I'm trying eating raw foods exclusively. Why am I doing this? I honestly don't know. I'm not really trying to lose weight (although I could lose some pounds). I'm just, somehow, attracted to this diet right now. Maybe I feel instinctively I need it. Or maybe I'm just aesthetically attracted to the idea. Also, it fits me in that I'm already a vegetarian (it's possible to eat raw meats, but, aside from sushi, who'd want to? Steak tartar? Ew.). And I hate to cook. LOL. We'll see how it goes. I'm just doing it for a week, and, at this point, that's all I have the stomach for (NPI).
Breakfast
handful of rolled oats
a few dried apricots
a few whole raw almonds
a banana
3/4 cup skim milk
Lunch
Half cup of hummus
Half a cuke
Handful of baby carrots
A dozen raw almonds
8 raw macadamia nuts
A few dried apricots
A medium hothouse tomato
A banana
Dinner (this is getting monotonous)
Half cup of hummus
1/4 a cuke
Handful of baby carrots
A dozen raw almonds
8 raw macadamia nuts
A few dried apricots
A banana
A handful and a half of grapes
A peppermint hard candy (oh dear)
Behold, the atheist's nightmare: Kiwi Christian minister Ray Comfort.
Reverend Comfort's proof of an omnipotent creator's hand in "creation" has been the butt of some well-deserved internet ridicule for years now. Arguably, it does more harm than good to respond in any serious fashion to such a ridiculous argument. After all, even reasonable ideas have poor defenses and incompetent defenders. To pick the worst of them makes it seem like you're shooting fish in a barrel, while avoiding the best arguments. But, though this is a particularly ridiculous argument for "creation", in the following ways it is typical of many creationist arguments, even the "best", and so I think it's worth answering:
It has superficial persuasiveness, from the point of view of the naive, ignorant, and credulous.
It involves very little in the way of evidence and all the evidence is either wrong or yoked in the service of false premises.
It recklessly and brazenly ignores equally persuasive counter-evidence.
The evidence presented, to the extent that it's correct, actually argues against the speaker's thesis.
A hand of god is not required to explain the "creation".
The banana does seem well-designed for human consumption. Everything about a banana seems to aid its being eaten. Although, in this case, most of the evidence presented is correct (the banana easily fits in the human hand, is easy to peel, etc.), it is only relevant if you accept Comfort's false premise that the banana is a natural part of "creation". The banana is actually the product of thousands of years of selection pressure brought to bear upon a tiny seed-ridden blandly starchy fruit that became a staple of certain groups of prehistoric humans. Whatever its shape and snugness in the human hand, that fruit was anything but wonderfully convenient to eat, but it was also likely the result of selection pressure from animals who chose to eat it and thereby propagate its seeds. It undoubtedly became more palatable as a result, evolving from an ancestor that was even less amenable to easy consumption. Here is what a wild banana looks like, ancestor of the banana that was selected for human cultivation:
A jejune and seedy "nightmare", surely, for any hungry atheist, or theist for that matter. Quite naturally, ancient humans who grew and harvested early bananas favored bananas that were sweeter, contained more fruit and fewer seeds. This logical preference, based on human dietary needs and convenience, led to the modern cultivated banana that Comfort admires in his video, truly a "miracle" of human, not divine, creation.
Put another way, though the cultivation of bananas was a conscious effort made by intelligent animals, it is also an example of evolution. Gene frequency changed over time (which is evolution, by definition) guided by the preference of those that depended on the fruit for sustenance and therefore required certain phenotypic characteristics to dominate.
If a god wanted fruits to be easy to eat, he would have done many things differently. For example, if the banana lacks seeds (which, too, is a highly unnatural result of cultivation), why shouldn't apples lack them, or, better, pomegranates? Have you ever eaten a pomegranate? Even those who find them delicious must endure the tedious and endless task of separating seed, rind, and flesh.
Why must a pineapple be so prickly? Why shouldn't an orange's skin slough off as easily as a tangerine's? Why is the pit of a mango so large, fibrous, and hard to separate from its pulp? Why is the coconut so damn hard to open and eat? For that matter, why must fruit ripen and go bad? Why can't it be ready to eat always? Etc. The counter-arguments undermining Comfort's wonder at the ingenuity of "God" in service of the convenience of man are trivial and require but a few seconds' thought. The continued cultivation of these fruits by the hand of man will surely solve these and many other problems, at an ever more rapid pace as our technology develops. No hand of god is required.
