Talk:Buddhism by country

General

I have added a reference to a Buddhist site which gives much higher figures. Given the success of Buddhism in surviving the severest possible persecution in e.g. Mongolia or Cambodia, these figures must be taken seriously. They are probably too high, but then the generally cited figures are clearly too low. SelwynC 21:44, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

Brazil

There were 214,873 Buddhists in Brazil in 2000, according to our last census. Source: http://www.ibge.gov.br/home/estatistica/populacao/censo2000/primeiros_resultados_amostra/brasil/pdf/tabela_1_1_2.pdf (Budismo = Buddhism). PMLF 02:43, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

That list looks bad :)) I wrote a program to do all the math, sort, and generate the table. I will help you out here OneGuy 07:24, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Since so many countries don't have the percentage of Buddhists available, I am not sure if it's the right idea to list all of the countries in this case. Anyway, if you have percentage of a missing country available, post it on talk page (with your source) and I will recreate the table with the new percentage added. OneGuy 08:05, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

My calculations are wrong? I got the percentages from adherents.com. Please provide the source if you have a different number. OneGuy 08:17, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Hello

Go to the CIA factbook, this adherents.com link, and information about religions about countries in wikipedia and calculate. Also, the Malaysia info comes from the Philips World Gazetter. Population of Chinese is 25%. How can only 11% of the population is Buddhist?Mr TanMr Tan, 08:23, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

You are incorrect about China. According to State Deprtment, for China (including Tibet, Hong Kong, and Macau)

http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2004/35396.htm

Approximately 8 percent of the population is Buddhist

I don't know how you can claim 78% or 25% is Buddhist OneGuy 08:28, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Most of Latvians are Christians!!!!!!! Correct your facts at CIA world factbook. Mr TanMr Tan, 08:23, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Ok, that was a typo then. I will check it and fix it. In any case, stop editing the page and discuss each case OneGuy 08:28, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

China

In any way the author need to make clear the source of the number 77% formally in the article. OneGuy 04/23/07

No way China has 78% of Buddhists! Here is a list of largest Buddhists countries on adherents.com

http://www.adherents.com/largecom/com_buddhist.html

China is not listed! OneGuy 08:32, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Also, adherents.com has a very old list (3 or 4 years old). The population list that you are using is from 2005! Instead of plugging the exact old Buddhist population number from adherents.com, use the percentage and calculate the new population for 2005 OneGuy 08:36, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

The source for this is something like: http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2004/35396.htm

"Buddhists make up the largest body of organized religious believers. The Government estimates that there are more than 100 million Buddhists, most of whom are from the dominant Han ethnic group. However, it is difficult to estimate accurately the number of Buddhists because they do not have congregational memberships and often do not participate in public ceremonies. The Government reports that there are 16,000 Buddhist temples and monasteries and more than 200,000 nuns and monks."

This makes it clear that the source is a government which deliberately lists only the highly committed. This is fair enough but should not be included in lists which give nominal figures for e.g. Christians. A comparable figure for actual practising Christians in the U.K. might be about 15% rather than the 60% actually given for Protestants.

The only fair way to give a figure for Mainland China is to assume that the percentage of Buddhists is the same as for Taiwan i.e. 25% or for Singapore i.e. 42.5%. Although Buddhism might have grown in popularity in Taiwan more than it has on the Mainland, this is counter-balanced by a number of largely Buddhist minority areas (Tibetans, Mongolians, Manchu, Sipsong panna) included as part of China.

What is at all events clear is that the largest body of 'organized religious believers' will have a further large number of sympathizers. 78% is possible, allowing that many would also consider themselves Confucianists, Taoists or just Chinese traditionalists. Compare the Census figures for Japan. 30% seems a reasonable compromise. (SelwynC 20:57, 16 December 2005 (UTC)) I am amending the figures for China on this basis. SelwynC 21:02, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

HOW many Buddhists are there in China? According to the article, Buddhism in China, and the US Department of State website linked above, "estimates of the number of Buddhists in China range from 70 million to 150 million."

