Are atheists more intelligent than religious believers? Study suggests such a correlation

reply to post by TurkeyBurgers


Exactly! There's no more to be said, some people's viewpoints cannot be swayed, and are hardened.

I found by searching, and the search is what it's all about, but sometimes when you seek, you find, and that can only be a personal experience. One cannot "prove" the colour red to a blind person, or a computer. Observing self and subjective experience (qualia) are inseparable from consciousness, but one thing is certain, the human being is more than a mere machine, and the human brain, more than just a computer, and reality itself, infinitely deeper than what meets the eye and perception from a purely materialist realist perspective. That's a limited viewpoint, a narrow, largely ego-based view, a dead view.

So leave the dead to bury their dead, and why would a believer continue to try to sway the steadfast atheist. Knock the dust from your shoes and move ON.

On some issues, ya just have to agree to disagree.

It's been nice however to reveal to the atheists that believers can be scientifically minded people, and that even religion is not what many ASS U ME it is, based on nothing more than a contempuous bias, prior to investigation.

reply to post by badmedia

You think because they study the probabilitiy field at a single smaller point that the effect doesn't happen within all atoms around you at the same time?

Is this your response to my statement that 'there is no sense in which a probability field comprises a set of real events'?

It seems you have misunderstood the sentence. It has nothing to do with scale. It means that the range of probabilities within a field is not a set of real events; it is a set of potentials that one such event will occur.

Do you often have trouble seeing things in a bigger light?

The biggest light around here is the sun, and I rarely have trouble seeing things in broad daylight. Oh, I see, this is a rhetorical question. Sorry!

Choices only determine the path, they are not actual dimensions in themselves.

If you agree with me that choices are not dimensions, why did you write this -

But, when you look at the wave of particles rather than the single particle, what you are doing is viewing the nearest dimensions/possibilities.

- in one of those posts on another thread you referred me to?

Thanks for the giggles.

Any time.

Have you ever read a choose your own adventure book?

I write books, which is the same kind of thing, only better. What was your point?

[edit on 31/7/09 by Astyanax]

Yeah, but it's proven that religous people, people that pray regulary, are more stress-free than those that don't.

reply to post by makinho21


All human beings possess the same level of intelligence, but it's spread out in most people or it's the kind of intelligence that is not particularly useful in the mainstream world. Intelligence measurements are totally biased in that respect. Everybody has something they're really good at. It doesn't matter if you're a quantum mechanic or an auto mechanic. You're good at something. Religious people know a lot about mythology. Atheists know a lot about science. If they don't, then they're probably more middle-of-the-road in their beliefs. You'd have to know a lot about something before you put a lot of faith into it. Everybody else is taking someone's word for it.

reply to post by Republican08


Starred!

I agree with you 100%. We are greatly held back by religious views and beliefs. What was mentioned there about people with lower IQ's are more easily persuaded by religious viewsand beliefs realy makes sense to me.

Originally posted by Crying-Lightning
Yeah, but it's proven that religous people, people that pray regulary, are more stress-free than those that don't.

That's rubbish. My grandmother was a devout catholic, she used to pray thrice daily and was a VERY stressed woman.

Originally posted by mr-lizard

Originally posted by Crying-Lightning
Yeah, but it's proven that religous people, people that pray regulary, are more stress-free than those that don't.

That's rubbish. My grandmother was a devout catholic, she used to pray thrice daily and was a VERY stressed woman.

Well, that's you gradma, I'm talking about people in general. Like, people might be proven more intelligent athiests, but that doesn't mean there's not one single religous person who's smarter than someone who's so dumb, they don't even know how to pray. ^_^

Originally posted by badmedia
A real and actual choice can't be made without (free will). If all is a matter of causality, and all of existence is linear then choice is in itself not possible.

Glory be, he's actually starting to get it!

Getting AI to make a "choice" based on causality and determinism isn't hard. I just realize that it's not a real choice.

It is a real choice. It is not a free choice. There are no free choices. There is no such thing as free will.

Freewill is the base of intelligence. If it doesn't have freewill then intelligence is impossible, because it has no choice in the matter of it's perception.

Good grief.

First, what the dickens has perception to do with intelligence? Is a blind man automatically less intelligent than a sighted man? A deaf woman the intellectual inferior of one who can hear?

