Why does affirmitive action prohibit discrimination on the basis of religion? Certainly race, gender and arguably sexuality are products of genetics and should not be used to profile groups of people. Religious views, on the other hand, are presumably something one comes to conclude through rigorous logic. As an employer, wouldn't religious questions be relavent in an interview? If a potential employee is basing their life decisions on anecdotal evidence or word of mouth, shouldn't I be wary of putting them in some analytical position? On the other hand, if they can provide sound argument for their beliefs, shouldn't that make them stand out? Sorry for the typos, I'm on my phone.

1/24/2010 8:50:21 PM

Believe it or not, religion is often a product of genetics

1/24/2010 9:08:41 PM

Woah, woah, woah. What? Please, explain these "Jesus Genes". . .

1/24/2010 10:11:09 PM

Quote :

"Religious views, on the other hand, are presumably something one comes to conclude through rigorous logic."

Does not compute

1/24/2010 10:12:13 PM

most people inherit religion from their parents. Its not like picking a major. Its drilled into you from the start.

1/24/2010 10:15:51 PM

Quote :

"Religious views, on the other hand, are presumably something one comes to conclude through rigorous logic."

lol.

If this was the case, there wouldn't be any religious people.

1/24/2010 10:16:54 PM

^^ Haha. Okay. That, at least, makes a little more sense although thankfully we do have the ability to exercise free choice when it comes to religion even if it deviates from that of our parents.

1/24/2010 10:31:01 PM

Tell that to the Duggar children.

1/24/2010 10:32:33 PM

Fair enough. Some people chose to drink the kool-aid.

1/24/2010 10:34:22 PM

I should have said views about religion.

1/24/2010 10:35:01 PM

So while atheists may not be in fox holes they'll at least have a place at the office?

1/24/2010 10:38:33 PM

^ I'm not sure what you're getting at.

1/24/2010 10:40:27 PM

By that logic you should be able to deny employment to people based on their political beliefs, which opens up an (arguably) even more dangerous can of worms.

There's also the question of what qualifies you to judge whether or not an applicants beliefs are backed up by "sound argument." Why are you magically less prone to making logical errors than anybody else?

1/24/2010 11:30:45 PM

You are allowed to give logical tests, microsoft pioneered this practice and no one would argue it isn't a good judge of competency. The prototypical question of "how long would it take to move mt. Fujii" has no specific answer, and answers like "5 seconds with a teleporter" could be given, but would receive no credit from the interviewer. Instead, they are looking for well reasoned responses, possibly estimating the volume of the mountain and comparing that with the volume of a dump truck. I hope that most would agree the logic in the second response is a bit more sound, even if we know nothing of mountains and how to move them. As far as political beliefs go, presumeably you have come to those conclusions logically, starting from some set of axioms that mirror your personal beliefs. Identifing these would be a good judge of whether or not a candidate would make a nice fit with the company. I guess what I want to get at is their ability to defend their stated positions, particularly ones as important to them as their religious views.

1/25/2010 12:12:47 AM

Quote :

"As far as political beliefs go, presumeably you have come to those conclusions logically, starting from some set of axioms that mirror your personal beliefs."

So you're allowed to have "personal beliefs" that you can use as axioms for other things, unless those "personal beliefs" are religious?

Unless I misunderstand you, you are saying that there is a base level of personal beliefs that one can use as a basis for axioms upon which they can respond to other questions. How do religious beliefs not qualify?

I recall your complaints in another forum about a coworker who doesn't believe in dinosaurs or some such idiocy. And I agree, yeah, that's idiocy. But unless the guy is a goddamn paleontologist, I'm curious as to how it interferes with his job. My dad, a staunch agnostic, has worked for thirty years with an evangelical Christian, and he's managed to ignore her ranting because nothing in the Bible seems to interfere with her electrical engineering. Unless some aspect of this guy's work behavior is tangibly affecting his work performance, I suggest you leave it alone. And if it is affecting his work performance negatively, I suggest you go to the relevant superior and say "This guy isn't doing his job." What I don't suggest you do is set up a legal system whereby people with beliefs differing from your own are denied employment like second class fucking citizens.

