While I’m shirking my blogging responsibilities by linking to series of posts elsewhere, there’s an interesting discussion about hostility to atheists at the Volokh Conspiracy: see here, here, here, and here. You’d be unsurprised (I suspect) to learn that Americans find atheists to be one of the most untrustworthy brands of people around. Just to get an idea, here are the answers from a 2005 poll that asked whether “your overall opinion of [the group] is very favorable, mostly favorable, mostly unfavorable, or very unfavorable?”
|
Group |
Very favorable (%) |
Mostly favorable |
Mostly unfavorable |
Very unfavorable |
|
“Catholics” |
24 |
49 |
10 |
4 |
|
“Jews” |
23 |
54 |
5 |
2 |
|
“Evangelical Christians” |
17 |
40 |
14 |
5 |
|
“Muslim Americans” |
9 |
46 |
16 |
9 |
|
“Atheists, that is, people who don’t believe in God” |
7 |
28 |
22 |
28 |
Well, I suppose it’s understandable, since atheists are constantly killing innocent members of other sects in the name of their belief system. Oh wait, no they’re not. Must be the War On Xmas that is hurting our ratings.
December 13th, 2005 at 4:03 am
http://www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/news/local/13379915.htm
fun satire. and from kansas! gasp!
December 13th, 2005 at 4:48 am
Wow, who knew jews were more popular than christians!
December 13th, 2005 at 8:02 am
Sean,
I think the average US citizen uses the equation atheist = communist,
which may explain the results.
December 13th, 2005 at 8:27 am
I think the same as Wolfgang.
December 13th, 2005 at 8:44 am
What does communism have to do with this? Its got more to do that these people feel that you’re not a good person if you don’t have faith in God. But then I like your ending line, its that faith that has let to so much malice.
December 13th, 2005 at 8:51 am
Well, Chinese and Soviet atheists are indeed responsible for an enormous number of deaths in the 20th century – of the order of 100 million. I think Pol Pot of Cambodia too was an atheist.
I think any organized “-ism” is potentially dangerous – atheists are no more immune to human frailities than anyone else, it is their unorganized state in the United States that renders them not capable of any significant harm compared to the religionists.
December 13th, 2005 at 8:56 am
I think the problem here is that many (not all) people associate atheists with evil. There is a notion that if you’re an athiest then you don’t have good morals and you’re a bad person. I know many people who are athiest and have very good morals. They’re good, kind-hearted people, but I don’t think the general person on the street sees that.
December 13th, 2005 at 8:57 am
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December 13th, 2005 at 9:09 am
Maybe the problem is with atheists themselves. Sometimes I find listening to Richard Dawkins as taxing & tiresome as listening to Pat Robertson.
December 13th, 2005 at 9:11 am
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December 13th, 2005 at 10:07 am
Bad Marketing..
and I mean this in a constructive sense. The image many people have of atheists is people who file lawsuits to get the words “under god” out of the pledge of allegience.
It is not viewed as a belief structure but as and anti-religious advocacy group.
Its like framining pro-choice as being in favor of abortion.
Probably given that atheists are generally not a highly monolithic group, there is no PR budget or image building going on.
Elliot
December 13th, 2005 at 10:14 am
It seems reasonable to assume that most theists have a strong emotional attachment to their god because that god usually represents and supports all that they find meaningful in life. To suggest such a being is imaginary probably seems to them like saying all that they find meaningful is meaningless. And how could any good person suggest such a mean thing?
December 13th, 2005 at 10:42 am
I am not sure about those numbers – World War II took a huge toll on eastern Europe, in particular Soviets (~20 million) and Jews (~4 million),
but those were at the hands of nazis. There were also about 10 million chinese and ~8 million germans who died in the war.
The atrocities of Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot etc. to their own people are order of magnitude smaller than WWII.
I doubt one could argue that the casualties would be less had those countries been full of religious fanatics. So I am not sure this has to do with atheism.
