[

mood

|

amused

]

Ten Reasons Gay Marriage is Un-American

• Being gay is not natural. Real Americans always reject unnatural things like eyeglasses, polyester, and air conditioning.
• Gay marriage will encourage people to be gay, in the same way that hanging around tall people will make you tall.
• Legalizing gay marriage will open the door to all kinds of crazy behavior. People may even wish to marry their pets because a dog has legal standing and can sign a marriage contract.
• Straight marriage has been around a long time and hasn’t changed at all; women are still property, blacks still can’t marry whites, and divorce is still illegal.
• Straight marriage will be less meaningful if gay marriage were allowed; the sanctity of Britany Spears’ 55-hour just-for-fun marriage would be destroyed.
• Straight marriages are valid because they produce children. Gay couples, infertile couples, and old people shouldn’t be allowed to marry because our orphanages aren’t full yet, and the world needs more children.
• Obviously gay parents will raise gay children, since straight parents only raise straight children.
• Gay marriage is not supported by religion. In a theocracy like ours, the values of one religion are imposed on the entire country. That’s why we have only one religion in America.
• Children can never succeed without a male and a female role model at home. That’s why we as a society expressly forbid single parents to raise children.
• Gay marriage will change the foundation of society; we could never adapt to new social norms. Just like we haven’t adapted to cars, the service-sector economy, or longer life spans.

Jack

[	Tags	|	misc	]
[	mood	|	chipper	]

Recently at church the sermons have been family/parenting themed, and they handed out this prayer for parents to say. I found it touching and I've been meaning to post on it for a while. I hope this will stick in parents' minds and help them do a better job, even if they're already doing great. I hope that those who aren't religious will strip out that language and keep the essence of the message in their mind. So, for all of you who have parents, are parents, or will be parents someday, this one's for you:

Dear Lord,

Help me to understand my children, to listen patiently to what they have to say, and to answer all their questions kindly. Make me as courteous to them as I would have them be to me. Give me the courage to confess my sins against my children and to ask them for forgiveness when I know that I have done them wrong.

May I not hurt the feelings of my children. Forbid that I should laugh at their mistakes or resort to shame and ridicule as punishment. Let me not tempt a child to lie or steal.

Reduce, I pray, the meanness in me. May I cease to nag, and when I am out of sorts may I hold my tongue.

Blind me to the little errors of my children and help me to see the good things they do.

Help me to treat my children as those of their own age, but let me not exact of them the judgments and conventions of adults. Allow me not to rob them of the opportunity to wait on themselves, to think, to choose, and to make decisions.

Forbid that I should punish them for my selfish satisfaction. May I grant them their wishes that are reasonable and have the courage to withhold a privilege which I know will do them harm.

Make me so fair and just, so considerate and companionable to my children, that they will have a genuine esteem for me. Fit me to be loved and imitated by my children.

With all these gifts, O God, do give me calm and poise and self-control.
Amen.

Jack

[	Tags	|	event report, song interpretation	]
[	mood	|	awesome	]
[	music	|	Rise Against	]

I just got back from a Rise Against concert. They're a punk metal band that creates huge amounts of energy with their music, and then channels that energy towards social action and making the world a better place. They're a really metal-y for a punk band, but a bit too punk to be called a metal band, as far as their sound goes. As for their worldview, they are definitely punks in the best sense. I love them for their encouragement and motivation to do good in the world.

Here's a sample of their lyrics, kinda smushed together from several songs:

If we're the flagship of peace and prosperity,
We're taking on water and about to fuckin' sink!
No one seems to notice! No one even blinks!
The crew all left the passengers to die under the sea...

Countdown, to the very end.
Equality - an invitation that we won't extend.
Ready, aim - pull the trigger now!
Firmly secure your place in hell!

'GUILTY' is what our graves will read!
No years, no family, we did
NOTHING (nothing) to stop the murder of
a people just like us!

So please believe your eyes - a sacrifice is not what we had in our minds.
Today I offer all myself to this -
I'm living for my dying wish.
I give it all!
Now there's a reason -
there's a reason to give it all.

Blind to this impending fate,
we let the world carry our weight.
Its back breaks with every mile,
but we all live in denial!

Can we be saved? Has the damage all been done?
Is it too late to reverse what we've become?
Save us from what we have become tonight -
Eyes glazed with distrust, no sense of wrong or right!

The drones all slave away - they're working overtime.
They serve a faceless queen, they never question why.
Disciples of a God that neither lives nor breathes -
"But we have bills to pay, yeah we have mouths to feed!"

Life for you has been less than kind,
So take a number, stand in line.
We've all been sorry, we've all been hurt.
But how we survive is what makes us who we are.

I may write about individual songs later. I'd be happy to elaborate on my interpretation of them if you would like to hear. Just lemme know!

Jack

[	Tags	|	movie/book review, philosophy, theology	]
[	mood	|	chipper	]

I've recently finished an amazing philosophy book: Alvin Plantiga's God, Freedom, and Evil. It was incredible! Alvin Plantinga is a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame. He's heralded on the back of the book as "one of the top Christian philosophers in the world today" (which, it should be noted, is different from a "Christian theologian"). I really like his writing style - he's a captivating writer, he clearly states and numbers the propositions he's discussing, like physics or math textbooks do, and he uses the language of logic in a way that powerfully augments his arguments and explanations.

