Posted on 12/22/2010 11:20:50 PM PST by delacoert
This article sheds some light on the "Mormon Scholar" thing.
It seems that Scholars who start out Mormons have a difficult time staying Mormon.
And we’re surprised? Hell, basic analytical thought blows all kinds of holes.
The same could be said, to a lesser degree, about scholars who are Christians or members of other religions.
There is a definite correlation between years of schooling and loss of religious faith.
Are you sure that is the correct way of phrasing that?
Are they measuring the effect of the education and the schooling on people that start as committed Christians, from committed Christian families, or are they just telling you the religious level of the people that have that level of schooling?
We know this how? Liberal college professors and journalists tell us so?
Nope, I have seen studies showing quite clearly that the more years an originally devout Christian (or member of another faith) spends in schooling the more likely they are to become agnostic or atheist.
Doesn’t mean I approve or agree or think this is necessarily a good thing, but it is still a fact.
The primary reason is most likely the extremely anti-religious environment of higher education. It would be quite odd if spending more years immersed in it had no effect.
Such a loss of faith is of course not inevitable or universal, but there is a very strong statistical correlation. Unfortunately, I don’t have the references on me at the moment. You’ll have to take my word for it. Or not.
This is related to my point.
Scientists May Not Be Very Religious, but Science May Not Be to Blame
July 3, 2007 Did God make scientists? Most of them don’t think so.
“Among scientists, as in the general population, being raised in a home in which religion and religious practice were valued is the most important predictor of present religiosity among the subjects.
Ecklund and Scheitle concluded that the assumption that becoming a scientist necessarily leads to loss of religion is untenable.
Ecklund says, “It appears that those from non-religious backgrounds disproportionately self-select into scientific professions. This may reflect the fact that there is tension between the religious tenets of some groups and the theories and methods of particular sciences and it contributes to the large number of non-religious scientists.”
http://www.physorg.com/news102700045.html
Seems like the honest comparison of the rates of attrition would be between Christian scholars trying to prove the historicity of the Bible versus Mormon scholars trying to prove the historicity of the Book of Mormon.
Have any references on that? Care to weigh in with your personal opinion?
This is called the Dunning-Kruger effect. It happens regardless of education level and can be illustrated in a survey taken of college professors where 94% of the professors surveyed believed their work was above average. Obviously 50% of them were ill informed if the average held for the entire population of professors. Interestingly, the more a subject actually knows about a topic, the less likely they are to claim to know the most about it. The converse is also true, which explains our Senate, Congress and unfortunately...most of America.
I don’t think there is any doubt attempting to prove the historicity of the BOM is much tougher than doing the same with the Bible.
The Bible is conceded even by its critics to be an ancient book written by men who lived during or not long after the events they relate.
The BOM is taken by all but devout Mormons to be a work of fiction written by a not particularly well-educated young American man in the early 19th century. As a work of fiction it is quite remarkable. As a work of history it is ludicrous.
I once tried to read the BOM. Could not believe how boring it was, compared to the Bible, which admittedly also has unbelievably boring sections. Even as a literary work it is much inferior.
Interesting but irrelevant.
The appropriate study would be of originally religious students and the correlation between their years of schooling and maintenance or loss of religious faith.
I am not trying to say that loss of religious faith among the “most educated” says anything about the truth or falsity of religion, only that more years immersed in an anti-religious environment has an effect. How could it not?
LOL, you want to make a stupid claim, then back it up.
Fair enough.
The staunch ones seem: 1) to regard it as authoritative against the teaching and doctrine pf ALL Christian denominations, 2) to be emboldened by it to the extent that they are the proclaim themselves the only true Christians on earth (by way of the Smithian restoration), and 3) then to want to be recognized as Christian brothers by all those who have been judged heathen by their fictionalized polytheistic heresy.
Good points. I am unaware of any study along the lines you mention.
Although it is quite obvious that most “real” scientists are not “men of faith.”
This is merely an observation of a statistical fact, not a comment as to whether the scientists are right to hold this opinion.
For some obscure reason, if you mention the negative correlation between years of schooling and religious faith, many seem to take it as an attack on religion. As if somehow more schooling necessarily equals greater wisdom.
It is also a fact that the higher the level of education the greater the likelihood of a person being a liberal. That doesn’t make them right.
Not quite what I meant to say.
GOP vs. Democrat party membership, not exactly the same thing as conservative vs. liberal, but reasonably close, correlates with education as follows:
High school dropout - Democrat.
High school graduate - approximately split.
Some college up to an undergraduate degree - GOP.
Graduate school - increasingly Democrat the higher you go.
This correlates well with the observed fact that Democrats tend to appeal more to the two ends of the income scale than to the middle.
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