Second, What the blue blazes has choice to do with perception? We don't choose what to perceive, except in the rather bathetic sense of choosing to take a holiday in Egypt so as to be able to perceive the Pyramids, or closing our ears because we're afraid to hear the truth when someone tells it.

Third, how is it intelligent to choose not to perceive something? Sounds pretty stupid to me.

When free will is given away in such a manner, you agree to certain rules and laws, from that of a card game, to the laws of physics.

You agree to the laws of physics?

You had a choice?

Okay, free spirit: if you have agreed to be bound by the laws of physics, you can surely abrogate the agreement. Sign a notarized statement to the effect that you are no longer bound by the law of gravity. Now jump off the top of a very high building.

Doesn't it feel great to be walking on air?

*

Free will is an illusion. There is no rational decision you can make that is independent of your genes, your personal history and the circumstances of the moment. You cannot change any of those factors, therefore you cannot change the decision except (perhaps) in some irrational way. So where's the free choice? You think you're making a willed choice; it feels free; but in fact you are bound tight in the grip of the foreordained.

Nevertheless, your foreordained choice will often produce the results you seek from it. So you do have the power of choice and the power to affect events in the real world - what you don't have is the freedom to will otherwise than you do.

I feel for you, my friend, in your anxiety and confusion. Getting rid of God is traumatic enough - no more eternal life for wee little lambs, no reward for virtue or punishment of its opposite, no Big Daddy Up Above to go running to (or deluding yourself you're a part of) when you're sick and scared and in trouble. It's almost as hard giving up smoking... But getting rid of God is a piece of cake compared with giving the soul its marching orders. Credit for all the hard work you put in at IT school or Outward Bound camp or ballet class - gone. Self-esteem for being honest, honourable, courteous, charitable, kind - gone. Responsibility for oneself and others - gone. Kudos for giving up smoking (and God) - vanished. Anything you ever flattered yourself was an achievement, any act you ever felt guilt or remorse about - all of it reduced to crashing inevitability.

In their absence, your demoted consciousness has got to come to terms with the fact that you are what you are, not what you aspire to be; and though what it is - what you are - may be subject to change and you yourself may well be instrumental or at least heavily implicated in those changes, you do not and cannot will them. Humbling stuff.

Why believe this? Why accept such a bleak (at least, that's how it looks at first sight) view of human nature? Very simply, because it is the truth. The evidence from neuroscience and psychology, built up over the last twenty years or so, just keeps adding up - solid, irrefutable. And the thing about accepting, internalizing and acting on the truth is that it sets you free. Jesus was right about that, if about nothing else.

You may not accept what we're telling you now, but you will, believe me, you will.

You don't have a choice. You never had.

Originally posted by Astyanax
Is this your response to my statement that 'there is no sense in which a probability field comprises a set of real events'?

It seems you have misunderstood the sentence. It has nothing to do with scale. It means that the range of probabilities within a field is not a set of real events; it is a set of potentials that one such event will occur.

No, it seems you are incapable of looking at things from any other perspective than your own. It seems you are incapable of even trying to take an honest look at another perspective.

As established, a random number is not possible in a world of casuality. Thus, "probability" as you claim suggests chances, chance suggests randomness, and that is not true.

The only way you can get such things is due to lack of knowledge. And the lack of knowledge itself can give the illusion of chance, probablitiy and so forth. Once again, a poker game is a good example of this. Because we do not know all the cards, we rely on things like probablity, odds and chance.

But I am not looking at those things in the same perspective. Rather than looking at things in the limited "now", I am looking at things over periods of "time", in which case there is no probabilty because the "unknown" factor is gone. I'm looking at it from the perspective of after the hand is played and all the factors are known.

If you agree with me that choices are not dimensions, why did you write this -

But, when you look at the wave of particles rather than the single particle, what you are doing is viewing the nearest dimensions/possibilities.

- in one of those posts on another thread you referred me to?

If you ever elevate your perspective to beyond the "now", then you would know. I am looking at things in more of a timeline, rather than now. In the "now" you have change, you have limited perspective, and you get "probablity" and "possiblities". But it's not the reality of it.

