Read the previous blog posts by Chris F. Masse:
- Is Justin Wolfers a libertarian? Probably not.
- The information technology that caught Eliot Spitzer
- Eric Zitzewitz’s 10 minutes of fame
- Fun with conditional probabilities
- Wrongly Crafted Headlines Of The Day
- an American, petite, very pretty brunette, 5 feet 5 inches, and 105 pounds
- Mississippi: Is it a primary or a caucus?
Those descriptive verses do or do not describe the historic human condition?
As far as the cultural costs to reading the Bible, how should we explain the positive correlation of Bible reading to wealth and rights? For instance, the Magna Carta, the Reformation, the Scottish Enlightenment, the American Revolution. Let’s compare that to non-bible reading societies, such as Egypt, China or India or the tribes of New Zealand and the Amazon … And then pop that graph up on the Midas Oracle dashboard.
I’m not sure you can find any verses actually advocating any of the issues you mention, except for the use of alcohol. This appears to be irresponsible, illogical, unscientific, and undisciplined exegesis to me.
The readers and interpreters of the Bible get it wrong a lot of the time. But then again, not even prediction markets are perfect.
Cav, I agree with your second paragraph. With a caveat (
): When the Muslim religion was weak in Arabic countries, they lead the world’s civilizations. Arabs invented many things, a long time ago.
.
Any civilization can produce great stuff, providing that its religion(s) doesn’t/don’t mess with science, technology, and freedom of speech.
Sure, our numerals and arithmetic came from the East-West trade (of the Byzantine Empire?–I haven’t taken a history course since high school). I think the Arabs may have gotten it from trade with the Indians.
The problem with India and China is that their societies were eclipsed, at least from a GDP comparison, with little old England, who had adopted principles from the Bible reading calvinists Adam Smith, Thomas Reid, David Hume and other enlightened thinkers in Scotland.
Have you ever visited Scotland? There’s a lot to be said for bible-reading folks–they can be awfully nice.
As far as religion not messing with science, technology and freedom of speech, I would submit to you Bible-readers like Martin Luther. Luther was the one that challenged the monarchist-papal complex of his day, saying the individual had access to Divinity and divine rights, disintermediating out the coercive powers of state and church.
How far would the Renaissance have gone without the turbo boost of the Reformation? Maybe that’s a question for someone like Nassim Taleb.
So Chris Masse, since rights and freedom are so important to the efficacy of prediction markets, it might be nice for you to tell us where our rights come from.
Went many times in England but never went to Wales or Scotland. Did you know Nigel Eccles is Scottish and working from there?
Had no idea. I’d like to visit Edinburgh for the history, and then Dublin for the stout.
Those descriptive verses do or do not describe the historic human condition?
As far as the cultural costs to reading the Bible, how should we explain the positive correlation of Bible reading to wealth and rights? For instance, the Magna Carta, the Reformation, the Scottish Enlightenment, the American Revolution. Let’s compare that to non-bible reading societies, such as Egypt, China or India or the tribes of New Zealand and the Amazon … And then pop that graph up on the Midas Oracle dashboard.
I’m not sure you can find any verses actually advocating any of the issues you mention, except for the use of alcohol. This appears to be irresponsible, illogical, unscientific, and undisciplined exegesis to me.
The readers and interpreters of the Bible get it wrong a lot of the time. But then again, not even prediction markets are perfect.
Cav, I agree with your second paragraph. With a caveat (
): When the Muslim religion was weak in Arabic countries, they lead the world’s civilizations. Arabs invented many things, a long time ago.
.
Any civilization can produce great stuff, providing that its religion(s) doesn’t/don’t mess with science, technology, and freedom of speech.
Sure, our numerals and arithmetic came from the East-West trade (of the Byzantine Empire?–I haven’t taken a history course since high school). I think the Arabs may have gotten it from trade with the Indians.
The problem with India and China is that their societies were eclipsed, at least from a GDP comparison, with little old England, who had adopted principles from the Bible reading calvinists Adam Smith, Thomas Reid, David Hume and other enlightened thinkers in Scotland.
Have you ever visited Scotland? There’s a lot to be said for bible-reading folks–they can be awfully nice.
As far as religion not messing with science, technology and freedom of speech, I would submit to you Bible-readers like Martin Luther. Luther was the one that challenged the monarchist-papal complex of his day, saying the individual had access to Divinity and divine rights, disintermediating out the coercive powers of state and church.
How far would the Renaissance have gone without the turbo boost of the Reformation? Maybe that’s a question for someone like Nassim Taleb.
So Chris Masse, since rights and freedom are so important to the efficacy of prediction markets, it might be nice for you to tell us where our rights come from.
Went many times in England but never went to Wales or Scotland. Did you know Nigel Eccles is Scottish and working from there?
Had no idea. I’d like to visit Edinburgh for the history, and then Dublin for the stout.