Cultural Vertigo

SlowBlogging

2009-03-18T21:35:00.001-07:00

http://toddsieling.com/slowblog/?page_id=10

Too much time on your hands?

2008-12-19T07:02:00.000-08:00

Fun with secularist bigots.

2008-09-27T17:26:00.005-07:00

PZ Myers is a Prof somewhere in Minnesota. He is what you might call a secularist bigot. He figures that religion in general and Christianity and Christians in particular are worthy of nothing but derision. He doesn't seem to know the difference between a sneer and an argument.

He has penned this 'Atheist Creed' which shows quite nicely the contradictions inherent in an atheist worldview.

"I believe in time,
matter, and energy,
which make up the whole of the world."

**In other words, the only things that exist are artifacts of the physical universe. Immaterial things do not exist. Immaterial things include things like minds, numbers, letters, the laws of logic, justice, fairness, tolerance. These things are all immaterial and are rendered non-existent by an atheistic worldview.

I believe in reason, evidence and the human mind,
the only tools we have;
they are the product of natural forces
in a majestic but impersonal universe,
grander and richer than we can imagine,
a source of endless opportunities for discovery.

**Pargraphs 1 and 2 are mutually exclusive, and Myers affirms both. How can material causes lead to immaterial effects? If the mind is the result of only natural forces (he means random mutations and natural selection), how can we trust that the mind can accurately detect truth? If minds evolved through natural selection, then the ability of a mind to detect truth is not the reason for its existence. Myers assertion undermines his entire worldview. Material minds cannot be trusted.

I believe in the power of doubt;
I do not seek out reassurances,
but embrace the question,
and strive to challenge my own beliefs.

**Ignorance is bliss?!

I accept human mortality.

**Good for you Doc, how long did it take for you to figure that out?

We have but one life,
brief and full of struggle,
leavened with love and community,
learning and exploration,
beauty and the creation of
new life, new art, and new ideas.

**You forgot to add that suffering, struggle, love, community and learning are all meaningless in a materialistic universe. How nice! And how do we know these things are good or bad without an external standard by which to judge?

I rejoice in this life that I have,
and in the grandeur of a world that preceded me,
and an earth that will abide without me."

**You are right there PZ, the world will continue to turn without you, and in time, your secularist bigotry will be shown for what it is.

- An Atheist's Creed, by PZ Myers

Lets have some fun, shall we?

2008-09-26T23:34:00.001-07:00

"I believe in time,
matter, and energy,
which make up the whole of the world.

I believe in reason, evidence and the human mind,
the only tools we have;
they are the product of natural forces
in a majestic but impersonal universe,
grander and richer than we can imagine,
a source of endless opportunities for discovery.

I believe in the power of doubt;
I do not seek out reassurances,
but embrace the question,
and strive to challenge my own beliefs.

I accept human mortality.

We have but one life,
brief and full of struggle,
leavened with love and community,
learning and exploration,
beauty and the creation of
new life, new art, and new ideas.

I rejoice in this life that I have,
and in the grandeur of a world that preceded me,
and an earth that will abide without me."

- An Atheist's Creed, by PZ Myers

-------------

Feel free to comment.

Is Christianity Irrational!

2008-09-20T19:50:00.001-07:00

From the Wall Street Journal...

Look Who's Irrational Now
By MOLLIE ZIEGLER HEMINGWAY

"You can't be a rational person six days of the week and put on a suit and make rational decisions and go to work and, on one day of the week, go to a building and think you're drinking the blood of a 2,000-year-old space god," comedian and atheist Bill Maher said earlier this year on "Late Night With Conan O'Brien."

On the "Saturday Night Live" season debut last week, homeschooling families were portrayed as fundamentalists with bad haircuts who fear biology. Actor Matt Damon recently disparaged Sarah Palin by referring to a transparently fake email that claimed she believed that dinosaurs were Satan's lizards. And according to prominent atheists like Richard Dawkins, traditional religious belief is "dangerously irrational." From Hollywood to the academy, nonbelievers are convinced that a decline in traditional religious belief would lead to a smarter, more scientifically literate and even more civilized populace.

The reality is that the New Atheist campaign, by discouraging religion, won't create a new group of intelligent, skeptical, enlightened beings. Far from it: It might actually encourage new levels of mass superstition. And that's not a conclusion to take on faith -- it's what the empirical data tell us.

"What Americans Really Believe," a comprehensive new study released by Baylor University yesterday, shows that traditional Christian religion greatly decreases belief in everything from the efficacy of palm readers to the usefulness of astrology. It also shows that the irreligious and the members of more liberal Protestant denominations, far from being resistant to superstition, tend to be much more likely to believe in the paranormal and in pseudoscience than evangelical Christians.
[Bigfoot] Corbis

The Gallup Organization, under contract to Baylor's Institute for Studies of Religion, asked American adults a series of questions to gauge credulity. Do dreams foretell the future? Did ancient advanced civilizations such as Atlantis exist? Can places be haunted? Is it possible to communicate with the dead? Will creatures like Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster someday be discovered by science?

The answers were added up to create an index of belief in occult and the paranormal. While 31% of people who never worship expressed strong belief in these things, only 8% of people who attend a house of worship more than once a week did.

Even among Christians, there were disparities. While 36% of those belonging to the United Church of Christ, Sen. Barack Obama's former denomination, expressed strong beliefs in the paranormal, only 14% of those belonging to the Assemblies of God, Sarah Palin's former denomination, did. In fact, the more traditional and evangelical the respondent, the less likely he was to believe in, for instance, the possibility of communicating with people who are dead.

This is not a new finding. In his 1983 book "The Whys of a Philosophical Scrivener," skeptic and science writer Martin Gardner cited the decline of traditional religious belief among the better educated as one of the causes for an increase in pseudoscience, cults and superstition. He referenced a 1980 study published in the magazine Skeptical Inquirer that showed irreligious college students to be by far the most likely to embrace paranormal beliefs, while born-again Christian college students were the least likely.

Surprisingly, while increased church attendance and membership in a conservative denomination has a powerful negative effect on paranormal beliefs, higher education doesn't. Two years ago two professors published another study in Skeptical Inquirer showing that, while less than one-quarter of college freshmen surveyed expressed a general belief in such superstitions as ghosts, psychic healing, haunted houses, demonic possession, clairvoyance and witches, the figure jumped to 31% of college seniors and 34% of graduate students.

We can't even count on self-described atheists to be strict rationalists. According to the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life's monumental "U.S. Religious Landscape Survey" that was issued in June, 21% of self-proclaimed atheists believe in either a personal God or an impersonal force. Ten percent of atheists pray at least weekly and 12% believe in heaven.

On Oct. 3, Mr. Maher debuts "Religulous," his documentary that attacks religious belief. He talks to Hasidic scholars, Jews for Jesus, Muslims, polygamists, Satanists, creationists, and even Rael -- prophet of the Raelians -- before telling viewers: "The plain fact is religion must die for man to live."

But it turns out that the late-night comic is no icon of rationality himself. In fact, he is a fervent advocate of pseudoscience. The night before his performance on Conan O'Brien, Mr. Maher told David Letterman -- a quintuple bypass survivor -- to stop taking the pills that his doctor had prescribed for him. He proudly stated that he didn't accept Western medicine. On his HBO show in 2005, Mr. Maher said: "I don't believe in vaccination. . . . Another theory that I think is flawed, that we go by the Louis Pasteur [germ] theory." He has told CNN's Larry King that he won't take aspirin because he believes it is lethal and that he doesn't even believe the Salk vaccine eradicated polio.

Anti-religionists such as Mr. Maher bring to mind the assertion of G.K. Chesterton's Father Brown character that all atheists, secularists, humanists and rationalists are susceptible to superstition: "It's the first effect of not believing in God that you lose your common sense, and can't see things as they are."

Ms. Hemingway is a writer in Washington.

The God Gene

2008-09-13T21:23:00.001-07:00

Isaac Madland

2008-09-13T16:03:00.003-07:00

'Nuff Said.

More on the shack...

2008-08-07T20:07:00.000-07:00

Challies...

I am a coward

2008-07-15T18:36:00.003-07:00

How do I know?

Much to my chagrin, I do not have the guts to bite people myself, and so I have one of these...

The Shack...caveat lector!

2008-07-13T16:28:00.002-07:00

I am mostly finished reading the latest super-smash hit in 'Christian' literature..."The Shack".

I must say that I am thoroughly disappointed that this book is so popular. The premise of the book, of a man having a conversation with God after his young daughter was brutally murdered, is certainly compelling and had significant potential in illuminating the age-old problem of suffering and evil. The author, however, appears to have aimed for $ale$ rather than biblical accuracy or theological depth. Instead of delving into what it means to be a Christian in a world full of suffering, we get the same old 'emergent' fluff that we have been getting for far too long.

If there is one horse that is beaten to death over and over again it is that all God wants is to be our buddy, our peer. There are other horses as well. The cynicism with which the author describes the Church, scripture, Christianity, doctrine and theology is the same schlupp that we have read from Brian McLaren for several years now. It is time to get over it folks and move back to what we know to be true.

There are several reviews of The Shack available out there. I will post some following this rant.

Please, if you must read The Shack, at least know that while it has some interesting parts, it is, in the words of Mark Driscoll 'actually heretical'.

Here is the conclusion of a summary and critique by Tim Challies.

"Focusing on just three of the subjects William
Young discusses in The Shack, we’ve seen that
errors abound. He presents a false view of God
and one that may well be described as heretical. He
downplays the importance and uniqueness of the Bible,
subjugating it or making it equal to other forms of
subjective revelation. He misrepresents redemption
and salvation, opening the door to the possibility of
salvation outside of the completed work of Jesus Christ
on the cross. We are left with an unbiblical
understanding of the persons and nature of God and of
His work in this world.
But this is not all. The discerning reader will note
as well that the author muddies the concepts of
forgiveness and free will. He introduces teaching that is
entirely foreign to the Bible, often stating with certainty
what is merely speculative. He oversteps the bounds of
Scripture while downplaying the Bible’s importance. He
relies too little on Scripture and too much on his own
theological imaginings.
All this is not to say there is nothing of value in
the book. However, it is undeniable to the reader who
will look to the Bible, that there is a great deal of error
within The Shack. There is too much error.
That The Shack is a dangerous book should be
obvious from this review. The book’s subversive
undertones seek to dismantle many aspects of the faith
and these are subsequently replaced with doctrine that
is just plain wrong. Error abounds.
I urge you, the reader, to exercise care in reading
and distributing this book. The Shack may be an
engaging read but it is one that contains far too much
error. Read it only with the utmost care and concern,
critically evaluating the book against the unchanging
standard of Scripture. Caveat lector!"

For the full text of the article...go to Challies.com

The Shack

2008-07-13T16:21:00.000-07:00

Morgentaler's Canada is not my Canada!

2008-06-29T23:10:00.003-07:00

An email I just received from Jojo Ruba at the Canadian Centre for Bioethical Reform...

Dear friends,

To celebrate Canada Day, the Governor General of Canada, Michaëlle Jean will be awarding Canada's highest honour, the Order of Canada to Henry Morgentaler, the man who helped legalize abortion in Canada. He is also one of Canada's most prolific abortion providers.

Though there has been no official confirmation yet, I have it on good authority that this will happen and it will be this week, just in time for Canada Day.

