@dustcirclenews - HEADLINES: Homeland Security Spied on Peaceful Protesters, Monsanto Announces Huge Profits, Anti-Drone Hoodie, Dwindling Support for Religion, Offshore Financial Secrets, Surveillance Courts' Secrets, Disaster Capitalism, Guantanamo Prison Rights, Anonymous vs. Israel in Cyberwar, Avoid a Korean War, Facts on Immigration, more.

It has come to my attention that some of the VIDEO digests don't show some of the videos in the mailings. These are accessible on the website. The Video-related content I send out will have a link to the website so you can view the videos, instead of seeing just a list: http://www.dustcircle.com

The Whys of American Ignorance
http://consortiumnews.com/2013/04/06/the-whys-of-american-ignorance/

US Attorneys Reveal Online Bullying To Explain Why People Who Helped Them Prosecute Aaron Swartz Should Remain Anonymous
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130404/08381022576/us-attorneys-reveal-online-bullying-to-explain-why-people-who-helped-them-prosecute-aaron-swartz-should-remain-anonymous.shtml

Homeland Security Spied On Peaceful Protesters; Worried About Protests Getting News Coverage
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130404/03230222574/new-evidence-homeland-security-spied-peaceful-protestors-worried-about-protests-getting-news-coverage.shtml

Egypt foreign ministry: Israel violates the calm in Gaza
http://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/2013/04/04/egypt-foreign-ministry-israel-violates-the-calm-in-gaza-131-times-to-be-exact-including-full-list-of-violations/

Monsanto announces huge profits despite public backlash
http://endthelie.com/2013/04/04/monsanto-announces-huge-profits-despite-public-backlash/

Sexism, Work and The Public
http://freethoughtblogs.com/amilliongods/2013/04/05/sexism-work-public/

Anti-Drone Hoodie: Can It Really Protect You From the Government’s Eyes in the Sky?
http://intellihub.com/2013/04/05/anti-drone-hoodie-can-it-really-protect-you-from-the-governments-eyes-in-the-sky/

New research shows dwindling support for religion in Britain
http://www.secularism.org.uk/news/2013/04/new-research-shows-dwindling-support-for-religion-in-britain

A Tipping Point In The Financial System
http://www.thedailysheeple.com/a-tipping-point-in-the-financial-system_042013

Everything You Need to Know (So Far) About the Largest Leak of Offshore Financial Secrets in History
http://gawker.com/5993632/everything-you-need-to-know-so-far-about-the-largest-leak-of-offshore-financial-secrets-in-history

When Society Disintegrates: A preview Of What May Be Coming To Your City
http://www.thedailysheeple.com/when-society-disintegrates-a-preview-of-what-may-be-coming-to-your-city_042013

Public Banking: What Better Time Than Now
http://www.opednews.com/articles/Public-Banking-What-Bette-by-Stephen-Lendman-130404-882.html

Surveillance Court’s Opinions Must Remain Secret, Feds Say
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/04/secret-surveillance-court/

Government Exists to Serve the People, not the Privileged
http://www.opednews.com/articles/Government-Exists-to-Serve-by-Salvatore-Babones-130404-827.html

'Going Dark': What's So Wrong with the Government's Plan to Tap Our Internet?
http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/fbi-data-wiretap-trevor-timm-interview#ixzz2PUZUUS2a

From the San Francisco Earthquake to Superstorm Sandy, How Disaster Capitalism Makes Money off of Tragedy
http://www.alternet.org/san-francisco-earthquake-superstorm-sandy-how-disaster-capitalism-makes-money-tragedy

Another NATO Strike Kills Afghan Civilians
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2013/04/04-2

UN rights chief calls for Guantanamo prison closure
http://jurist.org/paperchase/2013/04/un-rights-chief-calls-for-guantanamo-prison-closure.php

When Did Peaceful Protests Become 'Anti-Government Rallies'?
http://www.activistpost.com/2013/04/when-did-peaceful-protests-become-anti.html

Israel ignores its many (at least 136) violations in Gaza, complains about some rocket attacks
http://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/2013/04/06/israel-ignores-its-many-at-least-136-violations-in-gaza-complains-about-some-rocket-attacks/

This Is What Superstition Does: ‘Witches’ Tortured, Burned Alive
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/04/06/this-is-what-superstition-does-witches-tortured-burned-alive/

What did science and religion discover last year?
http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2013/04/05/what-did-science-and-religion-discover-last-year/

‘#Anonymous’ vows to wipe Israel off cyberspace
http://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/2013/04/07/anonymous-vows-to-wipe-israel-off-cyberspace/

It was nice knowing you, America
http://www.thedailysheeple.com/it-was-nice-knowing-you-america_042013

A Lifetime in War Crimes
http://www.opednews.com/articles/A-Lifetime-in-War-Crimes-by-William-Boardman-130406-730.html

