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U.S.: How religious is your state?

Norman Alexander said:
There are plenty of religious non-Christians in the USA. They don't all live in the traditional Christian states. In fact, in many cases they might wish to avoid them. Therefore you would expect some bias away from the utterly predictable stats this report gives.
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For some values of "plenty". The studies I've seen, including the one used in wikipedia, typically identify a fraction of 4-5%.

Religion in the United States - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

Popular imagination tends to exaggerate vastly the number of practising Muslims here (it's around 1%). All indications I see are: around 90% of folks in the U.S. who identify as religious at all, identify as some form of Christian. Significant differences in the degree of religiosity from state to state are overwhelmingly likely to stem from differences in the number of people who identify as Christian. Other religions just aren't big enough to move the needle that much.
 
Reformed Offlian said:
For some values of "plenty". The studies I've seen, including the one used in wikipedia, typically identify a fraction of 4-5%.

Religion in the United States - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

Popular imagination tends to exaggerate vastly the number of practising Muslims here (it's around 1%). All indications I see are: around 90% of folks in the U.S. who identify as religious at all, identify as some form of Christian. Significant differences in the degree of religiosity from state to state are overwhelmingly likely to stem from differences in the number of people who identify as Christian. Other religions just aren't big enough to move the needle that much.
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Would you identify yourself as a socially persecuted religion in a society that has guns?
 
One interesting claim I heard on a podcast years ago is that while Americans are more likely than Europeans to claim that they are religious, in practice they aren't much more religious than Europeans (maybe not more religious at all). This conclusion was reached by comparing results of surveys versus activity logs. Ask an American if he regularly attends church and he'll say yes. He probably even believes he's a regular churchgoer. But have him just keep a log of his activities for a couple months, and it turns out he's no more devout than the European who just admits up front that he doesn't bother much with church.
 
Norman Alexander said:
Would you identify yourself as a socially persecuted religion in a society that has guns?
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One basically has two options here: 1) base conclusions on available evidence; 2) guess.

Both options have their limitations. I leave it as an exercise for the reader which option has the more serious ones.
 
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theprestige said:
One interesting claim I heard on a podcast years ago is that while Americans are more likely than Europeans to claim that they are religious, in practice they aren't much more religious than Europeans (maybe not more religious at all). This conclusion was reached by comparing results of surveys versus activity logs. Ask an American if he regularly attends church and he'll say yes. He probably even believes he's a regular churchgoer. But have him just keep a log of his activities for a couple months, and it turns out he's no more devout than the European who just admits up front that he doesn't bother much with church.
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I'm sure you've heard lots of interesting claims on podcasts. I know I have.
 
theprestige said:
Probably the most soulless, godless place in the country, no matter what the survey says.
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Well, since there is neither thing, they're hitting on all cylinders. But if you want to go with evil, well, Trump and his vile minions are there.
 
Define Religious
JayUtah said:
What!? Utah ranks only #6? I'm shocked!

Well, no, not that shocked. You think of Mormons when you think of Utah, appropriately enough. But only around 40% of the Utah population identifies as Mormon. And paradoxically you find a lot more lapsed and disaffected Mormons here, mostly because they were just brought up that way culturally but never had strong faith in it.
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Then there are the California Mormons..who are no much diffeent then Utah Mormons in many ways....

I would love to see how they define religion in that poll.
=
 
arthwollipot said:
I'd like to see the overlap between this and education levels.
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You might be surprised. Many highly educated people have religious beliefs.
Of course, althugh I am skeptic non believer when it comes to religion, i don;t have hate and loathing for it that somepeople here have.
My general attitude is live and let live; you leave me alone and I will leave you along. But the religious right will not let me alone........
 
dudalb said:
You might be surprised. Many highly educated people have religious beliefs.
Of course, althugh I am skeptic non believer when it comes to religion, i don;t have hate and loathing for it that somepeople here have.
My general attitude is live and let live; you leave me alone and I will leave you along. But the religious right will not let me alone........
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My question is what are they educated in? Almost certainly not in the sciences. More than 90% of the members of the National Academy of Sciences don't believe in a god.

I loath religion it because it is anti-science and anti-logic. And it has been responsible for more death and obscene behavior than almost all human ideologies. The Abrahamic religions are disgusting. And absurd. Talking snakes, talking donkeys, talking trees, zombies walking the streets, humans magically turning into salt. The sound of horns knocking down stone walls. Jonah living three days in a whale.

Samson kills thousand of Palestinians with a jaw bone of an ass. Netanyahu would thank him. He kills thousands more by tearing down a temple.

I know lots of wonderful people that are Christians. I have no animus towards them. But I give no quarter to a religion that tells us to stone homosexuals and brides that are not virgins. That says we should beat our children and stone them if they are unruly.
 
arthwollipot said:
Yes, but it doesn't necessarily go the other way. Many people with religious beliefs aren't highly educated.
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In fact, it is pretty much an indirect correlation. The more educated you are, the more likely one does not believe in a god.
 
acbytesla said:
My question is what are they educated in? Almost certainly not in the sciences. More than 90% of the members of the National Academy of Sciences don't believe in a god.
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About half of my scientific and technical staff are active Mormons. The only acrimony is our annual BYU vs. Utah Nerf gun battle.
 
JayUtah said:
About half of my scientific and technical staff are active Mormons. The only acrimony is our annual BYU vs. Utah Nerf gun battle.
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I didn't say they were acrimonius. But it is not like Mormons haven't abused non-believers.
 
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