Though we at CCBR and much of the pro-life movement, have not had any time to officially respond (one of the reasons they are doing this on the long weekend, very few people will be paying attention), this is certainly something we are concerned about.

If you are someone who prays, please pray for this nation and its leadership. Though the Harper government has no official power to stop this action, I already know they are trying to pass the buck and not take any responsibility. They need, as well as every elected official, and the Governor General, to know that this is not acceptable to Canadians. Here's the GG's website:

http://www.gg.ca/menu_e.asp

The parliamentarians are at:

http://webinfo.parl.gc.ca/MembersOfParliament/MainMPsCompleteList.aspx?TimePeriod=Current&Language=E

As always, please conduct yourselves as good pro-life ambassadors and be polite but firm when you write.

I for one, will find it very hard to celebrate Canada Day this year. The tag line I'll be using is that Canada deserves better than this. Canada's women, men and children, born and unborn don't want and don't deserve their highest honour given to this callous killer.

This action is only happening because of the hubris pro-abortion leaders have about this issue. Let's help them understand that this debate is far from over.

As you ponder what to do in response as well, please do remember this work. I want more of you to help pray for us, finance us and work with us so that one day Canadians will recognize how unthinkable abortion is and how sad this action really is.

Godspeed,

Jojo Ruba

PS This is from the National Post Blog:

http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2008/06/29/douglas-farrow-quot-henry-morgentaler-s-canada-is-not-my-canada-quot.aspx

Douglas Farrow: "Henry Morgentaler’s Canada is not my Canada"

Posted: June 29, 2008, 7:16 PM by Yoni Goldstein

Word on the street is that, barring an unlikely 11th-hour intervention, Dr. Henry Morgentaler, our country’s most famous abortionist, will be inducted into the Order of Canada.

The decision, which is to be announced in time for Canada Day, is clearly not driven by popular demand. For example, an online poll by the Globe and Mail, with over 300,000 respondents, went 92% to 8% against giving the award to Morgentaler.

Nor, I've been told, was the decision a unanimous one, as is normally the case. No doubt we will be hearing much more about this in the next few days — talking points were being circulated among MPs as early as Friday — and perhaps the facts will find their way out in spite of the spin. If and when we have the facts, here are four questions I believe must be addressed:

First, did the Chief Justice of Canada, Beverley McLachlin, who is chair of the awards committee, preside over this decision? And if so, why did she not recuse herself? The award to Morgentaler is not only linked to the subject of abortion — a matter on which Canada has been in legislative limbo for many years — it is a clear endorsement of the practice of abortion. But the constitutionality of some new legislation limiting that practice may yet be raised before her court. If it is, will she then recuse herself?

Second, how successful will the government be in distancing itself from this decision, which (if word on the street is to be trusted) it is preparing to do? The government has two members on the committee, one of which is a deputy minister. Perhaps these members were opposed to the selection of Morgentaler, for whatever reason. But if there was a change of procedure, did they consent to it, knowing what the result would be? (If there was a change, and they did not consent, that makes our first question still more poignant.)

Third, what business has the committee making such a controversial award, when it so gravely affronts a very substantial number of Canadians and, indeed, deeply offends their consciences? Some argue that this “brave” man must not be denied his reward for bringing down an unjust law restricting abortion. But many others argue that the real injustice is that Canada, thanks in large part to Morgentaler and his disciples, has no law at all against cutting up babies in the womb — indeed it is the only “civilized” country without such a law. Does the committee presume to settle this national argument for us? How else are we to read their decision to make the award? And what does that say about the state of democracy in Canada?

Last but not least, how will the living members of the Order of Canada — those, that is, who believe, for whatever reason, that a great wrong is being done here — respond to the situation? Will they return their own medals in protest? How will MPs and, for that matter, the Prime Minister respond? How will the bishops and religious leaders respond? How will the people of Canada respond, those who cannot in good conscience bear the burden of being told that abortion is a “Canadian value”?

I can tell you that I myself am pondering this last question very seriously. Henry Morgentaler’s Canada is not my Canada. I’m with the late Louis-Philippe de Grandpré, sometime justice of the Supreme Court of Canada: “Abortion at any stage of pregnancy is murder, and any attack against the fetus is a crime. To kill a fetus is murder.”

--
Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform (CCBR)
Box 123
5 - 8720 Macleod Trail SE
Calgary, AB, T2H 0M4
(403) 668-0485
jruba@unmaskingchoice.ca

See it. Believe it. Change it. http://www.unmaskingchoice.ca

Summer is here

2008-06-29T22:00:00.006-07:00

And it is ridiculously hot. The thermometer in our backyard hit 41C in the shade this afternoon. We have spent a good chunk of time the last few evenings down at Riverside Park trying to cool down a little and at least let the kids run around in the water.

Today, we stopped at Booster Juice as I had received a gift card from a student and happened upon this guy and his bike...

OK, so the guy isn't in the pics, just his daughter. He is cycling across Canada raising awareness about the difficulties of single-parent families.

He had quite the rig set up for his tour. I couldn't tell if it was a homemade rig or a commercial one. He had his daughter out front and above the small front wheel, then huge saddle bags followed by a BOB Trailer.

All the best Stephane and Annabelle!

http://www.anasia-tour.blogspot.com
http://www.anasia.ca

Lighting a BBQ in Japan

2008-06-21T22:34:00.003-07:00

BTWW

2008-06-20T20:07:00.005-07:00

Lots of bikey goodness in town this week.

I was biking up to the final athletic directors' meeting up in Sahali on Tuesday when I encountered a water and oranges refill station for BTWW. She was stationed half way up the Columbia Street hill...perfect. Thanks Investor's Group lady! I had my fill, chatted with the nice lady giving out water and oranges and went on my way.

There was a significant number of cyclers out and about town this week, which was good to see.

One downer was the newly resurfaced bike path adjacent to the Overlander Bridge. It was closed for a month and just re-opened a week ago. My first ride over the new surface was a major disappointment. The surface looks great, has great traction, is well marked and is modelled after this...

Brutal abuse of our tax bucks. The surface is in worse shape than it was before they 'fixed' it.

If you are a cyclist in Kamloops, please send a note to City Hall that the contractor who did the work needs to go back and do it again.

On the brighter side of life...the BTWW folks hosted a free BBQ in Riverside Park after work today. They serving up some fab burgers and smokies (not likely as good as Fatty's brats though...while you are there, make sure you click on the Lance Armstrong Foundation links and make a donation) and some of the best strawberries that I have eaten in a loooong time. They were a very good argument against the USAmerican anemic berries that we have been buying at Stupidstore. Thanks to the BTWW folks who provided me with a chocolatey new t-shirt for organizing a 'team' at school...even though there were only the usual two of us who rode to work.

It was good to see Councillor Arjun Singh present and supportive of developing a cycling infrastructure that actually works (ie. a good way to get from downtown to Sahali and Aberdeen on bicycle). He also was very sympathetic to the fact that the aforementioned 'bridge repair' was absolutely brutal and offered to take a video camera out there for some evidence...perhaps I will. Kudos to you Mr. Singh for supporting cycling in Kamloops.

Last Saturday, I took a ride up to what will be our new house. This time we will be paying our own mortgage and not someone else's! The house is about 10 km from our place now and 450 m higher in elevation. Took about an hour to get up there on the Kona (with knobbies) even with a couple of route finding detours. The fun part was the 15 minute ride back down.

Keep the rubber side down.

Jazz

2008-06-15T08:40:00.002-07:00

If you like Miles Davis...head over to iTunes and purchase "Seven Steps: The Complete Columbia Recordings of Miles Davis 1963-64"

You will get 50 songs totalling over 7 hours of music for 10 bucks. A steal if you ask me.

June is...

2008-06-09T21:19:00.005-07:00

As I have posted here before...

Gas is a bazillion bucks a litre, what better time to be proactive and reduce the smog in your local area, reduce traffic congestion, clear your head before you get to work and save a few bucks on gas while you are at it.

Live in Kamloops?

Next week (June 16-22) is Bike to Work Week . It is a great chance to give commuting by bike a try. Those of you up on the hill. The ride to downtown will take you about 10 or 15 minutes of pure unadulterated glee and chocolateyness...and then you can park your bike onto a city bus and take the easy way back home. If you are on the north shore, Brock, Westsyde, Valleyview the ride is flat and you can take the Rivers Trail for most of the way. The weather will be beautiful next week (I have a special request in with Thor)...see you out there!

In other news...

It was determined that I was the prime candidate to drive our Sr Girls Soccer team to the Provincial championship tournament a couple weeks ago. I said...ok.

Spending the better part of a week in Whistler with my bike is hardly a tough sell.

Twas a grand time!

Keep the rubber side down!

Lost Generation

2008-06-08T22:50:00.001-07:00

Very clever...

Bill C-484

2008-06-06T07:06:00.001-07:00

A good video that shows why opposition to Bill C-484 is ridiculous.

From the NY Times

2008-05-23T10:41:00.001-07:00

"Every one-cent increase in gasoline prices means Americans pay $1.42 billion more a year for gas, according to Stephen P. Brown, an economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. Nearly two-thirds of that goes to foreign producers."

That is a lotta cash!

It pains me that I need to buy a cage.

On Bacon

2008-05-22T21:47:00.000-07:00

For certain it is that God worketh nothing in nature but by second causes: and if they would have it otherwise believed, it is mere imposture, as it were in favour towards God; and nothing else but to offer the Author of Truth the unclean sacrifice of a lie. But farther, it is an assured truth, and a conclusion of experience, that a little or superficial knowledge of Philosophy may incline the mind of man towards Atheism, but a farther proceeding therein doth bring the mind back again to Religion: for in the entrance of philosophy, when the second causes, which are next the senses, do offer themselves unto the mind of man, if it swell and stay there it may induce some oblivion of the highest cause; but when a man passeth on further, and seeth the dependence of causes, and the works of Providence, then, according to the allegory of the poets, he will easily believe that the highest link of Nature's chain must needs be tied at the foot of Jupiter's chair. To conclude therefore, let no man upon a weak conceit of sobriety or an ill-applied moderation think or maintain, that a man can search too far, or be too well studied in the Book of God's Word, or in the Book of God's Works—Divinity or Philosophy. But rather, let men endeavour an endless progress or proficience in both; only let men beware that they apply both to charity, and not to swelling [pride]; to use and not to ostentation; and again that they do not unwisely mingle or confound those learnings together.

Francis Bacon, Advancement of Learning (1605), Bk I.

Our Youth...the future of our country

2008-04-23T21:40:00.002-07:00

Several of them were at the school playing floor hockey tonight when I returned from driving a team up to Clearwater. One in particular, a boy in grade 11 was out in the hall and had just removed one of his shoes. He had obviously been playing hard for a good long time. I saw him bend over and take a sock off, stand up with the sock in his hand and proceed to wipe his forehead with the sock. Then he bent over again to take a look at the blister that had apparently formed on his foot during the game and had obviously popped.

Youth is wasted on the young.

Global What??

2008-04-15T21:34:00.002-07:00

A couple of articles have caught my eye in the last couple days...

This one is about the use of corn to produce ethanol for vehicular transportation...

Did you know that it takes 232 kg of corn to fill a 50 litre car tank with ethanol? Did you know that that same corn could feed a child for a year?

We drive, they starve.

And this one, about the fact that global temperatures decreased significantly over the last 12 months. The reason? Decreased solar radiation.

