What if Paganism were the majority religion(s)?

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[Sperran]

I'm not surprised to see so many Shinto followers in a pie graph illustrating the religious demographics of Japan.  This has no bearing whatsoever on the data in Sailor Tech's link, which discusses worldwide religious demographics.

Sunflower

And even that I would be suspicious of as there is no clear mechanism for marking dual religious affiliation.  For example, it is common to be Christian but still incorporate Shinto into observance.

Sperran

[catja6]

Any source that uses the term "Dark Ages," never mind "Christian Dark Ages," is woefully out of touch with the scholarship of the period.  "The Dark Ages" was a slam term devised by 18th c. Protestant scholars who wanted to kick the Middle Ages while they were down, by claiming that the period when Catholicism was the dominant form of Christianity was a time of barbaric superstition.  Later, some people tried to reinterpret "Dark Ages" to refer to the lack of sources, but that's not accurate either.  Until the 1990s, there was very little scholarship on the period that is now called Late Antiquity/Early Middle Ages, outside of the two specific realms of Charlemagne studies and Anglo-Saxon studies; since then, the period has become very, very hot, because it had been so understudied that there was plenty of room for new scholars to make a mark.

(One of my professors in undergrad was an expert in this period; her first lecture in every class I took with her was on exactly this issue.)   

[Caliburn]

First, do you have permission from the copyright owners of the image you have posted to post those images on this forum? Having obtained such permission and mentioning that you have in your post is required by our rules.

The image is part of official government report and is intended for public use. 
The source is clearly referenced.

Second, any image that refers to the Dark Age in Europe as the "Christian Dark Age" is highly suspect for basis, IMHO -- as the Dark Age wasn't caused by Christianity. It was "caused" -- if something like this can be said to have a single cause -- by the fall of the Western Roman Empire to various waves of barbarians (and the continuing waves of barbarians thereafter). The Christian Church actually preserved knowledge during this time even if they were not big on advancement of knowledge. And scientific advancement did not slow worldwide, just in Europe.

While I realize that blaming Christianity for everything that ever happened that one does not like since Jesus appeared on the scene is easy to do, it is seldom a clear cut as people who have problems with Christianity make it out to be.

I think this is open to debate.

[Caliburn]

I'm not surprised to see so many Shinto followers in a pie graph illustrating the religious demographics of Japan.  This has no bearing whatsoever on the data in Sailor Tech's link, which discusses worldwide religious demographics.

Sunflower

Right, because Japan is situated near Jupiter.  
Compare the number of Shinto followers the religioustolerance.org gives and the correct number.

[Caliburn]

Any source that uses the term "Dark Ages," never mind "Christian Dark Ages," is woefully out of touch with the scholarship of the period.

Err, I did wrote "sort of a joke" and as far as I know, no one in their right mind would reference something that is very close to caricature as a source.

[Sperran]

Right, because Japan is situated near Jupiter.  
Compare the number of Shinto followers the religioustolerance.org gives and the correct number.

Where are you getting the "correct number?"  I looked at the religious tolerance site and found that they cite several different *possible* numbers for adherents of Shinto and makes note that it is very difficult to estimate the number of adherents because of the different definitions of what is means to be an adherent of Shinto.  There are legitimate criticisms to make of the religious tolerance site, but this isn't one of them.

Sperran

[Melamphoros]

Where are you getting the "correct number?"  I looked at the religious tolerance site and found that they cite several different *possible* numbers for adherents of Shinto and makes note that it is very difficult to estimate the number of adherents because of the different definitions of what is means to be an adherent of Shinto.

^ What she said.  In the chart provided by the Japanese government it said that Shinto had 108.6 million followers which they say is about 50.7% of the population.  The actual population of Japan (according to The World Fact Book) is estimated to be about 126,804,433.  The math just doesn't add up

There are legitimate criticisms to make of the religious tolerance site, but this isn't one of them.

Claiming that Wicca was founded in 800 BCE, for example.

[RandallS]

I think this is open to debate.

