Cracker Power!

Boredom is one hell of a drug. I've been told when people smoke pot they have deep conversations that aren't really deep. These talks are sort of like the, do you think Bugs Bunny is hot conversation from Wayne's World. Right now I'm a force fed boredom addict. Remember when Rick James and his girlfriend kidnapped a woman, forced her to do heroin and crack? Take the heroin and crack, replace it with boredom, subtract one part Rick James and girlfriend and then add something definitely not as cool as Rick James. Once you calculated the word problem you get my situation.

Under the influence boredom, my work friends and I have gotten into some interesting, yet totally irrelevant conversations. A topic that frequently comes up is the, I can do such and such conversations. This conversation usually boils down to stupid human tricks. Sometimes you get some cool information like hey I could have gone to circus school, or I use to be a ballet teacher. I have no such cool talents or no such cool tricks. Because of this I like to play spoiler and mention things people can't do. Yes I'm a jerk. On one such occasion I mentioned that nobody could eat seven saltine crackers in a minute. I roll with a lot of type A males. This was taken as a challenge. Come on no way seven tiny little crackers can stop them.

Crackers three, humans zero.

How Oprah killed Santa

I remember back in my younger days I had summers where I didn’t do much on such an occasion I did a lot of TV watching. I’d watch it all. I’d watch so much TV that I could say all the words to commercials as the actors in the commercials were saying them. This drove my babysitter crazy. I found that I had a particularly good talent at annoying people, but that’s another story. One show I watched was the Oprah Winfrey show. Back then it was just a day time talk show. It wasn’t the huge daytime show it is today. That was when the talk shows were all the same and you couldn’t catch an A list star dead on one of them. It is funny the transformation the show had developed. Back then it was just like all the other shows. One of the shows was about things men needed to change in order to make their women happy. They had this one guy, where all his wife wanted of him was for him to buy new clothes. As I watched it was interesting to see his argument. He stated that he liked his old clothes and they were comfortable. That seemed reasonable to me. Then his wife started talking about how he wouldn’t even buy new underwear. She mentioned how the underwear he had had holes in them from being worn thing.

I thought to myself I’m never going to be like that guy. What an idiot, you can’t get that attached to your underwear; an old hat, jacket, heck even old shoes, but underwear? I forgot about my adventures in daytime television thinking nothing of the resolves I had made while I was younger. You see I hadn’t really tried to see the guy’s point of view. I just got caught up in the mostly female audience’s snickers, boos, and what have you.

I have a favorite pair of boxers. They have the words, “Santa is Real” written all over them. They are comfortable and I like the message, even though nobody can read them. I think it is for me more than anyone else, as underwear should be. Well after my last wash I’ve noticed that they too have holes in them, in quit embarrassing spots. I was tempted to just keep on wearing them just because I liked them so much. Then memories of day time Oprah came rushing back. I figured I owed it to kid me to at least keep a couple of resolves I made back then. So this way if kid me ever ran into less kid me I could say to him, “at least I wear new underwear still.”

By the title of this blog you might have thought I would talk about how all her gift giving overshadowed good old St. Nick, and in that way killed Santa. Nope, but in a way she did wound my childhood. I suppose it won’t be long until Christmas and I’ll be able to buy another similar item. Well maybe Santa is dead after all.

Dreams of the Woman of your Dreams

I’ve run into this case scenario a lot. There is a guy and girl couple. The guy is having a perfectly normal day and thinks everything is fine. However after the first few moment of the day it turns out that the girl is very very upset at said guy. The guy can’t figure it out. He runs through his head to see if he did anything wrong, and low and behold he can’t think of anything. Well nothing to justify this level of anger. Since this guy is very concerned about this girl he keeps asking what is wrong. Finally, still angry mind you, she tells him. He cheated on her (wow that is horrible you should feel ashamed!). In a dream she had that night (say what? what?Me confused, me no understand, me go start fire now with sticks and rocks.). After telling him this she is still mad, and still feels justified in the way she feels; for a dream. Let me say that again for a dream. You know dream a thing that didn't actually happen.

The female of the species has always been a mystery to me. I want just say that this is string of isolated incidents but the more couples I meet, the more of this dream cheating anger I have encountered. The odds of such an event seem to go up exponentially if the couple is married. I know of one case where the dream event got so out of hand that when the wife woke up she punched her husband. I’m starting to believe that this is some kind of general trend. I always wonder how come women don’t have dreams where their other cooking, washing dishes, and mowing the lawn. Does the effect work in reverse? When a woman has a dream that is really nice about her other does she feel really good about him for at least the day? Even though he never really wrote a wonderful peom about her and sang it to music he wrote? With flowers even.

I know that people are entitled to feel how they want but it seems odd to hold something against someone for something that was not their fault at all, a creation of your own, and most importantly never happened! When I talked to some women about the issue they could give me no good reason why the anger/madness towards the partner was justified. However they didn’t seem to have any sense of remorse over it. It was like saying to me, yeah I know I’m crazy, but you’ll just have to deal with it. From my experience men don’t have these types of dreams often. When they do they seem to have a different kind of reaction.

I wonder if this is a topic I will just never understand.

You Kant Make Me

Lately on a work outing I got to catch up on some “good” reading. One of my co-workers happened to have a copy of the Grounding of the Metaphysics of Morals (“GMM”). This surprised the heck out of me considering the group that I run with at my job. It got me thinking about some of the old philosophical questions I use to contemplate before I said to heck with it.
The work GMM is itself a very dense reading. Immanuel Kant is considered one of the most difficult reads in the area of ethics. GMM I think is the easiest of his works to digest. He takes a purely logical view of ethics, which leads to some strange conclusions.

