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Who said sex sells

It seems they have been spreading half truths

The researchers looked at past experiments in which participants reported on their memory of, attitudes toward, and intentions to buy products after they were shown ads in print, billboards, posters, TV, or video that may have played elsewhere, like online. They found participants were more likely to remember ads that made sexual appeals than the ones that didn’t. But that they were not more likely to remember the brands featured in the ads. The participants were also more likely to have a negative attitude towards the brands that used sex in their ads than those that didn’t.

Study

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On bibliolaters

….unfortunately those who profess to value this book the most derive the least benefit from it. They mistake the meaning and purpose of its writers. They accept as facts its most palpable fictions. Its most laughable stories are read with the most solemn visages. This serious method of treating the ridiculous has produced an army of morose dyspeptics who mistake indigestion for religion and intolerance for virtue.

The bible by J Remsburg 

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Jesus who?

There is an interesting discussion over at the Stone god’s site addressing the who Jesus was.

There is a comment that we need to address. The author’s words will be indented.

We are inclined to agree with him when he writes

“Prove” is a big word. People who like “proof” should probably avoid ancient history altogether and stick to the hard sciences or to mathematics. Historians don’t “prove” things – they make careful and structured assessments of likelihood, based on analysis of relevant material.

But that as far as our agreement is likely to take us. What Tim write next

It is most likely that a man called Yeshua who came from Nazareth and was executed in Jerusalem by crucifixion is the point of origin of the later stories. This is the most parsimonious reading of the evidence and the one that requires the least number of suppositions.

is in my view not so much a historical position but a faith position. In my village, there is a story of Lwanda Magere whose strength lay in his shadow. To kill him, the enemy tribe gave him a bride who revealed his secret and so one day in the battle field, a spear was aimed at his shadow which killed him and we have stones as proof. That this story is not widespread is not reason enough to dismiss it.

Tim is stretching facts when he writes

The idea that there was no such person when so much of our material points directly to him existing, on the other hand, doesn’t stand up to Occam’s Razor.

The miracles claimed for Jesus are incredible. The material Tim claims must be the bible stories. But these unless he can demonstrate their supernatural nature are inadmissible. The bible is claimed to by others to be in every way the very word of god. Unless this is demonstrated, we can’t take it into evidence. But if for arguments sake we do, then any conflict in matter of fact that we are unable to arbitrate renders the whole record useless.

He continues to say

It requires a convoluted series of suppositions, perhapses, what ifs and maybes, none of which are sustained by any evidence. For example, most versions of the Jesus Myth hypothesis requires that there was an earlier form of proto-Christianity which didn’t believe in a historical Jesus at all but believed in a purely mythic, allegorical or celestial one. It is claimed this earlier form Christianity gave rise to the form that taught about a historical Jesus (even though one didn’t exist) and then vanished from history. Where is the evidence that indicates all this?

It could be the case that such versions exist. I am not aware. But Paul, the foremost character in this narrative doesn’t mention a physical Jesus. And there is no Christianity to speak of before Paul. The gospels if anything are biographies of the supposed Jesus. If Tim has contrary evidence, I am willing to consider it.

He concludes

The historical Jesus idea just fits the evidence better and makes more sense. It’s simply more logical.

Which evidence? The bible? The writings by the church fathers or what evidence?

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On authenticity of the bible

Of the 66 books of the bible at least 50 are anonymous works or forgeries. To teach that these books are divine, and to accept them as such, denotes a degree of depravity on the one hand, and an amount of credulity on the other, that are not creditable to a moral and enlightened people. 

Says Remsburg J.

Bunyan on the other hand tells us

Every book of it, every chapter of it, every verse of it, every word of it, is the direct utterance of the most high.

I take sides with Remsburg. 

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On housing

Following the tragedy in London, Mordanicus has a great article on cooperative housing as means of delivering housing. An article by Rasna Warah titled authorities do not care enough about death traps called homes looks at housing for the poor and the apparent failure by the public bodies to ensure safety standards are met.

The argument that countries such as ours do not have the funds to invest in social housing is not supported by facts. If the country can invest in a rail that is going nowhere and does not make economic sense, they can invest in social housing.

The private sector cannot deliver social housing. The main motive is profit and to expect them to provide social housing is not any different from expecting milk from a bull. It is not going to happen. The public sector must intervene either as the provider of public housing or by providing incentives to private developers to provide social housing. If the government is going to let the private sector to provide social housing, they must ensure all standards of safety are met and that the housing provided is adequate.

In a housing market that is not fully developed as ours, the entry of the government in housing provision wouldn’t destabilize the market. It would be important to map out the very vulnerable who should get social housing. This should be done to ensure those who are really vulnerable get the houses.

Since housing does take a big portion of households earnings, there is need to provide affordable housing for all income groups.

 

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Toward a phenomenology of television

This is an interesting reply by ejwinner to a post by David Ottlinger.

He writes

The true structural principle of television did not become recognizable until the late ’70s, when television began broadcasting 24 hours a day. By the late ’90s, when cable television was multiplying into literally hundreds of channels, it should have been obvious to all; but part of the success of television is that it depends on, and manipulates, our attention to the particular. Most people do not think of themselves as ‘watching television.’ They see themselves watching Seinfeld or Mad Men or The Tonight Show or ‘some documentary about the North Pole.’ On the immediate existential sense, they are quite right, it is the individual program to which they attend. The trouble is, when the Seinfeld rerun ends, many of them do not get up to do something more interesting in their lives; they sit there and watch Mad Men. Or at least let it play on while they discuss what it was like to live in the ‘60s, and then the Tonight Show… and if they can’t get to sleep, it’s that documentary about the North Pole on the Nature Channel, or an old movie on AMC (does it really matter which?), or an old Bewitched rerun….

and I can’t find anything that I disagree with.

I think you will enjoy his commentary.