What Atheists and Agnostics Know About Religion

[PowerEngineer]

I've noticed in some of our imfamous evolution-turned-religion threads that believers sometimes presume that non-believers know very little about religious beliefs. That's why this article might be an interesting read for ATOT regulars.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-religion-survey,0,7375137.story

If you want to know about God, you might want to talk to an atheist.

Heresy? Perhaps. But a survey that measured Americans' knowledge of religion found that atheists and agnostics knew more, on average, than followers of most major faiths. In fact, the gaps in knowledge among some of the faithful may give new meaning to the term "blind faith."

American atheists and agnostics tend to be people who grew up in a religious tradition and consciously gave it up, often after a great deal of reflection and study, said Alan Cooperman, associate director for research at the Pew Forum.

"These are people who thought a lot about religion," he said. "They're not indifferent. They care about it."

I can think of several members that fit this description.

Just something to think about the next time the exchanges get heated.

()

EDIT: It's been pointed out that there's already a thread on this article in P&N, making this a bit of a report. On the other hand, I'm probably not the only one who doesn't visit P&N often.

 

[Leros]

"I think that what happens for many Christians is, they accept their particular faith, they accept it to be true and they stop examining it. Consequently, because it's already accepted to be true, they don't examine other people's faiths. … That, I think, is not healthy for a person of any faith," he said.

Yup.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Here's what I know.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2108665

 

[ShawnD1]

We already did this thread in p&n. The conclusion is that many catholics do not understand that its supposed to literally be the blood of jesus they are drinking

 

[zerocool84]

Yup grew up very religious and went to private Catholic schools my whole life which would obviously make me extremely knowledgeable in the religion and all it's aspects and don't believe in a god. Hell I was even an alter boy for years and even went to summer religion camp.

 

[Eli]

Good article. Describes me exactly.

 

[bfdd]

Yup grew up very religious and went to private Catholic schools my whole life which would obviously make me extremely knowledgeable in the religion and all it's aspects and don't believe in a god. Hell I was even an alter boy for years and even went to summer religion camp.

Telling by your sig you do seem rather knowledgeable of your religion lol.

 

[GagHalfrunt]

The religious threads here pretty much prove the gist of the article. The atheists understand the origins of the fairy tales and see the lies and violence that have grown the faith while the wannabelievers fall back on screaming "TROLL!!" at the top of their lungs because they lack the knowledge to fight back with anything of substance. It's knowledge of religion that turns believers into atheists and it's ignorance of religion that is necessary for belief in it.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

The religious threads here pretty much prove the gist of the article. The atheists understand the origins of the fairy tales and see the lies and violence that have grown the faith while the wannabelievers fall back on screaming "TROLL!!" at the top of their lungs because they lack the knowledge to fight back with anything of substance. It's knowledge of religion that turns believers into atheists and it's ignorance of religion that is necessary for belief in it.

My sense is that the way you phrase things makes you a troll. Being "enlightened" doesn't prevent you from being a dick about it.

 

[Cerpin Taxt]

I've noticed in some of our imfamous evolution-turned-religion threads that believers sometimes presume that non-believers know very little about religious beliefs. That's why this article might be an interesting read for ATOT regulars.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-religion-survey,0,7375137.story





I can think of several members that fit this description.

Just something to think about the next time the exchanges get heated.

()

Oh look! A religion thread! Here comes Cerpin Taxt! :sneaky:

This survey's results have been banging around the interent a few places recently. I agere with a comment made in one of the articles (or maybe it was a comment made in a thread about the article, I can't remember) to the effect that the more one seems to learn about religion, the less likely he is to remain religious.

I spent more than a decade (geez! has it been that long? D on a Christian discussion forum before ever coming to Anandtech, and I wasn't an atheist when I first discovered that board. I am hardly the only poster to have made that transition while participating actively there, either. It's rather ironical how many atheists are generated by that particular website which purports to specialize in Christian apologetics.

Suffice it to say, after ten years there, I've learned a lot about theism and religion, and I suppose my posting habits exhibit that.

 

[Leros]

Yup grew up very religious and went to private Catholic schools my whole life which would obviously make me extremely knowledgeable in the religion and all it's aspects and don't believe in a god. Hell I was even an alter boy for years and even went to summer religion camp.

Yeah. I went to a private Episcopal school for 1st - 9th grade.

The religion didn't make sense to me there so I tried two other churches on my own time. When I was a kid, I tried very hard to believe in Christianity (and religion in general), but I just could not believe.

 

[DrPizza]

It's a lot more enlightening to look at the foundations - go back to the Old Testament and take a careful look at it. Look at how many stories were pretty much plagiarized from other groups. Read through Exodus & see how much of it was a set of rules for governing. Check out the 10 Commandments and think about it in the context of the times.
"You shall have no other gods before Me"
It's not like today - back then, there were a lot of different gods. What the very first commandment says is that there are other gods, but the Lord is superior to the rest of them. It doesn't say "you shall have no other gods." It says "you shall have no other gods before me."

