Sep 27, 2010
Sep 24, 2010
Intelligence Officer
If my university education all goes to custard and/or no one wants to employ me afterwards (particularly likely if I avoid / make a mess of biology and attempt to enter the murky depths of academic philosophy), I could presumably be an "Intelligence Officer" with the RNZAF. Surely the skill set required isn't too formidable and it sounds like the kind of job which a doctorate or two would help in obtaining. Pay is $14.42 an hour! (up to $33.65) At that rate, I'll have my loan for a few decades, but at least I'll be happy and my intelligence could hardly fail to be recognised. If necessary, I would wear a badge.
..
..
Sep 18, 2010
weighing the facts
Many atheists are annoyed at how they are, as they see it, misunderstood by Christians.
The fact - and it is indeed a fact - that many people do not treat atheists and their views fairly and with respect does very little to show that the atheists themselves really understand what they are themselves critiquing.
Hypocrisy is rife, integrity is valuable and the truth matters. This is the world we live in.
The fact - and it is indeed a fact - that many people do not treat atheists and their views fairly and with respect does very little to show that the atheists themselves really understand what they are themselves critiquing.
Hypocrisy is rife, integrity is valuable and the truth matters. This is the world we live in.
Sep 11, 2010
billboards
I'm quite enjoying this site: http://www.nogod.org.nz/generator/?page=0
Some of the Christian ones are ok (I may have added a couple) and there are a few I'm not sure about - are these people atheists or mocking and/or just internet trolls like me?
Arguably one of my favourites is:
"Excuse me? Aren't you to old to have a imaginary friend?"
(Old enough to have passed through primary school in any case.)
By no means are crude errors in spelling and grammar the least impressive thing about The Internet Atheists. Sorry guys, but telling everyone else how smart you are isn't as great as you may think, particularly when so many of your assertions are demonstrably false.
Some of the Christian ones are ok (I may have added a couple) and there are a few I'm not sure about - are these people atheists or mocking and/or just internet trolls like me?
Arguably one of my favourites is:
"Excuse me? Aren't you to old to have a imaginary friend?"
(Old enough to have passed through primary school in any case.)
By no means are crude errors in spelling and grammar the least impressive thing about The Internet Atheists. Sorry guys, but telling everyone else how smart you are isn't as great as you may think, particularly when so many of your assertions are demonstrably false.
Aug 30, 2010
it's a catch CO2, or release CO2, situation
I'm quite looking forward to being able to drive and owning a car; maybe in a few weeks, all going well. Cars create CO2. CO2 is bad. That's a problem. Maybe I just need to plant more trees (like, at least one) - but trees cost money and money doesn't grow on trees (not that I have any trees anyway). The alternative of non-independence isn't too appealing however.
I figure I'll make up for it later. The same logic which can justify a host of evils. But I NEED this, right?
I figure I'll make up for it later. The same logic which can justify a host of evils. But I NEED this, right?
Aug 29, 2010
Christians are so ... urgh.
The Onion makes me cry. Or cringe, in any case. Come on everyone; cringe with me!
http://www.theonion.com/articles/kind-bearded-christian-has-guitar-story-to-tell,926/
this one's interesting too: http://www.theonion.com/articles/smart-qualified-people-behind-the-scenes-keeping-a,17954/ particularly this salient point: "the reality is most of the smart, qualified people in this country are wasting away in assistant professorships at struggling public universities or making millions of dollars in some venture capital group. In fact, that's exactly the kind of job I would have right now if I were a real person. Which I'm not."
http://www.theonion.com/articles/kind-bearded-christian-has-guitar-story-to-tell,926/
this one's interesting too: http://www.theonion.com/articles/smart-qualified-people-behind-the-scenes-keeping-a,17954/ particularly this salient point: "the reality is most of the smart, qualified people in this country are wasting away in assistant professorships at struggling public universities or making millions of dollars in some venture capital group. In fact, that's exactly the kind of job I would have right now if I were a real person. Which I'm not."
Don't be offended, but
(in other words, get ready to cry);
In letting this blog run downhill, at least in title choice, I was just trying to communicate at your level,
or the level of the hypothetical "you" who reads this blog.
