Atheism and astrology
In September 2008, the Wall Street Journal reported:
| “ | The reality is that the New Atheist campaign, by discouraging religion, won't create a new group of intelligent, skeptical, enlightened beings. Far from it: It might actually encourage new levels of mass superstition. And that's not a conclusion to take on faith -- it's what the empirical data tell us.
"What Americans Really Believe," a comprehensive new study released by Baylor University yesterday, shows that traditional Christian religion greatly decreases belief in everything from the efficacy of palm readers to the usefulness of astrology. It also shows that the irreligious and the members of more liberal Protestant denominations, far from being resistant to superstition, tend to be much more likely to believe in the paranormal and in pseudoscience than evangelical Christians.... This is not a new finding. In his 1983 book "The Whys of a Philosophical Scrivener," skeptic and science writer Martin Gardner cited the decline of traditional religious belief among the better educated as one of the causes for an increase in pseudoscience, cults and superstition. He referenced a 1980 study published in the magazine Skeptical Inquirer that showed irreligious college students to be by far the most likely to embrace paranormal beliefs, while born-again Christian college students were the least likely.[2] |
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In 2015, Rodney Stark wrote in his book The Triumph of Faith: Why the World is More Religious Than Ever about secular European countries: "35 percent of the French believe in astrology, 35 percent of the Swiss agree that 'some fortune tellers really can foretell the future'..."[3] See: French atheism
Due to its past, namely the anti-clerical French Revolution and its after effects, in 2005 France had the 8th highest rate of atheism in the world with 43–54% of the population being atheists/agnostics/non-believers in God.[4] In 2015, it was estimated that at least 29% of France's population identifies as atheists and 63% identifies as non-religious.[5] In addition, France has the 4rth highest belief in evolution in the Western World.[6]
Atheism, General Social Survey and belief in astrology
The Inductivist blog reported about the 2006 General Social Survey (GSS) and belief in astrology:
| “ | In 2006, 1,782 Americans were asked if they believed in God, and if they considered astrology to be scientific. Here are the answers:
Percent who think astrology is somewhat or very scientific
Compared to people of faith, atheists are not more likely to believe in crackpot ideas (at least in the case of astrology).[7] |
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One likely reason why Baylor University found that traditional Christians believed astrology was not useful is because many conservative Protestants believe that astrology is an occult practice. Another reason is that many Protestants are not superstitious and believe in the usefulness of the scientific method (see: Christianity and science).
See also
Notes
- ↑ Look Who's Irrational Now
- ↑ Look Who's Irrational Now by Mollie Ziegler Hemingway, Wall Street Journal, September 19, 2008
- ↑ The Triumph of Faith: Why the World is More Religious Than Ever by Rodney Stark, Introduction section of the book
- ↑ Top 50 Countries With Highest Proportion of Atheists / Agnostics(Zuckerman, 2005)
- ↑ La carte de l’athéisme dans le monde : la France numéro 4, L'Obs, 2015
- ↑ Photo: Evolution Less Accepted in U.S. Than Other Western Countries, Study Finds
- ↑ Do atheists believe in anything?
