Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Saturday Buffet (a few days late!)

We had our biggest promotional event of the year at work this past weekend. My apologies for using that as an excuse to belate the Saturday Buffet...

In the field of politics and health care, there have been some very wild claims recently. For a critique of some of the gloom and doom stuff, see this post over at Crosswalk.com.

I'm not entirely sure what to make of this document. Apparently a long list of Muslim scholars is blaming Christendom for the lack of peace between us. And, they rightly point out, there does not seem to be a peaceful way to co-exist unless we submit to their desires. "Submission" ... isn't that what "Islam" means?

In the "apparently public outcry sometimes works" category is this set of articles. It appears that initially there was some effort at removing the word "God" from ceremonial flag certificates. However, now all that is behind us. What a relief! Millions are homeless in Africa? No one much notices. But take the word "God" off our certificates and we'll raise a stink you've not smelled since the pledge of allegiance scandal! Glad we've got our priorities straight here, folks.

Finally, this article is most interesting for the way the data is interpretted. It appears to my reading that a study has found humans are perhaps both a) more selfish and b) have an innate need for justice/fairness than do chimps. The effects of the Fall and yet still a shadow of the image of God? Nope. "Chimps choose more rationally than humans".

Hatushili

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The monkey article was a riot. The data and "facts" they can pull from such an oversimplified experiment are astounding!

Hatushili said...

I agree - it's remarkable what you can "prove" with a "scientific" study like this! It's just another obvious way to prove that Derrida was right - there truly is nothing outside of context. These scientists start with an entirely different set of presuppositions and - poof! - prove that monkeys make more rational choices than people. Sad and silly at the same time, eh?

Hatushili