Sunspots 930

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to others*: 

The Arts: (and computing) A Conversation author discusses art produced by artificial intelligence, and finds it wanting.

Health: Gizmodo reports on a smartphone app that can be used to take one's temperature, with no added hardware.

Science: Gizmodo reports on the use of dolphins in warfare, by Russia. (The US has also used them.)

Two Conversation writers tell us that we aren't going to crush microbes by walking on them.

*I try not to include items that require a password or fee to view.

Thanks for reading.

Is it OK to pray that my team (or my candidate) will win?

Is it OK to pray that my team will win, or that my candidate will win a political office, or a job, or an Oscar, etc.?

Well, God knows our hearts, and if that sort of outcome is one of our top desires, then we might as well pray it, because He knows. But perhaps praying of that sort isn't wise, and perhaps we should have more God-centered top desires.

The outcome we desire may not be the one that God wants. 

Here are some possibilities:

1) Perhaps God calculates which team is most deserving -- has practiced harder, prepared more thoroughly -- and awards a win to that team. Only God could do that. Does He? Who could know that? Would it be necessary for God to award the victory? Most of the time, the more deserving team would have won without divine intervention. Maybe the team that hasn't practiced and prepared so well has better players, and God counts that as most deserving.

2) I doubt very much that God adds up the number, length, and fervency of the prayers for team A, and the same for team B, and makes sure that the team with most prayer behind it wins. Only God could do that, but I really doubt that He does so. Prayer in the New Testament, and throughout the history of the church, shows little or no hint of that sort of prayer.

3) Perhaps God doesn't really care who wins.

4) God may have some particular outcome(s) in mind that we know nothing about. For example, a player might be injured, and, as a result, cease being an athlete, and enter some sort of Christian service. A player on the winning team may glorify God in a public way, influencing others, because of a win. Or a player (or coach) may be humbled as the result of a loss, and repent of some sin. I guess it's possible for a player, or a coach, or a fan, to tell God that she will obey Him if He lets her team win. I doubt that this would work, though. God surely could use the outcome of a game to subtly, or strongly, influence fans, players, coaches and referees for good, in many different ways we can't imagine, tailored to each of the individuals involved. We aren't likely to see such influence, unless we are personally involved.

Situation 4), that God uses events, including contests, to influence many people in various ways, for their good, and His glory, seems most likely, to me. And it seems to me that I shouldn't spend a lot, or any time, praying for a particular winner in athletic contests, and perhaps not even in political ones. (I ought to be praying that God's purposes, whatever they are -- we usually don't know all of them -- will be advanced, by my candidate, or the other one.)

I think it's OK to play for the safety of the players and coaches, and the audience, and that participants and fans won't be tempted to sin (for example by hating the opposition, or the referees, or being proud if their side wins) because of an athletic event. And the most important prayer, for an athletic contest, must be to pray that God will be glorified through it.

The same sort of actions by God could, I guess, be true of political contests. And dare I mention war? God did intervene in various ways in military contests in the Old Testament, sometimes, it seems, more interested in making some combatant the winner, or sometimes more interested in letting one side -- often the sinful Israelites --   be defeated. Perhaps God still intervenes in battles and wars in the 21st Century. Battles and wars usually must be more important than, say, the World Series.

Thanks for reading. Feel free to comment.

Sunspots 554

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:



Christianity: (And the Arts) A fine essay, in Christianity Today, about pop culture, especially Mad Men (which, I confess, I have never seen.)

Another essay in Christianity Today, on how and why it's so easy to ignore poverty in others.

Relevant tells us that the future looks good, and why it does.

Ken Schenck on the Christian's view of war.

Education: National Public Radio reports that some pediatricians are questioning our handling of Attention Deficit Disorder.

Health: (And Economics) The New York Times on why drug companies concentrate on treating cancer, rather than preventing it.

NPR on normal aging and forgetting, versus dementia.

NPR on the relationship between sleep disorders and Alzheimer's.

Politics: The New York Times on the probable effects of a flat tax (such as has been suggested by some Presidential candidates).


