Posted by Simeon on July 23, 2101 at 19:42:26:

Jonah,

I found out where the bloated number of 750,000 Bahá'ís in the USA
comes from. It is the number given in the newly published World
Christian Encyclopedia. (This is the source from which Britannica
gets their info, I am told.) I, too, wonder how the heck they came
up with this, and a lot of the other numbers in their book! It looks
like a wonderful resource at first, giving a detailed demographic
breakdown of religions for every country of the world. Unfortunately,
on closer inspection...

They seem to get the numbers for India OK (1,700,000), are maybe a
tad high with Iran (450,000), and are way off on the USA (750,000)
and Canada (35,000). Also, some countries seem to be drastically
underestimated... Bangladesh (8,000) and 700 LSAs (do the math) or
Mongolia (53) with 15 LSAs. Brazil comes in with only 36,000 though
my wife (raised there) recalls over 100,000. Also, the republics of
the former Soviet Union are counted with 0, despite the formation of
many LSAs there since 1991.

Total count given for mid-2000 is 7,100,000. That also seems a little
high.

What is the methodology of this book? Are they just more concerned
with Christian statistics, and not that much with other religions?
Anybody have any idea?

Peace,
Simeon

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