An Atheist President?

In a similar way to the way cows want to know what other cows are up to, so they can do the same thing, humans are very interested in the opinions of other humans, so they can have the same ones. This interest gave rise in America to the Gallup Organisation; a private group that collects statistical data about what Americans think (on those occasions when they are thinking).

Between the 2nd and 4th of March 2007 the Gallup Organisation asked Americans the following question. The responses are shown below.

Between now and the 2008 political conventions, there will be discussion about the qualifications of presidential candidates -- their education, age, religion, race, and so on. If your party nominated a generally well-qualified person for president who happened to be ..., would you vote for that person?

This data is of particular interest at present because two front running candidates for pre-selection as the presidential candidate for the Democrat party do not fit the standard mould of White Male Protestant, one being black (Barack Obama) and another being a woman (Hillary Rodham Clinton). While these figures, on the face of them, do not appear to reflect too badly in terms of average American prejudice against blacks and women, (93% and 89% respectively would be prepared to vote for a black or a woman), look at the numbers from the reverse:

7% (about 20.8 million) of average Americans would not vote for an otherwise well-qualified candidate from their party, because they are black, and 11% (about 32.7 million) of average Americans would not vote for an otherwise well-qualified candidate from their party because they are a woman.

But that's not the whole story. Down at the bottom of the list are Atheists, with less than half the surveyed Americans being prepared to vote for them. Statistically, Americans are far more likely to vote a Mormon into the White House, than an Atheist. For those who aren't aware of what Mormons believe, you may like to refer to my previous post. This data is spectacularly supported by statistics of the religious affiliation of current U.S. Senators, 5 of whom (Robert Foster Bennett, Mike Crapo, Orrin Hatch, Harry Reid and Gordon H. Smith) are Mormons.

Currently there are no U.S. Senators who site their religious affiliation as: "No Religion/Atheist/Agnostic", yet this category is embodied by 15% of the U.S. population according to the 2001 Census. So it is very fortunate for Mr Obama and Ms Clinton that they believe in God (and that they aren't gay), otherwise they'd have no chance of ever getting elected. Can you imagine? A gay, atheist female president? Or a gay, atheist black president? or even a gay atheist black female president? My God! Give me a President who believes Adam and Eve were Americans any day over that!!!

A Brief History of Specialness

Human beings lack the capacity to understand that events may occur in the world that are beyond the control of a sentient, conscious being. Very young children imagine their toys are invested with consciousness and that their teddy bear will provide them with security and defense against unforeseen nasty events that may occur during the night. This concept of investing non-conscious things with consciousness is known as "Animism". Some children even invest such diverse and unlikely objects as the common blanket with this property. Similarly, it was impossible for our ancestors, several thousand years ago to accept that meteorological events such as drought or rain were the result of natural forces that were beyond human influence. They developed the belief that the forces of nature were influenced and controlled by the whims of conscious, sentient beings, and they named these beings; "gods".

Humans in these ancient times coexisted in extended family groupings known as tribes. Although the beliefs of these tribes were essentially very similar, each tribe held its own derivative set of beliefs, and each tribe felt that they were held in the particular favour of the gods, and that by performing certain ritual acts, such as sacrificing animals, or even other tribe members, they could win the favour of the gods and influence them to direct the natural forces in such a way as to bring prosperity to the tribe. This made them feel special.

Now, about 5000 years ago, one of these ancient tribes, a nomadic people known as The Jews, who lived in a largely infertile desert region now known as the Middle East, developed an idea that was a little different to the other tribes. Their idea was that, rather than many gods, there was only one God. In most other respects though, their particular variety of theism (belief in a God) was essentially undifferentiated from those of the other tribes. This God still controlled natural resources and outcomes, and could be influenced by the performance of human rituals. The Jews also felt that this one God held their tribe in special favour as differentiated from all the other humans on the planet. There was only one God, and he was a God that loved the Jews best among all humans. This belief made the Jews feel very special.

Nearly 3000 years later, a tribe known as The Romans learned to rely on their own ingenuity more than on the influence of the gods, and as a consequence they became highly skilled in the art of war. Successful conquests of other tribes provided the Romans with slaves and other resources with which to support their own tribe, which consequently expanded into something known as an empire. The Jews were among the many tribes conquered and subjugated by the Romans, and like most of the other tribes they were not very happy. During this time, one particular Jew named Jesus expressed dissatisfaction with the Romans, and for a brief time he was able to carry out a brave program of political dissidence, until the Romans got wind of his antics and had him executed.

Subsequent to Jesus' execution a breakaway tribe of Jews, known as the Christians formed and proclaimed that God no longer held the old Jewish tribe in his favour. This new Christian God held the Christians in special favour. The Christians introduced an important innovation into their belief, which was that people from other tribes were welcome to break away, join the Christian tribe and by so doing, win the favour of the Christian God. Because of this innovation the Christian tribe grew swiftly throughout the Roman Empire. This made the Christians feel very special.

A few hundred years later, in the 7th century, the issue became really confused when an elder of another nomadic desert tribe named Muhammad started telling people that God didn't favour the Christians after all, and that in order to win God's favour they needed to join his new tribe called the Moslems. Becoming a Moslem made people feel very special.

As the Christians grew more numerous they split into different tribes that each believed they were so special and that God loved them so much that they refused to talk to each other. The Moslems also grew and split into separate tribes and, like the Christians, they were also too special to have anything to do with each other. As for the Jews, they'd been special for so long that everyone had had plenty of practice not talking to them.

Eventually God told the Christians that they needed to murder as many Moslems as possible, and conquer a city in the desert named Jerusalem. So Christians went to Jerusalem and killed as many Moslems as they could. This was known as "The Crusades".

Later, a period of intellectual exploration arrived during which humans invented science - which explained that events are not directed by Gods, but rather by natural laws which are not influenced by prayer, sacrifice or any other ritual. But the Jews, Christians and Moslems all felt so very special that they decided to ignore science and instead continue pretending that events on Earth are directed by God.

Hundreds of years later, Christians, Jews and Moslems continue to feel so special about being Christians, Moslems and Jews that they need to slaughter each other on a daily basis just to reinforce how special they are. A very small minority of humans called Atheists wish that everyone could just learn to deal with their insecurities enough to feel special without requiring the endorsement of a God to do so. These Atheists are understandably hated and pitied by everyone else and no-one is paying any attention to them. Meanwhile, sales of Teddy Bears, Bombs and Bibles are skyrocketing.