zzz03246's Xanga

Sunday, March 23, 2008

Sun, 23 Mar 2008 16:55:09 GMT

I'm bringing Xanga back - drop a comment if you're with me!

Finally, an update...

Fri, 06 Jul 2007 14:43:46 GMT

So, I'm sort of answering my sister's question about why I haven't posted in a while.

First of all, my main blog is likelierthings.com, and I have posted there. My Xanga sort of tends to get used for more personal stuff, and right now I'm not all that anxious to post to the world a whole lot of stuff about my personal life. I don't have a lot to say that wouldn't involve a sort of tearing as it came out of me, and to fling onto a public forum the bloody pulp of a personal observation torn out by violent means would be unfair to pretty much everybody. And that doesn't mean that everything's going badly, just that I want to be careful whom I share this all with. I'm not sure I'm happy in a culture where, apparently, some people exist solely for the purpose of being the subject of gossip *coughparishiltoncough*

Anyway, if you wander over to likelierthings.com, know the following true things:

I do think Evolution happened (as in macro-evolution, as in "life started from chemicals and evolved into us").
This does not mean God does not exist. The evidence for God's existence comes from other sources than as an explanation for what we can't completely describe scientifically.
Scientists who think that Evolution proves (or suggests) that God does not exist are delusional. Their judgment is not based on science but on their own atheistic philosophies.
The official "Intelligent Design" guys: Dembski, Behe, Johnson, et al, are barking up the wrong tree. They are wrong about some things. Nevertheless, the universe does show signs of "intelligent design".
I fully believe everything God teaches us in Genesis. I also believe that he was not teaching us about the length of time it took for him to create. But there are some good books that tell us about what he was teaching us in Genesis.We need to be veerry careful when we read ancient texts not to make distinctions that they didn't make. The ancient Hebrews didn't think about "science" or "reading literally" the same way we do. (This does not mean that the Bible does not have true history in it. The Bible has many different kinds of literature in it: poetry, epic, parables, history, proverbs. We need to be careful we do not mistake one kind of literature for another.)

Anyway, I know that quite a few of my former students occasionally read my Xanga, and I don't want to undermine parents' and teachers' authority. I might be wrong. I truly believe that if we respectfully submit to the Truth that is found in Jesus Christ and discuss these things in charity, we will come to know the truth about all of God's Creation, and in doing so we will find out more about the One who created it all.

And in other news...

Sat, 12 May 2007 09:54:13 GMT

Dawkins says religion is "like sucking a dummy"

Must be a British thing.

I think ... I think "dummy" is a British word for "pacifier". Maybe? Let's hope so.

Speaking of Dawkins, though. You really should check out this review by Terry Eagleton of Dawkins's book The God Delusion. The fascinating thing about Dawkins is that he spends so much time arguing against the kind of religion that Christians have never believed in, the kind Christianity came into existence to abolish. (And the rest of his time is apparently spent arguing the sort of mystical scientistic, progressivistic crap that imagines that there's some kind of inevitable and Godless cosmic impetus in the direction of bestest bestness that will somehow deliver all the goods - moral and material - that mankind's been craving. Which is an impression I'm drawing from Eagleton's review. I haven't actually read Dawkins.)

I did, however, catch the last half of a Terry Gross "Fresh Air" interview with him about a month ago, and all I could think of was "This guy doesn't know what Christianity is." I would really like to be a fly on the wall at an intense discussion (but not an argument) between Dawkins and a really knowledgeable theologian who could set him straight on what exactly Christianity is.

Close your eyes, boys! It's the Marlboro Man.

Fri, 11 May 2007 22:22:20 GMT

When I was a kid my mother occasionally held her hand up in front of the screen so that we wouldn't see stuff she disapproved of. I always figured it was a scantily dressed woman or something. Turns out, it might've just been a pack of Kools:

Smoking to affect movie ratings system

LOS ANGELES, California (Hollywood Reporter) -- Filmmakers now might get an R rating as a thank you for smoking.

The Motion Picture Assn. of America (MPAA) said Thursday that its rating board will consider film depictions of smoking among the criteria for assigning movie ratings. Anti-tobacco activists have been pressing for an automatic R rating for films with smoking scenes, but MPAA chairman and CEO Dan Glickman rejected the proposal for a more nuanced approach.

Um, how dumb can you get? Talk about majoring in the minors.

I don't understand our culture.

And it's not like all the actors and actresses in Hollywood aren't going to actually be smoking. They all do it. It helps keep their metabolisms up, their appetites down, and the weight off. It's a lot easier to be a skeletonized waif with a pack-a-day habit.

In other news, I'm in NH for a week before I head out to Chicago.

Oh, wait. Yeah, and my brother's engaged. Congratulations to him.

Christology was my final class for the year...

Wed, 02 May 2007 15:36:21 GMT

And he's done. Classes are over for this semester.

On to finals! ugh.

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Wed, 18 Apr 2007 16:21:42 GMT

The Children of Hurin, a completion by Christopher Tolkien of one of J.R.R.'s fuller tales, is supposed to be a decent read. I always enjoyed the versions in The Silmarillion and Unfinished Tales, but it will be nice to sink my teeth into a longer version.

The Salon.com review is positive.

And it turns out that Christopher Tolkien loaths the Peter Jackson LotR films. Excellent. It's nice to know someone in the whole business had taste, if no power to do anything about it.

