Luther King and Mother Theresa were deeply religious. It's a pity there aren't more religious people like these, for whom belief in God actually equates to doing something profoundly good in the world

Note that most Christian churches specifically say the exact opposite, ie. that "you are not saved by works but by believing in Jesus". Presumably this gives the religion better survival characteristics, because it encourages people to devote more time to it.

[Csonicgo]

fraggle said:

Note that most Christian churches specifically say the exact opposite, ie. that "you are not saved by works but by believing in Jesus". Presumably this gives the religion better survival characteristics, because it encourages people to devote more time to it.

There's also a sect that believes that you are saved by Grace AND works, and everything you do must be to glorify God. Everything. This style of thinking gives you a "Westboro Baptist Church"-like congregation where its members become truly fanatical in order to win a "large mansion up in heaven". Some have been led to believe that the more good works you do in jesus's name, the bigger your house in the afterlife is. This really exploits the psyche of some people, the ones that believe "he who dies with the most stuff , wins".

[geekmarine]

Well, polls can be flawed, this is true, but I see no reason to question the overall trend of belief in young-Earth creationism. I mean, we live in a country where people are still violently arguing about it, where schools are proving to be more and more a battlezone on the subject (just look at the Kansas state board of education), and where the Creation Museum exists.

I mean, sure, the number might have some error, but I seriously doubt that any more accurate study would produce, say, results that put it at 15% or something.

[ducon]

I'm morally atheist and scientifically agnostic. I don't know, I don't care (as long as religious people don't bother me) and I live without.

[Gez]

An example of why religion can be bad for your brain:
http://www.livegameauctions.com/CharityAuction.jsp

GenCon 2008 Charity Event:

On Saturday, August 15th, 2008 at 6:00 PM, the Gen Con Live Game Auction hosted their traditional charity auction. This year, the event was in honor of Gary Gygax. Originally the charity chosen for GenCon was Gary's favorite charity, the Christian Children's Fund. Unfortunately, when they found out that the money they would get came partially from sales of Dungeons and Dragons they decided not to be the sponsored charity.

...

[GreyGhost]

I thought it was common knowledge that D&D gamers dabble in black magic. :P

[Sharessa]

Muahahaha, welcome to the coven. I put on my robe and wizard's hat.

Actually, I do have a wizard's robe. Going to be wearing it tonight.

[Gez]

I wish I had a DM as hot as Ms Frost. And I wish I could learn to cast Mind Bondage spells on people. I'm very disappointed that D&D is nothing like this advertising claims it is.

[Creaphis]

I shouldn't have read that tract while sick. It just brought my headache back to full strength.

An article linked to on that page also warrants skimming:

http://www.chick.com/articles/dnd.asp

Let me give you a few excerpts:

To quote an old proverb, "Though the boys throw stones at the frogs in sport, the frogs die in earnest." Just because the people playing D&D think they are playing a game doesn't mean that the evil spirits (who ARE very real) will regard it as a game. If you are doing rituals or saying spells that invite them into your life, then they will come-believe me!

Now, the question becomes—if a person "innocently" works an authentic ritual that conjures up a demon, or curses someone; thinking that they are only playing a game-might not the ritual still have efficacy? I think we know the answer to that question.

Ugghhhh

[Quasar]

Creaphis said:

I shouldn't have read that tract while sick. It just brought my headache back to full strength.

An article linked to on that page also warrants skimming:

http://www.chick.com/articles/dnd.asp

Let me give you a few excerpts:
...
Ugghhhh

I had a "friend" in high school try to tell me that DOOM and Final Fantasy VII were "gateways to Satanism and summoning real demons." I told him I didn't believe that kind of hooey, and I was still nominally Christian at that point. I would probably be even less polite now ;)

[myk]

TSR was bought over by people who were willing to pay attention to the groups behind those pamphlets. Thus they removed hell, demons and devils from D&D (they "listened to the angry moms") and also degraded the creative quality of the games. These new owners were basically people who didn't give a shit about games, as opposed to Gygax who was one of the original creators. Not surprisingly the company went bankrupt eventually.

fraggle said:
Note that most Christian churches specifically say the exact opposite, ie. that "you are not saved by works but by believing in Jesus". Presumably this gives the religion better survival characteristics, because it encourages people to devote more time to it.

More like religion dedicates itself to matters of revelation because reasoned knowledge is the sphere of science. Works are material actions and are bound to the person's judgment, and God is supposed to be more than that. If religion is tied to works, then it must get deeply involved in politics. I don't think it encourages people to devote more time to it, but it does tend to not get in the way of the current material development of humanity.

[Creaphis]

Quasar said:

I had a "friend" in high school try to tell me that DOOM and Final Fantasy VII were "gateways to Satanism and summoning real demons." I told him I didn't believe that kind of hooey, and I was still nominally Christian at that point. I would probably be even less polite now ;)

Exactly - it's utter nonsense. I mean, everybody knows that the only way you can summon demons is with failed portal experiments.

[ReFracture]

Quasar said:

I had a "friend" in high school try to tell me that DOOM and Final Fantasy VII were "gateways to Satanism and summoning real demons." I told him I didn't believe that kind of hooey, and I was still nominally Christian at that point. I would probably be even less polite now ;)

What a load of crap.

[GreyGhost]

Creaphis said:

Exactly - it's utter nonsense. I mean, everybody knows that the only way you can summon demons is with failed portal experiments.

I disagree - claiming tax deductions you're not entitled to will summon some very foul beasts. :(

[geekmarine]

God I hate Jack Chick. Seriously, I'd love to just punch the guy, followed by a hearty "FUCK YOU!" My ultimate hope is, though, that if it turns out there really is something to this whole religion business, that there's a special place in Hell reserved for him. It'd be great - he'd be confused as hell, and Satan'd probably give him a high five for so thoroughly perverting the message of the Bible.