Isaac Schrödinger

Glorifying Uselessness II

On Friday last, I commented on Quran memorization and recitation. Today, I just read a surreal post related to that topic:

So I am reading the Quran - I am just regurgitating the words. They make no sense to me. The Quran is a beautiful book - just listen to a good recitation and you will fall in love with the enchanting verses even if you don't know the meaning - but I have decided it has to make sense to me.

I told this to an uncle and he was like 'why? The Prophet said reading the Quran is reward itself'.

Islam doth have a strange reward system.

Beautiful

"Woman Sculpture at History Museum of Catalonia".

Filthy and Impure

Not surprising:

Authorities in the Saudi city of Mecca have banned the sale of pet cats and dogs at the request of religious police, the Arab News reported Thursday.

The Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice made the request after many young Saudis had gone outdoors with their pet dogs thus violating the kingdom's culture and traditions.

Link via Western Resistance.

Click here to read what an imam has to say. My take:

I didn't see a single dog in over ten years of my sad life in Saudi Arabia. There, I only heard a dog once and it sounded like someone was beating the poor thing.

You have no idea how utterly repulsed Muslims feel when they see Westerners petting a dog on a TV show. To them, a dog is a filthy and dirty creature. They don't get how anyone could lower themselves to touch such a hideous thing. In my extended family in Pakistan, only one relative kept a dog. That dog was always chained and kept outside for protection. More than once in Pakistan, I've seen a group of kids throw rocks at a hapless street dog and heard the terrible cries of pain.

In "moderate" Turkey early this year: "Pro-islamic municipalities in Turkey are killing stray dogs, animal rights groups claim. Municipal workers are hunting, torturing and killing the animals by the hundreds, the campaigners say."

"A Little Nuts"

Question: Does it come with a toaster?

Downsized to "Dwarf"

NOOOOOOOO!

Catallarchy:

I mean, are we sure the International Astronomical Union isn’t an Iranian front?

The incompetent boobs are two days late!

Something Very Ugly

Amil Imani talks about the Muslim mindset. An excerpt:

Khomeini, the founder of the Iranian Islamic state, for one, made extensive use of the fatwa. Widely-known in the west is Khomeini’s fatwa condemning Selman Rushdie to death for his book. A less known fatwa of Khomeini during the last Iran-Iraq war led to the slaughter of thousands of Iranian children. Children, nearly all under 15 years of age, were given plastic keys to paradise as they were commanded by the fatwa of the imam to rush forward to clear minefields for the tanks to follow. The Islamic murderers, in obedience to the fatwa of a bloodthirsty man of Allah, had no problem in deceiving the clueless lads with made in China plastic keys to paradise.

Latent Power

A splendid shot at chromasia.

What Matters

I got here via Muslihoon.

There is a small detail about Muslim Nobel Laureates that I think reinforces the points made by Bithead.

Abdus Salam, a Pakistani physicist, won the Nobel Prize in physics in 1979. He belonged to a tiny Muslim sect called the Ahmadiyya Movement. By Pakistani law, he's not a Muslim. Wikipedia:

Professor Salam was a devout muslim who belonged to the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community. As such Salam is not officially recognized by the Pakistani government despite the fact that he is their country's first and only Nobel Laureate.

Think about that. A titanic achievement -- a Nobel Prize in physics -- couldn't overcome the sheer bigotry of the Pakistani society.

It's worse in Saudi Arabia. Try bringing a Jewish-authored book in the Kingdom and the customs officials will confiscate it. Names like Einstein, Feynman, and Friedman are banned in the heart of Islam.

The Muslim world would be better off if it were to emulate the Jews instead of trying to erase them.

A TERRIBLE Crime

Saudi drivers are so brave:

How often do you see a driver making a left turn on a signal from the far right lane in North America?

Not very. Though, when it comes to DWF, the Saudis clamp down:

Arab News reports on the latest case of DWF (aka Driving While Female). What makes it funnier this time around, though, is that the cops told the husband to make sure his wife does not repeat such a terrible crime as driving a car, which can lead to immoral behavior.

Yeah, who knows what the crazy bitch the woman will do next!?

