Study shows most religious countries are the most socially impoverished

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2013/03/05/f-religion-economic-growth.html?cmp=fbtl

My first reaction was: Big fat hairy duh. We needed a study for that??? That like freaking obvious to us free thinkers, atheists, agnostics, anti religion, etc whatever you want to call us - for a long time.

What say you?

 

Oh no! Not another "discussion" about religion.

 

yes another

all are welcome to participate even CGirl

Nice new thread to for Bunny when he returns from the sin bin.

 

It's always worth having an actual study to back up information that "everybody knows". It's much harder to argue with figures than with anecdotes.

 

one of the points in the article is that the u.s.a. is an outlier: lots of believers, high income. attitudes are changing here too though. people of my generation (the so-called "x"), y, and millenials are self-identifying as less and less religious than previous generations.

edit: some stats for you...

http://www.pewforum.org/age/religion-among-the-millennials.aspx

 

What was your second reaction?

 

That despite what many Americans would wanna have you believe and what they believe themselves......well you know. I refer you to the american infallibility thread

especially what thereligious are trying todo to women in thatcountry

 

What about Italy? Aren't they economically prosperous while being very religious?

 

Not exactly a revaluation! But it's nice to have factual evidence.

 

italy, ireland and the u.s.a. are the outlier countries in this study. although both italy and ireland are not exactly lighting the world on fire since 2007.

 

Correlation but not causation.

At 42% Canada is fairly high.

 

Blade, the order that your title runs suggests the first causes the second, which is the inverse of the actual story.

 

Brunei? Dubai?

 

I'm not clear on what you're saying, I'm afraid. I'm not trying to be difficult. I'm just trying to see what's here beyond the dig at religion.

 

Not much

 

I don't think it is a great study. I would prefer some other X axis such as education or internet/infrastructure of course all these are linked to GDP but the current survey gives a slanted opinion.

Personally I don't think that all those African nations are there because the people are poor, it is because the education system is lacking, government infrastructure non existent in many rural areas and simple lack of exposure to modern thinking.

 

One more 'outlier'. 80% of Israelis believe in G-d. Less than 3% are anti-religious and more than 65% as religious.

 

Eh? I have a postgraduate education, live in a "big government" socialised society and will happily discuss post modernism and relativism with you. None of these things impact upon my faith. I'm unsure what your point is besides being mildly offensive?

 

As others have said, the original post got the story backward. This is about how widespread poverty and suffering makes people turn to religion, NOT about how religion makes people poor and causes suffering.

 

Something I've been to interesting seminars on actually, the decline of the church as a socially useful service in England.
I also think that reduced immediacy of mortality has an effect.