america's atheists: stupid?
this newsweek poll is pretty dated - it's from march, 2007. how did it slip through our radar?
among the usual questions about bush, iraq, and the presidential hopefuls, questions 12 through 22 deal with religion. worthy of note:
- when asked "Which one of the following statements come closest to your views about the origin and development of human beings?", 27% of atheists/agnostics said god guided the process and 13% said god created it in its present form. at least 40% of atheists/agnostics apparently don't know what "atheist" or "agnostic" means.
- when asked "Do you think the scientific theory of evolution is well-supported by evidence and widely accepted within the scientific community?", 18% of atheists/agnostics said evolution was horseshit.
- big surprise: 26% of americans believe someone can't be a "moral person" if they're an atheist.
- still, the godless, making up 10% of the population, could take out all the rest of non-christianity (5%) in a fight and have plenty of juice left for the mormons(2% despite their myriad children)
Labels: religion
posted by the cold cowboy @ 2:01 PM
3 Comments:
technically, if that 40 percent is all agnostic, then they can in fact still know what agnostic means. The agnostic label includes all who are unsure and question and will not claim that they have or know all the answers about the Sacred.
if you believe that "god guided the process", it's an implicit belief that god exists.
my understanding of the term is perhaps provincial and non-academic but somewhat widely accepted:
1. One who believes that it is impossible to know whether there is a God.
2. One who is skeptical about the existence of God but does not profess true atheism.
the belief that "god guided" something or other is ridiculous if you believe it is "impossible to know" there's a god or if you are skeptical about its existence.
i'm not even sure aliens exist, but i can tell you they came to help build the pyramids.
interesting that we both see our own definition as supported by your link. I think that there's something to be noted in personal perspective and bias.
The term God is problematic, as is this survey and it's way of framing questions. I know a number of people who would not claim to believe that there is a "god" as defined by organized religion, but who would likely answer the question about in the same manner because they thing that 'something greater' (defined in a multiplicity of ways) affected the world's existence. It's certainly not something 10 multiple choice questions could fully define.
More importantly, I've heard lots of Americans say things like your last sentence and not realize that they are contradicting themselves and are totally ridiculous.
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