December 13th, 2005 at 10:56 am
Deaths under Communist regimes were hardly driven by a commitment to atheism. In fact they were driven by a commitment to a teleology, in the sense of these deaths are worth it because we’re building the radiant future. In this, its structure, logic and justification shares a lot with religous madness, as in the “yes, a sad loss but compared to winning the kingdom of heaven on earth, it’s a small one” logic.
December 13th, 2005 at 11:00 am
I also suspect that most people who’re unfavorbaly disposed toward atheists think that atheists are smug, arrogant people.
Oddly, atheists I know don’t find religous people (who believe that unbelievers will be damned to pain and desolation for infinite time because they’re far less morally virtuous than the religous person) arrogant and self-satisfied.
December 13th, 2005 at 11:47 am
Hunh. So, what if you’re a Jewish atheist?
Robin — Not all religious people believe that all (or even any) unbelievers are damned. (There’s no hell in Judaism, for example; there’s no doctrine in Catholicism that says non-Catholics are damned.) But when I see a bumper sticker that says something like “In case of rapture this car will be driverless” or hear statements of confidence about “going to heaven,” I do think “how arrogant” — though I realized at some point that the speaker may consider this a statement of faith in God, not a statement of pride about oneself. I do find certain strands within American evangelicalism to be incredibly arrogant and self-satisfied.
One thing I’ve found over years of observation is that a person’s religion or lack thereof has almost nothing to do with that person’s morality and character.
December 13th, 2005 at 11:54 am
On that topic, a famous Steve Weinberg quote
With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.
December 13th, 2005 at 12:54 pm
Atheists are held in low regard not because of their lack of belief in God but because of their lack of belief in religion. Buddhist, despite being atheists, are not despised to the degree that nonreligious atheists are.
Moreover, most atheists tend to have sophomoric views on religion. They fail to understand that it’s a pillar of civilization. There is no known superior means of suppressing inherent human savagery in large populations. Sure, it inspires war and killing. But its benefits (civilization) exceed its detriments (wars, jihads). The trick is to tweak religions to minimize the latter.
Lastly, who is less likely to commit crimes against you: a) Someone who believes that he will burn forever Hell as a consequence, or b) Someone who believes there will be no consequences, unless he’s caught? [Yes, there are crazies who want to kill you for an eternal reward, but they are far outnumbered in the U.S. those whose murderous impulses are restrained by their religion.]
December 13th, 2005 at 1:24 pm
Belizean — I would like to see some evidence for these assertions. There was a recent study published in the Journal of Religion and Society that claimed to demonstrate the opposite — that higher levels of religious faith in a given society correlate with higher levels of violence and other social ills. Frankly, I’m skeptical that such a thing could be proved either way.
December 13th, 2005 at 1:34 pm
So far nobody objected to the notion that atheism is an organized ism? Let me object. Atheism is not an organized ism. So there.
December 13th, 2005 at 2:01 pm
Belizean,
First, why is it reasonable to hold someone in contempt for lack of “religion” (which here seemingly means doctrinal religion, as opposed to say folk or animistic religions)? Second, what share of atheists have that view of religion? Remember even Marx’s full quote was sympathetic.
It may be wrong, but it isn’t ignorant of the positive role of religion. Third, you’re right that most people believe that atheists are more likely to commit crime, but I doubt that’s actually true. I’d be surprised if the rate of atheism among convicted murderers was more substantial than in the general population . . . and actually less surprised if it were the other way around.
December 13th, 2005 at 2:30 pm
Belizean, please don’t make sweeping statements like that without some numbers to back you up. Here’s a page that talks about religious belief for prisoners: Prison Incarceration and Religious Preference. The conclusion there is that there is no way to directly link religious belief and crime and that economic and social factors are far more important than any belief in a punishment in the afterlife. Based on this Fox News Poll from last year, while 92% of Americans believe in God, only 74% believe in Hell so 18% of religious people compared to 8% of non-believers should have no compuction about commiting a crime.
