If we measured the IQ of Christians and Atheists?

Question

Between Christians and Atheists, who do you think would be the smarter of the two and why?

Im not being Biased its just a general question.
For fun.

Answer 1

There is a negative correlation between intelligence and religious belief.

http://w-uh.com/posts/031226a-religion_vs_IQ.html
http://kspark.kaist.ac.kr/Jesus/Intelligence%20&%20religion.htm



I expect theists who claim the opposite to cite no studies, and provide either no evidence or anecdotal evidence.

Answer 2

Christians, easily. (PS, opinion modified based on research, see below)

However, real IQ tests are subjectively administrated by a clinical psychologist. The IQ tests that you take on the computer or written tests do not test IQ. These "written tests" determine the takers reading comprehension and understanding of the language the tests are in.

This goes back to the "Ebonics" debate. Children were being taught a dialect of English when being brought up in specific cultures and this dialect did not often translate easily into what most people would call "proper English". Like all dialects "Ebonics" was designed to easily communicate the things considered important in the culture.

Since most scholastic achievement tests have multi-lingual components for people who speak different primary languages by declaring Ebonics a dialect of English tests could be written so that people in specific American cultures could more easily understand them.

Most people in the States know that people from different parts of the nation speak differently and most know that "Spanish" and "Castelano (sic?)" are similar but different languages.

Since IQ tests are subjective based on language skills or psychologist experience/personal prejudice IQ is a very poor way to determine intelligence.

One of the smartest guys I ever knew grew up in the projects of Detroit and could not read for anything. If he had taken a written IQ test he would have failed miserably and been declared mentally retarded.

PS: 157 Christian

PPS: Studies (edu) have been conducted that show no specific correlation between religion and intelligence, however, the studies do appear to have discovered a relationship between a fathers education level and a child's level of religious devotion.

The studies I read (just now) have been conducted primarily on college students and do not represent population as a whole, either in this nation or in the United States.

In addition, many of the studies on sites other than edu are extremely subjective even when they claim objectivity. This is apparently something some Atheist researchers appear to be doing a lot of propagandizing about.

The atheist intelligence propaganda I read seems to be directed at attracting people with low self esteem and or intelligence levels who would like to appear "smarter" by becoming an "atheist", which explains why I get some really illogical and unreasonable (stu*id) hate mail from people claiming they are atheists.

Interestingly many stated atheists seem to pray which would indicate a belief in a higher being. Interesting.

It would be interesting to have a well funded group of clinical psychologists (9 or so) do a broad based research project on this subject. I don't think it would solve anything, but, it would be interesting.

Answer 3

As an atheist, I believe such an indeavor would be futile, and it would prove nothing. But I think it would be fun, any ways..... Hehe.

Okay, so lets make a list of intelligent non-christians. Albert Einstein (please, I don't want to read a counter comment qouting Einstein on god), Carl Sagan, Isaac Asimov,Richard Feynman, Richard Dawkins, Steven Weinberg, Jane Goodall, Francis Crick, James Watson, Richard Dawkins, Charles Darwin, James Hutton, Stephen Hawking, Diderot, Mark Twain... the list could go on for I don't know how long. Let me also add two special non-orthodox christians, Isaac Newton and Sir Lord Kelvin.

Now, for the christians. Hmmm. Galileo is a catholic, and so I think is JRR Tolkien. CS Lewis is a christian. The present president of the Human Genome Project is, I've heard, also a christian. There are a lot of intelligent christians in other fields but, ummm.... Gosh, I think this list just can't be helped.

So, I put my bets on the atheists on this one.

Answer 4

Hello,

They would both be on equal footing. Look at two examples; the evolutionist and atheist Dawkins and Pope Benedict.
One is a great bilogist scientist and writer with a doctorate degree, the other is a theologian, has a few doctorate degrees, speaks several languages including Greek, Latin and Hebrew and is an accomplished piano player. I'm sure they like many others would be on equal footing don't you think?

Michael Kelly

Answer 5

Studies have shown that atheism increases with education level.

So that would give some indication that atheist would have a higher IQ on average.

There are some very intelligent Christians out there, along with intelligent Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, etc. So on a individual basis there is no way to tell.

Answer 6

Livermore California has the highest average IQ of any place in the world. This is due to the two Nuclear research labs that hire primarily PHD's. 82 % of the scientists at the Labs are Christian with 14% being of othe faiths and 8% Atheist. This is about the same as the national average.

I'd say there is no corolation.

Answer 7

Well, I would be confused if I were a Christian who was just deciding to become and atheist.

Oh, you know that people are the same. Some very bright scientific types are Christians. But why is the question about Christians and atheists and not believers and atheists? Is your bias showing?

Answer 8

Based on the bad logic, bad spelling and bad grammar on Y!A I think it's a pretty clear cut case in favor of the atheists.

Outside this very limited population it's hard to say. Since larger groups have more of a chance of creating a bell curve, a smaller group like the atheists could benefit since their population is smaller, but if you only counted Christians who don't actually positively assert their belief then it might even things out a bit.

So, I think that if you consider how atheists tend to be scientific-minded, curious, inquisitive and skeptical I would be almost certain that this group would have a higher overall IQ. Considering that, at least in the US, most atheists become so as a result of a higher level of education I would consider the margin to be wider than one might think.

But an IQ test can be rather academic and measure not just aptitude but also (taught) knowledge, so, being a skeptic, I would naturally discount and results that were statistically insignificant.

Answer 9

The idea of intelligence based on belief is pure bigotry. While the Atheist love trying to convince people that theirs is the more intelligent way, some of our greatest scientists have been Christians.

Those small minded Christians only make up 7% of the global Christian population. Why should we all be blamed for their failings?

Answer 10

There wouldn't be a difference. Belief or non-belief is not a matter of IQ, and IQ tests do not measure the things that contribute to that. There are very intelligent and very dull people on both sides.

Answer 11

it wouldn't be a fair competition. the two groups tend to be educated differently. maybe if you take a sample of college educated people working in similar career fields and test their iqs then you could see if there was a difference...