Austin Texas, 5 August 2008

Workout notes 3 mile walk in 37:10 on the treadmill; 14 minutes for mile 1, 12 minutes for mile 2, and 11:10 for the last mile. When I am on the road, I don’t work out that much.

Note: faster walking caused a few twinges in my left calf (lower toward the achilles area)

Stuff

Obama: GOP takes pride in being ignorant!

McCain: family values, Republican style!

This youtube video is from the Buffalo Chip contest and was made in 2007:

PS: no, I am not a feminist and I don’t consider sexual displays to be inherently misogynistic. But please don’t mistake Senator McCain as one of those “family values” types.

Here is the viral Paris Hilton ad.

Humor It has been in the news that Dick Cheney probably won’t make it to the Republican convention. Here is an interesting take on this.

How I view these two: Cheney is smart, but also evil and without honor. McCain is good and mostly honorable, but, well, isn’t the most intellectual guy in the world. Taking the worst of both of these guys will give you my “stereotypical Republican”.

Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub: cute but profound blurb here.

Creation and origins of the universe: is our universe really “fine tuned” for life?
There are some top scientists who have argued that the physical and cosmological constants are so perfectly “fine tuned” for life to be able to exist that there might have to be some sort of cosmological intelligence somewhere. A recent article says that this is not necessarily so:

DON’T take our starry skies for granted. If you were unlucky enough to be living in some other universe, you might have nothing to stare at but black holes.

At least, that’s the view of a new study that examines the nature of other universes that might support life and suggests that our cosmic habitat is nothing special after all – wondrously starry skies apart.

The idea that certain aspects of our universe make it uniquely suited to life has never been properly tested, says Fred Adams of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. “You hear people say our universe is fine-tuned for life, that stars are rare and couldn’t form if certain things were different,” he says. “The truth is, no one has done the calculations.” Adams has now rectified that situation and found that it is not unusual for stars to form that can support life. [...]

Adams selected a range of possible values for each of these constants, then put them into a computer model that created a multitude of universes, or a virtual “multiverse”. Each universe within the multiverse used different values for the three constants and was subject to slightly different laws of physics.

About a quarter of the resulting universes turned out to be populated by energy-generating stars. “You can change alpha or the gravitational constant by a factor of 100 and stars still form,” Adams says, suggesting that stars can exist in universes in which at least some fundamental constants are wildly different than in our universe.

And though some universes were filled with things we might not usually think of as stars – radiating black holes or bodies formed of dark matter – they all gave out enough energy to power some form of life, and lasted long enough for life to evolve.

That may not necessarily be life as we know it, however. Since the simulations didn’t rely on the stars producing carbon, Adams points out that very different life forms to ours might be better suited to some of the universes. Because life depends on chemistry, and chemistry depends on alpha, varying alpha changes the nature of life. “You have no idea what life would be like in a universe with different constants,” Adams says.

Adams reckons his results, which will be published in the Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics, suggest that the “specialness” of our universe could well be an illusion. And this is only the very beginning of what can be probed to undermine the idea that our universe is fine-tuned for life. There are plenty more constants and processes that can be tinkered with, he says.

Religion: what God says.

God says: vote Republican.

David Klinghoffer is a Senior Fellow at the Discovery Institute and the author of the new book, “How Would God Vote?: Why the Bible Commands You to Be a Conservative.” He recently explained to the National Review’s Kathryn Jean Lopez that the purpose of the book is not to boost any candidate’s electoral chances, but simply to inform readers that, well, “the Bible commands you to be a Conservative” … and, as such, a vote for Obama is essentially a vote against God:

Lopez: Are you actually arguing that the Bible argues for the election of John McCain over Barack Obama? That voting for Obama is to vote against God?

Klinghoffer: It would probably violate federal tax laws if I told you the Bible endorses a particular candidate. I work at a think tank, after all, a 501(c)(3) organization. But even if I didn’t, I wrote this book not to inflate anyone’s election chances but to give readers and voters the tools to read the Bible as a guide to thinking about a range of issues. If on that basis, you concluded that a Biblical worldview was at odds with Obama on most issues, or on certain key litmus test issues, yet you went ahead and voted for him anyway, that would be a vote against giving God a voice in our public affairs. It would be a vote to silence God’s influence in that area, as far as it’s in your power to do so. In a real sense it would be a vote against God.

A vote against God huh? You mean, a vote against a God that does stuff like this: (Joshua Ch. 10)

29 Then Joshua and all Israel with him moved on from Makkedah to Libnah and attacked it. 30 The LORD also gave that city and its king into Israel’s hand. The city and everyone in it Joshua put to the sword. He left no survivors there. And he did to its king as he had done to the king of Jericho.

31 Then Joshua and all Israel with him moved on from Libnah to Lachish; he took up positions against it and attacked it. 32 The LORD handed Lachish over to Israel, and Joshua took it on the second day. The city and everyone in it he put to the sword, just as he had done to Libnah. 33 Meanwhile, Horam king of Gezer had come up to help Lachish, but Joshua defeated him and his army—until no survivors were left.

34 Then Joshua and all Israel with him moved on from Lachish to Eglon; they took up positions against it and attacked it. 35 They captured it that same day and put it to the sword and totally destroyed everyone in it, just as they had done to Lachish.

36 Then Joshua and all Israel with him went up from Eglon to Hebron and attacked it. 37 They took the city and put it to the sword, together with its king, its villages and everyone in it. They left no survivors. Just as at Eglon, they totally destroyed it and everyone in it.

38 Then Joshua and all Israel with him turned around and attacked Debir. 39 They took the city, its king and its villages, and put them to the sword. Everyone in it they totally destroyed. They left no survivors. They did to Debir and its king as they had done to Libnah and its king and to Hebron.

40 So Joshua subdued the whole region, including the hill country, the Negev, the western foothills and the mountain slopes, together with all their kings. He left no survivors. He totally destroyed all who breathed, just as the LORD, the God of Israel, had commanded. 41 Joshua subdued them from Kadesh Barnea to Gaza and from the whole region of Goshen to Gibeon. 42 All these kings and their lands Joshua conquered in one campaign, because the LORD, the God of Israel, fought for Israel.

Hmmm, this god is a ruthless bloodthirsty bastard…just a plain terror, right? Well maybe not that powerful after all as we read in Judges, Chapter 1:

19 The LORD was with the men of Judah. They took possession of the hill country, but they were unable to drive the people from the plains, because they had iron chariots.

I suppose our modern enemies are better armed than that.

But, according to this god’s modern day prophets, being a “Mr. Mom” is bad:

Though I have to admit that my searching for “stay at home with the kids dad” in the Bible didn’t reveal many results.

Really Bad Humor
From the “Fail Blog“; I won’t add anything to this: