# Religion based on rational belief? Then why the geographic variation? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 5, 2007, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955 "2007-02-05T18:09:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/61 "2007-02-05T22:22:53Z")
There are already two threads going where I’ve written a thorough debunking of **Valteron’s** arguments and where he has not seen fit to respond to the bulk of what I said. Perhaps the third time will be the charm. But somehow I doubt it. [QUOTE=Valteron] I realize that this is my fourth or fifth thread propagating my militant atheism. But please bear with me. As I explained in another thread, Satan gives prizes for the most zealous efforts. I already have two bronzed Renaissance popes (Satan delivered them last night). Now, for this thread, I will get a picture encyclopaedia of all the good servants of God from the Borgia Popes to Jimmy Swaggart having sex with hookers, other men, etc. (There is a volume about priests in the Boston Archdiocese, but I asked that it be left out of my collection because I refuse to have any child porn.) [/quote] You seem to believe that repeating this pitiful attempt at humor over and over again will somehow make it funny. Is that more of the famous atheist logic at work? > [@](#): > > People of religion tell us that their beliefs are logical and reasonable, and not based on simple brainwashing in their childhood or societal pressure. Your first statement here, amazingly enough is true. I do claim that my Christian beliefs are not based on simple brainwashing in their childhood or societal pressure. Moreover my claim is correct. My parents were atheists and I was an atheist throughout childhood due to brainwashing during childhood, which is the same reason that most atheists are atheists. In adulthood I’ve always lived in communities that were mostly atheist (or at least mostly secular), so I can’t have converted to Christianity due to societal pressure. > [@](#): > > “Logical and reasonable” would imply that their religious beliefs are based on the human brain examining reality and evidence and drawing reasonable conclusions that lead to these beliefs. That is correct. > [@](#): > > That being the case, how do you explain the religious belief varies enormously on a geographic basis? Look at a map of religions in the world. > > Why is it so evident to the vast majority of people born in Muslim countries that there is no God but a unitary God, that Mohammed is his final prophet, that Jesus was not the Son of God but a prophet who came before Mohammed, and that the Koran is the inspired word of God? In most cases, they were taught to listen for signs from God related to what the Prophet Mohammed taught. > [@](#): > > Why is it that the majority of people in Christian countries are equally convinced by logic and the observation of reality (using the same human brains as Muslims use) that there is a trinitarian God, that Jesus was his only-begotten son, and that Mohammed was a false prophet, etc.? They were taught to listen for signs from God related to what Jesus taught. > [@](#): > > Now apply my same question \*mutatis mutandis \* to Shintoism, Hinduism, etc. I’m not sure how to do so. Followers of those religions have less concrete dogmas about the nature of the deities they believe in, so the question doesn’t translate very well. > [@](#): > > Why is it that over 90% of the people whose rational minds and logic dictate the “correctness” of Hinduism are located in the Indian sub-continent? Is there something in the water that makes them reason differently than Christians and Muslims? > [@](#): > > Now I realize that there are Muslims, Hindus etc. in North America (mainly because of immigration) and Christians in India and Muslim countries. I also realize that there is such a thing as conversion. But these are the exceptions. The vast majority of Muslims in the west are immigrants from Muslim countries or the children of such immigrants, and were indoctrinated into the religion at an early age. If, as you implied earlier, religion exists only due to “brainwashing during childhood” or “societal pressure”, then there would never be any conversions. They existence of converts, even in small numbers, proves that your analysis of the situation is bullshit. > [@](#): > > So how do you explain the phenomenon that the vast, vast majority of believers in one religion or another were born into that religion and into a country where that religion is predominant, and were taught that that religion is right when they were children? Teaching. (Repeating this over and over again is getting rather boring.) > [@](#): > > If religious belief were based on logic and reason rather than childhood indoctrination and societal pressure, would the various and contradictory views of various religions not be more equally interspersed among humans everywhere on Earth? No. The only way to learn logic and reason is from another human being. Hence every person’s individual flavor of logic and reason will depend heavily on how they are taught it. Since it’s obviously taught differently in different places, one would not expect the types of logical reasoning to be evenly distributed throughout the world. The idea is absurd. > [@](#): > > In science, there are different theories and hypotheses about many things, to be sure. A theory can be slightly more popular among scietists in one country than another. At one point, there may have been more scientists in America who believed in plate tectonics and the movement of continents than in Europe, or vice-versa. But now pretty much every scientist today accepts plate tectonics. And even when the idea was controversial, you did not have the kind of geographic breakdown that you have with religion. There is a geographic breakdown of scientific ideas; to suggest otherwise is ludicrous. Take scientific question such as, “Are other galaxies moving away from the Milky Way?” Ask it to a thousand people in Japan, a thousand in Ecuador, and thousand in Saudi Arabia, and a thousand in India. I’d bet a considerable portion of my savings that you’d see a geographic breakdown of responses, probably with substantially more Japanese answering “yes” than any other nationality. > [@](#): > > So if religion is based on rational conclusions, why does reason operate differently on different continents and in different countries? My conclusion is that for the vast majority of people, religion is a matter of childhood indoctrination and societal pressure. I utterly fail to grasp where the conclusion came from. First of all, you began by stating that the majority of people in Muslim countries believe the tenets of Islam and the majority of people in Christian countries believe the tenets of Christianity. That is a truism, or what a hardcore logician would call a tautology. And a hardcore logician would happily explain to you that drawing conclusions from a tautology is meaningless. (As a side note, there are some religions that aren’t dominant in the societies they exist in. Take Scientology, for instance. Few scientologists were born and raised as Scientologists, and certainly our society exerts heavy pressure on people to not be Scientologists by mocking and belittling them at every opportunity. Yet Scientology still exists, contradicting your conclusion.) Further, you’d surely agree that the majority of secular thinkers arise from secular societies (or at least secular communities within non-secular societies). You’d surely agree that the percentage of people who are atheist varies widely across the globe. Hence, by your logic, whatever reason underlies atheism “operates differently on different continents and in different countries” as well. Thus, whatever logic you used to conclude that “religion is a matter of childhood indoctrination and societal pressure” must apply to atheism as well. But what exactly is that logic? You say that Christian belief is heavily dependent on a Christian upbringing and a Christian environment. That’s thuddingly obvious; every Christian would agree with it. Then somehow you leap from there to concluding that Christian belief is wrong. There’s no basis for such a leap. In fact it’s an inversion of logic. The fact that Christian belief is heavily dependent on a Christian upbringing and a Christian environment shows that Christian belief is right. Plainly any group of people seeks to pass the truth to its children. Plainly any group seeks to build a society that propogates truth. To imply that something is false because a society teaches that something to its children and pressures its members to believe that something is an abusrdity. Or consider this. I believe that combustion occurs when oxygen reacts with a hydrocarbon, producing water and carbon dioxide and releasing energy. Now this belief surely meets your standards; it is “based on the human brain examining reality and evidence and drawing reasonable conclusions that lead to these beliefs.” Now where did I get this statement about reality? From reality? Obviously not. As a child I witnessed many acts of combustion. But at no point did I sit on a log, looking at a campfire, and say, “wow, those hydrocarbons sure are reacting with oxygen to produce water and…” Nothing in reality said or suggested such a thing. Unsurprisingly I learned about the chemical basis of combustion in school. Or as you would say, it was “a matter of childhood indoctrination and societal pressure”. To me, this childhood indoctrination and societal pressure proves that the formula for combustion is true. But according to the logic in your OP, you apparently believe that this childhood indoctrination and societal pressure proves that the formula for combustion is false. You’d draw further evidence for this by observing that people in different continents and countries have different beliefs about combustion. > [@](#): > > Your opinions? Sorry, but I have only facts, no opinions. ---
**Author:** ![pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pseudotriton_ruber_ruber)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/62 "2007-02-05T22:23:09Z")
[QUOTE=WhyNot] an extraordinary claim that has yet to be proven. [/QUOTE] Like Xianity isn’t. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/63 "2007-02-05T22:29:39Z")
[QUOTE=WhyNot] OK, so if those are your cites, please link to them. And be aware that if you link to threads with unsupported claims like this one, posts that equate irrationality to wrongness, stupidity or ignorance, then they don’t count. [/QUOTE] I’ll do a search tonight - no time now. But the contention is that religious people claim rationality. I’m not going to ask you for a cite that some atheists do what you say, since I’ve seen it also. Doesn’t the famous “Lord, Liar or Lunatic” trichotomy prove the point to some extent? Clearly this is claiming that Jesus was sane and rational. (A point not in dispute as far as I’ve seen, outside of “Behold the Man,” that is.) What relgion is based on is lost in the mists of prehistory. Would you call a religion that begins as an attempt to explain (and control) the natural world irrational? Could any of us offer up a better explanation, given the facts that they had? Would it be more rational to posit atomic theory and cosmology? I don’t think so. They might have been wrong, but once you go back far enough they were wrong for the right reasons. And it’s not my OP. I’ve got better things to do. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/64 "2007-02-05T22:34:56Z")
[QUOTE=pseudotriton ruber ruber] Like Xianity isn’t. [/QUOTE] Well, that’s a beautiful non-sequitur you’ve got there, **prr**. (Not to mention you’re, if you’ll pardon the phrase, preaching to the choir.) [QUOTE=ITR champion] Then somehow you leap from there to concluding that Christian belief is wrong. There’s no basis for such a leap. In fact it’s an inversion of logic. The fact that Christian belief is heavily dependent on a Christian upbringing and a Christian environment shows that Christian belief is right. Plainly any group of people seeks to pass the truth to its children. Plainly any group seeks to build a society that propogates truth. [/QUOTE] I’m sorry, who to the whatsit now? It must be true or we wouldn’t teach it? I don’t get it. We teach our kids about (forgive me, it’s tiresome and comes up in every religion thread, but…) Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy and masturbation makes you go blind, bumblebees can’t fly by the rules of physics, glass is really a liquid and the superiority of the Windows operating system. Some of those have been taught longer than others, true. But I don’t grok why parents teaching their kids something “proves” it’s true. > [@](#): > > To imply that something is false because a society teaches that something to its children and pressures its members to believe that something is an abusrdity. Sure, but to imply that it must be true because it’s been taught is just as absurd. [QUOTE=Voyager] I’ll do a search tonight - no time now. But the contention is that religious people claim rationality. [/QUOTE] No, the contention is that religion is _based on_ rational belief. But I do apologize for calling it your OP. It was the usernames beginning with V but on different pages so I didn’t look closely enough that wooshed me. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/65 "2007-02-05T22:36:44Z")
[QUOTE=ITR champion] There is a geographic breakdown of scientific ideas; to suggest otherwise is ludicrous. Take scientific question such as, “Are other galaxies moving away from the Milky Way?” Ask it to a thousand people in Japan, a thousand in Ecuador, and thousand in Saudi Arabia, and a thousand in India. I’d bet a considerable portion of my savings that you’d see a geographic breakdown of responses, probably with substantially more Japanese answering “yes” than any other nationality. [/QUOTE] He said among scientists, not everyone. The pitiful acceptance of creationism in the US is well known, but among scientists it is just as much a fringe belief as it should be. Please give a cite showing scientists from Japan accept that the universe is expanding in smaller or greater numbers than anywhere else. BTW, it is not true that all galaxies are moving away from the Milky Way. The Magellenic clouds are in orbit, and I believe Andromeda is moving toward us. The actual situation is a bit different from your incorrect understanding. ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/66 "2007-02-05T22:38:51Z")
\*\*Why Not \*\* I really don’t understand your logic: > [@](#): > > The fact that Christian belief is heavily dependent on a Christian upbringing and a Christian environment shows that Christian belief is right. Do you think that the fact that Islamic belief is heavily dependent on an Islamic upbringing and an Islamic environment shows that Islamic belief is right? How can they both be right? You also said that Atheism is a result on childhood “brainwashing”. Is the fact that Atheism is heavily dependent on Atheist upbringing and an Atheist environment shows that Atheim is right? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9fc348/32.png) [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Flying_Dutchman)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/67 "2007-02-05T22:38:58Z")
[QUOTE=Valteron] That being the case, how do you explain the religious belief varies enormously on a geographic basis? Look at a map of religions in the world. [/quote] Even in the little US there is a wide disparity in religious belief. What I do believe is that there is a vast global population that believes in some sort of higher power that science would deny. If you search for global commonality you will find it. Furthermore, your atheism has very little traction outside a limited geographical area, north of the Rio Grande and west of the Caucasus. I’ll grant you that you’ll find atheists in every country as well, but if you believe that all atheists share a common scientific philosophy proving their beliefs are “logical and reasonable”, then I’ve got a machine that will elongate your penis. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/68 "2007-02-05T22:41:13Z")
[QUOTE=The Flying Dutchman] What I do believe is that there is a vast global population that believes in some sort of higher power that science would deny. [/QUOTE] Science does not deny a higher power. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/69 "2007-02-05T22:41:31Z")
[QUOTE=DanBlather] \*\*Why Not \*\* I really don’t understand your logic:Do you think that the fact that Islamic belief is heavily dependent on an Islamic upbringing and an Islamic environment shows that Islamic belief is right? How can they both be right? You also said that Atheism is a result on childhood “brainwashing”. Is the fact that Atheism is heavily dependent on Atheist upbringing and an Atheist environment shows that Atheim is right? [/QUOTE] Well, there’s thread karma for you. 😃 I got \*\*Voyager \*\*mixed up with the OP! Those weren’t me, they were **ITR champion** , and I’m just as confused as you are. ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/70 "2007-02-05T22:44:24Z")
