Do religious beliefs actually have any significant bearing on moral decision making?

[pathos]

I have been subject to several personal comments which as far as I can tell break the forum rules, as they have made me feel upset and unwelcome. Many of the complaints seem to relate to the fact that this is my first post. I don't think such a hierarchy is fair

No, none of the responses in this thread have broken forum rules as far as I can tell (I am a member of the AF.org staff).

I don't necessarily think that your first post violated any forum rules, however, it was a breach of etiquette. This is a discussion forum, and we are a community of sorts. Requests for participation in a survey are generally welcomed from members of our community, and from those outside the community that respect the community by asking staff if it's OK to post a survey. (I can't recall staff ever refusing a request from a student.)

Posting a student survey on your first post does not give the members of our community the feeling that you want to be part of it, or that you respect it.

As someone who has been bullied several times in my life and been part of a prominent anti-bullying campaign I would suggest you read up on the topic. Symptoms I have noticed in this thread are deconstructive criticsm, unfounded accusations and exclusion. Here are some examples

"How condescending of you and how out of touch from your original question you are. You are engaging people and how they think, stupid child. go back to your original classes and start again."

"No hunny you are a freshman starting his degree in Philosophy. The 1992 makes you roughly 21 years old and you are no more alpha than my left ankle. "

"The shame is on you student... Otherwise your research is flawed and incomplete and you will fail your assignment"

"Are you lazy?"

"No my dear...YOU are being lazy. get online and DO YOUR RESEARCH! IF that includes friends and family then so be it...do you know nothing? "

"Still doesn't detract from the freshman striving to be lazy though" (having just asked not to be referred to as freshman and making it clear I wasn't one. If this isn't a textbook example of bullying I don't know what is.)

It certainly would have been a community I would have been interested in participating in if hadn't been for the level of vitriol I have received. Whilst on the one hand I have had huge pointers given to me by well informed, generous individuals on the other hand I have been abused at every turn.
I attend a prominent University, despite the aspersions that have been cast over my academic ability, and have never encountered the condescending and belittling attitudes as I have in this community of faux-academia.

I would certainly hope that just because the regulators of a community accept comments that can clearly be classified as cyber-bullying and the group is accusing my attitude of lacking (I have asperger's so I apologise if my tone isn't correct) that I wouldn't join in to get an easy jibe.

I can assure you this will be the only thread I ever participate on in this forum. It has ruined my day and made me thoroughly miserable just to read through this thread and to reply to all these comments and reduced me to the point of tears. I have done the exact same with several other forums and got nothing but positive feedback so I can assure you it is the members of this community who take issue.

This sums up this forums backdated attitudes on bullying "Don't get all offended at people for putting you down, or this thread will just become one big whine from you about how mean we are around here... trust me, there's been enough of those."

I will end on this point. As people who clearly pride themselves as not being of a religious bent, what does it say that you unite around a common cause of belittling the person who didn't engage in the 'rite' of introducing himself and asking the correct group leaders for permission?

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student1992,

Why are you starting from scratch, particularly regarding The Trolley Problem? Read this:

http://philosophyfaculty.ucsd.edu/facult...ROLLEY.pdf

Now, if you understand this (or not) go to TPM Online (The Philosophers' Magazine). Towards the top, near the middle you will find links to Interactive Activities. The fourth down is titled "Should You Kill the Fat Man" and has 83,005 responses. Considering the above paper the next one down is titled "Should You Kill the Backpacker?".
http://www.philosophersnet.com/

In addition to scouring the internet for respondents, I would contact TPM to see if they would be willing to share results.

Thanks for the pointers, I will certainly be able to shoe-horn in some of this material.
I already have vast amounts of secondary data, my data collection on here is part of my attempts to fulfill the requirement that there must be some primary online data collection.