People get aggressive when god says to.
I came across this really interesting article about a study on the affects of religious texts on people's aggression levels. Both the religious and secular get more violent when they are subjected to god's words telling them to take up arms.
This is highly intriguing, and it would be an interesting follow up to see if the opposite was true. If they read a passage on people helping each other, and one version said "The Lord commanded Israel to take their brothers in their arms and comfort them before the LORD," would the people who were commanded by god to be good be any less violent?
And since the bible contains conflicting messages (god loves everyone, but smites people who upset him) how might people's aggression levels correspond to similar passages?
This is highly intriguing, and it would be an interesting follow up to see if the opposite was true. If they read a passage on people helping each other, and one version said "The Lord commanded Israel to take their brothers in their arms and comfort them before the LORD," would the people who were commanded by god to be good be any less violent?
And since the bible contains conflicting messages (god loves everyone, but smites people who upset him) how might people's aggression levels correspond to similar passages?
posted by new.atheist at 2:05 PM
2 Comments:
That movie scared me the first time I saw it. It was so bloody and violent.
On the funny side of it, I had free tickets to go and see it, so I took my aged aunt with me who was about 80 at the time.
I have to confess that I knew absolutely nothing about the movie before I went, so when it started with the $%$#@ and the &*^%$ I nearly died from embarrassment.
I could do nothing but apologise to my aged aunt, who probably left the theatre thinking I was some sort of perverted sicko.
Who takes their ancient aunt to see "Pulp Fiction" as a treat?
I quite enjoy the movie and the statement that it makes about violence, but I don't recommend viewing it with an ancient aunty.
There is an interesting post concerning this over at pharyngula as well.
Obey God — Kill!
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2007/02/obey_god_kill.php
I also linked to it in a post regarding cruelty in the bible.
And I will link your post to mine, as the video of pulp fiction is pertinent to this as well.
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