Sunday School

Sunday School April 23rd 2023

This topic contains 12 replies, has 6 voices, and was last updated by  PopeBeanie 5 months ago.

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  • #47931

    Pew Research: Most advanced economies say it’s not necessary to believe in God to be moral.

    Americans are becoming less religious and new data shows us where. But maybe not in Montana where Christianity is set to become the State religion or in Texas that is allowing child indoctrination again in public schools.

    We will need to stay vigilant and understand the post-liberal thinking of extremist Christianity to expose, engage and defeat any of its further attempts at political power. It is not an irregular occurrence on the House floor and Trump still holds sway among Evangelicals.

    I so want to be in Boston next week for Hexennacht that my hooves are already getting itchy.

    Thank God I’m an atheist… and so is my rabbi, writes David Baddiel.

    Lauren Boebert is a national embarrassment.

    World of Woo: The carnivore diet is the latest fad diet that is particularly pseudo-scientific.

    Environment:  Earth Day 2023.

    Maybe planet Earth generated its own water supply? The acceptance of our cosmic loneliness and the rarity of our planet should be a wake-up call.

    The long evolutionary history of human imagination.

    Do JWST’s results contradict the Big Bang?

    What do you get when you combine an AI image generator, a 98-year-old woman named Lillian, and Harry Potter?

    What the new Covid-19 vaccine guidance means for you? The children of the religious will be allowed to infect each other with polio in many States. See also the first long read below.

    Two myths fueling the Conservative Right’s dangerous Transphobia.

    Long Reads: Life expectancy continues to decline in the U.S. as it rebounds in other countries.  Imagine a constitutionally secular country where the politicization of school textbooks was done by religious supremacists.  SCOTUS and religion in the workplace.  We can learn about the universe without conquering it. Meet Sudan’s web of warlords, foreign backers and their tangled alignments.  How to wander when the destination does not matter. Soylent Green is people!

    Sunday Book Club: Humanly Possible.

    Some photographs taken last week.

    While you are waiting for the kettle to boil……

    Coffee Break Video:  How video games can level up the way you learn. The science of demonic possession dreams.

    #47933

    Have a great week everyone!

    #47934

    Strega
    Moderator

    Thanks, Reg!!

    #47935

    Strega
    Moderator

    Also Happy St George’s Day – patron saint of England. He died on this day (apparently). His great and notable  achievement was to slay the dragon that was troubling the villages, and rescue the princess.

    #47938

    TheEncogitationer
    Participant

    Strega,

    Are you sure about that? I think ol’ George might have missed a few. 😉😁

    #47939

    I have been slaying a few dragons too in recent days……on the PS5 .

    #47940

    Simon Paynton
    Participant

    Pew Research: Most advanced economies say it’s not necessary to believe in God to be moral.

    This is really interesting and it ties in with a fascinating paper I am still reading.  It’s about the differences between communal and individualist societies.  The individualist societies are mainly Western, and these (concidentally or not) mainly have a higher income per head of population.

    Communal societies rely more on in-group favouritism and partiality, moral enforcement using public shame, and personal revenge-taking to right wrongs.  Individualist societies rely more on impartial cooperation and universal values, moral enforcement using private guilt, and impartial third-party punishment to right wrongs.  Crucially, communal societies are more governed by belief in hell.  Individualist societies, although religion helped to build them (so the hypothesis goes), don’t need religion any more, presumably alongside strong state institutions.

    Who does this remind you of?  Republicans and Democrats.  Republicans tend to favour the in-group more than Democrats.

    Apparently moral purity is more of a thing in communal societies.  I think this is because moral purity is linked to physical cleanliness, and it’s more shameful and harmful to be dirty around others in a more communal society.

    Also, this:

    For example, small-scale anthropological studies show that huntergatherers predominantly reside with genetically unrelated individuals, flexibly form new groups, and have generally weak extended family ties … . In contrast, … more advanced production modes in agriculture and animal husbandry are believed to be characterized by stronger kinship ties.

    This ties in with what I always think: that Liberal values come from the ancient small-group phase of human history (loose borders, communism, etc.) and Republican values belong to the more recent, strict, organised, closed-borders, large-group phase.

    #47942

    TheEncogitationer
    Participant

    Reg,

    Looks like fun. Much more articlate and engaging than the old-timey Dragon’s Lair I used to play in the arcades.

    I wonder what kind of chicken dragons taste like? Buffalo Wings? Nashville Hot Chicken? The Colonel’s secret blend of 11 herbs snd spices? 🍗😋

    Speaking of, as much wild and edible flora and fauna as we have invading cities nowadays–like wild muscadines, blueberries, strawberries, snakeberries, blackberries, acorns, black walnuts, and sorell for fruits, veggies, and nuts, or squirrels, racoons, rabbits, quail, pheasant, ducks, goose, fish, bear, moose, and deer for meat–somebody would have to be just damn dumb to go the route of Soylent Green! C’mon, Taylor! Tuck into some bison jerky and dried plums! 😁

    #47943

    Strega
    Moderator

    Encog, did you know KFC on Twitter follows only eleven people?.

    These are the five Spice Girls, and six random guys called Herb.

    #47944

    jakelafort
    Participant

    Cogitoergoiaintenco, to Looney Tunes he swoons.

    To libertarianism he croons.

    To the stimulus check he moons.

    To theists he lampoons

    #47945

    TheEncogitationer
    Participant

    Strega,

    Encog, did you know KFC on Twitter follows only eleven people?.

    These are the five Spice Girls, and six random guys called Herb.

    I do know that Sci-Fi writer Robert Heinlein said that the plural of “spouse” is “spice,” and there was an R&B duet called Peaches & Herb. Somewhere there is a tie-in apropo of something pruient.🥰

    #47946

    TheEncogitationer
    Participant

    Strega,

    Oh, there is also the urban legend that the reason the corporation calls itself KFC is because their product is not really chicken.

    What would the acronym stand for: Kentucky Fnord Creature? 🐙🦑😱

    Fortunately, I know that’s not true, as I have voraciously cleaned the meat off of many bones and they all look like chicken bones to me. 😋

    #48000

    PopeBeanie
    Moderator

    Imagine the day, when people will say, “This chicken tastes like reptiles”.

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