Lately I’ve been using Twitter and Google Docs to find out how I compare to my presumptive peer group with little spot polls. A few weeks ago I found out that I do, indeed, wake up later than most of you. On Tuesday I asked the Twitterati if they believe in God. Here are the results, based on 172 replies:
Surprised? I was. I doubt that this poll would have had the same results three years ago, before the atheist “coming out” movement had so much momentum. Three years ago, I think there would have been a lot more agnostics.
I was also surprised that there were so few animists. How many people say they are “spiritual, but not really religious?” I think a lot of that is acting out a primitive animism. A genetic ur-religion, rooted in our instinct for anthropomorphization. Scientists who refer to subatomic particles as “guys,” programmers who say their code is “unhappy,” the urge to describe a car’s “personality.”
Crickets mourn -
sing out of genetic code.
Here’s a random selection of the comments people left on the poll:
I wish there were a god, but there probably isn’t and we can’t know and oh my god this dog is so beautiful with such a shiny coat and such well-formed hears and attractive feathering on its rump, clearly there is a god
A monotheistic form of Hinduism! [ I didn't even know this existed! --Nat]
Active Atheist. Working to start my own church celebrating science and discovery.
Anyone who thinks they can argue rationally for the existence of god(s) needs to read Kant. Anyone who thinks belief has any place near things we can know needs to read Saint(sic!) Augustine’s “de utiltate credendi”.
In America, Most of the people are atheistic about gods like Thor, some daring individuals go one god (Jesus) further. — Dawkins
I believe in one God but don’t judge those that don’t
I was raised a Catholic and still consider myself a Christian. I do, however, respect everyone’s choice (or non-choice) of religion, don’t try to push my beliefs on anyone.
I was raised Jewish but became estranged when I realized that Judaism and Zionism are inextricable. Today I consider myself a sort of vaguely proto-American Buddhist, except without the theological aspects.
I’m a born again Christian although I’ve also studied Messianic Judaism. Both believe that Jesus (Yeshua) is the son of God.
I’m a reverend in Church of Sweden (lutheran, but think episcopalian).
I’m sick of being tolerant and respectful to believers. Religion has way to much power and influence in our societies. Based on crazy people hearing voices. Watch George Carlin: Religion is Bullshit
I’m too lazy to pick a side. You can’t prove that there are or are not gods, so refusing to answer seems the more prudent solution. Does it really matter, regardless? Even if there is a God, we still need to solve our own problems. We’re not children.
No god, but I do enjoy many aspects of religious culture – which is to say community culture based on groupings by religion.
You can call God in different ways but he’s always the same
if a burning bush told you to kill your son today, people would rightly think you were high…
Thanks for playing!
Posted on 7 May 2009
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I must say I like the result, the more atheism the better.
What about you Nat, what’s your choice? Though I’m pretty sure I know the answer to this one.
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I’m an atheist
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I’m pretty sure that you have here a sample of well-educated people. It looks like, the more educated people are, the more atheist you will find amongst them.
Any causality ?
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“spiritual, but not really religious?” … For myself that interprets as believing in something greater than myself, while also being horrified at the actions and intolerance of most “religions”. (But I tend to rational interpretation of beliefs such as the afterlife is us living on through other people as a result of our actions and attitudes while we were alive.)
@Ploum, how do you define education? Are you referring to those who seek out formal education like masters and phd’s (possibly in religion or philosophy), or those with outstanding breadth and depth of life experience and other styles of learning? Perhaps those who are drawn to masters/phds are inherently analytical types who naturally and through training, are less accepting of things not concrete and testable.
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Hey Nat!
To what do you attribute the shift from agnosticism to atheism? Personally, my path from being raised Pentacostal (yes, Sarah Palin’s brand of crazy) to atheist was completed after reading a lot of Dawkins. Surprisingly (to me, anyhow), the clincher was The_Selfish_Gene, rather than The_God_Delusion. The concept that we (meaning all life as we know it) are just machinery for hauling around our genes is both mind-blowing and humbling.
There is no proof one way or the other, of course, but in my mind, arbitrary belief based in wishful thinking is a pointless exercise. Even if we are really just complicated coalitions of various genetic lines, we exist, we know we exist, and we have the freedom to make choices about how we exist. Furthermore, we ought to recognize that we all have a genetic obligation to ensure that our species doesn’t kill itself.
