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Saturday, December 08, 2007

TEST!

You don't have to actually answer the questions. Just read the e-mail straight through, and you'll get the point.

1. Name the five wealthiest people in the world.

2. Name the last five Heisman trophy winners.

3. Name the last five winners of the Miss America.

4. Name ten people who have won the Nobel or Pulitzer Prize.

5. Name the last half dozen Academy Award winner for best actor and actress.

6. Name the last decade's worth of World Series winners.


How did you do?

The point is, none of us remember the headliners of yesterday. These are no second-rate achievers. They are the best in their fields. But the applause dies. Awards tarnish. Achievements are forgotten. Accolades and certificates are buried with their owners .


Here's another quiz. See how you do on this one:

1. List a few teachers who aided your journey through school.

2. Name three friends who have helped you through a difficult time.

3. Name five people who have taught you something worthwhile.

4. Think of a few people who have made you feel appreciated and special.

5. Think of five people you enjoy spending time with


Easier?


The lesson: The people who make a difference in your life are not the ones with the most credentials, the most money, or the most awards. They are the ones that care .



Pass this on to those people who have made a difference in your life.??

"Don't worry about the world coming to an end today.
It's already tomorrow in Australia."

Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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Police Brutality!

I seems things are not that different in the land down under than they are here!

TWO police officers handcuffed a 64-year-old pensioner, threw her to the ground and then searched inside her bra and underpants on a busy suburban roadin Sydney, Australia in the mistaken belief she was a drug dealer.

The ordeal left an ailing Leentje McDonald, of Maroubra, in hospital and severely traumatised.

But she did not receive an apology from police. Rather, she has been charged with assaulting an officer.

While it is unusual for a pensioner to be mistaken for a 40-year-old drug dealer, as was the case here, civil libertarians say such aggressive searches, and the charging of people for assault or resisting arrest if no drugs are found, are a common and disturbing feature of modern policing.

In her case, Ms McDonald resisted the intrusive search because longstanding nerve damage in her right shoulder meant she was in excruciating pain when the two police officers handcuffed her during the full body search on Maroubra Road.

"I started screaming, screaming so loud because it was extremely painful. It was so painful I could feel it in my spine. I had a blackout. I thought I was going to die from a heart attack," Ms McDonald told the Herald at her small Department of Housing flat, where she lives alone.
October 18 had began like any other pension day. Ms McDonald went to the shops to buy some ingredients for a "nice dinner" and stepped into the Maroubra Junction Hotel to play the pokies for a few minutes while she waited for her bus.

As she left the hotel, two plainclothes police officers, a man and a woman, approached.

"They said, 'Are you dealing drugs.' I said, 'No, never in my life. I don't even like smoking,' " she said. Ms McDonald says the two officers said they were looking for an Asian woman in her 40s.

"I said, 'You must have a mistaken identity. I have never done this in my life. I'm 64, a grandmother of six, please.' I said, 'You can't search me like this on a busy road. I beg your pardon, no.'"
The police grabbed her bag, finding only her wallet, some bills and two cans of coconut cream. But they were not satisfied. While Maroubra police station was directly across the road, about 20 metres away, the officers moved to handcuff and search her on the street.

"I said, 'Please don't do this, I have a frozen shoulder,' " Ms McDonald said.
In terrible pain, she lashed out, scratching one of the officers. They finished handcuffing her and threw her to the ground.

"They did a full body search. They put their hands inside my bra, inside my pants. I said, 'My God. Why is this happening to me?' Then the officer, she says to me, 'Stand up.' But I couldn't stand up. I was crying. Then they said, 'Put your shoes on.' My handbag was everywhere, my glasses, my coconut cream.

The commotion drew a large crowd of onlookers, intensifying Ms McDonald's humiliation. One witness, Josephine Chen, who worked at a nearby photo studio, said: "Everybody stopped to look.

"She kept screaming 'My shoulder, my shoulder' but the police kept ignoring it. She was struggling to free her arm. She wasn't trying to hit anyone."
In the past 10 years, NSW police have been granted increased powers to search people, culminating in the decision last month of the Premier, Morris Iemma, to extend indefinitely the powers given to police to deal with the aftermath of the Cronulla riots.

These powers mean police need only have a "suspicion" of illegality before they undertake an intrusive body search in an authorised area.

Cameron Murphy, of the NSW Council for Civil Liberties, said: "We get hundreds of complaints about this, more than any other issue, particularly when it involves police sniffer dogs at train stations or outside nightclubs.

"If you get upset about what is often a degrading and humiliating experience and they don't find drugs, the police charge you. Some people get what we call the trifecta: disobeying a lawful direction, resisting arrest and assaulting a
police officer."
A police spokesman from Eastern Beaches command, Chief Inspector David McBeath, would not comment before Ms McDonald's scheduled appearance at Waverley Local Court on December 19.

However, he said police would take into account any comments from the magistrate before determining if any action would be taken against the officers.

(And as further proof of the Hubris of cops and how they think they can do whatever they want we have this news about questions being asked in Albuquerque about one recent case in which a pair of the city's finest dropped in for a box of Krispy Kremes in a police helicopter.

Eyewitnesses said a Kiowa OH-58 chopper owned by the Albuquerque Police Department --which reportedly costs taxpayers about $180 an hour to fuel and fly, not including salaries and benefits for two crew members -- came swooping in out of the night sky one recent evening.

It circled several times around its intended target, then alighted in a nearby lot while a passenger went in for a box of doughnuts. Mission accomplished, the chopper buzzed off, sounding the siren by way of bidding onlookers adieu.)


Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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"Perspective" wins again at Canadian Blog Awards!

Canadian Blog AwardsAllan W Janssen, president and publisher of "Perspective" is very pleased to announce that for the second year in a row the award winning research staff here at our humble home has won the Canadian Blog Awards 2007 for "Best Investigative Journalism" of any North American Blog!

Allan and the entire staff would like to thank Tina, Mary, Waldo, Renate and Mark for their achievment and a reminder that there will be a little something extra in the Christmas bonus again this year! Luv ya all!

Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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Saturday Morning Confusion #4

I quit smoking quite a few years ago but even I have to admit that the "no-smoking" crowd is getting out of hand.

This should start you off in a confused state for the weekend.

The town of Bridgewater, N.S., is considering a bylaw that would ban smoking on all town property — streets and sidewalks included.

Opponents of the bylaw plan to take a stand on Saturday by smoking on a provincially-owned bridge that would be the town's last haven if the proposed bylaw gets approved.

In such a scenario, anyone driving on the 66 kilometres of streets in town or walking on the 34 kilometres of sidewalk faces a fine for being caught lighting up. The same rules would apply to public buildings and public parks.

Bridgewater Mayor Carrol Publicover said the proposed ban started with complaints about students smoking around school property.