December 13th, 2005 at 3:01 pm
Belizian,
while those assumptions about most athiests and the role of religion may play a role in peoples oppinions of athiests, the assumption are not really grounded in anything. As many situations will testify to it is lack of order in society(usually suplied by government) that seems to be the best explanation for “suppressing inherent human savagery in large populations”
perhaps you should analyze your own views more closely before characterizing other views as sophmoric.
December 13th, 2005 at 7:39 pm
nice quote moshe!
now, wouldn’t it be interesting to repeat the same survey but this time only questioning athiests, to see which group gets the biggest beating? if anyone suspects as i do as to who would get off the lightest in such a survey, i thought i’d just leave you with a bumper sticker quote i saw in new york a while ago…
‘buddhism sucks too.’
… made me laugh anyway.
December 13th, 2005 at 8:44 pm
I wonder what the results would have been if instead of “atheist” they had put “scientist”……
December 13th, 2005 at 10:04 pm
Since the subject is atheism and religion I thought readers of this post would be interested in two wonderful recent essays on C. S. Lewis and the Narnia books by Adam Gopnik (in the New Yorker) and Meghan O’Rourke (in Slate).
From Gopnik:
December 13th, 2005 at 10:09 pm
Belizean-
Atheism is simply not the same as the lack of moral reasoning. Just because a person doesn’t believe in a god or practice a religion, doesn’t mean that they believe there will be “no consequences” to their actions.
And besides telling people not to do bad things in order to avoid some alleged eternal damnation is not really the most grown-up way to organize a society.
December 13th, 2005 at 10:33 pm
I couldn’t resist quoting this paragraph from Meghan O’Rourke’s essay:
December 14th, 2005 at 12:04 am
One issue here is that both religious and non-religious people developed in a large dynamic world. We, the believers in Socratic humility (such as saying “I don’t know, but from what I’ve observed probably not”), opposed to those who choose to believe in fantastic explanations, both relate to each other through our experiences. Most non-god asserters do develop reactionary attitudes toward the mainstream because we are disenfranchised with the fixation on asserting fantastic, non-testable ideas that have a history and structural dynamic that encourages giving up the self to a higher power, (often, in practice, the lord, or kings or pope that has all the answers and all the guns).
The biggest reason that atheists are so distrusted is simple. Their position refutes the entire premise of the majority’s most sacred possession – IDENTITY.
People (well more people than before) have gotten used to the idea about his or her neighbor worshiping Athena instead of Zeus, or one of many Protestant variations of teh “Christian” god, and even the idea of Allah. (Hindus and Buddhist are more than likely seen as silly but well intentioned hippies, what with the multiple gods and whatever the hell that “Nirvana” thing is… some God like thing, right??)
Atheists and Agnostics and Transcendentalists, are by their very identity, opposed to the core philosophy of all those that bet their chips on some sentient deity – that life is bad and we need magic to fix it.
While this may seem a little harsh, let us not forget the god-morality connection in their minds. Good comes from an external imposition – God’s laws (or the rule of your Duke or whomever). They look to atheists as void of morality because they only conceive of an imposed morality instead of a natural one, or one chosen of true “free will.”
You don’t love your neighbor and show respect and kindness to the people and world around you because you HAVE to. You do it because it is inherently BETTER. IT IS THE REWARD. It is a better life.
What terrifies the believer is life. The unknown. What is lightning? well here is an answer!
I think that most of the leaders like Jesus and Muhammad and Buddha were, as a previous writer noted, using the power and fear of “magic” to encourage the ends and lessons that they valued. If you aren’t good you won’t get presents from a magical fat man.
Look, we all die.
Nothing matters in this or any world UNLESS YOU VALUE IT.
They value identity and psychological comfort over objective truth and honest humility.
The problem is having ship makers that don’t believe in buoyancy, so to speak.
Mind versus Matter? In the end, matter always wins.
