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Correlation between increasing intelligence and atheism

dilbert2

There are a lot of websites on the internet indicating that atheism often increases with education and a rise in intelligence. For instance, countries with better education systems and higher IQ’s are usually secular with little religion. In secular nations such as Sweden there also seems to be a lot less bigotry, sexism etc. than what one would find in a more religious and superstitious society and this is surely a sign of intellectual maturity and intelligence.

Do you agree that there is a correlation between atheism/ secularism, and a better educated, less superstitious populace?

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Ghost Buster

Access to information and a wider social group can certainly help ones noggin get around the whole notion of atheism being possible. I had a very typical irish upbringing as a catholic in a rural area outside a small town with catholicism being rooted in every aspect of life. I knew i did not believe most of what i was being told from my early teens but the notion of not believing in something was utterly alien to me as I had been taught voodoo and superstitious bollockology from year one.Then I went off to college, the internet was born, non RTE / Church run tv became available and so after a very brief flirtation with Paganism I had that EUREKA moment and realised that its possible to live very happily without any supernatural beliefs in ones life.
I think its possible to realise that religion is nonsense at any time but certainly access to other information or call it education if you like is a help toward atheism.
And no Im not a science head by any means.

Sky King

Success is subjective, and different people have different priorities in life.

For some people, success is rearing a healthy happy family. Is this any less valid than business or sporting success?

pragmatic1

Sky King wrote: »

IQ tests measure very specific things and do not measure loads of facets of what I would consider important aspect of the mind, including emotional intuition and creativity.

Ergo they are a load of cack.

Theres a fairly strong correlation between high IQ and success in later life. Being emotionally intelligent isnt really equal to being highly intelligent. In addition, the two arent mutually exclusive. Maybe we arent comfortable saying that people arent equal when it comes to intelligence because we equate intelligence with a persons worth.

Sky King

Killer Pigeon wrote: »

I think it's obvious that creationists have a very low IQ though.

I would tend to disagree.

We're all very worldly now because of easy access to media and the internet. A person could have had a strict and isolated upbringing, believing in creationism and still be very 'intelligent' in this capacity that is measured by IQ.

I would argue that it is education and exposure to the wider world as opposed to this classical notion of intelligence that makes a person question things they were taught as a child.

philologos

MagicMarker wrote: »

Courtesy of the same Wiki page.

Your claim was about education. There are contradictions in studies. Indeed, in respect to intelligence it largely comes down to social class, education, region, wealth in respect to atheists. Like all things, correlation is not causation but it comes down to other factors.

From the link above:

For a start, look at the graph of IQ versus belief, and focus on nations with a mean IQ of around 100. In these nations, there's almost no correlation between IQ and belief. The apparent connection comes mostly from a gaggle of nations that are characterised by high levels of belief and low IQ. And, importantly, these are all low-income nations. We already know - and Lynn acknowledges - that increasing material wealth in Western Nations in the 20th century lead to increasing IQ. Does this have anything to do with it?

Killer Pigeon

Sky King wrote: »

IQ tests measure very specific things and do not measure loads of facets of what I would consider important aspect of the mind, including emotional intuition and creativity.

Ergo they are a load of cack.

I think it's obvious that creationists have a very low IQ though.

Sky King

IQ tests measure very specific things and do not measure loads of facets of what I would consider important aspect of the mind, including emotional intuition and creativity.

Ergo they are a load of cack.

Killer Pigeon

Some people show off the fact that they are atheist to make themselves look smart. They think, "Hey, all the smart people seem to be atheists now, I think I'll join them". TheAmazingAtheist on youtube is an example, the reality is people like him are actually morons.

You have to pass 'The Test' before you can be considered a true atheist/agnostic.

MagicMarker

philologos wrote: »

Courtesy of Wikipedia.

Courtesy of the same Wiki page.

Religious Believers as a group were found to be significantly less intelligent and more authoritarian than religious Skeptics.

MagicMarker

paddyandy wrote: »

Information is all you get from Books.Teachers can teach wisdom if they have any.Education helps over some hurdles in life

I'm sure there's a point in there somewhere.

Seachmall

paddyandy wrote: »

Information is all you get from Books.Teachers can teach wisdom if they have any.Education helps over some hurdles in life

People of wisdom exist in all religions and in non-religious communities. Only one of those religions or non-religious communities can be right. Therefor one can assume there is no correlation between wisdom and belief.

Wisdom, also, is not measurable so your claims are unprovable. Nor can the distinction between "True" and "False" wisdom be made.

pragmatic1

paddyandy wrote: »

Information is all you get from Books.Teachers can teach wisdom if they have any.Education helps over some hurdles in life

What else would you be expecting from books?

philologos

Tonyandthewhale wrote: »

So you have a weak correlation in one study (with a small and not particularly generalisable sample population and no representation for atheists), another correlation which the researcher puts down to the confounding factors of age, class and income (so not technically anything to do with the link between atheism and intelligence) and another study about patterns WITHIN mormonism which again has nothing to do with more intelligent people being atheists? What was your point?

