bluemana
Are Creative People More Likely to Be Immoral?
Travis Riddle writes in Scientific American:
In the mid 1990’s, Apple Computers was a dying company. Microsoft’s Windows operating system was overwhelmingly favored by consumers, and Apple’s attempts to win back market share by improving the Macintosh operating system were unsuccessful. After several years of debilitating financial losses, the company chose to purchase a fledgling software company called NeXT. Along with purchasing the rights to NeXT’s software, this move allowed Apple to regain the services of one of the company’s founders, the late Steve Jobs. Under the guidance of Jobs, Apple returned to profitability and is now the largest technology company in the world, with the creativity of Steve Jobs receiving much of the credit.
However, despite the widespread positive image of Jobs as a creative genius, he also has a dark reputation for encouraging censorship,“ losing sight of honesty and integrity”, belittling employees, and engaging in other morally questionable actions. These harshly…
I’m Back: First Case of Mad Cow in the U.S. in Six Years
Reports Elizabeth Campbell in the Washington Post:
The first time mad cow disease appeared in the U.S., beef exports plunged 82 percent. More than six years later, the discovery of an infected dairy cow in California may do little to prevent shipments from surging to a record for a second straight year.
U.S. beef sales to buyers including Mexico, China and Japan will jump 6 percent to 1.34 million metric tons in 2012, exceeding last year’s record, which the government valued at $4.7 billion, said Global AgriTrends, a Denver-based researcher that advises meat companies, investment banks and hedge funds. The company affirmed its forecast after the U.S. reported its fourth case of mad cow since 2003 and first since 2006.
Detection of the tainted carcass before it entered the human food chain should bolster confidence that U.S. meat is safe, the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization said yesterday, as cattle prices rebounded…
Does Drinking Make Someone A Better President?
Timothy Egan breaks down the drinking habits of past presidents in his opinion piece in the New York Times:
We know from a rare personal admission that Mitt Romney experienced a faint whiff of alcohol, a long, long time ago. “I tasted a beer and tried a cigarette once as a wayward teenager,” he said last November, “and never tried it again …
… The last president to swear off alcohol was George W. Bush, who seems doomed to have his name forever followed by the words, “and we know how that turned out.” During his misspent youth, W. was a heavy drinker and considered quite the cutup, but was also obnoxious, smashing his car into trash cans and challenging his father to go “mano a mano.”…
… Jimmy Carter was a teetotaler, and he earned his one-term status. Were the two connected? Can’t say. But his temperance (though he now drinks wine)…
Is War Porn A Natural By-Product of War?
Joanna Schroeder wonders whether war porn is deviant, or a natural by-product of teaching young people to kill, on the Good Men Project:
The nation was shocked when we learned of more supposed bad behavior by US troops overseas, in the form of posing with the bodies of dead enemy combatants. This isn’t shocking news though, is it? It’s been happening since the beginning of this war, and as far as we know, as long as war has been happening, in one form or the other.
In a fascinating Salon.com piece, former infantry soldier and combat veteran John Rico an insider’s perspective on the function of so-called war porn, and wonders what it is about society that makes us so shocked to learn that young people who’ve been trained to fight and kill since they were 18 years old have reveled in the death of their enemies:
I have to say that I find…
Catholic Church Looking for Missing Exorcist After ‘Possessed’ by the Devil
Richard J. Brennan writes in the Toronto Star:
A perceived demonic possession in Saskatoon has caught the Catholic Church there off guard since it has no one trained to perform an exorcism.
The Saskatoon Archdiocese is investigating after a priest was called to a home in late March where a 41-year-old man had carved the word Hell on his chest and was talking in the third person, saying, “He belongs to me. Get out of here.”
Church officials told CBC the priest did his best to calm the man down, including blessing him, before the man was taken to Royal University Hospital for a voluntary assessment.
Bishop Don Bolen told CBC it was not clear if the Saskatoon man was possessed or experiencing a mental breakdown. “I would think there are perhaps more stories about exorcisms in Hollywood than there are on the ground,” Bolen said. “But the Catholic Church teaches that there is…
Talking to Yourself Makes You Smarter
Jamie Condliffe writes on Gizmodo:
Talking to yourself is the preserve of mad men, right? Not according to a new study, which reveals that the seemingly irrational act of chatting to oneself actually improves cognitive function.
The research, carried out by Gary Lupyan and Daniel Swingley, was inspired the pair’s experiences of seeing people audibly muttering to themselves when trying to find items on supermarket shelves. To test whether speaking to oneself was actually beneficial, Lupyan and Swingley devised a set of experiments.
