Disqus - Friends of silent0

Re: Blessed are the entitled?

Mike Blyth — Tue, 14 Dec 2010 07:55:03 -0000

I just wish I could click on the like button a few more times! I wrote a blog entry two years ago, "Should we 'Keep Christ in Christmas' or let him go free?" (http://bit.ly/dS7pzc). Each year I end up wondering if the whole Christmas thing doesn't now harm the gospel more than it helps, both by trivializing it with sentiment and myth, and by making Christians seem like petty, partisan people -- after all, it's the vocal ones who get attention. I think it would be great to get a grass-roots movement going to "let Christ go free" from Christmas, and instead observe an alternate Nativity day far from Christmas, for those who still want to have a Christian special day. End the battle for Christmas, the syncretism, etc. by separating the fun, love and family in December from the Nativity celebration in, say, August.

Re: Genetic hitchhiking in English

Mike Blyth — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 15:41:59 -0000

Is this question related to or the same idea as Müller's ratchet? It's not something I understand very well, but isn't the idea that accumulation of deleterious mutations will gradually decrease fitness in the absence of a way to restore the good copies? I've read that both horizontal gene transfer and sexual reproduction exist in part to solve this problem. True or controversial?

Re: Is Nigeria's Boko Haram group really tied to Al Qaeda? - CSMonitor.com

Mike Blyth — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 17:01:16 -0000

It is simply untrue that "In the past year, the city of Jos in Plateau State,
east of Abuja, has emerged as the frontline of the battle between the
Boko Haram and Christian militants. Firefights occur daily." Jos is in no way the frontline of the battle--perhaps you're confusing us with Maiduguri?--nor are there daily firefights. There have been sporadic ethnoreligious clashes, of courses, but these go back at least to 2001 and have none of the characteristics of terrorism. There was a multiple bomb attack on December 24, 2010 that was quite distinct from the conflict to that point and closer to the tactics of Boko Haram, followed by more communal conflict in January. There was also an outbreak of conflict between groups of youths last month, leading to about 1 week of unrest and sporadic fighting. Since then, tension has gradually decreased. Daily firefights? Please. Expected increase in casualties because security forces are being increased? Perhaps some people believe that, but I hardly think it's representative of all. Or perhaps the whole section about Jos was actually supposed to be about Maiduguri?

--Mike B in Jos

Re: Boko Haram challenge to the Nigerian Islamic establishment, orthodoxy (2)

Mike Blyth — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 03:22:33 -0000

Interesting
to hear about the document “The Boko Haram Tragedy: Frequently Asked
Questions; Responses to 26 of
the most commonly asked questions regarding the Boko Haram crisis and
tragedy,” but the article is of limited use without at least a little
discussion of the answers given to the questions. The document itself is
available as a PDF download (0.2 MB) at http://bit.ly/rqmvZN

Re: Researcher’s Video Shows Secret Software on Millions of Phones Logging Everything

Mike Blyth — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 07:06:06 -0000

No, as ISPs they have access to your data stream, not the raw data you type in. That's the whole point of a keylogger, isn't it, to make available (on the stream) the raw keystrokes. Furthermore, if the stream is encrypted then the ISP does not (should not) have access to anything except the IP addresses you're connecting to.

Re: Researcher’s Video Shows Secret Software on Millions of Phones Logging Everything

Mike Blyth — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 07:18:52 -0000

Psst, Red, "its" = possessive form of "it" while "it's" = "it is," so if you want to police grammar and use mistaken apostrophes to condemn someone, better get it straight first.

Re: Rails 3: controllers unit testing with Rack | Dev blog af83

Mike Blyth — Thu, 02 Aug 2012 08:12:48 -0000

In the testing environment console I type

env = Rack::MockRequest.env_for('/')
status, headers, body = SessionsController.action(:create).call(env)

and get the error

ActionController::RoutingError: No route matches {}

I'm using Rails 3.2. Not sure what's wrong since this approach is supposed to bypass routes altogether, if I understand correctly.

Re: PostgreSQL schema's owner altered in database dump preventing Rails from finding the data - softr.li

Mike Blyth — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 03:21:10 -0000

Thanks much for the tip. Such simple things can take so long to figure out.

