Friday, March 30, 2007

Science triumphs!

I have a die-hard scientific outlook in that I believe there is a scientific explanation for everything. Two fabulous bits of info came through my RSS feeds today that really made me smile.

Curiomanic Tidbit #1
"A new study shows that people with memories of past lives are more likely than others to misremember the source of any given piece of information. "

According to an article today at Scientific American, people who believe they can remember their own past lives actually suffer from a memory affliction and "are committing a source-monitoring error, or an error in judgment about the original source of a memory." I suppose this explains why people really truly believe they have experienced past lives.

I was cogitating on this a bit. There are some people who come up with many past life memories on their own, almost always of famous people. These poor folks most likely have the source-monitoring error in their memory. But what about otherwise memory-functional folks who undergo past-life regression? These experiences often result in mundane details about non-famous lives. These details are often believed. Does the hypnosis that precipitates past life regression somehow tigger a source-monitoring error in otherwise healthy individuals? I'd be interested to know.


Curiomanic Tidbit #1
According to a creationist, the absence of spontaneous life in a jar of peanut butter disproves evolution. Hmmmm.

The, um, dare I call it "logic" behind this statement is that:
According to evolutionists, energy plus matter can sometimes create life.
The US food production industry constantly combines heat and matter.
Ergo, the absense of any discoveries of life in a jar of peanut butter disproves evolution.

Ooooookaaaaay. Check out the short video and read the comments. My favorite is:
"Despite a lifelong love of peanut butter (and jelly) I have never once found god inside a sealed jar, thereby conclusively and indisputably disproving divine creation. "

1 comment:

Stephanie said...

Hmmm....I eat a TB of peanut butter everyday. When I first started this diet I sure felt like I had found god in there...since it was one of the only foods with flavor I was eating!!! ROFL! I love the look on the guys face when he is peeling back the foil to prove that there is no new life in the jar.