A Scientific Study?

[Yvonne]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2111174/Intelligent-people-less-likely-to-believe-in-God.html

 

I wonder, then, how "intelligent" some politicians are?

 

But, seriously, is there really believe there is a link intelligence and belief? Wow. That's going to surprise an awful lot of people.

[PaulS]

I think the study itself is probably a bit simplistic, but I do think there is a correlation between intelligence and the lack of belief in supernaturalism. Obviously the more science uncovers/discovers, the less room there is for what was previously often understood to be, or to be of, God. That said, there are many intelligent people that still hold to to a literal, fundamental understanding of the bible, so it would appear that intelligence isn't always the deciding factor.

[glintofpewter]

Professor Lynn, who has provoked controversy in the past with research linking intelligence to race and sex,

He may be out on a limb or just talking about things that we would rather not talk about.

many more members of the "intellectual elite" considered themselves atheists

The data depends on how you ask the questions

 

A decline in religious observance over the last century was directly linked to a rise in average intelligence,

This is a terrible way to measure belief. His science is bad, not just about religion.

 

Those who study population growth and religion say if you want your liberal smarter than average grand children to win elections you better start having children because conservative religious folk are having babies at above replacement level and intelligent, cosmopolitan liberals, in general, are not. I know we all believe education have solve even bad belief so pray it does.

 

Dutch

[glintofpewter]

Both attitudinal and behavioral measures of religiosity were significant predictors of perceived emotional intelligence.

You may have high IQ but they have high EQ.

 

Labeling prevents you from being in the moment.

 

The answers you get depend on the questions you ask. Consider the options below when you answer "which God you believe in?"

1. a powerful, human-like, supernatural being
   
2. the monistic substrate
   
3. that which we cannot understand,
   
4. a metaphor for a transcendent reality.
   
5. An impersonal and universal spiritual presence or force.
   
6. Government Of Darkness, a fictional criminal empire
   
7. the source of all moral obligation
   
8. any question which cannot be defined cannot be answered by science and is therefore either nonsensical or is not worth asking, on the grounds that only empirically answerable questions make sense and are worth attention.
   

 

Dutch

[glintofpewter]

I do think that there is something to the study that observes that there is a functional difference in the brains of those who believe in a loving accepting God and those that believe in a fearful judging God. These groups are also generally divided in their ability to tolerate ambiguity.

 

dutch

[Yvonne]

Oh yeah, having been a researcher interpretting statistics for many years, I am always questioning the validity of "research studies". Maybe there is a linkage between intelligence and belief in a supernatural God, but I'm not so sure. In a past life (meaning when I went through my "finding religion phase"), I read things by scientists who were also fundamentalists attempting to prove the existence of God. Maybe they weren't particulary intelligent scientists? I doubt my IQ has changed much in the past 10 years, but the way I view God certainly has. I didn't get more intelligent, but I did become more open-minded. And I cannot say that intelligent people are more open-minded, I've known some highly intelligent folks with pretty narrow views.

 

Dutch, I'm not sure what you meant when you said he was "talking about things we'd rather not talk about" in regards to sex and race and intelligence. I won't ask you to clarify, because that's way beyond the scope of this forum, but I sure hope you're not saying what I think you're saying because I have a great deal of respect for you!

 

I do take your point about EQ as opposed to IQ. But again, I think these studies may be biased or, as Paul said, simplistic. And, to tell the truth, I posted it more/less as a joke, sorry, guess it wasn't as funny as I thought.

 

Cheers.

[GeorgeW]

To suggest that religious faith is a function of low intelligence is not, IMO, a very intelligent proposition.

 

However, I suspect that that there is some correlation between IQ and education and education helps us learn to examine evidence in a critical and logical way. This can lead us to examine traditional religious beliefs and some to deviate from these beliefs (and may deepen the faith of others).

 

We often make a theist-atheist distinction, but I think there is also a large group of people, many uneducated, who are largely indifferent to religion. If asked, they may say that they believe in God, but in reality, this is not an important issue in their lives or something they have given much thought to.

 

George

[JenellYB]

Synchronicity this morning, big time. My FB feeds from several mental health research organizations this morning already had me thinking in directions (not directly involving religion) that don't require a very long cogntive leap to this very topc.

 

First, like you said Yvonne, having some research experience/background....most of us are really unprepared to deal effecitvley with and at the mercy of any so-called "research shows" we might be presented through the media....often because whomever in the media that wrote the stuff are themselves not qualified to be making any evaluations out of it. I had even before my college experience been cautious about claims about "studies that show" in the media or elsewhere outside actual scientific circles, but I think anyone that could make it through "Research Methods" and "Statistics for Social Sciences" would never regret having taken the effort. Except maybe, for how much more insane and ignorant the rest of society looks after haing done so, lol.

 

Honestly, ALL of the "studies" I've seen, was able to look at any real details about how they were done and the conclusions drawn, were seriously flawed. It was actually a 'class' of types of studies common in our society, that we looked at in those courses AS usually being examples of flawed research. Without seeing details of this or any particular study, of course, I can say what its flaws are, but for its subject/conclusions, most likely include failure to adequately define "believe in God" and method of determining do//do not beleive....just for starters. As others point out here, if "beleif in God" is actually "in" some specific image of god, there's a serious flaw, as well as how beleif is measured, also as noted, church attendance and religious activities is an entirely inadequate measure of that.

[Yvonne]

I had even before my college experience been cautious about claims about "studies that show" in the media or elsewhere outside actual scientific circles, but I think anyone that could make it through "Research Methods" and "Statistics for Social Sciences" would never regret having taken the effort. Except maybe, for how much more insane and ignorant the rest of society looks after having done so, lol.

 

(there's no emoticon with tears of laughter)

[JenellYB]

Edit into my post above.."all the studies I have seen..." INSERT in this area of interest/topic.....just to clarify the scope of my statement there, lol!

 

An awful lot os what gets passed off as 'research studies' not only in this topic,but more than we'd like to realize, and even by supposed educated and 'qualified' reasearchers, is actually less accurately 'research' than 'apologetics' and outright attempts to manipulate, thinly disguised under a cloak of supposed 'scientific' credibility.

 

Jenell