RFID, Sign of the (End) Times?

andy753421 writes "Wired is running an article featuring Katherine Albrecht who, with her new book 'The Spychips Threat: Why Christians Should Resist RFID and Electronic Surveillance', is warning that RFID tags may in fact be the "mark of the beast". Among her arguments are that in a futuristic world anyone who wishes to buy and sell goods would be compelled "to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads," as is foretold in the book Revelation. Others are skeptical saying that many new technologies, such as the printing press, bar-codes, and several others, have also created fears about the beginning of the end."

Comments

Last post

[saltydogdesign]

Get it? Huh? Huh?

Re:Last post

[ookabooka]

Perhaps your post was merely the end of the first of the beginning of the last posts.

Re:Last post

[secolactico]

From Wikipedia (so take it as you will): "So be it; truly"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amen

Re:Last post

[HermanAB]

Hmm, I lived in Israel for a few years and cannot remember ever hearing a Jew use the word - though I didn't go anywhere anybody would be praying to the Gods either, since those are generally good places to stay away from...

I have heard 'Alah akbar' shouted from minarets in many places all over the world, but no Arabic sounding like 'Amen' either.

Does any real Jew care to comment on 'Amen'?

Re:Last post

[AuMatar]

I am a real jew, born into it. Many of our prayers end in amen. For example, the prayer over wine- baruch atah adonai elloheynu melech haolam boreh pre hagofen amen (fogive the rough phonetic spelling there). It doesn't end every prayer, and its not said reqularly outside of prayer as some christians do. But its definitely used. Go to a friday night kiddush and you'll hear it.

Re:Last post

[Almonday]

"But many who are first will be last, and many who are last will be first." -- Matthew 19:30

Jesus would probably read Slashdot at -1, that masochist.

Re:Last post

[HermanAB]

OK, cool, one mystery cleared up, but no, I rather won't go to any Shabat thing - since people may be offended by my ignorance of the customs. I was actually confirmed in a Christian church, but it was against my will. I was pretending due to enormous peer pressure in an overwhelmingly Christian setting. This is why I feel I earned the right to speak my mind about religion, since it was forced down my throat as a child... :)

Re:Last post

[Namronorman]

I read at -1, it is real hell sometimes.

Fallacy

[XanC]

Just because those other inventions weren't the mark doesn't mean this one isn't.

Re:Fallacy

[Anonymous Coward]

Just because some old book tells a pointless fairy tale doesn't mean it has any connection to reality either. ( -1, Flamebait, I know.)

Re:Fallacy

[mce]

Agnostic as I am, I do not believe this apocalypse nonsense at all. But it has to be said that there's another logical error here as well: maybe the invention of (for instance) the printing press really was "the beginning of the end". Maybe the whole process just takes 600 years to complete...

Re:Fallacy

[sedyn]

Exactly...

Hell, when England made the Domesday Book in 1086 Christians probably went ape-shit over it for the same reason.

I've learned something about Christians, when something like this comes, many don't say "this is the mark of the beast" instead they say something along the line of "the end is near"... So, they're learning.

I think that the stance against RFIDs needs all the help it can get... So, let the Christians rant and rave next to the EFF... Just as long as the reasonable people raise that point that tracking technologies COULD be used for bad reasons, and encourage people to weigh the good against the bad... Or does that involve thinking?

Re:Fallacy

[bigpicture]

You should read Revelation again. The "mark of the beast" is actually the "mark of the beast". "BIOMETRICS". When they have this technology perfected and in common use, you will have your "mark of the beast". Not silicon chips which are the "mark of sand".

Re:Fallacy

[Nutria]

And why the sobbing at funerals? Aren't they happy their loved ones went to be with Jesus?

The (original, non-commercialized) New Orleans Jazz Funeral recognizes this fact.

The band plays dirges while the casket travels from the Church to the cemetary. Then, from the cemetary to the deceased's house, the music is lively and happy, celebrating the fact that the deceased is now in Heaven.

Re:Fallacy

[ehrichweiss]

I learned a long time ago to find groups that share an agenda you'd like to promote and then use their power to get what you want done. A simple letter of appreciation to the right group for "taking a stance against this new threat" with some motivational languaging will work wonders. In short, "I read your church's newsletter about this RFID technology being the mark of THE BEAST and I pray that Jesus(tm) will give me strength to resist their evil armies. I have attached a donation. It's not much but it's all that my social security check will allow after rent, food and tithing. Blessed be His name."

So yeah, call in when you get the chance and get them fired up about this. Write them letters, get them to get Pat Robertson and all his idiots involved and you'll see some changes made. You'll be surprised how easily it'll work, and how quickly all these people will be forgotten once the message makes it to the right person much in the same way each church will be forgotten once the message makes it to someone like Pat.

Re:Fallacy

[porcupine8]

Why do parents cry when their child graduates high school or college? Aren't they happy their loved one will finally become a useful, productive member of society?

Of course they are, but they're also sad that the child is moving away from them. Most people crying at funerals aren't nearly as sad for the person as they are for themselves, having lost the person.

Re:Fallacy

[mr i want to go home]

Maybe the whole process just takes 600 years to complete

Surely you mean 666 years to complete :)

Let's see anyway - printing press invented in 1440. Add 666 years. That's 2106. Plenty of time for RFID to become required, and just about the time this asteroid will hit Earth!

Ha! I win the thread!

Re:Fallacy

[croddy]

It doesn't matter whether you are religious or not -- an identification system that can be read remotely and surreptitiously is a friend to no one but evil.

Re:Fallacy

[dsanfte]

Shh, don't rock his worldview too hard. We have to respect ignorance, it's a point of view now.

Re:Fallacy

[Glonoinha]

You are pretty close.
Actually I was talking about being able to identify a unique person via DNA when I wrote that business about 'mark of the beast' in Revelations.
Once 'they' get that ability in near-real-time (ie, on the spot) - you guys are screwed.

It is always funny to watch how you young people misinterpret what I wrote in that book.

Re:Fallacy

[theStorminMormon]

When did religious conviction become ignorance?

-stormin

Re:Fallacy

[Xabraxas]

There are actually a lot or Christians who are looking forward to the end times. Some of them are actually public servants in the United States.

Environmental Armageddon

Re:Fallacy

[jbrader]

I'm not really sure. How long has there been religious conviction?

Re:Fallacy

[NetRAVEN5000]

No. We already know it's not whether the other inventions were or not. How? Because the Bible says that NO ONE knows when it'll happen.
Plus, the Book of Revelation was written as a consolation to the early Christians who were being prosecuted.

And wasn't the War in Iraq also supposed to be the beginning of the Apocalypse? I don't believe that one bit, but I'd certainly believe that more than I'd believe RFID is the beginning of the Apocalypse.

Re:Fallacy

[Zeinfeld]

I never did understand the Christian aversion to the Beast. The Beast must come as part of Christ's second coming, prophecy says so. Why would they resist this?

It would have a negative effect on property values.

Re:Fallacy

[TubeSteak]

Funerals (New Orleans Jazz or otherwise) are just rituals designed for the living, not the dead.

There are asshat relegious types who'll hold a relegious funeral, even against the express wishes of the dead. But like I said, the funeral isn't really for the deceased.

Funeral Directors get this, which is how they've managed to turn it into a business.

Re:Fallacy

[hazem]

If I were a Christian, I would be doing anything I can to hasten the return my my God.

And that explains so much of the Bush foreign policy. Starting civil wars, giving out nukes, it all makes sense in this context.

Re:Fallacy

[teknomage1]

More importantly when did willful ignorance become revered as religious conviction?

Re:Fallacy

[hunterx11]

There are actually congressmen who support Israel for this very reason, scary as that is.

Re:Fallacy

[cammoblammo]

some consider suicide to be an unforgivable sin (esp. when there's no time to repent for the sin of suicide).

Assuming we're talking Christianity here, there's no biblical reason to believe that suicide is an automatic hell penalty. Nothing. Nada. Zilch.

Of course, some feel they've got to threaten those who would like to shortcut life, but there's no biblical way to justify it.

