Thought for the Day

It seems to me that, to be consistent, anyone who is a socialist ought also to be a creationist, and anyone who is a creationist ought also to be a socialist. Because deep down, both socialism and creationism (or "intelligent design", at least) are based on the same rejection of the concept of emergent phenomena, the same refusal to accept the idea that order can arise spontaneously from the interactions in unplanned complex systems. And yet, I generally get the impression that in the Venn diagram of socialism and creationism, the overlap is quite small.

"Intelligent Design" Theory Is Satanic

1 Corinthians 1:22-23 (NIV):

Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles

Feel free to follow that link and read the entire chapter, or examine some of the other translations.

To paraphrase this passage (and some of the context): Some people require evidence (signs) proving the message of Christ, others require logic ("wisdom", and remember that Greeks pretty much invented formal logic). But Paul is saying here that you cannot arrive at God through either signs or wisdom, evidence or logic, only through faith.

Now, in order for that to be true, it must be that God's existence cannot be proven through either evidence or logic. After all, if it could, then it would be possible to arrive at God through signs or wisdom. God's message would not be "foolish", as Paul calls it - it would be demonstrable fact. So the Bible itself tells us that God's existence must be taken on faith, that there cannot be either scientific (evidentiary) or logical proof.

Therefore, the "Intelligent Design" theory, to the extent that it is remotely scientific, must be anti-Christian (if it isn't scientific, of course, then it certainly has no place in a high school science class, does it?). The underlying basis of ID is that there are some things which are so "irreducibly complex" that they must have been designed by an intelligence, and could not have come into existence in any other way.

But if that were true, then irreducible complexity would constitute a "miraculous sign" that proves God's existence, which is precisely what Paul says cannot be. In fact, in order for what Paul says to be true, there has to be a complete, coherent scientific explanation for the existence of life that doesn't involve God. If there were no such explanation, then God's existence could be demonstrated through that "miraculous sign", and faith would be unnecessary.

Therefore, ID theory attempts to undermine the Bible; it is against God. Since, by definition, anyone who is against God is serving Satan, ID advocates are Satanists. QED.

Parenting Tips for Complete Boneheads

Brenda and I watched the last half of the Dr. Phil special last night... If these parents are in any way representative, there’s going to be a whole lot of people growing up in the next generation with absolutely no concept of how Real Life^TM actually works. There was one mother who literally buys her 4-year-old daughter everything she asks for. Her husband took her credit cards away from her, and actually gives her a daily allowance in little envelopes... which she said she cheats anyway by shifting money from one envelope to another. And why does she do this? Because apparently she doesn’t want the girl to be "traumatized", and because she’s afraid of what other people think of her when the girl starts throwing a tantrum in the store. "Other people in the store think I'm beating her, the way she screams" (to which I, personally, would respond, "Has anyone ever actually come up to you and accused you of beating your daughter? No? Of course they haven't, because everyone knows kids throw tantrums, and what those people are actually thinking about you is 'Why does she let her kid get away with that crap? What a lousy mother she is, not even able to win a battle of wills with a preschooler'").

Dr. Phil's advice: Take away 99% of the kid's toys and stuff, and either put it in storage or, better yet, donate it. Keep the few things the girl actually plays with regularly. And I would tend to agree with that advice, except that he didn't give her a good explanation of why she should do this, and I suspect that the result is that nothing will change—either she'll give in and give the toys back, or she'll buy the kid new toys. Because the real reason she needs to do this is not for the kid's benefit so much as for her own. She needs to see this kid throw the worst, god-awful, screaming tantrum fit she's ever had, and survive it. She needs to see that when the kid doesn't get her way by screaming, eventually she will get tired of screaming and stop. And then she'll get over it, probably a lot quicker than mom expects. And, for obvious reasons, this (being basically the first time that throwing a fit doesn't work) is going to need to happen at home rather than out at a store somewhere. But because Dr. Phil didn't tell her any of that, that the main reason for doing this is to train herself to resist the kid's tantrums, or even give her any idea of what to expect when she does it, I suspect that when the kid starts throwing her fit over mom taking her toys away, mom isn't going to be able to go through with it.

And then there was the woman whose 3-year-old son watches 9 hours of television every day, because "it's so easy to just leave him in front of the TV, so I can get work done around the house..." Twit. This is someone who didn't want an actual child; she wanted an ornamental bonsai child she could set out on display on the coffee table when they have guests over: "See my kid? Isn't he adorable?" I guess it hasn't occurred to her that she could get just as much done with the kid playing in the yard, or in his room, or wherever, as she could with him watching TV. Dr. Phil's obvious answer: Get rid of the TVs. Get them out of the house. Of course, there are a couple of problems with that. For one thing, mom's reaction was a facial expression along the lines of "Oh, well, that can't possibly be a serious suggestion, he's just exaggerating to make a point or something", so I'm skeptical she’ll actually do it. I have a feeling the idea of actually not having a television is inconceivable for her. For another thing, this teaches the child that mom is so weak-willed, she can't actually say "no" to him, and it teaches him that if temptation is available to you, at all, it's impossible to not give in to it. Only by making temptation physically unavailable to us can we resist its lure. These are not good lessons.

And I have to say, for all Dr. Phil's reputation as no-nonsense and brutally frank, Brenda and I don't think he was nearly hard enough on these airheads. We decided we probably wouldn’t make very good Dr. Phils, except maybe for people who are only motivated to change by being ridiculed and abused (at least verbally, although there were a few of them who could have used a good thwack on the head with a cricket bat).

Jesus Rice-Caked Christ!

Boy, if this isn't emblematic of everything that's wrong with the Catholic Church today, I don't know what is.