Political Manifesto for the 21st Century

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. (Declaration of Independence, 1776)

We affirm these self-evident truths, and declare that it is time to abolish our form of government, not by armed revolution, but by the election of representatives who will change it.

The Constitution of the United States allows for the people to elect their representatives every two years, and to elect every senator every six, and to elect the president every four. Each state constitution allows the citizens of that state a similar power to choose their government. Through electing representatives that represent our desire to preserve our government solely to protect the individual rights of everyone, we propose the following changes be made.

1. Limited government. Our governments are limited by the constitutions that form them. We need to enact a common understanding among the people of what those limits are and impose them on our governments. We need also to strengthen the already existing limits, overturning bad interpretations by our courts, legislators, and executives, and impose new and stronger limits on our governments which will forever ensure our individual liberty.
2. Dramatic cuts to spending. Our governments should spend our money procuring only those goods and services that will protect our rights.
3. An end to government charity. It is the role of our churches and the individual to supply charity to the poor, not the state. If the individual and churches cannot supply the charity, government could only do worse. Having government provide charity absolved the conscience and duty of the people from their proper role to love their neighbor.
4. An end to unfunded legislation. Any program that congress enacts must be completely and fully funded at the time of its creation. We will not enslave future generations to programs that we create but do not fully fund. Existing programs that are unfunded should be canceled or modified until they can be funded.
5. Dramatic cuts to taxation. Our governments should collect far less taxes than the people can bear. The people should be free to pursue whatever economic matter they wish without burden or undue influence due to taxes. Taxes should not be used to punish the rich or to mold society’s behavior. They should only be used to raise the necessary money to meet the spending requirements of a government that protects the rights of the individual. Any surpluses should be immediately refunded to the people in proportion to taxes paid, or used to pay off debts. Taxes should never be raised to meet spending; rather, spending should be cut to meet tax revenue.
6. An end to government debt. Our people have become more prosperous than any other people in the world. We do not need to borrow money anymore to provide for the needs of government. Paying interest on our government debts is slavery, not freedom. We are not free until we have paid off all of our debts. Any debt that we must incur should be paid off within a very short time frame, so that our debts are not repaid by our children.
7. An end to bureaucratic regulation. Any kind of regulation must be debated and passed by the legislatures of our governments, and no other way. No public official should be allowed to set policy that governs the life of anyone but their own employees. No court should dictate legislation. No executive should issue orders except to his troops and employees. Anyone exceeding these limits should immediately be removed from office by impeachment because they are a threat to our liberty.
8. An end to over-litigation. The laws of our country are unjust, in that they are used to punish those who have done no wrong with tort laws and allow the criminal to go free. Let our laws be simple and just so that we no longer have need of lawyers. Do not allow our constitution to be interpreted as giving shelter to the guilty or limiting the freedoms of the individual.

We boldly declare that freedom and liberty are dramatically different than tyranny and slavery. In a free society, government works differently than in an enslaved society. Our governments should be eternally fearful of the will of the people, forever locked in by the limits of the constitution which creates them, and ever subservient to the people, both the individual and as a whole.

We emphatically reject the tenets of communism, socialism, fascism, totalitarianism, colonialism, and every other form of government or political idea that sets one person above another, that limits the freedom of the individual for the “greater good”, or attempts to convince any individual that they have no rights or fewer rights than the rights man is endowed with by their Creator.

We boldly declare that in our society, the checks and balances in our government includes the individual, private organizations such as businesses or churches or political groups, and federated governments such as the local, state, and federal governments. By distributing the power to govern among these people, organizations, and governments, no one person or group of people is able to obtain much power over the rest.

We also declare that there is enough in this world, and to spare, if the individual is freed from the constraints of government to seek his own fortune in life. We also declare that the man who has obtained wealth is capable of providing charity to the poor, jobs to those who want them, and also to pursue the critical role of participating in politics to keep government constrained. We encourage all men, everywhere, to embrace their freedom, seek their own fortunes, and once having obtained it, spend their time and resources as they see fit in service to their fellowman, without the entanglement of government.

Mormons Lie

One of the many charges anti-Mormons level against Mormons is that they lie.

Let me help those in more neutral grounds understand the truth of the matter.

Mormons do lie. We also lie, cheat, steal, murder, and commit adultery. Mormons are not perfect. No one is. God has made it clear that dishonesty is a sin.

However, I want to help you understand first, what a “lie” is; Second, examples of righteous people and even God himself “lying”; and finally, the so-called lies that Mormon leaders have been accused of telling.

First, what is lying? There are many definitions, but the broadest I see, and the one I try to live by, is to never cause deception, either through speaking or lack of speaking. However, and this is a big however, we cannot be expected to correct every mistruth out there, nor can we expect that every word that comes out of our mouth to be the absolute truth, in every way someone may interpret it.

The broad definition of lying is considered deception, that is, causing people to understand something that isn’t true. The narrowest definition could be saying something that isn’t exactly true in any context. Under the broad definition, lawyers “lie” and they do it all the time. Under the narrow definition, no lawyer lies, and if they do, they would lose their law license or worse.

I strive to live by the broad definition. I would hope everyone does. That’s the ideal—living in a society where misunderstanding simply doesn’t exist. Imagine a world where everything is exactly the way you understand them to be! How many problems and economic costs would disappear? I can’t count them. Indeed, honesty, or the lack of deception, is what makes business possible in the first place. The cost of verifying every statement is so high that business could not happen at all without some degree of trust.

In order to stamp out deception, we must first be very careful in what we say and how we say it. Under the broad definition, not only do we need to say things in a way that is true, but ensure that the way people hear it is true as well. This means we must understand our audience and speak in a way that communicates, clearly, our thoughts to their minds. I challenge anyone to live their life this way. I boldly declare that it is impossible, but a noble goal nonetheless.

We must also live our life so as to correct deception when it occurs without out action. In other words, do not allow it to continue by inaction. Of course, this is equally as impossible as the former goal; no one can know the mind of everyone around them. Even if they could, no one could spend the time required to correct every misunderstanding of deception they believe. Indeed, who would want to live with a compulsive pedant?

So, in the end, I try to live my life so as not to cause misunderstanding, and yet I find it impossible. Some of the things I say are incorrect, even according to my current understanding. Others are not understood correctly. And there are a lot of things people around me think that I will not bother correcting unless it becomes important.

Let’s talk about examples of righteous people, even God himself “lying” in this way.

The easiest examples of lying are those who lie, sometimes outright and boldly, to their enemies as part of war. I think this kind of lying is just as excusable as the “crime” of “murder” during warfare. If you get to the point where killing someone is a good thing, then lying to them is not a bad thing either. Go ahead, search the scriptures, there are plenty of examples of this behavior.

What about lies to protect one’s self or loved ones? Certainly, when Abaram (Abraham) went to Egypt, he lied to the Pharaoh about his wife, claiming she was his sister. Of course, we know this was outright deception because the Pharaoh brought his “sister” in to become, eventually, his wife. This was not the only time Abraham lied about his wife; he did the same to Abimelech.

Latter-day Saints believe God himself told Abram to lie to Pharaoh. So this lie was supernatural; it was much more than Abram lying to Pharaoh.

I am sure we can easily excuse this behavior as we can excuse the behavior of killing someone in self-defense. If it is no crime to kill someone who is going to kill you, then it is certainly no crime to lie to the same person, and that’s exactly what happened here.

Are there instances of God lying? If you use the broadest definition of the lie, permitting misunderstandings to continue, then our entire existence is an exercise in God lying to us. What excuses this behavior? Why does God sit by, allowing us to wallow in our ignorance? Aren’t we expected to correct misunderstandings, particularly when the misunderstanding is between us and another person?

I can invent a moral excuse or explanation for this lie, the same as the moral excuse that permits killing. That is, this lie is a necessary one. Did we not live in ignorance, we could not progress or grow or accomplish any part of God’s plan. Of course, if we base our morality on God himself, then anything God does is moral and good and just, and we cannot complain even the slightest.

So perhaps, in our moral universe, we have come full circle. In trying to be moral, we must lie in certain circumstances. Just like the general who deceives his adversaries, just like Abram lying to Pharaoh, perhaps the “truth” is the “lie”. In other words, perhaps the most moral course of action is to deceive the people around us.

