Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Something good
Here's the opening monologue to the movie Hitch - I liked it. So I memorized it.
Of course, the spice of life will only get you so far. It's the garnish, it's the aroma - the spark, the rush, the stomach love.....but it's got to be based on something. Something stable and solid, something that pays the bills and does the laundry - cuts the grass and does the dishes.....speaking of which.....I better put this thing down.
.
Basic principles: No woman wakes up saying: "Gosh, I hope I don't get
swept off my feet today." Now, she might say, "This is a really bad time for me." Or something like, "I just need some space." Or my personal favorite: "I'm really into my career right now." You believe that? Neither does she. You know why? Because she's lying to you, that's why. You understand me? Lying. It's not a bad time for her. She doesn't need any space. She may be into her career... but what she's really saying is, "Get away from me now." Or possibly, "Try harder, stupid." Well, which one is it? 60% of all human communication is nonverbal. Body language. 30% is your tone. So that means that 90% of what you're saying... ain't coming out of your mouth. Of course she's gonna lie to you - She's a nice person, she doesn't wanna hurt your feelings. What else is she gonna say? She doesn't even know you. Yet.
Basic principles: No matter what, no matter when, no matter who... any man has a chance to sweep any woman off her feet. He just needs the right broom.
Of course, the spice of life will only get you so far. It's the garnish, it's the aroma - the spark, the rush, the stomach love.....but it's got to be based on something. Something stable and solid, something that pays the bills and does the laundry - cuts the grass and does the dishes.....speaking of which.....I better put this thing down.
.
Monday, December 8, 2008
Awesome Pictures
That's a hulluva potato. I'd like to see that sliced and tempura-ed.
And this next one is over a year old - It was on the front page of the BBC News Website and it made me burst out laughing - it was right after one of Chavez' crazy schemes got voted down by his own people:
"Grrr...Chavez Angryyy...."
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And this next one is over a year old - It was on the front page of the BBC News Website and it made me burst out laughing - it was right after one of Chavez' crazy schemes got voted down by his own people:
"Grrr...Chavez Angryyy....".
Sunday, December 7, 2008
はっきり見れる
This is the most clearly I have seen since coming to Japan. I wrote a blog quite some time ago titled "tearing" which was about my identity and feeling torn between the place where my mind dwelt and the space that my body occupied. It has been very difficult for me having come to a totally new place for really the first time in my life. I was so comfortably situated in my mid-west, Scandinavian, middle-class American life back home. I wasn't willfully ignorant but I was a bit naive - I wasn't arrogant but I was a bit ethnocentric - I meant no ill-will but I certainly committed a sin of omission in letting the world lie, unopened and unexplored.
It's been a real struggle for me in beginning to view the world as "we" rather than "them." And a lot of it has to do with my own identity. I am finally, finally starting to see myself as a whole person - dynamic and whole. I used to have trouble picturing myself since I saw my two worlds as mutually exclusive places - here, and there. But now, slowly, the light from this world has grown, stretched concentrically all the way to where I find it touching and joining the light of my previous known world and I see: I live on one globe and that globe is called "The World." I am very comfortable being Luther and being here and surviving and now thriving.
Some of it has to do with language. I have found that, the more Japanese language I learn, the smarter Japanese people get. It was so easy to fall into the trap of simplifying a thing to meet the level at which I could understand. With every little bit of Japanese I learn, a bit more of the Japanese psyche emerges - everyone's personality is pumped up, everyone's humanity becomes that more apparent. It's horrible to admit, but it's taken me a long time to recognize Japanese people as fully functioning, thinking breathing feeling humans...it was so easy to see myself thinking and operating outside of (again) what I found to be their simple world. I knew it was not simple, of course. But I couldn't feel it.
I took the 日本語能力試験三級 (nihongo nouryoku shiken san kyuu) ((Japanese Language Proficiency Test - Level 3)) today. There are 4 levels with 1 being the most difficult. Level 3 isn't supposed to be that difficult - I think they say you can pass it with about 300 hours of studying - but it also doesn't do a whole lot for you other than give you bragging rights. Passing Level 2 or 1 can get you various jobs in Japan. Even so, I probably failed. I didn't take my grammar studies seriously enough these past few months.