In one experiment, volunteers were shown 20 pictures of everyday objects of the same kind and asked to search out a specific one. Initially participants were shown a piece of text telling them which object to find and left to complete the task in silence. Then, in subsequent tests involving different objects, the participants were asked to repeatedly say the name of the object they were searching for. Across the board,…
Vatican: American Nuns Are Too Liberal, Pursuing ‘Radical Feminist Themes’
Reports Agence France-Presse via the RAW Story:
The Vatican has issued a scathing condemnation of the main association of Catholic nuns in the United States for taking liberal stances on contraception, homosexuality and female priests.
The Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) said in a statement on Thursday it was “stunned” by the Vatican report which pointed to “serious doctrinal problems” and “unacceptable positions” on a range of issues.
It accused members of LCWR, which represents around 45,000 US nuns, or 80 percent of the total, of “corporate dissent” with the Church’s teachings against homosexuality and said it was pursuing “radical feminist themes”…
The Strange CIA Connection with Penn State Pedophile Jerry Sandusky
Luke O’Brien writes on Deadspin:
We’ve written about Ray Gricar before. He’s the former Centre County district attorney who declined to prosecute Jerry Sandusky in 1998, despite a psychologist’s warning that Sandusky showed a “likely pedophile’s pattern” of behavior. On April 15, 2005, Gricar mysteriously disappeared from central Pennsylvania and, seemingly, from this earthly realm. Gone. No trail. Just an empty car with a cell phone inside.
Three months later, fishermen discovered Gricar’s government-issued laptop in the Susquehanna River. Police later found his hard drive on a riverbank, damaged so badly that no data could be recovered. They also learned about the Internet searches run on the DA’s home computer before his disappearance: “how to wreck a hard drive,” “how to fry a hard drive,” and “water damage to a notebook computer.”
Cases like this often don’t get solved. Rather, conspiracy theories pop up, some more wackadoodle than others. And when news about Sandusky’s…
What Kind Of Believer Are You? Take The Dawkins Test
As Mark Cheney writes on Big Think, the criteria:
Richard Dawkins’ Belief Scale Scoring Rubric
1. Strong Theist: I do not question the existence of God, I KNOW he exists.
2. De-facto Theist: I cannot know for certain but I strongly believe in God and I live my life on the assumption that he is there.
3. Weak Theist: I am very uncertain, but I am inclined to believe in God.
4. Pure Agnostic: God’s existence and non-existence are exactly equiprobable.
5. Weak Atheist: I do not know whether God exists but I’m inclined to be skeptical.
6. De-facto Atheist: I cannot know for certain but I think God is very improbable and I live my life under the assumption that he is not there.
7. Strong Atheist: I am 100% sure that there is no God.Do you believe in God? Sometimes this question warrants more than just a yes or no answer. To categorize one’s own beliefs about the possibility of the existence of a deity, Dawkins proposed a…
Atheist Symbol Rejected By Capital One, But Jesus Is Preapproved
Chris Morran writes on the Consumerist:
Consumerist reader Mike has a Capital One credit card. He’d hoped to get one of the bank’s customizable “Image Cards” printed with a big red “A” for atheism. His initial upload was rejected by Capital One, which sent him a long list of possible reasons. And when he called to appeal, things just more bizarre.
The first person Mike spoke with said they had no idea why it was rejected and submitted his appeal.
Then the image was rejected a second time. “I spoke to someone after the second rejection that someone there said that there was a note in my file regarding the fact that they do not allow religious or anti-religious images,” Mike tells Consumerist.
And yes, far down that list of possible reasons for rejecting a card, CapOne does list “Controversial subject matter such as political or religious statements and/or images.”
Remembering ‘The Passion of the Christ’ (Video)
Via South Park Studios:
Kyle goes to see Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ.” He leaves confused about Judaism.
Ohio School Bans ‘Jesus Is Not a Homophobe’ Shirt, Gets Sued
Michael Allen writes on Opposing Views:
Waynesville High School in Waynesville, Ohio, threatened to suspend a student for wearing a shirt that said ‘Jesus Is Not a Homophobe,’ according to Lambda Legal, which filed a lawsuit on Tuesday against the school on his behalf.
Last April, Maverick Couch, a gay junior, wore the shirt during the National Day of Silence, which is meant to raise awareness to anti-LGBT bullying and harassment in schools.
Couch said: “I’ve been bullied and called names, I wanted to wear the T-shirt to encourage respect for all students, gay or straight. I wish my school would help me create an accepting environment for LGBT kids, not single me out for punishment.”
