Posts 276 to 300:

Testing...

My friend Steve helped me out with my visitor log script, and it should be pretty robust now.  The problem with the double-logging appears to have been the result of a visitor hitting a page at nodivisions.com and then another at www.nodivisions.com.  This resulted in 2 different ID cookies being created, since cookies belong to a particular host, and strictly speaking nodivisions.com is a different host than www.nodivisions.com (although they resolve identically).  The quick and easy fix for that was to redirect anyone visiting www.nodivisions.com to nodivisions.com; you should now see the www disappear from the address bar if you try to visit that way.

Steve also reminded me of the fact that cookie-based logging is subject to sabotage, since a person can simply delete their cookies at will anytime.  Argh... other than that, it’s an incredibly simple and clean solution.  But alas, I’m back to logging the way I used to (partially), which is based on a combination of a user cookie and some other less dynamic characteristics of the client.  We’ll see how it fares.

Posted by Anthony on 5 replies

Biking biking.

Slow posting here.  It’s been a while, I’ve been busy.  Or lazy.

Last week, I went mountain biking in French Creek state park with Chris and Josh.  Since my bike has no suspension, and they both have full-suspension bikes, they each offered to let me ride theirs for a while.  Well, that only lasted about 10 minutes, because that was as long as they could stand to ride mine!  (It’s really, really rocky in French Creek, and pretty much everywhere around here, sadly... and going down rocky hills really hurts your arms and wrists and back, if you don’t have any suspension.  And going up hills... don’t even get me started.)

But 10 minutes was all it took for me.  I’m hooked.  I’m getting an FS bike, and soon.  I’ve had my Trek 950 for 6 or 7 years now, and it’s been a great bike, but I’ve done a ton more road-riding than mountain biking.  And it did OK on the mountains too, but now that FS has become affordable, I’m there.

After biking, Chris and I watched the movie Phone Booth.  It was better than I thought it would be, but still pretty odd and not entirely satisfying.  After seeing previews a while ago, I thought "I wonder how they’re going to manage to make an entire movie in a phone booth interesting."  But it was.  Still, I wasn’t thrilled about the ending.  Oh, and just about every other word was an expletive.  That was rather put-offish.

Later, I introduced Chris to Strong Bad.  Have I mentioned that your life is incomplete without a weekly (daily?) dose of Strong Bad?

Anyway, Sunday I went mountain biking with Rolly in Wissahickon park, within Fairmount Park, in Philly.  It was super.  It was rocky too -- I went over the handlebars once, but recovered nicely -- but not nearly as bad as French Creek.  After biking about 6 miles out, we rode down off the mountain onto "Forbidden Drive," aka Wissahickon Drive, and took that back.  That drive is the place to be... mad peoples all over.

So, I definitely want to get an FS bike and start biking a lot more.  I wish I knew some people in State College who were into biking like I am.

Oh, on the way to church Sunday, I realized that The Postal Service is totally Volkswagen music.  Sunny Sunday morning, windows down, weird happy "almost da-da-da" music on the stereo... it could have been a VW commercial.

Posted by Anthony on reply

THE COMMA JOHANNEUM

All bibles contain the substance of the following statement at 1 John 5: 7:
"And there are three that bear witness in earth: the spirit, and the water, and the blood: and these three agree in one."

Some bibles precede this with a controversial text known as the Comma Johanneum that reads:
"For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one."

Did John write these words?

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

Thanks Anthony for the references in support of the Comma I must confess I’ve never previously had to investigate it quite this thoroughly! To recap, you quoted the following sources:

1) 200 - Tertullian quotes the verse (Gill, "An exposition of the NT", Vol 2, pp. 907-8)
2) 250 - Cyprian, who writes, "And again concerning the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit it is written: ’and the Three are One’" (Vienna, vol. iii, p. 215)
3) 350 - Priscillian cites the verse (Vienna, vol. xviii, p. 6)
4) 350 - Idacius Clarus cites the verse (MPL, vol. 62, col. 359)
5) 350 - Athanasius cites the verse (Gill)
6) 415 - Council of Carthage appeals to the verse as a basic text proving a fundamental doctrine when contending with the Arians (Ruckman, "History of the NT Church", Vol. I, p. 146)
[numerous African and later references omitted]

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

TERTULLIAN
John Gill (1697-1771) said
"in the middle, of the "third" century, about the year 250; [it] is referred to by Tertullian {c} about, the year 200;"
Tertullian (160-220) is often credited with being the first to formulate the CONCEPT of the Trinity, though Theophilus of Antioch was the first to use the word ’trias’ (translated into Latin as ’trinitas’) in 180AD. However, crucially, Tertullian never ascribed the Comma to John. In his definitive statement on this matter, Against Praxeas, he marshalls the assistance of 332 scriptures that bear on the Trinity doctrine without any reference to a passage that would absolutely have nailed his argument – why? 
Tertullian’s writings seem to be the first step toward the Trinity doctrine rather than a summation of the Trinity as formulised by Athanasius; certainly they differ at key points. Can you find any reputable reference to the effect that Tertullian believed John wrote the Comma? Gill seems to be out on a limb here.