Town councillor Kevin Marlin decided to draft an anti-smoking bylaw for school property, then went even further to propose banning smoking in all public places in the town, except for two spots — the two bridges that span the LaHave River.

That's because the town landmarks are owned by the Province of Nova Scotia.
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Now, to help get things back into "Perspective" we have this note from the logical and no-nonesense Germany.

Germany moves to outlaw Scientology!

The announcement came Friday after a two-day conference of interior ministers of Germany's 16 states well as federal Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble.

Actor Tom Cruise is one of the world's most high-profile Scientologists.->

Berlin Interior Minister Erhart Koerting, who presided over the two-day conference, told reporters that Scientology is an organization that is not compatible with the German constitution.

The government considers Scientology not a religion, he said, but a commercial enterprise that takes advantage of vulnerable people.

The ministers plan to ask Germany's domestic intelligence agency to begin preparing the necessary information to ban Scientology as well as jumping on couches!

The agency has had Scientology under observation for a decade on allegations that it "threatens the peaceful democratic order" of the country.

Scientologists have long battled to end the surveillance, saying it is an abuse of their right to freedom of religion.
The U.S. State Department regularly criticizes Germany in its annual Human Rights Report for the monitoring practice.

During the summer, Germany initially refused to allow the producers of a movie starring Scientology follower Tom Cruise as Germany's most famous anti-Hitler plotter to film at the site where the man was executed, although it did not expressly state Scientology as its reason.

Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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Friday, December 07, 2007

I found Jesus!

Today is a good day because I found Jesus.

(He was behind the sofa the whole time!)

And let me tell you something else. I FOLLOW JESUS!

And I will continue to follow him until I get back the five bucks I lent him!

(That night I had a dream that I died and went to heaven. When I got to the Pearly Gates St. Peter met me there, gave me five bucks, and told me to get lost!!!!!)

Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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15 Definitive Answers to Creationist Nonsense.

Opponents of evolution want to make a place for creationism by tearing down real science, but their arguments don't hold up. Rather than re-hash all the arguments the Creationist keep bringing up here is an objective view of the whole thing by Scientific American magazine.

After all, if you can't trust them, who can you trust?

Guest post By John Rennie.

When Charles Darwin introduced the theory of evolution through natural selection 143 years ago, the scientists of the day argued over it fiercely, but the massing evidence from paleontology, genetics, zoology, molecular biology and other fields gradually established evolution's truth beyond reasonable doubt. Today that battle has been won everywhere--except in the public imagination. (And U.S. public opinion - ED.)

Embarrassingly, in the 21st century, in the most scientifically advanced nation the world has ever known, creationists can still persuade politicians, judges and ordinary citizens that evolution is a flawed, poorly supported fantasy. They lobby for creationist ideas such as "intelligent design" to be taught as alternatives to evolution in science classrooms.

As this article goes to press, the Ohio Board of Education is debating whether to mandate such a change. Some antievolutionists, such as Philip E. Johnson, a law professor at the University of California at Berkeley and author of Darwin on Trial, admit that they intend for intelligent-design theory to serve as a "wedge" for reopening science classrooms to discussions of God.

Besieged teachers and others may increasingly find themselves on the spot to defend evolution and refute creationism. The arguments that creationists use are typically specious and based on misunderstandings of (or outright lies about) evolution, but the number and diversity of the objections can put even well-informed people at a disadvantage.

To help with answering them, the following list rebuts some of the most common "scientific" arguments raised against evolution. It also directs readers to further sources for information and explains why creation science has no place in the classroom.

1. Evolution is only a theory. It is not a fact or a scientific law.

Many people learned in elementary school that a theory falls in the middle of a hierarchy of certainty--above a mere hypothesis but below a law. Scientists do not use the terms that way, however. According to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), a scientific theory is "a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world that can incorporate facts, laws, inferences, and tested hypotheses."

No amount of validation changes a theory into a law, which is a descriptive generalization about nature. So when scientists talk about the theory of evolution--or the atomic theory or the theory of relativity or the theory of gravity for that matter--they are not expressing reservations about its truth.

In addition to the theory of evolution, meaning the idea of descent with modification, one may also speak of the fact of evolution. The NAS defines a fact as "an observation that has been repeatedly confirmed and for all practical purposes is accepted as 'true.'"

The fossil record and abundant other evidence testify that organisms have evolved through time.

Although no one observed those transformations, the indirect evidence is clear, unambiguous and compelling.

All sciences frequently rely on indirect evidence. Physicists cannot see subatomic particles directly, for instance, so they verify their existence by watching for telltale tracks that the particles leave in cloud chambers. The absence of direct observation does not make physicists' conclusions less certain.

2. Natural selection is based on circular reasoning: the fittest are those who survive, and those who survive are deemed fittest.

"Survival of the fittest" is a conversational way to describe natural selection, but a more technical description speaks of differential rates of survival and reproduction.

That is, rather than labeling species as more or less fit, one can describe how many offspring they are likely to leave under given circumstances.

Drop a fast-breeding pair of small-beaked finches and a slower-breeding pair of large-beaked finches onto an island full of food seeds. Within a few generations the fast breeders may control more of the food resources.

Yet if large beaks more easily crush seeds, the advantage may tip to the slow breeders.

In a pioneering study of finches on the Galapagos Islands, Peter R. Grant of Princeton University observed these kinds of population shifts in the wild [see his article "Natural Selection and Darwin's Finches"; Scientific American, October 1991].

The key is that adaptive fitness can be defined without reference to survival: large beaks are better adapted for crushing seeds, irrespective of whether that trait has survival value under the circumstances.

3. Evolution is unscientific, because it is not testable or falsifiable. It makes claims about events that were not observed and can never be re-created.

This blanket dismissal of evolution ignores important distinctions that divide the field into at least two broad areas: microevolution and macroevolution.

Microevolution looks at changes within species over time--changes that may be preludes to speciation, the origin of new species.

Macroevolution studies how taxonomic groups above the level of species change. Its evidence draws frequently from the fossil record and DNA comparisons to reconstruct how various organisms may be related.

These days even most creationists acknowledge that microevolution has been upheld by tests in the laboratory (as in studies of cells, plants and fruit flies) and in the field. (As in Grant's studies of evolving beak shapes among Galapagos finches.)

Natural selection and other mechanisms--such as chromosomal changes, symbiosis and hybridization--can drive profound changes in populations over time.

The historical nature of macroevolutionary study involves inference from fossils and DNA rather than direct observation. Yet in the historical sciences (which include astronomy, geology and archaeology, as well as evolutionary biology), hypotheses can still be tested by checking whether they accord with physical evidence and whether they lead to verifiable predictions about future discoveries.

For instance, evolution implies that between the earliest-known ancestors of humans (roughly five million years old) and the appearance of anatomically modern humans (about 100,000 years ago), one should find a succession of hominid creatures with features progressively less apelike and more modern, which is indeed what the fossil record shows.

