linux.poet said:

Moderators always win.

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feels good doesn't it.

bob121 said:

Steve, thank you for laying out that graceful-exit roadmap. My own Tokyo witness has never hinged on clever rhetoric: I simply raise Jesus’ name, share the freedom He offers, and leave the growth to God. Online, my blogs try to encourage deeper thought, but the depth always points back to the One who deserves all praise, life, and love. It’s a daily struggle for us all—yet plant, witness, and bow we shall. Grace and peace to you, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

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I remember when I was younger and just reflecting on how the gospel was preached it was simple. There wasn't all the counter and alternative ideas and rationalisations for not believing in God.

It was a case of 'oh well if thats what you believe in, good for your'. People were more open to at least hearing the gospel and it was often framed as one of the ways people could find what they were looking for compared to other ways.

So if a person is lost and had no hope they were open to at least hearing the hope and life Christ offered. This was how I came to God.

But now the culture is full of all these voices proclaiming a better way. Along with the fact that the church was exposed for abuses and coupled with the fall away from God in the public square its become a mindfield of counter ideas and skepticism against religion and especially Christianity.

Thats why I think the simple gospel is more important than ever and not engage in the semantics and arguements over its truth. It is a truth and we are speaking and living that truth exactly as it was taught.

Today I think churches want to water this down to try and accommodate the world because the same gospel and teachings that had previously saved many was not as appealing today due to all these counter arguements and modern norms encroaching on the church.

But really its the very thing that has always saved. It may seem more outdated or in conflict today but the message is still the same. It still works the same way. People thirst for the truth even if it may seem too hard to believe or outdated to todays ears.

So telling that truth just like it is is exactly how we should preach the gospel and not be afraid of embarrassed about it. If people reject it that is up to them. But to then try and water it down to appease others is selling the gospel short.

Servus said:

I think that's what's being read into it. But it seems more likely that Hegseth was referring to the boat strike period.

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And that whatever was done (and they are no longer denying the "double tap"), Bradley was in charge.

Isaac the Recluse said:

I like the response of just calling it "growing up". Also, a large draw of SciFi was the concept, the what if. I guess that when the ideas are nearing a quarter of a century old, and have been growing in familiarity all that time, they just lose their shine a bit.

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Some recent Sci-Fi is awesome.
The Expanse, Last of Us, 3 Body Problem and even swashbuckling fun with "Mech's meet Mad Max" in Fallout.

Let alone the new Sci-Fi books!

But I do drift between genres, and there are also seasons of life. Younger, more idealistic versions of myself were obsessed with the more utopian versions. Older, more cynical versions of myself hope for the best for my kids, but kind of look at the dystopian stories like The Road, Blade Runner 2049, Last of Us, Fallout, and various Cli-Fi (Climate collapse fiction) as warnings of possible futures if we are not careful.

Tim Winton is a literary author in Australia who usually writes about life in small Western Australian country towns and is quite philosophical. (He's also a Christian - but you might not know it from his writing because he keeps his characters real, using real 'Aussie vernacular' if you know what I mean.)

He just wrote a Cli-Fi called Juice.

Seriously! It was like reading Ernest Hemingway writing about climate change!
Set 200 years from now - it was so bleak!


Then I'll go through a phase like yours where I feel guilty for reading or watching any fiction - and go nuts for various research projects and blogging.

I guess it depends on which version of myself gets booted up for that month!

Everything I said is correct. Revelation is in chronological order, and Rev 13-22 is future. The new Jerusalem coming down to new physical heavens and earth, final judgement lake of fire in rev 20-22 is future still. Rev 13-22 won't happen until 4400-4500 AD based on 1 Enochs 10,000 year starting at creation 5500 BC prophecy.
Whatever the abomination of desolation was mentioned by Jesus happened 70 AD. He was referencing the one in Dan 9, and 12 both ended 70 AD. Dan 8 ended in Maccabees, and Dan 11 ended before 70 AD whenever it was. . The man of sin in Thes had to happen before 70 AD whatever it was. The believers body is the temple of God now.
The language about mountains is found in the old testament too. Paste 1 Enoch 1:1-9 into chat GPT, and ask it to show all the same language from the OT. In some cases it is metaphor for judgement other cases literal eg earthquakes the day Jesus died, and more leading up to 70 AD. All the stuff chat GPT will show was about the Babylonian or Maccabean judgements in the OT but some was about 70 AD too. Jesus about 70 AD-
Luke 21:22 NIV
For this is the time of punishment in fulfillment of all that has been written.

There are NO issues with what I said. Rev 13-22 is future still.
Christians are supposed to love neighbor, and God help the poor sick needy etc or teach the bible preach. Not supposed to love money and focus on worldly gain.
The last kingdom of Daniel 2, and 7 is still future. It overlaps with Rev 13. It is the country "Israel", and the mark of the beast is the hexagram.

