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12/26/2008 Reading Minds, Dream Logging, Performing Commands Mentally - Now Possible!I have long had a dream of finding a personalized/portable EEG device that I could use and program for mind reading, dream logging, etc. Based on my research and psychological studies, I’ve often told people that while it might be unethical, if I could have an EEG device constantly connected to a person’s head to monitor all the electrical activity they had at all times, that with enough time, testing, and computer programming help, I could essentially read every single thought & feeling that person had. I have often wondered why nobody has created such a system, because it’s so obvious, and was so sure that eventually it will come out, and I’ll want one for personal use. So I just watched a video for this new game/system by Emotiv Systems that connects up a small/portable EEG (electroencephalography) device to your head which simply monitors the electrical activity in your brain and performs commands based on pre-recorded commands that you associated with their corresponding thoughts. For example, you focus on an object on the screen, and think about making it rotate. Then you have the software associate those thoughts (electrical activity) with rotation on the screen. You think about pulling or pushing an object, and record those similarly. You can record thoughts of anger or enjoyment, etc and it remembers what that looks like from pre-recorded electrical activity. Thus far, the demonstrations I’ve seen have focused on promoting this device as a gaming system where you move around and do things in the game all by using your mind. While I think this is cool, I would prefer to use it for other things, like as a dream log. It would be cool to use one of these little EEG’s to link certain thoughts/brain-waves to images or symbols and then have it record everything you think while you dream. For example, you can think about a tree repeatedly and link those brain waves to a picture/symbol of a tree. Then while you're dreaming, if there is a tree in your dream it could record that thought. Since a lot of people supposedly think about sex in their sleep, it could also be interesting to link different thoughts about sex to different symbols, words or (non-pornographic) images to see what comes up in a dream. Since words are essentially symbols of concepts, I wonder if you could simply think about a word/concept and have the machine write for you while you simply think to yourself. It could also potentially record words and log everything you say or hear in a dream. The more thoughts you register in the system, the cooler it could be for a dream log’s description and detail. You could register thoughts of specific family members or friends, thoughts of common activities, places you are familiar with, feelings, and many other things and have them all logged as they occur in your dreams. It would also be interesting to have an alternate profile where you link things in reverse. Like in those games they have, if you are supposed to imagine being MAD to scare away these little balls of light, maybe you have to do the opposite and have thoughts of love and caring and link everything oppositely. Instead of pulling the object, you have to imagine pushing it instead. Man, if these things aren't too expensive I'll certainly buy one...imagine the fun possibilities you could have just linking thoughts to certain things like that for personal use. I could go on and on about the possibilities with this device, but this is a good start. Supposedly it may be released in a few months from now. 4/29/2008 CNG Utah - Natural Gas Cars - Stations MapNot too long ago, Misty and I bought a dual fuel car. It runs on both regular gasoline as well as Compressed Natural Gas. Besides already needing a second vehicle, we were primarily interested in it for the amount we would save driving around. I mean it only costs $0.639 per gallon everywhere in Utah! That's AWESOME! There are currently (April 29, 2008) about 18 public CNG stations in Utah. I've mapped them all out with several details on each of them Here: UT CNG MAPS. We wanted a dual fuel vehicle for our first CNG car, and looked around online and found several out of state. We primarily searched out of state because Utah allows you to take a $3000 state tax refund off a CNG car spread out up to 5 years. Most places out of state we looked at were willing to ship them in to UT for you for about $300-$400. Also there were several places willing to take a current vehicle and upgrade them to CNG for a couple thousand dollars...mostly for big vehicles like trucks, but supposedly conversions have some part of the engine that wears out a lot faster because CNG burns at a higher temp and some part of the vehicle needs to be replaced more often from what I hear. While we were looking, my brother in law got a dual fuel car in at the dealership he worked at, and so we decided to get the one he had. It was a 2001 Chevy Cavalier with about 54,000 miles on it and cost us about $5,500. If you consider the $3000 tax credit we get, it's actually only costing us about $2,500. The CNG tank is only a 6 gallon equivalent, with a PSI of 3600 and takes up about half of the trunk space in the small car. CNG vs regular gas MPG are basically the same. Unfortunately, most stations in UT only pump between 2500-3000 PSI though, so we rarely get the whole 6 Gallon usage out of it. One time the Park City station did pump higher than our PSI rating, and when we took the pump off the tank, it started hissing Natural gas back out the tank until it was at the proper 3600 PSI. It was scary at first, but at least we know what happens when you over fill a CNG tank. Nothing drastic. A Newspaper article recently came out about a new CNG station opening in Brigham City, and how Utah has more CNG stations per capita than anywhere else. Supposedly there were so many people calling dealerships asking if they had CNG cars that some made contracts with places to do conversions for those who want them. I've started to see lots more CNG vehicles at the stations more and more since we've had our car. Tons of people talk to us about them too, asking for pointers on how to get them, etc. Newbies are always really excited about getting their new cars and talk to other CNG owners at the pumps, etc. It's kind of funny. CNG is really picking up in Utah. The Natural Gas price savings more than pays for our car loan on the new vehicle every month. It's kind of stunning to see how having TWO CARS, even one with a monthly loan payment on it, is STILL CHEAPER than having ONE regular gasoline car for us. We've decided that we'll probably eventually sell off our Lumina and get a CNG or dual fuel Truck or van. I haven't looked into it much, but supposedly you can also get a little CNG converter to hook up to your house gas line so you can fill up at home instead of having to drive to a CNG station. If I knew I was going to be living somewhere for a few years, I'd be tempted to install one just for the convenience. You can fill it up over night or whenever, and have it come straight out of your Monthly utility bill for even cheaper. Anyway, it's nice to be getting gas 5-6 times cheaper, and have a second car with a loan for cheaper than we were paying for a single regular gas car that was already paid off. Of course we travel between Logan-Kaysville at least a couple times a month, and Misty drives around doing parking enforcement up here for a few hours at night, so I guess we do drive quite a bit too. Feel free to ask questions. I will update my blog entries here on myspace, MSN Spaces, etc with new developments on Utah CNG (map updates, exact to call to see if VIN eligible for tax rebate, etc) for those I notice are finding my posts through searching the net. 3/8/2008 History of Joseph Smith by His Mother Lucy Mack Smith: The Unabridged Original VersionI wrote a book review on Facebook today for the book: History of Joseph Smith by His Mother Lucy Mack Smith: The Unabridged Original Version (Hardcover) - by R. Virnon Ingleton (Compiler) I wrote a similar review on Amazon just from memory almost 3 years ago which is currently rated as the most helpful review on the book (of course there are only 3 reviews total as of the time of this blog). Anyway, since I consider this particular version of the book one of the best LDS books ever (on my top 10 for sure), I have decided to post my recent facebook book review as a blog as well to explain WHY some of you would also really appreciate this book. Here is my review: This is absolutely the BEST version of Lucy Mack Smith's "Biography" of her son. For those unaware, the book has gone through several versions as follows: Rough Draft Manuscript Fair-copy manuscript 1853 edition "RLDS Versions" The Improvement Era Edition (1902) The Preston Nibley Edition At one point, Brigham Young even denounced the book as "a tissue of lies" and warned the saints of dire consequences if they didn't turn in all copies of the book to the church to be destroyed, saying that it contained falsehoods; scribes had fictionalized the work; William Smith (Joseph's "black-sheep" brother according to the church) was portrayed positively; Orson Pratt published it out of greed and without Brigham's consent; the project was stolen; and Lucy's memory was shot. Brigham offered other books or store goods in exchange for turning in the book to be destroyed. Nearly a year after his denouncement of the book, Brigham decided the book held some potential merit and consented to prepare the book for republication to be sent out to "ALL THE WORLD" with several "errors" being corrected under the direction of Wilford Woodruff, assistant church historian at the time (mainly with George A Smith and Elias Smith to help him). Approximately 78 corrections were made at this time, at which point the now updated version sat for over 35 yrs until a while after Brigham's death. THIS edition, compiled by R Vernon Ingleton, takes the original 1853 edition as the backbone, and adds in missing "treasures" which were in the rough draft manuscript by putting them in a different font so you know things that were in the draft which nobody has ever seen before in any of the other editions that Lucy originally thought was worth sharing, that never made it into a final printed copy. Another font is used to depict things Lucy's scribe notated from things Lucy said that also never made it into print. Things that were REMOVED in editions after the 1853 edition are set in a sort of corner type brackets 「Like these」 And so on and so forth with differences between the different versions, including footnotes for further clarifications, insights, notes, etc. Whether you have already read one of the other editions or not, I highly recommend THIS version as it has combined all previous editions with added tidbits never before publicly available. If you are merely curious what was changed or taken out of the original version, get this book. I have to think Brigham must not have read the book himself before he made those statements, as all the changes were quite minor and unimportant. If you are simply curious what they left out from the rough draft, get this version too! I'd say that by far and large the greatest reason to get THIS version is for all the additional information from the Rough Draft that was never added into the printed editions. These little extras are certainly valuable treasures in and of themselves. No other version or edition comes close to matching this one, and I've read through and checked out many of them. If you were unsure before now, get this version of the book. You won't regret it. 2/5/2008 Funerals - Hinckley, Packer & MeSome time ago when my Uncle Sterling died, it was brought to my attention that President Boyd K Packer proclaimed that funerals are NOT supposed to talk about the person, or eulogize them, etc. In "The Unwritten Order of Things", President Packer seems to take this to an extreme in my opinion. He says that the Family members shouldn't be ALLOWED to choose who will speak, or for how long or on what they should talk about. He even goes on to say that funerals should really only talk about the Atonement, resurrection, how WE have the truth in this church etc and to use it as a missionary opportunity. We're NOT supposed to talk about the person who died, or their life, etc. He actually said that if someone tries to talk about him at HIS funeral that he'll raise up and correct them. I personally think President Packer is overboard on this one by stating his personal opinions as if they are churchwide policies from the Lord that should be followed (It should be mentioned that Packer's policies are actually stricter than the General Handbook of Instructions). If funerals quit talking about the person, stopped being eulogies, or funny and good stories to remember the person, etc and only talked about church stuff and simply being held to try to convert the non-members in attendance, I know that I for one would NEVER go to them anymore...that's what I go to church for. I was extremely pleased to see that Packer's policies were NOT followed for President Hinckley's funeral. In fact, though not a big deal, the General Handbook of Instructions' policies weren't even strictly followed (videos/slides were actually used against handbook policy). Hinckley's funeral was a good tribute to a remarkable man, though it certainly was a eulogy. In my opinion, funerals would really SUCK and be nearly pointless to attend if you weren't allowed to talk about the deceased at all as Packer has suggested. For me personally, I'm not saying that I want people to only say GOOD things about me at MY funeral, on the contrary, I'd prefer something ala "Speaker of the Dead" if it were possible for someone like Ender to actually do it right. For those of you who haven't read the Ender's Game series (I would highly recommend it), in that book, "Speakers" research the dead person's life and give a speech that attempts to speak for them, describing the person's life as he or she tried to live it. This speech is not an apology/defense, but rather a way to understand the person as a whole, INCLUDING any flaws or misdeeds. Several years ago, my good friend Wendy who knew a lot of my good and bad, intent and all, once said that she'd be willing to do a "speaking" on me some day because she probably understood me the best based on everything we'd talked about and been through. If it could be done right, I'd totally love to have a real funeral like those in the books. Unfortunately, such "speakings" seem to take a while to compile correctly and clearly. Maybe a person realistically has to write thier own "speaking" but then it's so easily subject to unitentional bias, whether intentionally or not. Maybe some of my family and friends could do a decent job at it if they worked together. Regardless, not that I intend to die soon, but I still want to make it CLEAR to people I know that they are NOT to follow President Packer's policies for MY funeral even if it has to be held out of a church building and by someone other than the Bishop, etc...the General Handbook states that the Bishop is in charge and decides EVERYTHING if it's in the church (which could lead to unwanted policies), so IF it MUST be held elsewhere to be done properly, then so be it...otherwise it doesn't matter. At the very LEAST (if not a real "speaking" as mentioned above), I'd prefer funny stories about me, even embarrassing stories, good memories, things I was known for, the type of employee I was, etc. Sure, of course church/gospel stuff and my beliefs, etc were a big part of my life...I mean I was/am absolutely obsessed with church history for example. It has literally consumed my life in MANY ways as many of you know...but such things like gospel subjects should also be put in context with the rest of the funeral RELATED to the deceased (which is the ACTUAL reason people came in the first place). When I go to funerals I go with the intention to remember the deceased and their life, who they were, how they lived, etc. A memorial, tribute, etc. Not to hear a Sacrament meeting talk or missionary discussion that's unrelated to why we all showed up. The absudity! I assume others would come to mine similarly. The best funerals I've ever been to (like that of my friend/Co-worker Kristen as a GREAT example) have followed the things discussed in this paragraph. You know, for Joseph Smith's funeral, he had everyone dress in ALL WHITE instead of any black. I would prefer that as well. Not that I expect anyone would go through with it (maybe if it was announced in the obituary or something), but the whole "everybody dress all in black" for mourning thing is kinda creepy weird to me to be honest. I've never really understood the point. I LOVE the all in white idea that accompanied Joseph's funeral. That's so beautiful! Also, I wouldn't MIND if I was cremated into one of those new lifegem diamonds or something similar/cheaper instead of the traditional methods which typically cost more overall both economically and environmentally in the long run. I think lifegems are kind of cool, and much better than traditional gravesites, etc which will eventually inevitably cause a problem with population and environment issues, etc anyway. Meh, do whatever you guys want with my body when I'm dead. I suppose it doesn't matter to me at that point. You know, an LDS author once suggested that everyone should write out their answers to the following questions for their own benefit (feel free to respond in the comments or your own blog): What would you like to be said about you at your funeral? What do you EXPECT to be said about you at your funeral? From a Family member? From a Co-Worker? From a Friend? Any others in particular? Anything specific you want done at your funeral? Perhaps I'll answer those myself in a future blog. I've been meaning to do that for the last 9 years now since I was first asked to do so, and haven't gotten around to it yet. 6/28/2007 Sleep DeprevationMy brother Jeff and his wife Beth moved in with us for a month while we wait to move into our new apartment complex we bought together. We've been playing this new Nintendo Wii game lately called "Big Brain Academy" together alot and I was doing so well on it. Misty, obviously looking for excuses as to why she's not beating me in the smartness game, dug up one of my old essays I wrote on sleep deprevation and sent it to me claiming that I'm only beating her in the smartness game because of what I said in this essay since Kiara keeps waking her up to eat every couple/few hrs! Pshh...excuses...  