But one should not--and does not--find modern human fossils embedded in strata from the Jurassic period (144 million years ago). Evolutionary biology routinely makes predictions far more refined and precise than this, and researchers test them constantly.

Evolution could be disproved in other ways, too. If we could document the spontaneous generation of just one complex life-form from inanimate matter, then at least a few creatures seen in the fossil record might have originated this way.

If superintelligent aliens appeared and claimed credit for creating life on earth (or even particular species), the purely evolutionary explanation would be cast in doubt. But no one has yet produced such evidence.

It should be noted that the idea of falsifiability as the defining characteristic of science originated with philosopher Karl Popper in the 1930s. More recent elaborations on his thinking have expanded the narrowest interpretation of his principle precisely because it would eliminate too many branches of clearly scientific endeavor.

4. Increasingly, scientists doubt the truth of evolution.

No evidence suggests that evolution is losing adherents. Pick up any issue of a peer-reviewed biological journal, and you will find articles that support and extend evolutionary studies or that embrace evolution as a fundamental concept.

Conversely, serious scientific publications disputing evolution are all but nonexistent.

In the mid-1990s George W. Gilchrist of the University of Washington surveyed thousands of journals in the primary literature, seeking articles on intelligent design or creation science.

Among those hundreds of thousands of scientific reports, he found none. In the past two years, surveys done independently by Barbara Forrest of Southeastern Louisiana University and Lawrence M. Krauss of Case Western Reserve University have been similarly fruitless.

Creationists retort that a closed-minded scientific community rejects their evidence. Yet according to the editors of Nature, Science and other leading journals, few antievolution manuscripts are even submitted.

Some antievolution authors have published papers in serious journals. Those papers, however, rarely attack evolution directly or advance creationist arguments; at best, they identify certain evolutionary problems as unsolved and difficult (which no one disputes).

In short, creationists are not giving the scientific world good reason to take them seriously.

5. The disagreements among even evolutionary biologists show how little solid science supports evolution.

Evolutionary biologists passionately debate diverse topics: how speciation happens, the rates of evolutionary change, the ancestral relationships of birds and dinosaurs, whether Neandertals were a species apart from modern humans, and much more.

These disputes are like those found in all other branches of science. Acceptance of evolution as a factual occurrence and a guiding principle is nonetheless universal in biology.

Unfortunately, dishonest creationists have shown a willingness to take scientists' comments out of context to exaggerate and distort the disagreements.

Anyone acquainted with the works of paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould of Harvard University knows that in addition to co-authoring the punctuated-equilibrium model, Gould was one of the most eloquent defenders and articulators of evolution.

(Punctuated equilibrium explains patterns in the fossil record by suggesting that most evolutionary changes occur within geologically brief intervals--which may nonetheless amount to hundreds of generations.)

Yet creationists delight in dissecting out phrases from Gould's voluminous prose to make him sound as though he had doubted evolution, and they present punctuated equilibrium as though it allows new species to materialize overnight or birds to be born from reptile eggs.

When confronted with a quotation from a scientific authority that seems to question evolution, insist on seeing the statement in context. Almost invariably, the attack on evolution will prove illusory.

6. If humans descended from monkeys, why are there still monkeys?

This surprisingly common argument reflects several levels of ignorance about evolution.

The first mistake is that evolution does not teach that humans descended from monkeys; it states that both have a common ancestor.

The deeper error is that this objection is tantamount to asking, "If children descended from adults, why are there still adults?" New species evolve by splintering off from established ones, when populations of organisms become isolated from the main branch of their family and acquire sufficient differences to remain forever distinct. The parent species may survive indefinitely thereafter, or it may become extinct.

7. Evolution cannot explain how life first appeared on earth.

The origin of life remains very much a mystery, but biochemists have learned about how primitive nucleic acids, amino acids and other building blocks of life could have formed and organized themselves into self-replicating, self-sustaining units, laying the foundation for cellular biochemistry.

Astrochemical analyses hint that quantities of these compounds might have originated in space and fallen to earth in comets, a scenario that may solve the problem of how those constituents arose under the conditions that prevailed when our planet was young.

Creationists sometimes try to invalidate all of evolution by pointing to science's current inability to explain the origin of life. But even if life on earth turned out to have a nonevolutionary origin (for instance, if aliens introduced the first cells billions of years ago), evolution since then would be robustly confirmed by countless microevolutionary and macroevolutionary studies.

8. Mathematically, it is inconceivable that anything as complex as a protein, let alone a living cell or a human, could spring up by chance.

Chance plays a part in evolution (for example, in the random mutations that can give rise to new traits), but evolution does not depend on chance to create organisms, proteins or other entities.

Quite the opposite: natural selection, the principal known mechanism of evolution, harnesses nonrandom change by preserving "desirable" (adaptive) features and eliminating "undesirable" (nonadaptive) ones. As long as the forces of selection stay constant, natural selection can push evolution in one direction and produce sophisticated structures in surprisingly short times.

As an analogy, consider the 13-letter sequence "TOBEORNOTTOBE." Those hypothetical million monkeys, each pecking out one phrase a second, could take as long as 78,800 years to find it among the 2613 sequences of that length.

But in the 1980s Richard Hardison of Glendale College wrote a computer program that generated phrases randomly while preserving the positions of individual letters that happened to be correctly placed (in effect, selecting for phrases more like Hamlet's). On average, the program re-created the phrase in just 336 iterations, less than 90 seconds.

Even more amazing, it could reconstruct Shakespeare's entire play in just four and a half days.

9. The Second Law of Thermodynamics says that systems must become more disordered over time. Living cells therefore could not have evolved from inanimate chemicals, and multicellular life could not have evolved from protozoa.

This argument derives from a misunderstanding of the Second Law. If it were valid, mineral crystals and snowflakes would also be impossible, because they, too, are complex structures that form spontaneously from disordered parts.

The Second Law actually states that the total entropy of a closed system (one that no energy or matter leaves or enters) cannot decrease. Entropy is a physical concept often casually described as disorder, but it differs significantly from the conversational use of the word.

More important, however, the Second Law permits parts of a system to decrease in entropy as long as other parts experience an offsetting increase. Thus, our planet as a whole can grow more complex because the sun pours heat and light onto it, and the greater entropy associated with the sun's nuclear fusion more than rebalances the scales. Simple organisms can fuel their rise toward complexity by consuming other forms of life and nonliving materials.

10. Mutations are essential to evolution theory, but mutations can only eliminate traits. They cannot produce new features.

On the contrary, biology has catalogued many traits produced by point mutations (changes at precise positions in an organism's DNA)--bacterial resistance to antibiotics, for example.

