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But what of the other 50 percent? In the data, the only factor that correlates with this is date of birth—people born later are less likely to have a religious
by danbruc 13y ago
But what of the other 50 percent? In the data, the only factor that correlates with this is date of birth—people born later are less likely to have a religious affiliation. But as Downey points out, year of birth cannot be a causal factor. “So about half of the observed change remains unexplained,” he says.
Increasing year of birth means increasing human knowledge. While it was convincing a long time ago to have a god for thunder, for fire, for love and a thousand other things, we learned that thunder works without any god. And now people learn that the universe works without any god at all, i.e. monotheistic religions are no longer as convincing as they used to be.
- pradocchia 13y agoIncreasing year of birth means increasing human knowledge. What, since the 1990s? No, don't be silly. There may have been a bump due to improved access to basic human knowledge. Is this what you mean?
- azakai 13y agoAnd the improved access is likely mostly due to the internet.
- danbruc 13y agoGood point, raw increase in human knowledge is probably not a good explanation. But it is almost a quarter of a century since 1990, the rate at which new knowledge is obtained is constantly increasing, the Internet made access to this knowledge easier than ever before, people have - I guess - more time available to spend on such topics, the Internet enabled discussions in a way not possible before, ... Therefore a better explanation is probably easier access to knowledge than raw increase in knowledge.