BPPLEE said:

I don't know if any of the strikes were lawful. It seems to depend on who you ask

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I'm talking about the "double tap" to finish off survivors. For the military that is flat-out unlawful.

The Barbarian said:

In biology, it's called "natural selection." It might look like magic, but species evolving in the same environmental pressures often tend to look very much alike.

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Yes, but why couldn't there be two things?

The Barbarian said:

I'd be interested in any literature about rat populations being able to learn more quickly after an isolated population learns something. What do you have?

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• Harvard Water Maze Experiment: A series of experiments started by William McDougall at Harvard in the 1920s involved training rats to escape from a water maze by avoiding a brightly lit pathway (which resulted in an electric shock).
  • Generational Improvement: Over many generations (up to 22 in some studies), rats learned the maze significantly faster. The initial rats required an average of around 150 shocks to learn, while later generations needed only about 20.
  • Control Groups' Improvement: Crucially, Sheldrake points out that even control rats whose parents had never been trained showed the same rate of improvement, suggesting the ability was not passed genetically but through a wider influence.
• • Global Spread of Learning: This is the core of the morphic resonance argument. When the same experiment was replicated with rats of the same breed in Edinburgh (Scotland) and Melbourne (Australia), those first-generation rats started their learning at the advanced rate where the Harvard rats had left off. The knowledge seemed to be instantly and non-locally accessible to rats of the same species and breed.

Sheldrake's Interpretation
According to Sheldrake, this phenomenon occurs because:

• Repeated behavior forms a "morphogenetic field" which acts as a kind of species-wide collective memory.
• Individual animals can "tune in" to this field through a process called morphic resonance, making it easier for them to learn behaviors that many other members of their species have already mastered, even without any physical communication or genetic link.

o_mlly said:

Belief in things unseen seems to be the problem.

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God doesn't seem to think so:

Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

Fortunately, evolutionary theory is based on evidence of confirmed predictions of the theory. Would you like to learn about some of those?

How could an Israelite be saved by the Old Covenant Law? The Old Covenant was never about salvation. All the Law could do was point out sin. Only Jesus saves.

How are Jews who have not accepted Jesus any different than the rest of humanity? Gal3:
19 Why, then, was the law given at all? (to Israel) It was added because of transgressions until the Seed to whom the promise referred had come. The law was given through angels and entrusted to a mediator. 20 A mediator, however, implies more than one party; but God is one.

21 Is the law, therefore, opposed to the promises of God? Absolutely not! For if a law had been given that could impart life, then righteousness would certainly have come by the law. 22 But Scripture has locked up everything under the control of sin, so that what was promised, being given through faith in Jesus Christ, might be given to those who believe.

In Matt 5, we read that Jesus came to fulfill (bring an end) the prophecies concerning His coming. In the same sentence, he also claimed the same for the Law. Doesn't that mean that during His time on Earth He ratified the New Covenant? The New Covenant then had to supersede the Sinai covenant. The Sinai covenant could not save one soul. It could only point out sin. Every living soul can hear the Word and claim the promises that Jesus made in the New and better Covenant. The Old Sinai Covenant is now history. No one is subject to a covenant that ended at Calvary.

To all who believe they are still under the guidance of the old covenant I would point you to Gal5:21 But now apart from the law the righteousness of God has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. 22 This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. 25 God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— 26 he did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.

What good would it be for Jews to still under laws that Jesus brought to an end? Gentiles are not under those Law, and we find Jesus.

Say it aint so said:

Did how did I know what article and authors were referenced? Prophecy?

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I was referring to the article that I posted which you quoted. I am also referring to the article which said 500 Minnesota government workers are whistleblowers about the billions dollars fraud committed by Somalians in Minnesota.

I've never observed nuclear fusion in the lab, either. But like macroevolution, scientists have observed it.

o_mlly said:

Nothing new here.

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Right. This has been observed for a very long time.

o_mlly said:

Keep looking and, as I'm sure you will, keep your faith in evol theory.

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It's always funny that YECs pretend that science is about faith, as thought faith were a bad thing. But science can't be about faith, since it depends on evidence. If your faith isn't strong enough to save you, science can't help.
"Macroevolution" means the evolution of new species. If that seems meaningless to you, we've located the problem.

o_mlly said:

Nothing new here either and, yes, we've located the problem.

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It seems so. You've confused evolution including macroevolution, which is an observed phenomenon, with universal common descent. And that is from genetics, not evolutionary theory. Even Darwin just supposed that God created some number of original living things.

All this confusion is curable, if you're willing to investigate a little.