Taiwan

Since 8% of Buddhists in China includes Taiwan (according to State Department), I am going to remove Taiwan from the list since that is counted twice OneGuy 09:03, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

opps, it was Tibet, Hong Kong, and Macau, not Taiwan OneGuy 09:20, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Revert Changes

I reverted the changes. I think that we should do these slowly. I explain why.

• I agree with Brazil, there is nothing wrong. I'm sorry, it has to be removed for the time being as it clashes with the wrong results of others. My main point goes here.

Why Lesotho is not accepted:

• Lesotho is 80% Christians, not Buddhists!

• Using calculations from my calculator, by dividing 1,020,000/1,300,000 X 100%, you get 78%. Different sources state differently. I'm terribly sorry, but 8% is ridiculous. Neve fully trust websites. Calculate on your own.

• Go to Chinese Malaysian. Can it be only 11% of the population is Buddhist? The majorty of the Chinese are Buddhist! Of the 25% Chinese, the Philips Gazetter states 17.5% is Buddhist.

• • Evidence:[1].

• Thirdly, I think I have to recorrect the facts accurately. You did not add Brunei, where 13% is Buddhist, nor South Korea. Cambodia is 95% Buddhist, not 89%. Go to Demographics of Cambodia or the CIA factbook once again.

Once again, I hope we can build an interesting WP.

Mr Tan, 19:00 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

---

I will fix Lesotho. China has 102 million Buddhist, not 1.02 billion! Fix your caculator :)

North Korea doesn't have 26% of Buddhist population!. Here are two sources

http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2004/35402.htm

The number of religious believers is unknown but has been estimated by the Government at 10,000 Protestants, 10,000 Buddhists, and 4,000 Catholics.

Another source

http://www.adherents.com/Na/Na_86.html

Korea, North 1.67%

These figures are ridiculous. See: http://www.adherents.com/adhloc/Wh_177.html#434

There, two figures are given 400,000 (1999?) and 2,253, 200 (1998?). Neither is reliable but the true figure certainly lies between the two. Official government figures must be ignored. Alternatively, Communist era figures for Christianity in the former Soviet bloc would have to be adopted in order to obtain comparability. (SelwynC 20:56, 16 December 2005 (UTC))

I am altering it on the basis that the percentage for North Korea will be around the same as for South Korea. Obviously this cannot be exactly correct, but it will give an approximate figure of th eright order of magnitude. SelwynC 22:01, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

As for Japan,

http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2004/35400.htm

According to statistics published by the Agency for Cultural Affairs in December 2002, approximately 49.9 percent of citizens adhered to Shintoism, 44.2 percent to Buddhism, 5.0 percent to "other" religions, and 0.9 percent to Christianity. However, Shintoism and Buddhism are not mutually exclusive religions, and the figures do not represent the ratio of actual practitioners; most members claim to observe both.

For Mongolia,

http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2004/35419.htm

Buddhism and the country's traditions are tied closely, and it appears likely that almost all ethnic Mongolians (93 percent of the population) practice some form of Buddhism. Lamaist Buddhism of the Tibetan variety is the traditional and dominant religion.

Malasyia

http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2001/5604.htm

According to government census figures, in 1991 59 percent of the population were Muslim; 18 percent practiced Buddhism;

I will fix Malasyia

Anyway, don't revert to a mess version of the article. I will fix a percentage and recreate the list if you point some factual error OneGuy 11:19, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Ok, I see what's wrong with your China calculation. China's population is not 1,300,000. It's 1,306,313,812 i.e 1,300,000,000 OneGuy 11:26, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

You are missing zeros everywhere from your China calculations. Try this 102,000,000/1,300,000,000 * 100 = 7.8 is the answer. Much closer to 8% I had from State Department. Also, keep in mind that China population was not 1.3 billion 3 or 4 years ago when adherents.com posted this. So 8% is the right answer OneGuy 11:42, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Singapore

The total population figures for Singapore cannot be right. See http://www.singstat.gov.sg/keystats/c2000/topline13.pdf That gives 3,263,000 in the year 2,000. Dec 2005 (SelwynC)

changed percentages

I changed many of the percentages to US State Department's International Religious Freedom Report 2004 [2].

