Fox News Teaches Us How to Make Super Biased Opinion Polls

March 4, 2010 By

Logical, rational, and sane people already know that Fox News is the media talking head, and lie spreading feux news channel, for people who are controlled by fear, promote hate, and are in a perpetual state of playing follow the leader (aka Conservative Christian Republicans). One of the things they’re very good at is relentlessly promoting their narrow-minded message, in spite of differing, more reasonable opinions. However, I admire their ability to be so blazen in their bias – it’s definitely a sight to see, even if just to witness the pure destructive spectacle of it.

One of the best things Fox News is good at is spinning a poll. Not only can they throw around poll numbers that are completely different from other news organizations–numbers that are always in favor of their message–they can also craft a damn good biased poll. They recently did a poll called Does the ‘Reconciliation’ Gambit Make You Angry?.

The three options they included (there were actually four, but the “Other” option is just there to filter out trolls) would have been fine if they were expressed without their tacked on opinions. In its simple form–without opinions–it was Yes, Not Sure, and No. Simple enough. However, the opinions that came after each option were cynical, biased, and designed to fuel the moronic angst of the type of people who actually go to Fox News to get their news.

  1. Yes. This is outrageous! They’re using rules to bypass the clear voice of the people – payback in November, guys.
  2. Not sure, but if they have to resort to rules loopholes to pass a law, doesn’t that indicate that a lot of people oppose it?
  3. No. Look, we need health care reform and we need it now. Let’s get started, even if it means using a rules loophole.

The “Not Sure” and “No” options were sabotaged with dickishness.

“…doesn’t that indicate that a lot of people oppose it?”

“Let’s get started, even if it means using a rules loophole.”

I mean, really? Not surprisingly, most people chose yes ;) If you preach to a choir, can a tree in a forest hear the preaching?

Filed Under: Politics Tagged With: , ,

Is Imposing Religion on Children Abusive?

February 23, 2010 By

Atheist Revolution asked the question (actually, they made a statement), is imposing religion on children abusive? They gave the example of a seventeen-year-old that was forced to go to church.

17 year-old being forced to attend church and told that he belongs to a particular religion by his parents. He’s wondering whether this is legal (I suspect that it is) and has raised questions about what any of us can do to prevent other children from having to endure similar experiences in the future.

The writer then talked about their own experience as a child—being forced to go to church—and how the relationship with their parents was never the same after that experience.

The question, or statement as it might be, is not a new one. Most recently, Richard Dawkins got attention for making similar statements. He suggests that labeling children as Christian children or Muslim children is absurd, as is filling their minds with the idea that unless they believe, they will burn in hell.

Personally, I think the word abuse is a bit much. Oppressive maybe, but abusive?

Filed Under: Religion Tagged With:

Morality Without God

February 20, 2010 By

via The Thinking Atheist

Filed Under: Religion Tagged With:

My Imaginary Friend Jesus

February 20, 2010 By

When I first started seriously questioning the validity and truth of my now past faith, I created a list of hard questions. These were questions that I didn’t have the answer to, and most, if not all of them, held the potential to dislodge my world view. One of those questions was:

“What’s the difference between Jesus and an imaginary friend?”

The question at first seemed absurd, but I knew it had to be answered. When I initially researched it, I found out that the official psychological term for it was “imaginary companion.” I thought companion was a fitting word for how I and most Christians view their relationship with Jesus.

The more I pondered my own belief in Jesus, and what it meant to have an imaginary companion, the more it looked exactly the same. I would constantly ask myself how this could be. How could so many people have the same imaginary friend? Not only that, how could rational adults believe in an imaginary friend, let alone, the same one?

Imaginary friends, which are usually experienced by children to combat loneliness or an emotional deficit in their lives, have names, unique characteristics, and most of all, provide companionship. Even though imaginary friends can’t be seen by the person who is imagining them (except in some rare hallucinatory cases), the person fully believes in their existence. They talk to them, depend on them, and often love them. The alternative to life without them is loneliness, and in some cases, despair.

