Hot item in the news of late is the repeal of the 17-year old 'Dont Ask Dont Tell (DADT)' military policy. After few attempts to pass the legislature, it finally made through both the US Congress and US Senate. It's just a matter of time that the law will be finally penned by the US President.
Going over the readers' reaction to the news projects the impression that bigotry still exists in the modern US society. I once thought the US is one of the world's most tolerant countries, where everyone regardless of race, creed, religion and sexual orientation are treated equally. A country which sticks to the belief that all men are created equal. I heard about equal opportunity to employment all, and that nobody would be disqualified based on race, creed, religion and sexuality. The American Disability Act ensures that nobody, even with those crippling disability, should be discriminated.
The DADT is one policy that runs to the contrary. And the repeal of such policy depicts so clearly the existence of polarity which divides among us. This is a welcome development to many in the military who hide their actual sexual identity in the closet as they continue to relentlessly render service to the nation. Being able to express themselves openly now, if not soon, while doing the same heroic act of being in war's front line does not, without any doubt, matter to them. Infact, being under their skin will allow them to carry out their duties more effectively as they never harbor any fear of suspicion and persecution.
What's more mindboggling to me, are the raucous reactions of the self-righteous holier-than-thou folks who seem to harbor a lot of personal insecurities and issues about their own sexuality. They are so biased against against gays and lesbians, and are apt and quick to render their judgment, all in the name of ethics, morality, and yes, of god! These are people who think they are all morally-upright, immaculate, infallible and who think themselves as god. For they speak of god to advance their vindictive and self-righteous evil invectives.
Bigots are not necessary the uneducated, unintelligent. There are many highly placed and 'supposedly' highly respected individuals. They use ( or more appropriately abuse) their god to unjustly condemn peoples' acts and convictions. A well known religious figure thought the tsunami in Thailand as god's wrath for breakdown of morality in the area. And the earthquake in Haiti was a consequential curse of the pact between 'Haitians and the devil.
Two weeks ago, some Americans mourned the loss of Elizabeth Edwards. She was known to be an outspoken figure, supporting the legalization of same-sex marriages (not only unions) and health care that covers abortion in America. During her wake, an anti-gay church group assembled together with hand-held placards and boards containing hateful messages.
Religion or spirituality brings the good among so many. Too much of it is a poison. Extremists do not care about killing many people , for doing so pleases their god and will have them eternally rewarded. There are religious snobs among us, who put themselves wrongly in the shoes of their god. They act swiftly to judge and condemn others while glorifying in their wishful thinking that they render their god a great favor!
Nobody has the wisdom and genius to fully comprehend what and how god (whoever he is ; Buddha, Allah, Yahweh) thinks and wants. So many words were put into god's mouth. If god would have his way, he would sue these people for libel!!! The sad thing is that, these people claim to be his!
Sunday, December 19, 2010
Friday, December 17, 2010
Shifting Gears
Christmas is upon us! Just like in the past Christmases, people are busy preparing for this great holiday. Halls and malls are decked ostentatiously. Christmas carols, old and new, fill the air. Glittering lights trim houses and trees. Busy shoppers trooping the malls, checking their lists not once but twice. Parties..Exchanging gifts, cheers and goodwill.
Christmastime is the time spent by Christians to commemorate the birth of the Savior, Jesus Christ! Accordingly, the message of the baby boy's birth in a manger is humility and simplicity. But apparently, two thousand years after the 'supposed' first Christmas, the real essence of celebration is warped around commercialism and materialism, and the main celebrator is obscured by the white-bearded red-suited overweight sleigh riding fellow. Ask the kids whom they associate Christmas with. Santa is the sure answer!
Okay.okay.. ' Christmas is the most wonderful time of the year'... says the lyric of a song.
***************
I don't want to sound like a 'Grinch' who stole Christmas. For I am not one. But I'd just like to share some interesting facts about Christmas.
