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No USA base Muslim group of any statistical significance (or other group) is anti-democracy in the USA (and the USA is about 20% Muslim, so we would notice if it was a primary agenda).

According to Pew Research, Americans are 0.6% Muslim.
http://religions.pewforum.org/...

Where did you find 20%?

And you'd (probably) be wrong. According to a recent Pew poll, only 37% of Americans think "clergy" contribute a lot to society, while 65% believe that "scientists" contribute a lot to society.

This isn't exactly the same as "trustworthiness" but I think it's probably in the same ballpark. Americans are generally at the top of international polls on trust in science - there are a few areas of distrust/disbelief (evolution, climate change), but in general, Americans like their science and want more of it.

According to Wikipedia ISIS has around 100,000 people fighting for it. The world's Muslim population is around 1.6 billion. Therefore ISIS contains 0.006% of the world's Muslims fighting for it.

Interestingly that's around the same percentage of the US population (0.006%) who were convicted of murder in 1994 (source), so is Islam really any more broken than, for example, 1994 America?

That's how many soldiers ISIS has, where did they get money for weapons, outside support. Where are they getting rations, outside support. Where are they getting vehicles, outside support. It was 20 years ago but I don't remember a Guns for Murders program, I do remember a Jail for Murders program that still continues today. Again it was a long time ago but I don't remember there being support for murders, even congress has better approval numbers then murders. When you look at Muslim support for terror groups and their activities it is much higher then 1994 US support for murders, 32% of Palestinians support Itamar attack which was a brutal murder of 5 family members including a 3 month old. 89% of Palestinians support attacks on Israel. 20% of British Muslims sympathized with the 7/7/7 bombers, 16% of French Muslims support ISIS, 51% of Pakistanis grieved for the death of Osama Bin Laden, only 16% though the killing of Bin Laden was justified, the majority of Muslims in the middle east have positive or mixed feelings of Bin Laden. This is not a small percentage that approves of this behavior it's 25-50% of all Muslims.
sources
http://www.ynetnews.com
http://www.telegraph.co.uk
http://www.worldpublicopinion.org
http://www.pewglobal.org
http://www.pewforum.org

It's a tempting point, but not strictly relevant. The histories of other religions neither vindicate, nor worsen the standing of, Islam. Far better to emphasise that most modern Muslims in western countries are peaceable.

(Regrettably, this is not also true of, say, the average Afghan Muslim.)

Too true. People believe, because they were taught to believe, from an early age by people they trust. The vast majority of Christians (insert religion of your choice here) are Christian by an accident of birth.

You have a source for that? Anecdotally from my church a large percentage of folks joining came to faith later in life (college, etc). Looking at a poll on this indicates that thats about right-- 40% or so tend to switch from what they were raised with, 60% do not. Im really not sure in what world "60%" forms a vast majority, but whatever.

Its sort of hillarious to hear people talk of ignorance and then bust out anecdotal and unsupported "facts" like this.

If you want a good laugh ask a Christian why they believe in God and Jesus and the Holy spirit, but not in Zeus or Odin or Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva. If you get anything other than circular logic or "because" let me know.

Do you mock Stephen Hawkings declaration that the universe self-created itself because "there is such a thing as gravity", for being circular reasoning? Why not?

Atheists are distrusted as much as Muslims are among the general population: http://www.pewforum.org/2014/0...

Outside of local races in certain areas, I wouldn't expect an open atheist to be elected right now in the USA.

What, wasn't their faith in god strong enough? It works wonders for children without vaccinations...

In some cases, even religious people will trust science ... (though not enough if other persons are affected)

Seriously, have we gotten to the point that we're actually bigoted against all religions?

73% of Americans believe in God: http://www.pewforum.org/2012/1...
41% trust scientists, with another 46% trusting them "Somewhat" http://www.asanet.org/images/j...

  73% believe in God, 87% trust scientists at least "somewhat" so, at the very least, 60% of people believe on God AND trust science at the same time! That's assuming there is no overlap.

