The Messiah Who You Didn't Hear About

Let me tell you one of the most fascinating stories I ever heard. I read about it in The Battle for God by Karen Armstrong. It's a true story from history about a seventeenth-century would-be messiah named Sabbatai Zevi. The story is worth reading for repeated surprises in the ending that give an insight into how it's possible that people would think Jesus of Nazareth, or for that matter Monty Python's "Brian that is called Brian," to be a messiah.( Read more... )

Empathy Quotient and Systematizing Quotient

According to these tests, my Systematizing Quotient is 22 and my Empathy Quotient is 12. This site says that most women tend to average an SQ of 24 and most men tend to average an SQ of 30, and that most women tend to average an EQ of 47 and most men tend to average an EQ of 42. And someone with High-Functioning Autism or Asperger's Syndrome has EQ of about 20, which is eight points better than mine. I've been feeling downright autistic lately in my dealings with some people (except without the accompanying genius), but I know better than to believe that feeling. This is further demonstration that personality evaluation tests are like psychics: the only answers they give back are the ones you unconsciously feed them. They reveal only what you already know or happen to believe. Throughout the empathy test I kept wondering how anyone can know an answer to give to the questions. If you fail to read people's feelings, how would you know? What if the emotions people think they're reading are just an illusion that they are projecting?