Values

2008-04-07T21:15:00.003-07:00

A significant reason for this blog was to share with you (all 3 or 4 of you) some of my thoughts and experiences related to living in Japan and our adjustment to life on this side of the Pacific. Our time there was tremendously formative in many ways, one of which was realizing that we needed to slow down. The practical outcome of that was that we sold our car and started riding our bikes or walking or riding transit.

We have been without a car for over a year now. We survived a Kamloopsian winter (although we never really hit below -15C and didn't really get any huge dumps of snow).

Things were cruising along quite nicely. We had our plans set out for the next several years and it seemed that we were progressing towards good things.

How times change. Towards the end of January, we discovered that Kelly is pregnant. This was certainly NOT in the long term plan. Needless to say, everything has changed since then. One of the changes that we knew was coming regardless of any pregnancy was the fact that we know that we have to move this summer. Our rental agreement will end and we will need another place to live.

Shortly after our surprising news, we received an invite from my sister to collaborate on a house that we could share with our families on an acreage just outside town, close enough to commute to work, yet far enough to be unmistakably rural. Since that time we have spent a significant amount of time looking for land to purchase, looking for the right house plan that works for two families and generally imagining what this little venture could look like. One of the obvious implications of moving out of town is the necessity of buying a car.

One of the things that I noticed during this process was that I was truly disappointed at the prospect of buying a car and the costs of a car seemed to become almost ridiculously insurmountable. While it is a 'good' time to buy a car in that cars are cheaper than they have been in a while, gas is crazy expensive and the thought of intentionally moving to a place that requires a 30-40 minute commute each way, every day just isn't appealing to me. I want MORE time on my bike and LESS time in a car. Having been car free for over a year, I get car-sick (rather appropriate) much more readily than I used to, and Mixon does too.

Perhaps the real trade-off that makes it all worth our while is that being out in the country will allow us to become more self-reliant by planting a garden, using alternative energy sources (passive solar) and possibly starting some sort of home-based business. Self-reliance is a good thing.

I know that I need to suck it up and buy a car. Asking Kelly to go car-free during the later stages of her pregnancy and while this next little Madland is an infant would be...uhh...met with some resistance. The big question is whether I want to live in a place that will maximize the amount of time that I spend in that car.

Taking Christ out of Christianity...

2008-03-28T18:25:00.003-07:00

...is kinda like taking the 'a' out of atheism. You are not left with a slightly different version of what you had before, you are left with the opposite.

"Reverend" Gretta Vosper the supposed spiritual leader of West Hill United "Church" in TO has this to say...

"There is no authoritative Big-Godism. No petitionary prayers (“Dear God, step into the world and do good things about global warming and the poor”). No miracles-performing magic Jesus given birth by a virgin and coming back to life. No references to salvation, Christianity's teaching of the final victory over death through belief in Jesus's death as an atonement for sin and the omnipotent love of God. For that matter, no omnipotent God, or god." (Maybe that isn't a direct quote...but you get the point.)

This is not a kinder, gentler version of Christianity, it is atheism dressed up in spiritual clothes.

It seems to be popular now-a-days to dismiss the Bible as being myths and legends that were written down decades after an imaginary person named Jesus supposedly lived. This is simply not the case.

The Bible enjoys far greater textual support, in the form of thousands of very early copies of manuscripts, than any written text in history. This includes Shakespeare, Plato, Socrates, Artistotle and many others. If you decide that the evidence for the reliability of the Bible is so weak that you throw it out, then you have to throw out the reliability of every text prior to the 18th century.

Calling this 'progressive christianity' is retarded. This is not Christianity at all and it goes to show that the United 'Church' has, in many respects become a cult.

More on the Abortion Debate at York U

2008-03-26T22:41:00.001-07:00

Here.

A Good Song

2008-03-23T07:48:00.000-07:00

Christ the Lord is risen today, Alleluia!
Sons of man and angels say, Alleluia!
Raise your joys and triumphs high, Alleluia!
Sing, ye heavens, and earth reply, Alleluia!

Lives again our glorious King, Alleluia!
Where, O death, is now thy sting? Alleluia!
Once he died our souls to save, Alleluia!
Where's thy victory, boasting grave? Alleluia!

Love's redeeming work is done, Alleluia!
Fought the fight, the battle won, Alleluia!
Death in vain forbids him rise, Alleluia!
Christ has opened paradise, Alleluia!

Soar we now where Christ has led, Alleluia!
Following our exalted Head, Alleluia!
Made like him, like him we rise, Alleluia!
Ours the cross, the grave, the skies, Alleluia!

...ianity?

2008-03-22T00:02:00.001-07:00

Tolerance and Free Speech

2008-03-20T12:44:00.004-07:00

The current ethos of moral relativism as the prevailing moral 'view' (although it does not qualify as a moral view because it makes no moral prescriptions) in our culture showed itself for what it really is in the last few weeks.

Many people have this mistaken idea that moral relativism is a tolerant viewpoint that allows everyone to make their own decisions about moral issues. But it is not. Moral relativism is radically intolerant of people who are moral objectivists. This was highlighted at York University recently when the York University group 'Students for Bioethical Awareness' organized a debate between Jose Ruba of the Canadian Centre for Bioethical Reform (the CCBR website contains graphic images of aborted babies) and Michael Payton of the York group 'Freethinkers, Skeptics and Atheists' about abortion.

When Kelly Holloway, President of the York University Graduate Student's Association heard of the debate, she became instrumental in calling an emergency meeting of the student council executive which voted unanimously to cancel the event only 90 mins or so before the scheduled time.

According to Holloway, "Most people understand that every woman has the right to choose what she does with her own body and that moral considerations about abortion are a very personal matter for individuals to decide," and "every York student has the right to make up their own mind and there is no need for an event, organized by anti-choice campaigners, that is disguised as a debate."

In other words, nobody has the right to tell a woman that abortion is wrong. It is a personal decision. Notice that Holloway is saying that it is WRONG for people to tell people that abortion is wrong. According to her own view, Holloway cannot tell anyone that anything is wrong, because she views moral decisions as being personal matters for individuals to decide. But she decides for people who are pro-life that they cannot even debate the merits of their view, let alone tell someone that they might be wrong about abortion.

Moral relativism, especially the kind of relativism promoted by Holloway (that each person decides for themselves what is right or wrong) is almost always self-refuting in practice.

Fortunately the Administration at York U has responded to the outcry from newspapers and the general public about the stifling of free speech on campus and hosted the event on Tuesday, March 18.

It seems that Holloway's panicked reaction to speech that she did not agree with ended up backfiring on her as turnout to the re-scheduled event was boosted by the controversy over it being canceled in the first place.

According to Richard Fisher, a university spokesman, "Any debate that is legal and protected by free speech needs to occur...if it can't happen at a ... liberal arts university, where can it happen?"

Turns out also that Ruba was more successful in defending the pro-life position than Payton was in defending the pro-death position.

Large Fella on a Bike

2008-03-19T23:02:00.002-07:00

I don't remember if I have mentioned Large Fella on a Bike on my blog before. Two years ago Scott, the Large Fella, was 501 lbs. His Doctor told him he had about 6 months to live without radical bariatric surgery. His Doctor also told him that his chances of surviving the surgery were about 50/50 given all the stresses on his heart.

Check out the rest of the story here or on his blog.

Children and TV

2008-03-18T17:41:00.002-07:00

Here is a photo series of children watching TV.

I would be interested to know what kind of programming they were watching and how their facial expressions (or lack thereof) would change from genre to genre.

One thing I noticed when our kids were younger was that when Kelly and I were watching TV, the kids would be largely disinterested...until the ads came on. At that point, they would drop whatever they were doing and come running.

I read recently that Prez Sarkozy over in France has suggested banning advertising from public TV in an effort to encourage more thoughtful and valuable programming. He proposed
taxing cell phone and internet contracts to make up the difference in revenue.

While I think his motives are laudable, maybe he should instead look to ways to make do without the ad revenue and maybe even reduce the size of his government.

We have a TV but it is used for our XBox and watching DVDs. It is much easier to control that way.

From 'Weighty Matters'

2008-03-18T08:06:00.001-07:00

Does playing Wii Sports burn calories? Follow the link...

Food

2008-03-17T14:48:00.001-07:00

From Michael Pollan's book "In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto"

From the book, here are Pollan’s twelve commandments for the serious eater:

1. “Don’t eat anything your grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food.”

2. “Avoid foods containing ingredients you can’t pronounce.”

3. “Don’t eat anything that won’t eventually rot.”

4. “Avoid food products that carry health claims.”

5. “Shop the peripheries of the supermarket; stay out of the middle.”

6. “Better yet, buy food somewhere else: the farmers’ market or CSA.”

7. “Pay more, eat less.”

8. “Eat a wide variety of species.”

9. “Eat food from animals that eat grass.”

10. “Cook, and if you can, grow some of your own food.”

11. “Eat meals and eat them only at tables.”

12. “Eat deliberately, with other people whenever possible, and always with pleasure.”

Abortion and Mental Illness

2008-03-17T10:14:00.003-07:00

Fancy this; The Times, from London has published an article that reports that the Royal College of Psychiatrists in England is warning that having an abortion actually causes mental illness.

According to the article...

"Women may be at risk of mental health breakdowns if they have abortions, a medical royal college has warned. The Royal College of Psychiatrists says women should not be allowed to have an abortion until they are counselled on the possible risk to their mental health.

This overturns the consensus that has stood for decades that the risk to mental health of continuing with an unwanted pregnancy outweighs the risks of living with the possible regrets of having an abortion."

And...

"More than 90% of the 200,000 terminations in Britain every year are believed to be carried out because doctors believe that continuing with the pregnancy would cause greater mental strain.

The Royal College of Psychiatrists recommends updating abortion information leaflets to include details of the risks of depression. “Consent cannot be informed without the provision of adequate and appropriate information,” it says."

A key point is that in order for consent to be given, adequate and accurate information must be given to the woman about the 'procedure'. Is it too much to ask that Canadian women be given adequate and accurate information about abortion? Why does the pro-death lobby aggressively campaign against any consent laws regarding abortion?

In England, arguably a much more liberal society than Canada, they are debating whether to allow abortions after 20 weeks gestation rather than the current 24 weeks. Why is it that in Canada, abortion is legal through all nine months of pregnancy for any reason? Why does the pro-death lobby aggressively campaign against *any* restrictions on abortion in Canada? Why has parliament refused to deal with the legal status of the unborn in Canada?

Don't you think it is time that Canadians start to speak up for not only the rights of the unborn, but also for the health and safety of mothers who are in the midst of difficult pregnancies?

Shouldn't a compassionate society have room for both mothers and their children?

Back in the groove

2008-03-16T13:41:00.003-07:00

As a family, we are not really set up for a lot of winter riding. We didn't get a whole lotta snow this winter, but enough so that it would have been silly to try and take the kids out on the bikes. However, spring is springing. We have had some really nice weather the last couple of weeks and it has been good to get out a little.

Yesterday, Mixon asked if he could accompany me on my shopping trip to Superstore. I figured that would be a great idea, even though I figured it would mean several stops on the way up the hill. Thing is, he had it in his mind that he was going to make it all the way up without stopping. I think that it was related to the fact that the kids have been training at school for the local fun run in April. They call it Boogie the Bridge and our kids have signed up to run the 5k course...which means they need to be accompanied. ...

On the way up the hill, Mixon told me that he was setting small goals to break up the climb. It was slow, but he made it all the way up Columbia Street...I was impressed.