Start at Point A in a room, any point can be point A. Now, walk across the room. Where you stop is Point B. Now, rather than looking at where you were at any point in time there, imagine you are in all those places at once. This is how I am looking at things when I say that, but I'm not just looking at even that 1 single path you took, but all possibilities you could have choosen. The one which became reality was the one you choose.

You see a single linear reality, and I don't.

Have you ever read a choose your own adventure book?

I write books, which is the same kind of thing, only better. What was your point?

What does it matter what the point was if you refuse to answer the question, and avoid it? Does you writing books have anything to do with the question? No.

No, Athiest are not more intelligent.

en.wikipedia.org...

Beginnings of modern science
www.christianity.co.nz...

The Scientific 100:
A Ranking of the Most Influential Scientists, Past and Present
www.adherents.com...

Which one of us on this fourm can hold a candle to any of these great scientist, for that matter how many new scientist can hold a candle to them, today?

Ancient mankind saw no distinction between a priest or a prophet, or a scribe, or a astronomer or an astrologer.

Curiosity and imagination.

My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.



[edit on 123131p://bFriday2009 by Stormdancer777]

Dr. Francis S. Collins is Director of the National Human Genome Research Institute at the National Institute of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. He currently leads the Human Genome Project, directed at mapping and sequencing all of human DNA, and determining aspects of its function. His previous research has identified the genes responsible for cystic fibrosis, neurofibromatosis, Huntington's disease and Hutchison-Gilford progeria syndrome. He is a member of the Institute of Medicine and the National Academy of Sciences. For the rest of his credentials, click on the link here: www.genome.gov... Collins spoke with Bob Abernethy of PBS, posted online at www.pbs.org... in which he summaries the compatability of fact and faith thusly:

"I think there's a common assumption that you cannot both be a rigorous, show-me-the-data scientist and a person who believes in a personal God. I would like to say that from my perspective that assumption is incorrect; that, in fact, these two areas are entirely compatible and not only can exist within the same person, but can exist in a very synthetic way, and not in a compartmentalized way. I have no reason to see a discordance between what I know as a scientist who spends all day studying the genome of humans and what I believe as somebody who pays a lot of attention to what the Bible has taught me about God and about Jesus Christ. Those are entirely compatible views.

"Science is the way -- a powerful way, indeed -- to study the natural world. Science is not particularly effective -- in fact, it's rather ineffective -- in making commentary about the supernatural world. Both worlds, for me, are quite real and quite important. They are investigated in different ways. They coexist. They illuminate each other. And it is a great joy to be in a position of being able to bring both of those points of view to bear in any given day of the week. The notion that you have to sort of choose one or the other is a terrible myth that has been put forward, and which many people have bought into without really having a chance to examine the evidence. I came to my faith not, actually, in a circumstance where it was drummed into me as a child, which people tend to assume of any scientist who still has a personal faith in God; but actually by a series of compelling, logical arguments, many of them put forward by C. S. Lewis, that got me to the precipice of saying, 'Faith is actually plausible.' You still have to make that step. You will still have to decide for yourself whether to believe. But you can get very close to that by intellect alone."

www.tektonics.org...

Scientists of the Christian Faith -- Alphabetical Index

www.tektonics.org...

www.tektonics.org...

I actually think we are getting dumber because of lack of the things of the spirit.

Notice this statement,

I came to my faith not, actually, in a circumstance where it was drummed into me as a child, which people tend to assume of any scientist who still has a personal faith in God; but actually by a series of compelling, logical arguments, many of them put forward by C. S. Lewis, that got me to the precipice of saying, 'Faith is actually plausible.' You still have to make that step. You will still have to decide for yourself whether to believe. But you can get very close to that by intellect alone."

Faith was not forced upon him.

[edit on 123131p://bFriday2009 by Stormdancer777]

Originally posted by TurkeyBurgers
Well at least Bad Media is Intelligent enough to create very good arguments! I guess this proves that Atheists and NOT more intelligent than religious believers! MYTH BUSTED! We are equal! Lets roll on to the next thread!

I was thinking the same thing.

Originally posted by Astyanax
It is a real choice. It is not a free choice. There are no free choices. There is no such thing as free will.

IF the choice is predetermined by causality, then there is no choice. This is about like saying the unknown card on the top of the deck of cards - which has a probability of being any card due to it's unknown, has a choice in what the next card will be.