Anyway, I'd almost forgotten about this essay, but it really is full of amazing information, and entertaining at that. I got an A on all my essays, including this one, and my teacher asked if they could use them as an example of EXACTLY the type of stuff they were looking for in the assignments for future classes...including this essay. I figured it's been a while since I've posted a blog, and this would be a nice break from my Religious philosophy posts for some of you. :) READ IT! You won't regret it! It’s a Bigger Deal than You Thought You stagger to your left as you make an effort to clear your dizzy head and attempt to stumble forward. Your eyes are all glazed over with a distant blurry glare at nothing while slowly nodding off. It’s all you can do not to just pass out, falling into the snow bank to rest your two-ton eyelids. You could probably fool any cop, but no, you only wish you were drunk or stoned right now. At least that would be more fun than all the crazy effects that go along with a bad night’s rest. Studies show that missing as little as one hour of needed sleep can impair both your mental and physical feats just as much as two alcoholic drinks could. “If you sleep only 4 to 6 hours a night for 2 straight weeks, your brain will function about as well as it would if you'd stayed up for 3 nights in a row,” says Hans P.A. Van Dongen, Ph.D., lead author of the study. Luckily, sleep deprivation is cumulative, so a night or two of good rest can sober us right up without a hangover. The causes of sleep deprivation vary between people and most are generally deliberate. Some of us lose sleep due to work or even just family and friends. We could even go the other direction and stay up late because it’s the only time we get to ourselves (like me). Different foods and drinks can also affect how late we stay up, and of course there will always be stress and anxiety to keep us up due to things like tests, and Christmas. Hopefully as we mature most of us don’t often get scared sleepless after nightmares, though there are cases where we’re unable to avoid certain other very unfortunate traumatic events in our lives (my sympathies to them). There are some causes which are rather surprising to learn. For instance, Pilcher and Huffcutt found that sleeping intermittently for short periods of time (even naps, or hitting the snooze button a few times), can be worse than staying up all night long, at least in regard to test performance. They have come to the conclusion that this is because such actions send signals to confuse the biological clock, which creates a greater sleep debt. However, staying up all night has been shown to stimulate the body into some kind of an emergency mode that will permit it adjust to a sleepless state, and secrete more cortisol for energy. Napping, if longer than 30 minutes, will make you groggy. Sleeping in on weekends will also throw off the biological clock and cause sleeplessness, so in some ways it is not good to simply assume that “catching up on weekends” will work. . . at least it may take your biological clock a few days to get back to normal sleeping habits (assuming your intention is to get back to healthy sleeping habits of course). Believe it or not, age and gender also play a role in our sleep deficits. Kantrowitz & Springen state that, “Researchers have found adolescents' natural body clock keeps them up until at least 11pm.” This severely hurts these adolescents as most schools start early in the morning, and thus lack of sleep is virtually unavoidable. Contrary to popular belief, it’s not the amount of sleep required for an individual that decreases with age, it’s the capacity for being able to stay asleep that changes with old age. Women tend to be sleep deprived more frequently than men. Men, however, are at a greater risk of not being able to cope with that stress and all the factors that coincide with a lack of sleep. As previously mentioned, occasionally you even find those people who don’t have much choice in whether they sleep well or not. It may even be a sleep disorder, or a biological/chemical balancing factor. In either case, they are subject to the same risks and symptoms as the rest of us, though they may possibly be more habituated with how to deal with the adverse side-affects. Even insomniacs experience periods of “microsleep” sessions for fractions of a second long in REM which is long enough to keep a person alive. The difference is that typical chronic sleep deprivation may feel ok to you, not because five to seven hours of sleep is all that you need, but perhaps because you don’t even remember what it feels like to be fully rested and awake anymore. Besides, the effects are frequently cloaked with different stimulants; and whether it affects your performance or not, it will often affect your health. Thus we see that the cause can vary differently from person to person, but the effects of such actions are almost always consistent and fairly predictable from case to case regardless of the reason or cause behind the lack of sleep. Some of these effects are well known and commonly recognized, while others are astonishing and sometimes more subtle to discover. Besides obviously just plain being tired, one of the most significant physiological consequences induced upon an individual for sleep deficit is the highly increased amounts of cortisol which is secreted. Cortisol, also called “the stress hormone” or “the death hormone” by many scientists, is a steroid type hormone that regulates blood pressure, cardiovascular function, and the body’s use of proteins, carbohydrates and fats. Any kind of stress, whether it is physical or psychological, sets off a chain reaction by increasing cortisol secretion which causes a breakdown of muscle protein, which in turn releases amino acids that are used by the liver to synthesize glucose for energy, thus raising the blood sugar level so the brain will have more glucose as fuel. It also releases lots of “fatty acids” from the fat cells for the muscles. The reason cortisol is termed “the death hormone” is because it actually prepares our body to die. While cortisol increases with age, it makes the growth hormones decrease, which causes us to age. Thus we can see that with this one factor alone, lacking sleep can cause potential serious detrimental side-effects. Blood sugar levels can sky-rocket as can blood-pressure itself. It can lead to depression, and cause instability in many other hormones such as growth. It degrades memory encoding and retrieval and if consistently high, will even cause reduced muscle-mass. It impairs your immune system, and activates fat storage enzymes in cells which will help cause obesity. Even a short amount of deprived sleep will cause other physiological repercussions akin to slow reflexes and poor motor skills to occur. We’re all used to seeing people with black circles under their eyes, but you can’t see how staying awake too long builds up adenosine, which is believed to make the brain fatigued. Studies on the cognitive effects of missing out on sleep-time have shown that it causes reduced performance in an assortment of mental tasks and problem solving. We already mentioned that it affects the encoding and retrieval of memory, but it is important to note that this severely damages the learning process. It even goes so far as to decrease writing and speaking skills, which is enough evidence in and of itself to prove that the amount of sleep attained at night does have a strong correlation to the grade received in a given class (at least classes that use writing and speaking skills such as a language class), or even on a lower scale such as a single test. Of all of the symptoms of sleep deficiency, perhaps the most misdiagnosed is that of depression. Sleep deprivation has nearly all the same symptoms of depression. You feel like there is a great lack of energy, irritability, difficulty concentrating, major mood swings, etc. It is all there. Some individuals may even end up on medication for it for years, being treated for a malady which they do not even contain. Ever wonder why people are so irritated when they haven’t slept? Dreaming is a key participant in how our bodies rejuvenate itself. A normal good quality dream pattern will begin with negative dreams at first, and gradually decrease by morning. “Dreaming is a mood-regulatory process that helps you get rid of anger and other emotional issues," explains Rosalind Cartwright, Ph.D., director of the Sleep Disorder Service and Research Center at Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke's Medical Center in Chicago. If we do not attain the necessary amount of sleep, then we are not able to cope with our problems as effectively, the cortex part of our brain (the cognitive/thinking/rational part) shuts down and we begin running on “limbic brain” which basically means we’re controlled by emotions, and our inhibitions are weakened severely, all of which can make us appear to be bi-polar or have major mood swings. This in turn negatively affects our relationships with other people, including family, friends and work. The negative consequences for staying up late and sacrificing our sleep (intentionally or not) will almost always far outweigh the benefits (assuming you are intentionally losing sleep). A lack of sleep causes increased stress and anxiety, and ironically increased stress and anxiety increases lack of sleep into a never ending cycle. The solution? Calm down, relax, try to avoid the whole mess in the first place and just go to bed earlier and for more time. Works Cited Alberts, Nuna. "The Healing Power of Sleep." Good Housekeeping;. 230.3 (2000): 55 Christodoulou, George N., and George N. Papadimitriou. “Gains From Lost Sleep.” Mental Health Letter; Jan. 1994: 10.7, 7. Goh, Victor Hng-Hang, et al. "Effects of One Night of Sleep Deprivation on Hormone Profiles and Performance Efficiency." Military Medicine, 166.5 (2001): 427-431. Kantrowitz, Barbara. "Why Sleep Matters". Newsweek 22 Sept. 2003: 75 McGinnis, Marianne, Drozd, Shelly. "Sleep It Off." Prevention; 55.6 (2003): 82. “Paging Mr. Sandman.” Nursing; Sept. 2000: 30.9, 74. Stieg, Bill; Goins, Liesa. "Snooze and Lose". Men's Health Sept. 2003: 56. “Too Little Sleep Impairs the Way Your Body Handles Food.” Tufts University Health & Nutrition Letter; Mar. 2000: 18.1, 3.
Anyway, let me know what you think! 6/6/2007 Our Daughter Kiara is Born!They Induced Misty Monday June 4th around 8pm and told us it would take around 12 hrs before she went into labor, and then another 12-20 hrs before she actually delivered. It went a lot quicker than that (only took about 5 hrs total). Our daughter, Kiara was born 06/05/07 (3 weeks early) at 1:08am. 4lbs 7 Ounces. 17 inches. She was born with a lot of hair! Both baby and mother are doing fine. We anticipate both Misty and our daughter will come home Thursday Morning (June 7th). As per the name...we started with a list of 60-70 names and narrowed it down to a handful by this afternoon.We finally decided on Kiara (pronounced Kee-Are-Uh), because we like how it sounds, etc. Since thinking about the name, we've also discovered it is based on a Latin word meaning Clear/bright/light...in other languages it's a variant spelling of a word meaning something else, like in Irish, it can mean dark...maybe that makes it a balanced yin-yang name or something, or maybe when she's being good it's the Latin one, and when she's being bad it's the Irish one. lol Middle name will be the same as Misty's middle name = Dawn. After Misty gets out of the hospital, I'm sure her blog/picture section will have more as days go on, so I'd recommend checking her profile/blog. Qwest said I could basically take off the next 6 months if I wanted to. LOL I need the money though, since we're buying a 5-plex (apartment building) and just had a baby, so I'll prob go back in next week. Anyway, myspace is blocked on the hospital's wifi...I got a few proxies to work a bit, but they were really limited, so we haven't been able to post things. I came home to sleep for a bit and thought I'd post the details for now. Anyway, it's off to bed with me. Enjoy the picts:      5/3/2007 An Interesting Sealing Policy...In one of the forum discussions I was involved in, we were talking about sealings and relatively recent church policy changes regarding such. After having posted the official policies listed in the Church Handbook of Instructions, something caught my eye about child sealings. Let us examine what is said: If a woman who has been sealed to a former husband remarries, the children of her later marriage are born in the covenant of the first marriage unless they were born after the sealing was canceled or after it was revoked due to excommunication or name removal. I'd like to hear your thoughts on these matters, and for now let us first examine an example: In other words, besides the obvious recommendation of hoping to never have to remarry in the first place…girls, if you do ever have to remarry…make sure to stick on birth control at least until your first sealing is canceled. Men, if you marry a woman who's been sealed before, you might want to make sure that first sealing of hers gets canceled before you have a baby...or her ex-husband will apparently be the REAL father of your first born for the rest of eternity. :)
Thoughts, Comments, questions, concerns? 3/25/2007 Quit with the Justifications, and just admit to drinking caffeinated beverages!This is another blog that is being written for use in my future debates in the Myspace forums I am always in. Since this topic comes up SOOOO Frequently, I've agreed to turn my arguments into a blog to simply link to here, especially since I know of no other more complete list of sources than I have. If you have some I am missing, PLEASE post them. I lost some that I once had, so I know there are more out there (in other words, this blog is subject to being updated in the future). Now first off, I am not judging those in the LDS church who either drink or don't drink caffeinated beverages. For the record, I drink them from time to time when I am really tired, or when I get those Energy drinks (Rockstars, Red Bulls, etc) free at work, or when we accidentally buy them from the store not knowing they had caffeine. Sometimes I just plain feel like a Mountain Dew or something. I drink at least a couple dozen Caffeinated drinks a year I'm sure...so rest assurred this is NOT some mote in your eye, beam in my own eye type of blog. Now that we have that out of the way, it is true that there is no officially ENFORCED Policy in the church on Caffeinated soda/pop beverages. If you drink Coke or Pepsi or whatever, it won't keep you from getting a temple recommend, or from taking the sacrament, nor will you suddenly stop having/feeling the spirit. You won't be disciplined by the church in any way. Condemnation Now just because something doesn't stop you from getting a temple recommend doesn't mean it's good for you either. It all boils down to "Condemnation", which doesn't mean the same thing as "Damnation". Damnation means your progression is STOPPED. Condemnation means that though you won't "LOSE" the spirit, you may not progress AS FAST as you COULD had you been a bit more faithful. As an extreme example, President Kimball got distracted by a little bird chirping during a sacrament meeting once, and felt so horrible that he had to repent! How many of us would feel utterly sinful for being distracted for a second during a meeting? Of course he was trying to live to a higher standard than most of us, but that's the point. That's probably part of our punishment on the other side of the veil, seeing the blessings we COULD have enjoyed had we been a bit more faithful. While drinking caffeine or even watching certain R-rated movies won't keep you out of the Temple or Celestial Kingdom, they may SLOW your progression. It's similar to President Kimball...if you want to be on a higher level then work at it and live a higher standard, but otherwise you won't go to hell for it, and you won't entirely lose the spirit like popular mormon myth claims. According to President Benson and the D&C, every one of us is ALWAYS under some form of condemnation (not progressing as fast as we have potential to). Chocolate Some people try to make all sorts of justifications to explain (aka JUSTIFY) why drinking caffeinated Soda is ok, but Coffee is still bad. We've all heard the arguments that Caffeine couldn't possibly be bad because then we'd have to outlaw chocolate too. Actually, that's not true. It's true that Chocolate does have theobromine (xantheose) in it, which is similar to Caffeine in that they are both xanthines, but they are very different from each other: Here's some differences between the two if you really care to know: Theobromine: gentle mild effect very slow onset long lasting 50% in bloodstream after 6 to 10 hrs increases feeling of well being mild antidepressant gentle, smooth, sensual stimulation stimulates cardiovascular system stimulates muscular system mild effect on central nervous system almost no one is allergic not addictive no withdrawal symptoms mild diuretic stimulates the the kidneys CAFFEINE: intense strong effect fast acting rapid dissipation 50% in bloodstream after 2 to 5 hrs increases alertness increases emotional stress jagged, nervous stimulation stimulates cardiovascular system stimulates respiratory system strong effect on central nervous system many people allergic physically addictive many proven withdrawal symptoms extreme diuretic requires large intake of fluids to balance the diuretic effect Most people mistake the two because they're both xanthines. It's also possible to find trace amounts of caffeine in the hulls of the Cacao seeds but they're discarded before processing. MOST OF THE TIME that you read about caffeine in chocolate it's an ignorant over sight because it's not native to chocolate, Theobromine is. So no...outlawing Caffeine would not outlaw chocolate, but it was a nice attempt at justification anyway. :) Then you see people making claims about how no prophet or church leader has ever specifically said we shouldn't drink Caffeine. This too, is not correct. For those of you blindly in denial, here are your references (keep in mind I am not judging, as I admit to drinking caffeine myself...I just want people to quit being in denial): On Cola drinks "I say to the Latter-day Saints, and it is my right to say it (he then says because you have sung and quotes from 'We Thank Thee, O God, For a Prophet). Now, if you mean it--I am not going to give any command, but I will ask it as a personal, individual favor to me, to let coca-cola alone. There are plenty of other things you can get at the soda fountains without drinking that which is injurious. The Lord does not want you to use any drug that creates an appetite for itself." Heber J. Grant "I have the statement on the examination of a capable chemist that cola drinks contain caffeine, the element that is so prevalent in coffee and other stimulants. There is one thing that I do know, however: this stimulating drink is not served in my home, and no matter where I am I personally avoid it." Joseph Fielding Smith "Caffeine is a drug. It is classed as a narcotic. Constant use of caffeine, whether in coffee, tea or soft drinks, can have only a dangerous effect upon the human system. "Studies even now are showing that coffee may be attacked as vigorously as tobacco now is when the scientists studying it assemble all their data." Church News editorial, April 25, 1970, p.16. the leaders of the Church have advised, and we do now specifically advise, against the use of any drink containing harmful habit-forming