Image source (public domain)

Ender's Game: the movie

In the last post, I discussed Ender's Game, the award-winning book by Orson Scott Card. Ender, by the way, is from a rendering of the name of Andrew Wiggin by his sister, when she was small. It also can have another sort of meaning.

I have now seen the movie. Let's put it this way -- my wife liked it. It's a PG-13 film, for violence. There's no sex at all, and very little questionable language. We thought that the sound track was louder than it should have been, but have heard worse.

As would be expected, there were some deviations from the book. The most obvious one was the age of Ender, and the other battle school trainees -- they were 5 years, or more, older, than they were in the book, which actually makes more sense.

There were some other minor changes. The enemy species was called formics -- bugger was not used. The role of Petra Arkanian was magnified somewhat, which is a good thing. She was well played by Hailee Steinfeld. Asa Butterfield played Ender, the lead role, and did a good job, also, although we couldn't understand a few of his lines. Harrison Ford did a good job in an important role, and Viola Davis looked like she belonged in service in a future military.

There was even less religion in the movie than in the book. Ender's brother, Peter, was less important than in the book.

I don't wish to give away the plot, any more than in the last post, but will say that the theme, in the movie, is not so much relationships, and how they work, as it is war, and the morals of it. Is all fair in war? The book did deal with that, quite a bit. It was written before the war expense, fatalities and injuries, drone attacks, invasive data collection, and, depending on who is talking, torture, of the Bush 2 and Obama administrations, so was not a commentary on them, and the movie shouldn't be taken that way, either. There will be serious moral questions about war whenever one is fought or contemplated, and Ender's Game brings some of them to the fore.

Thanks for reading.

Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card

Ender's Game (1985, by Orson Scott Card, and based on a 1977 short story) was, and is, an important science fiction book. See here for its Wikipedia article -- the book won both the Nebula and Hugo awards. The book has been adapted for a movie, which is to come out tomorrow. I have not seen the movie, but I like the list of actors -- Harrison Ford, Ben Kingsley, Abigail Breslin, Hailee Steinfeld, Viola Davis. I don't see many movies, but I have seen all of these people in one or more, and like their work. I may see this one. Card, himself, has been deeply involved in the script of the film.

Amazon recently advertised the Kindle edition of the book. I purchased it, and I'm glad that I did. I hadn't read the book in a decade or two, and it's a good read. Also, the new edition includes a fine introduction by Card, about the book, and other things. Here's an excerpt:

Why else do we read fiction, anyway? Not to be impressed by somebody’s dazzling language—or at least I hope that’s not our reason. I think that most of us, anyway, read these stories that we know are not “true” because we’re hungry for another kind of truth: The mythic truth about human nature in general, the particular truth about those life-communities that define our own identity, and the most specific truth of all: our own self-story. Fiction, because it is not about somebody who actually lived in the real world, always has the possibility of being about ourself.

What is the book about? Before I give a brief summary, some broad themes:

Relationships. I would say that extended family relationships is the most common theme I have encountered in Card's books, almost so much that his science fiction and alternate history tales are, in large part, vehicles for portrayal of that.
War, and some of the ways it warps our morals.
Teaching children to stick up for themselves by not backing them up.
What it's like to be an exceptionally intelligent child.
Bullying.
How we might interact with aliens.

There are some interesting science fiction ideas in the book. One of them is the ansible, a device for communicating instantaneously with others, not matter how far, really far away they are. Ursula K. LeGuin seems to have invented this device, in her equally important science fiction novel The Dispossessed. Another one is the alien species that Card describes sketchily in Ender's Game.

There is no explicit religion in the book, except for some Bible quotations, and a mention of the religions of Ender's parents, one of them a Mormon, one a Catholic. (Card is a Mormon.) No one prays or goes to church. There is a high moral tone, or at least recognition that some things are right.

Now, for a summary. Don't say that I didn't warn you! Spoilers included.

