Author Archives: randomraindrops
Wowzer Revealed
Girlington Cat’s Sidekick Wowzer.
Wowzer is nicknamed that because he exclaims “Wowzer! Lookit that!” every time he helps Girlington find a clue. Together they solve mysteries, do genealogical research, pursue paleontology, prowl through attics and act as second-story men, and get the goods on the crooks. In spite of appearing to be a mouse Wowzer actually is a Nisse, and no human can pronounce his 45 character name. Girlington gave up on pronouncing it long ago and just nicknamed him.
Can Christians Be Wrong?
Brian was bitching about Billy Graham. I objected.
Here is our conversation.
Brian:
Billy was a man and not right about everything. He was wrong about it not making a difference. The very Gospel he preached depends on it.
ME:
Brian Betsworth In what way does Jesus being the propritiation for sin depend on faith that the universe did not exist in 4005 BC?
It is an added criteria that says Jesus’ blood on the cross is not enough but all must instead believe the interpretations of the concordists. It makes no sense. But Billy is correct it doesnt matter because the concordists can still be saved by the blood of Jesus in spite their opinions about concordism. Concordism doesnt save anybody. Concordism is a human fabricated belief developed after 1700 AD.
Brian says to me …
David,
Millions of years (of supposed evolutionism) before Adam would put death, disease destruction before sin, completely removing any need for a savior. I explain it partially in the following video.
My reply to him:
Brian Betsworth,
I think your definition of life and death here is centered around biological life and death whereas the scriptures are talking life as being the spiritual life, the soul. There are at least three separate words for life in the greek scrolls. So I think your teaching on the theology is dead wrong. Justification depends only on the blood of Jesus Christ on the cross. What concordists do, and this is just my personal view of concordism, is teach that Christ isn’t enough, instead it takes Christ + Concordism. I reject this latter because to me it not Christianity! Its more like Mormonism. The death that came into the world was the death of the soul just like the life that came into the world with Adam was the soul, made in the image of God. Imago Dei.
So Im stickin’ with Martin Luther and the church leaders who followed in the wake of the apostle Peter.
Not the latter day concordists LDC. ( Latter Day Concordists) a modern theology invented since 1800 AD as far as I can tell.
Ask Ted Davis about that subject.
Regardless, Blessings, even though we disagree.
Hollywood Ideas of Mixed Metaphors
If the Sun Is Created on Day 4, What Is the Light on Day 1?
If the Sun Is Created on Day 4, What Is the Light on Day 1?
TESTING POSTING OF LINKS INTO A FACEBOOK PAGE.
https://www.thetorah.com/article/if-the-sun-is-created-on-day-4-what-is-the-light-on-day-1
https://randomraindrops.com/day-1/
https://www.thetorah.com/article/if-the-sun-is-created-on-day-4-what-is-the-light-on-day-1
https://www.thetorah.com/article/if-the-sun-is-created-on-day-4-what-is-the-light-on-day-1
https://randomraindrops.com/day-1/
https://www.thetorah.com/article/if-the-sun-is-created-on-day-4-what-is-the-light-on-day-1
https://www.thetorah.com/article/if-the-sun-is-created-on-day-4-what-is-the-light-on-day-1
https://randomraindrops.com/day-1/
Photo Gallery on Windows 11
Thursday Jan 25, 2024. I’ve been looking for a photo gallery software to organize my photos. It must run on windows and on linux both, and store files in flickr, dropbox, and my openmediavault NAS server, all three.
I dont want to run a web server on any desktop.
It looks like digikam meets all these requirements. So, let the experiment begin!
Milestone 1. Downloaded digikam installer and installed. Took 5 minutes to be up and running. 5 more minutes to configure.
Milestone 2. Adding an album. OK, you are supposed to import a bunch of unorganized photos first. Then you can add albums. Took me 10 minutes of watching a youtube to figure this out. The first youtube demo was terrible and almost useless.
OK, I now know its a viable tool. I’m done for the day. More tomorrow.
Tee hee, a bit late, I found this. https://docs.digikam.org/en/main_window/albums_view.html#creating-a-new-album. Yeah Baby.
A Brit asks about American turmoil.
Someone answered him on why there is such a divide and why America may fall. Atheism.
