Holy Confirmation Bias Batman!

"Confirmation Bias" is a constant slogan of the atheists on CARM. Every time I put up any kind of proof or show any data they sing out with "confirmation bias." In threads Backup (on CARM 0f course) argues that Christians are stupider than atheists. Every example he applies his own criteria, which I'm sure is the most unbiased objective in the world; finds that the atheist who claims little aliens assigned her to destroy Christianity is not nutty but those tho think Moses wrote the Pentateuch are much so than she. (that is Aschyra S.)

one thread is here:

and

One here:



NOTE that thread has been closed.

I thought he was a provocateur because of these. In in the interest of spreading sunshine, which surely entails spreading understanding, maybe there's more there.


In the attempt to spread understanding I will give you my understanding of things and I hope he will answer rationally.


Now first of all I can't deny that there are a great mean y stupid Christians. I don't its fair to say that there are more of them than of atheists, at least proportionally. the proportion of intelligent learned atheist has greatly diminished since my day, when i wan an atheist.

Both of these outlooks are unfair. It's unfair to try and say that Christianity must be wrong because it has so many more stupid people. There's an objective measurement that proves this is wrong. I'll tell you that in a minute. The finding that atheists have gotten stupider, while true is unfair to use as a weapon becuase there's a logical reason there too, and neither case entails a correlation between the stupid population and the truth content of the belief.

(1) why are there more stupid atheists now than there used to be?

More atheists are less intelligent proportionately because in the old days people became atheists due to contacts in college. That was the major way one became an atheist. A very small minority of workers became so due to communist affiliation but there were never more than 2% communists America at the most communistic time. Now there's a huge number of young people who become atheist becuase they are looking for an identity and atheism is reaching out on the net. Naturally they are going to attract more people with less than a college education.

(2) Why are more stupid Christians than atheists?

By "Stupid" I mean less intellectual. Because there are a lot more Christians than atheists. Christian more clearly fit the bell curve. I've said this before backup didn't think about it, but if you think about it is absolute. it is the answer. it proves why there are more and why that doesn't spell defeat for the belief system.

There will always be more "non intellectuals" than intellectuals. this is becuase of the bell curve. The small portion that is more than 100 in IQ (average) goes down further and get's smaller as the IQ get's higher. But people who are not intellectual include all the average people (who are like the largest group) and then the below average. The intelligent people only include the above average. So they will always be smaller as long as there is a bell curve.

this is not to endorse the book the bell curve. that's a different matter. the basic set up that there is a bell curve as a result of plotting intelligence on a graph is absolute y true. that means there will more stupid Christians than atheists because Christians are 80% of the public, they are the public. The are not just in the majority they are practically the whole country.

actual are only about three percent. the number of people who are angry with established religion lets say including those who say "there may be a God I don't like organized religion" are 12%, that includes the 3% atheists.

Naturally there are more stupid atheists than used to be but still many more stupid Christians. but this also means there are more intelligent Christians than atheists too.

(3) Why we can't connect intelligence to Belief.

Of all the studies on religious belief and IQ only 6 support the idea that religious people are less intelligent than skeptics. The studies say this also included theological liberals so they are not even rally excluding religious believers from the intelligent group. They are also older and less well done studies.

there are 16 studies that show either religious people are smarter or there is correlation.

6 t0 16 in favor of the no correlation hypothesis.

all of that can be found here:

http://www.doxa.ws/other/smarter.html


(4) These last two points spell out the realization that we can't correlate intelligence with being right.

Intelligent people can believe stupid things.

The year I started to Doctoral work at UT Dallas two guys from that school won the Noble prize for scinece. One of them was a Mormon and a creationist! the other was a conservative Christian of some other stripe.

I have found web sites of very intelligent people who know a lot of science who know philosophy of scinece (which I studied in Ph.D. work) but they are ID guys.

It is extremely insulting and angering when this guy says that such people are "crazies." I think televangelists are crazy. I can them as nuts some them are true nut cases. you are also talking about a lot people I've known who were good kind decent people and some thing pretty smart. you are intentionally provoking hostility.

I've known plenty of smart people who had stupid ideas. I've known a few smart republicans. believe it or not. although I would never vote republican. perish the thought. My father would be spinning if I did.

In response he says this:

 So the only dishonest, stupid, or crazy atheists anyone could come up with was Madalyn Murray O'Hair, Dan Barker (which I do not agree with) and a very small group of speculative "historians" with dubious research skills that may not even be atheists.

It looks like our movement is almost 100% pure.

In all honesty, why is this information so threatening?

I am totally serious. This makes no sense to me whatsoever.

I am not making fun or in anyway trying to be insulting. I asked a serious question in order to get an answer.

Can anybody explain what seems to be a very odd overreaction?

 then he also says this:

Hi Deist,

Metacrock listed you and me both on his stupid list. High five bro!

Hooks too. I can't remember who else.

I also listed a guy named Keith on carm as well as Big Thinker and MFFJM2 and others. I also said I've seen thousands of stupid atheist on the net in the 13 years I've been doing this. I made clear that I consider most atheist I've seen on the net as indicative of this kind of thing. they are just as bad as the fundies. This is a classic studying in seeing only what one wants to see. Every time I named an atheist he just asserted that it was "obvious" that their behavior and beliefs were not as nutty as the fundies. When He had to admit one was he questioned her atheism.