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20Y study finds little evidence religiosity leads to greater life satisfaction

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Re: 20Y study finds little evidence religiosity leads to greater life satisfaction

#71

Post by sammalloy »

WarOnPrivacy wrote: post #34
onion2k wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes they would. If you ask people if they're happy they'll say yes. If you actually measure it by observing what people do they'll exhibit behavior that shows they're not actually happy. Self-delusion is a well researched topic. There are many studies.

> If you actually measure it by observing what people do they'll exhibit behavior that shows they're not actually happy. The best part of this notion is the inverse where miserable people are doing happy people things.

> The best part of this notion is the inverse where miserable people are doing happy people thing

Sartre called it “bad faith”.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bad_faith_(existentialism)

I know a lot of religious people like this. On the outside, they seem like the happiest people you’ve ever met, but once you get to know them, it turns out that they are miserable, and that the religious beliefs and behavior that they embrace are used to self-regulate their mental states. The more extreme religious people appear to be suffering a type of scrupulosity unique to disorders like OCD, and many sufferers will tell you that they are not happy.

Re: 20Y study finds little evidence religiosity leads to greater life satisfaction

#72

Post by azth »

LatteLazy wrote: post #45
dustingetz wrote: post #6

The point of religion is to solve civilization-scale game theory coordination dilemmas. "Thou Shalt Not Kill" is a mutually beneficial metastable equilibrium but is only stable to the extent that it is a universally adopted principle. A lot of modern tragedies like climate change can be tackled in this way if we can establish universal shared values that apply to all people independent of nationality, status and in p…

Except that problem is already solved by a bunch of things like empathy and reputation. The point of religion is to solve civilisation wide coordination dilemmas like war. How do you get people to kill and die for strangers? Religion's purpose is to get people to do horrible things not to behave nicely. It's used for wars mostly (plus genocides etc). That's why we no longer need it. If we were fighting a ground war a…

> Religion's purpose is to get people to do horrible things not to behave nicely. It's used for wars mostly (plus genocides etc).

Flat out false.

> Philip and Axelrod’s three-volume Encyclopedia of Wars, which chronicles some 1,763 wars that have been waged over the course of human history. Of those wars, the authors categorize 123 as being religious in nature, which is an astonishingly low 6.98% of all wars.

Re: 20Y study finds little evidence religiosity leads to greater life satisfaction

#73

Post by azth »

krapp wrote: post #55
coding123 wrote: post #54

As more people lose faith, you have higher numbers of people that have faith in only themselves. What replaces morality? I haven't seen a large movement to replace it.

Morality doesn't presuppose religion, faith or belief in the supernatural. The religious can be amoral and selfish, atheists can be moral and selfless.

You can't have morality without religion, it's a senseless question to pose.

Re: 20Y study finds little evidence religiosity leads to greater life satisfaction

#75

Post by Grimm1 »

phkahler wrote: post #67
Grimm1 wrote: post #42

Honestly, and completely anecdotally, having been raised Catholic I would expect it to result in quite the opposite when so much of the doctrine is based on guilt. That said before anyone jumps on me, also anecdotally, I haven't found any greater life satisfaction by not being religious either. You do you. The article says the study suggests there's not a really strong causal relationship in either way which surprise…

Aside from that Catholic guilt and community aspects, people like to feel hope and purpose. Religious beliefs can offer both of those. I do like to point out that this effect will take place regardless of the truth of the belief system, so paint yourself a picture that brings "meaning" to your life however you want - as long as it's something you can actually believe ;-)

Yes, hope and purpose are important. I like existentialism and cling hard to thought of being able to define that belief system myself and what purpose I have from it. That said as of late, after years I seem to be going through a bit of a dark night of the soul with that chosen system, to borrow more from religious terminology.

I guess one of the downsides of forming my own belief system versus religion is it's bedrock is just a wee bit younger and potentially less well formed as I've been learning. Back to the drawing board :P

Re: 20Y study finds little evidence religiosity leads to greater life satisfaction

#76

Post by sologirlcamper »

dustingetz wrote: post #6

The point of religion is to solve civilization-scale game theory coordination dilemmas. "Thou Shalt Not Kill" is a mutually beneficial metastable equilibrium but is only stable to the extent that it is a universally adopted principle. A lot of modern tragedies like climate change can be tackled in this way if we can establish universal shared values that apply to all people independent of nationality, status and in p…

Hoping not to flame or anything, but personally the point of my religion (orthodoxy) is to be correct and to provide an understanding of reality. Morality and coordination stem from that for sure, but they aden't the purpose per se.

