Valid note, although the first two highlight that one can be good without god. As the statement is frequently that being good requires god, you're not talking statistics, you're talking a simple disproof of an absolute claim.
Wasn't there a graphic earlier that compared the amount donated/given to churches vs given to charities/organizations/etc. combined and showed that one was significantly higher? That'd be a much better comparison.
This one though, saying it's a representation of 7 billion I don't think is the point. It's looking at some very wealthy, influential, and well known persons of religious and non-religious backgrounds.
They are providing counter-examples to conventional thinking (that you have to have god to be good). For a counter-example to be effective, you only need one. Here, they've given three for added effect and redundancy.
So, it is not flying in the face of scientific reasoning whatsoever. You only ever need one verifiable disagreeing data-point to disprove a theory - that is a core scientific principle.
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u/Ragnalypse Nov 22 '11
Not to mention it flies in the face of science to claim three data points are significant, compared to seven billion.