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In 1990, about 8 percent of the US population had no religious preference but by 2010, this percentage had more than doubled to 18 percent. That's a difference of about 25 million people, all of whom have somehow lost their religion. Now MIT Technology Review reports that Allen Downey, a computer scientist at the Olin College of Engineering in Massachusetts, has analyzed the data in detail and says that the dramatic drop in religious affiliation is the result of several factors but about 25 percent of the drop is due to the rise of the Internet. Downey concludes that the increase in Internet use in the last two decades has caused a significant drop in religious affiliation: for moderate use (2 or more hours per week) the odds ratio is 0.82. For heavier use (7 or more hours per week) the odds ratio is 0.58.
What Downey has found is a correlation and any statistician will tell you that correlations do not imply causation. But that does not mean that it is impossible to draw conclusions from correlations, only that they must be properly guarded. "Correlation does provide evidence in favor of causation, especially when we can eliminate alternative explanations or have reason to believe that they are less likely," says Downey. It's straightforward to imagine how spending time on the Internet can lead to religious disaffiliation. "For people living in homogeneous communities, the Internet provides opportunities to find information about people of other religions (and none), and to interact with them personally," says Downey. "Conversely, it is harder (but not impossible) to imagine plausible reasons why disaffiliation might cause increased Internet use."
There is another possibility: that a third unidentified factor causes both increased Internet use and religious disaffiliation. But Downey discounts this possibility. "We have controlled for most of the obvious candidates, including income, education, socioeconomic status, and rural/urban environments. (PDF)" If this third factor exists, it must have specific characteristics. It would have to be something new that was increasing in prevalence during the 1990s and 2000s, just like the Internet. "It is hard to imagine what that factor might be."
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Lagg on Thursday April 10 2014, @05:27PM
There is a reason this saying exists. Because it's true. The massive amounts of immediately available information and scientific material leads to people exercising their critical thinking skills. Once this starts happening it gets harder and harder to rationalize religion in general because it's just too goddamned worthless and stupid to put it bluntly. As the brainwashed person in question becomes further exposed to the plethora of material directly conflicting with their worldview it becomes harder for them to give religion a place in their mind. There is no room for faith in a place that thrives on information like the internet and the people using it. To put it one way the internet can be thought of as one gigantic digital clue-by-four.
Also, here is one reason disaffiliation may cause increased usage: When you use the internet you're exposed to such gigantic amounts of scientific material and humanistic thinking that the only way to ignore it as a religious type would be to stop using the internet or avoid it as much as possible. This fits in well with the general mindset of "Ignore reality if it doesn't fit my dogma" with religious people. As someone who was once a christian I know this feeling well. It was hard for me to escape the brainwashing but now with the internet it's easier than ever to escape it. And that's awesome. So naturally once someone does become disaffiliated they no longer have any reason to avoid it.
Or maybe the sheer volume of cat pictures distracts people just that much.
http://lagg.me [lagg.me] 🗿