We are left wondering what the real definition of lying is, or rather, immoral dishonesty (dishonesty that is evil), as opposed to moral dishonesty (dishonesty that is nonetheless good) or even immoral honesty (honesty that is nonetheless evil.) If you are confused, you are not the only one. All 6 billion of us struggle with what “good” and “evil” really are, and none of us can pin our finger on a universal definition that works everywhere, although we have lots of rules of thumbs that seem to work in most situations.

God hasn’t revealed to us what the definition of morality is. Nowhere in his scriptures does he declare unto us a formula that we can use to choose the right in every case. Sure, we have commandments, commandments which end up not being as universal as we would like them to be, but commandments which we are promised if we obey we won’t be held accountable for the consequences. In some cases, God shares with us tidbits of his reasoning, and we can try our best to apply them. The best advice in the scriptures is to follow the Spirit, wherever it leads, which means, basically, turn over our moral compass to God.

Now, to instances of modern LDS leaders lying. I am going to make my argument simple. Let’s suppose that the leaders of the church did what exactly you claimed they did: they committed sins, and not just any kind of sin, but the gross sin of lying. Let’s suppose that God did not command them to do this, and he did not, in any way, justify them. (I do not believe this to be the case in every instance, but perhaps there are a few where I may believe such to be true.)

So we say that Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, and all the prophets, including Gordon B. Hinckley and Thomas S. Monsen , are liars. Very well, they are liars.

Let’s put things into context.

First, they were called by God to be his prophet. Are you challenging God in this matter? Do you think you really know better than him who should be prophet? Do you really think you can manage the complex work of preparing the earth for the Second Coming? If so, then you are the worst sort of person, the person who believes he is superior in one way or the other to God.

Second, they have been forgiven by God. Do you question the power of Christ to forgive people of their sins? Or do you believe that Christ, the one who called them to be a prophet, will not forgive them?

Recall that Christ said that by the same judgment we use to judge men, we will be judged. Are you, perhaps, holding the prophets to a higher standard than yourself? Do you expect them to be better than you are, and condemn them for failing? If they have no hope for salvation, what hope do you have?

If only there was a clear-cut way to see through all the clutter that mortality imposes on us. There is, and it is called the Holy Ghost. Do you think Mormons preach this doctrine, just to bring people into the church, and then abandon it once they have joined? No, we use the gift of the Holy Ghost every day and in every way you can imagine. We use it to discern which points the teacher is teaching that are needed for us. We use it to discern how to interpret the commands that the Lord’s prophets give us in our every day lives. We use it to discern when God has forgiven someone and when he has not.

We do not “lean unto our own understanding” or “trust in the arm of flesh”. We do not count our learning as greater than God’s wisdom, and we do not allow observations to supplant the tender feelings of the Holy Ghost. If it is true that Joseph Smith and Gordon B. Hinckley were liars of the worst sort, and you could prove it in the court of law, it would have little if any relevance to us. We do not believe them as prophets of God because they were more honest than anyone else; we believe them as prophets because the Holy Ghost tells us so.

I add: If God called these men to be prophets, and they violated our understanding of morality, is it God that is flawed, these men who are flawed, or perhaps our understanding of morality that is flawed? Or are we not supposed to question the things within us, because we automatically assume that to be correct, and things in contradiction outside of us to be wrong?

I think we live in an age where, if you only trust your eyes and ears and your understanding of morality, you will find no reason at all to believe in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I cannot deny that. Perhaps there was once a day when you could believe the church just based on objective analysis, or maybe there was never such a day, it doesn’t matter. If you want to drag us into a court of law or into a research laboratory, you could probably build a clear case that we are not who we claim to be. You could probably convince every member of the church that the evidence the world has and the wisdom that men have show the church to be a fraud.

But we also live in an age when the Holy Ghost is boldly testifying to everyone everywhere, and that is why we are baptizing and growing as a church despite the evidence that appears against us. You cannot explain our growth by anything but this.

I think, in the end, we will all be surprised by who God really is. We expect him to be this perfect God, and he is, but our definition of perfection is grossly flawed. I don’t mean it needs work on the edges, I mean fundamental assumptions we may have are simply backwards. For instance, we expect God to be peaceful, loving, kind, and gentle, but he is also a God of absolute justice, war, wrath, and obscene power and destruction. The same God that made the earth also made earthquakes and typhoons and has killed countless billions of people. (Everyone that dies, after all, dies because God said they would.)

It’s our understanding of perfection that is flawed, not God’s nature. We make a mistake when we try to impose our pathetic understanding of morality on God, rather than working the other way around.

When you measure the church by God’s standard, you would be lead to conclude that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (as opposed to its members) is the only church with which he is pleased. After all, that’s what God said, through his prophets.

If you do not agree with me, all you have to say is, “I do not believe God called Joseph Smith to be a prophet.” You don’t have to try and show how Joseph Smith fails to live up to your expectations of what a prophet should be, or how he has committed sins in his life. That is wholly irrelevant. He could, after all, be perfect in every way, yet lack God’s authority on earth, in which case I would no longer believe he was God’s prophet. Or he could, after all, be imperfect yet obtained God’s authority. And I would accept him as prophet, warts and sins and all. What’s important is the authority, and that is all. Nothing else matters, not a whit.

Evangelicals would rather forgive a murderer than a Mormon

A story, a rumor, is floating around. The conversation goes something like this. A Mormon asks an Evangelical, “Can a Christian who commits adultery be saved?”

The Evangelical confidently replies, “Yes.”

The Mormon, stunned, then asks, “What about a murderer?”

The Evangelical, without hesitation, responds, “Yes.”

The Mormon then asks, “What about an Evangelical who becomes a Mormon?”

The Evangelical thoughtfully pauses, then replies, “I don’t know.”

I must admit that this conversation, if true, is truly astounding to me. This shows that Mormons and Evangelicals really have little, if any, common doctrine.

Talking with a neighbor, I was surprised that he didn’t believe that someone who had once received the Holy Ghost could act in contradiction and lost the same gift. He asked me to find instances in the Bible where that had happened, or at least where the scriptures say it can or does happen. I found several. The Bible’s replete with examples of people who, once having obtained God’s grace, lose it completely. The best example is probably Judas, or even Ananias, or even the numerous predictions of the apostles that there would be a “falling away” before Christ returns to the earth. I though this was as clear as day, that once we obtain Christ’s grace, we must then persevere in Christ’s way until the end. I guess this is one of those truths that the Book of Mormon makes perfectly clear and undeniable.

I suppose you could reverse the conversation, and have it go something like this. The Evangelical asks a Mormon, “Can a Mormon adulterer be saved?”

The Mormon would say, “Not unless they first repent and obtain forgiveness from God. This is not a trivial thing to repent of, and may require excommunication during the period of repentance.”

The Evangelical would ask, “What about the Mormon murderer?”

The Mormon would say, “Again, not unless they first repent, although repentance for murder is hardly a trivial thing. Most likely, the possibility for salvation in the highest degree of glory is lost when someone commits murder who knows full well what they are doing.”

The Evangelical would ask, “What about a Mormon who becomes an Evangelical?”

The Mormon would reply, “If they believe in Jesus Christ, and obtain forgiveness of their sins, then they would be saved from their sins, no matter what church or religion they belong to. However, that is not the same as the Mormon who obtains all the covenants and acts with strict faithfulness during his entire life, who would not only obtain salvation from their sins, but exaltation in the highest degrees of glory.”

In this presidential debate, I can’t help but explain why I cannot support Newt Gingrich, even if he were the ideal candidate. If this were a race between four adulterers, then I would have little choice to choose the lesser of the four evils, but it is not. Three of the four candidates are not adulterers. Even if I agreed with those other three on no issues at all, as long as I can admit that they have some degree of wisdom, then they would be preferable to Newt. Why?

Sin is not something to be trifled with. Those people who have committed the most grave sins, which I consider the sins of adultery and murder to be, have shown themselves to be stained, and likely stained beyond repair, at least in this lifetime. If we have the choice between someone who chose to never commit adultery and murder, and someone who has but later repented, I’d rather wager on the one who has never committed those sins.

Newt has other baggage, of course; all candidates do. But his worst offense, his adultery, is the reason why I cannot support him at all, particularly because any one of the other three candidates have lived their entire lives controlling that aspect of their nature out of the respect that they have for themselves, women in general, families, society, and natural law, respect which at least at one point in Newt’s life, he showed a grave lack of.