drugs under circumstances that would result in acquiring the habit. Any beverage that contains ingredients harmful to the body should be avoided.'" (Clifford J. Stratton, “Caffeine—The Subtle Addiction, ” Ensign, June 1988, 60; Priesthood Bulletin, Feb. 1972) In 1996 President Hinkley had the following conversation with Mike Wallace on 60 minutes: Wallace: Mormons adhere to a very strict health code. No alcohol, no tobacco, no coffee, no tea, not even caffeinated soft drinks? Hinkley: Right. Wallace: eat meat sparingly, exercise? Hinkley: Right. Wallace: get plenty of sleep. Hinkley: Right. It's wonderful! In a 1997 interview, David Ransom and President Hinkley had the following exchange: Ransom: But you do condemn so many things that are commonly accepted. For example no sex before marriage. No tobacco, no alcohol, no gambling not even coffee. Hinckley: Yeah that's right. Ransom: And very, very strict. Hinckley: That's wonderful. And you live longer. And you're happier. And you're healthier. Ransom: What's wonderful about not drinking coffee? Hinckley: Oh ah coffee has all kinds of caffeine in it. Interview with Larry King Live: Larry King: No to caffeine? Gordon B. Hinckley: No to caffeine, coffee and tea. "We have a Word of Wisdom that says if there's anything that's bad, we should avoid it. The Word of Wisdom doesn't mention arsenic, but we know to avoid that. We don't need to be commanded in all things." -Boyd K Packer “Two of the tests we can employ as we question the use of any food or beverage are: Is it wholesome? Is it prudent? As we know, some of us need more rest than others. These same principles imply that we should not tax our bodies beyond good judgment. Finally, remember that the Lord has counseled: 'For behold, it is not meet that I should command in all things; for he that is compelled in all things, the same is a slothful and not a wise servant; wherefore he receiveth no reward.' (D&C 58:26) “We know that cola drinks contain the drug caffeine. We know caffeine is not wholesome nor prudent for the use of our bodies. It is only sound judgment to conclude that cola drinks and any others that contain caffeine or other harmful ingredients should not be used.” (“Q&A: Questions and Answers, ” New Era, Oct. 1975, 34 NOTE: Scroll down to Bishop Peterson's question/answer section about cola drinks.) Elder Sterling W. Sill, Conference Report, April 1965, General Priesthood Meeting, p.88 And one of the most damaging sins and one that gives greatest strength to our death instinct is the violation of that great revelation given 132 years ago called the Word of Wisdom. Some violators of this law tend to excuse themselves because it appears to be such a small thing. It seems like just a little disobedience, a little caffeine a little nicotine, a little friendly indulgence in alcohol. Yet these are the springboards to disease, broken homes, immorality, disloyalty to God, physical death, and the death of many of our eternal interests. The pleasures of vice are mere illusions, tricks of the nervous system, and each time these tricks are played it is more and more difficult for the mind to tell the truth. Such deceptions come through drunkenness and narcoticism. In greater or less degree all nerve-affecting drugs produce it: nicotine, caffeine, opium, cocaine, and [all] the rest, strong or weak. Habitual use of any of these is a physical vice. A physical vice becomes a moral vice, and . . . to cultivate vice is o render our mind incapable of normal action. . . . One and all, these various drugs . . . tend to give the impression of a power or a pleasure . . . which we do not possess. . . . One and all their function is to force the nervous system to lie. One and all the result of their habitual use is to render the nervous system incapable of ever telling the truth. . . . Indulgence . . . destroys wisdom and virtue; it destroys faith and hope and love. . . . Whatever you do, count all the cost." (Elder Richard L. Evans, Conference Report, October 1969, Afternoon Meeting, p.66 - 67) Elder John H. Taylor, Conference Report, October 1940, Afternoon Meeting, p.37 We have the same proposition in relation to the Word of Wisdom. We know the fundamental truth of the Word of Wisdom is based on a truth that cannot be eliminated or removed by any type of argument or reason. For instance, in coffee we have caffeine that is harmful, yet we sometimes reason that the same thing that makes coffee objectionable may not be so objectionable when it is used in some other way. It just indicates that we have not proven the thing so thoroughly that we have been able to hold fast to that which is good and make it a part of our lives. Elder George F. Richards, Conference Report, October 1938, Afternoon Meeting, p.56 Some of our people quibble over the matter of tea and coffee, and say there is no mention of tea and coffee in the Word of Wisdom. I want to say to you that from the beginning of this Church, in the days of the Prophet Joseph, down to the present time, the leaders of this Church have interpreted that Word of Wisdom to include tea and coffee and all drinks that are habit-forming because of the caffeine and drugs they contain. We, as Latter-day Saints, who by our uplifted hands sustain the prophet in our day and time, President Grant, are under obligation to accept the interpretations that are made by him and by his predecessors [not to mention Gordon B. Hinckley and his interpretations that all Caffeine is bad) with respect to this matter. President Rudger Clawson, Conference Report, October 1935, Third Day—Morning Meeting, p.107 - 108 And in respect to these things that are pronounced as being evil, he does not tell us in the revelation why there is evil in them, but time has determined this question. Scientific men have told us that in tobacco there is a deadly poison, and in tea there is a poison called tannin, in coffee a poison called caffeine. And we know that such must be the case, because these forbidden things are really and substantially narcotics, and a narcotic is something that is habit-forming. The things that are good for us are not habit-forming. We can take them up or put them down, but these badhabits very often and in most cases become masters of men; the habit is greater and stronger it appears than the individual. Elder David A. Smith, Conference Report, April 1930, Afternoon Meeting, p.85 "Coffee and tea do more harm than good. Caffeine and tannic acid are the harmful agents in these beverages. Howard W. Hunter, The Teachings of Howard W. Hunter, edited by Clyde J. Williams, p.105 Live the spirit of the Word of Wisdom. We complicate the simplicity of the Word of Wisdom. The Lord said don't drink tea, coffee, or use tobacco or liquor and that admonition is simple. But we confuse it by asking if cola drinks are against the Word of Wisdom. The 89th Section of the Doctrine and Covenants doesn't say anything about cola drinks, but we ask questions that go beyond the simplicity of the lesson that has been taught. We know that caffeine is taken out of coffee and used as an ingredient of cola drinks. It seems to me that if we really want to live the spirit of the law we probably wouldn't partake of that which had been taken from what we were told not to drink. Improvement Era 1939 Cola drinks contain the drug, caffeine. For that reason, every argument used against coffee and tea, and some other arguments, may be used against cola drinks, and all other beverages containing caffeine, even in small amounts. They are determined habit formers, and may lead to the coffee and tea habit. They injure human health. The following cola drinks are specifically mentioned by the sources below listed, as containing caffeine: Braser, Bromo-Kola, Shero, Cleo-Cola, Coca-Cola, Dandy Cola, D. C. Cola, Double Cola, Dr. Pepper, LaVida Cola, Lime Cola concentrate, Par-T-Pak Cola, Pepsi-Cola, Royal Crown (R-C) Cola, Western Cola, Wynola. (By John a. Widtsoe) Whatever the source of caffeine may be, the physiological action of the drug is the same. (1944 John a. Widtsoe) While not causing paralysis or death, small regular doses of caffeine are a very big challenge to the body. For instance, caffeine causes stomach temperature to rise 10 to 15 degrees, makes the stomach more acidic, and years of over-acidity can lead to stomach ulcers. Caffeine causes the heart to beat faster, lungs to work harder, and the blood vessels leading to the brain to narrow, while increasing the body's metabolic rate. Studies show that caffeine consumption is related to increased bladder and stomach cancers, elevated blood pressure, aggravated diabetes, and damaged stomach lining. It's technically classified as a poison. The point...I couldn't care less if you drink caffeinated beverages or not. I myself drink them sometimes too. I admit it. That's all I want...if you drink them, just admit it...WofW = World of Warcraft...er whoops, I mean Word of "WISDOM"...and as the Lord said, it's not necessary that we be commanded in all things. You can still get a temple recommend, you won't be damned or lose the spirit any differently than you do for letting a little bird or crying baby distract you in sacrament like happened to President Kimball...just quit using false justifications that no leader has ever talked about it because they have...don't try to claim chocolate has caffeine, because it doesn't. Point out President Grant saying it wasn't a commandment, just a personal favor/recommendation, pass me another Rockstar and just plain admit to drinking Caffeine because we like it. :) You'll hear no judgment from me personally...but if you STILL remain in denial after all these quotes, there is no hope for you. Uh...bytheway, pass me a Rockstar even if you are still in denial...I use them at work on occasion when tired so I don't fall asleep on the phones ANYMORE! :) 3/15/2007 Joseph Smith Ordered Destruction of the Garments (& how the "magic underwear" myth began)So in the Myspace LDS group forums I debate in a lot, several people have asked me for details regarding what we know about Joseph ordering people to stop wearing garments and destroy them before he died, so here are the details on that and how the rumor got started about the "Magic Mormon Underwear" that supposedly protects us from physical harm AS WELL AS spiritual protection. I'll list most of the sources in case they also somehow relate to it...I'm sure a couple of them aren't applicable to the command to destroy the garments, but they relate to the garments situation somehow...it's been a while since I checked the sources Quinn listed: Joseph had given orders for members of the Quorum of the Anointed (if you don't know about the Q of Anointed, its an interesting deal in and of itself) to destroy their endowment garments. William Law's wife recounted how not too long afterward a mob had decreed some kind order that wherever they found endowment clothes, would mean death...so everyone began to tear up the garments, etc. There's even some affidavit on 20 June 1844 referring to this plan of the anti's to "take some of the head men of Smith's clan and hold them under bonds of death until Smith was delivered up to them." Sarah G Richards to Zina Huntington Young (though her full name should really be: Zina Diantha Huntington Jacobs Smith Young), 20 Sept. 1890, LDS Archives; History of the Church, 6:508; Andrew F Ehat, "Joseph Smith's Introduction of Temple Ordinances and the 1844 Mormon Succession Question," M.A. thesis, Brigham Young University, 1982, 103, 184; However, Joseph didn't just order the destruction of the garment in Illonois, Heber C. Kimball said Joseph sent word to the apostles on the east coast to destroy their garments too. Infact, this command was supposedly in the same letter that Joseph sent requesting the their immediate return to Navoo. Joseph wrote a letter to the President of the United States begging them to "save the innocent and oppressed from such horrid persecution." History of the Church, 6:519, refers to his letter to the Twelve, but apparently this letter is either lost or is still locked up in the secret sections of the Archives. Hyrum Smith's letter of 17 June 1844 21 Dec. 1845, in Smith, An Intimate Chronicle, 224 -Heber C Kimball referreed to Smith's instructions for the apostles on the East Coast to destroy their endowment Garments in his diary. Thus Joseph went to Carthage without any garments on. He told everyone else accompanying him to also remove their garments. Joseph F Smith later explained: "When Willard Richards was solicited to do the same [remove his garments], he declined, and it seems little less than marvelous that he was preserved without so much as a bullet piercing his garments." D&C 134:2 also explains that Richards went unharmed. This is where the rumor started that the garments SUPOSSEDLY protect you from physical harm too...though this is simply a traditional myth founded upon the true story of Willard Richards being the only one unharmed and superstitiously attributed to his being the only one who rebelled against the prophet's command and wore his garments anyway. Moral of the story of Willard Richards...apparently we believe that God will sometimes reward us for disobeying the prophet. :) Joseph F Smith statement in Heber J. Grant journal sheets, 7 June 1907, LDS archives; Zina Y Card and Lucy B Young statements in Oliver B Huntington diary, 22 Apr. 1897, Lee Library, quoted in Linda King Newell and Valeen Tippetts Avery, Mormon Enigma: Emma Hale Smith, 2d ed. (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1994), 189. William W Phelps added that "Joseph told him one day about that time, that he had laid aside his garment on account of the hot weather" (see Smith, An Intimate Chronicle, 224). Sure, it's possible Joseph had always intended the garment ban to be temporary...but a man can dream that MAYBE...just MAYBE Joseph intended to get rid of them all together and that they really AREN'T that "necessary" but were simply a teaching aid Joseph used. Perhaps one day we'll be rid of them again...at least we know they'll be useless after the resurrection...after all, according to Joseph, Moroni wasn't wearing garments (see Joseph Smith history 1:31). Ah well, until that day...here's to wearing them as I promised and hoping someday they'll be banned again for security purposes. :) 2/9/2007 One Third of the Hosts of HeavenI posted this as a new thread in one of the forums I'm often debating in...and thought it would make a great blog both to keep, and for those of you who are never in the forums with me, so here it is: |
So we read in the scriptures that one-third of the hosts of heaven in the premortal life were cast out for rebellion. Some people claim this means fractional 1/3 or 33% rebelled and were cast out (we'll look at the other interpretations in a minute). If this is so, one might ask the question how many people have ever lived on Earth since Adam. Taking varying Birth rates into account, etc estimates range from between 51 billion and 110 billion humans that have ever lived. 33% of 51 Billion would mean there are AT LEAST 17 BILLION "demons" on Earth. And that is given simply by estimating how many people have lived on Earth up to date....how many more people are still going to come and increase that number? If we estimate there have been 110 Billion people, that would mean there are about 37 Billion Demons. I read in a church publication once that one of the LDS leaders estimated 30 Billion Demons...though of course such an estimate/opinion is not part of canon. If there are between 17-37 Billion Demons on Earth, but only 6 Billion people alive right now...that leaves 2-6 demons per living person on Earth right now. Logic claims some of the people on Earth wouldn't NEED to be double-teamed by the demons because they're already "converted" to the demon's philosophy/way of live and thus more demons can be used to "double-team" the "better players" or those who are more difficult to convert to their ways. That's what we do in sports, right? Double team the best players our opponents have? Especially if your team outnumbers the other team by double or even by 600%! Now...my question is...why does everyone automatically assume Satan and the one-third are all stuck on this Earth? Doesn't God have other worlds according to LDS beliefs? Where in the scriptures does it say Satan and those demons are always HERE? Where does it say He's stuck on Earth? Now you must take into account if there really ARE other worlds...how many people have lived on them too, and if you take one-third of all of those worlds, how much higher is that from 17-37 Billion? Did it double? Triple? Wait...God has Billions of worlds with people on them? So you mean it Billion-a-plied? So there are now Trillions and trillions of Demons? So why does Satan love EARTH so much? Because we're the most special? Because the Savior was born here? Because we have the most righteous and thus the most opposition? If that's the case, then you're telling me that instead of having our even, fair share of 17-37 Billion demons, that they are "double teaming" Earth with even more than that because the other worlds aren't as special and didn't have the savior on them and this is the world where it's all at? Hmm...You don't say...oh wait...and why not put your best players on the ones that can make the biggest difference? Why not put more effort into "influencing" politicians, and leaders, etc. Instead of having the average 2-6 on a leader, put 12 or 20 on them! After all, they're the ones who make things happen that can control and influence the rest of society! Wow, if the one-third thing were actually true that way, it would be overwhelming...no wonder I feel tired so often and like to sleep in! Yes, yes, I know the scriptures aren't specific about what it means by one-third. Some interpret it to mean one of three groups and not 33%...I just couldn't resist posting the above statistics out for my own entertainment. :) Nevertheless, for those of you that like to argue and will say the whole "IT'S not 33%...so and so said it one of three groups, or at least the scriptures don't specify" (reread that and add funny sounding self-righteous know-it-all whiny-sound in for correct context)...yes yes, we've basically ALL heard the whole "one of three groups" interpretation, so let us also debate what the three groups were. We are told by Brigham Young there were NO FENCE-SITTERS in the war in heaven...everyone was either proactively FOR God's presented plan, or proactively for Satan's plan...there was no neutral. I am curious then...if no fence-sitters or neutral positions...what were the three groups divided into? (this was my original intent for the post...I just enjoyed writing the part about how there could be Billions and Billions of Demons here if not trillions according to traditional interpretations of the war in heaven... :) 1/25/2007 Free AWESOME RCF potential & also FREE International LDI emailed this to my family, and a couple friends and I thought some of you who read my blog would be interested in this as well...read it, understand the applications and then decide for yourself if it's something you could use. It's FREE after all.