1. According to written accounts, the period known to be Christmas , has been celebrated long before the birth of Jesus Christ! December 25 was the celebration of the Italic god Saturn and the rebirth of the sun god, a pagan celebration! All the symbols associated with Christmas - evergeen tree, wreath, mistletoe, holly have roots traced to mythologies. Christmas is a pagan celebration adopted by Christians!
2. According to the Scriptures, Jesus Christ was born in late summer or early fall, sometime in September; definitely not in December.
3. During Christmas, parents give the impression to their young kids that Santa Claus exists. This runs counter to the value that parents should tell the truth. Unfortunately, even a high end department store in their store ad, encourages people to BELEIVE in Santa.
4. Reindeers don't and can't fly!
**************
Some events in Christmas are at odds with science.
1. The angel Gabriel announced to Mary that she would bear a child. Angels are supernatural beings taking human forms but with wings in addition to the arms (as depicted to us). The existence of angels, along with the centaurs or spinx, entails a major revision of human anatomy textbooks.
2. The birth of a child by a virgin. Science calls it parthenogenesis, when a egg develops into an embryo without fertilization. It occurs in few reptiles, amphibians and some lower forms of animals. But it has never been reported to occur in humans naturally.
3. Granted that parthenogenesis occurs in humans, the baby that will be born is a girl as genetically, the egg contains the female chromosome.
*************
This may sound a lttle eccentric. But are we not interested about the truth? For we know that 'the truth will set us free'. Truth from which vantage point of view - biblical or scientific? We know science and religion dont mix, they are always at odds which each other. Few scientists are trying to harmonize and connect these two poles together, but an unthinkably unfathomable divide does still exist. Charles Darwin, after piecing together the snippets of data he collected from a five-year voyage of the HMS Beagle, saw an intellectual storm brewing. He was born religious from a religious family and was married to woman with a strong conviction and unquestionable faith. The theory he formulated, he knew, was going against a strong current of his, his families' and his community's belief system, among others, the immutability of the species. Darwin was as confused as everybody else, being raised a Christian and exposed to the teachings in his youth and drawing a conclusion from the natural world, that is far on the contrary to the belief systems he knew and practiced. The inconsistency, he noted, unfolded right before his eyes, on the materials he collected from mother nature.
Apparently, the truth people are seeking, is dependent on either personal conviction or logical philosophy. Sound data, facts and figures will always lead to the truth, one which governs the natural world.
Is their supernatural truth? or spiritual truth? The world used to be filled with myths and superstition. But little by little, the rational human intelligence has debunked and demystified a lot of them, and made sense of what's going on. Such allows us to winnow and narrow down which 'truths' are worth believing. The scientific method, as it stands now, is the best way of knowing the unknown. It may not be the only way! Its endless capacity, ironically, is limited only to the natural world. And so science can neither confirm nor deny that supernatural or spiritual truth exists.
***********
And so it's Christmas once again! The miracle of Christmas for so long I held so close in my heart! This was 'truth' to me for a long time. That Jesus Christ was the reason for the season!
But time changes..The meaning of miracle has become so loose, so cheap, and it loses its real meaning. It has become associated with anything looked at beyond mediocrity. The miracle of the Hudson River. The Chilean Miners Rescue. And a lot more! These 'miracles' were acted out of human ingenuity. Some extraordinary feats made possible because of modern day technology.
Well, I love Christmas! It still is the most wonderful time of the year! It's just that it has a different meaning to me now.
Merry Christmas everyone!
Christmastime is the time spent by Christians to commemorate the birth of the Savior, Jesus Christ! Accordingly, the message of the baby boy's birth in a manger is humility and simplicity. But apparently, two thousand years after the 'supposed' first Christmas, the real essence of celebration is warped around commercialism and materialism, and the main celebrator is obscured by the white-bearded red-suited overweight sleigh riding fellow. Ask the kids whom they associate Christmas with. Santa is the sure answer!
Okay.okay.. ' Christmas is the most wonderful time of the year'... says the lyric of a song.
***************
I don't want to sound like a 'Grinch' who stole Christmas. For I am not one. But I'd just like to share some interesting facts about Christmas.
