Thursday, February 22, 2007

Big/Whole

Pantheism/Panentheism. A quick thought.

(Crude/ancient) pantheism said that everything, the universe, is God. This means that the bigger something is, the more of God there is. Hence, worship a mountain instead of a pebble, because it's bigger. Pantheism seems to divinise Big-ness.

Panentheism on the other hand says that God is the universe, but that the whole is more than the parts that make it up. So the chemicals of my body may be worth less than $10, and if I sold my organs off individually I'd get around $250,000, but as a whole, I'm worth more than that. Panentheism seems to divinise Whole-ness.

Theism is another kettle of fish, which probably divinises self(ishness) or fear-of-the-other or something. But I won't get into that here. I'm more interested into what people think about the first two - am I onto something, is it a ridiculous over-simplification, or it is unfair?

Monday, February 19, 2007

Visiting DC

This past weekend I went to Crystal City, just outside of Washington DC. I went for a DnD convention and to see friends from Chicago, but while I was there I also took a few hours to see some of the sights in downtown DC. Here are my thoughts.

The metro was efficient, clean, curvy and ... concrete. Every station (of the ~10 I saw) looked alike and quickly became monotonous. There was no art, no creativity. At the Pentagon stop, there was a poster advertising "Unrestricted Warfare Symposium: Be a Part of the Solution." This worried me until I looked it up and discovered that it was actually anti-war (at least, anti-unrestricted war). However, the reason I assumed it was pro-war was that in every station there were posters advertising the US military and war-related jobs. Even the adverts for skin-care had war-related themes. The entire area was tainted with war. I was appalled.

Emerging from the subway I made my way across several of the sites, seeing the capitol building (from a distance), the Washington Monument, the White House (from a distance), the WWII memorial, the Vietnam (SE Asia) memorial and the Lincoln memorial. Out of these, the Vietnam memorial was the odd one out. All the others stood up, reaching for the sky. The Washington Monument was the epitome of this, being an enormous phallus that reached Babel-like into the heavens - I am hoping that someone will one day carve it into a shape that more closely resembles a penis so the blatant (white) male power-trip will be shown more obviously for what it symbolises.

The WWII memorial was a glorification of war. It was a celebration of victory, an excuse to 'show-them' that we won. It again reached up into the sky, although its shape also made it slightly less Babelesque and slightly more receptive to the heavens. There were quotations from several famous people carved into it, all of them glorifying war. I threw a snowball at one of them that made me mad. There was one that was trying to acknowledge women's contribution to the war, although this was carved in an unsymmetrical place, which made it appear to be an afterthought and less important. I was pleased it was there though.

The Lincoln memorial, or rather, Lincoln 'Temple' (as it calls itself) was, as I had been warned, repulsive. Although Lincoln himself said (and as was carved on the side of the temple), God doesn't take sides. However, clearly the American people who planned and built this 'temple' believed otherwise, as they built an enormous idol who clearly was there to be worshiped. The temple tried to impress you with its size, although it reminded me of Lord Farquaad - compensating.

The Vietnam Memorial was a completely different story. This did not stand up, reaching for the heavens - it was a scar, cut down into the landscape. This did not gleam with white marble, bathing in the light of the gods - it absorbed light into its black granite. This did not glorify war, it lamented the loss of the people whose names were carved into it. This was a wonder. It brought forth tears, rather than attempting to inspire awe. It rang of humility, of pain, of mistakes. It was beautiful in its simplicity. It is the only memorial I know of that tries to remember the dead, rather than trying to glorify the war.

Sunday, February 18, 2007

Lose Faith

Lose faith in government
- the elite aristocracy despise the people.
Lose faith in corporations,
- whom greed is good.
Lose faith in advertising, marketing and sales
- what they promise won't help.
Lose faith in military machines
- they sacrifice life for profit.
Lose faith in (mass) media
- the lies they've decided to entertain you with will entrap you.
Lose faith in universals,
- no one has the perspective from which to claim them.
Lose faith in one-size-fits-all
- it won't.
Lose faith in humanity,
- it consistently chooses extinction and is choosing its own.
Lose faith in God
- He is man's puppet.
Lose faith in the/a future
- it is not set, it is not determined, it is not sure, it might not...

-- Inspired during my visit to Washington DC this past weekend.

Sunday, February 11, 2007

Short Thoughts

In a week where I don't have much time, here's just a quick thought that's occurred to me, as well an unrelated quotation from Jimmy Carter.

It seems evolutionary scientists (Michael Ruse, Richard Dawkins) are still trying to set up an ontology - the way the universe really is. What they're missing is that the universe isn't an ontology (which Barry Allen gets). To say that God stepped into history to move evolution forward, or to say that the blind uncaring watchmaker (Dawkins) was the cause, is not the question. Those who advocate blind selection are missing out on the mystery, creativity and joy of the universe. Those who say God did it are setting up a mythology, because the mythology has a purpose, allowing for better living in the present and for the future. It's poetry, not machinery that is being emphasised. Creativity, not fate. Although the evolutionists will not believe in pre-destination, every possibility has been set in the past, and the train track of the future is determined by what has been (although we may be creating it as we go). There's no room for change, for radical difference from what evolution/DNA(/psychology) determines that I/we will do. Determinism is the end of ontology in science, just as it is in theology.