So, how could Comfort miss such obvious flaws in his argument? Why would he go before the video cameras with such a lame "proof" of the existence of god? I don't know, but I can guess. Since, judging from the fluidity of his speech and relatively competent grammar, Comfort has a normal IQ, I consider there to be two possibilities.
First, Comfort is so psychologically wedded to the notion of a god that he simply cannot see the obvious errors he makes. I suppose such psychological blindness is possible. It's certainly not unknown to anyone who has any experience with the follies and stupidities of human nature. But, given what I know of human beings, I consider the second possibility even more likely: it is possible that Comfort is deliberately and cynically leveraging the gullibility of his audience.
If that is true, then the purpose of his video is not to "prove" anything by rational argument, which is what it is designed to look like. The purpose is to create a memory in the viewer of once having witnessed the destruction of evolution by an apparently elegant and inarguable proof. Once that false impression has been created, the details are forgotten and the viewer, never seeking any other explanations or arguments, is more likely to remain in the creationist "camp", to vote for school officials that oppose the teaching of evolution, to vote for candidates who think the earth is 6,000 years old, and to give to creationist causes.
That is not to say Comfort disbelieves in his creationist folderol, but only that he has no rational argument against evolution. He "knows" evolution is false, because it contradicts his certainty in the literal reading of Genesis I. In the absence of a rational response to a century or more of massive amounts of supporting evidence for evolution, he resorts to this rather transparent propaganda. Once you understand reverend Comfort, you understand much of the snake oil sold by creationists.
Chances are you've never heard this instrument. It's called a clavichord.
During the Baroque and Classical eras (roughly: 1600s through early 1800s), the clavichord was the most popular home keyboard instrument. Early instances of the instrument go back to the 14th century. It has at least three advantages over the harpsichord. It's very quiet, and therefore didn't disturb the rest of the household; it is small in scale, and therefore less expensive; and it has expressive capabilities (in dynamics and even vibrato[!]) that the harpsichord lacked. It's also, as you can hear in the above video, a very beautiful sounding instrument, easy on the ears, sweet and mellow.
Clavichords found home in the houses of amateur musicians and professionals alike. The clavichord didn't really die out as a common household instrument until the 19th century, by which time composers were writing music that, in range, difficulty, and dynamics, was more suited to the burgeoning piano than its lighter weight forebears. JS Bach's household had several, and it's likely that it was the instrument he and his family most often played at home. Most of Bach's non-organ keyboard music works very well on the instrument. Some doesn't. For example, you wouldn't want to play the Goldberg variations on a clavichord.
The clavichord strikes its strings rather than plucking them (as the harpsichord does). And unlike the piano, there is no escapement in its hammers, which on a clavichord are called tangents. The tangent is responsible both for sounding the string and dividing it so that it sounds at a certain pitch (actually, the pitch on the instrument is not so "certain", but that's another story). Once the key is released, the string is dampened (stopped from vibrating). Note that this is different from a piano's action, where an escapement immediately removes the hammer from the string once the hammer has struck. Because the tangent remains in contact with the string, this actually allows you to apply a modest amount of vibrato to a note by worrying the key back and forth slightly!
Clavichords are sold today. In fact, it's probably fair to say that more clavichords are sold today than have ever been sold in history. In general, they're quite expensive, though you can considerably reduce cost by buying them in kit form, of various degrees of completion.
This instrument
This is a rather poor picture of the actual instrument played in the above video. The man in the above video was kind enough to inform me that this clavichord was built by Dick Verwolf in the Netherlands in imitation of one built by Stein circa 1750 (the year of Bach's death). An original Stein survives at the Municipal Museum in The Hague. The keyboard ranges from the C (do) below middle C to the C three octaves above middle C. As of this writing, one can be purchased for US$4,140. A bargain. Who knows what it would cost to ship such a delicate instrument.
The music
This is the adagio from JS Bach's e minor keyboard toccata. It's in a fantasia style. That is to say, it's improvisatory...this is probably very much how Bach sounded as he sat before a clavichord in his own home and improvised. It is beautifully played here by Joris Weimar. I picked this video out of one or two dozen sampled because, though the video quality is low, it showed the best sounding instrument and the one that I think best demonstrates the clavichord's charms. Hope you enjoy it.
Well, if you're wondering what chromatic means in music, this is a pretty good illustration. Chromatic means, essentially, the degree to which music strays from a key, or a tonal center. And, before perhaps Wagner (certainly Schoenberg), music did not get more chromatic than this. Glenn Gould's final comment, that this is "Bach for people who do not like Bach", I guess, means Bach for the musical avant garde of Gould's time who tended toward more chromaticism in music.