CYPRIAN (De catholicae ecclesiae unitate 6)
Cyprian did at least quote 1 John 5: 7 (the spirit, the water and blood being in agreement) and APPLIED this as a metaphor for the Trinity. Crucially again, a careful reading shows that his quotation of John’s words omits the disputed text.
"Since the statement about the Trinity in the Comma is quite clear (“the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit”), and since Cyprian does not quote that part of the text, this in the least does not afford proof that he knew of such wording. One would expect him to quote the exact wording of the text, if its meaning were plain. That he does not do so indicates that a Trinitarian interpretation was superimposed on the text by Cyprian."
Catholic Encylopedia: "The little that can be extracted from St. Cyprian on the Holy Trinity and the Incarnation is correct, judged by later standards."

PRISCILLIAN
The earliest evidence [of the Johanine Comma] comes from a MS. of Priscillianist provenance discovered by G. Schepss at Wurzburg 1885. Later the insertion is found in African authors. It would thus seem to have originated in N. Africa or Spain and to have found its way into the Latin Bibles used in those districts (both Old Latin and Vulgate), possibly under the stress of Arian persecution. It is absent from St. Jerome’s original text of the Vulgate."
The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, Edited by F.L.Cross, Oxford University Press, reprint of 1963.

"The Comma Joanneum, 5:7-8 of the Vg. is missing in all Gk MSS except four later MSS and in the Oriental versions. It is quoted by no Church father before Priscillian (380). There is no doubt that it is a gloss on the preceding lines, probably added in Africa or the Iberian peninsula."
John L. McKenzie, S.J., Dictionary of the Bible, The Bruce Publishing Company, 1965, p.445.

"[v]8. The famous interpolation after ’three witnesses’ is not printed even in RSVn, and rightly. It cites the heavenly testimony of the Father, the logos, and the Holy Spirit, but is never used in the early trinitarian controversies. No repectable Greek MS contains it. Appearing first in a late 4th cent. Latin text, it entered the Vulgate and finally the NT of Erasmus."
Peake’s Commentary on the Bible, edtors M.Black and H.H.Rowley, reprint of 1964, p.1038

"[1 John]5:7; This verse has not been found in Greek in any manuscript in or out of the New Testament earlier than the thirteenth century. It does not appear in any Greek manuscript of I John before the fifteenth century, when one cursive has it; one from the sixteenth also contains the reading. These are the only Greek manuscripts of the New Testament in which it has ever been found. But it occurs in no ancient Greek manuscript of Greek Christian writers or any of the oriental versions. its chief support is in two Old Latin manuscripts of the sixth and eighth centuries and in some manuscripts of the Latin Vulgate, but not the oldest ones. Erasmus did not include it in his first edition to the New Testament in Greek (1516) nor in his second (1519). When criticized for the omission, he rashly said that if anyone could show him a Greek manuscript containing the passage he would insert it, and the sixteenth century Codex Mantifortianus containing it was brought to his attention. He felt obliged to include the reading in his third edition (1525). From Tyndale the verse found its way into the King James Version. It is universally discredited by Greek scholars and editors of the Greek text of the New Testament."
Edgar J. Goodspeed, The Goodspeed Parallel New Testament, p. 557.

Metzger has an excellent book tracing the origin of the Comma Johanneum. Michael Maynard has another that takes the opposite view. However, they broadly agree on the following facts:

