Are Atheists Smarter Than Everyone Else?

Often research has been cited that shows atheists have, on average, higher IQ scores than theists. Does this mean religion makes you less intelligent or less intelligent people are more likely to become religious?

Thanks to the psychologist Jay Medenwaldt for helping to make this video.

Don't forget to help us create more videos! We need your support:

[wishyouthebest]

As an atheist I was proud of my intellect.

As a Christian I'm ashamed of my arrogance.

[SquizzMe]

Maybe more intelligent people are more prone to bias because their intelligence leads them to become arrogant, and therefore more stubborn against opposing views.

[JamesS]

“Well, I’m not biased. And you can test that.” Aron Ra

[adamduarte]

As a Christian who specializes in mathematical statistics, I really appreciate your use of the normal curve and suggesting the difference in believers and atheists might be non distinguishable based on effect size

[wax]

As an atheist this was incredibly refreshing to hear. I was half expecting the colloquial "bashing" but it very quickly delved deep into rationality.

I've never thought the argument made any sense in the first place, chiefly because of some of the reasons you mention, but it was good listening to the whole set of reasons, some I hadn't considered.

I appreciate the video.

[ThecrosseyedTexan]

Sounds like there's a very thin line between pride and intelligence and sometimes people play jump rope with it.

[theguywhocares]

The average Reddit atheists are surely not 🤣

[TacoTuesday]

Funny. In the area I grew up all the most intelligent kids were raised in Christian families. From my friend group all are still Christians and are things like CEO, Owner of their own company, software developer, QA engineer, Librarian, college professor, CPA among other professions and have thriving families.

[drhumupower]

I'm a PhD. I work with PhDs and MDs all day long. Many non-believers and a few mostly-secular believers. I see lots of people who are very good at applying very narrow kinds of critical and analytical thinking within their field of expertise, but the second you step outside of their expertise even slightly, the analytical/critical thinking goes to almost 0. Certainly some are more well rounded, but it's uncomfortable how many seem incapable of operating outside of a very narrow margin. All specific intelligence, virtually no general intelligence.

[joshd]

It's an odd assumption that higher intelligence would remove bias.

[williamwilson]

Had a conversation today.

“There’s no way a man could turn water into wine, walk on water, or be conceived by a virgin.”

“That’s why they’re called miracles, because they’re outside the bounds of everyday experience.”

“Shut up, we’ll agree to disagree.”

Pray for her, if you could.

[davidogundipe]

Someone should have told Leonardo da Vinci, Isaac Newton, and other great thinkers, that they're dumb compared to the highly intelligent atheists.

[davidogundipe]

Some atheist are a living Rick and Morty meme.

[KarlSumner-cnds]

This is an excellent video, IP. The conclusions reached have the unusual quality of being both simultaneously surprising and intuitively correct.

[michelferreira]

When I got into college to study computers, I learned about scholarly research, how to read, interpret and study academic papers, how to write reviews and resumes. I was an atheist back then.

Actually, learning how to do a proper academic research with a healthy skepticism while seeking to organize the thought into logical structures helped me in my conversion to Christianity in the study of theology.

It was a humbling experience since I was being told that religious people were dumb, that until I read some theologians. Today I see the bible as the revelation of God with an ocean of knowledge and wisdom that even after all these years I didn't even scratched the surface.

Studying the bible requires lots of skills and research in different fields of knowledge, such as Hermeneutics, manuscriptology, theology, philosophy, textual criticism, history, archaeology, literature, language and grammar, exegesis and many more.

It's quite hard, actually.

[justsomeguy]

Even as an atheist, I'm curious how many atheists know that most of the arguments they use have been challenged and debated by philosophers for hundreds of years, and a lot of the more common arguments against religion aren't even widely used by atheistic philosophers.

[orondahwali]

Thanks for this video IP, well researched and great points. Never stop! God bless

[joegibbskins]

Atheists might be more intelligent on average, but Reddit atheists definitely aren’t.

[HodgePodgeVids]

It’s awesome that this channel sites sources for all arguments made. Opposite of TikTok

[joshdb]

If anyone thinks that he knows anything, he has not yet known as he ought to know;
1 Corinthians 8:2 NASB2020