In a word the answer is "True!" Dr. Craig argued that God does matter and Christopher Dicarlo argued that God does not matter. This debate was different. Instead of trying to prove that God exists they were arguing about God's relevance. This is a very different question. I liked how Dr. Craig argued about the absence of moral absolutes and plain emptiness and purposeless of life without a relationship with our creator. He was brilliant. This one is important enough that I will post it below the link where I initially found the debate
I just read an article I found through AOL. It is called Does Any Woman Have to Lose Weight to Get Lucky? It details the story of a young woman who lost over half her body weight to make herself more attractive to men.
Charlotte developed an unhealthy obsession with food after she graduated from school. Being shy, she would stay home and have dinner for one while her friends went on dates. "I was 21 and desperate to be loved and to enjoy the affection my friends were getting from men," she said.
So she dropped the weight - 180 pounds and the article goes on:
After losing 180 pounds, Charlotte did the deed with a guy she met on vacation and has done it with two more since. She says, "Since I've become slim, I am more attractive to men. Sadly, that's the world we live in."
While we can't argue with the fact that we live in a looks-obsessed society, we know plenty of women of all sizes who have never let a few extra pounds stop them from getting active in the bedroom.
According to Charlotte, when she was heavy she "feared men seeing her naked and eventually stopped going out altogether." Sure, weight gain can take a toll on your self-esteem and energy levels, but that's only if you let it.
Take notice of what she said. She said she was "desperate to be loved" and she wanted attention from men because she thought that men would fulfill her desire to be loved. She overate because she was trying to fill a hole in her soul. My question now that she has slept with 3 different men, is her need to be loved been fulfilled. She's had three relationships with three men and after they got what they wanted from her, she was alone again. Is that love? Not according to the Bible. God wants more for us. Charlotte is not alone. We all have whole in our souls. Some of us try to fill it with food, material possessions, success, sex, drugs, television, all kinds of various vices, and everything that we use to make ourselves that we are happy apart from God. None of this will satisfy a human being but the love of God. It's a free gift. All we have to do is put our trust in Jesus, admit and repent of our sins - the things in our lives that are ungodly, and serve the Lord.
If you haven't heard the debate between James White and Bart Ehrman concerning the topic Does the Bible Misquote Jesus? you are missing out! Here is another link to get to it. Ehrman has just released another book. It's entitled: Jesus, Interrupted: Revealing the Hidden Contradictions in the Bible (and Why We Don't Know About Them). James White has weighed in on his blog. His comments bear reading:
So says Bart Ehrman when you challenge his highly challengeable theological conclusions and claims. Ehrman's new anti-Christian book, Jesus, Interrupted: Revealing the Hidden Contradictions in the Bible (and Why We Don't Know About Them), is lying on my desk, having just arrived. I flipped the book open to the back and my eyes fell upon this statement:
There is not literally a place of eternal torment where God, or the demons doing his will, will torture poor souls for 30 trillion years (as just the beginning) for sins they committed for thirty years. What kind of never-dying eternal divine Nazi would a God like that be? (p. 276).
Now, aside from the inherent problems (poor souls = innocent souls, the issue of divine justice, the continued hatred of those under punishment for God, etc.) in this common atheistic blast, the real issue is, does this book finally signal the end of Ehrman's "I'm not a theologian, I'm just a high-brow scholar so I cannot be held accountable for all the theological pronouncements I make" excuse making? Will those in the "academy" finally see his real intentions, and start to recognize his bias? Personally, I sort of doubt it. Anyone who is embarrassed by the open profession of the lordship of Christ over the mind will not wish to risk their next invitation to some major conference by pointing out Ehrman's bold anti-Christian zealotry. But churchmen who recognize when a wolf is stocking the sheep will do well to cull some of the whopper statements in this book as excellent examples of the fact that Ehrman is no unbiased textual critical scholar. He has moved far beyond the realm of his narrow expertise in his last three most popular books, all of which are designed to do one thing: destroy Christian faith.
I might note that the quote above would be just as applicable to the Islamic view of the fire as well. Just don't ask Bart about that. As he begins his rounds on NPR, do you think someone will ask him, "So, you are saying Allah in the Qur'an is a never-dying eternal divine Nazi?" Yeah, probably not.
It really infuriated me during the debate when Ehrman denied the theological implications of his conclusions while at the same time affirming that it was why he is no longer a Christian. Ehrman can't have it both ways. He also can't make assertions against the validity of the Bible without also applying those same conclusions to the Koran. It's dishonest. I doubt that Ehrman ever was born again Christian who truly ever knew Jesus. He doesn't talk about his faith as one where he had a relationship with the risen Christ. If he did he would come to different conclusions. I hope He finds Jesus and knows him so he won't be lost and that he'll stop leading others astray.