• No-one within 150 years of Jesus’ death even refers to the CONCEPT of the Trinity.
• In almost 300 years prior to Priscillian hundreds of writers quote 1 John 5: 7 without referring to the words above.
• In the same period, the text is not once clearly attributed to John.
• No apologist for the Trinity prior to Priscillian ever cites the passage, despite it being the clearest and most explicit statement of the doctrine - including Tertullian, Cyprian and Augustine.
• The passage is absent from the manuscripts of all ancient versions (Syriac, Coptic, Armenian, Ethiopic, Arabic, Slavonic), except the Latin; and it is not found (a) in the Old Latin in its early form (Tertullian Cyprian Augustine), or in the Vulgate (b) as issued by Jerome ... or (c) as revised by Alcuin...
• The Comma Johanneum doesn’t appear in any Greek manuscript for nearly 1500 years.
• The earliest instance of the passage being quoted as a part of the actual text of the Epistle is in a fourth century Latin treatise entitled Liber Apologeticus (chap. 4), attributed either to Priscillian or to his follower Bishop Instantius.
• In the 200 years following the publication of the King James version, there was a practically universal recognition of the origin of the Comma Johanneum as more ancient manuscripts came to light. During the 18th and 19th Centuries, only the staunchest defender of the Trinity doctrine, the Roman Catholic Church, held that it was genuine. Eventually, they too were forced to acknowledge that John did not write the passage.
• With the exception of the Catholic Douay bible, practically all translations omit the passage, or relegate it to a footnote.

As Daniel Wallace concludes: "All the historical data point in one of two directions: (1) This reading was a gloss added by Latin patristic writers whose interpretive zeal caused them to insert these words into Holy Writ; or (2) this interpretation was a gloss, written in the margins of some Latin MSS, probably sometime between 250 and 350, that got incorporated into the text by a scribe who was not sure whether it was a comment on scripture or scripture itself (a phenomenon that was not uncommon with scribes)."

Whether or not the Trinity is a bible teaching is another question - but the data is overwhelming that, from a purely biblical perspective, the Comma Johanneum is not admissable as evidence.

As we’ve previously agreed, one way or another, God sees to it that the biblical text remains uncorrupted and clearly intelligible to his creation.

Posted by Swikky on 1 reply

a weird email

Hey anthony, I myself got a weird email as well, I will be forwarding it to you, I think someone is trying to impersonate me as I am a poster on here, so you would be more apt to read it (why anyone would read an email from me, is beyond me, but hey, I suppose someone would)  Just hopped on the site to check if something weird has been posted about it, and haven’t seen anything.

Posted by steev on 4 replies

Bad Email...

I received an email today from a person who typed "vergecs@yahoo.com" as his/her return address.  But when I replied, it bounced, saying that there was no such account on Yahoo.  So, since I have no other way of contacting this person, I figured I’d post a reply here.

Original message:

I’m thinking of buying the exact same power inverter via Ebay for pretty much the same purpose and I want to ask ya if it was working out good for ya still?

Thanks

My reply, that didn’t go through:

Hi there,

Yeah, my inverter is working great, still.  I’ve been using it for 3 months now, and haven’t had any problems.  In fact, just last weekend I was using both outlets on it, one for my carPC and the other to charge my digital camera.  Not that charging the camera necessarily draws a lot of current, but it was nice that it worked without any problems.

Hope this helps,
Anthony

Posted by Anthony on reply

Bill Whittle

posted image
Trinity.

A lesson in economics and politics, on why in America the rich get richer and the poor do too, how in America we have a government limited by the people and not the other way around, why our economy when sick is stronger than any other economy in the world when healthy, and how attitude is nearly everything.

It’ll take a little time, but read it.  You’ll be glad you did.

(The photo is mine, but I think it’s appropriate.)

Posted by Anthony on reply

Looking for the name of a song, and perhaps a group or choir that sings it...

OK, I have watched the movie A Walk To Remember, and towards the beginning, there is a church scene, and the choir sings a song, it goes something along the lines of - ’let the light from the lighthouse, let it shine on me’

Does anyone know the name or a choir who sings it?  I like the song alot, and want to get a copy to listen to any time I would like.

Posted by steev on 2 replies

Shameless begging from a geek.

http://www.massedi.com/mass_multiples/c3h18_horizontal.htm

will someone please buy me that?  there is a store here in my local area that has a couple of them used for 1500, but alas, I can’t afford it, yet :)

Posted by steev on 2 replies

Good Times, Good Tunes, Good Buds

Cool things are happening.

I got a Nextel cell phone a few weeks ago (the i95cl), at a super discount because my company has a contract with Nextel.  The phone is awesome.  But the coolest thing is the direct-connect feature (aka "walkie-talkie").  This always seemed cool to me, but I never fully comprehended the power of its awesomeness until I actually used it.  It’s easily the most fun thing of all time.  It’s like their advertisements say... life is better when you’ve got the phone with a built-in walkie-talkie.  So if you don’t have a cell phone, or if you do have a cell phone, you should get a Nextel phone ASAP.

Cool thing #2: people are sending me photos.  Photos of themselves, which is awesome... it’s nice to actually be able to see the people you correspond with online.  And photos of helicopters that they work on at crazy army-base Avionics labs.  That is unstoppable.  So, if you ever have the inclination to contact me, and I reply and say "hey, thanks for writing, what’s up?", feel free to send a photo, of yourself or something else that’s neato.

