Clipmarks | haraya's Religion collection

Similar Diversity - Comparing the Holy Scripture

Wed, 08 Aug 2007 18:09:08 GMT

clipped by: Djiezes

Similar Diversity is an information graphic which opens up a new perspective at the topics religion and faith by visualizing the Holy Books of five world religions. Communalities and differences of Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and Judaism are shown up in this datavisualization.
The visual's basis is an objective text analysis of the Holy Scriptures, and works without any interpretations from the creators' side.

Tags: religion, god, visualization, art, text analysis, scripture, information graphic

The 100 Greatest Theorems!

Wed, 02 May 2007 05:30:49 GMT

clipped by: abbysname

Clip Source: personal.stevens.edu

The Hundred Greatest Theorems

The Irrationality of the Square Root of 2

Fundamental Theorem of Algebra

The Denumerability of the Rational Numbers

Pythagorean Theorem

Prime Number Theorem

Godel’s Incompleteness Theorem

Law of Quadratic Reciprocity

The Impossibility of Trisecting the Angle and Doubling the Cube

The Area of a Circle

Euler’s Generalization of Fermat’s Little Theorem

(Fermat’s Little Theorem)

The Infinitude of Primes

The Independence of the Parallel Postulate

Polyhedron Formula

Euler’s Summation of 1 + (1/2)^2 + (1/3)^2 + ….

Fundamental Theorem of Integral Calculus

Insolvability of General Higher Degree Equations

DeMoivre’s Theorem

Liouville’s Theorem and the Construction of Trancendental Numbers

Four Squares Theorem

All Primes Equal the Sum of Two Squares

Green’s Theorem

The Non-Denumerability of the Continuum

Formula for Pythagorean Triples

The Undecidability of the Coninuum Hypothesis

Schroeder-Bernstein Theorem

Tags: mathematics, theory, lists

Journalists Fined Over Islam joke

Mon, 15 Jan 2007 14:53:50 GMT

clipped by: haraya

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

A court in Casablanca has given two Moroccan journalists suspended sentences of three years for defaming Islam and breaching public morality.

The journalists' weekly magazine, Nichane, had published an article entitled How Moroccans laugh at religion, sex and politics.

The court banned publication of the magazine for two months and fined Driss Ksikes and Sanaa al-Aji about $8,000.

The journalists said the jokes they published were in common usage.

Their lawyer says they plan to appeal against the sentence.

The prosecutor had urged sentences of three to five years, saying journalists must balance liberties and responsibilities.

Their article had featured jokes about God, the prophets and the Moroccan king, which deeply insulted many ordinary Moroccans and their religion, says the BBC's Richard Hamilton in Casablanca.

The two journalists, backed by many international organisations, feel their prosecution was a blow to press freedom, says our correspondent.

Tags: news, media, religion, islam, politics, africa, casablanca, magazine, journalism, joke, humor, law, ethics, public, society

Religions don't deserve special treatment

Sat, 21 Oct 2006 12:42:37 GMT

clipped by: wildcat
clipper's remarks: wildcat concurs!

Clip Source: commentisfree.guardian.co.uk

Religions don't deserve special treatment

It is time to reverse the prevailing notion that religious commitment is intrinsically deserving of respect.

It is time to reverse the prevailing notion that religious commitment is intrinsically deserving of respect, and that it should be handled with kid gloves and protected by custom and in some cases law against criticism and ridicule.

It is time to refuse to tip-toe around people who claim respect, consideration, special treatment, or any other kind of immunity, on the grounds that they have a religious faith, as if having faith were a privilege-endowing virtue, as if it were noble to believe in unsupported claims and ancient superstitions. It is neither. Faith is a commitment to belief contrary to evidence and reason, as between them Kierkegaard and the tale of Doubting Thomas are at pains to show; their example should lay to rest the endeavours of some (from the Pope to the Southern Baptists) who try to argue that faith is other than at least non-rational, given that for Kierkegaard its virtue precisely lies in its irrationality.

Tags: religion, belief, atheism

Is There Room for the Soul?

Tue, 17 Oct 2006 12:03:29 GMT

clipped by: wildcat

Clip Source: www.usnews.com

Is There Room for the Soul?