I tell you the Apologetics 315 blog is a gold mine! I just found a debate between Bart Ehrman and William Lane Craig. They debated about whether the Resurrection of Christ is a fact of History or Not. To be honest, it is my opinion that Craig, who argued that the Resurrection is a fact of history, won this hands-down. Let me put it in the venacular of my generation: Ehrman got owned. The Resurrection is a subject of Dr. Craig's expertise and he did a wonderful job presenting it. It's so important that I would like to post audio below as well as a transcript of the debate. Here is the link to the Apologetics 315 post:
My favorite part of the debate was when Ehrman tried to argue that there are other possible explanations for Jesus' empty tomb. His point was that God supernaturally raised Jesus was improbable. Dr Craig countered by appealing to the work of a scholar from Oxford University who uses Probability Calculus to show the odds that Jesus was raised from dead against other possible explanations. I loved it. Here is the audio and the transcript.
More police brutality has been video taped and it has been making the rounds on the internet and television since last weekend. It found out that a 15 year-old girl was assaulted while she was in custody. She kicked her shoe at the deputies, and one of them slammed her against a wall and tossed them down on the ground. She was struck. Yes, she was being rude and disrespectful but I think the county deputies over-reacted. What do you think?
Did you see the video a guy did of himself over a period of time where he just sped up the time? They did a spoof on it on the Simpsons. Here is the video and the Simpson spoof.
I have found a video report on a miracle from last week. A woman's ex-boyfriend tried to shoot her in the head as she drove away but her hair weave kept the bullet from penetrating her skull. Amazing! I have never heard of such a thing before. God saved that young woman from certain death, proving that if He doesn't say its time to die, it doesn't matter what happens you won't die. She says she is thanking God everyday for her life. She's right.
I saw a story today from Black Snob that just infuriates me. Yet again we have people making racist remarks against Obama and then claim that black people are making more out of it than we should. There was a link to the following article: Los Alamitos Mayor Dean Grose Emailed His Friends A White House Watermelon Picture. The article explains that the mayor of Los Alamitos, California, Dean Grose, sent around a personal email containing the following picture: with the caption “No Easter egg hunt this year,” and yes, those are watermelons photoshopped into a picture of the white house. He sent this to a bunch of people as a joke. Out of the 12,000 people who live in that town, I doubt that there are a lot of black people but there is at least one black person on his e-mail list, Keyanus Price. She did what you are supposed to do just talk to the person who offended you. She wrote:
"Hey, that’s not nice at all. Not all black people like watermelon… you should know better than that.”
Grose replied: “The way things are today, you gotta laugh every now and then. I wanna see the coloring contests.”
In other words, no apology so Price went public. Now Grose says:
“It was just poor judgment on my part, and I am deeply sorry. It wasn’t meant to hurt her,” he said.
and
"Bottom line is, we laugh at things and I didn't see this in the same light that she did," Grose told the AP. "I'm sorry. It wasn't sent to offend her personally - or anyone - from the standpoint of the African-American race."
His defense: I didn't know it was racist. I'm sorry. Well at least he is stepping down as mayor. However, he never admitted that it was a racist joke!
I have also seen a quote from another person concerning this incident:
Obviously the email was a reference to certain agricultural policies of the Obama administration and their impact on California melon growers…some people are so touchy. If it makes you feel any better, I’m sure Mayor Grouse will apologize for you being so thin-skinned.
"Thin-skinned"? Serious? This with the monkey cartoon last week shows us that Eric Holder was right last week. Offending others using racist jokes and sterotypes has got to be faced head-on. Americans don't do that. That is why Holder said that we are nation of cowards. We gotta stop proving him right.
Here is a video from YouTube that shows the Physics Consultant on the film talk about Dr. Manhattan's powers and the theoretical science beneath the fiction. Very, Very interesting!
You may have heard about this already but a few weeks ago, an audio recording surfaced of Christian Bale going ballistic on the set of Terminator 4. Apparently someone made a mistake and he went on a tirade of cursing and belittling and insulting people and threatening to leave the set and never coming back. There are several versions of it on YouTube and there have been a couple of very funny parodies of this.
If you want to hear the original tirade, just type in "Christian Bale" into the search box in YouTube and you can see it, but I won't post it because it's just too much profanity and I could not find an edited version.