If you disparage someone for their religious beliefs, you are a bigot. Seriously, you really are. It's not some different thing, you can't cite the crusades as evidence of how evil modern Christians are, you can't point to wars in the middle east. None of that has anything to do with the little old lady down the street that goes to church. You're making an offensive, and more importantly, incorrect generalization about an entire group of people based on the actions of a very small minority that has nothing to do with them at all.

I know this will get modded down pretty quickly on Slashdot. This site is notoriously intolerant of the faithful, but that doesn't make it right. Have fun modding me down troll, just keep in mind you're doing it for the same reasons sectarian bigotry happens all over the world. No one thinks they're a bigot while they're being a bigot. And if you're teaching your kids this mentality at home? Shame on you.

What about religious people who cling to the efficacy of their face despite all evidence to the contrary? Such as somebody saying "Not going to the doctor, God will heal me". Is that bigoted? Because that is about the exact thing the poster you are replying to was referencing. The statistics you cite are also irrelevent, because between "believe in God" and "trust science" are not mutually exclusive, and "believe in God" was not presented as a dichotomy of "belief" and "belief somewhat". A better survey to find would be one that asks "If you had cancer, would you go to a doctor, trust God to heal you, or just give up and do nothing?"

What, wasn't their faith in god strong enough? It works wonders for children without vaccinations...

In some cases, even religious people will trust science ... (though not enough if other persons are affected)

Seriously, have we gotten to the point that we're actually bigoted against all religions?

73% of Americans believe in God: http://www.pewforum.org/2012/1...
41% trust scientists, with another 46% trusting them "Somewhat" http://www.asanet.org/images/j...

  73% believe in God, 87% trust scientists at least "somewhat" so, at the very least, 60% of people believe on God AND trust science at the same time! That's assuming there is no overlap.

If you disparage someone for their religious beliefs, you are a bigot. Seriously, you really are. It's not some different thing, you can't cite the crusades as evidence of how evil modern Christians are, you can't point to wars in the middle east. None of that has anything to do with the little old lady down the street that goes to church. You're making an offensive, and more importantly, incorrect generalization about an entire group of people based on the actions of a very small minority that has nothing to do with them at all.

I know this will get modded down pretty quickly on Slashdot. This site is notoriously intolerant of the faithful, but that doesn't make it right. Have fun modding me down troll, just keep in mind you're doing it for the same reasons sectarian bigotry happens all over the world. No one thinks they're a bigot while they're being a bigot. And if you're teaching your kids this mentality at home? Shame on you.

Actually, no, they are not. Hispanic Christians are dominantly liberal, so a conversion of illegal immigrants to citizen status would increase the Democrat ranks, not the Republican ranks.

Immigration Reform is like asking Republicans to vote to lose every election forever. What is weird is that about 20% are saying yes to that.

You can kill people without a proper trial all you want, but if you think that it can come without consequences you are delusional.

A majority of the US population are delusional.

The data I quoted was from 2012, so it's not what I would call "old" data. It's only 2 years old.
2011 is when it crossed over and more people started supporting gay marriage than opposing it.
So we're talking about an issue that less than 4 years ago a "clear majority" opposed.
Here is a graph: http://features.pewforum.org/s...
Unfortunately it doesn't differentiate between strongly and weakly.
It does however show how quickly opinions can change and how in flux this issue is.
It is far from a settled issue and could easily go back the other direction.
The media and corporate america have prematurely (in my opinion) decided which direction
this debate is suppose to go and is trying to make it unacceptable for anyone to have an
opposing view. I'm personally on the fence about the issue and can see both sides of the
argument but I don't like how corporate america is strong arming everyone to chose their side.
If I had my way instead of recognizing same-sex marriages I would rather the government
exit completely out of the marriage business altogether and no longer ask it on tax forms, etc...
It seems strange to me that someone unmarried and living together is treated differently than
someone who is married and living together or is treated differently than a brother and a sister
who are living together.

http://www.pewforum.org/2012/1...

You're welcome AC, who will never come back to this thread. Thank you for your broken english anecdotes.

