Saturday, March 9, 2013

compassionate atheist

Pity, sympathy, empathy, compassion. Each is received at various times by one in distress. They are the responses engendered by our misfortunes from those we encounter. And each feels different when received. Each has a different effect on those who are suffering in the midst of psychic or physical crisis.

Of the four, compassion has a unique quality, a quality so different from the rest that it connotes a certain spiritual as well as emotional characteristic. Perhaps for this reason it is often cited in spiritual/religious texts as a virtue to be sought and developed.
But what does it take to be a compassionate person,  maybe if you help others in need or maybe it is the way of what you give is what you get, so lets go and talk about generosity and what does it take to be one.
I looked at some articles and I stumble upon an article that has some sort of truth about being atheist is an advantage many people believe that if you give something you are automatically
A religious person but its not according to “Yasmin Anwar”.” In three experiments, social scientists found that compassion consistently drove less religious people to be more generous. For highly religious people, however, compassion was largely unrelated to how generous they were, according to the findings which are published in the most recent online issue of the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science”. (http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/04/30/religionandgenerosity/)
“The results challenge a widespread assumption that acts of generosity and charity are largely driven by feelings of empathy and compassion, researchers said. In the study, the link between compassion and generosity was found to be stronger for those who identified as being non-religious or less religious”.( http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/04/30/religionandgenerosity/)
In a society that has an overwhelming population, poverty and scarcity cant be avoided and religious person makes a profit out of it, by means of donation and ration they help people but they want money, but research shows that highly religious persons are not that compassionate and generous at what they do for people. According to“Laura Saslow”, “We hypothesized that religion would change how compassion impacts generous behavior”. But they where surprised that non- religious persons inclined in their  test, There are three experiment that is conducted for the purpose of finding out how generous and compassionate non-religious people are: (http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/04/30/religionandgenerosity/)
In the first experiment, researchers analyzed data from a 2004 national survey of more than 1,300 American adults. Those who agreed with such statements as “When I see someone being taken advantage of, I feel kind of protective towards them” were also more inclined to show generosity in random acts of kindness, such as loaning out belongings and offering a seat on a crowded bus or train, researchers found.

In the second experiment, 101 American adults watched one of two brief videos, a neutral video or a heartrending one, which showed portraits of children afflicted by poverty. Next, they were each given 10 “lab dollars” and directed to give any amount of that money to a stranger. The least religious participants appeared to be motivated by the emotionally charged video to give more of their money to a stranger.

In the final experiment, more than 200 college students were asked to report how compassionate they felt at that moment. They then played “economic trust games” in which they were given money to share – or not – with a stranger. In one round, they were told that another person playing the game had given a portion of their money to them, and that they were free to reward them by giving back some of the money, which had since doubled in amount.

This goes to show that this research suggests that although less religious people tend to be less trusted in the U.S., when feeling compassionate, they may actually be more inclined to help their fellow citizens than more religious people.
                                                                                                                                                           


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