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Not Tempting Jesus Again

I’ve been looking at Jesus' great “temptations in the wilderness” scene
and there's a whole stack of problems with this bag of biblical shenanigans...

The First Temptation of Christ
So at the end of 40 days starving in the desert, the devil pops up to ask his question....
"If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread."
Jesus answered, "It is written: 'Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.'"
So Jesus, to all intents and purposes answered 'Meh!' Theologians are unaware as to whether Jesus offered the customary ‘two fingered salute’ but I reckon it’s highly likely.
And Satan did what? Punished him?
Took him to Hell for half an hour of toe toasting to show him who's 'boss'?
No, you've guessed it, Satan's brilliant interrogation technique included absolutely no threat whatsoever for the wrong answer or no answer at all!

No matter how delirious because of thirst and hunger Jesus was at the end of his 40 days, by the end of the first ‘temptation’, Jesus is going to be feeling pretty cocky about his chances of defeating this halfwit Devil.
“No punishment? This dude’s a pussycat!” would have likely rolled across Jesus brain pan.
(Only he was Jewish, so he'd not have thought it in English, of course. Hebrew/Aramaic disputed.))


The Second Temptation of Christ
Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple.
"If you are the Son of God," he said, "throw yourself down. For it is written: "'He will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.'"
Jesus answered him, "It is also written: 'Do not put the Lord your God to the test.'"

Again here, notice the distinct absence of "Or I’ll X, Y or Z you!" from Old Nick!
No slapping of legs with a wet tea-towel! No light flagellation with a BDSM paddle!
Satan’s punishment for the big beardy’s best boy?
“Right then this’ll do you, I’ll ask another question”!! Even if he followed it with his best and most theatrical “Muahahaha”, any sane human would sarcastically comment on his method “Oh yeah; that’ll terrify the son of a god!”
So, so far the big bad red one, ‘lord of all evil’ and ‘prince of darkness’ is looking a lot like ‘Lolly limp, the ineffectual!

The Third Temptation of Christ
Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendour. "All this I will give you," he said, "if you will bow down and worship me."
Jesus said to him, "Away from me, Satan! For it is written: 'Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.'"
Then the devil left him, and angels came and attended him.

It’s well documented, across many free-thinking blogs, that to see ‘all the kingdoms of the earth’ from a single ‘high mountain’ is only possible if the Earth is flat and that this is biblical proof that the biblical authors thought the world was flat but, as this post is focusing on the temptations, I’m not even going to mention that. :)

So, for Jesus, who many think is god, being offered all the kingdoms of the Earth is an easily rejected temptation. It's like trying to bribe the “Mr. Kipling” to give up his cake manufacturing empire by offering him half a scone!
For a man who 'knows' he's a god or, at least, son of a god, it’s no temptation at all really.
If Jesus applied any thought at all to the offer, (it’s pretty much a no-brainer and only sounds like ‘a lot’ to us ‘mere’ mortals) his thoughts would have rolled something like this…
"Hmmm; accept the devil's kind offer of 'the Earth' or stick it out and get back to being heir to the entire universe and everything in it?” (Including Satan and his actions btw) “Oh I don't know, let me see, that's a tough one! Errrr, No. But thanks all the same!”
but once again with the not English.


And again with the 'no threat whatsoever' for Jesus’ non-co-operation!
No suggestion of Water-boarding! No fingernail splints! No Rack! No Iron lady!
Not once in the whole poorly constructed scene does Satan even hint that he might beat the living snot out of Loinclothman, and not once does it cross Satan’s tiny goat mind to abduct junior and hold him to ransom for half of the universe!
And remember, we are talking about the most evil and unscrupulous being ever to exist - yes even worse than ..............(Insert your most hated political figure here).
Not once!
All through this entire scene Satan acts like Ned Flanders' freaky beatnik father from the Simpsons episode “Hurricane Neddy”!
"We’ve tried nothin’ and we’re all out of ideas."!


So the ‘Great Temptations of Christ’, Jesus ‘glorious’ victory over naughty-naughty Satan’s extremely well thought out and highly tempting offers (that was sarcastic btw), Jesus’ 'sticking it out' through his most formidable challenge and hardship (more sarcasm), a mainstay of the bedrock of Christianity, is not impressive in any way! Satan in this scene is shown to be completely powerless and not scary at all; even a child could have come through it, not only unscathed but also, possibly, laughing at Old Nick’s impotency! And a child from an inner city school may even have kicked that bad boy all around the joint just for being so weak!
A five year old would be more traumatised by schoolyard bullying!


This story clearly relies on 'our' fear of Satan’s ‘great powers of evilness’ but Satan has displayed none; an evil being would have been torturing Jesus just for the fun of it, let alone to extricate the answer to a question which is, after Jesus baptism, for everyone, including the famous hippy and bad-boy McPointy, what we today like to refer to as common knowledge!!
The answer for which Satan is (not) torturing Jesus is already known!

After reading this scene in Matthew 4:1-11, from where all quotes are taken, how can anybody consider Satan or his domain dangerous?
Wouldn’t an eternity of this kind of torture be no more of a threat than a picnic where it was a bit rainy?

This is one of the Too Many Questions
PEACE
Crispy


Please leave a comment - Anything will do
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Oxford University Shame

"Belief in God is part of human nature - Oxford study
Professor Trigg said “the research showed that religion was “not just something for a peculiar few to do on Sundays instead of playing golf”.
“We have gathered a body of evidence that suggests that religion is a common fact of human nature across different societies,” he said.
“This suggests that attempts to suppress religion are likely to be short-lived as human thought seems to be rooted to religious concepts, such as the existence of supernatural agents or gods, and the possibility of an afterlife or pre-life.”

Dr Justin Barrett, from the University of Oxford’s Centre for Anthropology and Mind, who directed the project, said faith may persist in diverse cultures across the world because people who share the bonds of religion “might be more likely to cooperate as societies”.

Tim Ross, Religious Affairs Editor - Telegraph - 12 May 2011


So is “Belief in God part of human nature”? I can’t dispute the statistics of the report, in fact I’m disinclined to; for me, it stands to reason that it depicts the current situation. My problem is with the misleading religious rhetoric of the project co-directors who deliver their conclusions 'out of context', so I'm going to try to replace that context here.

Yeah, NOW it IS the case that "Belief in God is part of human nature", after hundreds of centuries of the religious consistently out-slaughtering or out-breeding the non-religious.
Out-slaughtered is obvious from history, and in the demonising of atheism, in most religions, as the most heinous blasphemy. If one didn't agree with the various witch doctors, high priests or popes you were likely to be, in more primitive times, stoned for heresy or, more recently, ridiculed and ruined. In an environment like this why would any atheist speak out?
And why this persecution? The free thinker is a threat to the priest’s power over his IQ<90 followers. Out-bred is obvious from the doctrines which prohibit contraception, promoting and objectifying women as baby factories.
As a primitive example of what I’m trying to get at…
(This is a 'philosophical equation', so to speak, the numbers are almost certainly, at least, imprecise and simple but the principle is sound, I think.)
In a setting of a twenty thousand years ago.
We place 20 breeding pairs of humans, 12 pairs feel a strong religious need and form a group, the remaining 8 pairs leave and form a new group.
The religious group's 'spiritual' leader is the most religious, claiming to be actually in touch with the envisaged deity. The instruction comes down from the high priest that each breeding pair must have as many babies as possible in order to ‘glorify' the deity.
The non-religious free thinking group gain no ‘divine’ instruction.

In only one generation, say a decade (this is primitive time and lifespan is short) the religious group's 12 breeding pairs produce 9 children each = 108 children. Add in the original 24 and the population grows to a community of 132.
In the same time frame the non-religious group's 8 breeding pairs produce only 4 children per pair = 32 and including the original 16 makes a community of 48.

In only one generation then, the religious out breed the non-religious by a factor of 2.75-1

Extrapolate 50 generations and you get (108x50) and (32x50) = 5400 and 1600 respectively but now the two groups’ philosophies and resources are beginning to conflict. The word comes down from the high priest, ‘God says: kill the non-religious group; eliminate the heretics’.
There are wars and, given the disparity of population size, the religious group slaughters 80% (1280) of the non-religious, whereas only 10% (540) of religious group die in battle.
This leaves the two groups' populations at
Religious: 5400 – 540 = 4860
Non-religious: 1600 – 1280 = 320

The population disparity is now more than 15-1 and the religious breeding instruction is still imposed.
Extrapolate another 50 generations and the religious group grows to a size which completely outstrips the non-religious, almost to the point of extinction.
This example only accounts for 100 generations.
In a period of 20,000 years you'd be looking at more like 1000!
And suddenly, certainly for me at least, it's obvious how it became 'human nature' to have belief in magic.
As a side point here...
Doesn't this example make all the accusations about brutal 'atheist' dictators
look like relatively small potatoes?


For a little background on the two doctors who produced the report
Dr Justin Barrett is described in the New York Times as a "prominent member of the byproduct camp" and "an observant Christian who believes in “an all-knowing, all-powerful, perfectly good God who brought the universe into being,” [and] “that the purpose for people is to love God and love each other.” He considers that “Christian theology teaches that people were crafted by God to be in a loving relationship with him and other people, Why wouldn’t God, then, design us in such a way as to find belief in divinity quite natural?” Having a scientific explanation for mental phenomena does not mean we should stop believing in them. “Suppose science produces a convincing account for why I think my wife loves me — should I then stop believing that she does?”

From Wikipedia


From what I can find online, Emeritus Professor Roger Trigg also looks and sounds a lot like a partisan member of the god squad; though the specific brand of his Christian delusion is elusive, there are sticky religious fingerprints everywhere his name shows up.
He calls himself philosopher but speaks of god as fact!

http://youtu.be/-PGQeQsqHxI

And there’s the stench of religion in this article. In the article, Prof. Trigg embeds the roots of democracy in Christianity which, for me, is an insult to reality too far.
And if you can get through his hour long bore "Reality at Risk" (YouTube) I feel you can hear him trying to deny what he has learned in favour, pitifully, of hanging on to his golden ticket to the chocolate factory.
Also, and by the way, I find labelling him “Emeritus” to be and insult to the word. It’s a joke; his findings in this report cast doubt on every word the man ever put on paper. If you've been taught by him, question every word he said. For me he’s not just self-delusional but self-fraudulent!

