Poll: Record one in five Americans say religion not important in their lives

[All Along The Watchtower]

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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/13/religion-poll-nbc-wsj_n_4957886.html

[DemPGH]

Not intended to be a banal comment and not intended to have anything to do with history, but in all honesty, what honest good is religion? What's it do? I mean there are social factors at work and social pressure to be spiritual, but why? And more relevant, why would that many people find any fulfillment in it? never mind the question, what good is organized religion?

I've been discussing the subject elsewhere off and on with a couple of atheists and one or two really weird new agey type of people, and I just think it boils down to how much a person knows, whether or not education alters their viewpoints (which it should), and that there is some sort of personal fulfillment mechanism at work in religion. Like, the fact that we basically come from carbon is too detached and impersonal. That there's some grand being somewhere who cares how I'm doing is very personal, and a lot of people need that, I think, or at least feel expected to value the notion. Sigh.

[Oswald Acted Alone, You Kook]

Youngs are getting less religious...If they stay that way, could there be an Atheist Great Awakening?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

An 'Atheist Great Awakening' in what sense? What are you envisaging this comprising?

[Oswald Acted Alone, You Kook]

An 'Atheist Great Awakening' in what sense? What are you envisaging this comprising?

Yes, I know that sounds dumb, but given that the Great Awakenings were all about spreading the gospels and a rise in church attendance/religiousness, this era seems to be the opposite. Yes, the Great Awakenings ended, but this "ending" is almost like a beginning of a trend to an atheistic society, even if its short lived.

[bore]

The vast majority of self identified nones are not atheists in the Richard Dawkins sense of being passionate about it (Hell, most of them aren't even atheists) they just don't care, one way or the other, about religion. If the trend continues you'll see the US eventually end up like europe, with a few religious people (about 10% maybe) a vanishingly small number of atheist activists and most people just not caring.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

[DC Al Fine]

Not intended to be a banal comment and not intended to have anything to do with history, but in all honesty, what honest good is religion? What's it do? I mean there are social factors at work and social pressure to be spiritual, but why? And more relevant, why would that many people find any fulfillment in it? never mind the question, what good is organized religion?

I've been discussing the subject elsewhere off and on with a couple of atheists and one or two really weird new agey type of people, and I just think it boils down to how much a person knows, whether or not education alters their viewpoints (which it should), and that there is some sort of personal fulfillment mechanism at work in religion. Like, the fact that we basically come from carbon is too detached and impersonal. That there's some grand being somewhere who cares how I'm doing is very personal, and a lot of people need that, I think, or at least feel expected to value the notion. Sigh.

From an evolutionary POV:

1) It helps group cohesiveness

2) Since the advent of contraception, we've been reproducing more than the irreligious.

[Frodo]

No great surprise -the more affluent, urbanized, and educated society becomes, the less religion matters in our everyday lives.  It is a long, slow process.  Look at Europe for instance, which is further along than we are.  Once its religious fervor was so powerful it drove masses to join the Crusades and slaughter entire cities in the name of the Cross.  Much of what is now Germany was depopulated in the Thirty Years' War, a titanic struggle for dominance between Protestants and Catholics -now try reconciling that past with the nearly-empty churches and cathedrals that dot the landscape today.  A totally different world. 

[Randy Bobandy]

The vast majority of self identified nones are not atheists in the Richard Dawkins sense of being passionate about it (Hell, most of them aren't even atheists) they just don't care, one way or the other, about religion. If the trend continues you'll see the US eventually end up like europe, with a few religious people (about 10% maybe) a vanishingly small number of atheist activists and most people just not caring.

That's a great way to live.