…and this is a 
The results of yet another poll are out, showing that the godless are rising and promise to rise for years to come. In 1990, we made up 8% of the population; now in 2009, we're 15%. They're extrapolating forward and estimating that we will make up 25% of the country in 20 years.
It's not enough, is all I can say. I suppose it's good news, but I am disappointed in my fellow Americans. I will not be content until the number is 100%. (OK, 95%. It's not fair to demand rationality from people who are brain damaged or locked up in asylums.)
The really bizarre news here is the way people are squirming to put a twist to the data to reassure the believers. They've got a label for that 15% that isn't "godless atheist unbelievers": they are "Nones". Don't panic, they say, only 10% of them call themselves "atheists"! They're mostly agnostics and skeptics of organized religion! You don't have to stockpile food and ammo, bar the doors and windows, and prepare for the anarchy and evil that would follow if all those people were atheists.
It's rather annoying. Every article I see on this subject makes this desperate rush to reassure their readers that this growing cohort of Americans aren't really those goddamned atheists — they're nice people, unlike those cold-hearted, soulless beasts called atheists, and they aren't planning to storm your churches and rape the choir boys and boil babies in the baptismal fonts, unlike the scary atheistic monsters. They're special. And most of all, they aren't French.
"American nones are kind of agnostic and deistic, so it's a very American kind of skepticism," says Barry Kosmin, director of Trinity's Institute for the Study of Secularism in Society and Culture. "It's a kind of religious indifference that's not hostile to religion the way they are in France. Franklin and Jefferson would have recognized these people."
Oh, please. All the low frequency of self-reported atheists in the survey tells you is that the long-running campaign in American culture to stigmatize atheism has been highly successful — and it's an attitude that we still see expressed in reports like this. The most important news they try to transmit is not the increase in unbelievers, it's "Thank God they aren't atheists! They're just rational skeptics, instead!"
Atheism is not a state to be avoided. It does not distort your features so that the founding fathers would throw you out of the country as an undesirable alien. It does not give you a French accent. It doesn't even make you want to bomb churches. We are "rational skeptics," too, we're just the ones who aren't afraid to confront the social conventions that insist that you must be churched or in some way pious in order to be a good person — we are just the ones who will get in beatifically complacent faces and tell them they're wallowing in bullshit.
So don't be reassured. Those "Nones" don't believe in a Bearded Ape of Cosmic Proportions, they aren't propping up the local priestly den of ignorance with donations, and Pat Robertson is still confident that every one of them will burn in hell. Most are not as vocal or as confident as the spokespeople for atheism are, but then, most of the people who have been filling church pews for centuries haven't been as noisy or assertive about their faith as have the priests and bishops and deacons, but no demographers have therefore felt compelled to split definitions and point out the weakness of Christianity by declaring only some tiny percentage to be church leaders.
Don't fall for their subtle attempts to divide the unbelievers. Religious institutions would love to see atheists continually demonized, even by, especially by, agnostics. It furthers their ends, not ours. There is no meaningful division — we are all abandoning the old superstitions together.
And if you are a believer, and are consoled by the fact that this growing demographic is called "Nones", don't be. They all reject your most cherished dogmas, your belief in Jesus and the Trinity and Mohammed and Transubstantiation and the Sacredness of the Holy Spirit or freaking whatever, and they all think your goofy myths are completely looney-tunes. More and more of us are rejecting your nonsense and moving away from your peculiar superstitions. That only 10% of us call ourselves atheists should not salve your fears. It's not that only 10% of the Nones call themselves atheists…it's that a whole 10% of the fastest growing beliefs in our our society are enthusiastic about openly tearing down and expressing contempt for those quaint religious institutions that have been shackling human minds in ignorance for so long.
Politics
Comments
Posted by: Abdul Alhazred
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September 22, 2009 9:36 AM
Not to mention all the churchgoers who just go along for social reasons.
Whereas why would a believer falsely claim to be an atheist?
Posted by: Andreas Johansson
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September 22, 2009 9:40 AM
Unlikely to be common in America, but I've seen it done to avoid bullying.Posted by: Michelle R
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September 22, 2009 9:45 AM
You know, I rarely describe myself as an atheist.
First of all, I rarely get the question. In Quebec, no one really gives a rat's ass about your religion or practices it.
But when I was asked, I said I'm free. I got a weird stare from the nun. She was puzzled.
I attribute my lack of religion and belief to freedom. I'm free, guys. I don't have any silly false principles and fake laws.
Posted by: raven
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September 22, 2009 9:47 AM
How many self identified xians are apathetics, deists, agnostics, or atheists? Might be most of them.
IIRC, 20% of xians haven't been in a church in decades. Another 20-30% might go once a month but aren't real active.
IIRC, that only 20% of Catholics regularly go to mass.
Posted by: set_abominae
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September 22, 2009 9:48 AM
I can just picture Barry Kosmin is sitting in his office among his bibles with his panties all in a knot over this story. "Well, we've totally failed in hypnotizing the American public. They are finally waking up to our hypocrisy. I think it's time for a mission trip to the far east to convert some tribal communities who don't have the same access to information and education!"
Posted by: Riaan Moll
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September 22, 2009 9:49 AM
The 10% + 15% seems to indicate a solid 25% to me! :thumbsup:
Posted by: Caine, ghetto féministe
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September 22, 2009 9:50 AM
I'm not a Nun! I'm not a 'None' either. I'll stick with atheist.
Posted by: Fred The Hun
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September 22, 2009 9:51 AM
Did I just hear that all "Nuns" have become atheists or some such?
Posted by: Pascalle
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September 22, 2009 9:53 AM
In the Netherlands in 2007 44% of the popuplation saw themselves as a None :)
Beat that!
Posted by: maxamillion
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September 22, 2009 9:57 AM
Great, can't wait to try that one myself. Unfortunately the question rarely comes up in Oz.
Posted by: llewelly
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September 22, 2009 10:01 AM
Damn! I was planning on that French accent to help me pick up dates. At least I'll still get the Stalin mustache, right?Posted by: mister-fire
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September 22, 2009 10:03 AM
"You know, the funny thing is, my father was a Nun..."
Posted by: Ray Moscow
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September 22, 2009 10:06 AM
Since I come from the US Bible Belt originally, I like to use the term "church free" with my relatives and southern friends, or "not religious" up north.
In Europe, the subject seldom comes up.
All nonbelievers are "atheists", of course. "None" is just way or avoiding the anti-atheist hassle pushed by theists.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp
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September 22, 2009 10:07 AM
No but some of us would think it was really cool
Posted by: Lee Picton
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September 22, 2009 10:09 AM
The researchers used the demographics of parenthood to claim their new numbers, without mentioning the people who are leaving religion in droves right now. If the population of "nones" has doubled in the last 10 years, might it not be possible that it could double in the next ten years? I'm certainly not expecting an exponential increase indefinitely, but one can hope, right? It would be so nice to see a 30% figure before I go into the void.
Posted by: HappyHead
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September 22, 2009 10:12 AM
@#8
I don't know if they've become atheists, but I did know a nun who got excommunicated and started campaigning against organized religion in retaliation, calling them a bunch of crooks. Of course, she also became a professional con artist afterward, using the skills she learned in the convent to sucker people into pyramid schemes and satellite TV pirating scams that cost more than just buying it legitimately. (I asked one of her "customers" about that, and he said "Yeah, it costs a bit (3x) more, but I'm stickin' it to the man! And besides, she's hot!" . . .)
Posted by: Samantha
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September 22, 2009 10:14 AM
I've never understood the hate speech so frequently associated with atheism. Most of my friends are atheists and although we will discuss the ridiculousness of religion together, we don't impose such on any of our (few) religious friends unless they feel the need to start proselytizing to us. Our stance is pretty much "Keep religion out of schools and the government and we're fine". Unfortunately, when you state that to the few that believe that things like evolution are based on the "religion of atheism" you get to explain why such sound science is NOT religion and SHOULD be in schools.