Plantinga has done a great job of keeping the scope of the book very very narrow, so that he can focus a lot of attention on the intricacies of the key arguments and not overwhelm the reader. The first half is devoted to discussing famous arguments of "Natural Atheology", which he describes as "the attempt to prove that God does not exist or at any rate it is unreasonable or irrational to believe that He does" (p.7). His focus is on the Problem of Evil, which is roughly the question: "Why does God permit evil?" The atheologist typically begins his argument like this:

If God is as benevolent as the Christian theists claim, He must be just as appalled as we are at this evil. But if He is also as powerful as they claim, then presumably He is in a position to do something about it. So why does He permit it? Why doesn't He arrange things so that these evils don't occur? That should have been easy enough for one as powerful as He. (p.9)

He makes it quite clear that he does not intend to offer a theodicy - a specification of God's exact reason for permitting evil - since "the fact that the theist doesn't know why God permits evil is, perhaps, and interesting fact about the theist, but by itself it shows little or nothing relevant to the rationality of belief in God" (p.10). Rather, he limits the scope of his arguments solely to refuting the claim that the following set of statements (set A) is inconsistent (contradictory):

1. God is omnipotent
2. God is wholly good
3. Evil exists

The idea is that there isn't an explicit contradiction in A, and no contradiction can be derived from A plus the rules of logic (an implicit contradiction), so one has to add some more (necessarily true) propositions to A to make it inconsistent. The two additional propositions that John Mackie suggests are (I'm following Plantinga's numbering here - he discusses a few propositions in between):

19. A good thing always eliminates evil as far as it can
20. There are no limits to what an omnipotent being can do

For the sake of discussion, Plantinga concedes that even an omnipotent being is limited by the laws of logic, a position I take myself to have refuted in a previous post. However, as he rightly points out, "the theist who thinks that the power of God isn't limited at all, not even by the laws of logic, will be unimpressed by Mackie's argument and won't find any difficulty in the contradiction set A is alleged to contain" (p.18). So, proposition 20 becomes:

20. There are no nonlogical limits to what an omnipotent being can do

It's a powerful tactic in arguments to concede some of an opponent's premises (or even a sub-conclusion or two) simply for the sake of argument, and then proceed to show that even so, they fail to establish the conclusion they're ultimately aiming at. In that way, we show that though we disagree about some premises or intermediate conclusions, it doesn't even matter if our opponent is correct about them, which saves lots of effort in argument trying to refute a claim that's not important anyway. Thus, we shall proceed as if we believed that God is indeed bound by logic, in hopes that we can show that even so, the natural atheologist's arguments fail to establish the intended conclusion.

After much discussion, Plantinga settles on a version of claim 19 that goes as follows:

19. An omnipotent and omniscient good being eliminates every evil that it can properly eliminate - that is, it eliminates every evil state of affairs such that in so doing it does not also eliminate an outweighing good or bring about a greater evil.

So now, all taken together, we have a new, slightly expanded set A:

1. God is omnipotent
2. God is wholly good
3. Evil exists
19. An omnipotent and omniscient good being eliminates every evil that it can properly eliminate - that is, it eliminates every evil state of affairs such that in so doing it does not also eliminate an outweighing good or bring about a greater evil.
20. There are no nonlogical limits to what an omnipotent being can do

Is this set inconsistent? The natural atheologist's aim is to show how claims 1, 2, 19, and 20 require that there is no evil - that is, that claim 3 is false. But those claims aren't sufficient to establish that there is no evil at all, just that "there is no evil that God can properly eliminate" (p.22). Another proposition must be added to A in order to make it inconsistent:

21. If God is omniscient and omnipotent, then he can properly eliminate every evil state of affairs

But is claim 21 necessarily true? In short: no. There are certain good states of affairs that "can't exist apart from evil of some sort. For example, there are people who display a sort of creative moral heroism in the face of suffering and adversity - a heroism that inspires others and creates a good situation out of a bad one. In a situation like this the evil, of course, remains evil; but the total state of affairs ... may be good" (p.23). The evil here would be one that God is not capable of properly eliminating - God could not eliminate the evil without also eliminating the outweighing good that comes along with it.

It seems like the natural atheologist has more work cut out for him than he realized:

Our discussion thus far shows at the very least that it is no easy matter to find necessarily true propositions that yield a formally contradictory set when added to set A. One wonders, therefore, why the many atheologians who confidently assert that this set is contradictory make no attempt whatever to show that it is. For the most part they are content just to assert that there is a contradiction here. Even Mackie, who sees that some "additional premises" or "quasi-logical rules" are needed, makes scarcely a beginning towards finding some additional premises that are necessarily true and that together with the members of set A formally entail an explicit contradiction. (p.23-4)

It may be tempting to take a deep breath and rest assured that all this discussion means that set A is indeed consistent. Unfortunately, that's not the case. All we have seen so far is that the somewhat naive first attempts of natural atheology have failed to establish their intended conclusion - they haven't found any necessarily true propositions that they can add to set A that lead to a contradiction. However, we haven't shown that they will never find such propositions - that is, we haven't shown that set A is consistent, just that the natural atheologists have failed to show it to be inconsistent so far.

It's also important to understand that even if we are able to prove that set A is indeed logically consistent, we have not given a proof for God's existence - we have only secured this set of properties against these arguments, but there may be other arguments and other sets of properties that lead to a logical contradiction in asserting that God exists. Still less will have given a proof that the omnipotent being has the properties and personality traits (all Good, all loving, etc.) that we Christians commonly ascribe to God. We must be mindful of the scope of our arguments so that we stay humble and avoid hubris.

Showing set A to be consistent is the objective of the rest of the first half of God, Freedom, and Evil, the discussion of which will have to be deferred to a later date.

Thanks for reading!

Jack

[	mood	|	curious	]
[	music	|	Red Hot Chili Peppers - 21st Century	]

So I found this new "experimental" flavor of Doritos at the store the other day, and they have a contest to figure out a name for the new flavor. I decided to give it a try, and the name came to me within 2 chips: McDonald's Double Cheeseburger! These chips taste exactly like McDonald's in bag! Including the low-quality onions, pickles, mustard, and cheese! All it's missing is the grease!

So here's the challenge:

1. Get yourself a bag of Doritos X-13D chips.
2. Go to McDonald's.
3. Sit down with the chips and a double cheeseburger, eat them side by side, and try to figure out the difference in taste. (Of course, the textures will be different - crunchy chips vs. greasy... uh... greaseplop.)