December 14th, 2005 at 12:53 am
Grey, I enjoyed reading your post. As Robert Carroll (skepdic.com) says, it would be a very scary world if the only concept of morality was one of fear of punishment.
I remember back when I was a Scientologist (I was born into it) the way psychiatry was viewed as the ultimate evil; I didn’t know a psychiatrist, and I doubt many other Scientologists know a psychiatrist. We fell into the trap of reaching conclusions about something we knew nothing about (other than what we were told by the church), and the results were emotions of true hatred and fear.
I know several people who happen to be Jewish. They are very decent, open-minded and tolerant.
I think it is a mistake to conclude that an entire class or group of people is “good” or “bad.” In most religions (and even other kinds of groups), there will be some people who go out to the extreme in belief, and some (probably many) who do not. Every person has some unique quality and does not deserve to be classified because of belief. Such a classification is like approximating a bell curve with a delta function.
December 14th, 2005 at 5:07 am
Ponderer of things:
The carnage of the last century has been totted up and is summarised in The Economist’s Survey of the 20th Century. (The Economist, Sept11th-17th,1999) Mainly Godless governments slaughtered far more of their own citizens than were killed in international and civil wars. In units of millions of deaths, we have
Soviet Union 62
China (communist) 35
Germany 21
China (Kuomintang) 10
Japan 6
Deaths in International wars – 30
Deaths in civil wars – 7
Make of this what you will; the figures seem to tie in with Arun’s comments
December 14th, 2005 at 5:40 am
As a Christian i am not of those who think atheists are persons of low or no integrity. On the contrary i am certain most (though not all) are persons of high integrity.
Just remember, however, that it is much easier for someone whose belief system is defined in terms of negation (as in “a-”theism)to maintain a position whereby any lack of integrity is less perceptible or even completely imperceptible. What is their standard ? Who sets it ? And who judges whether they have achieved it ?
Christians, on the other hand, hold to a positive personal ethic which is externally and not subjectively determined. So they are at a clear disadvantage. Their shortcomings are glaring and so open to being boldly trumpeted and paraded everywhere.
Also note that while very bad things have benn done and continue to done be done in the name of God or of religion the Guiness World Record holders of evil are the atheists like Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot.
December 14th, 2005 at 9:15 am
Amen. . .
To (most of) that Brother Celal aka Brother Hand Grenade of Moderation.
You are most graciously invited to enlist as a military pastor (who none-the-less keeps a few hand grenades handy for defensive purposes. . .) in my ongoing online Unitarian Jihad aka U*U Jihad®.
Allah prochaine,
The Dagger of Sweet Reason
PB2U and other like-minded Christians
December 14th, 2005 at 9:17 am
Er. . . The Dagger of Sweet Reason’s U*U Jihad®!
December 14th, 2005 at 12:29 pm
Celal: Who judges whether God has achieved the standard?
December 14th, 2005 at 1:09 pm
Celal makes a good point about clarity and judgment in terms of perceived standards. The religious structure does offer a more clear set of ethical codes to be judged by, however, I think part of the flaw in that is a fixation of surface morality and easily measured and judged fallacies opposed to the hard to judge ethics of “love your neighbor”.
There are external ethics, but they are subjective to the greater moral of identity within religoun. Because religious institutions are more social structure than proponent of earnest universal standards, the identity and balance of ethical standards are often distorted severely in practice.
Examples — the Catholic church rallying against gays in the priesthood, where all priests are supposed to be celibate — not sexual at all, while at the same time allowing/hiding pedophilia and sexual abuse. This is a product of identity solidarity (which adopts anti-gay as a pillar of identity) over universal ethics of protecting children.
I always said the best way to follow Christ is not to follow the example of “Christian” religions.