I'm a theist who actually cares enough about both science and correct theology to know the answer to this is laughably no. And I consider this sort of incredibly bad pseudoscience and other equally stupid superstitions to be the primary cause of that.

Even if you take my assumption that God exists, religious fundamentalists of various stripes make him out to look like an idiot. There is little wonder under 70% of Americans still believe in Him.

So when these atheist dictators banned religion and went around killing those who practiced it, that was just ONE BIG COINCIDENCE and had nothing to do with their atheism?

dictator
1. a person exercising absolute power, especially a ruler who has absolute, unrestricted control in a government without hereditary succession.

How can you have absolute power when people follow religious leaders, not you? And that claim to answer to a higher authority than you? Dictators suppress and eradicate religion because it's a threat to their power, it's in the nature of a dictator not an atheist. Sharing a religion means you are both working for the same god, you might disagree on the ways and means and goals but you're in it together. Branding it as ateists makes it sounds like we're your equal and opposite, but it's not. If two people go skydiving, they have something in common. If two people don't go skydiving, they still have nothing in common.

But the fact that 99.9% of Muslims oppose terrorism doesn't seem to be swaying the terrorists.

Are you lying or just ignorant? Here's an example from a huge study showing that just in Bangladesh is 150 million * 90% muslim * 26% = 35.2 million who think suicide bombing of civilians is sometimes/often justified. In Egypt there is another 85 million * 90% muslim * 29% = 22.2 million people and the same in Pakistan with 180 million * 97% muslim * 13% = 22.7 million. Together that's over 80 million people or about 5% of muslims that DO support terrorism. And a majority of the population in Egypt, Jordan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Palestine and Malaysia want to kill you for leaving Islam.

foxnews id a horrid source. They have a long and well documented history of lying and leaving out important details. Far more then any other news agency. There is a reason that can't call them selves a news agency in Canada. IT's so bad that it just shouldn't be trusted no matter what side they appear to represent.

It's more complex the what FoxNews is saying in there effort to get creationism thought of a a legitimate science. Since that have no evidence, they resort to public opinion, as if that is good data.

try:
http://www.pewforum.org/2013/1...

Well, latest survey shows acceptance of evolution amongst Catholics is a bit higher than US average (also mainline Protestants, unlike evangelicals, are even 2% more likely to think that humans evolved than religiously unaffiliated)

There's actually evidence for this sort of claim. For example the majority of American scientists are atheists or agnostics, and over the numbers for members of the National Academy of Science are even higher. See http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/news/file002.html. There's other data that suggests a similar pattern in terms of education. The GSS data shows that more educated people are less likely to believe in God. Curiously, there is evidence that people who don't self-identify as atheist or agnostic but don't identify as religious (e.g. "spiritual but not religious" or believe in God but no particular religion, or just don't care, etc.) know less about religion than most other groups, even as atheists and agnostics are some of the highest knowledge groups. See http://www.pewforum.org/2010/09/28/u-s-religious-knowledge-survey/.

Except for non-Abrahamic religions such as Hinduism, Buddhism and Shintoism (which by the way encompass more people.)

No, they don't.

I know, why bring actual data into a quantitative discussion...

... followers of Abrahamic religions making up close to half of the world population

More than half actually.

The Global Religious Landscape

The demographic study – based on analysis of more than 2,500 censuses, surveys and population registers – finds 2.2 billion Christians (32% of the world’s population), 1.6 billion Muslims (23%), 1 billion Hindus (15%), nearly 500 million Buddhists (7%) and 14 million Jews (0.2%) around the world as of 2010. In addition, more than 400 million people (6%) practice various folk or traditional religions, including African traditional religions, Chinese folk religions, Native American religions and Australian aboriginal religions. An estimated 58 million people – slightly less than 1% of the global population – belong to other religions, including the Baha’i faith, Jainism, Sikhism, Shintoism, Taoism, Tenrikyo, Wicca and Zoroastrianism, to mention just a few.1

At the same time, the new study by the Pew Forum also finds that roughly one-in-six people around the globe (1.1 billion, or 16%) have no religious affiliation. This makes the unaffiliated the third-largest religious group worldwide, behind Christians and Muslims, and about equal in size to the world’s Catholic population. Surveys indicate that many of the unaffiliated hold some religious or spiritual beliefs (such as belief in God or a universal spirit) even though they do not identify with a particular faith.

