File this story under “too good to be true.” Silicon Valley scientists have genetically engineered a bacteria that eats agricultural waste and shits crude oil. They’ve produced the world’s first jar of renewable crude oil. The bacteria, a non-pathogenic e. coli variant, literally consumes biomass, such as woodchips and wheat straw, and excretes nearly tank-ready diesel.

This is pretty amazing. They have literally taken a process that normally is measured on the geological time-scale and reduced the time it takes to days. A 1,000 liter jug of the bug can produce a barrel of crude in a week. We are moving closer to the ultimate source of all energy on our planet – the sun. Fossil fuels are simply stored solar energy from the distant past. This process makes the solar energy stored in plants available to us now in a form that our entire economic infrastructure is built to handle.

My first thought when reading the article was, “Great, just what the atmosphere needs, more oil burn-off.” But the scientists claim that this production technique is carbon-negative. They don’t go into detail as how that can be. They claim the means of production absorbs more carbon from the atmosphere than is produced by burning the fuel. My guess is that they are measuring from the wrong place. Sure, the plants that they use to feed the bacteria absorb carbon. But that is carbon that would have been stored by the plant waste for years. Converting it to oil and burning it will reduce the carbon turnaround time to weeks, if not days. Still, making oil renewable is a step in the right direction.

I also noticed that they didn’t talk about the cost of production. They did mention that it took $20,000 to genetically modify the bacteria, but once it’s modified, it’s self-reproductive, so that’s not a production cost. I guess the main cost would be whatever it takes to keep the bugs alive and healthy. Since we’ve already been doing the same thing with synthetic human insulin for decades, it must be cost-effective. Sure enough, they plan a demonstration-scale plant in two years, and a production-scale one in three. This puts it years ahead of it’s hydrogen-producing-bacteria competitor, which is unfortunate as hydrogen is much cleaner (its burn-off waste).

I ran across this story today via the Huffington Post. Documents released yesterday by the Senate Armed Services Committee confirm that terrorist suspects who received harsh treatment at the hands of the U.S. military where hidden from Red Cross inspectors.

Here are a couple of quotes from the documents that demonstrate that the cover-up was planned: “We may need to curb the harsher operations while ICRC (International Committee of the Red Cross) is around. It is better not to expose them to any controversial techniques,” – Lt. Col. Diane Beaver. “In the past when the ICRC has made a big deal about certain detainees, the DOD (Department of Defense) has ‘moved’ them away from the attention of the ICRC.” – Jonathan Fredman, the chief counsel for the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center.

Time has released additional key findings of the Armed Services Committee investigation that led to the release of the documents. The first was that the Pentagon learned their “harsh interrogation” techniques by reviewing a U.S. military program, SERE, designed to train U.S. troops to resist torture. We were expecting our enemies of the time, countries like Soviet Russia, Vietnam (during the War) and North Korea to torture captured troops. Where we used to just prepare troops to handle that threat we now borrow those ‘techniques’. We have become our enemies.

The committee also found that Rumsfeld approved the use of torture (though I don’t think they used that word) over the objections of top U.S. military lawyers from all four major branches of the military.

Of course, we already knew this to some degree. What the documents indicate is that the leaders knew it was wrong, else they wouldn’t have sought to keep it secret. Our country has been misled from the top down.

It’s about time that congress has started to take action. I sincerely hope it leads to more. I want hearings, I want Rumsfeld in prison, I want the President and Vice President impeached and removed from office for crimes against humanity. But most of all, I want it to stop and want America to return to the principles of basic human rights and basic human dignity.

The actions of America in the last six years has robbed me of some of my pride in being an American. They have undermined my faith that the U.S. military will act with honor and my faith in our democracy’s ability to elect capable, just leaders. I now fear for our troops who may face “harsh interrogation techniques” at the hands of our enemies follower our lead. I am disgusted by the Bush administration. These are dark times in our history for sure, but there is hope.

We humans are so self-important. We once thought that we lived in the physical center of creation: everything revolved around us. Then, in the mid-16th century, Nicolaus Copernicus discovered that the Earth is not the center of the universe. Copernicus removed us from our priviledge place in physical creation. We are not the point of the universe.

The importance of this discovery may seem obvious; he founded modern astronomy. Yet what is sometimes missed is a subtler point. There is nothing special about our point of view. Our perspective is not special. Copernicus objectified observation which paved the way for the subsequent scientific revolution, which is built upon objective observation.

Eventually, mankind adapted (as we are so apt to do). After all, we were still the center of biological creation. We were the only ones with cognition. We were the ones with free will. We were given dominion over the plants and animals by God Himself. We were the point of all life; superior and self-aware.

