Bill's Comments

This is a milestone, my 2000th post. When I started this blog on April 1, 2004, (And I still think April Fool's Day was appropriate) I had very modest ambitions. I was afraid I would run out of things to say, and I was happy that my hit counter was in the hundreds. So now I have said at least 2000 things, and received over 65,000 hits. Granted the single biggest hit generator still is my post on boiling eggs, and it still garners comment and questions by email.

The best part of this blog is the people I have become acquainted with through both mine and their blogs. I consider them at the least good acquaintances, and some are like virtual family.

Lately there is less time to post regularly and less inclination. When I posted regularly, I started to get a sense of saying the same things over and over in different words. I also had a sense of saying what everyone else was saying. As my time became more constricted by my job and by my own interests, I adopted a policy of posting only when I thought I had a different take, it was something so important that every voice should be heard, or it was an essay I had written. For this blog and its associated blogs have become my intellectual archive.

So to all my blogging friends, and especially to John Ray and Keith Burgess-Jackson, my blogging God-Fathers (There is humor in that title, as Keith is an atheist), many thanks for over five years of reading, encouragement, feedback, and friendship.

The Christianity presented in the mainstream media, (MSM= television, newspapers, and popular magazines) is usually a caricature of reality. If we are to believe the press, the Catholic Priesthood is composed of pedophilic perverts and the churches are full of homophobic, bigoted white people who want to restrict civil liberties. To read the news, churches would close all abortion clinics, prevent birth control from being practiced, and force Christian doctrine on everyone. Christianity is held up high for all to see in cases of polygamy and child-marriage, as if this is part of Christian doctrine. During the Presidential campaign, now-President Obama expressed the liberal view of religion in his infamous, “So it’s not surprising then that they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”

All of us have experienced negative forms of Christianity at the personal level. There are the tracts left in public places. For some reason restrooms are a common location. There are the people who preach on street corners, taking literally the injunctions to publicly witness, instead of the one to “Let your light so shine before men….” When I was in college I was accosted by the fundamentalist asking, “Are you saved,” when I was still a believing Christian.

There are also the interpretations of Christianity that have lead to such incidents as Waco, Texas, and the Branch Davidians, Jim Jones and Jonestown, Tony Alamo Christian Ministries, Warren Jeffs as leader of the FLDS, and the FLDS in general. Again the identification with Christianity and the coverage in the press goes to increase the negative image of Christian doctrine. I have also read intellectuals, supposedly Christian leaders, that blame the ills of the world on Christianity, per se, not on the interpretations of it. Though this essay will focus on Christianity, Judaism comes under that same sort of attack, being seen as a political force, even conspiracy, running counter to current political direction

All of these examples are far, far from the general truth about Christianity, but I know good, well-meaning liberal, atheists that accept this picture of Christianity. To read the agenda of the politically liberal, they believe this is true as well. There is a strong effort to remove all expression of Judeo-Christian belief from any public forum, regardless of whether there is explicit government sponsorship of it or not. Passive permission is not acceptable. Through tortured and ideological reasoning, along with a misconstrual of the First Amendment, it is seen as a form of establishment.

So let us look at some of the actual realities behind these caricatures. First of all, there is some truth in the above images or they would not have any power to convince. There have been pedophilic priests, and the Roman Catholic Church is belatedly dealing with it. What is important for perspective, is that there are hundreds of thousands of priests, past and current, that have never violated their vows with respect to sexual abstinence, and perform their duties faithfully (religiously? Couldn’t avoid the pun, either word is a pun.) every day.

While we are on the discussion of Roman Catholicism, much has been made in the press a year or two ago, concerning the statement that any politician that supports abortion and is a Roman Catholic should not take Holy Communion. Several prominent politicians fell under that rule—two of the most notable being John Kerry and Ted Kennedy. To liberals this was interference in politics. No, this was a restatement of the values that being a Roman Catholic includes. The Church did not tell them how to vote, it simply told them the consequences of a pro-abortion vote, with respect to their religion. In kind, this is no different from the ostracism of Joe Lieberman for supporting President Bushes war policies. The only difference is in the underlying philosophy.

Christian fundamentalists as a group tend to have the most courage in public expression of their values, including those against abortion, or so-called pro-life. As a consequence, since this runs counter to the views of most of the MSM, it is presented in a negative view, and generalized to imply it includes all of Christianity. Because fundamentalists tend to have intellectually simple viewpoints (not to say they are wrong, just not complex) they are seen as subjects of derision by the self-anointed elites of politics and the MSM. The scorn and abuse heaped upon Sarah Palin for giving birth to a Down’s Syndrome baby is the most egregious example.

