Clipmarks | jimbo1000's clips

very good simulation game

Sat, 06 Sep 2008 21:43:51 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: I am not really into games but this one looks great. watch the video demo at the end.

Clip Source: www.dailygalaxy.com

An Intelligent Simulation Game Darwin Would Have Loved to Play

We're totally psyched about SPORE, the long-awaited video game released this week.

SPORE is a simulation game created by Will Wright (The SIMs) and EA that allows players to control various life forms from the cellular to the galactic level. It's an epic journey that takes you from the origin and evolution of life through the development of civilization and technology and eventually all the way into the deepest reaches of outer space.

Wright explained

that because of the scientific theories it is based it is in fact an elaborate philosophy tool. "You walk away thinking about the meaning of life," he said. "How did we get here?"

SPORE Video Demo

Tags: simulations, computer gaming

Heavy handed policing at Republican Convention

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 11:42:58 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000

Clip Source: www.ekklesia.co.uk

Protesters face police raids at the Republican Convention

In developments which have been largely ignored in the US media, police have staged preemptive armed raids targeting protesters and alternative media around the Republican National Convention - including thousands of people demonstrating about war world poverty throughout the week.

Meanwhile, baton-wielding police later arrested 250 people, claiming a "riot". But eyewitnesses say they were subject to unprovoked attacks, including pensioners and peace activists. BBC video footage does not show any violence by protestors.

“We joined up with an altruistic vision of promoting freedom and justice around the world,” said Vince Emanuel, a Marine lance corporal who did a tour of duty in Iraq from August 2004 to April 2005, explaining why he was joining the protest.

He added: "What we saw was the killing of innocent people and the destruction of property ... for a lot of us it was very disenfranchising."

Tags: politics

Darwin's theory doesn't exclude meaning

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 09:47:13 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: Another adherent of Process Theology

Clip Source: johnmorehouse.wordpress.com

“Darwin’s theory of evolution provides detail on how biological diversity and new species are generated. But it does not tell us the why? Why is it that the physical laws of the universe are such that this wondrous thing called life emerged? Why is it that this amazing process called evolution worked so well to have produced the complex structures, organisms, and diversity that we see on Earth today? What we are talking about is a the mystery of creation that is not testable and therefore does not lie within the realm of science but rather within the realm of faith and philosophy.”

As Darwin himself wrote: “The mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble by us; and I for one must be content to remain an Agnostic.”

There is a name for this theology, process theology. The belief that God, the Holy, the Great Mother, is co-creating with us the universe we dream of.

Evolution does not exclude meaning or even a design,

Something to think about.

Tags: theology, philosophy, process theology, darwin

Are there two Americas?

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 23:31:14 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: Is this true?

Clip Source: www.guardian.co.uk

there are two hopelessly incompatible Americas

Small-town Americans have values and a lot of those values are good ones: neighbourliness, family life, a knowledge of the land and what grows in it. The other America they see on TV seems without ethics - crime, violence, drug addiction, pornography and prostitution - and they don't want any part of it.

So clear is the divide between big-city and small-town America that one American friend said to me: "These whitebread Republicans are like children - someone has to tell them what to do and what to think, they're incapable of independent ideas."

Tags: us election, election, politics

Theologians tackle concept of "Promised Land"

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 13:19:50 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: An encouraging article in a usually grim area. As Churchill said, "It is better to jaw jaw than to war war.

Clip Source: www.ekklesia.co.uk

Theologians to tackle contested concept of "Promised Land"

A conference in Bern this month will discuss the often thorny concept of the "Promised Land" and related theological issues with a view to helping more churches become advocates for a just peace in the Middle East.

The organisers say that the challenge for churches addressing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the fact that it takes place in a land that different religions consider holy in different ways and with different outcomes.

"One of the main goals we hope to achieve is to deepen church understanding of biblical promises concerning the land and its peoples. This will require a holistic approach to the biblical message, promoting common understanding of how theological issues may be related to the conflict,"

The conference will start a process of developing a handbook for congregations and parishes, aimed at facilitating their reflection on issues like the Promised Land, the Church and Israel, justice and peace.

