God is bad for you

**Don Corleone** · 09-27-2005, 17:07

Oy vey. It might surprise you to learn how many Christians don't believe in Satan, that the construct of the 'enemy' mentioned in the bible is our own sinful nature. One of these days, my enlightened European friends that so dogmatically adhere to secular humanism shall have to venture to the nescient land of America. I believe you'll be shocked to learn how different the majority of practicing Christians are from your caricature of us. I'm sure you'll be amazed to learn I haven't engaged in snake-wielding in three, maybe even four whole weeks now....

Well, I'm right there with you when it comes to Man United Fans, so long as you toss in New York Yankee fans to boot.

The author's point was perfectly valid. He's on step 2 of the 4 step scientific process. 1) Identify a phenomenon 2) propose a hypthesis 3) design experiments to prove or disprove your hypothesis 4) state your theory with supporting data. Interesting hypothesis, and I'll be happy to hear how me makes out with the rest of the investegation.

**econ21** · 09-27-2005, 17:25

A statistical problem with this kind of study is that the unit of observation is the country and, as Saturnus says, there are potentially a lot of differences - confounding factors - between countries. For example, the Times report places a lot of emphasis on the UK: US comparison but clearly there are a lot of other differences between these societies which are unlikely to be controlled for in the study. One way of overcoming this would be to look at whether given countries fared better or worse as they got more religious, but I am not sure the study did that (ie used panel data).

One contrary bit of evidence to throw in to the discussion is that studies of self-reported happiness tend to show religious people are happier. Again there may be confounding factors - certain personalities may be more predisposed to faith - but I tend to believe this result. The causality seems plausible - Marx did not call religion the opiate of the people for nothing. Moreover, since the unit of observation is the individual within the same country, there are not so great cultural differences as between countries. Plus you have more observations and hence less problem trying to simultaneously trying to control for lots of confounders.

I wonder if both kinds of study could be true? ie happy religious people cause social problems for others?

**Byzantine Prince** · 09-27-2005, 18:20

Society is the way it is because of people's developed nature. Stoping religion now will not solve anything.

**Don Corleone** · 09-27-2005, 19:47

Originally Posted by Byzantine Prince

Society is the way it is because of people's developed nature. Stoping religion now will not solve anything.

You could knock me over with a feather.... never thought this would come from you....

**Reverend Joe** · 09-27-2005, 20:00

I honestly don't see any way that violence, etc. can be attributed to religion. Religion is a natural construct for human beings, as a result of the god gene (which, for those who don't know, encourages the creation of a system of worship of a higher being. That's not to say that that being isn't real; just that we have a gene that predisposes us to worship him.) Therefore, religion is as natural for humans as killing each other, and having sex. Eliminate religion, and more religion will appear in its place- and our violence and debauchery will be just as unaffected (I, for one, hope to help with the debauchery.

)

**Adrian II** · 09-27-2005, 20:14

Originally Posted by meatwad

I honestly don't see any way that violence, etc. can be attributed to religion.

It can not. The article finds a high correlation between social ills and the belief in a personal God (not religion in general) but he does not state that correlation equals causation.

**PanzerJaeger** · 09-27-2005, 20:31

I dont understand why people hate religion so much. Most Christians certainly dont hate athiests or agnostics.

**A.Saturnus** · 09-27-2005, 20:45

Adrian, I had it over the Times article, which stated:

RELIGIOUS belief can cause damage to a society, contributing towards high murder rates, abortion, sexual promiscuity and suicide, according to research published today.

Which is hardly a valid conclusion. It is not surprising that a newspaper is misinterpreting a scientific paper in an outragous way.

The hypothesis that religion makes society better is indeed undefendable, but comparing different nations for which is least dysfunctional is not a reliable method. There are too many factors in it.

**Byzantine Prince** · 09-28-2005, 00:32

Originally Posted by Don Corleone

You could knock me over with a feather.... never thought this would come from you....

Society has become this way because of Christianity. Can you imagine what the world would look like if the pagans had survived christianity? Pretty different I would think. This is why I think history is important, it's looking at the origin of things and then deciding if the current state of affairs is legitimate at all.

Stopping Christianity now would not change what has already been engrained in people's minds over thousands of generations.

It's not 'God is bad for you'. It's religion is bad for you. Believing in God alone does nothing, it's the dogma and the way of thinking, which by the way is not what Christ intended, has been altered to a degree that no one is really Christian. I think Christ was the only true Christian, because every dogmatic leader and martyr after him have changed his message. It's quite obvious if you read the Bible actually, there are many contradictions between what Christ says and what Paul later added.

**Devastatin Dave** · 09-28-2005, 00:39

Originally Posted by Byzantine Prince

Society has become this way because of Christianity. Can you imagine what the world would look like if the pagans had survived christianity? Pretty different I would think. This is why I think history is important, it's looking at the origin of things and then deciding if the current state of affairs is legitimate at all.

Stopping Christianity now would not change what has already been engrained in people's minds over thousands of generations.

It's not 'God is bad for you'. It's religion is bad for you. Believing in God alone does nothing, it's the dogma and the way of thinking, which by the way is not what Christ intended, has been altered to a degree that no one is really Christian. I think Christ was the only true Christian, because every dogmatic leader and martyr after him have changed his message. It's quite obvious if you read the Bible actually, there are many contradictions between what Christ says and what Paul later added.

Amen, excellent post. Thank you.

**wipes tears from eyes**

**Strike For The South** · 09-28-2005, 00:41

Originally Posted by Byzantine Prince

Society has become this way because of Christianity. Can you imagine what the world would look like if the pagans had survived christianity? Pretty different I would think. This is why I think history is important, it's looking at the origin of things and then deciding if the current state of affairs is legitimate at all.

Stopping Christianity now would not change what has already been engrained in people's minds over thousands of generations.

It's not 'God is bad for you'. It's religion is bad for you. Believing in God alone does nothing, it's the dogma and the way of thinking, which by the way is not what Christ intended, has been altered to a degree that no one is really Christian. I think Christ was the only true Christian, because every dogmatic leader and martyr after him have changed his message. It's quite obvious if you read the Bible actually, there are many contradictions between what Christ says and what Paul later added.

WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH BP