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Burned Qurans Left at Va. Muslim Center
AP ^ | 6/16/05

Posted on 06/16/2005 7:38:47 PM PDT by ambrose

Burned Qurans Left at Va. Muslim Center

By Associated Press

June 16, 2005, 9:52 PM EDT

BLACKSBURG, Va. -- A bag stuffed with burned Qurans was left in front of an Islamic center, shocking members when they arrived for prayers.

The torched copies of the Muslim holy book were inside a plastic shopping bag, members of the Islamic Center of Blacksburg said. They said the bag had been placed at the center's front door sometime before Saturday prayers.

"It is a shame that people are so ignorant," member Idris Adjerid said.

Kevin Foust, the agent in charge of the Roanoke FBI office, said Thursday his office is helping local police investigate. He declined to speculate whether the incident would be classified as a hate crime under state or federal law.

(Excerpt) Read more at newsday.com ...


TOPICS: Extended News; Front Page News; News/Current Events; US: Virginia
KEYWORDS: blacksburg; haha; india; israel; justbeginning; korandesecration
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To: sinkspur

Who is running away? - the "no logic or facts" was directed at you and was posted to you.

You need to call your amigos at ansar al islam for support.


141 posted on 06/16/2005 9:05:43 PM PDT by eleni121 ('Thou hast conquered, O Galilean!' (Julian the Apostate))
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To: rawcatslyentist
Why hasn't ONE single Mooo come forward and been helpful in preventing terrorism?

Actually, since that would be something that the FBI would not allow to be made public, that is an invalid question.

142 posted on 06/16/2005 9:06:13 PM PDT by technochick99 (Self defense is a basic human right ; Sig Sauer is my equalizer)
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To: eleni121; pbrown; sinkspur
Sinspur is too simplistic to be argued with I agree. He has no sense of logic or facts...2 key requirements in making an argument.

Too many tangential statements as well. I find it hard to keep track of which foolish statement I am refuting.
143 posted on 06/16/2005 9:06:17 PM PDT by so_real ("The Congress of the United States recommends and approves the Holy Bible for use in all schools.")
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To: LongElegantLegs

Just some more muslims trying to use our laws to give themselves more rights than anyone else. I think it stems from their hating that all of us dirty, stinking, soulless Christians, Jews, and Muslims of other sects keep acting like we're equal to them.


144 posted on 06/16/2005 9:06:20 PM PDT by magslinger (I'd take to those Korans like Gallagher to watermelons)
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To: sinkspur
You're intolerant. That's not what "being an American" is all about.
So, I must be right.

FreeRepublic.com "A Conservative News Forum"


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Incompetence is bliss

Culture/Society Humor
Source: SJ Mercury
Published: 1/18/00 Author: Erica Goode
Posted on 01/18/2000 10:52:41 PST by tpaine

Incompetence is bliss, say researchers

BY ERICA GOODE

New York Times

There are many incompetent people in the world. But a Cornell University study has shown that most incompetent people do not know that they are incompetent.

People who do things badly, according to David A. Dunning, a professor of psychology at Cornell, are usually supremely confident of their abilities -- more confident, in fact, than people who do things well.

One reason that the ignorant also tend to be the blissfully self-assured, the researchers believe, is that the skills required for competence often are the same skills necessary to recognize competence. The incompetent, therefore, suffer doubly, the researchers -- Dunning and Justin Kruger, then a graduate student -- suggested in a paper appearing in the December issue of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

``Not only do they reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the ability to realize it,´´ wrote Kruger, now an assistant professor at the University of Illinois, and Dunning.

This deficiency in ``self-monitoring skills,´´ the researchers said, helps explain the tendency of the humor-impaired to persist in telling jokes that are not funny, of day traders to repeatedly jump into the market -- and repeatedly lose out -- and of the politically clueless to continue holding forth at dinner parties on the fine points of campaign strategy.

Some college students, Dunning said, evince a similar blindness: After doing badly on a test, they spend hours in his office, explaining why the answers he suggests for the test questions are wrong. In a series of studies, Kruger and Dunning tested their theory of incompetence. They found that subjects who scored in the lowest quartile on tests of logic, English grammar and humor were also the most likely to ``grossly overestimate´´ how well they had performed.

In all three tests, subjects' ratings of their ability were positively linked to their actual scores. But the lowest-ranked participants showed much greater distortions in their self-estimates.

Aiming high -- real high

Asked to evaluate their performance on the test of logical reasoning, for example, subjects who scored in only the 12th percentile guessed that they had scored in the 62nd percentile and deemed their overall skill at logical reasoning to be at the 68th percentile.

Similarly, subjects who scored at the 10th percentile on the grammar test ranked themselves at the 67th percentile in the ability to ``identify grammatically correct standard English´´ and estimated their test scores to be at the 61st percentile.

On the humor test, in which participants were asked to rate jokes according to their funniness (subjects' ratings were matched against those of an ``expert´´ panel of professional comedians), low-scoring subjects were also more apt to have an inflated perception of their skill. But because humor is idiosyncratically defined, the researchers said, the results were less conclusive.

Unlike their unskilled counterparts, the most able subjects in the study, Kruger and Dunning found, were likely to underestimate their own competence. The researchers attributed this to the fact that, in the absence of information about how others were doing, highly competent subjects assumed that others were performing as well as they were -- a phenomenon psychologists term the ``false consensus effect.´´ When high-scoring subjects were asked to ``grade´´ the grammar tests of their peers, however, they quickly revised their evaluations of their own performance. In contrast, the self-assessments of those who scored badly themselves were unaffected by the experience of grading others; some subjects even further inflated their estimates of their own abilities.