One of the concepts discussed at length when talking about GMM is free will/autonomy/choice. I really don’t want to get into the formulation of the categorical imperative, because I’m just too lazy to write that much. But the last post about Charles Xavier gave me some thought about compulsion. It is generally accepted that if one is forced to do something one is not morally accountable for it. That is to say if I held your life in my hands and forced you to do something that would normally be considered immoral you wouldn’t be held accountable for it. A corollary of that is if one didn’t choose to do something then one couldn’t consider the act a moral one, it was just an act that happened. So moral action for the most part; are not mistakes they are choices with deliberate thinking at some stage in the decision making process (the some stage part is for all those consequentialist that have a default action scheme).

The topic of being forced to do something against one’s will is an old topic. Another less old topic that for some reason came up in my mind was that of temptation. There are some prevailing ideas that surface when it comes to being tempted and being held morally accountable. In most Christian sects that I have experience with there is this notion that God will not allow a situation to arise where you cannot resist the temptation. In our system of law we have the notion of entrapment. These notions lead me to some interesting questions. If God won’t allow you to be in a situation where you cannot resist the temptation, there has to exist some situations where you can’t resist the temptation. What would suffice to be too tempted? When you throw in the mix of human autonomy it looks as if God is putting a very severe restriction on it with this line of not being tempted too much thinking. Then again there is always the line of thinking nothing is undoable with God on your side. But that idea sort of makes the “temptation exemption clause” sort of a meaningless statement. In society we seem to have an understanding if someone was tempted by things.

I could probably come up with a clear line of logic based on all those questions but I gave up doing things like that a long time ago.

Marvels of the Universe

I’ve always considered myself a fan of the Marvel Comic book universe. It’s not that I didn’t like the DC Comic book universe, I just always preferred Marvel. As I like to think long, hard, deeply about things that have no real importance in life, I pondered if it was still true that I preferred Marvel over DC today and why.

My initial Marvel Universe is better notion came from the contention that Marvel characters were more complicated and interesting than the DC counterparts. There was the whole notion of the anti-hero; you know the good guy that is sort of bad. A variation on that theme was the good guy with a shady past. You had the Punisher, Wolverine, Ghost Rider; heck even the Silver Surfer fit this class of hero. These guys, and some gals, were complicated; things were never simple for them. On the DC side you had Superman, Wonder Woman, and Green Lantern. The closest thing you had to a complicated anti-hero was Batman. Even then his shady past wasn’t so shady. And while the Bat was a vigilantly he always maintained his role as an augmentation to the system of justice already in place.

My premise I think is flawed, or incomplete. After further evaluation I think that it is the world of Marvel that is complicated and the characters simple, while the world of DC is simple and the characters complicated. Say what? Let’s take a look at the respective flagship characters from each universe, Spiderman, and Superman. What is Superman’s conflict; Kryptonite right? Wrong, Superman’s true conflict is the temptation of power. In every alternate universe for Sup he is a tyrant. His true test isn’t how he can overcome such and such problem, but how much should he help such and such. It becomes easy for anyone to always have things done their way when given the power to have it done that way. It is this constant struggle between how much should Superman help vs. advancing the good that he can do that makes Superman interesting. No matter how much the world changes ultimately he is always left with that temptation/choice. So what is Spidy’s deal? When you think about it Spiderman’s interest is in his problems not his powers. For instance will Peter ever get with Mary Jane or will he opt out and go for Felicity. Sure Spiderman has a bit of power but that isn’t what makes him so cool. Spiderman is cool because he has trouble talking to girls, everyone either hates or loves him, and he decided to damask himself because of the Super Hero registration act. In Civil War it is the conflict between the heroes that choose to damask themselves and the ones that don’t that makes me have any interest in the characters. By and large the conflicts of Spiderman are generated by the world that he is in, not because of who he is.

Another great example would be the X-men. If people would just get over their problems with mutants most of the interest in the X-men would evaporate. Now DC had made attempts to capitalize on these kinds of dilemmas with the problems in recent (relatively speaking) Justice League stories. I do have to admit the conflict between the JL and the Justice Lords was great. However it did sort of hinge on the whole Superman power thing I already mentioned. And face it whatever Superman wants goes in whatever league he is in. Well unless he is in my Starcraft/Halo/GhostRecon League, then he’s just a newb that needs to know his place.

So what conclusions have I drawn from all these new thoughts? If you’re asking that question you don’t know me very well or haven’t read my blog, but all six of you should know the reward is not the answer but trying to generate one.

Parents Just Don't Understand

Because of the nature of my job right now I find a lot of time to read periodicals. I try to avoid the gossip magazines but alas I succumb to them. So that should let anyone know that I read almost anything. On the way I’ve been pleasantly surprised and not pleasantly surprised. So in my quest to find interesting and useful reading I ran across a copy of “Outside”. The cover looks like it targets the “Men’s Fitness” crowd. I figured what the heck maybe I’ll learn about a new spot on the planet I can visit or learn some skills when it comes to being outside. One article was amazingly good. It was in regards to what has become of Mt. Everest. Another article was so, so regarding being alone in the outdoors with nothing to survive with, except a knife and a couple of knick knacks. However I’m not going to talk about those as neither effected me drastically in any way.