The Duty To Avoid A War In Korea

http://www.countercurrents.org/castro060413.htm

Americans Believe God Plays Favorites in Sports and with Athletes

http://atheism.about.com/od/American-Beliefs-God/a/Americans-Believe-God-Plays-Favorites-Sports.htm

‘Drones fly, children die’: US activists launch massive anti-drone campaign

http://rt.com/usa/anti-drone-campaign-usa-334/

Tyranny of The Reasonable: Popular Complacency In An Era Of Economic Exploitation And Perpetual War
http://www.countercurrents.org/rockstroh050413.htm

What Does the Worst-case Scenario of a Cyberattack on the United States by Another State or by Terrorists Look Like?
http://intellihub.com/2013/04/05/what-does-the-worst-case-scenario-of-a-cyberattack-on-the-united-states-by-another-state-or-by-terrorists-look-like/

The Facts on Immigration Today
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/immigration/report/2013/04/03/59040/the-facts-on-immigration-today-3/

Why do people find logic in supernatural rituals?

Story Source

Even in this modern age of science, people are likely to find logic in supernatural rituals that require a high degree of time and effort, according to new research from The University of Texas at Austin.

The study, published in the June issue of Cognition, is the first psychological analysis of how people of various cultures evaluate the efficacy of ritual beliefs. The findings provide new insight into cognitive reasoning processes — and how people intuitively make sense out of the unknown.

“One of the most remarkable characteristics of human cognition is the capacity to use supernatural reasoning to explain the world around us,” said Cristine Legare, an assistant professor in the Department of Psychology at The University of Texas at Austin. “We argue that the characteristics of ritual are the product of an evolved cognitive system.”

Cause-and-effect thinking is critical to human survival, Legare said. So it’s natural for people to find logic in supernatural rituals that emphasize repetition and procedural steps. If doing something once has some effect, then repeating it must have a greater effect. For example, if a mechanic says he inspected something five times, the frequency of his actions leads the customer to overestimate the effectiveness of his work.

To find out how people rate the effectiveness of magical rituals, Legare and graduate student André Souza conducted a study in Brazil, a country suffused with rituals called simpatias. Used for solving problems as varied as quitting smoking, curing asthma and warding off bad luck, simpatias are formulaic rituals that involve various steps and repetition.

The psychologists presented 162 Brazilian respondents several versions of these rituals. Each was modified with different characteristics, such as repetition of procedures, number of steps, number of items used, and the presence of religious icons.

As part of the study, Legare asked the respondents to rate the effectiveness of each ritual. According to the findings, three elements of the simpatias had the biggest influence: number of steps, repetition of procedures and a specified time.

To see how magical rituals are perceived across cultures, the researchers conducted the same study with 68 U.S. respondents of various religious and socioeconomic backgrounds. As the researchers expected, the majority of respondents didn’t believe in simpatias. Yet similar to the Brazilians, they were more inclined to believe in rituals involving numerous repetitions and steps. For example, they gave a higher rating for this sadness-curing ritual, which involves numerous steps and repetitions.

In a metal container, put the leaves of a white rose. After that, set fire to the leaves. Get the remaining ash from the leaves and put it in a small plastic bag. Take the small plastic bag and leave it at a crossroad. Repeat the procedure for seven days in a row.

Though simpatias are primarily practiced in Brazil, magical rituals and other superstitions are widely accepted in the United States. Findings from the study provide further insight into how people find logic in the supernatural, regardless of concrete evidence.

Christians Believe in Bible Verses That Aren't in the Bible

Christians Believe in Bible Verses That Aren't in the Bible

By Austin Cline, About.com Guide
July 19, 2011
[REPRINT]

It's hard to take seriously Christian claims about the importance of the Bible to their lives and religion when they have so little knowledge about it. I'm not just talking about the history of how it developed and how it's been used. I'm talking about the fact that so many Christians believe that things which aren't in the Bible are actual Bible verses.

Some are paraphrases that are similar to actual Bible verses, which is an easy error to make. Some don't have anything to do with the Bible at all -- and in some cases contradict actual Bible verses. But people still believe them. Why? Because they are statements which reinforce what people already believe and they are all too happy to accept biblical authority for what they want to believe.

Here are some popular statements that people think can be found in Bible, but which aren't really there:

"God works in mysterious ways."

"Cleanliness is next to Godliness." ...

"God helps those who help themselves."

"Spare the rod, spoil the child."

And there is this often-cited paraphrase: Satan tempted Eve to eat the forbidden apple in the Garden of Eden.

Source: CNN

It would be bad enough if this were just limited to "the average Christian in the street," but it's also true to people who study the Bible and should know better:

"In my college religion classes, I sometimes quote 2 Hesitations 4:3 ('There are no internal combustion engines in heaven')," [Steve Bouma-Prediger, a religion professor at Hope College in Holland, Michigan] says. "I wait to see if anyone realizes that there is no such book in the Bible and therefore no such verse.