Also (for the people who believe in literal translations) virtually all written works back then were allegorical in nature. Not literal works of non-fiction.

 

[CrazyHelloDeli]

 

[ShawnD1]

Yeah. I went to a private Episcopal school for 1st - 9th grade.

The religion didn't make sense to me there so I tried two other churches on my own time. When I was a kid, I tried very hard to believe in Christianity (and religion in general), but I just could not believe.

I went to catholic school from grades 1-12. I honestly did not think people were serious.

I didn't believe because it was taught the exact same way Greek mythology was taught. We learned many of the Greek gods, things they did, books written about them, references to them in modern times, etc. Religion classes for the first 6 grades were mostly about loving people and being a good person, so that seemed ok. After that, we started learning about Catholic history, and it was worded very similar to Greek mythology or Canadian history. In the class about Greek mythology, we wrote as if the events happened even though we knew they didn't - "and people would pray to Ares because he was the god of war and they thought he could help them win the war". Then the very next year we're writing about Jesus - "and Jesus went around curing leprosy and he raised Lazarus from the dead before dying and raising himself". There was no transition at all between what is considered mythology and what some people actually believe, so it all blurred together as mythology.

edit:
Canadian history is mythology too. We're still part of Britain.

 

[GagHalfrunt]

My sense is that the way you phrase things makes you a troll. Being "enlightened" doesn't prevent you from being a dick about it.

My sense is that there's no way to cite the facts of the origins of the fairy tales and indisputable evidence of the atrocities committed by the religions in a way that makes the believers happy. The more evidence that is presented on the atheists side the louder the wannabelievers will scream. It doesn't make us trolls and "pardon me, but I humbly submit the following list of the 10s of millions of people killed by your religion in the name of your god" will not be greeted with any more intelligent debate that "yo, your pedophile leaders are a bunch of murderers". The objections are to the message itself, not how politely it's delivered.

 

[DrPizza]

I went to catholic school from grades 1-12. I honestly did not think people were serious.

I didn't believe because it was taught the exact same way Greek mythology was taught. We learned many of the Greek gods, things they did, books written about them, references to them in modern times, etc. Religion classes for the first 6 grades were mostly about loving people and being a good person, so that seemed ok. After that, we started learning about Catholic history, and it was worded very similar to Greek mythology or Canadian history. In the class about Greek mythology, we wrote as if the events happened even though we knew they didn't - "and people would pray to Ares because he was the god of war and they thought he could help them win the war". Then the very next year we're writing about Jesus - "and Jesus went around curing leprosy and he raised Lazarus from the dead before dying and raising himself". There was no transition at all between what is considered mythology and what some people actually believe, so it all blurred together as mythology.

edit:
Canadian history is mythology too. We're still part of Britain.

And, as I pointed out above, if you study it in a historical context, it was a big blur from the other (now mythical) religions into the Old Testament.

 

[Perknose]

n. The conclusion is that many catholics do not understand that its supposed to literally be the blood of jesus they are drinking

I went to catholic school from grades 1-12.

I assume that if you went to Catholic school for 12 years you also went to church, so, what I'm not understanding here is how you could possibly not know that Catholic communion does not involve drinking anything, let alone bad wine posing as the blood of the baby Jesus.

I mean, back in the day we knew the Episcopalians and maybe the Methodists slurped grape juice (no lie) during communion, but not us.

No crappy cups of loose juice for us cat-lickers! Hygiene, heathen! We has it!

 

[MJinZ]

Studying religion is crazy. I mean, unless you become a TV Evangelist, you can't make a living off of it at all.

 

[zerocool84]

Studying religion is crazy. I mean, unless you become a TV Evangelist, you can't make a living off of it at all.

You don't need to be on tv to make money off it. Those guys on tv are just the richest ones. Pastors make a living off the "donations" of the followers.

 

[ShawnD1]

My sense is that there's no way to cite the facts of the origins of the fairy tales and indisputable evidence of the atrocities committed by the religions in a way that makes the believers happy. The more evidence that is presented on the atheists side the louder the wannabelievers will scream. It doesn't make us trolls and "pardon me, but I humbly submit the following list of the 10s of millions of people killed by your religion in the name of your god" will not be greeted with any more intelligent debate.

To be fair, too many atheists try to blame everything on religion even when actions have nothing to do with the idea rallied behind.
Let's use the Iraq war as an example. I think Bush's official reason for going in there and starting a war was about spreading freedom. Obviously that's bullshit, but that's what he said. Does that mean we can rally against freedom and say that people trying to spread freedom of evil? Of course not. You need to look deeper at what is causing things. Lots of people hide behind religion because they don't have the balls to say what they really mean.