There was an article that bothered me to no end. It was titled “Demerit Badge” “Is Boy Scouts of America doing enough to keep kids safe?” There were some valid points in the article. One was that the BSA doesn’t share its accident data with other organizations. Another was that the BSA has fostered a culture of not taking responsibility. Another was that the BSA does not train its leadership enough when it comes to outdoor survival issues. Another yet was that the BSA leadership makes bad decisions. Now you can debate the truth of these claims. Fact is that the BSA can do better when it comes to ensuring the safety of the children that it has stewardship over. That’s not what bothered me about the article.

When making the point the BSA doesn’t train its leadership enough the author (Annette McGivney who teaches journalism at Northern Arizona University) points to a defense the BSA raises to that issue. The author paraphrases Frank Reigelman, “it’s hard to enforce requirements in a volunteer organization with 47,000 troops across the country.” Now the author replies with this statement. “That argument would be more convincing if they didn’t manage to exclude gays and atheists from all BSA chapters.”

Now the argument itself I can see. The BSA does manage to enforce some requirements in its organization. But why do you have to drop the gay and atheist card? You could have said the BSA doesn’t allow felons to be in its organization. The BSA also makes sure the leaders are all adults. But these requirements are of a different kind than Outdoor safety requirements. The BSA does enforce some level of training when it comes to say water activities and such, but the statement of Annette McGivney were more than just an argument. It was an underlying statement that the BSA is a non socially desirable entity cloaked in an argument. That what the BSA stands for is sort of stupid.

This bothers me to no end. I have mixed thoughts about the wisdom of the BSA having a ban on gays in its leadership. More and more religious sects are accepting openly gay individuals in their church leadership. As the BSA is a religious organization that accepts nearly all religions I think it is unwise to establish this excluding policy. But you never hear about how stupid the Orthodox Greeks are and how silly and stupid their ways are. The BSA makes an easy target. While I welcome the arguments as I feel that they give new perspectives on the organization, I could do without the condescending nature of the arguments. As for the atheism comment yes that bothers me to no end. The BSA is a religious organization. Atheism and the BSA are two mutually exclusive forces. Anyone who was halfway involved with the BSA or bothered to understand the organization on any level would understand this. I think the atheism card diminishes the argument that the BSA could perform better controls. It also smacks of the condescending tone that in prevalent in attacks against the BSA. I don’t know why people just don’t say what they really mean, “I don’t like what the BSA stands for and the lifestyle that it tries to advocate.”

Self Awarness

Fear is a part of life. I don't care who you are you have to deal with fear. Even the bravest of people are afraid every day. I get tired of the "No Fear" attitude. I don't know what it is about risking oneself for pleasure that makes you brave. I'll tell you what real fear is; being afraid you'll let your friends down because of a weakness you have. That kind of fear can move people to do things that will kill them. Fear is when you have to deal with something in everyday life and you know it can destroy you. The great thing is all of us are brave. If you think you aren't you just haven't looked for it yet.

Selfish Service

Back in the day I use to work for the Boy Scouts of America. One of the principles of scouting was the value of selfless service. The value should be self explanatory but let me explain; selfless service is actually the center piece of scouting. With out the service aspect of scouting the Boy Scouts of America would be just another activity group. The point of the BSA was to teach young boys how to be good men, responsible citizens, and yes faithful members of their respective faith. All these thing hinged on the ability of the leaders to teach these young boys the value of loving others and manifesting it by works. As with most learning at the beginning it seems like something not worth one's time. Sometimes one has to be tricked, bribed, or even forced to learn the first few lessons. That is one of the things about scouting, it is know for it's great out door adventure, structured male bonding, and the ability to teach new skills. With the promise of fun and adventure one is/can ultimately be taught the true lesson goals of the BSA. After the first initial feel of doing good for others I know of very few people who turn back from that life principle.

Well it's time to do some service, but this time I think we all (yes all six of you who read this) to focus on ourselves for a change. That is, we need to take care of ourselves. Mainly I'm focusing in on physical well being but I'm sure there are other categories as well. There are plenty of excuses we use: I don't have enough time, it seems painful, now that is not my idea of fun, etc. . . There are many ways one can improve one's health. An easy way is to make a list of things you do that ultimately are just a waste of time and replace them with exercise. Just as the young boy scout learned by servicing others by his own sacrifice he could be happier, I think by servicing our own health through sacrifice we can also be happier.

Just so there are no excuses I'm posting my run goals (just my run goals not everything else that is done). As we all know I have a hard time running here, so if I can do it there really is no excuse, well unless you are missing a leg, wait I know someone who is missing a leg and still runs. So here it is:

Day 1, 7 mile pace run. Steady pace slow to ease into it.
Day 2, 7 mile increasing pace run. Pace gradually increases throughout the run.
Day 3, 7 mile hill intervals.
Day 4, 8 mile pace run. Moderate pace with increase in speed at the last 2 miles.
Day 5, Intervals, 1 mile warm-up, 1200 meters at race pace 400 meters recovery jog repeat 4 times, 1 mile cool down.
Day 6, Whatever I feel like running. I'll probably run hills and speed intervals till I build up more endurance for a long run.

I should be logging about 35-45 miles a week in the next month or so. I'm trying to build up to a consistent 60 mile run week.