These reports are more up to date than both CIA factbook and adherents.com. I also found them more accurate. If anyone finds an error (in most cases a typo with percentage), let me know OneGuy 04:32, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

East Africa

I told you, Mr Tan, you cannot directly change the region table. The table region are simple produced by country table. To change East Africa in table region, you have to fix Tanzania. Is your claim that there are no Buddhist in Tanzania? That's refuted by

http://www.buddhanet.net/africame/africadir.htm

Buddhist Temple and Meditation Center Plot no 606,P.O.Box 6665, Mindu Street, West Upanga Dar es Salaam 255 Tanzania Tel: + 255 22 2150422 Mobile: 255 741 451745 Fax: + 255 22 2150422 Email: Pannasekara@hotmail.com Web site: www.geocities.com/pannasekara Tradition: Theravada Spiritual Director: Rev. Ilukpitiye Pannasekara Chief Buddhist monk for the African continent

OneGuy 10:34, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Here is a web site of a Buddhist in Tanzania, so obviousl.y there are Buddhists in East Africa http://www.geocities.com/pannasekara/ OneGuy 10:44, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Percentages Chart

I don't think the percentages chart is correct. If you look at recorded number of Buddhists in a given country, the United States for example, it's just the estimated percentage (1%) multiplied by the population (295,734,134). So the column shows 2,957,341. There's no way that exactly 1.00000% of the population is Buddhist in the United States, so the number is incorrect and perhaps that last column should be removed.

- Dave

Table is not useful

Any protest to removing the "n/a" entries with redlinks from the table? If there are nearly 0 Buddhists in a country (i.e., Iraq) then it does not seem helpful to have an entry and redlink for them. Ashibaka tock 21:25, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, the main problem is that rather many of them do in fact contain significant (but not large) numbers of Buddhists. That is obviously true for countries such as Poland, Greece, Ukraine, Belarus in Europe. And probably also for countries in South America which do not list Buddhists. The CIA in particular is not much interested in seeking out Buddhists ! And Buddhists are not as organizationally or mission- orientated as some. It might be best to given a minimal figure of 0.1 for all the European countries which have N/A at present. Perhaps not for the Balkans ? But certainly also for the Americas. At present, the absence of figures for many countries (i.e. those whose governments do not provide figures) distorts the overall regional percentages. SelwynC 21:39, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

China

I am revising the entry for China, which is totally out of wack with any other estimate. User:SelwynC made this change a year ago, jumping up the percentage of Buddhists from 8% to 30%, with no source. The US Dept of State's International Religious Freedom Report 2005 here gives the percentage as 8%, and that estimate is consistent with adherents.com's estimate here. I am reporting the result to only four significant figures; it is downright silly to be more accurate here.

Neither of the above two sources are reliable for figures on Buddhism. An alternative is: here. SelwynC 19:36, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Similarly, for N Korea, SelwynC used the S Korea percentages. This is clearly original research. I replaced it with 400,000 in round figures, the latest figure available at [3].

The rest of this table is a mess, but China alone had the numbers off by a few hundred million; the rest I don't have time to deal with now. Let us be careful to avoid violating WP:OR on this page! bikeable (talk) 21:23, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

I also took out rows not used in the country table (really, they don't help a bit, and clutter the page terribly). The "top 20" table at bottom is pretty useless since the figures are so uncertain, but I at least made it internally consistent.

