Thursday, October 07, 2010

So typical

Diane Sawyer invited me to go online and pick "how I see God". There's only one problem.

I have to see him. There's no "nonexistent God". The closest you can pick is "distant":

The fourth and final way that those surveyed view God is a "distant God" who set the universe in motion, but then disengaged.

"These tend to be higher educated, more 'spiritual' people," said Froese.... Believers in a distant God are apt to be less suspicious of science and more likely to agree with Benjamin Franklin's assertion that a "supremely perfect" God doesn't care one bit "for such an inconsiderable nothing as man."

On the other hand, as of this moment, all the comments on the poll are saying precisely this. For instance

What about atheists? My answer is: none of the above. Your news piece should have included information about how the atheist lack of belief shapes our lives and decisions.

I suppose the authors would say we're like the "distant" believers, but still. "The 4 Ways Americans View God"? That assumes we all view him. (Actually, of course, it assumes we're all followers of the Abrahamic desert god in one of its variations... Also not true.)

Oh well - we very quickly got people chastising the atheists for wanting an option. All's back to normal.

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1 Comments:

At 8:47 PM, October 07, 2010 Blogger Wishydig had this to say...

that's definitely a gap in representing views "regarding" a god. i'm guessing the defense of their frame is something along the lines of "what we meant was, if you see a god, how do you see it?"

you know, why ask people who don't believe in sasquatch how tall they think it is? or what color martians are?

the problem is that even with that frame, there are a lot of americans who don't fit into any of the assumed views. polytheists? i guess they aren't "real" americans, so…

 

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