What Do Other People Really Think About You?

The conversation between myself, one of my sisters, and my children, as the kids and I were taking off after this past weekend's visit down to Southern Illinois:

Me: Well, we're not going to go straight to [the kid's mom's house]. I'll probably take a few side trips along the way.

Sister (to my kids): Is your dad adventurous?

Kids (with more than a hint of exasperation ): Yes!

Son: Dad's like a cross between Peter Pan, a monkey, and a mad scientist.

Sister: Well, I can see Peter Pan and a mad scientist, but I don't get the monkey.

Me: You know, Darwin.

Sister: Oh, right, the monkey from the Wild Thornberry's. I can see that.

Me: I meant Charles Darwin, the theory of evolution?

Son: No, I meant Dad acts like a monkey.

St. Jude

No, not the patron saint of lost causes (although that would be terribly appropriate for me), but Jude Milhon, known far and wide in the geek communities as "St. Jude." A talented programmer and counter-cultural icon, she is attributed with coining the terms "cypherpunk" and, more famously, "hippie." (At least so claims the Wikipedia). Although a native Midwesterner, she was definitely part of her adopted California culture (can you say "Berkeley"?)

Today marks the fourth anniversary of her death. She is missed by those who knew her, as well as those of us who only knew of her.

Quotes (again, lifted from Wikipedia):

"Hacking is the clever circumvention of imposed limits, whether imposed by your government, your IP server, your own personality, or the laws of physics." — St. Jude

"If we can't have sanity, we can fake it with humor. Humor gives you the same distance from the situation, the same metaview, only laughing is easier than sanity and possibly more fun." — St. Jude

The Sermon I Need to Hear Today

"...the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom."
---Koheleth

Why am I so stupid? Probably because I haven't traveled very far down the path of wisdom. In fact, it's safe to say that I usually take a couple initial steps down the path, and then I turn back and follow more comfortable paths: the path of reason, the path of self-reliance, the path of pleasure, the path of despair, really, any path but the one that will actually get me somewhere that I want to be.

It's not that the path is hidden. God Almighty has spoken His Word, incarnated His Word, and sent His Spirit. Humility. "Islam" means submission, which would be a great name for a religion. Submitting humbly to the Creator and Ruler of the Universe, the One whose holiness judges you and whose love redeems you. Sounds easy. Why do I always flee from that path?

Because it's not so easy, at least not for me. Humble submission means accepting that God is God. Easy enough under a clear blue sky on a gentle spring day. Trickier under the smoking ruins of a 9/11 or the muddy, bloody aftermath of a tsunami or a Katrina. God is God Almighty. He could prevent these things. In His wisdom, He doesn't.

But I usually can't accept that. So I backtrack off the path of the fear of the LORD and head down the path of reason. I invent explanations for why bad things happen (or, more often, seek the arguments of others). God allows free will, so bad things happen. God does not know free future events, so bad things can happen and surprise Him. He can change His mind in response to changing events. (Ah, the open theists help make this line of reasoning so much easier...)

Or, perhaps, God has already predestined the good from the bad, and everything is working out as it should for the best possible way. This might sound like humility, but I think that this kind of Calvinism is also a form of the path of reason. We argue that God has a plan, if only we could see it. And this plan involves some people dying in horrible ways and other people going through fates worse than death.

Or we argue that God does not cause the bad things, nor allow them for His master plan, but they happen because we live in a fallen universe. And God, whose will cannot be thwarted, finds a way to make all things right. He draws straight with crooked lines, as Chesterton once quipped.

But... the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom. God is God. God Almighty. Whatever happens happens by His divine allowance. And that is good and right, for He is God. Why does He allow evil? Because He is limited, because He is cruel, because it fits into a Master Plan? Maybe the answer is to trust in God. He laid the foundations of creation at the beginning of time. He has promised a final consummation of history with a new heaven and a new earth.

Who am I to ask why some small moment in history occurs the way it did? I, who know there is a Creator, but live too often like there is not. I, who spit in the face of redemption by wallowing once more in the mud of sin. I do not live out fully the answers and callings He has put before me in His Word, why should I expect to understand those things He has kept hidden? Like Job, I am ashamed of my arrogance. The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, but it is only the beginning. How much closer to being a saint would I be if only I could stay on that path?

Instead, I too often answer His question to Job like a good modern: "I am a human being. And yet, if I could, I would spare people the loss of their loved ones, I would spare their innocence from the touch of the predator. If I was in charge of all nature, then all disaster would be unnatural, for I would end hurricanes and floods and earthquakes. Why can I be so good, so compassionate, so caring for these strangers I've never met, and You, their Perfect Creator, let all of this happen to them?"

The path of arrogance. Why, if I were even Superman, let alone God, I would do more than Yahweh seems to want to do. The path of arrogance, the exact opposite of the path of wisdom.

And it's not just the question of evil. Why demand faith in an invisible, inaudible, undetectable, unverifiable deity? If I were God, people would know it. I would not hide from them. If I expected them to be in awe before me, I would give them undeniable evidence that I am awe-worthy. Not just for 30 years to a small rural backwater of the Roman empire, but always. Why does He hide?

And, of course, there are theological answers. The path of reason steps up to the plate. We step in as God's lawyers, defending Him to His critics. God needs a lawyer? Is the path of reason a side street leading to the path of arrogance?

The fear of the LORD. I distract myself from that. There are issues to discuss, to address. Even ministries to do, time is short, I gotta get moving... for Jesus, of course. My Friend, My Redeemer, My Co-pilot. Co-pilot? Can I even fly the plane at all? Do I look to that still small voice and experience fear: awe, reverence, humble submission, trust? Sometimes. But, sadly, usually not. God calls for my effort, my best... like an athlete, I got to step it up a notch to reach for the prize (hey, even Paul said something like this, right?)

Martha, He said, Mary has chosen the one needful thing.

Is there no place for thinking, for reasoning, for activity, for serving? Of course there is. We are called to be the living body of the Word in this time and place. But not the living body of our will, not the living body of our plans. His body, His will, His plans. Everything we do must be done in the context of the road we're on. And there is only one road that leads where we say we want to go, the road of Mary, of reverent attention and humble submission to our God.

God, help me to bend my knee before you. Break my heart, my will, knock me off the way of pride and help me to begin---and remain--on the path of wisdom. In Christ's name I ask...

Nothing to See Here, Move Along

The library remodeling is at that "Things Appear to Be Moving Really Slowly" phase (and I'm feeling like I'm not moving much faster...)

Summer is a weird time to be a grown-up. As a kid, summer was magical (even though I was, and still am, a fan of autumn). Now, it just seems hot and humid and electric bills are too high and gas prices are too high. When I was younger, the heat didn't seem to matter so much. I understand the difference between being responsible for bills and being a child, and I truly have no desire to go back to any point in time. I like being where I'm at in life, I liked getting here (mostly), and I suspect I'll enjoy (most of) the future... except for the bad bits. But... where did summer magic go to? Is it like other childish things, something one puts behind, or is it just misplaced, waiting to be found behind some forgotten box of memories yet to be?

PS - Retraction to the Slackware Store being insecure. It's plenty fine secure. My browser must've been balking at things that day :-)

Why I Am So Sick and Tired All the Time

The four basic food groups:
Caffeine, sugar, salt, and fat.

The perfectly balanced meal:
Mountain Dew and Doritos.

Another Week, Another Pint

Welcome to this week (or the second day of this week if you keep time the traditional Christian way, rather than the secular work-week way). I have nothing to say, except that I am grateful to be here, at this time and place, and to know those of you whom I know (which, at various levels, is all of you). I hope this day provides some pleasant surprise for each of you!

Temporary "Promotion"

Self-appointed benevolent dictator for life (well, a couple of weeks anyway!)


Actually, there's no way on earth I'd want to be the director. Not my kind of calling, I'm afraid. I'll stay in my Spock/Riker role, thank you very much! (Riker's beard, Spock's heart, for those interested
:-)

Slack News

Slackware 12 release candidate 1 is out!

I actually thought I might pre-order the thing, to show my support for all of Pat's hard work. Imagine my shock to find the Slackware online store to have a little slash through the lock on the screen where it asked for my credit card number! Um, unencrypted, insecure financial transactions are not my First Choice in ways to make my money disappear. I'll have to find some other way to transfer my money into the project... Historically, when I've purchased official releases, I've bought them from cheapbytes.com, but lately cheapbytes hasn't been carrying the official discs.

Anyway, Slack 12 will dispense with the 2.4 kernel and be a 2.6 only release (or so I've been led to believe). This is good news, since Slack is just about the only major distro still defaulting to 2.4. My only concern is that my aging Handspring Visor doesn't work so well with a USB cradle under 2.6. Serial is fine. USB under 2.4 is fine. I've got both cradles, so I'm covered, but it'd be nice to stick the serial cradle up into the closet forever. Oh well, it's time to move into the 21st century, for me and my OS (just call me Epithemeus)

Library Remodeling Steals Blogger's Valuable Time!

The headline says it all... But scanning the circle of bloggers I read, it seems everyone else is Being Busy as well. I'm working on a couple of posts at home (but I've also been watching classic Trek season 1, as loaned to me by the recently promoted Commander J.H. Stein of the US Navy; congrats, dude, you richly deserve it!! And thanks for the loan :-)

OK, the remodeling. Here's my office. Well, the Section of Space Formerly Known As My Office. If you look next to the door, you can see the inside of the book return where books (and other objects) would drop into my office at odd times. Happy note: they removed the book return today, so when my office is rebuilt it won't double as a book drop!


