OMG:
Interesting: After analyzing data from the European social survey, which included 25 coutnries and more than 40,000 participants, Vassilis Saroglou discovered that religious people have a greater chance of ending up in education, health, medical services and humanities than in other fields. Nonbelievers are more likely to go into engineering, sciences and mathematics. (Scientific American Mind, Are we born to be religious?)
I thought this was interesting 'cause most Waterlooers seem unreligious to me - like there is a general 'no religion' attitude, even here on OMGUW. Perhaps this is because the biggest faculties are math and engineering? Tt would be interesting if the psych department compared the religious attitudes of those in math and engineering to those in science, arts, and applied health sciences.
Interesting: After analyzing data from the European social survey, which included 25 coutnries and more than 40,000 participants, Vassilis Saroglou discovered that religious people have a greater chance of ending up in education, health, medical services and humanities than in other fields. Nonbelievers are more likely to go into engineering, sciences and mathematics. (Scientific American Mind, Are we born to be religious?)
I thought this was interesting 'cause most Waterlooers seem unreligious to me - like there is a general 'no religion' attitude, even here on OMGUW. Perhaps this is because the biggest faculties are math and engineering? Tt would be interesting if the psych department compared the religious attitudes of those in math and engineering to those in science, arts, and applied health sciences.
Posted on
Monday, July 2.
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July 2, 2012 at 8:19 PM
Waterlooers are some of the most religious people I've met. My experience directly contradicts this finding. Maybe the psych majors should study that.
July 2, 2012 at 8:26 PM
Might be that the OP just hangs out with a bunch of atheists, or that our religions rarely have anything to do with campus activities or higher learning.
July 2, 2012 at 8:36 PM
the biggest faculty is arts...
July 2, 2012 at 8:39 PM
Idk, OP might be on to something. Most of the people in my class (Nano) are atheist/agnostic. Even the "Christian" ones just seem apathetic toward religion. Though the Muslims on campus are pretty strong Muslims (at least compared to how strong the Christians are).
July 2, 2012 at 8:48 PM
I think you misunderstood the point OP. IF a person is religious, they're more likely to be in fields like humanities/education. That says very little about how likely it is that a given person in humanities/education is religious.
July 2, 2012 at 9:08 PM
@5: what if the UW identified % of religious students in a faculty and compared across all faculties? Just to validate the research results from Europe.
July 2, 2012 at 9:24 PM
most people don't say there religion to loudly since its really not an important factor for classes.
July 2, 2012 at 9:31 PM
I agree with 4. I'm also a nano, and most people in my year (including myself) aren't religious, with the exceptions mainly being Muslims. For example, people were posting in our group about going to Reason Rally, but there's never anything religious in it.
Even in my experience in clubs, people are mostly atheist, agnostic, or at least not religious enough to talk about it. Although the clubs I've been to also seem oddly homogenous in political views too, so perhaps people are just scared to speak out when they differ from the group.
July 2, 2012 at 9:33 PM
Yeah I've heard the exact opposite. That Engineers tend to attract a shockingly high number of religious individuals.
Some study found that engineers were amongst the highest believers of creationism.
There's also this, which found those in arts tend to decrease in religiousness over their course of study, while those in sciences remain steady.
http://digitaljournal.com/article/277324
July 2, 2012 at 10:09 PM
@9 4 here, Yes I've seen statistics like that as well. Engineers have a tendency to be very religious....But I guess it depends on the type of Engineering as well. Chemical and Nanotechnology Engineering students tend to be more interested in Biological and/or Quantum related stuff (evidently more Nanotechnology than Chemical). Because they would probably exposed to some aspects of evolution, they would be probably tend to be less religious.
On the other hand, the jackass who predicted the world to end on May 21st 2011 was a Civil Engineer for most of his life.
Of course, not all Civil Engineers are going to be fundamentalists and not all Nanotech./Chemical Engineers are going to be like Richard Dawkins, but its probably not enough to say "Engineers are very religious people". The people who did that study need to be a lot more specific.
July 3, 2012 at 12:59 AM
@8 Just a heads up, not talking about it much doesn't necessarily mean that person isn't religious. I would consider myself fairly religious and I rarely if ever bring up religion in conversation. Although from the people I do know I agree with you and 4 in that nano does seem to have a majority of atheists/agnostics or non-practising.
July 3, 2012 at 1:56 AM
lol thanks for forgetting to mention the faculty of environment...evidently bigger than AHS.
July 3, 2012 at 3:32 AM
I wouldn't say the anti-religious attitude is dominant in general, you're judging based on a blog where most commenters are young, hormonal university students who have to shove their opinions down someone's throat.
July 3, 2012 at 7:49 AM
I would say that people who are religious are afraid/unwilling/unable to challenge their preconceptions of the world, and gravitate toward fields where this is less of an issue. Or perhaps the qualities of people that draw them to math/sci/eng (thinking outside the box, requiring basis for knowledge) also cause them to reject religion
July 3, 2012 at 8:57 AM
I knew a girl from high school that now goes to UT for Life Science and doesn't believe in evolution. I once asked her if she believed dinosaurs were real and she said she'd ask her Sunday school teacher about it.