I suppose anything is open to debate -- after all, according to Fox News there are two sides to every story and both should be covered as if they were equally true even if the evidence is overwhelmingly greater than for one that the other. However, I think that's a silly position to take.

[SunflowerP]

Right, because Japan is situated near Jupiter. 
Compare the number of Shinto followers the religioustolerance.org gives and the correct number.

Oops, you're right - the table on the page sailor_tech linked to gives a figure of 2.7 million, which is not only waaay out of line with the data in the graph you provided, it's ridiculously low just as a proportion of the population of Japan (for which I'm happy to go with Melamphoros' World Fact Book figure).  I think what happened is that I disbelieved it so much that I "autocorrected" by two orders of magnitude without even noticing I'd done so.  Mea maxima culpa - not just because I had no grounds for dumping on you as I did,but because I certainly should not have the protein 'puter's autocorrect function engaged when the topic at hand is evaluating soundness of sources !

Their article on Shinto does somewhat better, mentioning what a wide range of estimates they'd run across - including noting that many Japanese are both Shinto and Buddhist, which I suspect may be why your pie graph doesn't jibe with Japanese population figures (a pie graph is a poor tool for illustrating religious demographics in a culture to which religious exclusivism - any person can have only one - is an alien concept) - but refuses to do any evaluating of sources itself (it reads to me almost as if they have no idea that there are ways to do so), and refers to "some sources say X while others say Y" without indicating what sources say what, leaving the reader with no means to do hir own evaluating short of examining all the links in the "references used" section, assuming they're not broken .  (Try the "some say..." thing when writing a Wikipedia article, and you'll get a "cleanup" flag at the top of the article - IOW, OCRT's standards fall far short of Wikipedia's .)

So, I'm not just apologizing, I'm changing sides completely - while there are still things I find the OCRT site useful for (the glossary, f'ex, is mostly good, if used simply as a glossary with all the limitations that inhere to that), combining this with the flaws others have mentioned means to me that overall, you're quite right, it's too unreliable to cite.

Sunflower

[SunflowerP]

I looked at the religious tolerance site and found that they cite several different *possible* numbers for adherents of Shinto and makes note that it is very difficult to estimate the number of adherents because of the different definitions of what is means to be an adherent of Shinto.  There are legitimate criticisms to make of the religious tolerance site, but this isn't one of them.

If they'd said anything like what you did, I'd be more inclined to agree.  But their phrasing is far less clear than yours - and you were just composing a forum post, not a reference article.

Sunflower

[RandallS]

The image is part of official government report and is intended for public use. 
The source is clearly referenced.

HOST HAT ON

I have thought about this reply overnight and have decided to issue an official warning as it seems clear to me -- or as clear as it can be from your short reply -- that you have either not read or not understood our rules.

First, the purpose of our copyright rule to two-fold -- to help ensure that our members respect copyrights and by requiring that indication of that "permission must be included with the post" ensuring that staff members to not have to waste their time trying to hunt up whether or not the information is listed somewhere as available for use elsewhere. The implication I get from your two sentences above is that you think staff should be required to research questionable use of copyrighted information to see if it is a violation. That is not their duty. Instead, our forum rules require the member to provide that information so staff does not have to waste their time.

Second, "The image is part of official government report and is intended for public use.  " I have no idea if Japanese government reports are copyright free (as most US government ones are) or not. So this information by itself is not enough to make a decision.

Third, "The source is clearly referenced." From this brief statement, it sounds like you are confusing copyright violation with plagiarism. Plargiarism is not referencing the source. Copyright violation is using the source -- whether referenced or not -- without permission. Merely referencing the source does not tell us whether or not the posted material is a copyright violation or not.

Finally, I find your reply on this issue -- especially in the context of your other posts -- dismissive of this board's concerns and rules. From your posts, you seem to be very dismissive of the concerns and opinions of others. That's your right, but do not do so with respect to the staff on issues of board rules. I consider that "rude and annoying behavior" -- a rules violation itself.

No reply to this post is expected or desired -- but if you have to make one anyway be sure it is private.

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