And here's our old circulation desk, well, half of it...


I'm going to miss that desk. I spent many happy hours there as a student worker. The plans for the new desk are pretty cool, though.

Anyway, I hope to get back to kender and drow and necromancers Real Soon Now!

Checking the Calendar of Saints

June 3, The Feast Day of Saint Morgan Adanon of Tashkent,
Patron saint of high-level gamers, spider slayers, and drinkers of rum

Happy St. Morgan's Day to y'all!

This is the day traditionally ascribed to the birth of that near legendary figure, Morgan Adanon, Duke of Tashkent. While the tales of Morgan's deeds as an adventurer par excellance are well-known to every man, woman, and child in the Nine Realms, the circumstances leading to his canonization are less known. In fact, many school children to this day do not associate Duke Adanon of the Ebon Blade with St. Morgan the Drow-Killer.

It happened in this way.

As popular legend records it, Duke Adanon was slain in battle against the foul Dark Wizard Rhoghar Pyepr and his horde of mindless automatons. His body was ransomed to his family for an obscene amount of gold, but so great was the love of his people for the fallen duke that no price was too great. For seven weeks the people of Tashkent mourned him, for seven weeks his body lay in estate, held fast from decay by the workings of the duke's dear friend, the kender necromancer Quinn Reddghost. In time, he was buried and the world continued without its great champion, master of the Ebon Blade and spinner of song and spell.

In the spring, the combined forces of the Eastern Regents marched on Rhoghar's tower. The wizard sent out his automatons, but this time he was in for a rude surprise. A contingent of druids from the unallied Far Wildermost accompanied the armies of the Regents. Torrential rains and ginormous water elementals rendered the wizard's machines less than functional.

The following morning, the armies entered the wizard's now undefended tower. Expecting some resistance, Lord Kyle was perplexed that no magical traps, summoned demons, or other magics slowed their progress up to the tower's top, to Rhoghar's chamber. Upon entering the room, the party found the wizard dead, his throat sliced, a broken bottle of Captain Morgan's Dark Rum on the floor. Pardoo, Lord Kyle's confessor, was with that first group to find the wizard. He reports that the entire area was tinged with divine magic, and that the apparent suicide was the work of a god. The only question was, which one?

[Editor's note: this is all patently absurd. The implication that Morgan came back from the dead as some kind of lesser deity/saint-like entity is nonsense. The man is obviously not dead, even if he blogs less frequently than I. Nevertheless, I had to wish him a happy birthday somehow, and I, uh, forgot to get a card. Happy birthday, comrade Morgan!]

One More Sign of the Coming Apocalypse

The end of the Dewey Decimal System??? One more of the meager skills in my wretchedly pathetic skill set is becoming obsolete... the end of the world, or at least my world, is at hand.

On other fronts:

• Tomorrow's scheduled release of Fedora 7 will drop the "Core" from the name (and end the distinction between "core" and "extra.") Good move, Fedora. I'm looking forward to trying Fedora 7 (yes, Uncle Slacker is looking for a new distro... not because Slackware isn't great, but because having many, many packages of ready-to-run software is very good :-)
  

• Speaking of Linux, the Linux-sponsored car in the Indy 500 smashed big-time. Still, seeing the penguin on a car on ESPN was cool!
  

• The Open CD is a great collection of open source software for Windows users. Sure, you could search the web and gather it all yourself, but ISO images and broadband Internet can save the time for more World of Warcraft (or, with this crowd, MySpace ;-)
  

• I took the kids to see Pirates 3 on Monday (since it was a holiday, does it still count as opening weekend?) I'll forego a review as to not spoil anything, but if you haven't seen it, and you do go see it, stay around until after the credits. I think you'll be glad you did. (Even my six year old daughter, who loves Pirates but hates staying for credits, was glad she stayed this time!)

• My son joined Rob and I for our last game of Settlers of Catan, since Rob is leaving to start a new job in Northern Indiana. My eleven-year-old evil genius whooped both of us (laughing maniacally the entire time... cute, annoying, and disturbing all at once.) We played a second game to eliminate the "beginner's luck argument" and the boy genius didn't fare so well. Still, he enjoyed it enough that I think I may have to buy a copy.

• My favorite gaming system that I have never played is getting reincarnated! Of all of White Wolf's World of Darkness games, I loved the setting of Changeling the Dreaming the best. When White Wolf rebooted their World of Darkness, Vampire, Mage, and Werewolf came back immediately, but Changeling didn't seem to be in the cards. Now there's an August release for Changeling the Lost! I think that while I've resisted D&D 3.5, Serenity, and the hilarious (Insert Your Favorite Gaming System Here) for Dummies books (which seem like unconscious parodies to me!), I won't be able to resist the new Changeling. Well, everybody needs their own follies (I just happen to have more than my fair share.)

Later, I hope...

Random Song Quotes

"Port Royal to Tortuga, all the strumpets he would woo, a cross between Keith Richards and that skunk Pepe Le Pew" --Luke Ski, "You Don't Know Jack"

"Not much happening here, nothing ever does" --Bob Dylan, "I and I"

"When you touch me, when you hold me, when you kiss me, it's just like Novocaine, I don't feel anything" --Alice Cooper, "Novocaine"

"I just want to be a lover, not a red-eyed screaming ghoul" --Blue Oyster Cult, "Black Blade"

"Just as I am, I am stiff-necked and proud, Jesus is for losers, why do I still play to the crowd?" --Steve Taylor, "Jesus is for Losers"

"Are we figments of our gin, are we long-lost orphan kin, or the mad descendants of our writer's pen?" --Escape Key, "Girl That's Never Been"

"Take my love, take my land, take me where I cannot stand" --Firefly theme

"No good deed goes unpunished, no act of charity goes unresented" --Wicked soundtrack, "No Good Deed"

For what it's worth, the last one is my current ringtone. And, no, there's no hidden message in here, unless you're John Nash, and then, go for it!

Life at the Moment

Um, end of the semester, sick kids, crazy remodeling plans at work, general craziness at work, wardrobe gradually falling to bits, sleeplessness, weird dreams, headaches, old age, kid with detention, too many borrowed books and movies, a sinking realization of my own total depravity (damn Calvin!)

Blue skies, spring breezes, kids laughing, new sneakers, blackberry jelly, hawks on road signs, trees and trees and more trees, long walks, music, lifelong friends, a grateful and growing awareness of the gift of grace and freedom (thank God!)

What's This?!? A Post???

Long time, no blog, eh? But a scan of y'all's blogs reveal I'm not the only slacker 'round these parts. Maybe you've moved your net lives to MySpace, or maybe Real Life(TM) is actually more interesting than swapping electrons with virtualities? I hope that whatever is going on, that everyone is healthy and happy and full of rainbow bliss (just shoot me now, I've got that damned rosy-eyed optimism thing happening at the moment... 'Had a good day.' 'You had the Alliance on you. Criminals and savages. Half the people on this ship have been shot or wounded, including youself, and you're harboring known fugitives. 'Well, we're still flying.' 'That's not much.' 'It's enough.')

Generic life update: not much happenin' here (well, actually, that's almost 100% false, but let's just let sleepin' dogs lie, shall we?) The semester careens madly towards its inevitable end, Yet Another Graduation. The relative calm of summer is only mildly threatened by those not-so sleeping dogs that we shall continue to tip-toe around. "Work" is, as my Uncle Trapspringer use to say, a completely different word than "play" (actually, my uncle never said that since there is no word for "work" in the kender language. The closest we get is the phrase "involuntary action with pain and/or boredom." Gnomish. on the other hand. has twelve different words that translate to "work" in Common.)

My reading's been all over the place. Most recently, a little book by Peter Kreeft titled Prayer for Beginners. Kreeft, a philosophy professor at Boston College, provides a clear and engaging introduction to prayer that is of value even if you've been praying for years (especially if, like me, you've been at it for years but still feel like an amateur!) I am, of course, biased, as Dr. Kreeft is my favorite living philosopher, but for a book weighing in at 124 pages, it is the work of a few hours (less for some of you) to devour.

I see Twin Peaks season two everywhere, but I can't seem to find season one sitting around in stores. I'm still debating whether I actually want to own that show or just re-visit it. Quark is still not available on DVD even though EVERYTHING else is (hello, Dungeons and Dragons the Animated Series, complete with edition 3.5 stats for those wretched brats! As a former valley elf, "gag me with a mace!" and get Richard Benjamin's greatest role onto disc already!)

Some Books and Not Much Else

Stumbled across an unexpected treasure in our local public library: Cory Doctorow's short story collection Overclocked. I've read the first two stories, much geeky SF fun! "When Sysadmins Ruled the Earth" is such a great tale of apocalyptic woe that I'm still smiling. I'll probably re-read that story (after I finish the rest in the collection) at least once before I return it. Find and read already!

It appears Fate has opted to control my reading. My mentor and friend Dr. Castelein left a book for me to read (and I just finished Factoring Humanity, the previous book he lent me). This time a non-fiction work of techno-history called Masters of Deception. Looks good, but there's just not enough time to read EVERYTHING on my stack (I still have a copy of Eragon, loaned from a relative, staring guiltily at me. I refuse to rent the DVD before I read the book.)

