study finds religious people are less intelligent than atheists

[Atreus21]

Atheism. "We're smarter than everyone else, dammit."

 

[sixone]

Atheism. "We're smarter than everyone else, God dammit."

FFY

 

[GagHalfrunt]

Intelligence leads to skepticism

Intelligence REQUIRES skepticism.

 

[Patranus]

Pat Robertson is worth roughly $1 billion. I would say that he is far more 'intelligent' than then combined 99.9999% of the population who doesn't believe in religion.

 

[almightyobo]

I'm just saying in America as a whole most of the ideas we hold on morality have their basis in Christianity, since historically it was the most predominant religion. When an Atheist claims they don't believe in god but are still moral they are talking about Christian morals. They have no morals of their own.



Yup so where do you think an Atheists morals came from.

oh.. my.. science..

 

[GagHalfrunt]

Pat Robertson is worth roughly $1 billion. I would say that he is far more 'intelligent' than then combined 99.9999% of the population who doesn't believe in religion.

What makes you think Pat Robertson believes in god? If Pat had even a shred of belief in heaven and hell he would not be risking eternal damnation by fleecing gods flock on a daily basis. He's smart as a hell, but he's not religious. Which, come to think of it, is even more evidence of the idiocy of the average religious person. Anyone that believes an omnipotent being would hire a schmuck like Pat Robertson to be his spokesman is exponentially more stupid than a person who believes in invisible men in the sky in the first place.

 

[s0me0nesmind1]

I'm not going to give an overall "Yes" but...

The difference between an atheist and a religious person shows intellect through one simple mechanism that another is clearly denying: One of the 2 groups questions authority.

That alone shows a MAGNITUDE of difference from a scientific level of the possibilities. One brain remains closed and dormant, the other shows to be open to a vast array of possibilities. It really is that simple. Now are all religious nuts that close minded? No, there are always exceptions to the rule. However that is simply the case for most - and how this research was concluded.

 

[cheezy321]

How do you know someone is an atheist?

Don't worry, they'll let you know.

/Atheism, the new religion of middle aged white guys.

 

[Zodiark1593]

For the most part yes, but I put the exception toward Buddhists.

 

[BurnItDwn]

Intelligence REQUIRES skepticism.

Intelligence and skepticism are always found in pairs.

You can't be skeptical without the abillity to be rational and logical, which requires intelligence.
You can't be intelligent without the abillity to be rational and logical, which requires skepticism.

I want to know how many self claimed theists are actually atheists and only claiming to be theists since our society as o whole promotes stupidity as a good thing and generally shuns intelligence as being "uncool."

I suspect that probably a solid 30% of theists are actually atheists who "choose" to believe something. How can anybody "choose" to believe anything? That is impossible. A belief is not a decision or a choice. It is simply a happening. You either believe or you don't believe. There is no choice involved.

 

[tynopik]

for a whole bunch of people congratulating themselves over their skepticism, there's a distinct lack of skepticism about the original article.

 

[IGBT]

Atheism is a form of belief just like any other theism.

 

[crashtestdummy]

for a whole bunch of people congratulating themselves over their skepticism, there's a distinct lack of skepticism about the original article.

Here's some thoughts:

The first thing to note is that you always have to be a little careful citing numbers and small trends when it comes to meta-analyses. The biggest problem is that the papers selected all have their own methodologies, and while those methodologies may have been appropriate for the study in question, they may be difficult to reconcile with those of other studies.

For example, there is no single definition of what it means to be religious. Does it mean going to church? Does is mean you believe in some sort of God? Does it mean you accept the bible literally? Does it mean that you give a number 1 to 10 of "how much do you believe in God? The review attempts to differentiate a little bit between attendance and belief, but they can't capture the subtleties in the question at hand while still providing a meta-analysis.

Also, these studies don't have a consistent definition of what "inelligence" means. Some of them use entrance exams (SATs, etc), some use school GPA, some use IQ test data, some use the wonderlic, some use other methods. This inconsistency means that they cover a wide array of types of intelligence, but calls into question the veracity of combining sample size between studies.

Nonetheless, the studies are pretty overwhelming in reflecting a negative correlation between the chosen measures of religiosity and the chosen measures of intellect. This correlation is small (about 6 IQ points), but persistent. I wouldn't dismiss it out of hand, but I'm not sure it gives us life-altering information, either.

 

[justoh]

Atheism is a form of belief just like any other theism.

Wrong. Look it up.

 

[WaTaGuMp]

You have to be pretty fucking stupid to believe the Bible.

 

[Pocatello]

I do agree that religious people are very stupid. ATOT members must be very religious. Just look at all the posts here, you won't find any form of intelligence here.

 

[blankslate]

What created Earth? (God)

And when Aquaman gets pissed enough, he'll have God get revenge for him....

 

[brainhulk]

Atheism is a form of belief just like any other theism.

 

[Broheim]

Atheism is a form of belief just like any other theism.

how can the lack of belief possibly be a belief?

there really shouldn't be a word for it either, just like there isn't a word for people that don't use a loofah...

 

[soulcougher73]

Atheism is a form of belief just like any other theism.

Hey, look, we found one of those religious people that article talks about.

 

[tynopik]

how can the lack of belief possibly be a belief?

careful, the other atheists might want to kick you out for bringing down the average

 

[Gibsons]

Have we had the atheist vs agnostic argument yet?

 

[soulcougher73]

Have we had the atheist vs agnostic argument yet?

What is their to argue? They are 2 different fairly well defined things.

 

[justoh]

What is their to argue? They are 2 different fairly well defined things.

Excepting that they are functionally equivalent.

 

[ShadowOfMyself]

I think the only people who required a study to notice something so obvious, were religious ones

The only kind of intelligent religious person I can imagine is that of someone who is fully aware of how delusional they are, but they are in it for the comforting aspect of having a "father figure" that watches over us, so they stick to it anyway

Fortunately atheism is becoming more and more widespread nowadays, thanks to the "information age"
There is a HUGE amount of people who are/were religious because they simply dont know better... Religion tends to make people AVOID questioning things, so they just go with whatever they are told since kids
The idea of there not being a god etc doesnt even occur to them, but once they start researching, and see/read some Dawkins, Krauss, etc they quickly realize how stupid they were, and in many cases they wind up becoming some of the most vocal atheists out there (a good example being Seth Andrews with his Thinking Atheist podcast)

The thing I find really baffling though is how religious as a whole the USA is... The way religion is weaved into politics is disturbing to say the least... I love how every presidential speech ends with "God bless America" or such
Meanwhile, look at some of the top european countries, like Sweden, Holland, Denmark, with atheism rates of 90%+

Good thing we dont have rednecks over here