On physics and chemistry as God/God substitute.

Miserable Creatures
Posted by William J Murray

Imagine if atheistic materialism was actually true and humans are nothing more than biological automatons – complexly programmed and reactive robots that behave and think in whatever manner happenstance chemical interactions dictates at any given time.  Let’s think about what would actually mean.

There would be no way for a biological automaton to determine whether or not any statement was in fact true or not since all conclusions are driven by chemistry and not metaphysical “truth” values; indeed, a biological automaton reaches conclusion X for exactly the same reason any other reaches conclusion Y; chemistry.  If chemistry dictates that 1+1=banana, that is what a “person” will conclude. If chemistry dictates they defend that view to the death and see themselves as a martyr for the computational banana cause, that is exactly what they will do.

All such a biological automaton has is whatever chemistry generates as what they see, hear, taste, smell, touch, feel, think, and do. If they eat some stale pizza and, through a chaotic cascade of happenstance physical cause and effect, accept Mohammed with great faith and zeal, then no determined atheist can resist – that is what will occur.  And they will think it was a logical conclusion, if chemistry says so.  They can only be whatever chemistry dictates.

Imagine the frustration of the atheist having to admit that they came to their views exactly the same way any religious fanatic came to theirs. Imagine the bleak realization that there is no way to prove it, or even provide any evidence, because such feats would require that one’s thoughtful capacity to consider such things be removed from, and in control of, the same chemical processes that generate all positions that disagree with theirs.

Imagine the misery of attempting to argue that some things are right, and others are wrong, when the same relentless, impersonal, uncaring chemistry produces both. One might as well call the shape of a fig leaf right and true, and call the shape of a maple leaf wrong and false.  How pitiful it is when atheists act as if their condition is somehow superior to some non-atheist condition, when all conditions are simply a products of happenstance chemistry and physics. It’s not like “they” had a hand in their own thoughts or ideas or conclusions; they have whatever thoughts blind mechanistic forces shoved in their brain.  “They” are nothing but a pitiful puppet doomed to think and act and feel whatever chemistry dictates while stupidly acting and arguing as if something else was the case.

Atheists insist that they live a life as capable of being good as any theist.  They are often proud of how “good” they are in comparison to theists they mock and ridicule. What are they proud of?  What are the mocking and ridiculing?  The inevitable effects of chemical interactions?  Any idea or thought or act that anyone has or does is nothing more than just another effect ultimately generated by mindless chemical interactions and effects.  You might as well be proud that grass is green or ridicule the color of the sky; the same mindless forces generated those things as your own thoughts, beliefs and actions.

How pitiful is it to rant and rave and argue against physics and chemistry?  If atheistic materialism is true, then atheists here are like Don Quixote, acting like windmills are great beasts, or like biological automatons are sentient creatures capable of doing something other than whatever chemistry dictates.  They might as well argue with a tree to get it to change the shape and color of its leaves, or with a stream to get it to change direction. They are tilting at windmills trying to convince the windmill to do something other than what windmills do.  They are madmen arguing with swirling dirt, animated by natural law and chance.


What a ruinous, ludicrous, miserable position to insist for yourself – arguing and debating against the onward, relentless march of happenstance interactions of matter ruled by chemistry and physics as if such arguments mattered, as if you and everyone else is something other than programmed biological automatons doing whatever chemistry dictates.  But then, pitifully, they really can’t do anything else except foolishly act out this absurd facade because they, too, are just the puppets of chemistry.

Darwinists decide to get a life?

Something Is Missing: Evolution Meets Reality with ALIFE

Anika Smith 

Here's some exciting news from the UK, where 300 biologists, computer scientists, physicists, mathematicians, philosophers and social scientists from around the world have gathered "to address one of the greatest challenges in modern science: how to create a genuine artificial life form." ("Can we make software that comes to life?" Telegraph)

Despite the image of Wall-E (with the amusing caption "self-aware computers such as Pixar's Wall-E are surprisingly tricky to put together" -- no, really? Every nerdy kid who ever tried to make a robot in 6th grade science camp could tell you that), the focus of the story is on evolution and -- wait for it -- the failure of Darwin's theory to explain complex creatures.

Using computer programs to test evolution, researchers are learning that natural selection lacks the creative power to evolve complex life -- and so they're looking for answers.

Researchers thought that with more computer power, they could create more complex creatures - the richer the computer's environment, the richer the ALife that could go forth and multiply.

But these virtual landscapes have turned out to be surprisingly barren. Prof Mark Bedau of Reed College in Portland, Oregon, will argue at this week's meeting - the 11th International Conference on Artificial Life - that despite the promise that organisms could one day breed in a computer, such systems quickly run out of steam, as genetic possibilities are not open-ended but predefined. Unlike the real world, the outcome of computer evolution is built into its programming.

They might do well to learn from  Biologic's Stylus

 program. But I digress.

His conclusion? Although natural selection is necessary for life, something is missing in our understanding of how evolution produced complex creatures. By this, he doesn't mean intelligent design - the claim that only God can light the blue touch paper of life - but some other concept. "I don't know what it is, nor do I think anyone else does, contrary to the claims you hear asserted," he says. But he believes ALife will be crucial in discovering the missing mechanism.

Dr Richard Watson of Southampton University, the co-organiser of the conference, echoes his concerns. "Although Darwin gave us an essential component for the evolution of complexity, it is not a sufficient theory," he says. "There are other essential components that are missing."

One of these may be "self-organisation", which occurs when simpler units - molecules, microbes or creatures - work together using simple rules to create complex patterns and behaviour. [Emphasis added]

Of course, no one would dare consider the possibility of design (especially not with that straw-man description), but it looks like a few brave souls may be willing to admit, in the face of the evidence, that Darwin's theory really is not sufficient to explain life.

"Evolution on its own doesn't look like it can make the creative leaps that have occurred in the history of life," says Dr Seth Bullock, another of the conference's organisers. "It's a great process for refining, tinkering, and so on. But self-organisation is the process that is needed alongside natural selection before you get the kind of creative power that we see around us.

"Understanding how those two processes combine is the biggest challenge in biology."

I should say so.

A brave new world by any means necessary?

Lying in the Name of Indoctrination

Anika Smith

Dogmatists committed to a dying paradigm will argue with falsehoods to convince the public of their claims... especially when they're targeting children.

As we've covered here this week, Haeckel's faked embryo drawings are still used in science textbooks because, according to some Darwinists, "it is OK to use some inaccuracies temporarily if they help you reach the students."

