Atheists know more about religion (Pew)

[antonio107]

White Catholic - 14/15

I outscored my demographic in every measurable way. Even “Post-graduate training,” which surprised me.

I only didn’t know the one about the first Great Awakening. But being neither American nor Protestant, I cut myself slack on that. These weren’t especially hard questions.

[Yookeroo]

@Kyla

14/15. I missed the First Great Awakening question. I knew it took place much too long ago for Billy Graham to be involved, but got the wrong side of the 50/50 left over. Oh well.

I’ve never heard of the First Great Awakening before this test. I assumed that if Billy Graham was involved I would’ve heard of it. The same for Jonathan Edwards (there is a contemporary religious Jon Edwards, right?). Too common a name.

Also missed the Sabbath one. Couldn’t remember if it was Fri-Sat or Sat-Sunday.

@bibliophage

I’ve probably said it before, but I’ll say it again. The validity of a test breaks down when the people taking the test are smarter than the people who wrote it.

They aren’t. Did you see the results?

[Silophant]

White Catholic, 15/15, although the First Great Awakening was a 50/50 guess.

[Claude_Remains]

15/15 Having been brought up in a home where religion was not even on the table, I took it upon myself to learn the ropes cause I liked poking fun about it. It took me a good while to become confident and back up my shit stirring. complete and stringent non-theist.

[palindromemordnilap]

@Bosstone

I’m greatly entertained that Jews scored slightly better on the whole than even atheists/agnostics. Judaism is about the only religion I would want to join, and that’s a good illustration why.

I only got 13 out of 15. Missed the question about the Sabbath (the Jews would reject me anyway :D) and the First Great Awakening. In my defense, I don’t actually care.

It does concern me that verrrry few people get the “Bible as literature” question wrong, though. Even Jews and a-types only got 40% on it.

Those were the two I missed too. I suspected that the Jewish Sabbath starts Friday evening but went with Saturday because the other questions were testing basic knowldge and were straightforward while this one was a little bit of a trick question. I’m not familiar with the First Great Awakening, but I’m guessing the Jonathan Edwards associated wth it is not the guy who pretends to be psychic.

[Marley23]

Thanks for the link, Colibri. I got 31 out of 32 - I screwed up “Which group traditionally teaches that salvation is through faith alone?”

[JKellyMap]

15/15. Atheist/agnostic.

[ducati]

@Kyla

14/15. I missed the First Great Awakening question. I knew it took place much too long ago for Billy Graham to be involved, but got the wrong side of the 50/50 left over. Oh well.

I’m an atheist.

Me too. 14/15, atheist, guessed about FGA.

Meh.

[Shade]

14/15.

I’d never heard of the first great awakening.

I nearly got the Sabbath wrong too. It said when does the sabbath start which strongly hinted to me that they were looking for “Friday” rather than “Saturday”. (Although honestly I agree with palindromemordnilap that most people who have no Jewish friends have no particular reason to know that.)

But then, it occurred to me, according to the tradition which makes the Jewish sabbath start at sundown, shouldn’t it also make the Jewish saturday start at sundown? But I decided that would be too subtle for the quiz (and certainly no Jews I know DO refer to Friday night as Saturday).

[Musicat]

@Mangetout

Bah. Keeps timing out. In one case, the link took me to a page that made me wonder if the site is currently being hacked.

Maybe you have to answer quickly without thinking. I was pretty quick, and it didn’t time out on me.

[Kyrie_Eleison]

@Chessic_Sense

I only know the Great Awakening question because Dopers keep mixing up John Edwards, Jon Edward, and Jon Edwards.

I also confuse them all with Mr. Edwards from Little House on the Prairie.

15/15, agnostic public-school-educated northeastern liberal not-particularly-elite.

[Shodan]

Christian, 15/15 and 32/32, but their answer to “what does the Constitution say about religion” is wrong. If they were testing what people know about what Thomas Jefferson said about religion in the US, they should have said so.

Regards,
Shodan

[Diogenes_the_Cynic]

It’s not wrong. The Constitution does say that, it just doesn’t say it in those exact words, but the principle is irrefutably in there.

[Enderw24]

Jewish. Agnostic. I got 15/15 on it. I guessed on “Which Bible figure is most closely associated with remaining obedient to God despite suffering?”

Because that would describe about 79% of the figures from the Bible.

[Rhiannon8404]

Raised non-denominational Christian, converted to Catholicism as and adult.

I got 29/32.

Before taking the quiz, I…

…had never heard of the First Great Awakening
…thought most of the people in Indonesia were Hindu
…didn’t know who Maimonides was

[Snowboarder_Bo]

15/15

Where is there a longer 32 question quiz? I wanna try that one too.

[Really_Not_All_That_Bright]

I thought Jonathan Edwards was the world’s biggest douche.

[ColdPhoenix]

13/15.

Got both the questions about US law wrong…

[sunstone]

As an agnostic, I was OK with 31/32. I missed the great awakening question, but had no problem with the rest of the test.

Of my two sons, the atheist got 32/32, and the Protestant got 32/32…well, he is really a born again Catholic, as he is Episcopalian…

[astorian]

First, before I make my main point, can we all agree that the questions asked were, for the most part, absurdly easy?

Yes? Good, I thought so. Now, moving right along…

There were 32 questions on this absurdly easy test. Know how many the average atheist got right on this test?

Guesses, anybody? 30? 28? 25?

Try 20.9 measly answers.

Now, is that better than Christians averaged? Sure- Christians averaged just 16.

In my humble opinion, given the easiness of the questions, 20.9 and 16 are BOTH pitiful scores!!!

Believers probably OUGHT to be ashamed of their ignorance, but atheists have absolutely no grounds for pride.