As for the numbers of deaths, it certainly cannot be contested that Stalin, Mao et all were horrible and that they were sort form of atheist. Clearly that argument is skewed in overlook the destruction of the old tribes of North and South America, Africa and all the others. — the point here is 1) the dichotomy explanation of god versus non-god inspired murders is disingenuous – other factors are far more decisive in the choice for genocides, such as identity supremacy 2) Blame is more often excused, or explained and eventually forgiven and forgotten for “our” group and held as a pillar of identity for the “other”.
We give the benefit of the doubt for our known group, such as massacres in southern Utah by LDS church officials, which are disavowed and forgotten/pardoned by members, and obviously not remembered fondly by those tribes, or others that adhere to universal decency over identity. This was a fluke, but the persecution of the Mormons by those in Illinois and elsewhere is seen as an indicator of true character.
The truth is not as cut and dry as those examples insinuate, but I hope that the point is illustrated.
Religion does a FAR better job at creating group identity (and all the faults that come with it) than “atheism”.
Nationalism (as well as solid ideology like communism opposed to the very loose ideology of ‘atheism’), however, DOES compete w/ religion on these identity factors.
December 14th, 2005 at 1:27 pm
To continue the train of through from Moshe above – what makes bad people do good things? Not religon, as such, but power.
Police, military, political and social pressure backed by real power to inforce, punish and reward behavior.
Religous institution have played a role in supplying some these elements of power to inforce decent behavior from people.
Better to have people that wont be decent on their own be decent for fantastic reason, then not at all.
December 14th, 2005 at 3:38 pm
The crucial part of that argument, Grey, is that “real power to enforce” is required to make bad people do good things. Religion alone (without a government or army to back it up) depends on one’s fear of a concept, such as Hell; whether or not Hell exists, an army probably carries more weight in a person’s decisions.
When a person’s religion is stripped away (there are any number of circumstances that can ruin a person’s faith), what is left? Unless there is the “power to enforce,” all you will have left is a bad person doing bad things.
December 14th, 2005 at 3:40 pm
On the other hand, for some people pressure from (friends, family, etc.) can easily act as “power to enforce,” and so no power of physical punishment may be necessary.
December 14th, 2005 at 5:07 pm
hi babboon,
what you’re saying paints a rather grim image of human nature. many non-religious people do good things without needing a carrot or a stick to motivate them, as you’re implying that religion provides. don’t discount altruism as a part of human nature, and our genes.
December 14th, 2005 at 5:29 pm
subodh
I was only talking about those people who would not act morally on their own – the “bad people who do good things” from Grey’s post. I think that many people can do good things without fear of punishment. My point was that religion alone, ultimately, does not necessarily ensure that people will be good.
December 14th, 2005 at 6:32 pm
i see babboon; good point, well made. and a point made every day on our tv screens i guess…
December 14th, 2005 at 6:33 pm
Good point, Babboon. Religon’s main power (other than times like the inquisition and crusades, which really are not indicative of the norm) is social pressure, which in a diverse society can be pretty weak, but if you consider the mullahs in Pakistan and how they influence people to take action, say against a tainted rape victim, then it can also be pretty strong.
I more real terms, it is hard to leave the world you know, like scientology or LDS in Utah or anything, because it is more than a religon, it is your firends and your familiy and the sturcture of how you relate to each other. Many friends of mine have families that don’t know how to live a secular life (not infusing religious perspective into all experiences) and as a result their children/brothers etc are isolated from them.
That part is more to do with sharing common activites, and the unwillingness of one party (generally the athiest/agnostic) to just follow the activites of the god-asserting majority.
I don’t like going to church w/ my very nice in sister in law, despite her understanable desire to share with me this thing that is important to her, i can’t help but desire to converse about it, instead of just abosrb their message, which would invaraibley lead me to pointing out flaws in the system and would look to her like i was simple putting down what she values (like saying your subjective hobby is no god) as opposed to arguing the objective reality of it and the flaw of making a leap of faith on a very specific item (like doctrine, and all the history and prophets and leaders that go along with that) opposed to a general sentient higher power.