This illustrates the many mannerisms that made Glenn Gould Glenn Gould. His unusual posture at the piano, conducting with his free hand, perverse phrasing (extremely staccato or detaché), bringing out melodies in the lower and inner voices that you weren't aware were there, etc. People tend to love him or hate him, for all these reasons. My opinion is that this is a memorable and valuable performance, and, thankfully, there's no need to choose between traditional/moderate approaches and Gould's more extreme idiosyncratic style.
The odd dude in glasses at the end is Bruno Monsaingeon, Gould's biographer and friend.
Imagine being so disgusted with yourself, with the wrongs you've done, that it is like a sickness, a putrefaction in your very bones ("...Als ein Eiter in Gebeinen..."). What do you do, how do you escape? You can't escape yourself. You have to find a way to forgiveness or live in suffering and self-loathing.
I doubt there's ever been a more touching expression of the torment of regret than this aria. The aria is obviously religious, but the universal message is that the very sincere self-loathing and sorrow expressed is the key to redemption, because it is only through honest repentance of a misdeed that we can ever be relied upon not to repeat it and to repair any damage we've done, if possible, which is the only ethical path to self-forgiveness. The agony is the way out of agony.
The equally talented and pretty soprano Magdalena Kozená imparts this message so touchingly here, without making it pathetic or maudlin. She makes you want to forgive her everything she's ever done, including that time she totaled your car and then had the gall to sleep with the tow truck driver who hauled your car to the junk yard!
Liebster Gott, erbarme dich, Laß mir Trost und Gnad ercheinen! Meine Sünden kränken mich Als ein Eiter in Gebeinen, Hilf mir, Jesu, Gottes Lamm, Ich versink im tiefen Schlamm!
Dearest God, Have mercy on me, Grant me solace and grace. My sins sicken me Like a pus in my bones! Help me, Jesus, Lamb of God, I am sinking deep in mire.
Women at the time Bach was writing his cantatas were not regularly allowed to sing in the church. This video hypothesizes a mother-copyist filling in for her malingering son by singing the aria Kommt, ihr angefochtnen Sünder from Bach's cantata BWV 30, Freue dich, erlöste Schar. The mother is played by the incredibly beautiful and gifted soprano Magdalena Kozena.
Kommt, ihr angefochtnen Sünder, Eilt und lauft ihr Adamskinder, Eur Heiland rut un schreit! Kommt, ihr verirrten Schafe, Stehet auf vom Sundenschlafe, Denn itzt ist die Gnadenzeit!
Come ye sinners sorely tempted, Haste from guilt to be exempted, Calls your Saviour, come apace. Adams children, wayward straying, Wake from sin, His call obeying; Now is come the Day of Grace.
This is the aria un pensiero nemico di pace from the Italian version of Handel's oratorio The Triumph of Time and Truth (Il Trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno). It is Handel's 1757 English version of this oratorio that is the namesake of this blog.
It's hard to imagine anyone singing this better or with more virtuosity than Cecilia Bartoli. Note especially in the da capo when, at about 3'19", she sings a particularly viciously difficult run an octave higher than written. This is bravura with skill to spare. Jaw-dropping.
Un pensiero nemico di pace fece il Tempo volubile edace e con l'ali la falce gli diè. Nacque un altro leggiadro pensiero per negare si rigido impero on'il Tempo, più Tempo non è.
A thought inimical to peace created inconstant, voracious Time, Endowing him with both wings and a scythe. Then was born a second, happy thought, to parry such a harsh dominion, in which Time is no longer Time.
"How many beliefs could a perfect brain check for logical contradictions? The answer is surprising. even if a computer were as large as the known universe, built of components no larger than protons, with switching speeds as fast as the speed of light, all laboring in parallel from the moment of the big bang up to the present, it would still be fighting to add a 300th belief to the list." --From The End of Faith by Sam Harris (see also Labyrinths of Reason: Paradox, Puzzles, and the Frailty of Knowledge by William Poundstone, which Harris cites for this idea)
Speaking of contradictions, the clue to this unintuitive puzzle may be that Harris is comparing apples and oranges. He begins with "a perfect brain" and continues with "a computer...as large as the known universe". It could be that one of the ways a brain is distinct from a computer is that a brain is capable of reconciling competing beliefs and resolving contradictions in a way that a computer is too literal to manage.