I received an e-mail this month stating that the only flight where the entire flight crew is black and female it seems that one of the crew started the e-mail chain. It got me thinking about the first black woman to hold a pilots license in the United States and internationally. Her name was Bessie Coleman. She was awesome. I'm going to make sure my daughter knows about her. Read this link to find out all about her life. It is very complete. Bessie's picture is on the upper left of this post and the all-black-female flight crew is on the right. Below is the e-mail as I received it.
VERY COOL! Possible First All Female African-American Flight Crew Very Motivating.. Our African-American women continue to demonstrate professionalism, intelligence and unlimited potential as they contribute to our overall struggle for unlimited freedom, access and opportunity in America. The sisters on Flights 5202 and 5106 (a jet owned by Atlantic Southeast Airlines) have proven that African-American women can do anything if just given a fair opportunity. Their aviation success is a very proud moment for us all. I'm not 100% sure, but I'm almost positive that we might have made history on Thursday, February 12, 2009. I was a part of an all African American female crew. I'm attaching the photos and you can pass them along to whomever. We were so excited! We operated flight 5202 from Atlanta to Nashville and flight 5106 from Nashville back to Atlanta . The crew included Captain Rachelle Jones, First Officer Stephanie Grant, Flight Attendants Robin Rogers and Diana Galloway!
This was just this month! The pictures of the crew are on this post
A few weeks ago, I posted an article about "motion" Comics. It's where comic book art is animated. I am planning to attend the Wondercon Convention this Saturday and I'm planning to see if i can get the Watchmen graphic novel, but this DVD would be another cool way to experience the story. It Comes out 03-03-09 I admit that Warner Brothers and Fox are attempting to milk us for all they can. That being said...I can't wait for the movie, the motion comic, and the animated companion movie called The Black Freighter on 03-24-09. Also I wanna see Watchmen in IMAX. Looks like a movie that must be seen in IMAX.
I enjoyed the debate between Frank Turek vs Christoper Hitchens. I blogged about it a few months at the following link. As you probably know Dr. James White has been busy with his own debates but he has finally commented on the Turek/Hitchen debate. It is interesting to hear someone who is an accomplished professional debator comment. I'm amazed. He pointed out something very important that I missed: although Hitchens is an atheist he was able to point out a flaw in Turek's argument: He tried to go from general theism (belief in the existence of some God) to arguing for the existence of God in the view of Judeo-Christianity without explaining how he did it! Here are Dr. White's commentes:
A little girl gives a speech on the following question: If Dr. King were alive today, what do you think he would say about current events? It is a great answer!
Here is a video I saw on YouTube that is very interesting...as well as humorous without being completely irreverent and I hope will not offend anyone. It raises questions as to how if you look at the life of Mohammad and what he taught in the Koran that you can conclude that Islam is a religion of peace? Take a look. All of the information presented I have seen in other sources.
There is no love lost between Alan Keyes and Barack Obama. They have been rivals for years. To be honest, had Keyes been running against Obama, I would have voted for Keyes. They are both politicians, but Keyes' is a black man who shares my world views much more closely than Obama. Considering their history I'm not surprised that he disagrees with Obama's economic policies. Listen to what he has recently said
The one thing that stand out to me about what Keyes points out the question about how is a bankrupt government such as ours going to bail out anyone? Where is the money going to come from? I don't agree with Keyes saying that Obama is telling people not to pay their mortgages because the government is going to pay for it. I have never heard that suggested by the Presidential administration. Another problem is that Keyes repeated the lie that Obama cannot prove that he was born in the United State. Unfortunately, instead of offering alternative he really rips into Obama - his character and his abilities to be President. Obama said that he would listen to other opinions. I wonder if the two have talked?
UPDATE: I just read an article from Newsmax in which they report this very same story. One thing that I have noticed about Newsmax is that they are conservative Republicans and have been against Obama since day one. As for Keyes the article does point out that he is wrong about raising doubts about Obama's citizenship. Here is what is pointed out in the article:
Obama has stated he was born in Hawaii. His campaign has released his Certificate of Live Birth - not his actual birth certificate. Hawaii state officials said they reviewed the actual birth certificate and that Obama was born in the state of Hawaii.
Also, Obama's family placed a legal advertisement in a Hawaii newspaper days after he was born.
You can't fake a legal advertisement dated 40 years ago with the intention that one day the boy would be President in a country where his father would have been murdered in some places for race mixing! Let's get real. Newsmax did not have anything positive to say about Keyes either because let's face it some white Republicans are scared by him even more than by Barack Obama.