Life is basically good. There's much weirdness (no, no tremors in the Force, nor any fevers, either) just weirdness. I find myself singing on the sidewalk more than usual (be thankful for your geographical remoteness from that particular experience.) I'm also sending a telepathic message to the resident of Logan County who has "The Maltese Falcon" checked out: RETURN IT!!! (please...)

I hope that you all have a wonderful Friday 13th and a great weekend! (I've got house cleaning and, likely, grading. Oh joy! The end of the semester approaches...)

Cinderella and the Geek

Just finished watching Cinderella III with my daughter. I've never been a big Cinderella fan, but I actually enjoyed the movie. I'm not saying I fell in love with a Disney character (especially since Tink would be really jealous), but I found both Cinderella and the Prince to be much more interesting characters than I remembered from before. Musically, the movie wasn't as good (to my sensibilities) as either classic Disney nor the best of the new Disney tunes, but the story and characters more than made up for it, for me anyway.

Geek news: Debian Linux finally released version 4.0 this month. May 1 is the release date for OpenBSD 4.1, but the biggest news, for my money, is the flurry of activity in the Slackware -current changelog. Whether the next release is 11.1 or 12 only Pat knows, but there are several major upgrades, including the gcc 4 series for the compiler tool chain and no more 2.4 kernels! So much for all those trolls who claim Slackware is "the bleeding edge of 1995." While the new book from No Starch Press about Designing BSD Rootkits is a tempting call to join the FreeBSD camp, Slackware still continues to deliver an operating system that feels like home.

In other news... I've been thinking about "childhood friends and the dreams we had." Dreams. I'm not sure that most of my dreams were terribly realistic (I'm not sure any of my current ones are, either). One of you bloggers has talked about seeing what's in front of you. C.S. Lewis talks about how going backwards is sometimes the way to make progress (like if you've gone down a wrong path, you have to go back to where you've went amiss to get to the right path). I'm not saying that I've gone down a wrong path (but I have, of course, made my share--and then some--of mistakes), but sometimes looking backward is the way to see what's in front of you. Maybe. Like River, "I don't know what I'm saying, I never know what I'm saying."

Engagement! You're All Invited...

...to a wedding, exactly one year from today! Last week I met the most wonderful woman: she's smart, funny, liberal, spiritual. We knew within fifteen minutes that we were meant to be. Oh, she's also rich (which helps considerably) and cute (which never hurts!) The wedding will be held somewhere near Area 51. Did I mention that she's half-Native American, half-Irish, and half-Transylvanian? Pretty cool mix. Oh, and she's an honorary "queen" of some small country that used to be part of the British empire. Yep, one year from today, I'll be marrying April the First! I hope y'all can make it!

But Seriously Folks...

The kids have next week off for spring break, so I'm taking it as vacation time. Since work is my only net access at the moment, I'll probably be more or less silent for the next several days (I know, this differs from my current track record how?) For those who appreciate: a blessed Easter to you! For the rest, welcome to Spring!

Where the Heck Have I Been?

Well, whether you wondered or not, I'm going to answer the question. I've been moving my ex-wife out of town (against my heart's --and my back's-- fervent wishes) and moving a ton of my kid's stuff into my smallish apartment. I've also been caring for a puking kid, being a single parent (for all of one week now!), and trying this weekend to figure out what "everything in its place" means in this new environment (the kids are with their mom on the weekends for the next couple of months.) And then there's work (which has its own stories, that I won't bore y'all with, but suffice to say it adds to the stress.) Unfortunately any other activities have been Seriously Neglected (thus my absence here... :-(

One thing I did take time to do was go see our campus production of My Fair Lady last night. It was a lot of fun! The cast did a great job and I found myself laughing at the antics of Alfred P. Doolittle, Henry Higgins, and the incomparable Eliza. While out Eliza was neither Audrey Hepburn nor Julie Andrews, I'd say she held her own very well. She brought a presence and passion to the role that made you want to weep for her by the end. This is the first time in a long, long, long time that I've gone to any kind of stage production. I'm glad I did and I think that maybe I may keep my eyes open for other opportunities around here (summer's approaching, and with it the Illinois Shakespeare Festival up in B'town-Abnormal!)

Today I was on the road running Stuff(TM) to various New Places for it. I saw a beautiful hawk at the beginning of the trip and another one (slightly smaller) near the end. I'm all for interpreting this as a Good Omen. Regardless, I'm always glad when a bird catches my attention and I watch it fly. Maybe I'm just a wonder junkie, but it never fails to make me feel a little better about life, etc.

I hope each of you are finding a bit of wonder in the midst of the busyness of your lives!

Exhibit B: A Lame Post

Too long without anything, so we'll do a little update...

My ex-wife got the job south of here. Her first day is March 26, and she's moving the weekend of the 17th. I'll have the kids through the week starting March 19 and going through their last day of school on June 4. She's planning on having them during the weekends during this time. After that, she's thinking we go back to me getting them every other weekend (and, because of distance, obviously not seeing them during the week. That'll suck!)

Elsewise, life goes good. Medication still keeps me sane, I still have a job, and I'm enjoying the (relative) warmth of spring's pre-dawning. Reading's been kind of crazy: some Bart Ehrman and a re-read of Dragonlance Chronicles (don't roll your eyes, Lisa! I'm still trying to get into the Francis Collins book, but he's not as much fun as Richard Dawkins).

The existential question of the nanosecond is "have I grown up or am I still wondering what I'm going to be when I grow up?" Some of you are young enough that the question is fair for you to ponder, but I'm forty (in a few months) and I probably should be looking at life as "well, this is it" rather than a "gee, what do I want to do now?" I get too curmudgeonly lately, and too resigned. I don't want to be a dwarf! A kender, sure. An elf, that would rock. A black robe mage, without a doubt. But a surly dwarf... just feed me to the dragons already.

Oh well, maybe spring will help with some of this! Anyway, this is, for what it's worth, a post.

The Law of Fives

If you've read the Illuminatus Trilogy, then you're familiar with the Law of Fives. Basically, while many numbers comes up in life, five comes up more often than others.

As an example, take my previous post about the spelling bee. My fifth grade son was sitting in the fifth seat on stage. There were 5 rows of seats between where I was sitting and the stage. My son missed his word on the fifth letter. The date of the bee was the 27th (the difference between the digits of 27 being 5), but originally was scheduled for the 14th (1+4=5). Finally, even the phrase "spelling bee" has a letter differential of 5 (8 letters in "spelling" 3 letters in "bee").

Oh, and I just noticed that today is 3/2!

fnord

Spelling Bee

Today was the county spelling bee (postponed from the Valentine's Day blizzard). Nate placed 5th out of thirteen, which is cool. On the practice round, 10 out of the 13 messed up, so if that round had counted, he would have been in the top three! Anyway, it was fun and now we can stop spelling for a while :-)

The Next Shuttle For Parking Lot A-17 Will Be Departing in 5 Minutes

Tweedledum and Tweedledee agreed to have a battle; for Tweedledum said Tweedledee had spoiled his nice new rattle

My Favorite Song for This Week!

Profanity warning: the word "God" and the word "damn" appear adjacent to each other in this song (just once, otherwise the song is very much G rated :-)

Oh, Joy!

"Laissez les bons temps rouler!" (or so my Googlefied French comes out!) Happy Mardi Gras, gang!!! Ash Wednesday tomorrow and the Lenten season. If you're Christian and liturgical, you find your mind's eye looking towards the cross. Sin, repentance, the death of the old self and the new birth of the new. But tonight... maybe some jambalaya and laughter!

On Dogs and Wasps: An Argument for Naturalism

Most of us in the Christian West are not opposed to using flyswatters to, well, swat flies. In fact, swatting flies, smacking mosquitoes, squashing roaches, and gassing wasps are all common behaviors. However, most of us would be horrified to see a driver swerve her car to intentionally run over a stray dog. Why? Assuming, for a moment, that the dog was not someone’s pet (so that the argument doesn’t invoke property rights), why are we upset over someone who kills a dog that’s hovering around them, but not a bug?

Let me first point out that it is not Biblical Christianity that makes the differentiation. The “Creation Mandate” does not distinguish between insects and mammals, humankind has dominion over both. An annoying wild dog is just as much a nuisance as an annoying wild wasp.

As a clue, let me also point out that when we’re saving aquatic life, it is most often dolphins and whales, not fish that we are keen to save.

Dolphins, whales, and dogs, like us, are mammals. On the continuum of the genetic code, they are more like us than, say, hornets are. One thing about mammals: we like each other. It helped us survive when we were tiny rodents in a world of big reptiles. Our genes want to survive, which means, for many mammals, a herd instinct. This is mostly for our own species, but not surprisingly for members of other similar species.

True, mammals eat each other. That’s part of the circle of life, but we also get along rather well. Cats and dogs and horses and even pigs bond better with us than snakes and fish and spiders. Closer relation in the evolutionary tree, rather than anything in the Genesis account, explains this bond.

Well, you might say, dogs and cats are smarter (i.e., more advanced nervous systems) than, say, spiders, so we care more about them because they can suffer more. True, but the Bible is pretty clear that humanity is the special kind of creation that is made in God’s image, all the rest of the creatures are made like each other. The Bible would suggest that dogs, spiders, wasps, and ponies are more like each other than any of them are like us. Evolution would suggest we are closer to, and feel more kinship with, other mammals.