It All Adds Up

The Anti-Romney crowd is screaming that they aren’t bigots against Mormons. Really? Have you lost your way and gone so far off the deep end that you actually have to tell people you’re not a bigot? Sorry, Eric Erickson, you’re bigotry is just too apparent. If you oppose Romney because of who he is or what he does, just say so. If you are judging him with a different measuring stick than other, non-Mormon candidates, then we’ll be able to see your true colors without you trying to tell us one way or the other.

Someone dropped McCain’s opposition research on Romney. Apparently, they could only come up with about 16 pages of material that can be used against him politically. If you’ve lived your life for more than half a century, and the politically elite can only come up with 16 pages of material that can be used against you politically, you are as good as it can possibly get.

My view on the candidates:

• Rick Perry: If you knew how to keep your mouth shut and stick to the talking points, you could’ve been the next presidential nominee. Apparently you’re not intelligent enough to do that, or your team is incompetent. Or likely both.
• Newt Gingrich: I see why people really, really don’t like you. You will never be president. You’ll never be dogcatcher, unless you file at the last minute in an unopposed race in some dark corner of our country. Even then, someone would likely run a write-in campaign against you and win.
• Ron Paul: People genuinely like you and a lot of people wish you would win. That means you have to stop shooting yourself in the foot by boldly declaring allegiance to ideas and principles the vast majority of the country disagrees with. The fact that you can’t do this means you will never ever be elected president, and even if you were, you’d be the worst president we’ve ever had. With Obama in the ranking, that’s saying a lot.

I wish as much as the next guy we had a really awesome candidate that everyone likes and that was super-brilliant and politically savvy and fought to defend conservative ideals I agree with. Such a person doesn’t exist. Trust me, everyone’s looked for better candidates than the group we have here today. Millions upon millions of dollars have been spent searching. Mitt Romney is as good as it is going to get.

Let’s go over, one more time, for those at home, all of Mitt’s negatives.

• He’s a Mormon. I know a lot of people don’t like Mormons, particularly because we are so good at taking away your few worshipers and making them into true-blue Mormons for life. I get that. Get over it, because the rest of the country loves us because we are not insane and we genuinely like people for who they are. Our church gets a bad rap, but our members are loved all around.
• He’s rich. I know a lot of people think we should have poor people be presidents. I don’t agree. I believe politics is a sport that only the rich and established can participate in. The rest of us have more important things to worry about, namely, how to secure our own economic future for ourselves and our families.
• He’s very handsome. I don’t know why this is a negative, but apparently it makes a lot of people very mad.
• He has redefined what “honor” and “fidelity” mean in private life. A whole lot of people hate Romney because he has lead the “perfect” life, morally speaking. If Romney is elected, the new low bar candidates must meet to run for high office means a good 90% of the elected people out there will never advance in their career in politics. If Romney hadn’t been absolutely morally perfect, Herman Cain would still be running and Newt would be doing far better than he is.
• He’s right on most of the issues, probably more issues than the other candidates. This makes people who oppose freedom and liberty very, very upset with Romney.
• He’s a political outsider. That’s right, you idiots out there who think Romney is the “establishment” candidate don’t even know the meaning of the word, nor do you understand what the “establishment” is. Tell me, when did Romney join the “inner circle” of the Republican political elite? Answer: He never did. He’s always been an outsider. He built up his own political network and brought people in to build his own new establishment. Gingrich is the “establishment” if there ever was one. He’s in it to make sure all the retirement plans of former congressmen are preserved, and that people who are not in congress cannot dictate what our national political strategy is.
• He’s got the best political network and financing the Republican Party has ever seen. Romney did something after his 2008 run that a lot of other candidates did and do. Except he was exceptionally successful at it. Palin and Huckabee and many others probably envy him a great deal for capitalizing on what little political capital he had, and converting that into a majority of the US.

I can’t say what motivates every detractor of Romney, and to be honest, I don’t care.

A lot of you are religious bigots. Religious bigotry says far more about the bigot than their targets. Mormons know and understand and actually take great pleasure in being the subject of bigoted religious attacks. It reinforces our belief system, and it shows why we are morally superior to your pathetic attempts at true Christianity. (If you feel a shiver running up your spine, it’s because you’re probably a bigot.) We have endured far worse bigotry than you can imagine, from the Mormon Extermination Order in Missouri, having our church leaders murdered at the hands of a mob of “Christians”, and watching as the Republican Party seized the assets of our church and hunted our leaders down as criminals in an extra-constitutional witch hunt. We grew up with bigotry, from the kid who can’t play with us because his mom thinks we’re of the devil, to the guys who think it’s fun to make fun of the most sacred elements of our religion, to the business associate who finds out what church we go to and whose last word to us was “Oh.” We’re comfortable with the bigotry, it’s a cross we are more than willing to bear, and I believe it is a critical component to our religion. If there were no religious bigotry against our religion, then I would probably be questioning whether our church is even true. In a paradoxical twist, by being bigoted against the LDS church, you’ve only reinforced our beliefs. If you really wanted to harm us, then you and the rest of the world would find us tolerable or even preferable. Call us the ultimate religious hipsters, because we probably are.

A lot of you are envious of Romney’s success. I get that. I worked my butt off in startups of one sort or another, and all I have to show for it is grey hair and good stories. I wonder why I can’t enjoy success at the same level of Romney. But to be honest, this kind of envy doesn’t belong in conservative politics. It isn’t healthy. It won’t make us happy or rich. We should be happy that someone is successful, and we should see it as motivation to do our best. We should learn from the successful, not make them our enemies.

Some of you are just politically ignorant. You are being played like a fiddle by your political masters whom you probably don’t even know. I hope one day you’ll learn to question everything, and you’ll mature in your understanding of what politics is and how it is really played, and how to really win big. Maybe you never will, and that’s fine, just don’t be surprised when a new person starts calling the tune and you suddenly start jumping to his beat.

The rest of you who are above all this are probably ready to get this election season over with, to move on to the generals, and see Obama shuffling out of the White House as the biggest disgrace to American politics since the beginning of American politics. We’ll be working busily to get someone elected who will represent our views, who will bring honor and respect to the sacred offices of trust, and who will simply lead the country the way we need to be lead.

One more note: Romney’s political rallies are very different than the rallies you’re used to seeing. A lot of people show up. Maybe some of them clap or whoop and holler. But most of them sit quietly. It’s called reverence and respect, and it’s completely foreign to American politics. You who do not enjoy the blessings of reverent and respectful moments cannot appreciate the emotions that run through your heart during a quiet testimony or sermon. If you want to understand where this culture comes from, all you have to do is attend more than a few LDS church meetings.

The GOP Supported King’s Vision

This Martin Luther King day, I want to share with you, readers, the perspective of the GOP, the Republican Party, on Martin Luther King’s vision for our society.

As you have been told, the GOP is a racist and hateful party. Nothing is farther from the truth. The inception of the Republican Party was when the current group of politicians could not find the backbone to stand up for the civil rights of the black race. In response, the Republican Party was formed, the Civil War was fought, and Reconstruction, that period of time when the Republican congress mercilessly pursued state governments and officials who tried to deny the black race their civil rights was enacted.

In the 60′s, republicans were well aware of the atrocities that the Democratic Party had enacted against the black race. Things like Jim Crow laws, and “separate bu equal” were abhorrent in our party’s sight. However, since for the better part of the 20th Century the Republican Party was a minority in congress, we could do little to help except in our own communities or realms of influence.

In the 1960′s, there were enough democrats, finally, that the republicans were able to get a new Civil Rights bill passed. About this time, people started defecting from the Democratic Party, not because they wanted to join the “racist” Republican Party, but rather because it was clear to them that the Democratic Party was quickly becoming the communist party of the United States. This meant a number of politicians with a racist past joined the Republican Party. It also meant that the Republican Party began to explain to these politicians the minimum behavior we demanded, and began to convince them of the vision we had for the black race, that of complete equality under the law, which they found to be tolerable and even preferable. This generation of republicans is all but extinct, along with their foolish ideas.

Martin Luther King marched with a very large number of black people. We all know this. What people often ignore is the very large number of white republicans that marched with Martin Luther King as well. This is but one example of how the Democratic Party has tried to change history.

