Dennis Prager brings up a challenge about deaths made about the U.S. compared to the rest of the world. Then he challenges his guest Dr. Joel Hay (BIO) regarding Sweden. Good stuff to memorize and have ready to respond to people who think this stuff is accurate. See my post on this: “Infectious Thoughts On ‘The RONA’”.
Author: Papa Giorgio
Infectious Thoughts On “The RONA” (My Facebook Posts)
JUMP TO: INFECTION RATES | HERD IMMUNITY | Uncommon Knowledge Bonus | EXCERPT FROM FACEBOOK CONVO | CAPACITY OF THE HEALTHCARE SYSTEM | Ventilator Myths
- (A quick note, I am not saying we should have done nothing, please do not infer that from what is below. However, I am saying that pushing the shutting down of our infrastructure for anything past two or three weeks ~ is ~ dubious at best.)
As An Aside, this is one of the most important article I believe regarding this whole “pandemic” issue we are dealing with. While it focuses on New York City, this is multiplied ad infinitum around our nation and globe. I would highly recommend this article at CITY JOURNAL:
My computer is down, and its a brand new build (something I did surely found out it is a bad motherboard). But my phone is allowing me opportunity to expand on some thinking. In a conversation about reopening Minnesota I had the other morning. I will include the conversations end below the raw numbers and pics. Take note I start with my old numbers of THE RONA’S estimated infection rates, with newer studies, as well as some HERD IMMUNITY stats/commentary. Enjoy number crunchers. I will add some other Faceboook posts as well.
INFECTION RATES
This portion was the earliest idea to how widespread the virus was. People would continuously mention the KNOWN infection rate of Covid-19 to the KNOWN death rate from Covid. And then in the same breath compare those stats to the ESTIMATED flu infection rate to the SOMEWHAT KNOWN flu death rate. And then they would say “see, Covid-19 is more deadly.” But I wanted to compare the same stats… so this was my way of referenced “estimations” to the infection rate of Covid-19. These were the two referenced numbers:
- There are probably 25 to 50 people who have the virus for every one person who is confirmed. (Dr. Makary BIO | YAHOO)
- That 86% of infections went undocumented (Journal SCIENCE | NEW YORK POST)
The above older work can be found at MY SITE — last updated end of March using above numbers: RPT — Here is an example from my post:
MY ORIGINAL ESTIMATES
(March 30th)
WORLD WIDE CORONA NUMBERS (KNOWN)
35,236 (known deaths) | 740,743 (known cases) = 4.75%
WORLD WIDE CORONA NUMBERS (ESTIMATED)
(There are probably 25 to 50 people who have the virus for every one person who is confirmed. [Dr. Makary BIO | YAHOO])
LOW # 18,561,550 (0.19% death rate with known deaths);
HIGH # 37,123,100 (0.09% death rate with known deaths).
(That 86% of infections went undocumented [SCIENCE | NEW YORK POST])
5,303,300 (0.66% death rate with known deaths).
UNITED STATES CORONA NUMBERS (KNOWN)
2,597 (known deaths) | 144,280 (known cases) = 1.79%
UNITED STATES CORONA NUMBERS (ESTIMATED)
(There are probably 25 to 50 people who have the virus for every one person who is confirmed. [Dr. Makary BIO | YAHOO])
LOW # 3,607,000 (0.07% death rate with known deaths);
HIGH # 7,214,000 (0.03% death rate with known deaths).
(That 86% of infections went undocumented [SCIENCE | NEW YORK POST])
1,030,571 (0.25% death rate with known deaths).
Now, as the testing for antibodies is getting under way, we are finding confirmation for the above numbers. Here are some articles to make the point (as well as some media) HERE ARE SOME IMPORTANT THINGS TO KEEP IN MIND regarding the Santa Clara County information….
Closer to the publishing date of the information garnered from the 3,300 volunteers getting the antibody test in Santa Clara County, there were 32-deaths attributed to the Coronavirus, or, THE RONA. So what we can assume is that as the death toll rises over a time-line, so does the infection rate. Here is what the REASON.COM ARTICLE notes closer to the studies publishing date:
Between 48,000 and 81,000 residents of Santa Clara County, California are likely to have already been infected by the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, suggests a new study by researchers associated with Stanford University Medical School. The researchers tested a sample of 3,330 residents of the county using blood tests to detect antibodies to determine whether or not they had been exposed to the coronavirus. If the researchers’ calculations are correct, that’s really good news. Why? Because that data will help public health officials to get a better handle on just how lethal the coronavirus is, and if researchers are right it’s a lot less lethal than many have feared it to be.
Currently, the U.S. case fatality rate, that is, the percent of people with confirmed diagnoses of COVID-19 who die, is running at 5.2 percent. But epidemiologists have known that a significant proportion of people who are infected are going undetected by the medical system because either they don’t feel sick enough to seek help or are asymptomatic. For example, recent research in Iceland suggests that about 50 percent of people infected with the virus have no symptoms.
In the new study, the researchers sought residents through Facebook to whom they could administer the antibody tests. The results were an unadjusted prevalence of coronavirus antibodies of 1.5 percent. After making various statistical and demographic adjustments, researchers calculated the likely prevalence ranged from 2.49 to 4.16 percent. At the time that these tests were administered, there were about 1,000 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 32* deaths from the disease in Santa Clara County. The upshot is that “these prevalence estimates represent a range between 48,000 and 81,000 people infected in Santa Clara County by early April, 50- 85-fold more than the number of confirmed cases.”
Using these data, the researchers calculated the infection fatality rate, that is, the percent of people infected with the disease who die: “A hundred deaths out of 48,000-81,000 infections corresponds to an infection fatality rate of 0.12-0.2%,” they report.* That’s about the same infection fatality rate the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates for seasonal influenza…..
- COVID-19 Lethality Not Much Different Than Flu, Says New Study: Possible really good news from a population screening antibody test study in Santa Clara County, California (REASON | ABC NEWS)
- Why A Study Showing That Covid-19 Is Everywhere Is Good News: If millions of people were infected weeks ago without dying, the virus must be less deadly than official data suggest (ECONOMIST)
- Medical Experts Appear on ‘Life, Liberty, and Levin’ to Urge Leaders to Reopen America (PJ-MEDIA)
- LA Study: Virus May Be More Widespread, Less Deadly Than Thought (NEWSMAX)
TWITTER: Andrew Bostom
@AlexBerenson “We find strong evidence that COVID-19 is widespread (>28 million) in the US but don’t panic.”
Yes. Reduces case-fatality ratio to ~0.1% https://t.co/DgmM1wDdqx— Andrew Bostom (@andrewbostom) April 14, 2020
YOUTUBE: Tucker Carlson
What is the actual death rate of COVID-19? (Multiple antibody tests mentioned)
See OANN’s video as well: The Best Argument against Govt Mandated COVID-19 Lockdowns
I mention to people that with all the precautions many states are forcing on its population they are retarding the rate of HERD IMMUNITY… which is important.
HERD IMMUNITY
Important because Dr. Fauci mentioned during one of his briefings that this is coming back in the winter season. But because we have chosen as a nation to not allow for normal contact that nature demands of us, we will be dealing with this at a higher rate than say Sweden.
Our governor, Gavin Newsom, thinks he “sounds” scientific — but has no idea [apparently] what or how to achieve “herd immunity.” Here is a MERCURY NEWS article discussing the issue statements by our “fearless” governor:
“The prospect of mass gatherings is negligible at best until we get to herd immunity and we get to a vaccine,” Newsom said. “So large-scale events that bring in hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of strangers altogether across every conceivable difference, health and otherwise, is not in the cards based upon our current guidelines and current expectations.”
Obviously he has no idea what he is saying, and, probably like Biden see’s this as an opportunity to advance a political agenda.
The article mentions no large gatherings until Thanksgiving… but then the flu and Covid-19 season starts again. Are we shutting down our economy (bars, restaurants, small businesses, etc) and flights, beaches, etc., in the 2020-2021 season? (THANKFULLY “Attorney General William Barr warned that states could find themselves in hot water from the Justice Department if their coronavirus lockdowns go ‘too far’.” | BREITBART)
- Why Simply Waiting For Herd Immunity To Covid-19 Isn’t An Option: Waiting for enough people to catch the coronavirus could take a very long time (MIT TECH REVIEW)
- Stockholm Will Reach ‘Herd Immunity’ Within Weeks (TELEGRAPH | AL ARABIYA)
- Sweden Resisted A Lockdown, And Its Capital Stockholm Is Expected To Reach ‘Herd Immunity’ In Weeks (CNBC)
Sweden has allowed nature to provide a natural defense to future Covid-19 outbreaks. By doing so, the next time this comes around (2020-2021) Sweden will be the most prepared out of the Western Nations. Bravo Sweden, and they took the idea that destroying their economy was not the wisest of choices.
JOHN STOSSEL
UNCOMMON KNOWLEDGE BONUS
March 27th
April 17th
Steve and I agree on a lot, I do not wish to put Steve here in a bad light… he is a guy that I would probably enjoy conversation with over a beer or two (or three):
EXCERPT FROM FACEBOOK CONVO
(ME)
- Steve W — you do know Steve that the same amount of death from and infection due to Covid-19 exists under the trend line of doing nothing and the most strict quarentine rules…. right? In other words, we are not saving lives. And, in fact, we have made it worse for our economy next fall/winter because it is coming back as it makes its rounds around the world.
(STEVE W)
- Sean Giordano I have heard that said but not seen it from a credible source. So I think that is false.
(ME)
- Steve W what is false?
(STEVE W)
- Sean Giordano “the same amount of death from and infection due to Covid-19 exists under the trend line of doing nothing”
(ME)
Steve Wallace now you are saying don’t listen to Dr. Fauci?
Many bemoan Trump for not listening to him (even though he has), and some I meet do not support Fauci in the idea that this was to elongate the process as to not put any undue stress on our health care system. Even though he clearly announced multiple times this was the reason to do so
WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM mentions the following, and all the graphs of the United States shown by Doctors Fauci and Birx have all used this idea as well (graph below from CDC and WEF)
CHRIS WALLACE: All right. You talk about slowing the virus down. You talk a lot, and I’ve very used to this now, you can either have a bump like this of cases or you could make it maybe the same total cases, but it’s a much more gradual and slower and longer curve. I want to put up some numbers. We have in this country about 950,000 hospital beds, and about 45,000 beds in Intensive Care Unit. How worried are you that this virus is going to overwhelm hospitals, not just beds, but ventilators? We only have 160,000 ventilators. And could we be in a situation where you have to ration who gets the bed, who gets the ventilator?
DR. FAUCI: OK. So let me put it in a way that it doesn’t get taken out of context. When people talk about modeling where outbreaks are going, the modeling is only as good as the assumptions you put into the model. And what they do, they have a worst-case scenario, a best-case scenario, and likely where it’s going to be. If we have a worst-case scenario, we’ve got to admit it, we could be overwhelmed. Are we going to have a worst-case scenario? I don’t think so. I hope not.
What are we doing to not have that worst-case scenario? That’s when you get into the things that we’re doing. We’re preventing infections from going in with some rather stringent travel restrictions. And we’re doing containment and mitigation from within. So, at a worst-case scenario, anywhere in the world, no matter what country you are, you won’t be prepared. So our job is to not let that worst-case scenario happen.
