Thursday, January 29, 2009
January Monthly connection
The issue of man versus woman, flower versus beast, sand versus dirt, and hammer versus nail the list continues I could go on for many days probably. But to close in on the point, the book Thousand Splendid Suns addresses this issue from the perspective of Afghanistan culture. The importance of equality is the point that this book tries to push across to the reader. The main male role is a wife beating husband who gets killed by one of his wives, obviously what the author is trying to say is that women should not be treated the way that he husband treated his wives so abusively. I have to agree just on the fact that they did nothing wrong yet revived punishment, this is not justice. I feel that grace and mercy balanced with objective judgment is the key to a good relationship, not violence. But the issue of equality is still presented in the aspect of even if people are different should they be treated the same. If a person has a mental handicap we must treat them different if we treat them the same then we are criticized. If there is a Spanish student who is in English class they get extra help even answers, where is the equality in that. Yet there must also be compassion for situations. So I feel that there is an absolute truth that can be applied but that no one person can completely understand it, that is why there are things such as “cultural relativism”, and why the world is screwed. We cannot treat people equal because they are different but we must be compassionate to our fellow man and it is no excuse for undeserved suffering.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
"Hurtling Toward Oblivion"
The end of the world. When will it arrive how will it arrive is it upon us? These are questions that every generation has asked. In Richard Swenson's "Hurtling Toward Oblivion" he makes a compelling arguments for the answers to these questions.
Swenson’s focuses on the concepts of profusion and progress and the relationship between the two. He shows progress leads to profusion, and the expediential rate at which they grow. The expediential rate is the basis of his thesis and the fact that when dealing with expediential equations a lot happens very fast as the graph moves in accordance with time. Compared to history progress is happening and growing at such an outstanding rate one is obligated to see that we are quite far along on this expediential graph, Swenson being convinced near the end of what the world system can take, for there is a limit this is undisputed. To illustrate the magnitude of exponential change he uses the following example;
“The Pacific Ocean spans sixty-four million square miles and, on average, is 14,000 feet deep. If all the continents of the world were placed inside it, there would still be room for another Asia…. Assume that the Pacific dried up and it was our job to fill it. If we began with a single drop of water and continued doubling the amount…..”
It would take only eighty doublings to fill it, and at the seventieth doubling it is only 0.1% full. This type of exponentially is found in such things as life expectancy, health care expenditures (U.S.), Gross Domestic Product (U.S.), air miles traveled and world population just to name a few of the examples given in the book. Going with the example the numbers show we must be nearing the eightieth doubling. Regional break downs of systems only support the numbers, widespread disease, genocide, economical crises political turmoil show what happens when the profusion expands past what the system can handle.
The reason for progress and profusion causing such negative results is simple; nothing is ever perfect in this world. Progress is a double edge sword that most fail to recognize as such. Progress has provided an environment for bad things to occur, with more progress it gets easier and easier for the bad things to happen. Take an evil dictator, with a nod of his head he can launch a nuclear weapon killing many people had this dictator been in control 1000 years earlier he would only have a spear in his hand, progress has allowed an environment where evil is easier. Another example of this is the advancement of medicine. It allows for human who would die to live and pass on a mutated gene. I would put money on the fact that cancer was cause by humans going against natural selection and using our brain to our “advantage”.
The problem is that progress cannot be reversed or stopped it is a natural thing that will not end until the world is over. So what do we do? I say enjoy the present and find the truth about what happens after death because there is only imperfection and suffering here. Not to say that there is no love, happiness or joy there is but it doesn’t come without hate, pain and suffering. I am a planer so I want to make the best plan and it seems a waste of time to invest to much in this world because it’s just about to crash and burn.
Swenson’s focuses on the concepts of profusion and progress and the relationship between the two. He shows progress leads to profusion, and the expediential rate at which they grow. The expediential rate is the basis of his thesis and the fact that when dealing with expediential equations a lot happens very fast as the graph moves in accordance with time. Compared to history progress is happening and growing at such an outstanding rate one is obligated to see that we are quite far along on this expediential graph, Swenson being convinced near the end of what the world system can take, for there is a limit this is undisputed. To illustrate the magnitude of exponential change he uses the following example;
“The Pacific Ocean spans sixty-four million square miles and, on average, is 14,000 feet deep. If all the continents of the world were placed inside it, there would still be room for another Asia…. Assume that the Pacific dried up and it was our job to fill it. If we began with a single drop of water and continued doubling the amount…..”
