love me like a song+ (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} draconis_tatsu) wrote,@ 2008-12-02 18:52:00 |
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021208: The Jedi Census.
Ytd was the Big Panic Day.
I love HKY.
..anw, main pointof today's post is:
Religion: Jedi
..I would so totally do that, but I haven't exactly participated in any censuses, and I might get charged with, idk, contempt of court. Scary thing, y'know.
"Statistics Canada, the Canadian census statistics people, at first said refused to publish Jedi numbers claiming it was just a media driven stunt. But they eventually produced the nnumbers we have been waiting for when asked to produce the statistics for the far fewer numbers of Rastafarians, Scientologists and Satanists."
"The NZ Census beureau believe that the Jedi answer means "Response outside of scope" or "Answer understood, but will not be counted", whereas "satanism", "wiccan", "yoga" etc are valid answers."
Sources include JEDI Census, Jedi Church; articles and entries from Mail Online (part of The Daily Mail - a UK paper), Wikipedia, BBC, and a few from Times Online, if anyone wants to read a little more about it. ..the above are links to a couple of articles, to save you a little time.
"In the 2001 UK Census 390,000 people listed their religion as Jedi Knight making it the fourth biggest belief in the country."
Also, this is interesting: an old article from The Times, in 2003, reads,
"Teachers have voted that no more faith schools should be set up, claiming that they cause social conflict.
The National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers agreed that it was an “inappropriate use of taxpayers’ money” to fund faith schools that, by their nature, had “exclusive and discriminatory philosophies”."
Myself, I can't say whether faith schools are directly related to social conflict (like, how the hell am I supposed to know!) and I figure if the faith wants to set up a school then whatever man, it's your choice, so long as you don't force people to go to it. Having the state fund the setting up these schools does seem rather biased, though - it appears that only the more 'conventional' and widely-accepted religions get this boon.
"Other delegates questioned why Jedi Knights— mentioned as a religion in the 2001 census — and Scientologists were not funded to start faith schools."
..if funding were left to the religion itself, I think the Jedi will never have a school.
uhh, not that it'd ever get state funding, anyway. XD
agnostic
(ăg-nŏs'tĭk)
n.
1.
a. One who believes that it is impossible to know whether there is a God.
b. One who is skeptical about the existence of God but does not profess true atheism.
2. One who is doubtful or noncommittal about something.
adj.
1. Relating to or being an agnostic.
2. Doubtful or noncommittal: “Though I am agnostic on what terms to use, I have no doubt that human infants come with an enormous ‘acquisitiveness’ for discovering patterns” (William H. Calvin).
I think I'm agnostic. I had more to say, but LJ wiped it out when I accidentally refreshed the Edit Journal Entries page.
Growing up, the bible ranked about the same as my Primary Science Encyclopedia - pretty pictures, interesting information. It just seemed that the former was more well-known than the latter - but popularity doesn't make something True.
What the author of this post says resounds with me, and is a lot like what I feel, 'cept he can say it and I don't have the words to, so I'm borrowing his.
While googling for how dinosaurs fit into the bible and creation, I got this website, which, I'm sorry to say, reads like a load ofcrock propaganda. Unfortunately, it is also the First Hit google gets, which If you read the Dec 1 article, it suggests rather strongly that the idea of evolution (which, I actually partially agree, is rather a belief as well, just one substantiated with evidence as they present it) came about as a result of Darwin's rejecting of biblical views because his daughter died. Unable to reconcile the 'good' in death with God, he decided that evolution would be his substitute for God.
uh.
Back to dinosaurs,
"If dinosaurs evolved from amphibians, there should be, for example, fossil evidence of animals that are part dinosaur and part something else. However, there is no proof of this anywhere. In fact, if you go into any museum you will see fossils of dinosaurs that are 100% dinosaur, not something in between. There are no 25%, 50%, 75%, or even 99% dinosaurs—they are all 100% dinosaur!"
And therefore, dinosaurs did not evolve to be, they were created. Further on, they relate how dinosaurs did live alongside humans, and likely died out after the Flood - unable to cope with the post-flood world, having to compete with all the other pairs of animals etc (which reminds me, isn't everything then a huge inbreeding problem?)
"There are certainly hundreds of dinosaur names, but many of these were given to just a bit of bone or skeletons of the same dinosaur found in other countries. It is also reasonable to assume that different sizes, varieties, and sexes of the same kind of dinosaur have ended up with different names. For example, look at the many different varieties and sizes of dogs, but they are all the same kind-the dog kind! In reality, there may have been fewer than 50 kinds of dinosaurs. "
Can't dispute that, I guess.