I am in love with The Postal Service.  You will be too, once you listen to them.  It was really hard to pick a song of the week from the album "Give Up" which I just bought, because there isn’t a sub-fantastic song on it.  But I settled on "The District Sleeps Alone Tonight."  So go listen to it.

Which brings me to cool thing #more: one of my neighbors/friends just opened a record store below my brother’s skate shop in my town.  How these kids are able to just open their own businesses like this is quite mind-boggling to me.  I am so impressed.  But anyway, that’s where I got "Give Up," just last night, on their first day of business.

And finally cool thing #awesome: a friend sent me a link last night to a webpage about state mottos, and it’s hilarious.  Here are a few:

Alabama
It Is: We Dare Defend Our Rights
It Should Be: At Least We’re Not Mississippi

Colorado
It Is: Nothing Without Providence
It Should Be: Too Wimpy to Cross the Mountains So We Stopped Here

Illinois
It Is: State Sovereignty, National Union
It Should Be: Please Don’t Pronounce the "S"

Kentucky
It Is: United We stand, Divided We Fall
It Should Be: Five Million People; Fifteen Last Names

Maine
It Is: I Direct
It Should Be: We’re Really Cold, But We Have Cheap Lobster

Mississippi
It Is: By Valor and Arms
It Should Be: Come and Feel Better About Your Own State

South Dakota
It Is: Under God the People Rule
It Should Be: Closer Than North Dakota

Go see ’em all here.

Posted by Anthony on reply

scientology/

also, stopped in Jackson today  for work, passed that church, it is called, First Church of Jesus Christ Scientist.  So I am not sure it is scientology, but still an interesting name.

Posted by steev on 1 reply

Dependency

Wow, this weekend, I learned that I have come to depend on the Internet and electricty alot more than I think is comfortable.  What could cause me to come to this conclusion?  Well, let us start from the beginning.  Monday, I worked 12 hours, which while great for my paycheck, is bad for me in general, mainly because I am lazy and like working only 8 hours a day.  Forward to Triday.  Great day, Not the end of the month, so things aren’t hectic (I deliver copiers, and sales people tend to put in all their sales for delivery at the end of the month, so the first few days/2 weeks of the month are mainly pickups and some sales) and because of the holiday, as soon as we finished our deliveries for the day, we could go home - WOOHOO!  Got done around noon, instead of 3 as usual time.  Was lazy for the rest of the day.  Friday comes, and it storms a tiny bit, there were approximately 15 minutes of 60mph winds.  Power went out.  3 hours later, the apartments across the parking lot from us had their power restored.  I couldn’t wait!  It was only a matter of time before mine would be up!  Well, it came up about an hour later, or at least, it tried to.  There was some electricity, but not enough to run anything.  The lights kept getting dimmer and dimmer, until I lit a candle and could see again.  Well, no, I didn’t light a candle, I didn’t have any.  But if I had, it would have been brighter than the lights were.  So, a call out to the electric company was in order.  What is this?  An automated system that sends the report to their technicians.  Awesome!  Automation at its finest, I just call and report it, and they send a technician out right away!  Ummm, no again.  Power was off from noon:30 ish on Friday, and then Saturday rolled around.  I woke up excited, my room was so bright!  Darn, it was the sun shining in my window.  A very hot day, one that would have been perfect with some air conditioning.  Unfortunately, we still didn’t have power, so it was not quite perfect.  A friend of mine from work showed up, and gave me some relief, because his computer and network was down at his house, and needed it fixed.  I jumped on the chance to fix his computers (he also has air conditioning!) Fixed them just great.  Then I installed the drivers for the motherboard.  Then WindowsXP refused to boot.  Safe Mode attempt showed that it was having a problem getting past the AGP driver.  Odd, there wasn’t an AGP video card in his machine.  Oh well, I would think on it, and return home, praying for electricity the entire way.  It did not happen.  Then I had an Idea!  I have a laptop, and I have a battery backup.  So, the little juice that was coming out of the wall was powering my laptop’s ac adapter, and the battery backup was powering the cable modem.  YES!  I was online!  I could just tell that things were going to get good.  Then I realized, I still needed to get Dee’s computers running.  Off to my pile of miscellaneous hardware.  No good video cards.  Hmmm, then it hit me, my webserver has a GeForce2  video card in it, and being a webserver, it didn’t need a video card.  And it was AGP!  So, I gave the AGP card to Dee, because I know he can put a computer together, so popping in the video card shouldn’t be a problem.  Off he went, and I was singing a happy song to myself as I was able to get on the internet on my (linux) laptop.  Well, there were no updates at the electric company, so I called them a few more times, hopeing that perhaps my first few calls hadn’t gotten through somehow (hey, if power was out here, why wouldn’t it be there right?)  Oh yeah, the people across the parking lot had power.  Turns out, only our row of 4 apartment buildings had power.  I went to bed a very sad person without electricity.  I woke up the next morning.  The sky was overcast, it was going to rain again, and my roommate had heard on the radio that they thought the power was going to be knocked out again.  "Wouldn’t it being knocked out again, require us to have powe restored first?" I asked him.  He just shrugged.  Suddenly, I was excited, the lights started to get brighter, but as if on some cue, knowing my excitement was rising, bam.  Off went all power, and with it, the battery backup drained of its power, and laptop could run, however, there was no internet connection, so no need to keep it running.  Then I had a novel idea.  Let’s clean my room!  I mean, it’s been a while (I have pictures that I may post if I can get over the embarrassment of them) since I had cleaned it last, and so I went all out.  Broke out the Endust, and Windex and 409, and was about to break out the vacuum as well, but then, I realized, no power, so I was kind of crestfallen that I couldn’t vacuum.  I cleaned and cleaned.  Then Dee showed up, his computer still wasn’t working.  Neither was my AC, so once again, I hopped at the chance of fixing his computer (and basking in the wondefulness that is Air Conditioning.)  I simply reinstalled Windows (it’s so fun to do that)  and everything was up and running, he was happy, and his wife made me some corn on the cob (YUMMY!!!)  So, I came home, and glorious day it was, I could hear the sweet music of the air conditioner running as I exited Dee’s car and stepped onto the sidewalk leading to my apartment.  Ah, it was nice, although, I still don’t quite understand how or why the power was out for 50+ hours while the apartments across the parking lot had power after 3 hours.  Its crazy how things work sometimes.  Hope everyone else had a great 4th of July though.

