Before I say the first word about politics, I need to be clear that I'm neither a registered Democrat or Republican; I am a independent voter who holds both political parties in pretty much equal disdain. They don't even bother trying to represent me in Washington. I'd love to be able to think of myself as a liberal -- it sounds wonderful, at least in principle. Some of the synonyms for the word 'liberal' are generous, abundant, copious, and plentiful. And of course, the antonyms for liberal include intolerant, stingy, narrow-minded, mean, and greedy. Really...who wants to be thought of as mean, or intolerant? I certainly don't. But the problem with self-identifying as a liberal is that the political ideology and the dictionary definition of the word appear to have very little in common with each other. Now people who know me personally know that I'm not really a confrontational sort of person, but neither am I the "go along to get along" sort of person, either. I'm about ten times more likely to initiate a conversation about the upcoming football season for the Georgia Bulldogs than politics or religion, but I'm also not shy about expressing my opinions or correcting the record whenever it seems necessary. I have this very annoying tendency of stubbornly refusing to concede that I could be wrong about something in lieu of better evidence. I'm also very unlikely to simply take your word for anything if the argument from authority has been invoked. Naturally, being radically liberal is a political orientation, not a religious one. It has been my experience … [Read more...]
Home Improvement(s)
When we bought our new house earlier this year, we realized several significant projects would need to be completed before we could relax and truly call this "home." Of course we needed a fence so our dogs wouldn't roam all over the neighborhood, and the Chamblee Fence Company recently completed an outstanding installation -- this is the first fence I have ever owned that the gates can only be left open if they are held or blocked, perfectly positioned so that they will automatically swing shut and close, a feat previously only managed post-installation, with a special hinge from Home Depot. There is nothing that will put fear into the heart of a pet owner quite like discovering an open gate when their dogs have been outside, enjoying the yard. Chamblee Fence has been in business longer than I've been alive for a very good reason. The fence came after the rotted old timber retaining wall was ripped out and replaced the incredible crew at Bentley's Nursery and Stone Yard. When professional engineers have highly recommended their professional work, it was an added bonus that Bentley's quote was considerably less than other estimates, and the quality was obviously exceptional. Check out the before... and after pictures! My final project was one that we decided to tackle ourselves, even though I need my fingers for typing, and hammers tend to place them at risk. Therefore my solution for the construction … [Read more...]
Demonic possession
The material world is often called the "real" world by strict materialists, who believe anything and everything can be explained away as natural phenomena. In the mind of a strict materialist, a personal experience with ghosts must be explainable as either an optical illusion or figment of the imagination, but never as the disembodied mind or spirit of a dead person, no matter what sort of evidence has been offered. Strict materialists don't believe in God, Satan, angels, demons, ghosts, or any other type of supernatural phenomena. I do, but I would never dream of trying to convince a strict materialist that Scott Patterson's ghost story was true. I wasn't there. I wouldn't even try to convince a strict materialist that my own personal ghost stories are true. Although the experiences documented in my writing constituted empirical evidence of supernatural phenomena collected via the scientific method, they are merely anecdotes to any third parties. It is rational, and logical to immediately seek a "natural" explanation for an inexplicable...until you run out of possible explanations that don't defy all logic and reason. All I would say to the strict materialist is this: when you run out of other options to explain some phenomena, leave open the possibility of a supernatural explanation. Don't completely rule out anything without evidence, or a better explanation. Even though Jesus implies that ghosts exist in the Bible when he differentiates between the characteristics of a ghost to his resurrected form, the strict materialist will not accept that as legitimate … [Read more...]
Hope without faith
Recently a friend of mine had an exchange on the internet with an atheist during which he asked what compelling evidence for an omnipotent (supernatural) deity might change the atheist's mind. My friend received this answer in reply: If all the stars were rearranged in the sky to spell "this is God communicating with you" and that everyone around the world could see it in their own language at the same time, then that would really make me change my mind. It's a good thing, knowing the standard for evidence of God has been set so low! (For the tone deaf, that was practically dripping with sarcasm.) I wondered to myself: does this person apply the same level of skepticism to climate change, or the theory of evolution? Was this person even being serious? After all, sciency types and the evangelists of scientism like to huff and puff about insufficient evidence for belief in a supernatural God, but they typically become quite vague or absurd when asked what it would specifically take to pass their personal threshold of disbelief. Then I remembered the wisdom of G.K. Chesterton, who said, "When men choose not to believe in God, they do not thereafter believe in nothing, they then become capable of believing in anything." At some point it occurred to me that this particular atheist might be thinking of author Douglas Adams as some sort of god. The evidence requested can be found on the pages of Adams's classic novel The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. However, in that hilarious book, God's message was not conveyed to humanity by reorganizing stars to spell words, … [Read more...]
Bill Nye, the sciency guy
Before I get started with this post, let me first say that I was a big fan of "Bill Nye, the Science Guy" when my kids were young -- anything remotely educational was better than "Pokemon" or "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" -- cartoons that weren't mercifully killing brain cells, they were torturing them to death. It's virtually impossible to dislike the public persona. As an added benefit was the catchy jingle for the show intro: "Bill Nye the science guy -- Bill! Bill! Bill! Bill!" turned out to be infinitely more pleasant to have permanently etched into your brain than "...heroes on a half shell - Turtle power!" However, even back then I realized that Bill Nye was not actually a science guy, but a television personality playing the role of a science educator of young children. Bill Nye had been an engineer before he entered the world of entertainment as a stand-up comic. "Bill Nye the Science Guy" was literally born on a comedy ensemble show -- it was a character he created that turned out to be a long running joke that people now take very seriously. At a website called Big Think where Nye answers questions from viewers, he is listed in their roster of "experts" as Television Host and Science Educator -- and that catchy, rhyming title of "Bill Nye the Science Guy" appears to give him instant credibility. Basically, Bill Nye merely regurgitates what he's learned from reading popular science books and tries to sound really smart while occasionally reminding his followers that he once was a student of Carl Sagan, presumably to borrow from Sagan's credibility as … [Read more...]
