passionately atheist

[Voter]

Apology accepted. Funny how no one butts in and jumps on the atheist for the personal attack. But anyway...

Forgive me, but the only conclusion you can draw from the statistics is that a correlation exists.

In this case, that's enough of a conclusion. I once took a research methods course and understand perfectly well that correlation does not indicate causation. I also know that it's often prudent to act on correlation despite this lack. For instance, suppose there are correlations between high blood pressure and heart disease, between exercise and reduction in blood pressure, but causative agents have not yet been discovered and substantiated. If I have high blood pressure, I'm going to start exercising, despite ignorance of the mechanics.

1) Within this category of people, there is a tendency (the correlation). Does this support the idea that all religious people are happier than all non-religious people? Of course not.

Does a correlation between smoking and lung cancer support the idea that all smokers will develop lung cancer? Of course not. But don't you agree it's a good idea to quit smoking?

2) The statistics concerned themselves with people who reported that they were "happy" or "very happy". This is a self-described condition, not some objective evaluation of happiness. Does it matter? Maybe - I'm just pointing this out. Consider, in the Shermer article, "healthiness" was evaluated by people describing their mental health. In other words, the conclusion that people were "healthy" appears to be based on whether or not they described their own mental-health as "happy" or "very happy". Doesn't this seem a tad weak? How much can we usefully conclude from this?

First, some factors are objective, like lifespan and charitable giving. Second, yes, self-reported happiness is weaker due to subjectivity, but I'd still give it some weight.

I think these things are important to keep in mind when considering correlation studies. Why? Because otherwise, we would use correlations like the ones summarized on this page http://kspark.kaist.ac.kr/jesus/intelli ... ligion.htm to support a conclusion that becoming an atheist will make you more intelligent, or that all atheists are more intelligent than all theists. Such a conclusion would be, in my personal opinion, absurd in the extreme. There are clearly intelligent theists and unintelligent atheists. It is also hard to image that flipping between belief and non-belief will make one more or less intelligent. But - this is my point about correlation studies. These claims would be no more errant than a claim that becoming religious will make you happier and healthier because of a simple correlation.

Happiness commonly changes throughout life. Intelligence is pretty stable, at least if you're using IQ as a measure. So I disagree. It's fairly easy to imagine a change in lifestyle having an impact on happiness. People actively seek such change. There are industries built on that concept. However, it's difficult to imagine a change in lifestyle having such an impact on intelligence.

What is a nation if not a collection of individuals? If a national homicide rate is high, who is being killed (and doing the killing)? The individuals. If the rate of STD transmission in a nation is high, who is this affecting? The individuals. In this case, the ones who caught the clap

This study might be helpful if you were choosing what country to move to. The other is more helpful for an American deciding whther to be religious or not.

Anyway, I don't think either of them is tremendously applicable to a particular individual because of my issues, which I've repeatedly raised, with correlation studies and the way people leap to unsupported conclusions from them.

Yes, people misuse correlation studies by inferring causation from them. However, you err in the other direction, by discounting their practical application due to the causation issue. Correlations can help us make health, career, and many other choices, even though causation has not been determined.

Sure - if you subscribe to the implications of these correlations. However, if you do, then you would also have to admit the inverse correlation between religion and intelligence,

I have no problem with that. You could make a Biblical argument predicting that.

[Whitney]

I admit I just skimmed...but why argue over if religion produces happiness?  I doubt anyone here still believes in Santa or the Tooth Fairy just because the idea makes them happy.  If we found out tomorrow that God exists but is actually Satan, I'd be happier to continue not believing...that wouldn't change what is real and I wouldn't be able to convince myself of an alternate reality.  No thinking person chooses their worldview based on what makes them happy, they decide based on what they can gather and extract from the available evidence.

[Voter]

No thinking person chooses their worldview based on what makes them happy, they decide based on what they can gather and extract from the available evidence.

We were discussing unthinking people, at least as far as religion goes.

[SteveS]

Thanks for the response.

I also know that it's often prudent to act on correlation despite this lack. For instance, suppose there are correlations between high blood pressure and heart disease, between exercise and reduction in blood pressure, but causative agents have not yet been discovered and substantiated. If I have high blood pressure, I'm going to start exercising, despite ignorance of the mechanics.

Sure, it may often be prudent, but it can just as easily be in err.  Sticking with the medical example, here's an excerpt from wikipedia (full page at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlatio ... ite_note-0):

In a widely-studied example, numerous epidemiological studies showed that women who were taking combined hormone replacement therapy (HRT) also had a lower-than-average incidence of coronary heart disease (CHD), leading doctors to propose that HRT was protective against CHD. But controlled trials showed that HRT caused a small and significant increase in risk of CHD. Re-analysis of the data showed that women undertaking HRT were more likely to be from socio-economic groups ABC1, with better than average diet and exercise regimes. The two were coincident effects of a common cause, rather than cause and effect as had been supposed.