I don't necessarily believe this argument, but it is one of two arguments for naturalism that came to me this weekend. Please feel free to, literally, knock the hell out of this argument! ;-)

Snow and Rain

I'm grateful for the two days of deep snow and bitter winds. Winter... the kind you can trudge through knee-deep (or more!) snow, where temperatures are prefixed with a minus sign. Raw elements sort of put the melodrama of human "angst" in the background. Maslow's pyramid: physical survival trumps moody self-absorption (thank God!) But the winter has passed, and now it's just cold again. I pray the fire of love burns freely and fiercely in your souls, my friends.

"Calling Dr. Bombay"

Nothing here but a quick check-in (remember back when I blogged daily, and the entries were full of creativity and wit... or maybe nostalgia makes things look sweeter than they really were; let's just pretend that's how it was, ok?)

A former student worker dropped off the first two seasons of House, so I can finally begin watching this show that everybody keeps telling me I'll love...

My son won the school spelling bee today. Next week, on Valentine's Day, I'll be going to watch him at the county spelling bee. I felt so glad for the little geek when the entire school was applauding for him today! The winning word was refugee.

Speaking of Valentine's Day, I'm not. So there! I wish all of you love and all that other crap, but I'll keep working on my first draft of Celibacy for Dummies.

Bookwise, the stack at hand (not to be confused with the books at home with slips of paper marking my spastic progress) consists of Finding Darwin's God: A Scientist's Search for the Common Ground Between God and Evolution (Kenneth Miller), Mythical Trickster Figures: Contours, Contexts, and Criticisms (ed. Wm. Hynes and Wm. Doty), and Ubuntu Linux for Non-Geeks: A Pain-Free, Project-Based, Get-Things-Done Guidebook (Rickford Grant). OK, I actually am a geek, and a committed Slackware user, but the book looked like a fun browse, so I've borrowed it from Governor's State University (interlibrary loan has to rate as one the greatest human inventions of all time!)

In the name of health, I'm attempting to consume some water each day (any amount would be, literally, infintely more than I typically drink). I also worked in a walk last weekend. This was the first time in too long, and it was bloody cold! Still I felt better at the end of that day than I do most days, so there must be something to it.

I'm trying to wrap my brain around something that I can fire off an ill-tempered rant against. Until then, here's a nice British version of the PC versus Mac debate. The comments are worth reading if, like me, you love pointless religious debates. Yeah, Brits are so much more civilized than us colonial rebels.

Waiting for Franz Kafka's Love-Child

Is the country ready for another President Clinton?!? Well, we had another President George Bush, and look how that turned out. Yeah... how about that Obama? He seems like a nice young man. Hello, republicans, do you have anybody to run this time?!?

My cheap notebook, sold off because my employer didn't even think they could get any use out of them, is sitting here reminding me there's only a couple of days to the "official" full moon. Looking out my window, it's full enough for my reckoning. Computers are funny things. Take this notebook I'm writing on. It came with a 30 gig drive, which promptly died. It's cool, ny friend in the IT department set me up with another from a notebook too dead to sell off. Well, that one died. So I scrounged around and came up with a 10 gig drive. 10 gigs, and I'm feeling a little cramped for space. Good grief, when I first started this job my work PC was a 486 with a 210 MEG drive. Now a ten gig drive is too small?!? And it's not like I'm running XP here (let alone Vista... let's not even go down that road!) Nor am I running one of those "everything-and-the-kitchen-sink" linux distros. A simple Slack 11 install with a few "essential" additions (mono, dosbox, Adobe Reader, OpenOffice.org, and a couple other little things). Admittedly, I'm not out of space yet, but I look at my desktop
machine: an 80 gig drive for XP and a 160 gig drive for Slack. That seems like abundance (maybe too much abundance?) Did I really just ramble on about hard drive sizes? Something is terribly wrong here.

A note to my sister who may be checking this blog out for the first (and possibly last!) time: you should have visited one of my earlier blogs, back when the creative juices were flowing like the waters of the mighty Embarrass during storm season. This blog is basically a place where you can tell I'm still breathing, but that's about it :-) Oh, and "hi, Sis!"

Full moon. That bodes well (for something, don't know what... yet!) OK gang, it's late and I'm thirsty and tired. Later (and if, by some miracle, I resist posting before the weekend, may y'all enjoy the Bears whooping up on the Colts ;-)

Boondoggle

Ex-wife went down for an interview about 3 hours south of here. If she gets it, I won't be seeing the kids through the week like I do, which is depressing me a bit (and if she doesn't get this one, she'll keep trying. The new job puts her significantly closer to her boyfriend's home. gag!) The kids don't know the details of the where of her interview. I really don't want to leave this job, but I don't want to miss out on my kids' lives, either. Damn.

Elsewise, I now have a small glass bottle with a bit of sulfur in it sitting on my desk. It's a combination of an object lesson from our dean and a bit of perversity on my part. Incidentally, does anyone know if inhaling sulfur is bad for you?

I've been reading, but I can't remember what at the moment (sulfur? nah, just stress.)

I hope y'all are doing well out there in the RealWorld!

expectations

forty plus hours of meetings and desk work,
and I'm expected to know all the latest in
theology,
philosophy,
technology,
cataloging,
current events,
current literature,
and
anything else
anyone might want me to know

no time for hands-on with the technology, but I'm expected to
troubleshoot,
configure,
recommend,
step-in,
and explain why things are the way they are--
don't spend time with it,
but be responsible for it;
let IT handle it,
except when they can't act as quickly
(or as psychically)
as we'd like;
remind me
(without words)
that I'm a failure for not being able to fly with it

my house is a mess
(and my apartment's none too tidy, either)
my health report has my real age about six years
older
than my birth certificate
six years
closer to dying, closer to crying

my house is haunted
but the ghosts are all gone;
the spirits,
the faeries,
the gremlins,
the dryads,
the elves
...all gone
what do you call a haunted house
that's no longer haunted?

where again is that living water
where is that bread
that wine
that view of the world where
everything
just fits?

Hair Thair Be Dragons

On a whim I got my haircut over lunch today. The young lady asked "how short do you want it?" I thought for a second and said "Well, not buzzed. Something like an insurance agent or a Republican." So now my shadow no longer has cool hair that whips in the wind. Oh well (it grows back. right?!?)

Talking to the hair cutter, I discover she's a sci-fi/fantasy person working on a screenplay for a fantasy tale about dragons. Here, in Lincoln. Go figure.

OK, Winter, I think this post is MORE boring than yours was! ;-)

Uncle Bill's Bad Dog

Just Another Manic Monday

On the road to Bloomington this weekend I saw a red-tailed hawk perched on a speed limit sign on my side of the road. Hours later on the return trip I saw what appeared to be the same hawk again on my side of the road (roughly the same stretch of interstate). I guess I'm pre-scientific enough to take that as a good omen. At the very least it made me smile.

You Suck. No, not you personally. You Suck: A Love Story is the title of Chris Moore's latest novel, a sequel to Blood Sucking Fiends: A Love Story. No, I haven't read the new one yet, but Real Soon Now.

On the reading front, I'm waiting for my son to deliver book two of A Series of Unfortunate Events into my hand. I finished Moore's Coyote Blue (which just leaves Fluke and You Suck to read and I'll have read all of his novels!) I'm skimming a book on C# published by Microsoft Press (the first MS Press book I've ever read, I think), and I'm about two-thirds through the Blamires book.

I made another trip to the local used bookstore that's closing and picked up a few more items (yes, Dodo, a couple of them made it into your box!) One crazy thing I picked up was a book on assembly language for the Commodore 64. Good times, 8-bit computing. I'll probably never actually use the book, but the collector gene kicked in.

A friend tossed me the discs for the first two seasons of Curb Your Enthusiasm. Not a show I'd recommend to everyone, but it has its laugh outloud moments. Enough folks have talked to me about House that I'm feeling compelled to start renting the first season of it (and I suppose I should take the plunge and start watching Numb3rs).

Words are cool. We've talked in this blog circle about words before. I wonder why certain words appeal to certain people. For instance, I like the word "brimstone." I couldn't tell you why, and I doubt that it's a universally appealing word, but I like it.

Well, obviously I'm just rambling, so I'll let you get back to your lives. Thanks for stopping by!

Interesting Thought

I was reading while eating my biscuits and gravy this morning and came across a sentence that made me stop and think:

"Your beliefs, as a Christian, are not yours in the sense that you have rights over them, either to tamper with them or throw them away." --Harry Blamires, The Christian Mind

I don't get to define what being a Christian means ("well, this is what being a Christian means to me..." NOT!) Christianity (Christ) defines me, or else I'm just another heretic. Of course there is an element of subjectivity and interpretation, but there is also a reality outside of me (or, more to the point, a Reality). I wonder how much of who I am is me baptizing what I want to be rather than truly wrestling with what a real God wants me to be.