In Christianity, if you bring together groupthink, a tendency to be superstitious (which includes every human being), religious doctrine, and the desperate need for hope and meaning in your life, then congratulations, you’ll be getting a new imaginary friend named Jesus.

The idea that everyone perceives Jesus in the same way is a fallacy. Jesus is experienced differently by everyone, even for those who are indoctrinated in the most homogeneous of religious sects. While the experience of Jesus may appear identical, that illusion comes from a religious group’s structured archetype of Jesus. The who and what of Jesus is a well defined social construct. The rest is completely up to your mind’s imagination. That’s why Jesus talks to people in different ways, and why they ultimately experience their relationship with him in very unique ways.

During my journey into becoming a rational, logical freethinker, I had the opportunity to meet with a very popular Christian author. This person is very intelligent, has a background in psychology, and is someone who I continue to have great respect for. We met privately, and I presented him with my list of questions. As with most of the questions I presented to him, he didn’t have a reasonable answer for it. When I asked him what the difference was between an imaginary friend and the belief in a relationship with Jesus, he quickly conceded that there wasn’t any difference.

Filed Under: Religion Tagged With: ,

Irrational Disbelief Syndrome

February 14, 2010 By


The marketing agency for FiberOne has launched a clever campaign called Irrational Disbelief Syndrome. The advertising campaign is a mixture of clever, stupid, and the absurd, but it’s all of those things on purpose.

The premise is that their high fiber foods taste good and will help you lose weight. From the campaign’s perspective, that’s a fact, like gravity and the existence of bears. What’s interesting about the campaign is that they’re subtly attacking people with superstitious beliefs. The kind of beliefs that make the Creation Museum possible.

The opening video on their Web site begins with a fake doctor, named Dr. Taggert Bane. He sets the tone of the campaign by stating:

Irrational Disbelief Syndrome is when people are incapable of believing things that are universally understood to be true. Things like science, eggplants, and…

Believers who disbelieve in the logical, rational world around them, may end up protesting against this new marketing campaign, because it’s directly mimicking and making fun of them. However, I’m betting they don’t get it, in the same way they don’t believe “things that are universally understood to be true.”

Filed Under: Culture Tagged With: ,

Focus on the Family Could Have Spent 2.8 Million On…

February 9, 2010 By

Christine Vyrnon had a productive rant about Focus on the Family spending 2.8 million dollars on a subtle pro-life, anti-choice commercial during the Super Bowl. She proposed that they could have spent:

  • 2.8 million dollars on single mothers in poverty.
  • 2.8 million dollars to lobby for the end of wars that kill or internally, externally maim sons and brothers and fathers like Tebow – instead of the simulation of war in the stadiums.
  • 2.8 million dollars on any number of women and children – just for the hell of it.
  • 2.8 million dollars for young men and women who want to explore the world before they try to teach their kids about the world.
  • 2.8 million dollars to pay for a mother’s or child’s medical bills.
  • 2.8 million dollars to pay grannie’s heating bills.

Focus on the Family’s Super Bowl commercial with Pam and Tim Tebow

Here’s the commercial in question. As I said before, it’s very subtle, and it’s meant to be a teaser to get you to visit their Web site. I have to admit, I didn’t recognize Tim Tebow without the Bible verses taped to his face.

Filed Under: Religion Tagged With: ,

Correlating Education, Poverty, Health (and Even Death by Firearm) with the Religiosity of States

January 3, 2010 By

The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life released a study on the religiosity of states. It measured three things; worship attendance, frequency of prayer, and belief in God. Unsurprisingly, the Southern states—also known as the Bible Belt—were found to be the most religious.

I thought it would be interesting to looks at the five most and least religious states, and compare statistics related to education, poverty, health, and death by firearms.

Five Most Religious States

  1. Mississippi
  2. Alabama
  3. Arkansas
  4. Louisiana
  5. Tennessee

Five Least Religious States

  1. New Hampshire
  2. Vermont
  3. Alaska
  4. Massachusetts
  5. Maine

When I compared the top five religious states with the top five lowest religious states, the results were dramatic. The most religious states were, on average, the least educated1, poorest2, and unhealthiest3. People in those states were also twice as likely to be killed by a firearm4. The differences were even more staggering when you removed Alaska from the least religious list. For example, you are almost three times as likely to be killed by a firearm.