Strangely enough, I got a better education of evolution in the Catholic high school I went to for grades 11 and 12 than my friends who stayed at the public school, although they did get taught the very basics. Granted, some of that difference was probably the fact that 1) the head of science at the Catholic school had a Masters in Biology, 2) the public school didn't have any "Biology" teachers but "General Science" teachers who taught Biology and 3) The International Baccalaureate program demanded a more advanced curriculum than the regular school program.
Either way, it was strange to go from that to a university where the English program was run mostly out of the religious affiliate college and in about half of the classes you are just expected to take God as granted and write essays and exams with Him and His presence in the literature in mind. In one of my first classes this term I got to hear the prof go on about how for the first half of the course he would be able to preach God "because that's the medieval period, you know" and that although we would hear about Him less and less as we moved forward through the years, He would still be there. He then proceeded to put this whole contrivance of human self on the board where our "will" was a battle between ourselves and God. I heard more about God in that 1.5 hour class than I did in my two years in Catholic school classes outside of the one religion class I had to take (World Religions, done in French).
I'll say the total cliche: we'd have more to fear from the religious than they do from us if they didn't fear such a simple thing as questioning their beliefs. They've mostly got the power, mostly got the money and they have an excuse prepared to negate any psychological disturbance they might feel at oppressing or eliminating us. We've got questioning and mostly logical brains.
Posted by: Gr8wight
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September 22, 2009 10:15 AM
Quite frankly, I don't believe that the numbers of "godless" or atheists, or "nones" is growing. I think that there are simply more of us willing to admit to our (lack of) belief in public than there ever were before.
Posted by: Raldo
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September 22, 2009 10:16 AM
I had a nun come knocking on my door the other day wanting to talk about god and jebus. Luckily for her I have a raging nun fetish, and she was a very pretty bride of christ, so she didn't have the door slammed in her face. Took her about 15 minutes to realise my contented atheism wouldn't go away; so she did.
Now if I could just switch from a nun fetish to a 'none' fetish I'll be good to go.
Posted by: mattheath.wordpress.com
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September 22, 2009 10:17 AM
Riaan Moll@6 The 10% atheists is 10% of the "nones". - i.e.1,5% of all.
Posted by: mister-fire
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September 22, 2009 10:18 AM
BTW @12:
The line's from Blackadder Goes Forth, around 5:00, in case anyone was curious...
Posted by: Somnolent Aphid
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September 22, 2009 10:20 AM
I take no (ray) comfort in these numbers. I won't rest until we have a young, black, asian, gay, (transgendered?), woman, atheist in the whitehouse.
Posted by: Andreas Johansson
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September 22, 2009 10:20 AM
Note BTW that "None" strictly refers to belonging, not beliefs. 27% of "Nones" believe in a personal god while only half of those who outright deny the existence of gods or other higher powers are "Nones", according to the study cited in the article.
Posted by: JSW
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September 22, 2009 10:21 AM
I, for one, am expecting our numbers to start growing exponentially in the not-too-distant future. Let's face it: We've got reality on our side, and the biggest weapon religion has against us is the cultural stigma against athiesm. Once our numbers have grown to the point where the majority of the population is likely to know at least one unshamed atheist personally that stigma is going to start to fade, and things will most likely snowball from there.
Posted by: El Guerrero del Interfaz
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September 22, 2009 10:22 AM
Well, as a former Walloon, I think I can reclaim at least some of the supposed French "hostility" against religion.
But the truth is that, until I lived in the States, I was a very quite and soft-mannered atheist. I even married *twice* by the Catholic Church (it's possible but you have to have the contacts and I had them despite being an atheist) to satisfy 2 families.
It was living in the States that made a militant atheist, one of the so-called "new" atheists out of me. It was the extreme hostility of USAmerican fundamentalism that made me react.
So it's more logical that USAmerican atheists should be more aggressive against religion than the European ones as they are getting pushed around and bullied much more in USAmerica than in Europe where believers are much more moderate and tolerant with unbelievers.
Posted by: kemist
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September 22, 2009 10:23 AM
Oh no ! And here I was hoping that my accent wouldn't give me away as a foreigner down south anymore.
And their median age is about 75-80 years old.
Here, if someone under 40 regularly goes to church and/or participates in church things, you can be sure he/she is a weirdo with very, very few friends their age.
Posted by: satansparakeet
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September 22, 2009 10:25 AM
A lot of that big increase in "Nones" is because of the way they changed the categorization so let's not get too crazy here. Also, I think the last couple of comments are right that it's only 10% of the Nones that are actually atheists, not 10% of everyone. Most of the Nones are just people who still kind of believe in God, but got tired of going to church. It's a step in the right direction, but a pretty small step.
Posted by: chuko
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September 22, 2009 10:35 AM
well said, but I do know an awful lot of "spiritual" types who mark themselves "none" on their religion, even though they believe in a higher power or something. They see religion as being an organized worship.
This blog has also enlightened me to a certain number of non-rationalist atheists. And there quite a few people who just haven't thought much about the issue - quite a few people always come off as confused in these surveys, professing both atheism and a belief in gods for instance.
So, maybe I'm committing a No-True-Atheist fallacy, but I'm still guessing that the percentage of rational atheists, while growing, is not anywhere near equal to the percentage who marked "none".
Posted by: Stefan
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September 22, 2009 10:36 AM
@Raven #4: What is IIRC? I have multiple choices on the web.
IIRC Interactive Illinois Report Card
IIRC If It Really Counts
IIRC Iraqi Islamic Reconciliation Conference
IIRC In Internet Relay Chat
IIRC If I Recall Correctly
Posted by: Susan
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September 22, 2009 10:38 AM
But we do want to tax them, which I'll bet, overall, is even more scary to the godbot leaders.Posted by: kemist
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September 22, 2009 10:39 AM
Yay ! Another IB graduate here, except that the school I did it in (a 'cegep') is a kind of tech/prep school that does not have an equivalent in US, after high school.
Posted by: blueJ
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September 22, 2009 10:40 AM
I don't believe in fairies or Santa Claus, but I don't call myself an afairiest or an akringler. Secular humanist is accurate but dry, and rationalist has little charm.
I am not as worried about believers in a god (though their institutions are bothersome) as I am in the believers in astrology, angels, reincarnation, and an afterlife. God-believers were conned into it at a young age by people they trusted; believers in those other ideas chose fantasy over reality all by themselves.
Posted by: daveau
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September 22, 2009 10:40 AM
Actually, I am becoming hostile to religion. And I'd love to go back to France.
Posted by: TGAP Dad
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September 22, 2009 10:41 AM
I propose that we adopt "none(s)" as an official designation for non-believers/atheists/humanists/rationlists/etc. It's got a bit more whimsy than "bright," lacks the elitist air, and provides great potential for word play. Imagine a debate titled "Nones vs. Nuns!"
Posted by: raven
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September 22, 2009 10:43 AM
IIRC, If I Recall Correctly. Sometimes this means reasonably sure, sometimes it means a big IF.
There have been many of these surveys over the last few years. Barna, Gallup, and Pew are three of the most common. The numbers vary but the trend is always the same. The USA is heading towards a Western European model slowly.
It was the fundie Death Cults. Humanoid toads like Falwell, Hagee, Robertson, Dobson, Parsley, etc.. have created more Nones in one day than Dawkins has in a year. Worked for me.
Posted by: Abdul Alhazred
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September 22, 2009 10:49 AM
I'm not in favor of taxing "churches" as such, just in having them pay taxes like any other property owning entity.
I'm also in favor of them being subject to the same consumer fraud statues as everyone else.
Yeah I know, dream on. Not even in Europe.
