Secular Children are more likely to Share

[Sarkus]

Well, Dostoyevsky sure seemed to think atheism and socialism were a package deal:

In the same way, if he had decided that God and immortality did not exist, he would at once have become an atheist and a socialist. For socialism is not merely the labor question, it is before all things the atheistic question, the question of the form taken by atheism to-day, the question of the tower of Babel built without God, not to mount to heaven from earth but to set up heaven on earth. - The Brothers Karamazov​

​

So now you take one person's view as truth, and to support that one view you quote from a novel that he wrote, and from that a passage that doesn't actually support Dostoyevsky's own view? Interesting tactic.
He did write in one of his letters, after all: "even if someone were to prove to me that the truth lay outside Christ, I should choose to remain with Christ rather than with the truth."
Furthermore, Dostoyevsky considered socialism to be "the latest incarnation of the Catholic idea", its "natural ally", and Russian Orthodoxy to be the perfect form of Christianity.
With regard the "package deal" of atheism and socialism, that is only if you effectively remove the possibility of religion, I.e. destroy the "absolute". If you had total atheism then, in his view (and others admittedly) you would tend toward a socialist society. It has very little to do with individual atheists within an existing religious society.
So please don't think I accept your "support" for your assertion from this.

And atheists (which are a subset of the non-religious) overwhelmingly favor democrats (which have a self-avowed socialist as one of its two top presidential candidates):

I'm not sure the table below actually shows what you think it does... The poll is how the party members of each party view the religious/atheist groups, not how those groups view the parties.
I.e. 51% of democrats report a positive opinion of Jews while 70% of Republicans did.
Only 20% of democrats report a positive opinion of atheists! while only 9% of republicans did. So the vast majority of both republicans and democrats have negative views of atheists.

So please try to understand the polls you want to post as "evidence", and be sure that they do say the things you think they do.
Again what you have posted seems thus to be no support for what you have asserted. Care to try again?

That said, I don't dispute that the religious are more likely to vote republican, but on the matter of sharing it seems that in the US republicans are at least more charitable than democrats, preferring it seems to leave it up to the individual to decide to give (and they do) than legislate for it as part of the government ("forced sharing"). Which again seems counter to your assertions.
But, to remind, we're talking about children here. The study is about secular v religious children. And all you have so far offered is a dismissal of religious raised as Catholics from consideration as being "accommodating of secularism". The study has nothing to do with republican or democrat. It is about religion. If you start bringing politics in then you simply muddy the water and try to equivocate one party with the religious and one with the secular, riding roughshod over the fact that atheists and religious vote for both.

So perhaps you can stick to the actual points, and perhaps you can now support your assertion that atheists are likely to be raised under more socialist ideals? Nothing you have offered so far actually seems to support it other than through such attempts to equate political parties to the religious and secular.

 

[Syne]

This is your rabbit hole, MR. You are the one who brought up liberal Christians. And "to the left of the evangelical and fundamentalist churches" is very far from equating liberal churches with the general liberal population. It really doesn't seem like you ever knew what my "original thesis" was. You diverted the topic, and then claimed victory in the diversion. Good for you.

 

[Syne]

So now you take one person's view as truth, and to support that one view you quote from a novel that he wrote, and from that a passage that doesn't actually support Dostoyevsky's own view? Interesting tactic.
He did write in one of his letters, after all: "even if someone were to prove to me that the truth lay outside Christ, I should choose to remain with Christ rather than with the truth."
Furthermore, Dostoyevsky considered socialism to be "the latest incarnation of the Catholic idea", its "natural ally", and Russian Orthodoxy to be the perfect form of Christianity.
With regard the "package deal" of atheism and socialism, that is only if you effectively remove the possibility of religion, I.e. destroy the "absolute". If you had total atheism then, in his view (and others admittedly) you would tend toward a socialist society. It has very little to do with individual atheists within an existing religious society.
So please don't think I accept your "support" for your assertion from this.

Might want to check out more of the context for your quote.

