Religion may become extinct in nine nations, study says

"A study using census data from nine countries shows that religion there is set for extinction, say researchers.

The study found a steady rise in those claiming no religious affiliation.

[...]

The team took census data stretching back as far as a century from countries in which the census queried religious affiliation: Australia, Austria, Canada, the Czech Republic, Finland, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand and Switzerland.

[...]

"The idea is pretty simple," said Richard Wiener of the Research Corporation for Science Advancement, and the University of Arizona.

"It posits that social groups that have more members are going to be more attractive to join, and it posits that social groups have a social status or utility.

[...]

Dr Wiener continued: "In a large number of modern secular democracies, there's been a trend that folk are identifying themselves as non-affiliated with religion; in the Netherlands the number was 40%, and the highest we saw was in the Czech Republic, where the number was 60%."

[...]

And in all the countries, the indications were that religion was headed toward extinction."

BBC News, 22 March 2011

Even in Ireland!

Australians to take the emphasis off religion in a new attempt to integrate Muslims

"The new Australian Government, led by Kevin Rudd, has decided that it will try to engage with a wider Muslim community in the country rather than allowing the dialogue to be always mediated through religious leaders.
This is a departure from the approach of the previous Howard government, which had created a Muslim Advisory Board consisting of the usual imams and clerics who were more interested in promoting religion than bringing Muslims into the mainstream.
Now a new attempt will be made to recast the image of Muslims in Australia as overly-religious. The Government wants to recruit sporting figures, academics, business people and others who represent a broader face of the communities.

[...]

Mr Ferguson said a broader body would be considered. "We would always seek to have the broadest representation in any national committees established," he said. "There's a belief that, per se, Muslims are always more religious than other groups. But I know a lot of Muslim youth in my electorate that are totally irreligious, or it's marginal to their existence and they don't spend a lot of time thinking about the Koran.""

National Secular Society, 14 March 2008

This should be noted. In Norway a year ago, or something, the Police announced that they wanted more Muslims to join the Police, and their solution was to go recruiting in the mosques. Only.
But as you can see from the chart below, that is hardly a representative part of the immigrant population. (Church/Mosque attendance to the left)

Faith propaganda: "Forgiveness has God on its side"

"People who believe in God or a new-age spiritual force are less likely to hold a grudge, a study of Australians has found.

A survey of almost 500 people has confirmed what many always suspected - faith helps believers forgive where secular people continue to hold onto their blame."

[...]

"The results showed that it doesn't matter what you believe in, but if you believe in something, have faith in something, it means you're more likely to forgive," said researcher Adam Fox, who led the study overseen by professor of psychology Trang Thomas.

"That indicates that there's something in the system of thought connected to spirituality that helps people to accept others and their actions."
The researchers were unable to compare individual religions due to "ethical considerations", but said there was only "slight differences" between each."

The Age, Australia, February 12, 2008

Now, this isn't surprising at all when you see what kind of moral dilemmas the participants were presented with. (Scroll down to Transgression Narrative Test of Forgiveness (TNTF))

The five moral dilemmas were "secular" dilemmas, that is, dilemmas were people from all sorts of backgrounds would feel pretty much the same, like being betrayed. And apparently, the religious were able to forgive the transgressions better than their secular counterparts. Bummer.

But if they're going to measure whether or not religious people are more forgiving overall, then why not ask about moral dilemmas with a religious touch too?

Say, dilemmas like this:

6. "Your daughter leaves your family to live with an Atheist with a pierced nose. They do not marry."

7. "You ask your son if he won't marry soon, and he avoids the question. The next day, you see him kissing a male friend in the park."

8. "After countless episodes of violence, a Danish cartoonist decides to measure your tolerance by mocking something you hold very dear. He draws the Prophet Muhammed with a bomb."

9. "Being an Orthodox Jew, you have a servant to take care of things on the Sabbath, since you're too holy to even make yourself dinner. However, on this particular Sabbath, the servant does not show up, so you can't eat until the Sabbath is over."
10. "Are you still mad about the Jews who killed Jesus 2000 years ago?"
11. "You're tricked into drinking alcohol, and get rather tipsy and are tricked into eating pork or non-kosher food as well."

OK, I could go on forever. But the point is: what is being betrayed by someone compared to breaking a religious taboo? A taboo that for an Atheist is not even worth considering? Atheists have preferences as anyone else, and we don't necessarily believe in forgiveness at any cost. But the taboos are few and far between, and that means that there's very little chance that you offend an Atheist ∞. Atheists have less toes that can be stepped on, and if you do step on an Atheist's toes, you don't simultaneously step on God's toes thereby damning you both to Hell.

Now, I could be forgiving, thinking that it's the reporter who didn't get it right(it happens all the time), but notice that they couldn't compare individual religions because of "ethical considerations". But they could use a survey to lie about how forgiving religious people are compared to infidels?
It has to be said, that this survey's goal seems to have been to learn about various religious groups, while the secular group was merely a control group. But I guess once the results were in showing how unforgiving the secular group were, they were too good not to be published, despite not being true.

