I agree with Glenn Beck that we haven’t reached the point where eugenics is being implemented as a matter of policy. However, when you look back at history, you understand the dangers that lie ahead in the health care debate. Click on the video below to see the whole story:

Shouting at congressional leaders is getting the Left all upset.  "This is not an appropriate form of protest!", they insist.  Fine, then.  Let’s use a form that the Left was all in favor of; throwing shoes at them.  (I’m sure a demonstration of this sort would be lauded as "patriotic", eh?"

(Hat tip: NRO)

Norman Geras yesterday pointed to a Dawkins quote and said some things which I agree (in which neither of us agree with Mr Dawkins) yet I would go further. He begins (the quote is from Mr Dawkins):

‘that imposing parental beliefs on children is a form of child abuse’ surely merits some clarifying explanation before we assent to it. It is, of course, easy as well as necessary to draw a distinction between putting a belief to children in a way that makes it plain to them that there are alternatives to, questions about, disagreements over it, and insisting on the belief as the sole unchallengeable truth. There’s a difference between trying to educate children in a spirit that encourages interest in the world and finding out about it, on the one hand, and indoctrination, on the other.

I don’t think this is really a reasonable point of view. The decision of whether there are “alternatives” depends in part on how strongly we feel the matter at hand is true and by contrast how strongly we believe the contrary is false. Take ethics. There are a variety of starting points for ethics, one of which is solipsism. We do not necessarily want to teach our children that solipsism is a reasonable basis for normative ethics even if some philosophers have suggested or explored that possibility (or even if some long lost civilization based its particular practices on that).

Mr Geras continues:

Again, must we not discriminate better from worse as between maintaining some standards of personal cleanliness and not doing so, or between behaving with consideration and kindness and being rude and dishonest? More generally, educating children involves, willy-nilly, the imparting of moral beliefs. This cannot be done without the presentation of some things as good and others as less good or downright bad. Even done in a non-doctrinaire way, it must involve a degree of active direction. It’s misleading, therefore, to pretend that only dogmatists and fanatics narrow the minds of their children to the available sum of human beliefs.

So the question I pose is as follows, examine this exchange attributed to St. John Chrysostom (wiki on St. John here):

“You cannot banish me, for this world is my Father’s house.”
“But I will kill you,” said the empress.
“No, you cannot, for my life is hid with Christ in God,” said John.
“I will take away your treasures.”
“No, you cannot, for my treasure is in heaven and my heart is there.”
“But I will drive you away from your friends and you will have no one left.”
“No, you cannot, for I have a Friend in heaven from whom you cannot separate me.
I defy you, for there is nothing you can do to harm me.”

Imagine a person with that sort of view of his faith (if that does not strike a chord or set an example to which you would aspire) and the way in which he sees the world. For more, I’d also recommend his very famous Paschal (Easter) homily as well, which might rightly be put in similar pride of place for the Church as the US places the Gettysburg address. Any educational process includes an implicit or explicit evaluation of the value of the “alternatives” suggested. How would this parent instruct his children? In yesterday’s discussion JA offered:

That being said, I think the idea that there’s something wrong with indoctrinating a child with one religion is an important one. Now it’s one thing if you are the liberal sort who says this is our tradition and this is what we do and this is what it means to us… but it’s quite another if you are more dogmatic and say this is what’s true, period.

I don’t find any way that a person, who is like St. John can do anything other but state that his faith is “what’s true, period.” It is my contention that those who assent to the notion as expressed in the quote above have a tepid faith specifically not a faith such as expressed by St. John above.

Former President George W. Bush walked a fine line between science and morality/ethics when he decided that existing embryonic stem cell lines, at the time, would be the only ones available for Federal grants.  Federal money would not be available to any new lines.

Contrary to some misinformed, partisan critics, he did not ban embryonic stem cell research.  Companies using private money were not restricted in any way.   Bush simply said that Federal money would be given out in what he believed was as moral and ethical a way as could be done at the time. 

The LA Times reported this week that a Stanford University study was done to determine the extent of this restriction.  The results show that the loudly-complaining scientists have put even tighter restrictions on themselves, making their protests disingenuous.

