Why people don\u27t go to church : a study of factors associated with non-participation and participation in church in Australia

Church-based religion in the western world is considered by many sociologists to be in decline. The causes of this decline have been linked to secularising processes such as institutional differentiation, urbanisation, industrialisation, and the rise of scientific rationalism. The primary research aim of this study is to identify what contribution the religious beliefs of individuals, their demographic characteristics, their work and leisure patterns, their attitudes and experiences of churches and their experience of the urban environment, make towards understanding patterns of non-participation and participation in local churches. A secondary research aim is to identify to what extent theories of secularisation and other theories of religious change receive support from these empirical findings, as well as from other social surveys and historical sources examined in the study. In order to address the primary research aim, a random sample, community survey was carried out. This survey included a wide range of questions covering the issues designated for research~ as well as eliciting stated reasons for non-participation. This survey differs from many others in that it was limited to selected local areas, enabling some assessment to be made of the impact of the physical characteristics of these local areas on church attendance patterns. Initially the data analysis focuses on bivariate relationships between particular characteristics of respondents and their extent of church participation. Thereafter, the data are subjected to multi-variate analysis, in order to identify the contribution of each variable while controlling for the effects of other variables. Path analysis and partial correlations are used to begin to identity the likely causal links between variables in the study. The study concludes that the certainty and salience of traditional religious beliefs and practices make the greatest contribution towards explaining patterns of church participation and non-participation. While the relationship between beliefs and nonparticipation can be shown to conform with secularisation theory, there are doubts about the direction of causality. There is evidence of the significant impact of religious socialisation during childhood on later patterns of participation and nonparticipation, and the likelihood of further declines in church attendance levels due to cohort differences. Many of the variables traditionally associated with conventional secularisation theory such as education, workforce involvement and aspects of urbanisation offer only a partial explanation of non-participation in church. By comparison, variables associated with leisure, material goals and the pursuit of happiness are more strongly related to church participation at the individual level. These provide evidence of other ways in which modernity interacts with religion to produce secularisation, apart from the rising tide of rationality associated with modernity

monthlyreview.org /2013/12/01/marx-rift-universal-metabolism-nature

The rediscovery over the last decade and a half of Marx's theory of metabolic rift has come to be seen by many on the left as offering a powerful critique of the relation between nature and contemporary capitalist society. The result has been the development of a more unified ecological world view transcending the divisions between natural and social science, and allowing us to perceive the concrete ways in which the contradictions of capital accumulation are generating ecological crises and catastrophes. Yet, this recovery of Marx's ecological argument has given rise to further questions and criticisms. How is his analysis of the metabolism of nature and society related to the issue of the "dialectics of nature," traditionally considered a fault line within Marxist theory? Does the metabolic rift theory-as a number of left critics have recently charged-violate dialectical logic, falling prey to a simplistic Cartesian dualism?1 Is it really conceivable, as some have asked, that Marx, writing in the nineteenth century, could have provided ecological insights that are of significance to us today in understanding the human relation to ecosystems and ecological complexity? Does it not rather stand to reason that his nineteenth-century ruminations on the metabolism of nature and society would be "outmoded" in our more developed technological and scientific age?2 In the following discussion I shall attempt briefly to answer each of these questions. In the process I shall also seek to highlight what I consider to be the crucial importance of Marx's ecological materialism in helping us to comprehend the emerging Great Rift in the earth system, and the resulting necessity of an epochal transformation in the existing nature-society metabolism. The Dialectics of Nature The problematic status of the dialectics of nature in Marxian theory has its classic source in Georg Lukács's famous footnote in History and Class Consciousness in which he stated with respect to the dialectic: It is of the first importance to realise that the method is limited here to the realms of history and society. The misunderstandings that arise from Engels' account of dialectics can in the main be put down to the fact that Engels-following Hegel's mistaken lead-extended the method to apply also to nature. However, the crucial determinants of dialectics-the interaction of subject and object, the unity of theory and practice, the historical changes in the reality underlying the categories as the root cause of changes in thought, etc.-are absent from our knowledge of nature.3 Within what came to be known as "Western Marxism" this was generally taken to mean that the dialectic applied only to society and human history, and not to nature independent of human history.4 Engels, in this view, was wrong in his Dialectics of Nature, in attempting to apply dialectical logic to nature directly, as were the many Marxian scientists and theorists who had proceeded along the same lines.