Situational Tests

I'm a big fan of Godzilla. Nothing says enjoyment to me like the Thunder Lizard. He is just cool. Godzilla can knock down buildings with his tail. He as radioactive fire breath. He has defeated countless other monsters and I don't care what you say Godzilla owns Mothera. Godzilla is always a mixed blessing though. On one had if MechaGodzilla is rolling down on you or, just as dangerous, the Monster from planet X; Godzilla is almost all upside. If Godzilla doesn't stop these guys you are toast. However if it's just a 500 ft ape rolling around Tokyo then you have to wonder if Godzilla was really worth it. The big guy has a price. (for how much I love Godzilla I have yet to see Godzilla Wars, yeah a crime)

I'm an introspective person, or so I would like to think. I'm also the worlds biggest day dreamer. I'm talking Calvin has nothing on me. So I like to day dream about things that make me think about myself and the situations I'm in. One reoccurring day dream is the instant insertion of Godzilla in the situation that you are in. In order for you to get the full benefit of the day dream you have to think how you would feel about Godzilla all of a sudden showing up and why. For instance if you are on a really bad date and Godzilla were to show up near by you might think geez all the destruction and panic sucks but I'm sure glad I'm off of this date. Or how about being stuck in traffic, you know you hate traffic, but would adding Godzilla make it a less boring, painful, and generally sucky part of your day? So if you see me being distant and staring off into the distance, I'm probably thinking about Godzilla. . . or zombies. What?

You see I am fascinated by zombies. I don't love zombies but I find them very interesting. (To be distinguished from Godzilla, I would almost never want Godzilla to be annihilated, while I can think of many where I'd get rid of a zombie.) Now there are many genre of zombies: you have the slow but huge numbers zombie, zombies by magic, zombies by science, fast zombies, zombies under the control of a master mind, etc. Needless to say zombies almost always require a social changing apocalyptic setting. I often think how would I handle a zombie infestation of such and such genre. You can apply the same test for zombies as you can Godzilla. Happy day dreaming.

Side note: zombies should not be confused with other members of the undead. While zombies are members of the "undead" they are not the same as say skeletons, ghouls, and other zombie like creatures.

Don't Burn Me at the Stake

Disclaimer: to my 5, oh wait I think 6 people read this blog now, readers if you haven't figured it out yet I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or a Mormon. This post will talk about some of the deeper issues associated with Church Doctrine concerning "original sin" or as we like to call it "the fall". This post as always is nothing more than my thoughts, they in no way reflect the CJCLDS stance on the topic. I do use sources that will give a good idea of the doctrine in question, but I in no way speech for the Church. So if you are one of my faithful readers or just some random blog encounter, you can go to http://www.lds.org/ to have any question answered about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

There is a saying in my Church, "I don't have a problem with the doctrine, I have a problem with the culture." That is to say while I believe the doctrines of my Church I don't necessarily think the way those doctrines are implemented by the members of my church is the best. Another aspect is if those doctrines are taught wrong then sometimes you get bad results. One of those doctrines I think fall into this category for me is the "Fall of Man". While I have come to an understanding of Adam and Eve eating the fruit of knowledge in a way that explains the basics, I think the way it is taught in my Church stifles a fuller understanding of the doctrine and thus the nature of God, free agency, and our own condition here on Earth.

I assume that the only time members of my Church talk about the fall of man in any meaningful manner is in Sunday School. This leads to a bigger problem I have with Sunday School in general. However I still attend Sunday School whenever possible. I still consider it a treat. For those of you who see Sunday School as a free time, then I recommend getting into a situation where you can't go or you are denied to go. The classes that were once a chore will become sweat to you when you are denied them. Also no matter what problems you have with any meeting I highly recommend you attend them. If you are not deriving benefit from a meeting then it is nobody's fault but yours. But back to the point; the perspective I am coming from is the way the topic is taught in Sunday School. I will go over what I think are the basics of the doctrine and then the way I see it being taught and understood, and eventually my concerns with those ways.

According to Lesson 4 of the "Old Testament Gospel Doctrine Teacher's Manual, 12" titled "Because of My Transgression My Eyes Are Opened" There are three foundations for the salvation of man: creation, fall and atonement. The way the lesson presents the pillars the fall is seen as a necessary part of our salvation. The lesson quotes Elder Bruce R. McConkie, "said that our salvation is made possible because of "three divine events—the three pillars of eternity" (A New Witness for the Articles of Faith [1985], 81)." The fall came about because of two commandments given to Adam and Eve, once again from lesson 4 :

" In the Garden of Eden, God commanded Adam and Eve to "be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth" (Moses 2:28). He also commanded them not to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil (Moses 3:17). As long as they did not partake of the forbidden fruit, they would remain in the garden and would not die. But they also would not be able to obey the command to multiply (Moses 5:11; 2 Nephi 2:23). Heavenly Father gave them agency to choose between the two commands."

The fall isn't all bad according to the lesson. The fall carries with it some benefits. Lesson 4:

"As you discuss these results of the Fall, emphasize how the Fall is beneficial to us. Latter-day revelation clarifies that even before the Creation, Heavenly Father intended our earth life to be a time of testing and proving so we could become more like him (Abraham 3:24–26). This required that we be mortals, able to learn to choose between good and evil, which was made possible through the Fall."