I could get into the theology of this, but hey, this is /. and I'm already an ignorant blowhole for daring to say I'm a Christian.

Re:Fallacy

[Anonymous Coward]

It's certainly not a "pointless fairy tale" to millions of people. In fact, the Bible is the most literarily validated books in history--and that's no fairy tale.

Re:Fallacy

[Thangodin]

The funny thing is that the whole book of Revelations is far more likely to be about events in the first century, with either Jerusalem or Rome being the Whore of Babylon and the Beast being the Emperor or the Roman Army. The Mark of the Beast probably refers to the tatoos that were given to slaves to mark them as such, usually in an easily visible place like the face or the hand. Early Christians also wore tattoos as a sign of their faith. Facial tattoos were sometimes worn by Roman Soldiers, although the Romans regarded tattoos as barbaric.

In fact, the Book of Revelations was a controversial addition to the early Bible, and several Bishops argued against including it in the canon due to the difficulty of interpreting it, and hence, its potential for abuse--particularly the type of abuse so typical of fundamentalists, who keep claiming that the end times are upon us. Other portions of the Bible specifically warn against doing this, because only God knows the time when the world will end. To this day the Eastern Orthodox Church does not consider it part of the Canon.

If you're a non-believer, like I am, all of this is moot--the whole thing is either about the world John lived in, or he got dosed with some grain ergot while in prison. If you are a Christian, however, steer clear of belief that these are the end times. It's a definite no-no in the religion. And if you believe in the Rapture, rest assured that the people who compiled the Bible would have denounced you as a heretic, and you probably would have ended up being used for sword practice by a Roman Legionnaire. This is a spin from the lunatic fringe on a single line of a book that almost ended up in the fireplace of history. It is also a morally corrosive doctrine because it undercuts personal responsibility, encouraging people to believe that God is going to solve all of their problems for them, kill all their enemies, and build them a whole new world.

Re:Fallacy

[uncoveror]

A few years ago when RFID was still too expensive, the paranoid were sure "The Mark" would be a tattoo. Now, it doesn't have to be visible. All the "crazy" things the paranoid used to fear and reasonable people used to laugh at are becoming real. It makes poking fun at conspiracy theory a lot less enjoyable.

Re:Fallacy

[NetRAVEN5000]

How is the End of the World going to come "as a thief in the night" if you recognize the mark? Will it be a surprise to anyone if they predicted it? Or do you think that no one will recognize the mark and we're all damned to Hell?

There's a lot of confusion here in general, and this whole thing is stupid. The Book of Revelation doesn't predict ANYTHING. It was written as a coded message to the early Christians - it was written so that only they could understand it, which is why there's so much confusion about it.

Let me help things out a bit:

1) In ancient times, the Jews and Christians had a special system for translating names and words into numbers. "666" could be the translated form of "emperor" or whoever the emperor was at that time (maybe Nero? I'm not sure).
2) Certain numbers in the Bible represent different things - the number 3 represents God, 6 represents man, 7 represents perfection. Therefore, a 3-headed beast with the number "666" meant a man pretending to be a god - and the Romans believed that their emperor was a god. So it would've represented the emperor, whoever that was.

What did the Mark of the Beast represent? I don't know. Maybe the Romans dressed differently than the Christians. Maybe it was the Romans' brutality which only the Christians saw as a problem. Maybe it was their inability to be non-conformist (the Christians were seen as "unpatriotic" because they were pacifists and refused to become warriors - certainly there must've been others in Rome who didn't want to fight but did so simply to avoid prosecution?)

Re:Fallacy

[nanojath]

Well, you've delivered a very sane, rational analysis for the true-believin' rapture preachin' hardcore eschatological hysterics. That should settle 'em. Why didn't anyone ever think to just explain it to them?

Re:Fallacy

[empvirus]

Indeed. Did this lady just pull all this stuff about avoiding RFID because "it'll end the world" out her ass, or what? I'm a christian too, but wow, that is a VERY extreme point of view there. And as such, it isn't too likely she'll have alot of followers. She should probably point more toward the facts if she really wants to be heard Go ahead and troll/flame me.

Re:Fallacy

[Tom]

Why didn't anyone ever think to just explain it to them?

Because for much of history since then, they killed anyone who tried.

Re:Fallacy

[tverbeek]

One of the more interesting interpretations of these "signs of the end times" is that they are meant to be useless for actual forcasting. There have always been "wars and rumors of wars", natural disasters, false prophets and leaders, etc. which means that we've been living on borrowed time all along and should always live as if these were our last days.

Re:Fallacy

[Citizen of Earth]

particularly the type of abuse so typical of fundamentalists, who keep claiming that the end times are upon us.

As with any cult, how could the Christian church recruit new members if the End of Times was more than a lifetime away?

Re:Fallacy

[theStorminMormon]

Thank you, the poll of anti-religion slashdot readers is now complete. It was also fairly good practice for me. I have this overwhelming tendency to reply to each and every reply individually and I get bogged down in counltess threads with - how else can I put it - scientific bigots. This time, however, I managed to hold off.

Religion is one of those topics - like abortion or evolution or homosexuality - that causes slashdot readership breaks into a frenzy whenever we have an article that allows us to vent (again) our particular poition on this issue. The tiresome part of this is not only that almost everyone is just talking to hear themselves talkk, but also that most people are also quite content to argue with phantom straw men rather than respond to real-world positions.

In this case the straw-man for the anti-religion crowd is a very specific definition of religion; more particularly its theological definition of faith as "blind belief". This type of faith is nothing more than willful assertion of some rote dogma or other. As such it necessitates an anti-science position as it is anti-thought. Rational thought involves questioning and doubting. These activities threaten the very nature of (blind beleif) faith itself. In short - I can see why people who value science, knowledge, fairness, and information highly would find this form of religion utterly repugnant. I share that sentiment.

There are two problems, however. The first problem is that not all religion is anti-intellectual. Not all religion has this "blind belief" view of faith. Some, like the existentialist thinker Kierkegaard, have blind belief but situated within a compelling rational framework. Others, like C.S. Lewis, focus on the aspects of their faith systems that are logically and rationally appealing to thinking, questioning and questing individuals and marginalize the blind-belief aspects as inconsequential. To throw out all religion as the base "blind faith" variety is just to show one's utter and complete ignorance for the vast spectrum of religious thought that does exist. Most people who are so convinced that religion is anti-intellectual have never bothered to read the writings of a single religious intellectual (note: this means someone other than Falwell or Robertson). When you dismiss all of religious heritage with witty one-liners you may think you look cool. +5 mod points for "informative" or "funny" may give you the credibility you apparently desire. But the fact is that you are no more informed than some Bible fundamentalist who's never taken a real sciene class in his or her life would be in assuming that evolution was just some crocked up scheme by satanist communists to lead the world from the path of God. Not only are they wrong (everyone is wrong from time to time) but they are publicly demonstrating their own prejudice and arrogance. The saddest part is that they, like you, would never even comprehend their own humiliation.

The second problem is quite simple: it's impossible to get away from some definitions of faith. What if faith isn't believing in gnomes, faeries, Gods or Goddeses just because it's the dogma - what if faith is actually the rational extrapolation from insufficient evidence to guide necesary action? In other words - faith is what guides our actions when we don't have knowledge but need to make a choice. Well, if you realize that certainty about the real world is impossible you quickly realize that all of the things we know or do are - in a sense - dependent on faith. Even science is, in some sense, dependent on faith. Faith in the law of causality logically (if not temporally) preceeds all experimentation. It may be subsequently reinforced by experience but it can neither be directly proved by experimentation or any other known means and yet is the pre-requisite for rational experimentation.

In the end it's a simple case of hatred for one thing spilling irrationally over into hatred for related or similar things. You guys really hate dogmatic and anti-i

Re:Fallacy

[Zspdude]

A great many Biblical prophecies referred to events that took place in past history... But they also refer to future events as well. They do both.

Take for example prophecy in the Old Testament - most of the OT prophets were quite clearly speaking to the people of their day, warning them of events that were about to happen (and, well, actually did happen - that's because they were prophets ;) ). But they also held significance of a greater scope. The key word here is *also*.

