From an article in Vox entitled How many American atheists are there really?
How to find “closet atheists”
So if you can’t ask people outright whether they’re atheist and get an honest response, how do you go about finding them?
Gervais and Najle set up a very subtle test. They sent a nationally representative poll to 2,000 Americans, who were randomly assigned to two conditions.
The first condition asked participants to read through a bunch of statements like, “I am a vegetarian,” “I own a dog,” and, “I have a dishwasher in my kitchen.”
All the participants had to do was simply write down the number of statements that were true for them.
The value of this method is that participants don’t have to directly say, “I am a vegetarian,” or, “I’m a dog owner” — they only have to acknowledge the number of statements that apply to them. That alone should zero out any embarrassment or hesitance to admit to a particular item.
That’s important because the other 1,000 or so participants saw the exact same list — but with one statement added: “I believe in God.”
By comparing the responses between the two groups, Gervais and Najle could then estimate how many people don’t believe in God. (Because both groups of 1,000 poll takers should, in theory, have the same number of vegetarians, dog owners, and so on in each group, any increases in the number of agreed-to statements from the first group to the second should be reflective of the number of people who don’t believe in God.)
One thing is clear from the results: Much more than 10 or 11 percent of the country (as assessed in Gallup and Pew polling) does not believe in God. “We can say with a 99 percent probability that it’s higher than [11 percent],” said Gervais.
His best estimate: Around 26 percent of Americans don’t believe in God. “According to our samples, about 1 in 3 atheists in our country don’t feel comfortable disclosing their lack of belief,” Najle explains in an email.
Gervais admits this method isn’t perfect, and yields an answer with a wide margin of error. (On the other end of the margin of error, around 35 percent of Americans don’t believe in God.) But the most fundamental question he and Najle are asking here is do polling firms like Gallup and Pew undercount atheists? And it seems the answer is yes.
Robin,
So you are making the claim that historical evidence is not evidence because the event which is being reported is not typical in the material world. If the historical case is weak there should be no need to play word games.
The support of the claim of the resurrection is very strong with a breath of supporting evidence; whether you want to call it evidence or not really is not material to the argument.
Haven’t you rejected historical evidence countless times right here on this web site? Haven’t you demanded experimental proof before you’re willing to believe anything countless times right here on this web site? (Talking about phylogeny here, in case you missed that.)
So why is historical evidence suddenly so compelling to you?
John Harshman,
I have not rejected historical evidence out of hand. I have rejected it when it did not support the claim being made. An example is a claim of common ancestry based only on similar sequences when there are also different sequences to explain and are left ignored.
The claims on this sight are often scientific and not historical. A scientific claim is best supported by testing as per the scientific method. In some cases experimentation is impossible and I understand that.
Clearly you understand very little. You can’t see that you have very different standards of proof depending on whether you do or don’t want to believe. I don’t think there’s much that can be done for you.
Why is historical evidence suddenly NOT compelling to you?
That’s a funny religion you have, very different standards of proof depending on whether you do or don’t want to believe.
I don’t think there is any hope for you. You are destined to submit meaningless posts, there is little that can be done for you.
I would probably put it in terms of many different explanations for many different problems. Whereas theism gives us one big explanation for everything, naturalism gives us many small explanations for lots of things (but not for everything).
The naturalistic explanation for why our cognitive abilities are generally reliable is different from the naturalistic explanation for why life is possible under certain conditions, which is different from the naturalistic explanation for why the universe has the laws and constants that it has.
And this is because ecological neuroscience, stellar chemistry, and fundamental physics are all different branches of science. with only the most tenuous and speculative bridges between them.
Kantian Naturalist,
Is there a naturalistic explanation for the existence of fundamental physics?
Of course: physicists
And fundamental physics made physicists?
No, but there’s no non-naturalistic explanation of fundamental physics, either.
It’s exactly the sort of thing I’d expect to see if God actually does exist.
Those “explanations” either do not exist or they presuppose the existence of a being like God.
🙂
It seems to me that KN invited just such a shift be asserting there are non-theistic explanations.
What utter nonsense Alan. You really need to try harder to do better than keiths. Because it is a contest, don’t you know.
That God is a human construct is an attempt to explain God. And if God did not exist there would be no good reason to invent Him.
But it’s not an entailment, so back to square one for you!
🙂
And they do a great job of it! Especially keiths.
fifthmonarchyman is back!
When the hell did I say that?
walto,
I’ve considered the transcendental argument that our ability to explain itself presupposes that God exists.
My chief concern is that that argument presupposes a philosophically problematic conception of what the mind is like. More precisely, the transcendental argument requires a Cartesian conception of the mind. But there are reasons to reject Cartesianism about the mind. So the transcendental argument for the existence of God doesn’t work.
(I tried making this point many, many times to FMM. He never understood it.)
Kantian Naturalist,
What reasons are there to reject this?
Not exactly, it is an attempt to explain the belief in God
Organized religion.
I think what you meants to write was the following:
Not exactly, it is an attempt to explain the belief in.
Some people will understand.
Are you asking for reasons for rejecting a Cartesian model of mindedness?
Kantian Naturalist,
Yes 🙂
There must be SOME argument that works, right? I mean, if it’s not First Cause, maybe an ontological one will. But there’s just GOT to be a decent argument!!!
Thanks,
Again, maybe the question you should be asking is, what reason is there to believe it in the first place?
You’d certainly be a lot farther along intellectually if you’d seriously ask this of your own beliefs.
Glen Davidson
The first cause is not a bad argument, if the principle of sufficient reason is assumed. But it surely doesn’t show what most Christians think it shows.
The ontological argument is a mess, for the reasons that Kant gave. (There may have been pre-Kantian thinkers who insisted that existence is not a predicate; I simply don’t know.)