Witch hunting is a good example. It's stupid to say Christianity is evil because of witch hunting. Christianity is not the cause of witch hunting. Nowhere in the bible does it say anything about witches. People hunt witches because they are stupid as fuck. Forget destroying Christianity; we need to kill everyone who is stupid as fuck. That would do a lot more good, actually.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

To be fair, too many atheists try to blame everything on religion even when actions have nothing to do with the idea rallied behind.
Let's use the Iraq war as an example. I think Bush's official reason for going in there and starting a war was about spreading freedom. Obviously that's bullshit, but that's what he said. Does that mean we can rally against freedom and say that people trying to spread freedom of evil? Of course not. You need to look deeper at what is causing things. Lots of people hide behind religion because they don't have the balls to say what they really mean.

Witch hunting is a good example. It's stupid to say Christianity is evil because of witch hunting. Christianity is not the cause of witch hunting. Nowhere in the bible does it say anything about witches. People hunt witches because they are stupid as fuck. Forget destroying Christianity; we need to kill everyone who is stupid as fuck. That would do a lot more good, actually.

That works for me

What's fascinating is the hatred which drips from his posts. It's as if he's the thing he protests. Never understood that.

 

[MJinZ]

You don't need to be on tv to make money off it. Those guys on tv are just the richest ones. Pastors make a living off the "donations" of the followers.

Ooh you're right I forgot about 7th Heaven. HE did pretty well for himself sending like 7 kids to college or something.

 

[ShawnD1]

I assume that if you went to Catholic school for 12 years you also went to church, so, what I'm not understanding here is how you could possibly not know that Catholic communion does not involve drinking anything, let alone bad wine posing as the blood of the baby Jesus.

I mean, back in the day we knew the Episcopalians and maybe the Methodists slurped grape juice (no lie) during communion, but not us.

No crappy cups of loose juice for us cat-lickers! Hygiene, heathen! We has it!

????

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eucharist#Catholic_Church

The Catholic Church teaches that when the bread and wine are consecrated in the Eucharist, they cease to be bread and wine, and become instead the Most Precious Body and Blood of Christ. The empirical appearance and physical properties are not changed, but for Catholics, the reality is. The consecration of the bread (known as the host) and wine represents the separation of Jesus' body from his blood at Calvary. However, since he has risen, the Church teaches that his body and blood can no longer be truly separated. Where one is, the other must be. Therefore, although the priest (or minister) says, "The body of Christ", when administering the host, and, "The blood of Christ", when presenting the chalice, the communicant who receives either one receives Christ, whole and entire.

The Catholic Church sees as the main basis for this belief the words of Jesus himself at his Last Supper: the Synoptic Gospels (Matthew 26:26-28; Mark 14:22-24; Luke 22:19-20) and Saint Paul's 1 Corinthians 11:23-25 recount that in that context Jesus said of what to all appearances were bread and wine: "This is my body … this is my blood." The Roman Catholic understanding of these words, from the Patristic authors onward, has emphasized their roots in the covenantal history of the Old Testament. The interpretation of Christ's words against this Old Testament background coheres with and supports belief in the Real Presence.

I don't remember the wine, but the crackers taste like fuck. I only went to church maybe 4 times ever and it sucked every single time.

 

[zerocool84]

Ooh you're right I forgot about 7th Heaven. HE did pretty well for himself sending like 7 kids to college or something.

and had two smokin daughters

 

[GagHalfrunt]

And, as I pointed out above, if you study it in a historical context, it was a big blur from the other (now mythical) religions into the Old Testament.

It pretty much had to be, it was all based on the same old stories from the same region. It's not a shock that the vast majority of the "modern" religions are stolen directly from the "pagen" religions they supplanted, it would only be a shock if they were not. The Sumerian Religion was stolen by the Greeks and Romans, so the Sumerians became "myth" and the Greeks and Romans became "real". When Judaism and Christianity and Islam stole the stories and rewrote them they became "real" religions and the Greeks and the Romans became "mythology". And sooner or later (sooner I think because it's already happening) Christianity will fall out of favor, something new will arise and future generations will look back on stories about Jesus and Moses and Noah the same way we look at stories about Zeus and Thor and Ra. It's just a common set of myths doctored up into a religion based on whatever the person who collates them wants them to say. You even see it in more modern religions like Anglicanism. They liked about 95% of Christianity, a few Kings decided they didn't like the pope having more power than them, threw a hissy fit and decided to invent a new religion. They kept the pieces they wanted, made up new parts that said what they wanted them to say about who had supreme authority, mandated that people follow and just like that, poof, it's a religion.