George Mason University’s Professor Peter Boettke (and one of the most prolific contemporary economists of the Austrian School) has an interesting post over on his blog, The Austrian Economists . Boettke is attending a conference of Institute on Culture, Religion and World Affairs and writes of institute director Peter Berger’s talk on the subject of the ’secularisation thesis’:
…Berger gave an overview of world religious movements. He spoke about the secularization thesis, and why the current empirical reality runs counter to the modernization/secularization thesis. Berger argued that the cultural elite are prone to overstate the case for secularization because of three factors: (1) geographic exception— Western Europe and Central Europe does conform nicely with the secularization thesis; (2) sociological selection bias — members of the intellectual/cultural elite in the human sciences tend to be non-religious (this is not true with respect to the hard sciences) and thus they tend to believe that just as they became less religious as they were educated and “modernized” it is only natural that others will be less religious as they are “modernized”; and (3) confusion between positive and normative statements concerning secularization, so that anti-religious zealotry is wrapped in pro-modernity rhetoric. These 3 factors make sure that a cultural elite cling to the modernization/secularization thesis beyond where it could reasonably be maintained.
(via Rafe at Catallaxy)