[ExI] FW: Spike, please post [science scepticism]

Wed Jul 11 12:56:51 UTC 2018

"What makes people distrust science? Surprisingly, not politics" by  Bastiaan
T Rutjens

https://aeon.co/ideas/what-makes-people-distrust-science-surprisingly-not-politics

One of the take-home messages of our research is that it is crucial not to
> lump various forms of science skepticism together.

The idea that "Republicans" and "Right-Leaning" people are more likely to
reject science is explained pretty well right here:

> We identified four major predictors of science acceptance and science
> skepticism: political ideology; religiosity; morality; and knowledge about
> science. These variables tend to intercorrelate – in some cases quite
> strongly – which means that they are potentially confounded.

I'll be showing what I believe to be evidence of this correlation below:

The "Right" in the United States is highly correlated with Christianity in
general, and more "Fundamentalist" types as well.

According to Pew, in 2014, those who were Republican or lean Republican
were: 38% Evangelical, 21% Catholic, 17% Mainline Protestant, 3% Mormon, 2%
Historically Black Protestant. (81% Major Christian)

Compare that with Democrats and those that lean Democrat in the same year:
21% Catholic, 16% Evangelical, 13% Mainline Protestant, 12% Historically
Black Protestant, 1% Mormon. (63% Major Christian)

Those affiliated with Republicans were more heavily dominated by the
Evangelical block, which formed almost 40% of the party. In contrast, those
affiliated with Democrats were much more likely to be part to a number of
different religious backgrounds, keeping the party from playing too heavily
into any one religious group's agenda.

Additionally, those affiliated with Republicans were about 14% religious
"nones", while 28% of those affiliated with Democrats were "nones" So
Republicans have 22% more Evangelicals, and 14% less 'nones'.

http://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/party-affiliation/

Now, there are a number of topics where certain viewpoints are affected by
religious belief, as can be seen in another 2014 Pew Poll.

Evangelicals are much more likely to think that humans are not the product
of evolution and that population growth will not cause a problem. In these
areas, Mainline Protestants and Catholics are also more likely to agree.
Both Evangelicals and Mainline Protestants are more likely to agree there
should be more offshore drilling. Evangelicals are also more likely to
oppose emissions restrictions and childhood vaccination. Mainline
Protestants are more likely to favor expanding fracking. These are of
course in relation to 'nones'.

If Republicans have 22% more Evangelicals, then the Republican party, as a
whole, is much more likely to reject Evolution, and not consider the
potential dangers of population growth.

http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/10/22/science-and-religion/

Another thing that's associated with being an Evangelical, is homeschooling.

 One of the two top reasons for homeschooling is the ability to teach from
> a religious perspective, and about two-thirds of homeschoolers
> self-identify as evangelical Christians.

https://hslda.org/content/docs/news/washingtontimes/200911230.asp

If, in 2012, there were about 1.8M homeschooled students, that would mean
that over 1M of them were self identified evangelicals (by HSLDA's count,
biased as they may be).

https://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/oii/nonpublic/statistics.html

Now of course, this leaves us in a sticky situation, how many parents do
those children really represent? But also, perhaps that is beyond the point.

Homeschoolers tend to exhibit weaker math skills than publically schooled
children.

The HSLDA-sponsored studies also found that homeschoolers do comparatively
> less well in math than in language-based subjects (Ray, 1997a; Rudner,
> 1999). Likewise Belfield (2005), in a well-designed study that controlled
> for family background variables, found that homeschooled seniors taking the
> SAT scored slightly better than predicted on the SAT verbal and slightly
> worse on the SAT math. A similar study of ACT mathematics scores likewise
> found a slight mathematical disadvantage for homeschoolers

https://giftedhomeschoolers.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/10-219-1-PB.pdf

In addition to being weaker at math, they were also less curious about math
as well

Homeschooled children were more intrinsically motivated in reading and less
> intrinsically motivated in math than children attending a conventional
> school using grades to evaluate students’ performance. [...]  It is also
> unclear why homeschooled children’s intrinsic motivation was higher for
> reading but lower for math compared to children who attended a conventional
> school and received grades for their work. Freedom from grades—a salient
> external reward—may allow children to maintain their interest in reading,
> which is often an appealing activity in itself. Math, on the other hand,
> may work differently. For example, there is some evidence that children’s
> intrinsic motivation for school work is related to the amount of
> instruction they receive (Stevenson & Lee, 1990). In this study, the more
> time homeschooling parents spent directly involved in instruction, the
> higher their children’s intrinsic motivation was for both reading and math.
> While intensive instruction in math is standard in conventional schools,
> many homeschooling parents use the Saxon math books as part of a
> self-teaching program involving minimal instruction (Richman, Girten, &
> Snyder, 1992; Sande, 1995). Thus less instructional time may have
> contributed to lower intrinsic motivation for math among homeschooled
> students.

https://www.nheri.org/home-school-researcher-academic-intrinsic-motivation-in-homeschooled-children/

Now, the science is somewhat conflicted on if homeschoolers actually test
worse on science in the K-12 sense, but testing worse in Mathematics puts
someone at a distinct disadvantage for College-level science achievement.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/tea.3660180403

On another front, educational attainment by religious group is interesting.