And that's it. Oh - and please let me know if you find any. I'd also be interested to hear what you think the X-13D tastes like.

Jack

*Not endorsed by Doritos in any way.

[	Tags	|	event report	]
[	mood	|	chipper	]

So, I guess I'll follow Ben Pu's example and write a little about life at the company I'm interning for this summer. Of course, I've got to be careful not to violate my NDA (Non-Disclosure Agreement), so I won't go into very much detail about the technical inner-workings of Amazon.com. I'll mainly stick to the sort of high-level stuff. I've also followed his example of googling stuff before talking about it, though I don't post as many links.

Perks & Such

Amazon gives a lot of perks to its employees. Part of the intern package is (pretty much) free relocation - plane tickets both ways, taxi rides to and from the airport both ways (so, 4 total), meals while traveling, up to $200 of shipping stuff each way, and either heavily subsidized corporate housing or a huge stipend for rent (on top of the rather generous salary). We get a free King County bus pass, which is really valuable because the bus system here is one of the best in the country - I honestly don't need a car in this town. And of course, there's the employee discount and the company store ;).

Office Awesomeness

I work at the Pac Med office in Seattle. It's the only building that Amazon doesn't share with other companies. Our other buildings are around downtown Seattle, and there's a shuttle service between them that runs quite frequently. The idea of getting an Amazon campus isn't popularly supported due to the consequences it entails. Employees at Pac Med are allowed to bring their dogs to work, and it's commonplace to see them walking around the office. There's a Sodexho cafeteria built in, which is pretty good for cafeteria food. It's also just a shuttle-ride away from the International District (as in, the Asian District) or the TCC with its amazing food court. Finally, I don't work in a cubicle, but instead I have a door desk in an open area with 6 other people around. What's a door desk? Greg Linden has this to say: "Buy a wooden door, preferably a hollow core wooden door with no holes predrilled. Saw a couple 4" x 4" x 6' pillars in half. Bolt them to the door with a couple of scary looking angle brackets. Put it in front of a programmer. Door desk." My door desk is awesome.

Business Model Stuff

Our CEO, Jeff Bezos, came up with the idea of the "Two Pizza Team". If you can't feed a team with two pizzas, it's too large. Large teams lead to lots of communication overhead, which severely limits productivity. Teams at Amazon are given a lot of autonomy. Also, it's a very informal atmosphere, so I could walk into anyone's office and ask a question or just say hi. I really like it.

Miscellany

Amazon also has lots of great community stuff going on. There are a bunch of email lists for people to join, ranging from tech help to your team's list to "RealPolitik" or the craiglist-like "for-sale". There are also several affinity groups, like GLAmazon (Gays & Lesbians at Amazon). There's also a group for blacks and one for women.

Anyway, that's enough for now. I've gotta go to sleep - work comes early tomorrow! ;)

Jack

[	Tags	|	event report	]
[	mood	|	chipper	]
[	music	|	Ozzy Osbourne - The Almighty Dollar	]

So I've been back in Seattle for 2 weeks. It's been an exciting time, with many adventures to tell tales of. But where to begin? Hmm... Ah! I know!

When me and my roommate moved in, we realized that we'd vastly underestimated how unfurnished an "unfurnished" apartment really was. All we had was the standard household machines - fridge, microwave, oven, dishwasher, washing machine, and dryer. No furniture of any kind - no couches, no tables, no chairs, and NO BEDS. We didn't even have shower curtains! So, we went right to work finding furniture solutions, and we decided to rent from a place a few blocks from our house. We had to sleep on the floor until the furniture finally came, which turned out to be an entire week! I used to complain about making my bed, but boy does it feel good to have a bed to make!

Now we're almost civilized! We've got food, plates to eat it on, tables to put the plates on, chairs to sit in, beds to sleep in... man, we've got it all! We even found a free TV on craigslist! It's been a pretty wild ride getting all settled without the corporate housing option...

We bought one of the most amazing contraptions ever to put in our house. Notice who uploaded those photos ;). That's also the feature that I'm working on at work: the Customer Image Uploads stuffs. Go ahead and mouseover the pictures and see all the beautiful JavaScripty goodness! :D

I just submitted my very first feature today. I even got it past the code review stage! Hopefully it'll go into production soon enough (that's SDE talk for "I hope users will be able to see it on the website soon enough"). It's pretty exciting to have something cool like that done in the first 2 weeks of work! That being said, please feel free to make suggestions to me about how to improve the Customer Image Uploads feature, or any other part of the Amazon.com site, for that matter. If I can't fix it myself (which will likely be the case, given that I have an assignment to do and deadlines to do it by), I can at least find out who to route it to and get it taken care of (eventually).

Aside from all that, we've been enjoying ourselves here in the city. The weather's been spectacular - sunny, low 70's to high 80's with negligible humidity. We've been visiting all our favorite restaurants, like "Mexico", "The Old Spaghetti Factory", and "Roti", as well as finding some new ones, like "Phuket" (pronounced however you like ;)). I saw Pirates 3 in a really awesome theater - bigger than the Statler Auditorium, for you Cornellians. It's awesome, btw - much better than the 2nd one. Other than that, just hanging out and stuff.

Alright, I've run out of quick-overview type stuff to talk about. Feel free to comment/IM/email/call me if you wanna chat about something in more detail. I'll be posting more soon!

Jack

[	Tags	|	event report	]
[	mood	|	discontent	]

I'm back in Seattle! YES!

It was kind of a rough first night though. I got in last night at 10pm local time, which would be 1am EST. Of course, the apartment office isn't going to be open at 10pm, which I realized during my layover in Philadelphia. I was going to have to find a hotel to stay at. My apartment office person gave me a number to call of a Travelodge about 2 blocks away. I called them, but they were full. They gave me the number to one of their locations "near the airport". I put that in quotes because that's what they said, but as it turns out, they were completely wrong. I called the number they gave me for that location, booked a room, and relaxed because I had just averted a disaster. Or so I thought.