However, school officials said the shirt was “indecent and sexual in nature” and told Couch to turn his shirt inside out, which he did.
A Quest For De-Baptism In France
Reports Eleanor Beardsley for NPR:
In France, an elderly man is fighting to make a formal break with the Catholic Church. He’s taken the church to court over its refusal to let him nullify his baptism, in a case that could have far-reaching effects.
Seventy-one-year-old Rene LeBouvier’s parents and his brother are buried in a churchyard in the tiny village of Fleury in northwest France. He himself was baptized in the Romanesque stone church and attended mass here as a boy.
LeBouvier says this rural area is still conservative and very Catholic, but nothing like it used to be. Back then, he says, you couldn’t even get credit at the bakery if you didn’t go to mass every Sunday.
LeBouvier grew up in that world and says his mother once hoped he’d become a priest. But his views began to change in the 1970s, when he was introduced to free thinkers. As he didn’t…
Priest Accidentally Plays Gay Porn Slideshow to Congregation
Reports Clodagh Sheehy in the Ulster Herald:
A priest has denied knowing how gay porn images appeared on a screen during a presentation he was giving to parents of children preparing for First Communion. Fr Martin McVeigh was setting up the PowerPoint display when the explicit sex scenes flashed up on the screen.
He was about to give a talk to the parents of First Communicants but abandoned the presentation after the pornographic images appeared. One of those present said the pictures appeared on the screen after the priest put a USB memory stick into the computer at St Mary’s School in Pomeroy, Co Tyrone.
“There were plenty of shocked faces. There’s a lot of parents very angry about it.”
‘Overpopulation Is A Myth’ Says Mom of 19, Michelle Duggar (Video)
Via the Huffington Post:
Michelle Duggar, star of TLC’s reality show, “19 Kids and Counting”, says there needs to be more children because our world needs more joy. And as for overpopulation? That’s just a lie, Duggar recently told the Christian Broadcasting Network in a web interview. “The idea of overpopulation is not accurate,” Duggar says, because the entire population of the world could fit inside of Jacksonville, Florida.
“I agree with Mother Teresa when she said, ‘to say that there are too many children is like saying there are too many flowers,’” Duggar said. She explains how her large family is resourceful and therefore not posing as big of an environmental problem as perceived. They buy used cars, she says, and frequently shop at thrift stores, purchasing things others would discard.
People Aren’t Happiest Until They Reach Age 33, Social Media Survey Says
Erin Skarda writes on TIME’s Newsfeed:
It’s true: 30 really is the new 20. A study by Friends Reunited, a British social-networking site, found that 70% of respondents over the age of 40 claimed they were not truly happy until they reached 33.
“The age of 33 is enough time to have shaken off childhood naiveté and the wild scheming of teenaged years without losing the energy and enthusiasm of youth,” psychologist Donna Dawson said in the survey’s findings. “By this age innocence has been lost, but our sense of reality is mixed with a strong sense of hope, a ‘can do’ spirit, and a healthy belief in our own talents and abilities.”
Conversely, only 16% of the survey’s respondents pined for their childhood, while 6% said they were happiest while in college. Many respondents claimed that their happiness at 33 came from fulfillment in their professional lives, as well as having a…
NYC Schools Want to Ban ‘Loaded Words’ From Tests … Like ‘Dinosaur’
Illustration: Hgrobe (CC)
Great job, NYC! Brian Vitagliano reports on CNN:
Divorce. Dinosaurs, Birthdays. Religion. Halloween. Christmas. Television. These are a few of the 50-plus words and references the New York City Department of Education is hoping to ban from the city’s standardized tests.
The banned word list was made public – and attracted considerable criticism – when the city’s education department released this year’s “request for proposal” on March 8, 2010. The request for proposal is sent to test publishers around the country trying to get the job of revamping math and English tests for the City of New York.
The Department of Education’s says that avoiding sensitive words on tests is nothing new, and that New York City is not the only locale to do so. California avoids the use of the word “weed” on tests and Florida avoids the phrases that use “Hurricane” or “Wildfires,” according to a statement by the…
Why is Hitler Selling Shampoo on Turkish TV? (Video)
Reports Ayla Jean Yackley on Reuters:
A Turkish shampoo commercial featuring an enraged Adolf Hitler is a “huge insult to human rights” and should be withdrawn, leaders of the country’s Jewish community said on Monday. The 13-second television spot for Biomen shampoo shows black-and-white archival footage of the Nazi leader at a political rally. Dubbed in Turkish, he shouts that men should not use women’s shampoo.