Illuminating Dark Matter

Good Math, Bad Math:

Everyone is scientific circles is abuzz with the big news: there's proof that dark matter exists! The paper from the scientists who made the discovered is here; and a Sean Carroll (no relation) has a very good explanation on his blog, Cosmic Variance. This discovery happens to work as a great example of just why good science needs good math.

Basically, one needs to know what gravitational lensing means to understand what the scientists did.

(That one astrophysics course in first year paid off! --Ed.)

Reclusive Russian Says No

The NYTimes via Crescat Sententia:

Grigory Perelman, a reclusive Russian mathematician who solved a key piece in a century-old puzzle known as the Poincaré conjecture, was one of four mathematicians awarded the Fields Medal today.

But Dr. Perelman refused to accept the medal, as he has other honors, and he did not attend the ceremonies at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Madrid.

Dang. Perelman just refused the most prestigious award in Mathematics.

The Jewish Media Exposed

Spiegel via LFG!!!!

Asked what they think of the suspects arrested for the foiled train attacks, many respond with remarks like: “They’re crazy.” Few have more to say. Abdulwahab also thinks such attacks are sheer madness. “It only harms people like us who live here,” he says. But even he — whose views are quite moderate and who even had a Jewish girlfriend once — can’t help claiming you’ll never get the whole truth from the Western media because “their reporting is just too pro-Jewish.” Many such anti-Semitic remarks — and worse — can be heard around Hamburg’s central station.

What started the whole conflict in Lebanon? Just read:

Just a few days ago, a 17-year-old Kurd from Bonn espoused the following theory on SPIEGEL TV: “What happened first,” he said, talking about the recent conflict in Lebanon, “was that the Jews raped a child, or something like that.” Later he claimed to have learned from a credible source that Jews once systematically shot six-year-olds in a kindergarten. “They let the teacher live so she would become mentally ill,” the young man said.

I can not comprehend the depth of stupidity showcased above.

Schiphol Scare

Liberty and Justice:

Two Dutch fighter jets (F-16's) have escorted a plane from Northwest Airlines back to Schiphol airport (Amsterdam). When the plane was flying above Germany, the captain contacted officials at Schiphol asking for permission to return to the Dutch airport. The plane was originally headed for Mumbai, India.

Wow. I've connected many times through the Schiphol airport.

BBC News:

The Dutch news agency ANP quoted a police spokesman as saying 12 people had been arrested, but declined to give further details because of the ongoing investigation.

Update at Liberty and Justice:

RTL Nieuws just reported that other passengers felt that the 12 other passengers were behaving suspicious: the examples they used were that they didn't pay any attention to the safety procedures and that they were 'exchanging cell phones' with one another.

True Lies

From Tim Blair comes news that Hezballah just sunk an Australian warship.

Reuters has solid evidence.

Lovely Lilly

Likely, the most spoiled dog in the world.

The Nation of Hezballah

The Big Pharaoh:

Every country on the face of this earth drap the coffins carrying their fallen fighters in its official flag. Not Hezbollah though. They're above Lebanon. They're a state within a state. Not only that, they unilaterally drag the country to war without its permission. These are our heroes. *vomit*

Go see the photo.

Not About Land

Umar Lee writes about the Middle East:

One cannot discuss this conflict through Western Secular lenses, because there is a strong religious dimension to this conflict. The cry of the Muslim ummah is not for Gaza or Jenin, it is for al-Quds and al-Aqsa. If one thinks that this conflict is just about refugees and land then they do not know the people. Western-leftists do not address the religious aspects of the Arab and Muslims movements, and thus are clueless as to understanding the nature of their struggle.

True. Leftists who only deal in material-based analyses will forever be wrong about the Middle East.

The Meaning of Life

In the summer of 2003, I was chatting with a few friends when a Muslim girl in the group turned to me and asked, "Do you believe in God?"

I had had some very heated conversations with that girl before. She was the usual conspiracy-theorizing Muslim who rabidly disagreed with the actions of America in particular and infidels in general. She likely wanted to know just how far I had gone in my beliefs.

I thought for a second and said, "Yes."

It was an awkward moment: I realized that I'm not an athiest, not agnostic, and I don't prescribe to any religion. I had been an ex-Muslim for 19 months then but still I believed in something. (Don't worry, I won't unleash a Jihad on you if you don't share my belief.)