Here is a good video framing what is at stake with redefining "marriage". It is good to watch. It's poignant for me in light of what my own marriage means to me and my parents' 51st anniversary which is today.
Today, 44 years ago, Malcolm X was assassinated. I'm not going to comment much now because his life and legacy deserve more space than I am prepared to make at this time. For now here are some great videos I have found that showcase who he was. You can purchase much of his speeches, video and audio, and transcriptions at http://malcolmxfiles.blogspot.com/
I think that a debate on "Does the God of the Bible Exist?" is very important. Dan Barker argued "no" and he claims that he used to be a believer. However all his arguments not only were new but boiled down to the idea that he did religion is based on the belief that there is something broken or missing from humanity and he rejects the idea that he needs to be saved from himself and refuses to serve or believe in God that would condemn anyone to hell for thinking for himself or herself. I thought Kyle Butt did the correct thing to not challenge Barker on everyone of his Bible "contradictions". Kyle was right, those "contradictions" can be reconciled and reasonably shown not to be contradictions. This is a good debate to listen to.
This post goes along with the polls in the side bar. I wrote a post yesterday called Eric Holder is Correct where I discussed an editorial cartoon that really angered me as racist. The truth is that I read a post today by an author, Peter David, whom I admire who happens to White. He did not see the same problems with the cartoon.
My response to the cartoon itself is twofold:
First, it's the New York Post. Were they attempting to slam Obama personally, associating him in a racist fashion with a monkey? Possible. Then again, there's the old notion that if you put an infinite number of monkeys in a room with infinite typewriters and give them an infinite amount of time, they could produce the works of Shakespeare. So it could be argued that a dead monkey is an editorial cartoon shorthand for something that anyone could have produced, in a random fashion, and not particularly well.
Second, and more important...it's the New York Post! Why does anyone give a damn what they say about anything? Before they produce the works of Shakespeare, the infinite monkeys will probably produce an issue of the Post. It should be accorded exactly that amount of respect and concern.
He thinks that Sharpton jumps the gun attributing racism to the editorial staff and artist at the New York Post. I don't agree with how he understood the cartoon. I don't see it. It got me thinking: Do all black people see the cartoon the way I do? What do other people see when they see it?
Here is the cartoon again:
I'd like to see some comments about what you believe the cartoon is saying. If you don't want to comment and vote in my poll, please just vote. I think the results could be interesting.
Today Eric Holder, the first black Attorney General of the United States, gave a speech for which he has received a considerable amount of criticism. He said that despite the fact that we consider ourselves a "melting pot" a diverse races, cultures, and viewpoints we are a nation of cowards when it comes to seriously discussing race. Here is what he said in his own words:
I don't understand why that would make people angry because he was telling the truth. How do I know he was telling the truth? What proof do I have? Well also today the New York Post ran a political cartoon that was based on the shooting of a pet chimpanzee that went "ape" and severely injured a woman in Conneticut and on the Obama's new Stimulus Bill. For anyone who did not see the "ape" story here it is:
For the record, I don't know what set the monkey off. I have no idea of what caused the attack. But for sure, the monkey tasted human blood. When an animal attacks and injures a human being, that animal by-and-large must be killed. The thing was 200 lbs and even those smaller, cute, chimpanzees that we normally think of are several times stronger than a normal human being. The woman did not have a chance. I said all that to get to this next point: the cartoon that the New York Post ran:
Okay, personally, this really offended me. I mean what were they trying to say. Obama is black. He just wrote a stimulus package. Racist white people used to (and still do) call black people "monkey". You've got two white cops standing over a dead monkey that they just shot talking about needing someone else to write another stimulus package. Duh!!! Are we not to get implication that they are saying a monkey was responsible for the stimulus bill and that monkey should be put down? What other interpretation should we get? I'm truly confused and don't understand how the New York Post could defend printing this! How could they be so "cowardly" to not admit that this is racially offensive to a lot of people. This is why I'd say Eric Holder is right. On top of this, it's Black History Month! I have yet to hear an alternate interpretation of how the editorial staff interprets what this cartoon is saying! Instead they suggest Al Sharpton is just trying to garner publicity when he spoke out against them this morning! Here is what Al Sharpton said:
Before I post the following video, I thought that it was amazing how much it comments on the state of feminism and cries of "equal" rights. This video is a humorous parody of what would happen if a woman became dictator of a third-world country. Most of the comments are applied to any woman who is "first" to be something or do something traditionally dominated by men. It's strange to hear those same comments being applied to being a dictator and engineer of genocide and persecution as those comments praising a woman for excelling at being an executive or successful at something good. Have we really gone that far at praising women for everything...good or bad? Something to think about. Personally, I don't have a problem with women having and welding authority and power as long at they do it according to the will of God. That being said men and women are different...neither is better or worse than the other. God said so.