All of these studies contradict what MagicMarker cited about education. You should read the post thoroughly before responding.

paddyandy

MagicMarker wrote: »

Not long ago I came across a Canadian study that found that the more years in education you have, the more likely you are to be an atheist.

Information is all you get from Books.Teachers can teach wisdom if they have any.Education helps over some hurdles in life

Tonyandthewhale

So you have a weak correlation in one study (with a small and not particularly generalisable sample population and no representation for atheists), another correlation which the researcher puts down to the confounding factors of age, class and income (so not technically anything to do with the link between atheism and intelligence) and another study about patterns WITHIN mormonism which again has nothing to do with more intelligent people being atheists? What was your point?

philologos

MagicMarker wrote: »

Not long ago I came across a Canadian study that found that the more years in education you have, the more likely you are to be an atheist.

Courtesy of Wikipedia.

A weak negative correlation between education and Christian fundamentalism was found by Burton et al. (1989), a small study comparing the religious beliefs and educational achievements of white, Protestant residents of Delaware County, Indiana. Contrary to the researchers' expectations, fundamentalist converts were not less educated people.

In Australia, 23% of Christian church attenders have earned a university or postgraduate degree, whereas the figure for the general population is 13%. Christianity is the predominant religion in Australia, although adherence is falling. Commentators on the survey attribute the educational levels to sociological factors, such as age, class and income, making no claims about intelligence.

Studies of Mormons in the US show that Mormons with higher education attend church more regularly than uneducated Mormons. Survey research indicated that 41% of Mormons with only elementary school education attend church regularly. By contrast, 76% of Mormon college graduates attend church regularly and 78% of Mormons who went beyond their college degrees to do graduate study attend church regularly.

philologos

Just what we need! More atheism on After Hours :pac:

MagicMarker

Not long ago I came across a Canadian study that found that the more years in education you have, the more likely you are to be an atheist.

fedor.2.

partyatmygaff wrote: »

Not this old chestnut again.

I disagree completely.

That what your god told you to say, huh?

Sisko

im invisible wrote: »

Funny, i was going to start a thread about the corelation between atheism and poor social skills/ lack of empathy/ tact the other day after reading a few threads on here, but thought better of it..

Ah yeah. Sure there's no need. We all know the religious excel at social skills , empathy and tact.

partyatmygaff

Not this old chestnut again.

I disagree completely.

pragmatic1

I agree. Think its fairly obvious tbh.

im invisible

Funny, i was going to start a thread about the corelation between atheism and poor social skills/ lack of empathy/ tact the other day after reading a few threads on here, but thought better of it..

Sisko

Yeah but having a large amount of either will naturally steer you away from man made fairytales.

paddyandy

Intelligence is not Wisdom and if you don't understand that..........

[Deleted User]

How many people in Ireland have actually taken an IQ test though?

Having gone through education etc all I've taken are aptitude tests, these stats are clearly made up tbh.

Seachmall

It's called the Savanna-IQ Interaction Hypothesis.

Essentially stating the more intelligent you are the more likely you are to follow evolutionary novel thinking.

It relates to religion as a result of Neoteny, i.e. due to us evolving in a pack we tend to look for superior, parent-like, figures in our life.

"Man's evolution as a neotenous ape has put him in a similar position to the dog's. He becomes sexually mature and yet he still needs a parent - a super-parent, one as impessive to him as a man must be to a dog. The answer was to invent a god - either in the shape of a Mother Goddess, or a male god in the shape of God the Father, or perhaps a whole family of gods. Like real parents they would protect, punish and be obeyed" - Dr. Desmond Morris (People Watching)

Taking this into consideration with the hypothesis suggest the more intelligent you are the less religious you tend to be. In saying that there are more influential factors that influence someone's beliefs (upbringing, culture etc.).

This is not a reason to believe there is or isn't a God, so don't use it as one.

cowzerp

I know intelligent people who believe in God etc, but far more less intelligent people who do and always will because there sheep who would still be believing in Santa if there mothers did not tell them it was only made up to make Xmas fun.

Intelligence will definitely give you more chance of looking at it logically and making up your own mind wheter it makes sense or not.

Sisko

Biggins wrote: »

Try here: http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=614

You might get some answers there too.

It'd get banned from there. It's the religion section after all.

Considering religion tends to take advantage of the uneducated and the ignorant , its pretty obvious that indeed it is the case that the more educated and intelligent a society is the less religious it becomes.

bnt

humbert wrote: »

It would be difficult to prove that one country has a higher average IQ than another.

These are Statistical questions, which never involve Proof in the conventional sense. Nothing is ever "proven" in Statistics, but there are expressions of confidence e.g. you can say that a statement has a Confidence of e.g. 95%.

Or you can say that two variables are correlated, which means that their trends are connected positively or negatively. The argument here is that there's a negative correlation between religiosity and intelligence, and I've seen studies over the last few years that support that. The correlations account for exceptions, so don't make the mistake of thinking that you can refute such statistical evidence by pointing out a few exceptions. A more detailed discussion of this is for the other forum.