From a book I've been listening to:
"We give mercy to those who deserve it, but justice to everyone."
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Why I Can't Support Abortion
Because it deals with babies like these, with the only difference being that they are inside the womb.
Friday, May 25, 2007
Thursday, May 24, 2007
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Dealing with Old Computers
It is a state of life in our age that computers quickly become obsolete. Computers are made with specific metals that individually pose no great threat, but en masse are rather nasty things to have in landfills.
I was looking at the Keep Truckee Meadows Beautiful website to see what other events they have coming up after we helped with the activities on May 12, and I stumbled onto a link for a company that does private computer recycling. What's more (and of particular value to me) is that they take non-functioning computer parts, too. Many places will refurbish computers for this or that charitable cause - but there's nothing left to computer when I have finished with my computers.
I encourage you to not toss un-functioning computers when you upgrade, not in the trash at least. These people will salvage what they can, and properly dispose of the rest.
I was looking at the Keep Truckee Meadows Beautiful website to see what other events they have coming up after we helped with the activities on May 12, and I stumbled onto a link for a company that does private computer recycling. What's more (and of particular value to me) is that they take non-functioning computer parts, too. Many places will refurbish computers for this or that charitable cause - but there's nothing left to computer when I have finished with my computers.
I encourage you to not toss un-functioning computers when you upgrade, not in the trash at least. These people will salvage what they can, and properly dispose of the rest.
I'm not the only one
Who thinks that the best way to reduce oil consumption is to make it expensive. And who thinks that there will never be the political will to do soemthing like this. It's nice to talk about CAFE standards, and requiring oil companies to invest in alternative energy research. But it is simultaneously painfully ineffective for the same reason it's politically feasible - because the effects center on someone else.
As soon as a voter is hit with a $1.50 tax per gallon of gas, they will get upset at the politicians that allow it. That's a cost they see. But the hidden costs of CAFE standards or "punishing" the oil companies is something they think doesn't affect them.
As soon as a voter is hit with a $1.50 tax per gallon of gas, they will get upset at the politicians that allow it. That's a cost they see. But the hidden costs of CAFE standards or "punishing" the oil companies is something they think doesn't affect them.
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Because I know people from the area
I thought you would appreciate this post on my cousin's blog.
Great Smokey Mountains, Tenenssee and North Carolina
Great Smokey Mountains, Tenenssee and North Carolina
If Ghandi could deserve heaven...
...would Hitler deserve Hell?
A common argument for whether Heaven and Hell are justified is "well, do you think Ghandi is in Hell just because he didn't believe in Jesus?"
The argument has a strong appeal - Ghandi sacrificed himself for peace, putting his body on the line for his people. He tried to follow the principles of the Sermon on the Mount, even. Giving his cloak to someone who asked, turning his cheek to one who struck him, living as though the meek, humble, and lowly really would inherit the earth.
Hitler, on the other hand, was a demonstrably bad guy. The butchery of millions and millions - driving the world to war, and being a rather rotten human being.
Let's make a broad assumption and say that Ghandi saved 2 billion people - improving their lot, giving them hope, whatever. Let's make the opposite asumption of Hitler - that he destroyed, directly or indirectly, 2 billion lives though war, genocide, etc.
If the "default" afterlife is Hell, would saving 2 billion lives be enough to earn Ghandi a trip the other way? Eventually, wouldn't the bliss of Paradise accrue to the point where what he did in life would "balance" the book? Should he at that point be cast into Hell? Dealing with infinite things like the afterlife is a tricky thing for this reason.
The opposite is true of Heaven: if that is the "default," (as so many people would prefer to believe - just don't be bad enough in life to get kicked out) wouldn't eternal damnation be too much, even for Hitler? If every life he ruined were worth 1,000 years of torment, then his 2 billion ruined lives would nevertheless be paid for in 2 trillion years. Granted, this is a timeframe some 100 times longer than the current theoretical age of the universe... but it is still but a speck in the light of infinity.
The worst part of the argument that Ghandi deserves Heaven and Hitler deserves Hell is where to draw the dividing line. If we assume a statistically normal distribution of goodness across all the people of all time - some very good, some very bad, many more in between - then we will have to make a cut off between two people who are very similar, with a very small thing dividing them. Perhaps Mark and John are the people on either side of the line. They've done their share of good and bad in life, but John cut off one too many people in traffic, and that pushes him just below the cutoff.
