Fair enough, and not a problem, but it can cause just as much side-debate the other way (as indeed here, where we’ve got people thinking you mean ‘all’, and others objecting to proposed counterexamples to the impression that you mean ‘all’). Damned if you do, damned if you don’t, I guess.
A few responses:
-
Although the proportion of correct answers given by atheists/agnostics, Jews, and Mormons were not very different, nevertheless they were noticeably higher than other religious groups — even at the (unstated!) level of significance used in the graph. If the average for religious groups is low, and some religious groups are very low, then other religious groups will unsurprisingly be rather high. Not to mention that Judaism at least is a special case, for which self-identification may not necessarily even require religious belief per se.
-
It’s interesting to note what happens when “nothing in particular” is lumped in with atheist/agnostic, but those groups can profitably be distinguished. After all, you’re not arguing here with people who believe nothing in particular — you’re arguing with people who, generally, self-identify as atheist (many of them quite strongly).
-
Again, it’s interesting to note that education and income account for the measured differences. That wouldn’t make it uninteresting that atheism/agnosticism is presumably correlated with characteristics that decrease ignorance about religious matters.
Edit: On the other hand, I do agree that “atheists know more about religion than religious people!” is at best a specious synopsis of the results. Clearly there’s more to it. But I think there’s something to it.
Everyone posting in this thread needs to cut back on the hostility immediately or the thread is going to be locked. If you want to trade broadsides on the bad behavior of atheists and Christians, do it in the Pit.
The burden of proof is on the advocate for prayer to prove it accomplishes anything.
As I said, I’ll be happy to answer any questions you want to ask me, but in a different thread.
So now you want me to open a new thread just so you’ll answer my questions from post #180?
Are you sure it’s not Atheist Cat who asking questions?
I didn’t say anything in this thread about the intelligence level of Hindus or Buddhists either. If you can ask me the question and expect a response, what’s wrong with me asking you the same question?
I’ve met many from both groups, worked with them, taught them, and been taught by them. That’s how I know they’re not stupid.
I’ve not discussed it with any of them and I’m not terribly good at mind-reading, so I’m afraid I can’t answer those questions.
I didn’t make any claims about being persuaded by the “intellectual argument” in favor of Christianity; you did. If it’s such a terrific argument, why hasn’t everyone been convinced as you have?
Then why haven’t they been convinced by the same arguments that convinced you that Christianity was right?
So far you don’t seem to be very good at answering many questions posed to you in this thread. You’ve evaded and made poor attempts at ridicule (“Atheist Cat” :rolleyes: ), and offered a link to someone else’s book detailing their conversion, but you haven’t really answered anything that anyone has asked of you.
And to make it worse, as I showed in post #50, you deliberately misquoted another member in an attempt to bolster an assertion you made.
If you don’t want to debate, then why are you here? If all you want to do is witness, could you just put a disclaimer in your posts, please?
I’ve not discussed it with any of them and I’m not terribly good at mind-reading, so I’m afraid I can’t answer that question. Everyone who has an intellectual conviction on a disputed issue necessarily has many who disagree with his or her intellectual conviction. I would think that’s obvious.
See above.
Looking back through the thread I can easily find numerous places where I’ve answered questions. If you think my answers are of low quality, so be it; I don’t think all that highly of your posts either. If I haven’t answered every single thing that anyone asked of me, I think that’s fair given that there’s only one of me; there’s many other folks attacking me; and, odd as it may seem, I have a life and therefore can’t spend every single minute on this message board.
And I clearly responded to your charge by pointing out that Locrian said exactly what I claim he said, only using the word “penalty” where I said “punishment”, and according to the dictionary those two words mean the same thing. Perhaps you were hoping that I’d forgotten that?
A vacuous question, since I do want to debate. Good day.
I’m glad someone linked that. I get the impression – and could of course be wrong-- of **obbn ** wandering out into the big bad world of the internet and being astonished at the indelicacy and impoliteness of the discussion, in part because of unfamiliarity with the medium… or perhaps we’ve just all become desensitised to the unpleasantness (I don’t know if that’s a good thing…)
I also get the impression of someone without some of the “meme” background and experience (such as the “prayer does nothing” motivational poster parody images).
A couple of other relevant (and hopefully illustrative) cartoons:
Sure.
Sounds like an insult to me.
I would readily acknowledge your insult was solitary and extremely mild compared to what some others have said.
Okay. Faith: “belief in God or in the doctrines or teachings of religion: the firm faith of the Pilgrims.” Doctrine: “an official system of principles or tenets concerning faith, morals, behavior, etc., as of a church. Synonyms: doctrine, teachings, set of beliefs, philosophy.” (Naturally the dictionary has several definitions for each word but presumably these are the relevant ones.) I certainly do not see how you get from those two definitions to the claim that religion in its entirety admits to being “apart from rationality and evidence”. Further, being familiar with many religious texts and catechisms and such, I know that the claim that religion admits to being apart from rationality and evidence is flatly false at least in some cases.
I’m not seeing the insult, either, nor does a religion’s attempt to establish a (mostly) internally consistent set of tenets give it any sort of claim on rationality or evidence. There are entirely fictional universes that are written with an eye on internal consistency, but that doesn’t comprise evidence for existence of Superman.
If anything, you should accept Novelty’s statement as fact and try another approach. Claiming insult is not convincing.
Your attempt to equivocate the two words by using a thesaurus was debunked by more posters than just myself.
And you did alter Locrian’s quote, as I showed.
But enough of that; I’ll let you get back to feeling insulted where no insult was given.
Really? I recall two credible sources saying that “penalty” means “punishment”. One was a dictionary and one was a thesaurus. What exactly is wrong with a thesaurus? Is it not a reliable source? Do you have any reliable source disputing that “penalty” means “punishment”? If so, what is it?
I certainly don’t recall you showing any such thing. I quoted the exact words that Locrian wrote, using the standard practice of adding a couple words in brackets for clarity. What exactly did I “alter”?
If the two words mean exactly the same thing, where was the need for clarification?
Maybe because it was easier for you to make the assumptional jump from “punishment” to “imprisonment” then it would from “penalty” to “imprisonment”?
I’m going to do something crazy and agree with ITR that “penalty” and “punishment,” while not precisely the same, are semantically close enough that it was reasonable for him to take the word as calling for “punishment” of Christians, whether that was the intent or not. Words like “penalty” and “eradication” are fairly inflammatory and unhelpful.
I know Der Trihs is the boogey man and all, but I have to agree with him here. 
Another vote for “penalty” equaling “punishment”, or at least that the difference is trivial.
Having said that, it’s not really reasonable for someone to feel persecuted for what someone says on the Intarwebs. But I agree with you.