<RANT>

When I got into the airport and waited around for forever for the Travelodge shuttle to get there, it took me to the nearest Travelodge. To my dismay, the guy at the front desk told me that he didn't have a reservation for me. Not only that, but then he said that there weren't any rooms available there. That's when I got pissed. My body thought that it was about 2am (by then), I made and paid for a reservation so that I could sleep somewhere once I got to my new city, and now I find out that I was misled by representatives of the company that was supposed be about hospitality. I called the number of the place where I did make a reservation, and they told me they were actually in Tacoma, a city that's all the way across Seattle from where I was. They said I should get a taxi from the Travelodge I was at, and pay $50 to get to the Travelodge over there. I told them that that was ridiculous, and asked if they would pay for my taxi trip, since I was given faulty information by a member of their company. When they refused, I told them to cancel my reservation, since there were plenty of hotels right near the airport that I could stay at. They told me that they can't cancel the reservation without 24 hours notice (which would have been impossible in my case, since I made the reservation about 8-9 hours before). I would either have to rent 2 rooms that night, or pay for a taxi ride that would be just about as expensive as renting a room... This is bullshit.

The guy at the front desk let me rent a room anyway, even though he said they were full up. He said that about 15 or so of the people with reservations hadn't shown up yet (by about midnight), and he expected there to be at least 1 that wouldn't show up at all. I was grateful. I thanked him, took my stuff up to my room, and promptly went to sleep. I paid for 2 rooms last night because the person answering the phone when I called had no idea what they were talking about. What a pain in the ass.

As soon as the week gets started, I'm going to try to convince my credit card company to put a stop payment on the charge for the unused room. They don't deserve my money. Fuck them.

</RANT>

On a lighter note, I'm now moved into my new apartment! It's a beautiful day! I'm starting work on Monday! Woohoo! :D

Jack

[	Tags	|	philosophy, theology	]
[	mood	|	pensive	]
[	music	|	A Perfect Circle - Weak and Powerless	]

As my class in Kant took its course through the "Ideal of Pure Reason", the third and final chapter of the second book of the Transcendental Dialectic in Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, I was once again catapulted into the subspace of Metaphysics concerning God. This is by far one of the most interesting parts of philosophy, in my humble opinion. During the class discussion it was brought to my attention that most of the philosophically-trained population regards the realm of metaphysical possibility to be properly contained in the realm of logical possibility. That's philosophese for "God can't do anything that's not logically possible".

The realm of metaphysical possibility is generally regarded as those effects that an omnipotent being could cause. The realm of logical possibility contains every effect that does not imply a logical contradiction (A and not A). For example, it would be logically impossible for an apple to be red-all-over and green-all-over at the same time, because obviously if an apple that was red-all-over had even the slightest bit of green on it, it would fail to be red-all-over, which would contradict our assumption. Of course, properly contained within these is the realm of physical possibility (what we can do in the external world), and within that the realms of economic possibility (what we can afford), legal possibility (what the law allows), political possibility, moral possibility, etc etc. These lesser realms are all overlapping each other, at it would seem that none properly contains any other. Of course, you can come up with realms of possibility and reason about how they fit in with the others as much as you like, but I shall leave that as an exercise for the reader.

So anyway, during the class discussion, my professor and I agreed that the proposition that "the realm of metaphysical possibility is properly contained within the realm of logical possibility" is, in short, total crap. But before we get into exactly why that is, let us review some basic properties of arguments (a.k.a. "proofs", for the loose-of-tongue).

The basic components of an argument are the premises, a logical progression, and a conclusion. All arguments aim to "prove" that the conclusion is true by following a logical progression from the premises. An argument is said to be "valid" if all the steps in the logical progression are correct - that is, if they do not contain any invalid moves, called "fallacies". This is analogous to the steps of algebraic manipulation, how each algebraic step follows from the previous one by some theorem or another. An argument is said to be "sound" if it is valid AND all of its premises are true. One can show that the argument fails to establish its conclusion by finding a logical fallacy or by showing one or more premises to be false. It's important to note that this is quite far from showing that the conclusion is false, and instead only shows that the argument presented is insufficient to prove that it is true. Asserting that a conclusion is false is a much stronger claim, which requires showing its negation to be true - another whole argument with its own premises and logical progression.

There are many logical fallacies out there that everyone commits from time to time, often without realizing it until someone else points it out. The fallacy we're going to concern ourselves with here is that of "Begging the Question". The fallacy of Begging the Question is one in which the argument uses the conclusion itself as a premise that is then used to establish the conclusion. This is often considered to be a form of circular reasoning. In it's simplest formulation, an argument that begs the question takes the form "Assume p. Aha! Therefore, p!" In a strict sense of "valid", this argument is completely valid - there is nothing wrong with the logic here. After all, given p we definitely have p, right? However, it makes no progress to establishing p on its own, and requires some outside argument to save it. If no outside argument exists that could save it, we're stuck not knowing the truth-value of the conclusion. For a powerful example of Begging the Question with profound consequences, please see David Hume's Problem of Induction.

So what does all this have to do with the limits of omnipotence? Recall the original claim: "the realm of metaphysical possibility is properly contained within the realm of logical possibility", or, equivalently: "an omnipotent being (God) can't do anything that's not logically possible". The question that's just begging to be asked is really quite simple: "Why is the power of God bound by logic?" Take a moment to ponder that question. After long enough you'll come to realize that any argument aiming to establish that logic limits the power of God - any argument at all - must use logic. A core component of every argument is reasoning governed by rules for rational thought (precisely what logic is). Without logic, there is no argument - there is no reasoning. Thus any argument to establish that God is bound by logic must assume that God is bound by logic in order to use logic to show that God is bound by logic. Sound familiar? You guessed it: that's a pretty serious case of begging the question. In fact, unless some premise of mine is unsound or I've committed some logical fallacy, we've just established that there is no possible argument capable of showing God's power to be bound by logic. We simply do not have the intellectual capacity to put limits on God's power. For all we can tell, it is well within God's power to create a boulder heavier than God can lift and then proceed to lift it, or to microwave a burrito hotter than God can eat and then proceed to eat it. It may never make sense to us, but it doesn't seem like there's any way around it. It would appear that, just as anything outside of space or outside of time is beyond the realm of our possible experience, anything outside of the realm of logical possibility is beyond our possible understanding.