Posted by steev on 3 replies

Conquer!

Yo!  I’m #1 on Google and Yahoo for fhqwghads!

Posted by Anthony on 1 reply

Plans

I’m going down to the shore for the 4th of July holiday, to the usual spot in OCNJ.  Should be lots of fun.  I might be leaving right now (from work), or I might be going home first and leaving tomorrow.  Don’t know yet.  I’ll decide when I get to the car I guess.

In the meantime, check out these links:

A visitor sent in this mini-itx page.  These are some of the neatest little computers I’ve ever seen.  Go to the Projects page to see more.

Also, Nuke the Moon.  This is hilarious.

Have a great holiday, everyone.

Posted by Anthony on 1 reply

MTBing

I was just daydreaming in my cube about the next time I’ll be able to hit the single track, and came across a good site for info on local trails and parks...
click here!
and here’s MTB slang dictionary... http://world.std.com/~jimf/biking/slang.html

Posted by Rolly on 3 replies

No Thanks

posted image

Posted by Anthony on reply

Today I didn't even have to use my AK

Man.  As far as days go, today was pretty spectacular.  At work, I found out that I might be starting a programming project that will take until the end of the summer (when I leave and go back to school).  Which is awesome, because although I’m technically an engineer and I like engineering, I really love programming lately.  And this particular project would involve writing some C code to either replace a bunch of Perl scripts, or embedding some Perl into some C.  (I got chosen for this because I’m fluent in Perl.)  Now, if you’re not a programmer, right about now you’re saying either "What?" or "So what?"  But I am excited.

I also got 2 rad emails today from random people on the internet.  I usually get one or two of these a week, but sometimes less, sometimes a little more.  It’s definitely gotten more often since my site went from about 10 or 20 visitors per day to nearly 200 every day over the past year and a half.

In any event, getting these emails is easily one of my favorite things ever.  Complete strangers just emailing to say "hey thanks for putting this-or-that online," or "hey I like the site!"  That just rocks.  I feel so useful  : )

The first of these 2 particular emails was from another comp-E working at the Aviation Applied Technology Directorate at Fort Eustis, Virginia.  That’s so important sounding.  He wanted to say thanks, because by putting some info online about a Kenwood CD changer adapter, I saved him $60.  And he also gave me props on my musicbox.

The second email was really short, from a girl, and it contained the phrase "You sound like the perfect guy!"  I’m not really going to comment on that because I don’t want to sound conceited (and I don’t think it’s true... not quite anyway), but I’m saying, I just can’t complain when I get an email like that.

Oh, and I found my Unisys ID which I’d lost about 2 weeks ago.  That’s important because you need it to get past security on the way into any of the buildings; I’ve been scaling the walls and dropping in through open skylights for the past 2 weeks.  (Just kidding... we don’t really have skylights.)