Measuring educational levels as "High school or less", "some college",
"college" and "post-graduate degree", Catholics make up about 18-24% of
each level, and 'nones' are similar, making up about 21-25% of each level.
Mainline protestents make up 13-19%, trending upwards toward more
education. Historically black protestents trend downwards, making up 8% of
high school graduates (or non-graduates), but only about 3% of
post-graduate degrees. Evangelical Protestants also trend downwards, making
27% of high school graduates, but only 17% of post-graduate degrees.

http://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/educational-distribution/

Those who attend college, even if they do not graduate with a degree, will
have more science eduacation that those who only completed High School (or
did not complete it).

Additionally, biblical literalism is associated with "High School or less"
level of achievement. About 42% of 'high school or less' thinks that the
bible should be taken literally, and 25% think it is not the word of God.
Among those with post-graduate degrees, 14% think it should be taken
literally, and 49% think it is not the word of God.

[same link]
http://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/educational-distribution/

Looking at these statistics we can agree generally with the findings of the
study which were brought up.

Moving beyond domain-specific skepticism, what did we observe about a
> general trust in science, and the willingness to support science more
> broadly? The results were quite clear: trust in science was by far the
> lowest among the religious. In particular, religious orthodoxy was a strong
> negative predictor of faith in science and the orthodox participants were
> also the least positive about investing federal money in science. But
> notice here again political ideology did not contribute any meaningful
> variance over and beyond religiosity.

But exactly what can be done about it?

Additionally, these results suggest that science skepticism cannot simply
> be remedied by increasing people’s knowledge about science. The impact of
> scientific literacy on science skepticism, trust in science, and
> willingness to support science was minor, save for the case of genetic
> modification.

In the writer's opinion, apparently not all that much?

But, to circle back to the point at hand...

>A religious person could trust a scientist to be unbiased;
>yet an engineer, industrial contractor--and so forth--
>applying the results of research would not be perceived
>as being unbiased.

I don't know if that is actually the case. If people primarily reject
science based on measures of religiosity, then I don't think that it is the
application of science which is really the problem.

Let's say, for example, a scientist is unbiased. Then when he says, "this
dinosaur is more than 6000 years old", the person would be forced to agree
with him, because the scientist is unbiased. Why would the scientist lie?
However, among very religious people who hold that the Bible is literally
true, they cannot accept the fact which the scientist says. To accept the
fact would contradict their worldview in a very pointed (and to them,
unacceptable) way. Because of this they will create entire "fake sciences"
to support their belief. It's really a very, very different worldview. I'm
not sure you really appreciate how totally foreign it can be to you.

"Science" must be false because it seeks out "natural" explanations to
things and pre-emptively rules out "supernatural" causes. "Miracles" cannot
exist inside of science. Science attacks many deeply held convictions by
religious people, evangelicals in particular. The earth created before the
sun, woman made from man's rib, immaculate conception, the age of the
Earth, the resurrection, etc. These are just the low hanging fruit.

Science cannot be reconciled with these literalist views, and rejection of
these views (from within the perspective of this mindset) would be eternal
damnation, so they reject the science instead.

>From within the religious perspective, "proof" is altogether different from
the scientific perspective. In the religious perspective, anecdote and
"feelings" or intuition hold a much higher weight than data. Whereas in
science, the reverse is the truth. The "currency" of the one domain is not
easily converted into the other. I have personal experience with this on a
few levels, just due to my upbringing and personal experience. I wish I had
a study or similar thing to share about it, but that has been my
observation.

On Thu, Jun 7, 2018 at 5:32 PM, <spike at rainier66.com> wrote:

>
>
>
>
> OK Alan, here ya go:
>
>
>
>
>
> *From:* Alan Brooks <alaneugenebrooks52 at yahoo.com>
> *Sent:* Thursday, June 7, 2018 3:01 PM
> *To:* spike at rainier66.com
> *Subject:* Spike, please post [science scepticism]
>
>
>
> "...science in general (‘Science is just one of many opinions’)..."
>
>
>
> The religious may not be skeptical of pure science as a whole, yet might
> be skeptical of Newtonian-derived science-- inchoately suspecting Newtonian
> science to be outdated in some way.
>
>
>
> The distinction between pure and applied science is often blurred. Though
> the article mentions that the religious are the group most skeptical of
> science, the religious may not be skeptical of scientific research albeit
> they could very well be of its application. A religious person could trust
> a scientist to be unbiased; yet an engineer, industrial contractor--and so
> forth--applying the results of research would not be perceived as being
> unbiased.
>
> Not that the religious necessarily feel that applying science is hopeless
> in outcomes, however there may be a sense of the dislocation involved
> negating positive gain. Perhaps all positive material gains. Eschatology is
> not concerned with laboratory research-- but rather, of the outcomes of
> human endeavor, which naturally includes scientific application.
> Eschatology itself is not based on hopelessness, it is about spiritual
> redemption in a post-apocalyptic world.
>
>
>
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