Prohibititions

1. No blogging until after graduation. (Date: November 22nd)
2. No Instant Messaging until after the bulk of work required for graduation is completed. (Date: September 20th)
3. No over-doing Instant Messaging until after the last of the exams. (Date: October 22nd)
4. Don't read every blog post that comes into the Google Reader...just the ones that are important to read.
5. Watch Daddy's videos on YouTube and school-related YouTube videos. Don't waste time on other videos, however interesting.
6. Don't feel sorry for yourself or martyr-like about any of this. One can definitely live without any of these (very nice) things.
7. Don't feel proud about yourself if you keep these.
8. Don't break them nonetheless.

Permissions

1. Do make a concerted effort to keep in touch with friends (both "online" and "real"- tangentially, see my post in David Ketter's thread, Online Life on the forum to see my thoughts on the topic of "online" and "real" friends).
2. Do answer and act upon emails and messages that friends and acquaintances kindly send.
3. Do comment on the blogs of friends.
4. Do approve comments on this blog post and reply if necessary.
5. Do enjoy your school-work!
6. Do stop writing this right now, publish it and go do music analysis.

1. Anika Qing (The Qing dynasty in China is my favourite Chinese dynasty.)
   
2. Chicken (My mum still calls me this- it's not an assessment of my courage, but a term of endearment.)

1. I am currently in a heavy metal band that is putting the works of Charles Finney (a theologian from the 12th century) to music.
2. I spend my weekends inciting the proletariat to revolution with my 10th boyfriend who is a member of the nihilist club.
   

1. I wouldn't mind a copy of Alister McGrath's Dawkins Delusion handy.
   
2. I wouldn't mind a cup of Ribena.
   

1. Thomasina (had)
2. Samwise Gamgee (have)

1. Worked on the biography.
   
2. Read a third of the way through God Delusion.
   

1. Pepper Sausages
2. Porridge

1. Mike- about fluffy toys
   
2. Mummy- about breakfast
   

1. From my capital city to the country town of my childhood.
   
2. From home to holiday spot. (Mummy quickly vetoed my idea of using the noun 'vacation'. I fear I am becoming Americanised - spelled, as my mum says, with an "s".)

1. Christmas
2. Australia Day

1. Red cordial (especially the kind rampant at church morning teas)
   
2. Coffee (not that I've ever tried, but I dislike the terrible addiction into which it has enslaved my father)
   

Labels: why do I do this?

In the 1930s, eugenics was sweeping the Western world. It seemed to make perfect sense. If evolution was true in saying that humans gradually developed from some sort of animal, would it not be plausible to say that some races of humans were ‘not quite’ human yet? It was based on this line of thought that Hitler’s Nazi Germany justified their atrocious treatment of the Jewish people. “After January 1933, the Jews became the “Untermenschen” the sub-humans.” ^[1] Though Nazi Germany was the most flagrant example, these ideas were poisoning policy everywhere, including Australia. Parties of scientists went to Torres Strait Island in order to ‘study’ the Australian Aborigines. These scientists decided that racial superiority could be measured by skull size and shape. This belief shaped government policy towards the Australian Aborigines in the 1930s. ^[2]

Today, though we are fortunately leaving our ideas of judging humanity by racial differences, the same sort of evolution-based logic applies. Humanity is being determined by ability. ^[3] Peter Singer is one of the most well known propagators of this theory. “Singer holds that the right to physical integrity is grounded in a being's ability to suffer, and the right to life is grounded in, among other things, the ability to plan and anticipate one's future. Since the unborn, infants and severely disabled people lack the latter (but not the former) ability, he states that abortion, painless infanticide and euthanasia can be justified in certain special circumstances, for instance in the case of severely disabled infants whose life would cause suffering both to themselves and to their parents.” ^[4] The Australian body the Atheist Foundation claims that: “A necessary condition for a living organism to become a human being is for mental activity which is associated with thought and mind…The early foetus has no central nervous system/brain, hence no mental activity…The early embryo is a potential human being, not an actual human being.” ^[5] (emphasis theirs) This emphasis on ability can be traced back to another evolutionary idea: the ‘survival of the fittest’. Will it be long before people state outright that only the fittest have the right to survive? That is the logical conclusion of Singer’s beliefs.

In this intellectual climate it is easy to see why ‘chimp rights’ are seriously being considered. After all, if the ‘necessary condition for a living organism to become a human being’ is based on cognitive ability, it is easy to see why primates could be considered human. It is true that some primates can do more than some disabled people. Does this make the primate ‘more of a human’ than the disabled person? Some people would claim so. Frighteningly, this emphasis on ability seems to echo of Adolf Hitler’s Munich speech in 1933 where he rationalized his beliefs about the Jews on the basis of his assessment of their ability: “His is no master people…He has never founded any civilisation…Foreign people, foreign workmen build his temples, it is foreigners who create and work for him, it is foreigners who shed their blood for him.” ^[6]

The world today is a scary place. With more and more of this emphasis on humanity by ability, could we be headed towards a more widespread neo-Nazi regime? The government would have a perfect weapon against those it decided were inconvenient. All it would need is a list of abilities that all humans would be supposed to possess. Whenever someone got in the government’s way, they could be easily classified non-human and be silenced in anyway that the government so chose. The ‘chimp rights’ issue is just another proof that the Western world is heading towards such a situation. In fact it would not be hard to argue that our civilisation is already there. The unborn, the elderly, and the disabled if allowed to live could be considered a ‘burden’ on the government. By taking steps towards the legalisation of the murder of these individuals, governments everywhere are showing that they are willing to classify those who are a ‘nuisance’ as non-human.

The statement of the Atheist Foundation sums up the implications of the theory of evolution when taken as fact: “All rules of conduct are human made. They are the result of the requirements necessary for cooperation in maintaining social order. The higher animals, including humans have evolved sympathetic and compassionate traits beneficial to survival. Our intellect continually refines these, as circumstance requires.” ^[7] (emphasis mine.) If we want a basis for any kind of morals, and a true definition of what it means to be human, we will need to look elsewhere than evolution for that basis.

Bibliography

1. Trueman, Chris “Jews in Nazi Germany”, © 2000-2007, Available Online: http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/Jews_Nazi_Germany.htm
2. Frontier: ‘The Government should shut its eyes.’ – ABC 21.03.1996
3. ‘The Albert Mohler Radio Program’, 30.03.2007, Available Online: http://www.almohler.com/radio_show.php?cdate=2007-03-30
4. Wikipedia, “Peter Singer” Available Online: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Singer
5. Atheist Foundation of Australia Inc. “The Abortion Debate: The Case For Legal Abortion”, 1996, Available Online: http://www.atheistfoundation.org.au/abort1.htm
6. Trueman, Chris “Jews in Nazi Germany”, © 2000-2007, Available Online: http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/Jews_Nazi_Germany.htm
7. Atheist Foundation of Australia Inc. “Top Frequently Asked Questions And Answers about Atheism”, Available Online: http://www.atheistfoundation.org.au/faq.htm

Labels: ethical issues, news reports

The readers of my previous (real) blog might remember dear Saint Alfred. I hope he will forgive me for my neglect. Life has been so busy. But now seems an opportune time to re-instate our patron waterbottle.

You may remember that dear Alfred is the patron waterbottle of gentle sarcasm. As a young waterbottle he grew up in the renowned "Michael's room" under the kindly oversight of Abbot Johnson. He struggled many years with the purpose of sarcasm, particularly about whether or not it was only permissible for male waterbottles. After many years, however, he had a vision of a previous waterbottle who informed him that sarcasm, when coupled with seven needful things, is, in fact, a good thing. Inspired by this vision, our beloved saint wrote his Treatise on the Seven things needful for Spiritual Sarcasm. While it is a travesty to summarize Alfred's flowing prose in this manner, the seven things needful are:

1. That the sarcasm arises not out of an inadequate sense of a matter's importance.
2. That the sarcasm arises not out of a desire to be clever.
3. That the sarcasm arises not out of a desire to harm but rather out of a desire to warn.
4. That the sarcasm arises not out of bitterness.
5. That the sarcasm arises not as a flood that never ceaseth to flow.
6. That the sarcasm arises not out of ignorance of that which is its target.
7. That the sarcasm arises to give God the glory.

What a worthy patron to walk with us through the coming year! We are so grateful to him for choosing us. I humbly beg that you make him welcome.

Rules:

1. Please don't try to talk to Alfred. You may as well talk to a dead person as talk to a waterbottle.
2. Please don't rely on Alfred to give you advice. You can never know whether he's being sarcastic or not, he has such a habit of it.

---

[edited to correct the spelling of "waterbottle"]

Labels: saint alfred

• draw out the "logical" implications of a passage in such a way as to ignore another passage that completely contradicts my "logical implication", thereby showing that I have a higher opinion of my logical reasoning capabilities than I do for the very Word of God. [*] These kinds of errors come about when I do not see Scripture to be its own interpreter and when I...
• read too little of the Bible, thus not understanding the fullness of its teaching on a topic.
• let the fact that a falsehood is beautifully expressed soften my attitude towards it.
• consider the antiquity of an author to be a good reason to blindly agree with what they say.
• treat Biblical truth as something to be discussed as if a) we have all the time in the world to discuss these things b) it is not truth, merely something to be thrown about for the sake of interesting philosophical discussion c) the Bible is not one of the most amazing gifts we have been given and to be treated with reverent joy d) it is not to be acted upon

Labels: application, scripture

Labels: incomplete thoughts, wedding