While there are definitely positives to this:

Johnson sees the trend as an opportunity for more Americans to embrace diversity. More children are going to be exposed to a more diverse group of classmates, and that will affect attitudes and outlook.

I see it as quite concerning. It means we’re leaving an important segment of the population behind. With increased education family sizes tend to decrease and with smaller family sizes the standard of living increases. While it would appear that white people have gotten the message, it would seem that with a little more than one quarter of the population producing more than half of the babies our neighbors didn’t. While this may prompt the next generation to be more comfortable with and embracing of diversity, it will likely continue the trend of impoverished minorities.

Unfortunately the solution isn’t easy. This isn’t as simple as increasing educational budgets in impoverished areas. We need more education grants and scholarship for minorities, especially minority women. Standards for comprehensive sexual education need to be improved and standardized, especially in areas where it would be least popular. Also exemptions that allow pharmacists to refuse to fill prescriptions due to religious objections, such as Catholic objections to contraceptives, need to be removed.

While better education and access to contraceptives would help, it needs to go deeper. Shifts in theology are needed, Black Liberation Theology will need to take on pro-education and pro-family planning as major tenants, especially since that’s the real way to empower minorities, and Catholics really need to drop their anti-contraception dogma, fast.

Lower birth rates are good for everybody, not just white people, but to get the job done, as much as I hate to say it, we need the help of religion.

If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.

During an interview with the National Conservative Examiner, Manny said “God’s words first … obey God’s law first before considering the laws of man.” He went on to say “God only expects man and woman to be together and to be legally married, only if they so are in love with each other. It should not be of the same sex so as to adulterate the altar of matrimony, like in the days of Sodom and Gomorrah of Old.”

I guess Manny forgot Deuteronomy 22:28–29 when talking about only men and women who are in love should marry:

If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and rapes her and they are discovered, he shall pay the girl’s father fifty shekels of silver. He must marry the girl, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives.

After this interview Manny was even banned from The Grove shopping center in LA since the owner thought Manny’s presence could cause a furor during a scheduled TV interview that was later held at one of his houses in L.A. instead. Granted, Manny later apologize a bit during that interview, saying he has a gay relative. Guess that makes it better since that would make him half gay by blood on his mothers side? At lease it seems he does not want to follow his book completely because he is not in favor of killing gay people… just denying them rights, saying: “I’m against same-sex marriage, but I’m not condemning you. My favorite verse is ‘Love one another as you love yourself. Love your neighbor.’ So I love everybody!”

Why can’t the LGBT community have the exact same rights as their hetero counterparts? They should have the same opportunity to be married and miserable as every straight couple out there. Mowing the grass, cleaning the toilets, changing diapers, paying mortgages – just like any other couple that is married.

India Fights Back
The Allahabad High Court of India is finally putting the kibosh on unauthorized, un-registered and un-qualified people from practicing modern medicine. This coming from a country that has been known for their woo of all kinds in recent years is great news. People who are “qualified” under non-scientific types of “medicine” such as Homeopathy, Unani, Ayurveda, Siddha, Tibbi, and others have been determined to not be doctors. They are to be arrested for attempting to practice modern medicine like prescribing drugs and carrying out surgery. The court even went so far as to seal the nursing homes that are operated under those non-scientific auspices.

Thankfully, the court is taking on the evil practice of “sex determination” as well. That is, a simple ultrasound test that leads often to abortion of female babies. Mandatory inspections of clinics is being fast tracked since a compliance report is to be submitted to the court by July 13, 2012. People found in these inspections that are to be delt with sternly – what ever that means. The quacks would also be open to prosecution, having their clinics closed, and medical equipment confiscated.

This is by far the best news that I’ve seen come out of India in a long while.

We Need More of This!

Pic-O-Tha-Day

~Wesley

Feel free to email me or add me on Google+

Dreams of vengeance can sure be sweet.

(Via Pharyngula)

While it seems that most people are in favor of this move, I’m curious how the money is going to work. Most European countries with state churches fund the church through taxes. Since Norway will now be treating all faiths equally, does that mean they all get money or none do? I hope its the latter.

It’s kind of ironic that while people clamor to tear down the wall of separation in the world’s oldest secular democracy, they’re building up the wall in an old “Christian” democracy.

(Kind of via Pharyngula)

I’d thought about quitting, but I like smoking. I like the way it feels, the sensation of it, and I find it to be a very satisfying and enjoyable habit (weather permitting). A few months ago several friends switched from smoking to “vaping.” To explain, vaping is the term for the use of electronic cigarettes. While “analog” cigarettes involve smoke and tar, the electronic variety deliver nicotine via water vapor. Smoking has been banned in many places (restaurants, bars, even parks) due to the health risks of second hand smoke, the staining it can cause, and the foul odor, but water vapor is harmless and odorless so vaping is legal and acceptable just about anywhere, even if it does get you interesting questions.

I tried my friends’ e-cigarettes a few times, but didn’t find them satisfying, but I was getting more and more curious about them and saw a news article (which I can’t find) which prompted a little more research. I’ll cover the data (myths, facts, limited research) a bit more in the future, but it’s pretty limited. However, electronic cigarettes tend to cost about half as much as regular cigarettes, even with the low taxes in Idaho, once you’ve recouped the initial hardware investment (takes at most a month) and without the dozens of carcinogens that are byproducts of cigarettes they have to be healthier. So I decided to do an experiment.

