Remember when Abraham neglects to tell a foreign ruler or two that his "sister" is also his wife? I occasionally hear someone use those stories of Abraham to demonstrate how Abraham was sinful and sometimes lacked faith.
I get irritated at this because we do not know enough information to criticize Abraham.
1. God never rebukes Abraham for this. God appears to even be on Abraham's side by giving dreams to the ruler or inflicting with an illness.
2. We also don't know Abraham's motivation for his. It could have been a common practice for rulers to kill the husbands of beautiful wives. Much like how I wear a seat belt. I still trust God for safety, but I don't put God to a test.
Wednesday, September 28, 2005
Wednesday, September 21, 2005
Gas Prices
Aren't companies supposed to price gouge? That's were you find the market price which is the price to maximize profit. If a gas company finds that market price first, they will gain an advantage over the others. If they charge too much, their profits will go down because some people will need to find alternates to gas. This affects shipping prices which affects the prices of everything else, but if this is really a problem, we will have to make some sacrifices with the products that we buy. Maybe it will affect how far we are willing to commute or how often we visit family. Maybe we will need to give up renting a movie so that we can buy groceries. Why should we hold gas companies to a higher standard than any other market? That is a result of scarcity, not greedy businessmen.
Working Theories and Tautologies
If you have a theory that is not a tautology and has been tested false, and have a theory that is a tautology and an adequate test has not been formulated, which should remain the working theory until a better one comes along?
Should you hang onto false theory, hoping that a more adequate explanation is discovered, or hang onto the tautology and pitch it only when a better explanation comes along.
Maybe I am making a wrong assumption that a theory can be spotless.
Should you hang onto false theory, hoping that a more adequate explanation is discovered, or hang onto the tautology and pitch it only when a better explanation comes along.
Maybe I am making a wrong assumption that a theory can be spotless.
Wednesday, September 14, 2005
Monday, September 12, 2005
The Exorcism of Emily Rose
Scary movie. There were a couple of interesting slants to this movie:
1. How the "faith evidence" was marginalized and trivialized. The point of the movie was to say that we can't know for certain that the supernatural doesn't exist, even when our society says it cannot.
2. How the psychologist gave the symptoms of Emily Rose a new technical term giving symptoms of demon possession a medical category. This would be like someone who sees a vision of Jesus and decides they were hallucinating.
So I like the perspective this movie shows. And by the end I was more saddend than scared.
1. How the "faith evidence" was marginalized and trivialized. The point of the movie was to say that we can't know for certain that the supernatural doesn't exist, even when our society says it cannot.
2. How the psychologist gave the symptoms of Emily Rose a new technical term giving symptoms of demon possession a medical category. This would be like someone who sees a vision of Jesus and decides they were hallucinating.
So I like the perspective this movie shows. And by the end I was more saddend than scared.
Thursday, September 08, 2005
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