Even if all the events of the Book of Revelation were realized in the 1st century, it doesn't mean they don't have another meaning to us today. Especially if you believe that the Bible is divinely inspired.

Re:Fallacy

[letxa2000]

Interesting that RFID usually seems to be part of the evil things Slashdot hates (Microsoft, SCO, patents, privacy violations with RFID, etc.), but as soon as it's brought up in a religious context, suddenly RFID is not evil... religion is evil and RFID is defended.

Re:Fallacy

[wrf3]

... has been actively pushing to have their particular brand of religion enforced as common law

That's true regardless of the group and is the nature of the beast. If you want to take the time, I would be interested in what you see to be some specifics in this area. I can guess, but I'd rather know...

The problem arises because most religions is that they are exclusionary...

But that isn't the problem of religion, that's the problem of truth. Truth, by it's very nature, is exclusionary. Those who think that 2+2=5 will be in conflict with those who disagree. For you to take the position of inclusion for all is, at least to me, a denial that truth exists (which is a self-refuting argument, but that doesn't stop a lot of people).

As for the "willy" factor, I happen to agree with President Bush about atheists. As an American, I hold that atheism is a pernicious worldview that unchecked must -- by definition -- result in anarchy or tyranny and is therefore anathema to freedom. Having grown up in Virginia, I'm quite fond of their state motto "Sic Semper Tyrannis".

As a Christian, the bad news is that, yes, you are an enemy of God. (Don't feel too bad -- everyone starts off that way). What you should find temporarily comforting is not that we are exclusive but that:
a) You're welcome to join us,
b) Forced conversion to Christianity is no conversion at all, and
c) Even if you don't join us, we are commanded to love our enemies. Furthermore, love does not consist in blowing them up or chopping off their heads. The parable of the "Wheat and the Tares" is instructive:

He put before them another parable: "The kingdom of heaven may be compared to someone who sowed good seed in his field; but while everybody was asleep, an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and then went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared as well. And the slaves of the householder came and said to him, 'Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where, then, did these weeds come from?' He answered, 'An enemy has done this.' The slaves said to him, 'Then do you want us to go and gather them?' But he replied, 'No; for in gathering the weeds you would uproot the wheat along with them.
Let both of them grow together until the harvest; and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Collect the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.'"

Re:Fallacy

[Scarblac]

Personally I believe there is a difference between "RFID is the mark of the beast, and a sign that the end of time is here" and "RFID is evil", don't you?

Re:Fallacy

[tutori]

I dispute your claim that even bright christians are capable of evaluating new information that goes against their preconceptions, btw - purely anecdotal, but there you go.

Unfortunately, I believe this to be pretty much par for the course for the majority of humanity.

Re:Fallacy

[Barabbas86]

Is that so? I was under the impression historians still haven't even verified the existence of many of the sites of biblical events (such as the infamous sodom and gomorrah) - conjecture aside. Of course, you can take any vague allegory or metaphor and find a real-life counterpart and claim its that which it represents. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy much like when you read a horoscope and miraculously everything it said comes true. Although, there are instances that the bible supposedly records, such as the great flood, which if my sources are correct, are now generally agreed as an exaggeration (i.e. the world did not entirely flood, most likely a river, whose name escape me, was what the writers were referring to, but not everyone who reads it knows that). To me, it seems a rather useless way to dictate strict behavior and beliefs through hyperbole and metaphor.

But, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and we'll say there are parts in the bible that are verified and valid. That does nothing to validate the rest of it, despite that it may suggest more credibility. In which case, you can't just pick and choose which truths you want to argue based on some historical accuracies in separate parts. Only the things which are verified can be treated as truths. Do any proponents of the bible follow this philosophy?

A problem arises when people start by assuming it is entirely true. Then they'll have license to deny the most likely truth for an extremely improbable possibility just because it conforms with their ideal.

Really though, the bible is a work of genius, throw in some historical truths that were kept alive by oral tradition, make up a background and moral to the story, and make vague predictions of the future while making demands of the behavior and beliefs of all those who follow its teachings. Just because all of the predictions haven't come true yet doesn't mean they won't all. And it contains some truth, so it must all be true, note the sarcasm. Surely those who could see into the future would have known that it would not be necessary to rely on oral tradition and that the printing press would allow for widespread reproducability without copying errors and biases (which plague the bible). In that case, the use of allegory would serve only an aesthetic function while detracting from the true purpose. If the language were explicit, the ability to abuse the messages in the bible would be all but nullified (and many of the rituals demanded explicitly by the bible are ignored by practitioners these days). Ironically, that's what made it such a useful tool and so powerful, for those who wished to abuse it (and please do not try to tell me that nobody could or did benefit by being the authority on the bible).

But, what about other statements in the bible that we have demonstrated as false. That the earth has four corners, or edges. The apologetic defense I've read refuting the four corners argument was that the word translated into 'corners' was similar to the word 'quarters' as in a sphere with 4 hemispheres, although from a more certain geometric point of view it would make more sense to divide a sphere into 8 equal sections, which provides the symmetry which the passage suggests. In any case, even if there are refutations that relate to the way in which the passage was translated, it would make one wonder what other truths have been obfuscated by human error in a supposedly infallible book.

To me, it's quite ridiculous that we learn lessons of easter bunnies and santa as children, and how the church believed the sun orbited the earth and oppressed science until the truth was undeniable (truth only reached by the scientific method), but in adulthood, many still believe in some figure whose qualities nobody can agree upon, but many assume, whose existence cannot be proven one way or another, but its existence is assumed, whose motives and authority cannot be verified, but goodness and supreme morality is assumed. All the while, in our pride, in our natural desires to be unique, an

There will be an end

[Anonymous Coward]

every society has had an end, the mayans, egyptians, romans, greeks
it all comes to an end, if you truly think the culture of greed, capitalism and consolidation can continue for ever then you are deluded, so when that time comes how will we know ? at what point do we give up and start again ? 20 years ? 50 ? 100 ? 500 ?

its not IF but WHEN

Re:There will be an end

[Guppy06]

"every society has had an end, the mayans, egyptians, romans, greeks
it all comes to an end, if you truly think the culture of greed, capitalism and consolidation can continue for ever then you are deluded,"

Except that looking at your examples (Mayans, Egyptians, Romans, Greeks), I'd say that greed, capitalism and consolidation have been around for a long, long time indeed.

Re:There will be an end

[crazyvas]

Just because every society *until now* has had an end, that doesn't mean that every society from this point on will have an end. A culture of of greed, capitalism and consolidation may not be what is traditionally thought of as "good", but that doesn't mean that such a culture may not be the most successful one yet. "Good" and "successful" don't necessarily have to occur together.

Barcodes

[Gyga]

The only reason barcodes weren't the mark is because they can't mark humans. People have ebbed RFID tags into themselves.

Re:Barcodes

[microarray]

"The only reason barcodes weren't the mark is because they can't mark humans"

I can tattoo myself with a barcode, does that count?

I love Slashdot, but..

[aychamo]

why are you guys posting articles by some flakey Christian who thinks progressive technology is the devil?

Re:I love Slashdot, but..

[MobyDisk]

Ooh, I have a non-troll answer to this one! It is a valid question.

Slashdot seems to consist of people who are equally interested in new technology, but also smart enough to be concerned about its effects. RFID could be very beneficial. And it could be very oppressing. While most Slashdotters probably don't believe that the number 666 will literally mean anything, or that it really matters which hand it will be or who the antichrist is. But they do heed the warning that it implies. The fact that it is a Christian mythology doesn't make it any different than if it was in a modern dystopian novel like 1984. Whatever sort of fiction it is, it was forward thinking and applicable now. And so, people will be interested.

Now, back to your regularly-scheduled trollish Christian-bashing replies.

Re:I love Slashdot, but..

[ultranova]

why are you guys posting articles by some flakey Christian who thinks progressive technology is the devil?

Technology isn't the devil. Technology is a pitchfork. People who try to use technology to oppress others are the devil, or at least work for him.