In other news...here is a good blog that I just discovered called Weighty Matters...written by a Canadian obesity doctor.

Rock Paper Scissors...its a big deal in Japan.

2008-03-16T13:22:00.001-07:00

Are you aware?

2008-03-14T20:47:00.000-07:00

Find out here.

Happy Pi Day

2008-03-14T20:26:00.002-07:00

Thinking

2008-03-13T18:32:00.003-07:00

I have been mulling and thinking about what I want to be when I grow up.

For a long time I have had in my mind some sort of job working with athletes in the strength and conditioning field, but that seems to be changing.

There are a great many dangerous ideas 'out there'. Most people think that morality is completely relative to the person engaging in any particular act, or that it is maybe relative to one's culture. That is a very bad idea.

Many people think that a 'perfect body' is attainable and desirable and will go to great lengths to try to reach that and in the process damage their health, sometimes irreversibly. That is a bad idea.

Many people think that educators should remain 'morally neutral' in a classroom and not describe any behaviour as being more or less moral than any other behaviour. That is a bad idea and it is also impossible.

I have recently come to realize that the people who control the ideas that circulate in society are scholars in universities.

I want to influence the ideas that Canadians interact with and think to be valuable.

Here is a short exerpt that I think hits the nail on the head...from Dr. Charles Malik:

"I must be frank with you: the greatest danger confronting American evangelical Christianity is the danger of anti-intellectualism. The mind in its greatest and deepest reaches is not cared for enough. But intellectual nurture cannot take place apart from profound immersion for a period of years in the history of thought and the spirit. People who are in a hurry to get out of the university and start earning money or serving the church or preaching the gospel have no idea of the infinite value of spending years of leisure conversing with the greatest minds and souls of the past, ripening and sharpening and enlarging their powers of thinking. The result is that the arena of creative thinking is vacated and abdicated to the enemy. Who among evangelicals can stand up to the great secular scholars on their own terms of scholarship? Who among evangelical scholars is quoted as a normative source by the greatest secular authorities on history or philosophy or psychology or sociology or politics? Does the evangelical mode of thinking have the slightest chance of becoming the dominant mode in the great universities of Europe and America that stamp our entire civilization with their spirit and ideas? For the sake of greater effectiveness in witnessing to Jesus Christ, as well as for their own sakes, evangelicals cannot afford to keep on living on the periphery of responsible intellectual existence." (“The Other Side of Evangelism,” Christianity Today, November 7, 1980, p. 40.)

Hat Tip... The Constructive Curmudgeon

The Faith

2008-03-05T20:49:00.002-08:00

Just finished reading an important book called The Faith. It was written by Charles Colson and Harold Fickett and is based on the first few verses of the book of Jude which say...

"Dear friends, although I was very eager to write to you about the salvation we share, I felt I had to write and urge you to contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints."

The subtitle is "What Christians Believe, Why they believe it and why it matters"

The book is under 250 pages and is written in straight-forward language. It is not written to either a Christian or non-christian audience in particular but is accessible to anyone of any or no faith.

Colson and Fickett discuss, although briefly, the key doctrines of Christianity and why they are important. Some of the doctrines that they touch on are the existence of God, revelation, truth, sin and redemption and the end of the world as we know it.

I recommend this book for anyone who is a serious student of Christianity and is interested in an introductory primer on the key doctrines of the faith, or someone who has been influenced by the popular atheist rants and tantrums from the likes of Dawkins, Hitchens, Harris, and Dennett. An honest reader will realize that the god and the faith that these guys caricature is certainly not the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob nor is it the faith that orthodox Christians profess.

The real Fat Cyclist

2008-03-03T21:09:00.001-08:00

Larry Norman

2008-02-27T16:43:00.001-08:00

1947-2008

"I feel like a prize in a box of Cracker Jacks with God's hand reaching down to pick me up, I have been under medical care for months. My wounds are getting bigger. I have trouble breathing. I am ready to fly home."

Breathing room

2008-02-24T20:09:00.002-08:00

Basketball season has pretty much wrapped up.

I will find out tomorrow how our senior teams did at the Okanagan championships and whether their season will continue for a couple more weeks. I know the girls won their first game, opening up the possibility of a top three finish and a trip to the provincial tournament in Osoyoos in a couple weeks. The boys lost their first game and would have to win their next two for any chance at a spot.

The junior teams are both done, the girls didn't make the playoffs, but played well for being a small team of grade 9s against much larger grade 10s. The boys played well enough to finish second in the city championships but lost a challenge match to South Kamloops Secondary, a much larger school.

The grade 8 teams have their playoffs this week.

Most importantly, I am not hosting any more tournaments! That is a good thing.

I have spent much of my blog time mixing it up with an 'agnostic atheist' who has started blogging at theframeproblem[dot]wordpress.com.

There is a concerted effort under way to show Christianity to be irrational at best and delusional, dangerous and a mental illness at worst.

I disagree.

It seems that the author of this particular blog (which has disappeared tonight) takes his cues and follows pretty much lock-step with guys like Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins and the like.

Needless to say, my opinions and comments on the blog were in a significant minority...but it was fun.

Hopefully I will have a little more chance to share about it here.

jazz

2008-02-14T20:10:00.002-08:00

sharing

life

together

was it your
eyes

is it your
laugh

わかりません
je ne sais quoi

mystery
keeps things
interesting

ephemeral
like the moments
we share
here and
gone

but never forgotten
and we are
better

we
are like
jazz

piano and sax
one

Taylor Mali on what teachers make

2008-01-27T21:29:00.001-08:00

Some things matter...

2008-01-25T20:35:00.000-08:00

Adhering to a faith does not make one a fanatic

Naomi Lakritz

Calgary Herald

Friday, January 25, 2008

To mark the 20th anniversary next Monday of the Supreme Court of Canada's removal of all legal limits to abortion, a group called LifeCanada wants Canadians to ask themselves if things have gone too far.

We shouldn't have to ask. The answer is self-evident. It's not just the staggering fact that in the past two decades, nearly two million abortions -- the equivalent population of two cities the size of Calgary -- have been performed in Canada. In those 20 years, the strangest attitude has grown up around the term "pro-life." To be, literally, "for life" is to be vilified as a nutbar or fanatic. Should we then be "pro-death"?

I am not using that term as a substitute for "pro-choice," but merely pointing out how ludicrous the opposite is, if "pro-life" is such an awful stance to take.

Pro-lifers, we are told, are crazies who shoot up abortion clinics and kill doctors. Pro-lifers ought to put their money where their mouths are and help all the unwanted, neglected children in the world. Pro-lifers are religious fanatics.

The reason for all this name-calling and ridiculous stereotyping is that it is anathema to insist that women have as much duty to responsibility as they do to choice. To suggest they take into account the life of the fetus will only net you catcalls of derision. If one were to advocate for women's unassailable choice to drive through red lights and break all the rules of the road, the reaction would be quite different. "Why, you could kill somebody that way!" they'd say.

It's OK, however, to kill someone when the only difference between him or her and the pedestrian crossing the street is that the former individual is unborn.

It might help to throw out a few myths here. Pro-lifers do not advocate shooting doctors and bombing clinics. Those are the actions of a lunatic fringe and they have been roundly condemned by the pro-life movement.

Since abortion is wide open in Canada because no laws restrict it, those "unwanted" children the pro-choice faction see all around us were born to mothers who were never denied access to abortion. Nothing stood in the way of them terminating their pregnancies, but for whatever reason, they chose to have their babies.

Pro-lifers do indeed care about these children -- one of the staunchest pro-life women I know has spent years fostering children with fetal alcohol syndrome.

These kids were all born to mothers who could have had abortions, but didn't. Nobody forced them to have these babies. Some of them had four, five or six infants taken from them over the years by child welfare authorities.

Pro-lifers are not religious fanatics. Adhering to a particular faith does not make one a fanatic. What it does is anchor a person in certain moral values, among them the belief that human life is sacred, regardless of where it is on the continuum from before birth straight through to old age. Since when is it fanaticism to place a value on human life?

I am often puzzled, in conversation with pro-choicers, at the inevitable sneers that arise whenever I mention that adoption needs to be promoted more than it is. I don't understand their objections. After all, in adoption, nobody dies.

Even though it's a basic scientific fact that by four weeks gestation, before a woman knows she is pregnant, the fetus has brain waves and a beating heart, the pro-choicers don't believe that someone dies during an abortion. Thus, they argue it would be too traumatic for a woman to give up her baby to an infertile couple who have been waiting years to have a family. Strange. The choice of giving a person life is too traumatic, so killing that person is better? I fail to see the logic -- only the monstrous selfishness.

Here's another example of how the meanings of words surrounding this issue, in the last 20 years of unrestricted abortion, have been skewed.

Dr. Henry Morgentaler is often referred to as a "hero." How very odd.

Heroes pull people from burning buildings or rescue them from drowning. A hero saves lives. Morgentaler is being called a hero for taking lives. Whatever else Morgentaler is, he is not a hero.

The question, Alice in Wonderland said to Humpty Dumpty, is "whether you can make words mean so many different things." If we're ever going to turn things around so that Canada is no longer the only western country where abortion is a free-for-all, then we must start with the words and have them mean the truth.

nlakritz@theherald.canwest.com

Can't wait for summer!!

2008-01-15T22:05:00.001-08:00

McElway Basketball

2008-01-10T20:03:00.001-08:00

I was hot as a pistol!

whew...

2007-12-17T21:19:00.000-08:00

This month has been nuts. You may have guessed.

We moved, again. Basketball season started and along with it came tournaments...two down and three to go. Christmas parties, christmas concerts...speaking of which...when St. Ann's puts on their Christmas concert, they take over the gym for close to a week. I have been booted out of my gym. So I took a bunch of trips up to the university to the new Gymnastics facility...well worth the trip, but loads more work than necessary.

I am looking forward to the holidays and some time to catch up.

Eco-chondriacs

2007-11-24T19:26:00.000-08:00

There are many good reasons to go Car-Free.

Because I do not have a car...

...I get a whole lot more exercise

...I save a whack of cash on payments, insurance, depreciation, maintenance, gas...
...I am more in tune with the climate and weather...
...I have to say no to a lot of activities, giving me more time at home...
...I notice more things about my town...
...I do not contribute to traffic congestion...
...I always have a parking spot...

Absent from that list is any mention of doing my part for 'the environment'. That is intentional. I am likely one of the few who are car-free who does not count the environment as one of my primary reasons for not driving. I have a few reasons why.

First, I tend to believe that while global temperatures are certainly rising, the impact that humanity has on that rise is negligible. The number one reason that global temperatures are rising is that the sun is getting more energy to us. The number one greenhouse gas is water vapour, not CO2. Water vapour causes over 90% of the greenhouse effect, CO2 causes less than 1%. Global temperatures have been rising for a good 15,000 or so years. 10,000 years ago, most of North America was under 3km of ice. I would venture to guess that most people would rather live with today's moderate climate, rather than the harsh, brutally cold climate of 10k years ago.

Second, eco-chondriac #1, Al Gore is a great salesman. If I want to sell something, I need a great salesman. If I want the truth, I need a poor salesman. I need someone who does not have a vested interest in whatever is being sold. Al Gore makes a killing off of his message. He is in the Carbon Trading business, he needs global warming.