The problem is that if (I don't know if they did or not, but if) doctors began prescribing HRT to people to prevent CHD, much as above one might decide to start exercising, it isn't really a no-cost proposition.  In other words, it isn't even fair to say "what's the harm?".  HRT presumably has a cost associated with it and actually seemed to correlate, in a more focused study, with increased CHD risk.  Focusing only on the connection between HRT and CHD might be ignoring other correlations with HRT, some of them potentially negative, and also other correlations with CHD.

Does a correlation between smoking and lung cancer support the idea that all smokers will develop lung cancer? Of course not.

Agreed.  Which means that there is a difference between an individual and a correlation group.  Although there is a strong correlation between smokers and lung cancer, that doesn't mean that an individual smoker will develop lung cancer or that an individual non-smoker will not.  What is important to the individual is what actually does occur with him.  Translate this idea to individual choices and personal happiness, and I think it becomes easy to see that these percentages aren't as meaningful as they might at first appear.  What is important to my own happiness is what makes me happy, not what makes everybody else happy.

Incidentally,

But don't you agree it's a good idea to quit smoking?

Speaking for myself, yes - I do.  

First, some factors are objective, like lifespan and charitable giving. Second, yes, self-reported happiness is weaker due to subjectivity, but I'd still give it some weight.

Fair enough.  My only observation would be that surely a great many factors must correlate with lifespan, and it is easy to entertain the idea that a simple correlation between being politically conservative and living longer might be subject to the correlation/causation problems.  Here is a reference to a research that correlated loneliness with possible health issues, for example: http://www.productivity501.com/lonliness-is-unhealthy/1016/.  If religious people regularly attend church, this could very well combat loneliness.  Could this be a factor?  Maybe.  Is the loneliness correlation itself problematic?  Maybe.  It seems hard to make a definitive conclusion to such a complex issue from simple high-level correlations.

Intelligence is pretty stable, at least if you're using IQ as a measure. So I disagree.

Actually, I think we agree on this point.  I did say that I thought it was wrong to conclude that your intelligence will change if you flip between belief and non-belief.

This study might be helpful if you were choosing what country to move to. The other is more helpful for an American deciding whther to be religious or not.

I can't help but disagree with this.  Do you honestly think that people choose to become religious based on a study of the personal and societal effects correlated with followers of faith?  Do people decide to become religious because they studied correlations of beneficial societal or personal effects against the followers of the faith, and if so, do they renounce their faith if the alternative changes and begins to correlate more strongly with the said benefits?  If not, then I think I have a reasonable challenge to the idea that these studies are helpful to an individual who is deciding to become religious or not.  If they are not used to help guide their choices for this purpose, then in what manner are they "helpful" for this purpose?

[myleviathan]

Instead of "throwing failure into the face," which IIRC was your spin on it to make VOter look like a big ol' meany, call it introducing cognitive dissonance in order to get him to examine himself. Call it an intervention. People are forced to face their failures all the time, and mature people come out better for it.

This is a direct quote from your first post:

You're projecting your own shortcomings and failure as a Christian onto all Christians.

Then you admitted to throwing failure in Dodge's face. Again, this is a direct quote:

OK, I'm throwing it seriously in his face. Maintaining faith for life is a primary goal of Christianity. He did not maintain that faith. Therefore he failed as a Christian. He should probably mature as an atheist before attempting to write general letters supporting it.

I haven't spun anything you've said. You've been very direct.

Also, I don't think you've 'introduced cognitive dissonance'. Dodge already experienced cognitive dissonance when he started to lose faith, and the resolution of that dissonance is his current atheism.

Furthermore, I would understand your concern if you were trying to help Dodge as a struggling Christian. But I don't get any inclination you're trying to help Dodge's faith as much as you're defending your own (at his expense). For instance, you claim that Dodge has completely failed in the way of Christianity, and instead of trying to encourage him, you tell him he should keep his letter to himself until his atheism matures.

I guess I'm just questioning your intentions for responding to the OP. You're not trying to help him develop those ideas, and you're not trying to get him to think further about Christianity, so what is your intention? It seems mostly defensive in nature, but correct me if I'm wrong.

No one is a strong atheist based on hard, sober, empirical evidence.

Atheism is the most natural, common-sense conclusion that can be drawn from the information that humans can sense. It can be claimed that there is some sort of extra-sensory reality that we cannot see, hear, smell, touch, or taste. However these claims cannot be universally verified. Since they can't be universally verified, anyone can claim anything about the spiritual realm, and be no more or less correct than anyone else. To make matters worse, people who do claim some sort of extra-sensory realm disagree as to its details. If there was a spiritual realm that could be reached, everyone who could reach it would agree on which god is in charge. As it happens, they can not.

Since the claims cannot be universally verified, no man can expect the belief of another in their religion of choice. Also, no religion can be regarded as morally superior to others.

Based on information that humans CAN universally sense, God or gods are not a viable conclusion. History and tradition propigate them, not readily observable facts or common sense.

Sure, for some the Bible is sufficient evidence for faith. Others are more discriminating, though. The quality of evidence should be taken into account before deciding whether or not you can believe that God ghost impregnated a woman.

Lots of people find the quality of evidence sufficient.

You're saying lots of people believe it so it must be true. Since when was truth determined by popularity?