Mutations that arise in the homeobox (Hox) family of development-regulating genes in animals can also have complex effects. Hox genes direct where legs, wings, antennae and body segments should grow.

In fruit flies, for instance, the mutation called Antennapedia causes legs to sprout where antennae should grow. These abnormal limbs are not functional, but their existence demonstrates that genetic mistakes can produce complex structures, which natural selection can then test for possible uses.

Moreover, molecular biology has discovered mechanisms for genetic change that go beyond point mutations, and these expand the ways in which new traits can appear.

Functional modules within genes can be spliced together in novel ways. Whole genes can be accidentally duplicated in an organism's DNA, and the duplicates are free to mutate into genes for new, complex features. Comparisons of the DNA from a wide variety of organisms indicate that this is how the globin family of blood proteins evolved over millions of years.

11. Natural selection might explain microevolution, but it cannot explain the origin of new species and higher orders of life.

Evolutionary biologists have written extensively about how natural selection could produce new species. For instance, in the model called allopatry, developed by Ernst Mayr of Harvard University, if a population of organisms were isolated from the rest of its species by geographical boundaries, it might be subjected to different selective pressures.

Changes would accumulate in the isolated population. If those changes became so significant that the splinter group could not or routinely would not breed with the original stock, then the splinter group would be reproductively isolated and on its way toward becoming a new species.

Natural selection is the best studied of the evolutionary mechanisms, but biologists are open to other possibilities as well. Biologists are constantly assessing the potential of unusual genetic mechanisms for causing speciation or for producing complex features in organisms.

Lynn Margulis of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and others have persuasively argued that some cellular organelles, such as the energy-generating mitochondria, evolved through the symbiotic merger of ancient organisms. Thus, science welcomes the possibility of evolution resulting from forces beyond natural selection.

Yet those forces must be natural; they cannot be attributed to the actions of mysterious creative intelligences whose existence, in scientific terms, is unproved.

12. Nobody has ever seen a new species evolve.

Speciation is probably fairly rare and in many cases might take centuries. Furthermore, recognizing a new species during a formative stage can be difficult, because biologists sometimes disagree about how best to define a species.

The most widely used definition, Mayr's Biological Species Concept, recognizes a species as a distinct community of reproductively isolated populations--sets of organisms that normally do not or cannot breed outside their community. In practice, this standard can be difficult to apply to organisms isolated by distance or terrain or to plants (and, of course, fossils do not breed).

Biologists therefore usually use organisms' physical and behavioral traits as clues to their species membership.

Nevertheless, the scientific literature does contain reports of apparent speciation events in plants, insects and worms. In most of these experiments, researchers subjected organisms to various types of selection--for anatomical differences, mating behaviors, habitat preferences and other traits--and found that they had created populations of organisms that did not breed with outsiders.

For example, William R. Rice of the University of New Mexico and George W. Salt of the University of California at Davis demonstrated that if they sorted a group of fruit flies by their preference for certain environments and bred those flies separately over 35 generations, the resulting flies would refuse to breed with those from a very different environment.

13. Evolutionists cannot point to any transitional fossils--creatures that are half reptile and half bird, for instance.

Actually, paleontologists know of many detailed examples of fossils intermediate in form between various taxonomic groups.

One of the most famous fossils of all time is Archaeopteryx, which combines feathers and skeletal structures peculiar to birds with features of dinosaurs.

A flock's worth of other feathered fossil species, some more avian and some less, has also been found.

A sequence of fossils spans the evolution of modern horses from the tiny Eohippus.

Whales had four-legged ancestors that walked on land, and creatures known as Ambulocetus and Rodhocetus helped to make that transition [see "The Mammals That Conquered the Seas," by Kate Wong; Scientific American, May].

Fossil seashells trace the evolution of various mollusks through millions of years. Perhaps 20 or more hominids (not all of them our ancestors) fill the gap between Lucy the australopithecine and modern humans.

Creationists, though, dismiss these fossil studies. They argue that Archaeopteryx is not a missing link between reptiles and birds--it is just an extinct bird with reptilian features. They want evolutionists to produce a weird, chimeric monster that cannot be classified as belonging to any known group.

Even if a creationist does accept a fossil as transitional between two species, he or she may then insist on seeing other fossils intermediate between it and the first two. These frustrating requests can proceed ad infinitum and place an unreasonable burden on the always incomplete fossil record.

Nevertheless, evolutionists can cite further supportive evidence from molecular biology. All organisms share most of the same genes, but as evolution predicts, the structures of these genes and their products diverge among species, in keeping with their evolutionary relationships.

Geneticists speak of the "molecular clock" that records the passage of time. These molecular data also show how various organisms are transitional within evolution.

14. Living things have fantastically intricate features--at the anatomical, cellular and molecular levels--that could not function if they were any less complex or sophisticated. The only prudent conclusion is that they are the products of intelligent design, not evolution.

This "argument from design" is the backbone of most recent attacks on evolution, but it is also one of the oldest.

In 1802 theologian William Paley wrote that if one finds a pocket watch in a field, the most reasonable conclusion is that someone dropped it, not that natural forces created it there. By analogy, Paley argued, the complex structures of living things must be the handiwork of direct, divine invention.

Darwin wrote "On the Origin of Species" as an answer to Paley: he explained how natural forces of selection, acting on inherited features, could gradually shape the evolution of ornate organic structures.

Generations of creationists have tried to counter Darwin by citing the example of the eye as a structure that could not have evolved. The eye's ability to provide vision depends on the perfect arrangement of its parts, these critics say.

Natural selection could thus never favor the transitional forms needed during the eye's evolution--what good is half an eye?

Anticipating this criticism, Darwin suggested that even "incomplete" eyes might confer benefits (such as helping creatures orient toward light) and thereby survive for further evolutionary refinement.

Biology has vindicated Darwin: researchers have identified primitive eyes and light-sensing organs throughout the animal kingdom and have even tracked the evolutionary history of eyes through comparative genetics. (It now appears that in various families of organisms, eyes have evolved independently.)

Today's intelligent-design advocates are more sophisticated than their predecessors, but their arguments and goals are not fundamentally different.

They criticize evolution by trying to demonstrate that it could not account for life as we know it and then insist that the only tenable alternative is that life was designed by an unidentified intelligence.

15. Recent discoveries prove that even at the microscopic level, life has a quality of complexity that could not have come about through evolution.

"Irreducible complexity" is the battle cry of Michael J. Behe of Lehigh University, author of Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution.

As a household example of irreducible complexity, Behe chooses the mousetrap--a machine that could not function if any of its pieces were missing and whose pieces have no value except as parts of the whole.

What is true of the mousetrap, he says, is even truer of the bacterial flagellum, a whiplike cellular organelle used for propulsion that operates like an outboard motor. The proteins that make up a flagellum are uncannily arranged into motor components, a universal joint and other structures like those that a human engineer might specify.

