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from the the-power-of-god-compels-you-to-read-it dept.
The conviction that demons exist—and that they exist to harass, derange, and smite human beings—stretches back as far as religion itself. In ancient Mesopotamia, Babylonian priests performed exorcisms by casting wax figurines of demons into a fire. The Hindu Vedas, thought to have been written between 1500 and 500 b.c., refer to supernatural beings—known as asuras, but largely understood today as demons—that challenge the gods and sabotage human affairs. For the ancient Greeks, too, demonlike creatures lurked on the shadowy fringes of the human world.
But far from being confined to a past of Demiurges and evil eyes, belief in demonic possession is widespread in the United States today. Polls conducted in recent decades by Gallup and the data firm YouGov suggest that roughly half of Americans believe demonic possession is real. The percentage who believe in the devil is even higher, and in fact has been growing: Gallup polls show that the number rose from 55 percent in 1990 to 70 percent in 2007.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/12/catholic-exorcisms-on-the-rise/573943/
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday December 06 2018, @03:40PM (1 child)
Civilization "peaks" when it is winning. All of the great civilizations of the past were highly respected, when they were running abroad, and kicking ass. Soon after they stop kicking ass, their decadent children and grandchildren start getting their own asses handed to them.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday December 06 2018, @06:40PM
I can think of any example of an empire at its peak of hard and soft power, where the child of someone acclaimed for winning a major war would start his own random half-hearted wars with no proper planning, massively squandering goodwill and resources, while at the same time starving the system to enrich his rich and powerful friends, and ignoring warnings of a major economic crisis. Combined with an unprecedented rush to systematically provide another rising power with the secrets of its most advanced tech in exchange for short-term profits, what could possibly go wrong?