For some reason Genny and I were at Vons (the local grocery near the house) and there was the lower half of a severed woman in the refrigerated meat section. Upon examining this, I saw that it wasn’t really a human body but a kind of roast done up to look exactly like the pelvis and legs of an adult woman. It had fishnet stockings and red high heels on. Genny thought it was gross but didn’t seem otherwise bothered with it. She moved on to continue her shopping, which, as usual, was voluminous. I stuck around and talked to some customers about it. The girl behind the meat counter was on her cell calling people and saying “you’ve gotta come see this”.
A foreign woman showed up and interrupted the girl. “Hi, I’m <some russian name which I don't remember>”. The girl, appearing to know who she was, said, “Oh hi! It’s over there!” and then went back to her conversation. I turned to the woman and said…”you’re from Russia?” She said, “no, Ukraine”. On a hunch, I asked “did you come all the way from Ukraine to see this?” which she answered in the affirmative. She was dressed in kind of goth clothes. I figured she was some sort of cultist.
She said “I don’t see it…can you show me?” For some reason, I took her hand and led her urgently over to the meat case where I had seen the severed body, but it was gone. We couldn’t figure out where it had gone. Had some fiend bought it? How could such a heavy object disappear so quickly? We couldn't guess. I felt bad that she had traveled so far without seeing what she came to see.
Returning to the meat counter, in the case in front of it, there was a kind of bath, half ice, half water. A fat guy was sitting in there bobbing up and down, dunking his head under and then coming up for air. He seemed very happy. I turned to the Ukrainian girl and said, feeling somehow this would impress her, “want me to hold his head under water until he stops moving? Then you’d have your meat corpse. Ha ha ha.” She laughed, apparently genuinely.
I noticed my cell vibrating and realized I had felt it vibrating a couple times before. It was Genny. Somehow I sensed that she had seen me holding the Ukrainian girl’s hand and gotten the wrong idea. She had left the store pissed (why I don’t know, since we’re no longer together) and said she was at … some intersection … and blah blah blah (I couldn’t hear her cuz her voice is so soft).
This looked like it was going to be a dreary British black comedy, but I ended up liking it so much I ordered it to keep on Amazon. I circled the two actors responsible for really making this movie for me. Two pants-pissing hilarious moments: when Andy Nyman's character Howard clumsily tries to console the widow by telling her of his "friend who died" by being stabbed in the neck. And Howard's attempt to distract the clergyman with anything he can think of, which turns out to be, among other things, the theological question of whether wine is sweeter on Sundays and what to do about his shameful desire to "push a pen up his bum". But the comedy doesn't come across in print. You should see for yourself. I was crying with laughter.
"We live in a country in which a person cannot get elected president if he openly doubts the existence of heaven and hell. This is truly remarkable, given that there is no other body of 'knowledge' that we require our political leaders to master. Even a hairstylist must pass a licensing exam before plying his trade in the United States, and yet those given the power to make war and national policy--those whose decisions will inevitably affect human life for generations--are not expected to know anything in particular before setting to work. They do not have to be political scientists, economists, or even lawyers; they need not have studied international relations, military history, resource management, civil engineering, or any other field of knowledge that might be brought to bear in the governance of a modern superpower; they need only be expert fund-raisers, comport themselves well on television, and be indulgent of certain myths. In our next presidential election, an actor who reads his Bible would almost certainly defeat a rocket scientist who does not." From The End of Faith by Sam Harris
I tell people I'm not a Democrat. I'm an anti-republican. There are so many reasons why. Here's one.
Among the many concessions Obama has had to make to Congressional republicans is that health care reform not add a single penny to the budget deficit.
When republicans say things like this, they are playing to their base, who are somehow persuaded that republicans are fiscally prudent. Fiscally prudent means that they will not raise their taxes or expand the budget deficit. Yet republican presidents have signed into law more taxes and spending than Democrats, by far, expanding both the taxation of the middle class and our ballooning debt.
When Obama enacted the (as it turned out, wildly successful and ameliorative) "Cash for Clunkers" program, republicans nationwide had a conniption. That was a $2B program.
The Congressional Budget Office has determined that the Iraq war of aggression costs the US taxpayer 2.6B per WEEK. The Iraq war has done nothing for American's security. Indeed, according to our own intelligence estimates, it has increased the threat from terrorism, not to mention made us a pariah in the eyes of the world and indebted generations. And it has killed over a million human beings for all that.
I'm about (and so's this blog) being a dad, science, literature, music, history, philosophy, and politics. The purpose of this blog is to highlight and save important articles and concepts, and to keep a record of some of my thoughts--which has become difficult on Facebook since they started restricting the character count.