Contemporary perspectives on language standardization: the role of digital and online technologies

There is plenty of evidence indicating that the rise in usage and influence of digital and online forms of communication is having an effect on language norms and processes of standardization. Some examples are the shifts in writing norms in digital spaces, the diversification of language norm authorities and the impact of crowdsourcing on dictionaries and reference works. Whereas existing research has predominantly centred on the consequences of digital and online technologies for developments ‘from below’, this chapter focuses instead on their significance for standardization and policies ‘from above’. With reference to the most recent official revisions to the Luxembourgish language orthography, the chapter examines efforts by state institutions and private organizations to implement language standards and create greater awareness of written norms for Luxembourgish. The analysis encompasses the Schreiwen.lu online resources and spelling campaign, digital Luxembourigish dictionaries and spellcheckers, as well as the rtl.lu online news platform. The findings indicate that such technological developments enable multiple approaches for creating, negotiating and disseminating language standards. Online and digital media not only affect bottom-up language practices, but also have an increasingly influential role in the norm implementation and standardization effected by the state and by private entities

Fordismus als Fetisch

Unter der Bezeichnung »Fordismus« wird in der sozialwissenschaftlichen Literatur die Verbindung von Massenproduktion mit durch hohe Löhne möglich gewordener Massenkonsumtion bezeichnet, als deren Vorreiter Henry Ford gilt. Der Artikel bemüht sich dieses Bild von Ford zu korrigieren: die in Fords PR-Abteilung produzierte Ideologie werde mit der Realität verwechselt. Darüber hinaus werden die Widersprüche aufgezeigt, die eine Analyse des Nachkriegskapitalismus mit dem Konzept »Fordismus« mit sich bringt

Civilización ecológica, revolución ecológica

What is needed to bring about an ecological revolution aimed at human survival is not simply environmental reform, but a much broader ecological and social revolution aimed at transcending the logic of capitalism itself.Lo que se necesita para llevar a cabo una revolución ecológica dirigida a la supervivencia humana no es simplemente una reforma medioambiental, sino una revolución ecológica y social mucho más amplia dirigida a trascender la lógica del propio capitalismo

Correlational Analysis of the Personality Characteristics of Subjects from a Selected Religious Organization

This study represents an attempt to investigate the personality dimensions of subjects selected from a particular religious organization. These organizations traditionally function as behavioral change agents within the social milieu. The researcher's personal experience has led to the conclusion that there exists, among religious leaders and educators, a lack of understanding of the personality developmental factors associated with the processes used to facilitate behavior change. For this reason, it was deemed essential, that an initial investigation be made which would lay the foundation for future studies in these related areas. The primary objective of this study is to determine the present descriptive personality characteristics of the subjects by conducting correlational analyses between demographic variables, which are considered to be relative to some degree to one's association with a religious organization, and personality development factors. From the statistical analyses of the data, it is possible to ascertain significant findings. This descriptive analysis facilitates further research investigations using similar or different methodologies.Educational Psycholog

In situ monitoring of powder blending by non-invasive Raman spectrometry with wide area illumination

A 785 nm diode laser and probe with a 6 mm spot size were used to obtain spectra of stationary powders and powders mixing at 50 rpm in a high shear convective blender. Two methods of assessing the effect of particle characteristics on the Raman sampling depth for microcrystalline cellulose (Avicel), aspirin or sodium nitrate were compared: (i) the information depth, based on the diminishing Raman signal of TiO2 in a reference plate as the depth of powder prior to the plate was increased, and (ii) the depth at which a sample became infinitely thick, based on the depth of powder at which the Raman signal of the compound became constant The particle size, shape, density and/or light absorption capability of the compounds were shown to affect the "information" and "infinitely thick" depths of individual compounds. However, when different sized fractions of aspirin were added to Avicel as the main component, the depth values of aspirin were the same and matched that of the Avicel: 1.7 mm for the "information" depth and 3.5 mm for the "infinitely thick" depth. This latter value was considered to be the minimum Raman sampling depth when monitoring the addition of aspirin to Avicel in the blender. Mixing profiles for aspirin were obtained non-invasively through the glass wall of the vessel and could be used to assess how the aspirin blended into the main component, identify the end point of the mixing process (which varied with the particle size of the aspirin), and determine the concentration of aspirin in real time. The Raman procedure was compared to two other non-invasive monitoring techniques, near infrared (NIR) spectrometry and broadband acoustic emission spectrometry. The features of the mixing profiles generated by the three techniques were similar for addition of aspirin to Avicel. Although Raman was less sensitive than NIR spectrometry, Raman allowed compound specific mixing profiles to be generated by studying the mixing behaviour of an aspirin-aspartame-Avicel mixture

Stoffwechsel, Energie und Entropie in Marx‘ Kritik der Politischen Ökonomie: Jenseits des Podolinsky-Mythos (Teil 2)

"Thermodynamische Überlegungen zu Fragen der Energieerhaltung, der entropischen Dissipation durch Reibung sowie zur Wechselwirkung physikalischer Kräfte spielen im ersten Band des Kapital eine zentrale Rolle. Sie finden sich vor allem im Kapitel über Maschinerie und große Industrie, das den zentralen Teil der Marxschen Untersuchung der industriellen Entwicklung im Kapitalismus darstellt...