Modern sins
The Vatican has issued a study on sinful behavior of men and women. Men' deadly sins are lust, gluttony, sloth, anger, pride, envy and greed, in this order. Women tend to face pride, envy, anger, lust, and sloth, in this order. This study is based on findings of a jesuit priest called Roberto Busa who seems to be quite a character himself. A priest born 1913 who developed an indexing system and a text search tool, started to co-develop this with IBM in 1949, intoduced a CD-ROM in 1989. Today the tool can found here.
I would be tempted to explore the gender differences in more detail, but this time I'll concentrate on something else that came up with the same news. Last year, Vatican has added new mortal sins to the list. It is now a deadly sin to carry out genetic modification, experiment on a person, pollute the environmental, take or sell illegal drugs, create social injustice, cause poverty or perform financial greed. I've never been a fan of the Vatican's way of seeing right from wrong. I think that sex education and free condoms should be every kids civil right, for example. The list of new sins just supports my thinking.
First of all, isn't sin something subjective where a person feels that he/she is not following his/her chosen religious way of life, rather than a list of things forbidden by an authority. This listing of things has an ugly resemblance to the lists that the Taliban regime is passing on in Afganistan and Pakistan (men are not allowed to shave and women are not allowed to go to school or work, or being treated by male doctors - then again women doctors don't exist because women can't work...).
Secondly, these "new sins" seem to be put together rather hastily and include room for interpretation. If I eat a genetically modified tomato, have I sinned? How does one sin with "social injustice"? Maybe this sin is specifically created for politicians who pass legislation that can lead to either social justice or injustice. How is the end result measured? When a new cure or drug is developed, there is always the first person who has to try it out. This would make the doctor a sinner. If all doctors would be catholic, medical science would stop altogether. Then there is Financial Greed. That's a problematic one.
Gordon Gekko's days are over, that's for sure. Capitalism is in crisis and Karl Marx's Capital is selling like never before. (in fact, I had some related books in my wish list to Santa, but he didn't appreciate my interest in socialism's new role in the global economy). When even in the USA the government needs to take over banks and other large private companies, it seems that nowadays the only vocal friends of capitalism could be fitted on a farm in Texas. Nevertheless it is clear that market economy has no alternative. Socialism didn't really work in the Soviet Union, and it's hardly working for North-Korea. China is taking huge steps forward because they are leaving more and more socialistic ways behind, and welcoming elements of market economy.
I've grown up in a country that executes the s.c. Nordic welfare state ideology. This means that the government guarantees basic services for all people: basic security, healthcare, education, infrastructure, national defense, etc. High taxes ensure that these services are of high quality and in principle shouldn't encourage private competition in these areas. This is because you don't want the country to end up in a two-tier systems where the ones who have more money would get better education or healthcare than the ones who have less money. (This system isnt' bullet proof, of course there are private kindergartens and medical centers even in Finland, but this is the basic idea). Now, this system would not work unless the economy allowed private enterprises to bloom. The only way for people to have money to pay those taxes, is for them to be able to start flourishing business and compete in the free markets. That's the only way.
How can one compete in a market economy if financial "greed", i.e. the pursue of financial benefits isn't the driver for businesses. Companies are founded for the basic reason that people are willing to invest their money in order to make a profit. If owners weren't allowed to make profits, there wouldn't be any investors, hence no companies. This basic rule seems to be forgotten when people propose that companies shouldn't be allowed to pay any dividend in tough economic times. If a governement forbids companies to pay dividend to its owners=investors, it would mean a path towards socialism that will harm free entrepreneurship.
The way Vatican sees the world is indeed very odd. It is a place where money comes from "somewhere", science is forbidden, people are all equal except if you happen to be a woman, then your role is to keep making babies until you die of AIDS at the age of 37.
I would be tempted to explore the gender differences in more detail, but this time I'll concentrate on something else that came up with the same news. Last year, Vatican has added new mortal sins to the list. It is now a deadly sin to carry out genetic modification, experiment on a person, pollute the environmental, take or sell illegal drugs, create social injustice, cause poverty or perform financial greed. I've never been a fan of the Vatican's way of seeing right from wrong. I think that sex education and free condoms should be every kids civil right, for example. The list of new sins just supports my thinking.
First of all, isn't sin something subjective where a person feels that he/she is not following his/her chosen religious way of life, rather than a list of things forbidden by an authority. This listing of things has an ugly resemblance to the lists that the Taliban regime is passing on in Afganistan and Pakistan (men are not allowed to shave and women are not allowed to go to school or work, or being treated by male doctors - then again women doctors don't exist because women can't work...).
Secondly, these "new sins" seem to be put together rather hastily and include room for interpretation. If I eat a genetically modified tomato, have I sinned? How does one sin with "social injustice"? Maybe this sin is specifically created for politicians who pass legislation that can lead to either social justice or injustice. How is the end result measured? When a new cure or drug is developed, there is always the first person who has to try it out. This would make the doctor a sinner. If all doctors would be catholic, medical science would stop altogether. Then there is Financial Greed. That's a problematic one.
Gordon Gekko's days are over, that's for sure. Capitalism is in crisis and Karl Marx's Capital is selling like never before. (in fact, I had some related books in my wish list to Santa, but he didn't appreciate my interest in socialism's new role in the global economy). When even in the USA the government needs to take over banks and other large private companies, it seems that nowadays the only vocal friends of capitalism could be fitted on a farm in Texas. Nevertheless it is clear that market economy has no alternative. Socialism didn't really work in the Soviet Union, and it's hardly working for North-Korea. China is taking huge steps forward because they are leaving more and more socialistic ways behind, and welcoming elements of market economy.
I've grown up in a country that executes the s.c. Nordic welfare state ideology. This means that the government guarantees basic services for all people: basic security, healthcare, education, infrastructure, national defense, etc. High taxes ensure that these services are of high quality and in principle shouldn't encourage private competition in these areas. This is because you don't want the country to end up in a two-tier systems where the ones who have more money would get better education or healthcare than the ones who have less money. (This system isnt' bullet proof, of course there are private kindergartens and medical centers even in Finland, but this is the basic idea). Now, this system would not work unless the economy allowed private enterprises to bloom. The only way for people to have money to pay those taxes, is for them to be able to start flourishing business and compete in the free markets. That's the only way.
How can one compete in a market economy if financial "greed", i.e. the pursue of financial benefits isn't the driver for businesses. Companies are founded for the basic reason that people are willing to invest their money in order to make a profit. If owners weren't allowed to make profits, there wouldn't be any investors, hence no companies. This basic rule seems to be forgotten when people propose that companies shouldn't be allowed to pay any dividend in tough economic times. If a governement forbids companies to pay dividend to its owners=investors, it would mean a path towards socialism that will harm free entrepreneurship.
The way Vatican sees the world is indeed very odd. It is a place where money comes from "somewhere", science is forbidden, people are all equal except if you happen to be a woman, then your role is to keep making babies until you die of AIDS at the age of 37.
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