Liberals and Atheists Smarter?

[ralis]

Just found this and I wonder how it applies to this diverse group.

 

 

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/02/100224132655.htm

 

 

ralis

[RyanO]

Interesting. It mentions sexual exclusivity being preferred by smarter men. That's also interesting.

 

I definitely think there's a correlation between intelligence and these things.

 

Then again, "IQ" isn't everything...

[Apech]

I like this:

 

"Humans are evolutionarily designed to be paranoid, and they believe in God because they are paranoid," says Kanazawa.

.... intelligent people think more about things and tend to break the mold ... isn't that all he's saying?

[altiora]

Interesting. It mentions sexual exclusivity being preferred by smarter men. That's also interesting.

 

I definitely think there's a correlation between intelligence and these things.

 

Then again, "IQ" isn't everything...

 

 

I think the survey just doesn't stand up when one probes.

 

First, to equate liberalism and atheism with "more intelligent" people just seems like a badly disguised value judgment about what "intelligent" people should think. I think every fanatic -- hypnotised by their own perceived brilliance -- considers that anyone who takes the opposite view to them is less intelligent for that reason. While I'm not really in any political camp (I'm a swing voter), I do recognise that many vocal leftist "liberals" seem to think they are the intellectual and moral elite, and that anyone who disagrees with them needs "education" or else is a bigot.

 

Second, I wouldn't have thought it didn't necessarily matter whether you were x-view or y-view. what's more important is whether you have had engaged in a rigorous thought process to reach that view, and how you respond to alternative arguments.

 

For instance, in my experience many atheists can't articulate why they have come to this view, or rebut any conflicting arguments successfully. To me it's not so much whether or not you believe in god, it's more how did you come to this view, i.e., is it due to prolonged thought? or did you just accept the view of your peers or culture?, and do you just cling to your view despite being confronted with contrary evidence or reconsider your view in light of that evidence?

Edited February 26, 2010 by altiora

[Birch]

As long as God is a sociocultural imposition (make way for them, they have comfy chairs;-))in any specific shape or form then I'm an atheist. Otherwise I'm fully devout. All roads lead to Rome, some of them via Sicily.

[innerspace_cadet]

My IQ was tested in college and it was in the 131-141 range. But even though my IQ did not change, I went from being agnostic and atheist to believing in a higher power again. My concept of "God" is very different, however, from the average American's. So being an atheist or a believer in God is not directly proportional to intelligence.

 

The one thing that struck me about this study is that smarter people are nocturnal; and I can relate to this, because I can stay up until 2 or 3 in the morning, but no matter how early I go to bed at night, I'm still mentally foggy in the morning.

[joeblast]

haha so of course the author of the article is using the usurped progressive definition of 'liberal' as opposed to the 'classical liberal' original definition, which is ostensibly conservative in nature.

 

I had to have a good laugh at some of the other articles, such as "Intelligent Children More Likely To Become Vegetarian"...

 

oh wait, its in this article too "So more intelligent children may be more likely to grow up to be liberals." I wonder how reflective that is of the leftist takeover of schooling - seems to be simply a matter of a 'higher degree' of indoctrination. Of course the author wont contrast that with the high percentage of 'liberal' youngens with the correspondingly high percentage of 'conservative' seniors, who have been around the block and have a good idea of what policies are likely to work and which are likely to produce crushing debts, because they've seen it happen.

 

This article is quite frankly, a bunch of unscientific propaganda-quackery.

 

 

excellent post, altiora. although I had my time in life where I put no CPU cycles into the thought of a higher power, logical contemplation puts me squarely in the belief camp - but then again I've had some experiences that reinforced the belief, so no doubts in my book these days.

[3bob]

I like this:

 

"Humans are evolutionarily designed to be paranoid, and they believe in God because they are paranoid," says Kanazawa.

.... intelligent people think more about things and tend to break the mold ... isn't that all he's saying?

 

My take: From day one after birth humans are designed to learn - but convoluted, non-evolutionary programing can take over quite young.

[3bob]

As long as God is a sociocultural imposition (make way for them, they have comfy chairs;-))in any specific shape or form then I'm an atheist. Otherwise I'm fully devout. All roads lead to Rome, some of them via Sicily.