(…. STILL ME….)
STEVE W for you not to understand the goal of all this, and then get on here sharing insights is itself insightful. I am not blaming you STEVE… I just see this fundamental misunderstanding of the underlying factors and goals of this whole endeavor of bending the curve as applicable to MANY A PERSON in these discussions here and elsewhere on social media. I am giving you, in fact, the most respectful benefit of a doubt, but am merely in conversation with you at this moment. This conversation is just multiplied (others are having) across social media many fold. Blessings to you and yours friend. Yet, this foundational view is not known well by others… that is, the reason behind flattening the curve as well as the data underneath the trend line.
(CLICK TO ENLARGE)
Here I wish to switch gears a bit and start to discuss another “info graphic” post from MY SITES FACEBOOK I shared with my readers. And since the entire idea behind “flattening the curve” was to keep the health and hospital system working well by not getting inundated all at once, this should have lasted two or three weeks. Not as long as it has — our economy is important too! Damnit!
CAPACITY OF THE HEALTHCARE SYSTEM
The following was compiled after a conversation I had on Facebook. It touches on some of the issues above. Enjoy
- I note the bell curve because many are under the false impression we are doing this to “save lives.” This was never the case.
The quarantine was to lessen the apex of the bell curve as to not put pressure on the hospital/health system. The same amount of people in the elongated “quarantine bell curve” (the trend-line) would die and get sick. In other words, the same statistics exist below the line (POWERLINE). Here is a site cataloging the hospitalizations for the rona that POWERLINE used – US CORONAVIRUS HOSPITALIZATIONS …they used both the CDC site and this one, but the CDC site has lower hospitalizations, so they opted for the most updated numbers. WHICH AS OF APRIL 21ST STAND AT 84,292 HOSPITALIZATIONS FROM JANUARY TILL NOW. This is important, because, the flu season of 2017-2018 we saw 810,000 hospitalization, and our health system didn’t collapse. Nor did the Swine Flu of 2009-to-2010, which saw 60-million American infected and 300,000 hospitalizations.
No exaggerated respirator shortages then.
SOME VENTILATOR MYTHS
- The Ventilator Shortage That Wasn’t (NATIONAL REVIEW)
- Report: New York City Auctioned Off Ventilator Stockpile (BREITBART)
- New York City auctioned off extra ventilators due to cost of maintenance: report (THE HILL)
- Gov Cuomo Refused To Buy Ventilators In 2015 Despite Knowing They’d Be Needed (INDEPENDENT SENTINEL)
- Trump Was Right: Cuomo Admits New York Has ‘Stockpile’ of Ventilators, Says ‘We Don’t Need Them Yet’ (DIAMOND and SILK | BREITBART | WESTERN JOURNAL)
(What was different I wonder? Maybe the Orange Man Bad Syndrome?)
This then may explain why all the field hospital’s the ARMY CORE OF ENGINEERS built are being dismantled without a single bed being used.
- The panic and fear among the people who cannot be bothered to read the actual statistics about this pandemic is what should concern most preppers. In fact, this virus has been so overhyped that the Army’s field hospital in Seattle, an “epicenter” of the pandemic has closed after three days without seeing one single COVID-19 patient. According to a report by Military.com, the hastily built field hospital set up by the Army in Seattle’s pro football stadium is shutting down without ever seeing a patient. [….] The decision to close the Seattle field hospital comes amid early signs that the number of new cases could be hitting a plateau in New York, the epicenter of the coronavirus epidemic in the U.S., and other states. At a news conference Friday, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said, “Overall, New York is flattening the curve.” — ZERO HEDGE (see: MILITARY TIMES | DAILY CALLER)
- Unlike the Mercy, the Comfort is treating COVID-19 patients on board as well as patients who do not have the virus. The ship has treated more than 120 people since it arrived March 30, and about 50 of those have been discharged, said Lt. Mary Catherine Walsh. The ship removed half of its 1,000 beds so it could isolate and treat coronavirus patients. [The Mercy has seen 48 patients, all non-Covid related] (THE STAR)
And literally handfulls of patients on the Comfort (New York City) and the Comfort (Los Angeles) — *see comment below. There was never a shortage of respirators (NATIONAL REVIEW), and we may surpass the 2018-to-2019 flu death rate, but come nowhere close to the 2017-to-2018 flu death rate:
(CLICK TO ENLARGE)
And it seems that we are reaching a plateau with The Rona, so there is good news in this regard (POWERLINE).
* Here is a comment from the Military Times article from a few days ago:
So, why did we spend all that Taxpayer’s money to move the Comfort to NYC and all the added Military medical personnel to staff the Javitt’s Center? Because Cuomo was crying WOLF.
“So far, the thousands of beds provided by a converted convention center and a hospital ship have not been needed, but the extra personnel are coming in handy for the city’s civilian hospitals.
About 200 doctors, nurses, respiratory therapists and others are working in New York’s medical centers, where bed space has not been overwhelmed, but where hospital-acquired coronavirus cases have sidelined civilian staff.”
American Contempt for Liberty | Walter Williams
Throughout history, personal liberty, free markets, and peaceable, voluntary exchanges have been roundly denounced by tyrants and often greeted with suspicion by the general public. Unfortunately, argues Dr. Walter E. Williams, Americans have increasingly accepted the tyrannical ideas of reduced private property rights and reduced rights to profits, and have become enamored with restrictions on personal liberty and control by government.
“Redlining” | Thomas Sowell
BANK LOANS
Group Disparities
In the course of a long and heated campaign in politics and in the media during the early twenty-first century, claiming that there was rampant discrimination against black home mortgage loan applicants, data from various sources were cited repeatedly, showing that black applicants for the most desirable kind of mortgage were turned down substantially more often than white applicants for those same mortgages.
In the year 2000, for example, data from the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights showed that 44.6 percent of black applicants were turned down for those mortgages, while only 22.3 percent of white applicants were turned down.1 These and similar statistics from other sources set off widespread denunciations of mortgage lenders, and demands that the government “do something” to stop rampant racial discrimination in mortgage lending institutions.
The very same report by the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, which showed that blacks were turned down for conventional mortgages at twice the rate for whites, contained other statistics showing that whites were turned down for those same mortgages at a rate nearly twice that for “Asian Americans and Native Hawaiians.”
While the rejection rate for white applicants was 22.3 percent, the rejection rate for Asian Americans and Native Hawaiians was 12.4 percent.2 But such data seldom, if ever, saw the light of day in most newspapers or on most television news programs, for which the black-white difference was enough to convince journalists that racial bias was the reason.
That conclusion fit existing preconceptions, apparently eliminating a need to check whether it also fit the facts. This one crucial omission enabled the prevailing preconception to dominate discussions in politics, in the media and in much of academia.
One of the very few media outlets to even consider alternative explanations for the black-white statistical differences was the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, which showed that 52 percent of blacks had credit scores so low that they would qualify only for the less desirable subprime mortgages, as did 16 percent of whites. Accordingly, 49 percent of blacks in the data cited by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution ended up with subprime mortgages, as did 13 percent of whites and 10 percent of Asians.3 In short, the three groups’ respective rankings in terms of the kinds of mortgage loans they could get was similar to their respective rankings in average credit ratings.
But such statistics, so damaging to the prevailing preconception that intergroup differences in outcomes showed racial bias, were almost never mentioned in most of the mass media. With credit ratings being what they were, the statistics were consistent with Discrimination IA (judging each applicant as an individual), but were reported in the media, in politics and in academia as proof of Discrimination II, arbitrary bias against whole groups.
While the omitted statistics would have undermined the prevailing preconception that white lenders were biased against black applicants, that preconception at least seemed plausible, even if it failed to stand up under closer scrutiny. But the idea that white lenders would also be discriminating against white applicants, and in favor of Asian applicants, lacked even plausibility. What was equally implausible was that black-owned banks were discriminating against black applicants. But in fact black-owned banks turned down black applicants for home mortgage loans at a higher rate than did white-owned banks.4
[1] United States Commission on Civil Rights, Civil Rights and the Mortgage Crisis (Washington: U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, 2009), p. 53.
[2] Ibid. See also page 61; Robert B. Avery and Glenn B. Canner, “New Information Reported under HMDA and Its Application in Fair Lending Enforcement,” Federal Reserve Bulletin, Summer 2005, p. 379; Wilhelmina A. Leigh and Danielle Huff, “African Americans and Homeownership: The Subprime Lending Experience, 1995 to 2007,” Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, November 2007, p. 5.
[3] Jim Wooten, “Answers to Credit Woes are Not in Black and White,” Atlanta Journal-Constitution, November 6,2007, p. 12A.
[4] Harold A. Black, M. Cary Collins and Ken B. Cyree, “Do Black-Owned Banks Discriminate Against Black Borrowers?” Journal of Financial Services Research, Vol. 11, Issue 1-2 (February 1997), pp. 189-204. Here, as elsewhere, it should not be assumed that two unexamined samples are equal in the relevant variable& In this case, there is no reason to assume that those blacks who applied to black banks were the same as those blacks who applied to white banks.
Thomas Sowell, Discrimination and Disparities, Revised and Enlarged Edition (New York, NY: Basic Books, 2019), 88-89 (added references).
With Michelle Obama recently railing on White Americans for “white flight” from her Chicago neighborhood as a kid, Larry explains his experience with the same phenomenon growing up in Los Angeles. However, he describes a very different experience with the issue of race relations, and it’s not as black and white as one would think.
BACKGROUND CHECKS
To take an extreme example of Discrimination 1b, for the sake of illustration, if 40 percent of the people in Group X are alcoholics and 1 percent of the people in Group Y are alcoholics, an employer may well prefer to hire only people from Group Y for work where an alcoholic would be not only ineffective but dangerous. This would mean that a majority of the people in Group X — 60 percent in this case — would be denied employment, even though they are not alcoholics.
What matters, crucially, to the employer is the cost of determining which individual is or is not an alcoholic, when job applicants all show up sober on the day when they are seeking employment.
This also matters to the customers who buy the employer’s products and to society as a whole. If alcoholics produce a higher proportion of products that turn out to be defective, that is a cost to customers, and that cost may take different forms. For example, the customer could buy the product and then discover that it is defective. Alternatively, defects in the product might be discovered at the factory and discarded. In this case, the customers will be charged higher prices for the products that are sold, since the costs of defective products that are discovered and discarded at the factory must be covered by the prices charged for the reliable products that pass the screening test and are sold.
To the extent that alcoholics are not only less competent but dangerous, the costs of those dangers are paid by either fellow employees who face those dangers on the job or by customers who buy dangerously defective products, or both. In short, there are serious costs inherent in the situation, so that either 60 percent of the people in Group X or employers or customers— or all three groups— end up paying the costs of the alcoholism of 40 percent of the people in Group X
This is certainly not judging each job applicant as an individual, so it is not Discrimination I in the purest sense of Discrimination Ia. On the other hand, it is also not Discrimination II, in the sense of decisions based on a personal bias or antipathy toward that group. The employer might well have personal friends from Group X, based on far more knowledge of those particular individuals than it is possible to get about job applicants, without prohibitive costs.
The point here is neither to justify nor condemn the employer but to classify different decision-making processes, so that their implications and consequences can be analyzed separately. If judging each person as an individual is Discrimination 1a, we can classify as Discrimination 1b basing decisions about groups on information that is correct for that group, though not necessarily correct for every individual in that group, nor necessarily even correct for a majority of the individuals in that group.