That's right. According to Darwinist biology professor Bora Zivkovic, who blogs as Coturnix at A Blog Around The Clock and is Online Community Manager at PLoS-ONE, sometimes you have to lie to students in order to get them to accept evolution. Why? Because:

Education is a subversive activity that is implicitly in place in order to counter the prevailing culture. And the prevailing culture in ... many other schools in the country, is a deeply conservative religious culture.
In order to combat that "deeply conservative religious culture," Darwinists like Zivkovic push the "non-overlapping magisteria" model, or NOMA, which claims that science is about facts and religion is about values, and when we keep them in these nice separate realms, nobody gets hurt.

In reality, this scheme was designed by Darwinists in order to convince religious people that evolution is not threatening to their beliefs... the first step towards dismantling their belief system:

You cannot bludgeon kids with truth (or insult their religion, i.e., their parents and friends) and hope they will smile and believe you. Yes, NOMA is wrong, but is a good first tool for gaining trust. You have to bring them over to your side, gain their trust, and then hold their hands and help them step by step. And on that slow journey, which will be painful for many of them, it is OK to use some inaccuracies temporarily if they help you reach the students. (emphasis added)

You see, teaching isn't about actually instructing children to think critically or giving them factual knowledge about a subject like biology. It's about getting young minds to accept evolution, even if that means they're mistaken about the facts of biology for the rest of their lives. Zivkovic admits that teaching bogus examples to kids, like Mickey Mouse's changing appearance over the years is an example of evolution in action, may be factually incorrect, but it's not morally wrong. Zivkovic explains it all for us:

If a student, like Natalie Wright who I quoted above, goes on to study biology, then he or she will unlearn the inaccuracies in time. If most of the students do not, but those cutesy examples help them accept evolution, then it is OK if they keep some of those little inaccuracies for the rest of their lives. It is perfectly fine if they keep thinking that Mickey Mouse evolved as long as they think evolution is fine and dandy overall. Without Mickey, they may have become Creationist activists instead. Without belief in NOMA they would have never accepted anything, and well, so be it. Better NOMA-believers than Creationists, don't you think?


This isn't about minor mistakes in textbooks -- this is about the willful use of inaccurate information in order to convince students that evolution is a fact. Mistaken believers are better than skeptical students for Darwinist biology teachers.

On defining 'science'

Has Science's Freedom Become Its Downfall?
Sarah Chaffee

Writing in The New Atlantis, Daniel Sarewitz has a lengthy essay on why science, "pride of modernity, our one source of objective knowledge, is in deep trouble." He argues that science, rather than being disconnected from practical purposes, is most effective when it has a goal. Sarewitz cites Department of Defense projects as examples, and notes the recent reproducibility crisis as a sign of failure.

These are important points, but one of his overarching themes jumped out at me as another reason to reject scientism. The theme is this: Science when considered as the final authority on all matters simply doesn't work. It doesn't work as science.

In contrast to the idea that we can simply unleash science and it will bring us progress, Sarewitz notes:

Advancing according to its own logic, much of science has lost sight of the better world it is supposed to help create. Shielded from accountability to anything outside of itself, the "free play of free intellects" begins to seem like little more than a cover for indifference and irresponsibility. The tragic irony here is that the stunted imagination of mainstream science is a consequence of the very autonomy that scientists insist is the key to their success. Only through direct engagement with the real world can science free itself to rediscover the path toward truth.

It is time to realize that science doesn't belong on a pedestal -- it is a human endeavor. Respecting science is one thing, and all to the good. Kowtowing to it is a different matter, as we see clearly in the area of origins science, where the neo-Darwinist view is typically treated as the only option. As noted by Jerry Fodor and Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini, two researchers who (while critical of ID) buck the dominant natural-selection paradigm:

Much of the vast neo-Darwinian literature is distressingly uncritical. The possibility that anything is seriously amiss with Darwin's account of evolution is hardly considered. Such dissent as there is often relies on theistic premises which Darwinists rightly say have no place in the evaluation of scientific theories. So onlookers are left with the impression that there is little or nothing about Darwin's theory to which a scientific naturalist could reasonably object. The methodological scepticism that characterises most areas of scientific discourse seems strikingly absent when Darwinism is the topic.

Case in point: the discovery of a complex eye in a single-celled organism. An Evolution News & Views article quotes Nature, noting that the eye is seen as helping to "demonstrate how evolutionary plasticity of mitochondria and plastids can generate an extreme level of subcellular complexity." ENV continues:

The authors did not think this is a clear evolutionary story. "The ocelloid is among the most complex subcellular structures known, but its function and evolutionary relationship to other organelles remain unclear," they say. Never in the paper do they explain how organelles with different histories came together into a functioning eye. Most of the paper is descriptive of the parts and how they function individually, or where they might have been derived by endosymbiosis. To explain the eye's origin as a functioning whole, they make up a phrase, "evolutionary plasticity" --

Nevertheless, the genomic and detailed ultrastructural data presented here have resolved the basic components of the ocelloid and their origins, and demonstrate how evolutionary plasticity of mitochondria and plastids can generate an extreme level of subcellular complexity.

Other than that, they have very little to say about evolution, and nothing about natural selection.

...

In the same issue of Nature, Richards and Gomes review the paper.

...

The work sheds new light on how very different organisms can evolve similar traits in response to their environments, a process known as convergent evolution. Eye-like structures have evolved independently many times in different kinds of animals and algae with varying abilities to detect the intensity of light, its direction, or objects.

"When we see such similar structural complexity at fundamentally different levels of organization in lineages that are very distantly related to each other, in this case warnowiids and animals, then you get a much deeper understanding of convergence," Leander says.

We've discussed before the idea that  sight is irreducibly complex  -- it could not have been built up by a step-by-step process. Neo-Darwinism is treated as if it were exempt from critical consideration.

Under scientism, methodological naturalism excludes the consideration of rational alternatives. But a different orientation may move science forward -- as Douglas Axe points out.

"Science is trapped in a self-destructive vortex," Sarewitz observes. "[T]o escape, it will have to abdicate its protected political status and embrace both its limits and its accountability to the rest of society."


He's right. Ironically, perhaps, it is by defining the limitations of science that we spur its advancement.

Natural powered flight Vs. Darwinism.

Birds, Insects, and What They Share
Evolution News & Views

Biologists are improving photographic techniques to study the intricacies of flight. Let's look at what two research labs have been observing about birds and insects. They share amazing similarities in their flight strategies, despite the vast phylogenetic distance between them. This will give us an opportunity to ask what kind of cause could account for these similarities.

"You don't just partly fly," Paul Nelson quips in  Flight: the Genius of Birds . "Because flight requires not just having a pair of wings, but having your entire biology coordinated towards that function." As he speaks, we watch a crow temporarily folding its wings and dropping like a rock. It quickly spreads its wings again and takes control of the air, demonstrating the truth of Nelson's statement. Insects, being lighter, might drop a little slower, but they can't just partly fly either. And what astounding flyers they are!