1/25/2010 12:41:39 AM

affirmative action and prohibition of discrimination is not the same thing. religion is a protected class, but affirmative action has nothing to do with that. affirmitive action is about creating equal opportunity in different scenarios (school, workplace, etc), but putting "Jewish" on an application form should not help nor hurt my chances of getting into a school or getting a job

unless that job is banker, broker, jeweler, lawyer, doctor, or actor

[Edited on January 25, 2010 at 1:04 AM. Reason : -]

1/25/2010 1:04:19 AM

There are talented people, in every profession, that happen to be religious. People can compartmentalize their beliefs and they won't even bring rationality into the picture. It's not that they aren't capable of rational analysis, it's that they're not willing to perform it on their own religious beliefs.

1/25/2010 9:02:30 AM

what does this have to do with affirmative action?

1/25/2010 9:04:33 AM

Quote :

"There's also the question of what qualifies you to judge whether or not an applicants beliefs are backed up by "sound argument." Why are you magically less prone to making logical errors than anybody else?"

Are you suggesting that facts and logic are subjective, or that they can't be held to objective standards?

Quote :

"Unless some aspect of this guy's work behavior is tangibly affecting his work performance, I suggest you leave it alone."

What if the employer felt that rational thought was a necessary attribute for the position, and that certain (or all) religious beliefs were simply incompatible with that standard? Should the employer not be able to point to these beliefs as proof that the applicant is unqualified? Why should the employer have to waste the time and energy to find some other proof of something he or she already knows to be the case?

Quote :

"What I don't suggest you do is set up a legal system whereby people with beliefs differing from your own are denied employment like second class fucking citizens."

It wouldn't be treating them as second class citizens. At least not in the sense that that label is usually applied. If people are unqualified, they're unqualified. Who better to decide the qualifications than the person actually doing the hiring? Or should we outlaw all employment requirements in this country lest we give anyone the impression that they're not quite as bright as their co-applicants?

1/25/2010 10:03:55 AM

It is possible for people to have a logical component to their faith. To state otherwise shows both ignorance and arrogance. No one knows how the universe came into existence, and believing that nothing caused it requires more faith than believing that there was a specific cause. There are many reasons to believe that a supreme being was the cause, and I believe it to be as logical as any other explanation. This is argued very convincingly in William Lane Craig's Kalam Cosmological Argument.

1/25/2010 10:13:58 AM

That said, I believe that employers in the private sector should be able to hire based on any criteria they wish. If they choose to eliminate a large portion of potential employees based on nothing other than their own stupidity, that's their choice to make.

1/25/2010 10:17:48 AM

^^ Oh shit here we go

1/25/2010 10:27:29 AM

Its entirely possible to have someone who believes every part of their religion litterally (world created in 6 days, etc...) who is capable of perfoming technical tasks. However, these people are probably really limited in their ability to think outside their programming. You give them a well defined set of rules and tell them to perform a task inside those rules and they're all good. They wont stray outside the rules, for better or worse.

Then you have other religious folks who realize all the voodoo stuff is crap and mostly do religion for the morality and community aspects. This is probably most people.

Then you have the zealots. You dont need to worry about them because they aren't capable of getting through any education that conflicts with their religion.

The first 2 have very apparent differences outside of religious views to the point that the original question becomes moot. Discrimination based on religion is irrelevent because other their are other consistant, legitimate factors to make hiring decisions on.

1/25/2010 10:47:53 AM

Quote :

"It is possible for people to have a logical component to their faith. To state otherwise shows both ignorance and arrogance. No one knows how the universe came into existence, and believing that nothing caused it requires more faith than believing that there was a specific cause. There are many reasons to believe that a supreme being was the cause, and I believe it to be as logical as any other explanation. This is argued very convincingly in William Lane Craig's Kalam Cosmological Argument."

+1

A lot of people in this thread forget that they're in the minority when it comes to religious beliefs. If one could ask religious questions in an interview and base their decisions from that, most of you would be unemployed.

[Edited on January 25, 2010 at 12:26 PM. Reason : .]

1/25/2010 12:24:08 PM

Quote :

" Unless I misunderstand you, you are saying that there is a base level of personal beliefs that one can use as a basis for axioms upon which they can respond to other questions. How do religious beliefs not qualify?"

