教育與宗教信仰
Falling away
此消彼長
How education makes people less religious—and less superstitious, too
接受教育越多，宗教傾向越少—迷信傾向也越少。這是為什么？
JUST one extra year of schooling makes someone 10% less likely to attend a church, mosque or temple, pray alone or describe himself as religious, concludes a paper* published on October 6th that looks at the relationship between religiosity and the length of time spent in school. Its uses changes in the compulsory school-leaving age in 11 European countries between 1960 and 1985 to tease out the impact of time spent in school on belief and practice among respondents to the European Social Survey, a long-running research project.
多上一年學(xué)，成為教徒（在教堂，清真寺或佛寺等宗教場(chǎng)所獨(dú)自祈禱）的概率就少10%；10月6日發(fā)表的一篇論文得出了上述結(jié)論。這篇論文是一項(xiàng)長期項(xiàng)目的成果，它通過社會(huì)調(diào)查的方法，調(diào)查了1960-1985年間，11個(gè)歐洲國家中義務(wù)教育年限的變化，以求揭示受教育程度對(duì)宗教傾向（包括思想上的皈依和行為上的尊奉）的影響。
By comparing people of similar backgrounds who were among the first to stay on longer, the authors could be reasonably certain that the extra schooling actually caused religiosity to fall, rather than merely being correlated with the decline. During those extra years mathematics and science classes typically become more rigorous, points out Naci Mocan, one of the authors—and increased exposure to analytical thinking may weaken the tendency to believe.
比較了背景相似但受教育程度不同的人群之后，作者可以負(fù)責(zé)任的說：上學(xué)越多的人，越是不容易信教。兩個(gè)現(xiàn)象之間確實(shí)存在因果關(guān)系，而非僅僅具有相關(guān)性。作者之一的南茜·莫肯聲稱，研究所面向的那個(gè)時(shí)期，數(shù)學(xué)和自然科學(xué)課程變得愈發(fā)嚴(yán)格，這就強(qiáng)化了學(xué)生分析問題的能力。而一個(gè)人愈是習(xí)慣于用分析的眼光看問題，就愈是具有懷疑精神；相反，宗教則要求人們不經(jīng)思考就加以接受：二者有著內(nèi)在沖突。
Another paper, published earlier this year, showed that after Turkey increased compulsory schooling from five years to eight in 1997, women's propensity to identify themselves as religious, cover their heads or vote for an Islamic party fell by 30-50%. (No effect was found, however, among Turkish men.) And a study published in 2011 that looked at the rise in the school-leaving age in Canadian provinces in the 1950s and 1960s found that each extra year of schooling led to a decline of four percentage points in the likelihood of identifying with a religious tradition. Longer schooling, it reckoned, explains most of the increase in non-affiliation to any religion in Canada between 1971 and 2001, from 4% of the population to 16%.
今天早些時(shí)候發(fā)表的另一篇論文表明，土耳其于1997年將義務(wù)教育年限從五年增加到八年之后，女性的宗教傾向下降了約三到五成（不過沒有調(diào)查土耳其男性的情況）；宗教傾向通過被調(diào)查者的自我評(píng)價(jià)，是否裹頭巾，是否支持伊斯蘭政黨等變量加以度量。2011年發(fā)布的一項(xiàng)研究成果，著眼于20世紀(jì)50至60年代之間，加拿大各省義務(wù)教育年限的延長。研究發(fā)現(xiàn)，接受學(xué)校教育的時(shí)間每增加一年，固守宗教傳統(tǒng)的概率就減少4%。這項(xiàng)研究認(rèn)為，1971年至2001年的30年間，加拿大人口中不信教的比例從4%上升到16%，其中主要原因是受教育程度的提高。
The most recent paper also showed that each extra year in the classroom led to a drop of 11 percentage points in superstitious practices, though these remain common. Two-fifths of respondents said they consulted horoscopes, and a quarter thought that lucky charms could protect them. Other research has shown that religious beliefs and practices seem to make people happier, and in some circumstances healthier and wealthier, too. But to argue that such benefits more than offset the gains from extra education would require a leap of faith.
最近發(fā)表的這篇論文還表明，每多上一年學(xué)，迷信行為就減少11%（雖然后者依舊盛行）。四成的被調(diào)查者相信占星術(shù)；另有四分之一認(rèn)為護(hù)身符能保佑他們。其他研究早已表明，宗教信仰可使人們內(nèi)心更充實(shí)，并在某些條件下，使人更健康、更富足。不過為了這些好處，就希冀人們少受些教育的話，恐怕只能說是“諸君北面，我自西向”了。 譯者：韋永睿 校對(duì)：沈曉旭
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