"Many would have been covered with tons of mud as the rampaging water covered the land (Genesis 7:11-12,19). Because of this quick burial, many of the animals would have been preserved as fossils. If this happened, you would expect to find evidence of billions of dead things buried in rock layers (formed from this mud) all over the Earth. This is exactly what you do find."
...so ah, where's the giraffes and the elephants and whatnot?
Will continue after dinner.
I abandoned that article, it sounded like a mockery of Christianity, actually. I really don't know whether or not to take it seriously, i.e., whether or not to trust that the author sincerely believes what he is writing. Reading other articles reassures me somewhat that this is one (frankly ridiculous) article in a bunch of more convincing ones, so lah-dee-dah to that one.
There is another article, on the formation of the Grand Canyon - if the Earth is only about 6000 or so years old, the Canyon must have taken a relatively short time to for, and not the Millions Of Years scientists claim it did, yes? This one sounds far less fallacious and ridiculous, and brings up this example of the Burlingame Canyon, a "miniature Grand Canyon", 1 500 feet (450m) long, 120 feet (35m) deep and 120 feet wide. It was formed in a grand total of 6 days.
A counter-argument to this not-uncommon answer, found here, claims that the volume of the Grand Canyon is about 89 million times that of the Burlingame one, and so, "(just) because you can create a tiny canyon in six days doesn't prove anything, unless you can repeat it on the scale of the Grand Canyon. And, if the Grand Canyon eroded at the same rate as Burlingame, you would still need 1.5 million years for the Grand Canyon to form." The Grand Canyon does look like it could hold a damn lot more water than the Burlingame one, especially if you consider that if the Flood did happen, there'd be a hell lot more water flowing off the land into the sea/ wherever it went.
I have no clue about Grand Canyons, but I do think that the second website - Answers in Creation - has a point here:
" If you are a Christian, and you doubt the young age of the earth ... You can still believe in an inerrant Word of God, and there is nothing wrong with your salvation! ... the doctrine of salvation has nothing to do with the age of the earth. Does the Bible say, “Believe in a young earth, or be condemned to hell.”? No, it doesn’t. Does it say you can lose your salvation? No, it does not. ... your salvation is secure.
.. Adam was created on the sixth day, and these “days” were as God sees days, because only God was here…not man. ... it doesn’t matter how I interpret the word day; the question is, ‘what is a day to God’?
God is God of the universe, not just God of the earth. Day as a twenty-four hour period only applies if you are standing on planet earth. What is the meaning of day if you are in the middle of space? There is no day or night there, so why should we limit God to a limited twenty-four hour earth day?"
Now this I can understand.
anyway I really, really, really, should go pack.
Ytd was the Big Panic Day.
I love HKY.
..anw, main pointof today's post is:
Religion: Jedi
..I would so totally do that, but I haven't exactly participated in any censuses, and I might get charged with, idk, contempt of court. Scary thing, y'know.
"Statistics Canada, the Canadian census statistics people, at first said refused to publish Jedi numbers claiming it was just a media driven stunt. But they eventually produced the nnumbers we have been waiting for when asked to produce the statistics for the far fewer numbers of Rastafarians, Scientologists and Satanists."
"The NZ Census beureau believe that the Jedi answer means "Response outside of scope" or "Answer understood, but will not be counted", whereas "satanism", "wiccan", "yoga" etc are valid answers."
Sources include JEDI Census, Jedi Church; articles and entries from Mail Online (part of The Daily Mail - a UK paper), Wikipedia, BBC, and a few from Times Online, if anyone wants to read a little more about it. ..the above are links to a couple of articles, to save you a little time.
"In the 2001 UK Census 390,000 people listed their religion as Jedi Knight making it the fourth biggest belief in the country."
Also, this is interesting: an old article from The Times, in 2003, reads,
"Teachers have voted that no more faith schools should be set up, claiming that they cause social conflict.
The National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers agreed that it was an “inappropriate use of taxpayers’ money” to fund faith schools that, by their nature, had “exclusive and discriminatory philosophies”."
Myself, I can't say whether faith schools are directly related to social conflict (like, how the hell am I supposed to know!) and I figure if the faith wants to set up a school then whatever man, it's your choice, so long as you don't force people to go to it. Having the state fund the setting up these schools does seem rather biased, though - it appears that only the more 'conventional' and widely-accepted religions get this boon.
"Other delegates questioned why Jedi Knights— mentioned as a religion in the 2001 census — and Scientologists were not funded to start faith schools."
..if funding were left to the religion itself, I think the Jedi will never have a school.
uhh, not that it'd ever get state funding, anyway. XD
agnostic
(ăg-nŏs'tĭk)
n.