Whom should I contact if I have any questions?
Please contact Professor Trang Thomas in the first instance on -. If your require support for any issue that may have resulted from your participation, you may approach any one of the following contacts below that can assist you in finding a support service appropriate to addressing your needs:

* Islamic Council of Victoria: Rowan Gould (Chief Executive Officer), -
* Kollel Menachem Lubavitch: Rabbi Groner (Rabbi), -
* Swanston Street Church of Christ: Alan Baker (Associate Pastor), -
* City Life Church: Ask for ‘Pastor on duty', -
* Crossway Baptist Church: Ask for ‘Pastor on duty', -
[* Surprise, no Godless infidel on duty]

Yours sincerely

Adam Fox B. App. Sci. Hon. (Psychology)
Trang Thomas Professor of Psychology

Faith school boom 'creates division'

"The rapid growth of faith-based schools under the previous federal government has threatened the social cohesion of the nation, according to Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard's most senior education adviser.

[...]

Professor McGaw's remarks reflect a profound shift in education in the past two decades, with more than 200,000 children — almost 40% of non-government school students — now attending a religious school outside the main Catholic, Anglican and Uniting systems.
The change has meant that, for instance, increasing numbers of children are taught creationism as part of their science classes."

The Age, Australia, February 25, 2008

30 per cent Australians practise no religion

"And, interestingly, two thirds of Australians still claim a religious affiliation. According to the yearbook 26 per cent of Australians are Catholic, 19 per cent Anglican and 19 per cent favour other Christian denominations. More than 30 per cent say they practise no religion, but followers of religions other than Christianity have shown the largest proportional increase."

Livenews.com.au, 12/02/2008

Btw. since I come across a bunch of articles that are good/interesting but which I don't make blog posts about, I've made a feed for them and you'll see it on the right. "Other news items..."
If you want to subscribe to it, then here's the link.

"One third of Russians believe in immortality – the poll
Almost one third of Russians (29%) believe in ‘eternal life’, Yury Levada’s analytical center told Interfax.
The theme of immortality is closer to women, people of 55 years old and upward, with low income level, those who live in towns and villages, the sociologists reported.
The number of Russians who believe in tokens has increased by 9%, and in prophetic dreams by 17%.
63% of participants say they believe in tokens while 59% believe in prophetic dreams. Respectively 31% and 33% stated the contrary.
One third of Russians (33%) are predisposed to listen to astrological predictions, the same percentage is sure that UFO-people visit Earth every now and then.

Interfax, February 11

In other words: Old wives' tales.

Secular Party of Australia needs your help

"I'm not sure if I have any Australian readers here, but if you are an atheist living in Australia, the Secular Party of Australia needs your help. They want their party to be listed on the ballot for the upcoming election, and they need additional members to make this happen. Membership is free, and you would be helping to bring attention to secularism in Australia."

Friendly Atheist 25. August 2007

I'll gladly pass this on! Good luck!

Religion losing its allure in Australia

"Since 2001, the number of people [in Australia] saying they have no religious conviction has risen from 2.9 million, or 15.5 per cent of the population to 3.7 million, or 19 per cent.

So, over a period during which the total population has grown by just under a million, the number of non-believers has risen by 800,000. Which means the percentage increase of non-believers is close to 30 per cent.

Conversely, the percentage affirming commitment to some form of Christianity has hardly fallen – from 54 per cent to 53.2. In numerical terms, the overall number of Christians has declined from 10,768,000 to 10,577,000 – hardly cause for the bishops to sweat.

However, when the population is increasing, it's difficult to deny the emergence of a trend towards decline – and if the trend were to continue, as it has over the past three census periods, Christians will a minority very soon.

Those who fear that as Christianity declines, other religions will gain new adherents need not do so. In the past five years, the percentage of Australians claiming belief in "other" religions – Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism and so on – has also slipped – from 30.5 per cent to 28.1 per cent.

[...]

So it seems beyond dispute that, rather than cleaving to "new" religions offering new alleged truths and insights and rather than falling back on the age-old shibboleths of "traditional" Abrahamic religions, increasing numbers of Australians are rejecting religion altogether."

Daily Telegraph (Australia), July 03, 2007

[Science] Prayer Study Author Charged With Plagiarism

"A controversial study claiming that anonymous prayers from people in the United States, Canada, and Australia doubled the success rate of in vitro fertilization treatments performed on patients in Korea is making international news again. Once again, the news is not good.

[...]

In summary, the man who designed and supposedly conducted the prayer study resides in federal prison, and the man originally listed as lead author admits he knows nothing about the alleged research. The only remaining author has now been charged with plagiarism.

This may be the first time in history that all three authors of a randomized, controlled study have been found guilty of fraud, deception, and/or plagiarism."

ObGynNews.com, 15 March 2007