What is ignored is that most fundamentalist Christians are hard-working, virtuous (in the Biblical sense), and generally happy, well-adjusted people. Except when they chose to back a public cause such as stopping abortions, they are never seen, but go about doing a lot of quiet, good work with all the various forms of the less fortunate, and they do it voluntarily. Their children grow up well-behaved and studious, and they provide the young men and women that serve in the armed forces, do service work, and go on to raise their own families.

There are minor denominations that go to what might be considered extremes of literality where their behavioral proscriptions make them stand out in public, especially the women with no jewelry, no makeup, hair that is never cut, but bound up, long skirts close to ankle length. Because they are different and have beliefs that do not fit our logic, they are often sneered at. Yet one would find in general that they are again, model citizens, and part of the strength of our country.

The situation is not helped when the mainline Protestant churches conduct their policy and doctrinal disputes in public. In particular I am thinking of the issues of homosexual marriage and ordination of practicing homosexuals as ministers. These are never presented sympathetically by the MSM. There is no discussion of the issues, or the fact that sincere, caring people are trying to sort out what the Bible, their fundamental source of doctrine, says vs. what they think should be the reality. And such leaders as Rowan Williams, Archbishop of the Anglican Church, generate more contempt than respect in the church, but a lot of press coverage.

What the press and other fail to see, is that mainline Protestantism is extremely diverse—having everything from the most abstract interpretations of Biblical scriptures to the most literal. It has beliefs concerning Jesus from being Divine to being a great teacher. Liturgy contains everything from feel-good, hymns and an uplifting sermon, to guilt-inspiring solemnity with lessons, sermons, and music to match. It has formal leadership to interpret doctrine and preach, or no doctrinal leadership with personal spontaneity providing the messages. Under it all, is a basic doctrine that preaches love and caring for others, which doctrine is quietly executed in many programs—caring for the homeless, caring for unwed mothers, caring for the elderly and disabled. These are not advertised, because Christians believe that public display of virtue negates the virtue. It becomes prideful rather than servitude.

What is also ignored, is that there are a myriad of interpretations of Christian doctrine. Those which grab headlines are presented rarely as one-peron’s interpretation but rather as somehow part of a more general doctrine. This is often the approach of some intellectuals, who blame Christianity for ills that are due to interpretations that are denied by the mainstream. In addition, that the entire Western culture is Judeo-Christian based is totally ignored today, or seen as something to be denied, removed, and blamed for the ills, many of which come from failure to adhere to that doctrine.

The greatest single concept in Christianity, that has led to its success in molding cultures is the line from Matthew 15: 21 “... Then he said to them, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.” This teaching had a specific context at the time, but it has a far more general application. This can be seen as a Biblical injunction to keep the Church and the State separate in action. By divorcing the actions of the State from the rule of the Church, the pragmatic, compromising actions of the State can be allowed the freedom to provide for all people, not just those that believe. It provides for the desired goal of a diverse society. At the same time it frees the Church from having to compromise its moral standards. It renders moral good whether in ones person or in ones action towards others to be truly a free choice and therefore have moral meaning. Theocracies, just as uncompromising political ideologies, fail because they allow only one view of all that should be, right or wrong in the reality-test sense.

Today, Christianity is often seen as a threat to our culture. This is reminiscent of the past when any deviation from Roman Catholic doctrine was subjected to the inquisition (or rather any person reported deviating from it). Just as the Priests recoiled in terror and horror at any non-Christian symbol, so today the symbols of Christianity, such as the Cross on Mt. Davidson, in San Francisco, or the Cross in the Seal of the City of Los Angeles is seen as powerful and corrupting of our political purity. Just as in the Pre-Renaissance period extirpation rather than tolerance was the rule, so today our modern inquisitors attempt to remove all public expression of religion rather than simply allowing it in whatever legal (not in the Politically Correct interpretation but in the sense of not violating others explicit rights) form people wish to chose.

The true face of Christianity in this country is not in the news. It is most of the people you meet and work with. Over 40% of the population goes to church, and over 80% believe in God (Granted, not all of those would consider themselves Christian.). They are diverse in their beliefs. Some sincerely believe in the Biblical injunctions that homosexuality is sinful, and others will agree that homosexual marriage is acceptable as are practicing homosexual clergy. Some will state that abortion is wrong under all circumstances (a small minority view), most consider it to be a very difficult decision to be undertaken only in the interests of the ultimate health of the mother and the child, and a few have no scruples with it. Politically they are represented in every view. Some are extremely liberal and some are extremely conservative, and both can exist in the same church, not just the same denomination. Christians are quietly generous and giving of both their time and money to many charitable causes.

