In certain sectors, as an atheist is just an attack against you. But during the online site OkCupid, it may simply help you to get a romantic date.
During 2009, the site’s founders analyzed reactions from significantly more than 500,000 users and unearthed that including the phrase “atheist” in a message that is first another individual had been very likely to garner an answer than virtually any spiritual descriptor except Christian.
“Mentioning your faith makes it possible to, but, paradoxically, it can help you many for those who have no religion,” co-founder Christian Rudder penned regarding the site’s web log during those times. “We know that’s likely to piss many people down, and we’re more or less tongue-in-cheek using this advice, however it’s exactly what the figures state.”
OkCupid’s founders — four 30-something guys who met at Harvard — recently t k home the “Humanist of the season” honor from their alma mater. Past champions consist of “Family Guy” creator and comedian Seth McFarlane, evolutionary psychologist Steven Pinker, biologist E.O. Wilson and California congressman Pete Stark.
“Humanism is really a philosophy of life this is certainly focused on building a far better world for many beings that are human without belief in virtually any gods, stated Greg Epstein, Harvard’s humanist chaplain.
“That could be the value we had been placing our little finger on with one of these guys,” he stated. “I don’t think there has ever been a location with an environment that is mixed of from spiritual and nonreligious backgrounds where it really is much more comfortable and respected to be an atheist, an agnostic or perhaps a humanist.”
Your website, Epstein said, embodies America’s “secular future.”
OkCupid had been started by Rudder, Sam Yagan, Chris Coyne and Max Krohn. A series of study guides that was eventually sold to Barnes and Noble in the 1990s, while still Harvard math majors, they created SparkNotes. The four launched OkCupid in 2003, and also the web web web site has since attracted significantly more than 10 million users.
Three for the founders describe on their own as nonbelievers within their on-site pages. Krohn, the organization technical officer, claims if OkCupid is now a favorite area for atheists and a beacon of humanist values, it is a by-product that is happy.
“The web site is an endeavor to utilize the medical solution to matching individuals up,” he stated through the company’s Manhattan workplace before visiting Boston to select within the honor on Nov. 4. “We aren’t key about our algorithm — every detail take display on the internet site. This is basically the concept of available inquiry and understanding that is scientific. And in case men and women have suggestions, we should simply take those tips and incorporate them to better make the project.”
Another humanist value the website embodies, Krohn stated, is an lack of judgment — same intercourse partners, the polyamorous, and the ones searching for lifelong lovers and quick h k-ups are typical welcome.
And then he views their own humanist values reflected into the site’s encouragement so it users dig much deeper by asking more questions about by themselves and their prospective matches.
“We ask people to ask,’Can I become a much better individual he said as I go about dating.
OkCupid has an abundance of business into the on line dating globe, with tens of thousands of free and pay-for-play web sites, quite a few tailored to particular spiritual teams, like Christian Mingle, Muslima (Muslim) and JDate (Jewish).
But OkCupid is the actual only real free service that assists nonbelievers with certain advice, data and tests. Final December, self-identified atheist users were sent “12 times of Atheist Matches” and present users usually takes an “atheist test” to get those with comparable quantities of nonbelief. The site’s “Darwin Test” appears to fit people that have comparable attitudes about evolution (sample question Are a lot of people a) g d? b) evil?).
Hemant Mehta, composer of “I offered My Soul on e-bay,” trumpeted the Harvard honor to OkCupid, which he’s utilized himself, on their Friendly Atheist weblog. “For whatever explanation, atheists flocked to this site in ways I’m perhaps perhaps not accustomed seeing any place else,” he said in a job interview. “It’s compliment login anecdotal, but we hardly ever really met’nice atheist girls’ on other internet web sites. A ton was found by me at OkCupid.”
Atheists Mark McCoy along with his wife met on OkCupid this past year.
“I believe it is the very best dating site on the market, since they don’t head to great lengths to pretend that everybody fits the exact same mildew,” he published on Friendly Atheist if the honor had been established.
“Atheists and LGBT and polyamorous individuals are in the same way welcome as Christians (and) Jews.”
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