Based on these correlations, one could conclude that there is a relationship with being religious and being less educated, having less money, being less healthy and owning, or at the very least, being killed by a gun. All four of which, even without including religion into the mix, usually have a direct relationship with each other.

Religion & Education

Education and access to knowledge has always been the enemy of religion. When critical thought, logic and historical reference are applied to theology, it tears holes into its very foundation. It is no wonder that a culture that is better educated, especially philosophically, would be less religious.

Religion & Poverty

Desperation and fear creates the greatest need for hope. Religion provides a psuedo-hope that people can easily cling too. Religion can be used both as a coping mechanism and an explanation for their current state of affairs. Poverty is often related to poor education, and both of those are often related to poor health.

Religion & Health

While education and poverty can have a direct influence on health, the attitudes — specifically religious attitudes towards life — can influence health too. For example, if life after death will be angelic and perfect, there’s really no need to concern yourself with living a healthy lifestyle. Especially if that means you’ll get to heaven quicker ;)

However, I tend to think (from personal experience), that most people in the South comfort eat in order to get relief from the neurosis caused by following and believing in illogical superstitions.

Religion & Guns

At the core of most people’s religious beliefs is fear. Fear of damnation and fear of death. It’s that fear that makes it easy to believe in make believe and it’s that same fear that gets people to unnecessarily arm themselves.

Conclusion

While this article is intermingled with correlations (which aren’t all that scientific), speculation, and personal opinion, I do think there are significant patterns within cultures that can be attributed to — both as a source and symptom — superstitious beliefs.

References
  • 1 “This fourth Smartest State designation is awarded based on 21 factors chosen from Morgan Quitno’s annual reference book, Education State Rankings, 2005-2006. Morgan Quitno Press, 2005
  • 2 Percent of People Below Poverty Level in the Past 12 Months (For Whom Poverty Status is Determined). American Community Survey 2004
  • 3 Health Index by state. “The Healthiest State designation is awarded based on 21 factors chosen from the year 2005 edition of our annual reference book, Health Care State Rankings. Morgan Quitno Press, 2005
  • 4 Number of Deaths Due to Firearms per 100,000 Population, 2002. statehealthfacts.org
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Filed Under: Culture, Religion

Religion Wanes While Superstition Increases

October 31, 2009 By

The University of Chicago just released a new survey on religion. In the survey, they discovered that more Americans are praying and more people believe in an afterlife, but less people have any formal religious affiliation. The study also found that New England and the Pacific North West are the least religious populations.

As I’ve stated before, religion is the survivalism of higher reasoning, which means it’s here to stay. And while I try to live a rational and logical existence, I realize that unless human beings can collectively reject a portion of their own nature, religious belief, in some form, is here to stay. With that being said, I really appreciated what Ray Waddle recently wrote in the Faith and Values section of the Tennessean about this survey and what it means to our culture.

Religion will outlast all theories of secularization. The weather of belief doesn’t go away. But unlike the daily uncontrollable motions of sun and rain, people can choose which kind of religious climate should prevails.

Healthy belief advances the cause of humane society, the spirit of God and scientific inquiry too. Sick religion dreams of authoritarian control and the destruction for everyone who disagrees

That is really the idealistic hope of the secularist – that religions of the world will reflect tenets that are conducive to humanistic philosophy. I realize that appears like an impossible juxtaposition, but what I’m really trying to say is that my hope is that if religion is here to stay – which it is – that the cultural influences on its dogma reflect tolerance and acceptance of other beliefs and lifestyles. That their belief system would include that all human beings have inalienable rights, and that their beliefs, or non-beliefs as some would see it, are respected within the canons and cultures of their religion.