[QUOTE=The Flying Dutchman] What I do believe is that there is a vast global population that believes in some sort of higher power that science would deny. [/QUOTE] I called it: [QUOTE=DanBlather] I can predict the whole thread. First some squishy, spiritual poster will say talking about specific beliefs is not necessary becuase we are all connected by a spiritual bond… [/QUOTE] ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/71 "2007-02-05T22:45:22Z")
[QUOTE=WhyNot] No, the contention is that religion is _based on_ rational belief. But I do apologize for calling it your OP. It was the usernames beginning with V but on different pages so I didn’t look closely enough that wooshed me. [/QUOTE] Okay, but this is from the OP > [@Valteron](#): > > Anyhow, here is my proposition: > > People of religion tell us that their beliefs are logical and reasonable, and not based on simple brainwashing in their childhood or societal pressure. > > “Logical and reasonable” would imply that their religious beliefs are based on the human brain examining reality and evidence and drawing reasonable conclusions that lead to these beliefs. At the end of the OP he does make an assumption that religious people, claiming that their beliefs are rational, also claim that their religion is rationally based. Whether or not that is true, even demonstrating that a religion is not rationally based does not mean that its adherents will accept it., and admit that their beliefs are not rational. I personally have caused **Polycarp** to be upset with me by saying things that imply his religion and belief is irrational. He is convinced that his experiences and the results of his experiences are a very rational reason for his belief. Agree or disagree, he is not one to say things like this without thought. ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/72 "2007-02-05T22:48:38Z")
[QUOTE=WhyNot] My religion is literally irrational: “not consistent with or using reason” (first Google hit on **define:irrational** ). It is outside the realm of reason, therefore it is not rational. [/QUOTE] Wouldn’t that be _a_rational? If it is outside the realm of reason, it is neither consistent nor inconsistent with using reason. [QUOTE=ITR Champion] My parents were atheists and I was an atheist throughout childhood due to brainwashing during childhood, which is the same reason that most atheists are atheists. [/QUOTE] Most atheists are atheists due to childhood brainwashing? I’m going to have to ask for a cite for that. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/73 "2007-02-05T22:51:30Z")
[QUOTE=Contrapuntal] Wouldn’t that be _a_rational? If it is outside the realm of reason, it is neither consistent nor inconsistent with using reason. [/QUOTE] Yes, thank you. I’ll take an order of that. I didn’t use it 'cause it’s not actually in the dictionary. But it ought to be. ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/74 "2007-02-05T22:59:29Z")
[QUOTE=WhyNot] It must be true or we wouldn’t teach it? I don’t get it. We teach our kids about (forgive me, it’s tiresome and comes up in every religion thread, but…) Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy and masturbation makes you go blind, bumblebees can’t fly by the rules of physics, glass is really a liquid and the superiority of the Windows operating system. [/quote] You do? Then I, for one, am quite glad that you’re not my dad. > [@](#): > > Some of those have been taught longer than others, true. But I don’t grok why parents teaching their kids something “proves” it’s true. I don’t either, nor did I ever say that teaching any arbitrary belief proves that belief true. I said that the persistent teaching of Christian belief, over 2,000 years, in countless different societies, under so many different circumstances, proves it true. Perhaps I’ll elaborate further in another thread. In _this_ thread, we started with **Valteron** saying (to paraphrase) “most Christians learn about Christianity in childhood, therefore Christianity is false”; I believe I’ve now debunked that. > [@Voyager](#): > > He said among scientists, not everyone. The pitiful acceptance of creationism in the US is well known, but among scientists it is just as much a fringe belief as it should be. So are you saying that scientific beliefs have some validity because they don’t vary widely from place to place _among scientists_? It would be equally true that Christians beliefs don’t vary widely from place to place _among Christians_. Hence I don’t see how that proves science a superior belief system to Christianity. (If that’s not what you intended to suggest, I apologize.) > [@](#): > > Please give a cite showing scientists from Japan accept that the universe is expanding in smaller or greater numbers than anywhere else. I made it clear that that was a hypothetical poll. If you want general proof that scientific literacy is higher in Japan than in the world at large, probably any international survey on science education would do. > [@DanBlather](#): > > Do you think that the fact that Islamic belief is heavily dependent on an Islamic upbringing and an Islamic environment shows that Islamic belief is right? How can they both be right? You also said that Atheism is a result on childhood “brainwashing”. Is the fact that Atheism is heavily dependent on Atheist upbringing and an Atheist environment shows that Atheim is right? To address your sentences in order: No. They can’t. I did not. No. (Elaborating on the third, I said that _most_ secularists are raised that way, but never claimed to judge all of secularism based on that. To elaborate on the first and second, this comes up in every thread where I discuss religion. When I state that the superiority of Christianity is proved by Christianity’s success throughout the world in such a huge variety of situations, atheists immediately demand to know if the same logic applies to other religions that have enjoyed comparable success. There is no religion that has enjoyed comparable success, so the comparison is meaningless.) ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/75 "2007-02-05T23:06:59Z")