So we know that the fall was a component of our salvation and that with it there are some benefits. I want to go a little deeper. We know that there was a fall but what does that mean? Well it means that Adam and Eve disobeyed a commandment from God. However what does it mean to disobey God? In this sense we use the term transgression instead of sin. The best articulation of the difference between sin and transgression was in the April 1981 Ensign in an article titled, "Salvation: By Grace or by Works?" written by Gerald N. Lund, director of college curriculum in the Church Educational System:

"The concept of sin rests upon the concept of law. If there were no law, there could be no sin (see 2 Ne. 2:13; Alma 42:17), because "sin is the transgression of the law" (1 Jn. 3:4). However, for purposes of understanding the Atonement better, it might be helpful to draw a distinction between two important variations in how the law may be violated. A person may violate the law in spite of his knowledge of it; that is, he breaks the law deliberately. But others may violate the law because they are unaware of its existence (ignorance) or because they do not have sufficient maturity to understand the implications of it (lack of accountability). For clarification, let us use two terms to delineate the important differences in these two concepts. Any violation of the law that is willful and knowing we shall call "sin." But any violation that results either from ignorance or lack of accountability we shall call "transgression." The scriptures do not distinguish between these two terms consistently, but such a distinction may help us understand some important points about the Atonement. For example, it helps us understand why children under the age of accountability cannot sin (see D&C 29:47). Any parent who has observed his children’s behavior knows that they often violate laws of the gospel. They hit brothers and sisters, demonstrate extreme selfishness at times, and can be unmercifully cruel to playmates. But while these are "transgressions" they are not "sins," because as Mormon points out, children are "not capable of committing sin" (see Moro. 8:8). Much the same is true of those who have reached adulthood but have relatively little or no opportunity to learn the principles of righteousness. They also violate the laws of God, sometimes horribly so, as in the case of many primitive peoples, but they are of necessity judged differently because they do not "sin" in the sense of willing and deliberate rebellion against God. (See Rom. 2:12; D&C 82:3; also Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, comp. Joseph Fielding Smith, Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1938, p. 218.)"

So since Adam and Eve did not willfully violate the commandments of God then they made a transgression and thus the fall. One of the natural consequences to the human condition because of Adam's choice was the introduction of death into the world. More importantly we were severed from the presence of God.

Well that is all good and dandy, thanks for the quick lesson in Church Doctrine. Well what is my gripe? My first area of concern is the light in which the choice Adam made is given. Adam was given two choices and made one. It seems that people are of the opinion that it was the best choice or the only choice. I think this is largely due to the wording of lesson 4 and the use of the word benefits. The fact is Adam had two choices either one of which would have led to transgression. It wasn't the best choice it was a choice, a choice that had to be made. I am personally glad that I wasn't the one to be given that choice because well I don't think I could have made either. People point out that because of Adam's choice we have the current plan of salvation and exaltation, thus it was the best choice. In this regard I would like to remind people that nothing is out of the power of God and a different route that preserved our agency and provided for our salvation and exaltation could have been laid out. For if it truly were a choice it could have gone the other way, and I don't see God as one who would gamble on the possibility of failure.

The next issue that is dodged like the plague is why would God put Adam in a situation where he was going to lose no matter what? When asked this question the usual answer is well Adam made the right choice and see how everything works out now? And the class continues without an answer to the question. Once again I would like to restate my opinion that Adam made a choice. One possible answer to the question (which I have yet to discuss in any depth due to dodging of said question) is that maybe God didn't put Adam in that position because of what God was but more because of what Adam was. That is to say, it wasn't that God created, put Adam there and said, do your best which is failure; rather whatever Adam was, it was not enough in the first place so it was impossible for Adam not to fail regardless of the situation created. Adam would fail regardless of what situation created by God because of what Adam was from his first estate. There was a deficiency in Adam and all of us that would prevent us from succeeding. So grace wasn't necessary because of the choice Adam made but because of the inadequacy of what we are. Yeah God's love is deep like that.

Another issue is that of knowledge. In our first estate we chose to go with God and not the Adversary. We were rewarded for that choice by being allowed to be tested and grow on Earth. Well if we chose and the choice meant something doesn't that mean we had a knowledge of good and evil from the get go? So does that mean God took away our knowledge of good and evil? I have to say no because of our belief that Adam gained it when he ate the fruit. So what kind of knowledge of good and evil did we have in our first estate and why is it insufficient for the next estate? This is a serious question for me because if we can learn what the difference is we can learn how to shape our choices so that our understanding of good is magnified and thus our understanding of God.

Mr. Popular

So contrary to unpopular opinion, being so cold that your body can't sleep even after you haven't slept for a day isn't very cool. However, it can be very funny.

When one is so cold you try all sorts of tricks to ignore the cold. However after time you body just tells you hey buddy you have to get up, I'm not sleeping. Time seems to drag. I think that is the theme for this month, time is dragging.

Twisted Fantasies

In the middle east and I'm sure everywhere else in the world there is this amazing peach soda.

It comes in about an 8 oz bottle. It's the perfect size for sippin. They come in 6 packs. They have the perfect amount of fizzle mixed with peach sweetness. For someone who doesn't drink spirited beverages I imagine this is the closest thing you could get to a pink champagne. Lately I've been day dreaming about sitting at the edge of Crater Lake (I've never been there adding to the fantasy). There is a steep drop off so I can let my feet dangle in the water. It is about 84 degrees out. I lean back on a rock perfectly positioned to support my back. I can feel the cold water flowing between my toes. I begin sipping the peach soda. This takes about 4 hours or so. Then gently I fall asleep.

I wake up because there is a warm gentle sensation on my feet instead of the cool waters of Crater Lake. Low and behold I'm in a hammock. What is that at my feet but it is wolf, licking my feet. If you have ever heard the audio tapes of the "Little Prince" just go to the episode where the Prince tries to tame a Fox. When you go there you now know the voice of the wolf when it begins to talk to me. It can tell that I'm quit alarmed at my sudden change of environment. The wolf puts me at ease and explains I'm at Canoe Lake in MN. (Canoe Lake National Park has the largest wolf population in the United States.). The wolf who's name is Buck points me to a camp fire where there is a skillet with hash browns on it. You know the sort of soft kind, not the patty kind you get at McDee's (though they are delicious anyways). As I eat my hash browns Buck explains I was brought here because Thomas Jefferson wanted to have a talk with me. I'm like TJ? Isn't he dead? Buck explains that there is a statue of TJ near by that can channel the spirit of Thomas Jefferson. (I know what you all are thinking if this is my day dream why don't I just meet TJ face to face? The answer I just wanted it this way.)