Sorry, can't have your cake and eat it too. If you want to liken things to being of this world, then you will be subject to the same principles of this world.

Part of free will is the ability to give it away, which we do in order to gain certain experiences. Same thing as when you agree to play a poker game. You agree to be subject to the rules of the poker game in order to have the experience. If the cards were all placed face up, then probability and chance are not longer there at all. The hand is completely know, people would only bet on the hands they won, and the game as it is known is not possible.

First, what the dickens has perception to do with intelligence? Is a blind man automatically less intelligent than a sighted man? A deaf woman the intellectual inferior of one who can hear?

As the blind man lacks the perspective of sight, then he has no knowledge or intelligence towards what things look like. Same with the woman. And because you lack any perspective beyond this world and such, then trying to explain things beyond this world to you, is about like me trying to teach a blind man what the color blue is, or explaining to the deaf woman what a song sounds like.

I stated it before, but this thread has proven the bible right to me in a certain area. And that is that since you only see yourself as flesh the things I say is beyond your perception in the same way the color blue is beyond the perspective of the blind man.

Second, What the blue blazes has choice to do with perception? We don't choose what to perceive, except in the rather bathetic sense of choosing to take a holiday in Egypt so as to be able to perceive the Pyramids, or closing our ears because we're afraid to hear the truth when someone tells it.

According to you, choice is not real at all. How could have you picked anything other than the pre-determined outcome you get?

Third, how is it intelligent to choose not to perceive something? Sounds pretty stupid to me.

For the experience itself. Same as with a poker game. Only if you agree to the rules does the game exist. If the rules are no longer being applied, the game itself does not exist. As such, we purposely limit our perspectives in order to bring about the experience itself.

You agree to the laws of physics?

You had a choice?

Okay, free spirit: if you have agreed to be bound by the laws of physics, you can surely abrogate the agreement. Sign a notarized statement to the effect that you are no longer bound by the law of gravity. Now jump off the top of a very high building.

Doesn't it feel great to be walking on air?

To do such a thing is to change the experience itself. If I change the laws of physics in order to do such a thing, then it's the same thing as changing the rules of a poker game and playing with the cards face up. Change the rules, and you change the experience.

Free will is an illusion. There is no rational decision you can make that is independent of your genes, your personal history and the circumstances of the moment. You cannot change any of those factors, therefore you cannot change the decision except (perhaps) in some irrational way. So where's the free choice? You think you're making a willed choice; it feels free; but in fact you are bound tight in the grip of the foreordained.

And if you actually truly believed this, then you wouldn't be bothering to post towards me.

In many cases you are actually right, people are not actually making choices. In fact, that is the entire game on this planet, to take away peoples choice. Which is done with duality and manipulation. At which point those with power can introduce certain actions that bring about the reactions in the people they want. Meanwhile, the people believe they made a real choice, and they didn't. The choice was just an illusion.

And so the manipulation is there to influence and take away the choice. 9/11 was the action, and the people demanded the wanted reaction of 2 wars, and a loss of freedom in exchange for security.

In the bible it is said you are hated because you are not of this world, and this is what it is referring to. Because you do actually have choice, that choice has to be manipulated in order to give those who want power the power they seek.

A rocket is loved for the power it gives such things. It has no choice, it is based only on this world and casuality, and so we introduce the action and it reacts the way we want. Because of this, it gives us control over that, and that control equals power.

And so the manipulation exists to turn humans into that as well. They limit information, present information in only a certain way, use fear alot, and so they get people to react to the actions in the way they want, and that gives "them" control and power over people.

If freewill and choice did not exist, then there would be no need for the manipulation, as they would never choose otherwise anyway, and all is predetermined. You don't see them presenting news and such with spin to a rocket do you?

So you can fall for that kind of crap and such all you want. I know better.

Nevertheless, your foreordained choice will often produce the results you seek from it. So you do have the power of choice and the power to affect events in the real world - what you don't have is the freedom to will otherwise than you do.

What makes us different and seperate from this world and that rocket is our free will and choice. Where as that rocket has no choice, we are able - when we actually choose to use it, most don't - to rather than be simply action and reaction, but to reason, understand and put in the actions we want, which then create the reactions we want. The ability to do that is "power". It is why in the end, the people are the real authorities, but through manipulation and so forth, the people give away their free will and choice and they are turned into mindless robot like slaves of action and reaction, turning choice into an illusion between those with power(those who realize and use there choice), and those without(those subjected to the manipulation).

