Category: General

A Better Blogger by far than I

Those of you who know me have often heard me compain that one of the best bloggers I knew was my mom – and she didn’t have a weblog!

Well, now [My Sister](http://on-fragile-wings.blogspot.com/) and I have conspired to give her one. She spams us, we post for you, and my mom’s luddite tendencies which keep her away from blogging are successfully circumvented.

The address is: [mingobird.blogspot.com](http://mingobird.blogspot.com). All the optimum features have not been installed, (such as RSS and proper commenting) but at least now when she says something cool, I can link to her instead of copying.

The jury’s still out on whether we should try to do some backdated posting.

It’s good stuff. This may be only familial affection coming through, but I think she can give [LaShawn Barber](http://www.lashawnbarber.com/) a run for her money… !

Epulopiscium

Now I suppose that I shouldn’t be writing about bacteria around lunch time but this sucker is cool…..

Epulopiscium

It’s called Epulopiscium fischelsoni and was found in the gut of a surgeon fish in the Red Sea. Most scientists believed that bacteria couldn’t get very big because the critters don’t have a system for getting food inside very well (have to use diffusion for water and phagcytosis for food). So when they found this critter, they thought it was originally a protozoan instead of a bacteria. Epulopiscium is the only bacteria you can see without having to use a microscope and is about a million times larger in volume that regular old E. coli.

If you’re interested in reading more go here or here.

That’s your science lesson for today. Enjoy your lunch.

Theme Previews!

A couple of weeks ago, I posted a [review](http://www.puretext.us/2005/02/25/wordpress-15/) of WordPress 1.5. My biggest complaint was that WP 1.5 had no way to preview new themes without showing off your broken design to the whole world. It was something like having a big bay window installed instead of tile in your shower. You just had to hope nobody was walking by while you were… uh… changing.

Well, this is why the WP community is a beautiful thing. [Ryan Boren](http://boren.nu/) already has a [Theme Preview Plugin](http://boren.nu/archives/2005/03/08/preview-theme-plugin/) that allows me to quickly check my design without drawing the curtains. I just type in *?preview_theme=* at the end of the address, plus the theme name. So:

http://www.puretext.us/?preview_theme=Neumatikos

pulls up the “Neumatikos ” theme I’ve been working on.

But you can’t see it, can you? That’s right. This ain’t no peep show!

Of course, there is one thing I wish he’d included, which my non-hacker skills are unable to impliment myself: I’d like a preview button in the Themes pages so I don’t have to remember long strings like “?preview_theme=”

Full integration, man. That’s all I’m asking. Full integration!

Calvinism and the Problem of Evil

Victor Reppert at [Dangerous Idea](http://dangerousidea.blogspot.com/) has a lovely discussion up on the [Problem of Evil](http://dangerousidea.blogspot.com/2005/03/why-calvinists-cant-solve-problem-of.html) which could stand some looking into. It has a very narrow focus, and doesn’t by any mreans try to “solve” the problem of evil. Instead, he’s does a little work toward demonstrating that the traditional Calvinist solution has some problems.

Continue reading “Calvinism and the Problem of Evil”

Pluralism Notes

*More from the archives. This is the finished part of an unfinished paper on pluralism I was supposed to write for a class on apologetics, which project marriage and moving forced me to abandon. My professor was pleased enough with my other paper (one half of the requirements) to give me a D- for the class. (Imagine if I had completed all the work!)*

One of the most shocking experiences for me happened during my first year at a new liberal arts college. The class was Logic and the lesson was on the law of non-contradiction: “‘A’ and ‘not a’ cannot both be true at the same time and in the same manner.” The example given was a man saying to his neighbor, “My grandfather has passed away, but it’s all right, because I know he’s in heaven now.” The neighbor replies, “How can he be alive in heaven if he’s dead, since death means the cessation of life?” Either he’s alive in heaven, or he’s completely dead and gone. But one girl on the right side of the room raised her hand and asked, “Why can’t he be both?” And she could not be dissuaded. As far as she was concerned there was no fallacy in assuming that he could be in heaven for his grandson, and nowhere at all for the neighbor—in the same sense, at the same time. Continue reading “Pluralism Notes”

Black Conservatism

[LaShawn Barber](http://www.lashawnbarber.com) has an excellent post up on what [Black Conservatism](http://lashawnbarber.com/archives/2005/03/08/black/) is supposed to mean. In the process she’s done a lot of name dropping, which of course, has reminded me how big my library is supposed to be.

New names on the wishlist: Booker T. Washington, W. E. B. Dubois (who I know has some excellent essays on religion thrown in there as well), and Ralph Ellison. Missing from LaShawn’s litany of black conservatives is Zora Neale Hurston. But she’s on my list! 🙂