Talk:Buddhism by country

message: I am responding to a request for a third opinion.  
; the disputed text
...although according to the Western standards of religion much of East Asia could be characterized as irreligious
Wikipedia - irreligion
reference.com - irreligion
allexperts - irreligion 
including Buddhists
Buddhism is an Education, Not a Religion
Buddha Net
Such a statement (poorly sourced at that) might have been widely perceived in the United States as true in the 1950s.  It does not belong in the article.  — Athaenara  ✉ 20:15, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Third opinion on "irreligious"

message: Why was "1.5 billion estimated Buddhists wild and unsubstantiated." archived? The last comment made was on the 31st of October. Saimdusan Talk|Contribs 10:54, 15 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Probably because the wiki editors / admins. were tired of your same old biased arguments using every logical fallacy in the book.  It was just getting too old and you were repeating the same unsubstantiated claims with no basis other than your own agenda.  I had nothing to do with it and just found out about it being archived.  Good decision, admins. thank you. Theravada1 (talk) 17:07, 15 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Why was this topic archived? 

message: I see this discussion is quite difficult due to widely varying sources and definitions, but how come even the lower-end totals end up around 500 million, while 350 million is an often used total figure in some sources? say adherents.com? Also, just wondering, what's the position arrived at on irreligious - adherents put that as high as 75% of japan for instance? Is irreligious actually overlapping with Buddhist - or just different research/definitions? Or could this number be added as lower-end estimate for japan? I don't wish to argue for any particular number or value, just wondering what positions has consensus here come to - and maybe suggest - an FAQ on a discussion page might be useful? Aryah (talk) 14:27, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: As it happens, I've been collecting estimates recently, here's what I've found so far. I'll put it after my signature so people can add to it. PS. No attempt top decide what's a "reliable source". Peter jackson (talk) 16:16, 30 June 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  totals 

message: The CIA World Factbook, which is an accurate source reports that China is only 3-4% Buddhist, yet wikipedia says 80% based off which reliable source? No reliable source indicates that China is 80% Buddhist at all. The Dhamma web site given as a source is not reliable and does not link to any reliable source indicating that China is 80% Buddhist. After China's communist rule Buddhism went down. A number around 8-23% is much more accurate.
--71.163.31.116 (talk) 07:06, 23 January 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: The article doesn't say that China is 80% Buddhist. It gives a range of figures from various sources and leaves the reader to decide which figure to use. The lead paragraphs explain the difficulties in estimating the % for China. See also the many discussions above about how to estimate. Beeswaxcandle (talk) 07:29, 23 January 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: The article doesn't give any reliable source that China is 80% Buddhist, the dhamma link site is not reliable and doesn't link to any reliable sources. If wikipedia is serious encyclopedia then why is it listed as 80% for? This entire time you haven't answered the question as to why the dhamma web site is used as source and why 80% is listed for? The number 8% appears referencing to the CIA World Factbook, yet the CIA World Factbook says 3-4%. So can you answer the question as to why 80% Buddhist is listed for China?--96.255.71.164 (talk) 03:45, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

text: The numbers aren't supported, and the user has been POV pushing this nonsense into multiple articles.  There is no reliable secondary source that supports these numbers.  They are simply based on anecdotal observations made by several religious and political leaders and should be removed. Viriditas (talk) 06:19, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

text: Anecdotally, being a Chinese from Mainland China currently living among the diaspora, I would have to say that maybe 10-15% of people are Buddhist. Maybe around 30% of people - mostly in the older generation - worship Guanyin or venerate an image of Buddha, but they do not practice actual Buddhism. Their worldviews are more in line with folk Taoism. 
Village grandmothers view the image of Guanyin on the altar like Latin American Santeros view the image of St. Barbara on their altar - as an indigenous deity in a polytheistic tradition. Urban people often identify with Buddhism because they want to seem 'modern' by identifying with a world, rather than indigenous, religion. Nonreligious Chinese (the majority) often also say they are Buddhist because they do not want to attract Christian proselytes.  
The term for Chinese spirituality is folk Taoism or Traditional Chinese Religion; an indigenous spirituality cognate to Shinto and Hinduism, similar to the Paganism of the ancient Mediterranean. Please do not impose biased viewpoints or interpretatio indica. The Dragon King and the God of Fortune do not originate from the Pali canon or other Buddhist sources. 
 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.250.181.192 (talk) 16:39, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  How is China 80% Buddhist? 

