Non human intelligent life: a god for the atheist

http://www.tgdaily.com/general-sciences-features/62672-claim-advanced-dinosaurs-may-rule-other-planets

I've looked at Star Trek with new eyes lately.  I've always thought of it as an interesting science fiction, and I continue to see it that way, but I don't think that everyone else does.  Some people apparently think that Star Trek-like multiple intelligent species acting together etc. is probable or even inevitable, at least as far as the existence of other species goes.  Is it likely that other intelligent species in other worlds have developed in a similar fashion to our own?  Are there hundreds, or an infinite number of intelligent species in the universe?

http://www.eiaonline.com/intercepts/2009/12/23/is-there-intelligent-life-out-there/ 

As a Mormon, we have a fairly clear idea that there may be children of God on other planets, but they would be like us, in the same way that we are like God, and would probably be for all intents and purposes as human as we are.  

http://flickering-flame.blogspot.com/2008/06/intelligent-life.html

The writings of many of those that believe in the extraplanetary intelligent species indicates a kind of blind belief that I can't help but find amusing.  At least for those that are Atheists.  You mean you can't believe in God because you have no scientific evidence of his existence, but you're sure that there are 'others' out there... even though there is no scientific evidence of their existence.  

http://www.buildingpersonalstrength.com/2010/11/search-for-intelligent-life-on-earth.html

I can hear it right now "well just because we haven't found any intelligent aliens yet doesn't mean they don't exist!  The probability of something having evolved in other places is very high."  

http://bartblog.bartcop.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/intelligent-life.jpg

Honestly I can't prove that God exists in any outright scientific way.  I would argue that there are many things that point to his existence, to such an extent that I find it hard to really understand how people can seriously contend that he doesn't exist.  To put it in scientific terms, I think there is a very high probability...  or in terms I'm more comfortable with, I have faith to act on my belief.  

http://forgetomori.com/2008/ufos/a-single-planet-of-the-apes/

We as humans are unique.  We have a poor view of the millions of years of history on this planet, and a worse view of other planets, but up until now there is no other creature known that is similar to us.  When we talk about evolution in terms of other creatures, we look at roles filled in a time and place, such as types of predators.  It is a cyclical thing where species appear, fill their role, and disappear in history.  For us ourselves we talk about cultural, scientific, or technological evolution in terms of a one way street, where evolution is a synonym for advancement.  Our evolution in our short history has been linear, ever increasing, building one idea on the last.  We are unique.

http://articles.nydailynews.com/2009-08-14/entertainment/17930865_1_prawns-south-africa-creature-feature

I guess the deeper question for me is how similar is the guy that believes in God to the guy that believes in extra-terrestrial intelligent life.  The one leans on very questionable science (in my opinion) to get a probability, with no assurance of what this foreign life is or does.  The other finds a deeper meaning in life, knows where he came from, why he is here, where he is going, has keys for happiness, love, health, and good social relationships, and is a benefit to his society as a result of his beliefs.  The one questions, and the other grows and becomes more.  For me, there is no question.

http://www.lds.org/library/display/0,4945,8555-1-4779-4,00.html

Related Links:

http://io9.com/5780020/if-humanity-went-extinct-what-species-would-replace-us

http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsharpscience/2009/02/how-many-intelligent-civilisat.html

http://www.littleabout.com/Science/intelligent-and-more-full-blown-species-may-exist-in-other-planets/671/

http://www.history.com/shows/ancient-aliens

http://www.tgdaily.com/general-sciences-features/62672-claim-advanced-dinosaurs-may-rule-other-planets

Terry Goodkind's The Sword of Truth series: my reaction

I have to say that Terry Goodkind is a good writer.  I haven't really read fantasy novels in a while, but several weeks ago while with my kids at the library, I had a couple of minutes, and there are a number of series that I never finished, because the author wasn't done writing them. 