Posted by Anthony on reply

Come on, fhqwghads

So today, my dad was mowing the lawn like he does about every other day, and he stopped to sharpen the blade because it was leaving patches of uncut grass behind.  In the process of tightening the nut after replacing the blade, he slipped and nearly cut his finger off.  Ow.  So he went to the hospital and got stitches, and 3 hours later he comes home and resumes mowing!!

As I hear the mower start up, I think man, I should probably go out there and finish the lawn.  But my dad is stubborn, and I figured there was no way he’d actually let me do it.  A little nudging from my mom convinced me to offer anyway, and he didn’t even put up a fight.  I know my dad, and the only thing I can figure is that must have hurt like a son of a gun for him to let me do it.  Or something.

Anyway, I haven’t mowed any lawn in..... well, I have no idea how long it’s been.  Three or 4 years, easily.  So it was actually kind of enjoyable, in a character-building kind of way.  And you really appreciate things like a swimming pool a lot more after you’ve done something like mow the lawn.

Speaking of awesome music, I so should’ve included the new album by The Postal Service when I ordered a few CDs the other day from amazon.  Mark had been saying how good they were, but I hadn’t heard them.... then the day after I place my order, my brother is like "Yo, check out these Postal Service mp3s."  And they rock.  They’re like nintendo sound effects mixed with other weird stuff mixed with nice pretty melodies and action-packed storytime semi-lovesong lyrics.  You can download an mp3 of "Such Great Heights" on that site; it’s a good one.

I am thinking it’s a sign, that the freckles
in our eyes are mirror images and when
we kiss they’re perfectly aligned.
And I have to speculate that God himself
did make us into corresponding shapes like
puzzle pieces from the clay.
True, it may seem like a stretch, but
it’s thoughts like this that catch my troubled
head when you’re away, when I am missing you to death,
when you are out there on the road for
several weeks of shows... and when you scan
the radio, I hope this song will guide you home.

Come on people, that is emo 9000 right there, you gotta love it.

So in closing, I’d like to say that my 2 favorite song titles of all time are:

1. "Making People Apologize for Accusing You of Things You Actually Did," by Shai Hulud, and

2. "Like I Care," by Helmet.

Posted by Anthony on reply

King James: Authorised for what and whom?

I note with incredulity on your list of  "don’t like’s" the inclusion of all bibles not authorised by King James. This on the same list as "interpretation’s of the bible".  (sorry)

No doubt the KJ is a monumental achievement of world literature; no doubt it is a resonant and fruity translation for reading aloud with Shakespearian pomp; but accurate it is not. Many modern translations  simplify with commercial intent, but many, many others are based on original Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic texts rather than the Latin Vulgate that forms the basis of the KJ.

As a consequence, the better 20th Century translations really are as close as we need to be to every jot and tittle of the original manuscripts. Despite its grandiosity, the many well documented inaccuracies of the KJ mean that it is little better than an interpretation itself -  your inclusion of I John 5: 7 shows how risky it is to pin your faith on one translation. DYOR.

Seriously, get (and read) a number of good modern translations; it might bring you even closer to the truth.

Posted by Swikky on 16 replies

Summertime

The "random" feature on my car mp3 player is the best thing ever.  This morning it happened upon the Counting Crows’ album "August and Everything After."  That album is so old, and it’s still so supremely good.  Now granted, I’m emotionally attached to it from having listened to it over the last 8 years or so, but still... music changes and styles change, but that album is really really good even today.

In looking over my photos from the AT hike, I realized that I have the same issue that my mom does when it comes to photography.  My photos tell many of the stories and events of my life, but they do it distinctly through my own eyes.  Which may seem quite natural, but as I reflect upon it sometimes it’s strange to realize that these stories of my life contain very few photos of myself.  And even though the objective beauty or "neatness" of a given photo may be its most important quality, it occurs to me that in the long run (i.e. after I’m gone), my photos’ personal value will have been much greater for me than for my friends and family, because of the dearth of photos of myself.  But they are after all my photos, so maybe that’s entirely sensible.

Speaking of photos, Garrett’s photos make me want to cry every time he takes a new set of them.  His latest ones of downtown Savannah are a case in point.  They’re all so remarkably vibrant and interesting.  It’s not that I don’t like my own photos, not at all, but Garrett produces like 2 or 3 beautiful photo sets each week.  He’s just consistently amazing.

