Woot; atheists are smarter than agnostics

CFLarsen said:
Are religious believers capable of coming to the decision that their religious beliefs are rationally based?

No, they are not. If they were, they wouldn't be religious.

Are religious believers capable of coming to the decision that their religious beliefs are not rationally based?

Sure. That's why they are religious.
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Perhaps you should read a dictionary, because you seem to have a really weird definition of the word "capable".
 
LostAngeles said:
This just encourages me to rotate which box to select when I have to, "self-report," my race.

ETA: So just out of curiosity, when do we get the companion thread to this where you celebrate how smarter whites are?
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This is unfair; show me where I've celebrated it. evidence please.
 
ImaginalDisc said:
He already supports The Bell Curve, so I think that base is covered.
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"Supports the bell curve" is an odd phrase. I've never campaigned for it or donated it money.

Whatever opinions I have about race and IQ could be formed rationally even if the bell curve were never written.
 
Anakritis said:
Do you not see that it is your argument that is untenable?
What possible effect could those responses (from the mentally ill) have on a NORMALLY DISTRIBUTED POPULATION?
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It would help if you went back to see what the actual argument was about instead of making this false statement based on the incorrect assumption we are arguing about "NORMALLY DISTRIBUTED POPULATION"s.


The actual argument here: The claim was made the study was flawed because the IQs did not average out to 100.

JoeTheJuggler said:
Must've drawn their entire sample from Lake Woebegone. (Aren't IQ scores designed to put 100 at the mean and median?)
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wollery said:
What he said, how can the mean of all peoples' IQs be more than 100?
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EGarrett said:
Yeah, when you take all groups into account it should average out to 100.
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CFLarsen said:
Having "whites only" will still mean that the average score should be 100.

Unless it is argued that "whites" consistently score above 100, of course.
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These arguments are false for several reasons.

IQs are not that consistent from test to test or standard to standard.
The study did not look at "all people" it compared two groups within a sample.
It is not feasible, practical, nor relevant to include feces smearing non-verbal subjects in the sample in this study.

The argument is not about "a NORMALLY DISTRIBUTED POPULATION", nor are IQ tests ever that exact with the exception of the samples upon which the IQ measurements are calibrated. And that is only going to be exact because the range is calibrated on that subject group. Once a test is devised, validated and calibrated, it is then used on subsequent groups and the variability becomes apparent.
 
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If it is celebrated that atheists are smarter than agnostics, because atheists have higher IQs than agnostics, why isn't it celebrated that whites are smarter than blacks, because whites have higher IQs than blacks?

In other words: Why is it a good thing when atheists are smarter, but not a good thing when whites are smarter?
 
CFLarsen said:
In other words: Why is it a good thing when atheists are smarter, but not a good thing when whites are smarter?
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That you even thought of that question does not do your reputation any favours



Maybe I am on ignore

What the hell... they're all recycled pixels

six7s said:
So Claus... how would Jesus you process survey results from those with sub-60 IQs?
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CFLarsen said:
If it is celebrated that atheists are smarter than agnostics, because atheists have higher IQs than agnostics, why isn't it celebrated that whites are smarter than blacks, because whites have higher IQs than blacks?

In other words: Why is it a good thing when atheists are smarter, but not a good thing when whites are smarter?
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So you can't conceive of any correlation between intelligence and how that intelligence is manifest in a person's belief system?
 
It is easy to imagine why some would accept a certain method, if said method would support their own sense of superiority.

What is interesting is when the same method is applied to different types of groups. If white atheists are smarter than black agnostics, due to higher IQ in both race and belief, it is telling that it is OK to celebrate that atheists are smarter than agnostics, but it isn't OK to celebrate that whites are smarter than blacks.

It is a blatant example of selecting the results based on political correctness.

We must remember that correlation is not causation. Are people atheists because they are smart? Or are they smart because they are atheists?

Being an atheist does not require you to do a whole lot of thinking. All it takes is to understand what evidence is, and accept that evidence trumps beliefs. You don't need a high IQ for that.
 
CFLarsen said:
If white atheists are smarter than black agnostics, due to higher IQ in both race and belief, it is telling that it is OK to celebrate that atheists are smarter than agnostics, but it isn't OK to celebrate that whites are smarter than blacks.

It is a blatant example of selecting the results based on political correctness.
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The phrase "selecting results" doesn't make any sense here. If you mean that the results were faked, then you should call them fake. If you mean deciding which ones to declare true and which ones to declare false based on something else such as politics, then you should say that. But I don't see anybody here doing either of those things or arguing that that's being done, and I don't know what else that phrase could mean.

CFLarsen said:
We must remember that correlation is not causation. Are people atheists because they are smart? Or are they smart because they are atheists?
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Either way, those questions themselves illustrate the difference between the two reactions you're talking about. Atheism or agnosticism is an idea, and where your ancestors lived is not. It's obvious how the relationship between intelligence and an idea is tighter than the relationship between intelligence and things that aren't ideas; it pretty directly implies something about either the idea's correctness or its influence on allowing the mind to work intelligently.
 
I was being tongue in cheek with the thread title; it's a small difference and I'm not sure why it exists if indeed it does. I even mentioned this above.

So I wasn't "celebrating" this, nor have I ever celebrated race differences.
 
CFLarsen said:
We must remember that correlation is not causation. Are people atheists because they are smart? Or are they smart because they are atheists?

Being an atheist does not require you to do a whole lot of thinking. All it takes is to understand what evidence is, and accept that evidence trumps beliefs. You don't need a high IQ for that.
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If you use the "not theist" definition, you could be completely brain dead and be classified as an atheist.
 
Egg said:
If you use the "not theist" definition, you could be completely brain dead and be classified as an atheist.
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What's wrong with that? It's a bit meaningless, but still accurate.

You could say it about rocks, "This rock does not believe in God." It would still be accurate, even if it's rather silly.
 
quixotecoyote said:
What's wrong with that? It's a bit meaningless, but still accurate.

You could say it about rocks, "This rock does not believe in God." It would still be accurate, even if it's rather silly.
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I wasn't suggesting anything was wrong with that other than maybe as you say it's a bit meaningless. CFLarsen implied it took at least some intelligence/thinking to be an atheist, my point was just that depending on your definition of atheist, it needn't require any intelligence at all.
 
Egg said:
I wasn't suggesting anything was wrong with that other than maybe as you say it's a bit meaningless. CFLarsen implied it took at least some intelligence/thinking to be an atheist, my point was just that depending on your definition of atheist, it needn't require any intelligence at all.
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Gotcha :)
 
If you don't need intelligence/thinking to be an atheist, a rock is an atheist.

That renders the concept meaningless.
 
skeptigirl said:
These arguments are false for several reasons.
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I stand by what I said. If you use any kind of statistical study, where several groups are used that SHOULD cover the entire population (atheists, agnostics, liberal and dogmatic religions), the numbers should average out to 100, because that is how the concept of IQ is supposed to function. If they don't, then there's something wrong with the IQ research.

IQs are not that consistent from test to test or standard to standard.
The study did not look at "all people" it compared two groups within a sample.
It is not feasible, practical, nor relevant to include feces smearing non-verbal subjects in the sample in this study.
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Please give a category that a person could fit into that is NOT covered by atheist, agnostic, liberal or dogmatic religion.
 
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