Two weeks ago today, I decided to give it a one week try. To make it easier, I bought a pack of Camel 99′s and a Lotus e-cigarette, but the Camels would have to last me the whole week. The Lotus didn’t last long, but even the first full day I only smoked 5 cigarettes. I also started to like it, even compared to cigarettes. It helped that I came down with a cold at the same time and the feel of the vapor was kind of soothing on my throat and provided a very clear contrast to smoke. The Lotus is disposable and I really don’t like the idea of the amount of waste involved so I then got the Cig2o starter kit. Rechargeable batteries are a big improvement and at first I enjoyed the flavor, much closer to a cigarette than the Lotus. Unfortunately the batteries would only last through at most half of the day and it was hard to tell when the disposable cartomizers (cartridges) were running out. The flavor and quantity of vapor also isn’t very consistent, with both starting good, but ending pretty weak, but over all I thoroughly enjoyed the Cig2o for most of the last two weeks.

It took 5 days to finish the pack of cigarettes and I had to force myself to choke down the last few, but to be honest I did bum two smokes last week. Its amazing how fast I stopped liking regular cigarettes. I also now find the smell of cigarette smoke to be unpleasant and the taste of the e-cigarettes are definitely getting stronger. I think it’s safe to say that my sense of smell (and associated sense of taste) is already starting to recover.

Yesterday I went to Vapoligy, a local store and online retailer that’s been in the electronic cigarette business since 1997, and I bought the Riva kit, tried six or so flavors, and left with two different Niqids (their preferred term for nicotine liquid, aka juice). Their staff is very helpful, they carry and service high quality equipment, and they mix their own high quality Niquid. Just a week ago I wouldn’t have enjoyed the “Smooth Raspberry” but found it to be quite pleasant. The person there who was helping me (I wish I remembered her name) has found that it’s quite common for people’s tastes to change drastically after a few days or weeks with a strong move away from the tobacco flavors. The other Niquid I purchased was the “Executive Cigar”, which is a surprisingly nice simulation of the flavor of a pretty standard class A cigar and I’ve found that it pairs well with beer and coffee.

I have more research to do, but considering that there is no smoke and tar, that it doesn’t make an ashy mess, and that it’s significantly cheaper, it’s a wonderful alternative to smoking.  I have to say, it’s about time that science and technology have finally spilled over to tobacco.

This will be continued with some of the myth, fact, and research I’ve already come across on the topic of e-cigarettes.

The archaeologists found chizzeled / carved / painted into the wall of a house what you might call a cheat-sheet or crib-notes on how to read the Mayan lunar calendar. While the end of 2012 is seen as the end of a cycle on their clock, it seems to show the years ahead are are almost uncountable and numbering in the octillians. (Octillion 10^27 or 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000).

Since the Mayans based a lot of their rituals around the calendar, it makes sense that priests or other important people would have the “formulas” written down for ease of use. These findings will also be published in the June issue of National Geographic. Keep an eye out for it to get more details. And, don’t forget to RSVP for 2013.

121 MegaPixels of Greatness
I found this on Gizmodo a couple days ago and I just needed to share it with you. Russia’s latest weather satellite, the Electro-L is capable of taking extremely massive photos of the earth. It can combine three visible light wavelengths and one infrared to make beautiful and exceptionally detailed photos that you need to look at this second. Why are you still reading this? GO look! Oh, I haven’t given the links yet. My bad. Here is a link to a zoomable photo. If that one doesn’t work, use this link: http://planet–earth.ca.

Penny Arcade

~Wesley
Feel free to email me or add me on Google+

Invariably theologians and pastors alike resort to metaphors. One that is currently popular (or at least was a few years ago) is to look at the trinity like the three states of water: solid, liquid, and gas. It’s all the same substance, but in each state it is functionally completely different than in the other states. The inherent weakness of this metaphor is that water does not typically exist in all three states simultaneously and in any circumstance where it could it would be highly unstable, which brings us to the “metaphor” that I think fits better.

The Christian god is crazy. To be specific, he suffers from dissociate personality disorder (aka multiple personalities) and he’s also a bit of a sociopath. This shouldn’t be surprising since an eternity of loneliness before starting to create the universe a few thousand years ago would be enough to drive even the most divine among us insane. Add on top of that all the senseless killing. To directly wipe out all but a few members of the species on one occasion and destroy two cities on another, then to order mass genocide on countless occasions would be quite psychologically damaging. That’s not even taking into account all the plagues and tests of his “chosen” people.

It’s no wonder that he finally reached the point where he felt the need to commit suicide. Unfortunately to do it he had to take human form and the final straw that broke the last shred of sanity in his feeble mind was raping his own teenage mother. That one event was just too much to bear, so to cope, it required splitting off the part of his mind that viewed her as mom from the rest and to make sure it never happened again, he created another personality to interact with the earth so he wouldn’t have to put us in harms way.

Oh, and the whole salvation thing, it’s just a cover for the suicide attempt. Much less embarrassing and shifts all the blame.