I saw this on YouTube and it shocked me. This woman is acting like a two-year-old little girl throwing a tantrum (trust me I know what that looks like!) I felt bad for her husband who looked like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming vehicle. Scary! To be fair maybe they was a reason for her reaction, I just can't imagine what that could be!
I've recently found a clip on YouTube from two speeches from Barack Obama before he took the Presidential Oath. In them, he calls for our government and society to commit to supporting science and innovation. To not just give money, but encourage and support education so that we can have new generations of scientists and engineers to return and keep America at the leading cutting edge of science. I agree. Here is the video.
The only thing I find that I disagree with is that he seems to suggest that science can be stymied or curtailed by religious ideology. The truth is that I think that history can bear out that economic concerns derail science just as much as religious ideas. Los Angeles is an example. Just after World War II, plans for giving the Los Angeles region of California a subway or light-rail system was abandoned because the powers-that-be decided that they could make more money selling cars and building highways in Southern California, resulting in some of the worst traffic and smog the world has ever seen. There are other examples.
Obama urges us to have open minds when considering science and being open to possibilities. However, we find more and more examples of people deciding to close their minds to the scientific and logic evidence against the theory of evolution. Some of which I have discussed in this blog with more to follow. There are legitimate scientists and engineers who interpret the data and come up with different legitimate conclusions! I am one of them. Let me just end this by quoting the title of one of Norman Giesler's greatest works: "I don't have enough faith to be an atheist!"
As you probably have heard, the passage of one the economic bills Obama has proposed has been passed into law. I have no idea what it all means but I thought that it would be good to post what Obama said about it:
Here is what John McCain had to say about the economic bailout
All I can say for sure is that something needs to be done. Only time will tell if what Obama is doing will prove to be right or not. The best we got, is to trust God and not in any one single man to save us from this mess. We also have to be prepared to accept what ever God decides for us because however or whatever that is will be what will happen and we need to just keep doing what we know we have each been called to do.
Well instead of multiple posts today I thought I would write a single post containing what I would like to say today. We are only about 6 weeks into 2009, but there has been so much going on.
The first thing I would like to write about today is that I thank God to see my 34th Birthday today. I'm very grateful. I still remember seeing the statistic when I was 17 in high school that said that I had a better chance to be dead or incarcerated by 25 being a black male in Oakland,CA than earn a degree from University of California. God said "No." At age 34, I have 3 college degrees, two of them from the University of California, Berkeley. I have a beautiful wife, Mitsouky, and wonderful daughter, Makayla, and a son, Mathias on the way. There is much to thank God for. I have a picture of picture of us at the top left and a picture of Makayla on the top on the right.
All that being said 4 things have happened in the news that deserve comment. One of those is that there was a devastating fire in Australia. We need to pray for them. I have never heard of anything so horrendous ever in my lifetime. I mean we have forest fires in California all the time, but I have never seen anything like it.
last month's story about a Dutch court's ruling that Geert Wilders [pictured on the right] was "inciting hatred and discrimination" - and that "it is in the public interest to prosecute" him - understandably didn't make the American news.
I was amazed when I read the reason why:
...he's a member of the Dutch parliament, and his precise villainy was releasing a 15-minute film. Entitled Fitna, it suggests a direct link between certain verses of the Koran and acts of terrorism.
Not to be outdone, the United Kingdom this week banned Wilders from entering the country. Its reasoning: His "presence in the U.K. would pose a genuine, present, and sufficiently serious threat to one of the fundamental interests of society." A letter from the home secretary went on to tell Wilders that "your statements about Muslims and their beliefs, as expressed in your film Fitna and elsewhere, would threaten community harmony and therefore public security."