Before the book starts, humans have encountered an alien race, insect-like, the buggers, a few decades earlier. They defeated them, but believe that the buggers may come back, with better weapons. Mazer Rackham was the military leader who defeated them the first time.

Ender is a six-year-old boy, highly intelligent. He, and others, all over the earth, have been monitored by the army, who is looking for children who are flexible enough in their thinking, intelligent, and physically adept, to train so that they can lead the fight against the buggers, when they return. A bully attacks him, and he believes that the only way he can stop this bully is to defeat him utterly. He does, but, although Ender doesn't realize it, he kills the bully. He is given the opportunity to go to Battle School, a satellite where such children will be trained in free fall group war games, with the understanding that he won't see his family for years.

Ender's brother, Peter, is a highly intelligent sadist. His sister, Valentine, is a highly intelligent good person. He will miss her, and hates to leave her at Peter's mercy, but accepts.

Ender becomes the best leader in Battle School. Again, a bully attacks, and Ender defends himself, so thoroughly that he kills the bully, although Ender doesn't realize this. The adult leaders of Battle School want Ender to understand that he is on his own -- if something bad happens, he has no one but himself to count on. I wonder how the movie will handle the two bullying/retaliation scenes, if at all?

Ender is so good at the games, especially at leading others to be effective, that he is sent to Eros, where he takes part in more drills to fight the buggers. Eventually, Mazer Rackham becomes his teacher. (Rackham has been traveling at near-light speed, so that he can still be helpful in the next battle with the buggers.)

As you might expect, Ender, and several colleagues from Battle School, who have joined him on Eros, eventually defeat the buggers. But there are a couple of surprises in that defeat, which I won't give away.

Ender is such a hero that he can't really go back to earth. His future, traveling with Valentine, makes up a part of four additional novels. So do the lives of some of his colleagues at Battle School.

In my opinion, the most important of the succeeding novels is Speaker for the Dead, the next novel. For more on that, and other Enderverse books, see here.

Thanks for reading

Death of bin Laden: musings

Osama bin Laden was an evil man. He was dedicated to the destruction of the U. S. Indirectly, he caused the deaths of three or four thousand U. S. citizens. (See here for the Wikipedia article on his beliefs.)

I have a few thoughts on bin Laden's death:

1) I don't believe God takes any pleasure in bin Laden's death. In Ezekiel 33:11, we read this: "Tell them, As I live, says the Lord Yahweh, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live: turn, turn from your evil ways; for why will you die, house of Israel?" (World English Bible) I don't think that I should take pleasure in it, either.


2) The Bible does seem to indicate that nations have a right to protect their citizens. I believe that we had a right to go after bin Laden. There is a long history of discussion, among Christian thinkers, about the issue of what wars, if any, are just. Not all military action is justifiable, probably including some military action by the United States. Any military action may lead to the death and injury of innocent civilians, and most of them do. They also lead to property destruction and environmental damage.


When the Israelites wanted to go through Edom, under Moses, the Edomites refused them passage, and the Israelites changed direction, rather than go to war. (Numbers 20:14-21) At other times, of course, they did go to war.


3) The United States is a nation blessed by God, with, for example, many natural resources and territory which is difficult to attack by land. There are many Christians in the U. S. But God is not necessarily on the side of the U. S. God sometimes favored other nations against the Israelis, after all. (The U. S. is not some sort of modern-day Israel.) When Joshua, a God-ordained leader, asked the leader of the heavenly hosts if he was on Joshua's side or not, the response was that he was not on either side. (Joshua 5:13-15) The important question is "are we on God's side?" God is not on ours. Joshua, by the way, was on a God-ordained mission, but even in that case, he could not take the approval of God for granted. We shouldn't, either. We have probably taken military actions that were not God-approved, and, perhaps, there are military actions that we should have taken, but didn't.


4) I said above that the Bible seems to indicate that nations can go to war in retaliation for attacks, or to protect weaker nations. It is less clear that individual Christians can retaliate for attacks on their own persons, or to their property, according to Christ, in Matthew 5:38-45. Christians can come to the defense of the weak, and oppose injustice.


