Be careful of getting what you wish for....alien overlords sounds pretty ominous to me...
By Dennis SadowskiCatholic News Service
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- How people value space exploration may just depend on someone's particular faith.
An analysis of the results of several national surveys by a University of Dayton political science professor found that Catholics are more supportive of the U.S. maintaining a leading role in probing the depths of space and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence than people of other faiths.
Political scientist Joshua Ambrosius told Catholic News Service evangelical Protestants, on the other hand, are significantly less likely than people of other faiths to see the value of the nation's space endeavors. Evangelicals also tended to have less knowledge about space, he said.
Why evangelicals are less supportive of the various facets of space exploration is uncertain, but having grown up in an evangelical family, Ambrosius said he can understand some possible reasons.
"In my family, there wasn't a lot of discussion about science and its relevance. I had influences that would question the findings and contributions of modern science, particularly the view of evolutionary origins (of humans). I grew up in a church and a tradition very oriented around creation science. It wasn't until I was an older teenager and in college (that) I turned to accept the scientific explanation of evolution," he said.
Ambrosius studied various factors outlined in four surveys, including knowledge of space, interest in space, support for funding of space exploration, views on the benefits of space exploration, space optimism and space nationalism -- whether the U.S. should be a leader in space exploration.
He analyzed data from the 2010 General Social Survey of the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago; the June 2011 Political Survey of the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press; the April 2010 Political Future Survey and the spring 2009 General Public Science Survey. He broke down responses from Catholics, evangelicals, mainline Protestants, Jews, Eastern religions and people with no religion.
Read the rest of this article at - http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/1405400.htm
By Dennis SadowskiCatholic News Service
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- How people value space exploration may just depend on someone's particular faith.
An analysis of the results of several national surveys by a University of Dayton political science professor found that Catholics are more supportive of the U.S. maintaining a leading role in probing the depths of space and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence than people of other faiths.
Political scientist Joshua Ambrosius told Catholic News Service evangelical Protestants, on the other hand, are significantly less likely than people of other faiths to see the value of the nation's space endeavors. Evangelicals also tended to have less knowledge about space, he said.
Why evangelicals are less supportive of the various facets of space exploration is uncertain, but having grown up in an evangelical family, Ambrosius said he can understand some possible reasons.
"In my family, there wasn't a lot of discussion about science and its relevance. I had influences that would question the findings and contributions of modern science, particularly the view of evolutionary origins (of humans). I grew up in a church and a tradition very oriented around creation science. It wasn't until I was an older teenager and in college (that) I turned to accept the scientific explanation of evolution," he said.
Ambrosius studied various factors outlined in four surveys, including knowledge of space, interest in space, support for funding of space exploration, views on the benefits of space exploration, space optimism and space nationalism -- whether the U.S. should be a leader in space exploration.
He analyzed data from the 2010 General Social Survey of the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago; the June 2011 Political Survey of the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press; the April 2010 Political Future Survey and the spring 2009 General Public Science Survey. He broke down responses from Catholics, evangelicals, mainline Protestants, Jews, Eastern religions and people with no religion.
Read the rest of this article at - http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/1405400.htm