I am assuming here that fully fledged religious beliefs are not base level thoughts. There is, hopefully, some logical string that connects the thought of ‘I exist,’ which could reasonably be taken as an axiom, to “some invisible dude in the sky loves me and wants me to live for his glory” or “through millions of years and random mutations I am capable of having the thought ‘I exist.’” What I am getting at is religion is something, for the most part, that all potential employees will have thought about with some amount of rigor. Because of this, all employees will have, in essence, already completed a logical test for employment and have only to articulate the core elements of their belief in the interview.

Quote :

" What I don't suggest you do is set up a legal system whereby people with beliefs differing from your own are denied employment like second class fucking citizens."

Certainly you would have no problem with denying employment to someone believing in ritualistic cannibalism or a particular from of Islamic extremism. You could claim here that you’d deny them based on what they might do because of their beliefs and not their beliefs themselves. But fundamentally you are denying them because their beliefs differ, and in your eyes their beliefs are wrong. What about scientology? There is nothing particularly disturbing about anyone who believes in scientology, but if put on a resume, I think most of us would question the applicant’s ability to perform logical thought, or at least their ability to stand up to peer pressure. But why stop there? As Shaggy said, a bible literalist is probably more likely limited in their ability to think outside of a well defined set of rules. Depending on the job, this might be a positive or a negative attribute. What is the difference between this question and some personality test?

FWIW, this thread is entirely unrelated the previous thread I made on the dinosaur denier.

1/25/2010 12:32:16 PM

Quote :

"Certainly you would have no problem with denying employment to someone believing in ritualistic cannibalism or a particular from of Islamic extremism."

Wat?

1/25/2010 12:56:36 PM

Quote :

"To state otherwise shows both ignorance and arrogance. No one knows how the universe came into existence, and believing that nothing caused it requires more faith than believing that there was a specific cause. "

-1. Making up causes with no evidence is the EXACT OPPOSITE of logic. Not concluding anything until evidence is available is logically sound and requires absolutely no faith.

The Big Bang Theory does not explain how the Universe came into existence. It only describes the physical processes that took our Universe from just after the beginning of time until now. What "caused it" or if it even has a cause is still uncertain, and may remain so.

But obviously a giant sky fairy who sacrificed himself to himself in order to save us and we have to eat little pieces of him makes sense.

1/25/2010 1:00:24 PM

disco stu let's not get into this pleeeeeeeaase

1/25/2010 1:01:40 PM

^^

[Edited on January 25, 2010 at 1:01 PM. Reason : ^]

1/25/2010 1:01:42 PM

Quote :

"Believe it or not, religion is often a product of genetics "

bahahahahhahahahahhahahahhahahahaha.

holy fucking hell, that performance deserves a grammy or whatever the fuck the award is.

1/25/2010 1:03:46 PM

Quote :

"disco stu let's not get into this pleeeeeeeaase"

I'm sorry, Golovko Internet high-fiving ghotiblue's absurdities needed to be addressed. I guess it's pointless anyway.

1/25/2010 1:05:25 PM

Quote :

"Wat?"

What are you questioning?

1/25/2010 1:10:40 PM

Quote :

"Making up causes with no evidence is the EXACT OPPOSITE of logic. Not concluding anything until evidence is available is logically sound and requires absolutely no faith."

I'm not talking about making up causes with no evidence, I'm talking about determining the most logical explanation for how things are, based on our understanding of the world. You are the one who claims that there is no evidence. Most people agree that at some point the universe began to exist, and most people agree that for something to begin to exist, there must be a cause. These claims can be justified using logic. There are also many logical reasons to suggest that this cause matches the description of the Biblical God. Therefore, it is possible for people to have faith backed by reason. I realize that people also have their reasons for doubting. This is a large debate that I'm sure has been discussed on here ad nauseam. However, I just felt it necessary to point out that this arrogant view that faith in God is illogical is completely unfounded.

1/25/2010 1:35:57 PM

Thread title mentions religion -> Thread dissolves into religion vs non-religion.

1/25/2010 1:41:11 PM

Quote :

"Are you suggesting that facts and logic are subjective, or that they can't be held to objective standards?"

