[Luis Dias]

No it certainly does not come from a mistranslation. It is sufficiently clear that the Bible describes a global flood where all animals on earth are doomed to extinction if Noah doesn't build the Ark. If it was only about a "region" such convoluted solutions would be absolutely unnecessary.

[Wobble73]

Could the story of the Great flood come about due to early geology that was never written down and since lost to antiquity? You know, some explanation of why pebbles are found in the desert and an explanation of fossils finds, (these would be the animals that didn't survive the flood and were not saved by Noah) that had been retold and garbled by the constant retelling into the mythos of Noah's Ark.

Just a random thought?

[Flipside]

Many strange finds like Sealife fossils in land-locked countries are actually definitely identified as from when that particular piece of land was underwater millions of years previously, that's why you can find fossils that are 400 million years old at the tops of cliffs in Southern England

[Dragon]

Yeah, but this happened waaay before even apes appeared, nevermind humans.

No it certainly does not come from a mistranslation. It is sufficiently clear that the Bible describes a global flood where all animals on earth are doomed to extinction if Noah doesn't build the Ark. If it was only about a "region" such convoluted solutions would be absolutely unnecessary.

Keep in mind, the writers of the Bible probably had no idea there's a difference. A large enough flood that covered everything those people knew could've made them jump to conclusions that the entire world was flooded. Primitive cultures are prone to that sort of thinking.

[Luis Dias]

Of course Dragon. They did not know the Earth was 12k Km in diameter. Of course they thought their own land was the "entirety of things". But that's precisely my point: the flood story is "global", is total. There was no escape to the flood. To say now that they knew it all along and that the flood was only local is misunderstanding the context and the intent of the story, to misread any exegetic analysis of the myth, etc.,etc.

[Bobboau]

12k Km

eh, thats... oh, yeah, right, just odd units/numbers combo

[Killer Whale]

12 Mm?

[watsisname]

They did not know the Earth was 12k Km in diameter.

I think it's hilarious that the Greeks figured out the size of the Earth by the second century BCE and apparently everyone ignored them.
Go go gadget Eratosthenes!

[An4ximandros]

Nobody 'ignored' them. It was/is easier to make maps if you see/saw the Earth as flat.

And few had the luxury of 'formal' education back then.

[Luis Dias]

They did not know the Earth was 12k Km in diameter.

I think it's hilarious that the Greeks figured out the size of the Earth by the second century BCE and apparently everyone ignored them.
Go go gadget Eratosthenes!

I think you know it and this comment is just a slight deviation from the discussion, but in case it isn't, you do realise that the relevant chapters in the Bible discussing the Flood are much older than Eratosthenes, right?

[Dragon]

Yeah. The Bible was pretty much done by the time Greeks came around. It was oral tradition at this point, so it was probably changed a bit, but important points were probably more or less consistent with what we have now.

[watsisname]

I think you know it and this comment is just a slight deviation from the discussion, but in case it isn't, you do realise that the relevant chapters in the Bible discussing the Flood are much older than Eratosthenes, right?

Yes; it was an aside speaking to how long it took for the true size of Earth to become common knowledge.

[General Battuta]

I think that this is pretty much established now, though. It's well documented that religiosity is decreasing all over the Western world. Even in America, which is almost certainly the most religious western country (possibly excluding Italy and Ireland), atheism and irreligiousness is growing. In more... shall we say moderate countries, the decline has been steady and is well established.

Personally, I don't see how it's news any more. Demographics shift, better educated younger people are beginning to outnumber people who grew up in an age where belief was simply taken as a given, in large part because they probably weren't taught any sensible alternatives - The big bang (and cosmology as a science even) was contentious well into the middle of the twentieth century - evolution too, to a lesser extent. The coherent alternative narrative we all take for granted today has only existed in a sensible, defensible form for a relatively short period, and things take time to filter from acadaemia into the school system and broad public understanding.

That's probably why the church is still doing so well in poorer countries (see the comparison in this very article between French catholocism and African). As the internet allows greater education in poorer parts of the world, religion should start to follow a similar (if slower) path worldwide.

Good news for everyone.

Depressingly, this seems to be incorrect in America. The apparent rise in 'religious nones' is not, as far as we can tell, a rise in the areligious, especially not one driven by increased understanding of cosmology and evolution.

Rather, it's simply a political change in survey response patterns. Individuals who previously responded to survey as 'not very religious' have been systematically changing their response to 'no religious identification'. Yet their other religious responses - belief in God, churchgoing behavior, etcetera - haven't changed, nor has the percentage of people who believe religion is very important. Belief, in other words, hasn't changed at all - only the survey box these people are checking. (Some think this may be a response to the change in the political overtones of 'being Christian' post-Reagan Revolution.)

Atheism and irreligiousness may not be growing at all in America.

[Luis Dias]

It does seem like the best first steps towards arreligiosity though: the self-inflicted apostasy from any official social religious groups. The path towards atheism will come decades, if ever, afterwards. And it's not even a requirement. I think that an america where most people are "believers" in the most unofficial sense should be a friendly place to secularism.

This mirrors the path towards arreligiosity in Portugal. Back in the 70s, most people were really dissatisfied with the catholic church, for they saw it as aligned with the previous dictatorship. Yet, they remained religious. Their children however, lacking the social environment where belief is bred (the constant forceful goings to the sunday mass, catholic teachings ("catequese"), etc.) were much more agnostics and deists. My generation is mostly atheist (apatheist, in general).

[General Battuta]

The data doesn't seem to suggest that's what's happening here, though. People's attitudes and behaviors about religion aren't changing at all. Rather, their beliefs about which box they should check to describe those attitudes and behaviors is changing.

[yuezhi]

God is Dead

[Phantom Hoover]

The data doesn't seem to suggest that's what's happening here, though. People's attitudes and behaviors about religion aren't changing at all. Rather, their beliefs about which box they should check to describe those attitudes and behaviors is changing.

The point you were making earlier was that the effect was mostly coming from people changing their self-description from 'mildly religious' to 'not religious', right?

[General Battuta]

Yes, in the same way that you could change your self description from 'mildly fat' to 'not fat' by changing the pound range that defines 'fat' rather than your actual weight.

[Bobboau]

so in other words people are beginning to assume that their religiosity is non-religious? to not recognize that they are religious when they are? that is a disturbing trend.

[Scotty]

No, that's not what he's saying.

He's saying that people have been relatively as nonreligious now as for the last decade, or two decades, or three decades, or <insert rational amount of time here>, and that the stigma against choosing "nonreligious" on the census checkbox is lessening.