A fruit fly can change its flight direction in less than one hundredth of a second. But how does it do that? A firm understanding of how fruit flies hover has emerged over the past two decades, whereas more recent work focussing on understanding how flight manoeuvres are performed. In a review article, as part of the special theme edition of Philosophical Transactions B, Florian Muijers of Wageningen University and Michael Dickinson of California Institute of Technology, describe how flies manipulate wing movement to control their body motion during active manoeuvres, and how these actions are regulated by sensory feedback.
That's how an article on Phys.org about "the flight of fruit flies under the microscope" begins. Dickinson has been studying these aerobatic champions for over a decade in his lab at Caltech. His fascination has not waned. How can these tiny insects dart about so fast, land on ceilings, and respond quickly to multiple sensory cues with only 1 millionth the neurons of a human brain? How can all their behaviors, including food searching, reproduction, and predator avoidance be packed into such a small space? Using innovative techniques, such as the Tethered Flight Simulator, Dickinson and his students have only begun to answer these questions. In a TED Talk  from 2013, you can see his infectious enthusiasm for flying insects as he compares them to engineered aircraft with sophisticated control systems.

The new study explores similarities between tiny fruit flies and larger insects and birds:

Fruit flies move their wings back and forth rather than up and down. This it is remarkably similar to what has been observed in hummingbirds, honey bees and hawk moths. Whether this pattern is optimal with respect to energetics is not entirely clear; nevertheless, the similarity among species is noteworthy and suggests that a combination of physical and biological constraints restrict the solutions available to hovering animals.
What does it take, for instance, to change direction in a hundredth of a second?

To keep in balance during such manoeuvre, the fly must perform corrective movements to control its body orientation. This mechanism uses input from different sensors: the antennae which can detect bilateral differences in airspeed, the visual system which can detect the optic flow created by the fly's forward motion, and the halteres which are thought to act as gyroscopes by detecting Coriolis forces resulting from body rotation. This allows a fly to correct itself in less than a hundredth of a second.
Like a helicopter, the fruit fly pitches nose down to accelerate. But like an airplane, it banks to change direction. A video clip in the article shows the wings flapping in slow motion. Notice how stable the body is during flight. When it sees a threat, the fly can respond and dart away in less time than an eye blink. In the TED Talk, Dickinson explores some of the computational requirements for these behaviors, and how they can be met with far fewer neurons than we have. He shows a parasitic fly with 7,000 neurons packed into a body the size of a paramecium -- and it can fly!

Birds

A colorful lovebird stars in a video from Stanford University posted on the BBC News Science-Environment section. Scientists spent four years designing and building a complex wind tunnel to study bird flight. In real time, the bird darts through the tunnel in about a second, but well-placed high-speed cameras show what really happens. It's as beautiful and graceful as a ballet.

The researchers want to "study how birds fly to develop better flying airplanes and robots," the narrator says. "And they want to understand how can it be that birds fly so effectively. We understand so little about it, although we see it every day and take it for granted." In future work, they want to watch hummingbirds to learn how, unlike other birds, their unique wingbeats provide lift on both forward and backward strokes, allowing them to hover. The Illustra film animates the shoulder joints unique to hummingbirds that allow the wings to rotate, providing optimal lift in both directions.

Vera Causa

So how do hummingbirds and fruit flies share similar wingbeat designs that allow them to hover, despite being phylogenetically distant? Evolutionists sometimes speak as if the environment itself causes different animals to arrive at the same solution (they call it "convergent evolution"). But that cannot be the vera causa (true cause). Constraints cannot bring something into being to meet the constraints. It takes engineering to design a system able to take advantage of opportunities in spite of constraints. It takes superb engineering to optimize a function within the constraints.


The student learns from the master. If top engineers at Caltech and Stanford study fruit flies and birds for decades and still have more to learn, who is the master? It's not so much the insect or bird; they do what they were programmed to do. The master is the mind that did the programming: an intelligent mind able to teach our designing minds a thing or two about engineering.

Jehovah's servants standing firm for Jehovah's sovereignty in the 'land of the free'.

A clash of titans.XXIX

A clash of titans.XXVIII

On the challenge of protecting our children III.The Watchtower Society's commentary.

AWAKE! 1985-01-22

Child Molesting—‘Who Would Do a Thing Like That?’

MOST parents would answer this question wrong. When we think of sexual molestation, most of us probably picture a weird stranger who exposes himself to children or lures them away into a car or to some wooded area. Publicity has also been given to groups that lure children away to exploit them for pornography or child prostitution. Such things do happen, but these people are far from the usual type of child molester. So who are the usual child molesters?

Sue was molested by a man who was running a church group. He ran a youth club, and everybody agreed that he was very pleasant. But he sexually abused Sue and other girls. Another young girl wrote to an advice column to tell that her favorite uncle had taken to pulling her onto his lap and fondling her improperly. One man remembers that as a boy he was habitually abused by the grown son of a close family friend. An 11-year-old boy was molested by the aunt that he lived with. A New York woman reports being molested by her grandfather when she was seven years old. A 15-year-old boy was molested by his doctor during a medical examination. For Pam, it was even worse. For many years, her own father molested her. And Mary was molested by two older brothers and an older first cousin.


 In fact, probably less than a third of sexual assaults on children are committed by strangers. Usually the victim knows the assailant. Often the abuser is a relative. Thus, in most cases children are molested by people they know and trust, which makes the problem of protecting them more difficult.

The Molester at Work

Many parents have another misconception. They envision molestation as being violent, with the child fighting and screaming for mercy. This may not be the case at all, at least not in the beginning. At the outset, sexual abuse may be disguised as playful or affectionate contact, and go on from there. The abuser is likely to persuade and pressure the child, using all the built-in authority of an older person. Do you remember what it was like when you were a child and were trained to obey adults even when they told you to do things you did not like, such as go to bed early or eat all your vegetables? Molesters take advantage of this training. One convicted abuser said: “Show me an obedient child, and I’ll show you an easy victim.”

One child was receiving obscene phone calls. When asked why she had not put the phone down, she said she thought it was rude to do that when someone was still talking! A woman of 30 remembers having been approached at the age of 5 by her grandfather. He said to her: “Good girls do this for Grandpa and never tell their mothers.” How many five-year-olds would be able to see through such a deception?

And do you remember how you loved presents and treats as a child? Abusers often use this childish trait to get an abusive relationship started. For example, what would your child do if the school janitor said: “Stay with me for a while in the office after school, and I will give you some money”? or if the baby-sitter said: “I will let you sit up late and watch television, if you do something for me first”?

