Fwd: is religion better for you?

Kannu

We have spoken about religion quite often, well I have emailed to you :) not sure if you have read them but then that's what Baba's do, lecture to their kids. Dadu does that to me. I noticed he doesnt do that to you! :) but then the link between a grandfather and grandchild is different. Anyway

Here's a fascinating article, son.

Religious Market Structure, Religious Participation, and Outcomes: Is Religion Good for You?
Jonathan Gruber
NBER Working Paper No. 11377
Religion plays an important role in the lives of many Americans, but there is relatively little study by economists of the implications of religiosity for economic outcomes. This likely reflects the enormous difficulty inherent in separating the causal effects of religiosity from other factors that are correlated with outcomes. In this paper, I propose a potential solution to this long standing problem, by noting that a major determinant of religious participation is religious market density, or the share of the population in an area which is of an individual's religion. I make use of the fact that exogenous predictions of market density can be formed based on area ancestral mix. That is, I relate religious participation and economic outcomes to the correlation of the religious preference of one's own heritage with the religious preference of other heritages that share one's area. I use the General Social Survey (GSS) to model the impact of market density on church attendance, and micro-data from the 1990 Census to model the impact on economic outcomes. I find that a higher market density leads to a significantly increased level of religious participation, and as well to better outcomes according to several key economic indicators: higher levels of education and income, lower levels of welfare receipt and disability, higher levels of marriage, and lower levels of divorce.

http://www.iefpedia.com/english/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/RELIGIOUS-MARKET-STRUCTURE.pdf

You can read the article if/when you are free or interested. But this was a curious antidote to my usual comments about religion being a pain in the backside. It still is, but as you can see from this article, people who are religious and live next to each other in the same religion are better educated, richer, more married and presumably more happy. Now how do you square the circle? The way I see it, peer pressure is a big big thing, son. If the religion keeps on telling you that you have to obey god and then your group shows off its religiousity by doing well, then the group will self pressure each to be better. Note that in the article, its mainly jews and christians who are researched. I wonder what would have been the result if we had other religious groups involved? Then that would be funny, then we could say that if you are a christian and live in a christian area, then you are better off than a hindu or a muslim.

Still, stay away, son, you dont need peer pressure or God to tell you to be good and happy and be nice. End of :)

Love

baba

“Godnapping” in the Ancient Near East

this was so fascinating, kings would kidnap the God Statues of the countries and kingdoms they conquered and took them back...

now this is something that India should have done as well, instead of breaking the idols and temples and mosques, you take it away to your own kingdom, eh? much better idea, no?

See the article here.

I captured the cities of Tarbaṣu and Yaballu. I carried off 30,000 people, together with their possessions, their property, their goods, and their gods. I destroyed those cities, together with cities in their environs, making them like the tells after the Deluge. – Assyrian King Tiglath-pileser III (745-727 BCE)

When Mesopotamian polities went to war, the successful party gained more than just territory. Triumphant kings boast in their inscriptions that they carried off royal family members, deportees, and precious goods and treasures. Often nested in these lists is a more unusual type of loot: the gods of the losing king or polity were also moved into the victorious king’s homeland. This particular removal of gods, called “godnapping” by modern scholars, is attested over a long period of Mesopotamian history, from the start of the 2nd millennium through the 5th century BCE. But how can a mortal carry off a divine being against its will?
Ancient Near Eastern gods were represented on earth by cult images. Often anthropomorphic, the images were made from a wooden core with precious metals and stones as decoration. These statues would have stood in temples, locations that were thought of as the houses of the gods, and received offerings there. Because of the perishable nature of the core material, none of the original cult images have survived until today, but there are texts that describe the creation of these statues and the rituals that imbued them with the divine spirit. Reliefs also depict these divine images, as seen in an example from the Assyrian king Tiglath-pileser III’s palace reliefs in Nimrud, which features Assyrian soldiers carrying off an enemy’s gods. Most of the evidence for godnapping, however, comes from texts, including royal inscriptions, chronicles, and letters.

Can identity be chosen or is it inborn? – Katharine Quarmby – Aeon

The answer is yes to both. 

Think about it. You guys were born and both of you inherited some identities immediately. Hindu background. Indian background. British citizenship and nationality. Male or female. Londoner. Suburban. And so on and so forth. 

And as you grow, you will keep on getting new identities and discard old ones. You may move to Paris so become Parisian. You may decide to become pastafarian so ignore and drop the Hinduism. And so on and so forth. There are two lessons to learn. 

One. Be supremely comfortable in what you are. Don't give a shit about what people say. You are what you are and are comfortable with it. 

Two. This is more interesting. You'll realise that people love to put other people into a box. As soon as they do, then they know how to react to you. But don't allow that. Force them to create a new box for you. For example, when people ask me where I'm from, I say I'm from Burma. Or I'll say I'm from Sweden. Or talking about religion, say you're a Jedi. People get confused. And don't understand. Don't allow yourself to be pigeonholed. It's fun. 

