Where are the Morals?

[Esquilax]

I made my calculations based on the total atheist population of the world. That was not my fault as there was no mention whether 1%, 0.7%, or 0.2% was taken from total atheist population of the world or from one country or from a specific jail.

... Except that it was clearly mentioned. Repeatedly.

Do you think I do not know who wrote that article? Writer have put the facts first then gave his justification.

This has nothing to do with anything I said.

The parts of the articles which attracts my attention are:

“As one proof that atheists aren’t without morals, in comparison to the general population, atheists, have been using one evidence, which is that only 0,2% of the prison population is made of atheists. The statistical data that they have been using was taken from a 15 YEAR OLD AND NOT VERY ACCURATE REPORT of the religious affiliation of inmates given to Denise Golumbaski, who used to be a research analyst at the Federal Bureau of Prisons, but TILL NOW THERE HAS BEEN NO OFFICIAL DATA OR CONTACT TO TRACE AND AUTHENTICATE THE REPORT.”

I am now completely convinced that you haven't read the article at all, beyond specifically searching for individual words or phrases that seem to express disagreement, devoid of context.

Do you know why? Well, it's because- if you'd actually bothered to read the article that you yourself posted- that paragraph, which is the first one in the piece, by the way, refers to an older set of data and not the one actually being discussed. In fact, if you'd gone on to, you know, read the very next paragraph, you would have seen that the writer goes on to discuss the new set of data that we were actually talking about, which comes from last year.

Congratulations: your cherry picking displayed just how little you actually care about the facts. You were talking about an old set of data and not what we were discussing, you moron. Read it again, in full, before you open your mouth.

In fact, just in case anybody wants to do that and see just how bad Harris has fucked up here, here is a repeat of the link we're talking about.

“For starters the numbers reported are only of the federal prisoners, about 218,000 people, not of all prisons in America, and they only cover a self-reported religious affiliation or lack thereof by the inmates themselves. Keeping all this in mind, the data showed that 0.07% of the inmates were atheists, 28.7% Protestants, 24% Catholics, 5.5% Muslims, and 3.1% American Indians. In addition 3% of the inmates listed “other” as religious affiliation, and 3.44% were “unknown”. We cannot assume that those who listed “other” or “unknown” have no religious affiliation; they might have religious affiliation and didn’t want to declare it, or they might not. Lastly 17% of the inmates reported no religious preference. We cannot make assumptions as to what this means either, they may be either religious but with no particular church affiliation, may be spiritual, non-spiritual, and they may even be “nones” (atheists/non-religious) as defined by some sociologists.

Did you actually think about this part before you posted it? What it's saying is that some of the "nones" or unknowns or what have you may, in fact, be religious. Which means that potentially the number of atheists in prison might be smaller and the religious larger. If this is a point of dispute in the data, it still only benefits the atheist point, not the religious one.

BUT THESE NUMBERS CANNOT MEAN ANYTHING WITHOUT COMPARING THEM TO THE GENERAL POPULATION. According to Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life’s 2008 U.S. Religious Landscape Survey, atheists make up 1.6% of the population, and according to the 2008 American Religious Identification Survey, 0.7% of the population described themselves as atheists.

Um, you highlight this part but it literally goes on to actually make the comparison you're trying to highlight as nonexistent, and shows that the atheist point is right; atheists are not represented in the prison population relative to their population in general. In fact, if we take the first number of general population atheists, the prison population is lower than it should be by about fifty percent. You're wrong again, genius.

REGARDLESS OF THE SMALL NUMBER, BASED ON ONE OR THE OTHER RELIGIOUS IDENTIFICATION SURVEY, ATHEISTS AREN’T PROPORTIONALLY REPRESENTED IN PRISON, AS A MATTER OF FACT THEY ARE BY FAR MISREPRESENTED, WITH A VERY SMALL NUMBER OF INMATES PER OVERALL ATHEIST POPULATION. BY USING THESE REPORTS IN COMPARISON WITH EACH OTHER, WE HAVE TO BE CAREFUL NOT TO CONFUSE THE INMATES WHO DID NOT DECLARE A RELIGIOUS AFFILIATION, BY SAYING NO PREFERENCE (17%), OTHER (3%), OR UNKNOWN (3.4), WITH THE GROUP IDENTIFIED BY SOCIOLOGISTS AS “NONES” (COMPRISED OF SELF-DECLARED NON-THEISTS, AND NON-RELIGIOUS) WHO MADE UP 15% OF THE POPULATION IN THE 2008 SURVEY.”