Thanks for reading.

More on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq

Wired reports that the recent leak of documents related to the war in Iraq shows that the Iraqi capacity to use weapons of mass destruction was probably somewhere between "none" and the massive threat that the Bush administration claimed. There were, apparently, stocks of chemical weapons.

War and the environment

I recently read War and Nature: The Environmental Consequences of War in a Globalized World, by Jurgen Brauer. The book, which is not for the faint of heart, as it bristles with notes and bibliography, is nonetheless important, because it is an authoritative volume on an important subject.

Over and over, Brauer points out that we don't really know very much about his subject. The main reason is that wars are not even close to ideal situations for ecological study. Even after a war, things are often chaotic and dangerous. Beside that, the entities involved in fighting wars seldom put a high priority on environmental studies. Also, wars often take place in countries that are poor, and that haven't done much study on the environmental situation before a war was fought, so it is impossible to really know how much damage a war might have done.

There have been some studies, in spite of the situations described in the previous paragraph. There was a study on the environmental effects of the First Gulf War, and there was a study on the environmental effects of the Viet Nam war. There have been a few other studies.

So what does Brauer conclude? Several things.
1) It is likely that wars can be extremely detrimental to the environment, in spite of the lack of studies that support that assumption, so far. Wars are terrible, and we should try to avoid having them.
2) Perhaps the most important cause of damage from war is displaced human populations, who often degrade the environment around where they end up, sometimes because they aren't used to living in the new area, and try to re-create the agriculture of their old place, which may not be appropriate. Not only that, but war refugees are usually, and understandably, desperate for food and fuel, and do considerable damage to their new surroundings to obtain these.
3) Sometimes wars have positive environmental effects. The Korean War left that peninsula with a Demilitarized Zone, which, having little human influence, has become a haven for wildlife.
4) War may be beneficial, in that it interrupts environmentally damaging activity by humans, such as mining and deforestation.
5) It appears that some areas have recovered quite well from the environmental effects of war.

We don't do a very good job, as a species, in taking care of the environment, even in peace time.

More on torture, II

This is not my favorite subject, but I feel that it should be aired. The Obama administration, under pressure under the Freedom of Information Act, released memos from the previous administration, describing what procedures that government operatives could use, in examining prisoners.

If you want to read those memos, here they are.

The Washington Post has an article on these memos, and what they authorized, with reactions from both critics and supporters.

CNN reports that a former CIA Chief has said that these memos should not have been released, but that South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who served in the military justice system, says that the techniques they describe should never have been allowed in the first place.

I saw G. Gordon Liddy, in a discussion on CNN. Liddy said that waterboarding (see in-depth Wikipedia article) wasn't torture, because his son had been waterboarded as part of his Navy training, and he hadn't broken under such torture. Well, there was one crucial difference. Young Liddy knew that he was being trained, and that those training him would not kill him. Enemy prisoners don't know any such thing.

The US Senate Armed Services Committee, which, of course, has members of both parties, agreed unanimously that the US had, indeed, carried out torture, and that such techniques do not serve a useful purpose.

It is also possible that we turned over some prisoners to other countries, where legal restrictions are even less than ours have been. I'm not sure of that.

A person under torture is likely to admit to anything, true or false, that will end the torture, so testimony obtained under torture is unreliable. Torturing others is an invitation to other countries to torture US citizens, and a recruiting tool for the enemies of our country. Let's stop it altogether.

Here is a post on Christianity and torture.

Thanks for reading.

* * * * *

On April 20, 2009, at 10:54 EST, I discovered an article in the Christian Science Monitor, which reports that waterboarding was used many times on two prisoners. This indicates, perhaps, that it isn't so likely to be torture, or, maybe, on the contrary, that the CIA overstepped its own guidelines, given in the memos above. It also indicates that the technique must not have been very effective.