Thanks Kant!

Jack

[	Tags	|	current events, politics, theology	]
[	mood	|	pensive	]

This Sunday my chaplain, most likely along with every other chaplain in the nation, gave a sermon regarding the Virginia Tech Tragedy. I found it moving and profound, so I wanted to share some of it with you. What follows is an excerpt from the sermon:

As the whole nation responded this week to the terrible tragedy at Virginia Tech, I had a curious experience of déjà vu. I listened and read and watched and waited for the voices to rise up, angry voices with their authoritative pronouncements. A desperately unhappy and paranoid and angry young man had shot 32 people to death, and then himself — and the whole country clamored to know, "Whose Fault Was It?" And everyone gave the same answer — "It’s YOUR fault."

Here, in no particular order, are some places where Americans assessed blame this week.

Some said, "Campus security, you failed—it’s your fault."

Some said, "It’s those lax Virginia gun laws—NRA, it’s your fault, and you too, spineless congress—it’s your fault."

Some said, "This is the result of sin. The young man who did this allowed sin to overtake him. Young man and Satan, it’s your fault."

Some said, "No, it must be his parents; they must have raised him wrong, damaged him or abused him, or spoiled him, or pampered him: family, it’s your fault."

"No, actually," others said, "it’s the legal system: judge who didn’t keep him locked in the mental institution, it’s your fault."

Some said, "It’s this liberal, weak-sister educational system that never teaches students anything useful, like self-defense—academia, it’s your fault."

Others said, "What about bravery? What about personal responsibility? Victims, it’s your fault."

And some even said, "God is punishing America for its complete sinfulness and depravity. America, it’s your fault, and God, it’s your fault — but of course, you are God, so you must be right."

Everyone who commented gave essentially the same answer — it’s your fault, not mine. It’s their fault, not ours. Sometimes I think our response to a horrible event such as this has the effect of a Rorschach inkblot test: how we respond has more to do with our personality characteristics and emotional functioning than anything verifiable or external to ourselves. In many ways people responded absolutely predictably, with the left blaming institutions and laws and the right leaning on personal responsibility.

I think we want to know whose fault this is. As a nation, and as individuals, we crave clear-cut answers at times of crisis, answers that will tell us what to do next. We want to take action in response to tragedy and horror — we want to do something, and we want to do it now. Some of the actions people take are spontaneously beautiful and heartfelt. Silent candlelit vigils come to mind. And some of the actions people take are heartbreaking — like students of Asian descent fleeing Virginia Tech’s campus for fear of retribution. And some of the actions people take are sick and horrifying, as in the case of the death threats that have already been made against the university president and the shooter’s family. We want to know whose fault it is so that we can do something — anything — in response.

But the question of fault, at this moment in time, leads us down a primrose path; we think we’re going somewhere, but we’re really being led astray. There will be a time for assigning responsibility, and hopefully that will be done carefully, and by people who have the appropriate expertise, and without some political agenda attached. But we can’t and we probably shouldn’t try to answer that question because, right now is not the time for that question. Right now is the time to cry.

Jack

[	Tags	|	event report	]
[	Current Location	|	Duffield Atrium	]
[	mood	|	chipper	]

It would appear that I have dropped off the face of the earth. However, that is simply not the case. For those of you who were wondering what's going on, I have but 2 words for you: the usual.

As with every other semester, this one hit hard and fast. I was working on the PCM website hardcore over break, and it was hard to slow down working on that and start working on schoolwork for the first week or two of the semester. This set up a vicious cycle of not just not getting my work done until the last minute, but not being able to start my work until the last minute because of working on other work due just before. I also pledged a campus fraternity this semester (Seal & Serpent, a fraternity unique to Cornell), and that took up even more of my time. As a result, no time for blogging, though there's been no shortage of ideas (I'm taking a class in Kant this semester, and sitting in on a class in Consequentialism).

This past weekend was Initiation Weekend at the frat, the end of Hell Week, which thus concluded the pledging experience and transformed us pledges into NIBs (Newly Initiated Brothers). The Reign of Terror is over, and now we can all have our lives back (to a degree). In addition, I've decided to drop a class. Macroeconomics was taking up too much of my time. Or rather, it was a different way of thinking that's a little difficult to get into from a CS/philosophy background, and while I could do it if I had the time to devote to it, I just don't. It's interesting stuff, but not worth the trouble for me right now. Because I'm dropping this late in the semester, I'll have a W on my transcript, but it's in a class that has nothing to do with my major, it's just an elective, and I already have all my electives taken care of. According to my advisor, no one who matters is going to care about that.

So anyway, I hope I'll have a lot more free time on my hands for the rest of this semester. For a glimpse into what I've got on my schedule so far for next semester, click here. That's right, I'm taking a class about wines, which involves tasting it. :)

Until I blog again.

Jack

[

mood

|

chipper

]

Well dang! It's been a whole week and I haven't posted the next installment of my New Orleans experience yet! That just goes to show you how much effort I've been putting into this website - I wake up, code, eat at some point, code, shower at some point, code, should go to sleep but don't, code, and finally crash. This week's gonna be different, though, because people are finally starting to come back to campus. Also, I'm going to pledge with Seal & Serpent this semester, and it's rush week, so I've got fun to have. Well anyway, on to the story!

In this issue you will find:

• Shades of Praise
• Natural Disaster Stories
• Bus Tour
• Second Line
• Real Cajun Food
• Gender & Sexuality Caucus

Enjoy!