A real-life example of the effect of the cost of knowledge in this context is a study which showed that, despite the reluctance of many employers to hire young black males, because a significant proportion of them have criminal records (Discrimination 1b), those particular employers who automatically did criminal background checks on all their employees (Discrimination 1a) tended to hire more young black males than did other employers.1
In other words, where the nature of the work made criminal background checks worth the cost for all employees, it was no longer necessary to use group information to assess whether individual young black job applicants had a criminal background. This made young black job applicants without a criminal background more employable than before.
More is involved here than simply a question of nomenclature. It has implications for practical policies in the real world. Many observers, hoping to help young black males have more employment opportunities, have advocated prohibiting employers from asking job applicants questions about a criminal record. Moreover, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has sued employers who do criminal background checks on job applicants, on grounds that this was racial discrimination, even when it was applied to all job applicants, regardless of race.2 Empirically, however, criminal background checks provided more employment opportunities for young black males.
[1] Harry J. Holzer, Steven Raphael, and Michael A. Stoll, “Perceived Criminality, Criminal Background Checks, and the Racial Hiring Practices of Employers,” Journal of Law and Economics, Vol. 49, No. 2 (October 2006), pp. 452, 473.
[2] Jason L. Riley, “Jobless Blacks Should Cheer Background Checks,” Wall Street Journal, August 23, 2013, p. All; Paul Sperry, “Background Checks Are Racist?” Investor’s Business Daily, March 28, 2014, p. Al.
Thomas Sowell, Discrimination and Disparities (New York, NY: Basic Books, 2018), 23-25 (added references).
Rich or poor, most people agree that wealth disparities exist. Thomas Sowell discusses the origins and impacts of those wealth disparities in his new book, Discrimination and Disparities in this episode of Uncommon Knowledge.
Sowell explains his issues with the relatively new legal standard of “disparate impact” and how it disregards the American legal principle of “burden of proof.” Sowell and Robinson discuss how economic outcomes vary greatly across individuals and groups and that concepts like “disparate impact” fail to take into account these variations.
They chat about the impact of nuclear families on the IQs of individuals, as studies have not only shown that children raised by two parents tend to have higher levels of intelligence but also that first-born and single children have even higher intelligence levels than those of younger siblings, indicating that the time and attention given by parents to their children greatly impacts the child’s future more than factors like race, environment, or genetics. Sowell talks about his book in which he wrote extensively about National Merit Scholarship finalists who more often than not were the first-born or only child in a family.
Sowell and Robinson go on to discuss historical instances of discrimination and how those instances affected economic and social issues within families, including discrimination created by housing laws in the Bay Area. They discuss unemployment rates, violence, the welfare state in regards to African American communities, and more.
The Housing Crisis of 2008 Revisited
THOMAS SOWELL UPDATE
Thomas Sowell discusses how we got into the current economic disaster that developed out of the economics and politics of the housing boom and bust.
This is an older topic that was freshly visited by the Sage of South Central (Larry Elder) because of a caller calling him disingenuous. I edit his segment on it — directly below — and add links to many resources for further study. Enjoy, and please, pass along to Democrat friends and family that have a skewed view of this ~ blaming corporations, banks, or Wall Street.
The line-up of video used in the above Larry Elder audio is as follows:
- Bill Clinton vs. Barney Frank on Freddie/Fannie
- Flashback » Maxine Waters And Dems Defend Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac
- How Housing Policy Caused the Financial Crisis
- Timeline shows Bush, McCain warning Dems of financial and housing crisis; meltdown
Here is some of the resources I have previously posted on my site — bringing them to one place for the furtherance of putting liberals in their place.
- AEI Scholar Peter J. Wallison Talks Housing Crisis ~ Larry Elder interviews Peter J. Wallison, a lawyer and the Arthur F. Burns Fellow in Financial Policy Studies at the American Enterprise Institute. He specializes in financial markets deregulation.
This is a good montage proving what is being attributed to the Democrats:
Larry Elder on his FACEBOOK notes some of these articles, so I will as well:
- This is Not George Bush’s Financial Crisis: Democrats Cannot Evade Responsibility For Much Longer
- “Hidden in Plain Sight” ~ Q&A with Peter Wallison on the 2008 financial crisis and why it might happen again
The following are very similar in substance (much of the video used at least). However, it is commented on and reordered a bit to make varying points that differ substantially:
- The Financial Crisis: Lets Go to the Video Tape…
- Democrats block regulation contributing to the 2008 housing financial crisis
This is merely a caller into the Michael Medved explaining succinctly the issue: Best Call of the Week. Likewise, here is a 30-second rebuttal by Larry Elder of the issue on his radio show: A Quick Rebuff to Freddie Fannie Charge. And finally here is Judge Andrew Napolitano’s speaking to the issue:
I hope this helps people settle old conversations.
Thomas Sowell asks three questions of the left with a claim that it is rare that the answers are readily available. This video frames the housing market crash from 2008 and challenges those on both the Right and Left. When a social policy is adopted and becomes a top priority – asking honest questions is the only way of ensuring you remain objective. The radical left today appears to run into difficulty when those same questions are asked. I certainly don’t agree with all of Sowell’s positions on every topic, but the questions are worthy of being asked.
How the democrats caused the financial crisis: starring Bill Clinton’s HUD secretary Andrew Cuomo. From Carter through Obama… banks didn’t want to be seen as racist, and ACORN w/ Obama pushing for more “affirmative action loans,” caused the Housing crisis.
Here is more from Moonbattery:
Old news, Democrats will scoff. But if you’re like me and lost the equivalent of years of work in the 2008 meltdown, you might still be interested in who was responsible. The truth is coming to light:
In a just-released book, former FCIC [Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission] member Peter Wallison says that a Democratic Congress worked with the commission’s Democratic chairman to whitewash the government’s central role in the mortgage debacle. The conspiracy helped protect some of the Democrats’ biggest stars from scrutiny and accountability while helping justify the biggest government takeover of the financial sector since the New Deal.
Wallison’s sobering, trenchantly written “Hidden in Plain Sight: What Really Caused the World’s Worst Financial Crisis and Why It Could Happen Again” reveals that the Democrat-led panel buried key data proving that the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and other federal agencies pushed the housing market over the subprime cliff. The final FCIC report put the blame squarely on Wall Street.
In 2009, then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi appointed her California pal Phil Angelides, a long-time Democrat operative, to lead the commission. The fix seemed to be in, and Wallison’s account of the inner workings of the 10-member body confirms it.
See IBD for details on how the phony $10 million probe came up with the predetermined verdict that free enterprise caused the collapse, which in reality was the result of the federal government inflicting Affirmative Action on the mortgage industry.
Here is a response from a friend on FaceBook:
- Happened almost 8 years into George W”s watch after controlling both Houses from 95-07. Hogwash and you know it!
My Response (edited):
…He (Bush and the Republicans) tried multiple times to change the now apparent issue…. 17-times to be exact:
2007 August: President Bush emphatically calls on Congress to pass a reform package for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, saying “first things first when it comes to those two institutions. Congress needs to get them reformed, get them streamlined, get them focused, and then I will consider other options.” (President George W. Bush, Press Conference, the White House, 8/9/07)
August: Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Chairman Christopher Dodd ignores the President’s warnings and calls on him to “immediately reconsider his ill-advised” position. (Eric Dash, “Fannie Mae’s Offer To Help Ease Credit Squeeze Is Rejected, As Critics Complain Of Opportunism,” The New York Times, 8/11/07)
[….]
September: Democrats in Congress forget their previous objections to GSE reforms, as Senator Dodd questions “why weren’t we doing more, why did we wait almost a year before there were any significant steps taken to try to deal with this problem? … I have a lot of questions about where was the administration over the last eight years.” (Dawn Kopecki, “Fannie Mae, Freddie ‘House Of Cards’ Prompts Takeover,” Bloomberg, 9/9/08)
Conservative-Republican ideals ~ [if] allowed to be implemented into law would have stopped this. And as Clinton clearly stated:
And as other video from committee meetings show, the first being Republicans bringing to light the issue:
As well as Democrats BLOCKING legislation that Republicans were trying to impose to stop the failure:
Some “Rona” Antibody Updates
CHICAGO CITY WIRE has this story (with thanks to FREE REPUBLIC):
A phlebotomist working at Roseland Community Hospital said Thursday that 30% to 50% of patients tested for the coronavirus have antibodies while only around 10% to 20% of those tested have the active virus.
Sumaya Owaynat, a phlebotomy technician, said she tests between 400 and 600 patients on an average day in the parking lot at Roseland Community Hospital. Drive-thru testing is from 9 a.m. to noon and 1 to 4 p.m. each day. However, the hospital has a limited number of tests they can give per day.
Owaynat said the number of patients coming through the testing center who appear to have already had coronavirus and gotten over it is far greater than those who currently have the disease.
“A lot of people have high antibodies, which means they had the coronavirus but they don’t have it anymore and their bodies built the antibodies,” Owaynat told Chicago City Wire.
Antibodies in the bloodstream reveal that a person has already had the coronavirus and may be immune to contracting the virus again.
If accurate, this means the spread of the virus may have been underway in the Roseland community – and the state and country as a whole – prior to the issuance of stay at home orders and widespread business closures in mid-March which have crippled the national economy….
A hat-tip to an unnamed friend from Facebook who didn’t want to post a DAILY WIRE article on her Facebook for fear of retaliation…
…At a hospital in Chicago, a non-randomized sample found that 30-50% of patients tested for COVID-19 have antibodies in their system, suggesting they already had the virus and have potential immunity.
“A phlebotomist working at Roseland Community Hospital said Thursday that 30% to 50% of patients tested for the coronavirus have antibodies while only around 10% to 20% of those tested have the active virus,” Chicago City Wire reported Thursday.
“Sumaya Owaynat, a phlebotomy technician, said she tests between 400 and 600 patients on an average day in the parking lot at Roseland Community Hospital. Drive-thru testing is from 9 a.m. to noon and 1 to 4 p.m. each day. However, the hospital has a limited number of tests they can give per day,” the report detailed. “Owaynat said the number of patients coming through the testing center who appear to have already had coronavirus and gotten over it is far greater than those who currently have the disease.”
“A lot of people have high antibodies, which means they had the coronavirus but they don’t have it anymore, and their bodies built the antibodies,” Owaynat told Chicago City Wire.
[….]
An antibody test study is reportedly underway in California by researchers at Stanford University.
“Researchers at Stanford Medicine are working to find out what proportion of Californians have already had COVID-19. The new study could help policymakers make more informed decisions during the coronavirus pandemic,” KSBW 8 News reported. “The team tested 3,200 people at three Bay Area locations on Saturday using an antibody test for COVID-19 and expect to release results in the coming weeks.”
This study mentioned at Stanford was brought up in conversation last week by my oldest son, and we are all (as a family) curious if the most vulnerable already had it as my father-in-law was pretty sick a few months back. Here is Victor Davis Hanson speaking to this issue with reference to the Stanford study as well (VDH is part of the Hoover Institution).
