The importance of critical thinking

Yesterday I got a text message and it reads like this:

U.S. GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY PREDICTS A 6.8 MAGNITUDE EARTHQUAKE WILL HIT PHILIPPINE PLATES TONIGHT. PLEASE BE CALM AND ALERT. This text message comes from Hawaii State Emergency Preparedness Office. Pls pass (no harm in being prepared). pls pray

Now I'm pretty sure many people were scared (and rightly so) and passed it onto family and friends. But is there really any merit to it? This is where critical thinking helps. Here's are some of the red flags raised by this bogus message:

1.) There's no such thing as U.S. Geological Society. There's the U.S. Geological Survey, and they certainly don't make any specific predictions.

2.) There's no such thing as the Hawaii State Emergency Preparedness Office.

3.) There is no technology that accurately predicts earthquakes. The fact that this states a specific time (last night) and a specific magnitude (6.8) should also raise a red flag.

It irks me that there are people who are willing to create a panic and spread fear for a cheap laugh. True, there is no harm in being prepared, but there is plenty of potential harm in creating a panic.

It takes religion

I am stunned at this. What does it take to be able to do something so horrific?

For Abdel-Qader Ali there is only one regret: that he did not kill his daughter at birth. 'If I had realised then what she would become, I would have killed her the instant her mother delivered her,' he said with no trace of remorse.

Wow! And what crime did his daughter commit?

Two weeks after The Observer revealed the shocking story of Rand Abdel-Qader, 17, murdered because of her infatuation with a British soldier in Basra, southern Iraq, her father is defiant.

For an INFATUATION with a British soldier???? What's even worse, the brothers helped kill their sister! Having a daughter myself, I cannot imagine wanting to kill my own. Even if god was real, I would rather defy him than kill my own daughter just because he says so, because any god that imposes such barbaric rules is evil himself, and deserves to be rejected.

What's worse is that even though he was arrested, he was released after two hours, and the police actually CONGRATULATED him! Is this the kind of sick and twisted society that a "religion of peace" brings?

One thing's for sure, there won't be any Muslims rioting in the streets in protest of this horrendous and evil act. If a child dies because of ridiculous beliefs happens to a Christian family, you'd certainly see the backlash from other Christians...

...or would you?