Thank Allah for the distraction

[RedHatLinux]

now maybe Christian fundies can occupy themselves railing against something harmful, rather useful things like evolution or Middle East peace talks.

Re:Thank Allah for the distraction

[mrchaotica]

Exactly -- the biggest problem (in my non-neoconservative opinion) with American politics today is the alignment of corporatism and fundamentalism in the Republican party. If this can drive a wedge between those two ideologies (and hence through the Republican party itself) maybe we'll have a chance at getting a balanced government again.

So.. its RFID today is it?

[nurb432]

40 years ago, it was the 'social security card'....20 years ago people said barcodes were it.. in anoher 20 it will be something else... no need to panic.

Now if some guy with horns and a tail, and breathes fire, comes out waving an RIFD injection machine THEN you can panic..

Re:So.. its RFID today is it?

[Hiro Antagonist]

That's just Ashcroft; he forgot to put his make-up on this morning.

Re:So.. its RFID today is it?

[boojumbadger]

isn't it just a little scary that governments keep trying to fulfil the prophecy?

Re:So.. its RFID today is it?

[croddy]

It is a very limited and fundamentalist reading of Revelation that requires a one-to-one correspondence of symbols in the text and historical events.

The reason the image of the "mark of the beast" is frightening is that authorities in human history have always attempted to assert their control in ways that reach into individuals' lives and compel them to function as slaves for a self-serving power.

Social Security cards, bar codes, and RFID tags all provide valid readings of the text in Revelation. There is no reason to try to force a fundamendalist, literal prophecy onto a text that's not asking for it. Take a warning about authorities' will to dominate mankind for what it is.

So...

[313373_bot]

you may defeat the beast by wearing a tinfoil hat (or glove)?

Re:So...

[dcapel]

Tin foil can increase the effectiveness of cooking noodles. Tinfoil can decrease the effectiveness of the Mark of The End Times. The Flying Spiggetti Monster likes noodles.

CONVERT! Convert all ye who want to have divine protection from the end times! The End is near. Only His Noodlyness can protect us!

Eh... Apocalyptic Stuff

[NitsujTPU]

This is a little different. There really are passages in the Bible signifying the placement of a mark on people that is required to trade, and people are already using these things as debit cards at night clubs. I guess that people don't mind getting a chip injected after a few beers.

One central mistake these people make...

[Jeff DeMaagd]

...relative to their believe is that the "mark of the beast" means that you have to recant your faith to recieve the mark. Unless they can make that claim and back it up, it's a meaningless claim. Bar codes supposedly have "666" encoded into them, but that is only because of ignorance of what the bars mean, and I don't remember anyone recanting their beliefs to get one assigned to their body.

Re:One central mistake these people make...

[jafac]

The other thing that MOST armchair christian eschatologists seem to ignore is that there is a particular Hebrew meaning to to with "on your right hand or on your forhead" - and that is that it will affect your actions (your right hand) and your thoughts (your forhead).

The "Mark of the Beast" is most likely not being referred to as a physical thing, but rather the acceptance of a doctrine that affects how one thinks and behaves. (Like Free Market Fundamentalism).

My Grandma thought punchcards were the mark...

[Proudrooster]

It seems like every generation comes up with a sign for the mark. Here is my brief history of the mark of the beast. Feel free to add yours.

Social Security Numbers
Punchcards (They used to be included with your utility bills)
Drivers License Numbers
Credit Card Numbers
Bar Codes
IP Addressess
Bill Gates full name converted to ASCII and summed.
CPU IDs
and now.... RFID (Which is really just a modern bar code.)

I think the "mark of the beast" might be figurative language in the book of Revelation, but talking about apocalytic literature can be like running the Boston marathon is quicksand. It is amazing how a 10 page book of the Bible could be expanded into a 2000+ page box set and miniseries. Maybe 666 is just a number that represents imperfection three times over.... What? I pity the fool that says the mark of the beast isn't a literal number stamped on the forehead... Ow, don't hurt me Mr. T....

Re:My Grandma thought punchcards were the mark...

[91degrees]

Bill Gates full name converted to ASCII and summed.

Comes to 663. Assuming you use capitals and ignore the space.

The extra 3 comes from him being Bill Gates the third. So you add 3. No doubt that will be fixed in MS ASCII v2.0

Re:My Grandma thought punchcards were the mark...

[iluvcapra]

Poster refers to the biblically reported dimensions of the ceremonial basin which sat in front of the first Temple (I'm way too lazy to look up the chapter and verse right now, it's in Beckmann).

Anyways, the bible says that the basin was 10 hands across, and thirty hands around. This is a contradiction, unless you consider that the rim would have to be a certain thickness, thus, rabinnical scholars conclude that thirty hands is the circumference of the inside of the basin, while 10 hands is the width measuring from the outside rim of the basin.

Such heroic scholarship is sometimes required to truly appreciate the bible.

Re:Crazy Cult Believes End of Times Coming

[ScrewMaster]

Well, I'm not particularly religious myself, but if you look at the current state of American society, it could just as easily be said that the ongoing failure of organized religion to maintain the effective forms of social control it exerted for centuries is more of an issue than their "crazy belief system." If you are referring to the conflicts that inevitably occur when fundamentalist groups of any stripe butt heads I might agree ... but America is, by and large, becoming less religious as time goes on. Don't confuse the copious quantities of white noise being generated by the more vocal subcultures as being a reflection of more mainstream value systems.

oh cmon

[lpret]

Revelations is a perfect specemin of apocalyptic literature. Here's a good definition of such literature: Hermeneutics.

It's written to warn and to use descriptive language to explain what the future holds. The idea of head and right hand are frequently used to depict what we think (head) and what we do (hand). As such, in this particular instance, the warning is not when we have implants in our heads or hands, it's when we think and do evil things.

Interpreting apocalyptic literature as truth verbatim is not only stupid, it's dangerous.

Re:oh cmon

[vux984]

10011011001

You don't even have to work it out by hand, or trust utilitiies. The final digit is a 1, that means its an odd number.

A mildly interesting aside, ALL normal binary palindromes are odd. (Because all binary numbers start with "one", and therefore must end with one.)

(Sure you could be annoying and make arguments about zero padded fixed width binary fields, or argue that its not against the law to write an arbitrary number of leading zeroes... but those aren't really "normal" ... by the definition of normal I choose to use... so there. :)

-cheers

Re:oh cmon

[lpret]

In case anyone starts blasting me, that was me stabbing the 0 and 1 keys several times in no specific order.

Not gunna happen

[TubeSteak]

Everyone who thinks that somehow, someday, everything is going to switch over to an RFID system are insane.

Lemme tell you why: The Black Market

The black market is never going to dissappear. It is fueled by personal anonymity and cash (because cash money is anonymous).

While the black market isn't necessarily something to be proud of, it shows up whenever there are market inefficiences or certain niches that aren't being fulfilled.

Money from the black market is like money from Bush's tax cuts... it trickles down into the rest of the economey and boosts it up.

Re:Not gunna happen

[big tex]

When that happens, the new 'Numbered Swiss Bank Account' will be the currency from one of the countries that refuses to tag their currency.
You won't ever be able to stop the currency exchange.

Re:ends vs means

[wall0159]

I love it..

"... it is a little too big brother" (emphasis mine)

yup.. just an eeensy teeenny bit to much. A barcode on the forehead would be just fine. ;-)

Other Technology isn't readable without contact

[thegrassyknowl]

Others are skeptical saying that many new technologies, such as the printing press, bar-codes, and several others, have also created fears about the beginning of the end.

Barcodes and print can be covered. Credit cards and magnetic stripes have to be practically inserted into the machine to read em.... the field strength is too weak otherwise. If you keep em in your wallet your are safe.

All of the other technolgies that might be used to track your actions require you to willingly and deliberately use them. You don't have to use plastic to pay for purchasses is one example. Use cash.

With RFID tags, they can be read from within metres of you so anyone just passing by you on the street can access all of the tags on you if they like. Anyone outside your house can read all of the RFID tags on your household equipment, books, porno, etc and figure out a bit about you completely without your knowledge.