After eating my wonderful breakfast I go to the TJ statue. It stands about three feet high. It doesn't move at all. Then all of a sudden a voice comes out from it. It explains that it is the spirit of Thomas Jefferson. Oddly enough TJ sounds a lot like George Clinton. There we have a long talk about the impacts of the Louisiana Purchase on this nation. After learning a lot about the difficult decision TJ had to make regarding the LA purchase I make my way back to Crater Lake via a transporter device given to me by Spock.

You are so mature, unlucky you.

You know I find that kids in general give me a lot of faith in good old humanity. There has been a lot of talk among my circle of friends about how different we are. When you look at kids though you see that we have a lot of things in common. Here are some things I've notice:

If you set a kid in any given area for a period of time longer than five minutes they like to throw rocks.
Kids are insanely curious.
No matter what language or culture, when a kid doesn't get what they want, they let out the universal phrase, "awh" usually followed by some other word (in English it is usually man or dad or mom).
Kids can spot a week parent/adult a mile away (weak as in a push over).
Kids in general think it is cool when school is canceled even when it is a bomb threat.
Kids think cows are cool.

There are plenty more but those are the ones I've seen recently. You know Jesus said that (I paraphrase here) that you must be like a child to be a follower of him. When did growing up become so great? Joseph and Mary left childhood Jesus behind and had to go back to get him. Sometimes we forget things and have to return to get our childhood. (Yes I basically stole this idea from a MLK speech so sue me.)

Hey the horse deserved it.

Well I've had the ability to go online at my leisure now. One consequence of this, I get into obscure news. Sometimes this is a good thing, sometimes not. Don't ask me how I did it but I ran across an author by the name of Kenneth Eng. He use to write for the AsianWeek (online at Asianweek.com). Kenneth is a self proclaimed Asian supremacist (no I am not Kenneth Eng). He has written such articles like: "why white people will always hate Asians", "why I hate Asians", and "why I hate Blacks". The Asian Week got a lot of heat for printing "why I hate Blacks". They deserved all the heat and them some. Just by the titles of the articles you can sort of tell that they are just going to be rubbish. You all know me, I just couldn't help read them. My premonitions about the articles where right, they were rubbish. What got me was that none of the responses to the articles seemed to be adequate. There also seemed to be a lack of understanding about some key issues that go way beyond anything limited to Asian American issues. It sort of pissed me off that no one could tear apart such a poorly written body of work. Then I started thinking could it be that so many people don't understand such basic things that would make the writing of Kenneth Eng clearly crap instead of accused crap. I concluded that people were just to lazy to write a full response to something not really worth any body's time. Because my skills are not good enough to tackle things worth peoples time I decided to address the things not worth people's time. So I would like to write about some of the issues Kenneth brings to the table.

The first question/statement I would like to point to is that the notion of Asian is sort of an antiquated notion. What does one mean by Asian? Does missing a tuck on the eye lid suffice to make one Asian. Do you have to have black hair? Do you have to be from an Asian country? If so is India a part of Asia? How about Russia? It seems that Kenneth and many Asians have fallen into the problem of making a generalization without any clear lines. In fact being Asian is a preoccupation of people in America not Asia. If you go over to anywhere in Asia and ask someone if they are Asian you will probably get the response, "I'm Korean" or "I'm Chinese" or "I'm Tia" etc.

This leads to the second point, you can't be an Asian supremacist. The fact is there are very few unifying social/cultural traits of the group "Asian" in America. Almost all of the similarities are artificial at best and make a poor basis for making a social evaluation. Lets face it a Korean would much rather hate a Japanese person than a white person. Just like in Japan you would be hard pressed to find a Japanese person that would marry a Korean over a white person. Unfortunately a lot of these notions have traveled across the ocean. In the end there are hardly any "Asians" that would consider the whole of "Asians" better than whites. You could be a Korean supremacist but not an Asian. This is just the tip of the iceberg of intra-Asian relations.

Third Kenneth makes a point of Asians sucking up to whites. One example he points to are Asians that speak with a British accent to sound more sophisticated. See the thing is everyone, whites included, speak with a British accent to sound more sophisticated. The problem here is that Kenneth seems to think that it is a bad thing for one culture to accept and ingrate a better aspect of another culture. What you say a culture can be better than another in certain respects? I figured Kenneth being a supremacist and all could have figured that one on his own. For instance if it is my culture to rob people, or burn the wives of a husband on a funeral pyre, or to do honor rapes, I think my culture could be vastly improved by adopting another culture's view on such topics. I believe it imperative that one evaluate the aspect itself to conclude if it is a positive trait to adopt. Does that mean the original culture is changed/diluted/lost? Yes but culture for culture's sake is of little value. Diversity for diversity's sake is of little value (not valueless). We have to ask does it provide benefits to society. This brings me to a topic that was lightly covered in a previous series of post involving racism, but the horse doesn't deserve that much.