Can we in good conscience say that, for all intents and purposes, that one act was enough to condemn John to eternal torment, while granting Mark eternal bliss? Even subdivided, with uber-Heaven, Boring-Heaven, not-too-bad-Hell and Terrible-Hell - you still have to put the lines somewhere in the distribution of man... and you are still making distinctions based on minute differences. distinctions that summed over eternity far outweigh the small choices that put them in category A, B, C, D, or whatever.
The only way I think this can be satisfactory is that everyone deserves heaven (including Hitler, Brutus, Judas, Osama Bin Laden, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush), or everyone deserves hell (including Ghandi, Martin Luther King Jr, and Mikey from the Life Cereal commercials).
A common argument for whether Heaven and Hell are justified is "well, do you think Ghandi is in Hell just because he didn't believe in Jesus?"
The argument has a strong appeal - Ghandi sacrificed himself for peace, putting his body on the line for his people. He tried to follow the principles of the Sermon on the Mount, even. Giving his cloak to someone who asked, turning his cheek to one who struck him, living as though the meek, humble, and lowly really would inherit the earth.
Hitler, on the other hand, was a demonstrably bad guy. The butchery of millions and millions - driving the world to war, and being a rather rotten human being.
Let's make a broad assumption and say that Ghandi saved 2 billion people - improving their lot, giving them hope, whatever. Let's make the opposite asumption of Hitler - that he destroyed, directly or indirectly, 2 billion lives though war, genocide, etc.
If the "default" afterlife is Hell, would saving 2 billion lives be enough to earn Ghandi a trip the other way? Eventually, wouldn't the bliss of Paradise accrue to the point where what he did in life would "balance" the book? Should he at that point be cast into Hell? Dealing with infinite things like the afterlife is a tricky thing for this reason.
The opposite is true of Heaven: if that is the "default," (as so many people would prefer to believe - just don't be bad enough in life to get kicked out) wouldn't eternal damnation be too much, even for Hitler? If every life he ruined were worth 1,000 years of torment, then his 2 billion ruined lives would nevertheless be paid for in 2 trillion years. Granted, this is a timeframe some 100 times longer than the current theoretical age of the universe... but it is still but a speck in the light of infinity.
The worst part of the argument that Ghandi deserves Heaven and Hitler deserves Hell is where to draw the dividing line. If we assume a statistically normal distribution of goodness across all the people of all time - some very good, some very bad, many more in between - then we will have to make a cut off between two people who are very similar, with a very small thing dividing them. Perhaps Mark and John are the people on either side of the line. They've done their share of good and bad in life, but John cut off one too many people in traffic, and that pushes him just below the cutoff.
Can we in good conscience say that, for all intents and purposes, that one act was enough to condemn John to eternal torment, while granting Mark eternal bliss? Even subdivided, with uber-Heaven, Boring-Heaven, not-too-bad-Hell and Terrible-Hell - you still have to put the lines somewhere in the distribution of man... and you are still making distinctions based on minute differences. distinctions that summed over eternity far outweigh the small choices that put them in category A, B, C, D, or whatever.
The only way I think this can be satisfactory is that everyone deserves heaven (including Hitler, Brutus, Judas, Osama Bin Laden, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush), or everyone deserves hell (including Ghandi, Martin Luther King Jr, and Mikey from the Life Cereal commercials).
Friday, May 18, 2007
In short
I love The Office. NBC has the best non-The Simpsons shows on TV right now. It's funny, and I can't help but be caught up in the Pam/Jim saga. The season finale last night was everything I had hoped for.
The season finale for Heroes is coming this Monday. I fear an uber-cliffhanger like the end of Season 2 for Alias.
And I agree with Ted Kennedy about something. It feels so... wrong. "Critics say the deal gives amnesty to people in the country illegally. Kennedy said amnesty was just 'a slogan and a cliché.'" I think it is more, but in most of the heated rhetoric, from talk show hosts to politicians - "amnesty" has become indeed a word devoid of meaning, except to rile the masses. Personally, I have little place for us v. them xenophobic fear-mongering on such an issue.
The season finale for Heroes is coming this Monday. I fear an uber-cliffhanger like the end of Season 2 for Alias.
And I agree with Ted Kennedy about something. It feels so... wrong. "Critics say the deal gives amnesty to people in the country illegally. Kennedy said amnesty was just 'a slogan and a cliché.'" I think it is more, but in most of the heated rhetoric, from talk show hosts to politicians - "amnesty" has become indeed a word devoid of meaning, except to rile the masses. Personally, I have little place for us v. them xenophobic fear-mongering on such an issue.
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