Gene Edward Veith Jr.'s Blog, page 223
September 2, 2015
Pope will allow priests to forgive abortion
Pope Francis will allow priests to forgive the sin of abortion during the upcoming Holy Year, from December 8 to November 26. Normally, abortion incurs automatic excommunication. Bishops must give special permission before a priest can absolve a penitents of that particular sin. That abortion cannot be forgiven, apart from an elaborate bureaucratic process, is [Read More...]
Did the Q’uran pre-date Muhammed?
Carbon dating of what has been called the world’s oldest Q’uran suggests that the manuscript may have been written before the Muhammed was born, so that the book of which this is a copy would be even older. Islam teaches that the Q’uran was delivered directly to the prophet from Heaven, but this would indicate [Read More...]
Scam, fraud, and blackmail at Wikipedia
Wikipedia has banned 381 of its editors for scamming and in some cases extorting small businesses and celebrities, taking money to get favorable articles approved and “protected.” From Wikipedia rocked by ‘rogue editors’ blackmail scam targeting small businesses and celebrities – Crime – UK – The Independent: Hundreds of small British businesses and minor celebrities [Read More...]
September 1, 2015
The Christian vs. the collective
Anthony Sacramone has a quite brilliant post entitled “There Are Only Two Conceptions of Human Ethics.” He begins with an excerpt from Arthur Koestler’s Darkness at Noon, a conversation between two Soviet-era totalitarians on the difference between the Christian ethic and the “collective” ethic. Then he applies it. Read the whole post. Here is the [Read More...]
Court rules that parents don’t have to be perfect
A mother in New Jersey left her sleeping daughter in the car for 5-10 minutes while she dashed inside a store in a suburban mall. Someone noticed, and the mother was charged with child endangerment. But the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled in the mother’s favor, making an interesting legal distinction. In a unanimous decision, [Read More...]
Sesame Street and the free market
Sesame Street has signed a deal with HBO that will allow the popular children’s show to double the number of original episodes that it will produce next year. Those shows will be shown free on Public Television nine months later. In the meantime, we can see the difference in how a free market supplies a [Read More...]
August 31, 2015
Donald Trump to meet with Prosperity Gospel preachers
Donald Trump will be meeting with a “select” group of evangelical pastors in an event organized by television evangelist Paula White, a woman who is the senior pastor of her megachurch and who teaches the “prosperity gospel.“ From Reid J. Epstein, Donald Trump Plans Meeting With Evangelicals – Washington Wire – WSJ: Leading in the [Read More...]
More and more experiments aren’t reproducible
Scientists are worried because more and more experiments are not reproducible. A principle of the scientific method is that for an experiment to be valid, another scientist who performs it must get the same results. In many cases today, that is not happening. This is especially true in the social “sciences.” From Pete Spotts, An [Read More...]
Tolkien’s new story & the impact of Finland
One of J. R. R. Tolkien’s earliest writings has been published this week in England. (It will be released in the U.S.A. in April.) It’s called The Story of Kullervo, a retelling of a dark episode from the Finnish national epic the Kalevala. Hannah Sander of the BBC tells about the influence of this epic [Read More...]
August 28, 2015
When Christian voters support the least Christian candidate
There once was a time when evangelical voters favored candidates who were Christians and who modeled “family values.” Today the favorite candidate among evangelical voters is someone who says he has never repented of his sins, has been married three times, brags about his sexual conquests, and has made much of his fortune by building [Read More...]