Day 2 - "See-Experience": Friday, 12/29/2006

On the second day we had a multiracial singing group called the Shades of Praise. They would sing a song for us, many of them praise songs (unsurprisingly), and then one of them would tell us the story of their experiences before, during, and/or after Katrina, and then they'd sing another song. They were really great, and they had the whole crowd moving and clapping along. Their stories were moving and, at times, heartwrenching. One of the guys told us about how his wife kicked him out of their temporary house because of "Katrina stress", but that they'd gotten back together again eventually.

Then there was denominational time where everyone split up and went into their respective areas. I went with the Methodists. There were local ministers from various parts of the area who told us some stories about their experiences. One of them from Tulane explained that none of his students were here because they live this every single day - they take any chance they get to get away from the area for a break from it all. Our activity for the day was to sit around in groups and discuss our experiences of Katrina, what we felt when we heard the news, what we did about it, etc etc. There was a group there from MGCCC who had a lot to say about the event. The guy in my group told us that the Mississippi Gulf Coast was hit really hard by Katrina also, but that it didn't get any (or, at any rate, very little) media coverage, so they didn't have nearly the influx of money and volunteers that New Orleans had. He complained that "all you hear is New Orleans this, New Orleans that. What about us!? We got hit too!" It was really moving to hear stories from kids my age about what they've been through because of Katrina and other natural disasters.

After lunch we went on a bus tour through the previously flooded areas. We saw places like the 9th Ward (upper and lower), the Industrial Canal Breach, and all kinds of stuff. The devastation was incredible. There were still houses sitting there cracked in half, cars upside down, cars rammed into the corners of houses and the houses leaning down on them, etc. There were other plots of land where the houses were removed and just the foundation was left. We got to see where the breaches occured, where they were rebuilding the levies and (hopefully) building them right this time. Our tour guide, one of the members of the Shades of Praise, didn't have a very high opinion of the Army Corps of Engineers, since the levies were 13ft high but broke when the water was at only 12ft. He also told us about a website where we could go to find out all kinds of information about New Orleans in general and Katrina in particular, including a map of the rebuilding progress and a map showing the time-elapsed flood progression. We also got to see a novel new residential area being built by Habitat for Humanity called the Musicians' Village for musicians who've lot their homes in the flood. The deal is something along the lines of musicians play for some 300 hours of community service-type things, then they get a claim on one of the Habitat homes, they go and help build it, and they get to live in it. Brilliant idea!

After dinner we participated in a New Orleans tradition called a Second Line. "Second lining" originated from the New Orleans "Jazz Funeral" where the funeral procession would include a jazz marching band followed by the "first line" of the deceased's family and friends, and then random onlookers attracted to the music would join the procession and dance around after them, forming the "second line" or "second lining". So, we followed a jazz marching band through the streets to Jackson Square, a block in the French Quarter. It was a neat experience to march through the streets and have people crowding around to see what was going on, and have some even join us!

Me and Caroline split off a bit early to go meet up with some of the friends she made and have dinner at a famous Cajun restaurant called Mulate's. I've always loved Cajun spices ever since I had them in a silver turtle on a Boy Scout campout a long long time ago. I've had blackened fish at various places, and loved it most of the time. Now was my opportunity to have the original Cajun experience. The real thing! And boy, was it worth it. The food was absolutely amazing, and the music was even better. Like most places I'd seen on Bourbon Street, this place had live music for its diners to enjoy. Wooooo! :D

Finally, there were a couple of topic-based smaller group meetings (they called them "caucuses") back at the hotel. I went to the one on Gender and Sexuality. Basically the message I got was that the gay communities on some college campuses discriminate against Christians just as much as the less tolerant Christians discriminate against gays. The way to fix that and bridge the gap so that people don't have to choose between being a Christian and being gay is to genuinely reach out to the gay communities and form relationships with them. Progressive "gay-friendly" Christian student groups should go to GSA meetings as straight allies, not just in word, but in deed. And if that can happen, and genuine friendships can form without ulterior motives like trying to convert people or make them renounce their sexual identity, tensions between gays and Christians will be relieved and it won't be such a rare occurance for a Christian to come out as a homosexual in their church group, or a homosexual to come out as a Christian in their GSA or other LGBT organizations. It would certainly dash some destructive stereotypes about Christians (like that they're all Bible-thumping self-righteous hypocrits who may say they accept you for who you are but all they want to do is change you) and homosexuals (like that they all practice what some people who don't know what they're talking about refer to as the "gay lifestyle", as if there were such a thing). It would definitely be a step in the right direction.

Jack

[	Tags	|	event report	]
[	mood	|	bouncy	]

I did say I was going to be "divulging my experiences" during my trip to New Orleans, didn't I? Well... ok. I'll try to keep it short and in summary form, but you'll have to understand that there's just so much to talk about! As for what's been keeping me busy, I'm working on re-redesigning the PCM Website to make it the awesomeness. You can be sure that I'll let you know when it's ready for launch ;). I've been working on that a whole lot - I coded for 24 hours straight on... what would be most simply described as "yesterday". I've also been going into work and learning Perl, which actually isn't all that bad as long as you have the proper equipment. Anyway, I digress. Storytime!

I'll be releasing a short series of entries about the trip because there's way too much to talk about to fit it all in one reasonably-lengthed LJ post. In this issue, you will find:

• Traveling to New Orleans
• The Riverside Hilton
• The New Orleans Jazz Orchestra
• And Adventures in the French Quarter!

