One tiny step in the shoes of Martin Luther

Questioning something that people have believed like, forever, can be hard. However, sometimes a man can feel so strongly about the sanctity of truth that he has no option but to do so. While ever this is merely a theoretical exercise, people seem happy to accept and ignore the fact you believe something that might be different to them, or to the church you attend. When you act on the basis of that belief, suddenly the world goes crazy. You actually believe what you said you believe? Crazy talk!

I know a story of a man who did that. On a scale that I find it hard to comprehend. In a time when there was one spiritual Christian authority in the Roman Catholic church who held not only the belief that they were the only authority on truth, but had linguistically locked up the only means by which you might be able to test that, he stood up and said "Your doctrine on salvation is wrong", challenging the authority of the papal structure of the time. I don't know how modern-day Catholics feel about Martin Luther and the Reformation, but it seems to me it would be a fairly big deal even today. Even if they acknowledged corruption in the church at the time, they'd have to think that on at least some level Martin Luther had it wrong, I would think. I could be wrong. But for me as a member of a church that formed from the linage of the Protestant movement, what he did directly relates to the way I live out my faith today. Truth, it would seem, is a big deal.

It seems almost blasphemous to compare my trivial matter to this. I believe something my church does not. In the context of my church as an institution, it's a ripple in a pond. If they tomorrow were to accept what I thought, it would not destroy the underpinnings of Baptist..ism. If they don't agree (right or wrong), it doesn't mean they're walking in some great fallacy that will cause millions to miss something vital to salvation. But for me, I see it as true which makes it a big deal to me. And my church are not happy for me to believe that, at least if I'm actually going to believe it. I cannot lead people in any capacity if I'm going to lead them while holding this belief. For my church, that's not an acceptable situation, and I can appreciate that. At the same time, I'm being ostracised for thinking for myself. So far, I have had my loyalty, honour, commitment, and motives questioned. I expect more.

BUT (and it's a bold, capitalised one), I'm not so proud as to believe I couldn't be wrong. I could be. It has happened before, and this is why I haven't explained the what and why of all of this. To do so publicly and then find out I was wrong would be devastating for me, as it may mean other people would start to think the same because of me.

What I did want to say was this:

I'm genuinely seeking truth from the Bible about what God actually says to His people. This morning, I sat and prayed for divine leading, and then read Matthew 1 through 3. Tomorrow I'll do the same and start at Matthew 4 and read from there. When I get to the end of Revelation, I'm going to go back to Genesis and read from there. This to me seems the best way to approach this. I'm asking God to show me. Asking that if I've got it wrong, He will point me at what is right. Surely, surely where you're asking questions about something you've been taught, to go back to simply the word of God is the best, if not only way to find what is actually true.

A Collection of MiniPosts

So I have some medium-size things to say, and I wanted to put them in a post all together. I've gone back and read posts from my blog in the past in the same way one might look at photos from years gone by. It can be revealing, or cathartic, or surprising, or a number of other fancy words. Basically, it's why I'm putting these thoughts together.

Someone Is Wrong On The Internet!
I've just spent my evening writing to someone I don't know to try and convince them of something they didn't ask to be convinced about, because it's something that is important to me. Not a religious argument, btw. Just something that reflects a little on me, so I wanted to advocate on behalf of those like me. Cryptic enough? ;) Anyway... I wonder sometimes why I care so much about what random strangers think of me.

Internet Dating Is Unfun
I'm paying far too much money to make new "friends", where the inverted commas define a class of person with whom I've had a couple of coffees and conversations, whom I've parted on good terms with, but who doesn't really want to pursue things any further. It's nice that it's friendly, but it's gut-wrenchingly soul-destroying that I am clearly predisposed toward being in the "friend zone". It's like my teenage years all over again, without anywhere near the degree of opportunity. Maybe I need a wingman...

