Science & Culture Corner
DIVINE CODES & SCIENCE
Of the letters and e mails received as a result of this column here and in other magazines, none are so many as those asking for the real deal on UFO's, Alien Abductions, Fortune telling, and many other science-related mysteries. Many wrote about the concept that Japanese people have personalities that can be predicted by their blood types. (This issue was explored in JT Oct 98.)
Many, of late, have been about coded predictions in the Torh or first five books of the Bible. We've all heard mention of it and Japanese bookstores are selling several versions of "The Bible Code." Save your money. When the same "revealing" computer programs are applied to other texts, such as "Moby Dick," similar words appear which can be strung together to appear prophetic.
This suggests neither the Bible is or is not divine, but merely that computers can be enlisted to number-crunch any text with similar results. For example, take the first two letters in divine from the previous sentence, count to the 28th letter and take those two, then another 28 and the word DIANA appears. You can also create the words HITLER and DEATH from these sentences (with varying counting systems) just as easily.
What's worse than unscientific nonsense is nonsense disguised as science. Case in point--the recent "Fingerprints of the Gods" and the even more absurd "Chariots of the Gods" previously. In "Bible Code" scientific method (a requirement of science) was never used.
If free time is something you have too much of, I suggest rather than reading about secret "divine" codes, you could make a pile of money if you simply think up an absurd idea and package it as if it were scientific... you'll sell millions!
by Angel
Stephens
angel_stephens@hotmail.com
EDITOR'S NOTE-
Angel Stephens as a Harvard student studied physics at the Harvard Smithsonian and writes today on the subjects of physical science and anthropology for numerous publications.
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