This article from PATCH is a bit critical of Hanson, but all-in-all, the common sense factor is there for me. Let me just say I am not convinced by the rejection of something stated without a refutation of the evidences mentioned. Chicago is already disproving Patch’s “expert input,” plus, I do not have to be an evolutionary biologist to critique neo-Darwinian theory, nor a woman to discuss the factual ending of a human life in the womb.
I am a fan, however, of this CLASSIC statement by William F. Buckley:
- “I would rather be governed by the first 2000 people in the Boston telephone directory than by the 2000 people on the faculty of Harvard University.”
(See also this MERCURY NEWS article on what Stanford has and is doing):
….“When you add it all up it would be naïve to think that California did not have some exposure,” Hanson told KSBW 8.
Stanford Medicine is conducting a study that may back up his assertion.
Stanford researchers took blood samples from approximately 3,200 volunteers in Santa Clara County on Friday and Saturday according to The Stanford Daily.
The test will show whether someone has been infected with the virus, including those who experienced mild or no symptoms, Stanford Associate Professor of Medicine Eran Bendavid told The Stanford Daily.
“It’s hard to stand up in this epidemic and say, ‘Look, we really don’t know if this epidemic is impending Armageddon,'” Bendavid said. “In order to know and reduce that uncertainty, you need numbers.”
Hanson believes the numbers could show that more Californians have been exposed to the virus than was previously known.
“One less-mentioned hypothesis is that California, as a front-line state, may have rather rapidly developed a greater level of herd immunity than other states, given that hints, anecdotes, and some official indications from both China and Italy that, again, the virus may well have been spreading abroad far earlier than the first recorded case in the U.S. —and likely from the coasts inward,” he wrote in a March 31 National Review column.
“So given the state’s unprecedented direct air access to China, and given its large expatriate and tourist Chinese communities, especially in its huge denser metropolitan corridors in Los Angeles and the Bay Area, it could be that what thousands of Californians experienced as an unusually “early” and “bad” flu season might have also reflected an early coronavirus epidemic, suggesting that many more Californians per capita than in other states may have acquired immunity to the virus.”…
AMERICAN THINKER joins the fray as well:
…In my home state of Colorado, “Health officials now believe the new coronavirus was circulating in Colorado as early as mid-January, about six weeks before the state even had the ability to test people for the disease.” These individuals, if extremely sick, might test negative for influenza and other known viruses, yet might still have a rough course just as the current COVID-19 patients are experiencing.
Again, if cases were circulating in the U.S. in mid-January, first cases were a month or two earlier, some symptomatic, some asymptomatic, but all below the radar.
Where were these first patients coming from? U.S. Customs and Border Protection reports, “Some 14,000 people flew into the U.S. from China each day — almost 5 million for that year.” Let me repeat, 14,000 people each day.
This was likely higher during the Christmas holidays with American students studying in China, and vice versa, returning home in December, then back to school in January. How many of these young people were asymptomatic carriers, bringing the Wuhan virus to parents, grandparents, and their professors?…
Best Gun For Any Type Of Shooting
Via MINUTE MAN:
Who Stands To Benefit from “The Rona” (China? Democrats? Socialism?)
(Why I now call it THE RONA)
FIRST and FOREMOST, I wish to set up the two audios well, as, I think the articles linked are MUST READS, and they describe the possibility of the post by OLD SCHOOL PATRIOT (Col Allen West, BTW) So, here is the description portion used for both Rush Limbaugh audios:
First, let’s lay up the main story with some earlier observations via the WASHINGTON TIMES:
- Coronavirus May Have Originated In Lab Linked To China’s Biowarfare Program (WASHINGTON TIMES, January 26th — follow the two links that say “HERE” — also LINKED BELOW):
- Coronavirus Lab Escape Theory Advances (WASHINGTON TIMES, April 8th)
CNN has an interesting story as well regarding some arrests of Harvard University faculty that may be involved in bolstering the lab in Wuhan’s research:
- Harvard Professor Among Three Charged With Lying About Chinese Government Ties (CNN, January 28th)
And finally — NATIONAL REVIEW notes an arrest by Border Patrol and detailing of suspicious activity in transporting SARS and MERS in and out of our country:
- Border Patrol Stopped a Chinese Biologist Carrying Viable SARS, MERS Viruses at Detroit Airport in 2018 (NATIONAL REVIEW, March 30th)
THIS ALL leads to this post by COL. ALLEN WEST titled, “SOMETHING SMELLS“.
EXCERPT:
…It cannot be debated, we have been hit with a massive biological agent. The question is not whether there was intent, but rather the level of intent. Sure, there are such things as coincidences, but in this specific case, nah. The indicators, trends, and warnings all lead to a simple, and reasonable, deduction.
Wuhan to Shanghai = 839 km
Wuhan to Beijing = 1,152 km
Wuhan to Milan = 8,684 km
Wuhan to NY = 12,033 km
The coronavirus started in Wuhan, yet there has been no major effect of Chinese coronavirus in nearby Beijing or Shanghai. Yet, there have been many deaths in Italy, Iran, European countries, and America. All business areas of China are now safe, so declared by the Communist Chinese government.
America is not just blaming China without a reason. The virology lab that does research on bats that carry the coronavirus is in Wuhan. The Chinese Army’s biological research lab is in Wuhan. The university that is connected to the Harvard University biology and chemistry professor who was arrested in January is the Wuhan University of Technology. As for the two doctors who treated the first cases of the Wuhan coronavirus, one is dead, the other is missing.
Even today, India is locked down, yet all the cities of China are open. China has also announced the opening of Wuhan beginning April 8th. Not a single leader in China has tested positive for the deadly coronavirus.
The virus has ruined many economies around the world. Many have had to close their borders in an attempt to contain and control the spread of the coronavirus. Thousands have lost their lives, millions have been exposed to this pestilence, countless people have been locked in their homes, and many countries have placed their citizens on lockdown.
The coronavirus originated in the city of Wuhan in China. We are told its origin is out of a wet market. Yet, these same wet markets remain open. Did someone release one of the lab bats into the local wet market? The Wuhan coronavirus has now reached every corner of the world, but the virus did not have deadly consequences in China’s capital of Beijing nor China’s economic capital of Shanghai, located in close proximity to Wuhan itself.
Or maybe it has and we just do not know about it?…
I found this post compelling due to the odd — to say the least — activity surrounding these viruses and this lab in Wuhan. Fact Checks of the story from January are rushed to a judgement based on incomplete evidence and a theory that it is a bio-weapon, strictly speaking. Here are two article refuting such nonsense (via the January Washington Times article):
- Experts Know The New Coronavirus Is Not A Bioweapon. They Disagree On Whether It Could Have Leaked From A Research Lab (BULLETIN OF THE ATOMIC SCIENCES, March 30th)
- The Proximal Origin Of SARS-CoV-2 (JOURNAL NATURE, March 17th)
All this is VERY interesting indeed!
This whole adventure is a key time for Democrats to try and defeat Trump by various means. One being vote by mail and early voting (all harvested of course). Here are some articles about this:
- Voting by Mail Is a Terrible Democrat Idea that Invites Fraud (BREITBART)
- California Compromised (RPT)
- Voter Fraud Is A Huge Problem In The Democratic Party (LIFESITE NEWS)
- Voter Fraud – Guess Who? (RPT) — older post regarding Democrats voting fraudulently – in general
- Coronavirus: Arizona Democrats Push for All-Mail Voting in 2020 Election (BREITBART)
- Democrats Want To Use The Coronavirus Relief Bill To Seize Control Of Elections (WASHINGTON EXAMINER)
- Citing Coronavirus Threat, Texas Democrats Sue To Expand Mail-In Voting (TEXAS TRIBUNE)
- Democrats Introduce Bill To Expand Early And By-Mail Voting (HUFFPOST)
ALL THAT BEING SAID, here are the two audios I think are relevant considering the above:
China Back To Normal (Limbaugh Part 1)
Rush Limbaugh notes that the media, some “scientific acolytes,” and political figures seem to want to hurt Trump bad enough that they would root and actively work against our economy. But the reason I am using this audio is also to bolster the idea that it almost seems to be a purposeful manipulation against Europe and the Americas. Not saying this was virus was released purposefully (see PART 2 below), but that if an accident, it seems to be used to benefit China. Not a conspiracy as much as an observation. This description will essentially be the same for Parts 1 and 2…
Rush Refutes MSM’s Conspiracy Charges (Part 2)
A caller floats a plausible theory that segues into a response to the Media (and Democrats and #NeverTrumpers) saying he [the MahaRushdi] said the virus was a Chinese chemical bio-weapon unleashed on the U.S. purposefully. This is a good example of how the media and the “fact checkers” distort reality.
Drive Thru Churches (The “RONA” 2020 Update)
(First posted in 2011)
Good example of most Christians these days.
I am updating this post with recent events — the above is “orthodox humor,” the below is of a more serious [secular] matter. (The above is technically MORE serious, as the watering down of the Gospel Message would be more “life-threatening through all eternity.”)
Many churches are offering drive-thru prayer — and one church is even planning a drive-in service with a jumbotron — as congregations are no longer able to meet in person for large gatherings to limit the spread of the coronavirus outbreak.
Troy Brewer, senior pastor of 5,000-member OpenDoor Church in Burleson, Texas, in Fort Worth area, told Fox News the circumstances may hinder their outreach globally but now is the time to focus on the local community.
“We want to love people, bless people, and we want to pray,” Brewer said. “We want to be available to people and serve them.”…
(FOX NEWS)
I think a wonderful — related — article to read is THE FEDERALISTS’S article titled: Why It’s Unconstitutional To Keep Grocery Stores Open While Closing Churches.
RIGHT SCOOP has an article detailing how a county in Los Angeles is stopping drive through churches:
…Notice San Bernardino county is banning actions where people actually stay in their cars. The first is a “drive-up” church service, where people stay in their cars as they attend an outdoor church service. The other is “driving parades”, where people just drive by someone’s home in a line and wave in order to celebrate a birthday party or some other kind of event.
Basically, if you go out for any non-essential service, you risk being fined or put in jail! And if you do go out for essential services, you must wear a face covering or, again, risk a fine or jail time.
I’m all about trying to get people to stay at home to halt the spread of the coronavirus. But threatening people with jail time or a huge fine when they are protected in their vehicles or for not wearing a mask is just ridiculous and fascistic. Welcome to the People’s Republic of San Bernardino.
Why “Rona”?
Believing In God Is Natural ~ Atheism is Not (Updated)
(ORIGINALLY POSTED APRIL OF 2016 | UPDATE ADDED)
We ARE programmed to believe one way and through the creative power (and infinite genius) of God, get to choose this natural tendency or to cover it up with our sinful, selfish nature that Romans 1 alludes to by numbing our faculties with an whole array of options.
What else does this craving, and this helplessness, proclaim but that there was once in man a true happiness, of which all that now remains is the empty print and trace? This he tries in vain to fill with everything around him, seeking in things that are not there the help he cannot find in those that are, though none can help, since this infinite abyss can be filled only with an infinite and immutable object; in other words, by God himself.
Blaise Pascal (Pensees 10.148)
Deborah Keleman studies cognitive development in children and Josh Rottman is a PhD student working with her. In a chapter in “Science and the World’s Religions.” they write (p. 206-207):
- …religion primarily stems from within the person rather than from external, socially organised sources …. evolved components of the human mind tend to lead people towards religiosity early in life.