So what we have is a report funded to the tune of (1.9 million) by the dubiously(?) motivated Templeton Foundation with conclusions drawn by two men who seem to be seriously biased bible thumpers.
More on Templeton here

Doesn't this Oxford University study merely suggest that the religious have quite brutally altered ‘our’ evolution?

This report has the stink of vested interest all over it and I feel should be ignored by all but serious academics who you should be as fucked off by the two doctors’ balderdash conclusions as I.
Doesn’t this study’s result show that it might be time for quality educational establishments to stop employing those with irrational beliefs and an agenda to match?
Fear of hell or addiction to heaven is no basis on which a rational human draws conclusions.
I find both these individuals contemptible quislings of reason and their findings are no more than propaganda for the church.
For me, they are a disgrace to the memories of all the rational, reasonable, honourable scientists on whose shoulders they stand and, personally, I think I'd like them publicly fired for their misleading conclusions.

Or, do you think the rotten tomato embarrassment of the stocks
would be more satisfying option?


This is one of the Too Many Questions
PEACE
Crispy
Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

David Cameron Decoded

Just a bit of fun at Posh Boy's expense.
Well it's only fair - he's having loads of fun at ours!
Champagne anyone? David - you're in the chair...
It's a new fangled electric one, you're gonna luv it! :)

David Cameron Decoded - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W-kzT13ast8


This is one of the Too Many Questions
PEACE
Crispy
Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

Evolution Misrepresented

In response to my post The Clearly Godless Human Eye a religious nut-job tweeted to me "@crispysea I saw your tweet about the human eye Crispy :) I thought I would send you this video I made also (http://bit.ly/fhwFJ9)" so I had a look.
The site seemed to be promoting evolution but it's paper thin a deception, so here's a quick breakdown for you, and for the nutjob, of the laughable human eye video from the deceptively named EvidenceForEvolution.org

http://youtu.be/kNaYGZEOYoc

This is clearly a religious video which starts laying groundwork to influence the viewer only a few seconds into the dialogue...
40 secs "nothing short of incredible" which attempts to instil a sense of wonder to that which is ordinary. Just counting humans there are 14 billion of these pieces of biological machinery. Take in the insects, birds, animals etc. and this is an item which is commonplace, even boring.
45 secs "perfect harmony" - implying a conductor / arranger
48 secs "precision instrument" - implying manufacturer
49 secs "that ALLOWS" - implying the eye is in control instead of the collection of biochemical reactions it is.
60 secs "no camera invented by man" - implying the eye 'must' have not only been "invented" but also subconsciously suggesting 'by some intelligence other than man'.
91 secs "these tears just happen to have perfect ph balance." - "Just happen" implying this could not be by chance/evolution.
155 secs Iris - "besides adding an element of beauty to the eye." - implying beauty is a 'purpose' of the iris!
167 secs "to let in precisely the right amount of light" - "precisely" implying prior measurement by an outside intelligence.
177 secs "too little light and a proper image cannot form." - The emphasis on the word 'cannot' implies that the eye would be inoperative but this is not the case. The word 'proper' imbues the sentence with sense of pre-ordination about what is 'right and correct' - however an image does form and the animal lives its life dealing with that quality of image.
210 secs "the human eye, my friend, ON COMMAND" - implying once again that it is not a biochemical reaction but that 'we'/our brains have control.
224 secs "countless number of shapes" - Countless? Really? I think we can discount dodecahedron and cuboids and etc. etc. etc.; in fact the shapes the lens can form are not countless. This statement is clearly designed to instil a sense of wonder and awe. The actual number of named shapes the lens can form is one - ovoid - it's the dimensions of the ovoid that changes.
233 secs Retina - "living cells" the emphasis on "living" is designed to instil a sense of wonder and awe, whereas living is its default condition.
249 secs "the image formed on the back of the retina is actually upside down but don't worry, the brain has been programmed to flip the image for us." - Programmed implies an intelligence to program it.

The video tails off with the old chestnut of a watch needing a watchmaker (YAWN) and finally it asks "which way does the evidence steer us my friend - you decide."
"You decide"!! - Outrageous. The entire video is designed to steer the viewer to the conclusion that the eye was created by a god.
The unaware will not notice all the tiny implications and set ups that litter this trash and they are likely to infer from it the answer that the video's producer wants.
"You decide?" Bollocks - there is no attempt to give the viewer free choice.
This is a disgraceful attempt to crowbar god into the evolutionary process which formed the eye. The producer of this blatant misrepresentation of the facts has created a deliberately misleading video full of religious implications and should be thoroughly ashamed of the brainwashing he is spewing into the world.
Dear video producer, please, for the love of humanity take this clap trap down, delete all known copies and keep your mouth shut about a subject you clearly know less about than even I.

This is one of the Too Many Questions
PEACE
Crispy
Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

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