Love

Baba

Can identity be chosen or is it inborn? – Katharine Quarmby – Aeon
http://aeon.co/magazine/psychology/can-identity-be-chosen-or-must-it-be-inborn/
(via Instapaper)

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Alice, the heroine of Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking‑Glass (1871), has many extraordinary encounters, but the one that's always stuck with me is her meeting with Humpty Dumpty, an egg-shaped being, balanced on a wall. He is annoyed when Alice calls him an egg, he tells her she should stop growing, and they end by arguing about the contextual meaning of the word 'glory'.

'When I use a word,' Humpty says, in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean – neither more nor less.'
'The question is,' said Alice, 'whether you can make words mean so many different things.'
'The question is,' said Humpty, 'which is to be master – that's all.'

As Alice walks away, Humpty Dumpty comes crashing to the ground.

Catholicism and Violence in Late Chosŏn Korea

You know kannu, I was surprised when I first found out that Korea is a huge Christian country. Seriously. I guess my initial impression was coloured by the fact that both japan and china managed to keep the Christian missionaries at bay. But Korea didn't and has therefore managed to have a huge Christian population. 

Proselytisation has had a bad rap down the years son. With good reason. People have killed each other over which god is better. Heck, people have killed each other whilst belonging to the same bloody religion. See what's happening in Israel to Iraq to India. Maybe they operate on the principle that kill them all, God will sort them out. How weird. 

But it's a salutary exposition on how governments use religion son to keep us under control. And the sad part is, the governments lose control over religion. And then you see the mess that you can witness in the USA to France to uk and in rest of the world. Which is why a strong secular perspective is the only way forward for governments. 

Anyway. Happy reading about a small aspect of Korea. They make the most amazing kimchee. And if I may point out, they are one of the hardest working people in the world. Absolutely gobsmacking. For them to rise from pretty much ruins after the Japanese occupation and then the Korean War to where they are at the moment is simply amazing. Much to learn. 

Love

Baba

Catholicism and Violence in Late Chosŏn Korea - Dissertation Reviews
http://dissertationreviews.org/archives/9089

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A review of The Ambiguity of Violence:  Ideology, State, and Religion in the Late Chosŏn Dynasty,by Franklin Rausch

Why do governments and those who oppose them use violence to advance their aims? What are their justifications for the use of violence? These are some of the questions that Franklin Rausch confronts in his dissertation centered on two case studies in late Chosŏn Korea between the late 18th and early 20th centuries. They involve two famous Catholics, Alexius Hwang Sayŏng and Thomas An Chunggŭn, and it is in its elucidation of the complex history of Catholicism in Korea that this dissertation particularly shines.

War trophies: When Hindu kings raided temples and abducted idols

Kannu Diya

Here's a chapter from horrible histories. How Hindu King's nicked idols and destroyed temples properly. Of course one can say that the Hindu kings didn't destroy the idols but that's a quibble. The champions of idol destruction are of course the children of that very jealous God of Jews, Christians and Muslims. Very very jealous. Reading the scriptures will give you a shiver. He's pretty clear (or at least his scribes said so) that if you worship another God, you will be cast into hell and bad stuff will happen. 

Of course this is all utter rubbish. The idea that a God is all tied up in blocks of stone or is unique is complete and utter rubbish. At best, idols are focus objects. Objects of art. Objects of veneration. But to expect that they have some innate divinity is rubbish. But see how many wars have happened over idols. Mecca. Jerusalem. Ayodhya. Constantinople. Thebes. Mexico. You name it. 

Religion is a way of control kids. Don't mix with faith. 

Have a lovely Week. Best of luck with the interviews son. 

Love

Baba

War trophies: When Hindu kings raided temples and abducted idols
http://scroll.in/article/767065/war-trophies-when-hindu-kings-desecrated-temples-and-abducted-idols
(via Instapaper)

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Temple desecration under the Muslim rule in India was a continuation of the policy the ruling dynasties pursued in the pre-Islamic period. Hindu kings victorious in battles plundered the temples their vanquished rivals patronised, ferreted away the deities installed there, and in extreme cases, even broke them. Such instances are documented and known to historians.

But this phenomenon has failed to inform the public discourse on Islamic iconoclasm. This has enabled the proponents of Hindutva to project the destruction of temples under Muslim rulers as an assault on the Hindu religion, and as an example of the tyranny perpetrated on its followers.

I

Mystery Over 15th-Century Drilled Skull Solved

People do strange things for faith kids. The power of belief is a very powerful and strange force in the world. I told you how I was near death and then didu went to pray at Ajmer chisti. A Sufi saint tomb and well I got better. I cannot pass a temple or a place where I meet God without asking God to protect you two. Mum prays for both of you daily. Now from a scientific perspective it's bunkum. How can we draw a causality line between that faith and our health? We cannot. Obviously not. But I still do it.

Don't get me wrong. That's got nothing to do with religion which is a way of controlling people. That I hate. Faith in God is different. Each of us comes up with their own relationship with God. As they say, it's complicated. You will have a relationship with him as well. You may be an atheist or agnostic or a fundamentalist or casual or indifferent. You may flip between these modes. No problems. No issues. And to be expected.

I was discussing with a friend whose son is also passing through a crisis of faith. He was challenging the presence of God. Does he exist. Does prayer help? All good questions. And I think everybody goes through these existential debates. More I read the more confused I become. It's strange. And I can see the attraction of meditation and prayers. Not the bloody crowded caterwauling with clapping or singing or poking your head in strange directions.