Re: Maker Faire Africa: Schoolgirls Create Urine-Powered Generator

Mike Blyth — Sat, 10 Nov 2012 14:25:06 -0000

I'm amazed that Wired.com swallows a story like this without any analysis. A back-of-napkin calculation: 60 watt light-bulb powered for 6 hours by urea (energy content 10 MJ/kg), so (360 watt hours)/(10 MJ/kg) = 130 g urea (thanks, Wolframalpha!), about 5 times what humans excrete in a day. That calculation assumes 100% efficiency, while the setup shown and described could obviously not approach that, and involves multiple conversions of energy. Perhaps my calculations are all wet, but a claim as amazing as this one should at least deserve a little analysis on a reputable science website, I think.

Re: Maker Faire Africa: Schoolgirls Create Urine-Powered Generator

Mike Blyth — Mon, 12 Nov 2012 01:29:32 -0000

The article clearly states the claim that a liter of urine can run the generator for 6 hours. The generator and light bulb in the picture are clearly not some kind of miniature ones running on single watts. No matter how the urea is generated, it doesn't have the energy to power such a gen for six hours. Urea is about 7% hydrogen, so the daily human output (~30 g urea) contains 2 g of hydrogen. Even just talking about it as a way of storing energy, let alone generating it, 2 g of hydrogen is not going to go far, having about the energy of one teaspoon of gasoline.

Thinking outside the box is great, but thinking needs to be checked by facts and analysis, not just floated uncritically as a beautiful fantasy.

Re: Maker Faire Africa: Schoolgirls Create Urine-Powered Generator

Mike Blyth — Mon, 12 Nov 2012 01:31:47 -0000

Hmm, and what is wrong with urine? Beautiful, clean, normally sterile liquid? Does it offend you?

Re: The Scandal of the Evangelical Heart

Mike Blyth — Fri, 25 Jan 2013 17:19:13 -0000

You say, "The bravest decision I’ll ever make is the decision to follow Jesus with both my head and heart engaged—no checking out, no pretending." That may be true for others as well, but they must know that it is not risk-free (otherwise, I guess it would not be brave). For me, your Zarmina story was a step along my path from faith to absence of faith; other steps included Enns' books, the theological evolutionists, and Smith's "The Bible Made Impossible," all intended to help Christians grapple with real challenges. Keeping my head engaged, for me, eventually meant that I could no longer consider Christianity to be very plausible. I truly think that, at my stage in life, I might have better off not engaging my head to such an extent, if that were possible.

Re: Google Reader shutting down on July 1

Mike Blyth — Thu, 14 Mar 2013 14:55:51 -0000

My first reaction was distress, too. Google Reader is how I read most of the content I want to every day, and a nice way to keep it all organized. But maybe there is a silver lining -- we'll all be forced to check out the newer services. It might help with innovation (ours and the developers') and let us worry less about putting so many of our eggs into the Google basket.

Re: Debunking Christianity: Sigh On David Marshall's Review of My Book: The Blind Leading the Blind

Mike Blyth — Sat, 16 Mar 2013 18:25:03 -0000

I happened to read Marshall's chapter 'John Loftus and the “Outsider-Insider Test for Faith” ' in "True Reason: Christian Responses to the Challenge of Atheism" right after reading about the OTF in "The Christian Delusion." I had found the OTF to be one of the most powerful and logical arguments in assessing the reasonableness of faith, but am still "in process" so was interested to hear the best refutation of it from an apologist.

I was actually appalled at how weak the "refutation" was. While writing as if the OTF was really just a big misunderstanding at best, the article IMHO failed to address it in any substantial way. I wrote a review on Amazon and on my blog (http://bit.ly/W2pXJJ), with some of the quotes from Marshall's article including perhaps the prize-winner: “Is not this vast movement of hearts and minds over centuries and continents, a more objective test of the Christian faith than the abstract mental exercise of an Indiana skeptic?” That one sentence tells you all you need to know about the philosophical stature of this "refutation" of the OTF.

Others include “The test of history: In a straightforward sense, Christianity has attracted more believers from more ethnic and cultural groups than any other religion,” and “The Insider-Outsider Test. The Gospel also fulfills specific archetypes and prophecies, beginning with the Jewish Scriptures, but even prophecies among Gentile writers who foresaw such a Savior.”

Re: The abusive teachings of Michael and Debi Pearl

Mike Blyth — Sun, 24 Mar 2013 04:49:32 -0000

First, I agree completely with your conclusions. However, I have one issue with your statement, "no one is called to endure abuse out of a commitment to the Bible or to Jesus."

I Peter 2 includes the admonition, "Slaves, in reverent fear of God submit yourselves to your masters, not only to those who are good and considerate, but also to those who are harsh. For it is commendable if someone bears up under the pain of unjust suffering because they are conscious of God. But how is it to your credit if you receive a beating for doing wrong and endure it? But if you suffer for doing good and you endure it, this is commendable before God. To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you,leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps."