Download the full report here: Religious Change Around the World (PDF)

Filed Under: Culture

Our Reality is Defined by Our Senses

February 15, 2009 By

We see, smell, taste, touch and hear the environment around us, and then our minds (both unconsciously and consciously) create realities based on what our senses tell us.  We generally believe that we are experiencing all there is to perceive, and we make assumptions based upon those perceptions, which ultimately shape our actions, world view and ideologies.

Without our senses, we wouldn’t be able to thrive and understand the world around us. Yet, at the same time, we are severely limited by our senses. This is especially true when we compare ourselves to other animals. Although human beings have a unique trait of higher-reasoning and self-awareness, our reality may actually be a limited, illusory perception.

When individual senses are directly compared to humans and other animals, we look primitive in comparison. In fact, there is an entirely different reality being experienced by amphibians, fish, mammals, birds, insects and reptiles. These enhanced senses undoubtedly shape an entirely unique perception of existence for the life of these animals.

Unique Animal Senses

Sight

  • Some insects like ants can see polarized light, while some fish can see infrared light.
  • Cats have a mirror-like membrane in the backs of their eyes that lets them hunt and move in almost complete darkness.
  • The eyes of insects and birds are attuned to wavelengths of light outside the visible range that humans see in

Smell

  • A Silkworm Moth can detect pheromones up to 11km away
  • Snakes smell with their tongue, which collects scent particles in the air, and then makes contact with the Jacobson’s organ, located on the roof of the mouth.

Taste

  • A pig’s tongue contains 15,000 taste buds compared to the 9,000 taste buds that a human has.

Touch

  • Rats use the long hairs in the same way that blind people use canes. By whisking the hairs across objects they come across, rats and other rodents form mental pictures of their surroundings.
  • Butterflies have hairs on their wings to detect changes in air pressure.

Hearing

  • Dogs can hear sound as high as 40,000 Hz.

Additional Senses

  • Migrating birds use the Earth’s magnetic field to stay their course during long flights. One recent study suggests birds might have a form of synesthesia that lets them “see” the planet’s magnetic lines as patterns of color or light that is overlaid on their visual surroundings.
  • Bats and dolphins use echolocation for movement and locating objects.
  • Sharks have specialized electrosensing receptors with thresholds as low as 0.005 uV/cm. These receptors may be used to locate prey. The dogfish can detect a flounder that is buried under the sand and emitting 4 uAmp of current.

A Different Reality

The limitations of our senses raise unlimited questions about what we perceive as our reality. For example, the following questions immediately come to mind:

  1. What would our relationships be like if we had a heightened sense of pheromones?
  2. What would our environment tell us and how would we interact with it, if we could see polarized and infrared light?
  3. How would we interact with our environment if we could hear sounds from far away and at different spectrums?
  4. What would it be like if we could use echolocation to determine where we go and how we identify objects?
  5. If we could taste like a pig, would we be overly consumed with taste and eating (more so than we are now)?

Our limited perceptions, coupled with our survival instincts, contribute to our inability to fully comprehend our true reality and also fuels our instinctual superstitious behavior. When spiritualists claim that there is much more beyond what we can perceive, they are absolutely correct. Except in our case, it has more to do with our limitation to perceive our environment and our higher-reasoning’s desire to survive and live forever.

So why don’t we have these enhanced senses? The answer is simple. The process of evolution decided we didn’t need them to survive and thrive.

References

Filed Under: Evolution

Warning Label for Bibles

December 13, 2008 By

Warning: This is a work of fiction: Do NOT take it literally.

Content Advisory: Contains verses descriptive or advocating suicide, incest, bestiality, sadomasochism, sexual activity in a violent context, murder, morbid violence, use of drugs or alcohol, homosexuality, voyeurism, revenge, undermining authority figures, lawlessness, and human rights violations and atrocities.

Exposure Warning: Exposure to contents for extended periods of time or during formative years in children may cause delusions, hallucinations, decreased cognitive and objective reasoning abilities, and, in extreme cases, pathological disorders, hatred, bigotry, and violence including, but not limited to fanaticism, murder, and genocide.

Filed Under: Religion Tagged With: ,
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