Posted by: raven
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September 22, 2009 10:51 AM
Nones would work. I just combine the apathetics, Deists, agnostics, atheists, and what have you together as.....the areligious.
Xianity has a similiar problem in reverse. There is no such thing as a "xian". The protestants hate the catholics and vice versa, the fundies hate everyboy else, and everybody else hates them back. Xianity is fragmented into 38,000 sects, each one of which is The One Real Xian Religion.
Posted by: kemist
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September 22, 2009 10:52 AM
It's a more important step than you might think.
It all begun this way here, in the '60s. People started going less to church. Now we're very accutely secular (we have changed our school progams, prayer in town halls is very marginal and frowned upon, while it was the norm before that), and people who wouldn't have dared call themselves atheists in the '60's now do so shamelessly and without any backlash, go as far as public apostasy.
When people don't get regular indroctrinment sessions into it, weird beliefs that clash with reality tend to become weaker and weaker. Those poor people get more time to think by themselves, you see. And more freedom to discuss and reason. Very very bad for the cult business, those are.
Posted by: theGobi
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September 22, 2009 10:56 AM
I prefer to call myself a realist -- I only believe in real things...
Posted by: Krystalline Apostate
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September 22, 2009 10:58 AM
Oh, real nice. Inferring that atheism isn't 'American'. & people wonder why some of us get antagonistic.Posted by: JiminKy
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September 22, 2009 11:26 AM
My parents always went to church. My mom still does. But so far as I can tell, she really goes just to have a ready-made peer group: the Sunday School class for her age group. My dad, when alive, would snooze through the sermon – he only went so he could grab my mom and me the moment it was over, hustle us out, and be first in line at Morrison's Cafeteria.
Had there existed a socially-respected alternative peer group, I doubt my mom would have gone. And that means my dad never would have. It might have saved me 20 years of wrestling with theological questions if they had acknowledged that their allegiance was to the form, not the (nonexistent) substance.
Posted by: AdamK
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September 22, 2009 11:28 AM
So you're saying the plans have been cancelled?
Why didn't I get the email?
Posted by: daveau
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September 22, 2009 11:37 AM
I prefer to identify myself as "not superstitious", but that's a little lengthy.
Posted by: Alyson Miers
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September 22, 2009 11:40 AM
What's with the talk of bombing churches? When they lose their worshippers to disbelief and indifference, I'd be perfectly happy to see them repurposed; many of the buildings are far too pretty to destroy. It's probably the cultural Christian in me that recoils at converting churches into pizzerias, but many would make perfectly good libraries or bookstores. Concert venues, perhaps? Community centers?
Regarding taxation: am I the only one here who thinks religious institutions might actually find it a relief, after the initial adjustment to paying taxes like everyone else, to lose their tax-exempt status? Bear with me here: for as long as they've enjoyed that favored status in the tax code, churches and the people who care about them have lived in near-constant anxiety about losing that status. It's a huge government-wielded sword always hanging over their heads. I think many churches and the people who care about them would feel a lot freer if they didn't have to worry about what the government would do to them if they...refused to host same-sex wedding ceremonies, for example. Of course that particular fear is groundless, but the point is that losing tax exemption is a major source of anxiety for religious organizations. Give up the privilege and the sword disappears.
Posted by: dr-rieux
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September 22, 2009 11:47 AM
I don't think this is a new poll. It appears to me that it's just the American Religious Identification Survery (ARIS) 2008, which was published almost seven months ago.
Possibly the specific analysis of the "Nones" is new?
Also, while I can readily believe that Kosmin suffers from various unfortunate stereotypes of nasty atheists, it's clearly not the case that he's invested, emotionally or otherwise, in minimizing the extent of dissent from religion. He and ARIS, his baby, have been the central figures hollering that the secular proportion of the U.S. population is growing fast.
I seriously doubt he's an enemy of atheists--at least much more than Sam "We Shouldn't Call Ourselves 'Atheists'" is.
Posted by: Die Anyway
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September 22, 2009 11:49 AM
I'm really opposed to "none", partially because of the ambiguity. For example: at certain health care facilities you are asked for your religious preference (on registration forms). If you put None, they assume you have "no particular preference" and will send whichever brand of priest/pastor/minister happens to be on duty to come by and visit. I want a label that unambiguously says "I don't want no damn religious dude pestering me!" None doesn't get it. I'm fine with the Bright label, I'm registered there and have made donations but it's pretty obscure. Atheist makes it clear. No ambiguity, no misunderstanding.
Posted by: Samantha
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September 22, 2009 11:52 AM
Alyson:
In our downtown we have an old church that was made into a shelter for at-risk teens. They pulled out the pews and altar for bed space and put in plexiglass rather than the stained glass. It works rather well and unlike some of the other shelters, it doesn't discriminate so long as the teens aren't obviously high or drunk (and that's mostly for safety reasons).
Kemist:
W00t! IB was totally useless for me in terms of credits but it taught me a lot about how to work smart and other fun things like that. Plus it saved my butt in first year math because I knew enough to pass my first two math courses. I switched to English the next year because I'd also NOT known enough to stay in math.
Having gone to a CEGEP you must be from Quebec, right? I have a friend who is from Montreal... he said the CEGEP was almost IB-like in how it tried to prepare you. Can't imagine doing the two combined.
Posted by: MAJeff, OM
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September 22, 2009 11:55 AM
You don't want to boil babies anyway. By that time, they're rough and stringy. Rather than boiling, a slow-cooking stew or roast works much better.
Posted by: mister-fire
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September 22, 2009 11:55 AM
Me and a
drinking buddybusiness partner of the gay persuasion once had the idea to buy into a vacated rectory, and turn it into an LGBT nightclub called 'The Confessional'.I argued that teh crazies would never firebomb one of their own former buildings, but the insurance companies did not agree with me.
Posted by: dr-rieux
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September 22, 2009 12:00 PM
I wrote:
Er, that was supposed to be "Sam 'We Shouldn't Call Ourselves "Atheists"' Harris."
Posted by: dr-rieux
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September 22, 2009 12:29 PM
The data are being massaged here, and I don't understand what's going on.
Take a look at the document being reported on by U.S. News and this earlier PowerPoint presentation generated by the same researchers. Specifically, compare the numbers on page 17 of the report with the ones on page 9 of the PowerPoint.
Somehow, in the handful of months between the release of those two documents, the number of "atheists," "hard agnostics," and "soft agnostics" have declined--even though both docs purport to be based on the same survey data.
The PowerPoint claims that 9% of "Nones" answered that "There is no such thing" as God, 21% answered "There is no way to know," and 19% answered "I'm not sure." That sums to a godless total of 49% of "Nones," or about 7.4% of the U.S. population*--i.e., about 17 million adults.
But in the document U.S. News linked to, all of those numbers have fallen. Now they're saying that only 7% answered "There is no such thing," 19% "There is no way to know," and 16% "I'm not sure." By those numbers, we godless are only 42% of "Nones," or a little over 14.5 million adult Americans. What the hell happened to 2,500,000 godless Americans? (From the same data set?)
The other issue, of course, is that limiting the title "atheist" to people who would answer this poll with "There is no such thing" is ridiculous. Which is more or less the point of PZ's post--but beyond that, what's going on with the numbers here?
* ARIS 2008 actually only studied the 48 contiguous states; they didn't gather any data from Alaska or Hawaii. Which seems uniquely dumb to me: I'd bet Hawaii is one of the most godless states in the nation.
Posted by: kemist
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September 22, 2009 12:36 PM
Samantha:
Yes, I'm from Quebec.
For Cegep, how hard it is depends what you take. Prep classes, except if you opt for the science curriculum, are not that hard. Tech classes tend to be much more demanding.
The main difference with high school is how autonomous you must be in learning - most Cegep profs are Ms' and PhD's, and do not have formal education in pedagogy. The courses are closer in content and teaching style to university level than to high school.