The mind is the ultimate place to find God. Maybe that's where the attraction of mountains comes from. Maybe I'll head off there and potter around having conversations with God. Anyway. I'm rambling.

Here's a fascinating historical story about how people relied on bone dust as an article of faith. Don't laugh at it. We all express our faith in different ways kids.

Love

Baba

Mystery Over 15th-Century Drilled Skull Solved
http://www.livescience.com/49749-mystery-over-15th-century-drilled-skull-solved.html
(via Instapaper)

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The skull showing multiple drill markings.
Credit: Gino Fornaciari/University of Pisa

Researchers at the University of Pisa, Italy, have solved the mystery over the honeycombed skull of one of the Italian martyrs beheaded by 15th century Ottoman Turk invaders when they refused to give up their Christian faith.

Featuring 16 perfectly round holes of various sizes and depth, the skull belonged to an individual who was executed on a hill outside the town of Otranto in Apulia along with more than 800 other men.

The skull was later drilled, most likely to obtain bone powder to treat diseases such as paralysis, stroke, and epilepsy, which were believed to arise from magical or demonic influences.

Photos: Drilled Skull Mystery Solved

Beatified in 1771 and canonized by Pope Francis on May 12, 2013 the so-called “martyrs of Otranto,” whose identities are largely unknown, are now the patron saints of the city of Otranto.

Rusting anchor: The creation & mutation of a national ideology

Son

We just came through a rather bruising election. I was supporting Nicola Sturgeon heavily. For couple of reasons. First I firmly believe that people have the right to craft out their own identity. Form their groups. And that's why I strongly support them. Second is that the country is too centralised in Westminster and it requires this kind of a shakeup to really focus minds on what exactly is the United Kingdom for?

It was very instructive during the Scottish referendum as to what the Scots were saying they wanted. They actually wanted to pretty much everything to remain the same. Queen. Taxation. History. BBC. Education. Ideology. International membership. But they wanted to be ruled by themselves.

But there is a problem with this Scottish nationalism. It's defined as opposed to Westminster. Not so much as what's Scottish. See above. There is no difference son. So ultimately when push comes to shove, there is no hard core reason to separate. Think about Wales or Northern Ireland. Same with Pakistan below. It keeps on having existential debates.

Every country which bases itself on religion first of all is run by idiots. Frankly morons. Secondly they are incoherent. And finally religion is a hugely pathetic way of organising a modern country which is why most religiously oriented countries like Israel, most Muslim countries keep on having functions. There's academic research backing this up as well. The Buddhist nations also learnt it the hard way.

Anyway one to read. Also read Seymour Hersh's report on Osama's death in the London review of books published yesterday. It's shocking to read the way the Americans and Pakistanis went about this. This will have long term repercussions. Not good.

Love

Baba

Rusting anchor: The creation & mutation of a national ideology
http://www.dawn.com/news/1160202
(via Instapaper)

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For decades certain sections of the Pakistani intelligentsia have been insisting on the importance of changing the country’s national narrative (to better fight the social aspects of Pakistan’s war against religious extremism).

They are correct in suggesting that the more militant ogres now at war with the state of Pakistan are armed expressions and projections of a rather myopic national narrative.

This narrative, to them, is the result of whatever that was concocted in the name of a national ideology many years ago and then proliferated through school text books and the state-owned media until it began to inform the political, constitutional and social mind-set of the Pakistani polity as a whole.

Today, it is largely being blamed for popularising a peculiar idea of nationhood engineered through the state’s many experiments that seeded a non-organic ideology - a dogma that has contributed the most in whatever that has gone down in this country in terms of faith-based violence and the ever-increasing episodes of bigotry.

So what was this idea? And why today even the military and political establishments of the country are finally looking to tweak it, if not outright replace it?

The paradox

Pakistan had come into being in 1947 on the back of what its founders called the Two Nation Theory.

The Theory was culled from the 19th Century writings of modernist Muslim reformers in India who, after the collapse of the Muslim Empire in South Asia, began to explain the region’s Muslims as a separate political and cultural entity (especially compared to the Hindu majority of India).

This scholarly nuance gradually evolved into becoming a pursuit to prepare a well-educated and resourceful Muslim middle-class in the region.

Eventually, with the help from sections of the Muslim landed elite in India, the emerging Muslim middle-classes turned the idea into a movement for a separate Muslim homeland in South Asia comprised of those areas where the Muslims were in a majority.

This is what we today understand to be the Pakistan Movement.

Well, d’oh, if you are more religious, then you are less innovative

File this under the label of stating the bleeding obvious.

In earlier work (Bénabou, Ticchi and Vindigni 2013) we uncovered a robust negative association between religiosity and patents per capita, holding across countries as well as US states, with and without controls. In this paper we turn to the individual level, examining the relationship between religiosity and a broad set of pro- or anti-innovation attitudes in all five waves of the World Values Survey (1980 to 2005). We thus relate eleven indicators of individual openness to innovation, broadly defined (e.g., attitudes toward science and technology, new versus old ideas, change, risk taking, personal agency, imagination and independence in children) to five different measures of religiosity, including beliefs and attendance. We control for all standard socio-demographics as well as country, year and denomination fixed effects. Across the fifty-two estimated specifications, greater religiosity is almost uniformly and very significantly associated to less favorable views of innovation.