But this test was a great experience. It was a humbling experience (it showed me all the stuff I still don't know) but at the same time it was a great motivator to study harder. If I can just master all the vocabulary and the grammar at the 3rd-level, I should in theory be able to operate in Japan on a daily basis. So this is my goal. The test won't be offered again until next December, but by that time, I should be ready to take level 2.
If I study for 2 hours every day between now and then. That's the suggested amount anyway.
I've never latched on to anything long term in my life. I've always had such varied interests and I've always dabbled. Now here's a chance to grab on to something sooo practical and honestly engaging. I'm pretty sure I'm coming home in August. But that means 7 1/2 more months in Japan. Why be satisfied where I'm at? I have the incredible opportunity to come away from the JET experience with a workable second language. It would be so もったいない (mottainai) ((wasteful)) to move back to the States without one.
Things are good right now and I think getting better. I had a really difficult September and October, but November has seen me on the up and up, and I should share some of why with you sometime. For now I'm bent on living in the moment. I have a history of over-analyzing to the point where analysis turns into paralysis and I'm no longer effective. I'm only thinking about the future without doing anything in the present. I have a lot of high-mined ideas about where and how I should go, but I don't get out of bed. Living in the moment overcomes this. Of course I have goals - I have the ultimate goal to love and serve God and love others - I have the long term goal of becoming a diplomat or finding and pursuing a woman to love - I have the mid-term goals of finishing my time in Japan or finding a job in Rapid City - I have my short term goals of class schedules and lesson-writing - I even have daily goals in a way of doing dishes, laundry, eating food, and this list could go on and on and that's the point and that's why I never get moving because I never stop planning or thinking about how things should or could be. So I set this down, and push it aside, and walk forward. And I push it aside when it rushes back to trip my step. And I push it aside to clear my head for the now - the sudden, immediate, incredible opportunity of now.
.
It's been a real struggle for me in beginning to view the world as "we" rather than "them." And a lot of it has to do with my own identity. I am finally, finally starting to see myself as a whole person - dynamic and whole. I used to have trouble picturing myself since I saw my two worlds as mutually exclusive places - here, and there. But now, slowly, the light from this world has grown, stretched concentrically all the way to where I find it touching and joining the light of my previous known world and I see: I live on one globe and that globe is called "The World." I am very comfortable being Luther and being here and surviving and now thriving.
Some of it has to do with language. I have found that, the more Japanese language I learn, the smarter Japanese people get. It was so easy to fall into the trap of simplifying a thing to meet the level at which I could understand. With every little bit of Japanese I learn, a bit more of the Japanese psyche emerges - everyone's personality is pumped up, everyone's humanity becomes that more apparent. It's horrible to admit, but it's taken me a long time to recognize Japanese people as fully functioning, thinking breathing feeling humans...it was so easy to see myself thinking and operating outside of (again) what I found to be their simple world. I knew it was not simple, of course. But I couldn't feel it.
I took the 日本語能力試験三級 (nihongo nouryoku shiken san kyuu) ((Japanese Language Proficiency Test - Level 3)) today. There are 4 levels with 1 being the most difficult. Level 3 isn't supposed to be that difficult - I think they say you can pass it with about 300 hours of studying - but it also doesn't do a whole lot for you other than give you bragging rights. Passing Level 2 or 1 can get you various jobs in Japan. Even so, I probably failed. I didn't take my grammar studies seriously enough these past few months.
But this test was a great experience. It was a humbling experience (it showed me all the stuff I still don't know) but at the same time it was a great motivator to study harder. If I can just master all the vocabulary and the grammar at the 3rd-level, I should in theory be able to operate in Japan on a daily basis. So this is my goal. The test won't be offered again until next December, but by that time, I should be ready to take level 2.
If I study for 2 hours every day between now and then. That's the suggested amount anyway.
