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Jul. 4th, 2005 09:01 pmCouple of snippets on religion from the SMH today.
Firstly, a letter to the editor:
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With global warming named as a sin ("Now global warming is a mortal sin", Herald July 2-3), let's reassess how scientific method has been overtaken by politics and hysteria. On the brighter side, teenagers will now be lining up to do it: "Go on, it's your turn to light the coal."
Larry Mounser, Waverley
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This is nonsense - what the Anglican Church says about global warming has no bearing on the science - but it interested me for the author's attitude to sin. For the Church, destroying the planet is an offence against its Creator: serious stuff. For Larry, it seems to be merely a bit naughty. (This strikes me as the same sort of tactic used by bigots who titteringly call themselves "politically incorrect".)
(The whole idea of sin as evil rather than disobedience or neglect - failure to perform a religious duty, offence against the gods - fascinates me. It seems to have been an innovation of the Hebrews, one of the many new religious ideas they came up with. Was it Sophocles who asked whether an act was good because God commanded it, or did God command it because it was good? That one was a bolt to the brain when I came across it.)
Finally, a piece on whacky pseudoscience magazines must have been running short, as the last two paras were about Witchcraft magazine. I would object to the piss-taking on behalf of my religion, but frankly, it is a rather silly magazine.
Firstly, a letter to the editor:
___
With global warming named as a sin ("Now global warming is a mortal sin", Herald July 2-3), let's reassess how scientific method has been overtaken by politics and hysteria. On the brighter side, teenagers will now be lining up to do it: "Go on, it's your turn to light the coal."
Larry Mounser, Waverley
___
This is nonsense - what the Anglican Church says about global warming has no bearing on the science - but it interested me for the author's attitude to sin. For the Church, destroying the planet is an offence against its Creator: serious stuff. For Larry, it seems to be merely a bit naughty. (This strikes me as the same sort of tactic used by bigots who titteringly call themselves "politically incorrect".)
(The whole idea of sin as evil rather than disobedience or neglect - failure to perform a religious duty, offence against the gods - fascinates me. It seems to have been an innovation of the Hebrews, one of the many new religious ideas they came up with. Was it Sophocles who asked whether an act was good because God commanded it, or did God command it because it was good? That one was a bolt to the brain when I came across it.)
Finally, a piece on whacky pseudoscience magazines must have been running short, as the last two paras were about Witchcraft magazine. I would object to the piss-taking on behalf of my religion, but frankly, it is a rather silly magazine.