Before continuing I just want to make a point, none of them by myself but brought here to review by myself. It has to do with merely assuming the evolutionist position, if true, makes theism true and atheism anathema to the survival of the species. For instance, Patricia Churchland notes what the brains primary chore is:
- The principle chore of brains is to get the body parts where they should be in order that the organism may survive. Improvements in sensorimotor control confer an evolutionary advantage: a fancier style of representing [the world] is advantageous so long as it… enhances the organism’s chances for survival. Truth, whatever that is, takes the hindmost.
And this is the main point… okay… if I assume evolution is true, then, out of the choices of “religion” and “non-religion” — which of the two provide a better survival rate of the species? To wit:
Even Darwin had some misgivings about the reliability of human beliefs. He wrote, “With me the horrid doubt always arises whether the convictions of man’s mind, which has been developed from the mind of lower animals, are of any value or at all trustworthy. Would any one trust in the convictions of a monkey’s mind, if there are any convictions in such a mind?”
Given unguided evolution, “Darwin’s Doubt” is a reasonable one. Even given unguided or blind evolution, it’s difficult to say how probable it is that creatures—even creatures like us—would ever develop true beliefs. In other words, given the blindness of evolution, and that its ultimate “goal” is merely the survival of the organism (or simply the propagation of its genetic code), a good case can be made that atheists find themselves in a situation very similar to Hume’s.
The Nobel Laureate and physicist Eugene Wigner echoed this sentiment: “Certainly it is hard to believe that our reasoning power was brought, by Darwin’s process of natural selection, to the perfection which it seems to possess.” That is, atheists have a reason to doubt whether evolution would result in cognitive faculties that produce mostly true beliefs. And if so, then they have reason to withhold judgment on the reliability of their cognitive faculties. Like before, as in the case of Humean agnostics, this ignorance would, if atheists are consistent, spread to all of their other beliefs, including atheism and evolution. That is, because there’s no telling whether unguided evolution would fashion our cognitive faculties to produce mostly true beliefs, atheists who believe the standard evolutionary story must reserve judgment about whether any of their beliefs produced by these faculties are true. This includes the belief in the evolutionary story. Believing in unguided evolution comes built in with its very own reason not to believe it.
This will be an unwelcome surprise for atheists. To make things worse, this news comes after the heady intellectual satisfaction that Dawkins claims evolution provided for thoughtful unbelievers. The very story that promised to save atheists from Hume’s agnostic predicament has the same depressing ending.
It’s obviously difficult for us to imagine what the world would be like in such a case where we have the beliefs that we do and yet very few of them are true. This is, in part, because we strongly believe that our beliefs are true (presumably not all of them are, since to err is human—if we knew which of our beliefs were false, they would no longer be our beliefs).
Suppose you’re not convinced that we could survive without reliable belief-forming capabilities, without mostly true beliefs. Then, according to Plantinga, you have all the fixins for a nice argument in favor of God’s existence For perhaps you also think that—given evolution plus atheism—the probability is pretty low that we’d have faculties that produced mostly true beliefs. In other words, your view isn’t “who knows?” On the contrary, you think it’s unlikely that blind evolution has the skill set for manufacturing reliable cognitive mechanisms. And perhaps, like most of us, you think that we actually have reliable cognitive faculties and so actually have mostly true beliefs. If so, then you would be reasonable to conclude that atheism is pretty unlikely. Your argument, then, would go something like this: if atheism is true, then it’s unlikely that most of our beliefs are true; but most of our beliefs are true, therefore atheism is probably false.
Notice something else. The atheist naturally thinks that our belief in God is false. That’s just what atheists do. Nevertheless, most human beings have believed in a god of some sort, or at least in a supernatural realm. But suppose, for argument’s sake, that this widespread belief really is false, and that it merely provides survival benefits for humans, a coping mechanism of sorts. If so, then we would have additional evidence—on the atheist’s own terms—that evolution is more interested in useful beliefs than in true ones. Or, alternatively, if evolution really is concerned with true beliefs, then maybe the widespread belief in God would be a kind of “evolutionary” evidence for his existence.
You’ve got to wonder.
Mitch Stokes, A Shot of Faith: To the Head (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2012), 44-45.
While I am not a fan of Charisma… as of late they have posted a few good articles. This being one of them:
➤ Science Proves Your Brain Recognizes the Reality of God, Researchers Say
Remember, there was much discussion about destroying or harming parts of the brain that decrease belief in God:
This has to be embarrassing… if you’re an atheist. A new study performed at the University of York used targeted magnetism to shut down part of the brain. The result: belief in God disappeared among more than 30 percent of participants.
That in itself may not seem so embarrassing, but consider that the specific part of the brain they frazzled was the posterior medial frontal cortex—the part associated with detecting and solving problems, i.e., reasoning and logic.
In other words, when you shut down the part of the brain most associated with logic and reasoning, greater levels of atheism result.
You’ve heard the phrase, “I don’t have enough faith to be an atheist”? Apparently we can now also say, “I have too many brains to be an atheist.”…
(Via my previous post on targeted magnetism)
I also posit that person’s who use illicit drugs, such as marijuana, are less likely to believe in the Judeo-Christian God due to deterioration/destruction of sections of the brain. Parts of the brain most affected are memory and cognitive or parts of the brain that use logic and reason). Whereas, it seems, we see that a healthy brain is ready to receive faith:
…In a piece for the Washington Post, atheist Elizabeth King writes that she cannot shake the idea of God’s existence.
★ “The idea of God pesters me and makes me think that maybe I’m not as devoted to my beliefs as I’d like to think I am and would like to be. Maybe I’m still subconsciously afraid of hell and want to go to heaven when I die. It’s confusing and frustrating to feel the presence of something you don’t believe in. This is compounded by the fact that the God character most often shows up when I’m already frustrated,” King writes.
Neurotheologian Newberg says this is because science does back the reality of religious experiences.
(CHARISMA)
HOWEVER, the key quote in my mind’s eye is this, from Shaheen E Lakhan, MD, PhD, MEd, MS, FAAN — the BRAIN BLOGGER:
- The question of whether religion has been “hardwired” into our brains or an evolutionary adaptation has been debated for decades, however, more recently we have uncovered scientific underpinning for both possibilities.
In other words, evolution (if one believes in that exclusively) has hard wired our brains for faith. Not for non-faith.
See also:
National Geographic contacted Neuroscience News and invited us to take part in a virtual roundtable discussion to help promote an upcoming episode of Brain Games called The God Brain. (Brain Games: The God Brain premieres Sunday, February 21, at 9 pm ET on National Geographic Channel).
This supports another study of Japanese kids raised with no thoughts of a monotheistic God
For example, researchers at Oxford University (at which Dawkins himself was until recently the holder of the Charles Simonyi Chair in the Public Understanding of Science) have earlier reported finding children who, when questioned, express their understanding that there is a Creator, without having had any such instruction from parents or teachers. As Dr Olivera Petrovich, who lectures in Experimental Psychology at Oxford, explained in an interview with Science and Spirit:
My Japanese research assistants kept telling me, ‘We Japanese don’t think about God as creator—it’s just not part of Japanese philosophy.’ So it was wonderful when these children said, ‘Kamisama! God! God made it!’—Dr Olivera Petrovich, Oxford University.
“I tested both the Japanese and British children on the same tasks, showing them very accurate, detailed photographs of selected natural and man-made objects and then asking them questions about the causal origins of the various natural objects at both the scientific level (e.g. how did this particular dog become a dog?) and at the metaphysical level (e.g. how did the first ever dog come into being?). With the Japanese children, it was important to establish whether they even distinguished the two levels of explanation because, as a culture, Japan discourages speculation into the metaphysical, simply because it’s something we can never know, so we shouldn’t attempt it. But the Japanese children did speculate, quite willingly, and in the same way as British children. On forced choice questions, consisting of three possible explanations of primary origin, they would predominantly go for the word ‘God’, instead of either an agnostic response (e.g., ‘nobody knows’) or an incorrect response (e.g., ‘by people’). This is absolutely extraordinary when you think that Japanese religion — Shinto — doesn’t include creation as an aspect of God’s activity at all. So where do these children get the idea that creation is in God’s hands? It’s an example of a natural inference that they form on the basis of their own experience. My Japanese research assistants kept telling me, ‘We Japanese don’t think about God as creator — it’s just not part of Japanese philosophy.’ So it was wonderful when these children said, ‘Kamisama! God! God made it!’ That was probably the most significant finding.”
Today, nearly a decade since Petrovich’s study, there is now a “preponderance of scientific evidence” affirming that “children believe in God even when religious teachings are withheld from them”.
I often hear atheists exude confidence in natural selection and evolution and all that it entails. However, when natural belief in God emerges… they reject this as fantasy rather than a superior survival mechanism. It is important to understand that I am not arguing for evolution but showing that it is self-referentially false:
- NOTE: if you believe in evolution and are an atheist, you would root for and support neo-Darwinian evolutionary “natural selection” in choosing religious belief as superior to that of non-belief!
In a debate during the Q&A session between a theist and atheist/evolutionist, a student asked this great question… and while he did not have the answer to Dr. Pigliucci’s challenge, I do:
Assuming the validity of the “underlying instinct to survive and reproduce” then, out of the two positions (belief and non-belief) available for us to choose from which would better apply to being the most fit if the fittest is “an individual… [that] reproduces more successfully…”?[1] The woman that believes in God is less likely to have abortions and more likely to have larger families than their secular counterparts.[2] Does that mean that natural selection will result in a greater number of believers than non-believers?[3]
Footnotes
[1] From my son’s 9th grade biology textbook: Susan Feldkamp, ex. ed., Modern Biology (Austin, TX: Holt, Rineheart, and Winston, 2002), 288; “…organisms that are better suited to their environment than others produce more offspring” American Heritage Science Dictionary, 1st ed. (Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin, 2005), cf. natural selection, 422; “fitness (in evolution) The condition of an organism that is well adapted to its environment, as measured by its ability to reproduce itself” Oxford Dictionary of Biology, New Edition (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1996), cf. fitness, 202; “fitness In an evolutionary context, the ability of an organism to produce a large number of offspring that survive to reproduce themselves” Norah Rudin, Dictionary of Modern Biology (Hauppauge, NY: Barron’s Educational Series, 1997), cf. fitness, 146.