People forget the massive and unprecedented effort to make sure congress passed the Civil Rights legislation. The TEA Party seems like a huge thing today, but it pales in comparison with the number of republicans who were raising money, knocking on doors, and making phone calls at that time. I doubt the bill would have passed if it weren’t for countless thousands of republicans doing the back-breaking work of shifting public opinion and showing politicians that their vote would be remembered. This was when republicans realized, for the first time in a generation, that they had enough people behind them that they could win. The seeds for the ’94 Republican Revolution were sown in this event.

The sacrifice that Martin Luther King and his supporters made will forever be remembered by the Republican Party. Martin Luther King spoke for us when he dreamed of a future where skin color doesn’t matter. That was the sentiment many republicans felt back in 1860 when the party was first formed. That’s the same sentiment the vast majority of republicans feel today. That’s why we are so welcoming to black politicians who rise to the highest ranks in our political party, and why we encourage everyone to participate in our party, provided they agree with our ideals of equality under the law. I do not care who is black or who is white; that is completely irrelevant to me. I simply wish everyone to do the best with what they have, to be treated equally under the law, and to be given the respect that God demands we render each other.

Don’t let the democrats tell you that the republicans are racist. It takes 5 minutes talking with a real live republican to see that this is simply not true. It takes 5 minutes of reading history to see that this isn’t true. The true party of racism is the Democratic Party. They continue with the same tactics they have used to keep the black race subservient to their political desires today.

Do not think that the over-sized federal government and the welfare state is designed to empower the black people. It is the same policy the American government used to pacify and enslave the Indian nations and make them a shadow of what they used to be. It is the same policy we use to keep foreign powers in check and below us. After all, when one person is paying off another, who is in control of the relationship when the payee becomes dependent on the money?

The new plantations are the projects and government handouts and preferential racist policies. The new slaves are people who grow up into this system believing they cannot survive without the government. The slave masters are the greedy bastards in political office who use this to get re-elected year after year, and grow fat off of the skimmings. They think they have a pretty good system, and it would work if their assumption about the black race—that they are inferior to the white race—was correct. One day, however, the black race will realize what a tremendous con game they have been cheated with, and rise up and demand equality and justice, equality and justice the Democratic Party does not offer them.

Today, the Democratic Party is falling to pieces, literally, before our very eyes. It used to be that the unions, black population, hispanic population, pacifists, environmentalists, and marxists would happily work together. Today, under President Obama’s failed leadership, none of them are getting along at all. The only party that can hold together a solid coalition is the Republican Party, and that only because they have rallied around ideas, not demographics.

Romney is the Nominee

The results from last night’s primary in New Hampshire are in, and Mitt Romney is the first non-incumbent republican candidate since 1976 to win both Iowa and New Hampshire.

The other candidates have a choice. Either they can line up behind #2 and hope the combined weight will topple Romney, or they can concede the race and support Romney for president. Since I doubt any of the other candidates would endorse Ron Paul, and he’d need all of their support, this race is over.

Here’s Romney’s victory speech. This is what he is going to sound like in the generals. Obama is toast.

What’s great about both the Iowa and New Hampshire victories is that Mormon bigotry is no longer a factor in our politics. There were vicious attacks against Mitt Romney’s faith, and there will be many more in the future, but the voters voted overwhelmingly to say, “We really don’t tolerate bigotry.”

What’s also great is that Newt Gingrich has already started attacking Mitt Romney with the same vector that the Obama camp would use. This is a really, really good thing. The earlier we work out the anti-freedom rhetoric, the better Romney will do in the generals. If the election comes down to whether people have a right to shut down companies which are not viable long-term, then let it be so.

To all those who think this is a bad thing: What do you think the shareholders do with the capital they pull out of a failing company? Hint: Where do you think other companies get their startup or expansion capital from? I know I saw someone trying to attack Mitt Romney for claiming he’s created, net net, over 100,000 jobs. They looked only at what was done with the companies Bain Capital bought into. They failed to look into what happened to the capital after it was liquidated! I am sure we will find out that 100,000 jobs created is on the low end of things.

 

A Simpler Model

I have spent more time than I probably ever have discussing religion and religious topics with Christians who are not LDS. I think there are several good reasons why the LDS faithful and other Christians simply do not understand each other.

First, let me describe what I understand the foundation of most other Christian’s understanding of the world is. They start with the Bible, and then they add on to that limited set of texts the writings and philosophies of people around the Bible. To an LDS believer, this is simply “the philosophies of men, mingled with scripture.” I know there has been considerable effort to go straight to the source, the subject that is called “exegesis” in those circles. But the problem plaguing even this method is that the Bible simply isn’t what they think it is.

Let me explain what I mean. The Bible, to a Christian, is the word of God. As an LDS believer, I believe that too. However, other faiths tend to take it one step further, and consider the Bible to be the unerring word of God. If it were possible that the 4,000 years of recorded history that is in the Bible were passed down without interpretation or changes from Moses’ pen to today’s books, that would be true. But that is not true, and anyone who has looked at the history of the Bible and its many different versions will know it is not true.

That’s not to say that divinity does not still shine throughout the Bible. I’m tempted to say it shows more in the New Testament than in the Old, only because the Old Testament is so many years older than the New. I think most people recognize the inspired passages when they see them. That’s why people tend to refer more to the prophets, particularly Isaiah, the chapters in Genesis referring to God’s actions in the pre-history of the Bible, Exodus, the four gospels, and things like that over Ecclesiastes and Songs of Solomon.

(Of course, there are those who claim to be Christian who do not think the Bible is inspired much if at all, or wholly errant, but I don’t want to spend time condemning them for their insanity.)

(And there are those who cling to the absurd, non-Biblical notion that the Bible is the only word of God. These people are so ignorant it is difficult to help them understand why. Perhaps if they actually read the Bible they claim to believe, they would understand why.)

But I don’t know many Christians who stop at exegesis, and proceed no further. How many Christians today swear belief in texts and thoughts that are clearly outside of the Bible? I think the vast majority do. That’s where we get Creedal Christians, or the various sects and denominations. Even the Latter-day Saints are clearly in this group of people. If the texts and ideas that these Christians adhere to are from God, then they are godly. Otherwise, if they are from man or worse, then they are clearly not relying on God’s word but something else. And that is where trouble lies. When you put your trust into something other than God and his word, you are putting your trust in man or worse. And we know, from the Bible, what happens to those people.

LDS theology, on the other hand, is built on one simple truth: God speaks. He speaks through the Bible, he speaks through other scriptures, he speaks through prophets (both the head of our church and anyone who has a testimony of Christ), and he speaks through a variety of methods and times and places to a variety of people. It isn’t always trivial to figure out which messages are from God or which have another source, but we can be sure that God speaks, and we can be sure that he’ll tell us what is his words and what is not.

And that’s about it. We don’t care much what the method of delivery is, as long as it is from God. I have learned a great deal about God from my Christian friends, because they are inspired and do receive, from time to time, messages from God. I have also learned a great deal from the Bible and the Book of Mormon and the living prophets and answers to my prayers and a visions and dreams and all kinds of things.

To the mainstream Christian, what I just described is utter chaos. It is. I think every living latter-day saint has the same problem trying to sort out what is from God and what is merely nice or what is clearly from another source. That’s why we have measuring sticks, things we know, for a fact, that are true, and are unquestionable. These things are basic doctrines such as the anointing of Jesus as the savior of the world, the validity of the Bible, etc… So if I were to receive a message which I believe is from God that taught me not to rely on Christ’s merits for salvation, I would question the source, and tag it as “obviously not from God”.

To those who believe in exegesis, I think the Latter-day Saints go one step further, delving deep into the mind of God rather than stopping at his written word. No, God does not like to repeat himself, and if we haven’t done our homework (meaning, studied ALL of his written words), then we shouldn’t feel entitled to gain knowledge from the source. But we can, and should, turn our minds and hearts towards God, not just his written works.

And this is where LDS and the other Christians diverge. LDS people put their trust in God, not just his word; it seems other Christians are not ready to take this step of faith and trust in only some of God’s words, leaning on the understanding on men to supplement the gaps.

You can see why the two groups would be so against each other if you think of things like this. Just like Atheists despise Christians for claiming to receive spiritual and physical benefits due to their fantasies, Christians despise Mormons for being able to receive more of God’s word and a clearer understanding of their purpose in life due to their fantasy. While in the former, the fantasy is the existence of God and mission of Christ, in the latter is the fantasy that God speaks to people today.