Then Charles Darwin came along. His objective observation of the evidence he collected from 1831 to 1836 led him to a startling conclusion… We are not the center of biological creation. The other creatures were not created for us to have dominion over and in many cases they were here first. Furthermore, there is nothing special about our particular ‘position’ in the evolutionary tree. Mutations occur randomly (though they are selected non-randomly), we are but one of many possible outcome of a natural process.

Read the rest of this entry »

No question of the week this week. I’m hoping for more responses to last week’s question first.

————–

This week’s “question mark” (and variants) search stats:
Year-to-date: over 800
Last week: 200
Strangest in the last week: “question mark who are you”

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?
Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing?
Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing?
Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing?
Then why call him God?
-Epicurus

This is Part II of my post on The Problem of Evil (PoE). The first post garnered quite a response! The responses generated three separate rebuttals to the PoE (theodicies). I’m sure there are more. If you have your own reason for why the PoE is wrong, let me know! I’m always up for a challenge. Thanks to Snurp, Scott, and sawaz for contributing!

This second part explains why the PoE has significant personal interest to me. It’s what caused me to lose my religion. Before even being exposed to this argument against the existence of God, I thought up a simplified version of it in my teens. At the time, I was a Republican-loving, Christian fundamentalist. What’s odd is that the idea of the PoE came to me as a result of this tasty little piece of Christian fundamentalist propaganda which was shown to me by the youth pastor at my Baptist Church. It’s a film aimed at scaring the shit out of Christian teens via that tried-and-true religious motivator: guilt.

I probably forget many of the details, but the following is how I remember my experience of the film. The basic idea was that four teens die in a car accident only to find themselves in a dramatized Christian afterlife. The four eventually make their way to a line in front of a receptionist at a computer terminal. One of the four is ‘saved’. During the wait, the other three have plenty of time to poor the guilt on the fourth for not sharing the “Good News” (as if they haven’t heard it before). They watch as each person walks up to the receptionist. The receptionist then takes their name, types it into a computer, which then brings up their personal info as well as their ‘reservation’ status. Those with reservations step off to the right (how politically symbolic) into the light. Those without reservations are directed to a scary elevator on the left that only goes ‘down’. The ‘saved’ teen watches with mounting guilt as his three friends enter the elevator before his reservation is confirmed.

The film ends with a shot of the computer screen listing name after name color coded according to their reservation status, which, if it isn’t obvious by now, indicates whether or not that person is ‘saved’ or not. The name is in red is the person is unsaved, and green if saved. If you pay close attention, approximately one-in-four names is green, the same ratio as the group of teens had, hmm. This coincidence is confirmed as the names blur and a statistic is placed on the screen claiming that only one-in-four humans on the entire planet are saved. This was one of the biggest shocks of my life.

I know the film’s purpose was to motivate us teens into evangelizing. “Don’t end up guilt ridden, like the main character”, was the message, “You never know how much time you have”. It had a very different impact on me. I had thought most people were ‘saved’. I immediately asked myself how God, who is all-powerful and loving, could allow this to happen to his creations? Three in four suffer eternal torture? Where is God’s love? Where is His mercy? Where is His justice? Why doesn’t God have a higher ‘win’ ratio?

I didn’t lose my faith immediately. It took time. Those question and related ones slowly undermined my world view. Eventually, those questions, combined with some deep, personal suffering experienced in my late teens and early twenties, and exposure to the multitude of other word views did my belief in Christianity in.

I now imagine my name switching from green to red on that fictional, 1980s style computer monitor and laugh.

Politics and the economy are intertwined. We all know this. That is why in recent political polls, the most common response to “Thinking ahead to the November presidential election, what is the single most important issue in your choice for president?” is “Economy/Jobs”. We wouldn’t name that as an election issue if we believed politicians could affect the economy.

Markets influence politics and politics influence markets. The actual stings on influence are many and diverse. Add to this tangle, a new thread, from Intrade.com. The site sets up a futures market for all sorts of events. Everything from the name of the last named storm of the 2008 Atlantic hurricane season (‘Omar’ is the current favorite) to the most used internet search engine. The most interesting futures, though, are about politics.

These are real markets. Real money is spent to buy shares of an Obama presidential victory and the like. The value of those shares fluctuate according to how the market views how his chances of winning change. As of the time when this sentence was written, an Obama victory is trading at 61.3 and McCain is trading at 34.4. They are followed by Clinton at 5.1 and, amazingly, Al Gore, who isn’t even running, at 0.6. I think I’d sell that one short, if I could find a buyer.