Third, Eco-Chondriac #1 does not give us the chance to really understand his famous graph. You know the one that shows levels of CO2 in lock-step with global temperatures. The problem with his graph is that it hides the fact that CO2 levels in the atmosphere actually FOLLOW rises in global temperature. That means that global warming (perfectly natural and beneficial to life on earth) causes rises in CO2. Interestingly enough, CO2 itself is necessary for any plant life to exist on earth.

Fourth, I do not believe that we have any moral obligation to the environment. Persons have moral obligations to other persons, not to 'nature'. I do not have any moral obligations to animals because animals are not moral creatures. If a bear damages me or my property, I do not hold it morally accountable, it was only trying to defend itself or get food. If it is deemed dangerous, the authorities go out and kill it, they do not bring it to trial. Animals are not moral creatures and do not hold any moral obligations over me.

When meteorologists are able to accurately predict the weather over a week or even 24 hours, then I may start listening to someone telling me what the temperature will be in 100 years.

At least that is the way I see it. Keep the rubber side down.

Crazy Japanese Game Show 02

2007-11-22T21:09:00.001-08:00

One of the reasons we loved Japan...
p.s. the kanji blocking out the jewels actually means "gold"/silver or money"! :)

Readability

2007-11-13T22:08:00.001-08:00

Car-Free Shopping

2007-11-12T19:13:00.000-08:00

Grocery shopping without a car is sometimes a challenge. Up until now we have been doing our shopping at Coopers which is nice because it is a local business (although purchased by one of the big guys). But it is bad because it is significantly more expensive than shopping at Superstore. The problem is that Superstore is at the top of the hill and we are at the bottom.

Recently, I was informed by 'The Owner' at my LBS that there is a 'back way' up the hill that avoids Columbia street. Great.

This past Saturday, I hooked up the Chariot and headed up the hill. Parking the rig was a bit of a trick as there is a concrete curb behind the bike rack that is about 5 cm too close to the rack for me to park the whole rig. I managed to get it in, but not easily.

After that it took me way too long to find everything on my list because I am not familiar with the layout of Superstore.

I did manage to find most things but was then confronted with the fact that the amount of groceries that I purchased might not fit into the chariot in a manner that is conducive to descending from Sa-Hali to downtown in a safe manner.

I am pretty sure that I over-shot the 45.4 kg maximum weight of the chariot and thought for sure that I would flip it on the way down the hill, but I got the whole works down the hill safely.

Original plans had us hacking one of our bikes into an SUB with the Free Radical and Free Loader accessories available from xtracycle, but it looks like that may be a little out of our price range right now. Up for current consideration is either a BOB or a Burley Flatbed trailer.

Here is the load of groceries, including 4 kg of oranges, 4 kg of chicken breasts and a whole lotta other stuff.

Remembering...

2007-11-11T13:59:00.000-08:00

In Flanders Fields
By: Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army

IN FLANDERS FIELDS the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

I am Pro-Life.

2007-11-08T20:25:00.000-08:00

I don't say enough on this blog about pro-life issues. Here is an article that recently appeared in the National Post.
--

New Life Matters

Margaret Somerville

National Post

Tuesday, November 06, 2007

In the past three years, at least five pregnant women, along with their babies, have been killed in Canada in violent attacks. The most recent occurred last month in Toronto. Pregnant women are at increased risk of domestic violence. The sense of abhorrence this elicits, especially when the violence is lethal, is magnified because of the loss of the fetus. Yet, at present, it is not a separate crime when a fetus is killed or injured. This should change. A just-released Environics poll asking if killing or injuring a fetus should be a crime found that 75% of Canadian women and 68% of men would support a fetal protection law (the level of support amongst all Canadians was 72%). The same poll found that, overall, 62% of Canadians support legal protection of the unborn child at some point before viability. (The Canadian Medical Association guidelines define fetal viability -- the possibility that the fetus can survive outside its mother's womb -- to be 20 weeks gestation and/or 500g in weight.)

In short, many Canadians' moral intuition is that "there ought to be a law" -- or laws -- protecting fetuses from some harms, although we don't all agree on what those laws should be, especially in the context of abortion. Presently in Canada, there is no express abortion law.

The Supreme Court of Canada has consistently ruled that under our current law the fetus does not exist as a protectable human being, and the Criminal Code holds that a child becomes a human being for the purposes of a homicide offence only after it is born alive. This means that criminal liability specifically for the wrong of killing a fetus in the course of a criminal act cannot at present be imposed. Only the wrong to the mother is legally cognizable.

Proposals for an Unborn Victims of Crime Act are adamantly opposed by pro-choice abortion advocates, for fear that any legal recognition of the fetus will lead to the re-criminalization of abortion. They accuse pro-life supporters of promoting such legislation as a back-door means to prohibit abortion. It's true that such a law could cause us to view the fetus and, therefore, abortion differently. But willful blindness is not an ethical approach to dealing with abortion.

Seeing the fetus as an unborn victim of crime strips away the medical cloak that abortion places on the taking of its life, a cloak that dulls our moral intuition as to what is involved. It causes us to see the fetus as what it is, an early human life. Those who support abortion must be able to square that fact with their belief that abortion is ethical in certain circumstances.

Abortion is always a moral and ethical issue. That does not mean, however, that it should always be a legal issue. But neither should it never be a legal issue as is presently the case.

As the legal void highlighted by the tragic murders of pregnant women show, we need to re-think our overall approach to the law relating to prebirth human life, including in relation to abortion. And we should do this within a context that promotes informed consent for women and the recognition of fetal pain.

Informed-consent law requires that a woman be given certain information if her consent to abortion is to be legally valid. In particular, the woman must be given information about the mental and physical health risks abortion poses.

A "Fetal Pain Awareness Act," similar to those some American states have enacted, could require a physician to inform the woman, before performing an abortion, that scientific evidence suggests that after 20 weeks gestation the fetus can feel pain. Furthermore, she would have to be offered anaesthesia for the fetus, which it would be her choice to take or decline. This type of law would not prohibit abortion; rather, its goal is to try to prevent the fetus from dying in excruciating pain. After all, even jurisdictions that allow capital punishment prohibit certain forms of it on the grounds that they are cruel. Likewise, we have criminal laws that protect animals from brutal treatment.

The fetus is a new human life. That matters ethically, and should matter legally. An Unborn Victims of Crime law would recognize that in one particular situation. What law should govern abortion is a separate issue that raises some different considerations, but having no law is not a neutral stance. It contravenes values that form part of the bedrock of Canadian society.

-Margaret Somerville is an ethicist at McGill University and author of The Ethical Imagination: Journeys of the Human Spirit.

Church was cool...

2007-10-29T20:31:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a good day.

I really appreciate our 'The Pastor'. He is a guy who didn't grow up in the church and definitely hasn't had what you might call an easy life. He is very refreshingly honest.

Yesterday, the service was dedicated to talking about our (as in the Church in NA) responsibilities to the poor and disadvantaged in distant lands. The more particular focus was on the AIDS crisis in Africa.

'The Pastor' did something that doesn't often happen...he showed a video instead of speaking. The video that he showed was of Bill Hybels interviewing Bono. You can find it on YouTube in 7 or 8 parts. Just search for 'Bono' and 'Hybels'. It even works to search for 'Hybles' like I did.

I realized a few things yesterday as a few of us were talking about the video. We were talking about the extent of our responsibilities and what we can actually do. A 'Think Global, Act Local' vibe was happening. I realized that most North Americans are thoroughly insulated from the majority of the people around them.

I also realized that on my ride to church, I said 'Good Morning' to pretty much everybody that I passed who was similarly cageless. I also made eye contact with them. I also smiled at them. They generally returned the salutations.

The best part of the service was when 'The Pastor' said something to the effect of 'I need to get off my aaa...uhhh...keister, and do something.'

Here is something you can do...

1. Check out the video on YouTube.

2. Check out www.makepovertyhistory.ca (Canada) or www.one.org (USA) or www.data.org and pass the word along.

3. Go for a bike ride.

Bill Maher - Anti-Pharma Rant

2007-10-29T17:35:00.001-07:00

'Ask your Dr. if getting off your ass is right for you!'

Cyclo-Cross

2007-10-21T21:26:00.000-07:00

The Canadian National Cyclo-Cross Championships were held in Kamloops yesterday and today.

The weather was beautiful yesterday and nasty today. Here are some random pics...

Start of the U23 Men's race...
Elite Women's...Wendy Sims in front placed first and Alison Sydor behind her finished second, followed by Lyne Bessette in third. These three were well out in front for the whole race and had quite a battle throughout.

The Ephemeral Rider...

An opinion...

2007-10-14T21:12:00.000-07:00

James Howard Kunstler is an opinionated man. I offer for your perusal his most recent rant.

October 8, 2007
The Grass Roots Syndrome
Because I wrote a couple of books about the design of cities (and the shortcomings of suburbia), a lot of blather comes my way about what towns around the nation are planning for the future -- and, off course, I hear plenty on the subject in my own town, Saratoga Springs, New York, which is a classic "main street" type town. I also happen to travel a lot and actually see what's going on far from home. Almost everything I see and hear is inconsistent with what I think reality has in store for us.
Most American towns, including my own, are obsessed to the point of mania with the issue of parking and more generally the management of cars, and much of their spending is directed to those ends. Municipal leaders (and the public they serve) have no idea what kind of problems the nation faces with oil. Because life in the USA has worked a particular way all their lives, they assume that it will continue to operate that way. Not only will they be disappointed as happy motoring spirals into history, but they will create a lot mischief in the meantime in planning things based on faulty assumptions.
My own town, for instance, relies heavily on tourism, in particular tourism based on happy motoring. There is not the slightest apprehension among the people here, or our leaders in city hall, that automobile-based tourism may not be happening as soon as five years from now. All our political energy is being expended in fighting about what kind of parking structures we will build (with borrowed money) and where to put them, and how these things might incorporate some secondary uses, such as police offices. We have also been debating plans for the expansion of our modest convention center -- in connection with added parking structures. It seems to me that one of the first things to go as the US economy contracts, along with its energy supply, will be activities like boat shows and optometrist's conventions.
Now this town happens to be on a railroad line that connects New York City to Montreal. Before 1950, it was the main way that people came to this town. These days, we get one train a day in each direction. The trains are invariably late, and not just a little late, but hours late. The track bed is in miserable shape and, of course, Amtrak is a sort of soviet-style management organization. There is no awareness among the public here, or our leaders, that we would benefit from improving the passenger railroad service, and around the state of New York generally there is no conversation about fixing the railroads. (Governor Elliot Spitzer is preoccupied these days with arranging to give driver's licenses to people who are in the country illegally.) We are going to pay a large penalty for these failures of attention.
Another aspect of all this has to do with our assumptions about land development. Here in my town, and elsewhere around the country, the assumption is that suburban development will continue just as it has the past sixty years. This assumption is shared both by the developers themselves and their opponents. The developers expect the current "downturn" to reverse before long. From the opponents' point of view, the assumption is based on their legitimate fears and heartaches about what they've seen heedless development do to the American landscape. Consequently, whatever mental energy is left after the parking debates get tabled is dedicated to fighting over projected suburban expansion.
My personal view about this is apparently radical -- though I am a man of modest habits and philosophy. My view is that the suburban project, per se, in the United States is over, finished. Like, totally. You can stick a fork in it. What you see is basically all that we're going to get. Not only do we not need anymore of it, but we have way too much of what is already on the ground. We don't need anymore suburban housing pods, and the ones already out there are going to hemorrhage value (and usefulness) as far ahead as anybody can imagine. We need more retail like we need 300-million holes in our heads. Ditto suburban office capacity. Ditto new roads and highways.
The projects that people see under construction now are things that went through the torturous permitting process at minimum a year ago and generally even further back. I would imagine that many of the developers of these few remaining projects -- whether they are condo villages or strip malls or chain store "power centers" -- are in deep melancholy as they read the news and desperately search for tenants. Their lenders must be equally depressed -- and in some cases cutting off further injections of capital. What remains is what bankers call "the workout" -- where the financial chips fall when people's hopes and dreams collide with reality's separate agenda.
In connection with the imminent collapse of our investments in suburbia is the fate of all the laws and codes that have governed the creation of it. I think it is a waste of effort at this point to attempt to reform what we generally refer to as "the zoning laws." They will simply become irrelevant. As we get in trouble with oil, and driving becomes more of a problem, it will be self-evident that regulations geared to keeping cars happy can no longer be followed. My guess is that for a period of time we will see a condition of stunned paralysis in the council chambers and planning boards. Eventually, if we are lucky enough to retain effective local governance, a new consensus will emerge that will be more reality-based by necessity.
In saying this, I imply that societies go through cycles of collective thinking that range from being fairly consistent with reality to being dangerously out of whack with it. We're at the latter end of the cycle these days. One of the symptoms of this is the fact that so many Americans believe the only thing wrong with America is George W. Bush, and that if only we could wiggle out of "his" war, every day would be Christmas, with Nascar around-the-clock, time-outs for shopping sprees down the aisles of the Target store, 5000-square-foot houses for all (for $750 a month), and three BMWs parked in the driveway. . . with fries, and supersize it!
In reality, there's a lot more wrong with how we live and how we think about how we live than the mere presence of George W. Bush at the head of the federal government. Our expectations are deeply out of phase with what the earth can provide for us and what the future has in store for us, and this failure of our collective imagination goes down to the grass roots.
--
I don't agree with everything that JHK puts out there, but I think that he is right that our current way of life in North America is rapidly becoming unsustainable.