Have you ever heard the riddle - Can go create a rock he can not lift and still be all powerful. The answer is yes, because it is simply a choice. All you have to do is create the rule/law that the rock is not liftable, and then it will be bound to that law/rule. Being able to life that rock once again is simply a choice to change the law. Once again, part of free will is the ability to give it away, and that is given away in the case in the form of a law/rule in order to have the experience of a rock that can't be lifted.

I feel for you, my friend, in your anxiety and confusion. Getting rid of God is traumatic enough - no more eternal life for wee little lambs, no reward for virtue or punishment of its opposite, no Big Daddy Up Above to go running to (or deluding yourself you're a part of) when you're sick and scared and in trouble. It's almost as hard giving up smoking... But getting rid of God is a piece of cake compared with giving the soul its marching orders. Credit for all the hard work you put in at IT school or Outward Bound camp or ballet class - gone. Self-esteem for being honest, honourable, courteous, charitable, kind - gone. Responsibility for oneself and others - gone. Kudos for giving up smoking (and God) - vanished. Anything you ever flattered yourself was an achievement, any act you ever felt guilt or remorse about - all of it reduced to crashing inevitability.

In their absence, your demoted consciousness has got to come to terms with the fact that you are what you are, not what you aspire to be; and though what it is - what you are - may be subject to change and you yourself may well be instrumental or at least heavily implicated in those changes, you do not and cannot will them. Humbling stuff.

Why believe this? Why accept such a bleak (at least, that's how it looks at first sight) view of human nature? Very simply, because it is the truth. The evidence from neuroscience and psychology, built up over the last twenty years or so, just keeps adding up - solid, irrefutable. And the thing about accepting, internalizing and acting on the truth is that it sets you free. Jesus was right about that, if about nothing else.

You may not accept what we're telling you now, but you will, believe me, you will.

You don't have a choice. You never had.

This is a bunch of rubbish and is an insult. You haven't a freaking clue what you are talking about and are just going around making assumptions.

I will never accept what you say because I know better. I use to believe the way you do, until I realized I was ignorant to do so. That is the thing about people like you, who live in an Objective Reality. You can't accept or see any perspective but your own.

Sorry, but your entire position is foolish and you have no idea what you imply. What I know not only includes your reality, but much more. Why in the world would I want to reduce myself to such things? Because someone who lacks insight into things not included in their current perspective calls me names, or tries to ridicule me because they can't see what I'm saying, and thus arrogantly dismiss it as impossible?

Enjoy your box(objective reality)



[edit on 7/31/2009 by badmedia]

reply to post by Crying-Lightning


Is that proven?...I think there is a lot of speculation, and no doubt church leaders spout these "facts" as potential benefits of being religious; however, I have never seen a study or results from an experiment that support such a statement.
Most religious people I know are enthralled in the normal every day woes of life just like everyone else. Perhaps it is just another avenue to release stress - like yoga, or sports, or hiking or fishing, etc.

To me, the fact they must rely on non-religious attributes to backup religion is a huge red herring - they are appealing to emotion because they have no actual credible basis for believing their unjustified dogma.
Cheers

My hotel has wireless so I can actually join in now! Hurray (though I have missed the last 10 pages of this pretty much)

[edit on 31-7-2009 by makinho21]

[edit on 31-7-2009 by makinho21]

reply to post by OmegaPoint


I look for those who disagree with me, rather than those who agree with me. While I generally agree with you, I would honestly rather debate/discuss with them rather than you.

And that is nothing against you in anyway. Just that you don't need a carpenter after the house is already built.

In public it is generally a good idea to just keep your mouth shut. Because the person may want to harm you for that. Probably not a good idea to walk into a KKK rally and tell them all how stupid racism is. But don't really have to worry about such things on forums like this.

The study is very convincing... the LOWER THE RATE OF RELIGION in a country, the HIGHER THE IQ of the people! The conclusion is very interesting... saying the LOWER THE RATE OF RELIGION in a country, the HIGHER GDP PER CAPITA!
But why... the poorer the people, the more klingy to religion they are (which I can understand), or is it that religion makes people have a lesser IQ because it teaches people to ASK LESS QUESTIONS? I believe the latter!

reply to post by badmedia

IF the choice is predetermined by causality, then there is no choice.