On an entirely random note, last Thursday was an awesome day.  (I wanted to post about this before but just didn’t get around to it till now.)  First of all, since I was off work Monday-Wednesday for the hike, Thursday and Friday really had no choice but to be awesome, because they comprised a two-day work week.  But on Thursday, there was a Unisys student employee event in the cafeteria from 2pm-5pm.  There were a couple speakers who talked about what it’s like to work here (hey, this is my 4th year here, so I know by now...), and then there was a scavenger hunt.

My first thought upon learning that there would be a scavenger hunt was, "You have got to be kidding me.  What are we, kindergarteners??"  But it turned out to be a hunt for things like Unisys’ 2002 revenue ($5.6B), the number of raised-dots on the metal techroom doors (it’s 11x17x2 dots), and the FCS date of our ES7000 server to Microsoft (I don’t remember, and I don’t feel like walking down to that end of the building right now... sorry).  So it was pretty fun.  But what really rocked is the fact that me and my man Mark teamed up and conquered it, beating the other ~60 co-ops/interns, and won $20 movie passes.  Then, they brought out ice cream and big bowls of caramel, chocolate syrup, cherries, sprinkles, and nuts, and we all made sundaes.  You just can’t beat that.  And when there was a bunch of ice cream left over, me and Mark decided to take it back to our hallway and hook our group up with it.  We’re going for intern and co-op of the year awards : )

Two guys who I’d never met before were going to see Finding Nemo right after work, and they invited me and Mark.  Well Mark had just popped 2 tires on his car the night before, so he had to get that taken care of.  But I went, and it turns out both these guys are Christians!  Super phatty.  Anyway we went in, and Finding Nemo was playing in 3 theaters.  We were about 10 minutes late, so we walked in and it had already started.  But when it was over in about 45 minutes, we walked out and realized that we had gone into the wrong theater!  So we went into one of the other ones where a new showing was just starting, and watched the first half after having already seen the last half.  It was rather a strange way to watch a movie, let me tell you.

Oh... it’s finally summertime here!  After 2 months of rain nearly every single day (there were something like 4 non-rainy days in 2 months...ugh), we’re finally getting a break this week.  It’s forecast to be sunny and 80° or 90° pretty much all this week, even into the weekend.  Amazing.  So, the song of the week is Summertime by Mae.

Posted by Anthony on reply

Maria is a sprite

posted image

Just a cute old photo of my sister that I found a while ago.... it’s from 5 years ago.

Posted by Anthony on reply

Scientology

During our hike last weekend, we were talking about the religion of Scientology.  I decided to look it up and see just what it’s about.  Here’s a statement from the official website:

Developed by L. Ron Hubbard, Scientology is a religion that offers a precise path leading to a complete and certain understanding of one’s true spiritual nature and of one’s relationship with self, family, groups, mankind, all life forms, the material universe, the spiritual universe and the Supreme Being, or infinity.

Scientology addresses the spirit — not simply the body or mind — and believes that man is far more than a product of his environment, or his genes.

Scientology comprises a body of knowledge which extends from certain fundamental truths. Prime among these are:

Man is an immortal spiritual being.

His experience extends well beyond a single lifetime.

His capabilities are unlimited, even if not presently realized.

Scientology further holds man to be basically good, and that his spiritual salvation depends upon himself and his fellows and his attainment of brotherhood with the universe.

Scientology is not a dogmatic religion in which one is asked to believe anything on faith. An individual discovers for himself that Scientology works by applying its principles and observing or experiencing the results.

The ultimate goal of Scientology is true spiritual enlightenment and freedom for the individual.

Sounds somewhat like a western version of Buddhism.  The fundamental flaw (aside from just being one of those touchy-feely happy religions) as I see it is their belief that man is basically good.  Not only is this the polar opposite of what I believe, but where I live (Earth) it’s abundantly clear that man is not basically good.

Posted by Anthony on 7 replies

Flood Watch

The National Weather Service has issued a Severe Weather Alert for today and tomorrow in my area... here’s a snippet:

THE ATMOSPHERE HAS BECOME QUITE MOIST AND UNSTABLE... AND IT WILL BE EFFICIENT IN WRINGING MOISTURE OUT OF ITSELF DUE TO ENHANCED RISINGMOTION.

"RISINGMOTION"??  And "wringing moisture out of itself"??  Who comes up with this stuff?

Posted by Anthony on 1 reply

Camp time

I’m leaving for my annual Appalachian Trail hike with Brian, Chris, Jason, and Josh.  Looks like it’ll be 30 miles this year.  My pack weights 45 pounds -- mostly food and 4.5 liters of water.  I’ll be back Wednesday night... don’t say bad things about me while I’m gone please  : )

Posted by Anthony on 6 replies

Lies

I’m about sick of hearing that there’s "escalating violence in the middle east."  If someone kills lots of American civilians it’s called terrorism, but if someone kills lots of Isreali civilians it’s called "escalating violence."