However, the contents of the IB and Cegep curricula are quite close, so that both can be managed - you get about as much work as the tech students.
The main challenge is to set yourself enough apart from students which have high scores, since they were, like you, pre-selected by an admission test. It makes your admittance to restricted university programs, like medicine, much harder (though I've heard that has changed).
But the higher level of challenge -and how motivated the students generally are - made it much more interesting to me as compared to the regular Cegep.
Your friend must have done the science option, since among my university friends, most of us say that we don't remember the two years we spent there - because we were totally wasted most of the time.
Posted by: agenoria
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September 22, 2009 12:39 PM
The Church of England is running a "Back To Church" campaign. The average number of people attending C of E on Sundays is now less than a million.
Church 'must shed its M&S image'
They may have their work cut out:
Sunday trading: Open all hours?
Posted by: Jafafa Hots
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September 22, 2009 12:41 PM
Sometimes when asked my "faith" or whatever, I would say something like, "oh, naw... I'm not superstitious."
They sure don't like that.
Posted by: Mrs Tilton
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September 22, 2009 12:45 PM
atheists ... aren't planning to storm your churches and rape the choir boys
Which is just as well, as the priests have long since beat them to it.
Posted by: Riaan Moll
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September 22, 2009 1:21 PM
#20 wrote:"Riaan Moll@6 The 10% atheists is 10% of the "nones". - i.e.1,5% of all."
I know - I was cooking the data creo-style! :D
Posted by: Spiv
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September 22, 2009 1:23 PM
Another quiet 'none' checking in.
Despite the part where the statistic is likely even higher than 3 in 20, they always fail to acknowledge the elephant in the room: that number is significantly higher in the 18-29 range. About 75% of us are under 50. We're not going anywhere, we are growing.
godders: Most likely at least 1 in 10 people where you work are likely atheists. 1 in 4 adults under 30 are too. Does that scare you? It shouldn't. It means we're nice people you can't tell from churchgoers without specifically asking.
Besides, the study still counts the non-specific religious. It says 1 in 6 say they do not feel they belong to a religion, and 1 in 4 do not actually practice one. About 25% answered from "higher power but no personal god" to "no such thing." It means a lot of deists are answering "christian" by default.
Posted by: Patricia, OM
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September 22, 2009 1:25 PM
Die Anyway @46 - I hope you are wrong about health care facilities just assuming you have no preference for which fraud they send to your room if you answer 'none' on your health care ap. My husband answered none in the box marked 'Religion' to the VA. Jebus better help the preacher that tries to talk to him!
Posted by: whydowebelieve
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September 22, 2009 1:46 PM
PZ,
This is one of the more beautifully stated pieces I've seen regarding atheism and its current place in society. You are calling out these people for their stigmatization of atheism, and quite frankly, I'm fed up with the misconceptions that it brings along with it. In my experience, I've been deemed non-rational, hateful, angry, dishonest, unthoughtful, etc. for my stance against the superstitions of religion. People have been genuinely shocked to know me, and then find out I am atheist. It has been a real mind-boggler for some, and it has encouraged stronger delusions for others, e.g. the "devil has a strong hold on his heart."
We are not the boogey-man. In my experience we tend to be more caring individuals than the theists. Indeed, I think we hold a higher capacity for care and goodwill, since we are not restricted by our religious bigotry to exclude certain groups of people.
Posted by: ChrisZ
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September 22, 2009 1:51 PM
I really don't like it when we're lumped in with the rest of the nones. A quarter of those nones surveyed were theists. Giving ourselves that 15% number when only about 1% of us actually identify as atheists (5% of 15% from the survey question on belonging) is absurd.
I'm not saying that self-identified atheism hasn't grown in the past 20 years, but I think the rise in the "nones" has much less to do with that and much more to do with people liberalizing their belief in God. Not saying that's not a good thing, but it's not atheists.
Posted by: Pierce R. Butler
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September 22, 2009 2:06 PM
Somnolent Aphid @ # 22: I won't rest until we have a young, black, asian, gay, (transgendered?), woman, atheist in the whitehouse.
My first thought on reading this was that you're going to need to change your handle to Insomniac Aphid - but then I got to thinking...
All you really need to do is deconvert our present WH resident from his lifelong christianism (he's smart, it shouldn't take too long) and get him to go for re-assignment treatments. Given that Indonesia - where we've all been told he was really born - is part of Asia, and that Michelle O probably won't turn him/her loose, that would cover your whole shopping list.
While you're at it, please bring up sane perspectives on Afghanistan, single-payer, Iraq, trickle-up bailouts/stimulus, wiretaps, the church/state divide, prosecuting torturers, and giving ACORN a chance to present a defense before dumping them like a broken CFL. MThx!
Posted by: Abdul Alhazred
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September 22, 2009 2:12 PM
When you tell people you aren't religious, you run the risk of them assuming you are "spiritual".
I've had this happen.
Posted by: AJ Milne OM
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September 22, 2009 2:31 PM
Yeah. I find this vaguely insulting, too... Like somehow this is a compliment. Like, I dunno... you're either that or some terribly shallow, nasty Gordon Gekko type...
Sorry, no. Smart, thoughtful, introspective people aren't 'spiritual'. They're smart, thoughtful, and introspective*...
There's this tempation, too, sometimes... To take a shot at the very ill-considered nature of such addlepated silliness with some parody of The Elephant Man: 'I... Am... Too... An Animal!...'
(/*Not that I'm saying I, personally, am smart, thoughtful, or introspective... Oddly enough, actually, I am Gordon Gekko... Which just makes the whole thing stranger, really...)
Posted by: Pierce R. Butler
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September 22, 2009 3:01 PM
TGAP Dad @ # 34: I propose that we adopt "none(s)" as an official designation for non-believers/atheists/humanists/rationlists/etc. It's got a bit more whimsy than "bright,"...
That's good enough for most of the atheisti, but the hard-core militant atheist (defined for present purposes as any regular Pharyngulite) needs something stronger. Just as the more outspoken same-sex rights activists call themselves not just "gays" but "queers", I propose the up-front scoffers move beyond "nones" to "stridents" (or maybe "shrills").
Posted by: Tulse
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September 22, 2009 3:23 PM
I dunno, that doesn't sound too Bright...
Posted by: Naked Bunny with a Whip
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September 22, 2009 3:26 PM
(or maybe "shrills")
Nah, I don't want to be confused with teabaggers.
Posted by: bastion of sass
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September 22, 2009 3:56 PM
One reason more atheists aren't out:
Response after I'd identified myself as an atheist to someone I've know for a while: "But you seemed like such a nice person!"
Note the "seemed like," not even an "are."
Posted by: Xenithrys
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September 22, 2009 4:35 PM
When I'm asked my religion (such an unnecessary question) I always say "None". But I am an atheist. I say "None" because atheism isn't a religion; I have no religion. Someone without religion is an atheist (even if they're a "don't care").
So I agree with PZ. American Nones are giving a truthful answer, and religionists should draw no comfort from it.
Posted by: Somnolent Aphid
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September 22, 2009 4:44 PM
@61 Pierce R. Butler
It's true. I'll never rest. But I haven't a clue on the topics you suggested other than to say increased godlessness will help world-wide. One less thing to fight about after we put aside our silly sillinesses for those who have sillied against us.
Posted by: Somnolent Aphid
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September 22, 2009 4:51 PM
The "little aphid" believes in rapture. Clearly there is room in this world for all types, at least until the rapture/rupture. I suppose I'll learn my lesson then by god. She was appalled that I was a noner. She started googling up reports on how godless and loserish we were and how we hated just about everything except starbucks. Guess it didn't change much either of us much in the long run, or maybe she thinks there's still hope.
Posted by: marie-annick
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September 22, 2009 6:07 PM
What if you already have a French accent ?