I'm astonished at how unable you seem to be at distinguising between 'choice' and true-freedom. Even when the porcess in choosing is outlined and demonstraited to be linear, you keep pretending like it is the same thing as true-freedom and that that somehow negates the seen determined process of making choices.

reply to post by Welfhard


Choice infers the possibility of any of the available options being selected. Causality means that the other options had no chance of being selected, as they have no chance of being selected, they are not actually options.

The only way they become options is if we use a randomness to it, which is illogical, irrational and outside causality in itself.

reply to post by badmedia

Choice infers the possibility of any of the available options being selected.

"Possibility"
If you have a series of options all with a possibility of being true (i.e. the one fated outcome of a choice), all that means is that 1 is true and the rest are not - but you do not know which one.

3 cards are face down. 1 is queen and 2 are 10's. The "possibility" of either of the cards being the queen is 1/3. However you also know that despite each having a "possibility" of being the queen, 2 are not the queen.

That means 2 10's each with a perceived possibility of being something they are not.

When it comes to choices and options, not knowing the outcome makes "possibility" (or rather, uncertainty) appear. upon which we make choices. That is why freewill, is only apparent, but it vanishes with the uncertainty.

Choice =/= True-freedom (aka freewill)

[edit on 31-7-2009 by Welfhard]

reply to post by Welfhard


Now you are simply using the lack of knowledge to produce probability, which is what I have said numerous times is why the pseudo-random numbers we use in programs are "random" enough for the purposes we use them for, even though in reality they are not actually random numbers at all.

It is the same exact reason we give away our free will and subject ourselves to the rules/laws of a poker game, in order to have the experience.

In reality, the probability you speak of is simply an illusion, and the card that is the queen is pre-slated to be what it is already.

You had to purposely remove knowledge from the subject in order to get that so called probablity.

This limited knowledge you speak of is the entire father/son relationship. The father is all knowing. In order to have this experience, you must limit the perception/knowledge and give away the free will, and subject yourself to these rules. In the exact same manner as your example and the card game.

While under those conditions and in the son perspective as we are now, you are within the Objective Reality. And while in that Objective Reality, Science is king. However, when you begin to question that object reality and you start to realize the above, you start to realize it is merely a single experience and an illusion in itself, and a reality within an unlimited number of possibilities. And then you start to realize the single Objective Reality you know is simply a lower level of a much bigger reality.

This is why you are called a son of god. The father who is all knowing, purposely limits that knowledge and perception and becomes the son. The father and son are 1 in the same, the only different is the perception. Thus, why Jesus "is" god, but at the same time says the father is much greater than he is. Because Jesus is in the limited perception needed for this illusionary reality, but the father is that which knows all.

It's why people who have NDE's and things of that nature always talk about a point they can't cross. The reason they can't cross is because if they do, the limited knowledge required for this experience will be gone, and "you" in your current state will cease to exist, as "you" and "your" experience is created from that limited knowledge.

Because all is known, there is no such things as "time" or "change" for the father, because there is nothing new that can happen in his perspective. But being all knowing means one must know all possibilities. And so it is within that field of all possibilities that you are given free will.

Like I keep saying, the father looks at the entire movie film, but the son watches the movie.

Time is simply the movement of 1 "frame" to the next. Your path appears linear across all those possibilities because in your perspective you only ever see the possibility chosen and made real.

If all possibilities do not exist, then free will does not exist. But is it just coincidence that quantum physics and such is coming up and starting to say that all possibilities do exist? Not at all IMO.

In your example, in order for that to be a real "choice", it means that you need 9 seperate realities, in which each of the 3 cards appear in each possible order. 3 really, since 2 of them are the same card, but I think the point is clear.

So you just proved if yourself. You just proved the son perspective, the Objective reality. Now start to look beyond that, and maybe you can start to the see that the Objective reality is just a smaller reality within a much larger possibility of realities. And that the objective reality is merely based on a chosen set of laws/rules while under the limited perspective in order to gain an experience.

Don't look at the single particle, look at the wave.