• Cutting the nets.
• Hate speech? Not hate speech.
• Before you (finally) go to sleep.
• Dawkins and “probably” (not an atheist)?
• On media bias.
• Elitism.
• Mr Obama’s tax plan which points at this post.
• Considering intelligence.
• Obama, his friends, and Israel.
• Trek vs Wars.

One of the critical points of disagreement in the abortion divide is notions of personhood. So it seems one interesting thing to examine might be what comprises notions and ideas of personhood and on what basis these ideas are founded.

There are role based notions of personhood. I’m told that in Bali for example, your personality (and in fact your name) is dictated by the order of birth. You are “first son”, or “third daughter” a name which indicates who you are. In Rome the notions of personhood and identification of a person was primarily a legal concept. Your status of citizenship, your membership in guilds and other associations defined your legal notions of personhood. But legal and definitions of personhood based on birthplace or occupation are foreign to members of the modern western world.

One of the common notions of self is based on memory, that is you are the sum of your memories and that your memory is the basis of your continuing notion of self. But this is incomplete and insufficient. If, in some speculative fiction, a persons memories are erased we still think of them as the same person, just that they being the person whom they are is now that person sans memory. That is, the memory did not define self. Similarly if, one person’s “memories” in a scenario such as the Total Recall movie were taken and transplanted into another person … that other person would not thereby “be” identified as the original person. We have a common notion that these to persons are in fact distinct. Memory it seems does not define person. Another example that comes to mind is Latro in the Gene Wolf novels whom awakes each and every morning with no memory of his past. How is “self” or concept of ego considered for someone like him.

Organic identity as well does not define person. Again in speculative fiction not just modern science fiction, there are ideas of a person being transformed into something else. He becomes the ghost in a machine (modern computer or whatnot) or earlier works in which his self is moved to another person, animal, or magical animate object. If the ego, the “I”, can be radically transmuted and that memory of whom I am is not self either … what is the constituent thing which identifies self?

One suggestion, given by the early 4th and 5th century Eastern church, expanded by the 8th century theologian St. Maximus, and put into modern context by  and John Zizioulas is that personhood and self are defined relationally. That your continuity of self and in fact your very notions of self are defined only in relation to “Other”. If we refer to the above identification of self through radical transformations, we recall from those stories that the validation of self past the transforming event is that one recovers and is recognized via re-establishing and restoration of those connections with those others with whom one was formerly connected.

"Gee, I’ll vote to get some of that wealth spread to me."  Welcome to the 21st century.

From Chuck Asay:

• Recession spreads.
• Society and the example of the church.
• Clearly not a person, or perhaps that’s just not true.
• Evolution inspiring faith.
• The Iowahawk satirist commends a new blog Tidestemmer.
• Ayers and disapproval, what might be required?
• Zooooom … and not so zoommy.
• GOP diabolical cleverness.

While surfing around on a few sites tonight I ran across an ad for the Barack Obama Test. The premise of this test is to help you determine how your views match up on key issues with Senator Obama.

It didn’t surprise me all that much that I disagreed with Senator Obama on every single issue. I’m a conservative and the Senator is extremely liberal.

But what surprised me more was what else I learned from the results. After you answer all 48 questions you not only get to see how your answers match up with Senator Obama but you also get to see how other Americans responded to the same questions. The poll questions were pulled together from several issues-oriented opinion polls that have been conducted throughout the campaign. On every single question, more respondents took a contrary view on the issue to Senator Obama’s.

I’ve long thought that this election was more about personality than about issues. Voters seem to like Senator Obama more even though ideologically they don’t line up with him.

Take the test for yourself and see. Just click the button below.

This feature, due to work requirements today will be delayed until later tonight or tomorrow morning.

It seems there is another connection for the “Mr Obama is a socialist” notion. He was a socialist is a factual statement. He was a member of the Alaskan separatist “A New Party” political party at one time. Wiki defines their political orientation taxonomically as following the ideas of “social democracy” which might be summarized as:

The nature of social democracy has changed throughout the decades since its inception. Historically, social democratic parties advocated socialism in the strict sense, achieved by class struggle. In the early 20th century, however, a number of socialist and labor parties rejected revolution and other traditional forms of Marxism and went on to take more moderate positions, which came to form modern social democracy. These positions often include support for a democratic welfare state which incorporates elements of both socialism and capitalism, sometimes termed the mixed economy or the social market economy.^[2] This differs from traditional socialism, which aims to end the predominance of capitalism and replace it with a worker-controlled economic system. Social democrats aim to reform capitalism democratically through state regulation and the creation of programs that work to counteract or remove the social injustice and inefficiencies they see as inherent in capitalism.

So it may be that he is not today a socialist, he however certainly has been one in the past.

• Marketing splained.
• Elite ideas, of killing Americans,, snuggling up with Papa Joe, and “Change”.
• Examining Mr Obama.
• A mini-homily on patience.
• CO2.
• Market: excess profits invites entry.
• A byline to avoid.
• Abortion in cases of incest and rape.

Mrs Palin’s $150k wardrobe (a reasonable explanation here btw) or Mr Obama’s $150k faux-Greek stage setting for his acceptance speech? Both? Neither?

Update: Actuallly, the $150k for the stage was low. Apparently of the $14 million spent on the Denver stadium acceptance speech event $4.3 million was for lighting and stage settings. It is unclear how much went in to the actual stage setting.

Ok, Democrats. Explain this:

There’s more, so read the whole thing. Now consider this excerpt from the official Democrat party platform:

we oppose laws that require identification in order to vote or register to vote

That’s on page number 56 of the plaform document, at the linked site it is p. 58 of the total document because the first two pages are not numbered.

Makes no sense to me. Vote once, vote often, vote a zillion times. Let the foreign visitors vote. Let the kids vote. Pay them to vote. Help them vote for the “right guy.”

Why? Why is this a “good thing?”

An article by Tara Ross at DoubleThink magazine is a very revealing look into the history of the mixing of church and politics, and the misnomer of "separation of church and state".  From Thomas Jefferson’s mistaken view of the matter to how unintended consequences from a Lyndon Johnson decision introduced the idea that politics and the pulpit don’t mix, this is a good history lesson for those that think things were always this way.

They weren’t.

• Books for kids, a series recommended.
• A monster.
• Considering a perfect world.
• more links here.
• Obama and the economy.
• Dan Rather and media bias and Biden’s remarks through the lens of satire.
• Heh.