Someone should go through this, clean and prune, and round everything to a reasonable number of significant digits. But that's too much effort for tonight...! bikeable (talk) 21:46, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

United Arab Emirates have some interestingly high number of buddhists, this doesnt sound plausable that theyd be on the top 20 list.. And, croats dislike being put into the balkans, and preffer central or at least south eastern europe. And I doubt the number anyways--83.131.159.9 13:59, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, it's only 50,000 people we're talking about. They're presumably immigrant laborers from some East Asian country. Depending on which country it is (for instance, China), it might be questionable whether 50,000 of them are actually Buddhists, though.—Nat Krause^(Talk!) 17:31, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

There are large numbers of Sri Lankan migrant workers in the UAE. SelwynC 19:36, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Canada

The 2001 Census gives the number of Buddhists as 300,345, which is significantly greater than the number quoted in the table.

http://www12.statcan.ca/english/census01/Products/Analytic/companion/rel/canada.cfm

Statistics Canada estimated the 2005 population as 32,623,500

http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/060927/d060927a.htm

The percentage thus increases to 0.9%. If we were using the actual 2001 population as the numerator, the percentage would be 1.0%.

Klima 02:47, 14 February 2007 (UTC) klima

The percentage of Buddhist in China mainland,South East Asia,East Asia.

Hi everyone!I am a mixed race of many Asian descents (Chinese/Cantonese,Vietnamese) with Filipino-Hispanic and I am a Buddhist and a religious researcher!Buddhism is the special religion which is very hard to know who is Buddhist in the secular society.As in Turkey,over 97% population is Muslims but they look like secular Westerns!I will discussion some wrong or not exact percentage of Buddhist in some countries!I will edit the list of religious population as soon as July 2007 with newest census and more exact!And Buddhism is the second largest religion with over 1.465 billion wasn't the liar or ridiculous behind Christianity (over 2.100 billion) and it followed by Islam and Hinduism.I think the recent census is too exact but not perfect!

• SOUTH EAST ASIA:

1/Vietnam: I am living in Vietnam now,Buddhism in Vietnam is very strong influence from about 2000 years ago to now;but I am decisive to say the percentage of Buddhist in Vietnam is around from over 85% to maximum 88%,not 92% is very high and unbelievable (remember Hoa Hao Buddhism is a Vietnamese sect of Mahayana Buddhism not a separate religion;about Caodaism is NOT a sect of Buddhism'it is a separate Vietnamese religion which is the mixture of Buddhism-Taoism-Confucianism with Christianity mainly and included Hinduism or even Islam too).

Here is percentage of religion in Vietnam: Buddhism (all sects):88%; Christianity:8% (Roman Catholic is over 6.5%,Protestant is around 1% to 1.5%); Cao Dai (nearly 3%) and 1% is other religions (Muslim 0.08%;Hindu;Bahá'í)

2/Laos: The Buddhist must be over 90% at least to 95%;91% is too less.It is too funny when the percentage of Buddhist in Laos is less than Vietnam.Although,the influence of Buddhism in both these countries is heavy but in Laos,it is more important as a state religion!

3/Thailand: The percentage of Buddhist population is only could be 95% is the maximum,not 97% is quite high!

4/Myanmar: The percentage of Buddhist in Myanmar is around from 88-90% is the most possible.93% is couldn't true!

5/Malaysia: 44% Malaysian people is Buddhist===>It is very unbelievable.The real percentage of Buddhist in Malaysia is 19.2% (Buddhist only) to 21.8% (plus 2.6% of Confucianism and Taoism which is called East Asian Buddhism or "Triple religion").I will edit it soon with the latest census of 2007 soon!

6/Singapore: The Buddhist population in Singapore is from minimum (42.5%) could to be 51% (Buddhism+Taoism 8.5%) and maybe high as 60% acceptably!(plus more 2/3 of 14.8% No religion)

7/Philippines: The Buddhist population is only from 2 to 2.5% not 3% is a liitle bit high!

• CHINA MAINLAND:

I have stayed in China in nearly a month (total time of 2 visits) and over 1.5 million Chinese live in Vietnam (half is concentrated in ChinaTown or Cho Lon in Vietnamese;which is the area of District 5,6 and a part of some neighbour districts in Ho Chi Minh city with predominant Chinese people).