Dostoyevsky distinguished three "enormous world ideas" prevalent in his time: Roman Catholicism, Protestantism and Russian Orthodoxy. He claimed that Catholicism had continued the tradition of Imperial Rome and had thus become anti-Christian and proto-socialist, inasmuch as the Church's interest in political and mundane affairs led it to abandon the idea of Christ. For Dostoyevsky, socialism was "the latest incarnation of the Catholic idea" and its "natural ally".[116] He found Protestantism self-contradictory and claimed that it would ultimately lose power and spirituality. He deemed Russian Orthodoxy to be the ideal form of Christianity.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fyodor_Dostoyevsky#Political​

Self-identified atheists tend to be aligned with the Democratic Party and with political liberalism. About two-thirds of atheists (69%) identify as Democrats (or lean in that direction), and a majority (56%) call themselves political liberals (compared with just one-in-ten who say they are conservatives). Atheists overwhelmingly favor same-sex marriage (92%) and legal abortion (87%). In addition, three-quarters (74%) say that government aid to the poor does more good than harm.

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/11/05/7-facts-about-atheists/
​

Even if you dispute the effective democrat/socialist equivalency nowadays, 74% of atheists favoring government aid to the poor is probably the most relevant bit to this discussion.

If you had total atheism then, in his view (and others admittedly) you would tend toward a socialist society. It has very little to do with individual atheists within an existing religious society.

We are not talking about societal tendencies. We are talking about individual parental influence upon their children.

I'm not sure the table below actually shows what you think it does... The poll is how the party members of each party view the religious/atheist groups, not how those groups view the parties.
I.e. 51% of democrats report a positive opinion of Jews while 70% of Republicans did.
Only 20% of democrats report a positive opinion of atheists! while only 9% of republicans did. So the vast majority of both republicans and democrats have negative views of atheists.

So please try to understand the polls you want to post as "evidence", and be sure that they do say the things you think they do.
Again what you have posted seems thus to be no support for what you have asserted. Care to try again?

Haha. You are completely right on that count. Very sorry I posted that without sufficient scrutiny. I took that from: Why Atheists Align with Democrats

I think the above Pew figures cover what that table was meant to.

That said, I don't dispute that the religious are more likely to vote republican, but on the matter of sharing it seems that in the US republicans are at least more charitable than democrats, preferring it seems to leave it up to the individual to decide to give (and they do) than legislate for it as part of the government ("forced sharing"). Which again seems counter to your assertions.
But, to remind, we're talking about children here. The study is about secular v religious children. And all you have so far offered is a dismissal of religious raised as Catholics from consideration as being "accommodating of secularism". The study has nothing to do with republican or democrat. It is about religion. If you start bringing politics in then you simply muddy the water and try to equivocate one party with the religious and one with the secular, riding roughshod over the fact that atheists and religious vote for both.

So perhaps you can stick to the actual points, and perhaps you can now support your assertion that atheists are likely to be raised under more socialist ideals? Nothing you have offered so far actually seems to support it other than through such attempts to equate political parties to the religious and secular.

I agree. Republicans tend to be more charitable. It is the "forced sharing" that the difference turns on. If raised with socialist ideals, that forced sharing is normalized. It's a fairly straight forward psychological reaction to reject things forced on us, so it isn't surprising that those raised in such expectations would be less charitable as adults. And exactly as you point out, in this study, we are talking about children, as there was no attempt to further compare their upbringing to their adult behavior. Adult expectations are a stronger motivator in children, whose survival depends so completely upon their caregivers. So this explains the religious/non-religious discrepancy in charity between children and adult. Children under a higher expectation to share, do so, but once those children reach adulthood, they tend to reject compulsory charity.

Catholics, while charitable, are the least giving among Christians.

Catholic giving averages out to about 1.5 percent of gross income. Mainline Protestant giving is 2.9 percent. In some of the evangelical and charismatic/pentecostal groups such as the Assemblies of God, average levels range from 4 to 8 percent.

http://www.philanthropyroundtable.o...hilanthropy/giving_in_different_denominations​

This doesn't effect the study, as it doesn't break down the denominations, but says something to the degree to which differing denominations may raise their children. Christianity just isn't known for being monolithic.