I don’t think I need to try hard to explain something that exists only in the minds of believers. I’m not hugely interested in the conviction of those believers and where some bring what they claim to be evidence it doesn’t reach any kind of level that enables it to be tested (other than YEC claims that always fail such tests). I’m happy for others to hold what beliefs make sense to them so long as they don’t want to foist them on me. Live and let live.
If I substitute the word “unicorns”, does that argument still work? Seems to. Before people knew what narwhals were, at least.
If God had not been invented as a human construct there would be no reason for me to write “God exists only as a human construct”.
And that, to you, means there are no proofs of ANY belief? Please.
walto,
Proof is very difficult and generally requires assumptions even in mathematics. There is evidence that supports beliefs but falls short of proof. Science in general is tentative. I don’t think we disagree here but are just quibbling over language.
Alan Fox,
Is this just your opinion?
Also, you seem to be quibbling over a matter of degree. The evidence in support of scientific findings, especially over time, becomes increasingly solid. Eventually it reaches the point where, as Gould said, it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent. At that point, intersubjective verification approaches universal, and there is no longer any rational substantive disagreement.
And this is qualitatively different from religious beliefs, for which there is NO universal assent, and for which there is no such thing as cumulative empirical evidence. From the scientific perspective, religious beliefs are circular sets of confirmation biases.
So saying “both are tentative, therefore they are alike” is fatuous. No two believers believe in exactly the same god(s).
It is my opinion, yes. Not sure what you mean by “just”. If you mean do others share it, then I can’t say. I’m not that interested in discussing other people’s beliefs. I certainly don’t belong to any atheist organisations (are there such things?) and it’s not a subject I raise in a social context (though I don’t avoid it if it comes up).
Perhaps you meant “have you evidence to support your opinion”, in which case it’s the lack of contrary evidence that convinces me. Look closely at any religious claim of any religion and it is all hearsay. I can understand why people continue with these beliefs – the pressures are largely cultural – but I’m a lost cause! 🙂
https://firstchurchofatheism.com/
What is your explanation for conversion and for resilience of religious beliefs in a predominantly atheistic culture?
I know you didn’t ask me, but I’ll give my own opinion here: fear of dying.
Incorrect statements don’t need to be explained. Regardless of conversions and resilience of religious beliefs, atheism is on the rise.
The share of Americans who identify as atheists has roughly doubled in the past several years. I won’t bother to link to any supporting evidence, you can find that easily enough should you care.
No, I am making the claim that historical evidence is not direct evidence and thus is (and always has been) a claim of evidence. But indirect evidence is only as reliable (or credible) as independent corroboration. Biblical stories have no independent corroboration. As such, they amount to weak evidence at best.
There is no supporting evidence for the resurrection.
It’s amusing how the contradictory accounts of the resurrection become multi layered hidden information that can only be decoded by initiates, as recently discussed here. One telling is the spiritual level, another the physical and so on. No contradictions to those who understand. A bit like ID I suppose.
That, or it’s completely bollocks. One or the other.
You mean atheists are not afraid to die? You can threaten them with a gun and they are always like meh?
Does not seem at all that atheism is attained by overcoming the fear of death. As far as my experience goes, cultural indoctrination explains atheism as much as it explains religiousness, namely partly. According to you, what explains atheism? Exhaustively.
Does not answer the question at all. The question was about the situation where atheism already is prevalent, e.g. pretty much anywhere in Europe, Western, Northern, and post-Soviet.
Particularly in post-Soviet countries there already are two generations of culturally indoctrinated atheists in the overwhelming majority. Americans of course like to limit themselves to talking about America, but this only serves to limit things. I prefer a thorough analysis and exhaustive explanation.
Another,to give life meaning
In most of those places there is a long tradition of religious belief which atheism supplanted.
And? Therefore when someone there converts to e.g. Buddhism or Hinduism or animism of which there are no other practitioners, the explanation is still “cultural indoctrination”?
There’s the return within the lifetime of the original disciples. That worked out well.
Flint,
Science is by definition tentative. So Gould was making a philosophical statement regarding Darwinian evolution. The problems with the theory started to surface since the discovery of DNA and its code like function.
Michael Dentons book, Evolution a Theory in Crisis, began to surface the contradictory biochemical evidence. This was supported and expanded upon 10 years later by Michael Behe’s book Darwin’s black box.
Gould was a Paleontologist and from the fossil record stand point the contradictory evidence was less evident. Richard Dawkins did recognize the contradictory biochemical evidence and tried to counter it with cumulative selection supported by Weasel. The program, however, was not able to work through the sequence without a target. Since you are a programmer, I assume you understand these issues well. So I would say at this point it would be perverse not to have healthy skepticism regarding Darwinian evolution.
Science for the most part is study of the natural world. So I would agree that it is different the Religious beliefs. I would however say that the natural world contains evidence that its ultimate cause required creative intelligence.
Robin,
Is this just your opinion?
Fear of dying plays into it, but of course it’s a ready-made counter culture within an appallingly anti-human culture, in many cases. Connections to the past and to friends and family often played large roles, too.
Religion was something that the people owned, not the government.
Glen Davidson
No, that it was a code was predicted by Schroedinger. How would one produce exact amino acid sequences except by some sort of code? How would a code be a problem, except to people indoctrinated into the belief that it’s a problem?
The fact is that the evidence for evolution has increased exceedingly with our ability to decode the genomes of organisms. But for those who simply won’t abide evolution, there are also more questions raised. For those who want very much not to accept evolution, the questions can be hammered, the evidence ignored.
Glen Davidson
No, it’s scientifically and scholarly definitional.
But hey…feel free to point to something you think is supporting evidence for the resurrection and I’ll be happy to assess it.