I think ultimately it boils down to worldliness. If you are unwilling to give up the world and embrace God, you’ll be an enemy to God, whether you want to be or not. Just like the Atheist is an enemy to God, so too are those who refuse to accept the fact that God can and does speak today.

I apologize if my words seem harsh; I am merely trying to find the kernel of truth, which means ignoring any sentiments and embracing the way things really are.

How To Convince Me To Vote for Your Guy

I’m a big Romney fan. I believe he, as president, will set our country on the best course possible. I appreciate the other candidates, some a lot more than others, and I believe most of them would make a good president and all of the republican candidates would be better than Obama. But to me, and for me, Romney would be the best.

If you’re a supporter of one of those other candidates, or if you’re one of the candidates yourself, let me clue you in to how I feel about the primaries and what would convince me to vote for your guy (assuming Romney doesn’t do something idiotic that would change my opinion of him.)

I believe there are a lot of people out there that do not support Romney but otherwise would simply for the fact that he is a mormon. There are a lot of people who would otherwise not support Romney but who do because he is a mormon. In both cases, we have a classic case of an absurd logical fallacy. People who demonstrate this logical fallacy show me that their opinion is all but worthless. So don’t try to play this card, ever, at all, or even hint at it.

This put Huckabee out of the running the moment he opened his mouth. Many people, particularly on The Gateway Pundit and on Free Republic are simply ignored by me because they suffer from this logical fallacy.

There are a lot of people out there who are simply misinformed or uninformed. That’s alright, we are all ignorant in one degree or another. However, those who are rash and make life-changing decisions without gaining a full understanding of the decision being made likewise are not trustworthy. I throw their opinion out the window.

If you call Romney a “flip-flopper”, you lose my attention. Ron Paul, you made that mistake, and it has cost you my potential support. Of all the other candidates, you may have been the one to earn my support, but now you won’t, because you’re clearly all-too-ready to jump on political bandwagons before considering their truth. Pretty much anyone who says Romney supports federal mandatory health insurance is in the same boat, along with those who claim that Romney “forced” “Romneycare” on the people of Massachusetts, or people who say Romney is pro-choice.

Now that we’ve discussed some of the things that will disqualify you, let’s talk about some of the things that will make me consider your opinion with seriousness.

One thing I like to see in a candidate and their supporters is a grasp of political reality. If you do not understand what it really takes to get elected president in this country, and if you cannot see why someone who completely agrees with you on everything cannot get elected, then you are really missing the boat. On the other hand, if you can say, “I disagree with this person on that, but I still support him,” then I know that you are aware of political reality, and I will pay close attention to what you have to say.

Even more so for people who understand political strategy and tactics and who behave intelligently! Gingrich probably scores highest on this scale, at least until he failed to get on the Virginia ballot. Perry fails in many regards, because he had a difficult time working Texas politically, even though hardly anyone disagreed with him! Romney, of course, walked the hardest walk a candidate alive today has ever walked, and performed brilliantly.

Another thing I like to see is someone who treats his political opponents with dignity and due respect. That is, it is perfectly reasonable to disagree with someone politically but still be kind and generous with them. It is this unique trait that made America possible in the first place. Romney is such a man. His political opponents have remarked at how kind and gracious he is, even to his worst political enemies. Tell me how you and your candidate is the same, and I will pay attention.

Something else I like to see is someone who can defend their positions and their ideas. This is not an easy thing to do. Many issues are not as simple as we wish they were. For instance, on homosexual marriage, it’s awfully hard to explain in 5 seconds why government should be involved with heterosexual relationships but not homosexual ones. (It takes about 5 seconds to even say the word “relationship” properly.) But what’s important is that you can do that, or at least say what you need to say in a clear and concise way. If there is some subtlety to your position, you should be able to make that clear. Romney, in his earlier years as a senate candidate in Massachusetts, would say that he wouldn’t overturn Roe vs. Wade despite his beliefs. This was a really, really good way of expressing his position, which is subtly different from vanilla “pro-life”and vanilla “pro-choice”. Of course, today, Romney does support overturning Roe vs. Wade, and so he simply says, “I am pro-life” because he agrees almost 100% with everything that means.

Finally, something I really, really like to see is someone who is open to new ideas. (New to them—not necessarily new to the world of ideas.) Does your candidate research issues relentlessly, calling on people from all sides of the spectrum on a topic, and debate the issue within their own mind? If not, I have no use for them. Romney has, of course, shown himself to be such a person. He is thoughtful and deliberate. If you want to see how Romney has grown in understanding, you only have to look closely at how he handled the issue of life and abortion.

Candidates and their supporters who demonstrate these abilities earn a lot of respect from me. I have always found Paul supporters to be somewhat articulate, politically savvy, and able to reason and argue. I don’t agree with a lot of what Ron Paul believes in, and I notice that not all of his supporters agree with him 100%, but we all realize we are not choosing someone to run for pope or king. Unfortunately, Ron Paul is attacking Romney with the same ignorant and idiotic argument that others have tried, which has all but completely turned me off to him as a candidate.

A Fundamental Misunderstanding in the Greenhouse Effect

I’ve been searching the past few days for something, anything, that would hint at why people ignore basic thermodynamics in favor of the more complicated radiation models. I think I have finally stumbled upon it.

See, in space, a good way to determine how hot something is is to look at its radiation output. This spectrum can give you a sense of the total power output of the object, as well as its temperature.

In a simple model we can consider the earth in space as an object where the sunlight incident on the earth is either reflected or absorbed. If absorbed, we can assume radiative balance. However, you have to measure the complete spectrum of both the incident sunlight and the earth’s emissions. The two should balance because energy in should equal energy out (unless there is a source or a sink of energy in the earth.)

Of course, this isn’t precisely accurate. Some of the energy could go to plastic deformations of the planet, or a change in the chemical properties of the planet, such as melting or freezing snow. Some of the energy could be leaked to outer space through evaporation. Some of the energy could manifest itself in the changing magnetic field, or a change in velocity or position. There are an infinite number of ways the earth could hide energy from radiation detectors. Assuming earth doesn’t, or doesn’t do it very much, is why we can use radiation balance as a rule of thumb in the first place.

And this is where climatologists go wrong. They forget that this is only a rule of thumb that is useful when you have vast vacuums between the two objects. Climatologists stretch the above simple model into a complicated model of the earth and the layers of atmosphere between them. Then they have to pretend that the layers of atmosphere can only interact through radiation. Of course, this is completely wrong; the layers of atmosphere interact with each other through convection and conduction and mass transfer. In addition, the ground interacts with the air through conduction.

Trying to map all of these interactions is nigh impossible. I know a lot of people have done tremendous work to try and figure out how much radiation goes where, and things like that. Some people even seem to have answers that seem to match what we see in nature.

Of course, in thermodynamics, the type of interaction is irrelevant. You can just measure how well the material transfers heat (via all heat transfer methods), and then have the number you were looking for all along.

I propose this simple experiment: Measure the heat conductivity of air and air with CO2 doubled or even trebled. If you think radiation is so important, then control for that, or use a really big room, or a long tube. The numbers you measure under controlled circumstances in a laboratory will give you much greater precision than anything you can measure in the wild. Show me how different air and air with more CO2 behaves, then we can start a discussion. As far as I can tell, no one has performed an experiment like that that shows the Greenhouse Effect. In fact, all measurements point to “NO.” Theory and measurements are in agreement here: there is no measurable Greenhouse Effect.

Tyndall and others did measure how radiation and various gasses interact, which is supremely interesting. But he had to isolate every other heat transfer method before making his measurements, because the interactions were nigh undetectable otherwise. Thus, his work is irrelevant in determining how well CO2 conducts heat from the surface of the earth. If anything, it is testimony to how irrelevant considering the radiation alone is.

Climate Science has a long way to go before clearing the bar that would cause me to give up my “addiction” to oil or skepticism towards climate science. It’s not an impossible road to travel, but involves scientific integrity, something which simply does not exist in the climate sciences. It has been revealed far too many times that the actors involved are not acting with any sort of scientific integrity. The fact that they do not release the data they are using is a sign that something has gone horribly, horribly wrong.

Unlike climate scientists, I don’t shift the goalposts every time something new is found. I simply want scientific integrity, accuracy, and sound logic and reasoning.