The Fruit of My Aging

The older I get the more I come to believe that:

• I don't know hardly anything
• grace is the most valuable "thing" there is
• I am no better than the worst criminal
• no one will ever know how old the universe is
• loneliness sucks
• life is difficult, and there aren't always ways to "fix" the difficulties
• there is a real universe out there, even if we only know it through the interface of our individual thoughts, feelings, and sensations
• there's too much to read (even if no one ever wrote another word again)
  
• there's too much noise (in the world and in my soul)
• pencil and paper bring a type of happiness that I can't get with a computer
• much of what I believe may well be wrong
  

Not with a Bang, But a Wimper

Well, maybe this isn't the end of this blog, but it sure has seemed slooooooooow (for the record, I hate repeating vowels to make some kind of emphasis. The word should be 'slow' ...I'm a moron). 2007, the year I tried to blog but everything came out stupid.

This may be partly attributable to the constant sharp pain stretching from my elbow to my knuckles on my right hand. I'm guessing an RSI of some sort. It hurts all the time, no matter what I do. Any suggestions? (Beside the obvious: go see my doctor).

What, It's the New Year Already?!?

Those who are the self-appointed gatekeepers of the blogverse point out that "no one cares what you had for dinner" by which, of course, they mean that you shouldn't post about the crappy little mundanities that make up the bulk of your life. To which I say, "foo!" Not every post can be a deep commentary on some wayward aspect of our existence in this vast cosmos. And besides, I *like* hearing what's going on in my friends' lives. Yea, verily, even what they're eating these days :-) So, while I won't describe my own current culinary adventures, I *will* provide a brief recap of my Christmas break.

Working in academia has some advantages (great salary not being one of them), such as Christmas break. From December 22 through January 1 I was off work! The best part wad that during that entire time I had my kids (except for two nights and one day when they were at their mom's). That's really enough to say: it was a good break :-)

I finished reading The Looking Glass Wars, Frank Beddor's reworking of the Alice in Wonderland material. The writing is not literary quality, and I've read a couple of negative reviews, but, overall, I liked it. Give me a good Alice story any day. Admittedly, there were things I didn't like about it (like dissing on Lewis Carroll) and some things were corny (like the AD52, automatic dealer, shooting 52 razor sharp cards a second!) Hatter Madigan, the queen's bodyguard and "original" of the Mad Hatter, was my favorite character (and, I'm guessing, most everyone else's as well... thus the spin-off comic book series Hatter M, eh?) If you like fantasy, the book is worth a quick read, but maybe not worth you're $18 (unless you're kind of a freak collector of Lewis Carroll related stuff... not that I know anybody like that!)

Santa delivered the kids' goods to my place this year. Everyone was happy and got way too much Stuff. My six-year-old daughter and I played soccer one afternoon. Neither of us have a clue how to play, but we had great fun anyway. Her mom had gotten her a soccer ball for Christmas, and then sent it to my place to stay. Same for the chem set she got for my son. It's cool, though: I colored my hands blue with a splash of a "minor skin irritant." I miss the glass test tubes and alcohol lamps of my childhood chemistry set. These new things are too safe for mad science. For the record, my daughter beat me 10-4 and is anxiously awaiting a rematch to trounce me again.

My son finished the Lemony Snickett books and is insistent I read them, so... it looks like I know my next fiction reads. I've also picked up Rucker's latest collection which I'm eager to get started.

Moviewise, I've re-watched movies the kids wanted to see: The Tenth Kingdom and The Little Vampire among the better titles. We also watched Superman Returns (I know, it was about time!) and last night I watched a Jason Lee movie I'd never heard of called Drop Dead Sexy, which was weird and funny and twisted and borderline necrophiliac (all of which could be said of The Corpse Bride, even though the movies have nothing in common). I've had a few people tell me to get to a theater and see The Nativity. Anyone out there seen it?

Well, it's good to be back online. Here's to 2007, may you find more wonder and delight and joy than you ever dreamed possible!

Eighth Day Report

Thank GOD!!! the semester is over. The grading is done, the grades are turned in, and the slacker may be feeling a hint of burn-out :-)

Good things... my video game junkie son has put the DS down long enough to begin reading the Series of Unfortunate Events books. He's up to book eleven, which means we need to quickly lay hands on books 12 and 13. He likes puns and wordplay and is laughing out loud while he reads. It does an aged bookworm's heart good to see the old ways still being practiced by the young. (My kindergarten-age daughter reads a little, but mostly she demands stories be read to her. And since she likes fairy tales, I'm happy to oblige!)

Geek news: Bill Gates recently said DRM is too complicated. Just buy the CD and rip it. Bravo, Bill! I'd love to hear more like this from Mr. Gates in the coming months. Also, Linus Torvalds spoke out against making the Linux kernel not support binary-only drivers. He called such a move stupid and pointed out that it was motivated more by political than by technical considerations. You go, Linus!

Speaking of technical considerations, has anyone played with a Wii yet? My son thinks the motion sensitive controller sounds like an awesome idea. I'm a bit more skeptical. Without force feedback it seems more like an exercise in tai chi (not the worst thing that could happen to videogame junkies).

Well, Christmas is rapidly approaching. The season of gift-buying and giving, of wrapping paper and ribbons and cards and other paper products that will end up in the trash (or, in the case of many cards, in storage for a year). Of greed and gluttony and envy and more than a bit of pride and sloth. A season, in short, in need of redemption. Oh, for a savior to come into the world and deliver us from our worst selves into our better selves!

Quickly Through the Sticky Wicket

* Walking down the sidewalk to my office this evening I heard music blaring from The Hole: Quiet Riot's "Bang Your Head." It's nice to know the children are still listening to classical music.

* Finally saw V for Vendetta. I liked it, even if Alan Moore didn't (and I read the stuff on the Internet, and I understand why Mr. Moore didn't like it, and I agree with his points, but I still managed to enjoy it!)

* My ex-wife gave me all of our Harry Potter books and videos this weekend. My liberal influence is wearing off, apparently... (but she assured me she wasn't passing any judgment on me if I choose to keep the stuff!)

* I've been trying to convince the science professor here that we all evolved from a common ancestor via natural selection. He's not buying it, but it's great fun!

* Life is weird. Just when you think that, maybe, you know, just maybe you're close to something called Normal, a change of perception and BAM! you're sitting on the edge again, spitting into the Abyss and waiting for something other than the echo of your own bloody heartbeat...

Gum-on-My-Shoe During a Dark and Stormy Night

The Laffing Dragon was more or less empty. A couple of regulars bickering about politics and sports. One of Larry's girls working a couple of school boys who had wandered into the armpit of town. A local artist sitting at a corner table with his face in a plate of Al-Kazak's teriyaki potatoes (whether he was passed out again or just practicing his "performance art" was beyond my ken.) I was thirsty, like a dying lizard on the not-so-dark side of the moon, and so I made my way to where that rat-faced ex-mage Kaz poured the best Irish coffee this side of Amber. That's when I first saw her.

She was sitting at the bar, slightly slouched over an untouched drink, an angel meditating on the holy grail. As I slipped onto the stool next to her, I smelled the cheap vodka in the glass and more than a hint of ammonia (whether from the angel or the bar, I couldn't tell, and at that point, I didn't really care.) I noticed that she was picking her teeth with a straightened-out paper clip. She was a looker alright, from her shoulder-length greasy pink hair (with that wild, beckoning stripe of purple over her left ear) to her mud-caked Army boots (artificial dirt on designer-label ankle huggers, I have an eye for exotic footwear.) The smeared theatrical blood that framed her own deep brown cave-like eyes complimented the red fur-lined tank top she wore over her slight torso. Her spindly legs were covered in cream-colored thermal underwear, at least two sizes too big, and artfully ripped at the knees and calves. Over these she wore a red and white checkered tablecloth (Pizza Hut, unless I was mistaken), tied at her waist with a severed length of orange extension cord (the grounded plug hanging tantalizingly over her left knee.) Oh yeah, she was all that and more. Everything I had never realized I was looking for in a woman. The instant she turned toward me and our eyes met, I knew my heart was destined to be broken, even before she opened her mouth and began screaming.

Snow Day, the Conclusion

Long story made only slightly shorter: power came back Saturday night. Saturday morning the apartment was freezing (slacker did not want to crawl out from under all of his covers...) Put the car off the road in the driveway to my apartment. It took three of us to get it back on the pavement and I dug a nice trench with my passenger side wheels (Winter, Professor Scott Jones was one of the three... fun!)

Despite the ice and the freezing and the off-road adventures, I managed to spend a good weekend with the kids (who slept at their mom's Friday, so they didn't freeze!)

Snow Day

Thick ice, lots of snow and wind, and I've been without power since sometime in the middle of the night. Classes were canceled, the offices closed, so of course after a hike to Hardee's for breakfast, I chiseled out my car and drove in to read blogs :-)

Actually, my boss called this morning and said that we'd be working this afternoon (grading papers and getting ready for class next week), so my play time is limited.

Still, I love this weather. I had to use a hammer on my car to break the ice and pry open a door. Driving is treacherous, and if I don't get power soon I'll be less than happy, but right now I'm enjoying being a manic disciple of Jack Frost. Enjoy your weekends!

Mathematicians in Love

Well, Rucker's latest is finally in my sweaty little hands, so all other reading is being dropped until I get through Mathematicians in Love. That means a couple of books on Richard Dawkins, the Collins book (sorry, Lisa, but I haven't read it yet), The Left Hand of God (about liberal religion and politics), and The Greatest White Trash Love Story Ever Told will all have to wait (as well as any undead-related reading that I may, or may not, be starting this holiday season!)