Fourth Kenneth points to Asians lacking honor. He point to Asians being rather complacent about protecting one's self and standing up for "our community". The oddest thing is he points to the Japanese samurai as an example of honor. You got to be kidding me the samurai, really? I think Kenneth has been watching to many movies made by the white man about the samurai. The reality is that the samurai during the Tokugawa period were nothing but bureaucrats. These bureaucrats made it a practice to live off the broken backs of the peasant. Yes the samurai could have a peasant executed no reason at all. Most samurai were cowards. You know who did most of the war fighting in feudal Japan? The answer is, not the samurai. These are the same group of people that would have a peasant held so he could test his sword out on him. Yep a lot of honor there. Yeah and when the samurai did fight they weren't the most honorable of people. You know who most of the ninjas were? If you guessed samurai you may be on to something. This relates to another of Kenneth's points: black people are weak willed because they were enslaved for over 300 years. Sorry to say the vast majority of "Asians" were enslaved till after WWII. Now does that mean the samurai are of no value? No it just means that there are good things and bad things about every culture and sub group.

Lastly Kenneth's points seem to boil down to everybody hates Asians so Asians should hate back. No Kenneth everybody hates white people. Check that rich white people. Kenneth points to personal experiences of hatred. I got news for you Kenneth, everyone, including white people have suffered hatred of the sort you describe. A question you might want to ask is when was the last time being "Asian" negatively effected you during a job interview? How about getting into college? I have long contended that everyone is racist so we should just admit it and deal with it. Everyone one makes snap decisions about other people, the question is are we allowed to change or reinforce those decisions based upon our merits. If you look at our "Asian" average income and college attendance rates I think you can see where I'm going.

Unfortunately I am probably suffering from what every other person who bothered to respond to Kenneth Eng suffered from. Because while I could write another 5000 words about how poorly written Kenneth Eng's articles are (including style points) I just ran out of motivation. One last note as an Asian people we seriously need to get over our addiction to pop music. Come on enough is enough. I'm begging you please on my knees.

Curse the Girl Scouts

I have been trying to eat health the last couple of weeks or so. I really don't have a huge choice as to what I eat but I try. This eating health usually consists of eating more veggies and eating less needed things like cakes and ice cream. Recently a work buddy of mine just recieved over 200 boxes of Girl Scout cookies in the mail. I took some of the boxes as a gift even though I kept thinking this is a bad idea. As I was on the internet oddly enough, I opened a box and ate one, then two, then three, a whole box of cookies. I wondered, "what am I actually doing?" So I decided to read the nutrition facts. Apparently I just consumed over 200% of my daily saturated fat and over a thousand calories. So what did I do when I discovered such information? Come on do you really have to ask? Yep I shrugged my shoulders and opened up another box.

I have to tip my hat to the Girl Scouts. KFC's Colonel has nothing on these ladies. Whatever secert ingredient that the Colonel puts into his chicken to make you crave for it daily is nothing close to the cookies. Also you feel kind of bad if you don't eat them. I'm looking at a box right now and there is a picture of girls learning how to train and handle owls! How cool is that! I want girls to learn how to handle birds of prey. With a motto like, "Courage, Confidence, Character" you have to eat the cookies. Hey I want young girls to grow up to be women of bravery, confidence, and principles. I gotta eat those cookies. Come on all those hopes, dreams, and smiles on the box can only happen if I open it up, right?!? Heck the box is even made out of 100% recycled paper. This is a win win situation. I don't smoke so my arteries can take a slight hit. It is my duty to sacrifice a little to gain so much. Hey I know what you are thinking, I'm trying to shake responsibility for eating over 2000 calories and 400% of my saturated fate intake for the day. The truth couldn't be farther, I'm taking credit for it. Curse you Girl Scouts putting me in this impossible position to do good with bad. Or is it doing bad for good. Hey now they are getting into my racket!

If one of my childhood heroes wans't the Cookie Monster then I think I would have some serious ideological problems. But luckly C is for Courage, Confidence, Character and . . . Cookie? Well that is good enough for me.

Spread the Poverty

I just read an article in Scientific American. The article pointed to evidence that when people think about money or are introduced to stimuli that would invoke thoughts of money one becomes less likely to ask for help or to help other people. I thought the result was fairly interesting but not all that shocking. After I thought about it for some time I noticed an oddity about the study, there seems to be a link between asking for help and having a desire to help other people.

This seemed very counter intuitive to me. For the most part, the people I know that help people the most are least likely to ask or accept help from another. I have always attributed this character flaw to a bit of hypocrisy in all of us. I think the core of is one is to prideful to accept help as it seems like a weakness and one is willing to give help as it seems like a strength. So it is OK for others to be weak but not me. This of course is never really the case as asking and accepting help often requires one to swallow ones pride, or deal with some other fear of inadequacy; in such the asking requires more strength than most acts. It is those acts which dominated the urges that would hinder self improvement that require the most strength.

But I digress. I have long thought that not asking for help was fundamentally an issue of pride and fear. After much thinking and a deeper understanding of the article in Scientific American it has become clear to me that not asking for help is fundamentally an issue of greed. When one helps others one gets the benefit of altruism. When one does not allow others to help them one denies that gift of altruism to others. That seems quit selfish to me. I get to enjoy the benefits of being benevolent but you don't. I can not view that as anything else but hording. Thinking of money instinctively brought about selfish behavior in the study, one of which was not asking for help. I remember a long long time ago I said to someone, "Hey sometimes you have to serve by letting yourself be served."