Read the rest of this entry

1. Considering Dawkins and imposition of beliefs on the young. Two remarks from me, first I’d guess that this person has not personally yet raised any kids and second the assumption that religious beliefs are the sort in which you “should teach that there are alternatives” presupposes a tepid sort of belief. You would not teach your child that the universe really doesn’t exist (solipsism) is “a viable option” for basing ethics because you don’t believe it is reasonable.
2. SSD cleaning.
3. Judgement vs vetting.
4. Matters the Democrats are dodging in the healthcare “debate”. Why the scare quotes.
5. Birther and truther, a graph.
6. Oddly enough the thing that struck me in this piece was his vision of “ideal” society, wifi, robust GDP, and universal healthcare. How tepid. And, in response to the main point, the problem is The Bottom Billion.
7. Exercise won’t make you thin … tell that to the endurance athletes of the world, they’ll likely disagree just a bit.
8. An Attack!!
9. On Sodom and Gomorrah two short pieces, here and here (the second is a response to the first).
10. Christian response to political oppression done right.
11. Turning it around.
12. A motive for Russian aggression against Georgia.
13. Afghanistan and marketing.
14. Plugging the City.

What follows is the text of my recent segment on Shire Network News. Normally I don’t post these commentaries here, but I thought this one fit well with this blog. And if you want to hear it, click on the link above. (Disclaimer: The shows are sometimes rated PG-13 for some language from the host and other commentators.)

Hi, this is Doug Payton for Shire Network News asking you to "Consider This!"

This just in: Religious texts are not universally revered.  Liberal ministers shocked.  From the AFP article:

Christians voiced anger and dismay Tuesday after a Bible, which was part of an exhibition inviting viewers to add their reflections, was defaced with offensive and foul-mouthed scrawl.

Glasgow’s Gallery of Modern Art has decided to put the Bible in a glass case after the exhibit, called Untitled 2009 and part of a show entitled Made In God’s Image, was vandalised.

Artist Jane Clarke, a minister at the Metropolitan Community Church, asked visitors to annotate the Bible with stories and reflections, as a way of making it more inclusive.

But visitors to the gallery took the invitation a bit further than she had anticipated.

"This is all sexist pish, so disregard it all," wrote one person, while another described the Bible as "the biggest lie in human history" and a third wrote: "Mick Jagger and David Bowie belong in here."

The oh-so-easy point to make here — one made innumerable times on this podcast — is that if this were the Koran, then the phrase "voiced anger and dismay" could very likely be the mildest thing you’d read, especially if this took place in, say, Denmark, and included a few cartoons.  We’re repeating ourselves, but it’s worth repeating.

Now, Breibart.com has a link to other articles about the Metropolitan Community Church, and they are, unsurprisingly, a very liberal church.  I part ways with my SNN brethren and "sistren" on the issue of same-sex marriage.  I’m against it, and thus I am on the opposite side of the debate from Metropolitan as well.  They have, in my opinion, ignored what the Bible says on the subject of homosexuality.  And so it comes as no surprise to me, frankly, that the general public around the Metropolitan doesn’t take the Bible seriously; the Metropolitan doesn’t.  Thus this church may actually be having an effect on their community, though likely not in the way they planned.  Its irony in motion.

In addition, the display was rather self-serving.  Clarke said, "Writing our names in the margins of a Bible was to show how we have been marginalised by many Christian churches, and also our desire to be included in God’s love."  Oh please!  What do you mean by "marginalized"?  Thieves, murderers, guys who cheat on their golf scores and, yes, homosexuals are welcome in any church.  No one’s being marginalized.  Ya’ wanna’ come to Jesus?  Then come on down.  Ya’ just wanna’ find out what this whole "Christianity" thing is?  Pull up a pew and we’ll let you know.  Ya’ wanna’ be coddled and told you’re not really doing anything wrong?  Wellll, that’s not going to happen because we all do things wrong, and it would be lying to tell you otherwise, and that would also be wrong.  (Can I have an "Amen"?)

I would hope that the folks running the Metropolitan believes that theft is a sin.  If they do, then saying so is no more marginalizing thieves than saying what my church believes about homosexuality marginalizes gays.  We’re both doing the same thing, so this "holier-than-thou" attitude, so often attributed to conservative churches, seems to have a nice enough home at Metropolitan.  Irony is now becoming rampant.

Finally, this "desire to be included in God’s love" that Clarke mentioned is, for someone who knows their Bible, a given.  How well she knows it is her business (though she is a minister, the church’s former pastor), but here’s a quick refresher.  Most folks, churched or not, know the line, "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone."  This is Jesus standing with an adulterer and against some religious leaders.  Without asking, she’s already included in God’s love.  No need for liner notes with her name, no parades, no fanfare; it’s there.  Clarke’s own words seem to call that guarantee into question.  There’s no reason why her community would think any differently. Instead of salt and light, it sounds to me like the Metropolitan is presenting bland shades of gray.