New challenges to our most cherished beliefs about self and the human spirit

By Jay Tolson

Posted Sunday, October 15, 2006

Tags: science, neurobiology, soul, human, spirit, belief

Experiencing God Through Meditation

Fri, 13 Oct 2006 05:23:56 GMT

clipped by: arifsali

Clip Source: www.beliefnet.com

Experiencing God Through Meditation
Former Trappist monk James Finley talks about the spiritual benefits of contemplative practice for Christians.

Many people associate meditation with Eastern traditions. What do you mean by meditation?

Today more and more Christians are using the term meditation in a way that was traditionally referred to in the Christian tradition as contemplation, and that's how I'm using it.

At the heart of the Gospel is Jesus saying "I and the Father are one." The early Christians understood this as a call to enter into Christ's divine oneness with the Father. They felt they could respond to that call by entering into that oneness experientially; even on this earth they could realize something of this eternal oneness with God that Christ came to reveal and proclaim. And they sought to experience this through meditation and prayer.

Tags: religion, christianity, meditation, spirituality

America's Gods

Sat, 23 Sep 2006 16:11:01 GMT

clipped by: haraya
clipper's remarks: The survey came up with other odd findings: most Americans believe in prophetic dreams, 4 in 10 believe in ancient advanced civilizations like Atlantis, 3/4 of Americans think their relatives will go to heaven, and only 2.2% identified with the term Evangelical even though 1 in 3 attend churches that theologians consider Evangelical. The real bottom line was that asking someone if he is Protestant, Catholic, or Jewish isn't likely to tell you much about what that person actually believes.

Clip Source: www.plastic.com

31.4% of Americans believe in the Authoritarian God (43.3% in the South), who is angry at humanity's sins, engaged with every creature's life and with world affairs, and ready to toss thunderbolts of judgment at the unfaithful. Most people who believe in this God are white Evangelicals or black Protestants.

23% of Americans believe in the Benevolent God (28.8% in the Midwest), who may set absolute standards for mankind but is defined primarily by his love for us and his willingness to forgive us again and again, rather like the father who embraces the repentant prodigal son in the Bible. Mainline Protestants, Catholics, and Jews tend to go for this God.

16% of Americans believe in the Critical God (21.2% in the East), who keeps his judgmental eye on the world and its people but doesn't intervene in our affairs, to punish or to comfort us.

24.4% of Americans believe in the Distant God (30.3% in the West), who is the cosmic force that created the world but then left it to spin on its own. This version of God also captures the attention of many Catholics, mainline Protestants and Jews, as well as most moral relativists.

How different are these groups when it comes to moral, political, and social issues? Very different indeed. 38.5% of followers of the Authoritarian God think embryonic stem cell research is morally wrong and 41.5% think abortion is wrong even if the woman has been raped, but only 3.8% of believers in the Distant God oppose stem cell research and only 4.5% think a raped woman shouldn't have the right to an abortion. More supporters of the Critical God think supporting war policies is always wrong (23.1%) than supporters of any of the other Gods. Supporters of the Benevolent God or the Authoritarian God are much more likely to think that God favors the US in world affairs than supporters of the Distant or the Critical God. Supporters of the Distant God are more likely to support gay marriage than not, the only group that feels that way.

Tags: religion, god, america, faith, perception, belief, society

Refining intelligent design

Sun, 10 Sep 2006 21:43:48 GMT

clipped by: tpq62

Clip Source: uncyclopedia.org

Malevolent Design (or M.D.) is one of the leading theories in micro-miracology, the division of Creation Science which deals with the origin and development of microorganisms, including bacteria, viruses and fungal parasites. Beginning with the fundamental insight of Creation Science that the complexity of life is such that it must be the result of divine intervention, and employing the micro-miracological observation that pathogenic organisms change rapidly in order to defeat or circumvent the human immune system, the theory of Malevolent Design posits that the adaptation of human pathogens is the result of malevolent actions taken by an intelligent designer. Put simply, the theory explains that humans continue to become sick because God hates us.

Pat Robertson, one of the leading scientific minds of our time, has been a passionate defender of Malevolent Design.

Leading defender of Malevolent Design, Pat Robertson, defends against these criticism with a simple analogy: "Suppose you were walking through the desert and found a Rolex sports watch and looked at it closely. Would you decide that it had arisen from natural forces alone? That it had been caused by erosion or coincidence? No, you would see that it had clearly been engineered and know that there must have been a designer.