Those of you who are not believers in Christianity would do well to find out about it. Not to become Christians, but to know and understand a significant portion of our society, and the source of the values on which it was built. The ideal forum is a dialog where both Christians and non-Christians can exchange their views—not to convert one another, but to respect and understand one another.

This essay in Jewish World Review for today, very clearly shows the similarities of President Obama and Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain. In fact the two are so close it is eerie. Please go read it.

.....for today's events.

I have embarked upon the reading of Edward Gibbon's monumental "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." It is still, after 230 years, a major information source on the Roman Empire. Just as literature, it is a joy to read. His prose is clear and flows almost as nicely as poetry. As history it makes important reading. The parallels of the Roman Empire to the United States today are very great. Both have been the sole superpower in their known world, and both have been republics. It will be of interest to see just how far it all applies.

Gibbon takes up the history of the Roman Empire at the height of the Pax Romana, from 98-180, and describes it in detail. What is most telling is his analysis of one of the causes of the peace, in addition to moderation in government, Gibbon makes the following observation:

The terror of the Roman arms added weight and dignity to the moderation of the emperors. They preserved peace by a constant preparation for war; and while justice regulated their conduct, they announced to the nations on their confines that they were as little disposed to endure as to offer an injury.

In other words, we are powerful, but as long as you leave us alone, we will leave you alone. (Reading further along at the organization and training of the Roman Legions, they were indeed the superwarriors of their day.) Very much like the US until rampant political correctness and the anti-military groups took control of our fate.

It shall be interesting to see in the ensuing volumes how this played out. My own suspicion is that there is much to be learned that is directly applicable to the US today---IF we would pay attention. (For example, as the quality of soldiers decreased, the amount of technology, balistas, etc., increased.) However, the entire society seem to suffer from Attention Deficit these days.

The third paper in this series on Free Will and Determinism is now available in Bill's Big Stuff. There will be a fourth paper on why the universe appears deterministic even though it might not be.

Here are the opening paragraphs:

As I have explored in my first attempt at this discussion, determinism can be approached from various levels, and to varying degrees of absoluteness. I explored physical, psychological, and situational determinism. However, when the issue comes up in such discussions as this one, the issue really relates to choice—“Could I have done otherwise?”—to quote from Daniel Dennett. Thus we see the entanglement of free will with determinism and their potential antithetical characters.

Having shown in the preceding papers that the problem of a deterministic universe is insoluble, we now arrive at the question of free will. In the discussions I have seen, the argument is simplified to “if the universe is deterministic there is no free will and if it is not, there is.” What I shall try to do in this paper is show that free will exists regardless of the deterministic state of the universe.

So how should we approach this issue? Do we consider free will as existing when we could have done otherwise but did not know of the other choice(s)? Or does it exist only to the degree of our ability to see the choices? In the day to day world, this is probably the most common concept of free will, though we often will later do a Homer Simpson (Say, “Doh!” And smack our foreheads.). For this discussion to even attempt to be conclusive or effective, we will adopt the definition of having a choice whether we see the choice or not. In saying we have a choice, we are saying that at the point of choice, there is no influence on the choice but our own real or potential considerations. But there is a subtlety here. We could certainly say there is free will if the choice can be made randomly, but the choices that mean something are not random.

Labels: determinism, free will, philosophy

In mammals that hibernate, there is a layer of fat in the back near the kidneys that is brown instead of yellow like ordinary fat. This fat has been found to be metabolically different from other fat, in that all the energy that is consumed by the fat does not create either more fat nor do work. All it does is create heat. The heat is what keeps a hibernating animal from freezing.

Brown fat is useful, though I have often compared government organizations to brown fat--money goes in and all that comes out is hot air and useless programs. Considering the scale that it has now come to, I think I need to create a new category, black fat. Black fat consumes energy and poisons its host with the metabolic byproducts. It takes in good energy, far more than it can use, consumes a lot of it in useless metabolic cycles, and then spews out altered nutrients that can only be used by the least useful cells of the body, and poison the remaining ones or transmutes them into other useless cells. Sounds like the US government to me.

I have been reading "The Gospel of Thomas." This is a non-canonical book of Jesus's sayings that forms part of the Gnostic literature. Why it is of interest, is that many of the sayings correspond to the so-called Q material. However, and I don't think it is just the translation I am reading, there are considerable variances in the wording, though the sayings are easily recognizable.