The numbers represent the percentage chance of the event occurring. Thus if you think Clinton’s odds of winning the 2008 Presidential election is greater than 5.1%, then you should buy shares. If not, you should sell them. The monetary value is one-tenth the percentage. Thus, in this example, a share of a Clinton victory is $0.51.

Anyway, they do a state-by-state victory as well. For instance, you can buy shares in a Republican Presidential victory in Ohio for $3.90 apiece (representing a 39% chance that the republican candidate will take OH’s electoral votes). Because of this, they always have a current Presidential electoral map based current prices. Check it out now and then and let’s see how self-correcting this market is.

Note: This was an article I originally wrote for ReligiousFreaks.com back in October of ’06. Unfortunately, the site has fallen into disrepair and risks disappearing altogether. As such, and with inspiration from a recent Spitball Politics post, I wanted a permanent home for the article, so I am copying an edited version of it here. Note that some of the links are no longer valid due to the age of the article.

The Christian States of America?

There has been much debate across the web over whether the United States is a Christian nation or a secular nation. The debates can be categorized into three distinct questions: Is America currently a Christian nation? Was America founded as a Christian nation? And finally, should America be(come) a Christian nation? On the extreme sides of this debate are fundamentalists and atheists. Fundamentalists who desire a ‘Christian America’ often are of the opinion that the nation was founded as a Christian nation but an encroaching anti-Christian sentiment has made it a secular nation in need of reformation. On the other hand, atheists who believe America should be secular are of the opinion that America was founded as secular and has been growing increasingly Christian in recent times. Both sides feel they need to save the country from the other group. Which group is right about which questions and to what extent? This article attempts to detangle the noise surrounding this debate and argues that the nation was founded as, is still, and should remain secular.

Read the rest of this entry »

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?
Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing?
Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing?
Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing?
Then why call him God?
-Epicurus

As expected, I received multiple counter-arguments to my post about the Problem of Evil (PoE). Instead of very long comments addressing each counter-argument, I’ve decided to dedicate a separate post for each. That way, we can keep the various debates more organized.

This post is reserved for The Free Will Theodicy (FW).

For convenience, here is the formal PoE argument that we started with:

1. If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect.
2. If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to eliminate all evil.
3. If God is omniscient, then God knows when evil exists.
4. If God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to eliminate all evil.
5. Evil exists.
6. If evil exists and God exists, then either God doesn’t have the power to eliminate all evil, or doesn’t know when evil exists, or doesn’t have the desire to eliminate all evil.
7. Therefore, God doesn’t exist.

Like The Spiritual/Personal Growth Theodicy (SPG), The Free Will Theodicy is a rejection of premise 4. As with any of the premises, refute one, and the conclusion is not valid. The FW theodicy actually has a lot in common with the SPG theodicy. Indeed, the two counter-arguments are often conflated, as they were in Snurp’s initial comment. Both account for evil as tied to a greater good. In the case of the SPG, the greater good is spiritual and/or personal growth. In the case of the FW, the greater good is free will itself.

A distinction between the two Theodicies (and the reason they are distinct arguments) is subtle, but important. In the SPG, evil causes the greater goods, in the FW, the greater good causes the evil. In the former, the fact that evil was necessary turned out to limit the power of God. The latter doesn’t suffer from this criticism. Evil is the result of the exercise of free will. It doesn’t exist necessarily, but conditionally upon the free choices of autonomous entities.

The obvious rebuttal is to deny the existence of free will. Personally, I believe free will to be illusionary. We are machines complex enough to self-analyze, yet not complex enough to predict our own choices. Free will is a problematic philosophical concept in and of itself. While a debate over free will would be interesting, I’d rather not detract from the PoE. So, for the time being, I would like to debate the FW theodicy with the presumption that free will exists. I hope to return to the question of free will in a future post.

One thing is certain, though: free will is not absolute. There are many behaviors and thoughts we are incapable of controlling. When to feel hunger and whether or not to jump when we hear an unexpected, loud noise are just too examples. Also, we definitely have biological tendencies and predispositions. Can you really prevent yourself from becoming angry if you saw someone harming your loved ones? The fact of instincts, biological tendencies, and predispositions provides an open door for a rebuttal similar to the ones for other theodicies. Simply refine the PoE argument:

1. If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect.
2. If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to minimize evil.
3. If God is omniscient, then God knows when evil is not minimized.
4. If God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to minimize evil.
5. Evil is not minimized in our world.
6. If evil is not minimized and God exists, then either God doesn’t have the power to minimize evil, or doesn’t know that evil is not minimized, or doesn’t have the desire to minimize evil.
7. Therefore, God doesn’t exist.