[QUOTE=ITR champion] (Elaborating on the third, I said that _most_ secularists are raised that way, but never claimed to judge all of secularism based on that. [/QUOTE] Well, you said most atheists, not secularists, and declined to offer a cite. Why no just admit that you misspoke? There is no way you can know such a thing. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9fc348/32.png) [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Flying_Dutchman)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/76 "2007-02-05T23:06:57Z")
[QUOTE=DanBlather] I called it: [/QUOTE] Man you are really, really reaching. My post was certainly not one of the first responses, and nothing I said would suggest that I have a spiritual connection with you. Give your ego a break. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/77 "2007-02-05T23:11:39Z")
[QUOTE=ITR champion] You do? Then I, for one, am quite glad that you’re not my dad. [/QUOTE] Come now, I was using the cummulative “we” and you know it. If you’re a modern Roman Catholic, then Baptists teach things your church considers just as wrong and stupid. And vice-versa. [QUOTE=ITR champion] I don’t either, nor did I ever say that teaching any arbitrary belief proves that belief true. I said that the persistent teaching of Christian belief, over 2,000 years, in countless different societies, under so many different circumstances, proves it true. Perhaps I’ll elaborate further in another thread. [/QUOTE] Good luck with that. I’ve been tempted to attempt the same argument on the merits of Traditional Chinese Medicine, based on the theory that it’s worked well and been accepted and passed down for roughly 4000 years. At some point, I personally think that accumulated anecdotes _do_ become data, and that double blind placebo controlled trials are not the only valid measure of efficacy. But I don’t think I’m going to try out those arguments on this board any time soon. And if you think the teachings of your Christianity are anything at all like the Christianity taught 1500 years ago, you’re sorely mistaken. I assume you can have sex with your wife on fast days, right? That she’s allowed to go to church and even sing there? That every member of your church doesn’t leave a substantial amount of their estate to the church in their will? So the Christianity that “worked” back then wouldn’t work at all now, nor would today’s version of Christianity (if there were only one) “work” for feudal peasants. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/78 "2007-02-05T23:12:33Z")
[QUOTE=ITR champion] I don’t either, nor did I ever say that teaching any arbitrary belief proves that belief true. I said that the persistent teaching of Christian belief, over 2,000 years, in countless different societies, under so many different circumstances, proves it true. Perhaps I’ll elaborate further in another thread. [/QUOTE] Two questions; - Haven’t other religions survived that long, or indeed longer? Judaism, Hinduism, and Buddhism to give three examples. - Do you believe that if you looked at Christians today and what they believe, it would match exactly what Christians 2000 years ago believed? ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/79 "2007-02-05T23:13:38Z")
Curse you, **WhyNot** , for putting my problems more eloquently! 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2007, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955/80 "2007-02-05T23:32:19Z")
[QUOTE=ITR champion] So are you saying that scientific beliefs have some validity because they don’t vary widely from place to place _among scientists_? It would be equally true that Christians beliefs don’t vary widely from place to place _among Christians_. Hence I don’t see how that proves science a superior belief system to Christianity. (If that’s not what you intended to suggest, I apologize.) [/quote] No, I was actually correcting your blatant misreading of what Valteron claimed. In any case, you have it exactly backwards. Science is not valid because scientists from different countries believe the same thing; but rather scientists from different countries believe the same thing because science is valid - in other words open, testable, and repeatable. No matter where you are, you can redo the experiment described in a paper if you wish to. The whole point of this thread is that the fact of the geographic variation of religion indicates that religious claims are not testable and repeatable. > [@](#): > > I made it clear that that was a hypothetical poll. If you want general proof that scientific literacy is higher in Japan than in the world at large, probably any international survey on science education would do. As much as I’d love that a survey of science education be indicative of anything, it is not. The validity of evolution is not changed one whit by either the fact that 60% of people in the US don’t believe or that 70% of people do believe. If you don’t understand why that’s true, we can discuss it further. It is rather fundamental. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religion-based-on-rational-belief-then-why-the-geographic-variation/390955.md?page=5)