Free Remote Call Forwarding Basically you can get a free phone # with free Remote Call Forwarding as it's called. Only this service is really cool...it will allow you always keep the same phone # no matter where you move to, etc because it just always forwards to whatever # you tell it to forward to. Or you can use it to give people, or businesses this RCF phone # if necessary and then just cancel it later or if they start spam calling you, while your friends still have your real direct # that never has to change. Also, you can use this site to have a single # call you at all your different phones all at once. So if you dialed my RCF # it would ring my Cell phone, Misty's Cell phone, our home phone, and maybe my work phone all at the same time, and I can choose which one I want to talk to you on. Or I could switch in the middle of the conversation from my cell phone back to the home phone so I'm not burning my minutes anymore...and then switch back to my cell phone on my way out the door to go shopping while I'm still talking to you. I can also have it automatically record the entire conversation if I wanted. I could also tell it to be the voicemail service for ALL my phone lines so I don't have voicemail on several different lines. Still all for free. You can also pick up the call, tell it to send the call to voicemail, and listen in to the message they leave...if you decide you actually want to speak with them NOW, you can pretend it was an answering machine and pretend you just picked up the phone by pressing the * key and start talking to them then. There are so many possibilities! Maybe you'll create a new special # for just special people so it will ring all your phones so they can always find you and you'll know it's them because all the phones start ringing. You can also change the ring on the phone so the person calling you hears music or a message you create in MP3 format instead of a ring. So much customization, it's great. Whether you want it as a temporary # to give to people (whether priority/family/etc or for stalkers you don't want to know your real #) or businesses you don't want to have your REAL phone # either and want just a temporary # that's easy to change, or for someone you don't want to be able to track you down....or whether you want a one in all solution to all your phones, this is a great option especially since it's free, and they claim it will ALWAYS be free. I think I am going to start using it. I began testing it today. I am thinking of setting up a new phone # so I can get voicemails from customers without them having my real cell phone #, etc so it will work out for me that way at the very least (that and they'll no longer hear my voicemail saying "You've reached the SPRINT voicemail box" when they are calling me as a Qwest employee to order Qwest products. :) The website to sign up for your free Remote Call Forwarding # is this: http://www.grandcentral.com/ You can check out their FAQ's for more info. EDIT: I forgot to point out that you can also use this so that it's no longer long distance for someone to call you. Just set up a number in the area of the person you want to be able to call you LOCALLY and have that # forward to your phone # for free. :)
How to get FREE INTERNATIONAL CALLS: Point #2 is how to get unlimited FREE international calls. For those of you who will be calling missionaries for Mother's Day, or who have friends/family out in the Military or just out of the country...now you can call them for free (assuming you have a cellphone or home phone that doesn't have to pay for Long distance to Iowa) for unlimited amounts of time due to a cool new law. Here's how it works... This site: http://www.allfreecalls.net/ (supposedly there are other sites/access #s that work too, but I haven't checked them out) explains what you have to do...so basically you follow these steps: 1: Dial 712-858-8094. 2: Listen to the instructions in Mandarin, Spanish, English. 3: At the prompt, enter 011, the country code you are calling and the number you wish to call. Enjoy your free call! For those of you still hesitant about this...here is an article that explains how it works and how the new law allows free International LD. http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/01/12/complicated-laws-free-calls/ http://saunderslog.com/2006/10/11/whats-with-the-712-area-code/ Hopefully someone here will get some good use out of this like me. p.s. I applied for a manager position at Qwest today (fingers crossed), not that I EXPECT to get the job this time around, but it would be great. Even if I don't, one of the corporate trainers said he'd vote for me to get the new Corporate Trainer position and he already recommended me to the head guy. That might be better anyway. :) p.p.s. Got in an accident today. My buddy was driving his car, slammed on his breaks to miss hitting an ambulance running the red light, and the guy behind us admitted he was too busy looking at the ambulance, didn't see us, and plastered into us before he knew it. We're fine (I was looking backward because I knew it was coming, and got slight whip-lash that only lasted 5-10 minutes), but we missed a lot of work waiting for the stupid cop who apparently did a "NO FAULT" decission...not sure how he determined that one, but whatever. Add another to the list of reasons every cop I've met outside of friends has been an idiot... 1/10/2007 Working for Qwest - Part II have had several people ask me about my new job at Qwest, why I wanted to go work there in first place, what it's like and most recently what's up with this whole "New/Temporary promotion" I got here recently. I am so happy at work these last couple months and absolutely LOVE what I do so much I just couldn't keep myself from writing about it as if I was compelled to do so. I like it even more than I ever thought and actually look forward to going to work every day so far this Winter. I even had extra paid-time-off scheduled in December that I canceled because I actually WANTED to go to work. I know, I'm crazy! Let me explain a few things in this blog first that led me to go to Qwest in the first place, and then we'll get to the rest in PART II... Hard to Beat My History of Good Jobs Previous Call Center Experience w/Convergy's SALES How I Became Interested in Qwest Suddenly I read in the Newspaper that Qwest's phone job pays $10/hr (less than I was making) PLUS commission. they said this ends up being a goal of about an extra $2/hr. Not bad I guess, but then I saw that they said several of the management positions will be upwards of $40K-$60K/yr Salary, not including their commissions/payouts. WOW...considering the Cost of Living in Logan, UT that is pretty dang GOOD, and doesn't even take their commission pay into account?!?! I was drooling now...a Telecommunications company that I could work for my whole life and still absolutely love my job and keep learning. Plus, even a basic supervisor position with Qwest paid more than a manager position at Convergys so it could actually become a career. Even if I did get promoted at Convergys, it still wouldn't feel like I was going anywhere with my life because I'd still be getting paid nearly nothing even if I moved up to upper management, but with less opportunity for trades and time off...but with Qwest, it would be worth it for me to go up and be promoted! I REALLY wanted to wait another 6 months so I could get my pension...but if I stood a chance at getting a manager position for a telecommunications company then it'd be worth it to lose my pension. Nobody at Convergy's actually knew ANY details, and everyone was too paranoid to talk about "The Q-Word" so I decided to go interview with Qwest myself and find out the truth...I couldn't stand not knowing the details any longer! What Qwest Told Me Convergys Tries to Keep Me So I left Convergys to work for Qwest...went through the 3 month full-time training and then switched my schedule to part-time so I could finish college at the same time. To Be Continued , where I'll explain about my temporary promotion for December and January, and why I really LOVE this job so much (Especially This Temporary Promotion as a "New Hire Training S.M.E. [Subject Matter Expert]")...9/24/2006 Wayward children and Kingdom ProgressionI posted this on my myspace blog here: http://blog.myspace.com/jonrcarver but since many of you don't have a myspace account I am posting it here too.
In January of 2005 I wrote an essay about Wayward children and Kingdom Progression and emailed it out to a limited number of family and friends. In Elder's Quorum a few weeks ago this subject came up, and after my comments, I had several people ask me about it after church saying that to their knowledge as a church, we didn't have a clue what any of these quotes really meant and they wished there was clarification. I have decided now to revise my essay A LITTLE (taking out a few parts so it's not QUITE as long as it used to be, and making a few clarifications as to what I originally meant, even though it may not hold with my updated interpretation/understanding in full) and repost it as a blog here now to see if anybody else has some insights on the matter. Keep in mind that since the time I wrote this originally, I have learned more and altered my understanding to some degree. Nevertheless I will post it mostly the way I understood it back then (believing everything a prophet said was automatically doctrine as opposed to now where I believe that often they express their opinions too, which may not necessarily be official doctrine...ie adam-god, blood-atonement, some blacks & the priesthood statements, etc). 7/17/2006 3 Degrees of Glory in the Celestial Kingdom?D&C 131: 1 In the celestial glory there are three heavens or degrees; 2 And in order to obtain the highest, a man must enter into this order of the priesthood [meaning the new and everlasting covenant of marriage]; 3 And if he does not, he cannot obtain it. 4 He may enter into the other, but that is the end of his kingdom; he cannot have an increase. Traditional Mormon thought pictures the Celestial Kingdom like a globe divided in three parts with the top being Exaltation, the middle being degree 2 and the bottom being the lowest degree, or #3 like this: Exaltation -------- #2 -------- #3 Here is an alternative look at the scriptures: We know that the Celestial Kingdom has three seperate heavens or degrees/glories. This scripture only talks of the "HIGHEST" but notice it doesnt actually mention a lowest in the singular form, let alone a "lowest" at all for that matter. It may be possible that the other two are equal with one another. WE are told here that in order to obtain the highest degree of glory one must enter into eternal marriage. Such a requirement is not made for the other two degrees within the Celestial Kingdom. It may well be that the other two are for single people in the Celestial Kingdom only. Speaking of those who are worthy of the Celestial Kingdom, yet unworthy of Exaltation, the Lord said this: D&C 132:17 For these angels did not abide my law; therefore, they cannot be enlarged, but remain separately and singly, without exaltation, in their saved condition, to all eternity; and from henceforth are not gods, but are angels of God forever and ever. Read the whole section. God is speaking of the Celestial Kingdom here, and "ANGELS" in the Celestial Kingdom who are not worthy of the highest degree. Notice the Lord said that all who are not worthy of exaltation in the Celestial Kingdom remain SEPERATELY AND SINGLY. How could they remain "seperate" if they are together in the same degree of glory? This leads us to conclude that perhaps if they are kept seperate and single that they are in different heavens/glories on the same level. Perhaps the women are seperated into one and the men into the other. It could look like this: EXALTATION ----------------------- FEMALE | MALE | One can thus see how exaltation is "the highest" degree of glory in the Celestial Kingdom, and how there are still two others below it that are equal, but keep the angels seperately and singly. This also explains the apparent typo in 131:4 that says he may enter into the other but that is the end of his kingdom. Notice how the word other is singular and not plural. It doesn't say he may enter into either of the OTHERS below it as if there more than one they could possibly get into. It is quite clear by saying the other singular you can enter into. This indicates it is not level 1, 2 and then 3. This hints that you are either in level Female or Male depending on your gender/sex Or option 2 is Exaltation. Are you an angel or a God? There is no middle level in the Celestial Kingdom. It's top or bottom, and the bottom has 2 sides, at least so far as the scriptures indicate. Questions? Comments? Insights? Would like some input on it. What flaws do you see in it? Strengths? 4/18/2006 DREAMS: Shoot Out - Save the Kids; Dillemma in the CIA; Trina's Family; Breathing Under WaterIt's been a while since I've updated my dream log. I easily forget them now that school started, but I do have a few I'd like to remember because many of my dreams are so realistic they almost feel like they were real memories.
4/18/06
Shoot Out - Save the Kids
I must be getting mature. Even in my dreams I am acting more mature. Last night (aka this morning), I dreamed I was with a group of people. I only really remember Misty, and there were a couple really small young children with us (I only remember that somehow they were related to me, maybe my inlaws).
We were walking in a parking lot next to a major road (behind us) in a major city. A siren could suddenly be heard, following which, a big truck or SUV sped by with a cop car following behind it. I did not see where the car went, but the cop car turned in to the parking lot we were walking in and sped around the line of parked cars just as we reached the store buildings. The cop car had cut off the SUV full of joy-riders. The vehicles stopped, and two cops pulled their guns and started screaming at people to drop their weapons, keep their hands where they can see them, and get on the ground, etc.
Suddenly the doors opened and countless men came jumping out of the SUV firing guns EVERYWHERE. Someone yelled "GET DOWN!" It might've even been me. I instantly tackled one of the children, covering him with my body to shield them from the shattering glass that was now falling all around us with bullets spraying everywhere too. It was so REAL, so intense. I am positive I literally had adrenaline flowing through my body even though I was actually asleep (after all, your limbic system cannot distinguish between imaginary/dreams and reality). Most of the people in the car were pretty big and muscular. I would say that about 3/4 of them were black. Most of those who ran were black, but plenty turned themselves in/didn't run. I personally knew some of the guys who didn't run.
Backup came, and they tracked down most of the gangsters in the surrounding stores. One cop down, and one gangster down. Normally in my dreams I am usually taking some sort of violent action in these situations by getting involved. In this scenario, my first reaction was to save the children because the other adults would be smart enough to get down by themselves and stay still while the children might not get down, or might not sheild themselves from the ensuing debris properly.
3/12/05
Dillemma in the CIA Brett lyman, me and others, had to attack, infiltrate and kill a renegade (evil) church millitia group like we were some sort of secret cia agents or something. If I remember right, we were the only ones who COULD possibly pull it off (maybe because they didn't see us as a threat and would overlook us). I had the first and one of the most important assignments in the mission. I had to run over to the right side of the building. There was a wall there where a row of snipers kept watch incase of an attack/infultration. They would take out countless numbers of people easy. There was a trampoline on the ground next to the wall (whether always there, or someone put it there for the mission, I don't know). I had to sneak/run/get over there, quickly jump on the trampoline, bounce up and slash a row of snipers throats (with a knife) so we could sneak in, which I did. After which we broke in and subdued the whole group one way or another.
Tara Mayhue found out somehow and was very disappointed in us. I didn't know what we should do. If the others in the group found out that she knew, they'd kill her to keep from being exposed. It was crucial to security. If I let her live, she'd probably expose us and we'd all be killed. I was in such a horrible position and didn't know what to do because the only options I had were to either let all of us die from being exposed, or let Tara die. I couldn't do either and it was literally tearing me apart. Luckily it was SOOO intense that I woke up and didn't have to deal with either alternative. It was a real nightmare, even though we were doing what was "RIGHT" and best.
3/??/06
Trina's Family
I was at Trina's house for some reason, I vaguely remember Misty being there with me. Trina was out getting things ready for her wedding with Trevor coming up soon. In the mean time I was just hanging out with her family for some reason as if we were all good old friends. Eventually Trina came home, and I ran up behind her and gave her a big hug. She SCREAMED and then saw it was me and gave me a big hug back. We haven't seen each other in a really long time, so it was really great to see her since I've always considered her one of my best friends even though right after that I went back to hanging out with the rest of her family and she went back to getting ready for her wedding as if me hanging out with her little brother, etc was completely normal and casual.
12/??/05
Fat Chipmunk Friend
I brought some big fat chipmunk (similar to the one Jeff had in his dream) into some store (after hours) in my backpack. I let him out, untied him and we became good friends.
11/19/05
Drug Lord Theft Stealing from some big drug lord or another to save my life from these gangsters.
9/21/05
Singing with the Stake President Another efy dream (at least some efy kids were there) stake pres had me come up and sing a hymn if French with him.
Breathing Under Water
Camping with Mo and Matt. We went snorkeling in some pool, jumped in with normal clothes on and started sinking after a while and almost drowned, when I realized my shoes were still on and dragging me to bottom. I tried to remove them ASAP, but eventually I couldn't hold my breath any longer and when I did have to breath in, I somehow breathed in air, I guess I realized in the dream that it was the snorkle above the water level, but that couldn't realistically be possible because I'd sunk too far. Oh well. The pool had all sorts of fish and stuff in it. 4/7/2006 The Meaning Behind HOW God Would Cease to be GodI joined a new LDS doctrinal forum/group recently (I've been really engaged in several LDS doctrinal forums recently, and thus my space has suffered because all my research and insights have been posted on forums instead of my space as of late), and wouldn't you know it...my reply for this new group was TOO BIG and they don't allow you to post twice in a row so I can't even finish posting the rest of my reply (spam protection I'm sure, but still lame) yet!
Anyway, there was a convo going on about Can God Not Do Certain Things? So I decided now would be as good a time as any to share a theory I developed on my own over the course of the last couple years or so, to help explain this. As the conversation went on, they innevitably began to talk about God's omnipotence, etc and how God can't do certain things or else He would cease to be God. I responded by both answering the original Question for the thread as well as presenting a logical way of HOW God Would Cease to be God and what that means. Here is my response:
I had a similar conversation with a Calvinist the other day as he claimed God is “infinite” in EVERYTHING including physically. I pointed out that you have to play semantics in order to make this true. Obviously God isn’t “infinitely” evil, or insane, or stupid, etc; but in order to be totally infinite, you’d have to claim that, otherwise he’s not “infinite”. In actuality, God is only “Infinite” in “finite” boundaries and limits. He’s “infinite” in love, and other character traits, but not in others, making Him essentially “finite” and thus destroying the Calvinistic doctrine of an “infinite God” leaving space for God to possibly even have a finite body (which WE in the church know he does have, though you could technically argue this with semantics as well).
I use this as an example to show that you can’t always deal in infinites/ultimatums even with God (“Only a Syth deals in absolutes!” -Sorry, couldn’t resist). See, God is all-powerful, but only when you play semantics and define what you mean by omnipotent. As the old point goes: “God can’t create a rock so big that even He can’t lift it”. Obviously God can’t do something like that that’s inconceivable, so if God can’t do something…then obviously he’s not “omnipotent” to the FULL extent of the meaning (perhaps this is an extreme/ridiculous answer for which better ones could be substituted, but my point is that there are inherently things that make it impossible to fully “omnipotent” unless you redefine the word with boundaries and limits, the same way you have to God being “infinite”)
It is all about what is your definition, or more appropriately, God’s definition of a word. For example, we used to think that endless and eternal punishment meant it goes on forever. The Lord Clarified this in the D&C by explaining that “eternal punishment” doesn’t mean it never ends, it simply means “God’s punishment” because He is endless and eternal, though the punishment does have an end to it. He said it that way in order for it to work upon our hearts the way it should…be “God-fearing” if you will. God is the ultimate psychologist/social engineer. He knew saying it that way would have a certain reaction upon us. Thus, your points are well met…God is Omnipotent, and he’s not, simultaneously. He can do anything, and yet He can’t. He could do something evil and against His “nature” and yet His nature won’t permit it, meaning He will never do it. He has the power to do so, but He won’t, and thus He is only limited by his own self-control (which is why we have certain commandments for us to practice self-control).