Some people here look at us like we are from Mars when we tell them that we do not have a car. The temperature in the mornings around here has been 5-10 degrees...perfect cycling weather...and people think we are nuts to be out in the cold. Today we were offered a ride (in a car) because riding (our bikes) to our destination would take at least 20 minutes.

For three years in Calgary, we told ourselves that something was going to have to give...during our time in Japan, we realized that the great enabler of our frantic lifestyle was our car, so we gave it up. I can't help but think that if more people would give up their automobiles, that the world would be just a little more enjoyable.

The Blasphemy Challenge

2007-10-09T22:08:00.001-07:00

Something worthwhile on YouTube!!

Cultural Vertigo

2007-10-09T21:11:00.000-07:00

The title of this blog started out referring to the fact that I was experiencing disorientation with life in Japan. Japan is a very different country from Canada and there were many things that were frustrating about living there.

Now that I am home, although I sometimes call Japan 'Back Home', I realize that there are many things about Canadian culture that has most people experiencing a sense of vertigo. Some examples...

At the beginning of the summer, Facebook and the CBC collaborated on a project called the 'Great Canadian Wishlist'. It is still posted on FB if you are interested in checking it out. The idea was that people could 'wish' for certain things and then others could offer their support or not. One of the cool things that came out of that was that the number one wish was that abortion would be abolished in Canada. It had over 10,000 supporters by the end. The pro-aborts were mighty pissed off by that...and they cried foul blah blah blah...

Needless to say the discussions were often intense and about very weighty topics like abortion, gay 'marriage', God etc.

What was distressing was the utter lack of many people to put forth any sort of reasonable argument.

I was discussing the Big Bang with several people. One implication of the Big Bang is that the universe (time/space) had to have a beginning. One person agreed that an infinite regress of cause and effect is impossible but would not admit that the universe had a beginning. His response was "Whatever happened when the universe 'began', it wasn't a 'beginning'." I was dumbfounded...still am.

Another statement that seems to be popping up with alarming regularity is that people don't believe in God for the same reasons that they don't believe in leprechauns. This is just plain silly.

To borrow from Greg Koukl...

"Believing in leprechauns is a leap of faith. Believing in God is like believing in atoms.

You simply follow evidence of what you can see to conclude the existence of something you cannot see. The process is exactly the same. The effect needs a cause adequate to explain it. There is nothing unreasonable about the idea of a personal God creating the material universe. A Big Bang needs a 'Big Banger'. A complex set of instructions (DNA) needs an author. A blueprint needs an engineer. A moral law needs a moral law giver. This is not a leap. This is a step of intelligent reflection."

Thanksgiving

2007-10-08T16:36:00.000-07:00

Some pictures from my ride this morning...

This is from the top of Billy Miner Trail. The bridge is part of the Trans Canada Highway. In the distance is the North Thompson River.

Almost at the top of Billy Miner Trail...notice the beetle-killed pine trees.

Looking down into Peterson Creek...more beetle-killed pine.

At the bottom of Peterson Creek.

Downtown Kamloops.

The hills around here are steep and the single-track is fantastic.

I will ride this little drop into the creek another day.

The weather was perfect for a ride this morning before all the family got here for Thanksgiving turkey. It is great that there is such great riding so close to town. The trailhead for this trail is within a kilometre or two of my back door.

Keep the Rubber Side Down!

Cool Blog

2007-10-06T22:51:00.000-07:00

Confessions of a Car-Free Mom

Reading

2007-09-27T20:32:00.000-07:00

From J.P. Moreland's book, "Love Your God With All Your Mind" (pp. 93-94):

"Eventually the church without readers, or with readers with the tastes just listed [Christian self-help and books about Christian celebrities] will become a marginalized, easily led group of Christians impotent to stand against the powerful forces of secularism that threaten to bury Christian ideas under a veneer of soulless pluralism and misguided scientism. In such a context, the Church will be tempted to measure her success largely in terms of numbers- numbers achieved by cultural accommodation to empty selves."

Quoted from the blog 'In Pursuit of that which is True'.

Amsterdam: The Bicycling Capitol of Europe

2007-09-25T21:34:00.001-07:00

Great blog...

2007-09-08T20:38:00.000-07:00

A blog recommendation...

In Pursuit of That Which is True

A survey...

2007-09-07T21:57:00.000-07:00

Sans Auto has posted a survey as part of his research. It takes about 15 minutes. Its about transportation. You can access it here.

I haven't laughed this hard in a long time...

2007-09-05T21:27:00.001-07:00

Cycling in Kamloops

2007-08-31T23:43:00.000-07:00

We have learned a few things about living without a car here in Canada.

1. Public transportation here is really cheap. We can ride the bus for as long as we want anywhere in the city, we can transfer to a different bus and go for as long as we want on that bus too. And it will only cost us $2. The kids are $1.50. I suppose my taxes are paying for something good. In Japan, 200Y would get us one or two stops on the bus or train. No transfers.

2. It is good to be close to shopping and other amenities when you do not have a car. Living downtown certainly helps with that.

3. If you want to live downtown, you will pay through the nose for accommodations. We are paying way too much. And we live in the seedier side of downtown, I can't imagine what people on the west end are paying.

4. Cycling downtown with kids is a bad idea. My new policy is that if we are north of Seymour Street, we walk the bikes on the sidewalk. Having been a bike courier in downtown Calgary (for all of two days...story for 'nother day) I have the confidence needed to ride with traffic in downtown. The kids, well, not so much.

5. Off-Street bike paths are necessary to promote cycling for families in cities. I know that there are arguments against them, but there is no better way to get families commuting to and from school and work than to remove much of the risk from vehicles. After all, the thing that makes cycling dangerous in the city is not cycling, it is drivers of cars.

6. Kamloops drivers seem to be pretty decent folks. More often than not they will stop to let us cross a crosswalk when they don't have to...that is cool.

7. The current trend towards urban planning that includes multi-use zoning allowing for retail space directly adjacent to or mixed in with residential space is a good thing. Allowing people to live much more locally would be good. Walking or cycling to get your groceries, take your kids to school, go to work is good for many things. My Dad's commute has changed a little, I think he would agree that it has improved. Gone are the days of car-pooling in to Surrey everyday. Now he just walks out his front door and he is at 'work'. Although, as a newly retired teacher, I am not convinced he considers building his house to be terribly tedious. School starts next week...congratulations on your retirement, Dad.

Kamloops

2007-08-25T22:09:00.000-07:00

We have been here for a week and a half. We have gotten ourselves re-connected to the digital world and are ready to roll.

Once we get ourselves a little more situated in our little house, we will get some pics up and posted. It is an older house that has recently been renovated, although we are starting to realize that the renovations didn't go terribly 'deep'. It kinda looks like things were just painted over. It certainly looks nice, the colours are great, but it is still very much an old house...and we are paying a ridiculous amount of money every month to live here. It is also pretty close to some less than savoury elements that tend to congregate near the downtown cores of many cities. There is evidence that there are more professional offices and the like moving in, but there is still a significant population of people that we don't want our kids hanging around with.

Given the above info, we will start looking for a new place that we can actually buy in the very near future. Hopefully we will not be here long.

Kamloops itself seems to be a pretty decent little city. We have been to Riverside Park a few times for swimming, water parking and listen to musicking. Every evening during the summer, the city hosts Music in the Park with local and some not-so-local bands for free concerts. It is a great atmosphere.

The weather has been great. We have had a few pretty warm days but the temperature drops off very nicely in the evening. We have heard from a few people back in Japan (I keep wanting to say 'back home') that it has been ridiculously hot, in the 40C range...and presumably humid to boot. Glad we missed that.

Lots more to talk about...school, cycling, adjusting, living without any kitchen chairs...

We are here...

2007-08-21T14:50:00.000-07:00

...but we are still waiting on access to the 'net.

Cow Town

2007-08-07T19:03:00.000-07:00

We have arrived in Calgary after a very uneventful flight from Toronto. WestJet has apparently been updating their aircraft as the one we were on for this trip had very nice leather seats, even back in the cheap seats where we were. We had free satellite TV, PPV movies etc. Like United, we had to buy our food onboard which was not cheap. Fortunately we knew that coming in so we bought some veggie wraps just before we boarded the plane.

Toronto was good. The first things I noticed upon arriving was that vehicles here are really big, second thing was that everyone seems to be in a hurry. I had the dubious opportunity to drive highway 401. Never want to do that again. I think one thing that I will miss about our time in Japan is just that...time. We were forced to slow down. Not only are the roads really narrow, but people are extremely patient drivers. Driving 5 or 6 km into Ogaki could sometimes take 30 minutes, but it never seemed to be a problem.

So far, our time here has been very much a vacation. We have been tourists in our own backyard. We went to Niagara Falls for a day, a first for me and the kids. It was very nice even if a little crowded and commercialized. I did find it interesting that the Niagara Park area has been entirely supported by proceeds from the aforementioned commercialization for the better part of a really long time.

We also spent a day visiting Kelly's relatives on Georgian Bay. Twas a beautiful day, smokin hot but there was a very nice breeze blowing off the lake which cooled things down nicely. We went out to the family farm for homemade apple pie...and lemon pie...hisashiburi! It has been a long time since I have had pie that good.

Other firsts for me and the kids were spending a day on Toronto Island (kinda like Stanley Park) and checking out the CN Tower.

