Clay Pots, Watches, The Human Eye, Oh My...

Is common sense allowed as we consider how our lives and this universe got here?

Archaeologists will say that a clay pot is solid evidence that a civilization once lived here. No one believes that the ground, or wind, or chemicals randomly assembled to form that clay pot and accidentally painted a design on it. People made it. If a simple clay pot shows human design, what do we conclude about an object whose make up is far more complex? Like, the human eye. It can distinguish among seven million colors. It moves 100,000 times each day with automatic focusing and the eye handles 1.5 million simultaneous messages.¹

Are we to believe that though a clay pot did not arise from natural means, the human eye just came about from elements in the atmosphere? Some would say that science demands such a conclusion, because to believe in God is not scientific. How is that different from finding the clay pot and starting with the assumption that people didn't exist in that location, so scientists must now find out how that clay pot developed from the elements in the ground or air.²

We're told that producing a human eye takes a long time. It is assumed that such random chance takes a great amount of time to perfectly assemble something complex. So, here is a test. Let's say someone handed you a plastic bag filled with all the parts to a watch, where you were certain that all the correct springs, screws, discs are in that bag. How long would you be willing to shake that bag hoping that the pieces would fall together and the screws would each find the right hole and tighten nicely? There must be some possibility that it could happen. Picture yourself shaking that bag. You probably wouldn't shake it beyond 30 seconds. Why not? Because common sense tells you that no matter how long you shake that bag, the pieces will never align to become a working watch. It wouldn't matter if you shook that bag one minute or thousands of years.

Just because someone argues that "maybe, someday, somehow, by chance"... should that line of reasoning supersede common sense? Like the Emperor’s New Clothes, shouldn't there be a voice in the crowd saying, "Yeah, but complex life arising from simple non-life is such an outside chance, wouldn't it make more sense to look for another explanation?"

What about the likelihood of life on Earth? Maybe you are aware of all the perfect conditions that were necessary for us to be here: the earth's perfect distance from the sun, the perfect combination of gases in our atmosphere, the perfect tilt and rotation of Earth, the perfect gravitational force, the presence of water, and on and on.

Astrophysicist George Smoot explains that the degree of fine-tuning required for life to exist on Earth would be similar to shooting an arrow all the way to the unofficial planet Pluto (four billion miles away) and having the arrow come within a hundred yards of the target.³

Do you like to bet? Would you be apt to bet if the odds were 5:1 against you? How about if they were 6,000:1 against you? If you were to bet on the universe developing without a Designer, the odds of our universe forming on its own is 10¹²⁴ to 1.

Again, just because there is a vastly remote chance that all the requirements perfectly fell into place by chance, why would a reasonable person conclude that it actually did come about that way? If the odds of a jet making it safely to its destination were 10¹²⁴ to 1, who would get on that plane? We are so reasonable in so many areas of life. We look at clay pots and watches and are willing to say that obviously people made these, even if we don't see those people. Could not the same logic be used when we consider the human body and the universe?

Don't the intricacies of the human body and the universe give reason to say, "Though I don't see him, it makes most sense to conclude that God exists"?

¹ Hugh Davson, Physiology of the Eye, 5th ed (New York: McGraw Hill, 1991).

² Concept and the hyperlinked article that we recommend later, are by Dr. John P. Marcus. He received his Ph.D. in biological chemistry from the U of Michigan and is research officer at the Cooperative Research Centre for Tropical Plant Pathology, University of Queensland, Australia. He is currently researching novel antifungal proteins, their corresponding genes, and their application in genetic engineering of crop plants for disease resistance.

³ Fred Herren, Show Me God, 3rd ed. (Wheeling, IL: Day Star, 1997), 213.

The Secret Society!

Doesn’t “Secret” mean that no one should know?

For centuries, men and women have been trying to keep information from one another.

Paradoxically, many have come to the conclusion that the best way to keep a secret is to tell it to a bunch of other people and then swear them all to secrecy.

This effort is then unsuccessful, and we call the result a "Secret Society."

If the effort was intended to be successful, we wouldn’t call the result anything, because we would never hear about the effort to begin with.

Net, net . . . . the Society part is easy. The Secret part is hard.

In the past I have found information regarding these “Secret Societies in libraries around the world. Having to dig up the dirt in obscure places. Recently, all you have to do is “Google it.”

Most groups can arguably be included in more than one of the categories which follow, and probably all of them can be included under the final heading: Fictional, Fraternal, Political, Religious, and Ridiculous.

The aura of mystery surrounding the urban legend of secret societies has always been fodder for books and movies but what if it's all much ado about nothing? The smoke and mirrors game of men and women who need to be part of something.

