Henry Imler November 30th, 2006

The semester is coming to a close. It is nice, but a bit hectic. I
have the following things to complete by the end of the week after next:

1. 10 page paper looking at the problems and possible solutions on Said’s Post-Colonial Theory
2. Finish a 5 page exegetical pager on Augustine’s “Letter to Simplician“
3. Write a 12-15 page paper on early, middle, and late Augustininan thought. Couple of things
   • This was originally supposed to be a 20 page paper, but the professor is moving, so I have gotten some lee-way.
   • I
     think I am going to structure the paper as 3 disciples of Augustine (at
     different time periods) meet at a conference and give short papers on
     their respective views on free will and predestination. After each
     gives his/her paper, they will all have a discussion about them.
4. Put the finishing touches on my Canonical Billboards paper
5. Grade 44 papers and 44 extra credit assignments

But what I want to do instead of writing and grading is to talk about the following:

• Discuss the relationship between Religion and Philosophy (I have talked about Religion and Science already)
• Discuss the relationship between Religion and History
• Talk
  about morals and ethics in the Liberal or Progressive / Conservative or
  Libertarian Ethos (I spent, like, 45 minutes thinking about this with
  the book, Becoming Divine as a starting place.
• Stylish
• Google Reader and their folders
• Purchasing a $50 mouse for $.91.

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Henry Imler November 30th, 2006

ESPN.com - NCF - Big 12 admits officials blew call that cost Missouri win

The league’s supervisor of officials admitted Monday
that the crew working Saturday’s Missouri-Iowa State game made a wrong
call that nullified what would have been the go-ahead touchdown late in
the Tigers’ 21-16 loss to the Cyclones.

Walt Anderson, who heads the Big 12 officials, apologized to
Missouri coach Gary Pinkel for the error and said his crew “made a
mistake” when offensive lineman Monte Wyrick was called for holding on
fourth-and-goal from the 1 with 26 seconds left in the game.

The call wiped out a touchdown run by quarterback Chase Daniel that
would have given Missouri (7-4, 3-4) a 22-21 lead. On the next play –
fourth-and-goal from the 11 after the 10-yard penalty was marked off –
Daniel was sacked and the game ended.

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Henry Imler November 30th, 2006

I love my teeth - they let me eat.

I hate my teeth - they are impacted and give me headaches and cost hundreds of dollars to remove.

Oh yeah, they keep me up with those headaches the night before early morning sections…

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Henry Imler November 29th, 2006

Meredith
was doing an assignment for her Business Communication class where she
had to describe several search engines, online encyclopedias and
academic online resources.

She asked my opinion of JSTOR and I
told her how awesome it was and that I sometimes grab articles off of
there for pleasure reading. I then realized how big of a dork I was…

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Henry Imler November 29th, 2006

it
is about to freeze over. Yesterday it was 70 degrees in Columbia
Missouri. At noon today, it was 64 degrees. Now, 7 hours later it is 37
degrees.

Yesterday they were calling for 1-3 inches of snow from Thursday to
Friday. At 11 this morning they were calling for ice, then 2-4 inches
of snow from Wednesday night thru Thursday morning. At 2 they called
for ice, then 3-6 inches of snow during the same time period.

Now they are calling for ice, then 8-12 inches of snow from Wednesday night thru Friday morning.

Damn. To go from 70 degrees to 12 inches of snow in half of a week is crazy. And I have to teach class at 8 AM tomorrow, right after it is done icing and we get the first layer of snow.

I wonder how bad it will really get? Last year everything fizzed out in Missouri. I think we had an afternoon of snow on the ground. I bet we make up for it this year.

Now back to grading tests…

Update: Well, there was a sheet of ice on my car
this morning, but thanks to the warm ground (it was 70 a few days ago),
there was no ice on the road with the exception of bridges (yikes) and
top level of the parking garage.

They are calling for 8-14 inches of snow now.

