VENUSIANS MORE MARTIAL THAN MARTIANS:

The role of freedom, growth and religion in the taste for revolution (Silvia Pezzini & Robert MacCulloch, Department of Economics, University of Milan, Italy)

This paper ... surveys ... revolutionary tastes of 130,000 people living in 61 nations between 1981 and 1997.... Being Muslim in a free country has no effect on the probability of supporting revolt compared to a non-religious person. However being Muslim in a country that is not free increases it by 13 percentage points. Being Christian in a free country decreases the chance of supporting revolt by 4 percentage points, compared to a non-religious person, and in a not-free country by 1 percentage point.

So Christians are more peaceable than the non-religious, despite the protestations of various folks.

Now that Europe is thoroughly non-religious, and if her economies continue to fail, the urge to fight may grow. Perhaps George Miller is right to predict revolution in France.

Posted by Paul Jaminet at July 12, 2004 9:02 PM