Pew Research report: "The Global Religious Landscape", with global numerical breakdowns.

What the actual fuck are you on?

Watch your language, young man, if you wish your questions, however rhetorical, answered.

They [Republicans -mi] ignore all sciences, not just 'real' ones. See fracking & evolution for just a couple examples.

The only "science" in dispute over fracking is whether or not the natural gas-extraction process is dangerous to the environment. Given that the only arguments against are either sponsored by OPEC or put forward by bona-fide anti-Capitalists, it is indeed most prudent to ignore them.

As for evolution, the process is rejected by most major religions, which makes it hardly a Republican-only problem. Even among Christians Obama, for example, got a (slightly) higher share of votes, than McCain in 2008 and Romney in 2012.

Hi. Nice to meet you. I am a homeschooling parent. My child has been taught from day one that magic isn't real. That includes magic that gets called 'miracle'. Every single kid or adult that has every tried to convince him that magic is real has been publicly schooled. Making a point to teach your child that magic, while fun to pretend some times, isn't real, gives you a clear view of just how nut-bag religious public schooled people are.

Approximately 86% of Americans are religious nut-bags. Approximately 1.7% of Americans children are homeschooled. Thus, the vast majority of religious nut-bags are in the public schools. Your children's teachers are likely the religious nut-bags you are talking about, and if you think that your kids are not being indoctrinated into thinking magic is real by the public school, you are fooling yourself.

People that like to pull out the claim that home schooled kids are young earth creationists generally, are religious nut-bags themselves. They just want every kid to go to public school where they will be taught that God didn't create the earth 6000 years ago, he did it much longer ago than that. The idea that magic isn't real, doesn't even show up on the radar, so since the homeschooled kids don't follow your religious nut-bag thinking, you assume that they belong to some competing nut-bag group.

Of course, if you have children, it would not be surprising that you wouldn't know what kind of nut-bag magical thinking they are being indoctrinated into, as the children are under your care for so little of their waking hours that you could barely be called a parent.

That's... a very interesting report, but very different from the one that I linked. It says a lot of things, such as that the three groups are distinct, but only supports what it says via quotes from individuals. That isn't necessarily a bad method to disseminate information, but it doesn't really counter either of the surveys mentioned in the article that I linked.

The Pew survey suggests that the think-alike hypothesis doesn't explain the Tea Party's religious leanings, since as you can see, Tea Partiers are further right on social issues than the average Republican. They specifically ask about abortion, not Planned Parenthood, so it's not a question of funding.

Link? Most of the polling data I've seen suggests there's significant overlap between the Tea Party and social conservatives. Cursory googling turned up this one:

http://www.pewforum.org/2011/02/23/tea-party-and-religion/

Compared to the set of Republicans and "lean-Republicans", the Tea Party was:

1. Very slightly less socially conservative w.r.t. same-sex marriage,
2. Very slightly more socially conservative w.r.t. abortion,
3. Very slightly more socially conservative w.r.t. illegal immigration,
4. Very slightly more socially conservative w.r.t. gun control.

Moreover, among "white evangelicals" 41% said they "agree" with the Tea Party vs. 8% who disagree. White evangelicals were in the highest agreement with the Tea Party among all groups polled. Of those who support the "conservative Christian movement" a whopping 69% agree with the Tea Party. Of those who affiliate with the Tea Party, 42% also agree with the "conservative Christian movement" vs. 11% who disagree.

Wow, time flies, the survey was not as recent as I remembered. But here it goes: http://www.pewforum.org/U-S-Religious-Knowledge-Survey.aspx

About dishonesty and insanity, I think the former may help lead to the latter. If you suspend belief in reality to allow belief in the supernatural, you may as well allow other contradictory and inconsistent beliefs. That doesn't seem healthy, imho.

The fact is most people who badmouth religion and it's connection to science know very little about religion itself.