Oh, and by the way, there is another line in that same Bible story that isn’t repeated as often as the "first stone" line.  The last thing Jesus says to here is, "Go and sin no more."  Can you believe it?  By calling what she did a "sin", He was marginalizing her!  Consider this!

Growing up in the North, school never started until after Labor Day.  Living now in the South, it comes much earlier.  Today is the first day of school for most districts around metro Atlanta, and I have 2 in high school; one a freshman and one a junior.  For the freshman, it’s his first day of public school, and he’s looking forward to it.  All our kids have been home schooled through 8th grade.

One reason (of many) that we do this, relates to this article talking about Delaware schools.  It repeats a statistic that I’ve highlighted in the past, and think now is as good a time as any to repeat it.

Across the country, it was estimated in 2003 that nearly 10 percent of American students — or more than 4.5 million — were targets of sexual harassment or abuse by a public school employee between kindergarten and 12th grade, according to a study by former Hofstra University professor Charol Shakeshaft.

The study, commissioned by the U.S. Department of Education, said those numbers could be low because inappropriate behavior by educators is likely under-reported, Shakeshaft wrote.

Emphasis mine, as I emphasize them again.  Know your school district.  Home schooling is always an option.

1. The freedom of letting go.
2. Anti-semetic and philosemetic and some 19th century literature.
3. There will be a second round. Jah, we knew that.
4. Concerning a particularly useful invention.
5. On SSM.
6. Bitter-sweet customs.
7. What is democracy … a global view.
8. A ghastly city, perhaps that will put an end to romanticising the native American culture.
9. An early road map.
10. This sort of begs an important question. How do people think they can do climate prediction if solar output varys and we don’t understand how or why?
11. He may “have a point”, just not the one you think he has. When you read, “The recent attacks by Republican leaders and their ideological fellow-travelers on the effort to reform the health-care system have been so misleading, so disingenuous, that they could only spring from a cynical effort to gain partisan political advantage. By poisoning the political well, they’ve given up any pretense of being the loyal opposition.” I think one could transplant objections and responses to objections over the Iraq war directly into this sentiment. Yet, I figure few on the left thought their objections were “cynical efforts to gain partisan political advantage”. There’s a lesson here.
12. In that line of thought, an exercise for the left. Replace the words “Obama” with “Bush” in this article and what would be your response.
13. If this idea becomes the norm, will publishing in a “reject” journal satisfy degree requirements?
14. This notion on healthcare that everyone without insurance wants it that way is problematic.
15. Where the left’s version of the birther inanity is showing up.
16. Syriac study resources.
17. Religion and Egypt.
18. On Darwin and ideas.

A few weeks ago I posted several versions of an essay on Faith and Science, this is the start of another (which unlike the first has no “target” for publication). I may return and extend and refine it, but I have no definite plans to do so. In part that depends on whether this attempt engenders any response. In the spirituality class I am taking we read a number of St. Ephrem’s hymns “On Virginity” from the CWS collection. A few of these in the series concentrate not on virginity but St. Ephrem uses oil (olive) to indicate a “type” of Christ. In Syriac apparently oil, Messiah, and Anointing all come from the same root word, which is not the case with English (or Greek apparently). St. Ephrem also then lists a number of properties of oil, used in cooking, healing, for light and so on and illustrates how, because Christ does the same, that oil is a “type” reflecting and illuminating our understanding of Christ. This hymn thereby becomes a way in which common practice (contact with oil) in daily life can be uses to remind oneself, a trigger for reflections, and in general a way of connecting one’s daily life with one’s theological practice and belief. It can be noted that the common features and uses of oil come from the science and practices of the day.

So it might be an interesting project to do the same with modern science. Light was a common type of Christ in the days of St. Ephrem and the theological writers of late antiquity. Today, in late modernity, we can add to thse typological constructions. Today we might add things like the following:

1. Light is simultaneously without confusing both particle and wave. Likewise, Christ was man and God.
2. Light illuminating an atom can stimulates it to a higher state. Again Christ’s actions in a man’s heart can stimulate it to seek (and attain) for higher things.
3. This same light, further illuminating a population of exited (previously stimulated) atoms can cause the creation of more light, i.e., lasers. Atoms acting in concert, a type of “communion” through Christ (the light) and by Christ in communion a type of Christ and the Eucharist.
4. Light exists in a sort of timeless fashion, particles travelling on null or light cones in Minkowski spacetimes interact with things “in time” yet for the massless particle no time passes.
5. Light through photosynthesis is the source from which oxygen and sugars comes into our world, that which we derive our very life depends. We similarly depend on Christ to “trample death by death” unlocking the gates of Hades.

