Atheists a minority?

[_DrW]

if you are going to "break out" Mormonism from Christianity then you must do likewise with atheists from Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist, otherwise your assertions are flawed and illogical.

What?
This is an odd assertion, especially in light of what you said next. (As stated, Mormons were "broken out" by me to provide an relative idea of the contribution of Mormonism to Christianity in terms of numbers.)

Besides, is not the point of the argument about only 2 groups? religious versus non-religious, of which there are only 2 ranks...1st to religious....2nd to non-religious, and the latter, historically, suffers; so logically speaking it is not beneficial to associate with them.

Again - what? If you bothered to look at the plotted data from the 137 country study above, then I honestly do not understand what you are trying to say starting with your second sentence here. Perhaps you could re-phrase.

[_subgenius]

..... insert summary of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religiosit ... ef_and_I.Q here....

i am not familiar with the BYU study you mention.
you still fail to recognize the flawed assumptions you are making.

By implication you are making the following argument.
Scientists are smart
More scientists are atheist
All Atheists are smart

You also fail to recognize that many universities may promote atheism and provide propaganda against religion, as is supported by the Lynn, Harvey, Nyburg study/graph you cite above (i suggest you read that study rather than cut/paste the graph). The support comes from the idea that when they correlated IQ with percentage of religious it seemed that some countries did not agree with the lineal correlation. For example, Cuba and Vietnam did not correlate with the expected IQ ranking considering their low rate of religion. This was attributed to the well documented by these communistic countries having intense atheistic and anti-religious propaganda. Communism is very fashionable in academics, ain't it? Now consider history, the more educated people from most of history were likely religious (ie Dante, Shakespeare, etc..) and likely the education system they encountered was administered by the Church which i would gather served up a contrary propaganda than Cuba or Vietnam. Either way, an argument could made that Das Kapital is a sacred text tantamount to the Bible.
Even the United States, according to your cited study, has an incredibly low population of "atheists" considering the overall high IQ of our nation. Clearly, we do not, according to your data and premise, have enough atheists in the United States to be as intelligent as we actually are.
All in all, it seems that the only correlation being made is that skepticism leads to greater intelligence, and i would agree, because i am certainly skeptical of your premise, logic, and reasoning....but wait i am religious, how can i possibly be skeptical, right?

[_subgenius]

What?
This is an odd assertion, especially in light of what you said next. (As stated, Mormons were "broken out" by me to provide an relative idea of the contribution of Mormonism to Christianity in terms of numbers.)

i was speaking to the idea that you show relative rankings but fail to show where atheists, alone, would rank. If you break-out Mormons then break-out atheists and place them on the list as an individual group...see if their subtraction would re-position the ranking of Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist from #4 to another #. To say, What is the contribution of Atheists to the Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist group in terms of numbers.

Again - what? If you bothered to look at the plotted data from the 137 country study above, then I honestly do not understand what you are trying to say starting with your second sentence here. Perhaps you could re-phrase.

i actually took the time to read the study, i suggest you do the same. But, the original point of departure for this discussion was not about christian, buddhism, pagan, etc...but rather the idea of how communities and societies have, historically, treated non-religious individuals and groups.

[_DrW]

i am not familiar with the BYU study you mention.
you still fail to recognize the flawed assumptions you are making.

By implication you are making the following argument.
Scientists are smart
More scientists are atheist
All Atheists are smart

If you think that this reflects my arguments on this thread, then you need to go back and re-read the thread.

I have not even mentioned scientists on this thread (let alone claiming that they are smart). Nor I have not mentioned on this thread that atheists and agnostics (non-believers) constitute a higher percentage of the population of professional scientists than of the the general population of the US (which is true). And I have certainly never claimed (on this thread or elsewhere) that all atheists are smart.

So before we continue the discussion, perhaps you can demonstrate that you understand what is being discussed on this thread and that you know what I actually have said.

Alternatively, we could just go back to the OP and start again by my asking if you believe that there are more believing Mormons in the US than there are non-believing atheists, especially keeping in mind that less than half the Mormons in the US are active in the Church.

by the way, you might just be surprised at how many LDS Church -attending Mormons are actually atheists. It appears that when folks finally figure out that Mormonism is a massive fraud, they pretty much give up on religion in general and become non-believers. Many of these folks, however, continue to attend Church for the sake of their families and for purely social reasons.

[_subgenius]

.....So before we continue the discussion, perhaps you can demonstrate that you understand what is being discussed on this thread and that you know what I actually have said.

ummmmm. that atheists are "more intelligent" than religious people? to which i have asserted that conclusion is unsupported by facts, and that the "intelligence" of atheists may be in question by their rather haphazard social alignment, given the history of how that group is treated.