RFID is this technology that nobody really cares about except the people who would want to misuse it and the tinfoil hat brigade. Problem is that the tinfoil hat brigade will be made out to look like crackpots by the people who seek to abuse the technology.

Yes, it's very unfortunate...

[bADlOGIN]

That one group of Church leaders under the direction of then Roman emperor (Constantine) chose to include Revelations instead of The Apocalypse of Peter (see the APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS for all the rest of the stuff left out) when they were whimsically throwing together a collection of writings that they believed were correct according to thier power induced plans of what direction Christianity should go in a full 300+ years after Jesus was dead.

If only that had been arbitrarily put in and Revelations left out. We'd all be talking about how Jesus went to hell and that after the Apocolypse, if those who ascended to heaven asked to for clemancy for those in hell, it would be granted. Guess it just didn't have the fire and brimstone to keep the stupid peasants under controll that all the 666 bullshit and no redemption theme Revelations does.

The worst thing about modern so called "christians" is that they don't know thier own history.

Re:Yes, it's very unfortunate...

[HermanAB]

Uhhhh, not quite. Constantine did some important stuff. For example he defined the Trinity at Nicea in 325, unified the Roman churches and outlawed the Pantheon, Egiptian, Persian and other churches. The Christian Bible as we know it today however, was compiled under the auspices of King James of Britain, France and Ireland, roundabout 1611.

Re:Yes, it's very unfortunate...

[ajwitte]

OP was talking about the canonization of certain texts, which was done well before the translation of the King James Version.

Re:Yes, it's very unfortunate...

[Citizen of Earth]

That one group of Church leaders under the direction of then Roman emperor (Constantine)... whimsically throwing together a collection of writings that they believed were correct according to thier power induced plans of what direction Christianity should go in a full 300+ years after Jesus was dead.

Emperor Constantine had more influence over the process than you indicate. Just ask Arius or Marcius. Jesus's divinity was decided by a non-unanimous majority vote of men.

Re:Eh... Apocalyptic Stuff

[NitsujTPU]

Oh, wait, I left part out of that that I thought was in the article.

There are programs discussing the implantation of these in people. It's being piloted in the military as a way of tracking medical records, and there are already medical trials of having this inserted into people.

Verichip is pushing for people to get implants, and bars and clubs in other countries are already using them as debit cards linked to your tab.

So, the implants are here, and people are already using it to trade. There has been discussion of a national program to implant Americans with these, and it's being backed by a former head of the FDA (I forget the dudes name).

That's where the idea that it's the mark of the beast comes from.

Re:Crazy Cult Believes End of Times Coming

[donscarletti]

In this case, the cult is Christianity. If they were any other group, we'd be laughing at them. Unfortunately, they are large enough that their crazy belief system may cause trouble for the rest of us (yet again).

Christianity does not believe end times are heralded by RFID tags, some Christians do. That is what separates Christianity from crazy cults, since it is large and diverse enough to have people make up their own minds on such things. Cults need centralized leadership to tell its adherents what to do and what to believe, Christianity hasn't got a central authority and so its adherents are free to interpret the canon however they see fit and form groups where they share crucial facts of their interpretation. Most Christians believe the book of Revelation to be a non-literal message about what kind of persecution the church has faced and will face in the time between Christ's first and second coming, others believe it is an allegorical prophecy of the history of the thousand years after it was written in about 50AD and some (like the RFID nutter) believe that it is an allegorical prophesy of the thousand years before Christs second coming (whenever that may be). What almost all scholars agree on is that whoever the beast may be is irrelevant when one simply holds to the principles that the bible teaching when dealing with the beast as with dealing with anyone, thus finding the beast is pointless. Unfortunately, not all Christians are scholars and some like to draw shaky parallels and make accusations without merit.

I know I have just bitten a troll, but someone had to clarify it.

Don't Forget Your Towel

[LordVaderSithLord]

Remember that the answer is 42. Don't forget your towel, and above all else DON'T PANIC. Please remember too that God's final message to his creations was "Sorry for the Inconvenience." This too shall pass.

Re:Crazy Cult Believes End of Times Coming

[grub]

I know I have just bitten a troll, but someone had to clarify it.

You didn't clarify, you were acting as an apologist for followers of christian mythology.

SSN as master primary key is still scary

[HighOrbit]

Well, image your SSN as a common primary key across several databases such as credit card records ,bank records, national identity card, tax, criminal records, and library. Now immagine it imbedded in your right arm or just in your driver licence in you wallet and readable at 10 or 20 feet. Now imagine it read everytime you enter a store, check out a library book, buy a hamburger, sit at a computer terminal, or drive by a stoplight.

Stop letting the fact that religious people are leary trick you into dismissing the threat as a fantasy.

RFID is not cost effective and is very problematic

[Wayne_Knight]

It's just plain silly to use religion to try to manipulate politics this way. Anybody can see why RFIDs are simply not economically viable.

I am currently working with one of the RFID companies that is "working" with Wal-Mart on the actual implementation of RFID. Let me tell you that there is no foreseable ROI in the near future. Currently at a cost of about 25 cents a tag, it is much too expensive to be worth it for anyone. The technology is in its infancy so there are so many problems we have encountered so far.

One of the problems is the tags. Not only do they cost so damn much, but they are also not very high quality. There's a feature called "locking" which allows you to set a number on the tag and not allow it to change, but when using this we have too high a failure rate to be effective (10-30% depending on the tag type). So we had to turn off the locking, meaning its much easier to change the unique number associated with the tags (which will be a problem when tags hit the retail sector) and now we only get around a 1-2% failure rate. But when doing high volumes, even this small percent is expensive to deal with.

Another is the hardware. Part of the tag writing problems we have seen may be due to the tags and/or the reader/writer units. But right now, some tags get created and written to with no problems, but when they go by a reader, the reader just does not see a number on that tag, meaning as i said before its either a bad tag or some sort of incompatibility/problem with the reader unit. Currently we are trying to get the tags applied cost effectively, but unfortunately its pretty much boiling down to using people to grab tags from a RFID printer and hand-apply everything.

We have also been having trouble verifying all the product on a pallet, and certainly cannot expect to read 100% of product 100% of time. Some product is easy to see, but depending on the density/material in the materials on the pallet, it can be very difficult to read many of the tags.

Software is another hinderance. While the company i have been working with has had its large share of problems in the last few months, they are getting better, but still are not perfect. And unless things work perfect, it can cause so many problems. One small chink in the software can make it inoperable (essentially crashing the software a-la Windows), but the software is slowly getting more and more stable.

And there's no suffering now?

[Anonymous Coward]

We have six billion people on the planet. Over the next five hundred years, hundreds of billions will live and die. Most of them will spend most of their lives suffering terribly. They will starve, kill each other, rape, drug themselves to death and more.

If the six billion alive today suffered through the apocalypse now, it would prevent the suffering of hundreds of billions. More, really, since you can extend this for as many thousands of years as you like. It's clear that the sooner the world ends, the fewer people will suffer, and the sooner those of us who are righteous will be in heaven.

Just one of the reasons God is clearly a son of a bitch.

Re:And there's no suffering now?

[lbates_35476]

And if God had not chosen to create this world and all his children, nobody would have suffered! But, then again, nobody would be able to be with Him in heaven for eternity because they would not have existed. I believe it helps if you start looking at our existence on earth in the context of ETERNITY. A few years of suffering for eternity with God is a small price to pay for EXISTENCE (even though it doesn't seem like it at the time). Our existence was not guaranteed until God willed it. The alternative to the suffering you observe is the lack of existence altogether. I'm completely sympathetic to the misery that some of His creation must endure, but compared to forever with Him it nothing. I'm convinced that there will come a time when the suffering many people endured while here on earth will be like the scraped elbow you had when you fell off your bike when you were 9. It hurt a lot at the time, but now it is a distant memory. People have the power to eliminate most of this misery if we would choose to, but free-will also allows us to choose not to. That's the problem with free-will, we can choose to ignore God's commandments. But without free-will, there is no true love and that is what God wants from us. He didn't want to create robots (you can't love a robot). He wanted to spend eternity with beings (both heavenly and earthly) that truely loved Him.