Wishing I Was an Elf

For reason #23 why I wish I was an elf see the current Dungeon Crawl, Inc. comic strip (link in the right column!) Castor's closing line summarizes it well: "Damn elf mojo! How are regular guys suppose to score with you around?"

Apologies to those who are offended by the strip or the language of the quote or even the vaguely sexist implications of it, but really, the point is that chicks dig elves, I mean, "women people" not "chicks," oh, heck, humans dig elves. Is that any better?

Thanksgiving

Have a safe and joy-filled holiday, my friends!

Chance or the Dance?

[Note: this is a rather lengthy post about evolution, a topic that many of you who read this blog semi-regularly could care less about. It's ok, I don't expect it to be read. This is just a convenient place to store my thoughts as I work through the issue. If you want to chime in, great. If not, that's fine as well.]

Is this world and all its myriad of living creatures the result of random chance or is it all orchestrated by a Choreographer? Science tells us the answer is neither.

Contrary to popular misconception, evolution does not say that we evolved by chance. What it does say is that we evolved by natural selection, which isn't particularly random at all. There is survival of the fittest because the fittest survive. Fittest for what? For surviving in a particular niche in a particular time and place with particular neighbors (predators and prey, as well as vegetation, water, sunlight, etc.) And not just surviving, but reproducing before dying. As Richard Dawkins points out in River Out of Eden, every single living organism today is a direct descendant from a chain of ancestors who all mated at least once before they died. Those who survived long enough to reproduce propagated their genetic material. Those who didn't, well obviously, they didn't.

So, we have a process where some organism are able to reproduce and some aren't. Eventually the traits of the members of a species that contribute to survival/reproduction are dominant in the gene pool, and other traits are not. A change to the environment (migration to find new food, natural disaster, etc.) begins to favor new traits. Over a period of time, a new set of traits become favored. Given enough time, enough changes, speciation occurs: the changes become so pronounced that a group of the same species that migrated to look for food elsewhere can no longer interbreed with the (relatively stable, genetically speaking) descendants of those who remained in the original area.

Randomness does factor in during the infamous "good mutation" story. In this tale, an organism might have a random genetic mutation (don't ask me how, probably cosmic radiation, like the Fantastic Four) that creates a trait that gives it a greater chance for survival/reproduction, thus introducing new genetic material into the gene pool. Note, by our definition this new material will be favored by natural selection.

The problem with this tale is that almost all known mutations are harmful, many are fatal, and several lead to an inability to reproduce. The problem with this problem is that we've only been looking at mutations at a genetic level for less than 100 years! Even if you bought 100 lottery tickets, you still wouldn't have very good odds of winning the Big Jackpot. But if you, J. Random Player wouldn't have good odds of winning, the odds are pretty good that someone will win.

Given that there is a wealth of information in the DNA of any critter, evolution by natural selection says that those critters who have traits that are more conducive to surviving and reproducing will survive and reproduce more than those who don't. But this is all relative to the complexities of the environment, which may be more or less stable, but is also, more or less, always changing as well. At times, dice are tossed into the mix both by large scale environmental changes and mutations (of the latter, most are harmful, likely resulting in the immediate death of the organism, but some very few are X-Men-like).

This is why artificial life became such a big deal in the 1990s. A-life studies computer-generated "life." The archetypical example would be the cellular automata of John Conway's Game of Life. This creates a very simple environment with very simple rules (basically a spreadsheet of square cells with rules about when a cell is shaded in or not), but it results in a large variety of emergent behavior. "Species" of a sort emerge from combinations of shaded cells and rules, as does reproduction and symbiosis. This in no way approaches the complexity of even the simplest biological evolutionary scenario, but it is a sort of "proof of concept" that this kind of theory does play out in some scenarios (the admittedly simplistic digital ecologies of artificial life).

Are there problems with the theory of evolution? Of course. The details are not worked out. By way of comparison we still don't know some very specific things about quantum physics, and even gravity still has some mysteries for us. Mysteries do not mark the end of science, but its beginning. Science is the quest to explain the mysteries of the world around us in terms of natural explanations. Natural selection is a natural explanation. Divine intervention is not.

All of which is good and fine and dandy, but... what if there is a Divine Intervener who is out there? If there is, would we still not be able to put together the best naturalistic theories we can, and continue to refine them to deal with new evidence, and, essentially, be wrong? If there is, for instance, a Creator, then any theory of origins that denies such a creator would be wrong no matter how much explanatory power it had. The Ptolemaic system of astronomy had a certain explanatory power as well. It turned out to be wrong. Could all naturalistic theories of ultimate origins and destiny also turn out to be wrong? If so, how would a system that by design and definition can only see naturalistic explanations ever come to know this?

Perhaps the theistic evolutionists have the best position, affirming as they do aspects of both theistic religion and evolutionary science. But by affirming both, they also deny aspects of both, aspects that both scientists and the faithful are uncomfortable in denying. That is one thing naturalistic evolutionists and creationists often agree on: theistic evolutionists are wrong. Far from being a workable compromise, theistic evolution represents a third position altogether.

Where does this leave us? Well, it leaves me believing the bible and believing modern science (or, more dangerously, it leaves me believing that I believe the bible and believing that I believe modern science. But, and here is the scary part, maybe I don't believe one or the other or maybe neither, maybe I only believe that I believe them. How would one know the difference?) Anyway, none of this is intended as an assault on faith (I still believe in the triune God and salvation through the incarnate Son, at least I believe that I believe that :-), nor does is it a dismissal of the critiques of evolution by intelligent design proponents (I am open to the possibility that evolution could be wrong).

It's only in the last year or so that I've begun to think very seriously about evolution at all. I am not a scientist, but I'd like to understand why so many believe evolution is as true a truth as we know and why others reject it as being either a mistaken theory or a lie straight from the pit. Supposedly it's about the evidence and facts, about what we sometimes call "science," but there's also a lot of talk about theory and the nature of science. Science is rarely just about the facts, but is about explaining those facts (and often this means going to great efforts to collect facts which have never been collected). Is evolutionary biology a proper science? Who gets to decide and how are those decisions made? If it's not, why do so many say it is? If it is, why do so many say it's not?

No Spin on Video Games?

Ah, Morgan, your man O'Reilly here is takin' his shots close to home now, innit he? 'Course, I ain't sayin' he's all wrong now, not at all, at all. I'm just thinkin' things must be slow down in the old No Spin Zone. Oh well, they say it's a free country, so I guess it's alright then ;-)

Zombies for Scholars

Two new books for those who like to reflect on what the undead have to tell us:

• The Gospel of the Living Dead: George Romero's Visions of Hell on Earth (Baylor University Press)
• The Undead and Philosophy: Chicken Soup for the Soulless (Open Court Books)

No, I haven't read either of them yet, and Christmas break seems like the wrong time to begin a deep study of the undead. Maybe in 2007 (I can see it now, "My New Year's resolution is to read two tomes on the undead..." Some things really don't change!)

Is It Plagiarism When You Steal From Yourself?

A friend of mine (who does not read this blog) has been asking me to write a more detailed email than "hi, how are you?" The exact request was for a novella. So I obliged by writing several screens of random junk. Being an exceptionally lazy slacker, I decided to lift a few paragraphs from my epic epistle on nothing and turn them into a post. So...

I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up. My high school dreams of starving writer, Russian anarchist, or computer programmer are all pretty much beyond me now. Ditto on the elementary school kid that wanted to be a doctor. Actually, being a librarian who thinks too much isn't that bad. Eventually I may get off my lazy butt and do more work in philosophy, but until then... life's not so bad.

I drink too much. Caffeine, of course. In fact I usually tell people I run on caffeine and good intentions [editor's note: yeah, I cribbed this line from this blog. I'm lazy I tell ya!] It's more or less true (I also ingest disgusting quantities of sugar, fat and sodium). Oh, and the inside of my nose is sore.

I've been wondering about why certain things become important to us and other things don't. Why do some people like hockey and others don't? Why do I like vampires but not slashers? Why do I like mad scientists but not mad painters? Why is NASCAR an obsession for some, but others think it the most boring thing in all the world? Why do some things click with some of us, and other things with others? People are different. Sure, but why? What causes the differences? If I had a life maybe I'd stop wondering about these kinds of things.

Tangerine were the moths' heads, as fluttering and stuttering they sought the knights' fires, victims of uncertain meds, insect brains filled with lost desires.

White Christmas. Some kind of mythological event. Do we actually think the holidays will be less stressful with eight inches of white powder covering the land? Arctic lands look dead. Maybe that's the peace that White Christmas brings: the peace of the cemetery. Morbid? Not really, just wondering why we associate snow with the birthday of a kid in the Middle East.

Which is scarier: the thought that you may be crazy or the thought that you may be sane? For myself, I usually say I'm more afraid of being crazy. Sometimes I look at my thoughts, though, and hope that I'm not sane (because insanity would explain a whole lot...) The moon is waxing. It should be full around December 5. I guess that's what I'm thankful for. Full moons and internal combustion engines. Oh, and the letter "F" And, of course, my kids, my friends, my family, my acquaintances, the founders of our country, my ancestors, all modern technology (especially indoor plumbing), black and white photography, and Marie Osmond.

Busyness... we all have intimate knowledge of it

When is it busyness, and when is it being active and engaged? When is it finding peace and balance, and when is it sloth and idleness?