She was molested by her minister
Sometimes molesters misuse a child’s natural love of secrets. Wasn’t it exciting, when you were young, to have a secret? One little girl had a secret that she kept from her parents. But one day her parents saw her acting in a precocious, sexual manner. When asked where she had learned such a thing, the little girl said: “It’s a secret.” Her father explained that sometimes we should not keep a secret, so the little girl revealed her secret. A 40-year-old man with a family of his own, who was a close family relative, had pushed her down and sexually assaulted her.

Finally, threats may be involved, subtle threats that strike at a child’s sense of security. A grown woman tells of having been abused by her stepfather when she was a child. She says he abused her for four years, starting when she was six. Why did she not tell her mother? “He said that if I ever told anybody about it, the police would come get him and my mother would lose her job. The family would starve and it would all be my fault.”

 Author Gail Sheehy covers many of these points in the following observation: “We forget how grownups seemed omnipotent to us when we ourselves were children.” She adds: “It is very easy for a parent or babysitter to initiate sexual activities under the guise of normal bathing and hygiene inspection. The child gets the message something is wrong only when secrecy is introduced: ‘Don’t tell your mommy that we did that’—and sufficient intimidation can be laid in with a single stroke—‘or she won’t love you anymore.’” Would your child be able to withstand that sort of psychological blackmail?


The Child’s Best Defense

So you see, molesters can be the most unexpected of people and they can use sophisticated and cunning tactics. Child molestation is probably almost as old as history. But as this generation progresses, and more and more people are “lovers of themselves, . . . having no natural affection, . . . without self-control,” the threat is becoming greater. (2 Timothy 3:1-3) However, children do have one very strong defense. What is that? Their parents. These are the adults best able to protect them from other adults who may wish to molest them. Let us see how.

Child Molesting—You Can Protect Your Child

A YOUNG woman who was molested as a girl by her brother and her brother-in-law says: “I was afraid, so I did not tell anyone. For this reason, I would like to warn all parents: ‘Please teach your children not to let anyone in the family, or outside the family, put their hands on them in any wrong way. If anyone tries to, do not be afraid to tell on them.’” She adds: “It can happen to any child at any time!”


In this degenerating world, we must take definite steps to protect our children from sexual molestation. It is not wise to leave things to chance and just hope that nothing will happen.

The First Line of Defense

The first line of defense is to avoid situations that leave our children vulnerable. For example, parents are advised to be careful about using as baby-sitters young adults who seem to prefer being with children rather than with folks their own age. One clinical psychologist reports that two thirds of the molesters he is treating committed the offense while baby-sitting.

Dr. Suzanne M. Sgroi mentions two more situations that have led to trouble: Children doubling up (in beds or rooms) with adults or teenagers, and large family gatherings where the grown-ups get involved  in enjoying themselves and just assume that the older children are taking care of the young ones.

The truth is, the more we can keep our children under our own supervision, the less opportunity molesters will have to get at them. Ann, a mother of three, goes to the extent of not allowing her youngest child, a 14-year-old boy, to wander around the shopping mall—or even to go into public rest rooms—alone. The boy probably finds this very restrictive, but his mother has her reasons. She was molested as a child.


However, parents cannot always keep such a close watch on their children. Working parents may have no choice but to use day-care facilities or to leave their children with relatives or baby-sitters. Children have to go to school, and parents cannot always be with them. Relatives and friends come to visit. And then there are the neighbors! How can we protect our children when they are so vulnerable? Really, there is only one way—

Talk to Your Child About the Danger

Psychologist Debrah Shulman said: “It’s foolish to pretend to children that dangers do not exist. Children are aware of their vulnerability and are naturally concerned about their own safety. It’s part of a parent’s job to give them the tools to deal with danger realistically. If presented honestly and positively such information will not threaten children, it will reassure them.” Yes, we have to talk to them about it.


This is easy to say but not so easy to do, especially since the greatest danger is from friends and relatives. We may already have warned our children against the stranger who wants to lure them into the woods or carry them away in a car. But how can we give them “the tools” to protect themselves from ones they know, respect, and even love?

How Can We Tell Them?

First, we have to bring the subject up. One suggestion is that if ever a scandal is reported in the news, parents could use it as an opportunity to ask their children: “Did anyone ever do anything like that to you?” and then go on to tell them how to act if anyone tries to.

Parents who teach their children about the Bible can use parts of it as a starting point. They can use the story of Dinah, the daughter of Jacob, to explain the boundaries that exist in what one person may do to another. (Genesis 34:1-4) The story of Tamar and Amnon can be used to show that there are things that even close relatives are not permitted to do to each other. (2 Samuel 13:10-16) And we should make sure they understand that if something like that does happen to them, we want to know about it. We will not get angry with them if they tell us.


Mary was molested when she was a little girl, so she made very sure to put her three daughters on guard against molesters. How did she do it? As soon as they were old enough to understand, she told them: “If anyone touches you in the wrong place, tell me and I will not be angry.” How would they know where the wrong places are? Mary says that when they were about three years old she showed them. When she was bathing them or getting them ready for bed, she pointed out the parts of their body that other people should not touch. As they got a little older, she presented situations: “Nobody should touch you there, even if it is a schoolteacher or a policeman. Not even Mummy or Daddy should touch you there. And a doctor should only touch you there if Mummy or Daddy is with you!”Did this work? Mary remembers one occasion when a relative was playing with her six-year-old daughter. The things the relative was doing started to make the little girl feel uncomfortable. What did she do? She just walked away from him. Mary is not sure whether the relative had bad intentions or not. But she is delighted that her daughter was able to walk away from the situation when it started to feel “not right,” or “strange.”

Hence, just as parents warn their children against going off with strangers, playing in a busy street, and putting their hands on electric wires, they should also tell them about avoiding molestation. They should explain the boundaries on their bodies that others—even their own parents—should not transgress. They should clearly state that if something does happen, they want to know about it. And they will not blame the children.

The “What if . . . ?” Game

Sometimes adults will use their greater experience and intelligence to deceive children into joining them in some inappropriate activity, and children may not spot the deception without help. So Linda Tschirhart Sanford, author of the book The Silent Children, suggests a tool that could be used to counter this in advance: the “What if . . . ?” game. From time to time, ask the children what they would do in certain situations: “What if the baby sitter said that you could stay up late watching television if you got in the bathtub with him and played games? What would you tell him?” “What if someone you knew took you for a ride and wanted to put his hands where he should not? What would you do?” “What would you do if an older friend touched you in a way you did not like, or wanted to undress you and play a secret game with you?”


