Just another weblog
Just finished reading The Branching Bush of Horse Evolution by Brian Switek over at Laelaps. Its an interesting read especially from an historical perspective about the development (or evolution if you will) of our understanding.
And heres Stephen Jay Gould on the same subject in Life’s Little Joke.
The Omnipresent deity (also known as God) is embroiled in a lawsuit and is accused of causing untold death and horror and threatening to cause more. State Senator Ernie Chambers sued God last week, saying in his lawsuit that God has made terrorist threats against the senator and his constituents, inspired fear and caused “widespread death, destruction and terrorization of millions upon millions of the Earth’s inhabitants.” He also accused God of having caused “fearsome floods … horrendous hurricanes, terrifying tornadoes.”
While Friedrich Nietzsche agreed to defend God on the grounds that “The only excuse for god is that he doesn’t exist.”, God, for his part, has characteristically refused comment.
How soon till we can file a class action suit against Alloahu who is popularly held to be responsible for many calamities that have marginally touched Maldives in the recent past, killing scores of people and displacing a third of the population, while leaving a few standing mosques in a bid to demonstrate his all-round-Coolness?
Simon sez: declare war on d fledgling bloggers tht haunt d mvbogosphere (Ok, he didn’t actually say tht. but he duz call to “Get that fire burning” against wht he considers to b a smear on divehi bloggin)
Suppsdly only his brand of more-linguistic-than-thou bloggin shud b allowed to grace d internet.
Bloggin is abt self expression ain’t it? if u have nothin more to offer than the mcdinner u hd on d outin wit d crush of ur dreams dats wht ur blog wud reflect. this isn’t a freakin’ im-smarter-than-you coz i delve into d mysteries of existence and wht not. som of us rightly find postings abt abstract musings to b more borin than . . . somthin that is really very mundane n immensely borin. n i certainly m also curious to knw wht nourishments sustain my fellow intrepid bloggers n wht dirty linen they choose to wash in public.
n not all bloggers r out to change world either. for better or worse.
noone is born smart. ppl grw up. personalities develop. these r jst teens after all. as they mature their postings wud evolve too. we certainly dn’t need to be a balding (im assuming he’s angry at all d newly hair-ied hormone laden teens prancing abt on wht ws previously his private pasture), 30 somthin whtever to have wisdom.
so which is it? xenophbia. or is dis old dino tht afraid of change? u will wilt n whither while d youth thrive on.
criticism of dhinglish. dnt u knw the only constant is change. languages evolve, jst as ppl do. so wht if d nxt generation duznt adhere to societally imposed arbitrary spelling conventions. isn’t the utility of d written word in gettin d msg across, even if som mite consider d msg to b pure nonsense. and if it functions on tht level who r v to stand in d way of d march of progress (even if its jst a progression of time n not quality)
here’s a friggin’ hint – don’t read them teenage mutant blogs then if it lights tht big a fire under ur ass.
PS: Spot on on the copy/paste bloggers. I hereby declare a comment war to xpose these parrots (no insult intended at real parrots 
)
Some muslims like to believe that their holy book contains scientific proofs which could not have been known in 7th century desert Arabia. It makes a much sense to say this is a fulfilled prophecy about the animated movie The Ant Bully.
The Qur’an, Surah 27 An-Naml, Verses 18 – 19:
“Till, when they came to the valley of the ants, one of the ants said: “O ants! Enter your dwellings, lest Solomon and his hosts crush you, while they perceive not. So he [Solomon] smiled, amused at her speech and said: “My Lord! Inspire and bestow upon me the power and ability that I may be grateful for Your Favors which You have bestowed on me and on my parents, and that I may do righteous good deeds that will please You, and admit me by Your Mercy among Your righteous slaves.”
Science:
1. Basically all communication between ants is through chemical signals.
2. A few subspecies of ants which do use some sound communication. Although the use of vibrational signals is weakly developed in ants in comparison with communication by pheromones. Two forms of sound production have been identified, body rapping against the substratum and stridulation, the latter employing files and scrapers clearly evolved for a communicative purpose.
4. It has long been known that ants are nearly deaf to airborne vibrations but extremely sensitive to vibrations carried through the substratum.
5. Stridulation in ants produces a monotonous series of chirps with limited meaning. All evidence point to the chirps of stridulation as simple unitary signals. In other words, ants do not “talk” by modulating sound through time. Sounds do not appear to vary within species or within the repertory of one worker ant through time.
6. In all the intensive studies of ants, “speech” (modulated sound of complex meaning) has never been observed.
7. The signaling pattern is independent of the triggering stimulus. That is, the ants do not modify the drumming to identify the category of danger to the nest.
Conclusion:
The use of sound in a few subspecies of ants is not sufficient to account for the kind of talk that the ant of the Qur’an supposedly uttered.