[2] Dinesh D’Souza points to this in his recent book, What’s So Great About Christianity:
- Russia is one of the most atheist countries in the world, and abortions there outnumber live births by a ratio of two to one. Russia’s birth rate has fallen so low that the nation is now losing 700,000 people a year. Japan, perhaps the most secular country in Asia, is also on a kind of population diet: its 130 million people are expected to drop to around 100 million in the next few decades. Canada, Australia, and New Zealand find themselves in a similar predicament. Then there is Europe. The most secular continent on the globe is decadent in the quite literal sense that its population is rapidly shrinking. Birth rates are abysmally low in France, Italy, Spain, the Czech Republic, and Sweden. The nations of Western Europe today show some of the lowest birth rates ever recorded, and Eastern European birth rates are comparably low. Historians have noted that Europe is suffering the most sustained reduction in its population since the Black Death in the fourteenth century, when one in three Europeans succumbed to the plague. Lacking the strong religious identity that once characterized Christendom, atheist Europe seems to be a civilization on its way out. Nietzsche predicted that European decadence would produce a miserable “last man’ devoid of any purpose beyond making life comfortable and making provision for regular fornication. Well, Nietzsche’s “last man” is finally here, and his name is Sven. Eric Kaufmann has noted that in America, where high levels of immigration have helped to compensate for falling native birth rates, birth rates among religious people are almost twice as high as those among secular people. This trend has also been noticed in Europe.” What this means is that, by a kind of natural selection, the West is likely to evolve in a more religious direction. This tendency will likely accelerate if Western societies continue to import immigrants from more religious societies, whether they are Christian or Muslim. Thus we can expect even the most secular regions of the world, through the sheer logic of demography, to become less secular over time…. My conclusion is that it is not religion but atheism that requires a Darwinian explanation. Atheism is a bit like homosexuality: one is not sure where it fits into a doctrine of natural selection. Why would nature select people who mate with others of the same sex, a process with no reproductive advantage at all? (17, 19)
Some other studies and articles of note: Mohit Joshi, “Religious women less likely to get abortions than secular women” (last accessed 9-6-2016), Top Health News, Health News United States (1-31-08); Anthony Gottlieb, “Faith Equals Fertility,” Intelligent Life, a publication of the Economist magazine (winter 2008) [THIS LINK IS DEAD] most of the original Economist article can be found at the WASHINGTON TIMES as well as The Immanent Frame (both accessed 9-6-2016); W. Bradford Wilcox, “Fertility, Faith, & the Future of the West: A conversation with Phillip Longman” (last accessed 9-6-2016), Christianity Today, Books & Culture: A Christian Review (5-01-2007); Pippa Norris and Ronald Inglehart, Sacred and Secular: Religion and Politics Worldwide (New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 3-32, esp. 24-29 — I recommend this book for deep thinking on the issue.
- And churchgoing women have more children than their nonreligious peers, according to the Center for Disease Control’s National Survey of Family Growth, an ongoing survey spanning 2011-2015. The survey involves about 5,000 interviews per year, conducted by the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research. Women between the ages of 15 and 44 who attend religious services at least weekly have 1.42 children on average, compared with the 1.11 children of similar-age women who rarely or never attend services. More religious women said they also intend to have more kids (2.62 per woman) than nonreligious women (2.10 per woman), the survey found. (Baby Boom: Religious Women Having More Kids — LIVESCIENCE)
- In fact, Blume’s research also shows quite vividly that secular, nonreligious people are being dramatically out-reproduced by religious people of any faith. Across a broad swath of demographic data relating to religiosity, the godly are gaining traction in offspring produced. For example, there’s a global-level positive correlation between frequency of parental worship attendance and number of offspring. Those who “never” attend religious services bear, on a worldwide average, 1.67 children per lifetime; “once per month,” and the average goes up to 2.01 children; “more than once a week,” 2.5 children. Those numbers add up—and quickly. Some of the strongest data from Blume’s analyses, however, come from a Swiss Statistic Office poll conducted in the year 2000. These data are especially valuable because nearly the entire Swiss population answered this questionnaire—6,972,244 individuals, amounting to 95.67% of the population—which included a question about religious denomination. “The results are highly significant,” writes Blume: “…women among all denominational categories give birth to far more children than the non-affiliated. And this remains true even among those (Jewish and Christian) communities who combine nearly double as much births with higher percentages of academics and higher income classes as their non-affiliated Swiss contemporaries.” (God’s little rabbits: Religious people out-reproduce secular ones by a landslide — SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN)
- Another value that is both measurable and germane to fertility is the importance of religion. People who are actively religious tend to marry more and stay together longer. To the extent that time spent married during reproductive years increases fertility, then religion would be a positive factor in fertility rates. For example, in Canada women who had weekly religious attendance were 46 percent more likely to have a third child than women who did not. (The Northern America Fertility Divide — HOOVER INSTITUTE)
[3] Adapted from a question by a student at a formal debate between Dr. Massimo Pigliucci and Dr. William Lane Craig. The debate is entitled “Craig vs. Pigliucci: Does the Christian God Exist?” (DVD, Christian Apologetics, Biola University, apologetics@biola.edu ~ Category Number: 103000-400310-56107-Code: WLC-RFM014V).
UPDATE
The AMERICAN SPECTATOR published a wonderful article. And it in large part supports the above contention that belief in God is a natural (in born) position… and that atheism is the REAL product of environment. Read on to see:
University of Oxford developmental psychologist Dr. Olivera Petrovich has spent years researching a single question: Are children predisposed to belief in a transcendent being?
This research, much deserving of greater exposure, intrigued me, since I have engaged atheism’s most prominent modern proponents. I chaired three of atheist and evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins’s debates with his Oxford University colleague, the mathematician and Christian John Lennox. I debated Christopher Hitchens on stage, chaired a number of his debates, and wrote a book about those encounters. And I debated Tufts University cognitive scientist Daniel Dennett on Al Jazeera television with a Muslim tossed into the mix. I even had a lively exchange with agnostic John Stossel on the “God question” on Fox News.
In each of these discussions, much was made out of the evidence — or, as some would have it, the lack of evidence — for God’s existence. Belief in God (or a god, if you prefer), they say, is a product of environment, wishful thinking (like belief in fairies or Santa Claus), or a “mental virus.”
“Part of what I want to say,” writes Richard Dawkins in his bestseller The God Delusion, “is that it doesn’t matter what particular style of nonsense infects the child brain. Once infected, the child will grow up and infect the next generation with the same nonsense, whatever it happens to be.”
But as Dawkins’s archrival, the aforementioned mathematician John Lennox, has said, “Not every statement made by a scientist is a scientific statement.” This appears to be just such an instance. According to Dr. Petrovich, Dawkins’ statement lacks scientific evidence. On the contrary, her research strongly suggests that children are “hardwired” to believe in God.
In a cross-cultural study of British and Japanese children who were shown photographs of manmade and natural objects and then asked to explain how those objects came into existence, children predominantly chose the theological explanation. Dr. Petrovich told me,
The pattern of responding among Japanese children is highly significant in this context seeing that those children live in a culture that does not in any way encourage a belief in God as creator. Yet, the most common reply given by Japanese preschoolers about natural objects’ origins was “Kamisama [God]! God made it.” Whilst there is growing research evidence that children from across different religious and cultural backgrounds consistently attribute to god the existence of natural objects, what is so interesting about the Japanese participants is that this particular causal inference is not a product of their education but a natural development in their understanding of the world.
Another aspect that shows the increased natural selective nature of belief and longevity (the opportunity to leave more offspring) is the POSITIVE INFLUENCE OF RELIGION:
Social Sciences Agree
~ Religious More “Fit” ~
Via my post on family values: A Family Values [Atheist] Mantra Dissected: Nominal vs. Committed
SOCIAL SCIENTISTS AGREE
- Religious Belief Reduces Crime Summary of the First Panel Discussion Panelists for this important discussion included social scientists Dr. John DiIulio, professor of politics and urban affairs at Princeton University; David Larson, M.D., President of the National Institute for Healthcare Research; Dr. Byron Johnson, Director of the Center for Crime and Justice Policy at Vanderbilt University; and Gary Walker, President of Public/Private Ventures. The panel focused on new research, confirming the positive effects that religiosity has on turning around the lives of youth at risk.
- Dr. Larson laid the foundation for the discussion by summarizing the findings of 400 studies on juvenile delinquency, conducted during the past two decades. He believes that although more research is needed, we can say without a doubt that religion makes a positive contribution.
- His conclusion: “The better we study religion, the more we find it makes a difference.” Previewing his own impressive research, Dr. Johnson agreed. He has concluded that church attendance reduces delinquency among boys even when controlling for a number of other factors including age, family structure, family size, and welfare status. His findings held equally valid for young men of all races and ethnicities.
- Gary Walker has spent 25 years designing, developing and evaluating many of the nation’s largest public and philanthropic initiatives for at-risk youth. His experience tells him that faith-based programs are vitally important for two reasons. First, government programs seldom have any lasting positive effect. While the government might be able to design [secular/non-God] programs that occupy time, these programs, in the long-term, rarely succeed in bringing about the behavioral changes needed to turn kids away from crime. Second, faith-based programs are rooted in building strong adult-youth relationships; and less concerned with training, schooling, and providing services, which don’t have the same direct impact on individual behavior. Successful mentoring, Walker added, requires a real commitment from the adults involved – and a willingness to be blunt. The message of effective mentors is simple. “You need to change your life, I’m here to help you do it, or you need to be put away, away from the community.” Government, and even secular philanthropic programs, can’t impart this kind of straight talk.
- Sixth through twelfth graders who attend religious services once a month or more are half as likely to engage in at-risk behaviors such as substance abuse, sexual excess, truancy, vandalism, drunk driving and other trouble with police. Search Institute, “The Faith Factor,” Source, Vol. 3, Feb. 1992, p.1.
- Churchgoers are more likely to aid their neighbors in need than are non-attendees. George Barna, What Americans Believe, Regal Books, 1991, p. 226.
- Three out of four Americans say that religious practice has strengthened family relationships. George Gallup, Jr. “Religion in America: Will the Vitality of Churches Be the Surprise of the Next Century,” The Public Perspective, The Roper Center, Oct./Nov. 1995.
- Church attendance lessens the probabilities of homicide and incarceration. Nadia M. Parson and James K. Mikawa: “Incarceration of African-American Men Raised in Black Christian Churches.” The Journal of Psychology, Vol. 125, 1990, pp.163-173.
- Religious practice lowers the rate of suicide. Joubert, Charles E., “Religious Nonaffiliation in Relation to Suicide, Murder, Rape and Illegitimacy,” Psychological Reports 75:1 part 1 (1994): 10 Jon W. Hoelter: “Religiosity, Fear of Death and Suicide Acceptibility.” Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior, Vol. 9, 1979, pp.163-172.
- The presence of active churches, synagogues… reduces violent crime in neighborhoods. John J. Dilulio, Jr., “Building Spiritual Capital: How Religious Congregations Cut Crime and Enhance Community Well-Being,” RIAL Update, Spring 1996.
- People with religious faith are less likely to be school drop-outs, single parents, divorced, drug or alcohol abusers. Ronald J. Sider and Heidi Roland, “Correcting the Welfare Tragedy,” The Center for Public Justice, 1994.
- Church involvement is the single most important factor in enabling inner-city black males to escape the destructive cycle of the ghetto. Richard B. Freeman and Harry J. Holzer, eds., The Black Youth Employment Crisis, University of Chicago Press, 1986, p.354.
- Attending services at a church or other house of worship once a month or more makes a person more than twice as likely to stay married than a person who attends once a year or less. David B. Larson and Susan S. Larson, “Is Divorce Hazardous to Your Health?” Physician, June 1990. Improving Personal Well-Being
- Regular church attendance lessens the possibility of cardiovascular diseases, cirrhosis of the liver, emphysema and arteriosclerosis. George W. Comstock amd Kay B. Patridge:* “Church attendance and health.”* Journal of Chronic Disease, Vol. 25, 1972, pp. 665-672.