While I was doing my reading on Q, I found that all Pro-Q writers mentioned the Gospel of Thomas and how it was probably either late first century, or early second century and that it had many parallels to the Q sayings. They used this as part of their authentication of Q as existing as a document at one time. However, I never saw any table comparing Thomas to Matthew and Luke in the detail that Matthew and Luke are compared. The anti-Q commentors ignored Thomas, probably because it tended to undermine their case, and because it was not a canonical book. (Anti-Q people tend to be more literalistic and have rigid ideas of what is valid scripture).

So far, my reading indicates that the Thomas material is similar enough to support some sort of common source, but I think it undermines the idea of a single written document. The changes in the Thomas material are what might be expected from the capture of an oral tradition for the first time. There is also the possible editing to fit the needs of Gnosticism (which I see as and East-meets-West thing. Much of the writing reminds me of Zen Buddhism with a Christian outlook.).

If Thomas captured an oral tradition directly, then how do we explain the close parallels of Matthew and Luke? Several arguments are in the material I read:
Luke read Matthew
They used a common document
Their arrangements of the material are greatly different
Their wordings are so similar, or according to Eta Linnemann, not that similar

Nobody seems to take seriously the idea of independent capture of oral tradition, save possibly Eta Linneman, though she supports Luke reading Matthew.

The truth is, the amount of Q material is not that great that a person could not memorize all of it. It is far shorter than a one-act play. So it would be a reasonable concept that both Matthew and Luke heard and captured the recitations of one or more early preachers that had essentially the same versions memorized.

I subscribe to the independence of Matthew and Luke for a number of reasons, but the primary is that each has material the other doesn't, and both use Mark, but edit him quite differently.

The extreme pro-Q people would consider independent capture of an oral tradition as undermining their fundamental assumption--that Q was a written document. They need this to provide sufficient authority for them to claim that Q was the "true" teachings of Jesus and should be the only source of Jesus words, thus invalidating all of 2000 years of Christianity as it has been developed. Independent capture of an oral tradition would not harm the writings of most moderate scholars. It provides a source for the Two Source hypothesis, so they can still talk about "Q material." It would be indifferent to the single-source scholars and anti-Q people.

At this point, I favor the independent capture of an oral tradition. It helps explain more in my mind than a written document does, especially since none has turned up yet--even a Third or Fourth Century copy. It also accomodates the statistical analysis of Eta Linnemann.

Considering the highly conjectural nature of this topic, about all one can do is make a provisional choice and wait for further evidence (not further conjecture).

Belmont Club published a chart from innocentbystanders.net. It is self-explanatory.

This post in Belmont Club in the last two paragraphs shows exactly what is wrong in the world today. A murder in Great Britain is current events writ small. Here are the paragraphs:

The aesthetics of the jungle and of civilized society are as different as night and day. In jails and raw slums, what is deadly is beautiful. In settings “red of tooth and claw”, having long teeth and sharp claws are the ultimate fashion accessory. By contrast, the aesthetics of civilization are often pointedly impractical: high heels, shoes with pointy toes, constricting pants, jangling rings, vestigial pockets, fragile clothes are but a few examples. The aesthetics of civilization are based on the conspicuous consumption of safety. Over time, some societies forget that safety is not a natural condition, but a hard won commodity. They begin to think it is as free as the air and are outraged when they cannot have it on demand. Eventually they evolve into cultures where nobody can see the harm in releasing Jihadis into general population; where possessing a gun for home defense offends those who are aware of it; when the proper response to violent crime is sympathy and when mass murder is met by abject apologies from the victims.

The sad fact is that when French students Gabriel Ferez and Laurent Bonomo encountered Dano Sonnex and Nigel Farmer, in that lawless context Sonnex and Farmer were functionally the more beautiful. When the jungle and civilization meet, the jungle wins unless the civilized man is armed and able. But maybe nobody remembers that any more.

Melanie Phillips writes for the Spectator in England. Her essays are always clear and to the point. This one is on an issue I have tried to comment on before, but not nearly so effectively. Please take the time to read this.

The history of the three Gospels, Mark, Matthew, and Luke, is both speculative and controversial. The greatest controversy surrounds a Gospel that does not exist, and may or may not have ever existed as a document, Q. The name comes from the German, Quelle or source, and refers to a hypothetical source of the common material in Matthew and Luke that does not appear in Mark. The controversy is part of the so-called Synoptic Problem and has one extreme of saying that Q was a written document that had a complete social structure associated with it that undermines all of Christianity, even to the point of denying the crucifixion. In effect the proponents of this stance on Q say that it is the only meaningful document concerning Jesus. The other extreme states that not only does Q not exist, but also that there is no Synoptic problem. Being of the nature that I am, I cannot stay out of the fray, and am taking my own stance, relatively uninformed (compared to the scholars that are disputing) that it may be.

