Interesting Links for 02-11-2023

[andrewducker]

1. A Jewish woman finds that staff at The Guardian are about as compassionate as you'd expect

(tags:Jews guardian Israel Palestine OhForFucksSake )

2. Latest Long Covid research update

(tags:Pandemic )

3. Giant white stag made of boulders re-emerges on Aberdeenshire hill

(tags:Scotland deer viaDanielDWilliam art )

4. Medical researcher discovers integration, gets 75 citations

(tags:mathematics communication doctors )

5. The Family Recipes That Live On in Cemeteries

(tags:death recipe )

6. City of Edinburgh Council set to declare housing emergency

(tags:housing edinburgh )

7. Autumn colours in Scotland's woodlands, parks and streets

(tags:autumn scotland photos )

8. Religious people have the most positive experiences. People in less religious countries have the most positive experiences. What a fascinating contradiction.

(tags:religion experience happiness )

9. BT are going to remove 85 phone kiosks from Edinburgh, clearing up a bunch of vandalised eyesores.

(tags:edinburgh phones )

10. "I'm only going to have sober sex - even one drink can ruin it"

(tags:sex alcohol )

Comments

[simont]

#8: off the top of my head, my first thought is that that need not be a contradiction at all.

There's a large class of things that improve the experience of the person doing them, but worsen the experience of people in general. Namely, anything with significant externalised costs, so that doing the thing is selfish, benefiting you at the expense of those around you. I wouldn't go as far as to say that religion is necessarily one of those, but it certainly seems to me that some forms of religion can be; most obviously, the ones that include intolerance or bigotry in their belief systems, or just in their in-practice behaviour.

The article also mentions that religious countries have lower wellbeing overall, but also a higher contrast between the wellbeing of their religious and non-religious inhabitants. That could very easily be translated as "being a Religious Country is mildly good for the people sharing that religion, and seriously bad for the people who don't, averaging out to a net loss."

[andrewducker]

Looks that way - Difference of 8 points in high-religion countries vs difference of 0.6 points in low-religion countries. With religious people 3 points higher in the low-religion countries (on average).

[adrian_turtle]

The article also mentions that the less religious countries tend to be wealthier. While money doesn't buy happiness, exactly, poverty often causes unhappiness and anxiety. It's not clear to what extent a religious country is less wealthy, considering how many religions order their adherents to do no work one day each week. (Hard to tell, as some such countries are located on top of enormous oil reserves.)

[andrewducker]

You'd hope that most people would have at least one day a week where they didn't work.