BUT
I've decided, after relative failure in that regard and now that I almost have a break from uni and some time to think, that I'll forget about targeting this blog to the audience I know it gets atm and just write stuff that I care about. If you don't like it, the internet is a free country. As it were.
In letting this blog run downhill, at least in title choice, I was just trying to communicate at your level,
or the level of the hypothetical "you" who reads this blog.
BUT
I've decided, after relative failure in that regard and now that I almost have a break from uni and some time to think, that I'll forget about targeting this blog to the audience I know it gets atm and just write stuff that I care about. If you don't like it, the internet is a free country. As it were.
Aug 26, 2010
True humour
From an absolute master (Plantinga) comes this review of science and religion in the standard free philosophical reference, the SEP. You may not laugh much, but it is brilliant, in an appropriately subtle way. There is a reason why this man has, arguably, nigh on single-handedly (with the help of some of his cronies and students) transformed the landscape of analytical philosophy of religion in recent decades.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/religion-science/
Here's a taste:
For example, suppose I tell you that I saw you at the mall yesterday afternoon. Then with respect to part of your total evidence base—a part that includes your knowledge that I told you I saw you there, together with your knowledge that I have decent vision and am ordinarily reliable, and the like—the right thing to think is that you were at the mall. Nevertheless, we may suppose, you know perfectly well that you weren't there; you remember that you were home all afternoon thinking about methodological naturalism. Here the right thing to think from the perspective of a proper part of your evidence base is that you were at the mall; but this does not give you a defeater for your belief that you were not there. Another example: we can imagine a renegade group of whimsical physicists proposing to reconstruct physics, refusing to use memory beliefs, or if that is too fantastic, memories of anything more than 1 minute ago. Perhaps something could be done along these lines, but it would be a poor, paltry, truncated, trifling thing. And now suppose that the best theory, from this limited evidence base, is inconsistent with general relativity. Should that give pause to the more traditional physicists who employ what they know by way of memory as well as what the renegade physicists use? I should think not. This truncated physics could hardly call into question physics of the fuller variety, and the fact that from a proper part of the scientific evidence base, something inconsistent with general relativity is the best theory—that fact would hardly give more traditional physicists a defeater for general relativity.
Similarly for the case under question. The traditional Christian thinks she knows by faith that Jesus was divine and that he rose from the dead. But then she need not be moved by the fact that these propositions are not especially probable on the evidence base to which HBC [Historical Biblical Criticism - ME] limits itself—i.e., one constrained by MN [Methodological Naturalism - ME] and therefore one that deletes any knowledge or belief dependent upon faith. The findings of HBC, if findings they are, need not give her a defeater for those of her beliefs with which they are incompatible. The point is not that HBC, evolutionary psychology and other scientific theorizing couldn't in principle produce defeaters for Christian belief; the point is only that its coming up with theories incompatible with Christian belief doesn't automatically produce such a defeater.
Plantinga, Alvin, "Religion and Science", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2010 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2010/entries/religion-science/
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/religion-science/
Here's a taste:
For example, suppose I tell you that I saw you at the mall yesterday afternoon. Then with respect to part of your total evidence base—a part that includes your knowledge that I told you I saw you there, together with your knowledge that I have decent vision and am ordinarily reliable, and the like—the right thing to think is that you were at the mall. Nevertheless, we may suppose, you know perfectly well that you weren't there; you remember that you were home all afternoon thinking about methodological naturalism. Here the right thing to think from the perspective of a proper part of your evidence base is that you were at the mall; but this does not give you a defeater for your belief that you were not there. Another example: we can imagine a renegade group of whimsical physicists proposing to reconstruct physics, refusing to use memory beliefs, or if that is too fantastic, memories of anything more than 1 minute ago. Perhaps something could be done along these lines, but it would be a poor, paltry, truncated, trifling thing. And now suppose that the best theory, from this limited evidence base, is inconsistent with general relativity. Should that give pause to the more traditional physicists who employ what they know by way of memory as well as what the renegade physicists use? I should think not. This truncated physics could hardly call into question physics of the fuller variety, and the fact that from a proper part of the scientific evidence base, something inconsistent with general relativity is the best theory—that fact would hardly give more traditional physicists a defeater for general relativity.