1. According to written accounts, the period known to be Christmas , has been celebrated long before the birth of Jesus Christ! December 25 was the celebration of the Italic god Saturn and the rebirth of the sun god, a pagan celebration! All the symbols associated with Christmas - evergeen tree, wreath, mistletoe, holly have roots traced to mythologies. Christmas is a pagan celebration adopted by Christians!
2. According to the Scriptures, Jesus Christ was born in late summer or early fall, sometime in September; definitely not in December.
3. During Christmas, parents give the impression to their young kids that Santa Claus exists. This runs counter to the value that parents should tell the truth. Unfortunately, even a high end department store in their store ad, encourages people to BELEIVE in Santa.
4. Reindeers don't and can't fly!
**************
Some events in Christmas are at odds with science.
1. The angel Gabriel announced to Mary that she would bear a child. Angels are supernatural beings taking human forms but with wings in addition to the arms (as depicted to us). The existence of angels, along with the centaurs or spinx, entails a major revision of human anatomy textbooks.
2. The birth of a child by a virgin. Science calls it parthenogenesis, when a egg develops into an embryo without fertilization. It occurs in few reptiles, amphibians and some lower forms of animals. But it has never been reported to occur in humans naturally.
3. Granted that parthenogenesis occurs in humans, the baby that will be born is a girl as genetically, the egg contains the female chromosome.
*************
This may sound a lttle eccentric. But are we not interested about the truth? For we know that 'the truth will set us free'. Truth from which vantage point of view - biblical or scientific? We know science and religion dont mix, they are always at odds which each other. Few scientists are trying to harmonize and connect these two poles together, but an unthinkably unfathomable divide does still exist. Charles Darwin, after piecing together the snippets of data he collected from a five-year voyage of the HMS Beagle, saw an intellectual storm brewing. He was born religious from a religious family and was married to woman with a strong conviction and unquestionable faith. The theory he formulated, he knew, was going against a strong current of his, his families' and his community's belief system, among others, the immutability of the species. Darwin was as confused as everybody else, being raised a Christian and exposed to the teachings in his youth and drawing a conclusion from the natural world, that is far on the contrary to the belief systems he knew and practiced. The inconsistency, he noted, unfolded right before his eyes, on the materials he collected from mother nature.
Apparently, the truth people are seeking, is dependent on either personal conviction or logical philosophy. Sound data, facts and figures will always lead to the truth, one which governs the natural world.
Is their supernatural truth? or spiritual truth? The world used to be filled with myths and superstition. But little by little, the rational human intelligence has debunked and demystified a lot of them, and made sense of what's going on. Such allows us to winnow and narrow down which 'truths' are worth believing. The scientific method, as it stands now, is the best way of knowing the unknown. It may not be the only way! Its endless capacity, ironically, is limited only to the natural world. And so science can neither confirm nor deny that supernatural or spiritual truth exists.
***********
And so it's Christmas once again! The miracle of Christmas for so long I held so close in my heart! This was 'truth' to me for a long time. That Jesus Christ was the reason for the season!
But time changes..The meaning of miracle has become so loose, so cheap, and it loses its real meaning. It has become associated with anything looked at beyond mediocrity. The miracle of the Hudson River. The Chilean Miners Rescue. And a lot more! These 'miracles' were acted out of human ingenuity. Some extraordinary feats made possible because of modern day technology.
Well, I love Christmas! It still is the most wonderful time of the year! It's just that it has a different meaning to me now.
Merry Christmas everyone!
Friday, December 10, 2010
Our Genes, Our Destiny!
Greg was on top of his world. He had the looks which compares fairly well with the leading men in the silver screen or in the boob tube. His agility, strength and prowess were envied by many tennis enthusiasts in their high school, who tried to beat him in court over and over again but failed. Inside the classroom, he always stood out in solving challenging problems in Calculus, and he impressed his speech class by the eloquence and wits he put into the delivery of his talks. He was the ‘Casanova’, the apple of every lady’s eyes in campus. He seemed to have all the best qualities for a ‘perfect’ man. He graduated top of his class. And yet despite of these, he still set his feet on the ground.