This post may be long, but I want to explain clearly why I believe the “can’t” issue is a self-control one by using reason and logic. I hope you don’t mind. I have pondered this a lot and prayed about it, and while I don’t believe I am fully correct in this theory, I believe a lot of this still is correct from the things I have learned and felt.
Let us start with Lucifer. We know that Satan has some power (though not nearly as strong as God). We know by Latter Day revelation that Satan has some form of “Priesthoods and powers” (Disclaimer before someone bites my head off: Although this is generally only talked about in the temple, I am free to say that here because the same verbiage can be found in old discourses, talks etc by early leaders and is publicly released knowledge as well, though rarely talked about). So, Satan has power, priesthoods, etc and is sometimes referred to as “The God of THIS world.” Well, does his authority, power and Priesthood come from God? When we talk about priesthood, we generally refer to the power/authority to act in God’s name, but that is not the only definition of priesthood. Satan does not act in God’s name, and even if he tried to, is anyone going to suggest that Satan uses His Priesthood for “Evil” and God submits to these demands of Satan to use His own power for Evil? That would suggest God is simultaneously both entirely Good & entirely Evil at the same time to use His own power to HELP Satan with His desires. I could go on with this, but we will move forward for now. The question must be asked…if Satan’s power is entirely independent of God (God allows it, but isn’t giving it to him or doing it for him), then that means “priesthood” or the powers of the Universe aren’t inherently in God either. We know that even “God uses Natural Means to accomplish His purposes”. Thus this power in the Universe must come from something/somewhere else because otherwise God is vicariously committing Evil through Satan by doing as He commands (when we do something with the priesthood, we say that miracle/act was done by God, not us…we were just the instrument, so in the same way, if all power is from God, then Satan is God’s instrument to do evil, and this cannot be, or He wouldn’t be God). I would like to be more clear and straightforward, but this is going to be too long already so I’m trying to be quick and short but still clear…maybe this should be a different thread (if that’s so, a mod will choose to separate it), but it will also be VERY relevant to this one when I finish explaining
OK, so that means that if Satan has his power from elsewhere, and god potentially does too…then we can assume that this power is learned. After all the Lord is VERY emphatic in the scriptures about knowledge being extremely important! Even Joseph Smith talked about how it will take some of us a LONG time after this life before we “learn” everything we need to in order to eventually become exalted. Thus reason claims that these powers are taught/learned. You LEARN how to become a God if you are worthy of the knowledge. We are being tested to see who will use this power for Good. If you pass, you go to the Celestial Kingdom (the Lord’s REAL university) to learn how to become a God. If you fail, you essentially cannot be fully trusted and are put in a prison more or less. A REALLY REALLY NICE prison, but lets face it, there’s no progression, there’s no escape, you can’t go anywhere or visit anywhere. It’s a prison for those who can’t be trusted to use the “Priesthood” powers in a “GOOD” or righteous way. That’s all. The Lord loves them, but He can’t trust them with all that power because they would wreak destruction or who knows what else could happen...the Lord just knows they wouldn’t obey Him, or they wouldn’t follow the laws completely, or accept truth and goodness to the full extent, and thus they are a liability.
OK, back to Lucifer…we know he was a “Son of the Morning” (notice it calls him “A” son of the morning, not “THE” Son of the Morning, indicating it is a title that others also held), which was a position or a title given to some of the GREATEST leaders in the premortal life. We know that at SOME point Lucifer was one of the best, most righteous and obedient children of our Father. We can reasonably assume that it was because of this, that the Father chose to TEACH him, and others certain powers. Obviously God is more powerful, and more efficient with this power, and more experienced and more knowledgeable so they could never match Him, but reason claims that it was from God that Lucifer learned his “Powers and Priesthoods”, after all, he was one of the most trusted spirits that ever existed at some point and held great power and prestige (he did convince a third group of heaven to LEAVE Their own Father…their God…that’s pretty influential and trusted). We can assume that Jesus and others (maybe Michael/Adam) were also taught this power and how to use it independently of God, if Satan learned how to use it independently of God.
So, we can logically assume that because Satan has power independently of God, then so do the other “Gods”, meaning those who have received their Celestial Diploma of Exaltation and graduated to “Godhood” which is basically a title of power, authority and respect. We know Adam, Noah, Abraham and others have entered into their exaltation (perhaps they were even quicker than most because they began their schooling before this life as a “Son of the Morning”…who knows).
This next paragraph is pure speculation of curiosity which I am not really sure of at all…but lets quickly consider this: God is all powerful, and casts Satan out of heaven for rebellion. We traditionally “assume” Satan was cast out to Earth, yet the Earth wasn’t created until AFTER the rebellion/war in heaven. Obviously he couldn’t be immediately confined to a non-existent Earth that was made out of scattered materials/debris. Later, when the Earth was formed, Satan came to the Earth, but reason claims he wasn’t there originally (because it wasn’t there by the time he was banished), and that God wouldn’t “intentionally” place such an evil raging spirit intent on destroying his children and plan. Considering this, it is illogical to think that if an astronaut went to the moon, that Satan or other demons couldn’t tempt them. Why did God not ban Satan to Pluto, or some other remote planet where he couldn’t do anything harmful to others or God if he really was confining him somewhere? We know Satan isn’t NECESSARY to the plan because if he wasn’t here it would be similar to those in the millennium who will still have trials etc, but no longer under a Telestial state because Satan has no power (yes, I know the theories and arguments about WHY he has no power, but the point is that even righteous people can be tried by God without Satan’s influence). MAYBE (ie, theory, you don’t have to convince me it’s not “official doctrine” I know that) Satan’s knowledge/power is enough to keep him out of confinement to SOME degree, or at least not make it worth the effort, especially since the plan can work even when he is here…after all, God will just take Satan’s influence (and our weaknesses) into account when we are judged anyway, so it essentially shouldn’t make too much of a difference when all things are factored into the equal judgment of a just God. As I said, ALL speculation.
Now, if any, some or most of this post is true, then that would mean that those who have learned to use this “priesthood/power” independent from God would in turn become a “God”. Satan knows some, and is referred to as “the GOD of this Earth” sometimes, though he is not an “Exalted” or true God of course. So if this power can be used for good or bad, it stands to reason that God would want to ensure that “Good” is always in power and more powerful than “evil” and thus part of the requirement for the mortality “test” to see who is worthy to learn it. Receiving a body isn’t ONLY for those who will become Gods because some who get a body won’t become Gods, and some like Satan have learned power, but don’t have bodies (Christ and Michael were also considered as “Gods” before they came to Earth for example, even though they weren’t exalted yet with physical bodies). Thus gaining a body serves the purpose of becoming more LIKE GOD because he has one, but you apparently don’t need one in order to gain the Godly powers typically associated with being a “God”. That is why we are here, to see WHO is worthy to go to the Lord’s university to eventually join the “council of Gods” that Abraham hints at.
After understanding all of that, we will SOON reach the POINT of how God would cease to be God. If there are other Gods, and they are all exalted beings equal in status and power with our Father (whether they be His children, or His brothers or His Father, or otherwise), then it stands to reason this “Council of Gods” has decided that it is necessary to keep the powers of “evil” weak. In order to ensure this, the children of the Gods are tested and tried, then judged (we’re in the middle of this stage). Those who “pass” are taught to become Gods and learn the powers, ensuring that only “good people” become Gods, and thus Evil is rare and weak and easily dealt with. Good will ALWAYS be stronger than evil because #1 there are more good people with the Priesthood powers, and the evil people never or rarely learn/get it (though who knows if that was ALWAYS the case eons ago…after all, Satan has it, and he doesn’t appear to be “confined” but who knows). #2 Evil is selfish and divided, while Good will always be loving and united and there is great power in being united!
Here it is: Thus, if God did something uncharacteristic of an exalted God…if God did something “evil” or took shortcuts to not fully test His children, or who knows what else…then He would cease to be God because the council of Gods would combine against Him to remove Him from “Godhood” in the sense we think of it. God wouldn’t cease to exist…intelligences cannot be made nor unmade. He would lose the status of Godhood. That is what it must mean that “God would cease to be God”. It’s like saying that if you went out and murdered hundreds of people in cold blood, you would cease to be an LDS member. You’d be excommunicated, etc but you wouldn’t cease to be (or at least not until after your trial in some states). He is fully empowered to make such a choice, or do such an action that would cause Him to cease to be God, but He won’t do it because of His nature, personality, etc. He has been this way for potential eons. If his personality has not turned by now…by the time he’s become a God, then it likely won’t ever change because of who He is.
As I said at the beginning, the answer is simultaneously yes AND no. God is empowered to do something that would stop him from being God. We see through reason what that likely means, and how that would happen (what, you thought He would just disappear in a puff of smoke?). We also see that because of His tests, trials, judgment and personality that He “CAN’T” do some things because his personality won’t let him, and in that since it’s a “can’t” in other senses the “can’t” is a consequential can’t as in God “can’t” be evil OR ELSE he’d cease to be God. It all depends on how you twist the semantics as to what you mean by “can’t” because there are several ways God “can’t” do something. Some are inherent, some are a consequential can’t, etc. But the important thing is that God has self-control, and thus is SELF-LIMITING. He is good and loving and if at anytime He or any other exalted “God” ceased to abide by the laws of “Good” they would cease to be God through enforcement of the consequences laid down by the “Council of Gods” who will always be stronger united than any evil which will be eternally selfish and divided.
Again, sorry it was so long, I am VERY detail oriented…but I’m sure you just figured that out. As long as it was engaging and helpful to someone I’ll be happy, even if it’s not complete. I know there are flaws in some of what was said in the theory, but there is some truth in it too. Anyone want to refine or add other insight to the topic?
Obviuosly many of you will disagree with a lot of what I said (I'm ok with that...as I already said, even I don't think it's all true/right), others will agree, and others will pull the whole "it doesn't matter to my salvation" CARD which is a big pet-peeve of mine since the Lord TELLS us to seek out the Mysteries of the Kingdom, most of which don't "matter to our salvation" but that's another topic. Anyway, let me know what you think or feel about that. 3/22/2006 God's DebrisI eventually plan to make a list of my favorite books on here (which will look something similar to the books I have listed on my myspace.com profile HERE, along with short explanations as to why I consider them my favorite books. I recently finished reading the book God's Debris by Scott Adams (the creator of the Dilbert cartoons, though this book isn't funny and isn't anything like Dilbert), and I guarantee that this book is going to be on my list of all time favorite books. If you have never read it, I would HIGHLY recommend it...at least if you are into philosphy, metaphysics, religion, etc like I am (grr...my lousy obsession/addiction).
Of course I don't agree with EVERYTHING in the book, but then again, neither does the author agree with everything in the book. He says: The story’s central character has a view about God that you’ve probably never heard before. If you think you would be offended by a fictional character’s untraditional view of
God, please don’t read this. The opinions and philosophies expressed by the characters are not my own, except by coincidence in a few spots not worth mentioning. Please don’t write me with passionate explanations of why my views are wrong. You won’t discover my opinions by reading my fiction. Nevertheless the book is an amazing work of art, using logic, etc to come to a conclusion on life, the universe and EVERYTHING (oh wait, wrong book)...I only have SERIOUS objections to a couple parts of the book...namely that of God blowing Himself up (hence the God's DEBRIS) and we're all pieces/debris of God trying to come back together (though he uses some great logic and explanations to support this explanation, it just doesn't work with revealed truth. Other than that, I don't have any serious objections to the book, though plenty of them are up for debate and etc which I would LOVE to discuss with anyone else who reads the book. Make sure you read the ENTIRE book, including the introduction, etc. Too lazy or cheap to buy the book yourself? No problem!!! HERE IS A FREE COPY of the book in PDF format provided by the author himself (my brother found a link to it from the author's own blog). Personally, I bought the book, and plan to buy the sequel! If you're looking for a good intellectually stimulating book, then READ IT! It's really short, only 132 pages.
He is DEAD on with the whole "Genuine belief" stuff (in my eyes). He makes some interesting points about Free will, evolution, ESP, Holy Lands, Relationships and many other things!
Personally, I think I am somewhere on the borderline of the 3rd level of awareness (I think you HAVE TO be 2nd or 3rd level in order to be LDS) and fourth level of awareness. I'm not sure you can be totally fourth level and still claim to be a Mormon, hence why I'll always remain borderline on the third level, though most of the fourth level applies to me (I don't believe some of the stuff in the 5th level, though I agree with some of it to a degree). Some of you in the second level of awareness will HATE this book with a passion. Not that one level is ANY better than the others. As the book points out, most of the best leaders that have ever existed were always in the 2nd level of awareness! It's almost an essential attribute.
The author says this about it as well: When it first came out in hardcover, booksellers couldn’t decide if it was fiction or nonfiction. Was it philosophy or religion? It’s a religion/science book written by a cartoonist, using hypnosis techniques in the writing. It’s a thought experiment. It’s unlike anything you’ve ever read. How do you sell something that can’t be explained?
It is so true...read it yourself to understand what I'm talking about (sorry if parts were too cryptic)! If you want to discuss it, feel free to comment, or email me or whatever! Who cares if you agree with what the old man in the book says or not...I certainly disagree with some things, but keep an open mind and debate about them when you're done! I could hardly set the book down! Definitely going on my favorite books list! Anyone who's read this already know of any similar books?
3/4/2006 "SPORE" - The Coolest Game Ever imagined!There is a game that I am dying to get a hold on. It is not Unreal Tournament 2007 (although I am excited for that one too). It is a game called "Spore". If you've never heard of it prepare to start drooling...It is based on the idea of evolution, but it is SOOOO much more than that. You start out as a micro-organism, and as you grow, you reproduce and then you get to choose how your guy mutates over time. You earn credits and you spend them toward various things including putting extra credits toward a brain that will eventually lead your creature to become sentient. This game downloads new info from other players and uses their designs/mutations to help create variety on your game. No, it's not an MMORPG, and nothing is done real-time between players (that I'm aware of). It simply transmits data to an online database that will disseminate them to the universes of players around the world.
You also get to edit/create buildings, and make cities, conduct war on other civilations, or diplomacy. Build vehicles, weapons, anything. You can buy your guys things, or invent things yourself. You can do land cities, or water cities. It nearly has unlimited possibilities. It encorporates 2D and 3D game play as well as FPS and RTS type modes. As you get advanced enough you can create an air vehicle called a UFO. You can get lots of abilities for this, abduct creatures, steal things or even go to different planets, different solar systems, different galaxies eventually as you buy technology for different drives like the interstellar drive. You can meet Alien civilizations and try to communicate to them with sound/music. You can blow up their entire planet if they are hostile (assuming you learned the technology). You can create Hybrids of different creatures. You can take uninhabitable planets and manipulate them to be be inhabitable by making volcanoes and other things to create an atmosphere, etc etc. I'm telling you that the possibilities are virtually endless. You can change the skeleton structure of your creatures in ANY WAY you want! You can make a carebear(they actually made one), or a smurf, or a wacked out spider, or a monster, or anything you can think of. It isn't entirely computer generated creatures etc either. Almost EVERYTHING you see in the game was at some point created by another player and the game populates worlds with these creatures. There are potentially millions and millions of planets of life created by other players available to explore.
At this point you can simply play out any science-fiction dream you want any way you want. It has black holes, supernovas, I mean you name it! This is definitely a game worth buying! You start out as a tiny little micro-organism in an FPS style and make your way into something exciting. Then it becomes an RTS style game and you slowly become civilized, etc. This game is just TOO amazing! If you want to read more about it I'd recommend checking out THIS LINK. If you'd rather WATCH the demonstration for yourself (which I HIGHLY HIGHLY recommend) then you can check it out on Google Video HERE! The video demonstration is simply AMAZING! Be sure to watch the whole thing when you have time. You will be amazed at this game! Now for the bad news...it probably won't be released until 4th quarter of this year! GRR!!! I am dying to get my hands on this game! Watch the DEMO and understand...
2/20/2006 Update! Original Hebrew Definitions Support: God Dividing the Light from the Darkness = The War in HeavenThis is a continuation of my last blog about How God Divided the Light from the Darkness Before Creating the Sun, Moon and Stars...