Religion is being replaced, not just displaced

[dsanfte]

Religion is really about defining for us what the purpose and meaning of our lives is, or should be. In this respect, America and the west at large is definitely losing its religion. It isn't simply becoming a-religious though; religion is being replaced in our society even more than it has before by the indirect worship of materialism.

How do we define our lives? Work... for most people, whether they believe it or not. Kids ultimately, I suppose. Money, absolutely. The dreams the majority of us hold usually are tied to acquiring copious amounts of wealth, things, gadgets, cars, property, etc. This wasn't always so, it's actually pretty new.

It's important that people realize this, though. The hole that religion filled/fills in the minds/hearts of the public is now being filled by other things tied to capitalism/materialism at large. We don't see it, because just as a fish submerged in water, we do not know what it feels like not to be wet.

One thing is important: This current indirect worship (nobody goes to pray at the Sony store, but they sure spend a lot of time at the mall) of technology and materialism cannot fill any permanent voids in our lives. Our computers and cars won't sing our praises when we're gone, and if our kids are caught up in acquiring their own wealth and living for the present, neither will they. In the end we are (though I am atheist, I must use the term) spiritually bankrupting ourselves in the name of present gain. I just don't think it's worth it.

Re:Religion is being replaced, not just displaced

[TallMatthew]

In this respect, America and the west at large is definitely losing its religion.

Yeah, that's us in the corner.

It's Easy to Make Fun of the Pious

[Morosoph]

But then it's easy to ignore any group warning about anything.

Ignoring end-times psychosis, what is the reason why the "mark of the beast" is evil? Could it be something to do with the commoditisation of human beings? RFID would fit right in... I'm not saying that these groups are right, but when you look at why such things are seen as being evil or wrong by religious groups, they often have a certain consistency, and are in fact a pretty mainstream view.

Quoting from revelations isn't going to help their cause, but it is surely entirely possible that such things as RFID could, in some sense, be symptomatic, or even causative of what people who consider themselves spiritual would perceive to be a decline of civilisation.

Even if the delivery and mythos is nutty, this doesn't mean that the message itself is!

Easy Solution

[Plocmstart]

Get one implanted in your left hand or in your neck or back of your head or something. Just avoid the right hand or forehead. Disaster averted!

Re:Crazy Cult Believes End of Times Coming

[blaksaga]

Christianity hasn't got a central authority

Isn't he called the Pope?

Re:Clarify this, Pilate!

[donscarletti]

I never said the roman catholic church wasn't a cult. If you confuse the roman catholic church with Christianity as a whole you are doing your understanding a grave disservice. As for the "Paul is a Roman spy" theory, I won't pretend that is the first time I heard it but I would like to see your evidence. For the first 50 years of Christianity almost all of its members were ethnically Jewish, many of whom were Roman citizens. And may I point out that most evidence seems to suggest that Paul was executed by the Roman authorities after spending much of his last few years in jail for illegally preaching, this doesn't seem like what the empire would do to one of their own. I would also point out that the Christian extermination policy never really started up until after Pauls death, until Paul, Christianity wasn't even on the Roman radar and if it was, it was largely tollerated by the Romans in Judea since it took people away from Judaism. By the time Christianity was first persecuted in earnest, doctrine was largely based around Pauls letters. This makes no sence whatsoever in the context of your theory.

Limbo (together with pergatory) however was never part of the bible, it was simply part of that pagan stuff that was folded in by the Roman church to allign it with other popular beliefs of the day, it is part of what protestant churches reject. The catholic church actually did the bible a service by getting rid of that dogma. I don't think you personally know what the bible says, how different churches interpret it. I think you should learn a little about theology and church history rather than a bunch of crazy conspiracy stories if you want to talk rationally about something.

I don't let my personal Atheism prejudice my study of faith, I don't see why you should either.

A wide white bar to the left of 6, not guard

[tepples]

The three 'guard' bars, the long vertical pairs of thin lines that occur at the beginning middle and end are similar to the way 6 is represented on the right right of the two panels of the bar code - two thin vertical lines.

Similar, but not identical. Each guard bar has five cells (01010). The 6 of a UPC barcode has seven cells (0000101) and is easily distinguishable from guard by the white bar to its left.

Re:Crazy Cult Believes End of Times Coming

[Anonymous Coward]

Christianity does not believe end times are heralded by RFID tags, some Christians do. That is what separates Christianity from crazy cults, since it is large and diverse enough to have people make up their own minds on such things.

But Christians do believe that the end times are coming. That is 100% pure cult.

Cults need centralized leadership to tell its adherents what to do and what to believe, Christianity hasn't got a central authority and so its adherents are free to interpret the canon however they see fit and form groups where they share crucial facts of their interpretation.

Yes, there are many flavors of Christianity, standing as separate cults. Each has its own central authority.

Most Christians believe the book of Revelation to be a non-literal message about what kind of persecution the church has faced and will face in the time between Christ's first and second coming, others believe it is an allegorical prophecy of the history of the thousand years after it was written in about 50AD and some (like the RFID nutter) believe that it is an allegorical prophesy of the thousand years before Christs second coming (whenever that may be).

Nice to see you speak for "most Christinans." Too bad that you are completely wrong, as most Christians do believe it literally.

I know I have just bitten a troll, but someone had to clarify it.

Pull your head out of your ass. Take a look around. Study history. Come to accept that your religion is just as absurd as the myriad religions of yore that people don't take seriously today. You are nothing but a chump buying a load of crap. You are being sold down the river just as much as an ancient Greek who prayed to his gods for help. You are a dumbass.

Wait another sign of the end times....

[i_want_you_to_throw_]

When I was young back in the late 70s, there would circulate a story in the church that some old person received their social security checks mistakenly from the future. Usually the future date was the mid 80s and the check said "Not cashable without the mark of the beast" or some stupid thing.

Re:Crazy Cult Believes End of Times Coming

[HerrPastor]

I would like to think you are kidding that "the cult is Christianity." The vast, vast majority of Christians are embarrassed by this sort of nonsense. I know that I am.

Re:Crazy Cult Believes End of Times Coming

[bjason82]

To begin with, you Anonymous Coward, your use of the word CULT is meant in a sarcastic and demeaning way, and you're therefore attempting to label all religions as cultic in order to negate their value and relevance. You do this because you are attempting to pronounce your own personal beliefs and marginalize religion. I find it all too common now a days for atheists to take that superiorist attitude and look down upon us all too ignorant and feeble-minded idiots who believe in a higher order, a spiritual realm.

That said, and using Christianity as an example, I would like to point out that no Christian knows for sure when the events of the End Times will begin; not in march, not in 2012, and not in 2300. The Bible states that the rapture will come "like a thief in the night," and nobody knows the time of Christ's return. Many generations throughout history have thought the rapture will come during their lifetime, and of course, none have been correct.
I think why you have a lot of people saying the end times are near is because there are way too many conditions being set in place that coincide with Biblical and non-Biblical Prophecy. One prophet named St. Malachy wrote down in the 11th century his papal prophecies and stopped in detail with our current pope. He only vaguely mentions one more, peter of rome, who will be a martyr and the last elected pope. At least, until now, he has been eerily accurate, it will not take much more time to find out if he was correct. Benedict is pretty old and may not last too much longer.
The Non-Biblical prophecy of the Mayans says that the end of our current age will be around 2012, some scholars think that when you account for the inaccuracies of our calendar the Mayan 2012 might actually land on our 2006!

Even if you look at current events it seems like things are becoming more unstable and the United States is threatened by a looming great depression (reference: look up petroeuro). The dominance of the dollar is weakening and in order to maintain its dominance the Bush administration is trying to prolong the inevitable by resorting to war and aggression. There is no way a country can exist solely on a war economy, but that is what has been happening since WWII. The collapse of the American Empire will only lead to the rise of the European Union as the world's leading power and ultimately the much prophesized one-world-government. Of course, some of what I have just said is hearsay and speculation, but it is hard to deny that there are a lot of signs pointing to that outcome.