Three Things I Realized in Eschatology Class Today

Fri, 23 Mar 2007 12:56:43 GMT

The passage to joy is the path of greatest struggle.
The path of greatest struggle may be known by the signposts of greatest joy.
The path of holiness, the path to God, is through your greatest joy, your greatest struggle: that truth and goodness you most enjoy and truly respect.

I hope this doesn't sound too much like a fortune cookie. It's something I've been needing to realize for a while.

That'd be a good name for a band...

Thu, 22 Mar 2007 18:21:52 GMT

Okay, check this out.

There's a group called Australian Skeptics that apparently gives what are called "Bent Spoon Awards", which they award every year to "the perpetrator of the most preposterous piece of paranormal or pseudoscientific piffle." They've only got one trophy and they keep it locked up, so if you want it you have to come and get it by paranormal means. You're also notified by telepathy if you've won. Okay, so that's fun.

But look at their list of winners, particularly the 1985 winner: Brother Willard Fuller, the Psychic Dentist.

Psychic dentist.

I ... have no words. Do you go into his office, sit down in a chair while Br. Willard stands in front of you and squints real hard till you start getting all puffy and your wisdom tooth pops out?

Okay, so I did have a few words. Can you imagine Watson not having a few words? But psychic dentistry. How did he come up with that? Did he already have his D.D. and just decide one day to try his occipital lobe instead of that little metal hook? Or did the psychic powers come first and he looked around for a worthy use to put his powers to?

Let me know when Jean Grey sets up shop. She can clean my bicuspids anytime.

It's just like those miserable psalms, always so depressing.

Tue, 20 Mar 2007 13:09:00 GMT

So I’m reading William Dembski’s book, Intelligent Design, all about creation and evolution and how we can tell whether something is designed vs. whether it was produced “by chance”. I’m not sure this really gets at the heart of the philosophical problem, but I’m willing to give it a chance.

I am very interested in the relationship of faith and reason, especially since I find belief very … uncomfortable. I like to know, and as Thomas Aquinas points out, belief is basically a commitment to a person and his testimony that involves both full commitment of the will and the restlessness of unknowing. Belief is not as good as knowing, but in some cases it’s necessary. For instance, I do not know that my doctor is fully qualified to treat me without killing me, but I believe the testimony of the medical board that he is. For me to fully check out the credentials of my doctor would be both impractical and, frankly, impossible: I just don’t have the time to learn all the biology, chemistry, anatomy, etc, that I would need to in order to make such a judgment based on knowledge. So I believe even though I do not know.

And the restlessness is betrayed by the fact that every once in a while I wonder whether the medical board is worth listening to, or whether they know what they’re talking about. I might watch with interest a 60 Minutes report that showed that some of the members of the medical board were way behind the times and unaware of the standards of more recent medicine, or something like that. But that doesn’t change the fact that every time I go to the doctor I decide to commit my life to their judgment that my doctor knows what he’s talking about.

And we’re all in a similar case with belief in what God says about himself. The restlessness in which we every once in a while wonder whether God really is like that, or whether we heard him right or at all, or whether he really said that, or whether it’s all a crock, is inherent in belief itself. You can’t get rid of the restlessness. No one can, not even the greatest saint. The whole point of the belief is that you love someone such that you commit your entire self to his or her testimony even though you don’t know.

Like I said, I don’t like this. I like to know. *sigh* That’s probably a sign I do not love (anyone) enough.

But I’m way off my topic. I’m reading Dembski’s book and he quotes this atheist philosopher Norwood Russell Hanson, who gives an example of evidence of God’s existence that he would find convincing:

I’m not a stubborn guy. I would be a theist under some conditions. I’m open-minded. . . . Okay. Okay. The conditions are these: Suppose, next Tuesday morning, just after breakfast, all of us in this one world are knocked to our knees by a percussive and ear-shattering thunderclap. Snow swirls, leaves drop from trees, the earth heaves and buckles, buildings topple and towers tumble. The sky is ablaze with an eerie silvery light, and just then, as all of the people of this world look up, the heavens open, and the clouds pull apart, revealing an unbelievably radiant and immense Zeus-like figure towering over the features of his Michelangeloid face, and then he points down, at me, and explains for every man, woman, and child to hear: ‘I’ve had quite enough of your too-clever logic chopping and word-watching in matters of theology. Be assured Norwood Russell Hanson, that I do most certainly exist!’

(quoted in William Dembski’s Intelligent Design, p 27)

All I could think of when I read this was the scene in Monty Python’s Holy Grail where God pops out of the cartoon clouds and says “Oh, don’t grovel! If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s people groveling.”

This is God? What a crappy God. Something right out of Prometheus Unbound. If this was God I would believe that he existed, but I wouldn’t believe in him.

  The sound is of whirlwind underground,
    Earthquake, and fire, and mountains cloven;
  The shape is awful, like the sound,
    Clothed in dark purple, star-inwoven.
  A sceptre of pale gold,
    To stay steps proud, o’er the slow cloud,
His veinèd hand doth hold.
Cruel he looks, but calm and strong,
Like one who does, not suffers wrong.

Frankly, this kind of god we can live without. It was apparent to the ancient Greeks, like Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, that it was false.

So much of the time atheists are arguing against a very pagan, limited, and incorrect understanding of God which, frankly, many Christians unknowingly accept.

I'm sitting here in the computer lab trying to laugh hysterically, quietly

Fri, 02 Mar 2007 15:31:16 GMT

Check this out on YouTube if you've never seen it before:

Darth Vader calls the Emperor to let him know the Death Star got blown up

(warning, mild obscenity)

Oh man. I'm almost crying....