The possibility that this intricate array could have arisen through evolutionary modification is virtually nil, Behe argues, and that bespeaks intelligent design.

He makes similar points about the blood's clotting mechanism and other molecular systems.

Yet evolutionary biologists have answers to these objections.

First, there exist flagellae with forms simpler than the one that Behe cites, so it is not necessary for all those components to be present for a flagellum to work.

The sophisticated components of this flagellum all have precedents elsewhere in nature, as described by Kenneth R. Miller of Brown University and others. In fact, the entire flagellum assembly is extremely similar to an organelle that Yersinia pestis, the bubonic plague bacterium, uses to inject toxins into cells.

The key is that the flagellum's component structures, which Behe suggests have no value apart from their role in propulsion, can serve multiple functions that would have helped favor their evolution.

The final evolution of the flagellum might then have involved only the novel recombination of sophisticated parts that initially evolved for other purposes. Similarly, the blood-clotting system seems to involve the modification and elaboration of proteins that were originally used in digestion, according to studies by Russell F. Doolittle of the University of California at San Diego.

So some of the complexity that Behe calls proof of intelligent design is not irreducible at all.

Complexity of a different kind--"specified complexity"--is the cornerstone of the intelligent-design arguments of William A. Dembski of Baylor University in his books The Design Inference and No Free Lunch. Essentially his argument is that living things are complex in a way that undirected, random processes could never produce.

The only logical conclusion, Dembski asserts, in an echo of Paley 200 years ago, is that some superhuman intelligence created and shaped life.

Dembski's argument contains several holes. It is wrong to insinuate that the field of explanations consists only of random processes or designing intelligences.

Researchers into nonlinear systems and cellular automata at the Santa Fe Institute and elsewhere have demonstrated that simple, undirected processes can yield extraordinarily complex patterns.

Some of the complexity seen in organisms may therefore emerge through natural phenomena that we as yet barely understand. But that is far different from saying that the complexity could not have arisen naturally.

"Creation science" is a contradiction in terms. A central tenet of modern science is methodological naturalism--it seeks to explain the universe purely in terms of observed or testable natural mechanisms.

Thus, physics describes the atomic nucleus with specific concepts governing matter and energy, and it tests those descriptions experimentally. Physicists introduce new particles, such as quarks, to flesh out their theories only when data show that the previous descriptions cannot adequately explain observed phenomena.

The new particles do not have arbitrary properties, moreover--their definitions are tightly constrained, because the new particles must fit within the existing framework of physics.

In contrast, intelligent-design theorists invoke shadowy entities that conveniently have whatever unconstrained abilities are needed to solve the mystery at hand. Rather than expanding scientific inquiry, such answers shut it down. (How does one disprove the existence of omnipotent intelligences?)

Intelligent design offers few answers. For instance, when and how did a designing intelligence intervene in life's history? By creating the first DNA? The first cell? The first human? Was every species designed, or just a few early ones?

Proponents of intelligent-design theory frequently decline to be pinned down on these points. They do not even make real attempts to reconcile their disparate ideas about intelligent design. Instead they pursue argument by exclusion--that is, they belittle evolutionary explanations as far-fetched or incomplete and then imply that only design-based alternatives remain.

Logically, this is misleading: even if one naturalistic explanation is flawed, it does not mean that all are. Moreover, it does not make one intelligent-design theory more reasonable than another.

Listeners are essentially left to fill in the blanks for themselves, and some will undoubtedly do so by substituting their religious beliefs for scientific ideas.

Time and again, science has shown that methodological naturalism can push back ignorance, finding increasingly detailed and informative answers to mysteries that once seemed impenetrable: the nature of light, the causes of disease, how the brain works.

Evolution is doing the same with the riddle of how the living world took shape.

Creationism, by any name, adds nothing of intellectual value to the effort.


Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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Cloak and Dagger! C.I.A. in hot water again!

The C.I.A. is supposed to be a cloak and dagger type of organization so I am surprised at how much it has been in the news lately.

First they put the Ice on George Bush's flights of fancy and paranoia by reveling that Iran dropped their nuclear ambitions back in 2003, and now they are in hot water for destroying torture tapes so that no one can accuse them of any wrongdoing!

According to the intelligence agency, the tapes were destroyed to protect the identity of CIA agents and because they no longer had intelligence value.

Bullshit!

This C.I.A. is no different than any other law enforcement or security organization in that it will close ranks to protect itself and any information we get will be after the fact!

The New York Times, which broke the story, quotes current and former government officials as saying the CIA destroyed the tapes in 2005 as it faced Congressional and legal scrutiny about its secret detention programme.

Officials feared the tapes could have raised doubts about the legality of the CIA's techniques, the newspaper says.

The tapes are thought to have shown the interrogation in 2002 of a number of terror suspects, including Abu Zubaydah, who had been a chief recruiter for the al-Qaeda network.

The Associated Press news agency on Thursday obtained a letter sent to all CIA employees by the agency's current director, Michael Hayden, explaining why the footage was destroyed.

In the internal memo, Mr Hayden told staff that the CIA had begun taping interrogations as an internal check in 2002 and decided to delete the videos because they lacked any "legal or internal reason" to keep them.

Once again, with gusto, Bullshit!

The CIA acknowledges that these early interrogations were harsh, but Mr Hayden says that the CIA's internal watchdogs saw the tapes in 2003 and verified that the techniques used were legal.

"The destruction of these tapes appears to be a part of an extensive, long-term pattern of misusing executive authority to insulate individuals from criminal prosecution for torture and abuse," an ACLU statement said.
After the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the US, President George W Bush authorised the use of "harsh techniques" in the interrogation of suspected terrorists.

According to one correspondent, those techniques are alleged to have included water-boarding, a method in which a suspect is held down and gagged while water is poured into his mouth in order to simulate drowning.

Human rights groups say that water-boarding - and other techniques allegedly used by the CIA - can be defined as torture under various international treaties to which the US is a signatory.

The Bush administration has always maintained that it does not allow the use of torture but the BBC's Jonathan Beale in Washington says the news is likely to trigger more questions about the interrogation techniques used by the CIA.
There are also questions over whether CIA agents withheld information from the courts and a presidential commission.

These questions seem to be rather silly since we know that, for example, police departments will hide evidence, change facts, whitewash information and outright lie to protect themselves and the C.I.A. makes them look like amateurs.

Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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CONNECTIONS!

These documentaries by James Burke are among the best series of programs that have ever been produced. (Equal to the "Cosmos" series by Carl Sagan!)

Although they were made over twenty years ago the subject matter of these works is timeless and it's presentation is flawless.

The first in the series; "The day the Universe changed," was a ten part series presented here in full and it dealt with the impact certain inventions had in changing history.

