Monday, February 17, 2014

How religious are scientists?

Inside Higher Education reports on a paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science showing that scientists are more religious than most people think:

Scientists vs. General Public on Religious Observance
ScientistsGeneral Public
Attend weekly religious services18%20%
Consider themselves religious15%19%
Read religious texts weekly13.5%17%
Pray several times a day19%26%
As far as religious observance, obviously I'm an example....I generally attend weekly services, even though I'm not religious.  I don't pray, and I don't read texts, however.

So who are these scientists? Let's just say the Episcopalians appear well represented.  ;-)
Scientists and the Public by Religious Belief
PublicScientists
Evangelical Protestant22.9%17.1%
Mainline Protestant26.9%24.9%
Roman Catholics23.8%19.1%
Jews1.9%3.9%
Mormons1.8%1.7%
Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs, Jains2.6%7.2%
Atheists/Agnostics/No Religion15.5%24.4%
Other4.7%1.7%

Not surprisingly, the biggest gap between scientists is with Evangelical protestants--evolution, obviously, but also
Other findings in the survey point to significant differences between scientists and evangelical Protestants, nearly 60 percent of whom said that scientists "should be open to considering miracles in their theories or explanations.”
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1 comment:

IT said...

Quote from the HuffPo on this:

Many atheist and agnostic scientists think key mysteries about the world can be best understood spiritually, and some attend houses of worship, completely comfortable with religion as moral training for their children and an alternative form of community.

See It's not just me!