Enjoy, and check back in a bit to see if the next installment of the tale of my trip to New Orleans has been released yet! :D

Day 1 - "Celebrate": Thursday, 12/28/2006

This day started at 4:30am. I was on the road heading for the airport by 5:30, at Dulles by 6:15, through security by 6:45, on a plane by 8:30, in the air by 9:00, and on the ground in New Orleans by 11:30am (EST). Whew! I'd already had a day by the time my day usually starts! On the trip from the airport to the hotel, I noticed that New Orleans looks a lot like Southern or rural Northern VA (relatively small buildings, lots of roads, and lots of nature), except that there's palm trees and other exotic flora. A lot of the buildings were run-down and looked abandoned. We passed through neighborhoods where it was just like in Amy's pictures - lots of houses were broken, there were piles of trash out in the streets, the buildings were completely empty (except for mold and mildew), and there was a general aura of dilapidation. It was sad.

The hotel was a stark contrast - the Riverside Hilton is the biggest, most extravagant hotel I've ever seen (though admittedly I haven't seen very many hotels). It was composed of multiple buildings and the insides just exuded luxury everywhere you went. It was almost sickening. I spent a few hours in the hotel relaxing and napping. Thing's didn't get going until dinnertime. We all packed into this huge room for a nice New Orleans-style meal and some opening words from our organizers. After that we moved across the hall into the main conference area, the place we would be returning to several times a day throughout the trip. There we were serenaded by the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra and the brilliant compositions of Irvin Mayfield. It was truly amazing how he could tell us such moving stories without having to say a word. Incredible.

After that, me and Caroline decided to go try to find the French Quarter and see what there was to see. We wandered out of the hotel and kinda walked in the general direction that I remembered from glancing at the map earlier. It was good to be back in a city again. It reminded me a lot of Seattle, except the streets were really dark and practically empty, like the place was a ghost town. We finally found it, and managed to buy some mojitos from a liquor store around the corner, along with a souvenir shot glass :).

The first thing we met when walking down Bourbon Street was a con artist. She said things like "I bet I can tell you where you got those shoes - the city and even the store" to get our attention, then started shining my shoes (vans don't really shine... but she did manage to clean the white rubber part of them), verbally noticing details about them, saying "you'd better clip the wings off of her, she's an angel!" (she thought me and Caroline were dating), etc etc. She ended by saying that where I bought the shoes doesn't matter, but where I got them was right here on Bourbon street in New Orleans. Then she said something about "that's 10 for the shine and 10 for the line, and if you need change I got change", as if I owed her money or something. You see, I'm used to the business model where you have to ask for a product or service, you get it, and then you pay for it, instead of the model where people just do services for you spontaneously and then demand the money you "owe them". But anyway, I felt that I ought to give her something for cleaning my shoes, and I wasn't sure what sort of contingency she had in store for people who didn't pay - at best she's a con artist, at worst an extortionist with a gang to back her up. I couldn't understand exactly what she was saying, so I gave her $10, but then she started getting more animated "I said 10 for the shine and 10 for the line! that's 20! 20 for the shine and 20 for the line! $40!" I wasn't gonna give her $40 for something I didn't even ask for. I gave her another $10 and put my wallet away, but she was still insistent. Caroline stepped in and handed her $20 to satisfy her, which prompted another "you clip the wings off of this one - she's an angel! you hear me?" We finally parted ways, and Caroline said "well, it's all part of the experience. I just hope that money will be used for something good, and not... drugs or something."

We continued on down Bourbon Street just taking in the sights. The road was blocked off so no cars could go, and people were all over the street. There was at least one bar, food place, live music place (with music pouring into the street), or combination of the three on every block, along with a "Mango Mango" drink place and a strip club or sex shop. There was also the occasional hole-in-the-wall beer closet where it was literally just a door, enough room for maybe 3 people to stand, a counter, and a guy behind there with a few kegs of beer - you give him a dollar or two and you get a beer, and they only have one kind (though each of them had a different kind), and they don't ID. Some of the bars had multiple floors, and some of those had balconies where people would stand and toss necklaces of beads down on the street - you just look at them, hold up your hand, and they toss one at you. There was also an exception to the open container law on Bourbon street, so people were walking around with drinks in there hands outside. It was a really interesting place.

Jack

[	Tags	|	event report	]
[	mood	|	tired	]

That's right! I'm back in Ithaca already. I flew up here from New Orleans so as to avoid the complications of having to find a ride back here. Also, I've got work to do. "What?! Work?! It's winter break!" True, true, young padawan. But I've a website to (re)build! :D And... I really gotta earn some cash at ACCEL while I have the chance.

And yes, I know you're all dying to hear the tales of my trip to New Orleans (and to think, I was just there earlier today!!!). Do not worry, I shall be divulging my experiences bit by bit over the coming days.

But for now, it is time for me to rest. My pillow is calling to me. I cannot resist its song any longer, that persuasive Siren of Sleepatronics. Goodnight!

Jack

[	Tags	|	event report	]
[	mood	|	excited	]

Well, I'm off to New Orleans for this "Christian leadership experience like no other" called Celebrate! At the River. My plane leaves tomorrow at 8:30am. Afterwards I'm headed straight back up to Ithaca for 3 weeks of relaxing, web programming, and earning some cash. Woohoo! :D

Feel free to gimme a call on my cell phone (703.209.6086). I'll call you back as soon as I can if I can't talk at the moment. I'm sure I'll write a post about my experiences, perhaps each day as they're happening, perhaps at the end of the whole thing, I dunno. We'll see how it goes.

And with that, I'm off! Have a Happy New Year everybody, if I don't see/talk to you until after!

Jack

[	Tags	|	current events, politics, quote, theology	]
[	mood	|	chipper	]

I just read a really interesting blurb about the "war on Christmas" from Jim Wallis' God's Politics blog. I didn't really see this going on very much this year, and I recall being wished a Merry Christmas pretty much wherever I went, but I thought I'd share this anyway. It pretty much sums up what I think about this (ridiculous) conflict, so I'll just post some bits & pieces here (links preserved from the original text):

In the days before this Christmas Day, the so-called "Christmas wars" were again in full swing. ... It is actually all very humorous – the battle has long been lost, but to the forces of capitalist consumerism, not secular humanism. ... Richard Dawkins, author of the bestselling book, The God Delusion, was recently quoted in a New York Times piece titled, An Atheist Can Believe in Christmas. He said, "So divorced has Christmas become from religion that I find no necessity to bother with euphemisms such as happy holiday season. In the same way as many of my friends call themselves Jewish atheists, I acknowledge that I come from Christian cultural roots. I am a post-Christian atheist. So, understanding full well that the phrase retains zero religious significance, I unhesitatingly wish everyone a Merry Christmas."