OK, since the time I first developed this theory I have now reviewed all the original ancient Hebrew words from this chapter and their meanings. The meanings of key words will be explained with the verses. Literal translations of the verses in question will be presented, and afterward we will dissect certain individual words and their other meanings/definitions. You can simply use these verses to refer to as I talk about them:
Gen1:3-5 3. And said,
4. And saw
OK, so those are the verses in question. Now the Hebrew word for light that was used in Verses 3-5 can also be translated to mean happiness or even morning. The word divided means separate, distinguish differ, select, etc. The word darkness in these verses can also be translated to mean misery, destruction, death, ignorance, sorrow, & wickedness. So we could just as easily translate those verses as saying: “God divided happiness from wickedness.” Or that God divided the happy/good spirits from those who were wicked, and ignorant (and now sorrowful for being cast out of God’s presence for rebellion). He was keeping their misery and destruction of God’s kingdom separate from those who would be happy by following God. The “DARK” spirits were “death” and thus suffered spiritual death from God.
On top of that, the word Day comes from an unused root meaning to be hot. It is sometimes used figuratively and it’s possible uses are as follows: age, + always, + chronicles, continually (-ance), daily, ([birth-], each, to) day, (now a, two) days (agone), + elder, X end, + evening, + (for) ever (-lasting, -more), X full, life, as (so) long as (...live), (even) now, + old, + outlived, + perpetually, presently, + remaineth, X required, season, X since, space, then, (process of) time, + as at other times, + in trouble, weather, (as) when, (a, the, within a) while (that), X whole (+ age), (full) year (-ly), + younger
The word Night on the other hand means properly a twist (away of the light), i.e. night; and is sometimes translated as adversity
Think about that, God called the good spirits a never ending Chronicle, a birth, full of life; and the wicked, miserable, destructive, ignorant spirits he called adversity, or twisted (away from the light. Lucifer twisted the minds of one third part of the hosts of heaven to turn away from the light and become adversity to God’s plan. The words fit quite well with this theory.
OK, so on to verse 14 and 15. The word for light or lights in verse 14 and the first light in 15 is an ENTIRELY DIFFIERENT word than that used in verses 3-5. I can’t do the weird symbols, but as best as can be managed in ASCII characters, the word for light in verses 3-5 was ‘or while the word in 14 and 15 is me’oroth. The difference is that the one in 14 and 15 specifically means properly a luminous body or luminary, i.e. (abstractly) light (as an element); figuratively brightness, i.e. cheerfulness; specifically a chandelier. Now the last light mentioned in verse 15 is an entirely different word from the previous two words also, it is hair and it means to be (causatively make) luminous (literally and metaphorically) also sometimes translated as X break of day, glorious, kindle, (be, en-, give, show) light (-en, -ened), set on fire, shine. I find it interesting that the Hebrew Bible uses 3 different words for light between these few verses, especially when the one in question can so easily be taken to mean happiness while the others are obviously talking about real light. Why did God not use the Hebrew word hair in verses 3-5 to make it clear He was talking about REAL light like he did in verses 15? Why would He intentionally leave a difference? Perhaps it is because verses 3-5 are REALLY talking about the war in heaven, while 14 and 15 are actually talking about the element of light.
According to this theory, there is nothing scientifically wrong with the whole light/darkness issue. I mean there is no contradiction. Both verse 4 and verse 14 are talking about entirely different events. God did not create light twice, or create light before a light source. Those verses don’t contradict themselves (of course how the Sun was created AFTER the Earth, and after plant life upon the Earth, though BEFORE mammal life is still a scientific problem if you are a creation LITERALIST).
Anyway, of course this is only food for thought. It could easily be wrong, and I have thought of many ways to dispute my own claims from the other side. However, I thought I would share this side of the argument because I think it warrants more consideration and research. What do ya think?
2/13/2006 How God Divided the Light from the Darkness Before Creating the Sun, Moon and Stars...So I'm fairly active in certain forums on many topics. Some of my favorites are regarding religion, especially religion in relation to science, metaphysics and philosophy. One topic I have been thinking about lately deals with the argument that according to the creatiion accounts (at least if taken literally) God created light and darkness chronologically before he even created the Sun, moon or other stars (compare Genesis 1 Verse 4 & 14). Scientifically this doesn't appear to be possible, though there are theories/arguments that twist it to say that the light came from the light of Christ etc. Of course this still does not answer many other details of the matter.
I personally came up with my own theory. I believe it is talking about the premortal life "War in Heaven". The passage: "God said let there be light" could POSSIBLY be referring to having spirit children. Let me explain: For instance, we know that some of the greatest spirits were called "Son of the Morning" (yes Lucifer used to hold this title, but so did OTHERS, plural; besides prophetic statements claiming Lucifer was not the ONLY Son of the Morning, you can simply use common sense by noticing that the scripture says he was "A Son of the Morning", and not "THE Son of the Morning" implying that there were others.) which also explains why God would call "the light Day and the darkness he called Night" as the word "Morning" is associated with "Day" time. This means at one time Lucifer was a son of Light, a major leader in God's cause before he fell.
Also take special notice that in Gen. 1 verse 5 the words "Day" and "Night" are capitalized, but they aren't in the other verses that mention day or night, even the same words later in that same verse are not capitalized. This random capitalization is not RANDOM at all, it is in all three counts of the creation (Genesis, Moses and Abraham). Day and Night are intentionally capitalized when it mentions that God seperated the light from the darkness. You see, the act of following God is "light and truth" while going against Him is darkness and evil by definition. Thus dividing the light from the darkness is referring to dividing those who are loyal from those who are rebelling. Dividing the Light/Day (like TRUE/LOYAL sons of the Morning) from the dark/night (those who have FALLEN from God's grace). This is why the light and darkness were seperated before He even created the sun, moon and stars(other suns) to give off any light to divide. The verse is speaking somewhat metaphorically between the light and dark spirits/countenances. This also explains why it is the FIRST thing to happen in the creation account. The war happened right after the plans were presented, but before any action on the creation actually took place. Since the casting out of Satan happened before the creation, it is only right that it should be mentioned first. (Random thought...if Satan was cast out before the Earth/creation was completed, where did he go if there was no Earth yet?)
According to this theory, there is nothing scientifically wrong with the whole light/darkness issue. I mean there is no contradiction. Both verse 4 and verse 14 are talking about entirely different events. God did not create light twice, nor do those verses contradict themselves (of course how the Sun was created AFTER the Earth, and after plant life upon the Earth, though BEFORE mammal life is still a scientific problem if you are a creation LITERALIST).
I'd love to hear your comments on the matter.
 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License. 1/23/2006 Possible Compromise in the Abortion Debate Due to Biotechnology?Disclaimer: Though I came up with the idea on my own, I am not necessarily advocating it, nor does this imply on which side of the debate I stand. I am leaving my personal opinions out of this blog entry...well, besides the last comment about how I hate patents at the end...
I am taking a class on Ethics in Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering. Technically we have 2 PhD professors teaching the class. One in Philosophy, one in ADVS or Biology or something. ANYWAY, a debate was brought up about the never ending abortion ethics in class the other day. You have the Pro-life view and the Pro-choice views. Neither is willing to bend for the other at all because it seems impossible to compromise.
I came up with a good compromise on my own though. Technology has advanced to the point where we are already raising animals with human organs (mainly pigs since they are the most similar to humans), and we have machines that can do extraordinary things too. Why not allow the pro-choicers to have their way to let the women decide they don't want a fetus/embryo in them, and let the pro-lifers also have their way by "TRANSFERRING" (transplanting) the fetus/embryo/baby (whatever you want to call it) to another woman, an animal or a machine (similar to what they have been working on to make cloning possible without having to have a mother)? Everybody wins.
Yes, there are details to work out with the placenta, and uterus size, and all sorts of things. Would they keep pigs pregnant and then make a switch on the pregnancy with a pig? Would they use the original mother's placenta, or the new/surrogate mother's placenta? Taking it out and keeping it alive for long enough (possibly hours or even days) to do a transfer would definitely not be a problem (though we won't discuss possible methods for it in here). Anyway, there are a lot of methods/technical matters to work out on the issue, but I'm sure the debate would switch more toward "psychological effects" on the child when he finds out he was born by a pig, or a machine...a surrogate mother would not be as bad, but still...interesting things to think about and all of it is already quite possible, and may even happen sometime (though possibly in another country) in order to compromise between the two major sides of the abortion debate.
Just remember, if it ever does happen. . . you heard about it first from me! :) Maybe I should "Patent the idea and make millions! (just kidding, I HATE the whole idea of patents with a PASSION because they are hurting innovation more than helping it...but that's a different subject)
Jon Carver This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License. 1/20/2006 What did Ham do to Noah to make him curse Ham's son Canaan?Before my mission, I never really thought about the question, "What did Ham do to Noah?" or "Why did Noah Curse Canaan, Ham's son?" During one conversation on the O.T. I had a companion go off about all the messed up (and in some cases vulgar) things that are in the Old Testament. He said the one that disgusted him the most was how Ham went in the tent, saw his father naked and then afterward Noah "knew what his son had DONE to him." My companion claimed it was OBVIOUS that Ham had done some homosexual act with his father while Noah was passed out drunk and naked because he had "DONE SOMETHING" to Noah. I had never considered what this meant before, but fairly accepted it for a short period of time until I started to think for myself.
I began to doubt this comment/interpretation, instead guessing at things so many other people have similarly speculated on about the subject. A few examples include:
Proverbs 6:16,19
"These six things doth the LORD hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him:...A false witness that speaketh lies, and he that SOWETH DISCORD AMONG BROTHEREN." This may indicate that Ham was mocking Noah and by tearing him down, he might make people lose respect for Noah and his authority and thus "soweth discord among brethren" by gossipping which according to proverbs is one of the 7 abominations (not that proverbs is 100% trustworthy as "doctrine" by any means). If Noah lost their respect, and lost his authority over the people then they may lose respect for the God he worshipped and who put Noah in charge. It may have even lifted Ham up in the eyes of the people for exposing this. Obviously Ham didn't respect his father, and may have even lost respect for God. If Ham gained power, he may have led the people down the wrong path. Same thing works in politics today. release a scandal, or destroy respect in someone or demean or humiliate them enough, expose their weaknesses and people will stop trusting and respecting their authority (Bush for example?), and sometimes turn to someone else. Politicians use this method in virtually EVERY government. Maybe Ham started the first written attempt.
Another goes off about how Ham tried to steal the "Garment" that was made for Adam, and passed down through Generations to Noah which symbolized the birthright, thus trying to steal the birthright, and thus noah cursed him to show that he would not get that birthright or patriarchal priesthood, etc.
There are other "theories" out there, but the gossip one was the most "believable" for years. I recently came across a series of verses that could easily link the situation to another different but even MORE VILE option.
"The man who lies with his father’s wife has uncovered his father’s
nakedness…" (Leviticus 20:11)(Lev 18:8)(Lev 20:20?21)(Ezek 22:10) --check the rest of these verses as they relate to it too.
These verses MAY indicate that Ham "uncovered Noah's nakedness" by either sleeping with Noah's wife, or since the verse mainly says Ham "SAW the nakedness of his father" it could mean he simply looked at his wife, or it could mean "saw" in the sense people sometimes use it to say something like "he's seeing a prostitute regularly" or something, as in 'Ham saw Noah's wife, in a sexual context while Noah was passed out. Heck maybe his wife was even drunk with Noah and didn't know what she was really doing. Even if it was Ham's Mom, I mean incest wasn't exactly "BAD" back then (as you didn't have many other choices), and in some cases was NECESSARY. However, there are indications adultery was still bad, and this would indicate Ham committed adultery with his father's wife, thus "uncovering Noah's nakedness" which would understandably make Noah FURIOUS and Ham would deserve a curse! As to WHY Noah would curse Ham's son Canaan instead of Ham, you'll have to see one of my previous posts that kind of explain that (as it had to do with what the curse really was). One theory behind why Noah cursed Canaan is because perhaps Canaan was the child born to Ham and Noah's wife from the adulterous act.
Another interpretation claims that it was actually Ham's son, "Canaan" who sinned, but that his father Ham discovered what had happened and thus "saw" his Father's nakedness. Ham could've held that against Noah from there, or done something else. Either way, eventually Noah found out, the curse came, not for seeing a naked man, but for what Ham had done unto him. Maybe Ham even conspired with Canaan to try to undermine Noah's authority or something. There are arguments for both of these theories, including the fact that not all of Ham's children were cursed, only Canaan was cursed which indicates that he either had something to do with it, or was actually conceived by an adulterous act.
We may never know the full TRUTH to the matter, but these last theories (though interesting) still have some explaining to do. For instance, is it saying that Shem and Japeth covered Noah's wife, or Noah and his wife, or is it talking metaphorically like Leviticus saying that they tried to fix the situation somehow?
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License. 1/12/2006 The Carnival Cruise Ship SCAM; the Cruise; my Mexico dentist fiasco...Screwing Over Mo
We went on a cruise with Carnival's "The Paradise" cruise ship to Catalina Island and Ensinada, Mexico first week of January. The cruise was great, but Carnival wouldn't let Mo (Brian Mulholland) come because they told him he only needed his passport, and when trying to check in they said he needed his Green card (he's Canadian) because it's Carnival policy even though the USA doesn't require him to have it to get back in to the USA if he has his passport. So first they lied to him, then they punish him. No refund, no sorry, wouldn't even put him up in a hotel or anything while he waited for us to get back even when they admitted it was their fault. He called EVERYONE at Carnival including corporate, and they are all jerks. Admitting it's their fault, admitting it is only a policy and not the law (ie customs and imigration would have no problems letting Mo back in without his green card since he has a passport) and admitting the terms and conditions are not clear regarding alien residents because it singles out Canadians saying they only need passports. Several other agents told him his passport alone was good enough. In the end, after arguing at check-in, he even offered to have someone from an official government agency check the greencard in Utah, fax a copy to them and then overnight it to them to prove it's legit since they didn't need it for 4 days anyway, they'd have it in enough time, and if they didn't get it then he'd sign something promising they could fine him and even deport him. Nobody even tried to work with him. Carnival customer service sucks, and I hope people either don't use them or use them as a last resort. I know they're last resort for me after all the crap they pulled. I could write 5 pages on the situation and how messed up they are, but we'll leave that for our letters to the BBB and anyone else we can possibly complain to (especially when they admitted they made mistakes), and we'll move on in this blog for now...Read the last paragraph for More details on how Carnival is scamming people...
The Cruise
We left CA during the worst storm the Paradise has ever been in. A bunch of us tried to play miniature golf on the top deck in the wind and EXTREMELY rocking boat. It was NUTS! You'd hit the ball and it would roll back to you, or hit it while it rolls around everywhere till it gives you a hole-in-one. Often it would bounce and shoot off the track entirely (foul). It was weird to look back at the city lights and see the land sway up and down so exageratedly. We tried to see who could stand in place the longest, and it didn't last more than a few seconds up there. It was nuts, but fun (btw, motion sickness drugs are FREE on cruises...better and cheaper to prevent than to clean or risk having ruined/stained I'm sure they figure).
The TOOTH ACHE!!!
My tooth started hurting REALLY bad that night and I had to skip dinner and cry in bed. I can't describe the amount of pain I was in, it was excrutiating. At one point it was so bad I started to wish I could find a shotgun onboard to end my misery. The nurse gave me some ambesol, and pain medication (she said to take 3 pills every 4 hrs). They did nothing for me. I woke up in the morning and felt better. I found out Mo had a killer TOOTH ACHE too (he ended up getting a root-canal while we were in Mexico). We went Kaynooing, hiking and snorkeling. It was AWESOME! After the snorkeling my tooth started to KILL me again (US dentist that I just saw today said the cold water probably induced it to start hurting so bad again)! When we got back to the ship I went to the nurse again begging for any stronger drugs. She told me the same thing, to take 3 pills every 4 hrs. I told her I was taking 6 pills and basically doused my mouth in maximum strength ambesol and it's had no effect. She said I just had to suffer till we get to Mexico (btw, I begged to see one in Catelina, but they said there aren't any and I had to wait till Mexico).
Carnival Tried to Scam Me Too!
