I guess it's time to think about New Year's resolutions. F has one resolution that she makes every year: she resolves not to throw rocks at the Loch Ness monster, and so far she has demonstrated 100% compliance. While I am impressed by her record, I have to say that as a goal her resolution doesn't quite come up to S.M.A.R.T. standards: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and with a Time factor. It is all those things except relevant, although if F were to visit Scotland at some point in the coming year I suppose her goal could become that. (Or she might rethink it.)

As I have mentioned before, New Year's resolutions are a good time for examining one's life goals to make sure they are appropriate and on track. I usually try to think about mine in catagories: health, home, spiritual, personal development, finances, family. And I don't worry about finalizing my resolutions until February or so.

So I hope my readers (both of you) will have, or have had, a good New Year's celebration: a little bit serious, a little bit silly, and a good beginning to 2006.

This was fun.

Your Personality Profile

You are nurturing, kind, and lucky. Like mother nature, you want to help everyone. You are good at keeping secrets and tend to be secretive. A seeker of harmony, you are a natural peacemaker. You are good natured and people enjoy your company. You put people at ease and make them feel at home with you.

The World's Shortest Personality Test

Ozymandias

I met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said--"Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert....Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings,
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away."

- Shelley

And by the way, if you can find a copy of Tim Powers' The Stress of Her Regard, it's well worth a read. You'll never think of Byron, Keats, or Shelley the same way again. Or vampires, or Frankenstein, or standing stones, or a whole bunch of other things. F had quite a jolt when she found out that Shelley really did die in a sailing accident.

The question has been asked of me, why have I said I would never post about evolution v. intelligent design.

The answer is that I commented nicely about this subject on someone's blog and some other commenters jumped all over me and called me names. I see this a lot about this issue, and I have to say that when people react violently to other people's expressed opinions I think that is very telling.

Look at this thoughtful and interesting blog post, and then scroll down and look at some of the comments. Here is one sample sentence: "Perfesser, you are a lying sack of doo-doo." Charming, right? Mature and nuanced.

C.S. Lewis had a teacher in his youth who had this motto: "Let us never live with amousia, the absence of the Muses." That means that we should remember to include beauty in our lives, of course, in the form of art and music and poetry and what not, but it also means that we should avoid ugliness. I do not mind it when people disagree with me. I do mind when they tell me I am stupid and call me names because we disagree. It's unnecessary and I won't put up with it. Life's too short.

So I wish we could all (all of us who care) have honest and civil discussions about this issue. If we don't reach consensus, at least we may each develop our own understandings a little further, which would be a good thing.

And on a lighter note, I wonder how much of my tendency to want to see both arguments presented fairly and weighed against each other has to do with my being a Libra! Ha ha.

I'm going to post again about the thing I said I'd never post about. I have three thoughts to put forth.

1 - I've seen some discussion regarding the nature of "truth". Truth is what happened, end of story. If God created life on Earth, but 9 billion humans think it happened by chance, then the existence of the Creator is truth. Conversely, if 9 billion humans believe in existence of a creator God, but what actually happened was that everything on Earth developed by chance, then the truth is that we all developed by chance. I don't see what's so hard about that. If truth is what we are after, then no one should be afraid of asking questions. And I see fear in some of the arguments adamantly opposing one side or the other, sometimes hysterically and venomously and profanely. The truth will out, right? The truth will make you free? So chill.

2 - I have a book that I cannot find right now (got to straighten out those bookshelves) by Marilyn vos Savant, in which she talks about statistics. There's a fairly unpleasant example she gives that involves a reported statistic that the average rape victim waits one year before reporting the crime. All kinds of rationales were put forth for that. It takes time to come to terms with what has happened ... rape is such a stigma still in our society ... the turning of the seasons causes her to relive what happened ... and so on. But it turned out that in a sample of 10 women, 9 reported the crime to the police immediately, and 1 waited 10 years and then told a girlfriend. That averages out to one year, but no woman actually reported her rape after one year. All of the twists and turns taken to explain that one-year wait were based on a very basic misunderstanding of the data.

