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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+ Q" u8 Q0 U0 C; e* X- _6 x3 |6 P
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12811197: C" ~" l9 M) F' U8 r' z
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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- T4 a: d, E, h: Z- k
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Science and technology reporter, BBC News, Dallas% K1 u& r0 w! J0 X/ t, [3 X) ^4 |0 h3 {
" c. g* _ R. F1 B1 _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.
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- V/ c) z' I8 Q- a1 eThe team\'s mathematical model attempts to account for the interplay between the number of religious respondents and the social motives behind being one.6 p# D4 c& e/ i+ s2 A
# g# I7 P: t. I a* J4 yThe 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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6 |! s, |. ~! u$ q5 GThe 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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( X+ m% A! h3 eTheir 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.* U& c5 @- m& u! y. z
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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." j6 g+ [" X, Z+ a8 I l B4 b& ]
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At its heart is the competition between speakers of different languages, and the \"utility\" of speaking one instead of another.4 a5 Y! i5 J+ K. I/ Q
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\"The idea is pretty simple,\" said Richard Wiener of the Research Corporation for Science Advancement, and the University of Arizona.. D: V; f9 D: F& F S1 K
' \1 n! s3 J. S. {1 g3 T! c) N\"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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\"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.\"4 [: N. i' `5 r3 S* ~: V0 W
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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.- X8 ?: M$ @9 Q! B; I$ q$ n0 o6 N2 r
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They 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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( B$ K2 I) ]& D9 h- k, k# G4 d0 Q" BAnd 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.* r* E( w3 H- I- x
; l7 J C+ Y/ W- O ?& l" P9 g\"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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% J2 b$ P0 z [+ {9 hHowever, he told BBC News that he thought it was \"a suggestive result\".
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- |5 t( z7 h; S7 v& v* @& m- z\"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.# B# z% C9 x% L3 b
! e( V4 g5 G: `! b7 e\"Obviously much more complicated things are going on with any one individual, but maybe a lot of that averages out.\" |
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