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Henry Imler November 26th, 2006

[T]he methods of science cannot vindicate the ends of
science, and the knowledge acquired by scientific methods cannot always
justify the particular experiments used to acquire it. Yet scientists
desperately want such vindication in the eyes of their fellow citizens:
Good science (meaning interesting, promising, exciting) needs to be
seen as good (meaning virtuous, praiseworthy, compassionate) by
everyone. And so scientists have invented a new method to defend the
unfettered freedom of the old one: They claim the mantle of science
while making ethical claims (”embryo research is good”) that rest on no
special scientific basis at all, and they portray their opponents as
antiscience for raising ethical questions that are entirely consistent
with the scientific facts (”embryological development begins at
conception”).

- Eric Cohen, “The Ends of Science,” First Things [November 2006]: 27-33, at 27 [italics in original]

First heard at AnalPhilosopher :: Eric Cohen on Scientism

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Henry Imler November 24th, 2006

Here are the final tourney scores:

The big boys played on Pro, so there were no epic shoot-outs. Brad
was down 3-28 against Casey in the final three minutes of the game.
Brad threw a 50 yard strike to make it 28-7. Casey fumbled the kickoff
return to set up Brad’s next score. Casey’s ensuing drive came to and
end with a ill-timed interception. Casey was able to hold on for the
victory, though.

Final Talley’s

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Henry Imler November 24th, 2006

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Henry Imler November 23rd, 2006

Brad, Grant, Casey, and I are having a Thanksgiving Xbox 360 Tournament. The games:

1. NBA Live 2006
2. Gears of War
3. Madden NFL 2007

The rules:

1. Everyone gives their projected seedings. The aggregate of this determines the tournament seedings
2. Team picking starts with the 4 seed and works its way up.
3. A “Mercy Rule” is in effect
   • 40 point lead in NBA Live
   • 30 point lead in Madden 2007
4. For the sake of inexperienced players, the first round is played on
   rookie with the second round played on a higher difficulty level
   determined my and agreeance of the players.

So far we have played the first round of the NBA playoffs and half of the Madden First Round:

The 1-4 game was called at the end of the 3rd quarter.

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Henry Imler November 23rd, 2006

Blast from the past: Some Thoughts

I heard someone on the radio compare the Iraqi
constitution writing, and the U.S. constitution. He said something like
it was different because in the minorities trusted the majority in the
US constitution. I thought that was stupid, because the Majority called
the minorities SLAVES, and INDIANS.

And yet, I am a Native American. I was born here. The misdeeds of my
ancestors don’t necessarily apply to me. It is hard to articulate. How
does on handle being the beneficiary of such unjust land seizers? I did
not take any land - but I am profiting off of the taking of the land.
Kinda throws out any system of ethics that tries to deal with it, eh?
However, pretty much every other nation on earth has been established
via conquest.

Despite all of this, I still celebrate thanksgiving wholeheartedly.
I am just more mindful of the historical condition than I have been in
the past. I am thankful that I live in this land, for the time that I
live in. I love my family and friends. They are great. I feel that I
owe all of this to God, but even if He did not bless me as He has, I
think that would be fine too.

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Henry Imler November 22nd, 2006

… you had an original thought.

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Henry Imler November 22nd, 2006

Added a new poll:

Which is the best cartoon?

• South Park
• Futurama
• Family Guy
• Simpsons
• Robot Chicken

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Henry Imler November 22nd, 2006

I am guessing some teacher, somewhere, searched for the following:

borat AND “lesson plan” - Google Search.

I really hope someone is not using that movie as a teaching aid. If
you did, you would really need to pick and choose the whole while
staying away from overgeneralizing.

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Henry Imler November 22nd, 2006

… you had an original thought.

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Henry Imler November 22nd, 2006

The answer: No… well, sort of. Here is how I got there. So, are Science and Religion opposed? No, they are not. In fact, they often work(ed) together. Religion is very much in the business of explaining reality. In doing so, they co-opt the science that makes the best sense to them. For example, Aquinas used Aristotle and Christianized him to the point to which the Catholic church made his science official Church dogma. Recent creationists try to use science that seems to agree with their aims to refute the science that does not. Hubble’s discovery of the motion of the galaxies was a boon to the hopes of creationists in general because the subsequent Big Bang theory implied there was a creator behind it, whereas the Steady State theory needed no such “ummph” to get it started. Now, the question is, are the creationists and atheists doing good science? I’ll leave this one with a quote from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data.