Latest Thinking on Homosexual Marriage

The debate about homosexual marriage is really a debate about religion. The question is: should religious ideals guide our society at all?

The arguments in favor of homosexual marriage tend to center around discrimination. That is, those who support homosexual marriage tend to believe that either marriage is worth nothing at all (and thus we are free to redefine it at will), or marriage is worth something, but it is discriminatory and so should be modified.

To argue with the first point, I believe I can convince even a libertarian that marriage is critical to our society, and that government should play a role in it.  My reasoning is as follows.

1. Society with government-endorsed traditional marriage does not harm anyone.
2. Society without government-endorsed traditional marriage does harm people.
3. Therefore, if we desire not to harm others, we will endorse government-endorsed marriage.

All I have to do is show harm, or lack thereof, and my point will be made. This is done by showing how, when government chooses to issue marriage licenses, it doesn’t hurt anyone who chooses not to get one. It doesn’t hurt anyone who chooses to get one either. It is an option that people are free to either participate in or not. It is up to them. There is no government force involved in issuing licenses.

What about the religious discrimination, that is, the endorsement of government for a particular religious point of view? Doesn’t this harm those who do not hold that religious point of view? There are two ways to attack this. One is by showing that it is not religious, per se, and the other is to find a religion that does not believe in marriage and see if such endorsement harms them. I think you don’t have to look very hard to find people who marry without religion at all. And I can’t imagine a religion that teaches against marriage that is offended by the practice. The closest are perhaps those churches which believe celibacy is the superior way of life. However, here, offering marriage licenses in no way discriminates against those who choose to remain celibate.

The same argument that homosexual marriage advocates use here works against them: If it is true that homosexual marriage does not affect traditional marriage, then it is also true that traditional marriage does not hurt homosexual marriage. You cannot use this argument and remain intellectually honest.

If there was government sanction against people who choose not to get married, then we can discuss that because that is obviously wrong. But that is not the case, and if it were, it is a different topic.

I think I have satisfied most people with my arguments, and my point holds: government endorsed religion hurts no one.

But just because it hurts no one is not good enough reason to do something. There must be a compelling argument to be made that by NOT doing something, injury is had. For instance, some libertarians argue that by not providing a military, or courts, or whatever government program they agree with, harm is done, and so it is in everyone’s mutual best interests to have government provide these things.

So I need to demonstrate that by not providing government-endorsed traditional marriage, we all would be injured.

Let’s start with the repercussions of marriage, and imagine what our life would be like without it. In discussing this, we cannot argue about sexual practices inside or out of marriage. Although I believe great harm is done to society and individuals when sexual relations are had outside of marriage, this is not the topic we are discussing. Instead, I focus on the issues of families and the law.

Government recognizing and endorsing traditional marriage has provided a common idea that is spread throughout our entire land. Despite the facts that different sects of religions teach different things about marriage, there is one unifying norm that is common. Without this, there would be great confusion and inconsistencies.

One of the ideas of marriage is that when you marry someone, you become their unique and only spouse. If government did not provide a registry of who married whom, it would be impossible to tell who is already married and who is not. This is a convenience, no different than requiring people to declare what legal structures they have setup. If you did not believe that government should require people to declare their legal structures, then you might not buy into this argument; if you do, then you must agree.

Marriage provides a default legal structure that is almost identical to what people’s assumptions are about marriage. Some states have slight differences, but largely it is consistent. If you marry someone, you intend to share your property with them, for instance. If you marry someone, you intend to leave your wealth to them if you die; you intend to give them joint-custody of the children that you conceive, etc, and etc…

Because of this legal framework, ignoramuses can get married and not require the expense to higher a lawyer to make sure all of their expectations are met. Surely the harm of requiring everyone who wants to get married to draw up a legal contract that outlines all of their expectations is enough that this requires government endorse marriage.

There is a lot of debate about what the ideal family structure is for our children. I think the majority of Americans admit that the best bet is a family of a loving father and mother, who have devoted themselves entirely to each other and the raising of the kids. Although not every family lives up to this ideal, many come close. By government providing the structure by which families are formed, and by government endorsing the highest ideal (and providing a legal framework to handle the worst cases), are we not better served as a society?

Consider the costs, then, of removing marriage as an institution from our society. Young people would be more reluctant to pay the cost to draw up a legal contract between their spouse, and would thus probably avoid the institution altogether, or rely on a set of pre-made documents that do not reflect the general sentiment of all people. If you wanted to see if someone was already married, you wouldn’t have a central database to check. The influence of government would not be used to create any sort of family, and also, we would lose the protections that we have for when people do not behave appropriately in a marriage and family.

I think you can imagine ways around all of the above problems, but it is evident that the costs of these workarounds is far greater than the efficiency and benefit of having government administer in the affair of marriage.

Now that I have defined traditional marriage as valuable, and shown that government should have a role in it, I will move on to the next argument I encounter. That is, that marriage is discriminatory and we should modify it to include homosexual relationships.

I cannot imagine why people think marriage is discriminatory. The common argument that, “Marriage discriminates because I love someone who I can’t marry” has never entirely made sense to me. Sure, there is an emotional appeal (who wants to stand between two people who love each other?) but it is based on the fiction that marriage is about love.

Marriage is not about love. It is about an agreement between two people, male and female, that they will work together to build a family. We know from history that many marriages were not about love at all. In fact, many lovers could not be married to each other, due to one reason or another, even though they were of the opposite sex. In this day and age, where the people with whom government allows you to have sexual relations with has nothing to do with marriage, why do you need marriage to proclaim your love anyway, in any form?

I think we live in an age where people have the false assumption that marriage and love are one and the same. This is simply not true, not today, not ever, and not in the future. Whom you love is completely independent of whom you choose to marry. If you only use love as your criteria for marriage, I beg you, reconsider! You are making a lifetime commitment to that person. If you base that off of fleeting passions, then you are doomed from the beginning! I guarantee you, one day you will wake up and be faced with the dilemma of you not loving your spouse that day. Is that grounds for divorce? Unfortunately, in some states, it is, which only reinforces this woefully sad understanding of marriage.

Now, let me try to help you understand why the limits of whom you can marry do not discriminate against the homosexual at all, let us consider a completely separate scenario. Let’s say you have a friend whom you trust and want to start a business with. The property of the business will only be owned by you and him, and you don’t plan on bringing in any other partners nor do you want to sell parts of your company in exchange for investment money. This sounds like the perfect example of a limited liability partnership, and indeed, your lawyers advise you to go with this legal structure. However, you protest! You want to form a sole proprietorship!

“But,” your lawyer responds, “a sole proprietorship is a structure designed when only one person owns the company. Since you want two owners, you want to form a partnership.”

“Well,” you shout back, “That’s discrimination! I won’t stand for it!”

“It doesn’t matter; that’s the law. You can’t have two owners in a sole proprietorship.” The lawyer coolly replies, attempting to soothe the mood.

Do you see how absurd this sounds?

The institution we call marriage is and has always been an institution between husband and wife. Asking for marriage to legally unite two males or two females is like partners trying to form a sole proprietorship. It is simply not the right institution for that relationship.

Now, many states have created the “civil union”, which is a legal institution that matches more closely what people want when they intend to “marry” a man and a man, or a woman and a woman.

Of course, many, if not all, of the benefits we extend to marriages extend to the civil union, so the argument cannot be made that there is any discrimination going on here. Nowhere in marriage or in civil unions is the sexual preferences of the people involved relevant.

Now, for those who want to change the institution of marriage to include homosexual relationships, let’s discuss the harm that will be done to others by doing so.

First, if you say that there is no harm to traditional marriage to offer the same institution to same-sex couples, then the converse is also true: There is no harm to you. Obviously, you don’t believe this, so this argument is absurd.

Now, let me demonstrate the actual harm that occurs.

One, religions cannot discriminate based on the sexual orientation of the people involved, but they can discriminate based on the institution involved. For instance, in adoptions, we cannot say, “Oh, we will not allow you to adopt this baby because your husband and wife are both men.” But we can say, “We will not adopt this baby to you because you are not married.” Religions that have a sincere belief that man-woman couples, united in legal marriage,are the ideal institution to raise children in, cannot act on that belief without crossing discrimination laws. So, by extending marriage to include homosexual relationships, you have prevented us from practicing our religion (which you are free to disagree with), or have forced us  to break the discrimination laws.