Religion is a way of control, a way for safety, traditionalism and the like, why on earth would you be open?

Amma’s Multifaceted Empire, Built on Hugs

Son

Few things to note here in this description of an Indian religious leader's life and work. 

First is that when governments are failing or are unable to function, these religious - social movements frequently fill the void. It's a fascinating phenomena. For example people worry about Islamist or Hindu or such like movements. But this is because governments give them space because of their incompetence. 

Second is to note how single prophets and guru based religious movements can turn into long term movements. India Middle East etc etc all give rise to movements like this. Think of the Ramakrishna mission which is a broad mission now. Same with like Narayan guru. Or shirdi sai baba. Scientology. Etc etc. Islam and Christianity also started with individual prophets like this. 

Third is that religion is frequently associated with money. It's like flies t honey. Very common to see cultish behaviour. 

So this kind of behaviour isn't strange or unknown. People have this bizarre tendency to need to have gurus and prophets. I personally find it bizarre, just like I find people needing drugs or drink to be merry. But logic or arguments don't work on these people. Seriously. I used to argue and debate once but nowadays I just give a jaundiced look and back away slowly and stay away from them. People who can act irrationally like this can't be trusted to be around when you leave your guard down. 

Still one good thing, give hugs son. That's great and wonderful behaviour. Hugs make so many things better :) 

Love

Baba

Amma’s Multifaceted Empire, Built on Hugs - NYTimes.com
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/26/business/ammas-multifaceted-empire-built-on-hugs.html?_r=0&pagewanted=all

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THERE are entourages — and then there is the retinue of Mata Amritanandamayi, a 59-year-old Indian guru known simply as Amma, or “mother.” On Friday, she began a two-month North American tour during which she will be accompanied by 275 volunteers. They plan to ride in four buses across the continent from Bellevue, Wash., to Marlborough, Mass., visiting 11 cities, including New York. And at each stop along the way, Amma will sit on stage for 15 hours at a stretch, greeting her thousands of devotees.

Pilgrim traffic during the First World War

Pilgrimages are expressions of piety son. And they are fascinating phenomena to observe. Rationalists sneer at them. Say it's a waste of time money and energy. But the power of pilgrimages whether to amarnath or Lourdes or Mecca has to be considered. Despite the rise of secularism and modernity, people are going on pilgrimages even more. They used to go thousands of years back. They will keep on going. If you are ever in the middle of such a religious throng, you will feel surprised at the very strong faith based feelings that the pilgrims have son. I've seen this in Allahabad, in Paris in Jeddah in Tirupati in Jerusalem and so many other places. The interesting thing is that the stones of these ancient prayer pilgrimage sites are imbibed with the prayers of the millions of people and the stones talk to you. Despite the monstrosities that people erect in the places like in Mecca and other places. 

Love

Baba

Pilgrim traffic during the First World War - Untold lives blog
http://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/untoldlives/2014/03/pilgrim-traffic-during-the-first-world-war.html

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Every year Indian Muslims undertake the journey from India to Mecca as part of the Hajj, the fifth pillar of Islam.  Prior to 1947, the British Indian Government maintained a strong interest in the welfare and safety of pilgrims travelling from India, and regularly received reports from the British Agent at Jeddah on the yearly pilgrimage, copies of which can be found in the India Office Records.

The outbreak of hostilities between the British and Ottoman Empires in 1914 raised fears about the impact this would have on the Hajj.  In November 1914, the British Government published an undertaking in the Gazette Extraordinarythat the holy places of Arabia and Jeddah would be immune from attack or molestation by the British naval and military forces so long as there was no interference with pilgrims from India.  Similar assurances were given by the Governments of France and Russia.  Despite this, there remained fears for the safety of the pilgrims who would be entering a zone of conflict.  There was also a concern among British officials that foodstuffs and other supplies exported from India for the use of pilgrims in Jeddah would be appropriated by Turkish forces.  The Indian Government had briefly stopped exports of food from India to Jeddah following the seizure of a cargo of food supplies by the Turkish authorities in March 1915.  However reports of distress amongst pilgrims and residents of the holy places had caused the exports to be resumed.

God and the Ivory Tower-

Some interesting stats on religion kannu. Made me surprised, but as a citizen, we need to control religion, it's too dangerous to let loose. Just like any other ideology which is totalitarian as well. 

God and the Ivory Tower- By Scott Atran | Foreign Policy
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/08/06/god_and_the_ivory_tower

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The era of world struggle between the great secular ideological -isms that began with the French Revolution and lasted through the Cold War (republicanism, anarchism, socialism, fascism, communism, liberalism) is passing on to a religious stage. Across the Middle East and North Africa, religious movements are gaining social and political ground, with election victories by avowedly Islamic parties in Turkey, Palestine, Egypt, Tunisia, and Morocco. As Israel’s National Security Council chief, Gen. Yaakov Amidror (a religious man himself), told me on the eve of Tunisia’s elections last October, “We expect Islamist parties to soon dominate all governments in the region, from Afghanistan to Morocco, except for Israel.”