Evolutionists admit that they cannot rule out the possibility of a creator God. The question of whether God exists or not, or if he does exist, how he has acted and does act, simply isn't in the realm of science, they say. If in fact God did bring about life on Earth as we know it, and if ID proponents are right when they point out irreducibly complex features that they say are hallmarks of design, then for evolutionists to insist on trying to squeeze and bend their theories this way and that to account for those features without God is the same as those theorists who tried to figure out why a woman would wait one year before reporting a rape. They're trying to explain something that never happened. That isn't the path to truth.

3 - As for people on the other side, who say that evolution can't be true because it's not in the Bible, I invite them to imagine how God would have explained natural selection to the author of Genesis.

"Four billion year ago - let's see, that's 200 million score - hm. If you counted the fingers and toes of everybody on Earth, living and dead, even people you don't know about ...

Well, anyway. A very long time ago, I started with bacteria. Okay, bacteria are these little tiny animals. They're so small you can't see them, but they're everywhere. Yes, really. They're on your skin, and in your gut, even though you can't see them or feel or hear them ...

Okay, never mind. It's beside the point anyway. A very, very long time ago I created the Earth and everything on it."

Because that's the point, right, that he made everything we see and know? 'Nough said.

Another engineer story.

An engineer died and went up to heaven. But St. Peter turned him away at the pearly gates. He shrugged and went trudging down to hell.

St. Peter liked to call Satan up on the telephone every now and then, just to check up on things, and a few days after that engineer was turned away, he called - "What's up?"

"Oh, things aren't too bad, I guess," Satan said. "We've got an engineer down here now, and he's fixed the flush toilets. It's kind of nice."

Peter hung up a bit perplexed. A few days later he called again.

"That engineer you sent down here got the air conditioner working! It's cooling off already!" Satan said.

Well, that didn't set too well with St. Peter, so after a few days he called Satan again. This time he heard laughing and loud music in the background.

"Our new engineer fixed the refrigerators! We have ice for our drinks! Sorry I can't hear very well - we're having a party!" Satan shouted.

This upset St. Peter, and he told Satan that the engineer didn't belong there after all and he had to send him up to heaven right away.

"I don't think so!" Satan yelled. "We like having him here!"

"I'm telling you, a mistake was made! You have to send him up right now!"

"No!" Satan said.

"Send him up right away or I'll see you in court!" St. Peter shouted.

Satan burst out laughing. "Yeah, right! And where are YOU going to get a lawyer!"

We just got back from my sister's house in Tupelo. I guess that was the last hurrah of Christmas 2005 for my family. We did have church services on Christmas Day, in addition to the 11:00 PM C. Eve service. Also went to R's family in town here. Ate a bunch of stuff, including too many sweets. And there were gift exchanges of course. Among other things, I received a collection of short stories by Edith Wharton that I did not previously have, as well a book by Ann Rule, and from F, a gorgeous book about Queen Victoria's granddaughters. Q. Victoria and the next two or three generations after her are a hobby of F's and mine, although F is a little more interested in the Russian royals; of course, that's all connected. The picture on the dust jacket is so beautiful that she had to struggle to give the book to me rather than keep it for herself. I appreciate the sacrifice. From me and R and the cats, F received DVDs: "Gigi", "My Fair Lady", and "V: The Final Battle"; a collection of Katherine Anne Porter short novels; a nice leather jacket; gift certificates for iTunes and McDonalds; some appropriately nerdy t-shirts from thinkgeek.com; and some stuff for her computer. R's main gift was an overcoat that he needed, and he picked out one he really liked. F had some thoughtful gifts for him too. So we're set, and I'll go to bed soon, because somehow I have to go to work tomorrow.

Once in royal David's city stood a lowly cattle shed,
Where a mother laid her baby in a manger for his bed:
Mary was that mother mild, Jesus Christ her little child.

