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[Phys-L] Re: Are Prisoners More Religious? (was: god friendly science)



It would be wonderful if there were any reliable data here with which to
apply the 'scientific method', but (again an opinion) you aren't going to
get it. People lie! They tell half-truths (how many on the list would
[have] identified themselves with a religion that they don't _really_
believe in). Those in prison can have ulterior motives for appearing
'religious'. You would need to do extensive interviews with the
respondents hooked up to lie detectors to (maybe) get the kind of data that
we could analyze 'scientifically'. All of which leads me back to
(slightly more than opinion because of all the factors Brian listed in
questioning the survey) that the data provided by Hugh is pretty useless.

Rick [Who takes to heart what Mark Twain said about statistics!]

****************************
Richard W. Tarara
Professor of Physics
Saint Mary's College
Notre Dame, IN 46556
rtarara@saintmarys.edu

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FREE: Windows and Mac Instructional Software
www.saintmarys.edu/~rtarara/software.html
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[Original Message]
From: Brian Whatcott <betwys1@SBCGLOBAL.NET>
To: <PHYS-L@LISTS.NAU.EDU>
Date: 5/27/2005 7:37:08 AM
Subject: Re: Are Prisoners More Religious? (was: god friendly science)

At 06:47 AM 5/27/2005, you wrote:
Such statistics are pretty much useless in determining how 'religious'
individuals really are. Very few people will list atheist but very many
people who would list a religious affiliation either don't really believe
in god or fundamentally ignore the teachings of 'their' religion. So I'm
not sure that you can draw anything meaningful from the below.

Rick

****************************
Richard W. Tarara

Richard is here offering an opinion. Sadly, we have read far to many
opinions on this important issue.

Can I instead ask that we engage the usual scientific attitude, which
details experimental protocol shortfalls? It is unhelpful that
I happen to agree with Richard on this one. We all have opinions.
But I expect science teachers to be swayed by scientific criticism
and not by opinion.


Brian Whatcott Altus OK Eureka!
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