In teaching the child how to answer, parents can show that there are occasions when they can say no to an adult. There are also occasions when they should reveal secrets. If they are trained to say things like “I will just go and ask Mummy first,” they will be able to discourage most potential molesters. If the child learns the right answers in the “What if . . . ?” game, it is gaining some good tools to protect itself. If it gives a wrong answer, well, go back over the question and suggest a different answer.

Give Them the Words

The following experience shows another problem that children face in the matter of molestation: A woman relates that she was abused as a child and tried to tell her mother about it. But she did not have the right words and could not explain what had happened. Her mother thought that someone was just trying to be affectionate and that the little girl had misunderstood the situation and blown it out of proportion.


Because of similar experiences, social workers encourage parents to tell their children the right names for parts of their bodies. Give them the vocabulary to express themselves in case the worst happens.

Alert but Balanced

One of a parent’s worst nightmares is that their child might be sexually molested. However, we need to remember that most adults are not going to molest our children. Most of our relatives love them and would be as concerned as we are to protect them from abuse.


On the other hand, it can happen. And merely hoping that it will not happen is not enough. The Biblical proverb says: “Shrewd is the one that has seen the calamity and proceeds to conceal himself.” (Proverbs 22:3) Hence, it is wise to be cautious, especially in view of the times we live in. If we avoid, to the extent possible, putting our children in situations that leave them vulnerable, if we explain to them the boundaries that even adults are not to cross, and if we teach them how to react in case any adult should try to cross those boundaries, then we are doing a lot to protect our children from the molester.

If the Worst Should Happen

No parent can give a child complete protection against sexual molestation, although taking sensible precautions will enormously reduce the possibility that anything will happen. However, if parents have established good family communication, it may be that children will talk about it in the event that the worst should happen. Sometimes, though, children are so shocked by or ashamed of the experience that they will not discuss it. Hence, parents need to be alert. Here are some signs that researchers say may show that something has happened.

Be suspicious of any changes in the normal routine. In one case, a teacher asked that certain children come to school long before others. Watch for any telling signs in children such as declining grades or extreme anxiety around a specific adult. One woman who was victimized by her brother and her father as a girl said: “I came at the bottom of a class of 42, and nobody tried to find out why.”

Pay attention to physical symptoms, such as headaches, vomiting or loss of appetite, and difficulty in sleeping. Genital complaints, such as soreness, are particularly important. Be aware of precocious sexuality in language, dress, or behavior. Be on the lookout for sudden changes in behavior that might indicate a problem. If a child becomes unusually withdrawn or shows an inclination to avoid one member of the family, a warning bell should sound. We also have to listen for the oblique messages that our children send us. The statement, “I don’t like that math teacher any more” may be the child’s way of trying to broach this difficult subject.

If parents see anything like this in their child, they should try to find out what is wrong. The child has a problem, and it may be a problem of molestation. If so, the child needs help. Unfortunately, many children do not get that help. Molested children have been accused of inventing the incident, although researchers assure us that children rarely, if ever, invent such things. Incest has been covered up so as not to break up the family.

However, if molestation—and especially incest—is discovered to have occurred, two things must be done immediately:

First, the child—and other children too—must be protected from any further abuse. This must be done, whatever the cost. In many cases the accused molester will have to be confronted. But whatever it takes, it is important that the child should feel confident that the molester will never be able to get at her (or him) again.


Second, the child must be given a lot of love and emotional support. Parents must make it very clear that the little victim is not to blame. The crime and anything that happens as a result of it—even if a close relative goes to prison—is not her (or his) fault. But that reassurance will have to be given many times, so that the victim comes to believe it—and to believe that the parents believe it too!

The undeniable logic of design.

Time to hand intitutionalised religion the pink slip?:Pros and cons.

Here be dragons.

Fellow travelers.

Continuing to rethink the unrethinkable II

Theistic universe:Miracles with cause and purpose;Atheistic multiiverse:Miracles with neither cause nor purpose.

The Multiverse: Where Everything Turns Out to Be True, Except Philosophy and Religion

Denyse O'Leary December 9, 2013 5:39 AM

 

Perhaps we shouldn't be surprised by the multiverse's ready acceptance. David Berlinski observes, "The idea that everything is really true somewhere has been current in every college classroom for at least fifty years."

But as orthodoxy? New Scientist told us in 2009:

Until recently, many were reluctant to accept this idea of the "multiverse", or were even belligerent towards it. However, recent progress in both cosmology and string theory is bringing about a major shift in thinking. Gone is the grudging acceptance or outright loathing of the multiverse. Instead, physicists are starting to look at ways of working with it, and maybe even trying to prove its existence.

Maybe even trying to prove its existence? Yes because, remember, evidence is now superfluous. Methodological naturalism produced the Copernican Principle, which is an axiom. It axiomatically accounts for our universe's apparent fine tuning by postulating -- without the need for evidence -- an infinity of flops. And cosmologists' acceptance makes the multiverse orthodoxy.

 

Hailed as the "world's smartest man," with cameos to his credit on The Simpsons and Star Trek, Stephen Hawking has blessed the multiverse for popular culture. Denouncing philosophy (and religion) as "outdated and irrelevant", he announced that science dispenses with a designer behind nature because the law of gravity explains how the universe "can and will create itself from nothing."

Sometimes his pronouncements are less clear, though their outlines are discernible. Ian Sample, science writer for Britain's Guardian, asked Hawking in 2011, "What is the value in knowing 'Why are we here?'" Hawking replied:

The universe is governed by science. But science tells us that we can't solve the equations, directly in the abstract. We need to use the effective theory of Darwinian natural selection of those Societies most likely to survive. We assign them a higher value.

Sample had no idea what Hawking meant. But we can discern this much: Philosophy and religion may not matter, but Darwin does.

 

How far has the multiverse penetrated our culture? Tegmark observes, "Parallel universes are now all the rage, cropping up in books, movies and even jokes." Indeed, multiverse models can hardly be invented fast enough, with or without science. Cosmologist Andrei Linde has commented that a scenario that is "very popular among journalists" has remained rather unpopular among scientists. In short, popular science culture needs that scenario.

Multiverse cosmologists look out on a bright future, freed from the demands of evidence. Leonard Susskind writes, "I would bet that at the turn of the 22nd century philosophers and physicists will look nostalgically at the present and recall a golden age in which the narrow provincial 20th century concept of the universe gave way to a bigger better [multiverse] ... of mind-boggling proportions." Physicists Alejandro Jenkins and Gilad Perez say their computer program shows that "universes with different physical laws might still be habitable." And reviewing theoretical physicist Lawrence Krauss's Universe From Nothing (2012), science writer Michael Brooks notes that the multiverse puts laws of physics "beyond science -- for now, at least." Before methodological naturalism really sank in, undemonstrable universes, not the laws of physics, were beyond science.