- Regular church attendance significantly reduces the probablility of high blood pressure.* David B. Larson, H. G. Koenig, B. H. Kaplan, R. S. Greenberg, E. Logue and H. A. Tyroler:* ” The Impact of religion on men’s blood pressure.”* Journal of Religion and Health, Vol. 28, 1989, pp.265-278.* W.T. Maramot:* “Diet, Hypertension and Stroke.” in* M. R. Turner (ed.) Nutrition and Health, Alan R. Liss, New York, 1982, p. 243.
- People who attend services at least once a week are much less likely to have high blood levels of interlukin-6, an immune system protein associated with many age-related diseases.* Harold Koenig and Harvey Cohen, The International Journal of Psychiatry and Medicine, October 1997.
- Regular practice of religion lessens depression and enhances self esteem. *Peter L. Bensen and Barnard P. Spilka:* “God-Image as a function of self-esteem and locus of control” in H. N. Maloney (ed.) Current Perspectives in the Psychology of Religion, Eedermans, Grand Rapids, 1977, pp. 209-224.* Carl Jung: “Psychotherapies on the Clergy” in Collected Works Vol. 2, 1969, pp.327-347.
- Church attendance is a primary factor in preventing substance abuse and repairing damage caused by substance abuse.* Edward M. Adalf and Reginald G. Smart:* “Drug Use and Religious Affiliation, Feelings and Behavior.” * British Journal of Addiction, Vol. 80, 1985, pp.163-171.* Jerald G. Bachman, Lloyd D. Johnson, and Patrick M. O’Malley:* “Explaining* the Recent Decline in Cocaine Use Among Young Adults:* Further Evidence That Perceived Risks and Disapproval Lead to Reduced Drug Use.”* Journal of Health and Social Behavior, Vol. 31,* 1990, pp. 173-184.* Deborah Hasin, Jean Endicott, * and Collins Lewis:* “Alcohol and Drug Abuse in Patients With Affective Syndromes.”* Comprehensive Psychiatry, Vol. 26, 1985, pp. 283-295. * The findings of this NIMH-supported study were replicated in the Bachmen et. al. study above.
(From a post entitled “Love“)
(Also see 52 REASONS TO GO TO CHURCH) These indicators are also mentions in a HERITAGE FOUNDATION article, “Why Religion Matters: The Impact of Religious Practice on Social Stability“
More Stats
…A survey of 1,600 Canadians asked them what were their beliefs about God and what moral values they considered to be “very important.” The results of the survey are shown below:
Although the differences between theists and atheists in the importance of values such as honesty, politeness, and friendliness are generally small, moral values emphasized by religious beliefs, such as Christianity, including patience, forgiveness, and generosity exhibit major differences in attitudes (30%+ differences between theists and atheists). (Source)
- The strength of the family unit is intertwined with the practice of religion. Churchgoers are more likely to be married, less likely to be divorced or single, and more likely to manifest high levels of satisfaction in marriage.
- Church attendance is the most important predictor of marital stability and happiness.
- The regular practice of religion helps poor persons move out of poverty. Regular church attendance, for example, is particularly instrumental in helping young people to escape the poverty of inner-city life.
- Religious belief and practice contribute substantially to the formation of personal moral criteria and sound moral judgment.
- Regular religious practice generally inoculates individuals against a host of social problems, including suicide, drug abuse, out-of-wedlock births, crime, and divorce.
- The regular practice of religion also encourages such beneficial effects on mental health as less depression (a modern epidemic), more self-esteem, and greater family and marital happiness.
- In repairing damage caused by alcoholism, drug addiction, and marital breakdown, religious belief and practice are a major source of strength and recovery.
- Regular practice of religion is good for personal physical health: It increases longevity, improves one’s chances of recovery from illness, and lessens the incidence of many killer diseases.
So we can see that the above are important factors in a healthy, stable, family which would have the highest percentage or chance in a family situation to create “family values.” What about divorce rates and the 2009 data. This is dealt with well at CHRISTIAN ACTION LEAGUE, and shows how Barna and the Government can miss-categorize whole swaths of people and their affiliations:
…Wright did his own research using the General Social Survey; a huge study conducted by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago, and found that folks who identify as Christians but rarely attend church have a divorce rate of 60 percent compared to 38 percent among people who attend church regularly. More generally, he found that Christians, similar to adherents of other traditional faiths, have a divorce rate of 42 percent compared with 50 percent among those without a religious affiliation.
And his is not the only research that is showing a link between strong faith and increased marriage stability.
University of Virginia sociologist W. Bradford Wilcox, director of the National Marriage Project, concluded that “active conservative Protestants” who regularly attend church are 35 percent less likely to divorce than are those with no faith affiliation. He used the National Survey of Families and Households to make his analysis.
[….]
Glenn Stanton, the director for family formation studies at Focus on the Family in Colorado Springs, Colo., has been writing articles to spread the truth about the lower divorce rate among practicing Christians.
“Couples who regularly practice any combination of serious religious behaviors and attitudes — attend church nearly every week, read their Bibles and spiritual materials regularly; pray privately and together; generally take their faith seriously, living not as perfect disciples, but serious disciples — enjoy significantly lower divorce rates that mere church members, the general public and unbelievers,” Stanton wrote in the Baptist Press early this year.
At issue in Barna’s studies is how he defined “Christian” and to what other groups he compared the “Christian” divorce rate. Apparently, his study compared what he termed “born-again” Christians — those who described their faith in terms of “personal commitment,” “accept as savior” and other evangelical, born-again language to three other groups, which included self-identified Christians who do not describe their faith with those terms, members of other, non-Christian religions and people of no religious beliefs.
Because his second group would have included many Catholics and mainline Protestants, Wright points out that Barna was, in many ways, “comparing Christians against Christians.” No wonder the rates were similar….
In USA TODAY, David Kinnaman, Barna’s president, said that “the statistical differences reflect varied approaches, with Wright looking more at attendance and his research firm dwelling on theological commitments.” Duh! The bottom line seems to be that the more seriously couples take their faith, the less likely they are to get a divorce. That seems like a self-evident truth, but it appears there is also evidence for it. In other words, this is a nominal, vs. committed Christian vs. secular person battle.
I can go on-and-on, but lets shorten what we have learned, and it all revolves around this:
- “There’s something about being a nominal ‘Christian’ that is linked to a lot of negative outcomes when it comes to family life.”
I realize that much of this can be classified broadly as “The Ecological Fallacy” — but it is an amassing of stats to show that in fact the committed Christian understands the totality of “family values” and commits to them more than the secular person.
1a) Those who attend church more are to be found in the Republican Party;
1b) Those who do not, the Democratic Party;
2a) Those in the Republican Party donate much more to charitable causes;
2b) Those in the Democratic Party, are much more stingy;
3a) Republicans earn less and give more;
3b) Democrats earn more and give less;
4a) Conservative Christians and Jews (people who believe in Heaven and Hell) commit less crimes;
4b) Liberal religious persons (universalists) have a higher rate of crime;
5a) Regular church attendees have a lower drug use rate;
5b) Irreligious persons have a higher rate;
6a) Moral “oughts” are answered in Christian theism (one “ought” not rape because it is absolutely, morally wrong);
6b) Moral “oughts” are merely current consensus of the most individuals, there is no absolute moral statement that can be made about rape;
7a) Republicans are happier than Democrats;
7b) Democrats are more depressed;
8a) The sex lives of married, religious persons is better/more fulfilling — sex is being shown to be a “religious” experience after-all;
8b) The sex lives of the irreligious person is less fulfilling;
9a) The conservative is more likely to reach orgasm [conservative woman I assume];
9b) The liberal woman is not;
10a) They are less likely to sleep around, which would also indicate lower STDs;
10b Democrats are more likely to have STDs through having more sex partners;
11a) Republicans are less likely (slightly, but this is so because of the committed Christians in the larger demographic) to have extra-marital affairs;
11b) Democrats more likely;
12a) Republicans over the last three decades have been reproducing more…
12b) Democrats abort more often and have less children through educational/career decisions
13a) Christians are more likely to have children and impact the world;
13b) Skeptics replace family with pleasure and travel.
Forty-three percent of people who attend religious services weekly or more say they’re very happy, compared to 26 percent of those who go seldom or never. The Pew analysis does not answer the question of how religion, Republicanism and happiness might be related, however.
[….]
Most young people start out as naive, idealistic liberals. But as they get older, that changes. They get more conservative, usually because they grow up. But just imagine that you never get out of that liberal mindset. You go through your whole life trying to check people into a victim box, always feeling offended, always trying to right all of the wrongs in the world, and always blaming government for it. It’s no wonder you’d end up miserable when you get older! Going through your entire life feeling like that would make you a very angry, bitter, jealous, selfish person — and often, that describes aging liberals to a T.
All in all, being a Republican gives you a 7% edge in the happiness department, which doesn’t sound like much, but it’s a greater factor than race, ethnicity, or gender. And just a reminder — Republicans have the advantage across all class lines as well, from upper class to middle class to lower class. Lower class Republicans are happier than lower class Democrats. Middle class Republicans are happier than middle class Democrats. And upper class Republicans are happier than upper class Democrats.
And I’ll say it again. It’s because of the difference in world view.
THE BLAZE helps set up some of the following media presentations:
…The organization also released the results of a survey that it conducted among its members. That poll, commissioned online between June and December 2015, garnered 8,000 responses, finding that 96 percent respondents are registered to vote. It should be noted that the results are restricted to member of the Freedom From Religion Foundation and may not be representative of atheists more broadly.
Secular members were asked to identify their political persuasion, with 29 percent selecting “Democratic” and 36 percent selecting “progressive/liberal.” While that totals 65 percent, 21 percent selected Independent. On the flip side, only 1 percent identified as Republicans, with 3 percent selecting “Socialist/Marxist” and 3 percent selecting “Green.”
MORE MEDIA…
Democrats often think of themselves as kind and caring, and of Republicans as callous and mean-spirited. But why? Are Progressive policies more likely to raise people out of poverty than conservative ones? And what really counts as “kind”: supporting policies that feel good? Or supporting policies that do good? William Voegeli, Senior Editor of the Claremont Review of Books, explains.
AEI President Arthur C. Brooks explains how we can win the fight for free enterprise by articulating what’s written on our hearts. “We have to see that we’re not in an economic battle for the future of America,” Arthur says. “We’re in a moral battle.”
Dennis talks Arthur Brooks, professor of public administration at Syracuse University, Who Really Cares: The Surprising Truth about Compassionate Conservatism. (Originally broadcast December 28, 2006)
[…..]
. . . Survival of the Fittest!
“Since women that believe in God are less likely to have abortions, does that mean that natural selection will result in a greater number of believers than non-believers.” Assuming the validity of the “underlying instinct to survive and reproduce” then, out of the two positions (belief and non-belief) available for us to choose from which would better apply to being the most fit if the fittest is “an individual… [that] reproduces more successfully…”? The woman that believes in God is less likely to have abortions and more likely to have larger families than their secular counterparts. Does that mean that natural selection will result in a greater number of believers than non-believers?
