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Discussion and Debate
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Physical & Life Sciences
Intelligence, Atheism & Relgiosity.
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<blockquote data-quote="Quid est Veritas?" data-source="post: 73694990" data-attributes="member: 385144"><p>[USER=391745]@Zoii[/USER]</p><p></p><p>You seem to have completely missed my point. I don't doubt the internal statistics, but I am doubting its external validity. This is a known problem thereof, why Disraeli (maybe?) called statistics one of the three forms of lying.</p><p></p><p>Let me explain: Say we did a study correlating lack of melanin to IQ and income by country. What do you think it would find, seeing that we have wealthy, high IQ and mostly white Western countries? It would find a correlation therefore between darker skin and lower IQ. Correlation is not causation however, so this does not mean they have lower IQs because their skin is darker. If you think that, you might as well shave your head and get a Swastika tattoo. You'll find such statistics floating around the internet. Historical forces such as the rise of Scientific method in Europe, conprehensive education, colonialism, etc. better describe causation here.</p><p></p><p>Now back to this study. We have a correlation, but again their data is coloured by specific historic and cultural trends. They recognise as much, when they try and explain continued US religiosity from 19th century Irish and later Latin American immigration (being from poorer countries). It does not mean that being religious results in lower IQ, nor that higher IQ results in Atheism - that causitive mechanism has not been established, and frankly societal trends describe it better than IQ or income ever could. If we did this study 80 years ago, I think we would find very different results - what with more religious attendance in Europe, and openly Atheist regimes in the Soviet Union. The external validity of the study is doubtful, thus its use in a discussion moot.</p><p></p><p>Even then though, they arbitrarily asign a modification factor for Muslim majority countries, and exclude them from certain examined factors like income - citing cultural discrimination and the like. They also determine confidence interval by taking internal data to create artificial datasets and then applies this to validate the internal conclusions. I don't know, but I am used to Forrest Plots and EBM and such things would never pass muster in medical trials. The raw data itself weights the conclusion, with the great growth of Atheist self-identification in the developed world, but that doesn't mean it veridical. I am not surprised they have solid conclusions with such chicanery. This looks like a conclusion with a study written around it to me, and its magical Fisherian 5% statistical significance to ensure publication merely strengthens my feeling.</p><p></p><p>So I see much cause to doubt here, and though I take their results at face value, I see no reason to think anything other than socio-historical artifact. I am not going to waste more time on this though. Nothing in the article really means anything concrete in the real world.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Quid est Veritas?, post: 73694990, member: 385144"] [USER=391745]@Zoii[/USER] You seem to have completely missed my point. I don't doubt the internal statistics, but I am doubting its external validity. This is a known problem thereof, why Disraeli (maybe?) called statistics one of the three forms of lying. Let me explain: Say we did a study correlating lack of melanin to IQ and income by country. What do you think it would find, seeing that we have wealthy, high IQ and mostly white Western countries? It would find a correlation therefore between darker skin and lower IQ. Correlation is not causation however, so this does not mean they have lower IQs because their skin is darker. If you think that, you might as well shave your head and get a Swastika tattoo. You'll find such statistics floating around the internet. Historical forces such as the rise of Scientific method in Europe, conprehensive education, colonialism, etc. better describe causation here. Now back to this study. We have a correlation, but again their data is coloured by specific historic and cultural trends. They recognise as much, when they try and explain continued US religiosity from 19th century Irish and later Latin American immigration (being from poorer countries). It does not mean that being religious results in lower IQ, nor that higher IQ results in Atheism - that causitive mechanism has not been established, and frankly societal trends describe it better than IQ or income ever could. If we did this study 80 years ago, I think we would find very different results - what with more religious attendance in Europe, and openly Atheist regimes in the Soviet Union. The external validity of the study is doubtful, thus its use in a discussion moot. Even then though, they arbitrarily asign a modification factor for Muslim majority countries, and exclude them from certain examined factors like income - citing cultural discrimination and the like. They also determine confidence interval by taking internal data to create artificial datasets and then applies this to validate the internal conclusions. I don't know, but I am used to Forrest Plots and EBM and such things would never pass muster in medical trials. The raw data itself weights the conclusion, with the great growth of Atheist self-identification in the developed world, but that doesn't mean it veridical. I am not surprised they have solid conclusions with such chicanery. This looks like a conclusion with a study written around it to me, and its magical Fisherian 5% statistical significance to ensure publication merely strengthens my feeling. So I see much cause to doubt here, and though I take their results at face value, I see no reason to think anything other than socio-historical artifact. I am not going to waste more time on this though. Nothing in the article really means anything concrete in the real world. [/QUOTE]
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