He came down to earth from heaven who is God and Lord of all;
And his shelter was a stable and his cradle was a stall:
With the poor and meek and lowly lived on Earth our Savior holy.

And our eyes at last shall see him, through his own redeeming love;
For that child, so dear and gentle, is our Lord in heaven above:
And he leads his children on to the place where he is gone.

Not in that poor lowly stable, with the oxen standing by,
We shall see Him; but in Heaven, set at God’s right hand on high;
There His children gather round bright like stars, with glory crowned.

I swore I would stop talking about Intelligent Design, but I've slipped up in comments elsewhere and stuck in a sentence or two. I guess I can say what I like on my own blog, though.

Something I have tried to impress upon my daughter is that sloppy language leads to sloppy thinking. I think this is particularly true in the whole evolution/ID - well, I can't call it dialog, because both sides are talking past each other.

Some time ago I read the sequel to Jurassic Park (and found it disappointing, shallow and stupid, unlike JP which was very good) and I found a statement that I will have to paraphrase, because I can't find my copy to quote directly. The statement was to the effect that dinosaurs evolved a family structure because they needed to.

Okay, the way natural selection works is that changes are constantly happening when DNA is passed from one generation to the next. The changes may be copying errors, or they may be caused by some mutagen, or they happen for some other reason. Anyway, sometimes those changes are disastrous, and the offspring can't live. Sometimes they don't make any difference. And sometimes when they happen in a particular species living in a particular environment, they give the offspring some advantage so that it is better able to pass its DNA, with that alteration in place, along to the next generation. Over time the changed DNA and whatever physical way it manifests itself becomes more prevalent in the group. That's it in a nutshell.

But the change has to happen first, in a strictly random manner, and then prove advantageous or not. To say that any characteristic evolved "because it needed to" is completely incompatible with the idea of natural selection. One could argue that it's just an informal way of stating that the environment was such that only the dinosaurs that randomly acquired family structure could survive. But the problem comes in with the ID debate.

I know there is more to the concept called Intelligent Design than "something or someone caused this to happen". I've read Darwin's Black Box, and I'm frustrated by the fact that my background in life sciences is insufficient for me to determine whether Behe's arguments hold water or not. But I will say that if, for example, God brought about the dinosaurs using whatever combination of natural selection and direct design he found appropriate; and then he thought that it would be interesting, and they would have a better chance of survival, if they formed family groups, and then he caused that to happen: that makes sense. It flows. It's internally consistent.

I'm not saying that dinosaurs didn't get their family structures from natural selection in its purest form. I don't know how they got them. I don't know that they did in fact get them. But I do know that if a scientist insists on excluding the idea of a designer with unmerciful rigidity, then he should be rigorous in excluding sloppy language. He should be able to state his ideas in such a way that they make perfect sense without the concept of a designer deciding something was "needed" or whatever. Otherwise it looks like he's trying to have it both ways.

The Mad Gardener's Song

He thought he saw an Elephant,
That practised on a fife:
He looked again, and found it was
A letter from his wife.
"At length I realise," he said,
"The bitterness of Life!"

He thought he saw a Bufffalo
Upon the chimney-piece:
He looked again, and found it was
His Sister's Husband's Niece.
"Unless you leave this house," he said,
"I'll send for the Police!"

He thought he saw a Rattlesnake
That questioned him in Greek:
He looked again, and found it was
The Middle of Next Week.
"The one thing I regret," he said,
"Is that it cannot speak!"

He thought he saw a Banker's Clerk
Descending from the bus:
He looked again, and found it was
A Hippopotamus.
"If this should stay to dine," he said,
"There won't be much for us!"

He thought he saw a Kangaroo
That worked a coffee-mill:
He looked again, and found it was
A Vegetable-Pill.
"Were I to swallow this," he said,
"I should be very ill!"

He thought he saw a Coach-and-Four
That stood beside his bed:
He looked again, and found it was
A Bear without a Head.
"Poor thing," he said, "poor silly thing!
It's waiting to be fed!"