The next few; "Connections," Connections II," Connections III," and "Re-Connections," all look at how our modern world is interconnected and when one event occures, how it can have far reaching implications and be connected to other events in ways that we did not, and could not, know!

I am going to present a short clip from this series every day, Monday to Friday, and I promise you that following them will be well worth it! Enjoy!

Episode 2-5



Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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Thursday, December 06, 2007

Interesting!

As I said about a month ago, I am changing the emphasis of this blog from what I think other people will find interesting to what I find interesting.

This is an example and I'm not even goint to tell you what It's about!

(After you have seen it, please leave a comment!)


Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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Bush put on ice.

CIA VS. BUSH/CHENEY
HUGE RAMIFICATIONS

Guest post by: John LeBoutillier

The startling revelation that all 24 intelligence agencies in our government agree that Iran stopped their nuclear weapons development in 2003 is a shot across the bow of G.W. Bush and Dick Cheney.

(Bush did this to the American people and now the intelligence communty is doing it to him!)

Seriously furious over how Bush and Cheney misused ambiguous intelligence data back in 2002 and 2003 to justify a pre-emptive invasion of Iraq, the CIA and the rest of our vast Intelligence Community made certain this week by taking the unprecedented step of releasing for full public viewing the latest National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) so that the American people, the media, the Congress and especially the 2008 presidential candidates know the truth - without a White House filter.

In other words, our Intel Community wanted it known that Iran does not have a nuclear weapons development program.

They wanted this known before Bush and Cheney take our nation - again - down the road toward an unnecessary pre-emptive surgical strike in Iran which would have devastating economic, military and energy ramifications.

Make no mistake about this: the Intel Community’s action is a direct shot across Bush/Cheney’s bow.

We have never - ever seen anything quite like this in our history. Here we have an Executive Branch Agency - the CIA - and 23 other departments/agencies - all of whom report to the President of the United States. And they are basically saying to him, “We no longer trust you to tell the American people the truth. You distorted and misused intelligence on Iraq and we are not going to allow you to do it again.”

WOW!

This has huge ramifications.

1) Bush is not just a ‘lame duck’ politically; he is now a Dead Duck.

2) The Super-Hawks calling for surgical strikes against Iran in the next year have been de-fanged;

3) Hillary is hurt even more in the Democratic race for wanting to go after Iran;

4) The GOP candidates - except Ron Paul - look like Bush Toadies for all salivating at the chance to go after Iran in an Election Year;

5) Bush/Cheney may trot out another excuse to hit Iran: that Iranian agents are infiltrating Iraq and hitting and hurting US troops. This is probably true and was predicted in this space 5 years ago. Retaliation may be justified, but not hitting Iran nuke sites;

6) In sum, this takes Iran off the table as a major 2008 issue, shatters the remaining credibility of the Republican establishment, crushes the neo-cons, who have caused us so much trouble, and puts this Administration on ice.

We effectively have a care-taker government until January 20, 2009.

Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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CONNECTIONS!

These documentaries by James Burke are among the best series of programs that have ever been produced. (Equal to the "Cosmos" series by Carl Sagan!)

Although they were made over twenty years ago the subject matter of these works is timeless and it's presentation is flawless.

The first in the series; "The day the Universe changed," was a ten part series presented here in full and it dealt with the impact certain inventions had in changing history.

The next few; "Connections," Connections II," Connections III," and "Re-Connections," all look at how our modern world is interconnected and when one event occures, how it can have far reaching implications and be connected to other events in ways that we did not, and could not, know!

I am going to present a short clip from this series every day, Monday to Friday, and I promise you that following them will be well worth it! Enjoy!

2-4



Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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Canadian government can't even grow pot right!

Seems to me that to grow pot all you have to do is stick the seeds in the ground, water and fertilize them, provide plenty of light and viola, POT!

Well, the Canadian Government, like most other governments, is acting more like one giant Post Office again.

In other words, they can't do anything right.

(By the way, remind me sometime to tell you about the postal worker I know who is on disability because of work related "stress!" STRESS? What the hell did he do, get a route where the houses didn't have any numbers on them?)

Anyway, I digress;

Lawyers for Canadian users of medical marijuana who want Ottawa to ease restrictions on where they get their pot wrapped up their case Wednesday by telling a Federal Court judge that government-approved marijuana doesn't compare to higher-quality strains available on the street.

Patients ought to be able to pick their own grower, said lawyer Alan Young, who accused Ottawa of rushing into drafting a program in 2003 that ultimately forced patients to use a substandard product - a violation of their constitutional rights.
Whether or not Alan Young wins his case the part I find incredulous is the fact that once again it is private enterprise that shows how it's done.

If you can't get your own government to grow your pot properly then you might as well move to Amsterdam....... although I have to admit that since marijuana cultivation is the number #1 industry in British Columbia they probably have a lot more experience than the bureaucrats.

Your humble scribe;
Allan W Janssen

Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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Wednesday, December 05, 2007

Let Bush come clean on Iran, not the other way around!

Let's see if I have this right.

A U.S. intelligence agency reported yesterday that Iran had actually stopped their weapons program back in 2003 and was not nearly the threat the Bush administration had made them out to be!

That was yesterday. Today, as if he hadn't heard a thing, President Bush said; "Iran should reveal the full extent of its nuclear programme, or risk further international isolation."

Yes kids, this is the same guy who kept insisting there were "weapons of mass destruction" hidden in Iraq when all they kept finding was sand and more sand!

(This is also the guy that illegaly spied on Americans, and when they caught him said he was going to do it anyway and nobody said boo!)

I am not sure of anything about the Bush Administration except this..... Either they are really fucking stupid or they think the American public is, because something sure ain't right down there!

Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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The real history of violence!

These days, spin doctors can manipulate anything to prove anything they want. It's gotten so bad that not even professionals can tell anymore "what is real and what isn't!"

Someone from a publication called "Wired" (a tech publication)wrote an article justifying violence on video games and threw us the old argument that video's are not responsible for violence in society, just as T.V. violence is not responsible for your next door neighbors kid hacking up his grandmother with an axe!

Here is his argument!

There are plenty of folks who like to blame violent video games for crime despite a lack of any real proof. (Saying so doesn't make it so - Ed.)

As has been pointed out time and time again, just as violent video games have become more popular, incidents of violent crime keep dropping. (Prove it! - Ed.)

Obviously, there may be other factors involved, but if it were true that violent video games resulted in more violent crimes, then it at least suggests there's one heck of an additional variable that not only compensates for this increased desire for violence, but pushes the stats even further in the other direction.

And, certainly, while there are some researchers who insist that studies have shown that violent video games lead to violence, every time you look at the details of those studies, you realize that the data doesn't support the claims. (These are all just statements plucked out of the air! - Ed.)

Still, some people react to the issue from an emotional, rather than logical, point of view. This is human nature, so it's not that surprising.

