Belief-O-Matic

From the Beliefnet Belief-O-Matic Test.

Your Results:
The top score on the list below represents the faith that Belief-O-Matic, in its less than infinite wisdom, thinks most closely matches your beliefs. However, even a score of 100% does not mean that your views are all shared by this faith, or vice versa.Belief-O-Matic then lists another 26 faiths in order of how much they have in common with your professed beliefs. The higher a faith appears on this list, the more closely it aligns with your thinking.

1. Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (100%)
2. Eastern Orthodox (82%)
3. Roman Catholic (82%)
4. Seventh Day Adventist (76%)
5. Orthodox Judaism (75%)
6. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (74%)
7. Jehovah's Witness (74%)
8. Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (71%)
9. Islam (68%)
10. Bahá'í Faith (66%)
11. Orthodox Quaker (57%)
12. Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (50%)
13. Sikhism (45%)
14. Hinduism (44%)
15. Liberal Quakers (40%)
16. Reform Judaism (35%)
17. Jainism (29%)
18. Unitarian Universalism (26%)
19. New Thought (24%)
20. Mahayana Buddhism (21%)
21. Theravada Buddhism (21%)
22. Nontheist (19%)
23. Scientology (18%)
24. Neo-Pagan (12%)
25. New Age (5%)
26. Taoism (3%)
27. Secular Humanism (2%)

School is Coming

I went up to school and purchased the majority of my textbooks on Thursday, spending about $300 for three classes. And there are four books to pick up for Evidence, but since an assignment hasn't been posted yet and the first class is on Tuesday, I decided to wait to carry those home.

Today I came home to discover that GQ had arrived, and is 436 pages! Nestled among the shiny pictures of people wearing nice clothes (btw, purple is the color for men this season) is the tale of Rob Shuck, undergraduate at Cornell since 1993. And he's no plans, as of yet, to make his departure.

And in gardening news, I had an attack of caterpillars
And finally, here is a picture of my beets:



And my little mint plants (they are so very tiny) are starting to appear.

Mars In the Sky as Big as the Moon

So tonight, my Mom asks me if I'd heard anything about Mars appearing as big as the moon sometime soon (she'd read about it in an email.) I said no, and that I was a little suspicious about such a claim.

So I look on-line, and sure enough there's an article here from NASA debunking the myth.

But I did learn something. The first article I found, from the Salt Lake Tribune, mentions that they investigated the rumor with the NASA Ambassador to Utah.

Now, I had never heard of NASA Ambassadors, and so I was curious.

If you're interested, go here for more information.

A Response for Paul

You may recall I was quite mad when my plant disappeared. So mad I expressed myself in verse.

Now, when I mentioned this at work, I also pointed interested folks to my statement on the web.

But one person asked a question I felt a poetic response was called for:

For Paul
August 19, 2005
(Who on reading To The Thief, asked "But how is it a poem?")

Modern verse
Stands accurs'd,
The rhymes weak,
The meter burst.

Who wastes the time
Fit word to lines?

Hallmark writers
And morose men,
Their true loves thrall,
'Til true love ends.

And folks like me,
A helpless case.
Pull pen away,
I'll rap to space.

Modern verse
Stands accurs'd.
The poems bad-
The critics worse!

Fast Growing Beet Plants

Check out these fast growing sprouts. These Detroit Dark Red beets have already jumped up this far since being planted August 6th.

To The Thief

Oh, why did you take
My pot and plants?

Only a day ago, they moved
From my safe windowsill
To the porch.

Dear thief,
Did you not think
-Or did you not care-
That you would confirm my worst suspicions of
Human nature?

You could have watched, with me
The basil grow, and bolt.
You could have watched
The green miracle against
Black soil.

Oh Thief,
You can not know, of course,
That I planted those seeds in March
Sheltering them in my window.

I planted them in defiance,
My middle finger to the tired Winter
Unwilling to surrender
To springtime.

I worried, and coaxed,
And finally when my little plants were ready
To grow beyond their first pot,
I transplanted them, and placed them on
My sunny porch.

I could curse you.
You would deserve the
Divine retribution.

What defense would you have?
If your excuse was hunger,
Why steal the pot and soil?
Will you sell them on the side of the road?
Or did you take it out of simple spite?

Save your excuses.
I am forgiven of my sins;
I will not demand justice from you.

Remember, though, that the Lord
Also comes like a thief in the night.

And He, too, will reap
Where He has not sown.

Science v. Religion: Religion Still Winning

Jacob Weisberg, writing in Slate, wants me to understand that the scientific worldview that explains the world in materialistic terms is better than the religious worldview that explains the world via the Bible.

I do not find it at all odd that the President, like most Americans, wants schools to explain controversial topics in a way that does not offend the beliefs of the students and their parents.

If I understand his claim, the fact that the vast majority of scientists believe "we're here because of random mutation and natural selection" is suffient to require the teaching of evolution in public schools.

Now, why do I find his arguement odd? Read on (cited in the article):

According to the most recent Gallup poll on the subject (2004), 45 percent of Americans believe God created human beings in their present form 10,000 years ago, while another 38 percent believe that God directed the process of evolution. Only 13 percent accept the prevailing scientific view of evolution as an unguided, random process.

