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- x4 K/ u* s5 j: i/ r5 Chttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12811197
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: N8 M$ @0 \1 {. ?4 @3 W3 |22 March 2011 Last updated at 03:31 ET Share this pageFacebookTwitter ShareEmail Print Religion may become extinct in nine nations, study saysBy Jason Palmer8 X7 j( D+ y: v" a
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Science and technology reporter, BBC News, Dallas, K, j9 s }( |. c4 o6 Z0 a# {
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A study using census data from nine countries shows that religion there is set for extinction, say researchers.
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The study found a steady rise in those claiming no religious affiliation.
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5 l) M X( }- H. Y$ _! [! XThe team\'s mathematical model attempts to account for the interplay between the number of religious respondents and the social motives behind being one.+ Y4 Q9 X j" [5 G$ p
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The result, reported at the American Physical Society meeting in Dallas, US, indicates that religion will all but die out altogether in those countries.
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+ V0 P, x! f9 H0 B s# `2 {0 yThe 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.) [- G) E/ q& q' x7 u0 w4 E; w5 j8 K9 ?$ h
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Their means of analysing the data invokes what is known as nonlinear dynamics - a mathematical approach that has been used to explain a wide range of physical phenomena in which a number of factors play a part.
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: L6 k9 a3 `- B& X; K4 sOne of the team, Daniel Abrams of Northwestern University, put forth a similar model in 2003 to put a numerical basis behind the decline of lesser-spoken world languages.% r$ I/ l n, g" ?9 y. e; W
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At its heart is the competition between speakers of different languages, and the \"utility\" of speaking one instead of another.
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9 M& c0 B9 X. V" @/ E5 h. V! c1 v\"The idea is pretty simple,\" said Richard Wiener of the Research Corporation for Science Advancement, and the University of Arizona.
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W1 _6 L' H# a3 K. A" b\"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.0 J3 p5 f7 G- T [# K
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\"For example in languages, there can be greater utility or status in speaking Spanish instead of [the dying language] Quechuan in Peru, and similarly there\'s some kind of status or utility in being a member of a religion or not.\"9 K9 u! J: i. p' t+ V# {) q. l
! G; W, T% S5 U7 {: ~! MDr 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%.\"
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: F: ~) [/ A8 |( VThe team then applied their nonlinear dynamics model, adjusting parameters for the relative social and utilitarian merits of membership of the \"non-religious\" category. [' @( [/ e# P7 p- Q% I; P s c. [
2 w/ l) `* K" |, \( ~$ iThey found, in a study published online, that those parameters were similar across all the countries studied, suggesting that similar behaviour drives the mathematics in all of them.9 b: x0 ^3 V# D; X0 `6 R# b
4 ]1 v, q' o& a- C! \6 fAnd in all the countries, the indications were that religion was headed toward extinction.
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8 M2 g2 Z5 Y. G7 j: YHowever, Dr Wiener told the conference that the team was working to update the model with a \"network structure\" more representative of the one at work in the world.8 s5 j2 {0 K: \' ~
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\"Obviously we don\'t really believe this is the network structure of a modern society, where each person is influenced equally by all the other people in society,\" he said.
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However, he told BBC News that he thought it was \"a suggestive result\".
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\"It\'s interesting that a fairly simple model captures the data, and if those simple ideas are correct, it suggests where this might be going.
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\"Obviously much more complicated things are going on with any one individual, but maybe a lot of that averages out.\" |
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