On a global scale, Protestant evangelical churches (together with Pentacostalists) continue to proliferate, especially in Latin America, but also keep pace with the expansion of fundamentalist Islam in southern Africa and eastern and southern Asia. In Russia, a clear majority of the population remains religious despite decades of forcibly imposed atheism.Even in China, where the government’s commission on atheism has the Sisyphean job of making that country religion-free, religious agitation is on the rise. And in the United States, a majority says it wants less religion in politics, but an equal majority still will not vote for an atheist as president.

Spiritual-Religious Groups in the PRC after 1978

Kannu

I know I've been talking too much about religion recently and promise we will go back to more interesting topics :)

Here's an example of research done on how cults emerge, in this case in China. Cults emerge in strange and wonderful and not really well understood ways. What's fascinating is how normal people will give up one belief system and suddenly become disciples of some guru, faith, or something like that. Nothing wrong with this. As long as somebody else does it. And not you. Look up 'cult' in Wikipedia. People who follow organised religion or cults exhibit this kind of behaviour. Follow irrational beliefs and exhibit strange behaviour. 

I sometimes feel like I'm in a human zoo. Looking at these fascinating exhibits of strange and weird behaviour. And yes, I'm in a cage as well. With others looking at me and honking that I'm a complete nutter lol

Love

Baba. 

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Tiny screen, old eyes, ham fisted hands. apologies for typos and formatting. 

Begin forwarded message:

From: Dissertation Reviews <donotreply@wordpress.com>
Date: 13 May 2013 08:02:22 BST
To: bdasgupta@gmail.com
Subject: [New post] Spiritual-Religious Groups in the PRC after 1978

New post on Dissertation Reviews

Spiritual-Religious Groups in the PRC after 1978

by Francis Khek Gee Lim

A review of Emergence and Development of Spiritual-Religious Groups in the People’s Republic of China after 1978, by Kristin Kupfer.

December 2012 witnessed a seemingly curious case of convergence of Mayan civilization, Christianity, and Chinese popular religion. Many members of a group called “Church of the Almighty God,” believing the Mayan prophesy that the end of the world was imminent, began to organize mass demonstrations exhorting the Chinese people to repent their sins, to prepare for the coming apocalypse, and to overthrow the ruling Communist Party. What happened next was highly expected by most watchers of China’s affairs: the authorities initiated a crackdown on the group by arresting its many members, and stepped up their surveillance over unregistered religious groups in the country. Many people inside and outside of China have heard about the Falungong, the previous high profile case that involved a so-called “evil cult.” But who are the Church of the Almighty God? When Kristin Kupfer defended her dissertation on the emergence and development of “spiritual-religious groups” in China, she probably had not anticipated the events of 2012 and the Mayan connections. But for those who wish to gain further understanding of groups such as “Church of the Almighty God” and the Falungong, Kupfer’s research will be an excellent source.

The effect of education on religion: Evidence from compulsory schooling laws

Hmmm, very curious set of findings..

For over a century, social scientists have debated how educational attainment impacts religious belief. In this paper, I use Canadian compulsory schooling laws to identify the relationship between completed schooling and later religiosity. I find that higher levels of education lead to lower levels of religious affiliation later in life. An additional year of education leads to a 4-percentage-point decline in the likelihood that an individual identifies with any religious tradition. This is a reasonably large effect: extrapolating the results to the broader population would suggest that increases in schooling could explain most of the large rise in non-affiliation in Canada in recent decades.

but I am wondering if this holds for all religions….outliers are of course people who are all smarty pants (the Islamists and Internet Hindus…) but are frankly crashing bores at best and totally idiotic at best. I am reminded of Churchill’s point, “a fanatic is a person who wouldn't change his mind and wouldn't change the subject” :)

but interesting..more education indeed is required.

Appropriating Wives’ Income: New Form of Dowry

Dear son

Here's something that you will find of interest. How men steal the earnings of their wives. Despite the fact that it's religiously not mandated. There are two philosophical questions here. 

One, how can you ensure proper division of rights? Between man and woman, husband and wife. And what needs to be done from a legal perspective. Is that law from the sharia law? Or shall you do this from the perspective of universal law like the convention of rights of women or United Nations universal declaration of human rights. 

Second is what is religion? What has been written down or what is practised? Take this example in this situation. Islam in the majority version clearly says they the monies due to the wife are her's. But the way Islam is practised in Bangladesh is different. Then the question is, who determines who is right? Acres and tomes have been written on pretty much every topic under the sun and there's no consistency. 

For both questions, it's vital to remove religion from the public sphere. Absolutely vital son. Because most if not all religions are a way of controlling the populace and more importantly are skewed towards male patriarchy. It's one when you kick out morons of the religious orders that true civilisation exists. 

But it will be a long haul. Specially with these abhrahamic religions. Christianity has been controlled by and large. Judaism is still having challenges in Israel and well you know what's happening with Islam across the world. Both your and my generation will struggle with this religious genie son. It has to be forced into the bottle and capped hard. Long fight. 

Love

Baba

Appropriating Wives’ Income: New Form of Dowry - Dissertation Reviews
http://dissertationreviews.org/archives/7942

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A review of  Appropriation of Wives’ Income: a New Form of Dowry in Bangladesh, by Farah Deeba Chowdhury.