Posted by: wasd
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September 22, 2009 8:43 PM
Actually, these 2008 figures could be considered a bit down from a 2007 pew survey. Especially since 27% of those that are are counted as non-religious consider themselfs theist who believe in a personal god while 24 are deist who believe in a “higher power”. (This is especially the case among females, but, luckily, not for the below 30 year olds)
http://www.americanreligionsurvey-aris.org/reports/NONES_08.pdf
http://religions.pewforum.org/affiliations
aris 2008 US adult subset (N=1025)
2% atheist (“no such thing as god”)
4% hard agnostic (“there is no way to know”)
6% soft agnostic (“not sure”)
------ +
12%
12% deist (“higher power but no personal god”)
vs 70% theists (some are counted as non religious)
aris 2008 NON-RELIGIOUS SUBSET (N=1,106, my calculation for turning it back to a percentage of US adults assuming this subset is 15% of those)
1.05% atheist (“no such thing as god”)
2.85% hard agnostic (“there is no way to know”)
2.40% soft agnostic (“not sure”)
2.60% non religious deist (“higher power but no personal god”)
2.05% non religious theist (“definitely a personal god”)
1.05% unknown/refused
-------+
15%
vs 85% (86.4% in the N=54,461) who dont answer with “none,” “atheist,” “agnostic,” “secular,” or “humanist.” to the question What is your religion, if any?
Pew found in 2007
1.6% Atheist
2.4% Agnostic
12.1% Nothing in particular
------ +
16.1%
0.7% unitarian of which lessthan 0.3% spiritual but not religious
VS 82.9% in some denomination including new age
The difference between the non religious and us-adult subsets suggests that “what is your belief” and “what is your religion” are different questions. People answer “well sure I am an upstanding Christian” and then answer “do you believe in a (personal) god?” with “No, no not really, silly fairy tales” or they answer they are secular and then believe in god, which give three different samples which when combined with an apparent typo turning N=7,407 into N=7,047 in the graphs is why I am still working on this math at 1:57 AM
The pew/aris difference is within the margin of error (pew is N=35,009 aris N=1,106). I figured they hadn't tried to reach mobile phones, kind of important if you wanna get in touch with the 10-20 something demographic who might not have a landline, but it turns out both did and that pew found little difference so they ignored their n=500 cell phone sample. I suspected the one year difference ought to show some growth. After all between 1990 and 2001 46.6% of the population growth in the US was non-religious. I really wonder why the 2001-2008 growth was only 23.2%.
I did notice that these what the paper calls “nones”, are of course less likely than the average American to be divorced. (Save traditional marriage! save traditional marriage!) There is very little about this demographic that stands out, a tiny bit more education, a tiny but more likely to be self identify as independent, identification as dem is the same as national, ethnic and geographic breakdown are pretty much the same (Wyoming ranks 3d among the irreligious, about one in four Asians isn`t religious), only 1% less likely to believe in horscopes but about twice as likely to understand evolution.
Their parents aren't more likely to have separate religions, only 17% had parents that didn't identify with a religion while 10% had one parent that didn't identify with a religion... nothing sets these people apart as psychopathic babyeaters.
Whats interesting, and perhaps scary, is that 32% recall identifying as “none-religious” at the age of 12. As European who has traveled trough the states I know a couple of stories about growing up gay in the south. I also know stories about atheists in the closet.
Young kids in the closet have a really, really tough time.
When I advocate Atheism and tolerance toward homosexuals I always have this gut wrenching worry that I inflame the loudmouths into ramping up the forcefulness of the indoctrination among their own clique. Some idiots just assume their gay and atheist-bashing is directed at far away sinful adults and it good politics so who cares? They are oblivious to the roughly one in ten kids in the closet living among them. These kids are caught in the crossfire fearing those in authority and feeling alone unable to talk about their most important feelings of love and meaning just as hormones kick in and make these feelings explode. Shouting at openly atheist and gay adults is one thing, but some hurtful fucktards just don`t realize some of their own kids feel the hurtful things said apply to them and they are rightly afraid of talking about what they are going through. National coming out day and the blasphemy challange are fun and all but I don`t think adults in tolerant cities should just on a whim encourage kids to come out of the closet.
In short I worry about the suicide statistics among gay teens. I worry about kids who have trouble finding friends because they don`t dare to ask if there is someone who thinks like them, I worry about kids whose parents withhold education and medical treatment even though the kids would want it if they dared to speak out.
Intolerant fucktards suck. People who can substract 27 from 32 understand why this report has me worried sick.
Some conclusions:
Until I see some serious evidence I refuse to believe girls are somehow less able to be rational about religious ideas. So I think there is a lot of girls that can be won over relatively easily if only their specific concerns can be identified and addressed.
There is also gonna be an explosion of non religious and agnostic parents. This means:
- There is a good reason to fight over schoolbooks now
- There is a good argument to fight over schoolbooks now, afterall tomorrows parents are less likely to appreciate and pay for nonsense and more likely to stand up and make a fuss
- Reinforcements are on the way.
- All those godless teachers are gonna have a fresh batch of smart pupils no matter where they live in the states
- PZ is gonna have his hands full and less time to blog ;-(
As a European who has spend time in the US and France I have to say the idea of European animosity towards religion is silly. There is plenty of nasty stuff written about Muslims by people to chicken to admit they are talking about immigrants. And there is always criticism of religion in politics just like in the US where a majorities believe church and politics should be separate. The EU is more populous than the US, its not just Dawkins and three others you know. Just look at how many Europeans countries are run by Christian democrats and the absolute stranglehold the Christian democrats hold over the European parliament.
Posted by: wasd
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September 22, 2009 9:50 PM
Its frigging 3 in the morning and I finally felt I understood the data and now dr-rieux drops by in @50 and points out yet more versions of this data. The data in the slide is indeed different, I suspect its from the full +/- 7000 non religious respondents before a representative subset of 1000 was put together or something like that.
So its possible the non religious are at least: 12%(atheists+agnostics), 12.9%(from the N numbers in the graph), 13.6%(from the N number in methodology), 15%(non religious), 15.2%(non religious per slides), 24%(+deists) and 30% (100%-70%) Oh and the number of non-religious parents also fluctuates, which I suspect could only happen in the “none” subset with more extensive questions which would disprove my theory that the slides are from before the “silo” was selected.
OH and if 0.152% of Americans say they were discriminated in the military thats bad, very bad, considering how many Americans have never been in the military.
Assuming 24.5 million veterans but only 1.7 million are women and thus less likely to be an atheist, 9.5 million are age 65 or older thus less likely to be atheist add a couple million current soldiers (who may not answer their phone ATM) and assuming 300 million Americans and its very generous to say one in ten Americans was ever in a position to be discriminated in the military. This suggest 1.52% of soldiers reporting being discriminated against, I know there is real data that doesn`t suffer from these problemathic demographics and soldier being away from the phone. But just imagine are the odds of dialing a random phone number, getting a vet or soldier who is also an atheist who was also discriminated? Yet it happened ten times out of thousand to these researchers!
Posted by: Cycle Ninja
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September 22, 2009 10:55 PM
Funny, I was just watching "King Kong" on ABC the other night... I'd settle for Australian. I'm blond, so I can't get away with sounding Italian.Posted by: eyespy
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September 23, 2009 9:47 AM
If anyone ever called me a "none" to my face, it would be the last thing they ever said.
A. THE. IST.
You sing loud, you sing proud.
Posted by: rcragun.myopenid.com
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September 23, 2009 9:48 AM
You know, you could just email the authors of the report for clarification. It's not like we're unwilling to explain what we've done (I say we because I'm one of the authors of the report).
Why the label "Nones"? Personally, I don't love it because it sets the non-religious against the religious and defines them by what they are not. But, that's kind of the point, isn't it? We're saying these people (the 15%) do not identify with a religion. Thus, "Nones" describe them quite well because they are NOT religious. Besides, isn't that precisely what "atheist" does, define someone by what they are not?
