Is there a God?

[Zeta-Flux]

Originally Posted by cheesehead

Prosperous democracies.

I did forget that the author was limiting himself to prosperous democracies. Thus, you have shown that the claim of cherry-picking was unfounded.

However, that opens up a host of other issues. For example, it limits the sample size even further. It also opens up the study to problems such as the kidney stone treatment example at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simpson%27s_paradox (It further negates your use of Mexico's religiosity.) etc...

[Zeta-Flux]

How many prosperous first-world democracies did he leave out?

I'm talking about limited sample size in claim #1. Not leaving out any of the sample. There is a huge difference.

1. Hmm ... why is it that the religiosity of Mexico is "Completely irrelevant" to its homicide rate, but the religiosity of secular, large-population areas in the US _is_ relevant to their homicide rates? Hmmm? Inquiring minds want to know.

Ignoring the emotionality...

The religiosity of large population areas, in and of itself, without further studies, IS irrelevant. My point was that the author seems to have a double standard. That double standard is evidenced by changing "countries" to "states".

To make it even clearer: I was not claiming that the paper would suddenly become valid if the author changed countries into states (or include Russia and Mexico, or...). On the contrary. It stills remains invalid. [I pointed this out to HRB earlier, when he misunderstood me.] The point is, by picking the criteria in just the right way (e.g. using high population vs. low population, or limiting oneself to prosperous nations) and following the arguments of the author, one can come to a completely different conclusion.

I hope this helps you understand why your statement "If you're going to divvy up the US, then you have to divvy up all the other nations, too, to be scientific, right? You're welcome, as always, to sponsor your own study." is completely irrelevant to what I'm saying. [Such studies have already been done. Go to that wiki page I linked to earlier with the homicide rates. It breaks it down by state. Compare the states by religiosity. See what hapens... Of course, such an exercise says nothing about religiosity and a statehood propensity to homicide.]

[__HRB__]

Originally Posted by Zeta-Flux

Do you have reason to believe he was a drug user?

Hallucinations are a common symptom of intoxication. Accidentally ingesting the wrong kind of fruit, e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Datura, could have easily done the trick.

Originally Posted by Zeta-Flux

Or had a history of brain tumors in the family?

Maybe less likely, but still possible. You can get a tumor without genetic predisposition.

Originally Posted by Zeta-Flux

In other words, what makes those causes "more likely" to you?

Because the effects are reproducible and - more importantly - causal.

A good dose of atropine -> dissociative hallucinations
Brain tumor pressing on the optic nerve -> hallucinations
Sleep-deprivation -> hallucinations

Also, the magnitude of likelihood isn't even relevant in the greater context, since the mere possibility of other factors being responsible for the observations and not a god, makes a position size of 100% of one's bankroll in the gamble whether a god exists suboptimal.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelly_criterion.

But, if a god in fact gave you the power of reason for a purpose, it would not only understand that you doubt its existence, the god would actually expect you to doubt its existence, otherwise you wouldn't be appreciating the gift properly.

P.S.

Originally Posted by Zeta-Flux

Thus, you have shown that the claim of cherry-picking was unfounded.

No he hasn't.

[Zeta-Flux]

Originally Posted by __HRB__

Because the effects are reproducible and - more importantly - causal.

Okay. I'm reading you as saying that visions from God are not causal, nor reproducible, and thus not as likely as those things we can explain by science without any supernatural factors. Is this a fair assessment?

If so, I think my answer to your question would take this thread way too far astray, and have no bearing on the intent of the original quotation in its context to rogue. If you'd still like to know my answer, feel free to pm me.

[flouran]

When religion is used in place of science bad things happen, as most of us who are smart enough know.
but, this news report is particularly saddening:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32141869...me_and_courts/

[Zeta-Flux]

HRB,

The way I meant cherry-picking was that I thought the author had only chosen certain countries, without any criteria (except that they supported his position), from which to obtain data. However, the author does explicitly state he is limited to prosperous countries.

There may be other ways in which the author is cherry-picking. However, as far as I can see it, the way in which I meant it was definitely shown false by cheesehead.

[cheesehead]

Originally Posted by Zeta-Flux

The religiosity of large population areas, in and of itself, without further studies, IS irrelevant. My point was that the author seems to have a double standard. That double standard is evidenced by changing "countries" to "states".