Farah Deeba Chowdhury’s dissertation investigates the interrelationship between law, culture, patriarchy, and Islam in the context of contemporary Bangladesh.  The dissertation has nine chapters.

Chowdhury has concentrated on the situation of Muslim married women in her dissertation. In the introduction, she argues that many practices in Bangladeshi society are based on misinterpretation of Islam and the main purpose of such manipulation is to seek control over wives’ income, financial resources and other assets. The author characterizes such practice as “appropriation of wives’ income as a new form of dowry” (p. 1). As the dowry system has been legally banned in Bangladesh, the income of working women is now considered as a source of earning for their husbands.  The author argues that the root of such practice lies in the norms of patriarchal society. Women are deprived as the patriarchal society never conveys their role to the broader society. Instead, the dominant fallacy is women are only obliged to perform duties towards their in-law’s family.

This Is Danny Pearl's Final Story

Read and weep son. At how people can kill in the name of religion. And be proud of it. As if God, the merciful and compassionate, Allah u Akbar will celebrate and congratulate people who saw off people's heads. But down history, more people have been killed in the name of God than anything else. Think about Aurangzeb. We saw his pearl mosque yesterday at the red fort. A man who was so religious that he killed hundreds of thousands of people. Welcome to these religious bastards lives. And the only way to resolve this son is to keep educating them. The women. Get them into the economy. You cannot fight religious fundamentalism by war and guns only. You need to educate them. You need to laugh at their stupidity. 

Love

Baba

This Is Danny Pearl's Final Story
http://www.washingtonian.com/projects/KSM/index.html

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Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is walking toward me in a black prayer cap, a cream-colored tunic, and matching shalwar, or baggy pants. He’s hunched over, his beard dyed red, a symbol of piety to conservative Muslims, and I can’t take my eyes off him.

It’s May 5, 2012, the first time in three and a half years that KSM—as he’s known to American officials—has appeared in court, outside his prison cell. We are at Guantánamo, where a US military commission is about to arraign him and four other men for the September 11 attacks, in a courtroom that feels like a movie set. Erected atop an abandoned airfield on the base, it’s as big as a warehouse and has small trailers outside set up as holding areas, one for each defendant. When the courtroom door opened for the men, the Caribbean sun pushed its way into the room first.

I’m in seat number two in the first row of journalists and spectators, separated from the defendants by a wall outfitted with soundproof glass. A video system feeds sound and pictures to screens above us. I’m about 30 feet behind KSM, and there are 40 of us in the gallery. Yet as KSM takes his seat, it feels for a moment as if we’re the only two people in the room.

“Allahu, Allahu, Allahu,” I whisper.

For the families of those who died on 9/11, the day marks the start of what’s likely to be a years-long trial for justice against KSM, the self-described architect of the World Trade Center attacks. For me, it’s something else. KSM is the man who bragged about taking a knife to the throat of my Wall Street Journal colleague and close friend Daniel Pearl.

The Effect of Education on Religion: Evidence from Compulsory Schooling Laws

Kannu

Religion has problems with modernity. Without fail. It has to happen. Religions pump out the idea that they have infallible truths which are immutable. If there is something that's immutable that is that nothing is immutable. 

But still we have morons who go about saying that their religion is the best and they are very happy to kill for it. Read a Ricky Gervais quote. Blasphemy is the idea that an all powerful god is upset because somebody said something bad about him. That's the level of thinking that religious people believe. 

So what do you do? This article gives an indication. Educate the populace and that will reduce the stranglehold of the priests and mullahs on the populace. Proof. 

Then again, a significant number of terrorists are highly educated. Counter factual there. And it's not necessary that higher education always leads to good civic behaviour. The ex president of Egypt has a doctorate. The ex president of Iran is an engineer. And both of them have religion coming out of their asses. 

Love

Baba

The Effect of Education on Religion: Evidence from Compulsory Schooling Laws
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167268113002321

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Cover image

For over a century, social scientists have debated how educational attainment impacts religious belief. In this paper, I use Canadian compulsory schooling laws to identify the relationship between completed schooling and later religiosity. I find that higher levels of education lead to lower levels of religious affiliation later in life. An additional year of education leads to a 4-percentage-point decline in the likelihood that an individual identifies with any religious tradition. This is a reasonably large effect: extrapolating the results to the broader population would suggest that increases in schooling could explain most of the large rise in non-affiliation in Canada in recent decades.

So how did the Catholics respond to evolution?

A fascinating article.

This article discusses Catholic responses to evolution between 1859, the year of publication of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species, and 2009, the year in which the scientific world celebrated its 150th anniversary. Firstly, I will discuss how the Vatican initially responded to evolution in the period between 1859 and 1907, the year in which Pope Pius X issued the encyclical Pascendi dominici gregis. Secondly, I will explore the responses of Catholic authorities and intellectuals and identify the local factors that influenced their responses. Also, I will demonstrate that, gradually, Catholics have shifted towards a more lenient position concerning evolution. Thirdly, I will demonstrate that, in the end, the Vatican has complied with this pattern. In general, this article shows that not only Protestants, but Catholics too have struggled to come to terms with evolution and evolutionary theory and that local factors had an impact on these negotiations.

One laughs at people who do not believe in Evolution. Seriously, no? they belong at the same level of people who believe the world is flat. But then, this is quite common. I mean, I heard somebody talk about how mountains had pegs inside them. No, seriously. Here’s the argument.