That was the product of a just a few minutes reflection on light and modern scientific discoveries in a typological exercise. One could likely do similar exercises with our understanding of astrophysics, matter, the standard model and so on. So, here’s the question: Is science education so poor these days that these sorts of typological reflections are useless to the lay Christian? That is, in St. Ephrem’s day oil (of the olive) was in many ways akin to petroleum today, it was a linchpin of their economy. Olive oil then was used for light, food, health, lubrication and a myriad of other applications. It took no real specialized knowledge to understand this. People today have likely all heard of quantum mechanics (things have a wave/particle duality), that light excites atoms to higher states, that lasers exist, and even have heard via special relativity that time slows for fast moving objects and that via extrapolation coupled with remembering that nothing travels faster than light that perhaps time might essentially stop for objects travelling at the speed of light. So, there are two questions here. Is this sort of reflection (a) useful in helping people connect theological abstractions with things with which they are familiar and (b) perhaps have the further use of reducing what friction now exists between religion and science.

According to President Obama’s top counterterrorism official, we should no longer use the term "war on terror" to describe the struggle against jihadis.  Oops, sorry, John Brennan also said we’re not at war with jihadis either, since "jihad" is, "a legitimate term, ‘jihad,’ meaning to purify oneself or to wage a holy struggle for a moral goal".  No, this should just be called a "war with al Qaeda", because after all, they’re really the only jihadi terrorists that hate us. 

Oh, and World War II is to be renamed in all future textbooks as the "War Against Adolf Hitler, Personally".  Otherwise, it would sound like it took place everywhere and was against the whole country of Germany.  Well, and Italy, but the "War Against Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini, Personally" doesn’t roll off the tongue as nicely.

And it’s not a global war either, says Johnny.  Just because al Qaeda operates in the Middle East and Africa, and attacked the US on its home soil, we don’t want to risk making it sound like they really are all over the place.  It’s an image thing, you know.  Control the message.

So my question is this; if this counterterrorism official says we’re not fighting terrorists, what does that say about his position as a … counterterrorism official?  Perhaps he’d just rather put up a sign over his door saying, "Mission Accomplished" and hit the golf course.

1. New non-lethal military tech.
2. Nazi accusations in the news. Pelosi and Rush.
3. On disgruntlement in town hall meetings from TMV.
4. Krugman and pesky facts.
5. Neo-nomenklatura.
6. For the transfiguration, words from St. Ephrem. A church too. One more.
7. A book on ID noted.
8. Mr Harris (on Collins) gets a good going over.
9. Bully for her.
10. Ghastly science fiction.
11. The administration changes some words, here are two suggestions it’s a bad idea, here and here.
12. Noting Mr Hughes passing.
13. Putin viewed from St. Petersburg.
14. Obama and Mr Stewart.
15. Well that didn’t work out like planned.
16. Cash for clunkers, one more way in which Mr Huxley proved prescient.
17. In which I link a Bill Maher quote.
18. Finally, go girl go.

Mr Swartz is on the (far) left, which he thinks should be a larger plurality. In this post expressing that sentiment he writes:

It quickly became clear that I was the only person even remotely on the left. And it wasn’t simply that the others disagreed with me; they couldn’t even understand me. I remember us discussing a scene in Invisible Man where a factory worker brags he’s so indispensable that when he was out sick the boss drove to his house and begged him to come back, agreeing to put him in charge. When I suggested Ellison might be implying that labor, not management, ought to run workplaces, the other students (and the teacher) didn’t just disagree—they found the idea incomprehensible. How could you run a factory without managers?

And thereby it becomes clear why the left which Mr Swartz envisions is so small … it’s because the ideas he holds are so, well, wrong in a very obvious way.

Imagine as Mr Swartz suggests a “factory without managers.” How might that proceed. Well, consider that factory entirely consisting of managers. Somebody of course has to procure raw materials … and a good price would be nice. So one or more of the workers, depending on the size of the plant, isn’t on the plant floor, he’s making calls and finding suppliers. Somebody (or more people again depending on the plant size) has to manage the cash-flow: ingoing, outgoing, and arranging for lines of credit. People will have to locate buyers, find markets, locate new ways of the products produced at the factory to be used. Some people will need to tool up for new product, decide “build or buy” on new property for expansion and arrange for the, uhm, capital as is necessary.  Additionally some of those workers will need to arrange for the hiring of new workers, assist during health emergencies, and could even help plan retirement plans. Others will need to do engineering or basic science work to figure out new and better ways to manufacture whatever it is this factory produces. These roles, oddly enough, are indispensable. They all  in fact take quite a bit of hard work. Additionally many of these roles take more expertise and background training than an unskilled labourer requires, which cost that person time and money in order to acquire. A plant manufacturing “stuff” if it is real actually depends on these sorts of services. We have a name for those people in those roles, that name for people watching the supply chain, doing sales, managing capital and doing HR services are what we call management. Oddly enough the idea is in fact incomprehensible. It is in fact impossible to run a factory without managers in a actual real world situation.