And, as we have by now come to expect, the scheme is undergirded by tinny moralizing. From Max Tegmark: "The price we have to pay is becoming more humble -- which will probably do us good -- but in return we may find ourselves inhabiting a reality grander than our ancestors dreamed of in their wildest dreams."

Multiverse cosmologists are now so culturally secure that they no longer need confidence in their own assertions. Andrei Linde confessed, after offering a defense of multiverse thinking, "One can easily dismiss everything that I just said as a wild speculation," a prospect that does not trouble him much. Leonard Susskind reportedly told Alan Guth, "You know, the most amazing thing is that they pay us for this," and Nobelist David Gross (the fellow who "hates" the Big Bang) has admitted about string theory, "We don't know what we are talking about." But they do know what they are not talking about, and that is enough.

Concluding a defense of the multiverse, Nobelist Steven Weinberg (2011) tells us:

It must be acknowledged that there is a big difference in the degree of confidence we can have in neo-Darwinism and in the multiverse. It is settled, as well as anything in science is ever settled, that the adaptations of living things on Earth have come into being through natural selection acting on random undirected inheritable variations ...

Weinberg has faith in Darwin. Not so much in the multiverse:

Martin Rees said that he was sufficiently confident about the multiverse to bet his dog's life on it, while Andrei Linde said he would bet his own life. As for me, I have just enough confidence about the multiverse to bet the lives of both Andrei Linde and Martin Rees's dog.

So if there were no multiverse, for Weinberg there would still be Darwin. But now, what of those more confident ones, who know that the multiverse is a Sure Thing?

On the challenge of protecting our Children II:The Watchtower Society's commentary.

AWAKE! 1981-02-08

Incest—The Hidden Crime

“IS THERE any help for a person like me?” This sad question came from a woman with a difficult problem—one shared by a surprising number of other women today. After many years, she was still suffering from a childhood experience. She had been a victim of incest. How can her question be answered?

“Incest” is not a pleasant word. Most would rather not discuss it, yet it is increasingly common. If estimates are correct, it is quite likely that some of your personal friends have been victims. It is certainly a problem of which parents should be aware.


Most of us know what incest means—sexual activity between close relatives. It is suspected that a lot of such activity goes on between brothers and sisters, although this is not usually reported. Authorities are particularly concerned when children are abused by adult relatives. Of greatest concern, and probably accounting for most of the reported cases, are instances where children are molested by their fathers or stepfathers.

Is the Problem Really Widespread?

Despite the lack of complete statistics, the answer is clearly, Yes. Susan Brownmiller, in her book Against Our Will, says: “The sexually abused child is statistically more prevalent than the physically abused, or battered child.” Mrs. Lee Preney, a childcare worker, asserts that incest is “more common than rape, and less frequently reported.”

A report in the Seattle Times said: “Look at any 15 girls in your daughter’s classroom the next time you’re there . . . the odds are good that at least one—and possibly two or three—has been a victim of incest.”

Hank Giarretto, a psychologist who works in a sexual-abuse treatment program in prosperous Santa Clara County, California, thinks that incest is “epidemic” in America. In an area with a population of around one million, he saw incest cases rise from 30 in 1971 to more than 500 in 1977. In an interview with the magazine People, he said: “I think we are just beginning to tap the actual prevalence.”


Some estimate that 25 million women in America today suffered incestuous abuse as children! Reports indicate that many other countries are experiencing the same growing problem.

Should We Be Concerned About It?

Many experts have raised this question. For example, Wardell Pomeroy, coauthor  of the original Kinsey reports, was quoted in Time magazine as saying: “It is time to admit that incest need not be a perversion or a symptom of mental illness. Incest between . . . children and adults . . . can sometimes be beneficial.”

Are you a parent? How do you feel about that viewpoint? Would you allow your little boy or girl to have sex relations with an older relative?

If you are a Christian, you know you should be concerned about incest. God’s opinion about it—much more important than any man’s—was stated very clearly to the Israelites: “You people must not come near, any man of you, to any close fleshly relative of his to lay bare nakedness.” The forbidden relationships are specified, including: brother/sister, parent/child, as well as uncle-or-aunt/niece-or-nephew relations.—Leviticus 18:6-18.


The experience of children who have been incestuously abused also shows that we should be concerned.

What Happens to the Child?

In correspondence with the Australian Women’s Weekly, a woman described how childhood incest drove her to several suicide attempts, starting from the age of 10. Others could not have normal sex relationships when they grew up.

Another, one of three sisters molested by their father, wrote: “It has taken me 10 years and a lot of help from my husband to come to terms with it and discuss it freely. It affects everybody differently. My eldest sister thinks sex is the dirtiest thing in the world; my youngest just doesn’t care. She was charged with prostitution at the age of 14 and had a child by the time she was 15 years old.”

Prostitution, drug abuse, committing rape (in the case of boys), alcoholism, rebelliousness and emotional turmoil have all resulted from incest. One young girl could not think of God as her heavenly Father. An incestuous relationship with her natural father had soured her on the whole concept of fatherhood.

Why does incest seem to cause more emotional turmoil than, say, rape? Because the molester is imposing on a very close and important relationship. One girl complained that she felt more like a wife than a daughter and believed that she was there only for her father’s sexual pleasure.


Consider the comment of another victim: “I was terrified to tell anyone what was happening to me. I was so scared to disobey him; after all he was my father, he wouldn’t do anything he wasn’t supposed to . . . As I grew into my teens, things got worse and worse. I understood things better. I felt like I was dirty, cheap and worthless. So many times I considered suicide. And how I hated men! . . . I knew I was only a little girl when it started, but I could not stop feeling that it was all my fault . . . almost worse than the actual molesting is the guilt.”

What About the Perpetrator?

Not only the victim, but the molester, too, can suffer because of incest. Often he feels shame and self-hatred, while all the time becoming more and more involved. A therapist told the Seattle Times: “The problem is that we’re dealing with compulsive behavior. These men have conditioned themselves through repeated sexual daydreaming . . . to respond to young girls.”

One molester said: “I tried stopping it several times, and I told my stepdaughter that I had to stop because of what I was doing to the family.” But he did not stop. Another said his incestuous relationship left him with “permanent emotional scars.”


Besides this, remember that in most lands incest is against the law, punishable by a possible prison sentence. Surely, if all these facts were kept in mind, fewer parents  would allow themselves to fall into incestuous relationships.

Then Why Do They Do It?

Some adults who turn to incest are psychotic. Most are not, however. They may be apparently good family men, business or community leaders, even good churchgoers.

