Author claims "Atheism will replace Religion by 2041"

Population of Africa according to Google: 1.033 billion.
Population of the Middle East (minus Egypt) according to Wikipedia: 309,804,000.

I'm now more confident in Barber's predicition.
 
Humes fork said:
China no, the Middle East no. The Western world yes.
Click to expand...

I'd have to agree on China, and on the Middle East. But has the "western world" become more secularised these past two decades? Perhaps it is a yes and no situation? Haven't the religious blocks grown and become more radical (in the West)?
 
I'm skeptical just because I make it a rule to never underestimate humankind's capability and enthusiasm in treating sillyness as fact.
 
Needless to say, these kinds of predictions are difficult to make. Faith in government in the U.S. never recovered from Watergate and Vietnam (though it did make a short-lived comeback after 9/11). The marriage equality side has made rapid gains in the past two decades, but religion is a bit more obstinate; as an institution, it has been consistently underestimated for over a hundred years. During Communist revolutions in the early 20th centuries, people predicted the demise of religion. In the sixties, Time ran the in/famous cover story, "Is God Dead?"

The author gives a plausible account for why atheism flourishes in social democracies, but there's always the question of root causes, and anyway, I thought social safety nets were being eroded by globalization and immigration.

"A bet is a tax on ********." -- Alex Tabborak

I'd bet him 10 grand that atheism will not replace religion in 30 years the world over.
 
Cain said:
I'd bet him 10 grand that atheism will not replace religion in 30 years the world over.
Click to expand...

My money is on private faith replacing organized religion throughout most the first world nations in little over thirty years, not atheism. I don't see atheism replacing silly beliefs any time soon.
 
The notion that improving living conditions are associated with a decline in religion is supported by a mountain of evidence (1,2,3).
Click to expand...

This seems plausible, although i haven't seen the statistics she is referencing. What remains to be seen is that "improving living conditions" does indeed cause people to become atheists or less observant of religion rather than they being linked by some other factor.

An example would be the many communist countries where religious beliefs decreased due to government policies and education despite that the "wellbeing" of people fluctuated considerably.

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.
Click to expand...

I find it unlikely that developing countries will have a standard of living comparable to secular western countries anytime soon, and thus presumably become more secularized. Increasing costs of fossil fuels due to depletion and increased consumption coupled with global warming will likely reduce global prosperity, especially in the developing world.

Mudcat said:
I don't see atheism replacing silly beliefs any time soon.
Click to expand...

Atheism and silly beliefs are by no means incompatible.
 
Acleron said:
Yes, I cannot see that such large organisations will just peacefully give up. As their income stream decreases only the more extreme adherents will be left with no one in the organisation to balance their views.
Click to expand...

This is sort of a disturbing fact you've touched upon, Acleron: organized religion is a pretty powerful force, and if only totally convinced adherents give money to it, then, while perhaps it will lose in universal applicability, it will gain in falsehood.
 
As the saying goes "We live in interesting times". The Web has had a huge effect on religion. I used to wonder in church, how many people were sitting there who didn't believe for a minute, but dared not say so for fear of ostracism.
Of course that still applies, but many have discovered that far from being alone, large numbers of people feel that way.
Non-belief is still not very popular, but its become too main stream now to stamp the doubters into submission. In addition, you have all of the benefits and discoveries of science. People are enjoying too many modern conveniences and are finally beginning to see the benefits of actual knowledge.
I am concerned that science is becoming a bit of a fad. Too many commercials are appearing cloaked in scientific jargon. Hopefully, it won't disappear completely from view again.
I agree with others here, that there is certainly going to be some push back from religion and religious types as their struggle becomes more desperate.
Not sure when its all going to happen, but I think the trend is pretty clear.
50 years or 300 maybe, but I do think someday.
 
MikeG said:
Not 2040?...................or 2042? Eerily precise guess that.

I hope that the bulk of the work is done well before then, as I'll be in my 80's by the 2040s. I want to tell a lot of people "I told you so", and being old and doddery I'll have probably forgotten how to use the internet by then.
Click to expand...

Hey! I'm 80. I can do the internet. I am old and doddery though. I'm sure religion is not going to die before me, but at least I can die without it. Sure looking forward to a nap.
 
Last edited:
I don't care if it dies soon. Would like to see people stop using it as a way to justify killing others or controlling them.

Ranb
 
sowhat said:
As the saying goes "We live in interesting times". The Web has had a huge effect on religion. I used to wonder in church, how many people were sitting there who didn't believe for a minute, but dared not say so for fear of ostracism.
Of course that still applies, but many have discovered that far from being alone, large numbers of people feel that way.
Non-belief is still not very popular, but its become too main stream now to stamp the doubters into submission. In addition, you have all of the benefits and discoveries of science. People are enjoying too many modern conveniences and are finally beginning to see the benefits of actual knowledge.
I am concerned that science is becoming a bit of a fad. Too many commercials are appearing cloaked in scientific jargon. Hopefully, it won't disappear completely from view again.
I agree with others here, that there is certainly going to be some push back from religion and religious types as their struggle becomes more desperate.
Not sure when its all going to happen, but I think the trend is pretty clear.
50 years or 300 maybe, but I do think someday.
Click to expand...