December 14th, 2005 at 6:48 pm
It is not the lack of religion but the lack of belief in religion — the silly idea espoused by most atheists that religion is inessential and the world would be better off without it. Marx, a typical atheist, viewed religion as a coping mechanism of the weak rather than as the foundation of civilization.
1). In judging the effective of any influence on behavior, one must control for other suspected influences. Given that economic and social factors are equal between two groups, the religious group is less disposed to commit crimes. 2) You are incorrectly attempting to evaluate the effectiveness of religious constraints by focusing on the 1% of the population where it has failed (incarcerated prisoners) while ignoring the 90% in which it succeeded.
Sorry, but your meaning here is unclear. Understand that civilization, defined as large-scale cooperation between strangers, is unnatural. This unnatural cooperation results from the systematic parental labor in civilizing their inherently barbaric children. The means through which parents civilize them is to impart beliefs that act to suppress their children’s inherent savagery. We call such savagery-suppressing beliefs by a special name — “religion”. Even nonreligious people unwittingly teach their children religious ethics (free, of course, of doctrinal justification). The atheists who I’ve characterized as sophomoric are the ones who 1) don’t understand that they are completely dependent upon a pre-existing religious ethical heritage, and 2) don’t understand that to eliminate that religion, instead of improving it, is to destroy the civilization that it makes possible.
I am unaware of any widespread belief among nonreligious atheists in meaningful consequences to perpetrators of the anonymous commission by them of conventionally immoral acts. Unless it’s that they might, for example, briefly feel bad after murdering Grandpa in order to hasten the receipt of their inheritance.
December 14th, 2005 at 7:56 pm
*sigh* …jesus
You do have a lot of really good points, Belizean, but i disagree a couple key points.
1)ethics being inherantly religious – it is kind of a definition problem, but, i disagree that the perverbial chicken (religion def: the social institution, doctrinal explination and ethical rules) comes before the egg (golden rule ethics, inherant value humans find in social relations/friendships/spouses/, let alone the lord/serf factor in creating civilizations)
2)again, is the world bad and we have to fix it w/ magic? religon says yes and gives ethics (and explanations) that support it. non-god asserters would generally say no, life and existence are AWESOME! I love them! people just need to take responsiblity for them selves and for social contract issues.
There certainly has been a pre-existant religious heratige that should be appreciated, however, was truly the religon that pushed civil society forward? or was it independant thinking and actions that pushed religon in favor of the status qou forward?
It all depends on what you define the religion as – is religon Galileo trying to understand the wonderful world? or the church that jailed him for doing so?
Is it what Jesus taught about morals via ficticious stories? or the huge doctrinal infrastructure that came far after its founder?
The truth is really far to complicated for simple definitions.
December 14th, 2005 at 7:59 pm
The greatest fault of religion in general has been disassociating ethics from inherant values and reality – it opens the door to suicide bombings being completely ethical to that subjective perspective.
December 15th, 2005 at 1:16 am
I’ve heard some religious people complain that atheists who behave decently are free riders sponging off of religion. These people see morality as arising from God through religion, and think that atheists are taking unfair advantage by adopting moral values without paying God the honor due him for supplying them.
By this perspective, atheists can’t win; they’re deserving of condemnation either way. Either they’re just plain immoral, or if they are moral they’re still being immoral by in some sense stealing their morality from the morality utility. It’s kind of like having an illegal cable descrambler.
December 15th, 2005 at 3:38 am
Re 44: The first three statements are demostrably false as well as being inflamatory. I see no point in reading further.
December 15th, 2005 at 11:15 am
In my opinion, the whole of comment #44 is baloney. The basis of morality is a recognition of yourself in the other. If I cause another to suffer, then I suffer too, in so far as I can imagine what another is feeling. None of this has anything to do with the existence or nonexistence of a god or gods. In fact religions tend to divide the world into believers (who deserve compassion) and nonbelievers (who don’t).