Our brains are thoroughly confused regarding the time of day. We fall asleep at really odd times and are awake as soon as it gets light out. Hopefully that will actually benefit us once we get to Kamloops...I have my doubts.

Speaking of Kamloops...some of you know that I accepted a job teaching elementary school PE at St. Ann's Academy...not sure if that made it into the blog or not. I had originally interviewed for a high school PE job and was quite clear that it would not be a great idea to put me in charge of an elementary classroom. I was a little confused and admittedly disappointed when I was offered the elementary position, but I accepted because it seemed foolish to turn down a full time job in my field with declining enrolments country-wide.

Surprisingly, when I got to Toronto, I had received an email from St Ann's offering me the high school position, with a sports-specific PE course thrown in to sweeten the pot. I accepted quickly. It will be interesting to learn the ins and outs of that process...

I have lots of pics but they will have to wait as they are on my computer, which is currently offline.

O Canada!

2007-07-25T22:33:00.000-07:00

O Canada!
Our home and native land!
True patriot love in all thy sons command.

With glowing hearts we see thee rise,
The True North strong and free!

From far and wide,
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

God keep our land glorious and free!

O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

__

It is good to be here. It was a LONG and pretty boring day...

still here...

2007-07-24T22:31:00.000-07:00

...but not allowed to stay.

We are at Centrair...boarding in 15 mins or so...so far so good.

さよなら！ Sayonara!

2007-07-23T23:11:00.000-07:00

Things are really winding down here. The computer needs to be packed up today, I am going to pick up the van that will transport us to Centrair in Nagoya, one more sleep, then we are off.

Hopefully, I will have little to report from TO when we arrive there.

Thanks for tuning in to this part of our adventure...now we get to experience our own culture through very different eyes...stay tuned.

In the immortal words of The Long-Haired Apprentice...

...Catch you on the flipside, Homeslice!

Bike Helmets

2007-07-22T06:04:00.000-07:00

Here is an article from the Globe and Mail on bike helmets.

Bittersweet

2007-07-19T18:34:00.000-07:00

I am officially finished my duties at all my schools. Yesterday was the last day of classes at Kono Elementary School and it was good to get a chance to say farewell to the students. I played 'Animal Basket'...think fruit basket upset...with the grade 2 classes all morning. What a hoot!

Today, I was asked to attend their final assembly and officially say goodbye to the school. I gave them a small book about the Canadian rockies (purchased over 2 years ago at the Calgary Tower) as well as some omiyage...chocolate!

It was sad to say goodbye. Of all the schools that I was involved in this year, Kono was my favourite. The staff were always very kind, the kids were great, and it was nice and close to my house.

But it is time to move along...Kelly and I have resolved that it is time to stop moving every 2 or 3 years, hopefully we will be in Kamloops for a good long time...at least until the kids finish high school.

I have learned that relationships are permanent. When you invest yourself in another person, there will always be a relationship between you. When you enjoy those people, it hurts to change that relationship. The relationships that we have developed here have been a genuine source of joy for us and for our kids. Now that the time has come to move along, I think that in a mysterious way, a part of 'us' will linger here in memories, pictures, journals, school records, in the household goods that we used for two years and now bequeath to Kelly's successor. But those relationships will forever change on July 25th when we fly away.

For me, the hardest thing about leaving here is that we have really been helpless in communicating the source of our 'being'. So many people here live lives of what I call 'quiet desperation'. Seeing how long people work and the demands put on people to 'ganbatte' or 'fight' is tragically misplaced. When a mother can't see her kids because she has to be at school until 8 or 9 pm, something is wrong. The number one reason that teachers book time off work here is depression. When a child acts out at home, parents call the school and ask why the teachers aren't teaching their kids how to behave. This is not the way things should be.

The Japanese are outwardly very 'happy' and have ready smiles. But the fact that Japan has one of the highest suicide rates among developed countries tells me that something is wrong and the pursuit of 'happiness' is futile.

I firmly believe that the classical Christian worldview as it was intended to be understood provides the best foundation for the things that we observe in the universe.

It is only through our relationship to God that...

...we find true meaning for this life and beyond.
...we can make sense of suffering.
...we can have true hope for the future.
...we can make any sense of good and evil.
...we can recognize that 'we' and 'others' are inherently valuable.

小野小学校、ほんとにありがとうございました！おげんきで！

Got an extra $225,000?

2007-07-14T07:14:00.000-07:00

Buy yourself a parking space in Manhattan!!

This particular condo complex is selling units with 2.5 baths, 2 bedrooms etc for $2.2 million. At 1750ish square feet, that clocks out at around $1250/sq. ft. The parking space adds up to $1500/sq.ft.

Chalk this one up to people having more money than brains.

Bikes are good for more than riding...

2007-07-13T04:29:00.001-07:00

Bicycle Samba

It's comin'!

2007-07-13T00:40:00.000-07:00

Okinawa was hit earlier today and its on its way to Kyushu. The eye is on track to be over us sometime tomorrow. Maybe it will bounce off the island, but it doesn't appear likely.

Catching Up

2007-07-07T05:33:00.000-07:00

While I haven't been blogging a whole lot in the last little while, there is no shortage of things happening in our life.

A couple weeks ago, we were once again involved in a Tug o War competition in Ogaki. Last year it was just the kids. This year there were seemingly three divisions. The kids, the amateurs and the experts.

This is a picture of one to the expert teams. Please notice their body position...very low to the ground and most importantly, their hips are mostly in line with the rest of their body.

Intimidation is a big part of the game. This is me staring down a 7-year-old girl with a camera.

This is me in my 'Proper Body Position for Tug o War' lab. Turns out that proper body position really is important. At least my back is straight, but if you look at the team in the background, you will notice a slight difference.

This particular match was Loooong. Probably at least a minute long, I do not recall being that physically drained in a very long time. Kelly almost blacked out. This is a great sport. We lost this match; our team just ran out of gas. Our next match was a cake-walk...for the other team. They had the magic shoes that the experts were wearing. The last match was finally a victory for us, but we had already been knocked out of contention for the playoffs.

All in all, we had a fantastic day and came home tired.

Rain, beer and physics

2007-06-24T23:32:00.000-07:00

So, the rain has finally come. It came in buckets on Friday.

We had arranged with a couple other ALTs to have a viewing of the classic Canadian movie `Strange Brew` on Friday evening. It was deemed appropriate for me to go to the International food store and pick up some Canadian beer that they usually carry.

Unfortuantely, they were out of any Canadian brews so I selected three different beers from a Hawaiian micro-brewery that looked interesting and an apple beer called `Newton`...and two Root Brewskies for drivers.

On my way home in the pouring rain I decided to take a little shortcut through a gas station. As I committed to the turn, I briefly remembered that gas stations around here all have a little ditch around the circumference of the parking lot to keep any spilled fuel off the road. It is usually a few cm wide and several deep. Sometimes it is covered by a grate to keep people from tripping or cyclists from crashing.

On physics...

When the centre of gravity of a moving body moves beyond its base of support, it will generally fall over. Granted there are other factors that come into play, but if the BoS stops moving and the CoG continues moving, bad things happen. I know...

The beer survived.

Movin' Right Along

2007-06-20T02:55:00.000-07:00

Five weeks from now we will be at 35000ish feet over the Pacific. Interestingly enough, we will be flying east to get to the west.

Things have been happening as we march towards the big move.

We have put a deposit on our plane tickets that will take us from Nagoya-San Fran-Toronto. We have purchased our plane tickets from Toronto-Calgary.

This morning I accepted a job as Elementary PE coordinator at St. Ann's Academy in Kamloops. I was interviewed for the High School position, but...that's the way the cookie crumbles sometimes. I am grateful to have full-time work in a school teaching PE in a city where school enrollments have been declining steadily.

This afternoon, we were paid $1100 for our car and it was driven away for the last time. The title has not yet been transferred so there will be a few days where we will still be the owners of a vehicle, but that will be short.

The weather talk around here is centered on how very dry this 'rainy' season has been. There is concern that there will be water shortages to deal with if the expected hot summer is as bad as they think it might be. It also bodes poorly for the rice crops which rely on lots of water. It has made for fabulous cycling weather.

There is still a mountain of things that we need to get through in the next 5 weeks, it seems overwhelming, but it will get done because it must get done.

The following conversation actually took place...

2007-06-19T04:13:00.000-07:00

...while wrestling with Selah.

Selah: Its time to take out the trash! Daddy could you please get on the floor?

Car-Free

2007-06-17T19:01:00.000-07:00

Check out this article that briefly touches on the possibility that building more roads is not the best idea for Greater Vancouver.

Still here...

2007-06-12T22:40:00.000-07:00

I am currently expending a whack of energy contributing to discussions about subjective morality on the Great Canadian Wishlist on Facebook.

Tis a hoot.

Yesterday was a little nuts for me and my supervising teacher at Enami JHS. She was scheduled to to a `demo Lesson`. This is where one teacher teaches a class while the entire staff (teachers, admin, nurse, not the tea-lady though) watches and takes notes. The head hancho from the Board of Education was there too. I counted 26 other teachers in the class, all of them taking copious notes.

Following the lesson, they had a meeting. Ms. Oida, my teacher, was at the head table, alone. Everyone else formed a semi-circle around her and dissected her lesson. That meeting lasted 1.5 hours. Then she had a 30 minute meeting with the guy from the BOE.

No wonder teachers here are stressed! She had been preparing for this lesson since April.

How to get the afternoon off

2007-06-07T05:26:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I made a passing comment to my supervising teacher at Enami JHS that I had tried to go to the bank the previous day but it had been closed.

Her response was to say that if we just asked the vice principal, it would be alright if I went after lunch. Ok, cool.

After lunch, I was sitting at my desk waiting for students to be back in class before I headed out. Ms. Oida was surprised to see me still there and told me that it was ok to go now. So, I packed up the few things I needed for the bank and started out. I told her that I would return in about an hour. She looked at me like I was some kind of wierdo and asked why I would come back. I told her that I would come back to finish the rest of the work day. She still looked confused. So I repeated it. That is when she said that the VP had given me the rest of the day off! Sugoi!

So, I went to the bank, then home and remembered that my keys are in Nagoya. hmmm...better go for a ride.

I found this on the road outside our apartment. The aftermath of cicada vs. car. This one was a good 3 cm long. They hurt when you run into them at 20km/h on your bike.

One of the hazards of cycling here are these gates every kilometer or less. I almost clipped one on this ride. I even got to the point that I closed my eyes in anticipation of the impact...somehow I got through.

My bike there is coming home with me where it will be stripped down to a single-speed. I would love to go straight to a fixie set up or even a flip-flop hub so I can have both SS and FG options, but I think that with vertical dropouts, my options are limited to SS.

Maybe I will have to get a surly.

Survival of the Fittest

2007-06-06T05:07:00.000-07:00

The following conversation actually took place...

2007-06-05T05:08:00.000-07:00

While on a bike ride...

Selah: Daddy, are you hungry?

Me: Yup, a little.

Selah: Then eat my dust! (As she lays the hammer down)

Alternative Transportation

2007-06-04T04:35:00.001-07:00

Kananaskis Lodge. May, 2003.

It's not plagiarism, it's research!

2007-05-31T01:21:00.000-07:00

Bicycle wins in biker vs. car errand race

Published April 26, 2007 by The Gainesville Sun

By Andrew Tan

Brent Christensen was stopped at a light at rush hour on NW 13th Street and NW 5th Avenue when he saw him.