No, but I'm suggesting that pretty much everybody makes some decisions based on flawed logic or erroneous "facts," on a daily basis. We're not machines, and you and 1985 are no exception.

Quote :

"What if the employer felt that rational thought was a necessary attribute for the position, and that certain (or all) religious beliefs were simply incompatible with that standard?"

Well, then that employer would be acting just as irrationally as the religious person, which leads me back to the question of what qualifies him to judge other people's rational thought processes. People are capable of compartmentalizing religion and acting in an otherwise rational manner as pertains to, say, their work.

If the employer wanted to expend time and energy watching all his employees for lapses in reason I'm sure he could find them, religion or no. It would make him a paranoid weirdo that undercut his own productivity more than Yahweh or Vishnu ever did, but he could.

Quote :

"Who better to decide the qualifications than the person actually doing the hiring?"

We tried that for a while, but a lot of the people actually doing the hiring were using qualifications like "white" and "male." There wasn't a sound basis for using those qualifications, just as there isn't a sound basis for using religion (or lack thereof).

And when you deny somebody of opportunities because of something that does not tangibly interfere with their job, you are making them second class citizens.

Quote :

"I am assuming here that fully fledged religious beliefs are not base level thoughts. "

Then I'm going to assume that you're an idiot. How many people choose their political affiliation based on careful consideration? Many, to be sure. But how many choose them because that's how their families have been associated for generations? Lots. Religion is the same way.

Quote :

"What I am getting at is religion is something, for the most part, that all potential employees will have thought about with some amount of rigor."

This is where you're wrong. Tons and tons of people don't think about religion, or politics, with much rigor. They follow it because one day as a child they said, "Daddy, what party/religion are we?" "Well, son, we're Republican/Baptist."

Quote :

"Certainly you would have no problem with denying employment to someone believing in ritualistic cannibalism or a particular from of Islamic extremism."

Cannibalism is illegal in this country, and hiring somebody who could be arrested at any moment presents very real, tangible problems. As for Islamic extremism, if he manages to convince me in the interview that he's the best candidate, I'll hire a practitioner. Having been hired, as long as he is performing his job competently and not being disruptive in the workplace, I will keep him on. Ditto scientology.

Quote :

"As Shaggy said, a bible literalist is probably more likely limited in their ability to think outside of a well defined set of rules."

You have the ability to provide logic tests to employees, as well as the ability to read their resumes, which should include a fair amount of information. I guarantee you that these will gauge an applicants mental flexibility more accurately than "So let's talk about Jesus."

----

What disconcerts me the most is that using religion (or its sister, politics) as a litmus test for employment is something with zero oversight. If you allow people to use it they will begin abusing it immediately and it will be impossible to stop it. All an employer has to say is, "Well, they didn't give an acceptably logical basis for their belief system," and then deny employment to anybody they want. And it would go both ways. "Oh, you're an atheist? Well why ain't my grandpappy a monkey if Mr. Darwin is so smart? What? That don't make any sense. Sorry, but the position is unavailable at this time."

Employees shouldn't bring religion into the workplace, and neither should employers.

----

There's also the matter of this whole thread being personally insulting. I didn't realize, Travis, that this whole time you thought I was a narrow-minded fool undeserving of employment beyond the level of wrote task repetition, given my demonstrable inability to think outside of a narrow set of rules.

1/25/2010 2:20:48 PM

Quote :

"Its entirely possible to have someone who believes every part of their religion litterally (world created in 6 days, etc...) who is capable of perfoming technical tasks. However, these people are probably really limited in their ability to think outside their programming. You give them a well defined set of rules and tell them to perform a task inside those rules and they're all good. They wont stray outside the rules, for better or worse. Then you have other religious folks who realize all the voodoo stuff is crap and mostly do religion for the morality and community aspects. This is probably most people. Then you have the zealots. You dont need to worry about them because they aren't capable of getting through any education that conflicts with their religion."

You failed to mention the group of extreme non-religion (which is NOT atheism although most of you seem to think they are one in the same). By the way you link thought process to a person's religious beliefs, you can't trust this person either. Someone from this group believes that only what can happen will happen...but if something hasn't happened yet, how would they know if it can or not? There wouldn't be much outside the box thinking from this person either.