Research shows that atheists on average know more facts about religion than the religious do.

Reference: U.S. Religious Knowledge Survey.

There are more Mormons per capita in Idaho.

No, there's not.

Utah is 58% Mormon
Idaho is 23% Mormon

http://religions.pewforum.org/maps

I'm the biggest atheist you'll ever meet, but I'm still very much interested in what goes through the Vatican people's heads - a major mass-delusion involving over a billion people inevitably has some definite geopolitical and economic implications... As far as religions go, I tend to judge them by their aggregate voting patterns, with much respect going to the Mormons and certain Protestant sects. (Hey, not everyone has the brains to be a rationalist...) I'm also very much aware of how certain religions have historically sabotaged economic and technological growth, with Protestants in Northern Europe (especially the Netherlands and England) deserving much credit for the foundations of capitalism, independent science, the Industrial Revolution, and the modern world as we know it today.

When I first heard about that silly "Prophecy of the Popes" ~15 years ago, I wondered... What are the odds of them just choosing someone named Peter when the time comes (the first Peter in 2000 years, supposedly), and whether having this name would increase or decrease his chances of being selected pope... And now here we are, at the end of the list, with the leading candidate's birth name being Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson... Seems like "the scriptwriters" are trying to use this "prophecy" boost their show's ratings!

And then there's another "coincidence" - lightning striking the Vatican dome hours after the resignation announcement... (Very easy to fake, of course, by timing the Pope's announcement to take place on the same day as a thunderstorm, and then putting out a previously-unpublished photo of it happening before...)

It was funny to watch at first, sorta like scripted wrestling, but when I looked at Peter Turkson's political views - my blood turned to antifreeze! I don't care about the same ol social conservative bullshit that not even Catholics take seriously anymore (the fertility rates in Catholic Europe are among the lowest in the world), but look at his calls for a Global Tax and a Global Socialist Government! He's exactly the kind of Pope the government elites want, and it looks like they're ready to use the Vatican as a propaganda weapon, more intensively than in a very long time!

There were many reasons to dislike Catholics in the past, but Peter Turkson is the icing on the cake!

--libman

Rest in peace, oh great America. You had a nice run leading the world in science and technology.

Pretty soon now you will be just another religious state, just like the ones you are fighting right now, but with a different religion.

That is not true.

One-in-Five Adults and One-in-Three Under Age 30 Have No Religious Affiliation. This kind of stuff are the death-throes of religious conservatism. As the more normal people leave formalized religion, the crazies are left behind. Without a moderating influence, they get even crazier than before.

Statistically atheists know the most about religion, according to the Pew Forum's U.S. Religious Knowledge Survey.

The nuttier religions may be about to crack. In the US, the number of people reporting "no religion" has doubled in the past decade. There are now more than twice as many atheists and agnostics (4%) in the US as Jews (1.7%). "Unaffiliated" is at 16.1%. Islam only has 0.6% market share in the US, and Mormonism is at 1.7%. Total US "Christian" is at 78%, but that's self-reported. The number of people who say they go to church is about twice the number churches report showing up.

Some religions need a high level of coercion to maintain market share. For most of the period since the decline of the Roman Empire, Catholicism was the worst offender. It took several wars in Europe to overthrow that tyranny. Today, militant Islam (and its mirror image, ultra-orthodox Judaism) struggle to keep their members in line and coerce their children into their grip.

That isn't about religion. It's about power. Political power. The religions that fear "blasphemy", demand obedience, and want theocracy are political organizations. They should be treated as such. They have no moral right to demand that they not be criticized. Indeed, citizens have a duty to point out their failings and fight their excesses.

So keep that "blasphemy" going out. Religious leaders, not their followers, should be afraid. (And up the production value; "Innocence of Muslims" was ineptly executed. Read "Florence of Arabia" for what's needed.)

History I believe furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade of ignorance, of which their political as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves for their own purpose. - Jefferson

In a recent Gallup poll it has been shown that there has been no change in 30 years of Americans accepting evolution as truth. What do you think are the major factors for this?

At the same time, it's now OK to be an atheist in the US. What does Dawkins think of it ?

Couldn't they simply be, um, very frisky? Not every nation's total fertility rate is similar to the West's (below replacement). Here's charts on Muslem population by country note how fast many of the nations (Egypt, Afganistan, Indonesia, and Banglidesh for example) are growing even as emmigration to many other nations boosts populations rapidly in those nations.

Then why do half of all scientists consider themselves Christian?

At least if you're talking about in the US, I think you're overstating the number quite a bit. But even if it's true, considerably more than half of the US population as a whole identifies as Christian, so there's still a pretty strong negative correlation between being a scientist and being a Christian, or religious in any form.

Education
Fuel wouldn't be a problem, though, if North Korea didn't squander all of its money on its military. It doesn't need one; no one's threatening them. The US, China, and South Korea all loathe the thought of having to take care of all of the North Korean citizens.

Food
The people mourning are always from the few rich areas like Pyongyang. Out in the country, it's a completely different story. There are images of emaciated children in this video around 6:30. At 20:20 you can also see rice donated by relief agencies being sold for profit.

Indoctrination
In Canada, Alberta and Quebec aren't directly opposed to each other, but they do have very different value systems and priorities. Alberta is a wealthy rural province with most of its economy built privately through oil money, and Quebec is perhaps less wealthy, but has a long and intimate history of government support. It's a little like putting Texas and France in the same country—the cultural differences are much, much deeper than just language.
This 2007 survey suggests that about 16% of Americans were atheist. At least an additional 18% (mainline Protestant) and 4.7% (non-Christians) can probably be assumed to be level-headed thinkers, even if they're heavily exposed to religion. The real problem is the 26.3% evangelical Christians, who are the group that reject evolution and believe their nation is chosen by God.

Pluralism
Mass media in the US is divided according to political party. Republicans watch Fox, Democrats watch CNN and NBC. The political divide in the US is so extreme (almost every election is about 50/50) that swinging a vote can only happen at a municipal scale.

Colonialism and the Free World
No, it wasn't how I was using it, but that's apparently what it means! For better or worse, the US invented the idea of the free world and owns it.
Depending on who you ask, the freest country is probably either Hong Kong or Denmark.

Of you course, most Atheists are more ignorant than religious nut jobs. And my most Atheists, I mean only the ones that feel the need to tell the world they are atheists in order to make themselves feel superior. Anyone who comes out and starts debating something by leading their argument with critisms of someone rather than their though patterns, its certain they aren't talking about anything they actually know about.

Ironically, your post proves YOU don't know what you're talking about. Atheists are on average more knowledgeable about religion than believers. See for example this poll - and here's an excerpt, in case you don't feel like following the link:

Atheists and agnostics, Jews and Mormons are among the highest-scoring groups on a new survey of religious knowledge, outperforming evangelical Protestants, mainline Protestants and Catholics on questions about the core teachings, history and leading figures of major world religions.

On average, Americans correctly answer 16 of the 32 religious knowledge questions on the survey by the Pew Research Centerâ(TM)s Forum on Religion & Public Life. Atheists and agnostics average 20.9 correct answers. Jews and Mormons do about as well, averaging 20.5 and 20.3 correct answers, respectively. Protestants as a whole average 16 correct answers

I'd also like to point you to the following quote, from here:

American atheists and agnostics tend to be people who grew up in a religious tradition and consciously gave it up, often after a great deal of reflection and study, said Alan Cooperman, associate director for research at the Pew Forum.

"These are people who thought a lot about religion," he said. "They're not indifferent. They care about it."

Atheists and agnostics also tend to be relatively well educated, and the survey found, not surprisingly, that the most knowledgeable people were also the best educated. However, it said that atheists and agnostics also outperformed believers who had a similar level of education.
 
 

Ah but those people are not politically relevant or culturally influential, other than being laughed at.

The 40% of the population of the USA who believe in literal creationism are not politically relevant?

