Merry Christmas!

Recently, I have been receiving a lot of Christmas e-cards which cajole the recipients to celebrate the birthday of Jesus Christ.

But of course, Jesus was not really born on December 25. In fact, no one really knows when Jesus was born, or when he died. These 2 holidays that we mark on our calendars were decreed by the Catholic Church. Good Friday was formalised in the year 325 AD, and Christmas some time in the late 300s (probably 378 AD).

Think about it: Good Friday is celebrated on 21 March 2008 this year. However, it will be celebrated on a different date, 10 April 2009, next year. Why is Good Friday - Jesus death anniversary - not commemorated on a fixed day, but Jesus birthday is? (Note: Good Friday always fluctuate between March 21 and April 23 inclusive.)

If Jesus death anniversary can fluctuate every year, shouldn't Jesus birthday fluctuate every year as well?

The reason why Good Friday fluctuates is because the Hebrew calendar is actually based on the Moon, whereas our current calendar - derived from the Romans - is based on the Sun. As Good Friday is actually determined by the Hebrew calendar, this is the reason why the date fluctuates when mapped onto our solar calendar.

Logically speaking, Jesus birthday should follow the Hebrew calendar too, and thus Jesus birthday should fluctuate when mapped onto our solar calendar. For consistency with the fluctuating Good Friday, Jesus birthday should not be celebrated on a fixed December 25 every year, but should fluctuate likewise.

The bible does not explicitly state the date of Jesus birth. So why was Jesus birthday fixed on December 25?

One explanation is that the early Christians, being Jews, believe that their prophets always die on an anniversary of their birth, or of their conception. For Jesus, it was believed that his death on Good Friday was on the anniversary of his conception. If Jesus was conceived in March/April, then his birth, 9 months later, would be some time in either December or January.

During ancient times, people living in temperate countries have noticed that there is a day in the 3rd week of December where the hours of daylight is the shortest in the year (typically December 21 or December 22). This astronomical event is called the Winter Solstice. The Winter Solstice is commemorated by many ancient civilisations, including China.

In Rome, the common people have been celebrating the week long festivities of the Winter Solstice as Sol Invictus, or "the birthday of the unconquered Sun". This holiday has been celebrated for hundreds of years, where prayers and offerings are made to various Sun gods like "Elah-Gabal", "Sol", and "Mithras".

When Rome adopted Christianity as its official and ONLY religion, it could not rid its people from their pagan celebrations and worship of the sun gods during the Solstice festivities. The Catholic Church thus decided to co-opt the "birthday of the Sun" to the "birthday of the Son". The festivities were now made into the worship of Jesus instead of the worship of Mithras et al.

In Jewish families, infant boys must be circumcised on the eighth day of their birth, in a ritual known as the Brit Milah, to honour the covenant between Yahweh and the Children of Israel. Since Jesus is a Jew, he would be circumcised on his 8th day, and that would be the first day the child is officially with God. It was conveniently proposed that Jesus was circumcised on January 1, which means that he must have been born 8 days prior, on December 25, to coincide with the Solstice festivities.

And that is how Jesus birthday became officially fixed on December 25, and which we now mark on our calendars as Christ's Mass day.

Merry Christmas!

The Golden Rule

I received an email from TED.com about Karen Armstrong's (author of A History of God and The Bible: A Biography) new initiative, the Charter for Compassion (http://charterforcompassion.com).

The Charter for Compassion project seeks to build a peaceful and harmonious global community among the world religions, by seeking to remind the world that while all religions are not the same, they all share a core principle of the Golden Rule, which was stated as:

Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.

However, I have always thought that the Golden Rule was framed in the negative. To my surprise, I learnt that this variant is actually called the Silver Rule:

Do not do unto others as you would not have them do unto you.

Although they appear to be similar, there is a subtle difference. Suppose you are a masochist (a person who derives pleasure from being offended, dominated, or mistreated). Under the Golden Rule, you would be encouraged to inflict pain on others because of your delight in such mistreatment. A sadist (a person who derives pleasure from inflicting cruelty on others) is jokingly said to be a masochist adhering to the Golden Rule. Under the Silver Rule, inflicting pain on others would be discouraged.

