Los científicos más destacados siguen rechazando a Dios

Summary of a paper that appeared in the 23 July 1998 issue of Nature by Edward J. Larson and Larry Witham: "Leading Scientists Still Reject God." Nature, 1998; 394, 313.

Larson and Witham present the results of a replication of 1913 and 1933 surveys by James H. Leuba. In those surveys, Leuba mailed a questionnaire to leading scientists asking about their belief in "a God in intellectual and affective communication with humankind" and in "personal immortality". Larson and Witham used the same wording [as in the Leuba studies], and sent their questionnaire to 517 members of the [U.S.] National Academy of Sciences from the biological and physical sciences (the latter including mathematicians, physicists and astronomers). The return rate was slightly over 50%.

The results were as follows (figures in %):

BELIEF IN PERSONAL GOD  1914   1933   1998

Personal belief                             27.7    15       7.0

Personal disbelief                       52.7    68       72.2

Doubt or agnosticism                20.9    17       20.8

BELIEF IN IMMORTALITY     1914   1933   1998

Personal belief                              35.2     18       7.9

Personal disbelief                        25.4     53       76.7

Doubt or agnosticism                43.7     29       23.3 

                                                                                     (15,3 - dato correcto)

Figura resumen de la investigación

Figura tomada del artículo: La ciencia frente a las creencias religiosas

Ciencia y religión en los albores del nuevo milenio
Juan Antonio Aguilera Mochón

Mientras Tanto (publicación trimestral de ciencias sociales de la Fundación Giulia Adinolfi - Manuel Sacristán), vol. 95 (verano 2005), pp. 125-153.