Alternatively, we could just go back to the OP and start again by my asking if you believe that there are more believing Mormons in the US than there are non-believing atheists, especially keeping in mind that less than half the Mormons in the US are active in the Church.

Alternative to what? alternative stuff that is meaningful?

by the way, you might just be surprised at how many LDS Church -attending Mormons are actually atheists.

probably not. its probably a lot less, if at all, than you are assuming....yes, assuming.

It appears that when folks finally figure out that Mormonism is a massive fraud, they pretty much give up on religion in general and become non-believers.

appears where? the fantasy of your logic? It also appears that when an atheist finally figures out that atheism is a self-centered masturbatory exercise with no redeeming value they pretty much give up on selfishness and join the LDS church.

Many of these folks, however, continue to attend Church for the sake of their families and for purely social reasons.

of course they do, thanks for keeping your finger on the pulse of all these subtle demographics and insights into behavior. Of course, many people refuse to openly admit they believe in God, even though they do not attend church. Wow, i like your way of randomly drawing conclusions and promoting it as real substance.

[_Buffalo]

ummmmm. that atheists are "more intelligent" than religious people? to which i have asserted that conclusion is unsupported by facts, and that the "intelligence" of atheists may be in question by their rather haphazard social alignment, given the history of how that group is treated.

It must be nice to pretend that the facts you find disagreeable don't exist.

Still, are you really going to argue that it would be more intelligent for atheists to drop their position in order to have a more favorable place in society? Does the same hold true for Mormons? Or for second century Christians?

[_DrW]

.....So before we continue the discussion, perhaps you can demonstrate that you understand what is being discussed on this thread and that you know what I actually have said.

ummmmm. that atheists are "more intelligent" than religious people? to which i have asserted that conclusion is unsupported by facts, and that the "intelligence" of atheists may be in question by their rather haphazard social alignment, given the history of how that group is treated.

Alternatively, we could just go back to the OP and start again by my asking if you believe that there are more believing Mormons in the US than there are non-believing atheists, especially keeping in mind that less than half the Mormons in the US are active in the Church.

Alternative to what? alternative stuff that is meaningful?

by the way, you might just be surprised at how many LDS Church -attending Mormons are actually atheists.

probably not. its probably a lot less, if at all, than you are assuming....yes, assuming.

It appears that when folks finally figure out that Mormonism is a massive fraud, they pretty much give up on religion in general and become non-believers.

appears where? the fantasy of your logic? It also appears that when an atheist finally figures out that atheism is a self-centered masturbatory exercise with no redeeming value they pretty much give up on selfishness and join the LDS church.

Many of these folks, however, continue to attend Church for the sake of their families and for purely social reasons.

of course they do, thanks for keeping your finger on the pulse of all these subtle demographics and insights into behavior. Of course, many people refuse to openly admit they believe in God, even though they do not attend church. Wow, i like your way of randomly drawing conclusions and promoting it as real substance.

From your responses so far on this page of the thread, and the fact that you are directly attributing to me things that I clearly did not say (or even come close to saying) on this thread, it is pretty clear that either:

you don't understand what is being discussed,
or
you have no reasonable or logical response to the evidence that I have provided,
or
you would simply rather make silly statements of belief than try to hold any kind of discussion.

In any case, this will be my last response to you on this thread. Perhaps Buffalo or someone else has the patience to figure out what you are trying to say or to play your silly games.

Have a nice long weekend.

[_jon]

On the whole atheism seems to be a sensible position based on the factual and evidentiary information available to mankind.

Plus it's 10% cheaper than Mormonism...

[_joshua_voss]

Many of these folks, however, continue to attend Church for the sake of their families and for purely social reasons.

of course they do, thanks for keeping your finger on the pulse of all these subtle demographics and insights into behavior. Of course, many people refuse to openly admit they believe in God, even though they do not attend church. Wow, i like your way of randomly drawing conclusions and promoting it as real substance.

FYI subgenius - I am an atheist and have been for many years, yet I have never stopped attending the LDS church. I even pay some tithing. I attend as a concession to my believing wife.

Just a sample size of one, I know, but there are a few others in my area like me.

Josh

[_just me]

FYI subgenius - I am an atheist and have been for many years, yet I have never stopped attending the LDS church. I even pay some tithing. I attend as a concession to my believing wife.

Just a sample size of one, I know, but there are a few others in my area like me.

Josh

There are several on this board in a similar situation as you.

Welcome Old Testament the board.