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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 l( ]' R8 a: [" K/ l2 u/ ]
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12811197
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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
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$ U9 h& N, b; k% H ~Science and technology reporter, BBC News, Dallas8 e8 [9 i! M! S8 \2 x4 V
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A study using census data from nine countries shows that religion there is set for extinction, say researchers.
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The study found a steady rise in those claiming no religious affiliation.$ R5 S$ H) {" ~* I$ r: _
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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.
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, Z8 _1 F5 [4 `0 w. Q4 `/ U" B' J$ nThe 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.
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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.
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At its heart is the competition between speakers of different languages, and the \"utility\" of speaking one instead of another.6 i, W% H+ y* d+ r
1 g) A" a* X% H5 [/ s7 M\"The idea is pretty simple,\" said Richard Wiener of the Research Corporation for Science Advancement, and the University of Arizona.
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1 w$ _3 X. g' i( p; Q& | v\"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.% ]; I: Z9 `. W; V1 @
! l$ t6 F& ~# R- [3 s1 h\"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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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%.\"
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The team then applied their nonlinear dynamics model, adjusting parameters for the relative social and utilitarian merits of membership of the \"non-religious\" category.
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* A# R: ?6 f4 Y! `4 ] O/ WThey 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.
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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.. b9 Q# S8 n7 _* _
, ~1 q: `7 n/ B2 l% x6 q, x0 \\"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.
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& V8 Q- h, E) s L5 q' u! y: @! i! [However, he told BBC News that he thought it was \"a suggestive result\". + G# g5 d7 \# u$ o) r
' S3 a- y$ U6 ~! p9 D9 k\"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.: W( N) t- }2 z: w
' _1 F5 n) L+ d\"Obviously much more complicated things are going on with any one individual, but maybe a lot of that averages out.\" |
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