16. januar 2003

'Vampire' rumours kill in Malawi A vampire scare, a variation of an old myth now combined with the well-known organ theft urban legend, has surfaced recently in Malawi in southern Africa. The rumour has it that government officials and international aid organisations are stealing people's blood for food. In a modern twist of the old vampire myth, the blood is allegedly stolen to be used medically. Government official Erick Chiwaya was last week attacked and stoned to death by a mob of angry villagers after allegeations that he harboured 'vampires.' President Bakili Muluzi has ordered that the guilty are arrested and persecuted. The government is denying all the charges, so far with little luck it seems. 5:18:12 PM    comment []

Satanists eat children, again Media panics have a tendency to return. The myth about massive Satanic Ritual Abuse is at least two thousand years old, and it is bound to raise its head again. It is a 'documentary' on German ZDF that spawns the latest panic, and German police seems to be taking the case seriously. Perhaps they should consult their collegues in the US or UK, who conducted massive investigations into the phenomenon in the 80s and 90s, and came up with no evidence. The actual case of a cannibalistic murder in Germany some months ago may certainly have contributed to Germans being ripe for a little Satanistic scare now. 4:22:14 PM    comment []

US plague scare over The search for the missing vials believed to have contained bubonic plague samples seems to be over. Officials are pretty tight-lipped, but it appears that the vials had indeed been properly destroyed, but the records had not been updated. Bin Laden does nothing, and yet the world manages to scare itself senseless. That is effective terrorism! 5:52:59 AM    comment []

Venezuelan crisis gets international attention It's become impossible to ignore the hardened Venezuelan crisis, and now even the US comes on board to attempt to negotiate a solution. The somewhat embarressing US support for a failed anti.Chavez coup has lead Washington to keep a low profile so far. The USA, Brazil, Chile, Spain, Mexico and Portugal has set up a group to try to resolve the crisis along with the OAS. It will make a proposal for early elections, hopeful that the 46-day strike that has all but paralysed the country's oil export can be brought to an end. 3:34:35 AM    comment []

The irreverent po-8 You just know the new poem at Tim's For Whom the Blog Tolls has to be good, when the first line is "If Jesus Christ had breasts".... 1:30:32 AM    comment []

The gift that keeps on giving As a bibliophile from childhood, I have admittedly been slacking the last two years or so. Probably it was a reaction to the exhausting (but fascinating) studies that I completed in '00, and my budget for book buying has not been as good as I would like it. Imagine my surprise and joy when I went to the mail office to pick up a "letter" that I had been told was too large to fit in my mailbox, just to receive literally a sack from Amazon. It contained a very welcome gift from a good friend overseas, who picked generously from my Amazon Wish List. With such a load, it is not a surprise that Santa was a bit late this year. My friend obtained for me the following books. Richard Dawkins: Climbing Mount Improbable. I have read almost all earlier books by Richard Dawkins, I only missed this one and Unweaving the Rainbow. Dawkins is a unique populariser of science, and he conveys his enthusiasm for evolution and biology in a very entertaining manner. He is also a razor-sharp thinker, and he simply leaves few readers doubting that there indeed is a solid answer to the question about how life became as it is in this world, and the man who found out exactly how was Charles Darwin. Rodney Stark and William Bainbridge: A Theory of Religion. Those who have not followed the field of history of religions or comparative religion cannot appreciate how ambitious book title this really is. Stark and Bainbridge are two of some few sociologists of religion, in my opinion, who successfully uses a really scientific approach to the study of religion. Their The Rise of Christianity, which I used a bit for my thesis, is a major milestone in understanding of how sects thrive and grow. I am really looking forward to see what they have to say in this book. Rodney Stark: One True God: Historical Consequences of Monotheism. Again by the eminent scholar of religion, and what I say above applies. Robert A. Hinde: Why Gods Persist: A Scientific Approach to Religion. I guess you are beginning to see a pattern here. I have not read anything by Hinde yet, but he comes strongly recommended from people I trust. I am looking forward to see Hinde's answer to the question in the title. As you may guess, I already have my opinions. Susan Blackmore: The Meme Machine. Richard Dawkins, who writes the foreword to this book, coined the term 'meme' in his early book The Selfish Gene. It has become very fashionable, quite overused, and I have failed to become convinced that the good metaphor (and it is a metaphor) really has predictive power and tells us something about the propagation of ideas and human culture that we can't otherwise know. Susan Blackmore's book comes with good recommendations, and I hope she can convince me. I am already well on my way through Dawkins' book, and I hope to report in my blog regularly on what I learn from this stable of books. My heartfelt thanks, my friend. 1:14:56 AM    comment []

The Last Days in the 14th Century All through recorded history there have been people who have pointed to the calamities, horrors and disasters in the world, and preached that this signified an imminent end of the world. This isn't even unique to Christianity, which started off with strong millennial expectations in the 1st century, and for the most part retains the same expectations almost 2000 years later. [Read more...] This is an article I wrote some years back to debunk the commonly heard claim that our time is particularly bad. Not only religious doomsayers, but also secular ones frequently claim that the 20th century was particularly destructive when it came to wars, famines and disease. Nothing could be further from the truth, as this brief overview of the 14th century demonstrates. 12:00:45 AM    comment []

© Copyright 2003 Jan Haugland. Last update: 01.02.03; 00:36:55.