People tend to remember those sorts of things... Also, it's not like there are a bunch of Jews who play city roulette every decade and move to a major city. People tend to stick to the cities they're born in, or at the least the countries they're born in.
I'd be curious to see where the quizmaster got this information from. Growing up in Johannesburg, South Africa - there is a very large Jewish community, so much so that there are a number of Jewish schools all over. Not saying the figures are wrong, I'd just be interested to see how large the Jewish population in Johannesburg is.
Take a look at this website - http://www.citypopulation.de/Israel.html
Non-Jews are about 15-20% of the total population, but the overwhelming majority live in one of the 3 major urban areas (Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Haifa) or in urban areas with minimal numbers of Jews (Nazareth, for instance).
Baltimore and D.C. are often included in the same metropolitan area (though sometimes they aren't), but the quiz specifies that it's the city itself excluding metro area
In 1939 Warsaw would have been 2nd on this list. In fact, many of the top cities would be in Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltic States. It should be remembered that it was not only the SS who played a role in changing this but also Nazi collaborators who organized pogroms against the Jews. Footage of this happening during Operation Barbarossa can still be found.
Religion of any kind is the cancer of our civilization. It is religion that tells people what to believe, who to hate, who to follow, how to act. Human beings it seems have to have other human beings tell them how to behave and act in the world as if they know better. No person can be really free (that is free thinking and acting) while harnessed to a religion.
While some people twist religion to accomplish their own goals, religion in a true form seems to be the very essence of freedom. No religion (well, no major religion at least) tells people to hate others - they are all founded on the principles of love and peace, and many people use religion to cope with the world. They use it to seek guidance, but they aren't slaves to it; they simply feel the need for comfort or help and turn to religion for that help. I have many very religious friends who have read whatever religious texts they follow and have interpreted those texts freely, and applied them in the ways they see fit. Religion is a guideline for how to be kind and be a good person, not a dictation of how you must lead your life.
essence of freedom? Are you kidding? Islam literally means submission. They say "peace," but really, it means the peace one finds through submission to the will of god. Freedom from freedom. "the other thing," as Nick Fury put it at the beginning of The Avengers.
Christianity meanwhile promotes total slavish devotion to a god man and the silly Iron Age morality he professed to follow, and like Islam promises as reward for this an eternity of life in a celestial North Korea as the late great Chris Hitchens described it.
Not a dictation of how to lead your life? Again, are you kidding? Your heretical hypocritical apostate friends might view it that way, but certainly they would have been put to death for proposing such a thing not long ago in the Christian world, or today in parts of the Muslim world. Whether it's shariah law, Mosaic law, the barbarism of Exodus and Leviticus, or the eight-fold path, religion is not exactly a choose your own adventure book.
And without religion, people would all get along? No one would try to control others, no one would fight, no one would look to others for what to think and how to act, no one would kill out of tribal identity, etc? All would be enlightened? Or do you that all those things would happen, for new reasons around new totems of identity and (secular) dogma, but that those things would then properly be terms religion in turn? More precisely, are you saying (a year ago, lol) that you believe theologically-tinged social structures are more dangerous than others, or that society/tribalism lead to social control/frictions?
Tribalism is a huge problem facing society. Tribalism that supposedly is from and/or supported by an omniscient god is even more of a problem as it's harder to argue against with reason and it arouses greater passions in individuals than most other forms. So, yes, theologically-tinged social structures do pose a unique and especially potent danger to society. But getting rid of them, even if that were possible, will not extinguish all evil. Who said that it would? And this is all beside the point anyway as even a person who believe that religion is a force for good should be able to read BlankMind's comment above and see that it's nonsense.
I think the interesting question is how does one define good and evil (without god is irrelevant, to me, as with god doesn't help in the definition at all).
I think all of us have within us an innate ability to figure out when something is good or not. Unless we are sociopaths. And actually religion does a lot to pervert this. Which is the point. Because while any man uncorrupted by religious ideas would probably see the murder of thousands of innocent people as something bad. But... if you tell a man that by doing this you are doing god's will, then that might be enough to convince him to fly a plane into a building and while he's doing it be convinced that he's doing something good. But I admit that this doesn't really satisfy my own desire for objectivity.