Also, it's technically accurate - they have "no religion" and most of them are not atheists (though a large chunk are agnostics). If you have a better term, I'll gladly propose it to Barry, Ariela, and Juhem, but our lengthy discussions over the term (literally, we've spent hours discussing it) haven't resulted in a better term to date.
The main gist of PZ's post is also misguided. The point isn't to say that "atheists" aren't a threat. It's to disentangle atheists, agnostics, deists, and theists who are not religious because those are MEANINGFUL distinctions. You can attack us for trying to understand why people are leaving religion in droves, but unless we disentangle why theists are leaving from why atheists are leaving, it is difficult to actually understand what is going on. Oh, and the reasons do appear to be different...
I also find it a bit ironic that no one mentioned the actual name of the institute Barry and Ariela run: "The Institute for the Study of SECULARISM in Society and Culture."
Lastly, I find it quite hilarious that people assume the authors are religious. Google us!
Leave it to atheists to attack the social scientists who are trying hardest to understand them... :(
Posted by: eyespy
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September 23, 2009 10:01 AM
"Leave it to atheists to attack the social scientists who are trying hardest to understand them... :("
Go. Get. F*cked.
What is there to understand?
We don't believe. That's it. End of list.
Presented with an Olympus Mons of evidence that there is no god and confronted by a collection of quasi-historical and ecstatic stories written by Stone Age nomads who had clearly gotten into the ergot then cobbled together by a group of power-mad theocrats trying desperately to hold a collapsing empire together into a "holy" book with no more worldy authority than the Epic of Gilgamesh or the Bhagavad Gita ...
Words fail to adequately describe your dissembling "research."
"Social science" is the single greatest hoax since Adam.
Here's a clue for you, dear "social scientest:"
Research the books, not the people. You're bound to find the truth as the blind squirrel finds the acorn.
Posted by: rcragun.myopenid.com
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September 23, 2009 10:09 AM
eyespy, this is your response? I extend an offer to clarify our research and you tell me to go f*ck myself?
You then proceed to demean the entire field of inquiry known as social science. F*ck! I get more reasonable responses from fundamentalist Christians!
Posted by: eyespy
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September 23, 2009 10:18 AM
"You then proceed to demean the entire field of inquiry known as social science. F*ck! I get more reasonable responses from fundamentalist Christians!"
That's right, because the fundies and other believers are looking to your crackpot "methods" of "research" for validation of their idiocy.
I need no such comfort.
If I can replicate it with hard, physical science, it exists.
If I can't, it doesn't.
Anything else is myth, conjecture or outright falsehood.
Good luck with that, softie.
Posted by: eyespy
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September 23, 2009 10:25 AM
BTW, I didn't say go f*ck yourself. I said go get f*cked. I'd think this was a good idea.
"You then proceed to demean the entire field of inquiry known as social science. F*ck! I get more reasonable responses from fundamentalist Christians!"
You're indignant. Good. Take down my argument. I'll state it again:
"Presented with an Olympus Mons of evidence that there is no god and confronted by a collection of quasi-historical and ecstatic stories written by Stone Age nomads who had clearly gotten into the ergot then cobbled together by a group of power-mad theocrats trying desperately to hold a collapsing empire together into a "holy" book with no more worldy authority than the Epic of Gilgamesh or the Bhagavad Gita ..."
And...go.
Posted by: rcragun.myopenid.com
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September 23, 2009 10:40 AM
"You're indignant. Good. Take down my argument. I'll state it again:
"Presented with an Olympus Mons of evidence that there is no god and confronted by a collection of quasi-historical and ecstatic stories written by Stone Age nomads who had clearly gotten into the ergot then cobbled together by a group of power-mad theocrats trying desperately to hold a collapsing empire together into a "holy" book with no more worldy authority than the Epic of Gilgamesh or the Bhagavad Gita ..."
Your "argument" consists of an incomplete sentence without an assertion? Hmmm... I'd love to "take it down", as soon as I figure out what the argument itself is...
Are there any reasonable people who would like clarification on the findings of our "softie" report or am I just going to spin my wheels with "eyespye" here?
Posted by: eyespy
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September 23, 2009 10:55 AM
"Your "argument" consists of an incomplete sentence without an assertion? Hmmm... I'd love to "take it down", as soon as I figure out what the argument itself is..."
The question is phrased as an incomplete sentence as a frame to get you to complete the sentence with some sort of coherent response to the assertion.
The assertion, as was clearly stated above, is: "What is there to understand? We don't believe. That's it. End of list."
In the context of the evidence provided, can you answer the assertion?
Posted by: eyespy
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September 23, 2009 10:58 AM
BTW (again, how tiresome), it's eyespy, not "eyespye."
You may be stuck in the 18th century, but please spare me and my carefully chosen nom de guerre...
Posted by: Knockgoats
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September 23, 2009 10:59 AM
rcragun.myopenid.com,
I'd be interested in how you accounted for the fact that many atheists are unlikely to self-identify as such in the US, because of the hate campaign (I don't think that's too strong a description) against atheism.
I'd also say that Kosmin's quoted statement:
"It's a kind of religious indifference that's not hostile to religion the way they are in France."
strikes me as very dubious to say the least. France has a strong secularist and anti-clerical tradition, but where is the evidence of "hostility to religion". This does read like an attempt to distance moderate American "Nones" from those cheese-eating, religion-hostile atheists in Yurp.
BTW it is not obvious from googling you and two other of the authors (nor is there any reason it should be) what your personal beliefs are.
Posted by: eyespy
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September 23, 2009 11:09 AM
Knockgoats--
The "researchers" are from Trinity's Institute for the Study of Secularism in Society and Culture.
Trinity. That says it all right there.
If they were at all serious, they'd be from the "Intergalactic Space Daddy's Institute for the Study of Intergalactic Spacedaddyism in Society and Culture."
More apologetics from the religion of "social science;" the only "science" that can provide a positive answer for the question:
"Does An Intergalactic Space Daddy Exist?"
Um...no.
Posted by: Knockgoats
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September 23, 2009 11:18 AM
eyespy,
From its website, there is no indication Trinity is a religiously-based institution, although founded by an Episcopalian bishop in 1823, and "its charter prohibits the imposition of religious standards on any student, faculty members or other members of the college". You appear to be an ignorant idiot, to judge by your ludicrous dismissal of the entirety of social science. There may well be valid criticisms of the survey, but your frothing at the mouth is just silly.
Posted by: rcragun.myopenid.com
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September 23, 2009 11:21 AM
Knockgoats, thank you for asking some reasonable questions...
You're absolutely correct that many atheists do not self-identify as such in the U.S. Here's the issue as we understand it:
1) We ask, "What is your religion, if any?" When we ask this, only a very small percentage of people say "atheist." That very few do is quite reasonable as one of the commenters above noted - atheist is "not a religion." So, the obvious response is "None." Thus we use the term "None" to describe those with no religious identification.
2) But just because someone doesn't self-identify as "atheist" when asked their religion doesn't mean they are not atheists. Thus, we also asked specifically about belief in god (to the subsample of Nones and a representative subsample of the general population only, not the entire sample). In fact, many who say they are "Nones" are atheists (about 7.9%). Of those who say they are atheists when asked about their religion, 55% actually don't believe in god; 9% do (theists). So, self-identified religious identity is not perfectly correlated with actual belief in god. Can we account for this in our reporting? Well, yes and no. We report what percentage of people self-identify their "religion" (erroneously, IMO) as "atheist" (about .7%), but then we also report what percentage of people in the US say specifically that they don't believe in god (about 2%). So, does this address the issue perfectly? Well, it's the best we can do. Our best estimate of the % of "actual atheists" (people who do not believe in god) is about 2% of Americans - which is more than the Mormons, JWs, and many other groups. That's a lot of atheists. PZ and other readers should be writing about this - there are more atheists in the US than there are Mormons! That's a story!
