Okay, I know this isn’t a serious study, but I thought it was kind of funny. A student at Cal Tech decided to plot the ten most popular books at a given University (according to Facebook) on a graph with the University’s average SAT/ACT score. The study is here. (Hat tip to Friendly Atheist.)
Go have a look — it’s quite amusing to see where all of the different books fall on the SAT spectrum!
The researcher himself notes (in the FAQ):
The smartest religious book is “The Book of Mormon”. The dumbest religious book is “The Holy Bible”. I’m sure this pleases the Mormons immensely.
The thing that surprises me the most is how high up “Atlas Shrugged” falls…
Ugh. Yet another completely meaningless correlation as a result of an amateur data-mining operation. I predict that we will also see a correlation of political views of bloggers and the number of lolcats linked to on their blog.
lol, that would be an interesting study…
Obviously the results can’t be taken seriously. For starters, the connection between the ten favorite books (according to Facebook) and the whole university’s average SAT/ACT score is pretty tenuous. At the very least they should be correlating individual scores with individual book lists. But I think it’s pretty clear that this study is meant to be just for fun.
the Book of Mormon is REALLY boring.
Even remote “Moderin” ‘doctrines’- principles appear to have been lifted from the Bible.
Example: In the Bible, we read that restitution ‘should be’ 4 X the amount of harm (Luke 19:8); in ‘Modern scripture’, D&C 98:47.
If the historical incosistencies, the doctrinal flubs, and the sheer boredom of LDS presentation don’t anestheize and/or alienate attendees, they ‘Deserve’ an award…
Mormonism is The capital of Hype, Ambiguity, and Double-Speak. IMHO
GNPE — The study (even if it weren’t mostly a joke study) isn’t saying the book itself is written intelligently. It’s just claiming that the people who like it relatively intelligent.
And I do not think the Book of Mormon is boring. So there you are.
Whether or not I’m firing on all cylinders is for wiser heads to determine I guess.
To be honest, I think this study shows the correlation between economic advantage and SAT scores more than it shows anything else. That would explain Atlas Shrugged doing so dramatically better than The Color Purple as well as explaining why “The Holy Bible” scored so badly (as much as the atheist bloggers want to paint it as “religion = stupid”).
The Book of Mormon scores so high because of all the BYU students. The Color Purple scores so low because it is a book that appeals to African American women, many of whom do score high on the SAT, no doubt, but many others just did not have educational opportunities as children.
The Color Purple must be a gateway book to many people. Rather than making you stupid. It empowers people to become adult learners.
I agree with the sentiment that this is a purely fun survey that shouldn’t be taken too seriously one way or the other.
The Book of Mormon scores so high because of all the BYU students. The Color Purple scores so low because it is a book that appeals to African American women, many of whom do score high on the SAT, no doubt, but many others just did not have educational opportunities as children.
Exactly, that was my point in #6.