He says:
The answer is simple really: Change in religion. The percentage of atheism is now dominant and are actively changing the societal rules to conform to their religion.
When you have a society originally based on one religion and the religion changes, giant societal upheavals happen.
USA has embraced perversion in every form. Truth for one side is utterly irrelevant. Stealing is omnipresent. You cannot have a society based on lies, stealing, perversion. When the old guard hanging on finally admit the old nation based on truth/science is gone and admits that the most dangerous country in the world is the USA as majority have embraced corruption and lies at all levels of society, the quicker the USA can start fixing itself. Either evangelize and change the majority of people back to our ancestors religion which was based in speaking truth and scientific method of analysis, or USA is doomed into a state where the Oligarchs rule. We have seen this throughout all of history in a multitude of different nations/empires. Nothing new here. No one changes until brought down.
Roman Legions
Corn Futures and Disruptions in Trade
Have corn futures been affected by the war in Ukraine, pipeline disruption, energy disruption, China trade relations, and global food supply levels? Does the chart reflect general instability? Have the chances for stability improved or degenerated? What do you think?
Do grain commodities affect fertilizer company profitability? What do you think?
Thinking About That Rumored Petrol Collapse
Nancy Pearcy Jan 8 2024
Those who claim to be tolerant of religion often exhibit what is really “patronizing condescension.”
–philosopher Alvin Plantinga
“Ironically, those who pride themselves on being open and tolerant often end up merely practicing a different type of intolerance. They resist the idea that any one religion is true, because that implies the others are false—which they take to be disrespectful.
To them, it seems more respectful to say that all religions are symbolic ways of describing a mystical experience, or giving emotional comfort, or motivating people to be moral, or some such. In other words, in the case of religion, the actual teachings do not matter, only the social and emotional effects.
But is this relativistic view really tolerant? To say that the teachings do not matter is to say that all religions are wrong—because all religions claim that their teachings do matter.
The relativistic view insists that Hindus are wrong; Buddhists are wrong; Muslims, Jews, and Christians are wrong—and that only the postmodern view of religion is right.
As philosopher Alvin Plantinga comments, “I find it hard to see how this attitude is a manifestation of tolerance or intellectual humility: it looks more like patronizing condescension.”
The relativistic view of religion is just as exclusive as the claims of any traditional religion.”
(Saving Leonardo)
What Multiverse
Its not expanding forever?
Cloud9
Aria Stiles A Christmas Tune
Recorded by me, Copyright me 2024, all rights reserved, in case anybody ever questions.
What Happens To Old People.
They put you in conservative investments. You always underperform. What’s the chances you really really underperform? Consider:
Are you smart enough to know when to be defensive?
THIS IS WHY BUFFET SAYS PUT YOUT MONEY IN S&P 500 INDEX. I RECOMMEND VOO or SPY.
Self Love Deficit Pyramid
Characteristic 10
I’m having another day of catastrophic thinking.
Characteristic 10: Adult children of alcoholics usually feel they are different than other people.
Bingo! Right on target. How many people have catastrophic thinking? Maybe some? But not most. But I do. And I am indeed different. So I am trying to find other pathways. Without panic.
Every single person in the room tonight will tell me Characteristic 10 is true of them.
The reason I go is to listen to how they handle it. Because I haven’t got a clue.
The Basis for Heresy
This is the basis for a heresy claim made by YEC people. Well, one I know (Richard Swindell). I am trying to understand their (his) argument. In his first argument here he gives an example of Jesus referring to a well known (well known to the Jews) event in history and calls it a statement about science. He then draws a conclusion. He also concludes that anyone who interprets differently is calling Jesus a liar. Thus they deny the divinity of Jesus and are therefore heretics. It seems like that is his logic.
Richard Swindell says,
Whenever the Bible makes a statement with respect to science, it speaks with perfect accuracy, since it is the Word of God and the words of God.
Billy (Graham) was a man of God. Doesn’t mean he was right about everything.
If the world is billions of years old, and Genesis 1-11 is mytho-history, then Jesus was either too ignorant or stupid to have understood billions of years and evolution or progressive creation, or He thought the people were too ignorant or stupid to understand it, so He deliberately spoke as if Genesis 1:1-2:3 and Genesis 1-11 was actual literal history at least 15 times.