I just read these three posts that touch on something bigger:

1. "What is Transcendence..." by Lawrence Auster.
2. "Transcendence and Marriage" by Russell Wardlow.
3. "Transcendence" by Francis W. Porretto.

Numbers Count; Ideas Don't Matter

Lawrence Auster:

An Indian living in the West tells me of a story he heard recently from a Muslim friend of his who is also from India. The friend’s father once worked in the Middle East and was having a conversation with a colleague who was about to become a father for the 10th time. The friend’s father (who has only two children) asked his colleague, “Why don’t you stop now? What is the point of having so many children?” His colleague replied, “As a Muslim it is my duty to multiply and outbreed the infidels. This is how Islam will conquer the Earth—through the battle of the womb.”

Most of us will witness the outcome of this battle in excruciating slow motion on European soil.

I'm Sorry

I was drunk.

Islam Off-limits to Criticism?

The Age via Democracy Frontline:

IT IS impossible to vilify Islam without also vilifying Muslims, because the two are indistinguishable, the Victorian Court of Appeal was told yesterday.

Yes, you read that right.

Justice Geoffrey Nettle asked Mr Woinarski: "There must be intellectually a distinction between the ideas and those who hold them?" "We don't agree with that," Mr Woinarski said. "But in this case it's an irrelevant distinction, because Muslims and Islam were mishmashed up together."

Muslims are so special.

The State of the Ummah

Top 500 Universities in the World.

The state of Oregon (population: 3.4 million) has more institutions in there than all the Muslim nations combined.

Peace In Our Time

Kofi Annan puts Chamberlain to shame.

Canadian Useful Infidels

CBC:

Liberal MP Boris Wrzesnewskyj, New Democrat MP Peggy Nash and Bloc Québécois MP Maria Mourani are on a fact-finding mission to southern Lebanon as Israeli troops continue to withdraw from the region following 34 days of conflict.

The Liberal Party must be proud:

In a phone interview with CBC News on Sunday night, Wrzesnewskyj stressed that he considers Hezbollah a terrorist organization, but said he is concerned that Ottawa's list of terror groups doesn't differentiate between the militant and political wings of the party.

Hear that Al Qaeda. Just make a bogus "political" wing, and watch as dim politicians from the West support you. Oh, and don't worry about the fact that both the militant and the "political" wing call for the obliteration of Israel.

There's more:

Wrzesnewskyj's comments were echoed by Nash, who is also from Toronto. She said many Lebanese regard Hezbollah as resistance fighters.

"It's just not helpful to label them a terrorist organization," said Nash.

Yeah, an organization that shoots hundreds of rockets from residential areas into a neighboring nation should not be called a terrorist enterprise. That just might hurt their feelings (gasp!).

Update
Whoa!

A Tory MP has compared the terror group Hezbollah to the German Nazi party of the 1930s.

Jason Kenney says the fact that Hezbollah has a politicial wing doesn't change the fact that it is a terrorist group dedicated to the eradication of Israel.

Yes! There is hope in Canada.

No Problem With Posh

Never had one.

Centers of Advanced Terrorism

It is always informative to get the view of an insider:

Shiraz Maher, who joined the radical group Hizb ut-Tahrir while studying at Leeds University but later renounced his membership, told The Times Higher that universities were "bread-and-butter" recruiting grounds for extremist groups.

He said: "If you go to freshers fairs at University College London, the School of Oriental and African Studies and the London School of Economics next month, you will find Hizb ut-Tahrir undercover.

"Vice-chancellors have been wilfully blind to the problem. Recruitment of students is going on. That is categorical. Universities are not on top of this."

Link via Jihad Watch.

Fine Dining Will Make You Free

I don't have much to add to the whole asinine episode.

Post of the Day

I, like, laughed when I read this.

"In True Islam"

A video at LFG!!!, "I, A Muslim." There are many parts that stand out. It portrayed gender apartheid really well.

I just finished watching it and I noticed an error in the subtitles. Around 9:09 to 9:13, one guy comments on the Muslim and atheist marriage: "In true Islam, it is not halaal."

Which means that in Islam such a marriage is not allowed.

Though, the subtitle incorrectly states: "In true Islam, it's not forbidden." Just ignore that small "not".