However, when someones job is a gov't prosecutor, you might think she would recognize the importance of real evidence before making statements.

Not so for Wayne County, Michigan (which covers Detroit) prosecutor, Kym Worthy.

In an interview with Wired, Worthy notes that evidence is meaningless to her on this issue: "No one can convince me that there isn't a link between some of the gory, gritty, horrendous crime that we've been seeing in the past few years, particularly in the 18-25 year old group, [and] these games."

Apparently any evidence to the contrary are just "'silly' arguments made to justify a 'billion-dollar industry based on the most violent of scenarios.'"

Even better, Worthy wonders why kids can't just go play football instead of playing video games. So why is it that virtual violence encourages more violence, but actual violence in the form of football doesn't?
O.K. That's the statement by the apologists for the Gaming Industry.

NOW, I will only bring up one thing to let you see how full of shit they are!

Ready? OK............... here goes!

"These people claim that violence does not affect gamers or people who watch T.V."

"They claim that the 22 minutes of programming in a half hour T.V. show has no influence on the increase in the rate of violence (especially among the dip shit teenagers who are the main practitioners) yet can't explain why a 30 second commercial on that same program can get $100,000- bucks to influence people................ while they say that their 22 minutes of programing doesn't have any affect!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

"Someone is out to lunch here, and I don't think it's me!"

As proof, look at the movie "Jackass" (If you can!) and then read about all the copy-cat stunts and injuries and deaths this movie has caused!)

Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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CONNECTIONS!

These documentaries by James Burke are among the best series of programs that have ever been produced. (Equal to the "Cosmos" series by Carl Sagan!)

Although they were made over twenty years ago the subject matter of these works is timeless and it's presentation is flawless.

The first in the series; "The day the Universe changed," was a ten part series presented here in full and it dealt with the impact certain inventions had in changing history.

The next few; "Connections," Connections II," Connections III," and "Re-Connections," all look at how our modern world is interconnected and when one event occures, how it can have far reaching implications and be connected to other events in ways that we did not, and could not, know!

I am going to present a short clip from this series every day, Monday to Friday, and I promise you that following them will be well worth it! Enjoy!

2-3



Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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The Poop on Santa!

STOCKHOLM - Christmas is hectic for all, but particularly for Santa, who must live in Kyrgyzstan and make his rounds at lightning speed if he is to deliver gifts to all the world's children on time, a Swedish consultancy has concluded.

Between Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, Santa Claus's route around the planet includes stops at 2.5 billion homes, assuming that children of all religions receive a present from the jolly man in the red suit, Anders Larsson of the engineering consultancy Sweco told AFP. (Yes, even the little kids of China get a visit!)

"We estimated that there are 48 people per square kilometer (120 per square mile) on Earth, and 20 metres (66 feet) between each home. So if Santa leaves from Kyrgyzstan and travels against the Earth's rotation he has 48 hours to deliver all the presents," he said.
Father Christmas has long been believed to reside at the North Pole, although a number of northern towns, including Finnish Rovaniemi, claim to be his true home.

But Sweco's report on Santa's most efficient route -- which takes into account factors like geographic density and the fewest detours -- shows that he wouldn't be able to make his round-the-world trip from there in time.

"He has 34 microseconds at each stop to slide down the chimney, drop off the presents, nibble on his cookies and milk and hop back on his sleigh," Larsson said.
Santa's reindeer must travel at a speed of 5,800 kilometers (3,604 miles) per second to make the trip on time.

Another report circulating on the Internet suggested however that Santa's sleigh, weighed down with presents and travelling at supersonic speed, would encounter such massive air resistance that the entire contraption would burst into flames and be vaporised within 4.26 thousandths of a second.

This, of course, is utter nonesense since we all know that Santa employs magic and if he travels at those speeds he wouldn't let a little thing like "air resistance" slow him down!

Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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Tuesday, December 04, 2007

Everyone's got a double!


<-- John Kerry



Herman Munster -->








<--Larry Flint the Smut Guy and Jabba the Hut Guy -->











Michael Jackson Music's Weirdest -->


<-- Joanne Crawford, Mommie dearest










<-- Nick Nolte



Glen Cambell -->



<--Saddam Hussein


Karl Marx -->






Kim Jong-ill-->




<---Krammer



Ahmadinejad (Iran) -->





<-- Sonny




<-- Hammas Leader


George Clo0oney -->



<--Britney

Mr. Clean --> Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at http://www.god-101.com/ and the blog "Perspective" at http://god-101.blogspot.com/

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And now for something completely different! # 23

My dad used to love Pavarotti and sort of liked James Brown.

I, on the other hand, loved James Brown and sort of liked Pavarotti, so................... !
Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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CONNECTIONS!

These documentaries by James Burke are among the best series of programs that have ever been produced. (Equal to the "Cosmos" series by Carl Sagan!)

Although they were made over twenty years ago the subject matter of these works is timeless and it's presentation is flawless.

The first in the series; "The day the Universe changed," was a ten part series presented here in full and it dealt with the impact certain inventions had in changing history.

The next few; "Connections," Connections II," Connections III," and "Re-Connections," all look at how our modern world is interconnected and when one event occures, how it can have far reaching implications and be connected to other events in ways that we did not, and could not, know!

I am going to present a short clip from this series every day, Monday to Friday, and I promise you that following them will be well worth it! Enjoy!

2-2



Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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Monday, December 03, 2007

Fake Moon Shots

I wrote a few articles over the last year or so about how people will believe just about anything and this is why "conspiracy theorists" have such a hay-day when it comes to stupid stuff they dream up!

The latest is an uproar over photo's of the moon taken by the Chinese rocket that was sent there.

Let me back up for a minute........ first it was conspiracy theorists claiming the world was flat, not round. Then they said men didn't really go into space and finally that the moon missions by the United States never really happened.

Now these same people are claiming that the photographs taken by the Chinese spaceship are fakes and are just touched-up photo's of the Moon taken by the U.S.

(Remeber, this is when the U.S, DIDN'T go to the Moon and DIDN'T take any pictures!)

I hope that's clear?

Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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Toasted Virgin Mary!

How about "holy toast" for breakfast? All you need is a special stamp that makes an imprint of the Virgin Mary on your bread before you put it in the toaster!!!



This has given me an excellent idea for raising some extra cash for Christmas!

I can claim that this is "miracle toast" and serve breakfast for forty or fifty bucks a pop!

Now I just have to find a restaurant that wants to go along with this!

Does anyone know a corrupt Christian who owns a restaurant?

Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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JEWS! or, The Chosen People say; "Choose Someone Else!"

I just got a letter from a reader today asking a question I hadn't really thought about too much!

Basically what this person wanted to know was why I picked on, (or ran down) Muslims and Christians but had very little to say about the Jews?

After a bit of thought I came up with the answer......the Jews don't really cause any trouble.