Ed Poppell, vice president of business affairs at the University of Florida, was leaving Mr. Goodbike on his Kona mountain bike, meaning he was ahead of Christensen, president of the Gainesville Area Chamber of Commerce.

The two were involved in an "errand" race that pitted car against bike.

The car took 20 minutes to run a set of prescribed errands, while the bike took 10 minutes.

The race began at Tigert Hall on the UF campus and involved stops at Mr. Goodbike, Deja Brew, FIA Clothing and the Wine & Cheese Gallery.

Christensen said he wanted the light to change, but it didn't.

"It was maddening watching him leave," he said.

The errand race was part of "Walking the Talk/Closing the Gap: Transforming Environmental Values into Sustainable Practices," a series of events held by the UF office of sustainability, department of religion and department of political science.

Dedee DeLongpré, director of the office of sustainability, said the goal is to make people with environmental values begin acting environmentally. DeLongpré said the errand race tied together three important ideas: alternative transportation, shopping locally and supporting local agriculture.

DeLongpré said the importance of shopping locally and supporting local agriculture is helping reduce the amount of shipping in the United States.

"Everything is interconnected," she said.

Poppell said he was helped in the race because he didn't have to worry about parking, like Christensen did, and he was able to use more roads that didn't have traffic lights or stop signs.

Christensen said the little things hurt. The time it takes to leave the car, lock the car, put on the seat belt, they all added up, he said.

Christensen, who used a Flexcar Civic hybrid, said he knew it would be a challenge trying to beat a bicycle during rush hour.

"It was fun to try anyway," he said.

Reasons to Ride

2007-05-27T15:39:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Snakebite for finding this one.

Weirdness

2007-05-22T05:16:00.000-07:00

I have been working in downtown Nagoya for the last couple months on Sundays. It is a nice job teaching motivated adult students who are interested in overseas travel and possibly study.

It is a bit of an annoyance to have to get up early on a Sunday to head downtown, but the job itself is rather enjoyable.

I have been riding my bike to Hozumi Station for the half hour trip into Nagoya and then a few minutes on the Higashiyama Subway to Sakae, the downtown, ritzy shopping district in Nagoya, where my job is located.

Sakae Station is a very busy subway station with all the shopping and restaurants near there. One of the newest restaurants is a big Tully's Coffee, just a block away from the Starbucks. Kelly prefers Tully's so I have been picking up a bag of beans every couple weeks. Last week, I noticed that they were selling English Toffee Cookies for only 170 yen. I bought one.

I was munching on it on my way to the subway and ended up in the line to buy a ticket with a half-eaten cookie.

It was then that I felt a tap on my arm. I turned to look, expecting to find someone telling me off for eating in public. Instead I saw a very frail looking and quite possibly homeless man gesturing at my half-eaten cookie. I took a bite, not entirely understanding his intent. Then he pointed at the cookie, pointed at himself, and told me that he wanted my cookie.

I know that the recommendation is that people not give stuff to panhandlers and that thought flashed through my mind rather boldly...not to mention that this was a darn good cookie!

The other thought that overpowered that thought that this guy was obviously hungry and for him to have the cojones to actually ask for my cookie, I felt needed to be recognized.

I gave him my cookie.

Sometimes you just gotta dance!

2007-05-18T18:47:00.001-07:00

Do you eat organic food?

2007-05-16T18:07:00.000-07:00

Organic food is huge business. But how organic is the food that you are buying? What does organic mean?

I just read an article from Fresh! Fitness that addresses the issue of organic food.

Compare what they say with Sans` recent post on gardening.

Our garden right now consists of a little baby tomato plant that Selah brought home from school. We will see how we do with it in the next couple months.

Reasons to Ride...

2007-05-15T22:25:00.000-07:00

Monday morning...the dreaded return to work after the weekend. I was quite looking forward to it, primarily because of the ride.

I was almost at work when I caught up to a friend of mine on her way to her school. She normally rides with her hubby, but he was at home because he had to work on the Saturday previous. We said our hellos and `have a good day` and were on our way.

I was released from work a little early for some still unknown reason and caught up to her again. This time we had a little more time and so stopped to chat for a while. They are returning to the States a few days after we head home this summer and are in the midst of the same questions and frustrations that we are experiencing. It was good to be able to stop and chat as we hadn`t been able to get together as families for a while.

It wasn`t until after I got home that it dawned on me that it would have been close to impossible to have been able to chat with a friend had even one of us been driving a car. Our interaction would have been reduced to a very quick wave...if we had even noticed each other.

Cycling is good for communities.

Bad Blogger!

2007-05-15T05:53:00.000-07:00

I hear that if I want people to read my blog that I need to post stuff.

We are starting to ramp up our moving plans. It seems a little crazy to think that we will be flying home in just over 2 months. There is so much that needs to happen between now and then. We have someone very interested in buying our car (which has been parked since April 1 save a few trips that would have cost more by train).

I have finally sent applications for teaching jobs in Kamloops. I had been waiting for my BC Certification to be completed, but that is likely another month away and I want to get my name in front of the powers that be as soon as possible. There are no advertised positions available with the Kamloops board yet, but the St. Ann's Secondary is looking for a PE teacher...will keep you posted.

The Car Free thing has been going well. I have found a great route to my most distant school that allows me to put the hammer down and clear my mind.

Kudos to the Canadian Men's Hockey team for showing the rest of the world who is boss. I suppose at least some of my remaining interest should go towards the Sens who appear to be headed to the big show. At least Vancouver made it farther than Calgary....

Last week, Selah came home with news that she needs glasses. Knowing Kelly's visual history, we thought it reasonable that Selah's eyes could be starting to change. I figured that it would be better to wait a while to give her eyes some time to stabilise before getting glasses, but once I did a little research on th internets I discovered that such things are better treated early before they become permanent.

So, off to the same shop where we got Mixons specs. We knew that it was open until 7:30 pm. Except that it was closed when we got there at 6 pm. On our way home, Selah was quite distressed because her teacher told her to get glasses, so we stopped at another little shop for a test. They had a very poor selection of kids glasses that seemed ridiculously over-priced. It seemed a little weird that the prescription that this guy came up with for her was for far-sightedness, the opposite of Kelly.

After some cajoling and coercing, I finally got Selah out of there with the promise that we would go back to the other store with more selection the next day.

Next day rolls around and Kelly gets a phone call from Keiko, our personal translator, who is phoning for the school nurse. Turns out they did a little vision test for Selah at school that morning and everything was normal. We are not sure if her eyes were just bothering her or some unknown reason or if she really wanted glasses. Regardless, its a good thing we didn't buy the stupidly expensive ones from the little shop across from Asahi University.

Observations

2007-05-06T05:30:00.000-07:00

I noticed two interesting news items in the last few weeks. Unfortunately I didn't keep track of where I read them or how you can do the same, although I think many of you heard.

First was that Canadians bought more new cars last year than ever before, that they spent more money for a new car than ever before, and that the cars that they bought were more likely to be gas guzzling trucks, SUVs, mini-vans and the like than ever before. Good news eh? The Canadian economy is cruising right along.

The second was the shrieking outcry when gas prices took a little jump not too long ago. Average price of gas in Canada was about $1.10 a litre. I haven't paid that little for almost two years.

If gas prices are going to be a problem, and there is little reason for them to go down significantly, then it would make sense to buy small, fuel efficient cars, not large, inefficient cars. And if you buy a large, inefficient car or truck, expect to pay lots of money on gas.

And if fuel efficiency is what you are after, don't buy a car. Anything that weighs more than that which it is transporting cannot possibly be considered fuel efficient.

On a slightly different note. My vehicle needs new brake pads. I bought them yesterday. They cost me $8 for all four pads. I will install them next weekend.

Supper

2007-04-25T05:13:00.000-07:00

Living without the convenience of a car means that sometimes our eating plans get a little out of whack.

Today, after she got home from work, Kelly took Selah to the grocery store for our twice-weekly shopping run.

Mixon had six classes today so he stayed later than Selah. Once Mixon and I got home, I took him to the school supply store to buy him some much needed new shorts for school. The ones he has been wearing are just too small. He got 'LL', The biggest, baggiest shorts they had. I did not try to convince him otherwise.

When he and I got home, the ladies were still out, but they arrived shortly with their treasures, including supper from the deli. Some of the stuff available from the deli is quite tasty, although nutritionally suspect if not bankrupt. Some of it is rather nasty looking, but possibly quite healthy. I have heard that seaweed is good for preventing baldness...

Some of it is unidentifiable.

Kelly thought that she had identified one particular offering as being ginger beef. A selection that I would wholeheartedly support. I had previously seen this particular gastronomic delight and caught a glimmer of recognition from somewhere in my past anatomy courses.

A brief rabbit trail...

I have previously written about the delicacies available at festivals around here...if you missed it, here is a refresher...

We discovered a new treat at the recent Sakura Festival here in Sunomata. The tent where all the local Grandma's were cooking up a storm had a peculiar smell to it. I chalked it up to the combination of greasy food, rain, too many people and humidity. Then Kelly and I pegged it, it smelled just like a barn. We had found the tent where they sold liver...and Selah liked it!

Back to the story of our supper...

Once the 'ginger beef' made its way into the pan to be heated, Kelly mentioned in a hushed, yet barely concealed panic, I hope this isn't liver! It was then that I mentioned my suspicion that we were dealing with kidneys.

They ended up on the table and the kids helped themselves to rather large helpings. Mixon got one down the hatch, didn't complain but asked what that stuff was. Kelly said that she didn't know. He said that it was really chewy but didn't taste too bad. Selah offered to eat the ones on Kelly's plate. She seemed to like them. She popped one into her mouth and began to chew. It wasn't long before she said that this one was a lot chewier than the others. I told her she didn't have to finish it. She made a beeline for the loo.

I tried to cut one with the edge of my fork...nothing doing. I took a wee bite. It didn't taste all that bad, but it was kinda like chewing on a rubber ball.

I have a sneaking suspicion that some of the little goodies were hearts and livers as well as kidneys.

I'll pass on the organ meats next time.

Ride Report

2007-04-23T04:42:00.000-07:00

Last week's commute to Enami Chugakko was very enjoyable. I found a bike path that follows one of the many canals around here. Highly preferable to dodging traffic along rte 50.

The decision to commute in cycling gear rather than work clothes was a good one. It makes a huge difference to even be able to towel off and start the day dry. When you decide to start commuting to work on your bike, get some clothes to make the trip in. You definitely do not need to go all out and get the latest euro-kit for WAY too much money, but some comfy clothes will do you good.

As far as exposed lycra is concerned, I feel that such things are better left private. There are a whole ton of shorts available that have lycra sewn into them with a chamois and everything.

Sunday was warm and rainy. I suppose that is better than cold and rainy like an Abbotsford winter, but it still presents challenges in arriving at your destination dry.

I bought some rain gear that came with the claim that it is water-proof and breathable...for $30. We will see. I have a hunch that the breathability factor will be rather low and I will end up in my own little sauna/steam room.

One moment of sublimity occured on Thursday as I was riding to work in the morning. There was very little wind (that day) and so I was making good time. I noticed a cormorant sitting on the edge of the water watching me. Apparently I got a little too close and he took off. He flew just above the surface of the water, his wingtips would often hit the water, for about 500 metres, watching me all the time. I was going about 20 km/h and he was just a little faster, but I kept up with him until he skidded to a stop.

In the words of Tobymac...

You make me feel so fly!