December 15th, 2005 at 12:40 pm
Why has nobody pointed out that atheists are typically humanists and moral relativists, who aren’t simply “atheists behaving decently’… for this reason?
December 15th, 2005 at 2:32 pm
I would be worried about spending time with someone who appears to think that the only reason that people don’t commit murder and mayhem is fear of punishment — whether divine or civil.
December 15th, 2005 at 2:47 pm
So one who cannot imagine what another is feeling has no reason to be moral?
Moreover, if the above is the case, shouldn’t we also add the idea of imagining another’s happiness; or does morality only have a negative aspect?
December 15th, 2005 at 4:29 pm
Hi Arun,
Imagining another’s happiness too, of course! I do suspect, though, that if I didn’t believe other people (and higher animals) feel pain and happiness, then I wouldn’t care much about what happens to them.
December 15th, 2005 at 5:05 pm
Belizean, this sounds like a great hypothesis… now refer me to the actual study that was done. I won’t hold my breath…
December 15th, 2005 at 7:05 pm
“The British census of India of 1881 gives the record of convictions:
    Europeans        1 in 274
    Eurasians        1 in 509
    Native Christians    1 in 799
    Mahommedans       1 in 856
    Hindus          1 in 1361
    Buddhists        1 in 3787
These statistics were reprinted in the leading Catholic organ in Britain, The Tablet, with the comments:
“The last item is a magnificent tribute to the exalted purity of Buddhism…It appears from these figures that while we effect a very marked moral deterioration in the natives by converting them to our creed, their natural standard of morality is so high that however much we Christianize them, we cannot succeed in making them altogether as bad as ourselves.”"
(The above is from an introduction to “The Light of Asia” (Sir Edwin Arnold’s biography of the Buddha) , according to “Reincarnation: The Phoenix Fire Mystery”, compiled and edited by Joseph Head & S.L. Cranston, 1977, Warner Books).
PS – this is something I came across over 10 years ago; I have no
idea if it is factual. I haven’t had a chance to look up the census or find The Tablet. Just thought it was amusing.
December 15th, 2005 at 9:53 pm
The basis of morality can be anything. Stalin and Castro are highly moral with respect to a suitably chosen basis. What I think you mean to say is that the basis of civilized behavior is empathy (”recognition of yourself in the other”). What you, as a civilized person, fail to understand, however, is that such empathy extended to strangers is completely unnatural. Like all species, humans are by nature primarily concerned with ensuring that their genes are maximally represented in future generations. Killing a stranger for his food or other resources can be an obvious means of achieving this end.
The means of synthetically cultivating beings in which this impulse to murder for gain is suppressed is called “religion”. You are correct in realizing that this means of suppression need not involve deities or even, in principle, supernatural entities.
December 15th, 2005 at 10:50 pm
Religion and its Effect on Crime and Deliquency”, C.O. Butts III, et al, Med Sci Monit, 2003; 9(8): SR79-82
December 16th, 2005 at 4:14 am
over the centuries believers in christianity, islam, judaism, the roman gods etc have oppressed just as many people and kill them as the those dirty “Commies”.
Remember the Crusades, the War on Terror, the inquisistion, all were/are ran by people with purticular mindsets trying to control how other people think and “encourage” them to think along there line.
i like christians on the whole, alot of them a really nice people. what i don’t get is how some of them (sorta like what i’m doing now) tell people if u don’t think in a certain way u will go to hell because u have to believe in certains tenets of a religion, that in christianity for example there is this ting saying thou shalt Not Kill. didn’t stop the popes, the followers of Martin Luther etc. what i’m trying to say is, christians have the same capacity for evil as commies, its just how u define good and evil.
one last thing, earlier this year the secutary of the christian heritage party in NZ wrote and internal memo that was leaked to the media concerning brian capill. capill was a staunch believer in christian values for over 10 years until it came oput he had been sexuall abusing young girls. what this secutary said was what capill did was not rape until the biblical definition baceuase ther was no penetration. just because something is writen in the bible does not make it right. just because something is adhered to by atheists doesn’t mean its inherently always right and always wrong. its how people go about there lives (rosemary mcloud wrote some interesting stuff how atheists tend to be the moral, upstanding people she knows, but she is just slightly odd).
apoligies if this as been a bit tooo incoherent.
