QI on the US prison population.
Showing posts with label prison. Show all posts
Showing posts with label prison. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Thursday, October 23, 2008
California Propositions
Yes on 1a, 2, 3, 5, 12.
These are official SSnot endorsements.
1A High Speed Rail -- Trains might actually be kind of nice.
2 Farm Animal Conditions -- The standard claims of animal rights and from groups like PETA tend to try to exploit the desire for animal welfare with animal rights. While the former is a position everybody agrees with the latter is fairly silly. That said, this prop supports the former and suggests that farm animals shouldn't be forced into tiny boxes and never get to move around until they are killed for food.
3 Children's Hospital Bonds -- This sounds like something you'd call a proposition that creates death camps and forces people into slavery. Who would vote against Children's Hospitals? According to latest polling very few and according to the letter of the proposition it does what it says it does.
4 Parental Notification -- If a kid is under 18 and wants an abortion they gotta tell their parents. This is about as extreme as the pro-life people could get a bill in the state. The latest PPIC finally has it polling as a fail.
5 Drug Rehab Programs -- We love our drugs and our forced drug rehab rather than prisons.
6 Anti-Gang -- No, LOVE THE PRISONS INSTEAD!
7 Renewable Power Standard - Seems to force up the amount of renewable energy requrements at different levels but groups like the Sierra Club and the Union of Concerned Scientists because they say it's really poorly written.
8 Anti-Marriage -- Removes the constitutional rights of certain individuals to enter into a private contract because we hate them. Thankfully the PPIC study finally has this polling at a loss. The No on 8 crew sucked. They were caught completely offguard by a large influx of Mormon money pushing for a yes vote. "Proposition 8, a constitutional amendment that would end same-sex marriage in California, is losing among likely voters, 52 percent to 44 percent" -- After the silly laws against same sex marriage were overturned and the polling looked good then no so good and now good again.
9 Victim's Rights -- REALLY! LOVE YOURSELF SOME PRISONS!
10 Pickens Natural Gas -- Eh, no. Pickens doesn't seem like a bad guy from the commercials but screw giving him massive amounts of money. Sierra Club again against. I like my fighters for an energy secure future far from fossil fuels to not advocate switching to fossil fuels, especially one he has a massive stake in.
11 Redistricting -- Fair redistricting is a massive loss for the Democrats. If the dems can't draw the lines then a number of seats will be lost. I have nothing in principle against redistricting or against fair redistricting... but unless every state does it it's going to be a strong disadvantage to one party over another. Take the proportional delegate amendments that come up in California here and there, those serve only to make the Republicans win the presidency if they passed. BTW the PPIC polling says Obama is up by 23 points in California.
12 Veterans Bonds -- Much like the childrens hospital it's hard to vote against helping veterans.
These are official SSnot endorsements.
1A High Speed Rail -- Trains might actually be kind of nice.
2 Farm Animal Conditions -- The standard claims of animal rights and from groups like PETA tend to try to exploit the desire for animal welfare with animal rights. While the former is a position everybody agrees with the latter is fairly silly. That said, this prop supports the former and suggests that farm animals shouldn't be forced into tiny boxes and never get to move around until they are killed for food.
3 Children's Hospital Bonds -- This sounds like something you'd call a proposition that creates death camps and forces people into slavery. Who would vote against Children's Hospitals? According to latest polling very few and according to the letter of the proposition it does what it says it does.
4 Parental Notification -- If a kid is under 18 and wants an abortion they gotta tell their parents. This is about as extreme as the pro-life people could get a bill in the state. The latest PPIC finally has it polling as a fail.
5 Drug Rehab Programs -- We love our drugs and our forced drug rehab rather than prisons.
6 Anti-Gang -- No, LOVE THE PRISONS INSTEAD!
7 Renewable Power Standard - Seems to force up the amount of renewable energy requrements at different levels but groups like the Sierra Club and the Union of Concerned Scientists because they say it's really poorly written.
8 Anti-Marriage -- Removes the constitutional rights of certain individuals to enter into a private contract because we hate them. Thankfully the PPIC study finally has this polling at a loss. The No on 8 crew sucked. They were caught completely offguard by a large influx of Mormon money pushing for a yes vote. "Proposition 8, a constitutional amendment that would end same-sex marriage in California, is losing among likely voters, 52 percent to 44 percent" -- After the silly laws against same sex marriage were overturned and the polling looked good then no so good and now good again.
9 Victim's Rights -- REALLY! LOVE YOURSELF SOME PRISONS!
10 Pickens Natural Gas -- Eh, no. Pickens doesn't seem like a bad guy from the commercials but screw giving him massive amounts of money. Sierra Club again against. I like my fighters for an energy secure future far from fossil fuels to not advocate switching to fossil fuels, especially one he has a massive stake in.
11 Redistricting -- Fair redistricting is a massive loss for the Democrats. If the dems can't draw the lines then a number of seats will be lost. I have nothing in principle against redistricting or against fair redistricting... but unless every state does it it's going to be a strong disadvantage to one party over another. Take the proportional delegate amendments that come up in California here and there, those serve only to make the Republicans win the presidency if they passed. BTW the PPIC polling says Obama is up by 23 points in California.
12 Veterans Bonds -- Much like the childrens hospital it's hard to vote against helping veterans.
Friday, April 11, 2008
Atheism and Bad Statistics
You know, it's wrong when any group makes crap up... or at the very least smudges the numbers.
Okay, the numbers are actually there but there are strong objections on two points, prisons and marriage.
The prison statistic is a self-declared note. Atheists make up 8-16% of US population and only 0.209% of the prison population. Well, those stats aren't completely wrong. In fact, a 2006 Harris poll could be read to clock atheist at 27% of the population. If 73% of the population believes in God, then the remaining 27% don't and are thusly atheist (even if only 11% say they don't believe in God). Now, this is how the study screws up, and how many studies screw up. Taking a look at the recent Pew study. We see that those unaffiliated people claiming atheism was 1.6% with agnosticism at 2.4% and nothing in particular at 12.1%. Largely almost everybody in that unaffiliated grouping is an atheist, in the true meaning of the word... however, about 10% of atheists actually admit to atheism. There is a massive gap between declared atheists and atheists. One of the side effects of being simply a lack of belief is that a person can be an atheist even if they don't know what it is or want to be one.
Now look at the prison stats again and consider for a moment that parole boards like religion, your fellow inmates are largely religious, religions provide protections in prison, and atheists are the most hated minority in the US. Now, take into account that many atheists are better educated and your average criminal is more poorly educated. Further, consider that blacks make up a larger percent of the prison population than the general population (and crime rate) and that blacks are largely more religious. On top of this, realize the entire fucking thing is asking you to assume that correlation implies causality! Maybe atheists are just better criminals and don't get caught? There are too many problems with this stat to give it a second thought. I would be very interested in a real set of statistics on this point. In the mean time, this stat should be disregarded with prejudice.
Marriage is another stat I wish people would stop tossing around. That stat is fully explained by the age of atheists. It turns out that the 18-24 range of population is quite atheistic. Looking at the statistics over time they aren't getting any more religious.
As the atheist population ages they don't seem to be finding religion (in fact, no religion is one of the largest religious groups and has some of the best retention of any of the groups). The 18 year old atheists of today will be the 25 year old atheists of 7 years from now (while padding the numbers as previous believers who fall away). This provides a rather bottom heavy group of atheists. So, when you ask a bunch of people their religion and whether or not they are divorced you find that the atheists haven't been divorced nearly as much as the other religious groups... because they haven't been married as long or lived as much. They are a bunch of kids! Adjusting for such seems to make that stat go away. Further, consider the increased educational attainment and income. Not to say it isn't true, just that the statistics don't seem bear this out.
It turns out that people who care to learn what is and isn't true do better in life in a plethora of ways and end up finding out that religion is bunk. Pretty much all the stats flow from this. There's nothing about atheism that makes people more moral (or less moral).
If I had to venture a guess, I daresay that there something about good moral people and the truth.
Okay, the numbers are actually there but there are strong objections on two points, prisons and marriage.
The prison statistic is a self-declared note. Atheists make up 8-16% of US population and only 0.209% of the prison population. Well, those stats aren't completely wrong. In fact, a 2006 Harris poll could be read to clock atheist at 27% of the population. If 73% of the population believes in God, then the remaining 27% don't and are thusly atheist (even if only 11% say they don't believe in God). Now, this is how the study screws up, and how many studies screw up. Taking a look at the recent Pew study. We see that those unaffiliated people claiming atheism was 1.6% with agnosticism at 2.4% and nothing in particular at 12.1%. Largely almost everybody in that unaffiliated grouping is an atheist, in the true meaning of the word... however, about 10% of atheists actually admit to atheism. There is a massive gap between declared atheists and atheists. One of the side effects of being simply a lack of belief is that a person can be an atheist even if they don't know what it is or want to be one.
Now look at the prison stats again and consider for a moment that parole boards like religion, your fellow inmates are largely religious, religions provide protections in prison, and atheists are the most hated minority in the US. Now, take into account that many atheists are better educated and your average criminal is more poorly educated. Further, consider that blacks make up a larger percent of the prison population than the general population (and crime rate) and that blacks are largely more religious. On top of this, realize the entire fucking thing is asking you to assume that correlation implies causality! Maybe atheists are just better criminals and don't get caught? There are too many problems with this stat to give it a second thought. I would be very interested in a real set of statistics on this point. In the mean time, this stat should be disregarded with prejudice.
Marriage is another stat I wish people would stop tossing around. That stat is fully explained by the age of atheists. It turns out that the 18-24 range of population is quite atheistic. Looking at the statistics over time they aren't getting any more religious.
As the atheist population ages they don't seem to be finding religion (in fact, no religion is one of the largest religious groups and has some of the best retention of any of the groups). The 18 year old atheists of today will be the 25 year old atheists of 7 years from now (while padding the numbers as previous believers who fall away). This provides a rather bottom heavy group of atheists. So, when you ask a bunch of people their religion and whether or not they are divorced you find that the atheists haven't been divorced nearly as much as the other religious groups... because they haven't been married as long or lived as much. They are a bunch of kids! Adjusting for such seems to make that stat go away. Further, consider the increased educational attainment and income. Not to say it isn't true, just that the statistics don't seem bear this out.
It turns out that people who care to learn what is and isn't true do better in life in a plethora of ways and end up finding out that religion is bunk. Pretty much all the stats flow from this. There's nothing about atheism that makes people more moral (or less moral).
If I had to venture a guess, I daresay that there something about good moral people and the truth.
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