

Is the US Really a Nation of God-Fearing Darwin-Haters? - Rexxar
http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,628389,00.html

======
mixmax
_"The American observer of Europe is often baffled at European claims to
secularism since official expressions of religion are so public and yet --
apparently -- so taken for granted. A 10th-century depiction of the
crucifixion, for example, is part of every Danish passport, regardless of
whether its bearer is -- as many nowadays are -- a pious Muslim."_

There's a difference between culture and religion. Having a 10th-century
depiction of the crucifixion in my passport doesn't imply that I'm religious,
but it does remind me that I come from a country with a long and rich history
and culture. In Northern Europe religious artifacts are primarily seen as
cultural heritage, not as a way of showing your devotion to a god. I can't
speak for Southern Europe, but from my limited experience of living there it
doesn't seem very different.

 _"American church attendance and religious belief is not off the European
scale if one compares it with Europe's Catholic regions. A smaller percentage
of Americans consider themselves religious than the Portuguese and Italians.
Proportionately fewer Americans say they believe in God than the Irish and
Portuguese."_

The article compares all of America to a small very religious part of Europe.
That would be like saying that Americans produce 20 times as many cars as
Europeans because the average number of cars produced per capita in Detroit is
far above the average number of cars produced per capita in Europe.

The US is the country with the smallest percentage of non-believers (3%), and
as stated in the article Portugal and Italy aren't far behind(4% and 6%). The
article doesn't however mention Sweden or France that are 46% and 43% non-
believers.

Source: <http://www.swivel.com/graphs/show/8244121>

Spiegel should really know better than manipulating numbers like this.

~~~
Silentio
>There's a difference between culture and religion.

That's an interesting statement. Only in the West, and only in the last few
hundred years can religion be conceived of as a discrete object, separate from
culture.

Indigenous American and Hindu culture, for example, have traditionally had no
such division between religion and culture. With the rise of global capitalism
we may be starting to see a secular/nonsecular divide in traditionally Hindu
areas (India, duh) but this is a very modern development.

edit: I should say, none of the above necessarily negates anything you said. I
just think it's interesting.

edit number 2: Also, the above could also be further illuminated in a short
description of the differences between orthodoxy and orthopraxy. Worth
checking out each concept on Wikipedia if y'all are interested.

~~~
graemep
Lots of Asian countries have a common culture that spans groups following
different religions: Indonesia, India (and particular Indian regions), Sri
Lanka etc.

Also, most of the major religions spread to different cultures a long time
ago: A thousand years ago a Russian and a South Indian could have both not
only been Christians, but both Eastern Orthodox, or an Indonesian and a Libyan
could both be Sunni Muslims, or a Sri Lankan and Laotian could both be
Theravadan Buddhists.

If people of disparate cultures could share common beliefs, sure religion and
culture have always been separable. Especially pertinent to your examples are
the South Indian Christians who have undoubtedly shared the culture of the
Hindu majority for 2,000 years.

~~~
Silentio
What you say is true, as far as I know. It is entirely possible to share the
culture of the people who one lives nearby and yet practice a different
religion. It is also true that this has been going on for a long time. In the
case of the spread of Abrahamic offshoots (Islam and Christianity), a couple
of thousand years. In this sense religious expression has always been fluid.
However, I think that is different than viewing religion as an object. It is a
modern move to split culture into many different categories: public, private,
family, government, religion, education, medical, etc, etc. This way of
understanding and ordering the world is a particularly Western (some might say
Germanic) form.

Furthermore, there are languages that still survive to this day that have no
word for "religion" as such, something I talk elsewhere in this thread. This
says to me that in some cultures religion cannot even be conceived of as
separate from culture because the language does not provide the imaginative
capacity to understand it that way.

So, always fluid, yes. Separable, I don't know.

------
Dilpil
The point of credibility meltdown:

"The modern American creationist, interestingly enough, no longer takes
scripture as sufficient reason to believe the Biblical account of the origins
of the world. The debate is, instead, conducted on the turf of science, with
creationists attempting to argue the fine points of the age of the fossil
record, suggesting that orthodox evolution has gaps as a seamless explanation,
and otherwise indicating their acceptance that the modern world speaks the
language of science."

~~~
abalashov
Why? This is certainly consistent with the exponents of Creationism and/or
"creation science" that I've met, seen and heard of...

~~~
ubernostrum
The key is "speaking the language" of science, not actually _doing_ science.

Neo-creationists use scientific terms and talk about scientific theories, but
do not advance any scientific theories or apply those terms to their own
thinking. The creationist standpoint is and always has been that a literal
interpretation of particular English translations of the Bible is
unquestionably factually accurate, and that anything which contradicts that
interpretation is to be attacked by any means available.

The only difference is that now they talk about things "irreducible
complexities" (which aren't) and "the lack of transitional forms" (which
isn't) as a scientific-sounding cover.