I think it's clear that the author of 1 Peter thought that Christian slaves should endure abuse. You could say it's a different situation, since they didn't have the option of leaving the abusive setting, but it still has that flavor of enduring rather than confronting or trying to change something. I don't know what we should do with this passage (hopefully not apply it to marriage, at least).

Re: Can God count to infinity?

Mike Blyth — Wed, 03 Apr 2013 10:31:09 -0000

Isn't this a logical impossibility, or am I just falling for a day-old April Fools post? Since there is no number after which God would count "infinity" and be finished, how does this even make sense?

Re: HIV, cancer: Bee venom to the rescue

Mike Blyth — Thu, 04 Apr 2013 17:02:14 -0000

This article is misleading people! Anyone who wants to know the truth should go and read the original reporting on BBC or the journal article. Do not get the idea that bee venom is going to help cure HIV. Bee venom destroys cells and viruses both. The new trick in this report was that the researchers ATTACHED the bee venom to extremely small particles so that it could ONLY kill the virus and not human cells. Yes, it is very hopeful! But the research does NOT say we should try ordinary bee venom, talk less of other bee products!
Dr. Mike Blyth
Co-Author, AIDS Is Real and It's In Our Church

Re: Dumbing Down for Jesus ~ ExChristian.Net

Mike Blyth — Sun, 07 Apr 2013 11:52:13 -0000

As some others have implied, intelligence doesn't have much to do with believing the right things. We all share the same brain structure that makes us try to defend what we already believe and, as Michael Shermer has pointed out, smart people are able to come up with better and more imaginative defenses of their beliefs so can hold on to them longer. Certainly every movement of good or evil, knowledge or ignorance has had its share of brilliant people.

Re: Debunking Christianity: Sermon: Why Jesus Can’t Answer Prayers Anymore?

Mike Blyth — Thu, 11 Apr 2013 13:30:30 -0000

What's the point of an article like this? It's such a trivialization of Christian thought that it's just going to be laughed at by Christians, so no effect there (except as evidence that atheists don't know what they're talking about). It's hard to see how it enlightens atheists, either, since they neither have a question about why Jesus doesn't answer their prayers, nor learn anything really useful. Maybe I'm just in a grumpy mood (well, I am) ... was this just supposed to be funny?

Re: Cross Examination: The Will to Believe

Mike Blyth — Sun, 28 Apr 2013 00:21:37 -0000

Hi, Bob. You should check the excellent video lecture by Moshe Halbertal: Three Concepts of Faith (http://bit.ly/ZDk4Vu) which distinguishes believing facts, believing in a person (relational), and believing *as* (a sort of provisional belief while in a certain capacity). It touches, though briefly, on James' idea of willed belief.

To me, as a Christian moving away from belief toward skepticism, I don't see willed belief as a helpful concept (for this issue). It is certainly true that we cannot afford to postpone or avoid action forever because we are not 100% convinced of something--there is no certainty in life. However, to make a leap of faith against the best evidence one can find is a far different thing.

I actually *wish* I could go back and unlearn, or erase from my mind, the things that have led me away from faith in the past two years. It would be far more comfortable for me to remain a sincere believer with all the comfort of the Christian community, the belief that God is always taking care of me, that I have eternal life, and so on. What's not to like? However, now that I have reached this point, "willing belief" is not an option.

What can belief against one's cognition and perception even mean? Does it mean that we decide that we will make a prior commitment to a position regardless of the facts we encounter? Does it mean we decide to twist our perceptions and information until they fit with the position we "believe"? If truth is something we can "will", then is it truth or illusion?

Even if I take James' challenge, where does that leave me? I am not faced with a single choice but with hundreds of competing ones. Do I will to believe in Islam? That would certainly be a step away from doubt and passivity. Many have found deep meaning and purpose in such faith. Or what about Roman Catholicism, the longest-enduring branch of Christianity, and the one in Pascal's mind when he wrote his wager (as far as I understand)? Or maybe I should be bold and believe in Mormonism or Bahai'ism, more modern faiths.

You will probably answer that it is *reason* (facts) that lead toward Evangelical Christianity as the true faith, so that these others can be discarded. Then, however, you are back to evidence-based rather than willed belief, and I will say that the evidence is not convincing. Evidence is at least something that we can discuss from different perspectives, perhaps even changing our minds as we are confronted with new evidence, while "will to belief" seems to me a dead end.