It would take only eighty doublings to fill it, and at the seventieth doubling it is only 0.1% full. This type of exponentially is found in such things as life expectancy, health care expenditures (U.S.), Gross Domestic Product (U.S.), air miles traveled and world population just to name a few of the examples given in the book. Going with the example the numbers show we must be nearing the eightieth doubling. Regional break downs of systems only support the numbers, widespread disease, genocide, economical crises political turmoil show what happens when the profusion expands past what the system can handle.
The reason for progress and profusion causing such negative results is simple; nothing is ever perfect in this world. Progress is a double edge sword that most fail to recognize as such. Progress has provided an environment for bad things to occur, with more progress it gets easier and easier for the bad things to happen. Take an evil dictator, with a nod of his head he can launch a nuclear weapon killing many people had this dictator been in control 1000 years earlier he would only have a spear in his hand, progress has allowed an environment where evil is easier. Another example of this is the advancement of medicine. It allows for human who would die to live and pass on a mutated gene. I would put money on the fact that cancer was cause by humans going against natural selection and using our brain to our “advantage”.
The problem is that progress cannot be reversed or stopped it is a natural thing that will not end until the world is over. So what do we do? I say enjoy the present and find the truth about what happens after death because there is only imperfection and suffering here. Not to say that there is no love, happiness or joy there is but it doesn’t come without hate, pain and suffering. I am a planer so I want to make the best plan and it seems a waste of time to invest to much in this world because it’s just about to crash and burn.
Monday, January 26, 2009
Who is Man- good or evil?
Biblical view-
Man was created innocent in the garden. Then there was the fall with the disobedience. This is a fall into evil and as evil we are destined to Hell if no change occurs as God is perfect and evil cannot exist in his presence. The change is the acceptance of Jesus Christ as God Son, sent as a sacrificial lamb who lived the perfect life died and rose again conquering death. If this redemption is accepted then man can change into the redeemed who is destined for another change into a being in heaven. However just because man has been redeemed does not mean he has be rid his sinful nature from the fall. This is what creates the Cosmic Battle Within. On one side of the ring is sinful nature in the other corner is the sprit that enters us at the point of redemption. Therefore the redeemed are not absolved of responsibility of sin, in fact it becomes harder.
World View-
There is nothing outside of the “box” it is just what we can sense, there is no true god. Naturalistic Philosophy implications, if man is but a material beast, having nothing beyond the evolutionary cosmic particles, then we must conclude about man that he has no purpose beyond himself and can have no meaning in life. He can have no free will, there is nothing beyond the grave and he cannot be basically good as what he is made of is the same as whatever he would call bad, so he is just as much good as bad. No free will. We are just as much human as pig, as ant, as dog.
“As far as I know we just don’t have any intrinsic instincts for evil.”- Abraham Maslow. So where does evil come from? He admits that it exists but contradicts himself in that we come from evil yet we have no “intrinsic instincts”. Maslow says less than 2% of the population will become self actualized. That is a good thing. As humans are naturally evil if they base their lives off their inner motivations they are going to do some bad things. Basic question that only biblical view can answer is “where does evil come from?”.
Pernicious lie of our society- Follow own needs, it is all about me, I am basically good so what is the harm in doing what I want.
Man was created innocent in the garden. Then there was the fall with the disobedience. This is a fall into evil and as evil we are destined to Hell if no change occurs as God is perfect and evil cannot exist in his presence. The change is the acceptance of Jesus Christ as God Son, sent as a sacrificial lamb who lived the perfect life died and rose again conquering death. If this redemption is accepted then man can change into the redeemed who is destined for another change into a being in heaven. However just because man has been redeemed does not mean he has be rid his sinful nature from the fall. This is what creates the Cosmic Battle Within. On one side of the ring is sinful nature in the other corner is the sprit that enters us at the point of redemption. Therefore the redeemed are not absolved of responsibility of sin, in fact it becomes harder.
