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What percent of the world is Atheist/agnostic?

Altfish

Veteran Member
Yes, it does seem high although Wiki says...

"Studies on the demographics of atheism have concluded that self-identified atheists comprise anywhere from 2% to 13% of the world's population, whereas people without a religion comprise anywhere from 10% to 22% of the world's population."
 

Kilgore Trout

Misanthropic Humanist
I've always suspected about 80-85% of people are "believers," and 10-15% of people aren't. My experience seems to confirm these round figures.

By "believer," I mean anyone who tends to believe in empirically unsupported things, or for whom factual reality isn't a primary concern when it comes to what they believe. Theism would fall under this umbrella.
 

GoodbyeDave

Well-Known Member
I spent some time trying to compile figures from reliable, local sources. Atheists and agnostics aren't normally separated in censuses, and often lumped in with "others". The figure I got was 11%.
 

columbus

yawn <ignore> yawn
I think that there are far more nontheists out there than you will find. That's because for so many people their community would be really hard on them. So they will never admit to their true beliefs.
Tom
 

Soundwave99

Member
I think that there are far more nontheists out there than you will find. That's because for so many people their community would be really hard on them. So they will never admit to their true beliefs.
Tom

I have heard this before and if it's true, then the true percentages of non-theists could be much higher (I would guess around 30 or 40%).

Accounting for the above, my estimate would be between 10% and 40% of the world's population are nontheists.
 

LuisDantas

Aura of atheification
Premium Member
I've always suspected about 80-85% of people are "believers," and 10-15% of people aren't. My experience seems to confirm these round figures.

By "believer," I mean anyone who tends to believe in empirically unsupported things, or for whom factual reality isn't a primary concern when it comes to what they believe. Theism would fall under this umbrella.
Pretty much what I think as well.

Except that I suspect "belief" is often far more of a reflection of conforming to social expectations than anything else. There is anthropological evidence that god-beliefs are, so to speak, contagious through a social environment.

Were it not for peer pressure and indoctrination, I expect that no more than 15% of all adults would be theists.
 

MD

qualiaphile
Maybe 15%, but it is a growing demographic. I predict the future will consist of far more non believers than believers.
 

columbus

yawn <ignore> yawn
Maybe 15%, but it is a growing demographic. I predict the future will consist of far more non believers than believers.
The distant future perhaps.
For the foreseeable future I think that the human instinct towards tribalism will keep being reborn generation after generation. As municipalities and political groups become more multi ethnic, religions will remain the "tribe of choice" for most people. Even if they don't believe in the teachings.
Tom
 

LuisDantas

Aura of atheification
Premium Member
The distant future perhaps.
For the foreseeable future I think that the human instinct towards tribalism will keep being reborn generation after generation. As municipalities and political groups become more multi ethnic, religions will remain the "tribe of choice" for most people. Even if they don't believe in the teachings.
Tom
Sure.

Word got me that such a state of affairs has already been reached in places such as Germany and the Scandinavian countries, where apparently adhering to a specific church (usually Christian) is standing tradition, part of of building a social identity and there is even governmental pressure/insistence/subsidizing towards doing so.

Notably, those are also countries with very high percentages of non-theists, hinting that actual theistic belief may have a poor correlation with that tradition.

Tribalism is a powerful drive that will probably remain with us for many centuries. But the days of a theistic majority may well come to an end much earlier than that.
 

Cephus

Relentlessly Rational
I have heard this before and if it's true, then the true percentages of non-theists could be much higher (I would guess around 30 or 40%).

Accounting for the above, my estimate would be between 10% and 40% of the world's population are nontheists.

And that number is growing dramatically every single day. The non-religious are the fastest growing "religious" demographic, mostly because we're getting too smart to believe in religious nonsense.
 

Evangelicalhumanist

"Truth" isn't a thing...
Premium Member
Every child born is a non-theist of some kind or other, until they are taught otherwise. Believing your parents/community is a critical survival factor for a long-maturing creature like ourselves, and as a consequence, children believe what their parents believe --------- with a few exceptions. And those are the ones (like me) who ask questions with a truly inquiring mind, that religion inevitably answers really, really badly.
 

Andy Sims

NightSerf
I googled it and got 16%. What do you think?

This is one of those cases where google is not much of a friend. There are sites that deal with statistical studies of all sorts. The Pew forum has a pretty good religious database. Gallup has done a few good studies. Some universities have departments that specialize in that sort of thing.

Pew is my favorite. Pew Research Center
 

ChristineM

"Be strong", I whispered to my coffee.
Premium Member
What percent of the world is Atheist/agnostic?

Where? America? Could be as low as 2% if you follow some religious estimates or the CIA demographic or as high as 33% as the higher range indicated in Wikipedia
Irreligion in the United States - Wikipedia.

Or China with a population accounting for around 15% of total world population, with at least 55% and as many as 75% having no belief in gods.

Across Europe its more tricky from as low as 8% to close to 90% by country.

Anyway about 6 years ago i did the calculation based on averages which worked out between 17% and 22%.

However, as @Altfish has pointed out, children who have not yet been indicated it excludes children, at least 25000000 of whom are not yet indoctrinated.

 
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