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6ZOKCNKeGqnfsEFZnmGOEo-qG4os2nB2ItDa5X7I8SqO2p4XdqgslVXvqcWiu2U7DXfe5lZGJKRFIkYidABA3hpvmk-Dq8pMS-tuT-f-i8bXV5bkIA5AeRZCQM-V39OVOuawLGtPcWFo/s1600/Swordoftruth.jpg

I picked up book 9 or 10 in the Sword of Truth series, got re-addicted, and have finished the series.  Richard Rahl is a convincing character overall, and I recommend the books to anyone that enjoys fantasy. 

http://tvpedia.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/legend-of-the-seeker-wallpaper-1.jpg

There were a number of issues that I didn't like however.  Terry puts a lot of his own beliefs into the words of his primary characters, and at times it did seem a little bit preachy.  Actually, really preachy.  For example, there is this idea that the bad guys are really just attacking the good guys because they are jealous of their freedom and happiness.  It so reminds me of what President Bush said about radical Islam.  "They hate us because of our freedom!"  That seems to me to be way to easy and simple.  If we ask these bad guys why they are fighting, they aren't going to say that.  I have no real idea what they would say, but it wouldn't be that.   

http://images3.cliqueclack.com/tv/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/se2_98-425x237.jpg

Mr. Goodkind also talks a lot about sexual violence towards females.  All the bad guys do it.  And there's more detail than I'm really comfortable with.  From what I read about real world conflicts, there are certain types of conflicts where sexual violence is used, and this is a sad and terrible thing.  I think that in some ways it is good to paint a more realistic picture, but I also think that not all conflicts have that element as blatantly open or as universal.  In the Sword of Truth, all the bad men want to rape, and it's socially acceptable among the peers of the bad guys of each group, and none of them think twice, or show remorse, etc.  While ignoring this element of what happens in the real world may be a bit cowardly, there are other ways of including it.  Many authors use it without pages of detailing the specifics, and I think that works well enough.  I could almost see editors censoring in the book, because there are certain things that are completely explicit, usually involving actions and anatomy from the waist up, and certain things that were less so, like from the waist down, even if the circumlocuting for waist down actions and anatomy didn't hinder understanding of what was happening.

The author also shows a great disdain for selflessness and sacrifice, indicating that that is what the bad guys teach their people to do.  He uses only a narrowed connotation of these ideas, presenting only how they can be abused.  The women and wizards of the bad guys must offer themselves to the service of evil because of what they have and are. 

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The bad guys, for most of the books "The Imperial Order," teach that all people should be equal all the time no matter what, although, hypocritically, their leader Jagang considers himself better than the rest.  The good business people, the rich, and those with the "gift" (magic), should enslave themselves and give it all up for the order.  Mr. Goodkind states that this is a perversion of the right idea that all people are born equal.  I think this is kind of an anti-communism idea, and it works fairly well for him.  He does present it as black and white though, generally implying and showing that everything in the communal group is bad, and almost everything in the "free" group is good.  This may be fine for politics, but it lacks any real balance and seems a bit cartoonish to me. 

The people living under communism may not have many of the blessings that we have under capitalism, but I have seen some of them smile once or twice on the programs that I watch (history, news, cultural programs, etc.) and I don't believe that the entirety of their existence is sad drudgery as they wait to die.  Call me crazy. 

http://thetorchonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/terry-goodkind.jpg
Terry Goodkind also has a real dislike for religion.  The Good guys don't have religion, although the main character, Richard Rahl, gets worshipped by his entire nation who kneels down and puts their faces on the ground facing him and says "Lord Rahl protect us..."  and this whole litany about how Richard Rahl is their savior and lord.  This is finally stopped at the end of the series by Richard, because its usefulness in protecting the good guys has passed.  The bad guys who don't really worship anything per se, have religion, and that's bad, because they can't think for themselves. 

http://d-g-angel.cghub.com/files/Image/039001-040000/39163/466_stream.jpg

I'm kindof tire of this whole tirade against religion in these fantasy and science fiction works.  Religion is either not present at all, or it is a tool of the bad guys in a lot of these works.  Among many in my age group, religion seems to be worthy of all the negative press that it gets.  The good that it does is not often appreciated.  On balance, in my view, any objective person that has a full grasp of the facts and history will say that religion has had a positive impact on society. 

One thing that I really do appreciate from Terry Goodkind is his planning from beginning to end of the books.  You're still learning about things that happened in the first book near the end of the 12th book.  Things that (I think) he had to put there in part so that they could be used in story resolution at the end of the series. 

http://www.prestonr.com/books/images/books/goodkind-001.jpg

There was a TV show called Legend of the Seeker based on this series.  I didn't include many pictures from it though because I don't know much about copyright rules.  I have included links to all sources for pictures, and will remove them if asked by owners.

Romney, Obama, and me, a moderate Mormon.

I find myself in the rare position of being willing to vote for Obama over some of the candidates in the Republican race.  While my favorite, Governor Huntsman, is out of the race, I still might vote for Romney over president Obama.  But I might actually try and persuade people to vote Obama if someone like Gingrich is the republican nominee. 

