Re: Pat Robertson Fears E-cash?
The relevant verses are in Revelations 13, where some of the actions by which The Beast can be recognized are given. Among them are: 16 And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: 17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Millenialist Christians tend to regard this as a method by which the faithful will be shut out of the economy, since the pious will refuse such a 'mark'. E-cash is a bit of a reach from this, but some of them (eg, Robertson), extend the verses to cover all forms of trackable transactions. I suspect that if someone could get him to realize the privacy aspects of true anonymous ecash, he'd like it. Just don't propose an implantable cryptographic token :-). Peter Trei Senior Software Engineer Purveyor Development Team Process Software Corporation trei@process.com
On Wed, 2 Aug 1995, Peter Trei wrote:
The relevant verses are in Revelations 13, where some of the actions by which The Beast can be recognized are given. Among them are:
16 And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: 17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
Millenialist Christians tend to regard this as a method by which the faithful will be shut out of the economy, since the pious will refuse such a 'mark'.
E-cash is a bit of a reach from this, but some of them (eg, Robertson), extend the verses to cover all forms of trackable transactions. I suspect that if someone could get him to realize the privacy aspects of true anonymous ecash, he'd like it.
I read in the New York Times that a lot of fundamentalist Christians fear the e-cash revolution because they believe that eventually everyone will be required to bear a tattooed bar code on their right hand which would contain all a person's information: name, d.o.b., birthplace, etc. Such a tattoo would also be used to deduct e-cash from a person's "account" when they made purchases. It's still a bit of a stretch; they're using the book of Revelations to back up this theory. kelli@zeus.towson.edu http://zeus.towson.edu/~kelli/ GAT d? H+ s+++:-- !g p? !au a- w++@ !v@ c++++ UL++ P+ L+ 3 E---- N+ K W--- M-- V-- po- Y++ t+ 5-- jx R G'''' tv- b+++ D-- B e+ u** h* f++ r--- n+ z** Diverse Sexual Orientation Coll.Towson State University DSOC@zeus.towson.edu BigBrotherSystemsBBS........BigBrotherIsWatchingYou.......(410)494-3253#11
On Thu, 3 Aug 1995, K. M. Ellis wrote:
On Wed, 2 Aug 1995, Peter Trei wrote:
The relevant verses are in Revelations 13, where some of the actions by which The Beast can be recognized are given. Among them are: [Deletia]
E-cash is a bit of a reach from this, but some of them (eg, Robertson), extend the verses to cover all forms of trackable transactions. I suspect that if someone could get him to realize the privacy aspects of true anonymous ecash, he'd like it.
I read in the New York Times that a lot of fundamentalist Christians fear the e-cash revolution because they believe that eventually everyone will be required to bear a tattooed bar code on their right hand which would contain all a person's information: name, d.o.b., birthplace, etc.
Crapola. They fear the unknown, and read their own personal prejudices and beliefs into something they don't understand. Maybe I'll start going to church <shudder> and explain to the believers about the benefits of crypto *against* such Revalationary measures. I'm sure they would be interested in the work Chaum has done regarding truly anonymous transactions. Hell, maybe we could set up a Dining Christians net. "Freedom is meaningless unless | ic58@jove.acs.unt.edu - James Childers you can give to those with whom| No man's freedom is safe you disagree." - Jefferson | while Congress is in session EA 73 53 12 4E 08 27 6C 21 64 28 51 92 0E 7C F7
participants (3)
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Childers James -
K. M. Ellis -
Peter Trei