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RE: Morality
By clovell on 2/22/2008 2:01:56 PM , Rating: 2
Right on, Ringold. Maybe if this 'researcher' had included questions about religion on the questionnaire and the results had shown a directl correlation between religion and attitudes we could say the article was without spin.

As it is, it's probably the biggest production of hand-waving since Circle-Squaring went out of style.

RE: Morality
By B3an on 2/22/2008 2:29:47 PM , Rating: 2
"Oh no something bad about us americans, lets all mock it"

Come on, it's so painfully obviously religion plays a big part in the average american views. It's ridiculous and backwards. If the US didnt revolve around money so much i'm sure things would advance at around 1/4 the rate.

RE: Morality
By Gondorff on 2/22/2008 9:00:44 PM , Rating: 2
Religion certainly plays a large role in the US, but the above posters' critiques of the article were dead on. The researcher found in his studies that many people thought nanotech was immoral, yet the connection to religion was entirely speculation.
The answer, Scheufele believes, is religion

Note that there is no evidence behind this claim. It is simply the researcher's own ramblings, and completely unscientific. Therefore, it is rather objectionable that the story should show up in the news as "Religion Colors American's Views of Nanotechnology", when no correlation was shown. Only biased opinions.
Additionally there is the issue of the wording of the question, which is not explained.

It would seem far more plausible to me that the issue is simply that people don't know what nanotech really is (note that it is only by the researcher's own word that we learn that the survey respondents understood nanotech. How does he know that? He cites no source for that information). This would also agree with the related article on that same page that describes the low level of public awareness about nanotech.