Fat People Are Less Likely To Get Married (statistical fact)
Reference: http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM199309303291406
I'd heard this before, but had to find the reference. I think there are other studies that find the same conclusions.
So this one is hard to come to grips with, but I've thought about it lots and it does make sense. Yes, to express it in cliché: true beauty comes from within. But when you first meet someone, that person in your mind consists of perhaps 90% how they look, and maybe 10% the conversation you've had with them. Over time, as you get to know the person more, the character attributes they possess, their interests, etc., make up more of the picture, and so someone who is physically unattractive can still be found quite attractive by a member of the opposite gender based on who they are as a whole. But if you are dating outside of your normal social circle, it's not uncommon to decide after a date or two whether or not you want to continue seeing someone. And really, how you feel about that person is based fairly heavily on their appearance. This all sounds quite shallow (and let's face it - it is), but being on the statistical downside of this particular factoid, I can see that there's not going to be any changing it. And I can see that I'm doing it as much as anyone else. It's just how it is, but interesting to consider how we behave in this context.


Unrecovery
I made the following statement to my psychologist (gasp! yes, I see a psychologist occasionally):

"From my observation, a person in my situation who doesn't find their way into a new relationship doesn't recover."

She asked me a few questions about this: What situation? Any relationship? Define "recover"? When I'd answered, she rephrased the statement slightly to pinpoint what I was talking about. Something like:

"From my observation, a person who has lost a satisfying long-term committed relationship against their desire, who does not find another committed, long-term relationship, does not return to the level of emotional satisfaction they had prior to the loss." (my rather haphazard paraphrase - I don't remember the exact words now)

After saying this, she sat there and thought for a minute, and then said:

"I'd agree with that."

This both makes perfect sense, and also flies in the face of a lot of the well-meaning advice I've got along the way. Specifically, the advice that I need to "be happy on my own" in order to be emotionally healthy enough to not be on my own. Quite obviously when you're in a long term relationship, you clear other stuff out of the way to make room for it. You compromise. Sacrifice. Change plans, and make plans. When it's removed, you're not the same person you were prior, and can't just go back to being fine on your own. Ever. You have two choices: make do, or fill the gap. People make do a lot. They throw things into the gap that hide its size for a little bit. Maybe. But ultimately, there's something not right whether they'll admit it or not, and everyone else can see it.
I find often I feel bad for wanting to get married again as more than just a casual aside. I actually really want to, and am keen to persue it as a goal. But it's almost like it's socially unacceptable to be that guy or girl. The word "desperate" comes to mind. I'm not desperate. Just tired of tripping over the gap all the time.

Internet Dating Is Unfun, Part 2
Clearly, eHarmony has decided that I'm an outdoorsy kind of person, and that I should only meet other outdoorsy people.

...

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA...

...

forever alone

Sleep, or lack thereof

I'm finding it hard to get to bed at a decent hour. This can be traced to the following:

• My Playstation and Mass Effect 2
• Sites that deliver a random funny image every time you click a button
• General lack of motivation
• Writing blog posts

The problem is, tomorrow I will regret it. Again. Just like last time.

Also, I generated a meme:

That is all.

Conciousness

So I've been thinking about conciousness. What makes our experience of life work? Personally, I believe it's something external - the human soul, that is joined to our physical experience in a simular vein to how things work in The Matrix. The bit of us that makes us who we are isn't tied to the same 3 (4?) dimensional world that our bodies are. I like to think of it being like our brain is an interface that our soul is plugged into.

However, I was thinking about conciousness as a product of merely a physical brain, and I can't resolve some ideas. These all revolve around the experience of the person rather then external person looking on. For example, if conciousness was purely physical, I should be able to walk into a room, copy myself exactly (technology permitting) and have the clone walk out and go on with my life as if they were me - because from their perspective, they ARE me (with not much gramatical sense either). However, even though they feel as though their conciousness has been continuous, I know that they are a copy. To everyone looking on, I've walked into a room, and I've walked back out. So is it really me? Well, no - because I can then also walk out of the room. But while I'm in the room, doing nothing, experiencing nothing... say I'm asleep or unconcious or something... is the clone "really" me? It's the me having the experience of being concious, but my conciousness has stopped - I'm unconcious. Or if you'd like to argue that unconciousness is not really no conciousness, then say the me in the room dies. Is the clone, who wasn't the original me, now the real me?

You may note there's been movies that has explored this idea like The 6th Day, or The Island, and The Matrix does the most well-known job of exploring the idea of a reality above this one, although I'm personally rather partial to The 13th Floor. The ideas are around, but as scientific research moves forward I wonder if anyone has actually considered this to an appropriate level. Say you could deconstruct someone's matter and reconstruct it somewhere else - a common science fiction idea that is being worked on in real science. From an external viewpoint, there appears to be no adverse side-effects, as the person on the other end appears externally to be the person who was deconstructed. But who is to say that the person on the sending end didn't die - that is, their experience of conciousness stopped at the point they were deconstructed. How could you tell?