If your Jesus is Lord, and the One through Whom the Father created all life and the Universe but ignorant or stupid about how and when it happened, or is a deliberate deceiver, He is not the Jesus of Scripture.
He gives some examples to Andy Witt:
Andy Witt Matthew 24: 38 For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark;
39 and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.
Matthew 23: 35 And so upon you will come all the righteous blood that has been shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah son of Berekiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.
If Cain and Abel were real, so was Adam, real.
A few general examples:
Matthew 22:21; Mark 12:17; Luke 20:25—mankind is in the image of God.
Matthew 23:35; Luke 11:51—Jesus references Abel as a historical, righteous person, and the first of the martyrs.
Matthew 24:37–39; Luke 17:26–27—Jesus compares His coming to the time of Noah’s Flood.
Matthew 26:52—Jesus references Genesis 9:6 when he says “Those who draw the sword will die by the sword.”
Mark 13:19—Jesus references God creating the world.
Luke 10:19—Jesus gives the disciples authority to tread on serpents.
John 8:44—The devil is a liar and a murderer ‘from the beginning’
Richard Swindell none of these statements require reference to history. For instance, Mt 24:38-39 is making a literary reference to help us understand the coming of the Son of Man; this is true regardless
Andy Witt Yeah, it doesn’t take rocket science to understand that someone could be poetic and turn to popular knowledge to make a point. We do that all the time. This kind of arguing about whether Jesus was ignorant or lying or not reminds me of what happened to Sisyphus. … for example.
Robert Lindberg in case you don’t understand the Scriptures, Jesus was “God incarnate”, i.e., God in human form. Jesus KNEW who he was and his only “limitation” was being in human form, having flesh & blood, etc. JESUS was there at Creation!
Hence, Jesus knows the REAL history. IF you don’t accept that Jesus is God, or that God doesn’t exist… then your comments are totally irrelevant.
Andy Witt Do you believe the flood killed every human being, and every living thing with breath in its nostils that lived on land, as Genesis tells us and as Jesus believed.
Or do you believe in many local floods?
Richard Swindell How many years after the Flood did it take for the three sons of Noah to repopulate the entire world?
Steven Robinson “Hence, Jesus knows the REAL history. IF you don’t accept that Jesus is God, or that God doesn’t exist… then your comments are totally irrelevant.”
That doesn’t seem to be the issue. People are making similar comments about Billy Graham, because he said about what I said. The real issue here appears to be NOT whether one believes in God or in Jesus, but rather whether one believes in Ellen White.
OK, after looking at the scriptures he quotes I realized Richard is not making a valid argument. His hermeneutics are flawed. Later I may go into why they are flawed.
This is mind draining and soul draining to me. It is such an impediment to faith. A stumbling block.
Return of the God Hypothesis
An interesting review I saw on amazon.com
“A comprehensive and lucid argument for theism as the best explanation for the scientific evidence. Stephen Meyer has a true gift for conveying complex concepts clearly.” — Dr. Robert Kaita, former Principal Research Physicist, Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory
“A meticulously researched, lavishly illustrated, and thoroughly argued case against the new atheism. Even if your mind is made up—especially if it is—Meyer’s refreshing take on the origins of the Universe is a joy to read. You may not come away convinced, but you’ll be richer for the journey.” — Dr. Brian Keating, Chancellor’s Distinguished Professor of Physics, University of California, San Diego, and author of Losing the Nobel Prize.