In the Bible, Jesus taught his disciples to repay evil with kindness. In reality, no body really follows that. Indeed, when Confucius was asked about the Golden Rule, he replied: "Repay kindness with kindness. Repay evil with justice." This is surprisingly called the Brass Rule:

Do unto others as they do unto you.

But the problem with the Brass Rule is that it can create a vicious circle of revenge. Two wrongs do not make a right.

Even baser than the Brass Rule is the Iron Rule:

Do unto others as you like, before they do it unto you.

This Iron Rule has also been called the ironic version of the Golden Rule (a cynical variant goes: "He who has the gold, makes the rules.")

Of course, we don't live in an ideal world where people live their lives following just the Golden (or Silver) rules. In fact, most of the world seems to practise an amalgam of the Golden Rule for your superiors, and the Iron Rule for your inferiors. In maintaining the metallic references, this rule has been called the Tin Rule (as tin is known for its flexibility):

Suck up to those above you, and abuse those below.

***

Personally, although I do not have any major problems with the Charter for Compassion initiative, my main gripe is that the charter, as written, specifically omits any mention of people without religion. To be truly global and inclusive, such initiatives would also include people without religion. People without religion are people too. There appears to be an unstated bias that people without religion are immoral, when this is really not the case.

An atheist call to arms

In 2002, Richard Dawkins presented a speech at TED to appeal for atheists to make public their beliefs and to aggressively fight the incursion of religion into government and politics. The video was released to the internet on April 2007, but I had only watched it today. It is still a compelling video, and provides a very strong argument why atheists should not be apathetic and to let religionists rule society. http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/richard_dawkins_on_militant_atheism.html

It's Time for Reason and Science

A wonderful promotional video by some of the greatest scientific minds in the English speaking world:

Disk Drives

As I used to work in the disk drive industry (Conner Peripherals - bought over by Seagate), I like to follow news about developments in the disk drive industry.

Today, I came across a very amusing YouTube video featuring disk drives:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g3plw-oye90

The disk drives in the video are supposedly from Maxtor. Now you know why Maxtor lost money and was finally sold to Seagate too

However, the disk drive industry is facing a threat form flash-memory based drives (solid state drives). Today, I read a news item about Samsung releasing a 256GB solid state flash memory drive:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9952007-7.html

With such high capacity flash-based drives becoming main stream, I think it is a matter of time before flash-memory drives completely displaces disk drives in consumer appliances. Perhaps in 2 or 3 years, the only disk drives in the market will be the very high capacity ones - 1 terabyte and larger - used mainly for backup storage or in servers. The majority of consumers will probably be using only solid-state drives in their laptops, mobile phones, PDAs, game consoles etc.

"Jesus: The Missing History" - Discovery Channel documentary

I'd caught this documentary ("Jesus: The Missing History") on Discovery Channel (Asia) today, and was very impressed by the host, biblical scholar Kent Dobson, raising very important topics that critically questions the authenticity of the scriptures concerning Jesus. The documentary even ended with Dobson talking about how his study into Jesus' history had made him cast doubt on his beliefs, and even challenged his faith, which I felt was very remarkable for Dobson to do on a globally syndicated program.

I googled the net trying to see if the video of this documentary is available on YouTube. I couldn't find any, but instead learnt an unexpected piece of news. Apparently, after this documentary was broadcast in the US on March 16, Kent Dobson was forced by his school, the Northpointe Christian High School, to resign from his teaching post on March 27:

http://blog.mlive.com/grpress/2008/04/on_historical_jesus_video_oust.html

Dobson's unfortunate experience seems to resemble a Christian version of "Expelled".

Although Dobson is a man of faith, as a teacher, he is not afraid to teach his students to think critically and to ask hard questions. On the documentary, he comes across as an honest, sincere and earnest person, and I think that one day, he will have an epiphany like Prof Bart Erhman or ex-Reverend Dan Barker, and realise that we can all be moral and good people without having to believe that Jesus is a god.

