Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics

Well before I left but also before I had time to respond.  It was just pointing to another blog that is claiming the statistical data for atheists being underrepresented in prisons is a lie.  The site is Thoughtful Faith and the post is called Atheists in prison.

He starts by looking at Scottish prisons.

A higher percentage of Scottish inmates claim to have no religion in comparison to the general population. According to the Scottish Government’s Statistical Bulletin, Prison Statistics Scotland 2007-8, Table 8, 34.1% of the prison population has no religion. This compares with 19% of the general Scottish population answering that they had no religion, according to the ICM research faith survey conducted for the BBC in November 2005.

You can find the prison numbers on page 21.  Scotland has a total of 7,154 males and females in prison.  2,442 list none as their religion.  The faith survey he links uses an even smaller number of people, 1,019.  Of the 1,019 surveyed 227 listed no religion.  I am actually looking at the 2001 Census, which surveys everyone.  It gives a more accurate number of 27.55% listing as no religion.  Still the number of atheists in jail in Scotland is more than the population by 6.58%.  I am fairly sure that 6% would fall within standard deviation.  Also that just because one small subset in one area is equal does not mean that it is equal everywhere.

This is a bell curve:

When dealing with statistics one has to understand what a bell curve is and what it means.  Notice the majority of responses will fall into the middle range around the mean, which is usually simplified to average.  You will have outliers on both ends of the spectrum.  So having a small prison system that lies outside the mean is to be expected.

He also uses stats from England and Wales.

A higher percentage of English and Welsh inmates claim to have no religion in comparison to the general population. According to the March 2000 report, Religion in Prisons, 31.9% of inmates claimed to have “no religion”, of whom 0.2% who specifically answered that they were “atheists” and 0.1% who answered that they were “agnostic”. The national census, 15.5% of people in the general population answered that they had “no religion” and 7.3% gave no answer at all. Therefore between 15.5% and 22.8% of the general population were atheists, in comparison with  31.9% of inmates.

First off, if they don't claim to be an atheist you can't just relabel them as atheists.  So atheists consisted of 0.2% of the prison population.  By his own links, he shows that the census didn't even distinguish between atheists, agnostics and other non religious people.  So there is no way to compare the numbers here, without just making stuff up.

Finally he gets to America, which is what the original subject of atheists in prisons is about (apples, oranges, what's the difference).

The United States keeps no official statistics on religious beliefs of inmates. The claim that atheists were under-represented in prisions was seemingly started, by Rod Swift, who wrote it on his website, and publicized the claim through the internet and sceptical magazines. He claims that he received an email from an employee of the Federal Bureau of Prisons, Denise Golumbaski. According to this email, 0.2% of those surveyed specifically answered they were “atheist” and 19.8% give no answer. This compares with 0.5% of the US population at the time who identified as atheist, and 4 to 6% (according to Gallop) who gave no answer.

Rod Swift was one of the two sources I originally quoted.  The other source I found was from the Skeptic files.  It verifies the findings of Rod Swift over a longer period of time than just a single year.

In the end, there are many factors that make up why people are in prison and claiming any one is a bit silly.  I actually agree with his last statement, well except for the first and last part.

Although all three surveys indicate that people of “no religion” are overrepresented in prison, there are many complex factors which could be linked to criminal behaviour – including levels of education, age, economic well being. It may well be, for example, that atheists tend to be younger and more active – and therefore more likely to display criminal behaviour for reasons which have little or nothing to do with the atheist worldview. Nevertheless the claim that atheists are under-represented in prison is contradicted by the data in England, Wales, the US and also in Scotland.

I leave you with Norway via Russell's Teapot:

Edit:  Apparently FreeThoughtPedia thinks they own the rights to Russell's Teapot just because they were one of the many hosting the image.  So I have grabbed it from another source.

TF - Chapter 5 - The Problem of Evil

This could also be called 'How to Solve the Problem of Evil Via Red Herring'.

Of course the reason everything in the world is not perfect is because Satan appeared as a serpent (find Biblical quotes stating that it was Satan) and tricked Eve into eating a magical fruit that allowed her to tell the difference between good and evil.  Yes, someone who could not know that they were committing evil has damned us all.  That is Colson's premise and the premise of most Creationist Christians.  Colson does nothing to prove his premise but just states it and goes on.

Colson starts off describing the problem of evil and describing it well.

But why would God bring a world into existence that would be characterized by such evil and suffering?  What about "acts of God" like hurricanes, tsunamis, floods, and famine?  Humanity is afflicted with cancer and a thousand other diseases.  Can all the evil of the world be attributed to humankind's failings?  Is God truly innocent?  He put Adam and Eve in a situation where He knew, if God is omniscient, or all-knowing, that they would fail.

The last bit is a bit of a red herring but could easily fall into the discussion. It is usually the excuse for evil, but it ignores natural disasters.  Epicurus is credited with the first asking of the problem but Sextus Empiricus wrote the oldest extant version of it.  It states:

1. If a perfectly good god exists, then evil does not.
2. There is evil in the world.
3. Therefore, a perfectly good god does not exist.

It has changed some since but the basics of it are still the same.  The way I like to hear it is, as stated by David Hume:

"Is He willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then He is impotent. Is He able, but not willing? Then He is malevolent. Is He both able and willing? Whence then is evil?"

So what is Colson's answer to the problem of evil?  Free will causes evil and God wants us to have free will.  He never describes what free will is and how that is compatible with an omniscient God ( you can't do anything without God already knowing what you are going to do, thus free will is more of an illusion, as your choices are known ahead of time and in a sense predetermined).  He also never explains how free will causes natural disasters.  Instead Colson tells the story of a pilot that ignores his instruments and kills almost everyone on board.  What this has to do with anything, I have no clue.  It is a nice Red Herring.

Next Colson claims that evil is only here because of sin.  So, yes because a rib-woman ate a fruit, we have to deal with natural disasters.  He backs up this assessment by telling a story of asking a bunch of prisoners, in his church service, what they thought the cause of the increase in prison population.  They, according to Colson, all answered sin.  So obviously it must be sin.  It couldn't possibly have anything to do with a war on drugs that targets victims and not the root causes of drugs?  Also if it is sin, then surely countries that are more religious will have less crime than non-religious ones?  Let's look at the stats.

 According to a Gallop poll in 2007-2008 the top ten most religious countries were:

1. Egypt
2. Bangladesh
3. Sri Lanka
4. Indonesia
5. Congo
6. Sierra Leone
7. Malawi
8. Senegal
9. Djibouti
10. Morocco

The least 10 were:

1. Estonia
2. Sweden
3. Denmark
4. Norway
5. Czech Republic
6. Azerbaijan
7. Hong Kong
8. Japan
9. France
10. Mongolia

The top 10 countries with highest prison percentage:

1. United States
2. China
3. Belarus
4. Bermuda
5. Kazakhstan
6. The Virgin Islands
7. The Cayman Islands
8. Turkmenistan
9. Belize
10. Suriname

So what's it mean?  Well nothing as there seems to only be a slight correlation and correlation does not equal causation anyway.  There are many factors that go into prison populations, most of them are socio-economical.  Laying it all at the feet of sin is just ridiculous and ignores a vast number of issues.  Plus it doesn't answer the question of evil and natural disasters.  This is all just one giant red herring to make people forget about the problem.

Colson never answers the problem of evil in this chapter.  He goes on about Satan and sin and anything to throw off the fact that his God has the power to stop natural disasters that harm innocents but never does anything.