Time to Start This Up Again

I have let this blog lapse. Life has a way of being more important than my own ramblings. :)

A big question is if life is really busier today. We certainly do not have to scramble most of our waking hours for food anymore. Most of us are even beyond needing to work the Biblically proscribed "6 days." Most of us have more time than we really realize - we just waste a lot of it. I am bad at this at times. Over the holiday I found myself playing rather pointless games of Age of Kings (AOE2). I managed to fritter a way a good portion of my holiday beating up on the computer.

While many people play for a challenge, I just play to beat up on the computer for a while. This seems fun enough to me, and I still like that the best of all the "Age" games. (I own AOE3 and my son got the expansion for Christmas, but I haven't tried it yet.)

It makes me wonder how many others are like me? The magazines and websites are full of people who want to play the ultimate challenge, but how many are like me and just want to relax for a bit and beat up the computer.

Another one of my top games is Settlers IV, though it does not have an "easy" mode or any really good cheats. Playing through a game of it can eat up the good part of a day or two, as I end up botching it and keep restarting (along the way or at the beginning) until I figure the correct strategy. I always tend to build too many things and end up slowing myself down while they are completed.

I do wish the bugs in this game could be fixed. While it isn't perfect, it remains a fun game and is a good diversion from the normal conquer the world games.

Enough comments on this for now. :)

Brad

The idea of a creator must scare a lot of people. Look at how frenzied they get when something dares to even raise the problems with the Theory of Evolution.

A recent article on slashdot talked about an article claiming that discovering how bees fly put a "nail into the coffin of ID." http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/01/10/1950222

Right. I know how my computer works, so it must have just come together by "time and chance"....

Another recent story shows how much of "science" is full of mythical stories: http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/01/15/1921258

From the article: 'The team believes the plane could have formed in several ways. In one scenario, the galaxies may have fallen towards Andromeda along an invisible filament of dark matter. Computer simulations show these filaments can form a cosmic web along which galaxies flow.'"

The original article is at http://www.newscientistspace.com/article.ns?id=dn8571.

Note how believing in a creator is anti-Science, but believing in mythical "dark matter" (which has never been seen) makes perfect sense to many people. And we trust these people as our modern high priests?

I think I will stick with "The Heavens declare the glory of God." :)

Brad

Salt & Light?

It is a shame that so many Christians today are not being salt and light in our modern world.

We tend toward two extremes:

1. Huddle in our own little group crying about how bad it is and how lost others are, but doing little to actively get the transforming message of the Gospel out to unsaved people.
2. Actively engaging the world by participating fully in it, but failing to challenge things. This group goes to junk movies, spends hours watching TV, and participates in other such activities because they are fun. Sometimes this group will claim to be reaching those in such things, but their outreach will be very limited. Few of those who knew them would say they were Christians. And even if they were known as Christians, their witness is meaningless since they have no difference.

Instead of either of these we need to be actively developing Godly alternatives. We should be producing the materials and providing the services to transform our society. Modern presentation methods make this easier than any time in the past, yet too many Christians (myself included) are spending too much of their money piling up more toys for themselves, instead of investing in eternal things.

Can we see a change in this area? Will we?

Brad

Paranoid Evolutionistas

Isn't it interesting how paranoid the modern Evolutionistas are? They worship the two primary gods called "Time" and "Chance". Anything that dares stand against them is fought tooth and nail. It sounds more like a modern priesthood desperate to keep its control than a valid group of scientist with some real truth on their side.

How anyone could look at this world and say, "It all just happened," is beyond me. Would anyone look at a computer and say that it all just happened? Yet evolutionary doctrine says just that - organisms more complicated than anything we can create just happened, when we can barely keep our computers running without lots of intervention. How is the modern creation myth (called Evolution) any different than the myths of ancient civilizations like Egypt, Greece and Rome? All were believed with a fervor and allowed no dissent.

One reason I see for people standing so staunchly against anything that chips away against Evolution is because if they even allow for a creator (small "c"), they then have to figure out how they relate to that creator. And that is a very uncomfortable thought.

Not all are afraid of a creator, but I have a feeling this is a much more significant factor than many people realize.

Brad

Lets start this again.

Interesting test:

You are a Social Moderate (43% permissive) and an... Economic Conservative (88% permissive) You are best described as a: Capitalist Link: The Politics Test on Ok Cupid Also: The OkCupid Dating Persona Test

I am not sure that I agree completely, as I am very conservative socially. I think the difference came out because I am no longer in favor of the massive "drug war" that is doing little good and only serving to limit our freedoms.

I think most people are rather apathetic about politics. Who wants to spend their days following this stuff when life has so much that needs to be taken care of?

The problem is that many of our political "leaders" take a lack of response from the electorate as an endorsement of their actions and policies. Instead of marking them as illegitimate in much of what they do, they take inaction as endorsement. And the news media lets them get away with it, especially if their agenda matches that of the news media.