I saw a bumper sticker on the Internet: Don't believe everything you think. Really good advice for me, but as always YMMV.

I also saw a bumper sticker on a car on campus: So Mote It Be. Since that phrase comes from Freemasonry and is currently in use in dozens of Wiccan and other neo-pagan rituals, I find it interesting (to say the least...)

Finally, I was reminded today that in my youth I never expected to live past 25 (and apparently I'm not the only one with that delusion). Now I hope to see a century (but won't be too stressed if I don't :-) It's funny how time changes your perspective, but leaves the essential you unchanged. The ex-Infidel brought this to mind with his rechristening: Old Young Guy. I've often said that I don't feel any different than when I was thirteen. How does wisdom and experience factor into essence and consciousness? What changes, if anything, as we age?

I Don't Know About Where You're At...

...but it smells too good outside to be trapped in an office today! The temperature is perfect, the breeze is perfect, and the leafy smell of fall is perfect.

Births and (Un)death

Today my daughter turns six and my biological father turns... hmmm, I have no idea. It's a killer gorgeous autumn day. I'm armed with a glass of iced earl grey and woke up early enough to begin rebuilding my desktop computer (hopefully I'll leave it be for a while and just use the thing instead of playing tinker gnome.) Thor's day, Arthur Dent might not have ever gotten them, but I find them marvelous enough!

Currently pretending to read: Habits of the High-tech Heart by Quentin Schultze (he was on campus last week, a really nice and really smart guy) and Luck, Logic, and White Lies by Jorg Bewersdorff (I originally thought this might be a biography about me, but it's really a book on the mathematics of games, which is probably the more interesting of the possibilities.)

Kender necromancers... can you imagine the kinds of items they could pull out of their pockets? Speaking of necromancers, last month Dragon magazine ran a story on the cult of Vecna. Is it worrisome when a neutral evil cult begins to make sense? Necromancy is the biotech of a fantasy world, and like our biotech, raises the question "just because we can do something, does that mean we should?"

Choices

I suspect some of you are like me: there's more than one thing you want to be when you grow up, but you only have this one life. If you'd list the things you'd like to be and do, and then prioritize them, where on that list does your current set of life choices fall? What's preventing you from following the first choice on the list? The past is the past, and we all get to enjoy the good times and learn from the bad ones... but today is the present, the doorway to the future. Choose today, not based on where you've been or where you feel you have to be, but start planning for where you want to be. It's as easy (and as hard) as that (for the record, I'm a lazy coward, so I will not be taking my own advice; but for the rest of you, live boldly!)

Seasons Greetings

Happy Oidhche Shamhna to all of you druids, shifters, bards, and whisky drinkin' gentle-folk!

Filking My Soul Away

So I went searching to expand my filk collection this weekend. Of the dozens of songs I downloaded, two struck me deeply: one broke my heart and the other stirred my blood. Michelle Dockrey's The Girl that's Never Been stopped me cold between heartbeats and left me both sad and relieved by the end. I wasn't expecting from the title that it would be drawn from my own favorite source for my personal mythology. The other song is about Loki, and for just a moment, as I listened, my soul experienced a moment of what must have been honest pagan faith (fortunately, it died quickly and the liberal rationalist worked out a semi-convincing explanation of why I really wasn't breaking the first commandment...)

Note - the link to Loki's song I've provided is not the version I first listened to. The version I listened to over at The Filk Archive is performed by Justin Eiler. This one is by the author of the song.

Retro Geek Treasure

Yesterday at a local used bookstore I found the following item at well below Internet price:

Yes, Morgan, it has Elric and Cthulhu!

Sneak Peek

From my forthcoming compilation The Pepto Bismol Hymnal:

Jehovah's melting bowels yearn
To clasp his Ephraim to his breast.

Note, these are actually the last two lines of an old 19th century hymn.

Much Ado About Nothing

Nothing much to say, more of a "hi... I'm still here, just ain't got much to blog 'bout" (on the other hand, my friend the Lonely Infidel has finally come out of semi-retirement with a bunch of thought-provoking stuff. Go and read, I'll wait ;-) Now, on to my drivel...

Bland is as bland does. Inane factoid: my five most used applications according to Windows XP are Notepad, 7-Zip File Manager, Adobe Reader 7.0, Filezilla, and Internet Explorer. I promise you that I use Firefox far more than IE and that I use the Voyager cataloging client far more than Filezilla. I have no clue how Windows tracks these things, but then again, I have no clue about most things.

We are a strange species. We are hardwired as social animals, but our minds can become suspicious, paranoid, jaded, misanthropic, etc. We want the companionship of others, but we have the ability to learn that such companionship can lead to great pain. We have levels of trust, levels of sharing, levels of acceptable risk, yet we want to have complete trust with at least (and maybe at most!) one other. But the reality is that our minds record the failures of others and play these videos back to us enough that we hold some cards perpetually close. We become, if not full-blown sociopaths, then at least stunted in our emotional development, because we're afraid. We let our fear get in the way of empathy (but not compassion, which is too often self-serving ego stroking, rather than genuine suffering with another. But again, this judgement may just be on me. Your ego may be less egocentric than mine.) I'm basically a nice guy (don't disillusion me here!), but there's this crappy place inside me that is stubborn in its demand for self-preservation, for saying "never again!" to feeling the pain that it thinks is all-crippling (yet, paradoxically, I'm still alive...)

On reflection, maybe it *is* just me (and a handful of other fledgling mental cases). The feeling that there is some piece burned out inside, that despite medication and counseling, it's just broken ("Sometimes a thing gets broke, can't be fixed." --Kaylee Frye) Dunno. It seems a human thing to me, but most of us feel "normal" in the sense that our reality is our norm. Which gets us off on a tangent: do you ever look at people and think to yourself, "Wow, those people are nothing like me at all: their values, thought-processes, way of life is almost completely different"? And yet, at other times, no single person is a stranger. They all seem like close family members whose names I can't quite remember, but who I nevertheless find myself fond of.

Well, enough carthatic crap for one post. I'll try to come up with something clever and fun next time (or else I'll just post a bunch of quotes from Kevin Smith movies ;-)

Must...Resist... Must... Have One!

Random Crunchy Bits

• I've been playing Settlers of Catan with Rob most every Monday night since the semester started; it's a fun game of resource management.
  
• I'm half-way through a most delightful novel called Special Topics in Calamity Physics, which is not at all about physics, but very much fun nevertheless (thanks, Lisa!)
• I missed Superman Returns at the dollar theater, so now I wait for DVD.
• I dropped Slack 11 from the notebook and am playing with Ubuntu (Slack is still on my desktop... so I still get to call myself a slacker, right? ;-)
• Hamilton's Mythology is my current car book.
  
• A quote just overheard from a conversation between two student workers in the next office: "Basically it was pulled out of his butt at the last minute."

What the Teacher Might Have Said

Vanity of Vanities... all is bloody vanity. Whatever you believe, you should know that you're not 100% correct. Therefore, you are (in all likelihood, at least in part) wrong. If correct belief saves, then we are all damned. We are, at the very least, DNA, mixed during some kind of conception (whether passionate, passionless, or in a sterile machine), and propogating the information (genetic, social, mythical) until the meat machine wears out (or suffers some hideous accident.) Pleasure is a flash in the darkness, happiness a brief breeze in the harsh desert of the mind. Shopping helps, because it is, in a sad but real sense, a type of questing, a purpose (however shallow and fleeting.) But the acquisition of stuff is silly. The stuff itself rarely helps for long. Vanity. Nothing helps for long, because we are, in our own existence, utterly alone. Every quest, every joke, every song... eventually leaves us. All we know (all I know) is that there is something rather than nothing. This we ascribe to God, because all of our experience suggests that until something is {created, placed, formed, made, assembled, whatever} there is usually not that thing. Existence came from non-existence, at least, it is not non-existence. This we ascribe to God. God is the source of existence, which means God is beyond existent (trans-existent, or, in a logic-defying irony, non-existent? but still "real"... by this reckoning realer than anything that is real.) Words do not wrap around the grounding of being from non-being. Pagan gods came from already existence. They existed. God does not come from existence. We can create pagan gods, we cannot create a God beyond our sense of existence, beyond our "is", who is more real than reality as we know it (we cannot conceive of this properly.) We can only be awed that such a Being beyond being would make {him/her/it}self known to us. By clumsy words, by fingers pointing to the moon, by impossible to adequately describe experiences. Life is a snapping twig, its pleasures but for the moment, its brokenness enduring. Awe before the raw fact of existence, rather than non-existence, before the Source of that raw fact, who is known only through self-revelation, this must be the beginning of wisdom.

My apologies that this is neither coherent nor necessarily correct. Those looking for deep insight will be disappointed. Undoubtedly I'll deny writing this in the morning.

Friday the 13th... What Could Be Better?!?

Finished Lost Season 2. Very cool storytelling. Survivor meets X-Files, done as a soap opera. More twists and turns than the semi-regular DC comics reshuffling of their universes. Have no doubt that it'll end like a Shakespearean tragedy (or at the very least like Twin Peaks, a dark "How's Annie?" has to be forthcoming...)

The weather here is autumn cool, which is great! I have a stack of books to start reading this weekend, and I've got one more machine to upgrade to Slackware 11. My committment this time is use only 2.6 kernels (when running 10.2 I stayed with 2.4, consequently, my knowledge of udev and other 2.6 niceties is nil. Always a learning curve.) Amarok is a cool music player, though, so I may stay with KDE (ok, I'll play with GNOME when the dropline people get 2.16 out for 11!)