Similarly for the case under question. The traditional Christian thinks she knows by faith that Jesus was divine and that he rose from the dead. But then she need not be moved by the fact that these propositions are not especially probable on the evidence base to which HBC [Historical Biblical Criticism - ME] limits itself—i.e., one constrained by MN [Methodological Naturalism - ME] and therefore one that deletes any knowledge or belief dependent upon faith. The findings of HBC, if findings they are, need not give her a defeater for those of her beliefs with which they are incompatible. The point is not that HBC, evolutionary psychology and other scientific theorizing couldn't in principle produce defeaters for Christian belief; the point is only that its coming up with theories incompatible with Christian belief doesn't automatically produce such a defeater.
Plantinga, Alvin, "Religion and Science", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2010 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2010/entries/religion-science/
bloody haemoglobin!
Eating my breakfast, trying to focus on an upcoming biochemistry test (largely on oxygen-transporting metalloproteins) this (the title) was all I could think for a few seconds - quite depressing; then I realised the irony.
EDIT(2) - lol - 'irony', gettit??.. heme, iron - wow.
As for the 'Root Effect'; ah .. well, you can perhaps guess my thoughts around that one.
EDIT: after a few mins of study, I am more fond of haemoglobin. It is, like much of biochem, so freakin' clever. Whoever made this stuff, I take my hat off to you. As one of my first year lecturers said, (something like) "God is a very subtle biochemist - that's worth thinking about." Two negative allosteric effectors (which reduce oxygen binding, i.e. make haemoglobin give up the O2 it is holding) are carbon dioxide (indirectly, through reactions producing H+ and the Cl- shuttled into red blood cells, to replace hydrogencarbonate, by a Cl- transporter) and higher temperature. It just so happens that both of these conditions are found in exercising muscle, thus facilitating the exchange of O2 for CO2 here and keeping you folks alive. We see here a tight, tight relationship between the structure of the haemoglobin protein tetramer, its function (influenced in the 'right direction' by various different molecules/conditions) and its environment - but at the whole organism level of oxygen transport as well as at the molecular. E.g (as above): the temperature increase in skeletal muscle cells which is a side-effect of respiration also happens to affect the haemoglobin protein in the right way for it to function well when it reaches these cells.
More along vaguely similar lines, particularly on the relations between CO2 and HCO3- (as I recall) here:
EDIT(2) - lol - 'irony', gettit??.. heme, iron - wow.
As for the 'Root Effect'; ah .. well, you can perhaps guess my thoughts around that one.
EDIT: after a few mins of study, I am more fond of haemoglobin. It is, like much of biochem, so freakin' clever. Whoever made this stuff, I take my hat off to you. As one of my first year lecturers said, (something like) "God is a very subtle biochemist - that's worth thinking about." Two negative allosteric effectors (which reduce oxygen binding, i.e. make haemoglobin give up the O2 it is holding) are carbon dioxide (indirectly, through reactions producing H+ and the Cl- shuttled into red blood cells, to replace hydrogencarbonate, by a Cl- transporter) and higher temperature. It just so happens that both of these conditions are found in exercising muscle, thus facilitating the exchange of O2 for CO2 here and keeping you folks alive. We see here a tight, tight relationship between the structure of the haemoglobin protein tetramer, its function (influenced in the 'right direction' by various different molecules/conditions) and its environment - but at the whole organism level of oxygen transport as well as at the molecular. E.g (as above): the temperature increase in skeletal muscle cells which is a side-effect of respiration also happens to affect the haemoglobin protein in the right way for it to function well when it reaches these cells.
More along vaguely similar lines, particularly on the relations between CO2 and HCO3- (as I recall) here:
Aug 20, 2010
good times on wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swallow
"Swallows are excellent fliers, and use these skills to attract a mate, feed and to sometimes carry coconuts."
Or, I am guessing, all three at once!
But, holey maccaroni, I've got to get me a swallow and test this statement.
"Swallows are excellent fliers, and use these skills to attract a mate, feed and to sometimes carry coconuts."
Or, I am guessing, all three at once!
But, holey maccaroni, I've got to get me a swallow and test this statement.
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