Now, once there is a Unified world government under the leadership of a single individual, he might prove to be malevolent and require the allegiance of all who serve him. The "Mark of the Beast" will be his way of purging those who might stand in his way and threaten his authority, we're talking about the Christians. His "Mark" will most likely be some sort of technology that can interface with computers, presumably this technology will contain the numbers "666" signifying the wearer's allegiance to this leader or even the leader's ownership over them. Those who refuse to wear the chip that, in some way, contain the number "666" will, at first, not be allowed to participate in normal commerce and functioning within mainstream society will be all but impossible. Then it will escalate and full scale persecution will commence on those who refuse the "Mark". You can almost look at it as a reverse of what happened during Nazi Germany and the Jews, the Jews were forced to wear the star of David as a way to set this minority apart from the rest of German society. The only difference is that this new designation system will be displayed in an opposite manner of the Nazi's system. Everyone has the choice to accept the mark, but those who choose not to are instead choosing martyrdom and sacrifice.

It is difficult for even the staunchest atheist to deny the possibility of a future like this.
I think it is way too easy for atheists to call names saying Christians are "cra

It may not be Christian, but it's catholic

[lord sibn]

Many people fear the "end of times," "the mark of the beast," and all that.

Many catholics fear it as well, but what they do not realise is that the Catholic Church (by which i do not mean merely the RCC) pray for the return of Christ at every mass offered. This implies necessity of this "mark of the beast."

Regular people, many Christians, many Catholics hope to stave off the apocalypse by rejecting anything they construe as the mark of the beast. The first step in the sequence of all things apocalyptic. Yet the Catholic Church teaches that the the return of Christ (the apocalypse) FOLLOWS the mark of the beast. Additionally, the apocalypse is supposed to be a GOOD thing. Too many people are afraid of the wrong things.

You believe in the apocalypse? Fine. Welcome it. There is no reason to be afraid.

You don't believe in the apocalypse? Hey, your call.

Either way, there is no reason to live in fear.

Christianity == Crazy Cult [Read all first]

[woolio]

Being raised a devout Catholic, I have to say this:

For an outsider, most of the new testament looks like this to an outsider:

1) Man and woman engage in pre-maritial sex, woman gets pregnant. Father considers finding new woman to knock up...
2) Woman claims 'divine' miracle to escape village mockery. Villagers buy it?!?!
3) Child has some social/behavorial problems, reading too many religious texts at a young age, believing himself to be the next coming of god.
4) Child manages to recruit some poor uneducated fishermen into his self-made cult.
5) Unconscious man in comma mistakenly believed to be dead wakes up, miracle cited.
6) Drunk party-goers at a weddding ceremony mistake water for wine, miracle cited.
7) Child walks on a coral reef/sandbar, friends think he is walking on water.
8) Stories spread & distorted through "word of mouth", child becomes famous.
9) More followers join cult, start preaching about the demise of those who do not follow their teachings.
10) Government gets suspicious of this new "terrorist" group. Executes leader (child).
11) Followers go into hiding.
12) Many years later, they come up and spread the stories... Later write them into gospels.
13) Some of these followers are also imprisioned, appearing to be lunatics/terrorists...
14) **** ..) Followers unite into a "church" ..) This "church" becomes a major political party. ..) Church approves of and wages bloody wars on infidels [Inquisition] ..) Inner squabbling leads to three rulers claiming dominance [Papal Schism] ..) **** ..) Almost at world-wide domination in the 20th century!

[The ordering of these is likely inaccurate, but the events are accurate]

Interestingly, I learned in a Catholic high school that the 4 Gospels were written ~50 years after Jesus **died**. How well could you write about something that happened 10 years ago?? How about something that happened 50 years ago? 50 years later, how many people are going to be alive to verify/contest your story???

This fact seems to be heavily obscured... And of course, the Testaments have undergone revisions since then. Also the 4 Gospels are basically the same in content, so three seemed to have mainly copied off the 1st, and just re-wording them for different audiences.

If Jesus were alive today, he would be ex-communicated by most/all Christian groups, deemed as an international terrorist, and executed... And none of this would make the news in the US...

I don't know that to think about Revelation. I do know that there are many practical guidelines for living life that people have mistakenly mis-understood to be divine regulations in the Bible.

In that context and given that 2000 years ago, countries were still collecting taxes and taking census of their people, my guess is that Revelation is a warning about what could happen in a tightly-run society that documents, measures and meters out every little thing. What would happen in a restaurent if you only gave them 90% of the amount on the bill...? Would they let you walk away? Would the manager get involved? In India today, they would thank you smilingly and you would leave. In the US, there would likely be consequences... Which is quite ironic!

And considering technological & political trends nowadays.... yes, we have much to be concerned about.

Re:Christianity == Crazy Cult [Read all first]

[ndansmith]

Interestingly, I learned in a Catholic high school that the 4 Gospels were written ~50 years after Jesus **died**. How well could you write about something that happened 10 years ago?? How about something that happened 50 years ago? 50 years later, how many people are going to be alive to verify/contest your story???

This fact seems to be heavily obscured... And of course, the Testaments have undergone revisions since then. Also the 4 Gospels are basically the same in content, so three seemed to have mainly copied off the 1st, and just re-wording them for different audiences.

We do not know the exact dates of composition of the gospels. They are not dated, and we do not have to autographs. Still, 50 years after Jesus' death is one estimate, with 25-30 years being a lower one. It is also true that though the gospels themselves were written (or compiled) later, their actual source materials may have been written long before that, likely when Jesus was still alive. Also, three of the gospels have very similar content, while John is fairly unique and written quite a bit later. The postulation of scriptural revision is not so sure as to be a matter "of course." We have manuscripts from the early seconds century onward, so we can establish the textual history of the new testament to a greater degree of certainty than any other historic document collection. This means that even if major revisions happened (which they didn't), we can see through them. The compositional history of the gospels is a very complicated thing, in case you were wondering ;-).

Re:Christianity == Crazy Cult [Read all first]

[TemporalBeing]

Interestingly, I learned in a Catholic high school that the 4 Gospels were written ~50 years after Jesus **died**. How well could you write about something that happened 10 years ago?? How about something that happened 50 years ago? 50 years later, how many people are going to be alive to verify/contest your story???

This fact seems to be heavily obscured... And of course, the Testaments have undergone revisions since then. Also the 4 Gospels are basically the same in content, so three seemed to have mainly copied off the 1st, and just re-wording them for different audiences.

We do not know the exact dates of composition of the gospels. They are not dated, and we do not have to autographs. Still, 50 years after Jesus' death is one estimate, with 25-30 years being a lower one. It is also true that though the gospels themselves were written (or compiled) later, their actual source materials may have been written long before that

Also, remember that the culture was a very oral culture. Oral cultures tend to have far better memory in relation to this kind of thing than non-oral cultures (such as ours today) have. For example, many texts were solely known by oral tradition and could be passed on with little to no change; though parts may be embellished, etc. for different audiences by the same author, the majority of the story did not change to the point that it could be accurately transcribed years after it originally occurred - and not simply 5 or 10 year.

Additionally, remember that the disciples of Christ (Peter, John, etc.) are thought to have been around 18 or 19 at the start of Christ's ministry; so 50 years later they would likely have been about 70 in age - quite likely they would still have been around at the time it was written, along with numerous other first hand witnesses. Now add to that that there was written works (ala Paul and others) that could also be utilized, and it is very possible. For instance - do a modern day writing on the events of the 1963 JFK assassination - there are many written works, first-hand witnesses still alive, and numerous second-hand/after-the-fact witnesses that can attest (sp?) events, etc. It would have been quite doable for the writers to compile things together even 40 or 50 years after-the-fact and still have 100% accuracy.

Piece of paper on my door

[MegaFur]

Yeah, I already know about this. Some dumb ass put a little piece of paper in my apartment door one day that read "spychips.com Rev 13:16-18". As you might guess, Revelations 13:16-18 is that oh so happy and all too oft quoted section about the number of the Beast.