Myanmar

If you have been following news of the Myanmar Cyclone Nargis disaster, or have donated to the relief effort to help the Myanmar victims, you would know that the Myanmar government is preventing the relief organisations from using their own experts/equipment to handle the donated supplies. Instead, the Myanmar government has told these organisations to hand over the supplies to the army, who will then distribute the supplies to the victims. The Myanmar government does not want the relief organisations personnel to distribute the donated supplies to the victims themselves.

1. According to this New York Times article, a local official found that good rice donated from Thailand under the United Nations auspices have been kept by the army. The army instead gave poor quality/rotting/waterlogged rice from its own inventories to the victims instead:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/12/world/asia/12myanmar.html

2. This blog entry from a Myanmar dissident says that donated supplies are now found on sale in the black markets in Yangon. Since all donations must be handed to the Myanmar army as commanded by the Myanmar government, it is obvious who is re-selling these donated relief supplies for their own profit:

http://baydah.blogspot.com/

3. A report from Burma Campaign UK states that Myanmar earned about ₤1.35 billion (about US$2.7 billion) per year from the sale of gas. However, the Myanmar government, in a meeting with UN officials on 5 May, stated that they are spending ₤2.5 million on the disaster. The Myanmar government won't need to cough out more of their own money, not with the generous cash donations pouring in from UN, US, and other countries totalling hundreds of millions of dollars:

http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/pm/weblog.php?id=P348

4. So, if the Myanmar government is going to use only ₤2.5 million from their yearly earnings of ₤1350 million from gas exports for the relief effort, what should the balance ₤1347.5 million be used for? Well, how about a wedding? According to this BBC report, when General Than Shwe (the leader of the Myanmar government) married off his daughter in 2006, just the gifts for the couple came to ₤50 million:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6109356.stm

You can get a sense of the opulence that was lavished on Than Shwe's daughter from this YouTube video. Mind you, while 90% of Myanmar's population live below the poverty line, the military government is apparently using the country's wealth to benefit themselves:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWj0tDpLAaI

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It's too bad the UN, Singapore, and the other Asean countries will not interfere in how the Myanmar government treats its people. Yup. The policy of non-interference in another country's "internal affair" is sacrosanct, even if the Myanmar government actions (or lack thereof) can potentially kill hundreds of thousands of people. If hundreds of thousands of people were to die due to diseases or hunger because of the lack of relief supplies reaching the victims, this would be nothing short of genocide. And the UN, Singapore government, Asean members would all be partially culpable, because they would have foreseen that the deaths would be the end result, but didn't do anything to prevent it.

Tragic.

The LHC and the Higgs Boson

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is one of the most ambitious science project to date, rivalling that of the space project to sent humans into outer space. Costing an enormous US$6 billion to build (for comparison, the space shuttle Endeavour cost only US$1.7 billion, and the NASA Mars Project is US$1.2 billion), it boggles the mind that the main purpose of its construction is to determine the existence of an infinitesimally minute elementary particle called the "Higgs Boson".

More photos of the LHC at http://www.darkroastedblend.com/2008/03/time-machine-worlds-biggest-particle.html

There is a very engrossing talk by Professor Brian Cox about the LHC. It compresses in 20 minutes a presentation of the best scientific explanation of "what the universe is", and why the LHC is such an important project. I am sure you will enjoy this talk:

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/253

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If you need a primer of what is a "Higgs Boson" particle, here is my simplified explanation:

Back in my early school days, I was taught about how all matter is composed of atoms. In fact, the theory of atoms being the fundamental building block of matter was first written by the ancient Greeks back in 400 BC.

However, in the late 19th century, scientists discovered that the atom is not the most fundamental particle (a fundamental particle is a subatomic particle that is not composed of any other subatomic particle). Instead, they found that atoms were composed of electron particles orbiting a nucleus containing protons and a neutrons.

This is probably the level of science that most of us were taught up to in secondary school.

In the mid-20th century, scientists discovered that while electrons are fundamental particles, protons and neutrons were not. Protons and neutrons are composed of an even smaller particle called the quark.

Quarks never exist alone. They are always found in groups of other quarks. A composite particle made of several quarks is known as a "Hadron", which is what the LHC (Large Hadron Collider) is named for.

Thus, the scientists now have 2 fundamental particles: the quark, and the electron.

