Reply #110: Getting back to my original point... [View All]

OK, there are a zillion definitions of spiritual (a problem noted by the survey, actually). There are also differing flavors of atheism; Bishop Shelby Spong's non-theistic version of Christianity has been labeled "atheist" by some when "non-theistic" is more accurate. Non-theistic may or may not be sufficiently free of "religion" to qualify as atheist to some people; usually Secular Humanism passes the "atheist religion" test, but I've know some people are agree with every point of the Humanist manifesto and refuse to accept that any of their belief qualify as a "religion" because they are atheist.

The upshot of this is that "religious" has a zillion definitions, too.

Apparently "Protestant," which denotes a branch of religious Christianity, can also be atheist now because some Unitarians consider themselves protestant. That's OK, because some people identify as Jewish or Catholic or other culturally but don't believe any of the supernatural claims associated with those traditions.

This is not to say that none of this web of confusing and misleading labeling couldn't be sorted out, but this study doesn't do that.

I agree with you on what criteria should be looked at, but I disagree that "religion has strongly influenced their practice of medicine" would not apply to some atheists, as many atheist Unitarians would probably respond yes to this, as would atheist Buddhists and some atheist humanists, and any who consider their well thought out philosophy as a religion.

You're right, of course. The net result of all this ambiguity is that this study tells you only about correlations between how people self-identify and what kind of people they'll serve, and those correlations are pretty weak.

I mean, if you want to take your points to their extreme conclusion, then every respondent in this survey could be an atheist, in which case, it still proves nothing about atheists. This title of the OP was wrong about the conclusions of this study.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.