Two, government schools can no longer teach that marriage between man and woman is different and desirable. Instead, they are forced to teach us that homosexual relationships are just as good as heterosexual ones. Since we believe that this teaching damages us, we believe that that damages our society in real and lasting ways.

Three, consider our church, which believes that marriage between man and woman is ordained of God. If we were to teach that doctrine, then we would, rightly so, be considered as discriminating against the other people who enjoy marriage, if such a definition were to include homosexual relationships. I don’t think you understand what grave harm this is. Think of all the legal hurdles a church that would want to teach and advertise that blacks are subhuman would face, and then consider what we would face if we continued to teach and advertise that essential doctrine. If you believe that teaching that man and woman should be married is just as bad as teaching blacks are not fully human, then you are free to believe such. But injuring others for their beliefs? That is not what I hope you intend to do, because it shows gross religious discrimination.

I have not perfected all of these arguments, so they are subject to change. However, I do want to emphasize that it is entirely reasonable to oppose redefining marriage, and that it is a sentiment that is shared by a very large number of people.

I think when I engage in discussion on this topic, people who support homosexual marriage show a complete lack of civility. To them, arguments rely on passion, not reason. They also feel that others who disagree with them are stupid, or bigots, or full of hate. I can’t expect to change the mind of people who are so passionate and who lack reason in their thought process, but I will point it out to show how unreasonable their position is. If you are one of those who rely solely on passion to drive your political opinion, know that you too are unreasonable. We know what happens when we don’t temper our passions with reason, or at least, I hope we do.

So, in addressing my points, try to use the same dispassionate reasoning to make your case I tried to use to make my points.

Once again, I remind the reader that logical fallacies or polemics (combative tone) are grounds for me to not approve a comment. They are worthless and a waste of everyone’s time. If you have a particularly notorious example, I may show the public just so they can understand what people on your side are: In other words, I don’t think it will reflect favorable on your positions to try it.

Open Letter to TheNoize

A commenter on Digg called TheNoize asks:

I would assume religious freaks would WANT to see the christian cross broken and turned upside down – after all, it’s the torture device where Jesus was nailed and brutally killed. Why would anyone use that as a symbol of their love for Jesus? It’s completely nonsensical.

I reply:

You need to listen more to what Christians really believe.

Hint: Christ’s suffering is what makes our redemption possible. Why would we want to ignore that?

(Of course, my comment was buried because I didn’t represent the groupthink there, but that’s a different issue.)

In the interest of actually answering the sincere questions I believe TheNoize was asking, let me try to continue the conversation here.

There are several points of argument.

First, TheNoize asserts that Christianity is crazy.

Maybe you need to listen more to the clear indicators that christianity is coocoo and makes no sense in a world where science has figured out a lot more about the Universe than all religions put together.

My rebuttal is that if he thinks Christianity is crazy, then he doesn’t understand Christianity. Billions of people believe in Christianity, and they can’t all be insane. (Assuming, of course, that sane people tend not to believe insane things.)

He doubts my figures; very well, let me show them. The current best estimate is about 2.1 billion Christians. This is likely a lower figure than the actual number, because of the strictness of the data set. (reference: http://www.adherents.com/Religions_By_Adherents.html)

He tries to assert that I used argumentum ad populum, which would be the case if I asserted that Christianity were true because billions of people say so. That wasn’t my assertion. My assertion was that it’s unlikely something is crazy is billions of people believe it, since the population who believes in it is likely not crazy.

I figure this matter is closed, unless he wants to continue discussing it. It’s up to him to show how Christianity can be considered crazy despite the fact that billions of people believe in it. His assertion that billions of people have been wrong is a good start, but there is still more work to do.

Second, he asserts that Christians “are the least educated people in physics, astronomy, chemistry and biology.” My rebuttal was that I have a BS in Physics, minor in Math, and consider myself a Christian. (Thus refuting that the “least educated” are Christians. I am certainly not the least educated person.) I figure this topic is closed, unless he wants to try and defend the assertion that “generally, Christians are less educated than non-Christians.” I’d be happy to take that topic on. I believe atheism is a religion for the intellectually lazy, so it would be a fun debate.

The next section deals with some of the ideas I have about Christianity and science and how they complement each other. I think he missed some of the ideas I have, and I owe it to him to see that he has a correct understanding of what I believe.

Point one: The fundamental assumptions of science.

Me: “Point one: The universe is ordered and logical because God said so. There can be no other reason, because then you have circular reasoning. Using logic and reason to prove logic and reason is circular reasoning. (The same applies in so many other sciences: you start with a basic assumption and then run with it. The correct set of assumptions are the assumptions God gives us.)”

TheNoize: The universe is by no means ordered and logical, according to science. It’s actually mind-blowingly chaotic, in ways no human can understand (our brains are structured to organize information in order to understand patterns, and use them to survive). It’s not by circular reasoning – it starts with no reasoning, just observation. “Seeing is believing”. But you’re right, religion departs from a dogma imposed by the church – science stars with objective observation, and then formulates theories, not according to a book – but according to measurable, observable reality. Doesn’t that sound more reliable to you?

There are really two kinds of chaos. One kind of chaos is the assumption that the universe is not governed by any logical laws. The other is the idea of logical chaos, ie, unpredictable and dramatically varying results based on minute changes to initial conditions.

I don’t believe that you believe that the universe follows no law. In fact I think you are arguing that what you observe does indeed reflect the nature of reality, and that experiments should be repeatable, with no time or space variance. (Meaning, the laws of nature don’t change based on your position in time or space.)

My original point is that science starts with the assumption that the universe follows laws, one of the first laws being that things must be logical, that we can observe reality, that our observations can be used to deduce the laws of nature. The predictions that science has made have been remarkably accurate, so much so that it is obvious to any observer that making these assumptions was a really, really good guess.

Note that this idea is new! Throughout history, mankind has not assumed that nature is a logical thing. Indeed, people have long assumed that violent, emotional gods governed the motions and processes of nature. It is only the religion of Christianity, which teaches that God follows logic, and that God rules the universe through logical laws, that modern science began. In other words, the assumptions that lead to science were directly from the teachings of Christianity.

In answer to TheNoize’s question, no, I don’t think what he believes in is more reliable.

Point Two: Science is the study of God.

Me: “Point two: Science is the study of the universe, or in other words, the study of God’s handiwork. By understanding the laws that God has set down and that govern the universe, you come to understand science. Hence, science is, originally, a uniquely Christian pursuit. All of the great founders of science were Christian who believed God wasn’t lying. I believe any scientist who is honestly pursuing truth, and willing to accept the truth no matter what it may be, is doing God’s work. (If only every scientist were an angel…)”

TheNoize: I partially agree, because a lot of scientists were religious in a time when almost everyone was.

If you’re trying to say that modern science developed in a time when men were generally Christian, not because of it, I will argue with you. The entire reason why science was developed into the form which we understand it today is because religious people, Christians, were trying to study and learn more about God and his Creation.

You can turn back the clock to many moments in history when science could have, and according to many atheists, should have, developed, but at each of those times it sputtered. Why? Well, you can invent one reason or another, but I believe it is because none of those cultures were dominated by a religion that not only believed in logic, but necessarily assumed that the universe conformed to this belief. In essence, without Christianity, modern science would never have been invented.

Point three: Science can only show facts, and cannot deliver absolute truth about explanations.

Me:“Point three: Science, at best, can only show facts. While we may invent explanations of those facts, we can never tell which explanation is true.”

TheNoize: Well, those facts are clarified by more facts. Explanations are based on facts – the more facts science discovers, the closer it gets to the real explanation, and therefore the universal reality.

Me: “Even if we recorded and documented every event in the history of the universe, we would never arrive at one obvious truth that describes everything.”

TheNoize: How do you know that?

I don’t disagree that more facts brings better explanations (by eliminating incorrect ones.) But I question where the end will be: At some future day will we possess all knowledge of the universe through observation and reason? I don’t think that’s a reasonable assumption. I’d challenge TheNoize to show why he thinks there is an end to knowledge, because as far as I can see, all signs point to infinite knowledge in the universe.