Unlike the quarks which always exist in groups (you always find quarks in groups of two or three quarks), the electron is always alone (they are said to be solitary particles). However, scientists found that electrons were not the only solitary particle. Besides the electron, scientists found other solitary particles like the muon, the tau, and the neutrino. Scientists categorised these solitary particles as "leptons".

So basically, matter is made of the fundamental particles of quarks and leptons.

(There is actually another group of fundamental particles called "anti-quarks" and "anti-leptons", which are the components of "anti-matter". However, I will not discuss anti-matter in this explanation).

But how do protons and neutrons bind themselves together in the nucleus? Why do magnets attract iron nails? Why do uranium decay, (causing harmful radiation in the process)? Why does the Earth revolve around the Sun?

All these actions are actually forces that are exerted by particles on other particles. Scientists identified 4 kinds of forces, mainly:

• Strong Nuclear force (the force that binds protons and neutrons in the nucleus of an atom)

• Electro-Magnetism force (the force that allows a magnet to attract iron nails)

• Weak Nuclear force (the force that causes radioactive decay)

• Gravity (the force that stops us from falling into space)

To explain how particles exert this forces on each other, scientists proposed another form of particle called the "force-carrier particle" that interact between quarks and the leptons. The force-carrier particles for each of the 4 forces are:

• Gluon : Strong Nuclear force

• Photon : Electro-Magnetism force

• W+, W-, Z : Particles for the Weak Nuclear force

• Graviton : Gravity

In summary, matter is basically composed of quarks, leptons, and force-carrier particles.

Now, quarks and leptons are "space occupying particles". For example, two quarks cannot share the same "space".

However, force-carrier particles do not behave in the same way. For example, 2 or more photons can share the same "space".

Scientists classify "space occupying particles" as fermions, and "space sharing particles" as bosons.

Thus, all quarks and leptons are fermions, while all force-carrier particles are bosons.

The "Higgs Boson" is a force-carrier particle that that has been predicted by the mathematics of particle physics, but has not been physically observed. If found, it will provide the explanation of why particles acquire mass!

If you are interested in learning more about particle physics, I can't recommend enough the following site:

http://particleadventure.org/index.html

Babies being thrown off 50-foot tower

Truly one of the most bizarre videos I have ever seen. This practice of throwing babies off the temple tower has been practised by both Muslims and Hindus in a small village in Western India (the state of Maharashtra) for the past 500 years. However, it appears extremely reckless and dangerous to me. What if the baby twisted its body midway down and landed head first and snap its neck? Shiver....

CNN video on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDRlWGR1kLg

CNN article: http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/asiapcf/05/01/babies.tower/#cnnSTCText

Can't imagine parents would actually let their babies undergo this kind of religious ritual.

Mecca Time

You just can't make this kind of stuff up.

An Islamic conference held in Qatar last Saturday wants the world to change the reference point of world time from Greenwich in England (GMT) to Mecca in Saudi Arabia because Islamic scholars have "scientific evidence" that Mecca is the "true centre of the Earth".

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7359258.stm

http://www.gulf-times.com/site/topics/article.asp?cu_no=2&item_no=214103&version=1

I wondered to myself "who would be this crazy?", until I was directed to this video of an Egyptian TV program featuring Islamic "scientist" Dr Abd Al-Baset Al-Sayyed on why Greenwich Mean Time must be abolished and replaced with Mecca time:

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=_N7t19hfeSE

So what is the difference between setting the reference point in Greenwich and in Mecca? Well, for one, anyone can visit Greenwich - whether you are Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, freethinker etc. Greenwich is open to one and all. However, Mecca is completely out-of-bounds to anyone who is not a Muslim. That is, 80% of the world's population are not allowed in Mecca simply because they do not follow Islam.

These people are plain deluded in thinking they can ask the world to make one of the most restricted places on Earth to be a global reference point for everyone.

In the same news article, it was mentioned that a "Mecca Watch" was also introduced at the conference in which the hands move anti-clockwise, the same direction that worshippers move when they circle the Kabaa. Let's see, Mecca as the centre of the world, a clock that runs backwards. I think I see where this is going...