Cazaril, from Bujold's The Curse of Chalion, on war

"Chalion lost more than dy Jironal gained on that ill-conceived venture."
Iselle's eyebrows bent. "Was it not a victory?"
"By what definition? We and the Roknari princedoms have been pushing shoving over that border area for decades -- it's now a waste. Orchards and olive groves and vineyards burned, farms abandoned, animals turned loose to go wild or starve -- it's peace, not war,that makes wealth for a country. War just transfers posession of the residue from the weaker to the stronger. Worse, what is bought with blood is sold for coin, and then stolen back again." He brooded, and added bitterly, "Your grandfather Roya Fonsa bought Gotorget with the lives of his sons. It was sold by March dy Jironal for three hundred thousand royals. It's a wondrous transmutation, where the blood of one man is turned into the money of another. Lead into gold is nothing to it." (Lois McMaster Bujold, The Curse of Chalion, New York: HarperCollins, 2001, pp. 131-2) Cazaril is in Roya (king) Orico's menagerie with Iselle, now 16, the Roya's half-sister, and Betriz, her companion, a little older. He is tutoring them. Umegat, who runs the menagerie, is also present. The conversation starts with a discussion of a rare bird brought to the menagerie by dy Jironal.

Ursula K. Le Guin's newest book

Ursula K. Le Guin is one of the great authors currently writing in English. She uses words well, without being showy, or long-winded. She is interested in the craft of writing. She creates splendid characters. She imagines "what if?" situations, and writes about important themes. She is responsible for the invention of the concept of a communication device, the ansible, that is now commonly used in science fiction writing.

Le Guin was interviewed on National Public Radio's All Things Considered on April 26. The interview includes a brief reading from her book, Lavinia, by the author. It also describes the book, which is based on work by the ancient poet, Virgil. Le Guin said that the book is, in part, about the dreadfulness of war. The link to the interview goes to a page which includes an excerpt from the book. (Lavinia was published on April 21.)

Although written about the past, I am guessing that the book will be fantastic, in some ways.

Thanks for reading. Listen to Le Guin.

More on how we don't "Support our troops"

Reuters reports that a recent study indicates that about 18% of troops returning from Iraq or Afghanistan suffer serious emotional problems, which is bad enough. The really bad part is that about half of these don't receive any care for these problems. That's about 150,000 veterans needing and deserving care, but not getting it.

Once again, "support our troops," is a political slogan (used by persons of more than one political view) rather than a principle or policy. Whatever one thinks of the war, that would seem to be sad, bad, perhaps even hypocritical and cynical, on the part of the politicians.

A bipartisan group of U. S. Senators reacted to allegations that troops with war-related emotional problems have been discharged in such a way that they have been wrongly made ineligible for care by the Defense Department. (More on such charges, from a House member.) I don't know if these charges are true or not. I'm afraid that they are.

Thanks for reading.

Warfare in a theocracy

Deuteronomy 20:1 “When you go out to war against your enemies, and see horses and chariots and an army larger than your own, you shall not be afraid of them, for the Lord your God is with you, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. 2 And when you draw near to the battle, the priest shall come forward and speak to the people 3 and shall say to them, ‘Hear, O Israel, today you are drawing near for battle against your enemies: let not your heart faint. Do not fear or panic or be in dread of them, 4 for the Lord your God is he who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies, to give you the victory.’ 5 Then the officers shall speak to the people, saying, ‘Is there any man who has built a new house and has not dedicated it? Let him go back to his house, lest he die in the battle and another man dedicate it. 6 And is there any man who has planted a vineyard and has not enjoyed its fruit? Let him go back to his house, lest he die in the battle and another man enjoy its fruit. 7 And is there any man who has betrothed a wife and has not taken her? Let him go back to his house, lest he die in the battle and another man take her.’ 8 And the officers shall speak further to the people, and say, ‘Is there any man who is fearful and fainthearted? Let him go back to his house, lest he make the heart of his fellows melt like his own.’ 9 And when the officers have finished speaking to the people, then commanders shall be appointed at the head of the people.

