<div dir="ltr"><div>"What makes people distrust science? Surprisingly, not politics" by <span style="color:rgb(68,68,68);font-family:"Atlas Grotesk","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:16px;background-color:rgb(255,255,255);text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-color:initial;float:none;display:inline">Bastiaan T Rutjens</span> </div><div><br></div><div><a href="https://aeon.co/ideas/what-makes-people-distrust-science-surprisingly-not-politics">https://aeon.co/ideas/what-makes-people-distrust-science-surprisingly-not-politics</a> </div><div><br></div><div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:"Academica Book Pro",Times,Georgia,serif;font-size:22px;background-color:rgb(255,255,255);text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-color:initial;float:none;display:inline">One of the take-home messages of our research is that it is crucial not to lump various forms of science skepticism together.</span>
</blockquote><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>The idea that "Republicans" and "Right-Leaning" people are more likely to reject science is explained pretty well right here:</div><div> </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:"Academica Book Pro",Times,Georgia,serif;font-size:22px;background-color:rgb(255,255,255);text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-color:initial;float:none;display:inline">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.</span>
</blockquote><br class="gmail-Apple-interchange-newline">
</div><div>I'll be showing what I believe to be evidence of this correlation below:</div><div><br></div><div>The "Right" in the United States is highly correlated with Christianity in general, and more "Fundamentalist" types as well. </div><div><br></div><div>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)</div><div><br></div><div>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)</div><div><br></div><div>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. </div><div><br></div><div>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'.</div><div><br></div><div><a href="http://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/party-affiliation/">http://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/party-affiliation/</a><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>Now, there are a number of topics where certain viewpoints are affected by religious belief, as can be seen in another 2014 Pew Poll. </div><div><br></div><div>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'. </div><div><br></div><div>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.</div><div><br></div><div><a href="http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/10/22/science-and-religion/">http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/10/22/science-and-religion/</a><br></div><div><br></div><div>Another thing that's associated with being an Evangelical, is homeschooling.</div><div><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:"Trebuchet MS","Lucida Grande",Verdana,Lucida,Geneva,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:small;background-color:rgb(255,255,255);text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-color:initial;float:none;display:inline"><span> </span>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.</span>
</blockquote><div><br></div><div><a href="https://hslda.org/content/docs/news/washingtontimes/200911230.asp">https://hslda.org/content/docs/news/washingtontimes/200911230.asp</a><br></div><div><br></div><div>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).</div><div><br></div><div><a href="https://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/oii/nonpublic/statistics.html">https://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/oii/nonpublic/statistics.html</a><br></div><div><br></div><div>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.</div><div><br></div><div>Homeschoolers tend to exhibit weaker math skills than publically schooled children. </div><div><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
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</blockquote><div><br></div><div><a href="https://giftedhomeschoolers.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/10-219-1-PB.pdf">https://giftedhomeschoolers.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/10-219-1-PB.pdf</a> </div><div><br></div><div>In addition to being weaker at math, they were also less curious about math as well</div><div><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><span style="color:rgba(0,0,0,0.8);font-family:"Noto Serif",Georgia,serif;font-size:14.4px;background-color:rgb(255,255,255);text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-color:initial;float:none;display:inline">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. [...] </span><span style="font-family:"Noto Serif",Georgia,serif;font-size:14.4px;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-color:initial;float:none;display:inline"><span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255)"><font color="#000000">
<span style="font-family:"Open Sans",HelveticaNeue,"Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:15px;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-color:initial;float:none;display:inline">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.</span></font></span>
</span></blockquote><div><br></div><div><a href="https://www.nheri.org/home-school-researcher-academic-intrinsic-motivation-in-homeschooled-children/">https://www.nheri.org/home-school-researcher-academic-intrinsic-motivation-in-homeschooled-children/</a><br></div><div><br></div><div>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.</div><div><br></div><div><a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/tea.3660180403">https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/tea.3660180403</a><br></div><div><br></div><div>On another front, educational attainment by religious group is interesting.</div><div><br></div><div>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. </div><div><br></div><div><a href="http://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/educational-distribution/">http://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/educational-distribution/</a><br></div><div><br></div><div>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). </div><div><br></div><div>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.</div><div><br></div><div>[same link] <a href="http://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/educational-distribution/">http://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/educational-distribution/</a></div><div><br></div><div>Looking at these statistics we can agree generally with the findings of the study which were brought up.</div><div><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:"Academica Book Pro",Times,Georgia,serif;font-size:22px;background-color:rgb(255,255,255);text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-color:initial;float:none;display:inline">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.</span></blockquote><div><br></div><div>But exactly what can be done about it?</div><div><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:"Academica Book Pro",Times,Georgia,serif;font-size:22px;background-color:rgb(255,255,255);text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-color:initial;float:none;display:inline">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.</span> </blockquote><div><br></div><div>In the writer's opinion, apparently not all that much?</div><div><br></div><div>But, to circle back to the point at hand...</div><div><br></div><div>
<span style="font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:16px;background-color:rgb(255,255,255);text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-color:initial;float:none;display:inline">>A religious person could trust a scientist to be unbiased; </span></div><div><span style="font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:16px;background-color:rgb(255,255,255);text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-color:initial;float:none;display:inline">>yet an engineer, industrial contractor--and so forth--</span></div><div><span style="font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:16px;background-color:rgb(255,255,255);text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-color:initial;float:none;display:inline">>applying the results of research would not be perceived </span></div><div><span style="font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:16px;background-color:rgb(255,255,255);text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-color:initial;float:none;display:inline">>as being unbiased.</span> <br></div><div><br></div><div>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.</div><div><br></div><div>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.</div><div><br></div><div>"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. <br></div><div><br></div><div>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. </div><div><br></div><div>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.</div><div><br></div><div><br></div></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Jun 7, 2018 at 5:32 PM, <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:spike@rainier66.com" target="_blank">spike@rainier66.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div lang="EN-US" link="#0563C1" vlink="#954F72"><div class="m_6007261419378912308WordSection1"><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal">OK Alan, here ya go:<u></u><u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><div><div style="border:none;border-top:solid #e1e1e1 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in"><p class="MsoNormal"><b>From:</b> Alan Brooks <<a href="mailto:alaneugenebrooks52@yahoo.com" target="_blank">alaneugenebrooks52@yahoo.com</a>> <br><b>Sent:</b> Thursday, June 7, 2018 3:01 PM<br><b>To:</b> <a href="mailto:spike@rainier66.com" target="_blank">spike@rainier66.com</a><br><b>Subject:</b> Spike, please post [science scepticism]<u></u><u></u></p></div></div><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif">"...science in general (‘Science is just one of many opinions’)..."<u></u><u></u></span></p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif"><u></u> <u></u></span></p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif">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.<u></u><u></u></span></p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif"><u></u> <u></u></span></p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif">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. <u></u><u></u></span></p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif">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.<u></u><u></u></span></p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif"><u></u> <u></u></span></p></div></div></div></div><br>______________________________<wbr>_________________<br>
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