A more rational perspective is adopted by Muslim commentator and translator Muhammad Asad. He claims:
“In this instance, Solomon evidently refers to his own understanding and admiration of nature (cf. 38:31-33 and the corresponding notes) as well as to his loving compassion for the humblest of God’s creatures, as a great divine blessing: and this is the Qur’anic moral of the legendary story of the ant.” (Asad, The Message of the Qur’an [Dar Al-Andalus Limited 3 Library Ramp, Gibraltar rpt. 1993], p. 578, fn. 17)
The problem is the Qur’an nowhere implies that the talking ant story is a dream, vision, or fable. The surrounding context demonstrates that this is intended to be viewed as an actual historical event where animals have actual conversations with Solomon and with each other. The majority of Muslims throughout the centuries have viewed this story as an actual historical event, not simply a fable illustrating some moral truth (what truth I have no idea).
Was the Qur’an somehow hinting at the communications of the ants (as observed by science) in this story, a fact that could not have been known in the 7th century? Does belief in ants that talk like humans make him an expert entomologist? Is an ancient text that mentions talking ants is so incredible that it constitutes positive proof for the divine origin of that text? Then the Chinese legend of the goddess worshiper, and the collection of Æsop’s fables must be accepted as divine revelation too, since it makes the same statement more than 1000 years before the Qur’an. Even if it were true that ants are talking, the claim that this was unknowable in the 7th century would still be wrong since Æsop knew this already a millennium earlier, and the Chinese goddess religion also had this knowledge.
More likely all of these and similar stories have no more value than fairytale told to children at bedtime.
Islam, like its predecessors, has the fascinating end-of-times bad guy. But unlike Judaism or Christianity, our Antichrist or Dajjal is already among us.
“He (Prophet Mohamed) said: By Allah. I have not made you assemble for exhortation or for a warning, but I have detained you here, for Tamim Dari, a Christian, who came and accepted Islam, told me something, which agrees with what I was telling you about the Dajjal. He narrated to me that he had sailed in a ship along with thirty men of Bani Lakhm and Bani Judham and had been tossed by waves in the ocean for a month. Then these (waves) took them (near) the land within the ocean (island) at the time of sunset. They sat in a small side-boat and entered that Island.
There was a beast with long thick hair (and because of these) they could not distinguish his face from his back.
T: “Woe to you, who can you be?”
J: “I am al-Jassasa.”
T: “What is al-Jassasa?”
J: “O people, go to this person in the monastery as he is very much eager to know about you.”When it named a person for us we were afraid of it lest it should be a Devil. Then we hurriedly went on till we came to that monastery and found a well-built person there with his hands tied to his neck and having iron shackles between his two legs up to the ankles.
T: “Woe be upon thee, who are you?”
A: “You would soon come to know about me. but tell me who are you.”
T: “We are people from Arabia and we embarked upon a boat but the sea-waves had been driving us for one month and they brought as near this island. We got Into the side-boats and entered this island and here a beast met us with profusely thick hair and because of the thickness of his hair his face could not be distinguished from his back. We said: Woe be to thee, who are you? It said: I am al- Jassasa. We said: What is al-Jassasa? And it said: You go to this very person in the monastery for he is eagerly waiting for you to know about you. So we came to you in hot haste fearing that that might be the Devil. “
A: “Tell me about the date-palm trees of Baisan.”
T: “About what aspect of theirs do you seek information? “
A: “I ask you whether these trees bear fruit or not.”
T: “Yes”
A: “I think these would not bear fruits. Inform me about the lake of Tabariyya?”
T: “Which aspect of it do you want to know?”
A: “Is there water in it?”
T: “There is abundance of water in it.”
A: “I think it would soon become dry. Inform me about the spring of Zughar.”
T: “Which aspect of it you want to know?”
A: “Is there water in it and does it irrigate?”
T: “Yes, there is abundance of water in it and the inhabitants irrigate with the help of it”
A: “Inform me about the unlettered Prophet; what has he done?”
T: “He has come out from Mecca and has settled In Yathrib”
A: “Do the Arabs fight against him?”
T: “Yes”
A: “How did he deal with him?”
T: “He has overcome those in his neighbourhood and they had submitted themselves before him”
A: “Had it actually happened?”
T: “Yes”
A: “If it is so that is better for them that they should show obedience to him. I am going to tell you about. I am Dajjal and would be soon permitted to get out and so I shall get out and travel in the land, and will not spare any town where I would not stay for forty nights except Mecca and Medina as these two are prohibited for me and I would not make an attempt to enter any one of these two. An angel with a sword in his hand would confront me and would bar my way and there would be angels to guard every passage leading to it”Then Allah’s Messenger striking the pulpit with the help of the end of his staff said: “This implies Taiba meaning Medina. Have I not, told you an account like this?” The people said: “Yes”, and “this account narrated by Tamim Dari was liked by me for it corroborates the account which I gave to you in regard to him (Dajjal) at Medina and Mecca. Behold he (Dajjal) is in the Syrian sea (Mediterranian) or the Yemen sea (Arabian sea). Nay, on the contrary, he As In the east, he is in the east, he is in the east, and he pointed with his hand towards the east.”