Re: “Why Do I Keep Believing?” The Biggest Obstacles to Staying Christian

Mike Blyth — Sun, 26 May 2013 16:42:29 -0000

I did post my own list but will give a big second to your entire explanation; it's very close to my own.

Re: “Why Do I Keep Believing?” The Biggest Obstacles to Staying Christian

Mike Blyth — Sun, 26 May 2013 16:49:11 -0000

Though I no longer believe the biblical record, I never had a problem with miracles per se. After all, if there is a God as described, then it makes sense that he might do miracles. However, what bothered me was the miracles that don't seem to fit ... like virtually all the Sampson story, the ax head floating, and so on. The God of creation and love did *these* miracles?

Re: Why no alien radio signals?

Mike Blyth — Wed, 29 May 2013 03:38:53 -0000

I'm certainly no expert, but my understanding is that there is another view that sees the probability of the emergence of life as so remote as to make it virtually certain that we are alone in our section of the universe. For example, biologist Eugene Koonin (The Logic of Chance: The Nature and Origin of Biological Evolution) comes up with a probability of something less than 10e-50 of life originating in a given universe, and thus leans on the multiverse theory as a way to explain why we're here. Of course, tomorrow we might find some much more probable route to the origin of life, and some researchers must already see it as more probable, but at any rate it's still a viable explanation for our absence of detecting extraterrestrial life.

Re: It all begins with contraception: David Opderbeck on DOMA decisions

Mike Blyth — Mon, 15 Jul 2013 10:39:57 -0000

If I understand correctly, this line of argument relies on the assumption that procreative considerations are the only ones that apply as bases for sexual morality and marriage. At least, I see no other way in which one could argue that removing those will lead to an erosion of all restrictions on (consensual) sexual behavior. Do any Protestant theologians really believe that marriage as viewed in the Bible is founded solely on procreation?

Re: How Can We Know? (RJS)

Mike Blyth — Thu, 25 Jul 2013 10:33:55 -0000

I don't see how one could possibly use intuition as a reliable guide to truth either in nature or theology. From a biological point of view, it's a representation of our brain's first-pass, high-speed attempt to interpret reality and keep us alive. If one adds a theological perspective, then God may have planted some knowledge in us ... but how do we know which intuitions are from God and which are not, which are pure and which are corrupted? Yes, intuition is a starting point either way, but I can't see how it could trump reason or revelation, if one believes in revelation.

The bigger issue for me is the jump from (a) "there could be a creator who intentionally set up a world to include intelligent life" to (b) the entire Christian story which includes not only incarnation, as mentioned in the quote from the book, but much more besides.

It sounds like an interesting book ... I plan to read it; thanks for telling us about it!

Disqus - Friends of silent0

Re: Blessed are the entitled?

Re: Genetic hitchhiking in English

Re: Is Nigeria's Boko Haram group really tied to Al Qaeda? - CSMonitor.com

Re: Boko Haram challenge to the Nigerian Islamic establishment, orthodoxy (2)

Re: Researcher’s Video Shows Secret Software on Millions of Phones Logging Everything

Re: Researcher’s Video Shows Secret Software on Millions of Phones Logging Everything

Re: Rails 3: controllers unit testing with Rack | Dev blog af83

Re: PostgreSQL schema's owner altered in database dump preventing Rails from finding the data - softr.li

Re: Maker Faire Africa: Schoolgirls Create Urine-Powered Generator

Re: Maker Faire Africa: Schoolgirls Create Urine-Powered Generator

Re: Maker Faire Africa: Schoolgirls Create Urine-Powered Generator

Re: The Scandal of the Evangelical Heart

Re: Google Reader shutting down on July 1

Re: Debunking Christianity: *Sigh* On David Marshall's Review of My Book: The Blind Leading the Blind

Re: The abusive teachings of Michael and Debi Pearl

Re: Can God count to infinity?

Re: HIV, cancer: Bee venom to the rescue

Re: Dumbing Down for Jesus ~ ExChristian.Net

Re: Debunking Christianity: Sermon: Why Jesus Can’t Answer Prayers Anymore?

Re: Cross Examination: The Will to Believe

Re: “Why Do I Keep Believing?” The Biggest Obstacles to Staying Christian

Re: “Why Do I Keep Believing?” The Biggest Obstacles to Staying Christian

Re: Why no alien radio signals?

Re: It all begins with contraception: David Opderbeck on DOMA decisions

Re: How Can We Know? (RJS)

Re: Debunking Christianity: Sigh On David Marshall's Review of My Book: The Blind Leading the Blind