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澳洲, 奧地利, 加拿大, 捷克, 芬蘭, 愛爾蘭, 荷蘭, 新西蘭, 瑞士7 \. M4 ?, }1 H G1 i: h
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, k v0 N; N3 \5 t6 a$ xhttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-128111971 w% G4 c( q: n# [+ {; [# @
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22 March 2011 Last updated at 03:31 ET Share this pageFacebookTwitter ShareEmail Print Religion may become extinct in nine nations, study saysBy Jason Palmer: B" {6 v0 v2 n% o
4 |! d3 I* B) E U& S& G3 XScience and technology reporter, BBC News, Dallas
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8 [8 e: N3 `! z, o7 XA study using census data from nine countries shows that religion there is set for extinction, say researchers.
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- P: Z* }( W" U5 EThe study found a steady rise in those claiming no religious affiliation.5 i; e) k7 V5 K+ `/ R: K
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The team\'s mathematical model attempts to account for the interplay between the number of religious respondents and the social motives behind being one.
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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.) S' E O4 [+ c5 s- _( v
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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.
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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., h: R7 {: W- m ~5 S
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One 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.# Y/ E" S% K/ c+ N7 H" m
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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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\"The idea is pretty simple,\" said Richard Wiener of the Research Corporation for Science Advancement, and the University of Arizona./ o/ Y- s( G' S! d1 q; W( ?" u5 M
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\"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.- ?7 w6 n% R' m- X7 C- \% l9 x
) `8 {. _, `7 [; k; S; l\"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.\"
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1 a# K, t3 ~2 I0 @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%.\"3 A8 Y8 O6 f2 ?* k
2 \! I% q% K9 O- g$ E8 M" P" D+ C2 wThe team then applied their nonlinear dynamics model, adjusting parameters for the relative social and utilitarian merits of membership of the \"non-religious\" category.! }( L; F, y* y& x. {: O2 b# Q
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They 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.& T) r H5 w& _* `2 |
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And in all the countries, the indications were that religion was headed toward extinction.
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However, 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.
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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.4 g1 y" W f7 ]0 V. q" z
0 z% ^8 I* z$ }" ?3 KHowever, he told BBC News that he thought it was \"a suggestive result\". $ k. M6 y$ Z4 a
; Y' K* x4 T% A" k* h\"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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0 T# h) ~. w+ Y\"Obviously much more complicated things are going on with any one individual, but maybe a lot of that averages out.\" |
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