Just something I've been thinking about...

The Church of Faith-Based Science

I've been struggling lately with the emergence of science as a substitute for a belief in God, and the promotion of said belief system. While adherents will deny it adamantly, the belief that humans have the capasity and facility to understand the universe from an external perspective I believe requires as much faith as a belief in God, as if you follow the logic of that idea through, it very quickly becomes infinitely recursive, as it would require us to have a capasity to fully understand ourselves and all our understanding, which in turn would require us to have the capasity to understand ourselves and all our understanding, etc. etc. Presently, the issue of this recursion is resolved with a simple "it just is", which people choose to believe. The same result is used to explain away the advent of life, and the understanding of what it means to be concious, as well as my personal favorite, where did the empty space come from? Whenever something is finite, it must be contained by something else yes? So what contains the now-believed-to-be-finite universe? Ah, we don't know - but obviously something does.

The argument against the existance of God is that his existance can't be proved using experiments which produce consistant results. Possible results are all-encompasing, and therefore aren't real experiments, which leads scientists to believe God to be "made up" as his nature isn't testable. However, that doesn't prove God doesn't exist.
In a recent video I watched of a Q&A with Richard Dawkins, someone said to him:
"The problem is that you're applying natural laws to God, when He claims to exist outside of them."
Dawkins' response was: "Well that's awfully convenient, isn't it?"
While Dawkins is suggesting that the inability to apply natural laws to God's existance is ultimately evidence of his non-existance, that is not necissarily the case. It's just a fairly typical humanistic stance to take when faced with questions that don't fit in with our current understanding. It's just as convenient to ridicule an avenue of possibility simply because you find another more appealing (and in Dawkin's case, I'd suggest "comforting", but that's another discussion...).
Here's an example:

The rules of this universe are as follows: There are three school boys - Billy, Timmy and Freddy. Billy's mum and dad work overseas, and so Billy has to talk to them on the phone. Timmy and Freddy have never seen Billy's mum and dad, and so don't believe he has parents. Billy can talk to his mum and dad on the phone, but they screen their calls and will only answer phone calls from his home phone. Timmy and Freddy can't go to Billy's house, because they told their parents that Billy lives on his own, and thus are not allowed. Obviously Timmy and Freddy are school children, and can't travel overseas to verify Billy's parents existance. For the purpose of this experiment, the boys' universe is their town.

Timmy says to Billy: "You don't have parents Billy. I've never seen them."
Billy: "Yes I do. I talk to them every night, and they talk to me. Just only on the phone. But they send me presents and stuff."
Timmy: OK then, ask them to send you a scooter. Then I'll know that they're real.

Billy goes home, asks his parents for a scooter. They send one.

Billy: See, I have a scooter. My parents are real.
Timmy: No, see, that could have been a coincidence. You might have already had a scooter, or maybe you went out and bought one, or maybe another one of our friends sent it to you. Hang on a sec. (turns to Freddy) Freddy! Come here!
Freddy: What?
Timmy: Billy says he has parents, but I don't believe him. I got him to ask them for a scooter, and he got one, but now I need you to verify my findings. Get him to ask for something.
Freddy: OK... Um... Billy - ask your parents for a soccer ball.

Billy goes home, asks his parents for a soccer ball. His parents say no, as sometimes parents do.

Billy: My parents said no.
Timmy: No they didn't. They don't exist. You're just pretending they're real. You didn't get a soccer ball, so they're not real.

Timmy doesn't believe Billy, because Billy's parents exist outside of the confines of Timmy's explainable universe. This is a simplified analogy of why the science vs. religion argument will never be resolved. Science likes problems with mutually exclusive answers. You have to find an experiment that will either come back positive or negative. This doesn't work with God, as he doesn't necissarily choose to respond the way we want him to, and in particular he's not so big on being tested. Imagine if Billy's parents were getting calls from Billy every night asking them to provide evidence of their existance? What's important to Billy's parents here? Meaningful conversation with their son, or the belief of his friends? I'm going with option one. God isn't really into satisfying sceptics, and while sceptics will say that's evidence of his non-existance, logically that doesn't work. If I choose not to answer a question for you, that doesn't mean I don't have an answer.