“Scientist and philosopher Meyer has discussed intelligent design previously but has not gone as far as he does here in terms of making the case for God. He does so citing new evidence from cosmology, physics, and biology, especially as it applies to DNA research. Meyer knows how to take readers’ hands and lead them through the history before showing how new discoveries can be used to undermine the cases made by anti-design theorists such as Richard Dawkins, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and even Bill Nye the Science Guy. Agree or disagree, there’s lots to ponder here.” — Booklist
“Meyer’s book is a masterclass, lucidly exploring every alternative from multiple points of view, while persuasively showing that the God Hypothesis is the best explanation of our finely-tuned, information-rich universe. It does irreparable damage to atheist rhetoric.” — John C. Walton, PhD, DSc, Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Research Professor of Chemistry, University of St. Andrews
“No one in my experience can explicate such complex material with the grace and clarity that seem so effortless to Stephen Meyer. With meticulous rational analysis of the latest discoveries in cosmology, physics, and biology, Meyer confirms a truth ideologues find too frightening to consider. Their ad hominem attacks on his brilliant work, confirm its importance.” — Dean Koontz, New York Times #1 bestselling author
“Reviewing all relevant evidence from cosmology to molecular biology, Meyer builds an irrefutable ‘case for God.’ The logic throughout is compelling and the book almost impossible to put down. A masterpiece. Easily the best, most lucid, comprehensive defense of the ‘God hypothesis’ in print. A unique tour de force. ” — Michael Denton, M.D., Ph.D., former Senior Research Fellow, Biochemistry, University of Otago, Author, Nature’s Destiny
“More than 400 pages of straightforward, engrossing prose, close reasoning, intellectual history, and cosmology, all in the interest of asking the most important questions about existence itself. An astonishing achievement.” — Peter Robinson, Murdoch Distinguished Policy Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and former White House speechwriter
“With this book, Stephen Meyer earns a place in the pantheon of distinguished, non-reductive natural philosophers of the last 120 years, from the great French savant Pierre Duhem, through A.N. Whitehead, to Michael Polanyi…A profound, judicious book of great value bringing to bear advanced, scientific expertise and philosophical, integrative wisdom.” — Dr. Michael D. Aeschliman, emeritus professor Boston University, author The Restoration of Man: C.S. Lewis and the Continuing Case Against Scientism.
“Meyer masterfully summarizes the current evidence from cosmology, physics and biology showing that the more we learn about the universe and nature, the more relevant the ‘God hypothesis’ becomes.” — Dr. Anthony Futerman, Joseph Meyerhoff Professor of Biochemistry, Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel
“This book makes it clear that far from being an unscientific claim, intelligent design is valid science.” — Brian Josephson, Emeritus Professor of Physics, University of Cambridge, Fellow of the Royal Society Nobel Laureate in Physics
“When you don’t understand living systems, ignorance permits discounting a Creator. But when the scientific details are thrust upon you, you’re forced to ask: How on Earth did that happen? Thus, the God hypothesis returns. Stephen Meyer convincingly drives the point home: How could it be this way? Only God!” — James M. Tour, Ph.D., T. T. and W. F. Chao Professor of Chemistry and Professor of Nano-Engineering, Rice University.
“Stephen Meyer is a genuine renaissance person. His work tears down many purported barriers between science, philosophy, and religion. An important book of both breadth and depth.” — Dr. Henry F. Schaefer III, Graham Perdue Professor of Chemistry, Director, Center for Computational Quantum Chemistry, University of Georgia
“Dr. Meyer does a superb job in accurately describing the physics and cosmology that show the universe had a beginning. He also convincingly shows that quantum mechanics will not eliminate a cosmological singularity.” — Dr. Frank Tipler, Professor of Physics, Tulane University; Co-Author, The Anthropic-Cosmological Principle (Oxford University Press)
“A truly superb analysis of the relevant evidence.Stephen Meyer convincingly demonstrates that the God hypothesis is not just an adequate explanation for the origin of our fine-tuned universe and biosphere: it is the best explanation.” — David J Galloway, MD DSc FRCS FRCP, Honorary Professor of Surgery at College of Medical, Veterinary & Life Sciences University of Glasgow; Former President, Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow.
“A pleasure to read, [Meyer’s] inviting voice brings light to bear on complicated and profoundly influential subjects. With this abundantly rich book, Meyer completes a compelling trilogy which refutes the prevailing materialism of the intelligentsia.” — Terry Scrambay, journalist and reviewer for New Oxford Review
“I commend Meyer’s book to those who believe science and religion are in conflict, and indeed to anyone seeking answers to the ultimate questions.” — The Claremont Review of Books
What Historians Do
I got this from John Fea’s book Was America Founded as a Christian Nation. It applies to what I am doing in my own historical research. After listening to him I started changing my approach to my research. of course this was also affected by Elizabeth Shown Mills, Evidence Explained: Citing History Sources from Artifacts to Cyberspace. Because of Mills I had already started doing genealogy completely differently than other genealogists I know. I had started to think like a lawyer in terms of legal proof. But I also started to think like a scientist by demanding an explanation for why events took place. What were the underlying causes of events? This soon became more fascinating than the facts of genealogy. I find myself wanting to write a history book about the lives and migration paths of my ancestors.