I was floored. I think one characteristic of a cult is that a cult discourages scrutiny and investigations of the claims the organization makes. I'm not insinuating that all Muslims do that. In fact some so-called Christians do the same. If you can't explain what you believe and why you believe it, I think you need to re-think your claims. We are seeing in European countries such as the Netherlands and in England a fear of any criticism of Islam being seen as racism or persecution of the people who practice it. In trying to protect them from persecution, these governments are curtailing the freedoms of Christians. Christianity says many different things completely opposite from what Islam says. By saying that Christians cannot say things opposite to what Islam says or for Christianity to raise objections to Islam is effect silencing Christians. Why should we care in America? Simple. Some people are trying to do the same thing here. Christianity is open to investigation and invites scrutiny by anyone. Ask whatever you want. It's been 2000 years, there is no way anyone can raise an objection or ask a question that there is not an answer. Some well-meaning Christians and some not-so-well-meaning "Christians" have said that asking questions show a lack of faith. I disagree. More importantly, God disagrees. Christians believe that the Bible was written under God's inspiration. Therefore we must accept that the following came from God in 1 Peter 3:15-16:
But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, keeping a clear conscience, so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ may be ashamed of their slander.
We are obligated and mandated to provide a reasonable defense for the faith which we have pledged our lives.
And now for the last thing. Today, I saw an article on AOL.com that reports that a 13 year-old boy in Britian has become a father to a baby, and the mother is 15. The article talks about the boy not knowing what "financial" means when he was asked how he was going to financially support the baby. Apparently, teenaged pregnancy is just as big a deal in Britian as it is here. It seems like the decision to help the situation there is to start offering basic sex eductaion to kindergarteners. As the father of a two year-old girl, I don't want that here. I'm amazed that there are boys at the age of 12 and 13 are even considering sex. When I was that age I did not know what sex is and at two, I really don't want my daughter to be thinking about it either. I think education is important and needed. The question is what should be taught? I have never seen an educational program for sex education that was Biblically based (meaning teach what the Bible teaches about sex, not what it teaches about salvation) being tried in public schools. I think that would work to change our whole society for the better.
Here are two video. It can be found in the following article.
It turns out that Microsoft's Photosynth is not the only way to come up panoramic HD pictures. If you recall, CNN used Photosynth to put together thousands of photos of the moment Barack Obama took the oath to become President of the United States in to a single high-def image. Turns out that there is another competing software out there that allows you do the same thing. It's called GigaPan. It not only allows you to find and share high-def panoramic pictures in a user committee like Facebook or Filckr, but also allows you to learn how to make your own. To be honest, the GigaPan way seems more intensive than than Microsoft's approach. Here is how GigaPan describes it's process. With Photosynth, the software does most of the work and you can take photos from different sources.
The GigaPan process engages with you in four steps:
1. Explore
Starting right now, you can search, browse and explore all of the panoramas that are available on the GigaPan sharing site. Dive into the panoramas to explore for yourself, or explore other users' snapshots to see what others have found.
2. Discover
As soon as you create your free user account, you can not only explore, but you can also annotate and share your discoveries by creating new snapshots and describing what you have found. This is a way to take part in the GigaPan community even if you have not done panoramic photography yet.
3. Create
We are pleased to announce that large-scale production of the GigaPanTM robotic camera mount is underway. The GigaPanTM robotic camera mount is capable of capturing multi-gigapixel, explorable panoramas with many compact digital cameras. The GigaPanTM robotic camera mount is manufactured and sold by GigaPan Systems.
You don't need specialized GigaPan hardware to take your own panoramas. If you have lots of patience, a high-quality digital camera, and a good tripod (or very steady hand!) you can take hundreds or thousands of overlapping, zoomed-in pictures for a gigapixel-scale panorama, then use off-the-shelf stitching software to combine the images into one very high-resolution panorama for upload.
4. Share
Once you create your free account, you can download our free upload tool to enable you to take any panoramic, high-resolution image and add it to the GigaPan sharing site for community exploration, annotation, and discovery.
Here is an example from their site - a shot of the Inauguration by David Bergman.
As our economy worsens, I have noticed more people gravitating to Word-of-faith teachings. The thought that God wants everyone to be rich is heretical and unsupportable from scripture. Some even take it to the level of teaching that if you aren't rich then you are not pleasing God so he is not blessing you. This bother me so much. There is no way to get that out of scripture! We cannot allow this teaching to continue unchallenged. Hank Hanegraaff wrote Christianity in Crisis documenting the problems with these teachings. Don't believe that this is a problem. Look at an e-mail I received announcing a new book by Richard Briley (picture in the upper left).
Does God Want YOU To Be a Success?
Special OFFER! Go Here Now.
When God wants something done, He always gives it to ONE PERSON to do — a Moses, a Peter, a Paul, a David, a Gideon, a Mary. Had you noticed?
In Pray and Be Rich, Dr. Richard Gaylord Briley reveals a startling Biblical truth that has great implications for your life:
One person, committed to a goal, is all God needs to change the world.
