Ouch. Going on twenty days without posting. I gotta get back in the game.
The Frazetta thing and Amy’s wedding are all in the past now. I can’t use those as excuses anymore. I just haven’t finished any projects.
The caterpillars never came back as butterflies, but our parsley is coming back quite nicely. As it turned out, what we had on the patio was nothing special. My mother had 30+ of the same caterpillars on her parsley, and she didn’t even know it. So, there’s that.
I’m working on a yarn mosaic at the moment. I was inspired by this thing that I saw on craftzine’s blog. While that one is comic and… well… a sock monkey?, mine is bigger and more like something I would actually want to hang on my wall. Not to diss the sock monkey or anything, it was cute. Just not my style. Loved the idea though. All I have left to do on mine is the tedious detail in the background, and it will be done. I’m guessing maybe another week. I don’t have the patience to work on it every day. Pictures eventually to follow.
I’ve also been getting into genealogy. I found a free site a long time ago (rootsweb.org), and I always had fun clicking away at the names. You find someone you know was in your family, then just click on the parents and it will come up with their parents, and so on. I recently traced the tree through my maternal grandmother’s side all the way back to the vikings in 780-ish, and I actually think it was pretty reliable. Then, I tried another branch and the site lost all credibility. I just kept clicking and clicking, and eventually things like “Abraham and Sarah,” “Noah,” and… inevitably… “Adam and Eve” popped up on my screen. I was so disappointed. I don’t honestly think that it’s possible to trace my family tree back to biblical times, and I just don’t honestly think that the website is accurate anymore. What’s even better? The site is constantly updated by those who have traced their own lineage. There’s tons of room for error. But! There are numerous entries for Adam, and wife Eve (apparently still living, according to the majority of the rootsweb members), son and daughter of God (also, still living, male, and birth and death listed as being in heaven), who created the earth on March 25, 4001 BC. Where, oh where, did that date come from? March 25? Really? So, about two and a half weeks after Lindel’s birthday, everyone should stop what they’re doing and celebrate the six-thousand-somethingth birthday of the earth? I’m a little confused by that.
Which brings me onto the next topic. I don’t usually like to get involved in socio-political debates, but this one needs to be said. By me. Creationism versus Darwinism. It’s everywhere. You can’t read the news online without seeing attacks at each other everywhere.
My two cents was originally written in an old-fashioned pen-and-paper tangible journal, and I never intended on writing it on here. It’s funny the twists and turns that a one sided conversation (aka blog post) will take.
Eh-hem:
“9-17-08
I’ve been going through another phase of intense philosophizing and trying to piece together in my head a picture of (or story of) the universe and our place in it. This phase always seems to follow the same pattern:
1. Astronomy of nearby (our solar system)
2. Astronomy of far away and The Big Bang
3. “Shape” of the universe and properties of Time versus [present] time, other dimensions
4. Wei Wu Wei’s essay “Crossroads of Time & Space”
5. Buddhism
I agree with very much of what I’ve read of Buddhism: enlightenment, nirvana/samsara, god is all, but I don’t know anything of the Buddha that makes Buddhism. Was he real or mythical? Was he just some guy who reached enlightenment? And spread the news? [note: raised Christian, blissfully ignorant of the details of all other religions. I have a book from my father's college course Religions of Man that I've been meaning to read for... oh... a decade.]
I need to read more about it, though I’m certain I’ll never get to the point as to say “I am Buddhist.”
I feel as though I am a spiritual person in the sense that I ponder such things in great lengths, but I am also a very scientific person, which (no matter what others say) to me is very hard to reconcile in a religious/creator sense.
I don’t understand what all the fuss is about in the Creationism versus Darwinism debate.
The argument from Creationists that Darwinism is synonymous with Atheism is absurd and carries no weight. Why does Darwinism rule out a creator? Because things evolve? Why isn’t that accepted by Creationists as part of their God’s “Plan?” They can always argue that God created life in it’s most minuscule form and allowed for it to evolve like growing mold in a petri dish.
Their attack on Darwinism as “just a theory” shows a complete ignorance to the scientific process. Everything in science is called a theory:
The Theory of Relativity.
The Theory of Universal Gravitation.
Quantum Theory.
This word does not mean that these concepts are false, that they have no evidence, or that they are “just a guess.” Ideas become theories when there is enough evidence to suggest that they are true.
Sure, there are holes. Scientists are discovering that Newton’s universal gravitational theory, which has held strong for hundreds of years, may not be as solid as we’d believed. The Voyager Anomaly, as described in a book I just read by Michael Brooks, is showing that at the outer edges of the solar system, the spacecrafts are acting rather differently than Newton’s formulas suggest they should. And they are both, uniformly, acting the same. [Fascinating! Read that book, it was great.]
My point is that scientific knowledge builds on itself. We do not have a complete picture of most areas of science, which is why it tends to become controversial. People are afraid of experiments, of being wrong or making mistakes, or just afraid.
I don’t like the term “Darwinist.” It implies faith, or religious stance, or way of life.
I believe Darwin’s theory to be true, based on the heaps of evidence. I think there may be holes or small pieces that could be off or need to be reworded, but the fundamental ideas: things evolve, natural selection, is spot on.
Does this make me a Darwinist? Then I am also a Gravitist. A Quantumist. A Relativist. A Scientist.
Throughout history, many great scientists have been shunned by The Church for their discoveries. Copernicus! And Galileo was threatened with excommunication for backing up the heliocentric system. He was told to renounce his stance and placed under house arrest.
In respect to Darwinism, the Catholic church has already said that the theory is compatible with the scriptures, when taken metaphorically and allegorically. Which, I might add, is EXACTLY what they said when they finally accepted that the sun is the center of the solar system. When will the rest of the world follow suit?”
Apologies for the long read, if you actually read it. I just… felt like writing?
