… A newly-published study by sociologists Timothy O’Brien and Shiri Noy … “indicates that the conflict between science and religion may be limited to a few specific issues,” specifically evolution and creation. Religious Americans are not less knowledgeable about or supportive of science generally, “but may choose to interpret events in a religious light.” There may be less to the reported “conflict between reason and faith” than appears, O’Brien and Noy write.
Using the 2006, ‘08, and ‘10 General Social Surveys (GSS), which include many questions testing respondents’ scientific knowledge (for example, knowing about electrons, the earth’s core, genetics, and how antibiotics work) and a few questions measuring respondents’ attitudes toward religion, the authors distinguish three sets of Americans. CONT.
Claude Fischer, UC Berkeley