Probably the best argument I've seen made for an objective secular morality is laid out by Sam Harris in his book The Moral Landscape. It's too long to get into detail here, but in essence, he submits that if we try to envision a world of perfect good- everyone in it is content, fulfilled, happy, peaceful, loved, etc. And if we try to envision a world of perfect evil- this is a world where all living creatures endure maximum suffering, excruciating intolerable pain 24/7.
Taking these two extremes as the basis for defining what is good and what is evil he then narrows his focus and says, okay, what things that we do lead more to outcomes closer to the first extreme, and less to outcomes closer to the last extreme. And we can objectively measure this. So... ok, take slavery, which the Bible and Quran both endorse and say is okay. We can look at societies that practice it and those who don't. Which society produces more contentment and fulfilment, and which produces more suffering?
I'm not even sure I agree with Sam and the premise that good and evil can be objective but he makes the strongest case that I've ever heard. On the other hand I've listened to people like William Lane Craig lay out the argument that all morality comes from God and that just seems like complete and utter nonsense to me.
I'd recommend Ravi Zacharias for a good explanation of the Christian belief in the moral lawgiver (his writings and speeches are excellent for any kind of Christian apologetics actually).
I think you focus to much on the Old Testament, Kalbahamut. It is the Gospels where Jesus gives instructions to Christians, and the Gospels that are meant to be followed first and foremost. The Old Testament comes from what the Jews followed in ancient Israel. Applying laws to people whom it never applied to in the first place is crazy. I have never followed Leviticus because it was not intended as laws for me. In the Gospels, Jesus talks about accepting everyone and loving everyone. There's a reason they separate the old from the new. Also: slavish? God supports free will even over our own good. He wants us to do only good, but does not force us to, as forcing someone to do good things does not make it a good thing. Without free will, a good person is worth nothing. It is only with the freedom to do evil that we may be good. God never intended for us to be slaves, he lays down a path he knows is good and asks us to follow him as best we can.
Jetpunk has definitively ruled on such things as the ownership of the Crimea and the continentality of Cyprus. Why can Jetpunk not offer definitive conclusions about the validity of religions and the will of God?
"Your heretical hypocritical apostate friends might view it that way, but certainly they would have been put to death for proposing such a thing not long ago in the Christian world, or today in parts of the Muslim world. Whether it's shariah law, Mosaic law, the barbarism of Exodus and Leviticus, or the eight-fold path, religion is not exactly a choose your own adventure book."
Xeno: I do not. But I am familiar with the apologetic you are using here as I used to be a devout Christian myself. There is plenty of barbarism and nonsense to be found in the New Testament, and plenty to reinforce everything I said above, and Jesus himself supposedly said "For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled." ..."The Law" he's referring to, as he was Jewish, is the law of Moses, aka the laws laid out in the Old Testament. Christians today do not live at all like their religion tells them they ought to, though, and so have to do a lot of very pained mental gymnastics to try and explain the disconnect. I'm familiar with all of them. Used to employ them myself or at least see many of my brothers in faith do it.
Also, pretty interesting that you bring this argument up in a quiz about Judaism. Ever stop and think what Jews might think about you dismissing their holy books as disposable craziness?
That is why the church, known as the body of Christ, is meant to be Christ's bride. He wants us to be equal in purity, and it is only him that accomplishes this, because no person can.
Hey Quizmaster! How do you put images in quizzes, like in KoljiVriVoda's Partial Flag Image quizzes? I would like to do some quizzes like those myself.
Beersheba is wrong. According to Wikipedia, the population of Beersheba includes 177,000 Jews. Beersheba "Metropolitan Area" - which is a massive area that stretches out across the desert to include the towns of Sderot, Arad and Dimona, has 212,000 Jews, still a lot less than the 381,900 figure shown in this quiz.
I really don't get where the numbers come from. You say Wikipedia but they seem to think Tel Aviv is a city and so is Ramat Gam (they are right). Where would Netanya be? Haifa (60km away), Tel Aviv (30km away)? There are 200,000 people there who would love to sell their apartments for Tel Aviv prices.