Some background knowledge is required to understand what is going on with this controversy. For the last two to three hundred years, biblical scholarship has come away from the belief that the Gospels were written by eye-witnesses. All scholars, other than biblical literalists, agree that the Gospels were written from forty to eighty years after Jesus was crucified, and are compilations of oral and possibly early, lost, written traditions. Further examination showed that each Gospel told the story from a different standpoint, and that some things were in common and some things were not.

It was noted that most of Mark was in both Matthew and Luke, but that Matthew and Luke had material that was not in Mark. The material that was in all three has been termed the triple tradition, and the material that is only in Matthew and Luke is called the double tradition. In addition there is material that is unique to Matthew and to Luke. John is not considered part of this problem because his approach has almost nothing in common with the other three Gospels. Because the three gospels have so much in common and tell much the same story, they are call the Synoptic Gospels, from the Greek Syn, together, and optic to see. It is trying to explain the differences and similarities that the controversies arise, in particular concerning the double tradition.

Based upon a number of arguments, no one of which by itself is conclusive, but when added together make a fairly strong case, the Gospel of Mark is considered to be the oldest or first written, probably around 70 CE, after the destruction of the Second Temple by the Romans. I have seen no argument against this particular conclusion. What is very striking to scholars is how similar the double tradition material is for two authors that are supposedly writing independently. The double tradition material is composed mostly of sayings, but also a couple of narratives. The order in which it appears is different between the two Gospels, but the wording of any given set of verses is extremely close, in many cases, identical.

This close similarity has given rise to two competing hypotheses. One says that the two gospels are not independent and that Matthew read and used Mark, adding his own material to it, and then Luke read Matthew, and possibly Mark, using the Markan material but also the Matthewan material as well leading to both the triple and double traditions. The second hypothesis says that Matthew and Luke were written independently, and that they had a second source besides Mark from which to draw. This source has had various names in the nineteenth century but has come to be called Q as a neutral term for it. Part of the argument for Q also involves explaining why both Matthew and Luke have material unique to themselves that does not appear in Luke, if Luke read Matthew. The case for the second hypothesis is strong enough that probably the majority of scholars accept the idea of Q in some form, but what form is also subject to debate.

Keeping in mind that this qualifies as no more than a hypothesis, no document or fragment of a document has ever been found that could be considered to be Q, it is useful to examine the extremes of the controversy. One extreme could well be called the True-Believers. This group has been represented in the popular press by Burton L. Mack’s books (See the preceding post.). This group believes that a Q document existed at one time and that it was the result of a school of thought in the tradition of the Greek schools. In the Greek schools there was a Master from whom the school got its name. The master created the core of the teachings, and later students added to the teachings, but in the master’s name. The scholars that hold this position believe they see three or four layers of sayings in what is considered Q material, and think that the first layer came from Jesus, but that later layers were added by students. They consider this the earliest collection of Jesus’ teachings, and therefore it is controlling. Since it does not mention the crucifixion, they in effect say that it didn’t happen. They also use social theory to state that the later Gospels were created to meet social problems. In my opinion, they make two very big mistakes, first they extend their conclusions far beyond any grounds that might be covered by the data, and two, they take their analytical descriptions as the actual reality, just as physical scientists confuse their mathematical descriptions of the behavior of reality as the reality itself.

The other extreme has as an examplar, Eta Linneman, who in the one paper of hers I have read does a careful analysis of matching words and phrases, and makes a very persuasive argument against the existence of a true Q document. However, she goes farther and supports the single source hypothesis that says Mark was first, Matthew read Mark, and Luke read Matthew, that there is no Synoptic Problem. I think the work she has done is very useful and illustrates how easy it is to get carried away with a desired result if not checked by careful analysis. The combination of her analysis and what is still a high degree of similarity could also point to a wide-spread oral tradition of sayings, that both Matthew and Luke used, independently of one another.

I have greatly simplified the details of the controversy, but I think it is important to be aware of it. I strongly disagree with the “True Believers” as I have termed them. The existence of Q, even if written, does not throw into doubt the rest of Christianity. That is wishful thinking on their part. I think part of their over-extension of their position on Q is due to a desire to be politically active by undermining the Judeo-Christian pinnings of our society. I am not sure why it is so important to the one source scholars, such as Eta Linnemann, but I think they have a hard time explaining as much as the two source hypothesis does.

My own view is, that since it is hypothetical, (despite Dr. Mack thinking that once it is published it becomes more real and less hypothetical) one can work with it as an assumption, realizing that at any time it could be shown to be false. The two-source theory explains the most of the Gospel correspondences without special case pleadings. However, from my perspective at the present, we cannot know whether Q was an actual document or not. I am keeping my options open on that.