I'm not as optimistic as you about people seeing the benefits of science and knowledge. There appears to have been a growth of influential people who disregard both in favour of their own ideas. Politicians, anti-AGW journalists and promoters of alternative medicine have all abandoned the conclusions of science. They certainly enjoy the benefits and then fail to see that science has allowed these benefits. (:
 
Acleron said:
I'm not as optimistic as you about people seeing the benefits of science and knowledge. There appears to have been a growth of influential people who disregard both in favour of their own ideas. Politicians, anti-AGW journalists and promoters of alternative medicine have all abandoned the conclusions of science. They certainly enjoy the benefits and then fail to see that science has allowed these benefits. (:
Click to expand...

I hear you. They are certainly there, but I think in the longer, or hopefully shorter run, the wind is against them.
 
Saw an interesting graph on the news last night. "Bear market in God". It shows that in the last decade construction of religious buildings in the US is almost a third of what is was. Nothing to do with the recession. About the only other reason I can thinks of is that there is no need for new buildings people are not going to use them. Or maybe there is no money to do so.

http://www.alankohler.com.au/
 
Acleron said:
I'm not as optimistic as you about people seeing the benefits of science and knowledge. There appears to have been a growth of influential people who disregard both in favour of their own ideas. Politicians, anti-AGW journalists and promoters of alternative medicine have all abandoned the conclusions of science. They certainly enjoy the benefits and then fail to see that science has allowed these benefits. (:
Click to expand...

I think the Internet primarily eases the spread of new ideas. It helps people living in homogenous, perhaps semi-isolated, areas with a particular religious donination being prominent learn that there are several other options out there, and can also get access to communities where views different from their local one are prevalent. Of course, the audience at this forum and similar ones is a self-selecting audience. But you can find it to a lesser degree elsewhere. I frequent gaming forums as well, and atheists/agnostics are typically the biggest "religious" group, if not always the majority. The Internet makes critiques of religion and religious beliefs (and criticism of religion goes back to Antiquity at least) widely accessible to ordinary people.

But it also works in the other direction. Crackpot ideas can easily find a large audience, especially if they package their ideas in an attractive way. Think of the Zeitgeist movie (disclaimer: I haven't watched it).

In the end, I think the Internet will kill religion. Think of how the "flow" goes. Even clergymen lose their faith (see The Clergy Project). By contrast, whenever an atheist converts to religion, it's typically a former apatheist who thought it would be a good marketing idea to show off an atheist joining religion. It's practically never a philosophically committed atheist, who has given the subject some thought. Such people virtually always stay atheist.
 
So it's either atheism or religion?

Atheism is about non-belief (or lack of belief) in God, not about non-belief in religion (which provably exists). Get rid of religion you end up with a bunch of non-religious folks who may or may not believe in God.
 
Humes fork said:
I think the Internet primarily eases the spread of new ideas. It helps people living in homogenous, perhaps semi-isolated, areas with a particular religious donination being prominent learn that there are several other options out there, and can also get access to communities where views different from their local one are prevalent. Of course, the audience at this forum and similar ones is a self-selecting audience. But you can find it to a lesser degree elsewhere. I frequent gaming forums as well, and atheists/agnostics are typically the biggest "religious" group, if not always the majority. The Internet makes critiques of religion and religious beliefs (and criticism of religion goes back to Antiquity at least) widely accessible to ordinary people.

But it also works in the other direction. Crackpot ideas can easily find a large audience, especially if they package their ideas in an attractive way. Think of the Zeitgeist movie (disclaimer: I haven't watched it).

In the end, I think the Internet will kill religion. Think of how the "flow" goes. Even clergymen lose their faith (see The Clergy Project). By contrast, whenever an atheist converts to religion, it's typically a former apatheist who thought it would be a good marketing idea to show off an atheist joining religion. It's practically never a philosophically committed atheist, who has given the subject some thought. Such people virtually always stay atheist.
Click to expand...

Yes, perhaps I'm too pessimistic. Certainly the open disclosure of atheism has allowed many to realise that their lack of belief is neither unique nor a poor thing.

I often see people claiming they have moved from atheism to belief and wondered if they were really atheist in the first place.

And yes, the internet is a threat to all religions. You can't burn web sites that disagree with you :)
 
The author clarifies: 2014 is his projected date for when nonbelievers will outnumber believers:

'Atheism to Replace Religion by 2041': A Clarification
This story was recently taken up by the Guardian Express and the International Business Times, whose writers were responding to a prediction in my book Why Atheism Will Replace Religion. Unfortunately these writers got the story wrong in various ways. I want to correct some of their errors and clarify the actual claim.
The Las Vegas Guardian Express writer, Rebecca Savastio, falsely attributes to me the claim that religion "will completely disappear by 2041." What I do project is that religious people will be a minority by that date, which is a very different prediction.
Click to expand...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nigel...ligion-by-2041-a-clarification_b_3695658.html
 
Orphia Nay said:
Thanks for that link. (You might want to edit your date typo.)

So newspapers mis-stated his theory. So did I, in the topic title.
Click to expand...

No, that is the title of the book. Just read the opening few paragraphs of the book. As I expected the author defined what he meant, which is that atheism will be the majority view of the people in the world. So the newspapers did not even look at the book.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom