Excerpts from:
Unrealistic fatalism in U.S. youth ages 14 to 22: prevalence and characteristics.
Jamieson PE, Romer D.
J Adolesc Health 2008 Feb;42(2):154-60.

Approximately 1 out of every 15 youth interviewed (6.7%, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 5.9%, 7.5%) responded that they agreed they would not live much past the age of 30.

Fatalistic youth engaged in greater suicidal planning, had more accepting attitudes toward suicide, were less attached to religion, and were more impulsive than other youth.

Youth who were more religious, both in identifying with a religion and attending services, were significantly less likely to be fatalistic, an effect that remained in the model despite controlling for suicide acceptance. In addition to not accepting suicide, religion may also act as a buffer against fatalism because it provides reasons for living that may help to counteract stressors that trigger feelings of hopelessness about the future [30–32].

Spirituality — defined as an inner belief system — accounted for eight to 17 per cent of the average child's sense of happiness, the study showed.
By contrast, money, the marital status of parents and the child's gender didn't even register one per cent.
[…..]
"What we found out with kids is they know how wealthy they are. They are well aware of how rich their parents are, but it contributes to less than one per cent of children's happiness," said Holder.
Spirituality could be playing a larger role for several reasons. It produces a sense of hope and meaning and often involves socializing, which is important to a child's happiness.

- HERE

TT member Nick (not Matzke) outlined his views as a theistic evolutionist. He summarizes as follows:

I'm content with the label "theistic evolutionist," and I believe that:
a) God is the Creator;
b) the history and process by which God created living things is best explained by modern evolutionary biology, rather than "Intelligent Design" in its various incarnations;
c) that process included events that we (correctly) perceive as chance or the results of natural selection, but
d) those events were nevertheless known to God "before" the creation of the Universe, the universe is sustained by God's will, and nothing happens contrary to his will.

I bring this up because this is very close to my own theological views. I would quibble about (b) because I am not convinced modern evolutionary biology and Intelligent Design are mutually exclusive and keep an eye on ID for reasons I have explained before. But perhaps more interesting is point c). From my experience, many theists seem uncomfortable with chance playing a significant role in history. But I think God works through chance. What say you?

David Berlinski will conduct a tour of the United States in April to promote his newest book The Devil's Delusion. Berlinski is a talented writer, an imposing intellect and not reluctant to buck the tide of prevailing opinion.

Confident assertions by scientists that… they have demonstrated that God does not exist have nothing to do with science, and even less to do with God's existence.- David Berlinski

Attitudes about Intelligent Design are influenced by how we view science and God and whether our view of one affects our attitude toward the other. New Atheists have weighed in with their opinions. Another perspective from a bright analytical mind not committed to theism or Christianity is a refreshing turn of events.

Check it out. It's interesting to find that Miller does not consider himself a theistic evolutionist.

Mike Gene has pointed out that the identity of the designer need not be God. However, for theists, if living organisms were designed, the most likely agent is God. Many modern theists have objections to God directly designing organisms. Some see it as "tinkering" and beneath God's dignity. Others think that it means God would be forcing His will on the universe, and contrary to His nature, which allows as much freedom to His creation as possible. And others think the idea of God directly designing organisms is more vulnerable to the philosophical problem of evil than a God who leaves the universe alone. Read the rest of this entry »

The Books section of the weekend New York Times offers this article:
Dumb and Dumber: Are Americans Hostile to Knowledge?

It begins…

A popular video on YouTube shows Kellie Pickler, the adorable platinum blonde from “American Idol,” appearing on the Fox game show “Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?” during celebrity week. Selected from a third-grade geography curriculum, the $25,000 question asked: “Budapest is the capital of what European country?”

Ms. Pickler threw up both hands and looked at the large blackboard perplexed. “I thought Europe was a country,” she said. Playing it safe, she chose to copy the answer offered by one of the genuine fifth graders: Hungary. “Hungry?” she said, eyes widening in disbelief. “That’s a country? I’ve heard of Turkey. But Hungry? I’ve never heard of it.”

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The Irrationality of Science is a Viewpoint article which comments on the recent op ed piece by Paul Davies. A quote from the Davies article is followed by the author's response. My comments follow that.

Davies:

Science, we are repeatedly told, is the most reliable form of knowledge about the world because it is based on testable hypotheses. Religion, by contrast, is based on faith….In science, a healthy skepticism is a professional necessity, whereas in religion, having belief without evidence is regarded as a virtue.

Viewpoint author:

The last sentence is an irritatingly common misrepresentation of faith. Faith is not believing despite the lack of evidence, faith is believing despite the fact that the evidence falls short of proof. Anyway, Davies is going to argue that science, like religion, is ultimately based on faith:

Read the rest of this entry »

Bradford posted about Paul Davies' op-ed in the New York Times on the thread Science and Faith. Which quickly went downhill as our live-in critics decended like vultures to put a quick stop to any real discussion.

The SciBlog community wasn't hampered by such tactics, so came out hot and heavy in defense of their ideology against Davies' observations. Anti-theist PZ Myers insisted that Faith is not a prerequisite for science, but only managed to demonstrate laughable ignorance of the relevant science. My favorite excerpts…

When someone says that life would not exist if the laws of physics were just a little bit different, I have to wonder… how do they know? Just as there are many different combinations of amino acids that can make any particular enzyme, why can't there be many different combinations of physical laws that can yield life?

Read the rest of this entry »

Paul Davies authored Taking Science on Faith an opinion piece in the New York Times. He asks some questions about laws of physics at the end of this paragraph:

The most refined expression of the rational intelligibility of the cosmos is found in the laws of physics, the fundamental rules on which nature runs. The laws of gravitation and electromagnetism, the laws that regulate the world within the atom, the laws of motion — all are expressed as tidy mathematical relationships. But where do these laws come from? And why do they have the form that they do?

Davies next notes an attitude shift and the dependence of life on a limited range of mathematical values. We live in a universe that accomodates life; a most convenient condition.

Read the rest of this entry »