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Maps of life expectancy in 1800, 1950 and 2015 show that African countries have caught up with the rich world of 1950.

There has been several studies that indicated that using the Internet is linked to a decrease in religiosity. Here are just a few examples. Frequent Internet users may see themselves as 'free agents' and are less likely to choose a religious tradition, Baylor study finds MIT Technology Review...

Here is a new video from VisualPolitik published a few minutes ago. This time it is about the recent increase of crimes committed by Moroccans in the Netherlands. Moroccan gangs are playing a big role in drug trafficking, notably cocaine. The European cocaine market grew by over 400% from 2011...

This is worrying.

I understand what you mean, but if you are not interested in voting, like 1/3 of the US population at the last presidential election, you could give your provisional ballot to someone else, who would then vote for you (based on their political preferences). It would be very easy for party...

I saw the trailer on Netflix too, but it doesn't look very serious (like lots of documentaries). I was completely put off by the beginning of the trailer. They say "Over 300,000 years ago Neanderthals spread from Russia to the Atlantic coast until suddenly they disappeared. What went wrong?"...

Thanks for clearing this up. Most surveys about religion have similar sample sizes. Few countries conduct censuses across the whole population. Britain, Germany and Italy are among the few that do. I'm not surprised to see that religiosity has decreased by several percentage points from 2014 to...

I have made a map showing the percentage of irreligious people in Europe based on the data above. It would be interesting to have regional data for France and Spain, but I couldn't find any.

Statistics about religious beliefs evolve surprisingly quickly. In the USA the number of non-religious people has been increasing steadily by about 1% per year in the last 20 years. The same trend can be seen in Europe, although religiosity has fallen much faster in some countries than others...

In the Netherlands there is a new category of belief called Ietsism. The term derives from the Dutch word iets meaning 'something' and refers to people who are not religious but believe that "there must be something undefined beyond the mundane and that which can be known or can be proven." The...

I was wondering what they meant by 'non-strict photo ID'. I found this explanation on the National Conference of State Legislatures website: Non-strict: At least some voters without acceptable identification have an option to cast a ballot that will be counted without further action on the...

The epicanthic fold is a Mongoloid trait that was brought to Europe on several occasions (Uralics, Huns, Mongols, Tatars...). In this case I think that Barry Keoghan inherited the mutation(s) for the epicanthic fold from Viking ancestors who had Saami or Finnish admixture. Nowadays Finns and...

I asked ChatGPT its thought on the subject. It could be interesting what AI has to say based on the analysis of millions of online articles and posts on the subject. I asked: "Would you agree that Christian confession incites crime as people know they can be forgiven by God for anything they...

I was reading about the local UK elections. Boris Johnson had introduced for the first time requirement for voters to show a photo ID a few years ago and that buffoon was turned away at the polling station because he forgot his own ID! That made me wonder how many developed countries still...

I've just found out that since the change of forum software from vBulletin to Xenforo in August 2023 members in the the elite user group (about 30 people) were not allowed to react to posts (add likes), use links, or upload media. This has now been fixed. I apologise to the users affected. I'm...

True. And if we take this reasoning further, why would an Almighty God who created the Universe and all life beings specifically created sins for humans but not for other life beings? God can't ever accuse plants or bacteria to be sinful or immoral as they have no brain to reflect upon their...

A good demonstration of Christian faith. 😆 This is a scene from the series The Last Kingdom. Viking leaders Ubba (son of Ragnar Lothbrok) and Guthrum are meeting with the Christian Anglo-Saxon King of East Anglia, who is trying to convert them to Christianity. It didn't take long to confirm...

That's what I said above, wasn't it? That's what it means to confess (acknowledge the sins) and repent (feeling sorry). But that doesn't make it any less of a problem. Basically Christians can be forgiven anything as long as they feel sorry for what did it. That's completely unacceptable to me...

I know it's just a movie but it reflects reality pretty well in this case. See how quickly and easily the cardinal absolve the sins of the Godfather. I like how he admits that he "always has time to save souls". That's his main business. That's what keeps the herd faithful. The "aah" at the...

In Western countries, where Christianity has traditionally been the dominant religion, prisoners facing death penalty typically have (or had in countries that abolished capital punishment) the right to confess to a priest or pastor before being executed. This is because for a Christian it is...