Or maybe we don’t.
Nihilism dovetails easily with Atheism. Perhaps this is why so many people are threatened by the concept of atheism. The idea that morals can be arbitrary and inconsistent is deeply unsettling to many, I think.Regardless, even if they are arbitrary, as humans we have the ability to agree upon and adhere to a common set of morals. Ideally these morals should be free of local constraints and instead based on the simple fact that we’re all human, with the same basic set of needs and desires.
Incidentally, this is kind of a long-winded way of saying that I really should have filled-in the “Humanist” option in your poll.
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I am a Christian, but not a twitter user.
@Nil
I don’t think it’s philosophically consistent for an atheist to call something ‘better’ or ‘worse’. As Dawkins said, “[the universe has] no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind pitiless indifference.” Why should you really care what other people believe? It’s just a bunch of atoms and electrons bumping around inside their heads. Even if they posed some kind of threat to you (which would only be true for some extreme minority), why are threats ‘bad’?I’m sure you’ll say otherwise, but sometimes I think atheists just want other people to be atheists so they can feel more confident that they are right, not that it actually makes any difference in the world, or that any difference it does make actually has any lasting meaning. Perhaps you would say the same thing about Christians, but I think the difference is that Christianity is internally consistent in wanting others to believe.
@Ploum
I think it’s a sample of 172 people who probably have similar kinds of views to Nat, hence being connected through twitter (however that works, I haven’t used it). If I were to do a survey of 172 people taken mainly from my friends and their friends and so on, I think a majority of them would be Christians, simply by the way friendship groups form and the way families interact.I don’t think it has very much to do with being “well-educated”, and I think the implication is a little pretentious. In my opinion, the reason many academic people identify with atheism as oppose to agnosticism is simply that they realise the inconsistency of believing in a vague notion of “God” while at the same time not actually acting in any way on that belief (which I think is really common outside of academic spheres).
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I was born in catholic family, but I’ve been an atheist as long as I can remember. I said better simply because of my subjective opinion, I didn’t mean to label it like that. But why do you think Dawkins does the things he does if the “threats” are in a minority and not bad? Most of these people spread militant atheism because religion poses a threat to them and people around them, it’s not that innocent as it looks, at least in some countries. I’m surprised you said that as I can see you’ve listen to Dawkins apparently…
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Hi Nat,
One of my gripes is that atheism is often referred to as scientific or rational or empirical – it is none of these. (Sorry!)
It is a belief as well, just one that claims there is no God nor gods.
However, due to the nature of the argument, this cannot be proven rationally (or empirically) either: the question whether there might be a higher up entity outside our domain and dimension is of a transcendent nature, and thus cannot be answered within. It is a question covered by Goedel’s Theorem.
Agnosticism says: we cannot know. “Mu.”
Thus, we must resort to other approaches for ethics than falling back on the (non-)existence of gods. I like that a lot better myself.
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@lmb
Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorem (there’s actually two, but I’ll assume you mean to the first one) refers to formal systems, so it does not have strictly speaking anything to say about the Universe. So if you’re really concerned about empiricism you shouldn’t consider your personal extrapolations of that Theorem as relevant in a discussion on this topic.
About why a hard-liner approach to skepticism is quite pointless see the classic Russell’s Teapot (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell%27s_teapot).
@Kieran
You are confusing nihilism with atheism, an apparently common mistake among religious people. And if today only an extreme minority of religious people are a threat (which is debatable), it’s only thanks to centuries of hard work spent towards the creation of a secular society, not because religious people or ideas are inherently harmless.
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Ah, I meant the *second* Incompleteness Theorem in my comment.
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Kieran,
When there is no reason to believe in the existence of something, the logical approach is to assume the in-exitance unless/until proven otherwise. This is something one learns in elementary classes of Logic.
Now since there hardly ever has been any evidence of the existence of God, assuming He/She doesn’t exist is the most logical thing to do. A person doing the logical thing is obviously “better” than the person who not only believes in the existence of God but also believes in a whole lot of other non-sense associated with it.
