Do you think there will be a religious revival in the west?

[John Dule]

Nope!

[John Dule]

Nope!

In other shocking news, libertarians still don’t understand sociological trends.

And sociologists do?

[John Dule]

And sociologists do?

I’m hardly an arch defender of sociology, but yes, sociologists have refined their models & correctly predicted religious trends.

I recommend On Secularization: Towards a Revised General Theory by Martin, A Secular Age by Taylor, and A Rumor of Angels by Berger. The second is pretty complicated and not intrinsically as ontologically sociological as the other two.

And will this be on the final, or is that non-cumulative?

[John Dule]

      I expect something of the sort to occur in 50-100 years, once the West enters into serious decline. Wealth unfortunately tends to alienate people from God.

Or perhaps desperation makes people vulnerable to cults. Equally plausible!

[John Dule]

And will this be on the final, or is that non-cumulative?

If you want to get at the truth as to whether or not religion will increase in the general American populace, as it already is among scientists and other small groups, then you should study the sociology of it. If you don’t? Then keep on randomly saying “No!” to questions like this, but most atheists have made a habit of chanting “It is always wrong, at every time and in every place, to believe something without sufficient evidence.”

In case it wasn't clear, that was an invitation for you to put forth your argument in your own words and start a discussion (rather than trying to assign me a reading list every time we disagree).

How do you know you're not in a cult? You seem very convinced that everybody else is.

I don't believe that at all. And as for myself, I'm not a member of any groups or organizations whatsoever, let alone cults.

[John Dule]

How do you know you're not in a cult? You seem very convinced that everybody else is.

I don't believe that at all. And as for myself, I'm not a member of any groups or organizations whatsoever, let alone cults.

So how do you define "cult"? Must they always be of a religious nature? QAnon is clearly a cult to you even though it has no formal set of moral rules or any underlying philosophy concerning God or otherwise. Is the Boy Scouts a cult? Political parties? Fraternities?

How about small religions in the West which may or may not involve a deity but are of a religious nature nonetheless, i.e. Buddhism and Daoism?

I'm having an interesting discussion with Mopolis on this subject in another thread. Essentially, a cult is any group of people brought together by the veneration of a particular person, object, or idea at the expense of all others. In the pejorative sense, it is typically characterized as insular, small, and not socially acceptable.