Imagine a sphere that represented all of human knowledge. The inside of the sphere is what we know, and the outside of the sphere what we don’t know. The surface of the sphere represents what we know we don’t know. As that sphere grows, will it ever envelop everything? No. We do know, however, as the sphere grows, our knowledge of what we don’t know yet increases.

I believe that knowledge is infinite, and that infinite knowledge can only be possessed by an infinite being, which we are not (in this mortal state.)

Me:“We use things like Occam’s Razor to prefer one explanation over another, but there is nothing that says that the simplest explanation must be the best.”

TheNoize: Occam’s razor only steps in when you’re truly confused about which explanation is more factual and makes more sense… That rarely happens in science. You usually have at least 1 theory that has been more supported – and historically, that theory is usually the one that ends up being true!

Unfortunately, I think some of your ignorance about scientific ignorance is showing. It is not the case that on the leading edge of science there is obviously one correct theory. As an example, can you count on one hand the number of perfectly reasonable GUTs? Not to count String Theory, with all of its variations.

Popular media would have you believe that evolution and the big bang are settled science, and that no reasonable person can disagree with these theories. If that’s the case, why are we still studying these things? There are countless variations on these theories alone, and any honest scientist who supports these theories knows this. Much of the details of these theories are known to be incorrect, and demand more understanding, theories, and experiments to clarify.

If we take a broader view, science has to exclude a ton of explanations because they are simply not testable. One explanation that science can’t work with is, “God wanted it that way.” If the universe were really ruled by the whims of an infinite being, then this could be the ultimate explanation. But science is powerless to determine if this is the case or not. How would you test to see if reality aligned with an infinite being’s whim of the day?

Me:“Explanations (theories) are either right or wrong, and that’s all we can really say. “Yes, it agrees with observations,” or, “No, it does not agree with observations.”

Isn’t that brilliant? That means you’ll only believe something if you have facts to back it up. How mentally sane and stable is that?

I don’t know how you made the jump from what I said to what you claimed I said. I’d need more explanation.

I would normally leave these kinds of arguments out of a reasonable discussion, but I want to help you understand why these kinds of remarks aren’t helpful, and certainly don’t reflect well on your attitudes to science. The word “polemic” is worth remembering. Normally, scientists immediately give up arguing the moment polemic enters the discussion. Be grateful I decided to continue the discussion despite your polemic.

Point Four: Science is not worthy of religious worship.

Me:“Point four: Science is an imperfect art, so the conclusions of science are no more worthy of worship than idols made of gold or stone. Only perfection (God) is worthy of our worship. Therefore, even if you could prove to me something that contradicted God’s word, I would say, “Yes, that’s what the evidence points to, but I still believe in God.” In other words, people who “believe” in science the same way I believe in God are worshiping dumb idols.”

TheNoize: Science is imperfect? How about religion? What’s more perfect? A castle solidly build out of facts, or a palace on a cloud of assumptions that were vaguely extracted from ancient, outdated scripture, that we have no evidence to be actually the word of a God?

(In response to point two, but really about this point.) But my question to you is: how do you cope when science finds things that are different than what religion found to be true? List of true discoveries that took a while (or are still taking) for religion to accept: round earth, earth not the center of the universe, earth orbiting the sun, bats not being birds, evolution and natural selection. I remind you that, before the church admitted their errors, it tortured and killed innocent people who defended the scientific truth, for hundreds of years. Doesn’t that make you sad? To be associated with such an institution?

A castle built on facts alone is a castle without a foundation. Why are facts a foundation? You cannot say with facts alone. You need something more to explain why facts are a valid building material.

Religion is not based on assumption. Or do you think Moses was assuming while God was conversing with him on the mount? Do you think Jesus was conjecturing when he spoke with authority and declared, “I only do that which the Father commands me to do.” Do you think I assumed that I knelt down in sincere prayer, and received a response from God?

Religion is based on simply believing what we are told by God, his book, and his prophets and messengers. If you believe, then you will act according to what you are taught. If the thing is truly from God, then it will be proved true, according to God’s word. If not, then you will know likewise.

When science teaches something contrary to religion, what do I do? I investigate what God’s word really says. I ask God what his opinion on the matter is. I put my trust in God, not my brains, not anyone else’s brains, or eyes, or machines, but God. I know that eventually, I will find a way to resolve the difference, either through a better understanding of who God really is, or a better understanding of what science really says. But my assumption starts with God, and ends with science, not the other way around.

It is possible for me, a person who believes evolution to be incorrect, to do scientific work in the realm of evolution. In a way, science is a game with rules. As long as you follow the rules (and worshiping the theories of science is not a rule!) you can play the game. Many scientists do this every day. In fact, I have seen scientists play both for and against their own theories.

Point Five: Science does not give me what my soul needs.

Me:“Point five: The parts of my life that are important are my soul, my happiness, and my eternal salvation. Science provides me no more comfort than a car or food. My soul hungers for the companionship of Deity, and science can never satisfy that.”

TheNoize: My soul finds awe and respect for the Universe in science, and that satisfies my spirituality. Spirituality and religion have been tied to the belief that YOUR beliefs are true and correct, eternally. What better, more fact-based faith can you have, besides science? The parts of my life that are important is my positive influence in the world, my happiness, and the people I love. You’re more focused on eternal salvation in your next life (that may or may not exist) than being a good man in this world? I don’t think that’s very positive, or moral, or ethical.

Here, you’re making the fallacy of what’s good enough for you is good enough for me. You also don’t understand what all my religion entails, so you can’t render a judgment on whether I need it or not.

Me:There is so much more to life than the universe around us. We are more than meatbags that happen to have interesting electrical patterns in our skulls. Science doesn’t tell me that.

TheNoize: Sure, there’s philosophy. Why are we here? What’s our purpose? Science seeks answers to answer, ultimately, those questions as well. We don’t know the answer yet, because we don’t have enough information. That doesn’t mean we have to assume it’s all in the good book, and stop caring for studying our universe. That would be insane. Meat bags? Sure, we’re meat bags – but isn’t it amazing how we evolved out of single cell organisms and protein chains that started replicating in the primordial seas? It doesn’t seem like it was god – it seems like it was the universe itself, and we’re merely a part of the way it works. Why? Nothing can tell you that, because no one knows the truth. Religion can pretend to give you the truth – and you can believe in it 100% – but that doesn’t mean it’s the truth! If you know history (and philosophy), you still have to include the possibility that you’re believing in lies.

“Science seeks answers to answer, ultimately, [the questions of why we are here and what is our purpose] as well.” Unfortunately, no, this is not in the realm of science. I challenge you to find a scientist who believes that science can answer these questions. I doubt you could even put these questions in scientific terms, as a testable hypothesis or theory.

“Isn’t it amazing how we evolved out of single cell organisms and protein chains that started replicating in the primordial seas?” Unfortunately, I do not share your belief that this is where we came from, and even if I did, what would be more “amazing” is the powers of the infinite that have created the universe moved to create mankind in his own image. The product of lifeless processes are not amazing. They just are.

“Nothing can tell you that, because no one knows the truth.” Here’s where you’re wrong. If you assume no one knows the truth, then why bother? We’re all wrong. I assume that there are people that know the truth, and they are the people who are able to gather the truth from God himself.

“Religion can pretend to give you the truth.” False religion can absolutely pretend to do anything, kind of like the science religion you preach. True religion is based on truth, and truth alone, and does not need to pretend to be anything.

“If you know history (and philosophy), you still have to include the possibility that you’re believing in lies.” You think I am ignorant of this? Honestly, who do you think you are talking to? One of the points I hope I inspired you to consider is that there are other people with different ideas who may be just as smart as you. I would hope someone of your intellectual capacity would realize that just as you are smarter than others, there are people smarter than you. And just as there are smart people who have different ideas, then there are smarter people who have different ideas.

But to answer your question, the very, very first doctrine any Christian must adopt is the doctrine that allows them to see truth from error (or lies.) What gives them the power to do this? Their connection to God, and his personal revelation to them through the Holy Ghost. If you spent more than a few moments reading what Jesus actually taught, and how his disciples actually learned, you would know this.

Now that I have thoroughly explained to you how a sane person can believe in Christianity and be a scientist, the ball is in your court. You can apologize for your polemic and grow up and acknowledge that there are people smarter than you who do not think the way you do, and you can begin attacking Christians on the things they actually believe, rather than the things you wished they believed. Or you can persist in ignorance, although I imagine you would think less of someone who did so.