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I would have said atheist if you’d asked me when I was in high school. I grew up in a town which was filled with religious people trying to enforce their view on everyone else so I took a firm stance. Later I moved away from that town, and came to see how irrelevant religion is to my life so long as I’m being left alone. So now I list myself as agnostic. The growing atheist campaign hasn’t had any real impact on me because I don’t need confirmation on my views of religion.
In one sense, ‘atheist’ is accurate, because I don’t think it can be proven either way, although if I had to bet I’d side with the atheists. But in another sense, that doesn’t really represent me because it still requires me to quantify an attribute I don’t think I possess…it’s like asking me if I prefer my tail to be fluffy or hairless. I don’t have a tail, and I don’t think about what my tail would be like if I had one. I’m unreligious.
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@Xan: you are right about the application of Goedel’s Theorem, of course. I hate it when someone knows that bit
However, it still strikes me as impossible to prove or disprove the existence of God; as defined, God is outside physical reality, and thus trying to argue within about God is prone to be, well, a question of belief, one way or the other. (See all the attempts at logically proving or disproving said existence, and how all empirical facts can be interpreted in either way too. See Kant’s first critique. Though some of the logical arguments about whether prayer works or not, whether God can interact with the creation etc are quite fun.)
So, yeah, if applying Occam’s Razor, we should do without. However, that is not formal proof either; it just seems useful and sane.
My conclusion indeed is that the question is unanswerable, and that unless they can make a proof one way or the other, science is better of not making a statement and claiming “You know, we don’t know, the question is not within our domain.”
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@lmb
I agree with you about the existence of God being impossible to prove or disprove, but as you say the only sane choice, IMHO, is to assume it’s not real until we have any evidence on the contrary.
That being said, I think this only applies to the concept of God in its most general and abstract form. All the particular religions that exist are tied to specific historical and social contexts, and I believe we have enough data and means to show that their claims of absolute truth are not actually true (because, at the very least, there’d be no particular reason to give more credit to any one of them than to the others).
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I voted agnostic, as in my opinion it’s truly impossible for us to know whether or not a deity exists. Sure, anybody can claim the existence of some space wizard and there will be no way for us to disprove them, but I believe that if such a manifestation of power exists, us, in this current state of existence and consciousness — we probably aren’t capable of “seeing god”.
At the University of Arizona, there have been some (seemingly) objective/non-religious studies of consciousness and the possibility of an afterlife, and possible connections to quantum physics. Stuart Hameroff, maybe? Or, maybe Gary Schwartz… either way, while it can be a little far-fetched, it’s at the very least something to think about.
Check these links out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuart_Hameroff
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Schwartz
http://www.consciousness.arizona.edu/If I remember correctly, one of their studies “found” that certain quantum particles which “may be responsible for consciousness” are still just as active after death. Which doesn’t prove the existence of God, no, but maybe “spirituality” is just very big things happening on a very small scale. Am I even making sense anymore?
Sorry if I’m getting a bit deep here, I’ve a lot of thoughts on this issue, but no real idea how to say it. My point being, though, that I believe it is absolutely impossible for us to know “what’s out there”, at least not while we’re alive. I’ve never been a religious person, I realized that God most likely does not exist when I was about 8 years old. However, that won’t stop me from thinking of the infinite number of possibilities. What’s out there? Most likely nothing at all.
But, I suppose we’ll never know.
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Monotheistic hinduism is the belief that all the millions of hindu deities are just different forms of the one god.
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@miguel I’m not sure I understand how the second part of the video is related to the first
but it’s funny and sad at the same time. If the video is real, props to Michael for that. -
@mjmac – Some prominent atheists like Richard Dawkins have made an effort in recent years to convince people to be more vocal about their atheism, and a lot of online support has emerged for atheism in fora that didn’t exist until a few years ago (like reddit, est. 2005). I think this has pushed some former “agnostics” — who were really secret atheists who didn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings — into the publicly-atheist column. And maybe it’s caused some formerly genuine agnostics to think harder about their actual beliefs, and to conclude that they are, in fact, atheists.
We could also speculate that eight years of evangelical Bushism strengthened the opposition culture, which became more vocal about its non-majority views. I’ve always thought that an especially dominant/oppressive main culture can breed strong subcultures, which is why you have Japanese perversion, punks in Salt Lake City, great vegetarian restaurants in Munich, etc.