"Only a few catch on."

Most people don't recognize that favored sayings and ideas don't really come from the Bible because they want to believe that they come from the Bible. The authority of the Bible is such that this belief reinforces for them the truth and validity of whatever idea is being expressed.

Belief that something is in the Bible provides a comforting assurance that what they believe also happens to be what God wants and, moreover, side-steps any possible debate over the matter. If it comes from the Bible then it's God's Will and if it's God's Will then there's no legitimate basis for disputing it, disagreeing with it, or rejecting it. Adopting this position is a lot easier than actually having to develop your own arguments in defense of an idea.

"Most people who profess a deep love of the Bible have never actually read the book," says Rabbi Rami Shapiro, who once had to persuade a student in his Bible class at Middle Tennessee State University that the saying "this dog won't hunt" doesn't appear in the Book of Proverbs.

"They have memorized parts of texts that they can string together to prove the biblical basis for whatever it is they believe in," he says, "but they ignore the vast majority of the text."

Honestly, if you believe that something like "this dog won't hunt" appears anywhere in the Bible and actually use that belief in defense of the saying, then I think your right to ever use the Bible in defense of anything at all has been irrevocably lost. Actually, I think a lot more about you, too, but I won't go into that...

The worst and perhaps most significant example of attributing to the Bible something that doesn't appear there is the popular saying "God helps those who helps themselves." Not only does it not appear in the Bible, but it's arguably contrary to some things which do appear in the Bible -- at least in some of the ways this saying can be used.

The passage is popular in part because it is a reflection of cherished American values: individual liberty and self-reliance, says Sidnie White Crawford, a religious studies scholar at the University of Nebraska.

Yet that passage contradicts the biblical definition of goodness: defining one's worth by what one does for others, like the poor and the outcast, Crawford says.

Crawford cites a scripture from Leviticus that tells people that when they harvest the land, they should leave some "for the poor and the alien" (Leviticus 19:9-10), and another passage from Deuteronomy that declares that people should not be "tight-fisted toward your needy neighbor."

"We often infect the Bible with our own values and morals, not asking what the Bible's values and morals really are," Crawford says.

This is a useful piece of evidence of the degree to which religion in America is uniquely "American" -- infused with American culture, history, politics, economics, and assumptions. American Christianity is recognizably Christian, but it is also quite distinct from Christianity everywhere else because of the extent to which American assumptions have infused it.

This isn't unique to America, of course. At every place and time throughout Christianity's history, it's absorbed elements of the surrounding culture -- politics, art, economics, etc. Some of it is retained and passed down to future forms of Christianity; some of it is dropped and forgotten. It's precisely Christianity's ability to adapt to local conditions that has helped it spread so much. A more rigid system would not convert so many people and cultures.

I think Crawford is mistaken to say that these are cases of local cultures "infecting" the Bible or Christianity. After all, the Bible was itself created out of local cultures at particular times and places. The Catholic Church even recognizes the fact that the New Testament was produced by and for early Christian communities and thus not every element is necessarily something that binds every future community of believers.

So some people are simply in denial of the fact that their religion and religious beliefs are shaped as much by their own cultural, political, and economic beliefs as by scripture and tradition. Others are in denial of the fact that this not only always happens, but was in fact instrumental in the creation of those scriptures and traditions. They are all in denial of the fact that religion is a product of human culture, politics, and economics, and so we shouldn't expect to find anything else.

May 21st - Judgment Day?

There is much talk about the End of the World being on May 21st, 2011. Harold Camping, of Family Radio, is an absolute nut. Even mainstream Christians say that the hour of Jesus' return isn't known, but only to God the Father. However, this alone is crazy, because if the Father and Jesus are one, then Jesus should know also, but this is side-tracking.

Camping's ramblings are not new. The Seventh Day Adventists predicted the end of the world a few times, most famously once in the book, Evidences from Scripture and History of the Second Coming of Christ about the Year 1843. This date came and went. And there has been other predictions and speculations that are humorously in error. It'd be more funny, if it weren't for the gullible and vulnerable giving their life savings away to fund the knowledge of impending doom. There will be many suicides on the 22nd, thanks to Mr. Camping's ridiculous (and mathematically flawed!) claims. May he be charged with Aggravated Manslaughter when this happens. I am not a Christian, but heed my prophecy!

This is not the first time Camping had predicted the end of the world either. He's even makes a claim to know the year the earth was 'created,' and when the global flood occurred. Now, this weird nutcase predicts the return of the Son of God, the being that has no plausible existence outside of the Bible, if Jesus even existed at all.

I cannot wait until this man's claims are behind us, and the man is dead (he's in his late 80's). However, it's unfortunate that as time continues and people keep believing in myths, legends, fabrications and superstition, there will always be predictions of the End Times. And there will always be weirdos that buy into it, give away all they have (not to the poor, but to the Church), and die confused and embarrassed.