"And by the same token, when you found the skeletal remains of the pretentious yuppy bastard who died wearing it, you would suppose that the disease that killed him was also designed. It was designed by a higher power who wanted to smite that prick."

Tags: creationism, evolution

God the Mother

Mon, 21 Aug 2006 05:04:00 GMT

clipped by: pyrogyne
clipper's remarks: Interesting article

Clip Source: realmagick.com

God The Mother^[credits]

by William Bond and Pamela Suffield

IN THE WESTERN WORLD, we are all familiar with the concept of a male god, whether the idea comes from Christianity, Judaism or Mohammedanism. When we think of a male god, at the back of our minds is a picture of an old man in the sky, who has a certain set of laws, rules and regulations we must all obey. If we follow these rules we will be loved and approved of by god, but if we disobey, we will be condemned and punished. Even today, when the power of this belief has been weakened, and many do not believe in a god at all, the image of Jehovah from the Old Testament is still very strong. Though we may consciously reject this view of god, subconsciously and within the structures of our society, the idea lives on. When we feel we have done the wrong thing, or 'sinned', we tend to feel guilty or unworthy in some way, and expect punishment. It is so ingrained in us, that to a large extent the 'Jehovah' figure is the only way we can envisage God. We appear to have only two choices; either this male god exists or there is no God at all.

However, in the second half of the Twentieth Century, another concept of God has appeared. This time God is not a man but a woman. Its promulgators talk about 'the Great Goddess' or 'the Great Mother', who existed in the Western World before the advent of male-centred religions and before Christianity achieved its dominance of the whole of Europe. Many books have been written on the necessity for our society to turn towards the Great Mother, who has been ignored in the Western world for millenia.

Tags: god, goddess, matriarchy, religion

Isaac Asimov on Atheïsm

Sat, 15 Jul 2006 16:28:53 GMT

clipped by: Djiezes

Clip Source: www.celebatheists.com

I am an atheist, out and out. It took me a long time to say it. I've been an atheist for years and years, but somehow I felt it was intellectually unrespectable to say one was an atheist, because it assumed knowledge that one didn't have. Somehow it was better to say one was a humanist or an agnostic. I finally decided that I'm a creature of emotion as well as of reason. Emotionally I am an atheist. I don't have the evidence to prove that God doesn't exist, but I so strongly suspect he doesn't that I don't want to waste my time. -- Isaac Asimov, in "Free Inquiry", Spring 1982, vol.2 no.2, p. 9

Tags: isaac asimov, asimov, scifi, atheïsm, religion, agnosticism, sf, quote

Hot Priests Parade

Sat, 17 Jun 2006 23:18:57 GMT

clipped by: haraya
clipper's remarks: Oh yeah, if these priests were to say the homily on the months they were put in as models in the calendar, I'd hear mass everyday on March.

Clip Source: www.underconsideration.com

Calendario Romano

Piero Pazzi is an Italian photographer who wanted to expand beyond his souvenir calendar of Venetian gondoliers. Picking another Italian city whose streets are filled with American tourists (in this case, Rome) and combining that with the most commonly sighted Roman male (priests); he came up with the most astonishing, most tasteless, most notorious product available in Roman gift shops.

More than the boxer shorts with a photographic reproduction of the penis from Michelangelo's David, and more than the resin busts of Pope Benedict XVI with the beady eyes; this is the one gift I was compelled to bring home.

Behold, yon sexy priests:

Padre Marzo gets my vote for the Most Open for Interpretation award.

And it ends with a Papal chronology — because, it's really an educational calendar:

If you're interested in ordering one of your own, you could try here in September, after their summer vacation.

Posted by m. kingsley on May 31, 2006 08:24 PM | Permalink

Tags: priests, ethics, people, religion, rome, society

Clipmarks | haraya's Religion collection

Similar Diversity - Comparing the Holy Scripture

The 100 Greatest Theorems!

The Hundred Greatest Theorems

Journalists Fined Over Islam joke

Religions don't deserve special treatment

Religions don't deserve special treatment

Is There Room for the Soul?

Is There Room for the Soul?

New challenges to our most cherished beliefs about self and the human spirit

Experiencing God Through Meditation

America's Gods

Refining intelligent design

God the Mother

God The Mother[credits]

Isaac Asimov on Atheïsm

Hot Priests Parade

Calendario Romano

God The Mother^[credits]