Or maybe this is just the forward march of progress? Abolitionism, women’s suffrage, civil rights, feminism, gay pride, militant atheists, …
I sort of agree with @lmb that the existence of God is unknowable, but only for certain more theoretical/mathematical definitions of God that I think most theists don’t actually believe. Most theists believe in a “guy in the sky” who is listening to their prayers and who cares about their lives, and who occasionally appears in our world to parcel out land and kill Egyptians and that sort of thing.
And like Xan said, there are an infinite number of unknowable things that transcend our frame of reference, so I also apply Occam here.
Also, @Xan, thanks for reminding me about Russell’s Teapot, that really is great. You might enjoy this lecture:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Equfju9kJfA
Although it is a bit insulting to theists.And whatever its downsides, one of the great things about religion is that it can provide a community infrastructure and a sense of comfort to people who need it. Social connections to other people, sympathy, and comfort are really important to leading a happy and healthy life. Although that community can come with negatives too — bigotry, racism, ignorance, discouraging independent thought.
It’d be great to have more supportive communities/social institutions that are non-theistic.
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@ Nat: If you aren’t already aware of them, check to see if there are any humanist or secular humanist associations in your area. They are essentially churches without the religion, allowing for socializing, support, and community building without requiring faith or adherence to dogma along with it like churches do.
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So the Monotheistic Hinduism comment was mine. Hinduism is old enough to have mutated into a million (or so) forms, each only marginally different from another. One of those forms believes that each of the many million gods are just forms or representations of the same essential god. I don’t believe there is a definition of who that single god is, but I’m probably very wrong on that. .
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A little confusing/misleading… agnosticism and atheism (and indeed agnosticism and theism) aren’t mutually exclusive. Agnosticism is a declaration of knowledge (rather, an acknowledgment of lack of knowledge), while theism/atheism is a declaration of belief. Unfortunately mass media has mixed this all up such that most people don’t bother with (or even realise there’s) the distinction.
Personally, I’m an agnostic atheist. I have no friggin’ clue whether or not there’s a god, but I (unscientifically) think there probably isn’t. (And frankly I just don’t care about it enough; I don’t consider it an Important Life Question.)
Non-agnostic atheists are just as “religious” as theists.
(Or perhaps I’m just rationalising my averse reaction to being lumped in with the “there is no god, and those who believe in one are idiots” crowd. Those who think they know for a fact that god doesn’t exist are deluding themselves just as much as those who believe in the factual existence of god.)
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@ Srichand: I doubt this is universal, but a friend of mine who is a monotheistic Hindu considers the one God to be Brahma. However, in principle it was very unlike the Judeo-Christian-Muslim concept of an intelligent, judgemental being, instead he described it more as a universal existence that everything stems from, and that the goal of reincarnation is ultimately to return to being part of that existence. I am under the impression that this existence was not a distinct being, but the true, underlying nature of the universe.
@ Brian: Although I am not sure being a gnostic Atheist could be considered 100% certain, there are certainly logical reasons for concluding a perfect, omiscient, omnipotent, omnipresent, intelligent creator could not exist (primarily that it leads to a being with multiple sets of mutually exclusive properties). If you loosen the definition of God it becomes more difficult, of course. So although I would not say it is as good a conclusion as agnostic atheism, I would disagree that is is just as religious as theism.
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For those who don’t believe in god, please do us a favor. The world is getting crowded. Commit suicide. Help save the earth. And please don’t forget to sign the donor’s form so that other people can make use of your body parts. Sarcasm? I leave it to u to decide. When u dead, u dead. Right? If no god, then why bother?
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Can’t you just feel the love oozing off warna’s post? Please keep up the good work, warna. It is in no small part due to individuals like you that people are leaving religion in droves right now. You show the world that religion does not necessarily lead to peace and love for your neighbors, it can also lead to hatred, intolerance, and total disregard for the lives of anyone who does not share your beliefs. So I thank again you for your enormous help in legitimizing non-religion.
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The evolution of Witch-Doctors to Archbishops is just another example of nature at work.
Visualise the benighted origins of religiosity; It’s quite obvious that the early Human mind was BOUND to generate mythological imagery of an Elysian nature & from there, receptive, fanciful & PREDACIOUS minds took over.