"First of all, it would be a commitment to the principles that Christ espoused. We worship Him as the Prince of Peace, not the Prince of Pre-emptive War. And I have noticed how many leading Christians - I presume many of them call themselves evangelicals - have been among the most militant and warlike members of our society. Even before President Bush decided to invade Iraq, he had strong public support from a number of more conservative Christians.
The second things is justice - that is, the commitment of individual beings and their governments to utilise the power, the strength, the riches, the influence of a government to alleviate suffering among those who are mist in need - to give them food, shelter, water."
-- Jimmy Carter, from Idea magasine in discussing how the (evangelical) church could get back on track. Sadly the Evangelical Alliance responded negatively.

Sunday, February 4, 2007

Software I recommend

Here's some software I've come across that I find useful. I try to avoid using large corporations wherever possible (microsoft, adobe), and prefer to use open source, GNU/GPL, or independent programming when I can find it. All software listed is free and freely downloadable, but I will also include what license it holds to. I will update this slowly as I test and use new software. Please leave suggestions of useful software you have found, and any alternatives you have found to the corporately-owned software I am currently using.

Of course, I am a hypocrite because I am using Windozes, the ultimate corporate evil of computer software. But at least I'm not using Vista - if you are, unplug you computer from the internet, format your hard drive and install an operating system that doesn't spy on you and take all your rights and power away. Really, if you're using Vista you're stupid. Really stupid.


Web Browsing
:
Firefox, and see the bottom of the page for the addons I use. If you are using IE then stop everything and download firefox now. It'll save you time, disk space, annoyance, pop-ups and even some virus/spyware. Mozilla and other open source software licenses.

Office:
OpenOffice (very nice full office suite) GPL
Google Docs (simple text editor that you can collaborate with others to write documents, lacks footnotes) Warning: Corporately owned
MS Office 2003 (better than later versions, but don't pay for it) Warning: Corporately owned

Media (Music and Video):
VLC (The best media player out there) GPL
Media Player Classic (with Real Alternative and Quicktime Alternative) GPL
musikCube partially open source
Others various
Democracy (looks attractive for podcasts and internet TV but I haven't used it) GPL
FLV open source
Audacity (Audio recording and editing) GPL
CDex (Ripper and ogg/mp3 encoder - I've not used it but it has been recommended to me) GPL

Pictures:
GIMP GPL
Irfanview free for non-commercial use (make the corporations pay!)
Pix Resizer (also see Alarm from the same person) free/independent
PrintScreen (I use it because my print screen button is broken) Warning: Corporately owned

PDF:
Sumatra (Very simple, not good at handling high magnification) open source
PDF Download (Fantastic Firefox Addon) free/independent
Foxit Reader (It's less evil than Adobe, and smaller/faster than Acrobat) Warning: Corporately owned

Downloading:
µTorrent (The best torrent downloader, but get 1.6 or before, because the later versions collect information on you) Warning: Corporately owned (by BitTorrent Inc.)
eMule (Peer-to-peer downloading, decent but often flooded with malware/unwanted porn) GPL
Soulseek(tm) (A peer-to-peer (music) downloader with lots of small musicians) Corporate/inpedendent?

Communications:
GAIM (Multiple instant messaging clients in one) GPL
Skype (Cheap/free internet phone) Warning: Corporately owned

General Smooth Running:
7-zip (File zipper, with it's own superior 7z compression format) GPL
Ad-Aware (Remove spy/malware) Warning: Corporately owned (but well worth it)
ClamWin (Free Virus Scanner) GPL
CDBurner XP Pro (CD Burner that's significantly better than the Windows built-in) Independent donation-based

Saturday, February 3, 2007

I love skiing!

It's true, I love skiing. Flying down sides of mountains at out-of-control speeds, or working your way between dense trees trying not to crash. It's a fantastic experience every time, the best time I've had being in Utah Winter '03/04, when I repeatedly failed to land after attempting a small jump.

But this post is really inspired by Susan Bauer. She writes about the moral slippery slopes that find ourselves irrecoverably going down, out of control and helpless to resist. In the article she tells of how she has been accused (by US evangelicals) of going down the slippery slope, that once one accepts feminism as being a good thing, one is on a slippery slope to accepting homosexuals too.

Bauer points out that the slippery slope idea that is being invoked against her is a logical fallacy from Aristotle. She also points out that if you look back up the slippery slope that she is on, you see the liberation of slaves. In fact, the slope seems to be (in the US): liberate slaves, liberate women, liberate blacks, liberate homosexuals. What I want to suggest in this post is that slippery slopes are not necessarily bad.

Slippery is often seen to be bad, as it suggests that one is forced to do something against their will. And a slope is often seen to be bad, because it's going down (to the pit), further and further away from God (who we all know if up 'high' in/above the sky). But in (down-hill) skiing, a slippery slope is a good (necessary) thing. Take away the slippery and you fall over and stop, take away the slope and you don't move. Either way, you go nowhere. You need a slippery slope.

In the 'moral' slippery slope, you stagnate into a deadly conservativism if you're not on the slippery slope. Those so-called liberals who accept to a certain point and say "this far and no further" are following in the same deadly conservative vein. They go down the hill until they find a nice place to stop, whether that's accepting women, homosexuals, the polyamorous, or pagans. But each time if there is the cry of 'No further', the skiing stops, the fun ends, the exhilaration of life is lost. Conservativism kills another.

What we need to do is to keep skiing. It should be a joy to find another oppressed group that we can welcome into our community. We should uncontrollably accept people, loving them first. We should stay on the slippery slope, leaving the barren mountaintops far behind and keep skiing towards the fertile valleys, where communities live in harmony, peace and love (and other hippie-values).