Interesting subtitles from 21:02 to 21:18:

...shots from Saudi TV, which I was watching while I was in the Emirates. There are instructions from different spiritual authorities on how to beat your wife in such a way as to not break too many bones, so that she still can work and serve the man.

"What the hell was I thinking?" That's a question that many female converts to Islam must ask themselves after learning The Truth^TM.

Pakistani Cricket in Trouble

Cricinfo has got a few words from Inzamam:

"This game is about more than winning and losing," he told Cricinfo, "it's about respect and countries come first. If someone says to me you are a cheat and Pakistan is doing wrong things, my first priority is to my country."

I understand his point but he expressed it in the wrong manner. Again, following the rules of cricket, he might get punished quite hard:

Inzamam-ul-Haq has been charged with bringing the game into disrepute along with changing the condition of the ball and, if found guilty, faces a ban of up to eight ODIs or four Tests.

The World Cup is just over six months away. This will destroy the rhythm of the team. The PCB should act now and put Younis or Yousuf as the captain. Inzi can keep on playing.

It'll be better to lose Inzi, the batsman, in a few weeks or months than Inzi, the batsman + captain.

There is only one way that the Pakistani team can lift its head high: Destroy England in the ODI series.

Update
Osman Samiuddin, the Pakistan editor of Cricinfo, provides the best take on the whole mess. It's ugly.

Zzzz

A mesmerizing photo.

England vs. Pakistan Controversy

Cricinfo:

The fourth Test between England and Pakistan has been forfeited in favour of England, after an extraordinary day of rumour, speculation, and high farce that brought the game to the brink of arguably its biggest crisis since Bodyline.

Wow. [Wikipedia entry on Bodyline.]

The relevant info on the present scandal is on this page:

5.20pm Here's what Andrew Miller has for us. "The issue would seem to boil down to evidence. Has Darrell Hair got any proof that the Pakistanis were tampering with the ball? Did he see a specific player scratch at the seam, or did he take a look at a ball that is 55 overs old and draw his own conclusions? As Ian Botham has just said on Sky Sports, it's a matter of honour to the Pakistanis. If Hair has no proof, then they are well within their rights to take this stance."

The protest by the Pakistanis took too much time. By the laws of cricket, they forfeited the match. Never has this happened before.

Update
The Telegraph:

Pride, principle and prejudice replaced runs, wickets and catches as the final Test of the summer reached an extraordinary climax at the Oval.

[...] With 12,000 tickets already sold for today, and with cricket's reputation at stake, the match needs to be resumed, weather but not light permitting, at 11am.

Inzi ki izzat vs. Darrell's pride. Which will win?

Q&A With Adolf Ahmedinejad

Unaired portions of the Ahmedinejad interview by Mike Wallace:

Q: Favorite terrorist group?

A: Hezbollah.

Naturally.

Q: Do you prefer dogs or cats?

A: Goats.

I'm not even gonna go there.

Q: Do you like blondes, brunettes or redheads?

A: In a burrka they're all alike.

True. Read it all.

A Devilish Attraction

The Egyptian censors put their foot down:

What makes this so interesting is the fact that Nancy Ajram..., the Lebanese pop singer and one of the most eligible girlfriends in the Arab world, plays the role of a Mossad agent! You know, we always have this stereotype about female Mossad agents. They're the sexy young women who use sex to seduce that poor Arab guy.

I spent over ten years in the Middle East. Never met a female Mossad agent.

Sigh.

Operation Iraqi Liberation (OIL?)

Muslihoon:

“No War for Oil” or “No Blood for Oil” are common chants of the Left in opposing Operation Iraqi Liberation. All good and well. Except we really haven’t received any oil breaks from our alleged “occupation” of Iraq.

We did not go into Iraq for the oil. If we did, we would have completely ignored the various militias and terrorists, focusing only on rebuilding and protecting Iraq’s oil infrastructure.

Precisely. If the war was about oil, then it wouldn't make sense for the US to spend blood and treasure in Iraq as a whole when she should only be protecting the oil infrastructure.

Omar wrote in December 2003:

There had been a perspective that is widely spread among Arabs and the anti war, even some Iraqis, that America came to Iraq to steal the oil and other natural resources from Iraq [...] I wonder how their brilliant, clear thinking got to that nonnegotiable conclusion!!?

