What Does Tim Tebow Pray For?
In a recent Football Freakonomics video about Tim Tebow, I made a connection between his faith and performance: Tebow is hardly the first NFL quarterback to be demonstrative about his religious faith....
View ArticleJonathan Haidt Answers Your Questions About Morality, Politics, and Religion
A while back, we solicited your questions for social psychologist Jonathan Haidt, author of The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion. (He recently appeared on The...
View ArticleReligion, Crime, and Television
(Photo: espensorvik) A new survey study by Amir Hetsroni (who has also studied the difference between real doctors and TV doctors) and Hila Levenstein looks at the relationship between TV viewing and...
View ArticleSaving Money By Converting to Christianity
(Photo: Nora Morgan) The Phnom Penh Post reports on a Cambodian village that’s converting to Christianity for economic reasons: At upwards of US$500, the cost of slaughtering a buffalo to revive a...
View ArticleBetter Living Through Religious Conversion?
A response via Twitter concerning our recent post about Cambodian villagers who reportedly converted to Christianity to save money: @DavidFCox: I had an Indian friend that changed religion 4 times to...
View ArticleModesty Glasses
(Photo: Mr. T in DC) Men in the ultra-Orthodox religious community in Jerusalem object to women walking on the street in short skirts or sleeveless blouses, even attacking those who venture out in such...
View ArticleThe Status Quo
(Photo: Guillaume Paumier) If you ever travel to Israel (which, BTW, is a phenomenal place to visit regardless of your attitudes toward religion or Middle Eastern politics), you’ll certainly see the...
View ArticleContraception as a Prisoner’s Dilemma
A reader named Dennis Schenkel in Martin, Tenn., writes in with an interesting commentary about an article that intersects with a lot of things we’ve written about: First, I know I’m partisan. I’m a...
View ArticleThe Demand Curve for Religion
(Photo: Jeremy Vandel) “Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s”? In many European countries, religion comes at a price: If you want the services of a religious community — for marriages, burial, and other...
View ArticleA Clarification on the Immaculate Reception (and Conception)
In the “Immaculate Reception” documentary that premiered last night on the NFL Network, I was called upon to discuss the religious provenance of the play’s name. Here’s what I say in the program:...
View ArticleOne University That Isn’t Cutting Costs
(Photo: Taber Andrew Bain) A Washington Post profile of Liberty University, founded in 1971 by Jerry Falwell, says that Liberty has doubled its enrollment in the last six years: The surging enrollment...
View ArticleGay Rights in Russia? Nyet
(Photo: Peter Gray) Gay marriage and gay rights have dominated much of the U.S. news over the past week. In Russia, meanwhile, from the Associated Press: Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed...
View ArticlePontiff-icating on the Free-Market System: A New Freakonomics Radio Podcast
(Photo: Semilla Luz) This week’s episode of Freakonomics Radio takes a look at Pope Francis’s critique of the free-market system in “Evangelii Gaudium” (“The Joy of the Gospel”), his first apostolic...
View ArticleReligion, Labor Supply, and Happiness
(Photo: Guillaume Paumier) SuperFreakonomics looked at research by Douglas Almond and Bhashkar Mazumder on the birth effects of prenatal exposure to Ramadan. A new paper by Filipe Campante and David...
View ArticleOld-Fashioned Matchmaking as an Antidote to Modern Dating Dilemmas
We recently put out four Freakonomics Radio episodes that developed an arc of a theme: “Reasons to Not Be Ugly,” “What You Don’t Know About Online Dating,” “Why Marry? (Part 1)” and “Why Marry? (Part...
View ArticleDoes Religion Make You Happy? A New Freakonomics Radio Podcast
(Photo: www.CGPGrey.com) This week’s episode is called “Does Religion Make You Happy?” (You can subscribe to the podcast at iTunes, get the RSS feed, or listen via the media player above. You can also...
View ArticleBetter Living Through Religious Conversion?
A response via Twitter concerning our recent post about Cambodian villagers who reportedly converted to Christianity to save money: @DavidFCox: I had an Indian friend that changed religion 4 times to...
View ArticleModesty Glasses
(Photo: Mr. T in DC) Men in the ultra-Orthodox religious community in Jerusalem object to women walking on the street in short skirts or sleeveless blouses, even attacking those who venture out in such...
View ArticleDoes More Education Lead to Less Religion?
According to a new working paper (abstract; PDF) by Daniel M. Hungerman, an economist at Notre Dame who studies religion, the answer is yes. At least in his Canadian data set: For over a century,...
View ArticleMinority Rules: Why 10 Percent is All You Need
What does it take for an idea to spread from one to many? For a minority opinion to become the majority belief? According to a new study by scientists at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, the...
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