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Bentzen, ‘Origins of Religiousness: Natural Disasters’ (2013)

Nepal has earthquakes; Java has volcanoes; the United Kingdom has dreary weather. Is there a geographic correlation between religiosity and catastrophe?

Jeanet Sinding Bentzen. ‘Origins of Religiousness: The Role of Natural Disasters’. University of Copenhagen Department of Economics Discussion Paper 13-02, 2013. [official site / PDF]

From the Abstract

[…] Natural disasters are a source for adverse life events, and thus one way to interpret my findings is by way of religious coping. The results are robust to various measures of religiousness, and to inclusion of country fixed effects, income, education, demographics, religious denominations, and other climatic and geographic features. The results hold within Christianity, Islam and Buddhism, and across continents. […]

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Helliwell, Layard & Sachs, World Happiness Report (2012)

“The happiest countries in the world are all in Northern Europe…”

John Helliwell, Richard Layard and Jeffrey Sachs (eds). World Happiness Report. The Earth Institute, Columbia University, April 2 2012. [official / PDF]

So much to comment on, so little time. For starters: if you are a Theravādin, social capital and personal wellbeing have nothing to do with each other. Suffice it to say that much of the reaction has been unhappy. Related studies (e.g., on how ‘happiness’ has been quantified) may be found at the authors’ homepages.