Given free will, we will commit some evil. Why do we choose to so often? Our instincts, biological predispositions, and predispositions play some roll in the answer to that question. God could have created us so that we commit less evil without a significant reduction in our autonomy. Suppose it was a little more difficult for us to feel anger and jealousy. That would result in some reduction of violence. We could still choose to do violence, it would just be more difficult and less likely.

Since God is omnipotent, we need not limit ourselves to tweaking our biology. He could make certain choices impossible to make on the side of evil. I thinking the really egregious stuff, like participating in a genocide. Would anyone complain of such a restriction of free will? I don’t believe the ability to choose to commit genocide is a greater good than eliminating genocide.

The debate over the DoE continues in the comments. I add an additional refutation in the first comment.

The news media is unbalanced.

“Of course it is,” some of you might say, “it has a liberal bias.” Or, more likely for my audience, “It’s only as liberal as the corporate giants who owns it.” But political bias is not what I’m referring to. There is a bias against smart. Science is under reported, celebrity is over reported. Progress is deemed ‘uninteresting’ while violence is sensationalized. Emotional impact, not intellectual stimulation, is the goal. Entertainment, not information, is the product. Even the way stories are reported cater to short attention spans and limited vocabularies.

This situation has caused many important stories to go unnoticed. Here’s your chance to give some of those stories a little light. This week’s question is, once again, from The World Question Center on Edge.org. This was the question for 2000 and your question this week:

“What is today’s most important unreported story?”

I’ll loosen up the reigns a bit and ask, “What is a recent under-reported story that you consider important?” You can give more than one story if you’d like as well. I’d also like to know why you consider the stories important. I’ll answer after my readers have a chance.

————–

This week’s “question mark” (and variants) search stats:
Year-to-date: over 600
Last week: 118
Strangest in the last week: “person behind a question mark”

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?
Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing?
Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing?
Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing?
Then why call him God?
-Epicurus

As expected, I received multiple counter-arguments to my post about the Problem of Evil (PoE). Instead of very long comments addressing each counter-argument, I’ve decided to dedicate a separate post for each. That way, we can keep the various debates more organized.

This post is reserved for The Spiritual/Personal Growth Theodicy (SPG).

For convenience, here is the formal PoE argument that we started with:

1. If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect.
2. If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to eliminate all evil.
3. If God is omniscient, then God knows when evil exists.
4. If God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to eliminate all evil.
5. Evil exists.
6. If evil exists and God exists, then either God doesn’t have the power to eliminate all evil, or doesn’t know when evil exists, or doesn’t have the desire to eliminate all evil.
7. Therefore, God doesn’t exist.

The SPG counter-argument is a rejection of premise 4.

Snurp was the first to bring up the SPG (among other counter-arguments). Basically, it claims that some evil is necessary in order to promote a greater good. Enduring evil leads to spiritual and/or personal growth, which is a greater good than the evil endured. Thus God does not want to eliminate all evil because some of it causes greater goods.

The most common analogy I’ve heard to express this counter-argument is the parent analogy. God treats us like a loving parent treats his children. Protecting children from all evil and harm has a couple of negative effects. First, the children would not learn to appreciate good having never been exposed to evil. This would deny them important personal growth. Secondly, protecting them from evil and harm would ill prepare them for when they confront evil and harm when they grow up. You can read Snurp’s comment for another expression of the analogy and another analogy involving the government. Similarly, God allows us to experience evil and suffering for our own good.

One refutation is the same as for the Denial of Evil Theodicy. The PoE’s formal argument needs to be rewritten in terms of maximizing good instead of preventing evil.

1. If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect.
2. If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to maximize good.
3. If God is omniscient, then God knows when good is not maximized.
4. If God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to maximize good.
5. Good is not maximized in our world.
6. If good is not maximized and God exists, then either God doesn’t have the power to maximize good, or doesn’t know that good is not maximized, or doesn’t have the desire to maximize good.
7. Therefore, God doesn’t exist.

The argument is still valid and proponents of the SPG will now accept premise 4. In fact, that is the point of the parenting analogy: permitting some evil (usually in the form of suffering) is a means of maximizing good. So which premise is the SPG theodicy rejecting? Here’s the surprise, it’s premise 1. The SPG basically claims that God lacks the power and/or knowledge to achieve the greater good without using some evil. In other words, the SPG concludes that a God with limited power and/or knowledge exists. Once most religionists recognize this as the conclusion of the SPG, they abandon it.

The debate over the SPG theodicy continues in the comments. I have additional refutations in the first comment.