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Obama Quote on Religion

Truer words were never said:

...The most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning.

From Barrack Obama's March 18 speech.

Income and Religiousity

Ben Muse points to an interesting plot from the Pew Global Attitudes Project showing that income and religiousity are inversely related across countries.

Wealthier countries tend to be more secular, while poorer countries tend to be more religious.

The exceptions are what is interesting: the U.S. and Arab oil producing countries all have degrees of religiousity that are higher than would be predicted on the basis of their income.

It would be interesting to see the same data for states, or even better counties, in the U.S. My guess would be that the exceptions would be in the southern suburbs and Utah.

Sticking My Neck Out About Economics and the Christian Right

Have we "brought into a Darwinism system of economics that appears to be disconnected the with faith system of most in America." [sic]

Sage e-mailed me about his review of The Death of Adam by Marilynne Robinson. As a religious man, he wanted my opinion as an economist. He continues:

... In an essay on the family, which is really about economics, she complains of having heard people say they “can’t live by Jesus’ teachings in this complex modern world,” yet still maintain that they’re Christian. “They might as well call themselves the Manichaean Right or the Zoroastrian Right and not live by those teachings,” she suggests. She makes the case that we’re to take care of one another and the poor and that the Sabbath wasn’t a bad idea.

At the risk of sounding more pompous than I usually am, let me offer up two additions (without having read this book).

1) I actually have thought before that a lot of what passes for Christianity in the U.S. is just dressed up Zorastrianism. As near as I can figure, the point of religion for many people is to divide the world into us and them, and really, isn't that Manichaean enough to be unchristian? I guess I'll have to put this book on my to-read list.

2) Yet, I'm deeply suspicious of any religious advice on economics; and the problem here is what is regarded as scripture or the canon by whatever group is making the pronouncements. The problem is the zero-sum view of the world. Most of human history has been a zero-sum game: you get rich by making others poor. Most, but not all. We're in the midst of a 3 century period - with no end in sight - where life has been a positive sum game for just about everyone that each of us has ever known. Robinson criticizes the Christian right for being Darwinian. I think that this is a problem if the world is zero-sum: survival of the fittest means destruction of the weakest, and that certainly doesn't line up with what Christ said. If scripture - written when the world was zero-sum - is your guide, then there is clearly a problem here. But, what if scripture isn't comprehensive? What if it offers no guidance about how to act in a world that is positive-sum? I think there is a case in such a world for being Darwinian: do we really think society would be better off if Norman Borlaug or Al Gore (take your pick) spent more time working in a soup kitchen? They might be better as individuals, but it is a fantasy to think that you can always make society off by making individuals better off. Unfortunately, the typical response of the faithful is to claim that perhaps life is a positive-sum game right now, but that this can't possibly last - ultimately those zero-sum religious teachings will be more widely relevant. I'm not even sure how to address this with a straight face: I guess I would say there is probably less evidence to support this assertion than there is for the faith that God exists at all. It is an astonishingly hopeful Hail Mary to end the argument with (and a particularly nasty one, since it obviates any hope for the betterment of us all). It also gets to the crux of the problem with Christian objections to the Darwinian view: I simply don't think this is an assertion about which reasonable people can have different opinions. There are enough things that are important to society that are unbounded - like new ideas - that a return to a zero-sum society simply isn't possible or worthwhile envisioning for any purpose other than navel gazing. For better or worse - and whether or not God had a hand in it or not - the world of humans is positive-sum now and forever. I don't think this interferes in any way with those who want to view scripture as authoritative; I merely suggest that it isn't comprehensive and that assuming that it is would be a mistake. So, by all means, "take care of one another and the poor" as the Christian thing to do, but don't assume that this makes the logical inverse false. I get the strong impression that Ms. Robinson may have done just that.

Is Larry Craig Mormon?

The web is abuzz because Senator Larry Craig pled guilty to committing lewd acts in a public men's room.

A lot of the buzz is because Craig is a Republican from Idaho, so a lot of the buzz (see The Democratic Daily, Marc Ambinder at The Atlantic, Pam's House Blend, Magic Valley Mormon, and New West) revolves around whether Craig is a Mormon who has been involuntarily outed. This is mostly in the comments, where this is almost a foregone conclusion.

The answer is no. Craig is listed at Adherents.com as a Methodist.

N.B. The comments at The Democratic Daily do correct the claim that Craig is Mormon, but it is spotty elsewhere.

Faith and Evidence Quote

Here is Don Boudreaux:

Faith is required when neither evidence nor theory support whatever proposition you choose to (or happen to) believe.

He's talking about free trade, but there's one sentence you could apply to a huge array of issues.

Via Grasping Reality with Both Hands: Brade DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal and Marginal Revolution.

Uh-Oh

My county got mentioned in Friday's issue of The Wall Street Journal.

It isn't pretty.

Apparently, the Republican candidate for the house district I reside in - LaVar Christensen - feels that he is fulfilling one of Joseph Smith's prophecies. More specifically, that America and its government will have to be saved from their iniquity by a Mormon. (Links on this subject are very dicey, here is one with a lot of stuff - not necessarily positive -  on Mormon doctrine).

The LDS church - a serious, thorough, and well-meaning organization - has apparently toned down this claim over the years. But, like many ideas in Utah, this one seems to have acquired a life of its own: the "tale was originally publicized by two devout Mormon men seeking to make money off of the prophet's narrative ... [who] sold the prophecy in a pamphlet ...".

One way or another, Christensen is increasing his investment as the election approaches, so we know where he stands.

There's a message here for Mormons and evangelicals. The vast majority of people are positively predisposed to faith, curious about deep faith in others, and supportive when it promotes the common weal. But suspicions are raised and animosity aroused when the level of spiritual enlightenment is out of line with the importance of the issue.

For example, if someone of a different faith says their god says "do not kill" my inclination is to think that this might be my god too, albeit in a different form. But if they claim their god says to avoid wearing brown shoes with black slacks, I tend to expect a clash in quite a bit more than clothing.

Given his position and tribulations, Dubya' will get more of a free ride on this sort of claim than others. In Mr. Christensen's case, I'm sympathetic with most of the political positions, but I'll have a hard time pulling the lever for him. The bottom line is that a position is not enhanced by emphasizing an astonishing level of tone-deafness to broader society.