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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
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7 C! h- W7 f5 j+ \- z" v3 {/ Dhttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12811197
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# P0 _+ G+ y, O$ H22 March 2011 Last updated at 03:31 ET Share this pageFacebookTwitter ShareEmail Print Religion may become extinct in nine nations, study saysBy Jason Palmer8 e' l) `7 L- S
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Science and technology reporter, BBC News, Dallas
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+ \% Y( a) A* D' u+ O4 c+ KA study using census data from nine countries shows that religion there is set for extinction, say researchers.! a7 e9 K0 ^6 _9 e3 E5 P
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The study found a steady rise in those claiming no religious affiliation.& Y9 M) i3 s. c M% ^- C! i
$ L, u7 G. J r1 f1 a0 WThe team\'s mathematical model attempts to account for the interplay between the number of religious respondents and the social motives behind being one.3 w* c4 s6 Y( O; u
9 m3 S. ]1 t( G8 {2 m% V# zThe result, reported at the American Physical Society meeting in Dallas, US, indicates that religion will all but die out altogether in those countries.1 x! `; e D# e9 p% Z! j
3 A; T; y7 k# T& w+ Z q2 QThe 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.7 e. I6 l) D/ N' M' D
. ^7 c* U0 @# E) h0 k; @* fTheir 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.5 i0 N. r# h+ t, D
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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.- h. k/ C W% V. V1 Q
: J$ S/ H/ D1 i5 p* L3 l9 Y4 T; DAt its heart is the competition between speakers of different languages, and the \"utility\" of speaking one instead of another.# A6 C+ @4 R& ]& G( b6 d5 x( R6 H
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\"The idea is pretty simple,\" said Richard Wiener of the Research Corporation for Science Advancement, and the University of Arizona.# F1 H* F; W; r" V
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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.
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: w7 e$ u) e/ y) O+ 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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" a% O! ?, | C7 j& \6 n3 bDr 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%.\"4 F1 S( c6 @2 `: r4 [. x! g
/ `7 c, M2 F+ D+ @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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0 h" y2 b) N; u' QThey 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.. J& R$ Y' i h7 O& T/ E8 u1 `
; [0 Z3 h8 }# e# W) PAnd in all the countries, the indications were that religion was headed toward extinction.- \7 ~7 F- M- }; C
; s' i6 z. H* a0 c% ~ ~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.) Z3 ]7 P; T" i( L' u
p2 z8 S# _( W1 f, _However, he told BBC News that he thought it was \"a suggestive result\". / k9 ?8 Q; O+ A( E1 k ?
' }. O7 b6 ?+ m, v& B\"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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\"Obviously much more complicated things are going on with any one individual, but maybe a lot of that averages out.\" |
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