I was pretty sure that 40% was a bit high so I started poking around for numbers. According to Wikipedia (original source here), Evangelicals only make up around 26% of the population. This is the only large group I was aware of that would adhere to literal creationism as a rule, though they do not hold the belief universally. From my understanding a small percentage of Catholics adhere to literal creationsim also.

I then checked out the Gallup Poll that states the 40% number. I found this difficult to believe, but the wording of the question may influence the answer. I think that perhaps many Americans across all religions (including those who vaguely 'believe in god') don't really understand the difference between 10,000 years and 10,000,000 years. Maybe a lot of (even reasonably intelligent) people just don't care that much, and file it all away as "stuff that happened a long time ago".

Reference for US - people who agree that evolution is the best explanation for the origins of human life on earth.
In "Western" countries, most people appear to believe in human evolution. It appears that in the areas with strong public education and innocuous religious institutions, people tend to believe in evolution.

The data I can find is very sparse regarding belief in evolution in African and Middle-Eastern countries. (I note Turkey at that second link, and wonder if that's an indicator of beliefs in other nearby countries.)

Is evidence that even a majority of people in the world believe in evolution?

Yes really.

"John C. Green, a senior fellow at the Pew Forum, said he was surprised to see that teaching both evolution and creationism was favored not only by conservative Christians, but also by majorities of secular respondents, liberal Democrats and those who accept the theory of natural selection. Mr. Green called it a reflection of "American pragmatism."

Which doesn't address the point I made at all. Unquantified majorities on both sides displaying pragmatism doesn't say how many of each side believe in evolution.

The very same Pew Forum, in 2006 shows my assertion correct:
"Nor is the rejection of evolution a result of political or ideological beliefs. While Republicans and conservatives are more apt than Democrats or liberals to deny that evolution occurs, this correlation is mostly a result of the large number of evangelicals with creationist views in the Republican Party and among conservatives."
http://www.pewforum.org/Politics-and-Elections/Many-Americans-Uneasy-with-Mix-of-Religion-and-Politics.aspx#3

And your rejection of the very many studies showing liberals more intelligent than conservatives on the basis that people don't know what politics they have is laughable. The complaint about "kids" refers to a particular study of childhood intelligence together with how they later voted at age 34. At age 34 they know their politics very well.

I'm afraid neither of your denials are based in fact. They are imaginary arguments that you created from the gist you got from a couple of Googled articles. You cooked them up to support your beliefs, unconcerned that there was no hard fact in them. Typical right wing behaviour.

Except the tea party is all too willing to wade into social issues. Far more than the average Republican these days. The Tea Party could have been great, but it was poisoned by Fox, and taken over by corporations. Groundswell movements don't spontaneously show up in strength like this. They are so well organized that the entire nation is in sync, and they typically don't' have the largest ranging news station broadcasting their 'merits' 24/7:

http://www.pewforum.org/Politics-and-Elections/Tea-Party-and-Religion.aspx

A new analysis by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life finds that Tea Party supporters tend to have conservative opinions not just about economic matters, but also about social issues such as abortion and same-sex marriage. In addition, they are much more likely than registered voters as a whole to say that their religion is the most important factor in determining their opinions on these social issues.2 And they draw disproportionate support from the ranks of white evangelical Protestants.

Couple that with their refusal to compromise on any topic and you have what most would call an extremist.

You are correct in terms of government, but not in terms of makeup. It was overwhelmingly Christian in terms of makeup at formation, and for a large majority of its history.

As a matter of fact, a recent poll shows adults residing in the US is still overwhelmingly claim Christian affiliation. I'm not sure I believe this necessarily represents their true innermost beliefs, but there you go. I don't have any better evidence.

That's funny because the greatest deniers of AGW are white evangelicals: http://www.pewforum.org/Science-and-Bioethics/Religious-Groups-Views-on-Global-Warming.aspx

What part of religion is it that some atmospheric gases absorb infrared? Ever notice how on cloudy nights the temperature falls less than on clear nights? That's the greenhouse effect in action. More greenhouse gas (water) means less heat escapes to space, thus it stays warmer. Water is the main greenhouse gas, mainly because there is a lot more of it, about 1% of the atmosphere, vs 0.04% CO2. But you cannot ignore the CO2 contribution, because water vapor concentration is highly non-linear with temperature. Thus any temperature effect caused by CO2 is magnified about 3 times by added water vapor. The reason so much more vapor can get in the air is because the Earth is mostly covered in water, and even the land parts are mostly covered in wet objects (soil and plants).

