To me that seems quite a bit low. I am registered as religious because I keep getting mail from my old church and am to lazy to tell them to stop. How many Atheists in yahoo answers are registered theists like me? Just to check the numbers.
Carlton Banks
Favorite Answer
I keep getting them, too. Have been for years.
GambitGrrl
What study are you referring to?
Most of those studies don't look as church records to gather their information. They call a sample group of people, and ask them what their religious affiliation is, or go off census records where you claim your faith.
Even then, it's hard to get an accurate count. Atheism is a position compatible with other forms of identity. Some atheists also consider themselves Agnostic, Buddhist, Jains, Unitarian, Taoist or hold other related philosophical beliefs. With the limited number of choices to put people in, if you claim to be Buddhist for example, AND your atheist, you will be marked down only as Buddhist.
Getting an accurate number for the world is really difficult to do. In addition to the above problem, in many countries, it's still taboo or even dangerous, to admit your a different faith than the majority of the population, much less that your atheist.
So finding a poll and looking at how the information was collected is important when deciding how seriously to consider the results.
BC
Atheism is predominately a Western cultural belief. Most of the Eastern countries are very low in Atheistic beliefs. But that's where the majority of the world's population is. So, no, it's not far from correct. However, the percentage does seem to be growing slightly -- very slightly.
And by definition, approximately half the world is above average IQ. What does that tell you?
Tells me that there aren't too many smart Atheists.
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jethom33545
In recent polls in America about 14% of respondents claimed answered as atheist,agnostic or unaffiliated. I don't know of any worldwide polls.
You need better sources of information and a better grasp of the information.
Whether people were "registered" or not has nothing to do with polling results.
Josh K
I think the number of atheists, mainly in the western world will continue, and the way trends are going in the UK only 240,000 out of 65 million will attend church by 2025