message: If you rearrange the chart by percentage, it is very much out of order. I'm not sure how to fix this.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.21.109.65 (talk) 19:29, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Buddhism By Country Chart 

message: I can't believe that 2 years later, this article is still such a trainwreck. All the same faulty and misquoted references remain intact. The article even references a website written by the very user whose been violently inserting his POV in articles related to Buddhist demographics. I think it's high time this article had a revamp. Here's my old summary of the sources used in this article (from 2009) which as far as I can see remains relevant today.
 saɪm duʃan Talk|Contribs 00:14, 5 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wildly exaggerated figures 

message: Is it true that there are more than 20.000.000 buddhists in Western Europe ? I have recount and the highest number is > 2.000.000 people only. -- Si Gam (talk) 07:47, 3 June 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Buddhism in Western Europe 

message: I've been in Vietnam and I haven't seen any clear evidence that the government discourages the practice of religion. The figure of 10% seems to me to be too low. They mix it a lot with folk religion, but it seems clear to me that most Vietnamese people consider themselves as Buddhist and respect the Buddhist traditions (Mahayana).
Talk|Mondolkiri1 21:08, 27 April 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Buddhism in Vietnam 

message: I move here the discussion that the user Angelo De La Paz has started on my talkpage, accusing me of vandalism and original research:
 Hello, I'm Angelo De La Paz. I wanted to let you know that I undid one or more of your recent contributions to :Buddhism by country because it did not appear constructive. If you would like to experiment, please use the sandbox. If you think I made a mistake, or if you have any questions, you can leave me a message on my talk page. Thanks!
Angelo De La Paz (talk) 16:43, 8 November 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: My edits aren't an experiment, but a revision of the article with the aim or removing all the original research, synthesis, and unreliable sources used to support the claim of "1 billion Buddhists in the world", that you have contributed to construct, for which the article has been tagged for months.--79.54.84.104 (talk) 17:04, 8 November 2014 (UTC)

text: Please don't use tags to deceive people, thanks. The original research in question is your version of the article.--79.54.84.104 (talk) 17:16, 8 November 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the use of these warning templates (Vandalism + WP:NPOV) was not appropriate.  JimRenge (talk) 18:48, 8 November 2014 (UTC)

text: I agree with 79.54.84.104: inflated numbers, use of poor and unreliable sources/WP:RS, WP:OR, synthesis, and WP:POV have been criticised by different users on this talk page. The article was tagged accordingly since April/March 2014.  I have reverted to the version of 79.54.84.104 because his edit did reduce these policy violations and improved the article.  JimRenge (talk) 19:59, 8 November 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: @Iryna Harpy, NeilN:  could you please take a look at this?  JimRenge (talk) 02:01, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Having taken a look at the content developed by , I'm in agreement with  and  on their evaluation of the substance of it being WP:OR, POV WP:SYNTH and generally unencyclopaedic. Sources used are WP:BIASED at best although, in most instances, I'm unconvinced of their being WP:RS in any sense. As it stands, the remaining content is still highly problematic. The "Buddhism by Country" section is still dependent on - again, at best - WP:BIASED sources which would require WP:INTEXT attribution, but are really in need of being scrutinised at the Reliable sources noticeboard before meriting inclusion on such a basis if deemed relevant by consensus. The Pew Research Institute's reports also always need to be looked at in context. Their stats are not universally RS as it depends on where their figures are sourced from and the methodology by which they are analysed. They seldom present much in the way of information, and often use tiny test groups with no indication as to how the interviewees were selected, or what sort of cross section (other than an age range) they represent (urban, rural, social status, etc.). Any Pew statistics would, then, need to be looked at on a case by case basis. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 04:33, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I am 79.54.84.104, and 87.9.87.170 on 2 November. I have decided to create an account to deal with the situation under suggestion by JimRenge, because my IP is a dynamic one. I agree with Iryna Harpy about the dubious nature of some of the recent statistical tables published by the Pew Research Center (I have noticed that especially in the case of statistics for Christianity in European and North American countries, they have used data that is from ten years ago or even older), although they are very useful for the totals. In the case that statistics collected through censuses or surveys in specific countries are available, they should be preferred over the Pew Research ones.--Xyxyo (talk) 13:59, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

text: So what's your progress? 178.94.27.183 (talk) 13:25, 10 January 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Angelo De La Paz's original research and synthesis 