I'm going to take this one step further - I don't think it's the place of science to be suggesting that it can answer these kind of questions. Science might be able to tell me that sometimes my wife acts in a way I find irrational because of her hormones, it can't tell me the right thing to say to make her feel better every time. It's just not a "science" question. In the same way, science can make observations about the laws the govern the universe, but it can't answer the question of why they did, do, and will behave that way. It's just the way it is, and that's as far as it can go.

This is why I think it's important to recognise the growing number of faith-based science adherents who believe that ultimately, science holds all the answers. That our current scientific understanding shows the existance of God to be false. And most scarily of all, that steps should be taken to stop people being allowed to think, speak and act based on a belief in God, as they're "obviously deluded/irrational/unintelligent". The general consensus from the reading I've been doing seems to be that these faith-based science adherents (who would cry out in disgust at being called that, by the way) see people's right to hold a religious belief as a right to believe in something imaginary if that's what you want, but ultimately it IS imaginary, and the law, education, etc. should treat it as such. Well, I'm not up for that. I believe that God is real. Not just in my head, but that he's real in your world, even if you don't believe it. And believe me, I'm starting to get fired up about this. A short read of the forums on www.richarddawkins.com will show there's plenty of support for this idea, and as a Christian, I can see this as a possible threat to my freedom to continue to be a Christian in the way I can today.

Having just watched some short video on the above mentioned site, I'd like to prove the existance of what I describe as faith-based science adherants with the following quote from Richard Dawkins himself:

It is, of course, a very difficult question to ask how things began at the very beginning of the universe. It's very difficult to even know what the word 'beginning' even means with respect to the universe, that any scientist, any biologist, any reasonable person would accept. However, when you ask what is the
alternative - if the alternative that's being offered to what physists now talk about; a big bang, a spontaneous singularity which gave rise to the origin of the universe - if the alternative to that is a divine intelligence; a creator that would have to have been complicated, statistically improbable, the very kind of thing which scientific theory such as Darwin's exists to explain, then immediately we see that however difficult and apparently inadequate the theory of the physist is, the theory of the theologians; that the first cause was a complicated intelligence, is even more difficult to accept. They're both difficult. But the theory of the cosmic intelligence is even worse.

Well, Dick, that's your opinion. And that's just the thing - it's just opinion. Not science. But because it's a scientist's opinion, that makes it gospel in the church of faith-based science. Believing in the unprovable option you find most easy to rationalise is as much faith as believing in the one that you persieve offers the least rationalisation, but is the most universally applicable solution (which is why it's seen as being "convenient"). You want to believe that something sprang from nothing, even though it flies in the face of the rest of accepted scientific theory? Go ahead. I guess we'll all either see for ourselves or not exist in the end.

Old Draft: "My life blows"

I was digging through the list of posts that I'd made previously on blogger, and came across this one, saved as draft. While it is increadibly negative about my situation, I read through it and thought "Wow, that's really cool!" just because of it's style and oddness. So I present it for you all to read. So you know, I don't feel like this at all now. Things are generally goodness. But yes - like I say, very clever I think. It's unfinished, and I'm not really in the same place so I can't really go back and complete it, but hey - enjoy. Or not. Or be dragged down into it's beapfam-ish depression. You'll see... ;)

---

Hi. I'm sure some people still read this, but I know things have gone downhill as far as readership goes. So here's a quick... ah, thing...

Someone commented once that the tone of my blog seems to be somewhat downcast, and wondered if maybe I only blog when I'm unhappy. Sans technical stuff or random weirdness, my answer would be:

Yep - absolutely.

Only blog when I'm unhappy.

Which is why I'm blogging now.

See, that long wide corner on the rollercoaster that is my life has just straightened out to throw me down the biggest crapstick of a downhill.

Anything serious? Not really.

Things just generally suck. Or blow. Or whatever. I feel like crap - but the worst part is the hopelessness.

Black. And dark.

I don't see a solution. To any of it.

I'm screwed.

Metaphorically of course; I'm screwed as an imaginary description of how bad things are. Although, if I was being screwed - that would normally be a good thing, yeah? I mean, not to bring the moral tone of my illustrious blog down too far, but "screwing" is normally considered to be a good thing, isn't it?

Hmm.