The extra CO2 is demonstrably from humans, because the Carbon-13 ratio is changing along with the CO2 level. Plants have a 2% lower C-13 ratio than inorganic sources. The only source of enough plant-derived CO2 to explain the ratio shift is fossil fuels plus deforestation, i.e humans. Where is there belief in this chain of logic, rather than observation and deduction?

Atheists are absolutely not knowledgeable about "many" religions, or even one. Briefly browsing the wikipedia page doesn't count.

I'm sorry, but you're completely and demonstrably wrong. Studies have shown atheists to be the most knowledgeable about religion: see here. Some quick items from the study: atheists top the religious knowledge survey, with an average of 20.9 correct responses out of 32, followed by Jews and Mormons with 20.5 and 20.3 respectively. White mainline protestants only managed 15.8. Atheists score second only to Jews in the knowledge of world religions, and far above white evangelicals. Also, an interesting quote from here:

American atheists and agnostics tend to be people who grew up in a religious tradition and consciously gave it up, often after a great deal of reflection and study, said Alan Cooperman, associate director for research at the Pew Forum.

  "These are people who thought a lot about religion," he said. "They're not indifferent. They care about it."

Here is my attempt to win my own prize. When Lech Walesa was starting his work in the Polish shipyards and the Polish militia, the outer ring of the Polish army were closing in on Gdansk, he was interviewed with his then-fairly small group, and he was asked, aren't you frightened, aren't you afraid? You've taken on a whole all-powerful state and army - aren't you scared? And he said, I'm not frightened of anything but God or anyone but God.

This came back to me. I thought, well, this meets my two criteria. It's certainly a noble thing to have said, a distinguished thing to have said, and I certainly couldn't have said it. So it does meet both my criteria.

To me, this is very impressive. To write a book asserting that "religion poisons everything", and then say that there might sometimes be a few things that religion does not poison, and that belief in God might sometimes inspire great courage in ways that atheism cannot... well, wow. It shows great courage on the part of CH, motivated purely by intellectual honesty as far as I can tell. Who could not admire that?

That would make all kinds of sense except that the Tea Party, currently a major part of the GOP support is NOT largely made up of social conservatives just fiscal.

"They are mostly social conservatives, not libertarians on social issues. Nearly two-thirds (63%) say abortion should be illegal in all or most cases, and less than 1-in-5 (18%) support allowing gay and lesbian couples to marry."

46% of Tea Party adherents cite religion as the prime influence on their abortion views, compared to 40% of Republicans.

The current lead candidate in the GOP primary race is a Mormon, not even recognized as a Christian by the traditional Moral Majority Zelots.

Tied at just 21% (as of yesterday) isn't a particularly strong endorsement. Meanwhile just about every explicitly tea party candidate in any race has been a Christian conservative.

Actually, they do. Europe, especially. But I'm sure that has everything to do with the FDA wanting to make sure new treatments don't kill more patients than they save.

Why is it most atheists know more than most Christians do about there own religion?

http://pewforum.org/other-beliefs-and-practics/u-s-religious-knowledge-survey.aspx/

I always found this survey interesting.

It's pretty strange that 7% of Mormons are unaware of Joseph Smith's religion.

I always found this survey interesting.

Be very careful about your assumptions. "whereas in the US, the majority of the country supports gay marriage" is likely very false

It's almost certainly false. In 2009, the Pew Center found that 54% of the Americans they polled opposed same-sex marriage. This figure has fluctuated over the years, but in only one 2008 poll did the figure slip below 50%, and then only by a mere percentage point. Explicit support for same-sex marriage never breaks 40% in any year that article reports.

The good news for the future is that younger cohorts are more likely to accept same-sex marriage, though even among 18-29 year-olds, there's about an equal number of opponents and supporters.