I think you folks attempting to either condemn or defend "religion" need to check out Unitarian Universalism. They do not have a creed because they don't expect everyone to believe the same way. They do have covenants which they trust their congregants to promote. The first is to respect the inherent dignity and worth of every human. The 7th is to have respect for the "interdependent web of all existence." Read them all and then defend your view that "Religion of any kind is a cancer of our civilization" or that religion can't be a "choose your own adventure." UU includes Buddhists and atheists, Christians and humanists. I do agree with Kalba... that recognizing good and evil does not require the presence of "God." I think we are capable of a somewhat "objective secular morality." K is also correct that enormous evil has been done in the name of religion throughout history. But Amma 14's response is excellent.
Unitarianism seems like nonsense to me, too. I mean, some of what they preach sounds nice at first blush, but... the many religious traditions they claim are equally deserving of respect and reverence, and worth drawing inspiration and wisdom from, are all mutually contradictory, and also usually dogmatic and opposed to true wisdom or enlightenment. So... makes no sense to try and incorporate all of them. Just a bunch of superficial flowery mumbo jumbo that ignores and sugar-coats the harm that such belief systems do to the world and individuals.
I remember back when I was a devout Christian myself, writing a research paper on cults, my first exposure to Universalism was through Christian books that painted it as a dangerous cult. That was probably the worst research paper I ever wrote. Had some pretty bad sources.
There has to be some irony in Buenos Aires, the capital of a country that took in numerous Nazis after the war, being on this list, *especially* since many of the Jewish people in the city also came after the war
Non-Jews are about 15-20% of the total population, but the overwhelming majority live in one of the 3 major urban areas (Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Haifa) or in urban areas with minimal numbers of Jews (Nazareth, for instance).
Christianity meanwhile promotes total slavish devotion to a god man and the silly Iron Age morality he professed to follow, and like Islam promises as reward for this an eternity of life in a celestial North Korea as the late great Chris Hitchens described it.
Not a dictation of how to lead your life? Again, are you kidding? Your heretical hypocritical apostate friends might view it that way, but certainly they would have been put to death for proposing such a thing not long ago in the Christian world, or today in parts of the Muslim world. Whether it's shariah law, Mosaic law, the barbarism of Exodus and Leviticus, or the eight-fold path, religion is not exactly a choose your own adventure book.
I think all of us have within us an innate ability to figure out when something is good or not. Unless we are sociopaths. And actually religion does a lot to pervert this. Which is the point. Because while any man uncorrupted by religious ideas would probably see the murder of thousands of innocent people as something bad. But... if you tell a man that by doing this you are doing god's will, then that might be enough to convince him to fly a plane into a building and while he's doing it be convinced that he's doing something good. But I admit that this doesn't really satisfy my own desire for objectivity.
Taking these two extremes as the basis for defining what is good and what is evil he then narrows his focus and says, okay, what things that we do lead more to outcomes closer to the first extreme, and less to outcomes closer to the last extreme. And we can objectively measure this. So... ok, take slavery, which the Bible and Quran both endorse and say is okay. We can look at societies that practice it and those who don't. Which society produces more contentment and fulfilment, and which produces more suffering?
https://rzim.org/just-thinking/must-the-moral-law-have-a-lawgiver/
"Your heretical hypocritical apostate friends might view it that way, but certainly they would have been put to death for proposing such a thing not long ago in the Christian world, or today in parts of the Muslim world. Whether it's shariah law, Mosaic law, the barbarism of Exodus and Leviticus, or the eight-fold path, religion is not exactly a choose your own adventure book."
Shalom.
A bit of fun: Jesus and the Interpreter
<img src="http://www.something.com/image.jpg">
However, we don't approve most image quizzes because of a variety of issues including
1) Copyright restrictions (the main one)
2) Images that are larger than necessary
I've missed Montréal, Atlanta and Be'er Sheva, while I've guessed cities as San Diego and Buenos Aires.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_population_by_country#Jewish_population_by_city
Thanks to all for food for thought!
Social media spreads good AND evil!
I remember back when I was a devout Christian myself, writing a research paper on cults, my first exposure to Universalism was through Christian books that painted it as a dangerous cult. That was probably the worst research paper I ever wrote. Had some pretty bad sources.