They don't discriminate against other religions. They don't bother people who are of a different religion. They don't consider it their duty to convert other people to their beliefs or kill them if they don't convert. They don't bomb other faiths like the Northern Irish or the Arabs do. They don't run around claiming that science is garbage and only their interpretation of the world is relevant. They don't start wars but simply defend themselves when necessary.

In fact, the only negative thing I can say about the Jews is that they are always letting other people know that they are Jews and are different!

Now there is a reason for this! The concept of being different and apart from society is born out of the fact that they regard themselves as "The Chosen Ones" and are set apart from other people by God.

This belief has been the Jews biggest blessing and also their biggest curse over the years.

It has been a blessing because this sense of being different and apart from others is what has kept the Jews together over all these thousands of years when they didn't have a country or homeland to call their own.

Without their pride in being Jewish this group would have been assimilated by other cultures and religions a long time ago, and their race and religion would have been dispersed in the wind.

On the other hand it has also been their biggest curse because this attitude of being different and even "better" than others has made them disliked and even hated over the years.

Anti-Semitism is a direct result of this attitude and has been a stone around the neck of Jews since antiquity.

Isn't it ironic that a concept and a way of living can be such a curse and blessing all at the same time.

And who says God doesn't have a sense of humor!!!!!!!!!!!!

(Actually, from my book "The plain truth about God!" God is a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh!)

On top of everything else, this news release was sent to the "Perspective" research department and came in a few minutes ago!

Jerusalem Update — Jews, whose troubled, 10,000-year term as God's "chosen people" finally expired last night, woke up this morning to find that they had once again been hand-picked by the Almighty.

Synagogues across the globe declared a day of mourning.

Asked if the descendants of Abraham shouldn't be pleased about being tapped for an unprecedented second term, Jerusalem Rabbi Ben Meyerson shrugged. "Of course, you are right, we should be thrilled," he said. "We should also enjoy a good swift kick in the head, but for some reason, we don't.

"Now don't ask such questions until you watch the news, or read history, or at least rent 'Fiddler on the Roof'."

Much of the world's re-blessed Jewish community shared that feeling. "It's always been considered a joke with us. You know, 'Please God, next time choose someone else,' ha ha," said New York City resident David Bashert.

"Ha. Ha ha," Bashert added. "Shit."

According to a worldwide survey of faiths, not a single group expressed an interest in being chosen, and the only application submitted before last night's filing deadline, on behalf of the Islamic people, proved to be a fake.

"Somebody filled out a form and signed our name to it, but I guarantee it wasn't us," said Imam Yusuf Al Muhammed of Medina, Saudi Arabia. "I'm not going to say who it was, but the application was filled out in Hebrew."

"Oh, don't be such a k'vatsh," responded Meyerson. "It's only 10,000 years. Trust me, after a few diaspora, you would have gotten used to the universal hatred thing."

Due to the absence of voluntary candidates, God's Law stipulated that the Almighty had to choose a people at random to serve out the next 10-millenia term. Elias Contreau, director of the International Interfaith Working Group, said he wasn't surprised it came to a blind drawing.

"According to the Bible, God promised to bless Abraham and those who came after him," said Contreau. "Who knows, maybe that sounded good at the time, or maybe 'blessed' meant something different back then, like 'Short periods of prosperity interrupted by insufferable friggin' chaos.' Whatever, I think it's safe to say that people didn't know what they were agreeing to."

Now they do, Contreau added, which he said explains why so many religions had lately been exalting God's existence, but downplaying their own.

"We were not avoiding Him. We just told our parishioners that if Anyone asks, we're out," insisted Archbishop of Canterbury Dr. George Carey, who had called off services during February. "Besides, we weren't the only ones. I didn't see the Hindus raising their hands."

"Now look, it's like we told the ethereal vision who dropped off the application, 'Sure, we have a strong shared faith and all that, but I wouldn't exactly say we're a 'people,' not really,'" recalled Hindu leader Samuldrala Swami Maharaj of Calcutta. "Plus, you know, I told him we had a lot of other commitments. We'd like to help, honestly. Another time, maybe."

In Jerusalem, Jewish leaders said they will propose an amendment to God's Law prohibiting a people from having to serve more than two consecutive terms. "Hopefully, God will hear our prayer," said Meyerson. "No, wait, that's what got us into this."
Americans, meanwhile, expressed outrage at the decision, saying they had assumed they were God's chosen people. However, explained Archbishop Carey, "It only seems that way because so many people don't like you."

Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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CONNECTIONS!

These documentaries by James Burke are among the best series of programs that have ever been produced. (Equal to the "Cosmos" series by Carl Sagan!)

Although they were made over twenty years ago the subject matter of these works is timeless and it's presentation is flawless.

The first in the series; "The day the Universe changed," was a ten part series presented here in full and it dealt with the impact certain inventions had in changing history.

The next few; "Connections," Connections II," Connections III," and "Re-Connections," all look at how our modern world is interconnected and when one event occures, how it can have far reaching implications and be connected to other events in ways that we did not, and could not, know!

I am going to present a short clip from this series every day, Monday to Friday, and I promise you that following them will be well worth it! Enjoy!

2-1


Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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Sunday, December 02, 2007

Here's looking at you kid!


Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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Heavy Duty Quantum Physics!

Forget about the threat that mankind poses to the Earth: our very ability to study the heavens may have complicated the cosmos.

Quantum theory says that whenever we observe or measure something, we can select out a specific quantum state from what otherwise would have been a multitude of states, each of which could have been selected out with varying probabilities.

Over the past few years, cosmologists have taken this powerful theory of what happens at the level of subatomic particles and tried to extend it to understand the universe, since it began in the subatomic realm during the Big Bang.

But there is an odd feature of the theory that philosophers and scientists still argue about. In a nutshell, the theory suggests that quantum systems can exist in many different physical configurations at the same time. By observing the system, however, we may pick out one single 'quantum state', and therefore force the system to change its configuration.

(Our observations do not change the system so much as help determine what state we find ourselves a part of. This latter facet, related to treating the universe as a quantum state, has puzzled theorists for some time.)

The long and short of all this is that the Universe has, over a period of time, become more and more complex. What started out as ordinary matter was then split into atoms, which for a long time was considered the basic building block of all creation.

Then we found out that atoms were composed of even smaller objects which in turn were made of things that were smaller still.

This kept up till we got to where we are now with string theory and dark matter and all sorts of exotic material that keeps getting smaller and smaller and more and more complicated.

If, as modern quantum physics tells us, the mere act of observing something affects what it is, and what it will be, then perhaps things things really ARE getting more complicated just because we now study them and look for complexity when there was none there to begin with!

As usual I'm probably full of shit but it is still fun to think about these things!

Allan W Janssen is the author of The Plain Truth About God at www.God-101.com and the blog "Perspective" at http://God-101.blogspot.com

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