Background Probability

The Agnostic Popular Front has moved to its new home at Skeptic Ink, and will henceforth be known as Background Probability. Despite the relocation and rebranding, we will continue to spew the same low-fidelity high-quality bullshit that you've come to expect.

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Genesis 41: The Rise of Joe

Pharaoh has a nightmare, Joseph tells him it is a prophecy, and Pharaoh duly puts Joseph in charge of Egypt. Anyone remember how alarmed some Americans were when we found out that Joan Quigley was acting as unofficial White House astrologer? Well, this is far worse than that. In this story, the autocratic head of state makes economic decisions of great national import on the basis of a nightmare and the say-so of a foreign national and ex-con just out of prison. He goes on to make Joe chief royal steward over the entire palace and second in command in the whole of Egypt, even before discovering that the dreams were indeed prophecies after all. Not particularly stunning executive leadership there, Pharaoh. Good on Joe, though.

Also on the upside, Joseph's plan of warehousing grain works out well when the lean times come upon Egypt and all the surrounding lands. We can actually draw a timeless moral lesson from this, if only we studiously ignore the part where they are reacting to their dreams as if they come from something other than one's own mind.

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