Re: [asa] Most scientists believe in God?

I get asked the NAS question all the time. (Today, even.) I have a few
possibilities, and sorry if this is a repeat.

Possible reasons include:

1) Maye extremely smart people really are less likely to be believers. Maybe
there is even some biblical support for that: the foolish shaming the wise,
Jesus coming for the unrighteous not the (self) righteous,etc.

2) Christian schools and colleges (with some laudable exceptions, of course)
have an abysmal record when it comes to teaching science. When I was a youth
group leader counseling kids going to Christian colleges, I was appalled by
the course offerings I read in the Christian college catalogs they
collected. The effect of this would be similar to the discouraging messages
sent to girls--it would reduce the supply. And the Christian best and
brightest would go elsewhere. (As if we need a gazillion pastors.)

3) Related to 2, is the congenital distrust of science among many
Christians. This too would send messages: don't go into science.

4) Maybe really smart scientists are are also exceptionally self-confident
(big egos? now there is a bold prediction) and are immune to familial, peer,
and cultural pressure to self-identify as a believer. That is, they are more
honest about coming out as a non-believer. Maybe their percentages are
actually more accurate than the inflated percentages of self-identified
believers found when surveying the general public.

Again, sorry for jumping in late.

David P. Heddle
Associate Professor of Physics
Christipher Newport University &
The Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility

On Wed, Feb 4, 2009 at 11:45 PM, Nucacids <nucacids@wowway.com> wrote:

> Hi Allan,
>
> I think your alternative explanation has significant substance to it. Back
> in 2007, I arrived at a very similar hypothesis. Here is a modestly edited
> version of what I posted:
>
>
> Sam Harris notes that 93% of the members of the National Academy of
> Sciences do not believe in a personal God and then claims that "this
> suggests that there are few modes of thinking less congenial to religious
> faith than science is." I have already shown that Harris is circumventing
> rules of critical thinking and raises an argument that is essentially the
> same as saying "there are few modes of thinking less congenial to women than
> science."**
>
> What intrigues me most about this claim is that Harris abandons "scientific
> thinking" in order to cite it as a means to promote his social agenda. For
> example, a scholarly approach to the NAS statistic would entail curiosity
> and a desire to study this piece of sociological data. Instead, Harris has
> simply adopted the statistic and turned it into a *talking point *for his
> cause (it is also worth mentioning that both Dennett and Dawkins do the
> same).
>
> So we are left with a question. Why is that that only 7% of NAS members
> have a belief in a personal God? It is my contention that sociological
> phenomena are usually explained by multiple causes. So what causes might be
> in play?
>
> It is not surprising that Harris arrived at his conclusion. He has an
> agenda and a single-variable focus that just happens to fit the agenda. But
> if we truly wanted to answer this question in a fashion that moves beyond
> the realm of speculation and armchair philosophy, we would need to acquire
> much more data to provide a richer context. So here are some of the data I
> would like to see.
>
> *A1*. Do the NAS members hold any other beliefs/positions that are out of
> sync with the scientific community and general public? For example, what are
> their political affiliations? What type of political philosophy do they
> hold? What are their positions on controversial ethical problems? What are
> their views about global issues and parenting issues?
>
> *A2*. While the first point gives us more context for viewing the NAS
> members, we also need more context about our larger sociological setting.
> For example, it would help if we took the same God belief question and
> surveyed a) physicians; b) nurses; c) teachers; d) theater/music professors;
> e) Hollywood actors/actresses; f) dictators (etc., just citing things off
> the top of my head).
>
> *A3*. In addition to gathering more context, a closer look at the NAS
> members would be helpful:
>
> *a*. What is the psychological profile of a typical NAS member compared to
> non-NAS scientists and the general public?
>
> *b*. What is the socio-economic background of the typical NAS member
> compared to non-NAS scientists and the general public? Also, how many NAS
> members are married? How many times have they been married? How many
> children do they have?
>
> *c*. How much time and energy does a typical NAS scientist devote to
> his/her research compared to typical non-NAS scientists?
>
> *d*. Perhaps most importantly, when did the NAS members arrive at their
> godless state? Were they atheists before becoming a scientist? Before
> becoming a NAS member? After becoming a NAS member? Can the NAS members
> explain WHY they don't have God belief and if so, what is their reasoning?
> How many view religion as Richard Dawkins views religion?
>
> *A4*. Finally, a closer analysis of the way NAS members are chosen, along
> with the type of social interactions they enjoy, is needed.
>
> *HYPOTHESES*
>
> If we could generate these data, we would be in a much better position to
> evaluate different hypotheses and assign the proper weighting to each. Here
> are a couple possible hypotheses.
>
> *B1*. We can start with Harris' hypothesis "scientific thinking erodes and
> eliminates belief in a personal God." There could be some truth in this, as
> a mindset that demands reproducible, empirical data to justify a belief (and
> has been vastly rewarded in doing so) is likely to become impatient with God
> belief and disrespectful to faith. This is where data from A1 and A3d would
> come in handy. If a demand for empirical evidence is crucial, is this demand
> applied evenly across the board? Ironically, if Harris is correct on this
> point, then elite scientists embrace the god-of-the-gaps approach, where God
> belief is rejected because scientists have failed to establish a genuine gap
> in our ability to understand and explain. This in turn would indicate that
> their theological understanding and logic lags far behind their scientific
> expertise.
>
> A major sticking point in Harris' hypothesis is the great difference
> between scientists and NAS members on this single metric. Why are NAS
> members so much more atheistic? Can it really be about science? Apart
> from the NAS membership, is there any independent evidence to think NAS
> members better *understand scientific thinking* than non-NAS members? Does
> it really take an elite scientific mind to understand the basics of the
> scientific method? What element of scientific thinking does the NAS member
> have that leads specifically to godlessness? It can't simply be the demand
> for evidence or testable hypotheses, as these are commonly known and
> understood by all scientists.
>
> *B2*. A second possible cause can be gleaned by considering the ways in
> which Mesk accounts for the fact that women are significantly
> underrepresented in the NAS. Mesk recognizes that multiple causes may be in
> play and raises one possibility:
>
> "As for the under-representation of women in the NAS: as someone who works
> with a large number of female scientists (my lab contains 18 females to two
> males), I can testify to the difficulties for women in moving up into the
> higher echelons of the scientific community. However, there's more to it
> than simple discrimination. Scientists operating at the level required for
> admission into the NAS don't just work hard: they have to live, eat, sleep
> and breathe science. That's an exceptionally hard road for a female
> scientist who is often also shouldering the bulk of the burden of caring for
> a family. Women can make superb scientists, but for social and biological
> reasons it's very hard for a mother of three to match the scientific output
> of a father of three."
>
>
> He also adds:
>
> "Getting a world-class track record is intensely time-consuming: grants
> take months of sleepless nights to put together (and still have only a ~10%
> chance of actual funding success!), papers take weeks, and academic
> positions involve a fearsome level of paperwork. In the meantime, you have a
> lab to manage, collaborations to negotiate, and endless ethics applications
> to fill out. The true stars of science (and I know a few personally) seem to
> survive on coffee and cortisol: sleep, sex and social contact are minimal."
>
> The same type of dynamic may also be in play when it comes to the
> God-believing scientists. It is reasonable to assume that many God-believers
> commit a very significant portion of their time and life to their religious
> community. Since the religious community highly values family and children,
> there is also the distinct possibility that the God-believers are more
> likely to have families and more likely to spend more time and energy with
> their children. In other words, it's not the "mode of thinking" as much as
> it is the priorities one has in life. A scientist who makes more time for
> family, children, and other members of his/her church will not typically
> have the time and energy to become a "true star of science." Data from A2,
> A3a-c would help resolve these issues.
>
>
>
> **The original post I was referring to:
>
>
>
> In his column, the spiritual atheist Sam Harris sets out to debunk a "myth"
> that has been propagated by the NCSE: "Atheism has no connection to
> science."
>
>
>
> Harris argues:
>
> "Although it is possible to be a scientist and still believe in God "" as
> some scientists seem to manage it "" there is no question that an engagement
> with scientific thinking tends to erode, rather than support, religious
> faith. Taking the U.S. population as an example: Most polls show that about
> 90% of the general public believes in a personal God; yet 93% of the members
> of the National Academy of Sciences do not. This suggests that there are few
> modes of thinking less congenial to religious faith than science is."
>
> Let's just point out that not only does Harris ignore the critical thinking
> skill of considering multiple causes, he also makes the classic mistake of
> confusing a correlation with a cause. That is, he takes a sociological fact
> (a correlation) and attempts to explain it in a simple, one-dimensional
> manner - "there are few modes of thinking less congenial to religious faith
> than science is."
>
> But why has Harris chosen this variable alone? After all, one-dimensional
> explanations can be used to account for other facts about the NAS. For
> example, what is the % breakdown of males and females who are members of the
> NAS? I couldn't find a list of the NAS members (and I admit not looking very
> hard), so I decided to search the member directory of the NAS with the five
> most common male and females names . It turned out that 353 members have the
> five most common male names. Yet only 33 members have the five most common
> female names. It is thus probably safe to guess that something like 90+% of
> NAS members are male.
>
> So let's now apply Harris' logic. Would we thus suggest that "there are few
> modes of thinking less congenial to women than science is?"
>
> - Mike Gene
>
>
> I suggested some alternative explanations here:
> http://www.asa3.org/archive/asa/199808/0018.html
> from which I quote:
> "I suspect more of this difference is due to a lower likelihood of
> Christians in science achieving "leading" status. Things today are not like
> they were early in the century when talent and a little hard work could
> bring a scientist to "leading" status. Now, it tends to take talent, a *lot*
> of hard work, and often a good amount of self-promotion. Because Christians
> will (we hope) have other priorities besides worldly success, they will be
> less likely to exhibit the sort of single-minded, non-humble, workaholic
> pursuit that tends to be required (there are, of course, exceptions) to make
> a scientist "leading". My semi-informed guess is that this sort of
> self-selection is the biggest reason for the disparity in the numbers."
>
> Dr. Allan H. Harvey (ASA Member)
> (usual disclaimers here)
>
> ------------------------------
> Carnations mean admiration, Tulips mean love - what do Roses mean? *Find
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Received on Thu Feb 5 17:50:21 2009