According to the hadith he’s chained up in an island east of Arabia. Could this island be among the two thousand islands which form Maldives? Maybe even the notorious prison island Maafushi! The description of his bondage “with his hands tied to his neck and having iron shackles between his two legs up to the ankles” would certainly send waves of nostalgia washing over any former inmate at the facility.
If Tamim-Dari and his companions could see and talk to him, why can’t we see him or his island today in this age of satellites and Google Earth? I am sure someone would have noticed if a large version of Prince Eric’s dog Max was bounding around on the beach and would have investigated. And wouldn’t that monastery be of interest to the archaeological community? More importantly the discovery would enable geriatrics to investigate Dajjal’s secret of longevity, since he clearly has been around for more than 1400 years. And surprisingly he’s human.
“He (Dajjal) would be a young man with twisted, contracted hair, and a blind eye.”
Ofcourse he could be “hidden” from us, possibly in some form of cartoonish invisible bubble or perhaps in the Bermuda triangle. Just like the tribes of Yajuj and Majuj, (who with all their manpower can’t seem to knock down a wall) and that shady character al-Khidr (http://khidr.org/khidr.htm). And Tamim was just lucky that God chose him to prove His point.
Dajjal is also prophesied to ‘appear’ among the Jews of Isfahan. Its always the Jews isn’t it? And no one asks how he has broken his chains and when or how he transported himself to Iran from his island prison that no one seems able to find.
Anas b. Malik reported that Allah’s Messenger said: “The Dajjal would be followed by seventy thousand Jews of Isfahan wearing Persian shawls.”
As the current population of Jews in Isfahan is around 3000 we may be safe from this apocalyptic villain for a few more years. Lets hope that Dajjal survives till then. From the looks of it he might be submerged underwater with the rising sea levels. And his ‘little’ dog too.
Most of the terrorist acts perpetrated in the world today are done by people who claim to be Muslims and follow the Qur’an. Take the kidnappings, beheading of innocents in places like Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Indonesia, Israel as well as the September 11th WTC bombings, London bombings, Madrid bombings, airplane hijackings among numerous others.
I agree that not all people who call themselves Muslim are violent. And Islamic sources can be interpreted in more peaceful ways.
But it cannot be denied that the Qur’an, Hadith and Islamic history (even at the time of the Prophet Mohamed) provides many instances of violence. Modern day terrorists derive their ideology from these same sources.
It is a good thing that peaceful Muslims are standing up and voicing their opinions.
If you can honestly answer NO to all the above statements I for one would definitely not call you a terrorist:
1. There are no Muslim terrorists.
2. Muslim acts portrayed in news as terrorism are justified because Muslims are being oppressed.
3. Freedom of speech applies only as long as you do not talk about, Allah, the Prophet Mohamed and Islam.
Goodbye and good luck with your campaign.
Some people are absolutely flummoxed by the notion that people can actually be good without believing in a god.
As if monotheism has the monopoly on morality.
Two new Homo fossils are described in this week’s Nature showing that H. erectus and H. habilis had co-existed for nearly half a million years.
Rather than ask, “This is really interesting. I wonder what this means?” some seem content to sit back, quote Scripture, and gleefully say “See! I was right all along! Case closed!”
These discoveries do not put evolution in doubt. Just as your mother’s life most likely substantially overlapped with your own, the persistence of a parental species so that it overlaps in time with its daughter species is not a challenge to evolution at all. Here is an excellent post by PZ Myers on just this.
Also a paleoanthropologist weighs in.
Say goodbye to the Yangtze River dolphin (Lipotes vexillifer). It is officially extinct. This is the first official extinction of a large vertebrate in 50 years.
This same week the Aldabra banded snail, which lived on the Seychelles Islands also became officially extinct.
It probably won’t be the last.
We, humans are the only species pushing other species into extinction in our belief that we are not animals and we alone are capable of suffering in any meaningful way. If we thought they were sentient animals with as much value as a human being we wouldn’t have destroyed them and their environment.
Sahih Al-Bukhari, Hadith 4:543
Narrated Abu Huraira:
The Prophet said, “Allah created Adam, making him 60 cubits tall. . . . . Any person who will enter Paradise will resemble Adam. People have been decreasing in stature since Adam’s creation.”
Sahih Al-Bukhari, Hadith 4:544
Narrated Abu Huraira:
Allah’s Apostle said, “The first group of people who will enter Paradise, . . . . All of them will look alike and will resemble their father Adam, sixty cubits tall.”
Palaeontology was sneakily introduced by atheists into the realm of science in order to prove the fairytale of Darwinian evolution. On the contrary it has done just the opposite and has once again proved what Prophet Mohamed was telling us all along. Fourteen hundred years ago.
This proves beyond a shadow of doubt that Prophet Mohamed had a psychic insight into the mind of Allah whenever he forgot to take his seizure medication.
Meanwhile, back in the real world . . .
The image first surfaced in October 2002 as an entry in a Photoshop contest run by Worth1000.com. It was created by altering an actual photo of a Cornell University excavation of a mastodon skeleton.