He’s done it many times. And if history turns many more pages, He’ll surely do it again. At the very least, you and God together can change your world.
The new audio program — Pray and Be Rich — is about one person — YOU — and the success plans that God has for all who believe, pray and act on the message of the Bible.
To start, to get the most from this sensational audio program and find daring faith to act upon your God-given potential for success, you must already believe that:
* The Bible is more than humanity’s oldest book of living wisdom — though it is at least that. * Life has meaning and purpose. * Your life has a special purpose, even if that purpose and a plan to achieve it are not yet clear to you.
Get Pray and Be Rich's "Steps to Success" Go Here Now.
Scared yet? Pray...Pray...that people don't fall for this. Yes, God wants us to prosper but it is on God's terms not ours!
Marvel.com has announce a new direction Marvel - a hybrid of comic books and animation. They call it "Motion Comics". What it is an online product that takes the flat artwork of comics and add animation and voice and music. It reminds me of the first cartoons based on Marvel Comics characters, only better animated. I like the idea. I want to see more. Here is trailer for the technology
Well I got the Hulk Vs DVD and I've got to admit that it was great! I loved it. They were great stand-alone stories. To be honest, I liked the Wolverine story better because I think Wolverine was captured perfectly as well as the Hulk. Wolverine took a huge beating but he gave as good as he got. I thought Thor was too wussy. He got his can kicked and handed back to him a lot more than I expected.
I believe that I would say that the Hulk won both battles on the DVD and he fought more than just Thor and Wolverine. He fought all of Weapon X and the army of Asgard and beat all of them.
Is Apple working on a tablet computer? The fine folks at Gizmodo seem to think so. The site has examined an Apple patent and has come to the conclusion that the company has a tablet computer in the works.
"The patent describes several forms for these displays -- most of them already in use in current Apple laptops --, describing displays attached to portable computers. However, one of the claims describes the display as a 'housing for a computer device', which would include the computer electronics within the display housing, sandwiched between front and back shells."
I was a proud Newton user in the '90s. I loved the device's handwriting recognition, especially when watching my friends struggle with Graffiti on their Palm IIIs. I'd love for Apple to reenter the market with an elegant, portable-computing device that features the company's lauded user interface.
I'm amazed about the criticism James White has received concerning his debate against Bart Ehrman. I have to wonder did they hear the same debate I did?! On his blog, White points out the following example:
Alan Kurschner reviewed a KJV Only article yesterday, and the author [Kent Brandenburg] (who wrote his first post without having listened to the entire debate, completed his review. The level of bias flies past the level of sheer bigotry, as seen in this amazing paragraph:
In fairness to Ehrman, even though I hate the work that he does, he has a higher standard for text that comes from God than White does. White acts like any of us should expect errors. I think it is White's Calvinism---God wanted errors in the text because of the greater good there would be (something like that). The reason Ehrman, it seems, is willing to trust Tacitus more than the Bible, is because Tacitus doesn't claim inspiration or preservation. The Bible does.
Well there you go! Remember that a few months ago I played clips from a KJV Only radio program and demonstrated that the KJV Onlyists hold Ehrman's position, right along with the Muslims: "We need a variantless text, no matter what the realities of history are." And here you see it again. Of course, one can only imagine what an encounter between one of these folks and Ehrman would look like, but that's another issue.
Because King James Only advocates refuse to see that the King James Version is not divinely inspire, but the original Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic texts were they cannot really stand against Ehrman's criticisms. I mean look at Erhman's argument: "You don't have a single original copy on which to authoritatively base your beliefs." The KJV onlies think that the KJV Bible is superior to the older manuscripts but can't prove that it is. The men who translated the KJV admitted themselves that their translation was not perfect. So what can they say yo someone like Bart Ehrman? Nothing. They have no logical apologetic, yet they refuse to let go of their presuppositions instead of just studying and researching the facts. There is a logical explanation and a defense for every criticism Ehrman levies against the Bible. James White, with the help of the Lord, did a powerful job defending the faith.
Here is the Preface of the King James Bible from 1611.
The fastest computer in the world today was built last year. It's can run a 1 trillion calculations in a second (petaflop). Thank God that it's one of ours!
By 2012, the government and IBM will have built Sequoia, a computer that's 20 times more powerful than that.
Um, that will be twenty trillion calculations in a second! 20 Petaflops!!!! That's insane. They are going to be using it mathematically model nuclear explosions and predict weather patterns! Again, thank God that is one of ours!