July 3, 2012 at 12:23 PM
RL is referring to himself.
July 3, 2012 at 1:01 PM
It's more of a time thing. If you look at the trend of number of atheists as a function of decades the numbers steadily increases as time goes on. This is also due to discoveries in fundamental science providing evidence against the claims of old religions ( ie. 6000 year old earth theories, no evolution, lack of evidence of a flood, fossil records, etc...). People are more exposed to this evidence now than before and with a more socially liberal society people are more inclined to seek out information than others. It's just a difference in the way programs are designed. When you go into a basic sciences (math, engineering, bio, chem, physics) the idea is you go in them to not hold objective biases and look at the evidence without a predetermined outlook. That attitude generally translates into an attitude for daily life. It has nothing to do with what profession you are in. Your outlook is determined far before you ever reach university in most cases, but I would say that the drive for discovery does take those who have already adapted to this way of thinking about the world is more suited for the sciences.
July 3, 2012 at 1:38 PM
@15: I swear, these sunday schools could convince people that Asia doesn't exist
July 3, 2012 at 9:59 PM
I don't know who you are hanging out with but "a lot of waterlooers seem unreligious" is definitely a weird statement to make here are the reasons why I think it is weird:
1) I am in Biology, yet almost every class I take that mentions evolution someone either debates the prof about intelligent design, or the prof explicitly states at the beginning of the class that we are in the faculty of science and that evolution is a fact, and no debate will be allowed because it is has been a problem before (of course they all alway offer people who want to debate it to come to their office hours). You would think that educated students doing a degree in BIOLGY would understand the main principle. I honestly don't understand how someone can be that stupid, it's like they put their fingers in their ears every time the topic comes up or something.
2) The most active clubs on campus are religious/spiritual clubs. OMG has anyone else been harassed by Campus for Christ? I was in ML basement not even near the caf, trying to eat some lunch in a quiet place, alone, and chill on my break and these two chicks from CfC came up to me asked if they could talk to me. I said "no thanks I am an atheist" and they just continued to blab on for my entire fucking 40 minute break. I told them politely I was trying to eat and had to get back to class soon but they wouldn't leave me alone.
3) Can't the article at the moment but I read somewhere that the kitchener-waterloo region itself has the highest religiosity rate of any city in Canada. (will post link if I can find). Obviously students that are temporarily here are not included in the survey, but many students live at home or live here permanently.
July 3, 2012 at 10:15 PM
There is no excuse for working toward a degree in Biology and being a creationist.....absolutely none. Most of modern biology and medicine is based on how organisms adapt to changes in the environment.
Evolution is a fact. Deal with it fundies
July 4, 2012 at 12:15 PM
I don't want a super religious doctor. What's he/she going to do when trying to save someone's life? "Let's just pray and put it in God's hands" or "It's God's will that this person got cancer" :P
July 4, 2012 at 12:18 PM
@19 you sound a lot like me. I was walking over by DP and had these two annoying girls come up and invite me to Bible Study despite telling them I'm an atheist, always will be, and religion is extremely oppressing.
I don't understand the Biology situation either. Also, people who seek proof in everything they do (with respect to school/research) yet just blindly accept religion. I wouldn't trust those hypocrites.
July 5, 2012 at 8:43 PM
I am religious and working toward a MSc. in physics. I am not looking for an argument, but I'd like you to know that there are quite a few of us out there.
July 6, 2012 at 12:02 AM
^ So you believe in creationism?
July 6, 2012 at 2:02 AM
Of course, anyone can be religious. It's just that scientists, physicists etc. TEND not to be since they have come to the conclusion through reason that there is definitely no personal God (a deistic God is another matter, which is a much better case).
For the other scientists who ARE religious, for me it stems from three things:
1) A fear of death. Naturally, every human is is scared of death and indeed an eternal abyss of nothingness seems unimaginable for conscious beings such as ourselves. It impossible to imagine or comprehend not being conscious. Therefore, people resort to religion to give them comfort that this life is not the be all and end all. As an atheist, it is my opinion that these instincts are those which any primitive mammal would possess, but I accept death as the end of my existence. I therefore think that we should live our life as our own and not to glorify the name of a personal deity which does not exist (there is too much suffering in the world for a personal God to really exist, and him letting it happen makes Him malevolent, rather than benevolent).
2) A lack of examination and proper evaluation of evidence. If you are a scientist, you should look at all the evidence, for and against the existence of a personal deity. A personal deity is easy to disprove (problem of evil etc.). If after this and you still think God exists, I think you're doing it wrong.
3) You are Muslim, in which case you are indoctrinated so early from birth with extreme teachings. One does not simply grow out of the Islamic belief. Something very significant would have to happen for any muslim to really give up their faith
Religion and Science ultimately cannot exist together. That is true no matter how you look it.
July 8, 2012 at 3:20 AM
lol science and religion are two separate worlds. Physical and spiritual.
July 8, 2012 at 1:10 PM
Shame on OP for forgetting about ENV!