10 “When you draw near to a city to fight against it, offer terms of peace to it. 11 And if it responds to you peaceably and it opens to you, then all the people who are found in it shall do forced labor for you and shall serve you. (ESV)

One application for today's Christians is that, as long as we are on God's side, we don't need to fear. I'm not saying that the rest of these rules of war apply to anyone now, because I'm not sure that they do. Verse 10 didn't even apply throughout the Old Testament. It seems to have only applied to cities not in the territory of the Israelites -- they were to kill the adults in cities in their territory. I noticed this passage as a consequence of following the ESV on-line Bible reading for a day in April.

Thanks for reading.

On the cost of the Gulf War (Not the current one)

I was amazed to hear a report that stated that the US is paying about $12 billion (that's a thousand million) per month for veterans who became disabled because of the Gulf War, in which Iraq was driven back from Kuwait, by a broad coalition of military from several nations. (This was not the current Gulf War.) So I checked, and found this report, by CNN, that states that, indeed, in January 2003, there were 161,000 veterans receiving disability benefits because of their service in this war. (The report is not on this subject, but the statistic is included.)

A report says that we are paying 4.3 billion a year on personnel disabled in the first Gulf War, and cites the Veterans Benefit Administration as its source.

PRI's The World interviewed (scroll down to "Three trillion dollar war") Joseph Stiglitz, an economist, and he said that the current Iraq war will cost three trillion dollars, based, in large part, on estimates based on that same 4.3 billion a year for the first Gulf War, which, he said, was being spent on 40% of the veterans of that war, those who were disabled. These funds are not generally included in costs of the current war, but in costs of caring for veterans.

The Wikipedia article on the Gulf War states that, as of 2000, there were 183,000 veterans who were suffering from a disability, and that this was one-quarter of the total number of troops. I'm not sure why there is a discrepancy in both the number and the fraction disabled, but, unless both sources are seriously false, there are a lot more people who were disabled from the Gulf War than I had supposed, and the cost must be significant. If there are "only" 150,000 such (lower than either report gives) and the cost of treating each one, including medical personnel, record-keeping, prosthetics, physical therapy, surgery, counseling, facilities, medicine, disability support, etc., is only $2000 per month per person (which must be a low estimate) the cost would be $300 million per month, or 3.6 billion a year.

The current war may or may not have been justified. Continuing it may or may not be justified. But no one, including even politicians who oppose this war, seems to be talking about this aspect of the tremendous monetary cost. (And, of course, we don't seem to be giving our veterans very good care, in some instances. Besides which, none of this says anything about costs for caring for Iraqi civilians, or insurgents, or the Iraqi army.)

Perhaps others realized how many veterans can expect to be disabled, but I had no idea that the projected percentage was so high. War may be necessary some times, but it is a terrible event, at best.

Thanks for reading.

Two Quotes from On Blue's Waters, by Gene Wolfe

On Blue's Waters: Volume One of the Book of the Short Sun, by Gene Wolfe (New York: Tor, 1999) is the first of a trilogy of fantastic novels. Wolfe is a good writer. He considers lots of ideas. Here are two quotations from the book:
Immediate action is the soul of war, as I learned many years ago by observing General Mint. It is not the soul of peace. (p. 185)

Listen all you phantom readers. Buildings are temporary, ideas permanent. (p. 348)

Thanks for reading!

"Messiah, Prince of Peace," an anti-war hymn by Charles Wesley

This year is the 300th anniversary of Charles Wesley's birth. Wesley wrote many hymns. One that I have never heard, but which is appropriate for this advent season, is "Messiah, Prince of Peace." It is also an anti-war hymn! These are the words, as posted by the Cyberhymnal:

Messiah, Prince of peace!
Where men each other tear,
Where war is learned, they must confess,
Thy kingdom is not there.
Who, prompted by Thy foe,
Delight in human blood,
Apollyon is their king, we know,
And Satan is their god.

But shall he still devour
The souls redeemed by Thee?
Jesus, stir up Thy glorious power
And end the apostasy!
Come, Savior, from above,
O’er all our hearts to reign;
And plant the kingdom of Thy love
In every heart of man.