Many secret societies have become somewhat public through their charitable contributions. However there is still the continued belief in the “secret” in “secret societies,” like the ones depicted in the “DaVinci movies." Do we need to wise up and realize that we are being fooled? Also, will these Societies never fade if people continue to dramatize the events to perpetuate these myths?

Secret societies go back to the age of Pythagoras who stated the importance of true friendship; “a friend should be ones other self, or better known in Latin, alter ego.” The movement very much resembled a mystery cult, or sect, and Pythagoras taught the immortality and transmigration of souls, himself remembering all his previous lives, including the one as Euphorbus - a warrior in the Trojan War. One of Pythagoras beliefs was that everything is based on numbers, and that true reality consisted of them. He also discovered that the tones in music are relative to the length of the strings. The Pythagorean astronomy was also important, since it stated that the earth was round and revolved around a central fire together with the other planets. This movement created a musical harmony that we are so used to that we cannot hear it.

Other more written about societies include; Freemasons, the Illuminati, the Skull and Bones, Knights Templar, Priory of Sion and numerous other groups that have formed as a social means of attaining some ideal or end.

Research has found accusations that range from the ridiculous to the sublime;

Freemasons run NASA and cover up the truth about aliens; at the same time Skull and Bones fund this country's wars, The Jesuits control the Vatican, the Bank of England, and are supreme over all Freemasonry, etc, etc . . . .

Let us not forget the Bilderberg group. The original intention of the Bilderberg Group was to further the understanding between Western Europe and North America through informal meetings between powerful individuals. Each year, a "steering committee" devises a select invitation list with a maximum of 100 names. Invitations are only extended to residents of Europe and North America. The location of their annual meeting is not secret, and the agenda and list of participants are openly available to the public, but the topics of the meetings are kept secret and attendees pledge not to divulge what was discussed. The official stance of the Bilderberg Group is that their secrecy enables people to speak freely without the need to carefully consider how every word might be interpreted by the mass media. (Media Moguls are invited but are sworn to secrecy and if details were leaked they would be banned in the future.) However, some consider the elite and secretive nature of the meeting adverse to the principles of inclusion in democratic societies.

The 2006 invitees included David Rockefeller, Henry Kissinger, Queen Beatrix of Holland, New York Governor George Pataki, the heads of Coca-Cola, Credit Suisse, the Royal Bank of Canada, cabinet ministers from Spain, Greece. Attendees also included Bill Clinton's right-hand-man Vernon Jordan, as was his Mid-East negotiator Dennis Ross. The prime ministers of Britain and Canada — Tony Blair and Stephen Harper - have addressed the group before, as have former Prime Ministers Pierre Trudeau, Paul Martin and Jean Chrétien. In 1991 the little known Governor of Arkansas, Bill Clinton was on the guest list.

I’m sure it is only a matter of time until this group and their “Secrets” will be turned into the next great movie; maybe all invitees are aliens. You never know. The closest way I can relate to the secret rituals of these societies was the scene in the movie Animal House, with fraternity initiation of new members involving black-robed elders paddling pledges who respond, "Thank you, sir. May I have another?"

Predators Will Live Amoug Us!

Does The Sentence Fit the Crime?

We cannot tell sex offenders where they can live once they've served their time. Not even a convicted child molester, unless a judge has imposed a restriction as a condition of release in the original sentence. And judges rarely do that.

That possibly means, depending on what State you live, convicted rapists and child molesters can live on secluded roads surrounded by women and children, no matter how much that unnerves a rural community. Also, there's no cap on the number of offenders drawn to a given city zip code by affordable rents.

Megan's Law was signed into law in 1996. Megan's Law requires the following two components:

Sex Offender Registration and Community Notification

Is that enough? Schools are everywhere and so are predators.

I believe tracking these predators all their life is wrong and ineffective.

In order to control this predator we have to make the penalty for this crime as high or higher, as the penalty we assess to murders or even white collar criminals.

Martha Stewart was sentenced to five months in prison for obstructing a federal securities investigation, plus upon her release she was subjected to 5 additional months of home confinement while wearing an electronic tracking device. While in Vermont, a judge sentenced a child rapist, to 60 days in jail. The man admitted he raped a little girl countless times when she was between 7 and 10 years old.

We, as a society, need to decide if the prison sentence for this type of crime is too lenient.

Get involved, contact your legislators.

Your elected representatives in Congress and in your State Legislature need to know that their constituents demand action.

Illegal Immigration - Oxymoron?

I tend to think people who say "they do the work Americans won't do" are over simplifying the issue of illegal immigration. It seems that if there are jobs in the United States that people are not willing to do; and I believe that is the case. Maybe manufacturing and technology should come up with a better way to get these jobs done.

