Re: Atheists a small minority

On Apr 7, 3:00 pm, "Kevrob" <kev...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

One thing about the survey that the OP referred to, is that anybody
who knows anything about public opinion research is aware of, is that
there are subjects that those surveyed will fib about.

I'm definitely aware of that. I've actually been involved in survey
research before and I know all about that.

There's still
a stigma to atheism, and many people will not admit to others, even
complete strangers, that they are non-believers.

Lies happen, or what is even more common is that someone with an
unclear opinion about a subject will be forced into a box because of
the way a survey is worded. For instance, there are plenty of people
who don't think about God that much, and are unclear in their own
minds about whether God exists or not, or what it means for God to
exist, or exactly what form God takes, etc. If you have a survey with
a bunch of questions about how right-wing Christian politicians are
doing dastardly things, for instance, you'll get a much higher percent
of "atheists" or "agnostics" than if you led with a bunch of vague
feel-good questions about spirituality. A lot of people are surprised
how the context of a question can affect the answer, even on
supposedly cut-and-dried things like a person's political or religious
opinions.



Michael Harrington, the Democratic Socialist, used to write about
himself as a "cultural catholic." His cultural connections to the
church were important to him, even though he no longer believed any of
its doctrine about god(s.) I'm guessing there's many a non-believer
wjho puts up with the foofaraw of churchgoing because an open
declaration of non-belief would cause family friction (Believe me, it
can!) that they aren't willing to endure. Besides, in many
communities, especially smaller ones, churches are de facto community
centers, and not belonging to one shuts one out of a bunch of
recreational opportunities. Mouthing the words one doesn't believe
may seem like a good bargain to keep peace with the spouse, stay
eligible for the church softball league and have somewhere to
eventually throw family weddings and funerals. (See: "A&P Catholics"
and "Hatched, Matched and Dispatched.")

Right, or as I say some people simply don't know what their opinion is
on the subject. A lot of people simply don't think about religion or
the nature of God very much, and so their answers to certain survey
questions can be variable.

Now all that being said, the survey results on these sorts of
questions seem to be consistent enough that from what I've seen, it's
not unreasonable to say that the percentage of people who actively say
"I don't believe in God or am unconvinced that there is enough
evidence to believe in God one way or the other" is probably very
small in the US. However that's not the same thing as saying that the
rest of the people are all committed believers who attend religious
services regularly.

.

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