Alls well that ends well

First I would like to say I'm not a communist or a communist sympathizer. With that being said I would like to make a grip about capitalism. There is this general notion in a capitalistic system that all things can be boiled down to capital. In most cases this is true. A house can be converted into capital thus be transferred to cars or a wide variety of things. Heck capital can even be converted into some non materialistic things such as feelings of enjoyment and such. Now comes my grip; the notion time is money and money is time. I agree that time does equal money. The more time you invest in obtaining capital the more money you will probably get. However, this does not mean that once you get that capital you can regain or buy that time back at a later period. Granted there are things that capital can buy that will maximize you time, but time spent is time spent you don't get it back. So where am I going with this you may wonder. Prepare for the rabbit hole. . .

Next I would like to talk about holistic health. (how are these topics related? Just stick with me on this.) I would like to define what I consider holistic health. Holistic health to me is realizing that all aspects of you life effect your health. That is to say your social relationships have just as much bearing on your over all health as how many miles a week you run. What holistic health isn't to me is the use of crystals and snake oil to cure negative health conditions. Don't get me wrong I think alternative medicine has a great role in one's overall health, but when it comes to needing a kidney transplant you need to see a doctor. I've also noticed the aspect of alternative medicine that seems to be most successful are areas regarding pain management. Pain management is a huge deal in overall health. In order to have a holistic approach to health you have to fix and develop your non health related fields in order to be healthy. Some of these fields include increasing your faith, developing meaningful ties with your family and friends, etc.

So how does my grip with capitalism and holistic health relate? The answer is one word marketing. Lately holistic health has been associated with the concept of wellness. Because of this there has been a flood of wellness products that have arisen. Hey feeling a little unwell, then just take a sip of this new wellness drink and you'll be ok! Better yet spend the weekend at this wellness spa and it will magically erase the fact you have ignored your health for the past six months! We have gotten to the point where we think that if we work 70 hours a week that you can buy your health back. The problem is that your holistic health takes time and work. No amount of capital will replace that. You can't buy a 3 mile run every day. You can't buy being there for your kids. You can't buy having conversations with your parents. You can't buy going on that hike (but you can buy some really good hiking trips, but you still have to go on them). No amount of wellness products and services are going to replace the core of holistic health. You have to place your health as a priority. That takes time and often a lot of work. In these times we have become so accustomed to being able to buy something and/or have it quickly that we forget there are no capital solutions to the human being.

The Hype

A long long time ago I use to debate which band was the greatest of all time. Now you might observe I am not a musician of any sort or a historian in the area of music and if you haven't I'm confessing it now. Needless to say due to my complete lack of qualifications and the complete lack of qualifications of the people I associated with there was virtually no meaningful products of these debates. One comment does stick out in my mind however, "Led Zeppelin is the most overrated band of all time, it doesn't take away from the fact that they are the greatest of all time."

This statement lead to a vast new way of thinking for me. The concept is simple, one could be overrated and yet still be the best. For instance one could think that Michelle Jordan was the greatest basketball player ever and still overate his ability to win the game. One of the problems with being overrated even if you are the best people tend to get a warped image of you, and in turn a lot of unfair criticism comes your way. I think the United States is in this boat. We are overrated, lets face it. We are no longer the industry leaders in a lot of sectors, and our social stats in certain areas are less than what could be. However this does not mean that the United States isn't the greatest country here on Earth. It just means we've been hyped and now the illusion of the hype is fading away. Personally I'm glad the hype is going away. So what wisdom can we derive from this? None. There is nothing from the fading hype that will help us. So why bother blog about this you jerkface? First it's my blog and I blog what I want. Second this just gives me a perspective on the next big hype, China.

Yep China is the next big hype. Don't get me wrong I think China is an amazing country filled with potential and will have a huge impact on the world. I also think China is hyped just like us, or US err whatever. So what advice do I have for China? Get ready for the criticism. You thought the rest of the world was tough on you before, just wait. You need to do this, you need to do that. You will never make it so everyone will be happy, and some how everything will be your fault.

You know they say that China is the next super power that will match the US supposed hegemony over the world. I can't wait.

The Most Dangerous Game

I love water. Water is a great thing. I love the ocean, lakes, rivers, and drinking water. As with the rest of life your love can be the one that hurts the most. I remember back in the day I use to play this game called gulp poker. Since the group decided not to bet money we would bet drinks of water. (Neither I or my friends were into drinking spirited beverages.) I'm also a horrible poker player, but in this area I have a lot of wealth. Yes I can drink a lot of water. One game my friend/nemesis(at the time) got me pretty good on one hand. I ended up drinking so much water that I threw up, well water. Now you would think that my water stupidity would end there; oh how little you know me if you thought so. I've discovered a new game. The game is called lets drink all the water in the buffalo (or whatever ride you are in). Now the game starts to really get interesting when you load about 24-30 liters of water in said pimpin ride. I ended up drinking 7 liters of water in one sitting. Needless to say this is a stupid game, but hey it's what I do.

Greed is Good

When does one draw the line when it comes to being happy with your level of self improvement?

I have noticed a trend in my life; I'm never happy with the level of developent in my life. The question becomes is this a bad thing? I know that there are a lot of people out there who are of the philosophy that you have to be happy with you. I understand this line of thinking but I can't help thinking that with this as your guiding principle it is easy to become complacent about where you are in life. Is it good to be unhappy or uncontent about yourself if it pushes you to be a better person; you know the best you can be? I understand that one has to temper this with patience and a lot of wisdom. But I can help thinking about what Lance Armstrong said, patience didn't get me over that mountain (I paraphrase). Is it good to be a person who is never satisfied with where they are in life if it drives them to be better? Can one be unhappy with oneself yet still enjoy the simple pleasures in life? I think it can as I have done so. I have this feeling that the answers to these questions are more of degree than kind.