1.
a. One who believes that it is impossible to know whether there is a God.
b. One who is skeptical about the existence of God but does not profess true atheism.
2. One who is doubtful or noncommittal about something.
adj.
1. Relating to or being an agnostic.
2. Doubtful or noncommittal: “Though I am agnostic on what terms to use, I have no doubt that human infants come with an enormous ‘acquisitiveness’ for discovering patterns” (William H. Calvin).
I think I'm agnostic. I had more to say, but LJ wiped it out when I accidentally refreshed the Edit Journal Entries page.
Growing up, the bible ranked about the same as my Primary Science Encyclopedia - pretty pictures, interesting information. It just seemed that the former was more well-known than the latter - but popularity doesn't make something True.
What the author of this post says resounds with me, and is a lot like what I feel, 'cept he can say it and I don't have the words to, so I'm borrowing his.
While googling for how dinosaurs fit into the bible and creation, I got this website, which, I'm sorry to say, reads like a load of
uh.
Back to dinosaurs,
"If dinosaurs evolved from amphibians, there should be, for example, fossil evidence of animals that are part dinosaur and part something else. However, there is no proof of this anywhere. In fact, if you go into any museum you will see fossils of dinosaurs that are 100% dinosaur, not something in between. There are no 25%, 50%, 75%, or even 99% dinosaurs—they are all 100% dinosaur!"
And therefore, dinosaurs did not evolve to be, they were created. Further on, they relate how dinosaurs did live alongside humans, and likely died out after the Flood - unable to cope with the post-flood world, having to compete with all the other pairs of animals etc (which reminds me, isn't everything then a huge inbreeding problem?)
"There are certainly hundreds of dinosaur names, but many of these were given to just a bit of bone or skeletons of the same dinosaur found in other countries. It is also reasonable to assume that different sizes, varieties, and sexes of the same kind of dinosaur have ended up with different names. For example, look at the many different varieties and sizes of dogs, but they are all the same kind-the dog kind! In reality, there may have been fewer than 50 kinds of dinosaurs. "
Can't dispute that, I guess.
"Many would have been covered with tons of mud as the rampaging water covered the land (Genesis 7:11-12,19). Because of this quick burial, many of the animals would have been preserved as fossils. If this happened, you would expect to find evidence of billions of dead things buried in rock layers (formed from this mud) all over the Earth. This is exactly what you do find."
...so ah, where's the giraffes and the elephants and whatnot?
Will continue after dinner.
I abandoned that article, it sounded like a mockery of Christianity, actually. I really don't know whether or not to take it seriously, i.e., whether or not to trust that the author sincerely believes what he is writing. Reading other articles reassures me somewhat that this is one (frankly ridiculous) article in a bunch of more convincing ones, so lah-dee-dah to that one.
There is another article, on the formation of the Grand Canyon - if the Earth is only about 6000 or so years old, the Canyon must have taken a relatively short time to for, and not the Millions Of Years scientists claim it did, yes? This one sounds far less fallacious and ridiculous, and brings up this example of the Burlingame Canyon, a "miniature Grand Canyon", 1 500 feet (450m) long, 120 feet (35m) deep and 120 feet wide. It was formed in a grand total of 6 days.
A counter-argument to this not-uncommon answer, found here, claims that the volume of the Grand Canyon is about 89 million times that of the Burlingame one, and so, "(just) because you can create a tiny canyon in six days doesn't prove anything, unless you can repeat it on the scale of the Grand Canyon. And, if the Grand Canyon eroded at the same rate as Burlingame, you would still need 1.5 million years for the Grand Canyon to form." The Grand Canyon does look like it could hold a damn lot more water than the Burlingame one, especially if you consider that if the Flood did happen, there'd be a hell lot more water flowing off the land into the sea/ wherever it went.
I have no clue about Grand Canyons, but I do think that the second website - Answers in Creation - has a point here:
" If you are a Christian, and you doubt the young age of the earth ... You can still believe in an inerrant Word of God, and there is nothing wrong with your salvation! ... the doctrine of salvation has nothing to do with the age of the earth. Does the Bible say, “Believe in a young earth, or be condemned to hell.”? No, it doesn’t. Does it say you can lose your salvation? No, it does not. ... your salvation is secure.
.. Adam was created on the sixth day, and these “days” were as God sees days, because only God was here…not man. ... it doesn’t matter how I interpret the word day; the question is, ‘what is a day to God’?
God is God of the universe, not just God of the earth. Day as a twenty-four hour period only applies if you are standing on planet earth. What is the meaning of day if you are in the middle of space? There is no day or night there, so why should we limit God to a limited twenty-four hour earth day?"
Now this I can understand.
anyway I really, really, really, should go pack.