1/25/2010 2:44:43 PM

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that those of you who think religion is a joke have difficulty thinking 'outside the box' by your own definition. As long as you have "a well defined set of rules" (aka science), you won't stray outside the box and 'they're all good'

1/25/2010 3:24:03 PM

Actually the complete opposite is true.

People who follow their parent's same religious beliefs don't really "think outside the box."

1/25/2010 3:57:22 PM

Ok, so if your off spring become religious......?


So by saying God does not exist and thinking faith doesn't exist either is thinking out of the box now? lol

[Edited on January 25, 2010 at 4:22 PM. Reason : .]

1/25/2010 4:20:52 PM

Shit happens.

1/25/2010 4:21:17 PM

Yeah...like they started thinking outside the box.

[Edited on January 25, 2010 at 4:23 PM. Reason : side*]

1/25/2010 4:23:12 PM

No, I would think that I failed them as a parent, actually.

There's no "out of the box" thinking in believing in superstition and magic.

1/25/2010 4:24:14 PM

What religion are we talking about here? Is this some kind of harry potter religion?

You lack the ability to comprehend faith because you are stuck in your ways and cannot think outside the box. /thread.

1/25/2010 4:26:13 PM

Quote :

"Actually the complete opposite is true. People who follow their parent's same religious beliefs don't really "think outside the box.""

I was arguing that both the super religious and the super non-religious have trouble perceiving alternative methods and solutions.

It is those open to all thoughts and ideas that are in the best position.

Regardless, this thread is moot because as I mentioned, religion has absolutely nothing to do with affirmative action. Go argue the existence of God somewhere else.

[Edited on January 25, 2010 at 4:42 PM. Reason : -]

1/25/2010 4:42:12 PM

Quote :

"I was arguing that both the super religious and the super non-religious have trouble perceiving alternative methods and solutions. It is those open to all thoughts and ideas that are in the best position."

I'm not sure how one could be "super non-religious," but alright. If someone is super religious, they're (presumably) super religious about their own religion. When I called myself a Christian, I thought every religion except my own was a joke. Eventually, I turned that objective lens on my own religion, and discovered that it was no truer than any other.

If you're religious and you're open to all thoughts and ideas, then you would have to accept the viability of other religions. Logically, you can't claim to believe in all religions. In fact, you can't even claim to believe in all of Christianity, because there are contradictions within the doctrine itself. If you're truly going to be "open-minded," you'll eventually come to the conclusion that you cannot be absolutely certain of anything. The closest you can get to absolute certainity is by verifying something's existence in the real world using your senses. You can't do that with God, so to say that you believe in it (or religion, which is supposedly created by God itself) is to say that you accept pure, unsupported speculation as fact.

1/25/2010 4:58:47 PM

I'm super non-religious.

1/25/2010 4:59:24 PM

Quote :

" We tried that for a while, but a lot of the people actually doing the hiring were using qualifications like "white" and "male." There wasn't a sound basis for using those qualifications, just as there isn't a sound basis for using religion (or lack thereof). "

There is a distinct difference between passing judgment on the basis of ethnicity or gender, and passing judgment on the thought process of an individual. If someone is racist or bigoted, as a society we call them on it. Why is religion (or lack thereof) faux pas?

Quote :

" But how many choose them because that's how their families have been associated for generations? Lots. Religion is the same way "

You’re saying that there is no critical difference between people who make life choices based on family associations and those who make their choices independently, based on evidence and reason? There might not be, I haven’t seen a study either way, but I’d bet a substantial amount that there is.
You are right though, a lot of people haven’t thought about politics or religion. But if they portray themselves as political or religious (or nonreligious) without having done research, doesn’t that raise red flags about their intellectual honesty and integrity? On the other hand, if they openly admit to being uninformed and undecided, it would be hard to form an argument against hiring them. Absolutely this would be abused and Christians would hire Christians, atheists would hire atheists and so on. But if your company is consistently hiring subpar employees based on religious (or nonreligious) affiliation alone, you probably won’t last long anyway.

Quote :

"You have the ability to provide logic tests to employees, as well as the ability to read their resumes, which should include a fair amount of information. I guarantee you that these will gauge an applicants mental flexibility more accurately than "So let's talk about Jesus.""