Re: 20Y study finds little evidence religiosity leads to greater life satisfaction

#77

Post by OrvalWintermute »

squarefoot wrote: post #70
jawns wrote: post #48

I am a member of a religious group whose doctrine, practices, culture, etc. are very different from the doctrine, practices, and culture of other religious groups. Some people who identify as religious are monotheists, others polytheists, others pantheists, and still others agnostics or even atheists. (Yup, there is such a thing as Christian atheism.) So I always find it strange when 'religiosity' is used as a catch-…

I'm pretty sure there are different groups also among the same exact religion. If we asked to a large group of Christians whether we, say, should help immigrants, we would probably end up with 3 types of answers: "yes, let's help them!" - "yes, but only for very basic needs, then let's kick them out" - "nope, let's build a wall and let them rot on the other side". Of course the 2nd and especially the 3rd group have a…

> I'm pretty sure there are different groups also among the same exact religion. If we asked to a large group of Christians whether we, say, should help immigrants, we would probably end up with 3 types of answers: "yes, let's help them!" - "yes, but only for very basic needs, then let's kick them out" - "nope, let's build a wall and let them rot on the other side". Of course the 2nd and especially the 3rd group have absolutely nothing to do with anything christian, and they profess them as such only to not feel guilty, or possibly because the society they live in requires that (how many votes would a politician get is he/she admitted being atheist?) - religion for them is just a series of acts (go to church, make offers, say prayers aloud, etc.) intended to cheat the system and appear as good people while in realty they aren't. I am also sure that the 1st group live a better life, which doesn't mean they'll earn more, actually it's quite likely the opposite, but they grow better "antibodies" to overcome difficulties without anger.

I think you meant to say illegal immigrants, undocumented workers, or some other word.

> Of course the 2nd and especially the 3rd group have absolutely nothing to do with anything christian, and they profess them as such only to not feel guilty, or possibly because the society they live in requires that (how many votes would a politician get is he/she admitted being atheist?) - religion for them is just a series of acts (go to church, make offers, say prayers aloud, etc.) intended to cheat the system and appear as good people while in realty they aren't. I am also sure that the 1st group live a better life, which doesn't mean they'll earn more, actually it's quite likely the opposite, but they grow better "antibodies" to overcome difficulties without anger.

I think you doing a covert type of name-calling here.

Are Christians not supposed to care about US laws?

I care about the law. If we willfully ignore the laws, where could that stop? What would be the impetus to fix the laws that need updating, or the problem areas we have like a gap in short term agricultural visas?

If we encourage illegal border crossing, who will that benefit, and hurt?

I think it will benefit cartels, coyotes moving people, as well as the big corporations that operate meat-packing plants and foodservice, exploiting low cost labor, and underpaying people. It may benefit the person coming to the US, until that eventual time when they are caught, and sent home.

I think it will also hurt all the people looking for good paying jobs in lower ends of the service sector, and all the legal immigrants that are waiting in line for a chance. All the people that are hurt by an uncontrolled criminal element preying on members of their own communities. Nope, can't think about them. All the construction workers that used to be able to raise a family on doing residential work, nope, can't be concerned about them. Via exploiting the local emergency room for free medical care via EMTALA, the local hospital system will be damaged too, forcing higher rates to be negotiated with insurers, adding to ever increasing insurance rates. Nope, can't talk about that either.

please, refrain from projecting a simplistic morality onto others. There are many points of view out there.

Re: 20Y study finds little evidence religiosity leads to greater life satisfaction

#78

Post by anonporridge »

netizen-936824 wrote: post #10
dustingetz wrote: post #6

The point of religion is to solve civilization-scale game theory coordination dilemmas. "Thou Shalt Not Kill" is a mutually beneficial metastable equilibrium but is only stable to the extent that it is a universally adopted principle. A lot of modern tragedies like climate change can be tackled in this way if we can establish universal shared values that apply to all people independent of nationality, status and in p…

>"The point of religion is..." Citation please

Yeah. Successful religions are just a memeplex that have been exceedingly good at keeping themselves alive and growing.

They don't have a point.

They just exist.

Re: 20Y study finds little evidence religiosity leads to greater life satisfaction

#79

Post by boomboomsubban »

curiousgal wrote: post #39
noobermin wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

N=4167 for a longitudinal study is fantastic, actually.

For a medical study sure, for a subjective field where society and culture play a major role, even N=1e7 of individuals living in the same country wouldn't be enough to draw a conclusion on the entire human population.

>wouldn't be enough to draw a conclusion on the entire human population.

Which is why the study does not draw a conclusion on the viability of all religion, it merely says that it doesn't see much evidence that religiosity leads to life satisfaction. The author even notes "these results need to be evaluated within the context of the study." Hardly the wholesale dismissal of religion you claim it's making.

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