Why do such “ordinary people” commit incest? Loss of control due to alcohol has been involved. Sometimes, a man marries a woman who already has children. As his stepchildren get older, he may be tempted sexually.

Family problems can contribute. Hank Giarretto says: “Usually it’s a man losing his job or going through a low-ebb period in his life. He and his wife become alienated. The father reaches out to his daughter, looking for closeness. She is open to him, loves him, thinks he’s great. The first overtures are not sexual.”

There may be additional causes. One incest victim told how pornographic literature was always present in the house. Giarretto adds: “It’s the sexual climate of our society which helps create the problem. We teach our girls to be Lolitas and sexual provocateurs from the time they’re 2.”


An adult committing incest with a child betrays selfishness. He shows no concern at all for the welfare of the child. Yet, in a world that encourages us to ‘do our own thing’ and promotes such perversions as child pornography, is it surprising that cases of incest are on the increase?

Can It Be Prevented?

It surely can, but it means that individuals must make a determined mental stand against the worsening moral climate of this world. For this, we can get no better advice than that found in the Bible. The apostle Paul tells us: “Quit being fashioned after this system of things, but be transformed by making your mind over.” (Rom. 12:2) To do this, we must avoid unclean books and entertainment and block from our minds the unclean influences to which we are constantly exposed. Thus, we avoid conditioning ourselves to wrong behavior.

One incest victim recommended teaching children at an early age that certain parts of their bodies are not for others to play with. This can be done in a loving way, perhaps using the story of Dinah, in the publication My Book of Bible Stories. * Then, if anything resembling molestation should occur, the child can immediately tell mother or father. Remember, sexual molestation does not have to be intercourse. Fondling, “touching,” unwarranted intimacy or any sexual playing can cause great damage in later life.


Deep parental love is a true safeguard. Paul said: “Love . . . does not behave indecently, does not look for its own interests.” (1 Cor. 13:4, 5) This unselfish love will surely prevent parents from allowing fleshly weaknesses to nudge them to do wrong acts toward their offspring. It will also help to prevent another problem. Sometimes, as children start to become young men or women, their parents, afraid of falling into incestuous relationships, become cold and distant. Of course, this, too, is harmful to the growing child.

Handling the Problem

Handling incest has not proved easy. It is a secret crime. Families often try to keep it hidden. Mothers who know that “something is going on” may turn a blind eye, afraid of disrupting the family. Children who report their parents may come under strong pressure to withdraw the complaint. Yet, in the experience of many specialists, children rarely lie about incest.

Some feel that prison is not always the  answer for the molester. Hence, counseling centers have been set up where these families can be treated as a whole. Explaining what he thinks is very important in such treatment, Hank Giarretto says: “[The father] must face the daughter and accept full responsibility for whatever happened.” This may be difficult for the father to do; but it is a way he can try to undo some of the harm that has been done to the child.


Outsiders can help too. Many victims have testified how, through patient, considerate and selfless care, they were assisted to overcome the emotional confusion and start planning for the future. The scars may never completely disappear; but with persistence, they will at least recede into the background.

Another Source of Help

What, then, about the incest victim whose question appears at the beginning of this article? She was molested by her grandfather from the age of six until nine. She tried immorality, drugs and psychiatrists, but found in these no relief from her unhappiness.

Happily, there is help for such a person. However confused and “down” we may be, there is One who is “raising up the lowly one from the very dust,” and we can get to know him by means of the Bible. (Ps. 113:7) He can help even in the deepest depression, for he is the “Father of tender mercies and the God of all comfort.” (2 Cor. 1:3) It takes much prayer, study and discussion with mature people to replace the depressing, guilt-ridden thoughts in the mind with upbuilding ones. But it can be done. The following experience may help to demonstrate this.

A woman said that she was abused by her natural father from a very early age, and then by her stepfather. She sank into immorality, drug abuse and finally had an illegitimate child. But she says: “There is a way out of incest, child-abuse, statutory rape, drugs and homosexuality. You may feel as though you can’t live through these things with a completely sane mind, but you can if you have hope of something better to live for. I have that hope . . . I never fought back as a child. I only wish I had, but I was afraid, afraid no one would take care of me or want me. I was wrong, very wrong! Jehovah cares . . . and the elders at the local Kingdom Hall [of Jehovah’s Witnesses] care too.”


Whatever our past history, any of us can be “washed clean,” and “sanctified” from the standpoint of God. (1 Cor. 6:11) The Bible explains how. By the power of his Word and spirit, God can also remove our guilt feelings and provide escape even from emotional confusion. He can help us to live a satisfying life now, and give us confidence that, one day soon, we will live in a world where such things as incest will never happen again.

Rethinking hell some more.

Modern medicine has just promoted the golden rule to platinum.

By David Robson
26 November 2015

You’d have thought Sandi Mann was offering people a slap in the face – not a steaming cup of coffee. She’d been visiting her local cafe with her children, where they often enjoyed a cheap and cheerful breakfast as a treat before school. The youngest didn’t want the coffee that came with his toast, so she thought she might as well take it round and see if the other customers would like a free treat instead.
What could possibly go wrong? “I thought they’d be delighted – that everything would be warm and cuddly,” she says today. “Instead, I just got stares of bewilderment. There was this suspicion: Had I spat on it? Is it poisoned?” She ended up feeling that she had somehow acted wrongly – when all she wanted to do was offer a free gift.
It wasn’t meant to be like this. Mann, a psychologist at the University of Central Lancashire, had just embarked on a new project to explore the phenomenon of “paying it forward” – a popular philosophy of being generous to a stranger, in the hope they will pass on the kindness to someone else. “The idea is to create a chain – a domino effect,” Mann explains.Mann’s idea was to try it herself for a couple of weeks and observe the way people react. After all, most people might have the intention of being a little bit kinder, yet we feel that we are unable to muster up the willpower. So why is it so difficult to both give, and accept, kindness? And would it really pay off in the real world – or are we just too cynical in today’s society? Mann recorded the pleasures, and embarrassments, of that journey in her recent book – Paying It Forward : How One Cup of Coffee Could Change the World. (In the spirit of the book’s contents, Mann’s royalties from the book go to a charity for patients with muscular dystrophy.)
Like many people, Mann’s interest in everyday kindness started with a heart-warming post on her Facebook feed. Her American friend Debbie had been visiting a drive-through coffee shop only to find that the person ahead had already settled her bill. “She was so chuffed – it made her day,” says Mann. Straight away, she was intrigued by the philosophy’s potential – the idea that a single act of kindness could “have a knock-on effect, like the butterfly effect”, sending ripples of goodwill through the world.
As Mann started reading up on the subject, she found that the principle has a deep history. In Italy, wealthier Neapolitans have long embraced the tradition of buying a “caffe sospeso” in addition to their own, for someone who is less able to pay for the luxury. Benjamin Franklin is one of the most famous proponents of the idea. While lending some money to a friend, he explained: “I do not pretend to give such a deed; I only lend it to you; when you meet with another honest man in similar distress, you must pay me by lending this sum to him,” he wrote. “This is a trick of mine for doing a deal of good with a little money.”Today, “paying it forward” has become a popular and far-reaching movement – it has even spawned a novel and film. Google the term, and you will read heart-warming stories of grandiose acts of goodwill – like the generous philanthropists anonymously calling hospitals to pay for expensive operations, without expecting so much as a simple thank you.
But often it is the smaller deeds that are most touching. Mann points to the case of Josh Brown, a 12-year-old who found a stranger’s lost phone on a train. The owner was so pleased, she offered him a small reward for the trouble. Instead, he sent a note attached to the returned phone: “Don’t worry about the money, just do something nice for someone else.”These everyday altruists may not get an immediate payback (besides the “giver’s glow”), but people like Brown tend to reap their rewards in terms of general life satisfaction. Michael Norton at Harvard Business School has offered some of the most convincing evidence, repeatedly finding that people who spend a bigger proportion of their income on others tend to be far happier, in the long run, than those spending it on themselves.
Crucially, this is not just the result of the comfortable Western lifestyle: Norton has tested the concept with data from more than 130 countries, from the US to Uganda. “Across all countries – rich or poor, and in every continent – people who gave more tended to be happier people,” he says. For this reason, he thinks the joy of giving appears to be a “psychological universal” – a trait that lies at the core of human nature, independent of your culture.
Taking time to help others may even protect you from disease, Mann says. Over a 30-year study, women who volunteered for a charity were 16% less likely to suffer a major illness during that period – perhaps because it lowers stress levels, which may also, in turn, boost the immune system.There are many possible reasons why acting selflessly may soothe the body and mind in these ways. Giving to others can increase your social connection (who isn’t grateful after they’ve received a nice present) and your sense of purpose in life; you feel like you’ve made a difference, and there is a point in getting out of bed in the morning. Given that humans are social animals, this may be part of our evolved nature, says Norton. In the same way that we hunger for fat or sugar – we may all nurture a deep desire to help other people, he says.
Helper’s high
At least, that’s the theory – yet Mann found that the “helper’s high” was often difficult to earn. Having read the research, she had decided to spend two weeks trying simple, generous acts. “I was very determined that it shouldn’t cost lots of money,” she explains. “So I set myself the challenge that it had to cost less than a pound.”
Her first task should have been simple enough. The setting was familiar – her local coffee shop – and she was accompanied by her (“cringing”) children. All she wanted to do was to give away her seven-year-old’s unwanted cup of coffee. Yet as she walked among the tables, she was just met with suspicion rather than gratitude. “I felt like saying ‘I’m only trying to do something nice.’”
It was only once she framed the act differently, so that it seemed more logical, and less altruistic, that their attitudes changed. “Suddenly it was a different story altogether – it made perfect sense that my kid won’t drink coffee.” They still refused, but “the suspicion vanished, and there were smiles, and thanks”. Eventually it was accepted by a lady named Rochel, who subsequently found an opportunity later in the week to treat someone else.That initial mistrust was a common theme for each of the following 13 days – in which she tried to offer strangers an umbrella on a rainy day, pay for someone’s parking ticket, and let fellow shoppers jump ahead of her in checkout queues. “Suspicion was the strongest reaction throughout,” she says. Each time, it was only when she offered a rational explanation – such as the fact she was waiting for someone at the checkout – that people would accept her offers. Looking back, Mann now explains it as “stranger danger”. “We’re brought up to expect strangers to put one over us,” she says.Yet there were also moments when she genuinely touched people’s lives. “One man accepted the chocolates, and told me that it’s a great thing spreading love instead of hate,” says Mann. “When you know you’ve given someone’s mood a lift and made a difference – there’s nothing like it.” She even earned a good friend from the experience – she’s still regularly in touch with Rochel, the woman who accepted her coffee on that first day.
If anything, the occasional hostility has only made Mann more determined to persevere. She points to research showing that people have become individualistic over the last few decades, and score about 40% lower on tests of empathy than those brought up in the 1970s. Perhaps we’re just less used to being kind, and receiving kindness in return.
“It’s a sad society if that’s what we’ve become,” she says. “There’s so much hate, negativity, and suspicion, and with everyone’s individualism, we feel like we’re all fighting just for ourselves, but we need to counteract this and start a kindness movement. It sounds cheesy, but I think we need it.”Critics of the “paying it forward” movement may balk at its artificiality; they may even see it as somewhat coercive, guilt-tripping others into acts of charity they may resent. They may also point to evidence that goodwill does not spread quite as quickly as its proponents would like to believe. Norton’s own research, for instance, has found that spite and greed are far more likely to ripple through a population than generosity. “If someone is stingy, we are much more likely to pay forward that negative behaviour to next person,” he explains.Yet you could also argue that this is only one more reason why we need a bit more kindness in the world – to neutralise those bad apples. What’s more, even though these random acts of kindness may seem artificial to start with, there is some evidence that they can permanently change you for the better – so that kindness becomes your norm. “You can cultivate habits of virtue,” says David Rand at Yale University, who has found that subjects encouraged to perform good deeds tend to be kinder in subsequent tasks, a kind of “psychological spillover”. Indeed, he thinks that even the most astonishing acts of altruism – such as the heroism during the recent Paris shootings – all grew from tiny seeds of deliberate goodwill that eventually grew into an automatic desire to help others.
Mann, for one, is convinced that we can all change for the better. As a clinical psychologist, she has even started advising people with depression to try and incorporate small acts of generosity or kindness into their therapy. “Depressed people say they have a lack of meaning in life, and that they don’t feel valuable,” says Mann. She emphasises that it isn’t a “cure” – their other therapy is still very important. “But it gives a way to contribute back to society – and that makes them feel good, like they are something useful.”If you are inspired to give it a go, she suggests you should develop a thick skin. “It takes some courage and guts,” she says. For this reason, she would advise setting the bar low at the beginning. “I wouldn’t recommend standing in the street giving [out] free chocolates – start with something in your comfort zone, maybe just smiling at someone in the street, or talking nicely to shop assistants.” Simply complimenting people she encountered turned out to be one of the easiest, and most warmly received, acts of kindness.
Ultimately, she hopes that her book will help remind us all that sometimes being kind can be a reward in and of itself. “That’s the view I’d like to change; that there doesn’t always have to be ulterior motive. You can be kind just for the sake of being nice.”
BBC