Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!dimacs.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: tblake@bingsuns.cc.binghamton.edu (Tom Blake) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: 666's and Beasties everywhere. Message-ID: Date: 4 Jun 91 03:47:56 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: SUNY Binghamton Lines: 54 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu In article , st74044@oregon.uoregon.edu writes: |>Here's a fact for all of you people that are trying to figure |>out 666. In Belgium right now, there is a supercomputer. There |>is a group of many people that want to try this new thing called |>a cashless society-- no money. How would this work? Well, they |>want to put a tiny computer chip into the palm of your right hand, |>and if you don't have a right hand, into your forhead... To which OFM replies... |>[This is clearly an "urban legend". There are certainly efforts at a |>cashless society, but all of that I know of involve "smart cards" that |>you carry. They're not physically embedded anywhere. The formats |>that I know of have a good deal more information than 18 digits. A book I read some time ago, "What in the World is Going to Happen?" (as I recall), claimed that in California, a billboard had appeared one one side, a charge card, and the caption, "this you lose". On the other, a human hand, and the caption "this you don't". Tattoed across the hand was a number, with eighteen digits, in three groups of six. These two accounts seem very similar, it would seem that any campaign to push such a cashless society would involve a lot of public relations, and probably the employment of a professional public relations firm. I think any decent PR firm faced with marketting such a proposed system would see that a scheme of 18 digits in three groups of 6 wouldn't sell very well. I suspect they'd suggest the addition of a couple of digits and a reparsing at the very least. I for one don't like needles, or knives, or nasty drugs. It would be really hard to get me to implant a microchip in my hand. I suspect I'm not the only person who feels this way, this too would seem to be a real marketting blunder. Let us suppose for a moment that, as others on this board have suggested, "The Beast" was Nero. It's my understanding that when a new Ceasar came to office, his coins were minted. (Bearing his face, and they were considered to be his coins! [Show me the coin in which the tax is paid...]) People would have a tough time doing business without carrying the coin of the realm, now might the coin bearing Nero's likeness, be the mark of the beast? Tom Blake SUNY-Binghamton [Oh no, not another one! There's no way I can think of to prove such a billboard never existed in the history of California. But I think we can be sure that such a scheme has never been seriously considered. Among other things, a tatto is (1) not very secure, (2) not very conveniently computer readable, and (3) lacks the potential for storing the amount of information proposed as part of the "smart card" proposals. --clh]