The 80:20 rule is also known as the Pareto principle, and here are some very easily verifiable facts.
80% of the world’s population is religious.
80% of the world’s violence and wars are caused by religion.
80% of religious people are of below average intelligence.
There are numerous examples of the above, but such statistics are ignored or more importantly, deliberately concealed by religious groups.
Typically, a religious person will respond in one of two ways.
1) Post I’m intelligent and religious, or
2) Just cut and paste never ending religious quotes.
What the so called smart ones (1) fail to acknowledge is that 80% of religious people are below average intelligence and they may be in the insignificant 20%. That in itself highlights ignorance, which is typical of religious people.
Fortunately, the trend is your friend, and the trend amongst our younger more intelligent humans is a move away from religion, and that is good for humanity.
Update:RJA and Kjelstad
You are both so silly, but at least you're both trying to think. Re-read my post and your answer, and if you're stuck, ask for help on the Maths forum.
Tell me, are you both religious? I think I know the answer.
Answers & Comments
Verified answer
Look, religious people are usually dumb as hell, I'll give you that. That's it, I have nothing else to say on the subject.
A gross misapplication of the Pareto principle. Not only did you misapply it, but it has no valid application using all the criteria you gave.
The Pareto principle ("the 80 - 20 rule") suggests that in many phenomena, 80% of consequences are the result of only 20% of the overall causes.
The nearest approximate application of this principle would be to suggest that the MAJORITY (80%) of the consequences, violence and war, are the result of a MINORITY (20%) of the causes, atheists and average or above average intelligent theists. Is that what you mean to say? I don't believe that's correct.
The world is full of stupid people. I've known a few very intelligent atheists, but I've met a WHOLE lot of dumb ones. While many of the Christians/religious people I know are very intelligent.
Perhaps your "studies" do not account for the fact that people identify with others similar to themselves, and so are more likely to befriend people with similar philosophy, theology and intelligence. So your "study group" may be much more like yourself than the average person, excepting Christians, who I would hazard to guess you don't have many as friends. Likely, your study is quite biased and irrelevant, not to mention unprofessional.
Are you trying to show that you're smarter than I am? I never even graduated elementary school.
RJA
"If 80% of the world's population is religious, and 80% of them are of below average intelligence, then 64% of the world's population is of below average intelligence."
That was about all I had to say on the subject as well. That and every non religious person would be a genius and we know that is not always the case.
RJA is completely right - how can 64% of the population be below average intelligence genius.
"80% of the world's violence and wars are caused by religion" what complete horseshit - here are a few examples
WWI
WWII
Vietnam
Korea
Napoleonic Wars
Trojan Wars
Boer War
Iraqi war 1&2
Nearly every war of indepedence
Nearly every civil war
You are definetly well below average intelligence
If 80% of the world's population is religious, and 80% of them are of below average intelligence, then 64% of the world's population is of below average intelligence.
I think the person who came up with your stats is of below average intelligence.
If you're using "religious" as a synonym for "Christian", then you're probably right. Most religious people I know are pretty damn smart; just naive about how the world came to be...
You gave a bunch of facts. Ask a question. It seems your mind is already made up, so what use is it to blabber on your topic?