And Chinese is more "Buddhist" than Vietnamese.8-9 or even 100% in every 10 Chinese people are Buddhists and they are worship common Buddha,Bodhisattvas,Arhats (Buddhism) with Taoist God,Goddess,Saints and heavy influence by Confucian philosophy in family-society-nation with respect teachings of Buddhism in private spiritual or religious life as a spiritual treatments,the philosophy which could make the life more peaceful,relaxed,easier,merciful and healthier body and bright mind with fresh life!And Vietnamese is same like that!

I've travelled to China 2 times and I've just watched a travel series of the Buddhist culture in East Asia.And it said the Buddhist population in China mainland is OVER 1 BILLION PEOPLE at least;Buddhism,Taoism and Confucianism "all in one" but Buddhism could the balance of each others!Buddhism and Taoism is the true religions with common philosophy but Confucianism is the philosophy than a religion!I am confident to say the percentage of Buddhist in China mainland is must be over 80% at least or maybe over 85% probably!77-78% is under the minimum (80%).Example for percentage of religion in China mainland: Buddhism (80%-85%,common with Taoist and Confucianist),all sects of Christianity (6.5 to 7%),Muslim (1.5 to under 2%),others as shamanism,animist (1%) and Atheist (5-10%,almost is members of China's Communist Party)

And if you've ever watched the TV series or famous Chinese novel of "Journey to the West".You can see the Monkey King- Sun Wukong have made trouble in Heaven and defeated an army of 100,000 celestial soldiers, led by the Four Heavenly Kings, Erlang Shen, and Nezha.Eventually, the Jade Emperor (the highest God of Taoism) appealed to Buddha, who subdued and trapped Wukong under a mountain.The Monkey King could do impudent activities with Jade Emperor and his Heaven Palace but he daren't do it with Great Buddha and Guan Yin Bodhisattva because they are more powerful and more merciful who could punish and teach him only!

• EAST ASIA:

1/North Korea: 60% population of North Korea is Buddhist maybe certain but I think it is too less.The neutral estimate of Buddhist population here is should be over 65% certainly.

2/South Korea: Nowadays,South Korea is very particular country in East Asia where Christians is 49% and Buddhists is only 47% by the CIA's sources.But however,Buddhist population in Korea could be equal or 50% of South Korean population definitely;50.7% now is not really right!

3/Mongolia: Buddhist 98%, Muslim 2%, 20,000 Christians.No more no less!(Source:[4])

• SOUTH ASIA:

1/India: Over 1.1% of India' population is Buddhist could be certain!

2/Sri lanka: Over 90% Sinhalese people is Buddhist but the religious popualtion of Sri Lanka is Buddhism 76.7% (not high as 81%),Islam 8.5%, Hinduism 7.9%,Christianity 6.9%

3/Nepal: Hinduism 80.2%, Buddhism 21%, Islam 2.8%, other 1.2% The Buddhist population in Nepal is only 21%,not 33% is very liar!

4/Other countries in South Asia:

-Bhutan: Lamaistic Buddhist 97%, Indian- and Nepalese-influenced Hinduism 2%, Muslims 1%

-Pakistan: about 0.5% is Buddhist

-Bangladesh: 89.7% of the population was Muslim; 9.2% was Hindu; 0.7% were Buddhists; 0.3% was Christian and 0.1% was Animist. (Source:[5])

Portugal

The Portuguese numbers are not correct. The "União Budista Portuguesa" estimates that there are 3.000 buddhits in Portugal. That number is very far from the 60.000 this article suggests.

According to the 2001 census data, availabe at the Instituto Nacional de Estatística , there were 13.882 "other non-christhians" in Portugal, i.e., apart from the jewish and muslim communities. In this wikipedia article hinduism_in_Portugal the numbers of hindus is estimated as 7.000, leaving aproximatly 6.000 for all other religions, including Buddhism. it seems that the UBP estimate, of 3.000, is problaby the most accurate.