World View-
There is nothing outside of the “box” it is just what we can sense, there is no true god. Naturalistic Philosophy implications, if man is but a material beast, having nothing beyond the evolutionary cosmic particles, then we must conclude about man that he has no purpose beyond himself and can have no meaning in life. He can have no free will, there is nothing beyond the grave and he cannot be basically good as what he is made of is the same as whatever he would call bad, so he is just as much good as bad. No free will. We are just as much human as pig, as ant, as dog.
“As far as I know we just don’t have any intrinsic instincts for evil.”- Abraham Maslow. So where does evil come from? He admits that it exists but contradicts himself in that we come from evil yet we have no “intrinsic instincts”. Maslow says less than 2% of the population will become self actualized. That is a good thing. As humans are naturally evil if they base their lives off their inner motivations they are going to do some bad things. Basic question that only biblical view can answer is “where does evil come from?”.
Pernicious lie of our society- Follow own needs, it is all about me, I am basically good so what is the harm in doing what I want.
Saturday, January 17, 2009
Good Things
What are good things? To me something that is good is something that evokes a positive emotion. But why is it so hard sometimes to get this emotion, free of the negative emotions that the positive are bonded to. This is where I can see the adage "ignorance is Bliss" have some merit. For if one is ignorant of the negative emotions then they only experience the positive- enjoying a life of bliss. The problem is that true ignorance is does not exist. For if we are free human beings (speaking in an American backdrop, for more ignorance occurs when a culture is immersed in bondage but we won’t go there now). So if we are free human beings we are not truly ignorant as freedom is knowledge. Granted there are levels of ignorance, and I feel the more ignorant you are the happier you can be. That is when putting equal amounts of energy into something. For a person who has the capability to think will understand the concept of consequences and how EVERY action can have a negative consequence. This statement is difficult for the thinking man to overcome. For that is like telling him to kill one man in order to save his brother. The one man is the negative consequence the positive is his brother is saved. An ignorant man kills the other guy for he doesn’t comprehend the negative aspect of taking another man’s life, a man that was created equal in the image of God. So the ignorant kills and doesn’t feel the negative emotion due to ignorance and just experiences the positive emotions. The thinking man understands death, and therefore struggles with the choice. This struggle will not allow him to experience the positive emotion to the fullest. Therefore either way he chooses he fails, simply because he thinks. This leads me to wonder why advancement is so great; it just sets us up for failure. Take medicine for an example. The human race would probably become extinct without medicine; it is a crutch that we will never be able to remove. If we had no corrective lenses we wouldn’t be able to see and would die being blind how can one get food or avoid dangers, they couldn’t and would perish. But the fact that we would all die without medicine and technology is a mute point because we can’t go back now it is too late. But is a philosophical point, how great is advancement look where it has put us, more vulnerable and susceptible to dangers than ever before. So why is it stressed so much in our society? I am not trying to provide answers I am just pondering over the problem. I do not feel there is an answer and maybe everyone has seen this problem realized there is no answer and moved on a long time ago and I’m just the slow guy. I don’t know, I just feel like ignoring the problem isn’t the answer cause we cannot be truly ignorant, if we were that’s different, be we aren’t. so we need to man up see the problem and well I don’t know it’s like the man choosing the other guy or his brother what do you do? No one has the answer to this dilemma and this is why no one has the answer to the individual issues of how to experience good things better and more often. So if there is no answer to the big thing then there can be none to the little, and we must give up. Thankfully I have found something rather someone called God, in whom the answer is found for he is outside the box. Everything I have said thus far has been logic and reasoning inside the box of this world. But the answer is found outside. I can only speak for myself in all of this for it is a personal quest to obtain contentment in the problems and flaws of this world.
Friday, January 16, 2009
Who Are We?
Who I am, who you are and who anyone is, can be defined many different ways; but first and for most is our name. Names are particular to a person; it is the first step in creating an identity. Yet it is completely out of the person’s control. A person’s last name and sometimes even their first name are already decided before their birth. The implications of a person’s last name are great. The most obvious is genetic s, which defines how we look, or what we are. How much control does a person who is born with Downs Syndrome or Cystic Fibrosis have over their life? Then there is also the other side of the spectrum with professional athletes who are born with huge physical advantages, or geniuses who are born with a larger than average mental capability. Granted these are the tails on the bell curve, but does it not also show that the mere concept of being in the “bell” or on a “tail” is also out of our control? A last name also tells of the family situation the person will grow up in. This situation impacts who a person is through what type of morals and character will be taught to the child. All of our actions are based on our morals, or what we believe. A name impacts both our outer and inner person.