message: This article is fatally flawed, in that it fails to acknowledge a fundamental problem of enumeration. In the case of Theravada and Tibetan Buddhism, Buddhists are a clear enough identity group that they can be meaningfully counted (except in regions where the religion is suppressed). The situation is very different for East Asian Buddhism (China, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam), where small groups of people who actively identify with Buddhism get lumped together with much larger populations for whom Buddhism is but one element of their religious heritage (along with Daoism, Shinto, Confucianism, etc.--many might consider that they have no religion), and whose identities as "Buddhists" are very questionable. 
I see no simple way of resolving this problem, due to the inherent complexity of the situation. Unfortunately, the total number of Buddhists in the world would go up or down by several hundred million (i.e. 100 percent or more) depending on how this is interpreted. My recommendation would be to state a range, with a conservative figure for those who clearly identify as Buddhists, and a larger figure to include borderline cases, such as most ethnic Chinese and Japanese.
On the issue of whether Buddhism is a religion, it is true that the meaning of the term "religion" is debated (certainly there are many borderline cases), and that Buddhism lacks some features shared by, say, the Abrahamics. However, since virtually everyone--Asian, Western, or miscellaneous--except a few intellectuals considers Buddhism to be a religion, according to our ordinary use of language, I think we have to be guided by that. The problem with respect to East Asia is not debate over whether Buddhism qualifies as a religion--it is over what one has to do, be, or believe in order to be properly considered a "Buddhist."
In Japan there are temple registries (needed for burial) which encompass most of the population, even though few people admit to being religious. In several countries there are surveys of religious attitudes or practices. In some countries (like Malaysia), religion is printed on one's ID card (and everyone is assumed to have a religion); in others (like China), there are official state-run religious bodies which believers may join (though many do not, either out of fear or disinterest). All of these measure fundamentally different things. This article counts...nothing in particular.
One more thing: The first chart lists ten countries which are claimed to have the largest Buddhist populations, not ten countries with Buddhist majorities. (Several show numbers below 50 percent.) --Dawud  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 210.60.58.253 (talk) 08:59, 29 October 2015 (UTC)
thread_title: Another Opinion

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: I have removed the numbers added by  in e.g. this edit:  from the lead section, as well as numbers that were previously there. Since estimates vary widely, for example in the case of Japan, according to , we need to present them appropriately, as is done in the table. We should not choose any one particular estimate to state in Wikipedia's voice in the lead section. We do not necessarily privilege government data over other reliable sources, it depends on the context and the sources in question. --IamNotU (talk) 16:14, 3 January 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Numbers in the lead section 

message: I noticed that this article primarily uses and/or gives more visibility to PEW estimates over the national census data. I believe data from PEW estimates should be only used when reliable primary sources are not available. Would anyone be able to clarify the reason? I would happy to edit tables with numbers from the national census to give them more visibility over PEW estimates. Thought I would ask here before doing anything.Lipwe (talk) 09:12, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: Fully supported. The priority ranking for religious data should be: National censuses, national polls, other estimates, long term predictions. best Nillurcheier (talk) 10:08, 9 March 2022 (UTC)
replies: text:  I fully agree, Pew Research Center's data are low quality data drawn from surveys of around 1000 people. Moreover, these surveys were made in 2009-2010, and for countries which could not be surveyed Pew used the data from the censuses of 2001. All subsequent data published by Pew, with the exception of new surveys made only for the United States (e.g.), are pseudodata projections based on those 2001-2010 data and not on new factual surveys. I'm referring especially to the Pew-Templeton Global Religious Futures, which projects data to 2050; these are fabricated pseudodata and go against the policy of WP:CRYSTALBALL, but unfortunately they have already been spammed throughout Wikipedia (e.g. they are currently present in the country template of France, China, etc.). They have no authority whatsoever to be given priority over census data or national surveys. Similar fabricated projections are those published by the Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary (whose team also edits the World Religion Database), which are even worse as they come from a seriously partisan Evangelical Christian organisation. As I proposed here to Nillurcheier, whom agreed, it would be a good idea to add the Global Religious Futures and Gordon-Conwell to the list of WP:DEPRECATED sources.--Æo (talk) 13:35, 16 March 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: Æo Thank you for your clarification. Sorry I got busy and forgot the reply to you back. Lipwe (talk) 03:04, 16 September 2022 (UTC)

text: Thank you for your reply Nillurcheier! Lipwe (talk) 03:05, 16 September 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Giving priority to PEW estimates over national census 

message: * Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 395#Association of Religion Data Archives and World Religion Database (Gordon-Conwell's WRD/WCD/WCE+ARDA & Pew-Templeton's GRF) — permanent link; deprecation RfC — RfC permanent link — RfC closing summary:
----
 If you will need to cite it, hereinabove is the outcome of the RSN discussion + deprecation RfC about Gordon-Conwell's WRD/WCD/WCE+ARDA & Pew-Templeton's GRF, closed by Firefangledfeathers.--Æo (talk) 14:12, 23 January 2023 (UTC)
thread_title: RSN discussion+RfC outcome