I've never latched on to anything long term in my life. I've always had such varied interests and I've always dabbled. Now here's a chance to grab on to something sooo practical and honestly engaging. I'm pretty sure I'm coming home in August. But that means 7 1/2 more months in Japan. Why be satisfied where I'm at? I have the incredible opportunity to come away from the JET experience with a workable second language. It would be so もったいない (mottainai) ((wasteful)) to move back to the States without one.
Things are good right now and I think getting better. I had a really difficult September and October, but November has seen me on the up and up, and I should share some of why with you sometime. For now I'm bent on living in the moment. I have a history of over-analyzing to the point where analysis turns into paralysis and I'm no longer effective. I'm only thinking about the future without doing anything in the present. I have a lot of high-mined ideas about where and how I should go, but I don't get out of bed. Living in the moment overcomes this. Of course I have goals - I have the ultimate goal to love and serve God and love others - I have the long term goal of becoming a diplomat or finding and pursuing a woman to love - I have the mid-term goals of finishing my time in Japan or finding a job in Rapid City - I have my short term goals of class schedules and lesson-writing - I even have daily goals in a way of doing dishes, laundry, eating food, and this list could go on and on and that's the point and that's why I never get moving because I never stop planning or thinking about how things should or could be. So I set this down, and push it aside, and walk forward. And I push it aside when it rushes back to trip my step. And I push it aside to clear my head for the now - the sudden, immediate, incredible opportunity of now.
.
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Some more Apologetics
Question posed to Dinesh D'Souza:
"You maintain that the Big Bang must have had a cause, as you've been going on and on, however this in effect created the universe that is grounded in such rules as cause and effect. Yet at the same time you also maintain that as humans we are creatures of free will and choice and are therefore exempt from this universal canon of cause and effect. Doesn't that strike you as a gross inconsistency at best?"
Response from D'Souza:
"On the contrary it is completely consistent with my supposition, well hypothesis, let's call it a hypothesis, that a discretionary God who did not have to make the universe, the universe was not created out of necessity, it was created out of free--at least this is the Christian view--out of free will. We are created in the image of God which means that to some degree we have some resemblance to God, in what way? In what resemblance? God's not a material thing, there's no Christian tradition going back to the beginning that holds God be material, God is spiritual. So we don't resemble God in our material frame. That's why I have no problem with the theory of Evolution. Because I believe the material frame of man can be adequately explained by evolution, but I maintain that man also has a moral and a spiritual dimension. And while evolution has made pretty good headway in explaining what could be called 'low-altruism' -- I scratch your back you scratch my back -- or, the mother jumps in the burning car because 'wait a minute, her children happen to share her genes -- that's why she's doing it, disguised selfishness.' This is all very clever. But frankly, it doesn't go very far. It accounts for about 10 percent of morality. If you get up and give your bus seat to a stranger, you know, Richard Dawkins may come and go, 'Well that was a really cunning move - you're hoping the old lady will give you her seat next week.' No, you're just doing it because you're a nice guy. Or you give blood, or Mother Theresa, or 'Give me liberty or give me death.' There are lots of people who do things for strangers where they have no even disguised benefit. And I think evolution hasn't given a very plausible, it's given some implausible accounts of this, but it hasn't really accounted for morality. And I think that many people would admit that."
This debate is getting me fired up about going back to my notebook to finish blogging the notes I took about Dawkins' God Delusion. I'll have to go back and read what I've written so far and go from there.
.
"You maintain that the Big Bang must have had a cause, as you've been going on and on, however this in effect created the universe that is grounded in such rules as cause and effect. Yet at the same time you also maintain that as humans we are creatures of free will and choice and are therefore exempt from this universal canon of cause and effect. Doesn't that strike you as a gross inconsistency at best?"