We are a country of inventors; remember the cotton gin, sewing machine, etc. Have we stopped being inventive in the 21^st Century. The only inventions or progress you see lately are in the tech field; items that keep us entertained as well as sedentary.

As far as the immigration issue is concerned, I think immigration is great, the problem I have is the illegal part. How can you put the two words together and believe it is okay.

I am sorry to say this issue never was part of my life until 9/11. I remember watching shows like “Law & Order”, when New York homicide detective Lennie Briscoe would be looking for the bad guy and stumble across “illegals” and say don’t worry were not "Immigration". Not realizing at the time this was a “wink & nod” type of crime. Is it because it is so prevalent of a crime it was hard to enforce?

Too prevalent, until 9/11, then we realized if it’s that easy to get here illegally for jobs, then it’s just as easy to get here if you are a terrorist.

I believe we have to look at ourselves and stop blaming the government. These people would not be coming here illegally, if we weren’t giving them a reason to come here.

A rhetorical question: If the government asked you to pick lettuce for one-hundred bucks an hour, would you do it?

Why Liberals Hate The President

Why Liberals Hate The President

The War on Terror ... Liberal Style

Over the past years since 9/11 and before, I have noticed that there seems to be an intense hatred for President Bush. I'm not talking about just a dislike or disagreement about issues. I'm talking about a passionate, personal hatred of President Bush. I have personally seen hate fed language from John Kerry, Howard Dean, Hillary Clinton, Teddy Kennedy, Al Gore, Michael Moore, and the list goes on and on. After observing this hatred, I decided to explore the reasons for this.

The first reason liberals hate Bush is that they feel that he stole the 2000 Presidential election. They point to the fact that Al Gore won the popular vote. Bush was not the first President to be elected without winning the popular vote. As we all know, the Presidency is decided by electoral votes, not by the popular vote. Whether or not you agree with this system that is the way it is and will be until the Constitution is amended. Bush and Gore both campaigned in so called "swing states" for electoral votes. Crying about this issue is like deciding after you lost a football game that the score should be based on yards gained instead of touchdowns and field goals. You can't change the rules just because you don't like the outcome. That is not the way this great country works. (The “chad” issue aside, you should educate yourself before going to the polling place.)

The second reason the liberals hate Bush is the fact that he is a man of sincere Christian faith. This scares a lot of liberals. Bush openly gives credit to God and admits that his decisions are influenced by his faith. Any true believer will allow their faith to enter into their decisions. Sincere faith is rare in today's politicians. Liberals don't like the fact that this country was founded by men who believed in God. The United States of America was created to be a haven for all religions and allow the freedom to practice any faith or none at all. The First Amendment to the Constitution states that, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." This includes the office of the President, like it or not.

The third reason liberals hate Bush results from his view of who can best protect America. President Bush believes the United States should make the decisions about what is best to keep us safe. If the rest of the world supports us great, if they don't, we'll still do what is necessary to ensure our safety. Some liberal politicians want the United Nations to tell us what we should and should not do to keep us safe. This is the same UN who placed Syria, one of the world's largest sponsors of terrorism, on the UN Security Council. Also the same UN, who some members from Germany, Russia, France, and others accepted bribes from Saddam Hussein in the UN's oil for food program. It sure explains why they didn't want him taken out of power. The Democrats would have you believe that the United States acted alone. Yes, we are bearing the largest burden, but other countries have joined with us such as Great Britain, Australia, and others.

The fourth reason liberals hate Bush is the fact that they have lost power. The Democrats realize that unless they can brainwash a new generation of liberals, they will continue to loose power. A lot of the "close your eyes, shut your ears, I'm a Democrat because my daddy's, daddy's, daddy was a Democrat" people are getting older. The Democrat support, especially in the South, is drying up.

The fifth reason liberals hate Bush is that he has introduced his own version of many Democrat ideas. Examples of this include expanding legal immigration, the No Child Left Behind legislation, and prescription drug benefits for seniors. The Democrats feel like they lost the opportunity to boast about these programs themselves.

I don't agree with all of the administration's ideas. For instance I didn't agree with the Harriet Meyers nomination, the Dubai deal or Bush’s immigration policies. I do not walk lock step with my political party.

What I do know is if Al Gore or John Kerry had won the election they would be doing the same thing that George Bush is doing, protecting the citizens of the United States of America. As a citizen of the United States, I would not be trying to undercut him just because my guy lost the election. This is what I am seeing in the New Liberal Democratic Party (A National Party No More), a bunch of sore losers.

I do not believe that the war terror is going to be easy, especially with the politically correct war our troops are forced to engage in. However, the one thing I do believe and keep saying to anyone who will listen is that: "we will never see the end of terrorists or the terrorist mentality as long as young children are raised to hate as an essential part of their culture and destiny."