‘Beliefs’ were surely born of ignorance & fear of the unknown. With this realization, why can’t we all recognise simple basic facts & treat ALL ‘Faiths’ of today as ever they really were – - – Dogmatic preservations of irrational early thought – - – Pure Phantasmic Godswallop!
The PAST is unveiled through time. Of necessity, we must Profit from it, not Perpetuate it!
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Eh Nat, I wish reality was even remotely close to your poll.
Its the internet, it is in a way an advanced society with on average more educated and reasonable people. Those Jesus freaks are not twittering and a lot of them are forbidden from using internet. The whole point of religion is to retard technology and progress so that they can continue to flourish.If you make this poll on the streets all across the world, you know very well the result will be much different. But sure, things are moving and people really are slowly abandoning religion (mostly thanks to internet and knowledge it provides), but we have a long way to go..
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i’m a christian. i came across this post after typing “why do you believe in God?” i wanted to read others testimonies before i fell asleep. i feel a pit in my stomach as i read all of your posts about talking about how God isn’t real. i remember what it used to feel like when i didn’t believe. i will pray that you will all find Christ someday. Not because it’s some happy fix life solution but because He really wants you to know Him.
Good night……
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Did you ever think that most of your twitter followers are like you? Athiest? Just a thought.
Man, some of the comments here are simply rude.
I would love the Internet to be totally transparent someday. -
Hmm. Good point, @Camille. Wow, imagine that. Atheists like ofther atheists.
That poll is meaningless as far as the general public (even the “Tweeting” public).
@denis: “The whole point of religion is to retard technology and progress so that they can continue to flourish.”
The whole point of religion, eh?
Not much of point using reason or rational when people can get away with absurdities like that.
But I’ll try.
I consider myself quite “religious” by your standards, and I happen to run a web design business. My dad is a senior developer. Many of my Christian friends are involved in the tech industry.
Not to mention the fact the at modern technology and real science have their roots in the Judeo-Christian worldview. Say, Isaac Newton, Galileo, Robert Boyle, Michael Farrady, Samuel Morse, Louise Pastuer, Bacon, Kepler, Pascal, DaVinci, Benjamin Franklin, Mauray, Lord Kelvin, Lister…
http://tinyurl.com/z89t6So before you accuse religion of being “anit-technology” or “anit-progress”, please throw out this religious crackpot’s theory of gravity. He probably got the idea from praying to an apple on his desk.
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One would do better to contemplate exactly why mankind routinely questions “is there is a God?” What chance of circumstance brought us to such a point, yet left all the rest of creation void of lingering doubt and either comforted by childlike faith or sublime indifference?
Yes there is a Creator and he made a Way for us. Not for only those of high intellect to attain, nor for those with abundant means to aquire, but for everyone; regardless of station in life, capacity to fully understand, or inclination toward right or wrong, to approach a higher existance.
Yet for all the in depth searching,one need only look back to the origin of free choice in the garden of Eden and ask ourselves do we as if Gods place our faith in the commandments only given to slay us equally and show our eakness in the flesh…or do we accept the Word of God with childlike faith and escape the unavoidable penalty.
This is the Tree of life, take from it eat freely, and you will never die. But from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you cannot eat///lest you surely die.
And He yet He stands and asks every last man and woman at some point… Will you finally Believe Me, and choose to Live?…or will you yet believe a lie?One simple fact remains yet is overlooked when trying to explain God or describe His reasonings. The creator exists at the end of all things and where we each finish in the grand scheme of things is a past occurance to Him. And the unfairness you sense in this life can oft be explained by realizing that the very one who asks God “why”…may already have the answer for himself in heaven and not wish to alter things in the least.
If you can’t see it at once…by all means read it twice my friends. And by the grace of God through Jesus Christ…choose to live.
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I do believe in God!!!! I have talked to Him many times just as I would talk to you. I have felt His touch before. I could never make it without Him and His Son Jesus. I had a stroke about five years ago and God allowed to to go see Heaven. If you have never had that joy words can not express how beautiful. Without God I have nothing, With Him I have it all!
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elfinlorien@hotmail.com Just thought i’d add that in for anyone who’d like to talk to me about anything
Love,
~*Amber
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