FITNA - The Controversial Anti-Islam Movie

You may have read about the huge hoo-hah around the world about Geert Wilders controversial 15 minute anti-Islam movie. It has been criticised in the Straits Times in articles printed yesterday and today for being polemic and being sheer propaganda. Muslim nations every where have decried the movie, saying it insults Islam and that what it depicts is not "true" or "mainstream" Islam. Indonesia wants Google to eliminate the movie from its servers, effectively asking Google to censor the video, and thus countering one of the tenets of Western civilisation: freedom of speech.

I have watched the movie, and agree that it is indeed highly polemical and extreme. But the irony of it is that many fundamentalist Islam videos - those constantly put out by Al Qaeda and the Taleban sympathisers - is structured in the same way. But the Al Qaeda videos are not condemned by the Muslim nations universally, or as vehemently, as against Wilders' film. In fact, Geert Wilders has used video footage from many of these fundamentalist Muslim videos in his film. Many portions of Wilders' film is comprised of footage from news reels and Muslim terrorists videos, juxtaposed with Quran sayings, just like the terrorists' videos!

The Muslim nations keep making the call that Islam is a "religion of peace". Unfortunately, since the 9/11 US attack, 2002 Bali bombings, 2004 Madrid bombings, or the London 7/7 bombings, Islam has constantly demonstrated that it is anything but because all the perpetrators have been Muslim. The Muslim nations say that the terrorists are not "true" Muslims. But then, why do the news videos always show captured terrorists, as they are being hauled away, always screaming into the camera that they are unrepentant for their actions, and they are doing it all "for Allah" and "in the name of Islam"?

If Islam is a "religion of peace", why is Islam breeding such destructive elements? Why can't mainstream Islam halt the growth of the radicals?

Or, could it be that the mainstreamers could not criticise the radical Muslims' actions because what the radicals are practising is indeed condone by the Quran?

This is the stance of Geert Wilders controversial film.

Personally, I think Geert Wilders film won't have much of an impact in reducing radical Islamism. Radical Islam must be reformed from within by Muslims themselves.

However, as the Muslim nations want to ban the movie from the Internet, and they might succeed in doing so, you might want to take a look at it before it gets pulled down. Do watch it knowing that Geert Wilders is also an extremist, and that his video has been made in exactly the same extremist style that radical Muslims make in their own videos. Please be warned that there are extremely violent images in the film (I was particularly disturbed by the beheading scene):

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3369102968312745410

P.S. I just learnt that the trial has just started yesterday for the 8 Muslims arrested in August 2006 for planning to bomb 7 commercial passenger planes in mid-flight. These were the terrorists who initiated the worldwide ban of carrying liquids, creams, gels etc into planes. As the BBC news report indicated, the 8 Muslims were going to blow themselves and the planes up "in the name of Islam":

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7328892.stm

Chinese Characters and the Bible - Part 2

Yet another Christian friend has found the original World Bible School "Chinese Characters and the Bible" video and has again forwarded it to me. The following is a follow up reply to this second friend, in which I explain why I do not find the Bible to be that "great" a book:

---

Any big book, such as the Bible, can be made to advocate anything that you desire. For example:

- Want a harsh, strict, wrathful and vengeful god, killing everything and everyone through genocide and infanticide, or endorsing the practice of slavery? Read Exodus and Leviticus in the Old Testament.

- Want a quiet, subtle, kind, gentle, loving and forgiving god? Read Paul's epistles in the New Testament (eg. Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Philippians etc)

As I love to read history and philosophy, studying the world's many religions (their origins and their doctrines) holds a constant fascination for me. And when I read about the history of the Bible, it is very clear that most of the Bible's stories must be read metaphorically and symbolically, and not literally.

Many fundamentalist Christians believe the Bible is a divine book of God. As God's book, they believe it is inerrant - and that everything written in it is literally true! But if the Bible is a divine work of god, why are there so many errors and contradictions in it?

http://skeptically.org/newtestament/id19.html

If the Bible contain errors, then it is not perfect. If it is not perfect, is it still a divine piece of work from a perfect God?

The rationalist in me says that the Bible is simply a piece of work by humans, and is not divine. As the list of the errors and contradictions show, it is far from perfect.