~~~
sketerpot
In other words, _they_ believe in creationism just because the Bible and their
church say so, but they try to make it sound scientifical for their
propaganda. Science has a hard-earned cachet that comes from many years of
delivering the goods, and creationists would like to co-opt that.

------
sbt
This essay proves that you can find data to support pretty much any
conclusion, as long as you choose your data selectively.

~~~
ryne
So true; he has 27 diverse countries to flagrantly cherry pick from, however
when I read "But talk is cheap, and these findings may indicate desire as much
as reality" I was amazed for a second thinking he was going to analyze his
techniques and sources for biases but alas, no such evaluation ensued. Fainly
reminds me of Gladwellian journalism.

------
asdlfj2sd33
_Despite the myths of a hyper-motorized nation, Americans own fewer passenger
cars per head than the French, Austrians, Swiss, Germans, Luxembourgers and
Italians_

I find this very surprising!

~~~
nihilocrat
I find this surprising not because of cultural norms, but because of the much
higher price of gas and taxes on cars in Europe.

~~~
graemep
Europeans may also use their cars less. Most people I know in London own a
car, but most only use it on weekends or holidays.

------
russell
> a sober look at its empirical basis suggests that it is an inverted pyramid,
> a lot of conclusions perched on flimsy premises

Der Spiegel examines the US vs Europe in a large number of dimensions and
finds that the US differs far less than one might expect. For example, the
white murder rate is less than that of Britain. Or that we are doing pretty
well in the pollution department. Even the majority-minority tensions in the
US are starting to appear in Europe because of immegration from poorer
regions.

~~~
dimitar
Majority-minority tensions? Is this an euphemism for racism and xenophobia?

My observation is that most of us Europeans are pretty racist and xenophobic
and big hypocrites about it too.

Now, while I will not erase the above, keep in mind that both the EU and US
are huge and diverse places and generalizations are generally useless. Huge in
different ways and diverse in different ways.

~~~
russell
I didnt mean it as an euphemism, maybe a shorhand. The article draws a
parallel between racism in the US as a residue of slavery, and xenophobia in
Europe as a result of immigration of lower class workers who are different and
dont care much about the culture of the host country.

Integration in the US has taken huge steps in the last half-century. My ex-
wife's relatives were put in US concentration camps in WWII. I remember seeing
whites-only and colored signs in the south. I remember the civil rights
movement of the 60's and 70's. The article speculated whether European
countries are facing the same kind of transition from individual monocultures
to diversity.

I certainly would welcome any insight you have.

------
tybris
Another case of lies, damned lies and statistics. When I lived in the U.S. I
found the differences to be much bigger than I expected. Obviously, I did not
expect or find a god-fearing nation of Darwin haters. Rather, I found a
society that is different on every level. Despite being void of any religion
or conservative views, I found myself to be a traditionalist. Given an
alternative perspective I found the key principle behind European society to
be tradition, whereas in the U.S. it is business. These principles have
perpetuated into every aspect of society, from holiday celebration to city
planning, on to social welfare, politics, religion, etc. It was quite a
culture shock to me, but I really learned to appreciate the differences. Or as
I described it an American friend: Europeans know how to party, but Americans
know how to have fun.

More recently I've moved to another European country with entirely different
socio-economic and religious statistics. Same old.

------
johnnybgoode
This is related to something I often say: The US is more liberal than Europe.

Much of Europe feels relatively rigid, in the sense that there are ancient
attitudes, customs, social structures, and institutions that would seem out of
place in the US.

You might say Europe is to the left of the US, but then we'd be talking about
something else.

~~~
cschwarm
Assuming your premise is correct: What did you expect?

The origin of modern America dates back about 400 years, the origin of Europe
about 2000 years. Also, the reason for many early US immigrants was to escape
ancient European social structures. Europe was already crowded before America
was explored: there simply was less room for outside influence from other
parts of the world.

Even so, there are also quite a few attitudes, customs, social structures, and
institutions in the US that would seem out of place in (most of) Europe. In
fact, the sentence may even hold true for many comparisons within Europe.

I doubt, one could conclude that -- due to such differences -- one country or
nation is more liberal then the other.

~~~
johnnybgoode
It wasn't unexpected. :)

What matters is the nature of those differences. For example, in one place
it's considered acceptable for a government to regularly collect money for a
church. In the other, this would look very suspicious.

------
known
I think there is no SCIENCE behind any Religion, Race, Class, or Caste,
because all CURRENT living humans mtDNA is derived from a SINGLE woman.

And she is the MOST-RECENT common ancestor of all humans alive on Earth today
with respect to matrilineal descent. <http://tr.im/kvhm>