Well I found that the answer is so simple, that even a blind man can see...heh.

Read his timeless analysis.

Asymmetrical Ears

That's what I thought when I saw the first photo.

Not Lying Down

Charles Johnson on the Flight 613 Mutiny:

I suppose it’s one view to say the passengers were behaving irrationally. But you could also look at it as evidence that people are beginning to distrust their governments’ ability to protect them, because of the politically correct touchy-feely multiculturalism they can see all around.

When governments refuse to listen to their citizens, the citizens take matters into their own hands.

Pure Eeevil

Oh, the plight of men who work in Saudi stores that sell women's clothes! You see, some women use their, um, charms to get discounts or "borrow" a few items. Where are the Mutaween when you need 'em?

“It was frustrating and irritating,” said former salesman who preferred to be called Taha.

“Imagine during a day in Ramadan, a woman coming up to you and opening up her abaya to show you her size or a woman showing you the exact garment she wants to buy a duplicate of from the shop, one that she is still wearing!”

Astaghfirullah!

Propaganda Masquerading as Education

Franck Salameh via The Corner:

At Middlebury College's Arabic Summer School, where I recently taught Arabic, students were exposed to more than intensive language instruction.

[...] In maps, textbooks, lectures, and other teaching materials used in the instruction of Arabic, Israel didn't exist, and the overarching watan 'Arabi (Arab fatherland) was substituted for the otherwise diverse and multi-faceted "Middle East." Curious and misleading geographical appellations, such as the "Arabian Gulf" in lieu of the time-honored "Persian Gulf," abounded. Syria's borders with its neighbors were marked "provisional," and Lebanon was referred to as a qutr (or "province") of an imagined Arab supra-state.

I wonder what Spain was called.

Such attitudes and practices aren't confined to Middlebury. A former student of mine who recently took a summer Arabic course at Georgetown University relates that one of her professors, an otherwise excellent language instructor, refused to allow the word "Israel" to be uttered in class. And his bigotry wasn't confined to the Jewish state: during a class discussion on nationalism, my former student argued that "many Lebanese did not think of themselves as Arabs." The instructor's response: "while they might say that, it's just politics, because all Lebanese people know on the inside that they are indeed Arabs."

Arab Parallel Universe

Islamic Evil:

It is not only Arabs who live in an alternate reality very different from our own.  That alternate reality is also shared by Kurds, Pakistanis and other primitive Muslim peoples. This essay in the Kurdish Media will illustrate in part how different that reality is from our own.

The essay is, indeed, rich:

[...] Abu Zarqawi, Saddam Hussein and Bin Laden are all the creation of the American Military and the CIA. They trained them armed them and showed them good examples of savagery in Vietnam and the two great wars which took the lives of some hundred million Europeans.

Isn't that something. I have read that "the Islamists are puppets of the US," but the statement that the Americans somehow inflicted all or most of the death and carnage in the two world wars is a new one.

Jew-hatred To The Max

Jonah Goldberg via Discarded Lies:

[...] there is no Jewish conspiracy theory too outlandish in the Muslim world. Huge numbers of Muslims — even 45% of British Muslims — believe that the Jews were behind 9/11. Theories that the Mossad is behind every bad headline, from the Indonesian tsunami to bad soccer performances, are common on the Arab street. According to Herf, this is only the second time the world has seen this sort of radical anti-Semitic paranoia. And, again, too many in the unspotless West are saying, "they can't be serious."

They're dead serious.

Also, there's another level of insanity on top of the 9/11 conspiracy theories:

1. Remember that the Palestinians were celebrating and passing out sweets right after they heard of 9/11.
2. My father who was working in Saudi Arabia at the time told me that there was also a celebratory mood in his office.
3. A CNN reporter, I think, interviewed Pakistani school kids after 9/11. She asked a boy, "What did you feel when you saw the images of the collapsing towers?"
   
   "Happy," was his reply.

Ergo, millions of Muslims were overjoyed after 9/11 while "knowing" for sure that the Jews had ignited a spectacular war against them: See Afghanistan and Iraq.

Does one laugh or cry?

The Tongue is Too Small

Definitely not a Mercedes.

A Failure of Assimilation?

