Recently I was asked my opinion on anthropogenic global warming. In the ensuing discussion, there was criticism of my rejection of “the majority opinion of ‘experts'” as a good or valid method to base my position. Having rejected that, I was asked by what means, if not the majority of experts, would I personal espouse as how to base your belief or understanding of the truth behind a matter which is in contention. In the following, first I lay out a number of different methods that people use to form opinions, next I briefly describe the two methods I try to follow.  Read the rest of this entry

Good morning.

1. More antisemitism noted.
2. English usage corrected … or not.
3. “More” border security.
4. On that flight attendant.
5. How long will that candidate last?
6. A pair of books noted.
7. An evolutionary ethics (?!) scholar. Heh.
8. Climate and the Russian heat wave.
9. Of suffering and truth.
10. Some photo-essays.
11. Is outrage!
12. Keynesian angst.
13. The gospel is not limited to a social accomplishment, or something like that.

Good morning.

1. So you know.
2. Healthcare news.
3. An logical rhetorical fallacy can occasionally be apt. 
4. A lesson for the day.
5. Liberals and stupid numbers tricks. When chiding one news source for not being demographically “flat” noting without comment that the other similar sources are likewise not flat is just silly.
6. More on recession and supply and a reply.
7. Taxes and graphs.
8. Ooooh, GM pulls a profit, not mentioned is that they did so primarily selling SUVs and … if the Feds dump $50billion in your lap and you can’t pull a profit … well, give it up.
9. Children and dignity, fail.
10. Antisemitism.
11. Prop 8 news from a neutral corner.
12. On Eat, Pray, Love.

Good morning.

1. Parables about plagiarism.
2. Contra the latest bailout/stimulus bill.
3. A left handed defense of Mr Bloom.
4. Stirring up fear.
5. Soteriology and praxis.
6. Debt and growth.
7. A challenge for the Keynsian.
8. Nuclear weapons and the Administration.
9. On Market … hey, that gives me an idea … when businesses fail they cease to exist, maybe we should have a policy of “failing” and terminating, say, three government agencies every year based on their effectiveness.
10. This is not unrelated to the above.
11. Hmm, I don’t think I’ve heard a dumber idea in a long time.

Good morning.

1. Morning … in photo.
2. A response to a liberal charge of bigotry.
3. Problems with the standard story on Hiroshima.
4. Uhm, they need to add the “new” adjective to that post. For example, I bought a used Insight and economy wise I think I did pretty good compared to that Mercedes, e.g., driving from Chicago to Atlanta on less than 10 gallons of gas.
5. Zapp.
6. Ethnicity and church.
7. Climate.
8. An economic prescription for future growth and prosperity, which doesn’t involved more and more failing debt and stimulus.
9. A lawyer looks at case-law involving birthplace and citizenship.
10. Laffer curve and a poll (for myself I think the guy whose link I followed to get there was right).
11. The descent of cute.
12. Euro debt.
13. On the Ryan thing, here and the related Krugman stupidity here.

Good morning.

1. Continuing to work through the meaning of the Transfiguration.
2. Sort of a better moustrap.
3. Mr Obama, losing the pretentious demographic? I don’t think so, to where else might they turn their stuck up noses?
4. Stopping that pesky terrestrial rotation.
5. Addiction.
6. The problem with objecting to zoning the basis of “its offensive” is that … it is indeed the rightful basis of zoning. We don’t have industrial warehouses and residential houses mixed for exactly that reason, not to speak of bars and schools.
7. Are you one of the lucky?
8. Of love and marriage.
9. A (non-religious) conversion noted.
10. Talking about English and Orthodoxy.

Ann had an interesting meme post which I noticed today, the “Ann Rice” meme. This meme asks us to:

1. Name 3 things that really annoy you about church in general.
2. Name 3 reasons why you stay.

So, without further ado: here’s my list.

Annoyances

1. When Christians make references to “those sinners” with a tacit assumption that “they” are not us. That is having the hubris to make the claim that there are groups and categories more sinful in the sight of the Lord than any group that includes me.
2. That the “the road is narrow and the path is steep” doesn’t mean that there isn’t more than one road. It means that the getting there is difficult.
3. How often we fail to treat other Christians as our brother and to love those who hate us.

Things Keeping me there:

1. The Creator created, the tomb was empty, and the Spirit descended.
2. Those times in which we succeed to treat Christians as our brother and to love those who hate us.
3. The stories and writings of those who it seems before us did manage well to trod that narrow path.

Well, mid-to-late morning (I’m running a bit late) … but have a good day nevertheless.

1. What those living in freedom don’t remember.
2. School days.
3. Taxi licenses and no good deed goes unpunished.
4. Forest fires and politics.
5. Our Administration, pushing lower efficiencies to save jobs? Let’s go back to all living on one horse farms.
6. A blogging meme and the institutional Church.
7. Two useful sites noted for the Orthodox in our midst.
8. On the modern marriage culture.
9. Liberal vs Conservative and its (non) relevance for the church.
10. A photo essay from the Ukraine.
11. Mr Krugman and an argument applied now that was conveniently not present during the healthcare debate.
12. One of the leading evangelical atheist bloggers neatly skewered, although that seems to be a bit like shooting ducks in a barrel.
13. Of computer games and protein science.

Good morning.