The specs on this things are as follows:
Sequoia
* 3,400 square feet * 1.6 million processing cores * 1.6 petabytes of memory * 96 racks * 98,304 computing nodes * Uses 6 megawatts of power a year: Enough energy for 500 American homes!
I found a great video explaining how we got to the Internet we see today. It traces it's development over the past 50 years! If you wanna know how we got the current level of information technology, this is the video to watch! Really, Really well done and matches what I have already learned.
I wanted to make it a point to comment on the debate James White did recently against Bart Ehrman. I have bought the debate and listened to the debate myself and i gained a great deal from it. I would suggest that anyone who wants to interact with the question of whether or not the Bible we hold in our hands is an accurate copy of the texts that were inspired by God. The debate question was: "Did the Bible Misquote Jesus" taken from the title of Ehrman's book Misquoting Jesus. I think that Ehrman was condescending and unprepared. I agree with James White's analysis that Erhman did not adequately prepare for the Debate but I don't think he adequately met any of the White's challenges. Ehrman's main point is that there are so many variations in copies of the New Testament that there is no way to get back to what the original authors really wrote. He then concludes that God had not preserved the New Testament. People, like atheists and Muslims, further take that and conclude that the New Testament is full of errors and not inspired by God. During the debate, Ehrman, tried to distance himself from the conclusion drawn from his work saying that the was not responsible and that his conclusion that the texts are not inspired was based on his own opinion and not by his research. Thankfully, White called him on that.
In my opinion, James White did a great job explaining that Ehrman's conclusions are wrong. We do know what the original texts say although we don't have the original copies.
The blogger at Apologetics 315 has done it again! These are important for anyone who want to know how we got today's English translations of Holy Scripture.
While I realize that the following video was posted on YouTube by a conservative (using a picture of Ronald Regan for your profile is a dead give away), I've got to admit that Pelosi really stepped in it. Watch:
There are not 500 million people living in the United States. She is obviously Mistaken.
There are ten new species of amphibians discovered in the mountains of Columbia - including three kinds of poisonous frogs and three transparent-skinned glass frogs. That is amazing. It's dangerous to assume we have found every single living species on the earth. We keep finding new ones. The variety of life on our world is mind boggling. I'd like to know how would transparent skin helps a frog survive out there. I'd like to know how would people who believe in evolution would explain their transparent skin. Science is unable to answer these questions because we just found the animals. I'm amazed. I believe that God created those frogs and salamanders, gave them their abilities and habits, and placed them where they live. He did the same for every living thing on earth. I'm sure that there is a good reason for transparent skin for those frogs other than feeling us with awe and wonder, but it does that too!
An exciting discovery has been made: a non-gaseous planet orbiting a sun-like star about 457 light-years away. The COROT space telescope was used to observe the planet. Very little is known about the planet, they have named: COROT-Exo-7b
1. Orbits its star about once every 20 hours 2. Temperatures ranging from 1,832 to 2,732 degrees Fahrenheit (1,000 to 1,500 degrees Celsius) 3. Could be covered in lava or water vapor. 4. Estimated to be 5.7 to 11 Earth masses (means 5.7 to 11 times the mass of earth) in other words they are debating its size and density.
I found a site with some more information on COROT-Exo-7b.
I just heard that Wen Jiabao, the Chinese Premier, was heckled February 2, while delivering a speech about the world economy at Cambridge University in England. A protester threw his shoe! Fortunately, he missed the Premier by several feet. The man was apparently upset about Chinese policy towards Tibet. The man shouted:
“How can the university prostitute itself with this dictator? How can you listen to these lies?”
Before throwing his shoe and his forcibly being removed. I think that Wen Jiabao handled the situation with much more class than George W. Bush did. He said:
“This despicable behaviour cannot stand in the way of friendship between China and the UK.”
I got to admit I'm floored by the way people are choosing to protest these days.
On Danielle Belton's blog, The Black Snob, she has alerted everyone to the reality that advertising companies are scrambling trying to find several black girls to model in the wake of the Obama family's popularity. Like her, I'm surprised that they think that there is a "shorage". I've got lots of relatives too. I meran there are black folks all over the planet.It's like they've never been to a playground. In case she is serious about sending them potential candidate's model, here is my suggestion: my two year-old daughter, Makayla, in a candid video. I'll send the picture on the right in an e-mail. I might even send a newer one later on.
I'm sure that anyone who reads my blog has noticed that I like the Apologetics 315 blog. It is regularly updated with apologetic information...including debates and scholarly lectures. Here is a get one on Gnosticism.