Does that help?
I'm not going to defend Barry's statement about hostility toward religion in France (though I think I see his point as there is certainly greater acceptance of open hostility toward religion in France than there is in the US; e.g., ban on religious symbols, hijab, etc. in schools seems like hostility, though I'm sure that can be interpreted various ways). I will say, however, that calling the "Nones" "Nones" rather than the "godless" is far more accurate because they are fairly indifferent toward religion and even belief in god (the largest portion is agnostics), but they are not monolithically atheists or agnostics. That's simply untrue!
My personal website:
http://www.ryananddebi.com
At the moment it is filled with pictures and videos of my 3+ month old atheist son. But if you dig deep enough it is quite apparent that I'm a former Mormon turned atheist. I don't run around with a scarlet "A" on my sleeve precisely because I'm a scholar who regularly interviews religious people. Atheism is still stigmatized in the US (I have a paper on discrimination on this that should be coming out soon). As a scholar who studies the non-religious and the religious, I try to avoid stigmatizing myself (hypocritical, yes; necessary for me to feed my atheist son, yes!). So, I don't shout it from the rooftops. I won't speak for my co-authors, but let's put it this way - there are no Bibles in Barry's office.
Posted by: rcragun.myopenid.com
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September 23, 2009 11:32 AM
eyespy, Trinity is non-sectarian (that means not religious, in case you can't take the time to look that up), as knockgoats said. The internets - amazing things!
"The assertion, as was clearly stated above, is: "What is there to understand? We don't believe. That's it. End of list." In the context of the evidence provided, can you answer the assertion?"
Why do you assume you can speak for a large group of people who may or may not share your beliefs? You can't. You can't even speak for all the people who post on this forum.
Also, I'm not interested in debating religion. I came to answer questions about our report, nothing more.
Posted by: eyespy
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September 23, 2009 11:33 AM
"France has a strong secularist and anti-clerical tradition, but where is the evidence of "hostility to religion".
In fact, France still identifies as 51% Catholic and is home to the greatest medieval Gothic Cathedral at Chartres, the caretakers of the Bayeux Tapestry and the great houses of god here at Amiens...Arras...Bayonne...Bordeaux...Dijon...Grenoble...Lyon...Montpelier...Nantes...Notre Dame...Rouen...St Etienne...Strasbourg...Tours...Verdun...et Viviers.
Such a heathen land must clearly be stricken from the ranks of the worthy.
Posted by: eyespy
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September 23, 2009 11:46 AM
"You appear to be an ignorant idiot, to judge by your ludicrous dismissal of the entirety of social science. There may well be valid criticisms of the survey, but your frothing at the mouth is just silly."
Ooooooooooooookay.
Six of one, half a dozen of the other here, apparently.
I will have to assume the two of you have never been seen in the same room.
Fair enough.
Invoking the Trinity in any regard invalidates the intellectual standards of those involved and places their goals squarely in the realm of the religious, regardless of the dissembling of charters and mission statements.
This should be as self-evident as the preamble to the Declaration Of Independence.
Charters and mission statements are developed to deceive idiots and to take their money.
As for your defense of social science, for you I'm terribly sorry.
You've got religion now. Have fun with it.
Posted by: Naked Bunny with a Whip
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September 23, 2009 12:48 PM
Do you always close such offers with a whiny little insult toward your listeners? Interesting technique.
Posted by: AJ Milne OM
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September 23, 2009 12:53 PM
Now that's just a total calumny. I demand she retract...
(/Because yes, I hate Starbucks, too...)
Posted by: Pierce R. Butler
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September 23, 2009 1:02 PM
rcragun - as eyespy so inelegantly reminded us all, you have stepped into the middle of a messy, heated conflict. I hope this didn't come as a surprise.
Have you received comparable feedback from the other side of the divide (yet)?
More specifically - what's your take on the discrepancies noted by dr-rieux @ # 51?
Posted by: Knockgoats
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September 23, 2009 1:15 PM
Invoking the Trinity in any regard invalidates the intellectual standards of those involved and places their goals squarely in the realm of the religious, regardless of the dissembling of charters and mission statements.
Right, so anything coming out of about half the Oxford and Cambridge colleges can be dismissed...
As for your defense of social science, for you I'm terribly sorry.
You've got religion now. Have fun with it.
...and anyone who disagrees with the great eyespy must be religious. Yep, my diagnosis was correct: you're an ignorant idiot right enough.
Posted by: Knockgoats
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September 23, 2009 1:24 PM
We report what percentage of people self-identify their "religion" (erroneously, IMO) as "atheist" (about .7%), but then we also report what percentage of people in the US say specifically that they don't believe in god (about 2%). So, does this address the issue perfectly? Well, it's the best we can do. Our best estimate of the % of "actual atheists" (people who do not believe in god) is about 2% of Americans - which is more than the Mormons, JWs, and many other groups. - rcragun.myopenid.com
I doubt whether you avoided the "shy atheist" problem here - not that I can see any way of doing so. I'd take 2% as a lower bound rather than a best estimate.
Posted by: Tulse
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September 23, 2009 2:31 PM
Yeah, like all those fundamentalist atomic weapons scientists.
Posted by: rcragun.myopenid.com
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September 23, 2009 2:50 PM
RE: Pierce #93 (RE: #51):
Here's the answer: weighting. The earlier publication was a powerpoint given by Barry to CSICOP. In that he used unweighted data. The data in the report was weighted.
What do I mean by weighting? Despite the survey being a random digit dial survey, it does not, without weighting, perfectly reflect the US population. Part of the reason is because Hispanics and younger people are underrepresented. With weights, those groups are no longer underrepresented. So, in the presentation for CSICOP, Barry reported that 9% of Nones are atheists (that's the number I gave above), but that is unweighted. Weighted, it comes out at 7%. A difference of 2% isn't huge, but we probably should have noted when we weighted the data and when we did not.
Posted by: rcragun.myopenid.com
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September 23, 2009 2:54 PM
RE: knockgoats #95:
"I doubt whether you avoided the "shy atheist" problem here - not that I can see any way of doing so. I'd take 2% as a lower bound rather than a best estimate."
You may be right. But how do we know that? At present, all we have to go on is peoples' responses to an anonymous survey. What reason do people have to lie on a randomized, anonymous phone survey? I guess if their believing spouse was listening they might. Otherwise, why lie?
Posted by: Pierce R. Butler
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September 23, 2009 4:08 PM
rcragun @ # 97 - thanks for the clarification.
Regarding your # 98 - a lot of people will give whatever answer they habitually give to an "anonymous" (many will doubt that) phone survey, rather than conduct a deep self-google search from scratch with each query. Why shouldn't they?
A more general problem with such surveys is that they miss a lot of us surly misanthropes who screen all calls (I'm sure pollsters account for a significant number of the hangups my trusty answering machine deals with daily). Any idea how many of us there are, and whether the leave-me-alone-damnit reflex correlates with rejecting other socio-ideological norms?
Posted by: Andreas Johansson
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September 23, 2009 4:52 PM
Maybe he wouldn't if you hadn't quite needlessly insulted him first.I happen to agree with most of what you're saying, but the end of your first post seems designed to alienate, which makes it hard to anything but dislike you.
Posted by: Knockgoats
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September 23, 2009 5:00 PM
What reason do people have to lie on a randomized, anonymous phone survey? I guess if their believing spouse was listening they might. Otherwise, why lie? - rcragun.myopenid.com
You're a social scientist, and you think everyone needs a reason to lie? You think people have complete access to their own belief states, even?
Posted by: rcragun.myopenid.com
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September 23, 2009 5:09 PM
Re #99.
As for those who simply screen all calls - yeah, no idea. We don't really know anything about them.