Oompa Loompa said:

Reference to the law being violated?

"It ain't a war crime the first time."

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The one noted within the Department of Defense. Post 2.

Hans Blaster said:

It's not that you include a lot of history as background, it is about how much of that history is wrong.

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Then show me how its wrong.

Vambram said:

I doubt you did. There's a lot more in that article than what you think.

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Did how did I know what article and authors were referenced? Prophecy?

samaus123456789 said:

I can explain pretty much every single prophecy in the bible but it takes a long time so I will post an important one here
Jude quotes Enoch 7th from Adam about the Romans destroying Jerusalem 70 AD, and killing the people that killed Jesus, and quotes 1 Enoch 1:1-9. Enoch says it is a prophecy for a remote generation because he is writing pre flood about an event thousands of years into the future. He says people will be in tribulation like Jesus said 70 AD would be great tribulation. Enoch says God will come over MT Sinai because Jerusalem is metaphorically called MT Sinai (Galatians 4 25) first century AD, and Jesus told the apostles he was coming back in their lifetime. Jesus came back 70 AD like all the prophecies said, all the Israelites rose from the dead, the faithful ones got raptured same with some of the living pre destined elect remnant of the lost sheep of the house of Israel which was the 144 000 in Rev 7 all saved via belief in Jesus by 70 AD. Rev 1-12 happened 70 AD but Rev 13-22 is future. Gospel of Nicodemus inspired apocrypha for the wise only (like 1 Enoch is) has more info on people that raised from the dead the day Jesus died. Also some of the other acts Pilate has more info on the event too.

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well if only it is that simple, what do we do now?

You can’t get married? It’s getting cold I guess.

Now I wait to see how long it takes for someone to blame Trump.

Isaac the Recluse said:

Around 20-25 years ago I had a SciFi that I absolutely loved. As in I'd plan my time around the broadcast schedule for the next episode - didn't matter if I could record it, I couldn't wait that long.

I had all the DVDs, to make sure I'd seen every episode, and was hanging on to them with the idea that when I retire from work I'd watch them again.

Again, I didn't wait that long. I had some time on my hands, and realised the series is on Youtube, so I've been rewatching it. And it is kind of 'meh'. I have very little patience for the "wacky" filler episodes, little credulity for the likelihood of the overall story arc, and I couldn't care less about the romantic interest part.

A few things have changed with me in the 20-25 years since it was televised. I now don't have a tv, and don’t watch any series. I don't indulge in any fiction at all really.

I like the response of just calling it "growing up". Also, a large draw of SciFi was the concept, the what if. I guess that when the ideas are nearing a quarter of a century old, and have been growing in familiarity all that time, they just lose their shine a bit.

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And Tribbles were 14 years old when they were plagiarized into a Star Trek episode, a Martian Flat Cat is the same by any name.

And it is a lot more than a quarter century. Actually, well over a half century.

But the half white vs. half black episode will sadly still be relevant when it is over a century old.

Landon Caeli said:

This is the solution I have been looking for, in regards to why convergent evolution exists - why an octagon shaped species on the north side of the planet looks almost exactly like a species on the south end, completely unrelated, and having evolved separately from one another. Couldn't it be true, that the one species existed first, and the successes were somehow *easier* to develop then for another.

The amount of times, and the amount of crabs that have evolved, completely unrelated - Couldn't it be, because it happened once, and twice, and then three - and then many more because of morphic resonance?

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In biology, it's called "natural selection." It might look like magic, but species evolving in the same environmental pressures often tend to look very much alike.

Landon Caeli said:

Species have evolved to look like crabs (a process called carcinization) at least five separate times in evolutionary history... Completely unrelated.

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Actually, they are all decopod crustaceans. And interestingly, some lines of "crabs" have undergone "decarcination", suggesting that conditions changes, with a subsequent loss of crabby features. The reason this can happen is that arthropods, unlike chordates, are composed of a linear arrangement of essentially identical segments. Muscles, gills, legs, and so on. So they can rather easily change morphology.

Echinoderms, the two radially symmetrical examples you show, begin life as bilaterally symmetrical larva, and later become radially symmetrical. Number of radial segments vary, though. Interestingly, echinoderms and chordates are both deuterostomes, more closely related to each other than either is related to (for example) crabs. Some chordates also begin life as bilaterally symmetrical larva and later lose that symmetry. Ascidians, (sea squrts) for example.

Bats, birds, and pterosaurs all use forelimbs for flight, but the anatomy is different. They are analogous forms, but the homology stops at basic vertebrate form (femur, ulna/radius/carpals/metacarpals/phalanges). They each evolved separately, under the pressure of natural selection.

I'd be interested in any literature about rat populations being able to learn more quickly after an isolated population learns something. What do you have?