Another aspect of this same problem is that those who favor "traditional life" are too busy surviving their attempt to live it to spend a lot of time defending it. Unfortunately, those who oppose it are more than willing to spend their time (for they don't value "traditional" things anyway) trying to change things. Thus those who want to destroy have more time to devote than those who want to preserve, or maybe even return (or go) to a more stable "traditional" role.

While everything "traditional" is not always good, it remains a good term to describe those that are. If you think a family should allow a mother to stay home and actively raise her children, you will probably be too busy doing just that. You won't have time to actively lobby for laws to do this. On the other hand, if you think that this is not important, then you will have no problem leaving your children to the care of someone else (if you have children at all) and then using your work time to push for the changes you want to support your choices, or those of others.

I see this as another aspect of our continued slide into destruction. I am not sure an solution to the problem exists, outside of Divine intervention.

Brad

As I write this I am watching the show _Alien Planet_ which recently aired on The Discovery Channel.

Talk about Science Fiction! Though they note it is in the future, it is shown with the same level of "this is the way things will be" that was used in the _Walking With Dinosaurs_ series they aired (from the BBC I believe) a while back. Here they make outrageous speculation, acknowledge it as such, and yet continue long.

It also presents Evolution (the particles to people kind) as a given. After all, if it happened here, it would happen many other places, right?

But even if you believe in Evolution, this program has many flaws. While the mission is claimed to have contingency plans, in the end it only has 3 landers/explorers, one of which is damaged on entry to the planet and another of which is killed while trying to communicate with an alien creature.

This is rather stupid. Would you go to all the expense and trouble to send a probe to another world and have only 3 landers? Of course not! You would have a bunch more, perhaps even hundreds. Also, the one probe is killed by something surprising it while it is trying to communicate, but is it realistic that a probe would drop all scanning to communicate with a single alien? Would it not continue to constantly scan for dangers in all other directions?

Another unrealistic access is that it seems very ludicrous that probes would be launched before a full scan of the planet was performed. With even modern photographic techniques (let alone those we would theoretically have in this future time) could discover a lot of things from the relative safety of space. This is especially true if it only had 3 probes, let alone if it had a lot more.

The show also emphasizes over and over that life now is the result of lots of accidents. As with most of modern science, it has no allowance that we are specially created, let alone specially created by a Creator who cares for us.

I don't even rate this as good science fiction. It is full of a lot of fantasy, much of it needlessly so. Instead of some balanced fantasy, they had to go off the deep end.

I see this as more attempts to prop up the modern mythology that we call Evolution. We have believed the incredulous, so we are willing to believe anything that is fed us from "experts". Are we really any different than the ancients, with their own elaborate myths and tales? Will we ever stop to realize that the truth is much more believable than all this fantasy - that a real God created everything and really cares about each of us? That is doubtful since doing so would require us to then be accountable to that God, and we can handle any level of fantasy as long as we don't need to be accountable!

Brad

Lets get started again. :)

I am getting rather sick of hearing the Democrats talk about how the Republicans are going to stop open debate if they force a vote on judges as they are indicating they will do.

I would ask the Democrats, when has all this debate occurred? I am all for keeping the debate going, but make them debate! Make them stay there 24 hours a day until the debate is solved and things can be brought up for a vote.

An interesting thing to note, Republicans are too wimpy to pull something like this. Even if they found themselves in the minority again, they would almost certainly find themselves back in their old pattern of "go along to get along." While they may raise some issues, we have never seen strong principled conservatives, no matter how much the Democrats and other liberals claim we are just about to become a religious dictatorship. :)

As I think I have noted before, I have no great love for the Republicans, but the Democrats and their media pals annoy me so much I am finding myself much more in line with them (Republicans) than I would prefer.

Kerry crashed in flyover country: "Just so you understand the terms when you read about them or hear them debated on National Public Radio: When a Republican says he is pro-life, that is divisive, but when a Democrat says he is for abortion rights, that is not at all divisive. When Rush Limbaugh rips into John Kerry, that is an exercise in divisiveness and hate, but when Michael Moore produces a documentary attacking President Bush with every sort of libel, that's merely a filmmaker doing his job."

This is a very good point. The table is very slanted in the traditional media. How wide and deep would be the cries for "unity" if Kerry had won? Did any liberal speak out against Michael Moore? We live in a biased society. While politics should definitely be limited as he notes at the end of the article, we should not ignore politics either.

Just to make sure I completely offend everyone, lets talk about the age of the earth & universe.

I can completely understand why non-Christians believe everything is trillions of years old, they have nothing on which to establish anything more recent. (Even though a great deal of the physical evidence really does point to a younger earth.)

We claim to now be scientific and driven only by facts, yet our creation myths are just as elaborate and made up as any used in ancient Egypt, Greece or Rome. I read a recent article in Scientific American that claimed there had to be multiple paralell universes, they were a fact. How this fact was ascertained was not elaborated, merely stated.