Fortunately, someone in the current American administration has some balls.  As much as I like president Bush, he’s being way too politically correct and not nearly honest enough when he speaks about this situation.  Colin Powell, on the other hand, said today that we all want peace, and when the terror attacks stop, responses to such attacks will no longer be necessary.

The difference between what he said, and what nearly everyone else is saying, is that he isn’t pretending there is a moral equivalence between the two sides.  Arab terrorists attacking Israeli civilians is in no way "the same" as the Israeli government hunting and killing the members and leaders of Arab terrorist groups.  Fighting terrorism isn’t the same as committing terrorism, and anyone who pretends otherwise is a liar.

Posted by Anthony on 3 replies

25th Hour

I watched the movie 25th Hour last night.  It’s a Spike Lee joint starring Ed Norton, about a drug dealer who gets busted by the police.  The movie depicts the 24 hours before his jailtime begins, with flashbacks to earlier times to explain things.  Ed’s character (Montgomery aka "Monty") is struggling to figure out who dropped a dime on him, suspecting his girlfriend.

(Warning: I’m going to give away some of the details from the movie now.)

Interestingly, his bodyguard’s name is Konstantin, and they even got the nickname version correct (it’s Russian, but pronounced "Kost’-ya" with English characters).  It was funny to hear Monty call him a "fat Russian something-or-other" and then hear his response, "it’s Ukrainian!"  Funny to me, at least, because similar exchanges happen all the time (in jest) between me and my roommates Konstantin and Dimitry.  Except they’re both pretty skinny so the jokes are never about their weight (more like their Russian mafia connections).

There were at least 2 scenes that were incredibly similar to scenes in American History X, which (IIRC?) is also a Spike Lee joint, and definitely also stars Ed Norton.  The first was when Ed is confronting the boss of the drug ring (the head of a white supremacy group in American History X).  He is standing with his back to the door of the boss’ room, facing the boss who’s behind his desk, and he points and says "When I walk out that door, I’m out, you hear me!?"  The line is nearly if not completely identical in the two movies.

The second scene is towards the end, when Monty is just about to go to prison.  He’s with his two best friends (and his dog), and he’s asking one of them (Frank) to "make him ugly" by beating him up, for his own good when he gets into prison.  (Because he’s a pretty boy, you know, and they "don’t do well" in prison.)  Frank stands up from the bench he’s sitting on, and is like "no way, you’re crazy, I won’t do that!"  The other friend Jacob is just like "what??" and he’s still sitting on the bench for a few seconds.  Frank and Monty are yelling back and forth at each other, moving into the center of the little street they’re on, and eventually Jacob gets up and is like "Monty, stop this!"  At this point, Monty turns around and yells at Jacob to shut up.  The camera is switching quickly from person to person to side-views and it makes the scene very intense.  Well in American History X, the scene where Ed is yelling at his mom’s Jewish boyfriend is very similar; he turns around and yells at his sister who was pleading with him to stop, just like Jacob was in 25th Hour.  The same fast-paced somewhat-disorienting camera techniques were used too.

In 25th Hour, Frank does end up beating Monty pretty bad -- he’s got him pinned on the ground and he’s beating his face pretty hard.  It’s an incredibly sad and emotional scene as Frank is sobbing the entire time, and Monty isn’t fighting back at all.  I actually thought he was going to die.

The thing about this movie is, I thought it had a decent moral, because throughout the story his friends are talking about how he deserves to go to prison because he’s been living off the suffering of other people.  So even though you identify with the main character and feel bad for him, you’re sorta like "well, yeah, that’s what you get, you jerk."  However, at the end as his dad is driving him to prison, he’s like "Monty you just give me the word, and I’ll head west" and that’s what he does.  The last ten minutes of the movie depict the rest of Monty’s life out west, with his dad narrating from the present, saying things like "you go west, and you never come back... you don’t write, you find a job and you make a new life for yourself, the way it was supposed to be... I’ll miss you, but I believe in God’s kingdom, and I’ll be reunited with you and your mother... just not in this life."  And it’s sorta sad, but then it’s like "yes!  he got away!"  But then it’s like "hmm that moral really stinks: live your life as a drug dealer, get busted, then run from the law and start a new life and it works and you’re happily ever after."

But THEN, what’s really confusing is, the very last scene is back in the car as his dad is driving him to prison, presumably right after he said "you just give me the word, and we’ll head west."  So you sorta don’t really know, did he go west, or not?

Posted by Anthony on 2 replies

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