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Forums - Politics Discussion - Religious Children Have Difficulty Distinguishing Fact From Fiction

highwayuni said:
whatever said:
VXIII said:

Children with imagination have difficulty distinguishing fact from fiction. Which is about every child. That's why they are children.

Ummm, what?  Having a vivid imagination has nothing to do with distinguishing fact from fiction.  You must not have kids.

I teach kids. Kids at that age are gullible and will believe a lot of stuff you tell them.

Yeah, but religious kids are more likely to believe what you tell them according to this study.



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Scoobes said:
MTZehvor said:

I feel like you've missed the entire point.

Here we go once more:

The article's point is that kids' ability to determine the likelihood of a story being able to occur is skewed by being taught stories from the Bible which would seem far-fetched to most people. In other words, kids are unable to determine the probability of an event actually being able to occur because they believe that similar events have ocurred in the past.

The situation here is entirely different, because adults have the ability to weigh the probability, and STILL believe in it. In other words, they believe in spite of the improbability. They realize how far-fetched it sounds, and still believe in it. Kids, meanwhile, believe in it without recognizing how far-fetched it sounds. That is the difference.

Think of it like this: there are plenty of adults out there that believe in God despite not having done so as a child (and, to be fair, the inverse is true as well). IF this finding had any link towards adults, i.e. adults only believed in religion because their ability to determine the normal from the far-fetched was obscured, then we would not expect many children who are raised secular to become religious. But that isn't the case, only 46% of Americans who were unaffiliated with religion as children remain so as adults. Granted, we're discussing regions much bigger than just America here, but the point is still the same regardless; lots of people still believe in what seems far-fetched regardless of whether they were supposedly indoctrinated as kids.

My point is simply that there is no link between kids's ability to distinguish between far-fetched and realistic and adults'. Kids cannot distinguish, and so believe both. Adults can distinguish, and believe in spite of the difficulty. That's the difference, and why I believe this study is pointless towards drawing conclusions about adulthood.

To be fair, the original study didn't make this link. It talks specifically about children's development and ability to differentiate between reality and fiction rather than adulthood. It's not just religious stories either, but also stories featuring fantastical elements such as magic.

Basically, religious kids are more gullible than non-religious.

Right, and I realize that. My original point was directed towards the earlier posters in the thread, who were acting like this was some sort of horrible thing that would affect kids permanently or something.

It's nothing more than telling a six year old that Santa Claus exists. A six year old who believe in Santa Claus is probably more likely to answer "yes" when asked if the Easter bunny exists than a kid who doesn't. It doesn't mean their rational thinking is going to be affected, or their intelligence will be stunted, or anything. Are they more guillible for the time being? Perhaps, but the people arguing that this is somehow a permenant affect on their supposed guillibility are grasping at straws.



The_Sony_Girl1 said:
Guys stop it! This article is stupid, considering that while children are gullible, they always ask their parents or siblings if the things they learned was right. And NO ONE is born a Christian, that's a choice they make themselves.

Is it though? I'd argue that religion is often a desicion that is made for children by their parents.



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Ka-pi96 said:
Rawrerer said:

It is a fact that God is more probable. The probabilty for something to be created from nothing is the same probabilty as 0 = 1. Now the probabilty of a God who can manipulate physics into what he wants is far more probable. Just look at the math.

Dna and Rna have been compared to a computer code. What computer program do you know that created itself? A computer program is created by a programmer. That is the factual reality that God is more probable. Not saying God is 100% but i am saying that God is more likely then chaos.

I don't think you can try and argue what is more probable as a fact. For one thing, your analogy doesn't even work. If the universe was created by a deity then how was that deity created? Did it create itself? Does that not create the exact same problem that you think a universe without a deity had?

The theory of the God (om·nip·o·tent)- A god who can do anything can exist forever, see alpha and omega for more information.


"I don't think you can try and argue what is more probable as a fact." Well I just did so I guess I can.




Rawrerer said:
Ka-pi96 said:

I don't think you can try and argue what is more probable as a fact. For one thing, your analogy doesn't even work. If the universe was created by a deity then how was that deity created? Did it create itself? Does that not create the exact same problem that you think a universe without a deity had?

The theory of the God (om·nip·o·tent)- A god who can do anything can exist forever, see alpha and omega for more information.


"I don't think you can try and argue what is more probable as a fact." Well I just did so I guess I can.


God isn't more probable, if at all. It's an idea that humans came up with thousands of years ago because they couldn't explain certain phenomena such as weather. And let's say there is a god that exists. That god will not even be close to the Christian imagination of God or Yahweh or Allah.

Your DNA and RNA analogy is also dead wrong. Computer codes can be simply typed from the keyboard. However, it took millions, if not even a billion years for DNA and RNA to exist (see Miller-Urey experiment).



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"Religious Children Have Difficulty Distinguishing Fact From Fiction"

uh huh... and so do nonreligious children

its interesting to bear in mind though that a lot of the ideas that the general public holds as "fact" are fantasy

so if you ask me its a problem that is pervasive throughout society as a whole



Anfebious said:
It doesn't matter what this study says I will teach my kids about the love of Satan, my lord.


Is your dark lord stronger than my saviour, Cthulhu? Like do you reckon he could win in a game of hop-scotch?



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ikki5 said:
IIIIITHE1IIIII said:
Rawrerer said:

It is a fact that God is more probable. The probabilty for something to be created from nothing is the same probabilty as 0 = 1. Now the probabilty of a God who can manipulate physics into what he wants is far more probable. Just look at the math.

Dna and Rna have been compared to a computer code. What computer program do you know that created itself? A computer program is created by a programmer. That is the factual reality that God is more probable. Not saying God is 100% but i am saying that God is more likely then chaos.


Just because something can't be created from nothing that doesn't mean that something hasn't always been there. After all, that's how people explain God's existence. So why not be open for the possibility of matter always existing?

because then you have an even less likly occurance where you have Chaos from everything being pulled into order and staying maintained. It would be like if you took all the parts of a watch, shook the bag and you then came out with a working watch that was running on with the correct time.

But if you put all the base elements and chemicals in a bag they start making amino acids and base pairs... So they have a natural deposition to form the building blocks of life.





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justgames7604 said:
ikki5 said:
IIIIITHE1IIIII said:


Just because something can't be created from nothing that doesn't mean that something hasn't always been there. After all, that's how people explain God's existence. So why not be open for the possibility of matter always existing?

because then you have an even less likly occurance where you have Chaos from everything being pulled into order and staying maintained. It would be like if you took all the parts of a watch, shook the bag and you then came out with a working watch that was running on with the correct time.

But if you put all the base elements and chemicals in a bag they start making amino acids and base pairs... So they have a natural deposition to form the building blocks of life.




If you stuck Carbon, Nitrogen, Oxygen and Hydrogen into a bag, you won't get amino acids. Otherwise the atmosphere would be forming Amino Acids in redicious quantities in front of our eyes. We'd be swimming in them. There needs to be something to push the elements to form into that other wise they will just form into other easier things to create such as O2, CO2, H2 and N2, etc. You need something more than the base parts of those for them to be created. Also, when you say chemicals, that would mean other molecules formed by other elements which are again, usually Nitrogen, Hydrogen, Oxygen and Carbon though other elements may be included, still then, if you added them, the likihood of them just randomly forming into the side chains or the R group is very unlikily.



This thread is exactly as predicted.



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