Following hard on the heels of a prominent Texas pastor’s Rick Perry supporting declaration that Mormonism is a cult, James Fallows over at The Atlantic was compelled to issue his own declaration: “To be against Mitt Romney (or Jon Huntsman or Harry Reid or Orrin Hatch) because of his religion is just plain bigotry.” Not [...]
Tags:anti-Mormonism·atheism·bigot·bigotry·cult·ethnicity·evangelicals·Fawn Brodie·gender·George Bush·Harry Reid·immutable·Jacob Weisberg·James Fallows·Jon Huntsman·Joseph Smith·Mitt Romney·Mormon·Mormonism·mutable·Orrin Hatch·politics·race·religion·religious test·Rick Perry
“Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.”
With this famous sentence, Jean-Jacques Rousseau begins his masterful critique of political power. Less well known is another sentence from The Social Contract (1762): “No State has ever been founded without Religion serving as its base.”
My reading of history is that Rousseau was right. State-formation [...]
Tags:China·civic religion·disciplina·divination·Dominique Briquel·Etruria·Etruscan·Etruscan books·haruspices·haruspicy·J.G. Frazer·Jean-Jacques Rousseau·magic·politics·power·prodigia·religion·Roman·Roman epistemology·Rome·Romulus·science·Shang Dynasty·state formation·Tages Against Jesus
In polite American company, it is considered impolitic to declare that a presidential candidate should be disqualified by his or her religion. Perhaps this is why we have a British newsmagazine asking the tough questions about Michele Bachmann’s beliefs:
[Bachmann] recommends Christian books and films that suggest non-Christians are trouble, that the government may be poisoning [...]
Tags:Christian·creationism·evangelical·Fawn Brodie·Francis Schaeffer·Joseph Smith·Michele Bachmann·Mitt Romney·Mormon·Nancy Pearcey·politics·religion·Rick Perry
A high school physics and chemistry teacher in Pennsylvania has filed a federal lawsuit alleging that evolution is atheism and because atheism is a religion, it cannot be taught in public schools. Here is the complaint:
1. The Plaintiff is Thomas J. Ritter, Jr., an adult individual residing at 320 MacArthur Drive, Orwigsburg, PA 17961.
2. [...]
Tags:Anne Creyer·atheism·binary·evolution·federal lawsuit·ID·intelligent design·Kitzmiller·logic·religion·The Blue Mountain School District·Thomas Ritter
In my first post on Robert Rowthorn’s paper “Fertility, Religion and Genes,” I focused on its faulty premises and unrealistic assumptions; I also substituted the word “love” for “religion” in Rowthorn’s argument to show that nearly any beneficial and complex human behavioral trait could be explained using the same single gene model. In my second [...]
Tags:alleles·atheism·complex traits·confounding variable·culture·diabetes·fertility·genes·learning·religion·religion gene·religiosity·Richard Dawkins·Robert Rowthorn·Sam Harris·single-nucleotide polymorphisms·SNP·socialization
Last week, an unfortunate paper appeared in the Proceedings of the Royal Society, a leading academic journal. Its title is “Religion, Fertility and Genes: A Dual Inheritance Model” (open access). Despite being profoundly flawed in its premises and assumptions, the paper garnered major attention from the press. My local paper ran this headline: “Scientist: Religion [...]
Tags:Adam Stadtmiller·assumptions·believer gene·differential fitness·dual inheritance·Electa Draper·faith gene·fertility·fitness·genes·GIGO·God gene·group level selection·love gene·models·premises·religion·religion gene·Robert Rowthorn·single gene traits
Although many NASCAR fans at Talledega prefer praying to baby Jesus, people in Poland are opting for the giant Jesus.
Tags:baby Jesus·giant Jesus·NASCAR·Poland·racing·religion·Ricky Bobby·Talladega
Over at Live Science, the staff reports a recent study finding that people who left a “strict” religious group — i.e., Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons — tended to experience health declines after leaving the group. The key to this study is “strict,” as in a religious group that works hard and promulgates rules to regulate [...]
Tags:Christopher Scheitle·health effects·health impacts·health outcomes·Jehovah's Witnesses·Latter Day Saints·Mormons·religion
In a previous post, Religious Wars and Nationalism, I discussed two factors that play a major role in group cohesion. The first factor, which played a dominant role for the majority of human evolution, was extended and fictive kinship. This is what primarily held groups together during the Paleolithic. After the Neolithic Revolution, another factor [...]
Tags:Benedict Anderson·Blood Sacrifice and the Nation: Revisiting Civil Religion·Carolyn Marvin·Civil Religion·David Ingle·Durkheim·group cohesion·group identity·group level selection·guardians of faith·high priests·hymnals·Imagined Communities·kinship·liturgy·nationalism·Neolithic Revolution·Paleolithic·patriotism·patriots·religion·religiosity·religious violence·ritual leaders·ritual objects·Robert Bellah·sacred places·sacred texts·saints·temples·totemism·totems
Over at ABC News, Ki Mae Heussner reports on a Diane Sawyer interview of the renowned physicist Stephen Hawking with this contentious headline: “Stephen Hawking on Religion: Science Will Win.” This is an unfortunate banner. During the interview, Sawyer asked if religion and science could be reconciled. Hawking’s response was profoundly unhelpful:
“There is a fundamental [...]
Tags:animism·anthropomorphic·anthropomorphism·Babylon·Babylonian high god·city-states·Diane Sawyer·earthly kings·gods·Hebrews·hunter-gatherers·Judaism·Ki Mae Heussner·Levant·Mesopotamia·Neolithic·Neolithic Revolution·religion·Roy Rosenberg·science·spirits·spiritual kings·Stephen Hawking·supernatural thinking·Yahweh·Yahweh Becomes King