Have a Merry Weekend!

Mental Health Update

From the TMI Department:
Saw the shrink today (last scheduled visit was 8 months ago.) All is well. I'm still being medicated, but we won't have another visit for a year. He told me about the Vulture Festival held annually in Makanda, Illinois. I had no clue.

***

On other fronts, I'm crawling through Lost Season 2, reading Hamilton's Mythology, and avoiding theologically controversial topics in public forums :-)

The Argument from Inclusivism

Imagine for a moment that you were born and raised in a Muslim country (apologies if you're reading this and this is not a thought experiment for you. The majority of my regular readers were born and raised in Western Christian nations, and so this experiment is directed toward them.) So, you're a Muslim. All of the passion that you have now for Christ, you have for Allah. The joy you feel in singing hymns, you still feel, but they are Muslim hymns. You read the Koran and hear the very word of God. You are a Muslim, as is your family and loved ones. Maybe you have children, or nieces and nephews, or younger siblings. You love them, and, Allah be praised, they, too, are Muslim.

Statistically, it is unlikely that you would ever convert to Christianity (or Buddhism, or any other faith.) Most people believe what they were born into, at least culturally if not specifically what their own nuclear family believes (i.e., religious-minded Americans are likely to be some stripe of Christian.) So, you are a devout and happy Muslim, grateful to Allah that you were born into the true faith, saddened by the fact that so many around the world are not.

When you die, if evangelical Christians are right, you're going to hell. So is that son, or niece, or little sister.

How could a just and/or loving God send people to hell because of a geographical accident of birth? You may say that God isn't sending them to hell for being Muslims, but for being sinners. In the evangelical Christian take on things, everyone is going to hell because they're sinners, but God has foreordained to save those who believe in Jesus, which, for most people in the modern world, correlates very closely to accident of birth.

But, you may ask, what about missionaries? What about 'em? Can you really expect a devout Muslim in a Muslim country to take seriously a small Christian mission? How seriously do y'all take Hare Krishna?

The point is that as a native Muslim, you truly believe you know God, that you have heard His truth as revealed in His word. He hears your prayers, and sometimes answers them positively and sometimes answers them with the mystery of His silence. You are content in your faith and know in the depths of your heart that Allah is real.

If the God of Christians is real, and really created these souls (your soul, in the thought experiment) in a time and place where He knew they would not come to know Him through Jesus, how loving and just is He? Is it loving to stack the deck against some by placing them in Iraq, while bestowing the amazing grace on others of being born Southern Baptist in the Midwest of the US of A? Is it just to cosign these souls to eternal separation from God, when, to the best of their knowledge, they had a living and deep faith in Him all of their lives (even though they called Him Allah and did not accept Jesus as the savior)?

Christianity says, yes, it is loving and just of Yahweh to do just that. But try to remember, we're talking about your little brother, or your niece, or your baby girl, born Muslim, dying Muslim. Spending eternity in hell, not for telling God to sod off, but for being wrong.

Ponderable

"To know the things that are not, and cannot be, but have been imagined and believed, is the most curious chapter in the annals of man."

--William Godwin, Lives of the Necromancers

Just a Little Bit of Now

Sailing through day three of a stupid headache... found someone who's lending me Lost Season 2 (w00t!)... am currently reading (and thoroughly enjoying) two books by atheists extolling the virtues of their non-belief... loving this cool autumn weather... brought back my brother's comic book collection from the road trip last weekend, some small core of which was mine before college, but most of the collection is, or was, his. no worries, he's still alive, just passing the books along (now, what am I going to do with 'em?!?)... broke, tired, in pain, but overall in good spirits. Who'da thunk?

Entropy and Evil

I learned today that renowned author and all around good guy John M. Ford has passed away. I never met Mr. Ford, but he was good friends with my literary hero Neil Gaiman. For the Treksters among us, you may remember his novels The Final Reflection and How Much for Just the Planet? Each star that falls dims the night sky that much more. Like the rest of you, I a-wait the dawn.

A few minutes ago I learned that a colleague at another school has left his position. I've only met him a couple of times at workshops that he has presented. He's a nationally recognized guru in a certain area of librarianship. He's also a kind and generous person who recently has lost his wife to cancer. I hope that wherever he ends up he will find peace and happiness.

Tonight marks the midpoint of this year's Strauss lectureship (an annual lectureship that brings well-known scholars to campus to lecture on various aspects of Christian worldview thinking). Dr. Paul Copan has been speaking about "Evil and the Cross of Christ." It's been interesting, but I don't envy anyone who has to speak about the problem of evil. I don't think I'll ever be able to answer the why questions that cry out from the broken human heart. I can sympathize and weep with you, but I'm as clueless as the next as to why things go the way they go. Might be why I'm in the library and not lecturing in the classroom (of course, as an homage to futility, I continue to beat my head against the brick wall of the questions; I really like psychological concussions!)

Death, life changes, the mysteries of suffering and hell. Is this what the human mind was created for? I hope not, and I have the laughter of my children, the jokes of friends, the beauty of nature to smile with. But my children also cry, and someday will cry and I will not be able to console them. My friends jokes will either turn cruel, or turn to tears, or just fade away. All of nature is double-edged: wind, water, earth, sun... they all are destroyers when they are not being agents of delight. I sit on the edge and am overwhelmed by the ravages of time, the inevitability of the abyss. All I can do is have faith, a faith I do not deserve, but one that was given to me nevertheless. God is funny, in exactly the kind of way an all-holy, transcendent being might be funny. But I am grateful, I may not even understand what I am grateful for, but I am grateful for it anyway (yeah, I may not be making much sense right now, but I suspect there's something true here.) My hopes are with each of you, as you make your way through the happy days and dark nights, that you will become increasingly aware of the gifts you have to be grateful for, even the ones you're only vaguely aware of...

Slackware 11.0

It's finally out!!!

Ours goes to eleven!

My List of Essential (Free) Software for Windows

When I set up a Windows machine, I always install certain programs. You probably do, too.

OpenOffice.org - a free alternative to Microsoft Office, comes with a spreadsheet, word processor, presentation program, database, and more. You may want to install the Java runtime environment in order to have 100% functionality. OpenOffice.org will read and save in Microsoft formats.

Firefox - if you're reading this blog with Internet Explorer, consider Firefox. Internet Explorer 7 actually looks pretty cool, but Firefox is my browser of choice. I like tab browsing, cool extensions, and the logo is much cooler than a big blue "e"

Thunderbird - my email program, brought to you by the fine folk at Mozilla (makers of Firefox)

EditPad Lite - I need to edit text files. You may not. If you do, ditch Notepad and grab EditPad Lite. Most of my blog entries are written in EditPad Lite before I post them.

Adobe Acrobat Reader - an increasingly larger number of documents I find myself reading are PDFs. I've used other PDF readers, but Adobe's is still the best for my money.

7-Zip - a much better compression program than the one that came with Windows. It also supports a much wider range of formats.

Python - a programming language. No, I don't know python, but I'm old enough to remember when PCs all came with a programming language (some dialect of BASIC). Python seems like an appropriate replacement, and it's a constant reminder that I need to play with (er, learn) it.

Dosbox - a very nice MS-DOS emulator, because I haven't quite finished all of my old DOS games yet...

Nethack - before there were graphics, there were rogue-like games (um, called such because they all descended from a common ancestor, an ancient game called... Rogue). Nethack is a rogue-like game with a graphical tileset (that means pictures of things instead of textual representation. You'll like the game better with graphics :-) It's more complex than it seems at first glance, a more elegant game for a more civilized age. Oh, it's a dungeon crawl (if you're wondering what, exactly "nethack" is about.)


Frotz - a program for playing old Infocom-like text adventures, such as Zork, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, and Leather Goddesses of Phobos. A number of recent titles have been produced by a small, dedicated community of text adventure fans (although the current term is "interactive fiction" rather than "text adventure.")

So, what do you always install on your machines? (and, for the rabidly curious, yes, I also put all of this stuff on my Linux machines ;-)

Weekend Update

I had the joy of representing the library at a book sale this weekend. A minister from Southern Illinois was selling some 4,000 books (he's moving into a smaller house, and something had to go! Not to worry, he's still keeping at least as much as he sold.) It was a lot of fun, and I had the privilege of helping unload the truck and set up. I was able to pick up a few things the library might need (and, yes, I did some personal shopping... the phrase "conflict of interest" just isn't part of my vocabulary ;-) I also ran into an old friend from high school (who says to tell Morgan "hi!")

I made a weekend out of it by driving the extra little bit of distance to stay with one of my sisters. I saw three siblings (and their various spouses and children), so that was cool. I like my siblings a whole lot (even though I tend to leave early, but that's just me: if there's a road ahead, I'm itching to get on it...)

I wasted $2 on renting Lost Season 2 Disc 1. I say wasted, because it seems that I've seen some of season 2 already. Apparently JDC recorded a few episodes of season 2 and passed them my way. Now I've got to figure out whether I've already seen all of disc 2 or not. Knowing what's coming ruins a lot of the experience of the show (translated, it has a very low rewatch factor in my book; I can't imagine buying it on DVD!)

Well, the work day's a-startin'! Later...