And the Old Testament certainly does not describe a "nice" God that fits with contemporary societies. Many of my Christian friends only know of the "good" bits of the Bible, but never actually read its "bad" parts. They find reading the actual Bible to be very tedious because of its old language and style, so they merely read the "nice" parts selected by their priests or pastors. These "nice" stories are very tame and would not be out of place even in a collection of stories for children.

However, a more complete reading of books such as Exodus, Leviticus, Deuteronomy, Joshua, and you will see a much different picture of the "nice and loving" god.

In an effort to encourage people to read the WHOLE bible and not just the "nice" bits, the site "The Brick Testament" at:

http://www.thebricktestament.com

has illustrated many portions of the Bible as comics styled narratives using Lego bricks. Most people find reading the comic style illustrations much easier than reading the actual Bible itself. When people can see the writings in Exodus, Leviticus, Deuteronomy, Joshua presented graphically, they see a whole new dimension in the "Good Book".

I recommend the following links for a picture of the more "vindictive" and "cruel" aspect of the religion:

The Law : http://www.thebricktestament.com/the_law/index.html

Joshua : http://www.thebricktestament.com/joshua/index.html

Judges : http://www.thebricktestament.com/judges/index.html

As one commentator has said,

The Old Testament God is a "psychotic monster". Not only is the character of God diabolical in those books, but there are explicit prescriptions for how to live that are not metaphors; they are not open to theological judo. God just comes right out and says "stone people" for a list of offenses so preposterous and all-encompassing that the killing never stops. You have to kill people for working on the Sabbath. You kill people for fornication.

- Sam Harris

As you read the Old Testament and compare it against the New Testament, it would seem like they are describing 2 completely different entities! But then, that would contradict the mantra that there is only "One God".

This brings me back to what I stated at the beginning: that the Bible is such a big book that it can be used to advocate anything you desire. Need "Proof" of vindictive God? See Old Testament. Need "Proof" of loving God? See New Testament.

Using the Bible as "proof" that God is real is hardly persuasive.

Regards,

NJ

P.S. By the way, I just finished reading the book "Misquoting Jesus" by Bart Ehrman:

http://www.amazon.com/Misquoting-Jesus-Story-Behind-Changed/dp/0060859512

which describes how errors crept into the New Testament.

Bart D Ehrman, its author, is a famous Biblical scholar and author ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bart_D._Ehrman ).

He actually presented a lecture on his book at Stanford University, which is available from this link. It was after listening to this lecture that I went on to read his book:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=397006836098752165&hl=en

If you are keen to learn about some of the errors that have crept into the New Testament that you are reading today, you need to listen to Professor Ehrman's lecture.

Letter declining a church invite

This was a reply I wrote to a Christian friend declining his invitation to attend church:

Regarding attending church, I think you should know my answer by now :-) What is the point of my attending church when I am not a believer?

Yes, scientists do not know how the universe is created. But just because we don't know, why should we accept the explanation that the universe is created by a deity? And specifically the biblical god Yahweh at that. Just because we don't know how the world was created doesn't mean that we should accept any explanation that is offered. What if the explanation is wrong?

When I am given an explanation, I will always examine it to see if it answers my questions satisfyingly before I accept or reject it. As I have mentioned before, the explanations offered by Christianity do not answer my questions satisfyingly. That is why I don't accept Christianity.

Many of my Christian friends always tell me that the bible is a great book of morality because it contains god's instructions on how man should live his life by. And they always cite The Ten Commandments as the ultimate moral guide. But I've read parts of the bible, and the Ten Commandments, and I am not impressed. What does the bible say about Slavery? If the bible is so full of morals, why does it not condemn the enslaving of people?

Why does the bible treat women not as equally as men? Is not women also created by god? If women are equals of men, why did god put in statements in His Divine Book that say that women are inferior to men (e.g. "the head of the woman is the man", "wives must always submit to their husbands" etc)? Shouldn't a divine religion for all time preach equality of the sexes right from the beginning?

Why are celibate men "pure"? What is it about women that is so evil that when men is "defiled by women", men are no longer pure?