However, we do include "refuse/non-response" as one of the groups, which lowers the percentage of "identifiers with religion" down to 80% (remember, only 15% are Nones).
We have a little bit of a sense of who the non-responders are, and they may increase the percentage of Nones/atheists, but it's kind of an open-question. From our initial, but quite lengthy examination of the little data provided by those who did not respond to the religious identification question, we know they are slightly more wealthy and more likely to be white. As atheists are more likely to be both of those, that may increase their numbers.
Barry and I actually had a good discussion about whether we should then suggest that the 5% or so of non-responders really belong in the None group. We ultimately decided against it because we didn't want anyone to come back at us and say that our decision was not justified. Frankly, it probably wouldn't be justified. We could possible justify adding a couple percent to the None category, but I don't think we could add all of them as some of the non-responders also had the characteristics of recent immigrants from Asia and the Middle East (particularly India) and may have actually been fearful of responding to the question. So, perhaps the non-responders to the question lean toward None, and I think they do, but not all of them do.
As for people habitually responding to surveys... We know some of that happens. That's why we get different answers to age questions within the same survey depending on how it is asked (e.g., "What is your age?" occasionally elicits a different response than "What year were you born?"). So, some of that is happening. But we attribute that (rightly or not) to random error. So, some will habitually respond. But if there really are tens of millions of atheists out there just itching to turn this country into a bastion of secularism, why aren't they identifying themselves as such in an anonymous survey? I can understand if it wasn't anonymous, but it is.
Posted by: rcragun.myopenid.com
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September 23, 2009 5:18 PM
RE: #100
"Maybe he wouldn't if you hadn't quite needlessly insulted him first. I happen to agree with most of what you're saying, but the end of your first post seems designed to alienate, which makes it hard to anything but dislike you."
Here's what I said, "Leave it to atheists to attack the social scientists who are trying hardest to understand them..."
All of the authors of that report are trying to understand the non-religious. Three are employed full-time by an institute with the aim of understanding the non-religious (I'm not). Yet, PZ's post (along with many of the comments) clearly impugned the motivations of the authors, as though our goal was just to minimize the threat of atheism. PZ's post is misguided. I've clarified our intent.
So, I guess I could have ended my first post with something nicer (e.g., "Hey everyone, thanks for attacking our motives and assuming we hate and are afraid of atheists! You all rock!"), but that wasn't really reflective of how I was feeling after I read the post and comments. I was feeling attacked and felt like reflecting on the irony of the situation - atheists attacking atheists for trying to understand atheists.
Posted by: rcragun.myopenid.com
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September 23, 2009 5:25 PM
RE: #101
"You're a social scientist, and you think everyone needs a reason to lie? You think people have complete access to their own belief states, even?"
No and No.
Yet, here's the amazing thing about surveys - people generally tell the truth. Surveys are obviously subject to response bias, surveyor bias, recall bias, and all sorts of other problems, but when we compare survey responses to, say, observations (on things like health, religious service attendance, etc.), there's a pretty good correlation. It's not perfect, but it's pretty good. So, I'm inclined to believe the data.
If we were to get you on the phone, would you lie?
I've conducted dozens of surveys and in all those, I've only ever thrown out a handful of responses because they were clearly BS. Generally, people respond in logically consistent ways, which suggests they don't lie. Thus, the question stands, why would someone lie about their atheism (unless, as I noted, someone else was listening)?
Posted by: Pierce R. Butler
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September 23, 2009 9:05 PM
rcragun @ # 102: ... we do include "refuse/non-response" as one of the groups, which lowers the percentage of "identifiers with religion" down to 80% (remember, only 15% are Nones).
So the Surly Bastard contingent was only 5%?
By dawn, my teddy bear will be sodden with tears.
How much variation is there in the r/nr level across surveydom?
... some of the non-responders also had the characteristics of recent immigrants from Asia and the Middle East (particularly India) and may have actually been fearful of responding to the question.
Are you under the impression that such fears are not found among, e.g., Catholics & Southern Baptists? In particular, among the secret-doubter demographic whose estimated measure seems among the goals of this project?
Consider, say, a survey asking "Do you have homosexual tendencies?" and the likely responses of those striving to repress exactly such urges.
It is widely held among the stridents that inside the less doctrinaire believers there are svelte scoffers trying to break free - held in by expectation of family/social backlash at times comparable to the gay experience.
From here it looks like the gays have much the higher body count, but it must be at least considered that a significant number of borderline "Nones" might be fearful of asking such a question to themselves - some for entirely rational motives.
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, Quel Dommage
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September 23, 2009 9:14 PM
How do you run an anonymous survey? If someone called me on the phone and said: "Hi, I'm not telling you who I am and I'd like to ask you some questions," my response would be "The click you hear will mean you are soloing."
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, Quel Dommage
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September 23, 2009 9:23 PM
Never mind my post #106, I just figured out what an anonymous phone survey is. But it's not really anonymous. You could have called ID on the phone, and 20 seconds with a criss-cross directory (numerical list of numbers referencing to names) will give a name.
"Hi there, I'm going to tell you that it's impossible or at least very difficult for me to know who you are, even though it's ridiculously easy for me to find out, and I'd like to know if you are a member of one of the most hated and despised minorities in the country."
Posted by: eddie
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September 27, 2009 11:01 AM
How can I be anonymous? They already got my phone number!
I missed this post at the time, but I see their current poll question is
Nice to see they acknowledge it's one or the other.
Posted by: Knockgoats
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October 5, 2009 8:06 AM
rcragun,
If we were to get you on the phone, would you lie?
On some questions, from some questioners, certainly. This is in any case a silly, irrelevant question - what does what I would do tell you about what most atheists would do?
I've conducted dozens of surveys and in all those, I've only ever thrown out a handful of responses because they were clearly BS.
Er, yes. The problem is with responses which are false, but not obviously so.
Generally, people respond in logically consistent ways, which suggests they don't lie.
Or else they are lying consistently.
Thus, the question stands, why would someone lie about their atheism (unless, as I noted, someone else was listening)?
Well, you've given one reason yourself. Additionally, they might not have confidence that their answers would remain confidential, they might think the questioner would disapprove (after all, atheist-hate is common in the US). It is surely would not be a surprise to a social scientist to find that people tend to give socially approved answers to questions, even if they have no immediate reason to think this will be advantageous - and in the Us, it is socially approved to belong to just about any religion, but not to be an atheist. Perhaps more likely than all those reasons, they might not have admitted even to themselves that they are atheists (again, it should not surprise you that people tend to attribute socially approved characteristics to themselves). So given all these possibilities, it is clearly more reasonable to regard 2% as a lower limit, not a best estimate.
Posted by: ivankaramazov
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October 13, 2009 9:45 PM
Oh, PZ, you're beginning to sound more and more like a rabid nut everyday. It's time for your ass to face reality, rather than going off and sounding like the equivalent of a moon landing denier.
Only 7% of the of the 15% who fall under the category "no religion" have beliefs that would be categorized as "atheist". Meaning that only 2% of Americans hold a belief that would classify them as atheist. 98% of Americans hold some sort of nebulous beliefs, that's a just a fact, and you need to face up to that.
You can continue making the buffoon like claim, that more of the" nones" didn't come out with atheistic beliefs because of the fears of scorn of the public, on a survey that lacks their names and identities.
...and I might as well make the claim that they didn't want to come out as atheist, because the bizarre and foaming behavior of atheist such as yourself and Dawkins. I'd be pretty ashamed to be a part of a club of cranky old white men.
The truth is, the individuals surveyed responded with their actual beliefs, and you provide no evidence, other than deluded ranting to assume otherwise.
Perhaps you should learn to behave more like a scientist, than a deluded child.
Here's Dan Gilgoff, breaking it down for you:
http://www.usnews.com/blogs/god-and-country/2009/09/28/few-no-religion-americans-are-atheists.html