See those troughs? those are supposed to be pegs. Now I studied geography at the masters level while I was preparing for the IAS and my mum’s a professor of Geography. Do believe I have a nodding acquaintance with geography, plate tectonics and geomorphology. Here are few schematics which you may find more appropriate.

Ok so lets see some siesmological evidence on the Himalayas.

This is a seismic perspective of Yunnan South West China, the Eastern Himalayas. a depth of 17-56kms. Can you see pegs? If you are interested in mucking around with this topic, here’s a great overview. A step exists, but no pegs I am afraid.

Here’s another cross section.

So what does the blessed people say? I quote from the Islamic site:

This is how the Quran has described mountains.  God has said in the Quran:

Have We not made the earth as a bed, and the mountains as pegs?  (Quran, 78:6-7)

Modern earth sciences have proven that mountains have deep roots under the surface of the ground (see figure 9) and that these roots can reach several times their elevations above the surface of the ground.²  So the most suitable word to describe mountains on the basis of this information is the word ‘peg,’ since most of a properly set peg is hidden under the surface of the ground.  The history of science tells us that the theory of mountains having deep roots was introduced only in the latter half of the nineteenth century.³

Mountains also play an important role in stabilizing the crust of the earth.⁴  They hinder the shaking of the earth.  God has said in the Quran:

And He has set firm mountains in the earth so that it would not shake with you... (Quran, 16:15)

Likewise, the modern theory of plate tectonics holds that mountains work as stabilizers for the earth.  This knowledge about the role of mountains as stabilizers for the earth has just begun to be understood in the framework of plate tectonics since the late 1960’s.⁵

Could anyone during the time of the Prophet Muhammad  have known of the true shape of mountains?  Could anyone imagine that the solid massive mountain which he sees before him actually extends deep into the earth and has a root, as scientists assert?  A large number of books of geology, when discussing mountains, only describe that part which is above the surface of the earth.  This is because these books were not written by specialists in geology.  However, modern geology has confirmed the truth of the Quranic verses.

heh. Anyway, that was funny, I was hiccupping with laughter when I finally managed to close my mouth. But then when people believe in this kind of stuff as a faith item, then one cannot say anything, you can believe that the moon is made of green cheese and that’s fine. But don't give me the bumph about it being scientific. But then the argument remains, remember people who believe in the infallibility of religion go about doing some pretty bad things. We have seen so many examples of how people committed genocide because of religion down the ages. One chap even got sentenced to life in prison for doing that in Bangladesh. These are the people who believe in crap like this.

So how did the Catholics end up reconciling evolution with religion? It took time. It took almost a century since the publication of the On the Origin of Species in 1859 till middle of the last century for the Vatican to reconcile itself with Evolution even though it has serious issues still with evolution of human morality and intelligence. Similarly Islam and other religions will also evolve. If not, people will write more books like this and people will foam at the mouth like here. read the reviews of the people who object to the book. Hilarious. Before you object, there are other books like this, like this one for christians, and this one and this one for Hindus. Here’s an interesting one about Buddhism.

After God: What can atheists learn from believers?

Kannu

I have what can be called in Facebook speak as a complicated relationship with God throughout my life. I believed in him then became an atheist and then a firm believer when you two were born and have now settled into a situation which can politely be described as a secular spiritual humanist. 

Don't believe in religion. Hinduism is a good philosophy. It's great for historians and for people who want to exercise their mental muscles. All religions are powerful in terms of the hold they have on their worshippers. So whatever you decide to believe in, be careful of religions son. They are on the retreat and that's when they are the worst. 

Love

Baba

After God: What can atheists learn from believers?
http://www.newstatesman.com/lifestyle/religion/2013/03/god-dead-long-live-our-souls

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From the art series “A Place Beyond Belief, 2012” by Nathan Coley. Photograph courtesy of the artist.

Jonathan Derbyshire writes: Jeremy Bentham, his disciple John Stuart Mill once wrote, would always ask of a proposition or belief, “Is it true?” By contrast, Bentham’s contemporary Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Mill observed, thought “What is the meaning of it?” was a much more interesting question.

Today’s New Atheists –Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett and the late Christopher Hitchens principal among them – are the heirs of Bentham, rather than Coleridge. For them, religion – or the great monotheistic faiths, at any rate – are bundles of beliefs (about the existence of a supernatural being, the origins of the universe and so on) whose claims to truth don’t stand up to rational scrutiny. And once the falsity of those beliefs has been established, they imply, there is nothing much left to say.

The New Atheists remind one of Edward Gibbon, who said of a visit to the cathedral at Chartres: “I paused only to dart a look at the stately pile of superstition and passed on.” They glance at the stately pile of story and myth bequeathed to humanity by religion and quickly move on, pausing only to ask of the benighted millions who continue to profess one faith or another that they keep their beliefs to themselves and don’t demand that they be heard in the public square.

Earth-shaking cleavage

An amusing story with loads of spinoffs but just one point that I will raise besides the issue of idiot religious leaders banging on about women. Pretty much all organised religions have an unhealthy respect for women and what they do, say, think, wear etc. so don't listen those idiots. 