Tags: arab, israel, politics

The Churches plead for calm in Russia/Ossetia

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 13:02:31 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: The Russian and Georgian church leaders seek to calm the situation

Clip Source: www.ekklesia.co.uk

Russian and Georgian Orthodox leaders seek understanding amid conflict

By Ecumenical News International

2 Sep 2008

A Russian Orthodox Church missionary has defended Georgian Orthodox Patriarch Ilia II against charges that he is a Georgian nationalist, whilst other leading Russian clerics have warned against the war between their country and Georgia turning into an ethnic vendetta

As well as Kurayev, other clergy and hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church have warned against a cycle of ethnic hatred and revenge taking hold as a result of the current violence in South Ossetia, a pro-Russian enclave in Georgia.

The Rev Vsevolod Chaplin

told Soyuz, an Orthodox Church television channel, "Only a madman today can declare all Georgians the enemy, and inflame anti-Georgian sentiment in the country."

Archbishop Feofan of Stavropol and Vladikavkaz, both Russian regions near the war zone in South Ossetia, counselled believers to control themselves.

Tags: politics, russia, georgia, church

A progressive blog in Kent, UK

Sun, 31 Aug 2008 08:36:23 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: Just found this blog. Seems to line up with my views.

Clip Source: stuartjeffery.blogspot.com

Stuart's Big Green Spot

The need for green politics has never been higher

Tags: green, politics, progressive

Does God pre-determine bad things?

Sun, 31 Aug 2008 08:22:41 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: More on Open and Process Theology and the problem of evil in the world.

Clip Source: communities.canada.com

Canadian evangelicals like "open theology" more

Long before John Sanders became one of North American's most-talked-about evangelical theologians, he was a photographer for a newspaper. One day he covered a story that changed his life.

A semi-trailer truck had collided with a motorcyclist. When Sanders got out of his car to take photographs, he saw a young man's body crushed by the truck's wheels.

The dead man was his brother.

For two decades Sanders agonized over that horrible event -- not only emotionally, but theologically. "God, why did you kill my brother?" he asked in prayer.

The accident, and his questions, didn't lead to Sanders losing his belief in God. But they caused him to change his definition of divinity.

Out went his belief in a God who pre-determines everything,

Tags: theology, process theology, open theology

odd book titles

Sat, 30 Aug 2008 20:41:50 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: very droll, there are a lot more of the same type on the website

Clip Source: en.wikipedia.org

Bookseller/Diagram Prize for Oddest Title of the Year

the Diagram Prize, is a humorous literary award, normally given each year to the book with the oddest title

Past winners

1978 Proceedings of the Second International Workshop on Nude Mice

1980 The Joy of Chickens

1984 The Book of Marmalade: Its Antecedents, Its History, and Its Role in the World Today

1985 Natural Bust Enlargement with Total Power: How to Increase the other 90% of Your Mind to Increase the Size of Your Breasts

1986 Oral Sadism and the Vegetarian Personality

1988 Versailles: The View From Sweden

1989 How to Shit in the Woods: An Environmentally Sound Approach to a Lost Art

1990 Lesbian Sadomasochism Safety Manual

1992 How to Avoid Huge Ships

1994 Highlights in the History of Concrete

1995 Reusing Old Graves: A Report on Popular British Attitudes

1996 Greek Rural Postmen and their Cancellation Numbers

1997 The Joy of Sex, the Pocket Edition

1998 Developments in Dairy Cow Breeding: New Opportunities to Widen the Use of Straw

Tags: humour, humor, book titles

we learn subconsciously in 0.05 seconds

Fri, 29 Aug 2008 20:53:56 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: another unknown ability or is it a sense? I am also into pre-attention cognition which is about the way the brain can multi-task, working in parallel with higher level cognition. All to do with making road signs immediately understandable!

Clip Source: blog.wired.com

Humans Can Learn from Subliminal Cues Alone

Scientists have demonstrated for the first time subconscious learning in humans akin to that detailed in rats and pigeons by the famed-behaviorist B.F. Skinner seventy years ago.

The evidence comes from a cleverly designed experiment that eliminated conscious reasoning as a variable in conditioning. Study participants were shown a cue for less five hundredths of a second, far below the threshold for conscious vision. Then the respondents were asked to "use their intuition" to determine if pressing a button would yield a monetary reward after the cue.