He thought he saw an Albatross
That fluttered round the lamp:
He looked again, and found it was
A Penny-Postage Stamp.
"You'd best be getting home," he said:
"The nights are very damp!"

He thought he saw a Garden-Door
That opened with a key:
He looked again, and found it was
A Double Rule of Three:
"And all its mystery," he said,
"Is clear as day to me!"

He thought he saw an Argument
That proved he was the Pope:
He looked again, and found it was
A Bar of Mottled Soap.
"A fact so dread," he faintly said,
"Extinguishes all hope!"


- Lewis Carroll, of course.

So I walked past the bulletin board at work today with my coworker J, who is black. We paused to look at Christmas cards that had been sent by various vendors and so forth. I pointed to one card that had a photograph on the front showing about 30 people, all wearing red shirts and lined up in rows, and said, "Who's that?" J told me - it's a lab we do outsourcing to. We contemplated the card a moment, and then I asked, "Where are they?" "Minnesota," J said. "Oh!" I said. I nodded, and she nodded, and after another moment I blurted out, "Because I was wondering - where are the black folks?" J burst out laughing and clapped her hand on my shoulder and said, "See, that's why I stand next to you! I was thinking that but I wouldn't say it, but you would - you'll say anything! All I got to do is stand here!" And we both cracked up.

It's funny what you get used to seeing, and you don't really think about it until you see something different. Sometimes it takes me a moment to think about what that something different is.

But it's not really true that I will say anything.

F wrapped Christmas presents the other day while R and I were at work, and she got lots of expert help. She grabbed the camera and got a few shots, and converted them to gift tags. Here are two of them.




I think they're the cutest things.

I've been keeping up with the stem cell scandal in South Korea. Here is an article about it. There are those who suggest that the solution to keeping this sort of thing from happening is to train young scientists in ethics.

I doubt that you can train ethics into a person. You can explain exactly what falsification consists of, so that a person doesn't falsify by mistake, thinking that what he is doing is OK. I have found crumpled pieces of paper in the garbage, that turned out to be someone's original observations (sample weights, for instance) that were copied over because the papers were torn or had solvent spilled on them, and had to explain that that is raw data and you never discard it. If the technician truly doesn't know that and never repeats the error, that's one thing. If the technician has done it before and excuses himself by saying that he thought no one would know, that's something else again. My mom says character is what you do when no one is looking, and I think she's right.

The cruelest thing in the stem cell case is this:

"When I had a spinal injury 21 years ago, it was a death sentence that I couldn't walk again," said Jeong, 50, head of the Korea Spinal Cord Injury Association.

But, with talk of stem cells, "I began to hold a string of hope. I want to keep holding that string of hope," he said.

It is so wrong to lie to people like that. I don't know how people who lie like that can live with themselves. I wonder if the lies start out small, and are rationalized because they could become true with enough support for the research, and eventually take on a life of their own. It's why it is so important to be truthful even in small things that don't seem to matter. That internal commitment to the truth has to be there. It has to be guarded, even when the truth is disappointing, or embarrassing, or obstructive to what we want to do. I just don't think you can train that into a person.

Fourth Sunday of Advent

Villagers all, this frosty tide,
Let your doors swing open wide,
Though wind may follow, and snow beside,
Yet draw us in by your fire to bide;
Joy shall be yours in the morning!

Here we stand in the cold and the sleet,
Blowing fingers and stamping feet,
Come from far away you to greet--
You by the fire and we in the street--
Bidding you joy in the morning!

For ere one half of the night was gone,
Sudden a star has led us on,
Raining bliss and benison--
Bliss to-morrow and more anon,
Joy for every morning!

Goodman Joseph toiled through the snow--
Saw the star o'er a stable low;
Mary she might not further go--
Welcome thatch, and litter below!
Joy was hers in the morning!

And then they heard the angels tell
`Who were the first to cry NOWELL?
Animals all, as it befell,
In the stable where they did dwell!
Joy shall be theirs in the morning!'

- Kenneth Grahame