I can’t say that I disagree, but why is it law that we can’t ask that question? Why is it socially (and legally) unacceptable to question beliefs about religion and judge someone’s character on those beliefs when we do it on almost every other conclusion or opinion someone can form? If you walk into an interview with a birthday hat and clown shoes on because somehow you thought that would be a logical thing to do, you would absolutely be judged on this opinion, and if you couldn’t defend it, you most likely would not be hired. Why is that opinion different from the religious (or nonreligious) opinion? Whether or not we know the correct conclusion shouldn’t prevent us from having a legitimate discussion on the subject.

I tried, and ultimately failed spectacularly, to create this thread without connotation. Ian, I am sure the path that led you to the conclusions that you’ve come to are well thought out, and based upon your reputation, could be beautifully articulated ( I would, come to think of it, love to have that conversation). I have no doubt in your ability to justify your beliefs from some core set of (at the moment) non provable axioms (we don’t know what caused the big bang, etc.) And it would be absurd to disregard you as an employee without giving you the opportunity to defend your logic. Obviously it is entirely infeasible that a legitimate employer would ask each applicant to painstakingly recount all the thoughts that led them to their faith or non-faith. If it were instead summed up as a neat word on a resume, the employer would be passing over most of the qualified candidates if he were putting any weight on religion. Presumably this is the reason that it is the law and that is enough to satisfy my question. The remaining question of why it is socially forbidden is another topic I’d like to discuss.

Quote :

"I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that those of you who think religion is a joke have difficulty thinking 'outside the box' by your own definition. As long as you have "a well defined set of rules" (aka science), you won't stray outside the box and 'they're all good'"

At risk of derailing an already failed thread, this logic is absurd, replace ‘religion’ in that sentence with anything and it would lead to the same false conclusions, here let me show you:

Quote :

"I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that those of you who think Avatars living on Pandora is a joke have difficulty thinking 'outside the box' by your own definition. As long as you have "a well defined set of rules" (aka science), you won't stray outside the box and 'they're all good'"

1/25/2010 4:59:30 PM

Quote :

"If you're religious and you're open to all thoughts and ideas, then you would have to accept the viability of other religions. Logically, you can't claim to believe in all religions. In fact, you can't even claim to believe in all of Christianity, because there are contradictions within the doctrine itself."

There are some religious traditions where you can acknowledge the truth of others and still be considered devout.

1/25/2010 5:05:28 PM

Quote :

"At risk of derailing an already failed thread, this logic is absurd, replace ‘religion’ in that sentence with anything and it would lead to the same false conclusions, here let me show you:"

so then we do agree, pot, kettle, you know the drill.

1/25/2010 5:14:08 PM

Quote :

"The remaining question of why it is socially forbidden is another topic I’d like to discuss."

1) Most people think it appropriate to separate work from the rest of life. This is why sexual relationships in the workplace are often frowned upon (though of course they happen, because people will violate all sorts of norms in order to bwn). It's why many people don't like random drug tests at work. Likewise it's why nobody likes somebody who comes out to the bar and then talks about work nonstop.

People want to think that, at the end of their workday, they can come home and masturbate to the most depraved sexual imagery imaginable, or drink a fifth of whiskey alone, or shout profanity at the TV and throw things, or, in my case, all of the above. They want to think that they can do all those things and it won't matter a lick for their job prospects.

Because the more your private life matters at work, the more your life ultimately becomes about work, and nobody wants that. Nobody wants to be defined by their job.*

2) You know the old saying about how you should avoid talking about politics or religion. That's because people like to fight about these things. Most people have learned to avoid talking about them in contexts like work for that reason.

3) Most people differentiate between one's religion and their ability to do their job. My dentist is a very conservative protestant of some type or another, and so are most of her employees. They play Christian music all the time, their lobby is full of Jesus stuff, and frankly, it annoys the shit out of me. But, they've never given me reason to believe that they're anything less than professionally competent, and they're convenient, so I keep going. If they started going all Christian Scientist on me and telling me to pray for God to fix my teeth, I'd go elsewhere. If their degrees were from Jesus Jones University, I might get suspicious. But they don't.

1/25/2010 5:52:14 PM