Image by jamesomalley via Flickr

I think much of the Obama hatred is misplaced.  I honestly believe he couldn't have done much better in turning the economy around.  I don't think anyone can magically reverse the direction of the economy so quickly.  Obama has done a good job, but it takes a few years.  I also like Obamacare, or Romneycare, or whatever you want to call it.  It doesn't do a lot to cut costs, but it does do a lot to get coverage to people.  And it does do a little bit to cut costs. 

Something like Ryan Paul's idea is needed to work on cutting cost.  There are many countries with better health care than we have, and many of them cost less than ours does.  It may not be an inalienable right to have health care coverage for everyone garaunteed by the constitution, but we are a rich country, and we can afford to, so why not?

I don't like that Obama wanted to get out of Iraq at the worst possible time, and I'm glad that it became clear that staying in was working before he took office.  Otherwise we would have had another Vietnam scenario on our hands there.  I hope he learned from that . 

Image via Wikipedia

I like Romney because he's a Mormon and I'm a Mormon.  I don't think the presidency usually plays a big role in the economy, although they do sink or swim based on how it does, so I'm not overly impressed by his business acumen.  I kind of like how his candidacy highlights the very low tax rates that the rich can get.  :)  Why do we allow the superrich to pay less taxes again?  Why can't capital gains be taxed like wages? 

I also don't like this new "veto the dream act" thing.  The dream act is a great idea!  Of the illegal immigrants that are here, almost none come here to go to college.  The beneficiaries of the dream would overwhelmingly be kids that came to the USA when small.  They share no guilt with their parents, who committed the unspeakable crime of crossing a line on the ground without permission.  It's almost as bad (much less dangerous) as speeding, and just as illegal!

I

Image via Wikipedia

am somewhat concerned with how the LDS (Mormon) church will end up being perceived based on how Mitt does as president if he is elected.  I'd rather it stand on it's teachings and practices instead of on some random member's actions. 

Anyway, on many issues, Mitt is fairly moderate.  And that, for me, is no sin

Image via Wikipedia

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What are the white spots?

Image via Wikipedia

One of the difficult things about growing up is being different.  We are all different in one way or another.  Most of us are different in several ways.  Being young can be especially hard for people that are different. 

I remember in school we had a new kid that was from a couple of towns over.  He would say things like 'straight up.'  He probably watched too much tv.  If I remember right, he only lasted a few weeks before he left school.  Someone told me that he left because he was getting bullied too much.  But he seemed to me pretty similar to the other kids. 

Image via Wikipedia

One thing that made me different was vitiligo.  It's a skin condition where parts of the body lose their coloration.  It's not contagious.  It doesn't hurt, or cause any long term problems, except for maybe making sunburn more probable.  But it does look different.  I remember when I was about 13 I got some turtle neck sweaters for Christmas.  I had some vitiligo on my neck, and whoever gave them to me figured I'd want to hide the vitiligo.  At that point I didn't really stress out about the ones on my neck.  I couldn't see them, never really looked in a mirror much because I didn't care about my appearance.  I never wore them because they were itchy. 

Image via Wikipedia

Later on it definitely was hard.  Spot.  Patch.  Leper.  Freak.  Gross.  Get away from me.  One teacher felt the need to explain to the entire class that people that have white patches on their skin get it because they are descendants of both black and white people.  This kind of thinking comes from the slavery South.  In order to justify slavery, racists claimed that white people and black people were from different species, and that inter-marriage of the two a kind of physical oil and water effect where a person literally had separate white and black parts.  As you can imagine, this breaks down very quicly and can be shown to be false in a number of ways. 

Image via Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_skin_color  To put it in overly simple terms, present scientific thought is that too much or too little vitamin D is bad.  Peoples that have tended to spend too much time in the sun become darker to reduce vitamin D levels absorbed by the skin from the sun, for example equatorial peoples.  Peoples that haven't gotten enough sun and therefore vitamin D become lighter so that their bodies will absorb more sunlight.  I think there are some holes in this theory, but it's all science has right now.  Maybe epigenetics will help. 

Image via Wikipedia

So where does vitiligo come into play in all of this?  It doesn't.  People of all skin colors get vitiligo similarly.  It is found everywhere on earth.  The best idea I see as to a cause at this point is that it is an auto-immune disorder.  The cells in our skin that react to the sun and darken are called melanin.  Our white blood cells mistake the melanin cells (melanocytes?) as being bad, and then destroy them.  All the rest of the skin cells are fine.  The skin is healthy, though it does sunburn easily. 

