Tuesday, September 27, 2005
Times: Societies worse off with God on their side
London’s Times newspaper has a rather ridiculous story out this morning: “Societies worse off ‘when they have God on their side’” I thought it particularly timely in light of the Convocation contretemps of last week.
The Times leads with this:
RELIGIOUS belief can cause damage to a society, contributing towards high murder rates, abortion, sexual promiscuity and suicide, according to research published today.According to the study, belief in and worship of God are not only unnecessary for a healthy society but may actually contribute to social problems.
Looking at the piece; its headline and lead grafs; one suspect to entertain scientific evidence that religion in a society causes some negative. The actual substance, though, is a bevy of half-truths, logical fallacies, and politically-motivated caricatures (“…with the US, where the majority believes in a creator rather than the theory of evolution…”), all of which serve only to reinforce the closely-held view of one political sect.
Reading further into the article, the substance of the “study” is explained. It turns out that researchers looked at social circumstances in United States and Britain, made a qualitative judgment about which was more a successful society (Britain’s), made a quantitative judgment about which was more religious (America’s) and made the monumentally fallacious connection that religion causes a poorer society. Even forgetting the basic precept that correlation does not causality make, the ruling that America’s society is less successful seems wrong.
The study’s head, Gregory Paul, used data on homicide, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy and abortion in order to make the starting assumption that America’s society is more dysfunctional than Britain’s. (Never mind that the conclusion- that religion causes each of those ills- is self-referential to the starting presumption. Aren’t there more variables between the two nations than piety?)
Paul adds his dig: “I suspect that Europeans are increasingly repelled by the poor societal performance of the Christian states.”
Markets, of course, are appalled by the factual performance of old Europe.
Is the United States really a Christian state? Its current government structure was built with the same godliness as that of Europe. Even less so. And the Establishment Clause is still in effect, as it is in Europe. The only difference is that we take it to guarantee freedom of religion, not freedom from religion. That more people decide to worship in America indicates that perhaps Paul should be asking different questions.
If he wants to pick a non-successful society and pin the failure on religion, perhaps he should be basing “success” on indicators about happiness, livelihoods, prospects, and mobility, instead of brazenly declaring that crime in modern society (And Britain has the fifth highest criminal prosecutions per capita in the world. Gun crime is rising, too, despite gun bans.) result from religion. Or how about simply how many people can find work?
And perhaps he should demonstrate causality.
Posted on September 27, 2005 10:04 AM. Permalink 