December 16th, 2005 at 9:26 am
The study linked to in comment #57 is interesting. The (very short) note claims to be a review of the literature of the relationship between religiosity and delinquency. The lead author is Calvin O. Butts III, who turns out to be the Pastor of the Abbysinian Baptist Church of New York. The few papers cited have authors such as David Larson, who was on the Templeton Foundation advisory board when his papers were published, and Michael McCollough who works at the National Institute for Healthcare Research, which is primarily funded by the Templeton Foundation.
I’m truly shocked that they claim to have found a (small) negative correlation between religiosity and delinquency (after what was evidently quite a bit of tweaking of the definition of “religiosity”).
December 16th, 2005 at 10:05 am
This is readily explained by the Anthropic Principle. See here.
December 16th, 2005 at 10:30 am
Nala,
Actually, when the Romans conquered a city, they would keep the city’s gods and not displace them. The main concession that the Romans wanted was recognition of their own gods; and in a polytheist milieu this was rarely a problem. The problem arose only with the exclusive god of the Jews and the Christians – followers of Yahweh don’t recognize any other gods.
The something-BC advice by master statescraftman Kautilya to the Hindu who would be king was “He shall adopt the way of life, dress, language and customs of the people [of the acquired territory], show the same devotion to the gods of the territory [as to his own gods] and participate in the people’s festivals and amusements..”
-Arun
December 17th, 2005 at 7:00 pm
Belizean,
Well, I take back my snotty remark. But I’m disappointed by the article, which relates “religiosity” to “delinquincy” with certain definitions. I’m not surprised if the activities associated with religiosity (prayer, Bible studies, etc.) correlate negatively with a person’s penchant for crime. What I question is how belief in God (i.e. not being an atheist) directly affects whether a person commits crime. Even the authors admit that the positive effects of “religiosity” are really linked to a “loosely defined concept of hope combined with a positive self concept and happiness.” Granted, for the average person, this is probably easier to achieve through religion, but it is by no means necessary.
December 18th, 2005 at 12:08 am
Anonymous,
It’s not the best article. It’s just what I came up with after a 1-minute Google search. It’s a complicated issue. Many variables are involved.
The essential point is this. Suppose we have two identical groups. One goup is repeatedly subjected to aversion therapy against behavior X. The other group isn’t. It would be very strange if both groups had exactly the same propensity to engage in behavior X.
Religion is just a type of aversion therapy intended to reduces one propensity to engage in uncivil behavior.
You are correct that it need not involve a belief in God. Buddhist are atheists, for example. But we really don’t know how to reliably suppress uncivil behavior in large masses without religion — godless or not.
Most atheists don’t understand this.
December 18th, 2005 at 9:36 am
“It’s not the best article. It’s just what I came up with after a 1-minute Google search.”
I suspected as much.
February 14th, 2007 at 2:53 am
[...] This is a huge step forward. Keep in mind, the typical American thinks of atheists as fundamentally untrustworthy people. A major network like CNN will think nothing of hosting a roundtable discussion on atheism and not asking any atheists to participate. But, unlike a short while ago, they will eventually be shamed into admitting that was a mistake, and make up for it by inviting some atheists to defend their ideas. Baby steps. Professional news anchors may still seem a little befuddled at the notion that a clean, articulate person may not believe in God. But at least that notion is getting a decent public hearing. Once people actually hear what atheists have to say, perhaps they will get the idea that one need not be an amoral baby-killer just because one doesn’t believe in God. [...]
February 16th, 2007 at 7:00 pm
[...] Nothing new, of course. [...]