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Patria Senza Dio. Cosa Possono Insegnarci Sulla Contentezza Le Nazioni Meno Religiose (2008)

by Phil Zuckerman(Favorite Author)

3.96 of 5 Votes: 2

ISBN

8897909027 (ISBN13: 9788897909026)

languge

English

genre

History & Biography

publisher

Malcor D'

review 1: Maybe a bit too academic and repetitive for some people, but if you have an open mind and are interested in the topic then definitely give this one a chance, especially considering it's less than 200 pages. Everyone knows Sweden and Denmark are supposed to be the best places to live, so why is that the case when they are also the most secular of all countries? Religion doesn't necessarily make people good or lives better, we have thousands of years of religious wars to prove that alone. But going through the different examples of life in Scandinavia, the author shows how religion exists and is respected but is just not a part of everyday lives. People live for the present time and don't dwell on heaven and hell, yet they are still decent people. The interviews with Danes a... morend Swedes gets a bit boring at times...over and over again they say they're Christian and belong to a church even though they never go and do not believe in anything silly like God or the stories from the Bible. I did like the part comparing atheist countries like the former Soviet Union and Albania with Sweden and Denmark. Yes, the godless nations under communist dictatorship have/had low levels of societal health, but their form of atheism was forced upon their citizens, whereas the irreligious societies of Sweden and Denmark occurred slowly and naturally over several generations. It's like comparing apples and oranges.
review 2: Suffers a bit, I think, from confirmation bias. He seems to desperately want to make the point that society is better without god, not to necessarily want to actually study what a society is like without god. His sample, by his own admission, is not representative of the whole and can't be used to extrapolate across the nations "studied." If your plan is to spend a year plus studying a society it seems like it would make sense to have your sample be better planned. He makes passing reference to language differences being a possible problem in getting people to discuss the issue, and barely even mentions that cultural differences could be at the heart of his trouble getting people to talk about the question.In all interesting, but the notes on methodology should be taken into count when reading this. Also, it seems important to me that this book was supposed to be an important gap filler on the topic of how important religion is to a good society; if the lack of scholarship is so profound, why is the methodology so shabby? Though it's possible that I am being to harsh. less

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