Carnival tried to charge me for 4 alcoholic drinks during "Happy Hour" at the bar. We called BS, and the lady wouldn't believe that neither Misty or I had ever drinken alcohol in our lives. She tried to convince Misty that I snuck out of bed at night while she was sleeping. Finally they checked the receipts to make sure I didn't sign them, and then gave us the money back. What a scam...Yeah, I was passed out that night alright...on a PAINFUL toothache! Come to think of it, it's a good thing alcohol didn't cross my mind, I was so DESPERATE for ANYTHING to reduce the pain that I might've been tempted..."One tequila, two tequila, three tequila, FLOOR!" Would've been a much nicer feeling I am sure...and by the time I woke up, I could see the dentist!
The Mexican Dentist
Anyway, I can't exagerate how painful this was, and by this time ALL of my top right teeth were COMPLETELY numb. I had no feeling in ANY of them besides the painful one (second to the back on the top right), though I wished for no feeling in it either. Woke up, went to the infirmary and I waited for Carnivals "Mexican Agent" who would take me to a Mexico Dentist. There were 7 people all going to the dentist. I was the only "Gringo" in the group of all foriegners (hispanic, arab, indian), and the agent dropped them all off at one place (which we found out later didn't have electricity, for some reason it was shut off) and took me to some "private dentist". Some Sergio guy who had all his equipment in his house. He pulled out my old filling, which hurt like I can't describe even though he'd numbed my gums all around it. He said it might be infected, sometimes when it's infected or swollen inside the tooth the anesthetic doesn't help the inside. Well it sure didn't help, the drilling out of the filling KILLED! He gave me a temp filling and said I'd still have to see another doctor in the US because he didn't have any XRAY stuff with him and I'd be gone before he could get everything he needed. The guy was AWESOME, I really like him and his wife, we talked for a long time. He only charged me $50 (I gave him $55 because he was so cool). They even personally drove me to the pharmacy for antibiotics and painkillers he prescribed, and then drove me back to the ship! He was actually born in CA, grew up mostly in Mexico and had a master's degree from Spain. I found out from the US Dentist I just saw that the temp filling he gave me was a high quality one that lasts 3 months and was developed for use on soldiers in war. The assistant said I was really brave going to a dentist in Mexico, I said I was desperate, not brave...and he turned out WAY awesome anyway. His English wasn't horrible, but it was lacking a little, but after teaching English as a secondary language for over 2 years, I knew how to communicate with him quite easily so we got along great and he understood me great too. It was actually kind of fun being in the suburbs, I walked around the house a bit, saw some scary homeless guys going through everyone's trash (hoping they wouldn't take too much notice of the out of place GRINGO!!!) and enjoyed myself before they took me back to the boat. My tooth didn't really "hurt" that bad since he fixed my tooth, but all my top right teeth were still numb.
Misty and I walked all around Ensida for several hours, even outside of the main city. I think all third world countries are extremely similar to each other (houses, laws, businesses, traffic, clothes, customs, etc) and it kind of reminded me of Haiti. Matt Flamm and I talked about it and laughed about how we both wanted to speak our other language to them all the time, and slipped every now and then (me replying to the Mexicans in Kreyol, and Matt in Tagalog). It was weird to see everyone in the same living conditions as I was used to in Haiti, but have none of them be black...
The US Dentist
Anyway, to sum it up my numb teeth started to feel a little more normal as of yesterday (1/11/06). I finally saw the US dentist today. Wiithout being TOO detailed (as is my nature), after reviewing the xrays and looking at my teeth, etc he said my teeth look entirely fine, normal and healthy and that they shouldn't actually be causing me any trouble. I explained a lot about Mo's toothache, and a couple other people in our group who had toothaches that went away. I told him my theories of what might be happening and we xrayed my sinuses and stuff too. Come to find out I do have a bunch of crap in my right sinus. My sinuses actually extend down into the roots of my teeth. He agrees entirely with my theories that the sinus was caused by my cold, and probably built up worse in California pinching off my front nerve which goes to the front right 5 teeth, causing them to go numb. The front part of the sinus has recided taking the pressure off of the front right nerve and that's why my front teeth started feeling less numb as of yesterday (though there is still a little there). There's another nerve in the back that hits the back two teeth (plus wisdom teeth if you have them, but mine were pulled already) and the sinus stuffing was mostly concentrated back there as we saw in the XRAY. Anyway, sorry, too many details, so to get down to it, we're gonna wait about 3 weeks now that my medication for the dog bite, and the mexico meds are done and see if the sinus comes back and causes the tooth to ache again (in which case he'll know forsure what we need to do and schedule me in right away), or if it goes away so he can see me completely normal (well, as normal as I get anyway). :) He told me to quit favoring my left side when eating and start using my mouth normal, chewing, eating, etc. because the temp filling should hold up to anything for 3 months and we want to see what happens. So basically. . . I'm weird and they still don't know EXACTLY what caused my problem on the cruise, but the dentist THINKS my theory is right. :) He said it's too bad he didn't have XRAYs from before the Mexico dentist took out the old filling because it might've just been a bad filling, or too tight/whatever so that the nasal swelling put too much pressure inside the tooth/tooth nerve, but now he doesn't know where or how the filling was set.
Summary of Carnival's Scamming Methods
Guess we'll find out. Remember, Carnival is on the bad list until SOMEONE there shows they actually CARE that they screwed over Mo and make it up to him. I mean there are tons of things they COULD have done. . . he just got married and this was essentially their honeymoon cruise, ruined everyone's vacation by screwing over the one guy who brought them 16 new customers (Mo organized the vacation for us and convinced us all to come with him), and then just gave him the boot with no compensation, and wouldn't even give him a place to stay or anything even though they own their own hotel at the docks that wasn't even full. Especially when there was no law prohibiting him, Customs and immigration would allow him to come in, and the big point is that their own agents told him he only needed a passport, and the T&C doesn't clarify it either. Nothing in any writing does. The only HINT at it ANYWHERE says "Alien residents need proper documentation and Canadians need a passport." That could be interpreted in MANY ways to imply that Mo, as a Canadian citizen, only needed a passport because it singled out Canadians. Why ELSE would it single out Canadians and not say instead, "alien residents need proper documentation AND passports" Or say "Alien residents need proper documentation and ALL foriegners need passports" If it applied to everyone? Obviously all foriegners needed passports, infact even Americans technically need passports because we're going into international waters and a foreign country. By singling out Canadians in that sentence it implies Canadian residents are fine with just a passport. Or are they saying that other alien residents only need a Green card, but Canadians need both and extra precautions because we don't trust Canada? Why would a Canadian resident need both but not a Haitian resident, or a Chinese resident? That's what the boarding guys basically tell us it means. What a ridiculous interpretation, especially when several other Agents told Mo he would ONLY need his passport. One guy told us he personally sees this same problem at least 5 times a month, and that is just how many HE sees in this one place and only during the hours he works and only for people that come to him. So Carnival screws foreign people over by making an unclarified policy (that even their own agents misinterpret) don't let them on the cruise, save all that money because it's one less person eating food, etc even though they paid for it all don't refund or compensate them or work with them to resolve the issues and then don't care to try to prevent it happening to other people even when we tried to get them to do something about it so others don't get screwed? Sounds like a SCAM to me! They even refuse to make any changes or educate their employees and sales agents on their own policies?!?! They don't want to tell their other agents this clarification because they want canadians or other foriegners to pay them money, then screw them over to steal it from them by not letting anyone know their own policies, even their own employees. They regularly screw over 5 people a month that ONE guy in ONE location sees. How many others get screwed at the same location when he's not working, or who talk to someone else besides him? There are multiple people working in that foriegn bording dept after all, and this guy doesn't work EVERY shift. There are MANY Carnival locations. People are paying hundreds or thousands of dollars per cruise. Carnival is SCAMMING people out of THOUSANDS and THOUSANDS of dollars PER MONTH! Some business. . . we're reporting them to BBB and every other complaint service till they do something about it...can you blame us?
Not to mention they tried to rip me off and charge me for 4 drinks at the bar. . . did they really think people wouldn't look at their charges? Scammers, liars, cheats...how do you think we should feel about Carnival now? How many other people were charged for things they never ordered and were too drunk to notice? Scam Scam Scam...I think I'll write up a special article on the Carnival Cruise scam and post it on Digg so Millions of people will read about them I'll probably title it something along the lines of "Ever wondered why cruises aren't losing money off you pigging out on unlimited food? --The Carnival Cruise SCAM" That'll get some attention...cruises seem like a GREAT deal. I mean our cruise only cost $295 if you got in early enough. That is a deal! Hotels cost much more than that for 5 days/4 nights plus your traveling between countries is paid, unlimited food, lots of free games, and toys and shows and everything. It is an AMAZING deal. . . lots of people eat more than $300 worth of food, so the food, hotel room and the traveling stuff alone is amazing! Well, we found out how they make their money. . . they SCAM people... Maybe they'll quit ignoring Mo and do something about it once we expose the horrible way they treated Mo...make his wife go on their honeymoon cruise without him, and not even care...jerks... They must be the "Price rite photo" of cruise companies...Digg is gonna love this article...
I hope Mo sues them. . . he's documented every phone call, and names and stuff so far, so he could. Maybe someone should file a class-action-lawsuit against Carnival to teach them a lesson for screwing over so many foreigners...To think. . . all we asked them for was to at least give him a place to stay while he waited for us, or to do something, ANYTHING to make it up to him, and they didn't nothing but give him the boot even though it's their fault. We gave them TONS of options, and the supervisor just walked away in the middle of the conversation with us talking professionally the whole time. Since they wouldn't be reasonable then, they can deal with publicity now and owe Mo a free cruise with his wife or something for screwing over their honeymoon before we forgive them...That's still not unreasonable. . . they ignore that and maybe they'll get a lawsuit or class-action lawsuit on their hands. It could so easily have been avoided if they knew the meaning of reasonable CUSTOMER service.
12/28/2005 What I GAVE for Christmas - How I Got Christmas Stitches as a Present From a Boxer (no, not the Mike Tyson kind)In the spirit of President Monson who said we should spend more effort asking about what people “GAVE” for Christmas instead of what they got, I’ll begin by saying that my brother Ben apparently really enjoyed the gift I gave him this Christmas. I bought a game where 2-4 people hold on to their own little metal joystick while a device in the middle plays music for random amounts of time. As soon as the music stops and it starts beeping and flashing you need to be the first one to press the button on the joystick. If you press it before the beeping and flashing, or if you aren’t the first one to press it after the beeping and flashing you get sent an electric shock! Apparently Ben played this game with his wife before telling her what happens when you lose. She screamed and declared I am only getting coal for Christmas next year! He was so excited he played it with several other people without telling them what happens.
My in-laws decided they wanted to get the family a dog for Christmas. Misty and I usually walk my parent’s dog, Chewie, to visit her family which only lives 6 blocks away. When we walked him up there Sunday afternoon, Chewie was greeted with a boxer that growled, snarled, barked and bit the air really mean while the kids pulled it away and kept it back. We decided to keep Chewie in the backyard while the boxer was inside. Come to find out, the Boxer had attacked the huge dog, they were babysitting, twice already (looks like a lab, but WAY bigger, weighs more than I do, and very gentle like it’s mixed with a ST-Bernard or something) and cut it’s right ear. We ended up taking Chewie home, and found out that the Boxer, “Duchess,” was really very nice, loving, kissy, cuddly and sweet around people…it was just really jealous of other dogs. I’d noticed it had been in a few fights before as it’s ears were scared/torn a little and it cowered and ran if you picked up a stick which showed it had been beaten by the previous owners. To shorten the story, Duchess attacked the huge dog again, which still had never fought back. Misty’s dad picked Duchess up off the ground by the back of the neck and threw her away from the big dog, yelling at it that if it wanted a home it better learn to cool down. Duchess cowered and looked ashamed. The next two times it came near the big dog, it was actually nice (we were standing by, ready to intervene) and just sniffed his butt. I followed the big dog around the house for a while to protect it since it kept refusing to protect itself. Duchess came walking up to it a third time, and I raised my fist like I did the last two times to show her she better be nice, but she ignored me this time and just suddenly went on an all out attack at the big dog’s throat. The big dog actually fought back this time, and Duchess wound up with a cut on the top of her head (the HUGE lab was dominating!). I can’t remember if I kicked Duchess or not, but everyone was screaming at her to stop while I was both screaming and punching Duchess as hard as I could right on the head. In all honesty, I am amazed I didn’t knock the thing unconscious because if I’d been punching a human even with boxing gloves on and had them face forward (let alone the back of the head), they would’ve gone down (I have experience boxing). I wound up and BAM! Nothing. Again, wound up and BAM! Even harder. Nothing, still fighting. I do it a third time just as the dogs raise their front legs in the air and move their heads. My arm is going to hard and too fast to redirect the blow. My forearm gets caught in the boxer’s strong jaws now that they shifted so quickly and she chews down hard while my arm is moving really powerfully downward. My flesh rips open, and I don’t notice yet because of the adrenaline and endorphins rushing through me. The boxer is apparently opening and shutting her jaw like a machine-gun more than trying to get a good clamp on something because my arm was out of there just as quickly as it was in there. I slam the boxer a couple more times while they start to circle while biting. My blows are getting softer, but it doesn't hit me as to why, just that they are. A few other people come over to help intervene. The big dog backs the boxer up against the sliding glass door and a lazyboy-type chair, and the kids pin the boxer against the door, while others pull the big dog away. Luckily the huge lab was unscathed. Luckily the boxer didn’t attack the kids who were pinning it (their hands didn’t get in the way of her mouth like mine did). It really does love humans. Suddenly people were asking me if I got bit. I looked at my arm and remembered that I did get bit. “Oh wow, she got me pretty good too.” At least 11 cuts/scrapes on my arm, most of them minor on the outside. I could feel my muscles on the inside were damaged more from being smashed by the strong jaws. Then everyone looked at the one deep cut and kept telling me I needed stitches for sure. We washed it with water, dried it, then poured Hydrogen-peroxide on it, which barely foamed at all (the dog wasn’t diseased, it was just jealous). It made Misty queasy to see such a deep cut on me (hehehe). My arm didn’t “hurt” AT ALL, and I kept arguing that I didn’t need stitches and I don’t have insurance so didn’t need a doctor. Being Christmas, the only place open was the emergency rooms (we called and checked). I argued that if I really did need stitches, I’d sew it up myself, not pay an emergency room several hundred dollars to sew me up with thread and a needle which any 10 yr old could do. Someone told me they’d numb my skin for me. I considered that…hmm, I hate needles so bad it might be nice to have everything numb. I gave in and said I’d bandage the cut in a way to press the wound together, and then go in to a doctor in the morning when it was cheaper. Misty’s dad decided Duchess wasn’t spending another minute in his house and took her to the van and drove her back to the previous owners. The dog was a law-suit waiting to happen. It can’t be around any other dogs, which means the kids couldn’t even take it on walks or anything, and my dog couldn’t come visit anymore either. Plus if someone else tried to intervene in a fight with another dog, who knows what might happen. I went home to my parent’s house and they wouldn’t hear of it (me going to a doctor in the morning). Emergency room it was! So we drove out there and it was PACKED! The nurse told me it was a minimum 2 hr wait (maybe longer if more severe cases came in). We said forget it, and left. My mom shaved off part of my arm hair, washed the cut with baby shampoo (some class she took told her it was the best for cleaning wounds since it didn’t have perfumes, etc in it), then put iodine on all the cuts and used butterfly bandages to pull both sides of my arm to close the gash till morning. I started feeling dizzy, and sick to my stomach, had a bad head-ache, etc. Went to bed, woke up, and still felt really sick. My arm also started to hurt a little (not the cuts, as much as the bruising from being smashed in the jaws of a strong dog). I went to a doctor who said I needed stitches but that we were on the borderline of that not being an option. Apparently after 12 hrs, chances of infection are too great to allow stitching. He debated for a few minutes and then said he was going to do it as long as I promised to carefully watch it for infection (apparently our methods of cleaning it and bandaging it how we did were good enough). Yada yada yada I got 4 stitches (needed 5 though). Cost me a total of $160 including the anti-biotics. One problem left, I’m supposed to get the stitches pulled out on the following Monday, but am leaving on Friday to drive out to California to go on a cruise which leaves Monday. I called the doctor back and he told me I should have the ship’s doctor pull out the stitches on Monday (I’ll probably cut them out myself), and I could only go snorkeling, etc if it wasn’t colored or textured weird by then, etc (aka not infected since it might be). Guess we’ll have to see. He told me douse it with Neosporin and keep it covered to make sure nothing can get to it, and told me we had to legally report the dog to animal control anytime a dog draws blood on a human for any reason. What a fun Christmas present! Personally, I don’t blame the dog (at least as long as I don’t get rabies or something). I was stupid enough to intervene in a dog fight. Then I was stupid enough to use my own arm to punch the dog to make it stop instead of using a stick or something. The dog is honestly GREAT as long as you will never walk it and it will never see another dog. Personally, I’m just happy the big HUGE 150 lbs lab actually stood up for itself and fought back this time!