I hear often the complaint that Science presupposes Naturalism. This is because Science simply does not concern itself with God. It measures; it devises theories; it explains. Science does an excellent job telling us:

• Who?
• What?
• When?
• How?

What it does not do is tell us why. Whats that? Do I hear an objection?

Wait a second Henry. Science tells me why water boils when it reaches 100°C!

Well, you see, it does not give us the meaning of why water boils when it does. Instead, it really tells you how water boils. Take any scientific question - or historic, for that matter. The same thing applies every time. The historian can assign meaning or significance to his or her narrative, but at that point, they are not really doing exact and pure history. They are grafting interpretations onto the text. Not that doing that is bad, but it is not pure history.

Religion, on the other hand, gives us this why that Science lacks by Science’s very nature.

So, are Religion and Science opposed? Yes. But only in their subject matters. Sir William Bragg put it best:

“Religion and science are opposed . . . but only in the same sense as that in which my thumb and forefinger are opposed - and between the two, one can grasp everything.”

This is how I can have a keen interest in both Religion and Science. I yearn to understand how the world works and why the world works.

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Henry Imler November 22nd, 2006

Time for a double-whammy!

You know, Sony can make 80,000 bricks, and people would buy them.

Bill Gates

Three lines later…

And if the original Xbox is anything to go by, Microsoft knows LOTS about making bricks.

Brian Ashcraft

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Henry Imler November 22nd, 2006

The answer: No… well, sort of. Here is how I got there. So, are
Science and Religion opposed? No, they are not. In fact, they often
work(ed) together. Religion is very much in the business of explaining
reality. In doing so, they co-opt the science that makes the best sense
to them. For example, Aquinas used Aristotle and Christianized him to the point to which the Catholic church made his science official Church dogma. Recent creationists try to use science
that seems to agree with their aims to refute the science that does
not. Hubble’s discovery of the motion of the galaxies was a boon to the
hopes of creationists in general because the subsequent Big Bang theory
implied there was a creator behind it, whereas the Steady State theory
needed no such “ummph” to get it started. Now, the question is, are the
creationists and atheists doing good science? I’ll leave this one with
a quote from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data.

I hear often the complaint that Science presupposes Naturalism. This
is because Science simply does not concern itself with God. It
measures; it devises theories; it explains. Science does an excellent
job telling us:

• Who?
• What?
• When?
• How?

What it does not do is tell us why. Whats that? Do I hear an objection?

Wait a second Henry. Science tells me why water boils when it reaches 100°C!

Well, you see, it does not give us the meaning of why water boils when it does. Instead, it really tells you how
water boils. Take any scientific question - or historic, for that
matter. The same thing applies every time. The historian can assign
meaning or significance to his or her narrative, but at that point,
they are not really doing exact and pure history. They are grafting
interpretations onto the text. Not that doing that is bad, but it is
not pure history.

Religion, on the other hand, gives us this why that Science lacks by Science’s very nature.

So, are Religion and Science opposed? Yes. But only in their subject matters. Sir William Bragg put it best:

“Religion and science are opposed . . . but only in the
same sense as that in which my thumb and forefinger are opposed - and
between the two, one can grasp everything.”

This is how I can have a keen interest in both Religion and Science.
I yearn to understand how the world works and why the world works.

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Henry Imler November 20th, 2006

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Henry Imler November 20th, 2006

“It is the duty of all [humans] in society, publicly,
and at stated seasons, to worship the Supreme Being, the great Creator
and Preserver of the universe. And no subject shall be hurt, molested,
or restrained, in his person, liberty, or estate, for worshiping GOD in
the manner most agreeable to the dictates of his own conscience; or for
his religious profession or sentiments; provided he doth not disturb
the public peace, or obstruct others in their religious worship.”

- John Adams (Thoughts on Government, 1776)

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Henry Imler November 18th, 2006

Mothers are fonder than fathers of their children because they are more certain they are their own.

Aristotle

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