Image via Wikipedia

Of course there are a number of other skin problems that look like vitiligo, at least to those that don't know any better.  And Michael Jackson didn't help things.  People with vitiligo don't gradually get whiter evenly over their whole bodies.  It's bit by bit, with sections being completely white or the normal skin color.  Nothing in between.  No gradual change.  Michael Jackson became gradually white because of skin treatments that he had done to cover up his vitiligo, not because of the disorder itself. 

Image by juan.barredo via Flickr

The "final solution" to vitiligo is to permanently bleach the rest of your skin to that you have even coloring.  This isn't inevitable by any means.  Many people get one or two spots, and no more for the rest of their lives.  Sometimes the spots return to normal color.  About 1 in 75 people get vitiligo at some point in their lives. 

For more info, google vitiligo.  :)

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• Vitiligo, a disease in which t... (uncachable.com)
• White Like Michael: Vitiligo, Causes and Treatments. (alternativendhealth.wordpress.com)
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• Changing Colors (mjtheman.wordpress.com)

Researching bloggers: the good, the bad, and the ugly!

Image by Denis Collette...!!! via Flickr

There's a really good CNN article about blogging.  It refers to a lot of research about blogging and bloggers.  http://www.cnn.com/2011/11/14/living/blogging-career/index.html

Have you ever gotten a job through facebook?   Apparently there are a lot of people that have.  And a lot who have gotten a job through Linkedin.  http://recruiting.jobvite.com/news/press-releases/pr/jobvite-social-recruiting-survey-2011.php

Ideas on how to start your own blog: http://www.howtostartablog.org/

Image via Wikipedia

Blogging to make money is a very difficult thing to do.  It's kindof like practicing basketball for your shot in the NBA.  Or at least that's what this article says.  http://blog.penelopetrunk.com/2009/04/21/8-reasons-why-you-wont-make-money-from-your-blog/

Blogging is a great way to get a job that's beyond your experience level.  According to this article, you should blog about  that you want to get into.  This forces you to lear, and at the same time offers something for potential employers to look at that shows that you're talking about.  http://blog.penelopetrunk.com/2008/04/14/5-ways-to-get-a-job-way-above-your-experience/

Image via Wikipedia

Blogs can other people interested in the same yourself, which may offer future job possibilities, referrals, etc.  http://blog.penelopetrunk.com/2007/06/24/blogging-supercharges-your-career-by-making-you-more-connected/ 

Image by Alaskan Dude via Flickr

How to write a good blog: http://blog.penelopetrunk.com/2009/05/13/how-to-write-a-blog-post-people-love/

How to start a blog:  http://blog.penelopetrunk.com/2006/11/10/the-easiest-instructions-for-how-to-start-a-blog/

Other advice.  Put in random scenery pictures that have nothing to do with the article.  Because everybody loves those. 

Also, if you would like to guest blog on my blog, let me know.  I will post your pet peeves, opinions, advice, etc.  I will attribute them entirely to you!  You get some free views, and at the same time, my blog grows!!!   Mwahaha!!!

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Is the honey on your shelf actually honey?

Image via Wikipedia

Apparently the pollen in honey is very important for the quality of the honey, for health benefits, and for tracing where the honey comes from.  http://www.foodsafetynews.com/2011/11/tests-show-most-store-honey-isnt-honey/

This link opened my eyes as to what to look for when buying honey.  Well, that's not true, but it did give names and information about what honey is good and what is not.  We'll go to trader joes  next time we need honey. 

Image via Wikipedia

Some say the pollen is removed to increase shelf life, but I guess a lot of the reason is so that Chinese honey can be relabeled and sold as honey from somewhere else and not be detected for what it is. 

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The real cause of the financial crisis!!!

Image by Toban Black via Flickr

I really loved this article.  http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/what-caused-the-financial-crisis-the-big-lie-goes-viral/2011/10/31/gIQAXlSOqM_story_1.html 

It's amazing to me that so many people believe that the whole crisis was caused by government making banks lend to people of color.  The whole idea of it is staggering to me.  So simple.  So racist.  So easily proven wrong!

Image via Wikipedia

The above article gives about 12 factors that contributed to the financial crisis.  If you can't easily come up with some of the causes, I suggest reading it.  They are very easy to understand without having to be a banker.  :)

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