The logic of Christian punishment/salvation is also extremely unsatisfying.

- Hitler massacred 6 million Jews plus countless others during World War 2. But since Hitler is Catholic, he will be "saved" because he accepted Christ.

- Abraham Lincoln brought the United States to a civil war so as to free millions of blacks from slavery. But since Lincoln is not a Christian, he will not be "saved".

Does this make sense? Is salvation to be dished out to all and sundry who believe in Christ, and denied to all those who are not of the faith despite their meritorious deeds?

What is the explanation Christianity offers to explain the presence of suffering? Was god responsible for the 200,000 people who were killed by the 26 Dec 2004 Tsunami? Did god do this to punish certains groups of sinners? Why didn't he just kill those sinners instead of killing so many innocents (children especially) to accomplish his aim?

Perhaps god didn't create the Tsunami. Perhaps the Tsunami was made by the devil to destroy god's creations. If so, why didn't god stop the devil from accomplishing his task? Is god not omnipotent?

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.

Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.

Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?

Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

- Epicurus (341 BC to 271 BC)

Of course, it is fine with me if others believe in god, as religion has been an age-old tradition and teaching carried forward from the ancients. However, just as we no longer believe that the world is flat (the Earth is spherical), or that plagues and illnesses are due to demons (they are caused by germs), or that slavery is an acceptable way of treating people (definitely not), I also feel that in this day and age, we should transcend from a religion created by ignorant bronze-age people to a modern philosophy grounded in knowledge, science, mathematics and ethics.

Regards,

NJ

Chinese Characters and the Bible

Yesterday, a friend of mine forwarded me a video file that purports to show that the Chinese language shows proof of the authenticity of the stories of Genesis:

http://students.washington.edu/cbsf/cool/Chinese.swf

The video is produced by an organisation called the "World Bible School", but when I clicked on the link in the World Bible School's website, they have removed the video:

http://www.wbschool.org/chinesecharacters.htm

If you don't like the flash video version, the same contents can be viewed as a static web page here:

http://www.jdaniellowe.com/china.html

However "entertaining" this article is, and may seem utterly convincing and believable to some people, the sceptic in me immediately tells me that this is not PROOF!

There are at least 20,000 characters in the Chinese language, although only about 10,000 are used contemporarily (see note #1). With 20,000 characters to choose from, it is possible to find all kinds of coincidences and meanings to fit whatever you want. (Note: another Wikipedia entry states that at least 53000 unique Chinese characters were compiled in 1039 CE during the Song Dynasty. See note #2)

There are only 214 radicals in the Chinese language, which are used to form the Chinese characters. It is obvious that for any combination of radicals, you would get at least several characters that are formed from such radicals. Now, all you need is to choose characters that have any superficial connection to the bible stories, and put them into this multimedia presentation, and ta-da, you have a very convincing presentation that seems to say that the Chinese language validates the authenticity of the bible!!!

This is weak thinking. In actual fact, this video proves nothing except that you can choose to interpret anything you want to make the flimsiest of connections to the bible.

Fundamentalist Christians have a weakness for developing this kinds of "proofs", in which you first form the conclusion ("Chinese characters are related to the bible"), and then look for evidence that supports the pre-conceived conclusion and publishing them, while ignoring and discarding evidence that do not support it. This is totally against the scientific method, in which you accept and publish the evidence that are both pro AND con to your hypothesis. In the scientific world, if contradictory evidence is found, the initial hypothesis MUST BE REJECTED, and the researcher must refine it, or re-propose a new hypothesis. Unfortunately, fundamentalist Christians do not like to acknowledge contradictory evidence, always choosing to sweep aside facts and ignoring them when such contradictions are pointed out. This is the sole reason why fundamentalist Christians believe that the bible is LITERALLY true, and that the universe is only 6000 years old because of this unshatterable belief in the inerrancy of the bible.

I found that another blogger has written about this video, and has use the same kind of weird logic employed by the World Bible School to make a mocking association that is so provocative that you just have to read it yourself:

http://www.hanzismatter.com/2006/03/chinese-language-of-god.html

Notes

#1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_language#Vocabulary

#2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Written_Chinese#Literacy