In an essay called “Patience Amid Long Experiments“, in the Adventist Review, Justin Kim says “The pitch-drop experiment teaches our faith community some lessons.” Kim goes on to explain: “A parody of the world-famous Nobel Prize, the Ig Nobel Prize was established in 1991 to recognize achievements that first ‘make people laugh, then think.’ In […]
Philosophers, theologians, and many others have been searching for an unequivocal definition of Evil for at least 2,000 years. Perhaps a mathematical one might help? Francisco Parro, who is Associate Professor of Economics, Universidad Adolfo Ibañez, School of Business, Chile, makes steps towards such things in his latest paper : The problem of evil: An […]
What little things do some men get excited about? That’s one of the questions addressed in this new study: “Linking Evangelical Subculture and Phallically Insecure Masculinity Using Google Searches for Male Enhancement,” Samuel L. Perry [pictured here] and Andrew L. Whitehead, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, epub 2021. The authors, at the University […]
If someone was promised a ‘New Earth’, as a replacement, would they be less inclined to look after the current one? This was one of the questions posed in a 2010 paper for The Expository Times. The author, Professor Edward Adams of King’s College, London, UK, points out that : ‘In accordance with his promise, we […]
Has God ever been bored, or is currently bored, or might, at some stage, become bored? In a 2017 paper for the scholarly journal Religious Studies (Volume 53, Issue 1, pp. 51-70) authors Vuko Andrić (Akademischer Rat., University of Bayreuth, Germany) and Attila Tanyi (University of Tromsø, Norway) suggest that if God is omnitemporal [i.e. […]
What depths has the anus song? This study takes a look: ” ‘Everybody, Let’s Tighten the Anus’: Exploring the Social and Cultural Meaning of a Korean Folksong,” Joonseong Lee [pictured here], Journal of Media and Religion, vol. 11, no. 4, 2012, pp. 216-230. The author, at California State University San Marcos, explains: “The immanent approach to the […]
If you haven’t come across the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster (CFSM), and wish to read an academic overview, may we recommend a recent paper in the journal Le religieux sur Internet / Religion on the Web, Vol 8 (2015) ‘When Virtuality Shapes Social Reality. Fake Cults and the Church of the Flying Spaghetti […]
Improbable apologises for the late notice regarding the retirement of columnist Reed M. N. Weep from the scholarly journal Bulletin for the Study of Religion. An announcement of his retirement from the journal, and indeed academia in general, can be found here. The journal also lists his recent columns. May we recommend : ‘When Did […]
Dr. Tim Mawson is Fellow and Tutor in Philosophy at St Peter’s College, Oxford, UK. He’s the author of ‘Praying to stop being an atheist’ (International Journal for Philosophy of Religion, June 2010, Volume 67, Issue 3, pp 173-186) “In this paper, I argue that atheists who think that the issue of God’s existence or […]
From a medical point of view, not all religious practices are always 100% risk free. See, for example, a recent Improbable article : ‘Official word: The body of Christ is not and cannot be gluten-free.’ But gluten intolerance is not the only area for concern – what about Holy Water in hospital chapels for example […]