Then shall we exercise
The hellish art no more,
While Thou our long-lost paradise
Dost with Thyself restore.
Fightings and wars shall cease,
And, in Thy Spirit giv’n,
Pure joy and everlasting peace
Shall turn our earth to Heav’n.

These words were published in 1762, hence are public domain.

Thanks for reading.

Musings about September 11th

Some musing about September 11th, 2001, posted on September 11, 2007.

1) The attacks were a disaster for the US, certainly. However, although I can't find statistics on this, I'm pretty sure that more people die each year because they don't have health insurance than the total of those who died in the attacks, plus the US military who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan.

* * * * *
Added September 12th: A commenter says that this is comparing apples to oranges. I guess so. My point was not that being attacked by terrorists is the moral equivalent of not having universal health care, but that we responded massively to a few thousand deaths from a terrorist attack, but aren't responding much to an equivalent number of deaths because we don't have a good health care system. We also don't seem to respond much to other things that kill thousands of people, such as gang violence and drunken drivers. We just accept these deaths as normal. I wish we would do something about these three killers, too, or instead of, our "war on terror."

2) Osama Bin Laden is still at large. Why?

3) Except for those in the military, and their families, there has been little sacrifice in the so-called "War on Terror." The President, with the complicity of Congress, has not called upon US taxpayers to pay for our activity in the Middle East, at least not directly. The expenses for the war, as I understand it, have just been added to the national debt. We haven't had to ration things we need, and, although gas prices have risen, this doesn't seem to be mostly due to the war. I saw a TV new program, where they interviewed the wife of a soldier, and she said that most of us weren't sacrificing. We are at the mall, or Starbuck's, she said.

4) Quoting from an article in Slate: The surge will be over in April 2008, when the U.S. Army and Marines run out of deployable troops, and therefore at least a quarter of the 20 brigades now in Iraq will inevitably be withdrawn and not replaced. This is by now common knowledge. At the same time, nearly all politicians, including most Democrats, have come out against a total withdrawal and have recognized that we will have some military presence in Iraq for a long time to come.
If that's the case, what's the political furor all about? Posturing and trying to get votes, I guess.

5) "Support our Troops" is, unfortunately, partly a sound bite, a cruel joke. A recent USA Today report, which I read, but cannot locate, indicated that several members of Congress, from both parties, had felt it necessary to take some extreme steps, such as contacting defense contractors to encourage them to hurry, in order that our military have up-to-date equipment, because the Pentagon wasn't doing enough. It is well known that the troops were not sent to Iraq with adequate armor. Health-care in the military, especially for those with various kinds of mental illness, is in trouble.

6) For many Christians, the "War on Terror" is problematic. (Some Christians are against all wars.) See this post on the subject. I attended a large group discussion, shortly after September 11, 2001, which was supposed to consider a Christian response. I guess I shouldn't have been surprised that what most of those present wanted to do was to state their plans for pursuing attacks against the terrorists. In other words, they wanted revenge. That didn't strike me as a Christian response. Besides, the direct perpetrators had all died in the attacks.

7) I wonder, but don't know, if Iraq and Afghanistan are more open to the gospel than they were six years ago? I hope so.

8) Although President Bush has been criticized for a lot of things related to the war in Iraq, and, no doubt, some, maybe a lot of this, is deserved, he would probably have been impeached if he hadn't done something pretty drastic in response to the September 11 attacks.

9) The moral standing of the United States has suffered because of our actions in the Middle East.

Thanks for reading.

Sunspots 104

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

Science: A proposed experiment to see if quantum indeterminacy applies to objects larger than the sub-atomic.

There is at least one double asteroid -- two bodies, one in orbit around the other, as they orbit the sun.

On why New York City is the most environment-friendly place in the US. Really.

Cellphone radiation may be interfering with the lives of bees.