 

[Magical Realist]

And "to the left of the evangelical and fundamentalist churches" is very far from equating liberal churches with the general liberal population.

Right..because who would ever think the same word..liberal..would mean the same thing when referring to churches and the population?

It really doesn't seem like you ever knew what my "original thesis" was.

I already quoted it several times:

• The non-religious are more likely to be raised under more socialist ideals

Then I showed how this is not the case in Europe, South America, and China. Is your memory failing?

 

[Syne]

I realize that you will most likely be satisfied by no answer I could possibly give you, MR.

That said, the non-religious being more likely to be socialist is not necessarily equivalent to socialists being more likely to be non-religious. So religious populations in socialist countries are irrelevant to non-religious tendencies toward socialism in general and irrelevant to the study being discussed here specifically.

 

[Magical Realist]

That said, the non-religious being more likely to be socialist is not necessarily equivalent to socialists being more likely to be non-religious.

In both cases a religious population that is also largely socialist pretty much refutes your thesis.

 

[Syne]

In both cases a religious population that is also largely socialist pretty much refutes your thesis.

You mean the thesis you just quoted?

• The non-religious are more likely to be raised under more socialist ideals

I don't see anything in there about "religious populations" at all. You know, you can't really refute something unless you actually get around to addressing it. Seems you're still just confusing the non-religious relationship to socialism with the socialist relationship to religion. Just because the majority of the world is religious, making the majority under just about any governing system trivially religious, has nothing to do with the percentage of non-religious who espouse socialism.

Care to try again?

 

[Magical Realist]

You mean the thesis you just quoted?

• The non-religious are more likely to be raised under more socialist ideals

I don't see anything in there about "religious populations" at all. You know, you can't really refute something unless you actually get around to addressing it. Seems you're still just confusing the non-religious relationship to socialism with the socialist relationship to religion. Just because the majority of the world is religious, making the majority under just about any governing system trivially religious, has nothing to do with the percentage of non-religious who espouse socialism.

Care to try again?

Already refuted it. Consult post #36.

 

[Syne]

"Religion in the European Union is a diverse matter with significant levels of belief in all EU member states. The largest religion in the EU is Christianity, which accounts for 72% of EU population, with its largest denominations being Roman Catholicism, Protestantism (especially in the north), and Eastern Orthodoxy."===https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_the_European_Union

"South America has one of the largest concentration of States in the world that would call themselves socialists. Although there are other countries with left-wing governments, this political doctrine seems to have settled more strongly in this continent. With approximately as many nations that have welcomed right wing or Christian-Democratic heads of State, as those which stand-out with a radical left-wing government, overall, South America stands as a spot with a large amount of supporters of the validity of socialism."===http://soundsandcolours.com/articles/ecuador/socialism-is-alive-and-kicking-in-south-america-3155/

"According to the most recent demographic analyses, an average 30—80% of the population in China, that is hundreds of millions of people, practice some kinds of Chinese folk religions and Taoism, 10—16% are Buddhists, 2—4% are Christians, and 1—2% are Muslims."==https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_China

72% are also Christian. That contradicts your claim that more non-religious are raised socialists.

None of this tells us anything about the non-religious and socialism. This is all about the religious. Can you even comprehend the difference there? It's blatantly obvious.

Do you really think that 72% of a country being Christian means that only 28% of the non-religious can be socialist? If so, your arithmetic skills are sorely lacking. Even if only 28% of a country is non-religious, 100% of those non-religious could still be socialist (you can even be a socialist in the US, just ask Bernie Sanders), while 99% of the Christians may espouse socialist ideals, making the non-religious more socialist.

But remember, what we are talking about here is parental influence on their children. So practicing Christians obviously influence their children with Christian ideals and teachings. What do you suppose the non-religious parents have to influence their children in lieu of religion? Could it be the surrounding secular culture? If so, then it is trivial that, if one family espouses the surrounding culture's socialist ideals and one espouses those socialist ideals plus religious ideals, the religious family will have a less socialist influence.