Also,
- Divorce. Marriages in which both spouses frequently attend religious services are less likely to end in divorce. Marriages in which both husband and wife attend church frequently are 2.4 times less likely to end in divorce than marriages in which neither spouse attends religious services.1
- Mother-Child Relationship. Mothers who consider religion to be important in their lives report better quality relationships with their children. According to mothers’ reports, regardless of the frequency of their church attendance, those who considered religion to be very important in their lives tended to report, on average, a higher quality of relationship with their children than those who did not consider religion to be important.2
- Father-Child Relationship. Fathers’ religiosity is associated with the quality of their relationships with their children. A greater degree of religiousness among fathers was associated with better relationships with their children, greater expectations for positive relationships in the future, investment of thought and effort into their relationships with their children, greater sense of obligation to stay in regular contact with their children, and greater likelihood of providing emotional support and unpaid assistance to their children and grandchildren. Fathers’ religiousness was measured on six dimensions, including the importance of faith, guidance provided by faith, religious attendance, religious identity, denominational affiliation, and belief in the importance of religion for their children.3
- Well-Being of High School Seniors. Among high school seniors, religious attendance and a positive attitude toward religion are correlated with predictors of success and well-being. Positive attitudes towards religion and frequent attendance at religious activities were related to numerous predictors of success and wellbeing for high-school seniors, including: positive parental involvement, positive perceptions of the future, positive attitudes toward academics, less frequent drug use, less delinquent behavior, fewer school attendance problems, more time spent on homework, more frequent volunteer work, recognition for good grades, and more time spent on extracurricular activities.4
- Life Expectancy. Religious attendance is associated with higher life expectancy at age 20. Life expectancy at age 20 was significantly related to church attendance. Life expectancy was 61.9 years for those attending church once a week and 59.7 for those attending less than once a week.5
- Drinking, Smoking and Mortality. Frequent religious attendance is correlated with lower rates of heavy drinking, smoking, and mortality. Compared with peers who did not attend religious services frequently, those who did had lower mortality rates and this relationship was stronger among women than among men. In addition, frequent attendees were less likely to smoke or drink heavily at the time of the first interview. Frequent attendees who did smoke or drink heavily at the time of the first interview were more likely than nonattendees to cease these behaviors by the time of the second interview.6
- Volunteering. Individuals who engage in private prayer are more likely to join voluntary associations aimed at helping the disadvantaged. Individuals who engaged in private prayer were more likely to report being members of voluntary associations aimed at helping the elderly, poor and disabled when compared to those who did not engage in private prayer. Prayer increased the likelihood of volunteering for an organization that assisted the elderly, poor and disabled, on average, by 20 percent.7
- Charity and Volunteering. Individuals who attend religious services weekly are more likely to give to charities and to volunteer. In 2000, compared with those who rarely or never attended a house of worship, individuals who attended a house of worship nearly once a week or more were 25 percentage points more likely to donate to charity (91 percent vs. 66 percent) and 23 points more likely to volunteer (67 percent vs. 44 percent).8
- Voting. Individuals who participated in religious activities during adolescence tend to have higher rates of electoral participation as young adults. On average, individuals who reported participating in religious groups and organizations as adolescents were more likely to register to vote and to vote in a presidential election as young adults when compared to those who reported not participating in religious groups and organizations.9
- Ethics in Business. Business professionals who assign greater importance to religious interests are more likely to reject ethically questionable business decisions. Business leaders who assigned greater importance to religious interests were more likely to reject ethically questionable business decisions than their peers who attached less importance to religious interests. Respondents were asked to rate the ethical quality of 16 business decisions. For eight of the 16 decisions, respondents who attached greater importance to religious interests had lower average ratings, which indicated a stronger disapproval of ethically questionable decisions, compared to respondents who attached less importance to religious interests.10
Footnotes
- Vaughn R. A. Call and Tim B. Heaton, “Religious Influence on Marital Stability,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 36, No. 3 (September 1997): 382-392.
- Lisa D. Pearce and William G. Axinn, “The Impact of Family Religious Life on the Quality of Mother-Child Relations,” American Sociological Review 63, No. 6 (December 1998): 810-828.
- Valerie King, “The Influence of Religion on Fathers’ Relationships with Their Children,” Journal of Marriage and Family 65, No. 2 (May 2003): 382-395.
- Jerry Trusty and Richard E. Watts, “Relationship of High School Seniors’ Religious Perceptions and Behavior to Educational, Career, and Leisure Variables,” Counseling and Values 44, No. 1 (October 1999): 30-39.
- Robert A. Hummer, Richard G. Rogers, Charles B. Nam, and Christopher G. Ellison, “Religious Involvement and U.S. Adult Mortality,” Demography 36, No. 2 (May 1999): 273-285.
- William J. Strawbridge, Richard D. Cohen, Sarah J. Shema, and George A. Kaplan, “Frequent Attendance at Religious Services and Mortality over 28 Years,” American Journal of Public Health 87, No. 6 (June 1997): 957-961.
- Matthew T. Loveland, David Sikkink, Daniel J. Myers, and Benjamin Radcliff, “Private Prayer and Civic Involvement,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 44, No. 1 (March 2005): 1-14.
- Arthur C. Brooks, Who Really Cares: America’s Charity Divide, (New York: Basic Books 2006), 31-52.
- Michelle Frisco, Chandra Muller and Kyle Dodson, “Participation in Voluntary Youth-Serving Associations and Early Adult Voting Behavior,” Social Science Quarterly 85, No. 3 (September 2004): 660-676.
- Justin Longenecker, Joseph McKinney, and Carlos Moore, “Religious Intensity, Evangelical Christianity, and Business Ethics: An Empirical Study,” Journal of Business Ethics 55, No. 4 (December 2004): 371- 384.
3-Questions Liberals Never Ask
(Originally posted Oct 2013)
1) compared to what?
2) at what cost?
3) what hard-evidence do you have?
As a bonus: If you run these three questions by every one of Democratic Representative-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s arguments, her platform immediately crumbles. (CONSERVATIVE TRIBUNE)
A blogger on far-left website thought he ‘could go along’ with Obamacare – now he can’t believe what’s happening to his health insurance. this comes by way of CITIZENS AGAINST GOVERNMENT WASTE:
As the realities of Obamacare continue to sink in, more and more people are getting letters from their health insurance providers telling them that their plans no longer comply with federal requirements under Obamacare. We just brought you the story of “Trick Shot Titus” and his family facing significant increases in the cost of their health care plans.
Now, a community blogger on the far-left Daily Kos website has penned a blog post complaining that both he and his wife are facing a nearly 100 percent increase in their monthly premiums. He claims he is canceling his insurance and refuses to pay any “f***ing penalty.”
Blogger “Tirge Caps” explains:
My wife and I just got our updates from Kaiser telling us what our 2014 rates will be. Her monthly has been $168 this year, mine $150. We have a high deductible. We are generally healthy people who don’t go to the doctor often. I barely ever go. The insurance is in case of a major catastrophe.
Well, now, because of Obamacare, my wife’s rate is gong to $302 per month and mine is jumping to $284.
I am canceling insurance for us and I am not paying any f***ing penalty. What the hell kind of reform is this?
The blogger also notes he and his wife may qualify for some “government assistance,” but that it’s just “another hoop” to jump through to get assistance that he may or may not be eligible for…
CONSERVATIVE TRIBUNE brings it home for us:
…Conversely, the right believes that, “Man is flawed from Day One, and that there are no solutions, there are only trade-offs. And whatever you do to deal with man’s flaws, it creates another problem.”
“But you try to get the best trade-off you can get. And that’s all you can hope for.”
So when presented with leftist idealism as to how to fix the world, here is the first question to ask: “Compared to what?” The leftist idea is the solution, compared to what?
Look at the argument for government healthcare. ‘Government healthcare serves the poor.’ Compared to what? Strong arguments can be made that the poor are better off in terms of care and options under a free market system.
The second question Sowell presented is: “At what price?” What price will be paid for the leftist ideal to be implemented? This leads to the discussion of if it is worth it or not … or even realistic.
For this example, consider the argument for open borders. Strong arguments based on “at what price” can be made against having open borders. There are financial costs, national security costs, personal safety costs, national identity costs, functional government costs, national economy costs, job costs, and many more.
The “feel good” concept of no borders is nothing more than a “feel good” concept. It cannot withstand close scrutiny in terms of cost and practical implementation.
The final question is: “What hard evidence do you have?” This one is a doozy, since so much virtue signaling and “feel good” ideology is part and parcel of leftist ideology.
Oftentimes, even when “evidence” is presented, it is not authoritative, hard evidence. It is opinion or cherry-picked, out-of-context, questionable or even debunked in its “facts” and sourcing.
This presents a prime opportunity to then show hard evidence for the right’s argument. It may require time and patience, but if you have a willing audience, it can be well worth the investment to lead the way to why conservatives believe their answers are better.
Sowell noted that conservative arguments tend to be able to pass all three questions because “they don’t assume there is a solution out there.”…
Read My Lips, No New Cases | Dr. Fauci (Bonus Commentary)
Dennis Prager open up his 3rd hour on Friday by quickly going over Tucker Carlson’s noting Dr. Fauci’s understanding of when we can relax these quarantining and social distancing regulations (see more at DAILY CALLER)… and getting people back to work. Obviously, this cannot happen… we live in a world of trade-offs, as the Thomas Sowell video I added to this video points out (see more at RPT: “3-QUESTIONS LIBERALS NEVER ASK“). One comment I came across humorously noting the impossibility of Dr. Fauci’s statement is this: “Read my lips, no new cases!” ???????, get ready for the backlash from Leftists and #NeverTrumpers when Trump opens society before there are no new cases or deaths.
FYI — After the opening monologue, I truncated calls to almost exclusively include Dennis’ response… so while this sounds like almost an un-edited audio clip, stitch together portions of his third hour as well as add media.
Here are a few articles or blogposts I think are important to understand the irresponsibility of basing public policy on these faulty models:
- WOW! Dr. Fauci Now Says, “You Can’t Really Rely Upon Models” …WTH? (GATEWAY PUNDIT)
- Birx Warns of Inaccurate Models Predicting Large Spread Of Coronaviruses (FR24 NEWS)
- Numerators and Denominators in the Coronavirus Saga (AMERICAN THINKER)
- Are Covid-19 Models A Sound Basis For Public Policy? [With Comment By Paul] (POWERLINE)
- Complicated Mathematical Models Are Not Substitutes for Common Sense (NATIONAL REVIEW)
- Inaccurate Virus Models Are Panicking Officials Into Ill-Advised Lockdowns (THE FEDERALIST)
- We Cannot Destroy The Country For The Sake Of New York City (THE FEDERALIST)
- Coronavirus Modeling Had Faulty Assumptions, the Real Data Gives Us Hope (PJ-MEDIA)
- The Scientist Whose Doomsday Pandemic Model Predicted Armageddon Just Walked Back The Apocalyptic Predictions (THE FEDERALIST)
- Epidemiologist Behind Highly-Cited Coronavirus Model Drastically Downgrades Projection (DAILY WIRE)
BONUS COMMENTARY
TUCKER: WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION PRAISES CHINA, DENIES TAIWAN’S EXISTENCE: World Health Organization would rather deny Taiwan’s existence than offend the Chinese government; reaction from Gordon Chang, author of ‘The Coming Collapse of China.’
TUCKER: THE NEW YORK TIMES’ CORONAVIRUS COVERAGE CAN BE EXPLAINED IN 4 STEPS: The establishment press has botched coronavirus from the beginning.
INGRAHAM: WHAT IS THE NEW NORMAL? If it means abandoning the life we loved before coronavirus or using this the crisis as a vehicle for advancing a left-wing, freedom-killing agenda, count us out.