Moral of the story: Don’t use your own appendages to intervene in a dog-fight…
(I'll try to add pictures later) 11/18/2005 Finally: Truth on Canaan vs Cainan - Change of scribes/spelling; Book of Abraham; Right of the Priesthood; Cush, Olmecs & Jaredites Were BlackPREFACE: For anyone who has been following my struggles with understanding the “Canaan/Cainan” spelling issue I finally have my official final answer. For anyone who has no idea why the different spelling of these names could make a difference read AT LEAST the first section of my blog entry entitled Part I – Cainan vs. preflood Canaan (Is Spelling Important?) that is found here for further explanation: http://spaces.msn.com/members/JonRCarver/Blog/cns!1p0gscyuZhyxMgfP3rzJeehA!621.entry It will basically explain that Moses Chapter 5 talks of the people of "Cainan" that come from Seth; and Moses Chapter 7 talks of the people of "Canaan" that are "cursed" (which traditionally is interpreted to be the same people as the seed of Cain since a few verses later mentions them also having black skin). So while both Chapter 5 and 7 spell Cainan/Canaan differently in the Book of Moses, the JST "Inspired Version" spell both names as "Cainan" and indicate that they are the same group of people. Which is right? After understanding this conflict, PLEASE read the following as I’ve done many hours of research since then and here is the final report on the Cainan/Canaan issue (the rest of the "Blacks and the Priesthood" issue will be covered in detail in another essay):
Change of scribes/spelling I just found out that Joseph switched scribes between Chapter 5 and 7. This is EXTREMELY relevant because John Whitmer wrote Chapter 5 and part of 6, then Emma Smith wrote part of 6, then they switched back to John Whitmer again to finish 6 and the first in chapter 7, then they switched to Oliver Cowdery for Chapter 7 and 8! This means that since there was no standardization of spelling back then that everyone spelled things differently as long as it was pronounced the same. Try reading anything written back in the 1830's, spelling is all mixed up between different writers. Joseph never dictated to the scribes how to spell things in the JST/Moses, so John Whitmer CHOSE to spell it Cainan, and Oliver Cowdery (an educated school teacher) chose to spell it Canaan (since that's how the Bible spelled the Name of Canaan he was familiar with, and since spelling didn’t matter back then. For instance, “Enoch” used to originally be spelled like 4 or more different ways even spelled differently from one verse to the next in the SAME chapter until they finally standardized the spelling).
The following shows who was scribe for what parts of the translation and shows that JST and Moses were based off the same manuscripts and by the same scribes: It appears that
the ORIGINAL Book of Moses that was first printed (no, our POGP does not have
the ORIGINAL Book of Moses in it) came from the first/original
transcribing. Joseph worked on and edited a few things after the
original transcribing. It is very complicated to explain the history of the
JST, but to summarize: the first translation was written on a manuscript
entitled "OT1" then a copy was made (OT2) and some changes were intentionally
added in by the scribe without Joseph's permission (the scribe thought they were
mistakes he was correcting on his own accord). Joseph continued adding to OT2
and gave new revelations and insights into the translation. He then went back
through OT1 and made some additions that were never made in OT2. We primarily
have OT2 stuff, and are missing some of the changes Joseph added into OT1, we
also have some of the accidental errors made between copying OT1 to OT2. That's
right, even today we have ERRORS in the pearl of great price version of the Book
of Moses that were written in by the scribe copying the texts (we didn't know
until recently when all manuscripts were released to the church). Anyway,
Joseph's son took both manuscripts and made changes the best he could to
incorporate OT1 and OT2 to have all the corrections he could to have it
standardized between all different versions as correctly as possible especially
now that spelling was standardized. LDS Church
leaders (realizing the JST version was "more correct" (as they said so
themselves) and updated by Joseph than the original Book of Moses in our POGP
that was taken from EARLY versions of the translation before Joseph Smith had
edited much of OT1 or OT2) then used the JST to update the Book of Moses in the
POGP to be consistent to SOME of the changes Joseph had intentionally made
(though we still left in several of the scribal errors and didn't add some of
the changes Joseph himself made still). Apparently someone didn't
notice (or find it important) that the spelling of "Canaan" in chapter 7 was
changed back to "Cainan" in order to agree with Chapter 5 since there is no
prior mention of a separate group. Whether this spelling change was made by
Joseph, or his son is not entirely clear, but regardless of who made the change,
the facts stand that spelling was not an issue because pronunciation was what
mattered especially since in Hebrew the two variants would have been spelled the
same anyway (as Hebrew doesn't have vowels), and thus in translation, the names
would've been spelled identically. The point is that even IF the names were two
different groups, the spelling should still have been the same according to
Hebrew translation/spelling. This proves that the spelling of the two variants
of Canaan/Cainan is entirely scribal, and why they were updated to both be
spelled "Cainan" in the released JST/inspired version. So
we see that the "people of Canaan" that were cursed in Moses chapter 7 are the
same "people of Cainan" in Chapter 5. This means that it was the
Seed of Seth (through Enos, through Cainan) that were "cursed" with a skin of
blackness in that chapter. Be it as it may that the "Seed of Cain"
may have also had black skin, no where in the scriptures does it tell us how or
when they got it, or that it was ever a curse. Book of
Abraham To add to the
point, Mormons “TRADITIONALLY believe that "Egyptus" came from the preflood
people of Cainan/Canaan “and thus the blood of the Canaanites was preserved in
the land” as Abraham 1:22 states. I must now mention that again
the spelling was done by yet another scribe, that of William W Phelps this time,
who chose his own way of spelling. Joseph had not yet reviewed the
Book of Abraham yet, as he had the Book of Moses, since it was not ever
completed. The Book of Abraham was supposed to be “more lengthy
than the Bible” and we know that at least at one point a group of saints sat and
listened while Joseph had Oliver Cowdery read from the Book of Abraham.
After he got tired, Thomas Marsh read. This lasted over two
hours of them reading portions of the Book of Abraham that hadn’t even been
translated and written down yet. The portion we have now only
takes about 30 minutes to read, so Joseph and others knew a lot more than what
we have recorded (in fact most of Joseph’s King Follett discourse supposedly
stems from things he read in the Book of Abraham that weren’t recorded).
Now if the Book of Abraham is supposed to be bigger than the Bible, then
it was one amazing book! The major point here is that the spelling
was done by a scribe (Phelps) who spelled things however he felt like spelling
them. Joseph had not corrected any spelling because the
book/manuscript was not complete yet (like the Book of Moses/JST was through
draft one already). Joseph was murdered before he ever had time to
finish translating it. Secondly, too
many people assume this whole “blood of the Canaanites” thing is talking about
preflood Cainanites, when in reality it is most likely speaking of Noah’s son’s
seed and has nothing to do with preflood people of Canaan (who were never called
“Canaanites” anyway). Reading through the verses carefully we see
that it is simply explaining that the “King of Egypt” was a descendant of Ham
through his Son Canaan. It says “thus the blood of the Canaanites
was preserved in the land” speaking of the blood of Canaan, the son of Ham, son
of Noah, not the Canaanites who were cursed and whose skin turned black.
People also use these verses to attempt to “prove” that Ham’s wife
Egyptus was from preflood Canaan and that SHE is carrying over some “curse” of
the people of preflood Canaan. It doesn’t even mention Egyptus for
any of this other than to say that HER DAUGHTER discovered Egypt.
Besides, if Egyptus WAS black, then ALL of her and Ham’s children
would’ve been black. Interestingly enough we know that ONLY their
son Cush had black decedents (Canaanites and all others were never even black)
but that’s a different issue for my in depth essay. Right of the
Priesthood People also
misunderstand the meaning behind “the right of the priesthood” as mentioned in
verse 27. It has nothing to do with “not being able to hold the
priesthood” as is commonly assumed based on the assumption that they were
already under some kind of curse leftover from the seed of Cain (which we have
shown is not the case). Without going into too much detail right
now, this is talking about the “right to PRESIDE” in the priesthood, meaning the
birthright which went to Abraham (verse 31), Isaac, Jacob, Joseph and then to
Ephraim. The priesthood never remained exclusively with Ephraim,
but the RIGHT to preside did. Noah gave it to Shem, and thus Ham
could not be the heir. It’s the same way Esau lost the right to
Jacob, Reuben lost it to Joseph. Technically Manasseh lost the
right of the priesthood when Joseph gave it to Ephraim. They
didn’t lose the right to be ordained to the priesthood, but the right to preside
as the presiding high priest in a patriarchal order. The scripture
only states that Pharaoh could not have the “right of the priesthood” but that
his successors would try to claim that right from Noah (it seems Canaan through
Ham was the rightful heir, but Noah decided to give it to Shem instead because
of what Ham did. This is why Noah said he cursed Canaan when Ham
did what he did. Canaan didn’t do anything wrong, but the
birthright would’ve gone to Canaan through Ham, so Noah gave it to Shem instead
which indirectly curses Canaan by making him lose the birthright).
Joseph Smith used the same terminology when appointing his father as
Patriarch: “Blessed of the Lord is my father, for he (JS Sr.) shall stand in
the midst of his posterity and be comforted by their blessings when he is old
and bowed down with years, and shall be called a prince over them, and shall be
numbered among those who hold the right of the Patriarchal
Priesthood, even the keys of that ministry.”
Same thing for Hyrum Smith when he appointed later, only this time being
used by the Lord in D&C 107:91: “Hyrum may take the office of Priesthood
and Patriarch, which was appointed unto him by his father, by blessing and
also by RIGHT;” One more really
important thing to note on the “curse” on Canaan is to compare that curse in
Genesis 9:25-26 with what Isaac says to Jacob in Genesis 27:29 and realize that
it is basically the exact same thing, and probably not really a curse at all
like too many people assume. Esau received the same “curse” as
Canaan did. Isaac and Noah both promised lordship to one son, and
servitude to the other. There was no issue regarding who could
hold the priesthood or not, the issue at hand was who would be the rightful heir
to the patriarchal order that allowed only one lineage. Even
though the “curse” is the same on Esau as it was on Canaan, nobody assumes that
Esau’s seed was black or that they couldn’t hold the priesthood.
It is obvious that is not the issue. It doesn’t get too
much clearer than that. Cush, Olmecs
& Jaredites Were Black So we see that it
was a part of the seed of Seth who were the preflood Canaanites; that this
“curse” was not carried over by Egyptus, because those verses were not talking
about her at all, and they weren’t even talking about preflood Canaan
either! They were talking about Ham’s son Canaan and telling us
that this was how the curse of Noah on Canaan (Genesis 9) would be preserved
(what that “curse” from Noah actually was will be addressed in my essay
too). We can probably assume that Cain’s seed were all destroyed
in the flood, though it is POSSIBLE that Ham’s son Cush married a descendant of
Cain or one of the preflood Canaanites to preserve black skin (since Cush’s seed
were black according to all knowledgeable scholars, both LDS and non-LDS – even
our Bible dictionary points out that it was the seed of CUSH who were
black). If this is the case, it is interesting that the scriptures
do not ever mention them as being “cursed” in any way. It is
possible Cush’s skin became black another way since we know at least three other
groups of people were given black skin (preflood Canaanites, seed of Cain, and
Lamanites) for three different reasons, so why not Cush getting it for their own
reasons that we don’t have records for?
While we’re talking about Cush, I’ll mention briefly that
the Jadeites came from a city of Cushites. Since in those days the
people stayed with their tribal ancestry/race, they were probably black since
they were Cushites. This is also in harmony with overwhelming
amounts of ancient American history/archeology (especially paintings/drawings
etc) that shows the Olmecs were black and had Negroid noses, lips and many other
typically “black” features. Mormon scholars profess the Olmecs, as
the first major civilization on the Americas to be the Jaredites, and guess
what? They were all black! That’s right, the brother
of Jared was from Cush, and he was black, and the Book of Ether points out VERY
obviously that he was not “cursed” for having black skin or being descended from
anyone who was cursed with black skin. This means if Cush married
someone from Cain’s seed, then apparently they weren’t really cursed at all,
just despised by racist whites (some things never change). If Cush
married a preflood Canaanite to preserve black skin then that means their seed
didn’t have any “priesthood curse” either. If the seed of Cush got
their black skin some other way, then it still proves that black skin is not any
kind of curse because the brother of Jared and other Jaredites didn’t have any
kind of restrictions on them from God, did they? Anyway, not all
the people of Cush went with the Jaredites obviously. But they did
at least settle Africa (even the Bible dictionary mentions they settled Eastern
Africa and Southern Arabia), and like it or not, Jaredites and black Africans
are still from the same race (Black Africans did not come from Ham’s son Canaan,
the post-flood Canaanites were WHITE), that of Cush. This means
that if Jaredites didn’t have a curse on them, Africans wouldn’t have a curse
either. Both Gordon B Hinckley and David O. McKay separately have
pointed out that there was never a “doctrine” about blacks being “cursed” to not
have the priesthood and that it was simply a policy enforced by the church due
to personal interpretations of the scriptures in the past and not a restriction
imposed by God, so I don’t know why everyone still assumes it was ever a
“doctrine.” Anyway, this entry is not meant to go into high detail
about proving there was never a curse on blacks (that is the point of my essay
in progress that I’ve been working on for years and spent hundreds of hours
researching) so I will mention one more thing, and then we will move on. Many
scholars now assume that the Lamanites got their dark/black skin by mixing with
leftover refugees from the Jaredite peoples. The Nephites and Lamanites began
adopting Jaredite names and customs. I don't have much time to go into it in
TOO much detail right now, but search for Jaredite names in Nephite culture.
This also helps explain the whole DNA issues going on too. This is a whole blog
in and of itself, but suffice it to say that there is STRONG evidence that
leftover refugees from the Jaredites mixed in with the people (ask me personally
for details if you want them). Obviously they were no longer called "Jaredites"
just as defecters from Nephites were no longer called "Nephites" because they
abandonned their nation. FAIR, and Jeff Lindsey and others use this to point out that this is also why Ether was able to say all the "JAREDITES" were killed in the same way all the "Nephites" were killed. Though in reality neither group was TECHNICALLY entirely wiped out, the Nephites had defectors that went over to the robbers/Lamanites and were no longer "Nephites" and thus the Nephites were all the destroyed. The same thing happened to the Jaredites, some defected and thus were no longer part of the "Jaredite" nation, so all those who considered themselves Jaredites did die, just as all those who considered themselves Nephites died, even though there really were Nephites that lived on mixed in with the Lamanites and robbers. Anyway, moving on for now because we don't have time
for this argument and it's not critical, just interesting. Conclusion: The
preflood people of Canaan who were “cursed” in Moses 7 are the same people as
that in Moses 5 (ie the seed of Seth). Post-flood Canaanites were
never restricted from holding the priesthood, they simply did not hold THE RIGHT
to the patriarchal priesthood, or birthright priesthood. If
anything, it is most likely that blacks come from Cush, which is also who the
Jaredites were from which means there was never any real priesthood curse on the
black race. There was never a doctrine keeping blacks from holding
the priesthood, it was a policy enforced from a misinterpretation of the
scriptures (it is known that Joseph Smith personally approved at least 2 black
men to the priesthood (Elijah Abel and Walker Lewis), and at least a third one
in New York received the priesthood by a missionary during Joseph Smith’s
lifetime). The rest of these issues, and issues that have not yet
been addressed, will be covered in more detail in my extended and documented
essay. Until then, here are a couple pictures of the two Black men
Joseph personally approved to receive the
priesthood: I can be contacted here: Jon
Carver This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License.
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