Another inherited aspect of life that applies is the social/economic class that a person is born into. The place a person is from can have a large impact on this constraint. Compare a person who is born into a middle class suburban family and one who is born into a low income housing project. For the first eighteen years of life, a person is confined to the situation they are born into, and have very little control over how to change it. A main contributing factor to this would be education. As the typical person has no control over their primary education, and with education being so valuable in one’s ability to have control in the decisions in their life, it is easy to see how little control a person has. Yes, there are stories of people who fail having had every opportunity, and people who succeed without opportunities, but these are outliers. These outliers probably occurred due to an event that had the same chance of occurring or not. For example, a student in a poor school has equal chance of getting a teacher who expands their mind or not. In either case, the outcome seems out of the student’s control.
When the bigger picture is examined; the culture, government and era that we are born into are completely out of our control. I have been blessed with the freedoms of America, but were I to have been born in North Korea how different I would be. Would I still have my Christian faith, would I spend so much of my time pondering how to make the government better? I cannot say I think this would be the case. Then there is culture. American culture is very materialistic in comparison to a third world country where the average citizen is just trying to stay alive. The era we are born in greatly affects who we are and how we view the world. If I was born in Georgia in 1820 I would have most likely been a supporter of slavery. I feel slavery is wrong today, but how much of that is what I believe and how much of it comes from the era I was born in, an era of equality.
The general populous is set on a track for their life from the moment they are born. So much of who we are is out of our control, yet so much value is placed on decisions. Maybe because every choice is a chance to take control. What I can say for certain is that I am fortunate and humbled at the situation that I have been born into. I have a wonderful family, a comfortable lifestyle where I have plenty of luxuries but they do not come without hard work. I have the opportunity of a fantastic education, and live in a time and culture where love for fellow man is free to roam. Due to this, I have chosen to live my life and the decisions I do get to make , by the adage “to those that much has been given much is expected”.
Another inherited aspect of life that applies is the social/economic class that a person is born into. The place a person is from can have a large impact on this constraint. Compare a person who is born into a middle class suburban family and one who is born into a low income housing project. For the first eighteen years of life, a person is confined to the situation they are born into, and have very little control over how to change it. A main contributing factor to this would be education. As the typical person has no control over their primary education, and with education being so valuable in one’s ability to have control in the decisions in their life, it is easy to see how little control a person has. Yes, there are stories of people who fail having had every opportunity, and people who succeed without opportunities, but these are outliers. These outliers probably occurred due to an event that had the same chance of occurring or not. For example, a student in a poor school has equal chance of getting a teacher who expands their mind or not. In either case, the outcome seems out of the student’s control.
When the bigger picture is examined; the culture, government and era that we are born into are completely out of our control. I have been blessed with the freedoms of America, but were I to have been born in North Korea how different I would be. Would I still have my Christian faith, would I spend so much of my time pondering how to make the government better? I cannot say I think this would be the case. Then there is culture. American culture is very materialistic in comparison to a third world country where the average citizen is just trying to stay alive. The era we are born in greatly affects who we are and how we view the world. If I was born in Georgia in 1820 I would have most likely been a supporter of slavery. I feel slavery is wrong today, but how much of that is what I believe and how much of it comes from the era I was born in, an era of equality.
The general populous is set on a track for their life from the moment they are born. So much of who we are is out of our control, yet so much value is placed on decisions. Maybe because every choice is a chance to take control. What I can say for certain is that I am fortunate and humbled at the situation that I have been born into. I have a wonderful family, a comfortable lifestyle where I have plenty of luxuries but they do not come without hard work. I have the opportunity of a fantastic education, and live in a time and culture where love for fellow man is free to roam. Due to this, I have chosen to live my life and the decisions I do get to make , by the adage “to those that much has been given much is expected”.
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