It seems pretty obvious that what Christmas has become in modern consumerist temples (shopping malls) is not the same Christmas that Christians celebrate. What store clerks say to customers isn't influenced by the evil, plotting, scheming secularists nearly as much as it is by simple market forces (if it's influenced by secularists at all). Let's be reasonable here - why would a store insist on driving away customers who's money is just as valuable just so they can belligerently stick to their "principles"? If a customer is offended by a store clerk cursing at them, the company would reprimand the clerk. If a customer is offended by a store clerk saying "Merry Christmas" when the customer's Muslim or Jewish or anything else, the company would reprimand the clerk. It's not how the clerk offends the customer, but that the clerk offends the customer that really matters. Customers must buy things for the store to make any revenue, and it's generally hard for a customer to buy anything from you if you've made an effort to drive them away, never to return.

But besides market forces, this entire conflict is un-Christ-like. We're not going to convince anyone to put their faith in Jesus Christ by insisting that everyone says "Merry Christmas". We are going to drive people away from Christ by making Him look petty, unreasonable, and downright mean by the way we have been carrying on this debate. Instead of fighting to force our own terminology on the (to a degree) free market, we really need to be spending our energy doing things that matter. There are plenty of impoverished families out there that won't be (well, didn't) have a Christmas like we had, that couldn't afford groceries, much less presents, and whose lives aren't going to be made any better if someone wishes them a "Merry Christmas" instead of a "Happy Holiday".

But anyway, like I said, I didn't notice such a big stink being made over this issue this year, so I don't think this is really all that big of a deal anymore (at least, I hope). I just figured I'd share what was on my mind.

Merry Christmas! :D

Jack

[	Tags	|	quote, theology	]
[	mood	|	good	]

Here's something that the Sojomail Verse and Voice on 11.30.2006 brought me - some OT evidence against blindly following the eye-for-an-eye mentality. Not just OT evidence, but Pentateuch evidence! Of course, Jesus explicitly strikes that doctrine down, but some reason so many Christians and "Christians" still think that way, and I find that rather disturbing. Anyway, without further ado:

When you come upon your enemy's ox or donkey going astray, you shall bring it back. When you see the donkey of one who hates you lying under its burden and you would hold back from setting it free, you must help to set it free.

- Exodus 23:4-5

Yes, yes... dangerous liberal thinking, I know. Try to bear with me. It does seem like God wants us to be civil to our enemies as we would be to our friends. But hey, maybe it's just because the objects in question are animals...

Anyway, just found that interesting and figured I'd share. Any thoughts?

Jack

[

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It would appear indeed that America does face spiritual challenges unique to the American condition:

American preachers have a task more difficult, perhaps, than those faced by us under South Africa's apartheid, or Christians under Communism. We had obvious evils to engage; you have to unwrap your culture from years of red, white and blue myth. You have to expose, and confront, the great disconnect between the kindness, compassion and caring of most American people, and the ruthless way American power is experienced, directly and indirectly, by the poor of the earth. You have to help good people see how they have let their institutions do their sinning for them. This is not easy among people who really believe that their country does nothing but good, but it is necessary, not only for their future, but for us all.

- Peter Storey, former president of the Methodist Church of South Africa, as quoted in the 10.18.2006 Sojomail Verse and Voice.

We've got quite a ways to go before people finally do start waking up. There are too many people who are good at heart that just refuse to acknowledge the evil they support. I hear far too often: "well, wouldn't it just be easier if...?" or "doesn't Big Brother keep us safe?" or "we're not supposed to be a doormat!" or any of a number of other fallacies and straw-man arguments they've accepted so that they don't have to confront reality.

Doing what is right and rejecting what is evil is by no means easy or free of serious sacrifice, but it is the right thing to do nonetheless. In fact, God requires no less of us. It's far too easy to forget that we are Christians (or, for more emphasis on the important part, Christ-followers) first and Americans second. And so it's also often forgotten that our "rights" as Americans don't supercede our responsibilities as Christians. When this crucial tenet of faith is neglected, good natured brothers and sisters in Christ make ridiculous political and economic claims (as I do on occasion) while completely ignoring the spiritual implications of what they're saying. It saddens me.

We all need to do better.

Jack

[	Current Location	|	CSUG Lab	]
[	mood	|	exhausted	]

I'm taking a class called CS 330: um.. something having to do with data-driven web applications (my professor mistakenly labels things "web-driven web applications" :P). I just finished with my latest assignment. It was pretty cool, but really intense. I've been working on it for the last 3 or 4 days straight, which includes cutting out on sleep and skipping classes that I don't feel like going to.

The project is about this kinda lame mathematicians' game about proving subgraphs isomorphic (:P), but that's not what matters. The cool part is all the infrastructure required to support multiple users in the system, games being played, records being kept about the games in progress, who's won the finished games, etc. Anyway, I've been working hard on this project - harder than I have to because I think it's really fun (I spend a lot of time on CSS to make it look pretty, and security concerns that the project doesn't require).

I decided to check out how much code I've written for it so far, so I reached for my cygwin (or rather, the CSUG lab's cygwin), and commanded it thusly (from the root of my project directory):

$ cat $(find . -name "*.java" | grep -v "MyGraphUtil") | wc -l
    3002

That's how many lines of code I've written. I wrote all the Java files in my directory except MyGraphUtil.java (which is why it's taken out of the count). Yep, 3002 lines.

I think it's time for bed.

Jack