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[Servant Corps]

This is a survey in the United States, done by Pew Forum on Religion. What's important to take from this is that 21% of Atheists believe in God.

I was always curious on how an atheist can believe in God. Maybe you guys can help me solve this question. They're there, these Atheists believe in God, they said so to the poll workers, but...why?

EDIT: Just to make it clear. These people self-identified as Atheists. I believe the Pew Forum first asked what is the religion of the person, and then asked if they believed in God.

[sneakey pete]

Note that the 21% isn't "believe in god". it is NET Believe in god. Eg, it is the sum of the columns personal god, impersonal force, and other don't know.
The 21% means sweet fuck all, since they fucking included "other/don't know" as part of that total.

In other words: here we have a good example of how presenting statistics in just the right way can make them look like something completely different to what they are to the casual observer. They positioned the Net column in such a way as to make it look (intentionally or not) like 21% was just one part, and then the 6%, 12% etc was ontop of that.

[Servant Corps]

* Servant Corps sighs.

First, they asked if someone if they believed in God. They said Yes. That's what the 21% comes in. Then they asked what IS God? Is God a personal god, or an impersonal force? Some people say that they believe in God, they just don't know if it is a personal God or an Impersonal Force. So they say "Other" or "Don't Know".

You got 6% of Atheists who believe in a Personal God, and 12% who believed in an Impersonal God, and 3% who do not know what God is but still believe God exist. That's it. They wanted to know what type of God each person believes in.

I don't want this data being mistakingly misunderstood. That's all.

[inaluct]

Just goes to show you, only 21% of atheists are stupid, as opposed to about 90% of everyone else except for Buddhists and Jews. Hur hur

[Ampersand]

Maybe the question itself was misunderstood among the questioned to be equivalent to:

Do you believe in god? No. What is the god in which you don't believe?

[IndonesiaWarMinister]

Well...

HOW COULD ANY MUSLIM CHOOSE IMPERSONAL??

Wait, Allah, technically, is both.

Damn

[Yanlin]

Wait, this thread STARTED about religion?

Time to fetch my pyro suit...

[sneakey pete]

* Servant Corps sighs.

First, they asked if someone if they believed in God. They said Yes. That's what the 21% comes in. Then they asked what IS God? Is God a personal god, or an impersonal force? Some people say that they believe in God, they just don't know if it is a personal God or an Impersonal Force. So they say "Other" or "Don't Know".

Doh, i do believe i owned myself.

[mainiac]

Quite possibly my favorite scene from catch-22 is where nately's whore tries to kill yossarin because she is atheist about a kind and loving god, while he is atheist about a cruel impersonal god.

[JoshuaFH]

Quite possibly my favorite scene from catch-22 is where nately's whore tries to kill yossarin because she is atheist about a kind and loving god, while he is atheist about a cruel impersonal god.

That was the best book I ever read.

[chaoticag]

It is also one of my favorites too, my sister freaked out when she read the first line of it.

[LASD]

Someone get a thread up on General Discussion about Catch-22, I don't feel qualified to do it. It is quite likely the best book ever. I really need to read it again.

Also the derailment of this thread will cease.


Speaking of which, I'd really like to know also how those statistics came to be. The only explanation I come up with is that 21% of people that call themselves Atheists don't know what it means.I really hope this is not the case. Also looking at the God-believing number at Agnostics I'm starting to feel that these statistics are borked.

[mainiac]

The 21% of atheists who believe in God probably are mostly agnostics who don't know the right term.  But the 50% of agnostics who believe in God aren't necessarily mislabeling themselves.  You can be agnostic and believe in God, so long as you believe that we can't be sure and need to maintain doubt.  In fact, this school of thought gave birth to the first purely indigenous American philosophical movement, and had a big impact on 20th century philosophy.

Agnosticism isn't defined by belief or disbelief in God.  It's defined by the belief that we can't be certain.

[Strife26]

*Enters thread*

Not much for me to say, really. I find perfectly acceptable that atheists believe in God.

[JoshuaFH]

*Enters thread*

Not much for me to say, really. I find perfectly acceptable that atheists believe in God.

Except that, it, you know, contradicts the very idea of being atheist.