 

[Magical Realist]

LOL! Keep twisting yourself into a pretzel over this. I'm enjoying your frantic desperation.

 

[Syne]

So you can't follow that simple reasoning. Good to know.

 

[Magical Realist]

So you can't follow that simple reasoning. Good to know.

And you can't actually see how saying the non-religious tend to be raised with socialistic values entails saying that the religious tend to be raised with non-socialistic values? Are you that dense? I mean that WAS your point in listing the numbers of republican vs democrat members of various religions wasn't it? To show how religion tends to support rightwing values over socialistic values, at least in the United States that is. My suspicion is that the religion of a country tends to support whatever the predominant economic system of that country is, whether it be corporate capitalism or socialist statism.

 

[river]

And you can't actually see how saying the non-religious tend to be raised with socialistic values entails saying that the religious tend to be raised with non-socialistic values? Are you that dense?

Referring to post #49

No wonder this planet is in trouble; people have been dumbed down to the core of less than primitive reasoning and logic. MR.

We as Humans are in very serious trouble; as far as our survival . with this kind of thinking.

 

[Syne]

And you can't actually see how saying the non-religious tend to be raised with socialistic values entails saying that the religious tend to be raised with non-socialistic values? Are you that dense? I mean that WAS your point in listing the numbers of republican vs democrat members of various religions wasn't it? To show how religion tends to support rightwing values over socialistic values, at least in the United States that is.

No, there is no causality between one and the other. It is not like socialism is a finite commodity that has a remainder that must be absorb elsewhere. Come on, man, this is simple logic. And you can take up the religious affiliation by political party up with Pew: http://www.pewforum.org/2012/02/02/trends-in-party-identification-of-religious-groups-affiliation/

But why don't you ever answer any of the questions asked you? Here, I'll repeat a few:

What do you suppose the non-religious parents have to influence their children in lieu of religion?
Could it be the surrounding secular culture?​

 

[Magical Realist]

No, there is no causality between one and the other.

Wow..you really ARE that dense then..lol! It's not "causality". It's logic. Saying nonreligious tend towards socialistic values ENTAILS saying the religious tend towards non-socialistic values. It's two ways of saying the same thing. It's your whole thesis. Go back and review what you said if you are confused.

 

[river]

Wow..you really ARE that dense then..lol! It's not "causality". It's logic. Saying nonreligious tend towards socialistic values ENTAILS saying the religious tend towards non-socialistic values. It's two ways of saying the same thing. It's your whole thesis. Go back and review what you said if you are confused.

MR. Is syne referring to the Russia of old ?

So far I think so.

 

[Magical Realist]

MR. Is syne referring to the Russia of old ?

So far I think so.

I don't know. He seems to think religion, neither empirically nor in principle, supports socialistic values of communal sharing. He's wrong on both counts, as demonstrated by the history of christian communism AND the existence of socialist countries where the majority of people are religious. That's all I pointed out. Now he's undoing his whole initial argument just to save his ass from admitting he's wrong. It's like arguing with a man in a sinking boat. It's a waste of time.

 

[pjdude1219]

The report I linked to noted the disparity in numbers between two religious groups in the study. I'm not certain how Muslims view others with charity, but the lopsided numbers just might have skewed the study, I would think. Also, an adult Christian owes much of their charitable behavior to values they learned as children.

actualy if anything a hieghtened amount of muslims in the study would skew it to show more in favor of religious people has charity is one the pillars of islam. your complaint is crap. but than again its from breitbart.

 

[Bowser]

actualy if anything a hieghtened amount of muslims in the study would skew it to show more in favor of religious people has charity is one the pillars of islam. your complaint is crap. but than again its from breitbart.

Again, I'm not certain how Muslims practice charity. But I do think it has the potential to skew the numbers. I do believe religion, in general, offers more charitable effort than does the secular folks.
https://philanthropy.com/article/Religious-Americans-Give-More/153973

 

[sideshowbob]

I do believe religion, in general, offers more charitable effort than does the secular folks.

How do you define "charity". Isn't giving to the church more-or-less the same as giving to yourself? How much of the money donated to churches actually goes to real charity?