Response from D'Souza:
"On the contrary it is completely consistent with my supposition, well hypothesis, let's call it a hypothesis, that a discretionary God who did not have to make the universe, the universe was not created out of necessity, it was created out of free--at least this is the Christian view--out of free will. We are created in the image of God which means that to some degree we have some resemblance to God, in what way? In what resemblance? God's not a material thing, there's no Christian tradition going back to the beginning that holds God be material, God is spiritual. So we don't resemble God in our material frame. That's why I have no problem with the theory of Evolution. Because I believe the material frame of man can be adequately explained by evolution, but I maintain that man also has a moral and a spiritual dimension. And while evolution has made pretty good headway in explaining what could be called 'low-altruism' -- I scratch your back you scratch my back -- or, the mother jumps in the burning car because 'wait a minute, her children happen to share her genes -- that's why she's doing it, disguised selfishness.' This is all very clever. But frankly, it doesn't go very far. It accounts for about 10 percent of morality. If you get up and give your bus seat to a stranger, you know, Richard Dawkins may come and go, 'Well that was a really cunning move - you're hoping the old lady will give you her seat next week.' No, you're just doing it because you're a nice guy. Or you give blood, or Mother Theresa, or 'Give me liberty or give me death.' There are lots of people who do things for strangers where they have no even disguised benefit. And I think evolution hasn't given a very plausible, it's given some implausible accounts of this, but it hasn't really accounted for morality. And I think that many people would admit that."
This debate is getting me fired up about going back to my notebook to finish blogging the notes I took about Dawkins' God Delusion. I'll have to go back and read what I've written so far and go from there.
.
Some Apologetics
Here is a quotation from Dinesh D'Souza (Christian Apologist) during a debate with Daniel Dennett (Philosopher and Atheist). D'Souza here is responding to the idea of "materialist morality" which says that everything can be reduced down to the movement of atoms, and that even our morality is determined by the physical world.
"Why would anyone be attracted to a metaphysics, that ultimately denies, if you will, half of our humanity? The whole subjective dimension, the whole moral dimension? I want to suggest that ultimately atheism is not so much an intellectual revolt, because think about it, when it comes to God I would agree that I don't know that God exists, I believe that he does. Now knowledge is not the same thing as belief. I wouldn't say I believe in my brother. I know the guy. You only believe when you don't know. So here's the difference. I don't know, and still I believe. Dan doesn't know, and therefore he doesn't believe. What unites us is both of us don't know. We're actually both ignorant. The only difference is, Dan thinks he's a 'champion of reason and I'm a champion of blind faith.' No! We are both reasoning in the dark. The only difference is he won't admit it."
It's not reasonable to hold debates between Theists and Atheists unless they both first agree that both sides have made conscious decisions to believe something. (Which are hopefully based on observations, facts and experiences.)
Unfortunately Dan Barker didn't do this when he came and spoke at UW - Eau Claire, and it severely cut into his credibility among thinking Christians and Atheists on campus alike.
You can find this debate in its full here. I of course only highlighted one individual point. There is much more background to this statement as well as an elaboration in the video. This quotation came in part 6.
.
"Why would anyone be attracted to a metaphysics, that ultimately denies, if you will, half of our humanity? The whole subjective dimension, the whole moral dimension? I want to suggest that ultimately atheism is not so much an intellectual revolt, because think about it, when it comes to God I would agree that I don't know that God exists, I believe that he does. Now knowledge is not the same thing as belief. I wouldn't say I believe in my brother. I know the guy. You only believe when you don't know. So here's the difference. I don't know, and still I believe. Dan doesn't know, and therefore he doesn't believe. What unites us is both of us don't know. We're actually both ignorant. The only difference is, Dan thinks he's a 'champion of reason and I'm a champion of blind faith.' No! We are both reasoning in the dark. The only difference is he won't admit it."
It's not reasonable to hold debates between Theists and Atheists unless they both first agree that both sides have made conscious decisions to believe something. (Which are hopefully based on observations, facts and experiences.)
Unfortunately Dan Barker didn't do this when he came and spoke at UW - Eau Claire, and it severely cut into his credibility among thinking Christians and Atheists on campus alike.
You can find this debate in its full here. I of course only highlighted one individual point. There is much more background to this statement as well as an elaboration in the video. This quotation came in part 6.
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