I find this crap so banally boring. I mean, lookit--Revelations itself is chock full of stuff that you could spin into whatever apocolyptic message you want to. The fact that people are so pathetically boring as to only focus on a couple or three passages is at least as depressing as the fact that they feel the need to make up apocolyptic crap in the first place.

Oh well. By the way, if you're high or tripping sometime and you really want to freak yourself out, go read Revelations. Whole thing is whacked out on the weirdness. And you don't even have to get a bible, you can get as many translations as you want from http://www.biblegateway.com/ .

You mean Germany?

[Travoltus]

I still can't quite wrap my head around the concept that a country in Europe has literal thought police that put someone in jail for THREE YEARS. Think about that -- THREE YEARS -- for thinking the wrong thoughts.

You're talking about the Holocaust Deniers, right?

"Rapture loans"

[Animats]

Back around 1997, I came up with the concept of "rapture loans". The idea was to sell balloon-payment second mortgages to fundamentalist Christians. If the Rapture came before the end of 2001, they owed nothing. They could thus enjoy "abundance" until the Rapture. At the end of 2001, interest payments started, and if they couldn't pay, foreclosure would follow.

Marketing would be on Christian TV and radio stations, in the form of infomercials. "Quit your job now! Don't work again! Jesus is coming soon!", along with pictures of happy people with consumer goods. We considered finding some Christian figure to promote the product. Enough people were talking about the Rapture and the "Jubilee" back then that a modest market for the product clearly existed.

(For those of you interested in financial mechanics, the money for the mortgages would be obtained by creating a derivative security that could be resold in the secondary mortgage market. The "rapture" contingency would be taken care of by obtaining an insurance policy against the "rapture" for each mortgage (probably from Lloyds or Swiss Re), using exactly the same definition of "rapture" as in the loan. The combination of the insurance policy and the loan would constitute a resellable security without a "rapture" contingency that could be packaged up and sold in the mortgage-based security market. So we wouldn't have to finance the deal, just broker it.)

We didn't go through with it. It just seemed too evil.

Nevertheless, when there are people running around claiming that Jesus is coming back soon, it's quite feasible to make money taking the other side of that bet.

Re:"Rapture loans"

[StressedEd]

We didn't go through with it. It just seemed too evil.

You presumably work in the financial sector. You opted not to do something because it was too evil.

Hmm, maybe there is hope for humanity.

Re:"Rapture loans"

[Anonymous Coward]

The "rapture" contingency would be taken care of by obtaining an insurance policy against the "rapture" for each mortgage (probably from Lloyds or Swiss Re),

"Hi, I'd like to buy an insurance policy against the rapture."

"Um, pardon me?"

"Yes, I'd like to give you a half-million dollars right now, and if vast numbers of Americans go miraculously flying up into the sky, to be followed shortly by the end of the world, you will pay me 500 million dollars."

"If the US economy completely collapses, and then the world ends, you want me to pay you in dollars?"

"Yes, that's correct."

Dude, sign me up! Where can I get in on this deal?

calls to the prayer

[M1FCJ]

Btw, those calls from the minarets are calls to the prayer, just like church bells in Christian communities - both are nuisance in my opinion, wakes you up too early, especially the dawn prayers in muslim countries - bloody hell, it's 5AM and I've just gone to sleep and some idiot starts screaming thru speakers. Same with church bells, too noisy, especially on Sundays when I'm supposed to have my beauty sleep! :)

Basically calls to the prayers are not prayers themselves therefore they don't have to end with anything special. Allahuekber means "God is great". Bah.

Orthodox Church & Protestantism on Revelations

[jdfox]

To this day the Eastern Orthodox Church does not consider it part of the Canon.

I was baptised Orthodox, and I can assure you that that's not true. It's considered by the Orthodox Church as part of the Canon, but is not read as part of Divine Liturgy. A PBS documentary once mistakenly claimed the Orthodox Church doesn't consider it part of the canon, and this mistake has been widely repeated ever since. Walk into any Orthodox church this morning, and have a look. Most English-speaking Orthodox churches use the Revised Standard Version with Apocrypha, which includes the book of Revelation.

There's an Orthodox monastery above the place on the Isle of Patmos in Greece where St. John the Divine received his Revelation, and the spot where St. John is said to have written it is a site of frequent Orthodox pilgrimage.

The Orthodox Church teaches that Revelations is a divinely inspired book, but should not be taken as a literal account of future events.

In fact, the Book of Revelations was a controversial addition to the early Bible, and several Bishops argued against including it in the canon due to the difficulty of interpreting it, and hence, its potential for abuse--particularly the type of abuse so typical of fundamentalists, who keep claiming that the end times are upon us. Other portions of the Bible specifically warn against doing this, because only God knows the time when the world will end.

Neither did Martin Luther:

"About this book of the Revelation of John...I miss more than one thing in this book, and it makes me consider it to be neither apostolic nor prophetic...I can in no way detect that the Holy Spirit produced it. Moreover he seems to me to be going much too far when he commends his own book so highly-indeed, more than any of the other sacred books do, though they are much more important-and threatens that if anyone takes away anything from it, God will take away from him, etc. Again, they are supposed to be blessed who keep what is written in this book; and yet no one knows what that is, to say nothing of keeping it. This is just the same as if we did not have the book at all. And there are many far better books available for us to keep...My spirit cannot accommodate itself to this book. For me this is reason enough not to think highly of it: Christ is neither taught nor known in it" (Luther, M. Preface to the Revelation of St. John, 1522).

Luther didn't think that the Catholic Church was infallible in determining canonicity, and rejected Revelations, and the Epistles of James (he called it an "epistle of straw"), Jude and Hebrews. Yet the Protestantism that he was instrumental in founding still fiercely defends the Catholic/Orthodox Canon of the Bible, including the Book of Revelation. On the other hand, they reject the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches' teachings on it, and on much else besides.
I haven't entirely worked my own beliefs yet, but this contradiction never made any sense to me.

Re:another fallacy (or Thinking 101)

[mclaincausey]

I write this assuming from context that by "literary validation" you mean popularity. "Literary validation" would actually mean something like scholars of literature widely citing the book as some sort of masterpiece. The Bible is not a single piece of literature, so I don't think that would apply.

Sorry, but an appeal to popularity is yet another logical fallacy. At one point (and perhaps still today), the majority of people in America thought Saddam Hussein was involved in 9-11. The popularity of that (deliberately implanted) falsehood does not make it true. Truth is independent of popularity. In fact, many of the greatest scientific revolutions (continental drift and heliocentrism come to mind) were initially met with contempt, disbelief, and even censorship and threats. The popularity of the Bible, and even the fact that some of the events in the Bible are historically verifiable, do not make the other events in the Bible, particularly the ones that are unprecedented, any more credible.

Because it may not be a LONE nutjob

[abb3w]

why are you guys posting articles by some flakey Christian who thinks progressive technology is the devil?

If this "flake" is able to convince a large enough number of other Christians to flake out over this, it will impact how RFID gets used. The RFID design or usage plans may get modified, using "avoid freaking out the evangelical nutjobs" as an added implementation criterion. The resulting design changes may make for something that the rest of us will be happier with... or make for something that we will be much unhappier with. This makes it "stuff that matters".

Society affects technology, and vice versa. Not all of society is rational, but the irrational parts still impact technology. Of course, the Slashdot discussion won't focus on this, because (a) figuring out exactly how this will impact RFID is pretty hard and (b) making fun of fundamentalist christian whackos is more enjoyable for a lot of Slashdotters.

Have you read the book?

[miller60]

I haven't read the "Christian" version of Albrecht's book, but I'm reading "Spychips" now. I bought it after reading the story here on Slashdot about data center engineers having RFID chips implanted in their arms for security access. The plain fact is that whatever Albrecht's religious leanings, the book is really well reported, with a ton of information from patent filings filled with surprising revelations about the ways major corporations want to integrate RFID into everything. I think it's an important book that raises awareness of the potential privacy issues surrounding RFID. It sure raised mine.