User:Ruipedro.sousa|Ruipedro.sousa]] 11:16, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Not fair for Buddhist population!Other religions are not fair-play with Buddhist population!

I am a Chinese Mandarin and I know the culture of my nation!I am so agree with a person in this discussion who is mixed of many Asian descents with Hispanic.He was say right 90% about the Buddhist population!In China mainland and some our neighbor countries in Far East where is very mysterious,interesting just like "Forbidden palace" in Beijing or anywhere in Far East Asia.

I think 78% Chinese people are Buddhist is very very modest.It is the contradiction when in "mini Chinese nations" as Hong Kong,Taiwan (over 90% is Buddhist);Macau (85%) and Singapore (3/4 is Chinese and 60% total population of whole island is Buddhist).That showed in every 10 Chinese people,at least 8 is Buddhist and the highest is 9 per 10.And someone has explained what is the Buddhism in Chinese culture!I think Buddhism is the most fantastic religion and the true religion of Peace and the Concord!

Mostly Christianity's churches must build as Western and European style.And all Muslim mosques must build as Arab style.

But in Buddhism,you can see the pagodas,temples could build with any traditional style and keep the value of national heritages as Chinese style (common property with Taoism and Confucianism) , Korean style, Japanese style (common property with Shinto), Vietnamese style; those are in Mahayana Buddhism.

In Theravada,the architecture is different completely.You can see it in India, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia,...with Buddhist padodas are made of gold,silver,marble,v.v...

When you travel to Tibet or Himalaya,you can see more different style of Buddhism from architecture,costumes,buildings,v.v...

And so much more.That is the special and the lissomness of Buddhism;Buddhism is not boring,dry,rigid and monotonous as other religion as Christianity,Islam,Hinduism or Judaism!

I am swear to say Buddhist percentage in China mainland must more than Vietnam at least (86-87%) and even highest as 90% possibly!I will take the neutral figure (from 86% to 90%) is 88%

In China mainland;who is "non-religious" when he or she died,all their funerals would celebrate in Buddhist rituals mainly and Taoist rituals (burning of hell money;clothes,house,car,facilitiesfor life after death and wait for the new reincarnation in next life) and Confucianist (ancestor worship) with many (not all) ancestral altar under statues or pictures of Great Buddha,Guan Yin Bodhisattva or Dizang Bodhisattva!

I think Buddhist population must plus more 105 million minimum (86%) and 158 million people maximum (90%-only China mainland).And total Buddhist population must be from 1.588 billion and 1.639 billion (23.8% and 24.5% of World's population) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Chow zhang qui (talk • contribs)

Buddhim in Canada.

Only 1.1% Canadians are Buddhists?===>Very small and also not exactly because Buddhim is the biggest religion in Asian-Canadian communities ([6]).Because in many Chinese descent families,they worship Buddha or Guan Yin or Budai/"Laughing Buddha",v.v...(Mahayana Buddhism) with Jade Emperor,Xi Wangmu/Queen Mother of the West,v.v...(Taoism which is always called "other" in almost Western countries and even in PR of China,but it is always combine with Buddhism and Confucianism) together without any reasons!They believe on both of all and they love it!

If total main East Asian-Canadian communities (there are China,Taiwan,Vietnam,Korea,Japan,Sri Lanka and Laos where is the highest Buddhist percentage) is 6.2% of Canada's population.The Buddhist percentage of all Canada is 3.6% (2.5% "Triple religion",source of [7] with 1.1% original Buddhism included Mahayana,Theravada or Tibetian,Canadian government census) and it could make Canada to be the Western country with the highest Buddhist percentage,followed by USA and Australia (around 2% per each)!