Politics: "Even the highest morale is eventually undermined by back-to-back deployments...Something has to give and it's giving. Resources are overstretched. Frustration is up, as families are separated and strained. Morale is down. Recruitment is more difficult. And many of our best people in the military are headed for civilian life."*

(or maybe Science)
A US government study on the effect of government-sponsored programs using encouragement of sexual abstinence as a deterrent to teen pregnancy, etc. Here's a quote from .PDF page 17 (not the report's page number, but the number as counted in the file): Findings indicate that youth in the program group were no more likely than control group youth to have abstained from sex and, among those who reported having had sex, they had similar numbers of sexual partners and had initiated sex at the same mean age. . . . however, program group youth were no more likely to have engaged in unprotected sex than control group youth. In other words, such programs didn't help, but they didn't hurt, either.

Music: The German government has studied the so-called "Mozart effect."

Computing:
Catez Stevens has awarded this blog a Thinking Blogger award. Thanks!

This is two years' worth of the Sunspots part of this blog, and I enjoy doing it, and the blog as a whole. It helps me think.

Literature: A brief, but on-the-mark, essay on "Conflicts in Out of the Silent Planet."

There is a Christian Carnival this week! You can submit an entry yourself, for the next couple of days. For information on these Carnivals, go here.

Thanks for reading! Keep clicking away.

Image source (public domain)

*According to USA Today, this statement was made by President George W. Bush in 1999, when he was a candidate for President.

The Iraqi election, in California

Many things have been said about the manner of entry of the US into a war in Iraq, about the conduct of that war, and the like. I've said a few myself. But at least one good thing seems to have come from this war, and not a small one -- an evil dictator is in prison, and Iraqis have a voice in their own future.

This restaurant, in El Cajon, California, was one of the sites where Iraqis living in the U. S. could vote in the recent election. We drove by, a couple of days after the election, and took this picture. God bless them. May Iraq not only have elections, but may Iraqis be able to decide upon the claims of Christ, too.

You should be able to see a larger version of this photo, if you wish, by clicking on it. You can also get to all of our Flickr photos that way.

Thanks for reading!

Ethics and the wars of Lewis and Tolkien

In a previous post, I quoted a secondary source, which credited Aquinas with three parts of a just war: proper authority to wage one, having a just cause, and having right intentions. A commenter said, I think correctly, that Augustine also contributed to just war theory.

Did the "good guys" in C. S. Lewis' Narnia books wage just wars, when they waged them? How about the "good guys" in J. R. R. Tolkien's Ring books? I'll try to answer those questions.

First, Lewis. I have seen the trailer for the soon-to-be-shown "The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe," and, judging from the emphasis given in the trailer, the battle fought in the book the movie is supposed to be based on will be more important than it was in the book. This war seems to have unquestionably been just, on the part of Peter and his siblings, and, of course, Aslan. The White Witch attacked them.

Other wars are mentioned briefly in the Narnia books, and I don't think there's enough information to judge as to whether or not they were just. In The Last Battle, much of the book is about warfare between King Tirian and the Telmarines. Again, self-defense was involved.

Tolkien described lots of wars in The Silmarillion, and in the appendix to the Ring trilogy. I won't concern myself with these. What about the final war, where Gondor, Rohan, and others (such as the Ents) go into combat against Sauron. Although it's more complicated than the battles in Narnia, I think, again, that this is mostly self-defense. Sauron or Saruman have harried and harrassed, and conquered lands they were not entitled to. Sauron attacks Gondor. Saruman destroys sentient Ents. Sauron clearly plans to overcome the world. Gandalf gives, as it were, supernatural approval and encouragement to go to war. So does prophecy.

Because I have temporarily left most of our library behind, including our Tolkien and Lewis books, I am operating from memory. Also, this is merely musings on the wars in these books. Perhaps a reader can take this much further than I have. For what it's worth, Lewis and Tolkien (who had both served in the British military) presented wars that had to be fought, against enemies who were grossly unjust, in these works of fiction. There was proper authority: Aslan/Peter, or Gandalf/Denethor/Aragorn/Theoden. There was just cause: evil conquest and destruction that needed to be defeated. There was right intention: restoration of justice (including, in both worlds, better care of the environment.)