Michael Coren:

There in my Canadian newspaper was a photograph of an ordinary house in an ordinary street in ordinary working-class Walthamstow in northeast London. But the bland veneer was shattered by the presence of armed police officers. For this was the home of an alleged terrorist who, it is claimed, wanted to murder thousands of innocent people by blowing up airliners over the Atlantic and give his life in international jihad.

No longer ordinary, particularly for me. Because Walthamstow is where I was born, just yards away from where this terror suspect lived.

He talks about the Irish, the Jews, the West Indians, the Hindus, the Sikhs, and the Muslims and concludes:

I was back home just two weeks ago and this is what I found: The enormously successful British idea of what is best described as an "assimilation blanket" simply does not succeed with a significant number of young Muslims.

Read the whole sad article. Via Daimnation!

Headline of the Day

"Monks brawl at Sri Lanka peace protest".

Holy Crap!

Smile!

Immorally Consistent

Rishon Rishon:

If you read any Arab blogs - and I have been reading the most moderate ones I can find - you will see that a common topic is indignantly protesting Israel's "claim of moral superiority". Well, one thing that happens every time an Israeli corpse falls into Arab hands is that it gets mutilated.

The Palestinian Arabs, and I would wager other Arabs as well, support suicide bombings aimed at Israeli civilians. It doesn't take much of a leap to go from that heinous position to disrespecting a Jewish corpse.

Natural Treatment

John Hawkins comments on a dubious AIDS treatment policy:

If you want to know why Africa stays mired in misery, poverty, and sickness, you don't need to look any farther than the culture and the people running the governments across the continent.

Glorifying Uselessness

Michael van der Galien asks in the comments:

... why the heck do they teach the children this [the Quran] if they don't even understand it? We can't call it indoctrination really, if they don't have a clue what they're reading...

It's considered a great honor for a Muslim kid to quote any part of the Quran within seconds. The quotation is always in Arabic. The vast majority of Muslims don't speak Arabic; for them it's not indoctrination but utter tedium.

The indoctrination comes in when "teachers" in madrassas feed the children the rulings of Islam--Sharia--in their own language. So, it's memorizing the Quran + force-feeding hatred.

From what I've read of this particular story, they're only stuffing the Quran in tiny heads. No hatred involved but still, nine hours of that everyday is definitely abuse. The kids "learn" nothing but the parents accrue prestige within the Muslim community for having such "good" kids.

I went to a Pakistani school in Arabia. There, a few kids in my class knew the Quran by heart. These kids were utter jerks but they always got some respect from the teachers and the community for just that useless skill.

Competitions are held within the Muslim community on reciting the Quran and religious poems etc. where these kids show off their impressive Arabic and Urdu pronunciations and win awards and recognition.

Very few care if the kids actually comprehend the material. It's a hollow show.

Update
Muslihoon comments on the whole situation. I always found it amusing that reciting the Quran earns one sawaab (bonus points towards heaven).

The Iranian Regime is Scared

Gateway Pundit:

This week the Iranian regime announced that it was about to launch a crackdown against "decadent" satellite television dishes.

...It didn't take long for them to get cracking!

The Wahabbis in Saudi Arabia also tried to ban satellite dishes in the early 90s but business in the end prevailed. Infidelicious programs like Baywatch and beauty pageants were a big hit in the Kingdom.

The Iranian campaign, however, is aimed more towards information control. The jailing of bloggers attests to that:

"It shows their paranoia," said Derakhshan, who helped ignite the Iranian blog boom in 2001 by posting simple instructions to create sites in Farsi. "They fear these sites and blogs could someday become a way for protesters to communicate and organize. They are trying to control the Internet before it can control them."

Giuliani Speaks

The NY Sun via Prof. Reynolds:

"I think it's going to happen … we can't keep this country 100% safe," Mr. Giuliani said about the prospect of another terrorist attack on American soil, adding that he's "surprised" we haven't been hit again thus far. What's more, he said, Republicans shouldn't shy away from "politicizing" the War on Terror in fighting the Democrats. "You don't have to politicize a war," he said. "Wars are political … It's our right as Republicans to argue our case … There's a big difference between our party and theirs."

Right on. The Democrats are going to get hit with a sledgehammer in the 2008 presidential election.