[Vision2020] Atheism to Defeat Religion By 2038?

deb debismith at moscow.com
Thu Jun 7 18:14:06 PDT 2012


Bingo, and on the nose in one! Humans have never known what they were 
talking about when it comes to connection with the Devine. Likely we never 
will. religion (faith, belief in god(s) etc.)  is a way of making sense of 
the world, finding a metaphor that explains something, and giving us a place 
to put emotional content. Building Balefires, pyramids, temples, Oak Groves, 
or fatted calves is simply a means of expressing a need for someone 
(anyone?) else to intervene in the human catastrophe.....or expressing our 
own need to intervene in the mess we humans make of our lives and world.

Personally, I think it is too much control to give over, too much 
responsibility to dodge, and too little return on the investment to 
"worship" anything or "anyone"....
But, that's just me. Glad when others find something valuable (to them) in 
their religious preference.
Debi R-S
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Joe Campbell" <philosopher.joe at gmail.com>
To: "Donovan Arnold" <donovanjarnold2005 at yahoo.com>
Cc: <vision2020 at moscow.com>
Sent: Wednesday, June 06, 2012 7:04 PM
Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Atheism to Defeat Religion By 2038?


"How can someone believe definitively something that cannot ever be
proved or disproved by its very definition?" Similar comments would
seem to apply to the believe that God exists.

It seems to me that if you can have good reason for thinking that God
exists, then you could have good reasons for thinking that he doesn't
exist. Thus, were the world perfect that would constitute a reason for
believing in a perfect creator. But then some folks think that the
lack of perfection in the world is a reason for supposing that God
doesn't exist. After all, if he did exist, why the lack of perfection?

I'm sure you have a story to tell. That's not the point, although
feeling certain that something exists and being certain that it exists
are two different things. The point is you've got to give people some
slack when it comes to religious beliefs because none of us know what
the heck we're talking about. Not the theists, not the atheists; none
of us.


On Wed, Jun 6, 2012 at 3:57 PM, Donovan Arnold
<donovanjarnold2005 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Atheism is completely illogical and will never overtake the belief in God.
> Atheism is the belief that there is "No God". How can someone believe
> definitively something that cannot ever be proved or disproved by its very
> definition?
>
> Doubt God? Yes, that makes sense to some who have never experienced him.
> Doubt religion, yes, as many are anything but man made fabrications. Doubt
> certain Gods exists, certainly. But to proclaim, with all certainly there 
> is
> no God, is to claim that you know everything, either makes you a God, or a
> fool.
>
> People that put their faith and security in human wisdom, material goods,
> wealth, money, and things of the Earth are fools, for they can all be 
> taken,
> and will be taken from them. People should put their faith in love,
> understanding, and their belief in doing what is right by each other. Only
> by loving others, caring for others, and doing for others will you ever 
> know
> God and be certain of His existence.
>
> Donovan J. Arnold
>
> From: Art Deco <art.deco.studios at gmail.com>
> To: vision2020 at moscow.com
> Sent: Wednesday, June 6, 2012 4:08 PM
> Subject: [Vision2020] Atheism to Defeat Religion By 2038?
>
> Atheism to Defeat Religion By 2038
>
> Posted: 06/05/2012 5:00 pm
>
> Countries with the best standard of living are turning atheist. That shift
> offers a glimpse into the world's future.
> Religious people are annoyed by claims that belief in God will go the way 
> of
> horse transportation, and for much the same reason, specifically an 
> improved
> standard of living.
> The view that religious belief will give way to atheism is known as the
> secularization thesis. The specific version that I favor (1) is known as 
> the
> existential security hypothesis. The basic idea is that as people become
> more affluent, they are less worried about lacking for basic necessities, 
> or
> dying early from violence or disease. In other words they are secure in
> their own existence. They do not feel the need to appeal to supernatural
> entities to calm their fears and insecurities.
> The notion that improving living conditions are associated with a decline 
> in
> religion is supported by a mountain of evidence (1,2,3).
> That does not prevent some serious scholars, like political scientist Eric
> Kaufmann (4), from making the opposite case that religious fundamentalists
> will outbreed the rest of us. Yet, noisy as they can be, such groups are
> tiny minorities of the global population and they will become even more
> marginalized as global prosperity increases and standards of living 
> improve.
> Moreover, as religious fundamentalists become economically integrated, 
> young
> women go to work and produce smaller families, as is currently happening 
> for
> Utah's Mormons.
> The most obvious approach to estimating when the world will switch over to
> being majority atheist is based on economic growth. This is logical 
> because
> economic development is the key factor responsible for secularization. In
> deriving this estimate, I used the nine most godless countries as my
> touchstone (excluding Estonia as a formerly communist country).
> The countries were Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, 
> Japan,
> Netherlands, Sweden and the United Kingdom. These nine countries averaged
> out at the atheist transition in 2004 (5) with exactly half of the
> populations disbelieving in God. Their gross domestic product (GDP) 
> averaged
> $29,822 compared to $10,855 for the average country in the world. How long
> will it take before the world economy has expanded sufficiently that the 
> GDP
> of the average country has caught up to the average for the godless
> countries in 2004?
>
> Using the average global growth rate of GDP for the past 30 years of 3.33
> percent (based on International Monetary Fund data from their website), 
> the
> atheist transition would occur in 2035.
> Belief in God is not the only relevant measure of religion, of course. A
> person might believe in God in a fairly superficial way without religion
> affecting his or her daily life. One way of assessing the depth of 
> religious
> commitment is to ask survey participants whether they think that religion 
> is
> important in their daily lives as the Gallup Organization has done in
> worldwide nationally representative surveys.
> If fewer than 50 percent of the population agreed that religion was
> important to them, then the country has effectively crossed over to a
> secular majority. The godless countries by religiosity were Spain, South
> Korea, Canada, Switzerland, Uruguay, Germany and France. At a growth rate 
> of
> 3.33 percent per year it would be 2041 before the average country in the
> world would be at an equivalent level of affluence as these godless 
> nations.
> If national wealth drives secularization, the global population will cross
> an atheist threshold where the majority see religion as unimportant by 
> 2041.
> Averaging across the two measures of atheism, the entire world population
> would cross the atheist threshold by about 2038 (average of 2035 for
> disbelief and 2041 for religiosity). Although 2038 may seem improbably 
> fast,
> this requires only a shift of approximately 1 percent per year whether in
> religiosity or belief in God. Using the Human Development Index as a clock
> suggests an even earlier arrival for the atheist transition (1).
> Is the loss of religious belief something fear? Contrary to the claims of
> religious leaders, Godless countries are highly moral nations with an
> unusual level of social trust, economic equality, low crime and a high 
> level
> of civic engagement (5). We could do with some of that.
> Sources
> 1. Barber, N. (2012). Why atheism will replace religion: The triumph of
> earthly pleasures over pie in the sky. E-book, available at:
> http://www.amazon.com/Atheism-Will-Replace-Religion-ebook/dp/B00886ZSJ6/
> 2. Norris, P., & Inglehart, R. (2004). Sacred and secular: Religion and
> politics worldwide. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
> 3. Barber, N. (2011). A Cross-National test of the uncertainty hypothesis 
> of
> religious belief Cross-Cultural Research, 45, 318-333.
> 4. Kaufmann, E. (2010). Shall the religious inherit the earth? London:
> Profile books.
> 5. Zuckerman, P. (2008). Society without God: What the least religious
> nations can tell us about contentment. New York: New York University 
> Press.
>
>
> --
> Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
> art.deco.studios at gmail.com
>
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