So, when a majority of scientists hold a belief, it must be taught in schools. When a majority of everyone else holds a contrary belief, it must not be taught in schools?

I must admit, I am unimpressed.

And remember, the President said, quite reasonably, I think:

"I think that part of education is to expose people to different schools of thought," Bush said. "You're asking me whether or not people ought to be exposed to different ideas, the answer is yes."

So what is he unhappy about?

The president seems to view the conflict between evolutionary theory and intelligent design as something like the debate over Social Security reform. But this is not a disagreement with two reasonable points of view, let alone two equally valid ones. Intelligent design, which asserts that gaps in evolutionary science prove God must have had a role in creation, may be—as Bob Wright argues—creationism in camouflage. Or it may be—as William Saletan argues—a step in the creationist cave-in to evolution. But whatever it represents, intelligent design is a faith-based theory with no scientific validity or credibility

So that must be it, the president knows the real truth of the matter, but is hiding it from us, the plebes, in order to stay in office.

If Bush had said schools should give equal time to the view that the Sun revolves around the Earth, or that smoking doesn't cause lung cancer, he'd have been laughed out of his office.

So, the President is being faulted for saying things that scientists say are untrue but are popular, and for not saying untrue unpopular things, because then he would forced out of office (appearently via a heretofore-unnoticed codicil to the grounds for impeachment?)

Oh goodness this is a mess.

Let us review politics. Politicians give the voters what they want. In a Republic, we tell politicians what we, the voters want, and expect them to generally reflect our wishes (except when it would really harm a minority.)

Weisberg's real complaint is with democracy. That schools teach the things that the local community wants is critical to democracy, and to the whole scheme of public schools as well.

It's hard enough to get people to pay for schools; how likely is it that you'd willingly pay taxes to support an organization that ridicules and minimizes your fundamental religious beliefs?

Oh wait, isn't this the exact same arguement that lead to the disestablishment of the churches? Which, like the schools, were formerly provided for by public exactions?

Now, I know my point of view is unreasonable, but so what?

If I believe the universe is less than 10,000 years old, and that God created it in 6 days (and rested on the seventh) and that the Son of God was born of a Virgin, died and was resurrected to bring eternal life, well I may be unreasonable, but I'm in good company.

And since public schools have to reflect someone's beliefs, why not ours?

***

Back in Middle School, when we hit the sex ed portion of the health curriculum, teachers handed everyone a note alerting their parents, and advising them that they could opt to have their children study other health related topics in the library.

My answer is simple: when the class comes to the creationist and intelligent design portions of the curriculum teachers should send a note home with all the children.

And if the parents want to let their kids sit in the library reading about Galapagos, the school should let them.

A Time for Bigger Pots

The last week or so, my Basil had begun to look a little sickly. The top leaves where the new growth was occuring looked fine, but the older leaves were turning whitish and falling off. At first I suspected that I'd just failed to water enough, since the leaves were also a little droopy.

But more frequent watering wasn't helping.

Next on the list of possibilities, though one I'd feared, was that the roots had run out of room to grow. I'd been dreading it because there's always a risk when transferring to a larger pot that the plant will be unable to take the stress, and die.

But gardening is always a risky enterprise. So today I transferred both my basil and my pomegranite tree into new, larger pots. The basil had indeed become root bound, with clear roots spread all through the bounderies of the old pot, and peeking through the drain-hole on the bottom.



The pomegranite, while the roots were well-developed, only had a few tentative feelers out to the edges of the pot. Still, I wanted to give it plenty of room to grow as we head into the home stretch of the summer.



Speaking of home stretches, and of the sadly inevitable end of summer, I also wanted to try something a bit more exotic. On Saturday I bought a window box, soil, and something entirely new for me: beet seeds.

The beets are supposed to need just 60 days until harvest and will tolerate a little cold weather. I searched a little on-line, and it appears that the absolute end of the growing season in Philadelphia should be the first week of November. Thus, I should have plenty of time, but there's no telling the weather. (I also looked up my zone. My zip code is in zone 6. Thanks American Horticultural Society.)

Planted on Saturday, they've already started to sprout (which is always a little miraculous.) I'll punch the first pigeon I catch munching on a sprout.



The beet seeds were sold under the name American Seed, and should only be about 3 inches when I dig them up.

Finally, you can see in the basil picture that the Sedum is growing, and in fact is preparing to flower. The nasturtiums, however, croaked. I suspect that they didn't get a good enough footing in the unusually hot summer we've been having. Oh well, something to try again next year. I think the Sedum are quite handsome so far, with a lot of red in their thick stalks. And the flowers should attract butterflies and bees when they start blooming.

Joke Product?

You're a vegetarian, or you're on a diet. So you eat some tofu, done up to taste like something recognizably edible.

But what if you're a cannibal, and don't want to run afoul of the law or basic morality?

The solution?

Hufu

Tip of the hat to the Nashville Scene's Pith in the Wind.

Part of me suspects a little Bonsai Kitten hoax...