1. Canine stuff and more here. Our new puppie, Sophie, is 3 months old today.
2. But puppy-cide? 
3. It seems to me this is a good argument against government involvement, as when rationing occurs, it seems “ability to pay” is one of the fairest ways of deciding who gets what instead of a lottery mixed with “who has political connections” with the party in power.
4. Crunch.
5. Zoooooom.
6. Stupid tourist tricks.
7. Up in the air.
8. What we celebrate today.
9. A revolt on ICE.
10. Keep using the word “unexpectedly” and it shouldn’t be unexpected if there is no confidence in government economic meddling.

Good morning.

1. A man remembered.
2. Corporate leadership and party demographics.
3. Don’t talk to the man … and consequences therein.
4. Superman rescues family home … really.
5. Hack your A/C.
6. Weeeee.
7. Of Mr Kerry and his boat kerfuffle.
8. Is outrage.
9. A conversation continues.
10. Hmm, do you believe it? 
11. A picture/graph of interest.
12. Stupid Congress-critter tricks.
13. So does an asterisk come with that?
14. Two lawyers and that recent court/marriage thing, here and here.

Good morning.

1. Friday night lights, discussed. 
2. A report by HHS as smokescreen?
3. Tired? 
4. Mud juice?
5. So are you W.E.I.R.D (and not just weird)?
6. Hacking apples.
7. Huh? What the heck does he mean by “we know more about it.” 
8. So, why are coal burning cars so popular?
9. Yikes (more here).
10. Cute packaging.
11. A life lived and choices made.
12. A quote from a time when sexual predilections where not bound with ontology.
13. In the media is completely out of touch department, royal wedding indeed.

Some ink (some virtual) has been spilled on novelist Ms Rice announcing that she has “left the Church” but not left Christ. Recently I have been reading and studying the five theological orations by St. Gregory the Theologian (also known as St. Gregory of Nazianzus where he was Bishop for a time). These orations (or homilies) in an important sense define what it means to be an orthodox Christian today. In the time just prior to the convening of the 2nd Ecumenical council in Constantinople, the majority of those in the area and expected in attendance were (roughly speaking) Arian in sympathy. St. Gregory just before this council gave in short succession, just outside the city, a series of 5 orations and the matter was settled in the cause of orthodoxy. And for the following 800 or so years, these lectures were the primary pedagogical examples of the art of rhetoric for those studying the art of the rhetor in the Eastern Roman world. An American analogy might be Lincoln’s Gettysburg address, after which the case for the Civil war was arguably settled and subsequently this has been a speech studied by debators and rhetors as a jewel of the art.

What does this have to do with Ms Rice and her disillusionment with the earthly Church? Her situation came to mind when I read this (from the 1st homily of this set, which is Oration #27 in oeuvre of St. Gregory). He wrote (spoke):

Such is the situation: this infection [to much bitter disputation and argument over theological detail] is unchecked and intolerable; “the great mystery” of our faith is in danger becoming a mere social accomplishment. [emphasis mine]

Later in that homily he writes (speaking again against bitter theological quarrels):

But first we must consider: what is this disorder of the tongue that leads us to compete in garrulity? what is this alarming disease, this appetite that can never be sated? Why do we keep our hands bound and out tongues armed?

Do we commend hospitality? Do we admire brotherly love, wifely affection, virginity, feeding the poor, singing psalms, night-long vigils, penitence? Do we mortify the body with fasting? Do we through prayer, take up our abode with God? Do we subordinate the inferior element in us to the better — I mean, the dust to the spirit, as we should if we have returned the right verdict on the alloy of the two which is our nature? Do we make life a meditation of death? Do we establish our mastery over our passions, mindful of the nobility of our second birth? … 

So, what might this have to do with Ms Rice? Well, it might be said that her disappointment with the Church was that it wasn’t good enough as a social accomplishment. It might be offered, in the Church’s defense, that to complain of the failings of others and their tarnished social accomplishments is something like fretting about the log in my brother’s eye. Recall 1st Timothy 1:15. 

The orations can be found in this small paperback: On God and Christ: The Five Theological Orations and Two Letters to Cledonius

Good morning.

1. A very cool photo-essay.
2. Fun with toys.
3. It sounds like the strategy is the same-as-it-ever-was, that is talk is cheap (and cheap is all you’ll get).
4. Obesity and cause.
5. A narrow view of plagarism.
6. In which the European/US “,” vs “.” transposition threw me for a loop momentarily.
7. Maintaining civilization.
8. Abortion and slavery, continued.
9. Transit tech. 
10. Given that climate claims rest on difficult statistical analysis … this might ring alarm bells. Unless of course, AGW advocates are up in arms rejecting those claims.
11. One the rule of law.

Good morning.

1. Democrats and anti-semitism.
2. Politics trumps truth in the Democratic world.
3. Freedom and the press.
4. That secular/religion debate.
5. Why I am not … 
6. Fairyland.
7. Immigration.
8. Not grokking Mr Obama.
9. Mr Obama visits GM.
10. Equity.
11. Tenure.

Good morning.

1. Talking Arizona and the lawsuit.
2. Summer couture and consequence, here and here.
3. Screening potential employees.
4. A birthday of sorts … and this is apropos.
5. Mr Limbaugh and the spill.
6. Stadium crowds.
7. Advice and context.
8. Advice for Ms Sherrod.
9. What’s doing while doing time in Lithuania.
10. Democrats and the tea party.
11. Two essays on complex systems and contemporary politics, here and here.