Then you should learn more about Dennet. Krauss fairs poorly by comparison. Physicists, and other scientists, are useful to atheism but should leave the argument to philosophers who know what they're doing.

Pretty typical and ironic that those claiming morality without God tend to be the most immoral, self-absorbed people around. I've found few exceptions. One notable example of an obviously upstanding dude is Robert Price, Jesus mythicist and atheist.

I claim morality without God, am I immoral and self-absorbed?

If yes, feel free to include your evidence.

Dunno if the stats are true, but:

https://www.quora.com/Is-it-true-tha...e-atheists-Why

The link goes on to talk about a more detailed survey of scientists by Elaine Ecklund:

If you're interested in the prison population, Nate Silver has a rather an article about it:

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features...o-be-atheists/

Half of the people responding is an outstanding response though. It's in fact so high that I would flip the objection on it's head, how was the survey conducted - because the response ratio is so high I would like to know how the data was actually gathered.

For comparison, I've done survey research and been lucky to scrape 4%.

Which also means that if if the person writing that Quora-response thinks 50% response is low, they don't really know much about surveys...

Pew-Pew's 2009 survey operated with 41% atheists among US scientists across the board, and Pew-Pew is generally a very good source when it comes to demographic surveys.

Then again, how to measure atheism in surveys is a debate in itself in the US. Since it is such a widely disliked position, an indirect survey would probably be better than a direct one.

From same article, using different data:

I don't attach a lot of significance to this, just wanted a retort to doordonotdo. I feel certain atheists' vast under-representation in prison is due to class and income, not our superior morality. Although maybe we are a little

1 in 100 is pretty low. Pew has it 3% for "athiest". Then some agnostics and a whole bundle of "nothing in particular" folks that I guess people get to fight over what that means.

That's fair enough. I just linked it as a source of information.

I'm going to take the opposite position for the sake of exploring this. If you're interested to.

If we take morality to mean something like "a particular system of values and principles of conduct" or "principles concerning the distinction between right and wrong or good and bad behaviour., then you are claiming to have such a system or set of principles.

What are they and from where did you acquire them?

(I'm obviously leading up to a point where I intend to show that your values are arbitrary and that you can't know right from wrong unless you have an infallibale source of absolute values, and so whilst you could techniocally claim to be 'moral, that claim is virtually meaningless.

Also, while I'm no expert on ethics and moral philosophy, it's been a subject of great interest to me for some years and I'm not coming to this with no knowledge. I personally subscribe to a form of Virtue theory, althought it's not very helpful generally.)

We see the same correlation between IQ and criminal behaviour that we see between IQ and religiosity. We would expect to see the same correlation then between the IQ of criminals and their religiosity, and we do.

I would bet my house we'd see the same correlation between IQ and Trump voters.

If you like your house, I'm not sure that the bet would be a good idea.

Statistically, many (if not most) of the demographic groups that voted heavily for Secretary Clinton tend to have below-average IQ's.

I'm not saying whether you would or would not win the bet, but I don't think that it is a foregone conclusion either way.

On a side note, I'm not even sure what "IQ" really is. IQ tests omit many aspects of intelligence and can be culturally and gender biased. A poor, malnourished child who might really be "more intelligent" than a rich, well-fed child might do worse on an IQ test, for example.

what does it mean that they "might really be more intelligent"?

Between two random children who might be equally intelligent "all things being equal", the well-fed child will probably score better than the malnourished child. Even if the random malnourished child was more intelligent than the random well-fed child, he still might score lower on the IQ test.

that doesnt make sense. If the malnourished child is more intelligent, they will score better on an IQ test ( otherwise, the IQ test doesnt measure IQ). If you are saying, they have a lower IQ because they are malnourished, then ok.

Sorry I was unclear. The bolded is what I was trying to say.

I suspect you are trying to refrain from saying that black and hispanic people voted for Clinton. But we also know that more educated people voted more for clinton, and education skews to higher IQ.

+1

+1

It is true that IQ tests measure IQ accurately. There is disagreement about how well IQ correlates to human intelligence.

+1

Someone once said that an IQ test measures your ability to take an IQ test.

"someone once said" isnt an argument.

I don't think it was intended to be an argument. It's more of an observation.

Christian theology says everyone is immoral and self-absorbed. I definitely agree with it, because I analyze myself and everyone I know and it applies universally.

So yes, you are immoral and self-absorbed. I wouldn't trust anyone who claimed differently about themselves.

However, for your benefit I will humor you. What does your morality consist of, where did you acquire it, and what is it based on?

Could this be an honest freethinker? Egads! A rare jewel?