So it seems this is the sort of leftist who finds it sad that factories which don’t actually sell their product, acquire raw materials, and so on … are not seen as realistic. Or to put it another way, I find it completely incomprehensible that Mr Swartz figures on running a factory without people performing the jobs and roles noted above. Who will do this? How and why? There must be a standard answer in his repertoire. What might that be?

My commenter JA scoffs at my idea that those the communist sympathizers and the sympathies held by the left in the mid to late 80s didn’t suddenly have an epiphany and decide that everything they believed was wrong. That they instead have softened their rhetoric and acquired camouflage. Part of his difficulty with that sort of notion is that Mr Obama is of this generation and himself being somewhat younger and one of the “non left lefties” that Mr Swartz complains realize that the socialist/communist dreams of the 80s left has not been inherited by the younger left.

1. Well, that setup ain’t for racing, but one can certainly see the appeal, the other could probably climb a tree … and break your legs going downhill.
2. 2nd quarter shows no support for stimulus benefits.
3. The sun and climate change, oh my.
4. Hey, it’s not a ponzi scheme if you’re soaking the taxpayers, just ask Tweed and Tammany.
5. Some thoughts on income inequality.
6. Accusations that that opposition to Obamacare is “an insurance company plot” is demonstration that this Administration remains out of touch with reality. So say the cricket races.
7. Very cute.
8. A modal argument for the existence of God.
9. Well, I for one have little but good things to offer from my switch to Linux on my laptop.
10. 800 died, did you notice? I hadn’t.
11. The 100 + 1000 + 23 million Mr Clinton missed.
12. Alexandr.
13. Some unfunded government insurance liabilities … so says the liberal, “Please, sir may I have another?”
14. 3 down, 62 to go.
15. Memory and tribute.
16. Memory eternal.
17. I occurred to me while reading this, in the arguments discussed on “harm give birth” I wonder how those arguments transpose to the benefits to suicide? Larry?

Billy Hollis, writing at the Q&O blog, has a breakdown of Obama’s successes and failures in his first 6 months in office.  He comes away very unimpressed.  No President should be ultimately judged on his first 6 months only, but given how big a bite Obama has taken and the promises he led his supporters to believe, the trend is not looking good for him at all.

If you have said, "Obama is doing a great job", or substituted "good" or even "OK" instead of "great", you owe it to yourself to read this.

Making promises that pander to a particular voting bloc is one thing.  Sitting in the Oval Office is, apparently, quite another.

After early pledges by President Obama that he would moderate the Bush administration’s tough policy on immigration enforcement, his administration is pursuing an aggressive strategy for an illegal-immigration crackdown that relies significantly on programs started by his predecessor.

A recent blitz of measures has antagonized immigrant groups and many of Mr. Obama’s Hispanic supporters, who have opened a national campaign against them, including small street protests in New York and Los Angeles last week.

The administration recently undertook audits of employee paperwork at hundreds of businesses, expanded a program to verify worker immigration status that has been widely criticized as flawed, bolstered a program of cooperation between federal and local law enforcement agencies, and rejected proposals for legally binding rules governing conditions in immigration detention centers.

“We are expanding enforcement, but I think in the right way,” Janet Napolitano, the homeland security secretary, said in an interview.

Translation: It’s the same policy but we’ve tweaked it just enough to give enough cover to still talk about the eeeevil Bush regime.  But even this has an ulterior motive.

Ms. Napolitano and other administration officials argue that no-nonsense immigration enforcement is necessary to persuade American voters to accept legislation that would give legal status to millions of illegal immigrants, a measure they say Mr. Obama still hopes to advance late this year or early next.

That approach brings Mr. Obama around to the position that his Republican rival, Senator John McCain of Arizona, espoused during last year’s presidential campaign, a stance Mr. Obama rejected then as too hard on Latino and immigrant communities. (Mr. McCain did not respond to requests for comment.) Now the enforcement strategy has opened a political rift with some immigrant advocacy and Hispanic groups whose voters were crucial to the Obama victory.

"Trust me, I’m on your side" is a mantra many have heard from Obama, only to be disappointed.  Ask anyone hoping for fiscal responsibility.