by breakfast of champions 173 Replies latest jw friends
BTS - I know that critical thinking skills are great, but for goodness sake I was just being sarcastic. Kindly remove yourself from your own arse and don't forget to wipe on your way out.
What the survey shows, if anything, is that where culture, the need for group identity and religion are tightly intwined then people tend to identify with the religion in which they were raised. Who would have thought?
Yes, Gerogetown is known for being a university with very weak academic standards. So is Pew, for that matter.
But seriously.
What sort of hypotheses do we have for this -- I am actualy quite surprised to see it is so low?
Many atheists attend church and are members of churches, in my experience.
BTS - I know that critical thinking skills are great, but for goodness sake I was just being sarcastic. Kindly remove yourself from your own arse and don't forget to wipe on your way out.
Nice.
Perhaps I should bump this old thread of mine for newer folks. It received a number of interesting responses.
http://www.jehovahs-witness.net/jw/friends/190395/1/Ex-Atheists-What-Changed-Your-Mind
BTS - If you are to explain the atheist figures you also have to address the other stats in the survey. It is not a straw man. My comment was harsh so I apologise. Note to self. Think then post don't post then think.
Yes the sarcastic, caustic remarks are starting to fly!
What sort of hypotheses do we have for this
Its a survey of Americans. In god you trust.
Here is the problem with trying to pin-down beliefs. We are constantly taking in new information and evaluating our beliefs. Our beliefs change over time. Society, the way we were brought up, a need for self-identity and identifying with a group, and the list goes on, all influence our beliefs. Our beliefs/lack of beliefs may not even be that strong, we've just never questioned them.
How many active JWs only remain so for sake of family, and not for belief? How many identify as Catholic, Jewish, Protestant, Hindu, etc. based on culture and not on belief? How many atheists claim to belong to no religion, yet have a wide variety of beliefs ranging from spirit-worlds, ghosts, to supernatural phenomena and re-incarnation?
I think an interesting statistic to show would be who is practicing the religion and personally ask the person what they believe, not who they identify with. You might get an interesting answer.
Why don't born-in atheists (for lack of a better term) remain atheists? That would be something to ask them. Perhaps they can't identify with other atheists, given atheists can have such a wide variety of beliefs in the after-life and the here-and-now. There isn't anything particularly unifying about being an atheist, unless you were born in a certain religion, and then proceeded to reject it (obviously like a lot of us here). You will most likely identify with that particular set of individuals, because you would share a common experience.
BTS - If you are to explain the atheist figures you also have to address the other stats in the survey. It is not a straw man. My comment was harsh so I apologise. Note to self. Think then post don't post then think.
Now apologize to me for Mahon's law.
Back to topic: Did anybody ever consider that this may merely reflect on the fact that Athiests are far less demanding upon their children that they follow their parents religious preference?
If that is a factor, then the JWs really look terrible - as they slavishly demand that the children never consider any other religious course of behavior.
