A new survey from the annual social-cultural study Norwegian Monitor (Norsk Monitor) shows an historic level of Norwegians who don’t believe in the existence of God, Vårt Land reported.To the question “Do you believe in God?”, 39 percent responded “no” while 37 percent said “yes”. Another 23 percent of respondents said they did not know.The survey, which was sent to 4,000 Norwegians by post, marks the first time that non-believers outnumber the religious. Two years ago, the number of believers and non-believers was equal. When the question was first asked in 1985, a full 50 percent said they believed in God while just 20 percent did not...Jan-Paul Brekke of Ipsos Norway, who led the survey, said the question did not define who ‘God’ is. “It could be the Christian god, an independent god or one from other faiths... “There are quite a few immigrants included [in the survey] but the majority of them come from Western religious traditions.
My grandfather Knut must be rolling in his grave.
How can they not know if they believe in god ?
ReplyDeleteAgreed. If you cannot say yes to the question, "Do you believe in God?", then it logically follows that you do not believe in God.
DeleteUnless the question was phrased "Do you believe there is a God," in which case an agnostic could reply "I don't know."
Delete*Plurality
ReplyDeleteI wish they gave the option: I don't care.
ReplyDeleteThe question whether a god exists implies incredulity from the questioner towards the negative answer. Believers have a very hard time understanding that not-believing is a non-action. To a non-believer, the question of whether god exists, is equivalent to the question whether Santa Claus exist. Or dragons. Or Frankenstein. Kinda, but not really. Sometimes relevant, mostly in relation to a movie, book or religious building. Otherwise, not so much.
Well, if you assume that 0.08% (Norway has about 5,000,000 inhabitants) is a representative portion of the population...
ReplyDeleteThat is actually quite a large sample size. 4000 responses in a population of 5 million generates a margin or error of only 2% with a confidence level of 99%. Way better than you need. So yes, mathematically representative.
DeleteHah, wow. Talk about counterintuitive. :) I shall resume forthwith my reading of How Not To Be Wrong. Mange takk!
DeleteFair point regarding 4,000.
DeleteRespondents to what source?
Was this geographically normalized?
Is there a certain type of person that responds to junk mail?
A political survey of 100,000 in Austin, Texas would be a vast misrepresentation of the state.
'Believe in' might have been misunderstood to mean 'trust in'.
ReplyDeleteIn which case a strong believer who thinks a god to be unfair, untrustworthy or childish, etc. might answer, 'no' in spite of having a healthy contempt for such an entity.