Changing "countries" to "states" where?

Again, the title is "Cross-National ..."

Where is the "double standard", exactly? The study consistently refers to nations and national measures. How is that a double standard?????

To make it even clearer: I was not claiming that the paper would suddenly become valid if the author changed countries into states (or include Russia and Mexico, or...). On the contrary. It stills remains invalid. [I pointed this out to HRB earlier, when he misunderstood me.] The point is, by picking the criteria in just the right way (e.g. using high population vs. low population, or limiting oneself to prosperous nations) and following the arguments of the author, one can come to a completely different conclusion.

Hunh? Please give one or more examples that are consistent with the stated aim of the study (title: "Cross-National Correlations of Quantifiable Societal Health with Popular Religiosity and Secularism in the Prosperous Democracies")?

"limiting oneself to prosperous nations"? In other words, you don't like this study, so you declare it invalid on the basis of its scope? That's cherry-picking -- discarding the results of one study on merely the basis of its scope. Why, exactly, does limiting the study to prosperous democracies invalidate the study when all it ever claims to apply to is prosperous democracies? It doesn't claim that it applies to nonprosperous countries or nondemocracies, so where is the "invalidity" associated with limiting to prosperous democracies?

If I survey folks in Milwaukee, and all I ever claim is that the survey is about folks in Milwaukee, does that make the survey invalid because it doesn't cover Chicago?

- -

Can you please give a _specific_ example of how Simpson's paradox applies (or could theoretically apply, if that's what you're claiming) to the study?

I hope this helps you understand why your statement "If you're going to divvy up the US, then you have to divvy up all the other nations, too, to be scientific, right? You're welcome, as always, to sponsor your own study." is completely irrelevant

YOU wanted to shift the focus from _national_ to sub-national in the US. I just pointed out that you'd need to do the same for the other nations in the study in order to be fair! Why isn't that relevant? Why can't I point out that a change you propose in the scope of the study should be applied uniformly? Is scope uniformity irrelevant?

- -

Re: Mexico

YOU brought up Mexico's homicide rate. Mexico is never mentioned in the article. I didn't mention it. But YOU brought up Mexico's homicide rate as relevant to our discussion.

Since YOU thought Mexico was relevant, I wanted you to complete the relevance by including the religion rate. But you keep dodging.

Could it be that you don't want it pointed out that over 90% of Mexicans are Christian?

(From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...us_populations 103,265,846 Christians in Mexico as of 2007. From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_population Mexico's population 111,305,663 as of 2009)

Could it be that placing this over-90% Christianity rate next to the "huge" (your word, not mine) homicide rate in Mexico (10 per 100,000, from the link you gave) might tend to weaken your attempt to blame secularists in the US for the high (but less than Mexico's at 5.8 per 100,000) homicide rate here?

[Zeta-Flux]

cheesehead,

I respect you. Because of that I'm going to read the five question marks at the end of one of your sentences as a signal that I need to give the discussion some time to simmer on our brains. I'll get back to you in a day or so, if it appears that further discussion will be beneficial to us both.

Best wishes,
Zeta-Flux

P.S. Just a small suggestion. You seem to edit your posts frequently. On a discussion such as this, in which you are mostly dialoguing with a single individual, it might be best to write them out in a word processor, and give them time until you are sure they do not need any further editing. This avoids some of the problems of cross-posting, among other issues. [And to break my own suggestion let me add: I also know how exciting it is to post back and forth! But, I've found that even giving it a little time makes discussions so much more meaningful.]

[cheesehead]

Originally Posted by Zeta-Flux

P.S. Just a small suggestion. You seem to edit your posts frequently. On a discussion such as this, in which you are mostly dialoguing with a single individual, it might be best to write them out in a word processor, and give them time until you are sure they do not need any further editing.

Okay. Will try.

[__HRB__]

Originally Posted by flouran

When religion is used in place of science bad things happen, as most of us who are smart enough know.
This news report is particularly saddening:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32141869...me_and_courts/

Why is it saddening to observe evolution in progress?

[flouran]

Originally Posted by __HRB__

Why is it saddening to observe evolution in progress?

Well I feel bad for the girl. It sucks that she had dumbshit parents who cared more about God than they did about her well-being, till the point that it put her life in mortal danger.