But On the other hand, be mindful of over emphasis on physical attributes. Cleavage, tanned skin, long hair, etc etc on both males and females is a common sight. Which is fine. But use this fact, over emphasis on physical attributes over mental attributes is a signal that you must learn to identify and the make use of. Nothing wrong in this, don't get me wrong but it's a means of communication. He or she is telling you something and as with every communication, there is something said and unsaid about it. 

Till then laugh at these idiots

tabsir.net » Tabsir Redux: Earth-shaking cleavage
http://tabsir.net/?p=1570#more-1570

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Sun 16 Oct 2011

Tabsir Redux: Earth-shaking cleavage

Posted by tabsir under Gender and Sexuality , Iran , Journalism and Media

 

Violence, scandal and sex: the media feed us a daily diet and we lap it up like faithful mutts willing to chase any sensationalized bone thrown our way. So when an Iranian cleric says something ludicrous to our sectarian ears, it is all the more newsworthy because it is so entertaining. But after the recent loss of life in Haiti, Chile and China, is it really a laughing matter when a far-off cleric blames natural disasters on God’s wrath over human behavior? Consider an AP story which broke on April 19 and was submitted, ironically, by a reporter with the first name of Scheherezade (her namesake could spin a tale almost to death). Here is the bait:

Iranian cleric: Promiscuous women cause quakes

By SCHEHEREZADE FARAMARZI (AP) – Apr 19, 2010

BEIRUT — A senior Iranian cleric says women who wear revealing clothing and behave promiscuously are to blame for earthquakes.

Iran is one of the world’s most earthquake-prone countries, and the cleric’s unusual explanation for why the earth shakes follows a prediction by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that a quake is certain to hit Tehran and that many of its 12 million inhabitants should relocate.

“Many women who do not dress modestly … lead young men astray, corrupt their chastity and spread adultery in society, which (consequently) increases earthquakes,” Hojatoleslam Kazem Sedighi was quoted as saying by Iranian media.

Yet another story on Santa Claus

From here.

December 25, 2007

Op-Ed Contributor

St. Nick in the Big City

By JOHN ANTHONY McGUCKIN

ST. NICHOLAS was a super-saint with an immense cult for most of the Christian past. There may be more icons surviving for Nicholas alone than for all the other saints of Christendom put together. So what happened to him? Where’s the fourth-century Anatolian bishop who presided over gift-giving to poor children? And how did we get the new icon of mass consumerism in his place?

Well, it’s a New York story.

In all innocence, the morphing began with the Dutch Christians of New Amsterdam, who remembered St. Nicholas from the old country and called him Sinte Klaas. They had kept alive an old memory — that a kindly old cleric brought little gifts to the poor in the weeks leading up to the Feast of the Nativity. While the gifts were important, they were never meant to overshadow the message of Jesus’s humble birth.

But today’s chubby Santa is not about giving to the poor. He has had his saintly garb stripped away. The filling out of the figure, the loss of the vestments, and his transformation into a beery fellow smoking a pipe combined to form a caricature of Dutch peasant culture. Eventually this Magic Santa (a suitable patron saint if there ever was one for the burgeoning capitalist machinery of the city) was of course popularized by the Manhattanite Clement Clarke Moore published in “A Visit From St. Nicholas,” in The Troy (New York) Sentinel on Dec. 23, 1823.

The newly created deity Santa soon attracted a school of iconographers: notable among them were Thomas Nast, whose 1863 image of a red-suited giant in Harper’s Weekly set the tone, and Haddon Sundblom, who drew up the archetypal image we know today on behalf of the Coca-Cola Company in the 1930s. This Santa was regularly accompanied by the flying reindeer: godlike in his majesty and presiding over the winter darkness like Odin the sky god returned.

The new Santa also acquired a host of Nordic elves to replace the small dark-skinned boy called Black Peter, who in Christian tradition so loved St. Nicholas that he traveled with him everywhere. But, some might say, wasn’t it better to lose this racially stereotyped relic? Actually, no, considering the real St. Nicholas first came into contact with Peter when he raided the slave market in his hometown and railed against the trade. The story tells us that when the slavers refused to take him seriously, he used the church’s funds to redeem Peter and gave the boy a job in the church.

And what of the throwing of the bags of gold down the chimney, where they landed in the stockings and little shoes that had been hung up to dry by the fireplace? Charming though it sounds, it reflected the deplorable custom, still prevalent in late Roman society when the Byzantine church was struggling to establish the supremacy of its values, of selling surplus daughters into bondage. This was a euphemism for sexual slavery — a trade that still blights our world.

As the tale goes, Nicholas had heard that a father in the town planned to sell his three daughters because his debts had been called in by pitiless creditors. As he did for Black Peter, Nicholas raided his church funds to secure the redemption of the girls. He dropped the gold down the chimney to save face for the impoverished father.

This tale was the origin of a whole subsequent series of efforts among the Christians who celebrated Nicholas to make some effort to redeem the lot of the poor — especially children, who always were, and still are, the world’s front-line victims. Such was the origin of Christmas almsgiving: gifts for the poor, not just gifts for our friends.
I like St. Nicholas. You can keep chubby Santa.

John Anthony McGuckin is a professor of religious history at Union Theological Seminary and Columbia.