Laughable

1.5 BILLION Buddhists in the world? That's laughable given every other source puts the number some where around 500 million. The obvious contradiction is due to China that this article claims is 80% Buddhist! That's pure nonsense! According to the US State Department, "Approximately 8 percent of the population was Buddhist, approximately 1.5 percent was Muslim, an estimated 0.4 percent belonged to the official Catholic Church, an estimated 0.4 to 0.6 percent belonged to the unofficial Vatican-affiliated Catholic Church, an estimated 1.2 to 1.5 percent was registered as Protestant, and perhaps 2.5 percent worshipped in Protestant house churches that were independent of government control." [8]

This article has turned 8% to 80% !!! .. 24.166.188.29 05:51, 4 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree that this article's numbers are highly suspect. 58.186.233.71 reverted your changed, but I am reverting theirs back to you; at least 8% has a source. People have been editing this page and changing the numbers for months, but there are so many that it's hard to audit, and I haven't bothered. unfortunately I think we need a different way of organizing this article to keep it reasonable.

58.186.233.71, if you think that 80% is the correct number for Chinese Buddhists, please provide a citation. bikeable (talk) 16:03, 4 July 2007 (UTC)

Please see the some latest discussions near yours.And this is the article of not only mine!You can see the Buddhist percentage in taiwan,Hong Kong,Macau,Singapore (mini Chinese countries) with easten and southern neighbors of China (as Korea peninsula,Japan,Mongolia,Vietnam,v.v...from 80% to over 90% were Buddhists)!

Best regards!God bless you!

The census of CIA is biased-Christian (they said 33% is Christians but in fact only from 26-29%) and very very hard to know who is a Buddhist (in 1.5 billion Buddhists,only 1/4 have taken the Refuge of "Buddha,Dharma and Sangha" and remainders are natural Buddhist without any religious ceremonies because Buddhism is the special religion and Buddhism has been influencing in Far East Asian culture heavily with Taoism and Confucianism!) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.186.225.71 (talk • contribs)

Sabotage? I changed a number that did not have a reference to one that did. Of course it is very very hard to know who is a Buddhist in China, but 80% appears to be a wild overestimate. What are you basing that on? Please provide a reference. You seem to argue that Buddhism is "special" and "natural" and so it is the default religion of China, but that is your own belief and is not supported by the research. For a start, the table here gives varying numbers from 3 to 13%. The kind of arguments you present are original research if they are not backed up with a source. Counting 80% of the Chinese population as Buddhist gives an estimate of the world Buddhist population that is about 1 billion people higher than any other estimate I have seen. Finally, please assume good faith and do not accuse other editors of sabotage. It is also not a good idea to make assumptions about the religious backgrounds of others. bikeable (talk) 15:27, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Incidentally, comparing mainland China to Taiwan and Singapore is not a good basis for an estimate of the Buddhist population, since mainland China has had a very different (and extremely anti-religious) history. Estimates for Taiwan on adherents.com range from about 20 to 70%, and for Singapore 28-40%. All the numbers in this article seem inflated to me by comparison. bikeable (talk) 15:34, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Hi,Bikeable!First of all,I think you were anti-Buddhism and a religious extremist!And I don't know who are you?This article is the result of mine,Vexorg,58.186.233.68 and many people who are non-Buddhist.

And I am confident to swear all things in this article is the TRUTH! In many years ago,Buddhist population is the hardest unknow census but we have made this article in a really long period hardly.

Wow, that was unexpected. I will ask you again to assume good faith and be civil. Do not accuse me again. (And I think you are reading the wrong user page, since I am not a Disney fan.)

I am changing this number back to 8%. Please provide a citation for your number before you change it again. The US State Department's International Religious Freedom Report 2006 is a pretty good start, and it says 8%. If you do not have a source, do not change the number. As for your personal attacks, I promise you am not anti-Buddhist, nor am I a Vietnamese Christian you met on a religious forum. Be civil. ok? bikeable (talk) 03:58, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

I see we're still reverting back to the 80% figure for China, eh? Angelo, are you going to add a reference, please? bikeable (talk) 19:05, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

New format proposal

This article is a disaster of unsourced numbers, as we have seen above in the case of China.

I would like to suggest a new format for the country table.

