Sorry for the offtopic post on the other thread.
Quote:
Originally Posted by W.E.B. Du Bois
I checked this story out on National Geographic, which is a credible source:
Evolution Less Accepted in U.S. Than Other Western Countries, Study Finds
So it seems 40% believe in evolution, 40% do not and 20% are not sure. Oh well, pretty pathetic, but the US is more religious than Western European countries.
All of the evolution posts will be moved to a new thread as they are off-topic. |
You say that the US is "more religious" than Western Europe. From the feeling I get this is true, but statistics tell a different story actually. If you noticed on that figure about evolution, Italy ranks pretty much in the top third while according to Wikipedia (
Religions by country - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) the amount of atheists in the US is actually higher than in Italy, and the amount of Christians is pretty similar (Italian figures range from 70 to 90% while the US figure is 78%). Ireland has even fewer atheists - I didn't bother to compare the other countries, but I guess you get the idea.
In any case, considering Italy and its "affiliation" with the Vatican, I'd say Italy is a pretty religious country yet public oppinion of evolution is high. I know what the bible, specially the old testament, and other religious books say about the creation of the world but personally, eventhough I'm a Christian, I don't find evolution and religion to be contradticting.
Maybe European attitude towards religion is more pragmatic than that of people in the US, maybe the "God bless America" after every speech by a politican is getting to some people's head, I don't know. But from the numbers I showed you it could well be that religion per se is not necessarily the cause for it.
EDIT: According to this source (
http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/a..._report_en.pdf), 95% of people on Malta confirm their belief in God, and yet Malta is far ahead of the US in the evolution statistic.