And though you highlighted this part, I have to think that you only did it, as you did the first time, because it contains the word "misrepresentation," without taking into account the context. But I trust that the rest of you can read this part: it says that atheists are not proportionally represented in prisons, that there are lower numbers of atheists in prison than there should be, according to their numbers in the general population. That was the point that we said the data was making from the beginning.

Harris, you just highlighted the conclusion of the article, which agrees with my position, while claiming that it agrees with yours.

Just admit it: you didn't read the whole thing, did you? You just scanned for individual words that you thought might agree with you, right? You didn't even read the complete sentences seemingly, because everything you highlighted that you say says one thing, says literally the opposite.

Whatever written under the heading “GIVING MEANING TO THE DATA” is only a justification.

But you initially posted this article while claiming that it shows the data we gave you is wrong. The article, all throughout, says that the data we gave you does say what we said it did. You were wrong, and now you're continuing to be wrong.

Do you Believe in the existence of God? Your phrase “OH MY GOD” is the evidence that knowledge of God is embeded in the instincts of human beings. No matter how one try to hide that fact but the word God is at the core of human nature. Listen to this small segment from the speech of Abdul Raheem Green which he had given in India.

I said it because it conveys an expletive in Western english. Don't think you get to tell me what I believe, you fatuous imbecile.

I think you should read that article once again with care.

I think you should read it at all.

I'd remind you that the last sentence in the article, the conclusion, says that "people’s assumption that atheists lack morals, are mostly unsubstantiated. "

Does that sound like the conclusion of an article that disagrees with literally that sentiment, when we gave it to you earlier in the thread?

Whatever is written under the heading “Giving Meaning To The Data” is only a justification.

How would you know? You haven't read the article.

Sure! Things are getting better by applications of secular laws.

http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/bulletin_of...gster.html

Um... you linked me to a four year old abstract to a medical article about incest, which has nothing to do with secular laws, and whose conclusions don't even mention secular laws or behavior as a cause for that, so... irrelevant.

I can see how effective Australian secular laws are.
http://www.nationmaster.com/country-info...ates/Crime
http://extranosalley.com/?p=37279

Actually, you can if you read your own damn links: the first one was a side by side comparison of various things between Australia and the US. I suspect you stopped at the very first comparison, because it said Australia had 67% more of it than the US and that number fits into your predrawn conclusions if you don't think about it at all, but that comparison was over the age of criminal responsibility, not anything to do with actual crime rates. What it means is that Australia holds youths responsible for their crimes at a higher rate than the US. If we go to the "crime level" comparison, what do we see? Oh, we see that the US has "21% more" than Australia. Drug use? "29% more" than Australia. Violent crime? "6 times more" than Australia. Violent crime, specifically murder? "57 times more" than Australia. In fact, if you go down the list- and I recommend you do so!- you'll see that every single crime type is statistically higher in the US than in Australia. In your own link that you decided says the opposite.

As for your second link, it's some guy's blog. Not just any guy; some random gun advocate trying to spin Australia's lack of guns as being bad for law. It's biased.

Before saying “wrong again” you compare these statistics with the statistics of other countries.

Why? You were making an argument about the rise in crime correlating with increasingly secular laws in a specifically secular country. Your claim was wrong, but more importantly it wasn't about comparing countries. Stop all these distraction tactics, or maybe actually remember what your own damn arguments are next time.

Then why do modern monkeys are far behind of humans? Seemingly, human developed out from monkeys! Modern monkeys should logically be like those as shown in the movie planets of the Apes or by definition of evolution they should not exists anymore because they all transformed into human.

Humans didn't come from monkeys, humans and apes have a common ancestor. They evolved along separate pathways, and there's no one-way climb to intelligence. If you think that's what evolution describes you are sorely misinformed, but that's hardly shocking anymore.

According to Wikipedia, Plato was born about 2437 years ago. Can you prove Plato even existed?

More distraction tactics.

Guys, I think it's pretty clear by now: Harris has no idea what he's talking about, and he doesn't have any interest in honest discussion. He's not even reading his own links, he's just including them on the basis of individual words rather than content. He's a liar, a conman, and aside from the amusement one gets from shooting fish in a barrel, I doubt he's worth seriously engaging. I think I've pretty conclusively proved he's not paying attention even to the things coming out of his own mouth, in his mad rush to disagree with the atheists.