Posted on 09/28/2010 6:06:14 AM PDT by lbryce
Researchers from the independent Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life phoned more than 3,400 Americans and asked them 32 questions about the Bible, Christianity and other world religions, famous religious figures and the constitutional principles governing religion in public life.
On average, people who took the survey answered half the questions incorrectly, and many flubbed even questions about their own faith.
Those who scored the highest were atheists and agnostics, as well as two religious minorities: Jews and Mormons. The results were the same even after the researchers controlled for factors like age and racial differences.
“Even after all these other factors, including education, are taken into account, atheists and agnostics, Jews and Mormons still outperform all the other religious groups in our survey,” said Greg Smith, a senior researcher at Pew.
That finding might surprise some, but not Dave Silverman, president of American Atheists, an advocacy group for nonbelievers that was founded by Madalyn Murray O’Hair.
“I have heard many times that atheists know more about religion than religious people,” Mr. Silverman said. “Atheism is an effect of that knowledge, not a lack of knowledge. I gave a Bible to my daughter. That’s how you make atheists.”
Among the topics covered in the survey were: Where was Jesus born? What is Ramadan? Whose writings inspired the Protestant Reformation? Which Biblical figure led the exodus from Egypt? What religion is the Dalai Lama? Joseph Smith? Mother Theresa? In most cases, the format was multiple choice.
The researchers said that the questionnaire was designed to represent a breadth of knowledge about religion, but was not intended to be regarded as a list of the most essential facts about the subject. Most of the questions were easy, but a few were difficult enough to discern which respondents were highly knowledgeable.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
> It will be interesting to watch the evasion here though... :)
Before you get too pleased with yourself, you should keep in mind that this is New York Times writing about Pew - no reason to expect facts from either source.
Consider this:
> On questions about Christianity – including a battery of questions about the Bible – Mormons (7.9 out of 12 right on average) and white evangelical Protestants (7.3 correct on average) show the highest levels of knowledge.
This demonstrated that the followers of the majority religion (Christians) in the United States know more about their religion than atheists/agnostics or followers of a minority religion (Jews). No surprises here.
Also:
> Jews and atheists/agnostics stand out for their knowledge of other world religions, including Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism and Judaism;
Jews know more about Judaism. Amazing! And, atheists and agnostics know more factoids about multiple religions. Most of these factoids probably came from the recent “Eat, Pray, Love” movie.
Then we have a winner:
> Atheists/agnostics and Jews also do particularly well on questions about the role of religion in public life, including a question about what the U.S. Constitution says about religion.
Probably comes from complaining about school prayers.
(I must say that as a Jew, having my religion combined with atheists on any level is offensive.)
I know a couple of self-described atheists who can quote chapter and verse, from more than one Bible version. They actually studied it at some time.
I’m not saying that you;d don’t need to know the facts, basis for belief.
I’m saying that just memorizing facts doesn’t make you understand the greater concept behind those facts.
For example, I can memorize every state bird, every state capital, but that doesn’t make me a believer in the vision of being US citizen.
BTTT
“> On questions about Christianity – including a battery of questions about the Bible – Mormons (7.9 out of 12 right on average) and white evangelical Protestants (7.3 correct on average) show the highest levels of knowledge.”
Ah ha ha ha odd that this analysis was not prominent in the article!
And it appears that Christians don’t know much about the Hindu pantheon of gods, either.
Yeah, fairy tale stuff, sort of like how life just magically appeared from non-life, or how a spot of superdense matter exploded and somehow created order. You know, stupid, silly stuff like that.
OK. I had misunderstood what you were saying. I apologize.
Thanks for the full survey. Looks like it was designed to come up with conclusion it did. The question of why the Pew Center wants to mock Christian Americans, I will leave to the politicians.
That's okay, I know several dozen fundamentalist Christians who can quote entire chapters and books (and I don't mean the little shortie one-chapter books like Philemon or II John) off the top of their heads, word for word, AND tell you what it actually means.
My experience is that even the atheists who DO know something about the Bible generally only have a superficial knowledge. They know factoids - but that is not the same thing as actually knowing something about it. The major extent of their Bible knowledge comes from those hokie "Big List of a Billion and One BuyBull Contradictions!!!!!!" websites - sites which, when the intelligent and insightful reader sits down to them, are easily seen to be taking verses completely out of context, or even misquoting them, so as to generate the "contradictions."
You are welcome! The server was slashdotted for quite a while.
A deliberate hit piece? I dunno, maybe it’s important to know the difference between Shiva, Mars, Apollo, and Ganesh? /s
> Ah ha ha ha odd that this analysis was not prominent in the article!
Unfortunately, I actually had to go to the NYT web site to get that information. That vague stench will haunt me for the rest of the day.
I share your sentiments.
I'm always puzzled by the phenomenon of the Evangelical atheist. The obsession with trying to convince others (when they're really just convincing themselves) that "there is no God" smacks of desperation.
Very revealing, what a misleading article.
There is the key. I try to build on that rather than argue and fight with them.
Because, like many liberal beliefs, it reallies on deliberate ignorance.
The mathematical improbability of "atoms just randomly coming together and creating life" is so staggeringly remote, it defies description. It takes a lot of effort to keep up that facade.
IN the words of Homer “Lisa, Just because I don’t care doesn’t mean I don’t understand!”
He’s probably just making the point that there can be atheist conservatives. Conservatism is becoming a big tent, no matter how we may view it.
“He’s probably just making the point that there can be atheist conservatives.”
####
By that logic, there could be big government/high tax “conservatives” as well.
Conservatism is not just about fiscal issues.
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