Then I picked up Fea’s book and this reinforced my realization that I was woefully underprepared to understand my own past! I had not taken enough history courses in college to know how historians do anything. Well, Fea helps with that a bit. Let me share some of his ideas, below.
Fea is quoting Historians Thomas Andrews and Flannery Burke. He says there are 5 C’s of Histororical Thinking.
1. CHANGE.
Historians must see change over time. While some things stay the same over the course of
generations, many things change. The historian’s task is to chronicle these changes. As historian
John Tosh puts it, “There may be a gulf between ‘us’ and ‘them,’ but that gulf is actually
composed of processes of growth, decay and change which it is the business of the historian to
uncover.”
2. CONTEXT
Historians must interpret the past in context. They examine the documents of the past in
light of the time and the place in which they were written. Words ripped from their cultural and
chronological context provide useful material for the compilers of quotation books, but they are
useless to the historian. The words of the founders, for example, must always be interpreted from
the perspective of the eighteenth-century world in which they were uttered or written. There is a
wide chasm that separates the past from the present. Context helps us to realize that more often
than not people in the past do not think and behave the same way that we do.
3. CAUSALITY
Historians are always interested in causality. I remember a few years ago when the talk
radio host Rush Limbaugh announced that “history is real simple. You know what history is? It’s
what happened. Now if you want to get into why what happened, that’s probably valid too, but
why what happened shouldn’t have much of anything to do with what happened.”8 Limbaugh
could not have been more wrong about what historians do. They are not only interested in facts,
but always ask why a particular event in the past happened the way it did.
4. CONTINGENCY
Historians are concerned with contingency. This is the notion that “every historical outcome
depends upon a number of prior conditions.”9 Contingency celebrates the ability of humans to
shape their own destiny. Every historical moment is contingent upon another historical moment,
which in turn is contingent upon yet another moment. Historians are thus concerned about the
big picture—how events are influenced by other events.
5. COMPLEX (History is complex.)
Finally, historians realize that the past is complex. It often resists our efforts to simplify it or
to cut it up into easily digestible pieces. Most students of history are exposed to the past through
textbooks that offer rather straightforward narratives of how a particular era unfolded. While
often necessary for overviews and syntheses of the past, textbooks often fail to reveal that the
past can be messy, complicated, and not easily summarized in a neatly constructed paragraph or
two. Once again, the debate over whether America is a Christian nation is instructive here. On
one hand, the opponents of Christian America draw the conclusion that just because the
Constitution does not mention God then it must hold true that the framers did not believe that
religion was important to the success of the Republic. On the other hand, defenders of Christian
America conclude that if the founders were people of Christian faith, then they must have set out
to establish a uniquely Christian nation. Logicians call these assertions “non sequiturs.”
Historians would argue that those who draw such conclusions lack an appreciation for the complexity of the past.
6. CONSTRUCTION.
OK, that leads to Fea’s CONSTRUCTION
The task of historians is to use these five Cs to reconstruct the past and make their findings
available to the public. Historians make the dead live. They bring the past to an audience in the
present. If we think about the vocation of the historian in this way, then we must distinguish
between “history” and “the past.” The past is the past—a record of events that occurred in
bygone eras. But history is a discipline—the art of reconstructing the past.
References provided by John Fea:
1). Thomas Andrews and Flannery Burke, “What Does It Mean to Think Historically?” AHA Perspectives 45: 1 (January
2007). Accessed at http://www.historians.org/Perspectives/issues/2007/0701/0701tea2.cfm.
2) John Tosh, The Pursuit of History, 4th ed. (New York: Longman, 2006),
3) Gary Nash, History on Trial: Culture Wars and the Teaching of the Past (New York: Vintage, 2000).
4) Andrews and Burke, “What Does It Mean to Think Historically?”
OK, that’s enough for now. I have to actually apply these 5 or 6 “C’s”, and re-visit the topic later after some experiences in tracing my family’s past.