``Incompetent individuals were less able to recognize competence in others,´´ the researchers concluded. In a final experiment, Dunning and Kruger set out to discover if training would help modify the exaggerated self-perceptions of incapable subjects. In fact, a short training session in logical reasoning did improve the ability of low-scoring subjects to assess their performance realistically, they found.

The findings, the psychologists said, support Thomas Jefferson's assertion that ``he who knows best knows how little he knows.´´

Such studies are not without critics. David C. Funder, a psychology professor at the University of California-Riverside, for example, said he suspected that most lay people had only a vague idea of the meaning of ``average´´ in statistical terms. But Dunning said his current research and past studies indicated that there were many reasons why people would tend to overestimate their competency and not be aware of it.

Concrete clues

In some cases, Dunning pointed out, an awareness of one's own inability is inevitable: ``In a golf game, when your ball is heading into the woods, you know you´re incompetent,´´ he said.

But in other situations, feedback is absent, or at least more ambiguous; even a humorless joke, for example, is likely to be met with polite laughter. And social norms prevent most people, when faced with incompetence, from blurting out, ``You stink!´´ -- truthful though this assessment may be.


Hmmm, paraphrasing a bit; -- Those who score in the lowest quarter in logic, grammar & humor tests THINK they are way 'above average' in those categories..

If the shoe fits...

1 Posted on 01/18/2000 10:52:41 PST by tpaine
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145 posted on 06/16/2005 9:06:26 PM PDT by Publius6961 (The most abundant things in the universe are ignorance, stupidity and hydrogen)
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To: JCEccles
I can't recall seeing this same passion from you when a Bible is desecrated.

When are Bibles desecrated in America? Give me a few incidents with links.

146 posted on 06/16/2005 9:07:08 PM PDT by sinkspur (If you want unconditional love with skin, and hair and a warm nose, get a shelter dog.)
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To: sinkspur
Tell me, do you grovel when some white guy in California shoots up a school?

Grovelling? Those people arent even SORRY! Give me one link to a big rally, demonstration, press release, anything whatsoever.You have NO proof that anything other than a tiny minority of them are sorry at all.

You can't hear because your head is filled with mush, Sinkspur.

147 posted on 06/16/2005 9:07:13 PM PDT by Nonstatist
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To: sinkspur
Did I miss something, sink?

I think I missed that post where you were defending the actions of anyone guilty of burning anything. Or did that reply get removed by the AM?

All I read was a request by you for the 12 year old idiot running around screaming and waving the stick in the air screaming "Mooooozz!"...to sit down and behave.
Mebbe I need new glasses.

148 posted on 06/16/2005 9:07:31 PM PDT by Bloody Sam Roberts (Remember that great love and great achievements involve great risk)
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Comment #149 Removed by Moderator

To: sinkspur
"Did you apologize in public when pasty-faced Tim McVeigh blew up the Murrah building?"


We put him to death dumbass.
150 posted on 06/16/2005 9:07:47 PM PDT by Souled_Out
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To: eleni121
I agree. Some useful idiots are not worth the bother of elevated blood pressure.
151 posted on 06/16/2005 9:07:54 PM PDT by processing please hold (Islam and Christianity do not mix ----9-11 taught us that)
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To: sinkspur
None of the Muslims I know approve of what happened on 9/11 and they all applaud what America is doing in the war on terror.

Yea, massive protests in the streets by peaceful Muslims.

152 posted on 06/16/2005 9:08:00 PM PDT by sausageseller (Look out for the jackbooted spelling police. There! Everywhere!(revised cause the "man" accosted me!)
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To: Souled_Out

LOL!


153 posted on 06/16/2005 9:08:22 PM PDT by Petronski (Be alert! The world needs more lerts.)
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To: so_real
I find it hard to keep track of which foolish statement I am refuting.

No wonder. You haven't refuted any.

154 posted on 06/16/2005 9:08:37 PM PDT by sinkspur (If you want unconditional love with skin, and hair and a warm nose, get a shelter dog.)
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To: sinkspur
"Do you apologize when some white guy in your locale commits murder?"

Unfortunately, sinkspur, there is something to the perception of "guilt by association." If I hung out with your "white guy," and he committed murder, I most certainly would feel some amount of guilt in not having seen it coming or not having done anything to prevent it.

155 posted on 06/16/2005 9:08:57 PM PDT by sageb1
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To: eleni121

And now is an excellent time to do so...now that the left is pulling out all the stops to lose us the war.


156 posted on 06/16/2005 9:10:02 PM PDT by faithincowboys
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To: eleni121

"Cool - I think conservative Irish Catholics are gorgeous."

lol! Good answer! :)


157 posted on 06/16/2005 9:10:27 PM PDT by sageb1
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To: montag813
Why is the FBI wasting federal tax dollars by working on this trivial local matter?

They're not. Whoever interviewed the guy asked the leading question, and the "no comment" answer was meant to give the impression by the idiot "reporter" that it had entered the FBI's mind.

And I, along with most other readers, misinterpreted it hook, line and sinker!

158 posted on 06/16/2005 9:11:53 PM PDT by Publius6961 (The most abundant things in the universe are ignorance, stupidity and hydrogen)
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To: sinkspur
None of the Muslims I know approve of what happened on 9/11 and they all applaud what America is doing in the war on terror.

You really need to get out more Sinky.

159 posted on 06/16/2005 9:12:16 PM PDT by vox_freedom (Fear no evil)
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To: Souled_Out
We put him to death dumbass.

So obvious an answer. I could kick myself in the butt for not throwing that out there myself.

160 posted on 06/16/2005 9:13:58 PM PDT by processing please hold (Islam and Christianity do not mix ----9-11 taught us that)
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