That metaphore is not very apt. Instead, why don't we say I'm being eaten alive by piranah-faced monkeys. Actually, let's make an acronym. Being Eaten Alive by Piranah-FAced Monkeys. BEAPFAM. I'm totally BEAPFAMed.

There. That's a better metaphore.

So my life is beapfamed at the moment, and I feel I'm very quickly losing places of comfort to which I previously might have retreated. My life now revolves around being involved in nothing.

What? What do I mean?

Example?

If my lovely wife was to spend the evening in front of a riverting TV show, while I wandered around her general vacinity, aimlessly bumping my head into hardwood cupboards, that would be OK by her.

...however...

If I was to spend an evening engrossed in something I enjoy which she finds to be uninteresting, and she also was unable to find something to keep her amused, that would NOT be OK by her.

So in order to prevent large bumps on my head, I spend most evenings sitting on the couch watching crap on TV that I honestly couldn't care less about. Some nights the TV is good.

Or OK.

But mostly, it's less about me watching TV, and more about me not doing something that I would enjoy.

Crazy? Yes.

Yes I am.

And I think perhaps this is the issue. I am crazy.

Completely.

Nuts.

I, in the not so distant past, moved from one job I didn't really enjoy to another job I don't really enjoy. Different reasons for the non-enjoyment, but the warning signs were there. Why did I not heed them?

Why?!?

Why?

MONEY.

I had always thought to myself that the money controlled man would never be me.

Never.

But he is! And I am! Money is a funny thing like that. I mean, really, why is buying a house the epitome of a family man's financial life goals? I mean, he might have more after that, but that's the top of the hill - the one that makes it all good. Anything after that is a bonus.

B-O-N-U-S!!!!!

Like making squares with red orbs around blue orbs to get gold rings.

From my perspective, buying a house has increased my stress levels. It has enouraged me to take a job based on just one factor. It has stopped me from having dates with my wife, as even though people say you can do dates on the cheap, no one likes a cheapskate. And no one likes a cheap date. You know what rhymes with dates?

Rates.

Mine came today. Never paid rates before. Yesterday, we were celebrating the fact that thanks to my tax cheque, we could live a limited number of days without enourmous overdue bills hanging over our heads. True, they'd only be a week or two away, but perhaps just a few days of ignorant bliss. Just a few days... How many?

None.

I paid all our bills this morning. Our rates arrived this afternoon. It's like this is some collosal TV show where everyone is laughing at my rollercoaster of hope.

<...incomplete...>

Link: Wow...

If this turns out to be true... wow...

On a side topic, dark matter has apparently now been proved to exist. Mind you, a lot of this is based on inference and supposition, but that's good enough, isn't it?

Now in my wallet, I have some "dark money". It's completely invisible, and although it's effects cannot be demonstrated through conventional means, I can demonstrate to you in my computer simulation and with the use of ultra-high-tech equiptment that it's just as real as real money. Anyone want to sell me a 30" LCD monitor? I've got more dark money then I know what to do with!

On The Virtues Of Killing Children (link)

This would have to be the scariest and most profound thing I've read in a long time. I don't know that I can say much more about it, but read it yourself and consider what this guy has said because personally I believe that he's right. I think conflicts like the war in Iraq will never see a conclusion, simply because people are denying the fact that you go to war to kill people. Innocent people. Why? Because they're the ones whose lives carry the most weight. No one cares if 100 soldiers die in war, but if 100 innocents - that's an attrocity. So our "enemies" will kill our innocents. And we will kill theirs. Look at how World War 2 ended. The US killed hundreds and thousands of innocent Japanese citizens. Devestated by the colossal loss of innocent life, Japan was forced to surrender. Why did they surrender? Because the US demonstrated it had the power to kill their innocents in staggering numbers. I mean, they nuked cities - places people live and work; not millitary facilities. But who would suggest in retrospect that they should have NOT ended the war? It was us or them, and we chose them. A terrible and tragic choice, but one that needed to be made. How many lives were saved by that choice, on both sides? It'd be nice to have a "what if?" machine that could answer that question for us, but I guess we'll just have to think about it for ourselves.

Anyway - something worth pondering I guess in a world where the media will bring the horrors of war to our living rooms. The horrors were always there - we just didn't get to see them. Maybe it's time we wised up and realised what we've gotten ourselves into...