Mass Shootings Occur Because the Killers Don’t Believe in the Afterlife, Says Writer Who Makes Shit Up

… our culture has abandoned a collective belief in ultimate accountability — the belief that one’s actions on Earth are somehow tied to one’s experience after physical death.

That’s quite the hunch for someone who makes no attempt to explain the religious beliefs of killers. Obviously, atheists (who don’t believe in the afterlife) aren’t known for their violent beliefs. The only numbers we have (and they’re admittedly far from perfect) show that the percentage of atheists is much lower in federal prison than it is in the general population.

It’s very tempting to blame violence on a lack of supernatural accountability — what a simple answer! — but most atheists will tell you they have their own method of accountability that has nothing to do with a fear of hell. They believe in the Golden Rule, they respect their fellow humans, etc. I’m not saying atheists can’t be criminals, but our ethics are no less meaningful or solid than the arbitrary morality of many religions.

Hell, we’ve seen plenty of examples of terrorists or cult leaders who have committed horrific acts of violence (or led mass suicides) precisely because they thought they would be rewarded in the afterlife.

Mass Shootings Occur Because the Killers Don’t Believe in the Afterlife, Says Writer Who Makes Shit Up

See: Do mass shooters believe in the afterlife?

Religious exemptions to vaccines shouldn't exist | Finding Faith, Finding Home

An interesting read as I never quite knew how one could "justify" the anti-vac position biblically. As Stone points out, you can't (definitely something to explore,,,hmm).

One comment that struck me: "By the way, this summer being the centennial of the outbreak of World War I, it may be interesting to note that the U.S. Army lost more men to the 1918 flu than it did to German guns."
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“God Does Not Support Vaccines” is a remarkable example of scaremongering. The Big, Bad Government, Megan alleges, is steadily chipping away at the religious exemption currently allowed by 48 states. When that happens, you’ll have to home school, but even then, you can’t rest, because They Will Be Coming For You.

In some states, religious exemptions are simple to get. In others, it’s more complicated. Iowa, for example, requires that the parent demonstrate that

“immunization conflicts with a genuine and sincere religious belief and that the belief is in fact religious, and not based merely on philosophical, scientific, moral, personal, or medical opposition to immunizations.”

(Twenty other states allow a “personal belief” exemption, meaning that parents can simply decide, for whatever reason, that they don’t want their kids vaccinated and that is that.)

Megan’s post, as the title suggests, seems an attempt to offer vaccine skeptics a “genuine and sincere” belief “that is in fact religious,” this despite the fact that, as Judge William F. Kuntz II of Brooklyn’s Federal District Court noted in January, SCOTUS decisions have 

“strongly suggested that religious objectors are not constitutionally exempt from vaccination.”

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,,,Megan’s “religious” objections are founded on very shaky theological ground. She cites Genesis 1:31, the creation account, as ‘proof’ that vaccines contradict God’s will:

 “God saw all that he had made and ‘it was very good.’ God’s perfect. Nothing further needed.”

[,,,]
If you truly believe that vaccine-free is best, get on a plane with your kids and go to one of the countries where measles, mumps, diphtheria, and polio are not even close to eradicated. Then realize anyone from there can come into your community, your school, your church, your grocery store and start an outbreak — if not in you, than in the vulnerable people you come in contact with you. And if that truly doesn’t bother your conscience, you don’t deserve a religious exemption of any kind, since virtually every religion includes something like this: take care of others as you’d take care of yourself.

Religious exemptions to vaccines shouldn't exist | Finding Faith, Finding Home

Why Do People Commit To Behavior Which Consistently Lacks Moral or Ethical Principles | MyScienceAcademy

 What makes a person feel justified in taking advantage over another? Psychological scientist Gert Cornelissen of the Universitat Pompeu Fabra and colleagues found that people who have an “ends justify the means” mindset are more likely to balance their good and bad deeds, while those who believe that what is right and wrong is a matter of principle are more likely to be consistent in their behavior, even if that behavior is bad.

Previous research from the Stanford Graduate School of Business, found that providing a sense of power to someone instills a black-and-white sense of right and wrong (especially wrong). Once armed with this moral clarity, powerful people then perceive wrongdoing with much less ambiguity than people lacking this power, and punish apparent wrong-doers with more severity than people without power would.

Existing research is mixed when it comes to explaining how previous behavior affects our current moral conduct.

Some researchers find evidence for moral balancing, suggesting that we hover around a moral setpoint. Going over that setpoint by doing a good deed gives us license to engage in more self-interested, immoral, or antisocial behavior. When our moral self-image falls below that setpoint, however, we feel ill at ease and try to compensate by engaging in positive behavior.

What decides whether you will sell out your personal values to the highest bidder? It can be reasonably suggested that there would be no corruption in the world if people refused to sacrifice their value systems for monetary compensation. So why does it happen?

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The results from all three studies showed that participants’ dominant ethical mindset, in combination with their previous behavior, influenced their behavior in the lab.

When given a pot of money to divide, people with an outcome-based mindset allocated fewer coins to their partners after recalling recent ethical behavior. They were also more likely to cheat when given the opportunity to self-report the number of test items they answered correctly. These results suggest that they felt licensed to engage in “bad” behavior after thinking about their good deeds.

People who had a rule-based mindset, on the other hand, gave more coins to their partner and were less likely to cheat after recalling an ethical act, indicating that they were trying to be consistent with their previous behavior.

The relationship seems to be driven, at least in part, by the fact that people with an outcome-based mindset are attending to their moral self-image, or the discrepancy between the self they perceive and the self they aspire to be.

Why Do People Commit To Behavior Which Consistently Lacks Moral or Ethical Principles | MyScienceAcademy

Neanderthal cloning chatter highlights scientific illiteracy | Reuters

This is what happens when you take science (and critical thinking) out of the classrooms and replace it with the intelligent non-intelligent design bullshit,,,

In the interview, Church discussed the technical challenges scientists would face if they tried to clone a Neanderthal, though neither he nor the Der Spiegel article, which was presented as a question and answer exchange, said he intended to do so.

[,,,]
Still, the readiness of bloggers, journalists and readers to believe he was preparing an attempt to clone a Neanderthal, a species closely related to modern humans that went extinct some 30,000 years ago, led Church to ponder scientific literacy.

[,,,]
In the Der Spiegel article, which Church said reported his words accurately, and his recent book "Regenesis: How Synthetic Biology Will Reinvent Nature and Ourselves," Church theorized that studying cloned Neanderthals could help scientists better understand how the human mind works. Scientists have already extracted DNA from Neanderthal bones.

But such experiments would pose a host of ethical concerns - including how many Neanderthals would be created and whether they would be treated as mere study subjects or as beings with their own rights, Church said.

Neanderthal cloning chatter highlights scientific illiteracy | Reuters