But for Christians, the Bible is pretty clear about how old things are, something around 6,000 years. Of course you can dispute this with some very fancy, misleading, and inconsistent footwork, but the clear reading of the text is that the universe was made about 6,000 years ago, with many a mere 6 days later.

At one time I bought into the Gap Theory, the idea that there is a huge gap between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2. This is the only logical out, allowing for millions/billions/trillions of years that still keeping a consistent and trustworthy Biblical text. In reevaluating the Scriptures that seem to support/allow for a gap, I have concluded that they do no such thing. Thus I must believe what is written, not make up my own stories, no matter what other Christians or non-Christians say about it.

Ironically, I felt the idea of a Gap made so much sense because I had bought into the idea of millions of years through my years in government education. But why go for something that is not needed, and that conflicts with the text?

I can understand the world worshipping the creature (creation) rather than the Creator, but why do so many Christians insist upon doing so?

We no longer live in a civil society, at least not in one where civility is important. Think about how easily people resort to serious insults and slams quickly when they are bothered in the slightest.

Our current political contest is a good example. People on all sides almost demonize those they oppose. While the charges made may have an element of truth, doing such continually leads to a situation where it takes more and more to shock people into action. Where a mild charge would once have been sufficient to provoke extreme outrage, outrageous charges are now necessary to provoke any response at all. Even then, people are so numb to such things that they frequently just mentally "change the channel" in their brains when they hear such.

It is like a drug user: Each time, more and more is required to reach the same high, until the user finally reaches a point where a high is impossible, but a high level of consumption of the drug is necessary to just survive and avoid extremely painful withdrawal symptoms.

While I see this as a problem across the political landscape, I see it especially clearly in those who are socially liberal. They steer from reasoned argument and make villains out of those who disagree.

What is the answer? I don't see one, short of a Godly revival sweeping the land. Without God's intervention, we are headed for a crash. Though some people I greatly respect see that coming, I am not convinced. I have a sense we are headed for some mighty rough times, ones that will require a full reliance on God to survive. However, I do not believe these will be the "end of all time," as many speak of, but rather I see a rough period of reaping for all the horrible sowing modern man has been doing. History has examples of this. Life goes on, but it can be more difficult at times.

How does this relate to incivility? I believe you cannot establish a stable society without some ability to coexist without letting everything be very personal. Without that, even minor battles become major skirmishes, and they will end up with only one winner and one bastion loser. Even the winner in this case doesn't get what was expected, since the cost will have been paid in human lives.

Are Democratic parents really better than Republican ones?

http://slate.msn.com/id/2108556/

Interesting article. Are conservative parents really that unsuccessful, at least in the short run, or are these just not conservatives? It would be interesting to see something comparing politicians "governed" and how their children did. Are only Democratic presidents stricter, or is it really an overall trend?

I have a hard time believing that the liberal philosophy is stricter. Perhaps they are just
hypocrites to their own beliefs in this one area.

I would like to comment a bit more about the amoral, and even anti-moral
nature of many libertarians. While I completely agree with the idea that
the government should do very little in the way of enforcing morality,
having a "whatever goes attitude" seems very dangerous to me. God made
some pretty firm laws to govern the universe, and flaunting some of those,
legal or not, puts us in a lot of danger.

It is kind of like the idea that we can legislate to make the speed of
light different, or outlaw gravity. While legislation will not change
them (putting them outside the government's authority and control),
ignoring them or pretending they don't matter.

If we violate God's laws consistently, can we count on not reaping the
"natural" consequences?

Where to start? Clearly this hasn't come too fast, but part of the problem is that I have too much to say. Deciding where to start is the hardest. I am going to just start typing things and see where it goes.

I have gone through an interesting transformation over the past few decades. I began as a normal teen, but quickly found an affinity with strong conservatism. I wholeheartedly participated in Reagan's reelection and maintained the idea that if only the tide could turn, everything could be alright.

Many years and experiences, including the failure of the right to really change much of anything through politics have left me a lot more pessimistic.

The book Blinded by Might by Dobson & Thomas had some great points on the failure of politics to accomplish the means of righteousness. We cannot look to any political party as our salvation. Only by changing hearts can we have lasting change, and that is a much more difficult process.

I have come to lean more libertarian in recent years, though I can't stand a lot of the loose values of the national Libertarian Party. A key issue for me is abortion - I am staunchly pro-life and I cannot see how anyone justifies killing a human life, especially one that is clearly human in looks. How can a party claim to fight for "individual rights" and not champion the most defenseless? I have also found that they tend to favor laws granted special rights in some cases. A recent voters guide showed many/most of the Libertarian candidates as in favor of Hate Crimes legislation (where a crime is worse if the motive was "wrong.") and laws that prohibit descrimination against specific classes of people, both race and sexual preference were listed. A true libertarian would leave that up to individual choice, not government mandate!

I plan on commenting on a variety of many different issues here. My interests go into a wide range of areas and getting my thoughts out should be worthwhile.

Brad