Buddhism by country

Country	Population	% Buddhist	Buddhist total	References
China	1,300,000,000	8%	100,000,000	[9]

I've added a new column with references -- that way we can immediately see what's sourced and what's not. Note also that numbers should be rounded to the appropriate number of significant figures, i.e., the lowest number of sig figs in the data; thus 1.3 billion * 8% = 100 million.

Finally, I see no point in the "by region" tables or even the Top 20 table. Those just add a lot of work whenever a number changes. I would suggest scrapping them. (I removed the region in the example above, but it could be added back if people really care.)

Thoughts? bikeable (talk) 04:07, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

personally I don't necesasrily think an extra column for references is necessary. Putting the reference right next to the figure is probably better. It works cool on teh Christianity by Country page. Especially when you haev a range of figures Vexorg 22:09, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

ROUNDING NUMBERS? - You shouldn't round the numbers for indiviual countries. As this will introduce too uch innacuracy into the total figures. Good maths practise is to keep accuracy until the final result and then round off. Vexorg 22:09, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Ok, having the references next to each estimate would be fine. It seems we should also include a range of estimates (with references) in most cases.

As for rounding, you are correct as far as calculating the total. But since this article is "Buddhism by country", and obviously intended to be a reference by country, each country total should also be rounded correctly. The proper way would be to report the rounded number for each country, and calculate the grand total with full accuracy and then round that. That's more work, but it's the only way that makes sense. bikeable (talk) 18:09, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

New references

Thanks to Angelo for adding references for many countries.

However, I don't find the references for China appropriate. The paragraphs in the article under The explanations,notes are an argument for why there are a lot of Buddhists in China. This looks like original research. Obviously it is hard to know how many Buddhists there are, but we cannot make a guess based on an argument that sounds plausible. We need reliable sources. Note that the sources given for China are, 1) vipassanafoundation.com, which actually cites wikipedia's numbers (!), 2) ghettodriveby.com, which looks like a free web page, and 3) various other wikipedia sources. These are not reliable sources.

Angelo, note that you are using religiousintelligence.co.uk as a source for many figures, but you neglect to mention that they give an estimate of 8% Buddhists in China [10].

Again, these numbers give an estimate of total world Buddhists that is about a million higher than that given anywhere else.

Angelo, please find better sources. I will at least change this to a range (e.g. 8-80% for China) which is more consistent with other figures.

Finally, the The explanations,notes paragraphs desperately need editing; unfortunately I don't have any free time for the next few weeks. bikeable (talk) 02:52, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

I found a useful reference for China's religious populations: a study from East China Normal University, published on chinadaily.com.cn here. The authors find that 31.4% of Chinese adults identify as religious, of which 66.1% follow Buddhism, Taoism or traditional Chinese religious. This makes about 21% who identify as followers of one or more of those three religious. As Angelo has pointed out, they may follow all three.

Thus 21% seems a good upper-bound estimate for percentage of Buddhists. I'm going to change this now and make it a range. I would suggest we start using ranges in all cases where it's not clear-cut.

Angelo, do not revert me without providing a better reference. Arguments are original research and are not allowed. bikeable (talk) 16:33, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

OK!Or we can do it as Christianity_by_country with the lowest to highest estimates in the "By country" table!I think that will good!How do you think?With mostly Buddhists,the article of "Buddhism by country" is not important because that is dried estimate or lifeless numbers===> "Budddha in our heart" (Phật tại tâm)

Having a range sounds like a very good idea. I don't feel comfortable having the vipassana foundation as a source, they seem to be too biased. The China Daily article on the other hand seems good. Pax:Vobiscum 22:49, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

China in the top 20

Are you sure there are a billion Buddhists in China? I thought Buddhism was the religion of only 8% there.

Unreliable sources

Just to make things clear, please state your opinion on the use of vipassanafoundation.com as a source. I believe it should not be used since it is obviously biased and pushing an agenda. Pax:Vobiscum 07:42, 18 July 2007 (UTC)