These Oxford University researchers, like most other academics today, dismiss out of hand the possibility that religious violence could stem from the actual teachings of a particular religion. Then, having rejected that idea, they cast about for another explanation for it. This study focused upon the Troubles in Northern Ireland, which was a political struggle expressed in terms of religious allegiance, and the 2002 Gujarat riots between Hindus and Muslims. They appear to have ignored the 33,000 jihad attacks worldwide since 9/11.
And they make the preposterous claim that “religious violence is not our default behaviour – in fact it is pretty rare in our history.” In my book The History of Jihad From Muhammad to ISIS, I document, largely from Islamic sources, the fact that everywhere Muslims have gone, all over the world, for fourteen centuries, there has followed violent attacks by some of those Muslims upon non-Muslims. Those violent Muslims were acting against the non-Muslims in order to try to impose Sharia upon them, institutionalizing their second-class status. In most cases, they succeeded. In the book I show that there was never a time of peaceful coexistence between Muslims and non-Muslims, except when the Muslims enjoyed unchallenged hegemony.
The Oxford researchers either do not know this history, or do not want you to know. Either way, their study is a travesty.
“We might have worked out what makes religious people kill for their gods,” by Rob Waugh, Metro, October 31, 2018 (thanks to Paul):
Oxford University researchers created an AI system to simulate human society – to work out what causes outbreaks of religious violence.
The research used a ‘psychologically realistic’ system to investigate if human violence is ‘natural’ to our species – or if religion can stoke tensions between groups, leading to violence.
The researchers found that human beings generally are peaceful by nature – but when religious people’s ‘core beliefs’ are threatened, violence can ensue.
The researchers focused on intense periods of religious violence: the Troubles in Northern Ireland, which saw 3,500 people die and 47,000 injured in a three-decade clash between Republican and Loyalist paramilitary groups and the British Army.
They also investigated the 2002 Gujarat riots in India, which saw three days of violence between Hindus and Muslims, which ended with the deaths of 2,000 people….
The researchers found that in some situations, particularly when outsiders threaten religious people’s core beliefs, tensions can rise.
This only leads to violence in 20% of cases, the researchers say.
But the researchers point out that some religions have a tendency to encourage extreme displays of devotion – and this can lead to violence against other groups, or people who have broken away from the group.
Researcher Justin Lane said, ‘‘Religious violence is not our default behaviour – in fact it is pretty rare in our history.’ …
‘Ultimately, to use AI to study religion or culture, we have to look at modelling human psychology because our psychology is the foundation for religion and culture, so the root causes of things like religious violence rest in how our minds process the information that our world presents it.’