Study participants were able to choose the correct button 63 percent of the time, but only when they received a reward. Without it, participants did not fare better than chance would predict.

It was the subjects who believed that they had better intuition or "special powers," as he put it, that did actually have the best intuition.

Tags: signs, pre-attention

Guardian leader on the Russia/Georgia standoff

Fri, 29 Aug 2008 16:46:05 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: Why doesn't the BBC in its news bulletins refer to the Georgian opening artillery barrage? It seems to hold an unbalanced brief. Is it being leaned on?

Clip Source: www.guardian.co.uk

Russia and the west

Something shattered when the Georgian artillery opened up with a massive barrage on Tskhinvali on August 7

It was a 16-year post-Soviet consensus about the power of Russia to affect the course taken by its neighbours.

The cold, unspoken western calculation was that, the quicker we pushed eastwards

the less Russia could resist

The way to counter the forces unleashed on August 7 is clear: stop rearranging the furniture on Russia's sensitive southern border; stop militarising the Black Sea; stop pretending that this is only a conflict about loftier goals, a simple struggle between authoritarianism and western liberal democracy. The ethnically driven post-Soviet map is more complex than that. Local conflicts should be kept local. As things stand, everything is being done to widen them out to the regional level. As a result, Russia and Nato are sleepwalking into a confrontation that neither needs, and neither has planned for.

Tags: russia, georgia, politics

brilliant use of computer presented stats

Thu, 28 Aug 2008 16:34:20 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: you won't see stats better than this and the subject is important too

Clip Source: www.ted.com

Hans Rosling

with the best stats you've ever seen

About this talk

You've never seen data presented like this. With the drama and urgency of a sportscaster, statistics guru Hans Rosling debunks myths about the so-called "developing world."

Tags: statistics, presentation, development, politics

An eLearning course on Process Theology

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 09:17:25 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: A university level course on-line. I am not sure about the organiser's details but the syllabus available in PDF looks exciting and thorough

Clip Source: hermionesviolin.livejournal.com

Process Theology

An exploration of the basic concepts of the school of process theology that is grounded in the philosophical thought of Alfred North Whitehead and Charles Hartshorne. Specific attention is given to the interface of process theology with fields of contemporary interest such as feminist/womanist theologies, economics and politics, ecology, and world religions.

THEO 637F

Tags: theology, process theology

London's mayor says Britain is not broken

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 09:02:15 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: The current political mood of Britain is irrational. The government is suffering from the Mother of all Swings of the Pendulum. I think time is the only healer here.

Clip Source: www.timesonline.co.uk

Our Olympic success is just one of many things to celebrate

In 1996, after 17 years of Conservative government, the past six under the premiership of the cricketing Major, Great Britain went to the Atlanta Olympics and won precisely one gold medal.

And if Gordon Brown is to get it in the neck for every ill, real and imagined, why should he not get some credit for this?

Last week the Mayor of London, surfing the new narrative, praised modern British youth, adding: “If you believe the politicians, we have a broken society, in which the courage and morals of young people have been sapped by welfarism and political correctness. And if you look at what is happening at the Beijing Olympics, you can see what piffle that is.”

Britain is demonstrably less “broken” than it was in the late 70s and at the height of the Thatcher era in the mid and late 80s.

Earth systems a sign of design?

Wed, 20 Aug 2008 22:13:50 GMT

clipped by: jimbo1000
clipper's remarks: A retired science teacher's thoughts on the presence of order rather than chaos

Clip Source: jasscience.blogspot.com

Dynamic Planet Earth

Science writers are fond of describing our planet with phrases like “Our Dynamic Earth.” Dynamic is a word used to convey force, power, and energy.

That word may be overworked, but it doesn’t begin to convey the enormity of power and process in connection with our Earth.

The possibility of design is difficult to reject.

Naturalists complain that belief in God and His action in our world is “irrational.” But when we examine thousands of intricate earth systems, whose successful operation depends on multiple interdependent events nearly impossible to ascribe to pure chance, we conclude that belief in the existence of a creator’s hand is entirely rational.

Jim Virkler, a retired New Jersey public school science educator, now devotes his time investigating the harmony of scientific discoveries and Christian faith.

Tags: theology, science