Twenty five years after, Greg’s high school classmates were gathered together in a high school reunion as the silver jubilarians. Excitement filled the atmosphere as the jubilarians put forth their best. A showcase of how the quarter-of-a century changed the lives of the alumni was flamboyant. Dramatic and full of surprises, this best describes how people got into the huge event. Many got in tagging their families along. Some came singly. As the crowd was getting thicker, the huge arena was filled with so much snafus, guffaws and perfunctory musings. This is on top of the voice over announcements aired now and then, and the music played non-stop. A lot of catching up, family introductions, reminiscing the nostalgic good-old-high school days, and yes, reliving the gossips.
***********
There's a gene for everything. Pretty face, smooth skin, cute dimple? there are genes for that! Tall, dark and handsome? there are genes for that! Red hair? there's a gene for that! Good at Calculus? there's a math gene. Funny? cranky? feisty? there are genes for that. A god gene for the spiritual! Breast cancer? diabetes? there are genes for that. And there are countless other genes that may prematurely curtail our mortal journey
Our genes are the ultimate puppetters of our lives. We may be blessed by the good genes or cursed by the bad. Our genes make us who we are as a biological entity! They make us special and one-of-a-kind! Our genes is nature's endowment, randomly and endlessly mixed in a haphazard game of chance. We have no control over our genes. We can not choose our genes. We are what we got! And so, we live (and die) under our genes' bliss or mercy.
Our genes do not behave like robots. Though some of them selfish, they don't work with extreme exclusivity. Our genes pick up clues from the environment; from what we eat, we drink, we breath or from what we were exposed to while we buried ourselves inside our mother's womb, . Together, they make the person we are! The conditioning and programming of our genes started shortly after our beginnings, after mom and dad were having the times of their love.
We have a constant love-and-hate relationship with our genes. Just as we love some traits which make us a so proud about ourselves, we feel inept with some. Our genes foretell our future, but we know not what's in store for us. At some points in our life, some of our genes may bring us to the pedestal. But somewhere down the road, other genes may pull us down to the dark abyss.
Our lives, being controlled by our genes, makes us feel so powerless and lame. No matter how powerful the individual is! Cancer. Huntington's chorea. Parkinson's disease. Sickle cell anemia. There are genes for these! And these genes play no favorites. They know no boundaries. They don't care if one is young or old; rich or poor! They are totally indifferent!
Just as no one can go against nature, we can do nothing against our genes!
Friday, December 3, 2010
Amazing Web-Based Tools For Free
So Thursday this week has come and gone. I still have no topic in mind to write about for this week's blog. This week seems to be my busiest, time to wrap up everything in the laboratory and to tie up loose ends in the lectures in time for next week's final examinations. I got so caught up with the preparation and grading of laboratory exams, and giving the semester's last lectures. Despite of the apparently hectic schedule, though, I decided to attend a 3-hour hands-on training for Web 2.0, a faculty development activity which was scheduled this morning. I thought is a good thing to share some Web 2.0 tools!
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Web 2.0 is a collection of a variety of web-based tools with seemingly unlimited functionalities. These interactive tools allow social networking, chatting, data storage (information, pictures, or other forms of data), sharing of photos and links, regular information/news feeding, computing, to name a few. There is always a tool for people for all ages to use, if not, just to enjoy.
To many, Web 2.0 may sound unfamiliar. Yet I am quite certain that they are, one way or another, using one or many of these tools. And who does not have a Face book (facebook.com) account? Even the caveman has one, am sure! Planting and harvesting in Farmville? There is netvibes (netvibes.com) for that! Then, there is twitter (twitter.com) for the man on the go; skype (skype.com) for unlimited hours of free videoconference; goodreads (goodreads.com) for the booklovers out there! Before Face book, there were instant messaging tools like yahoo messenger, windows live, chats, etc.
Even this new pastime of mine, blogging, involves a Web 2.0 tool. Blogs (blogger.com) and Wikis (wikispaces.com; pworks.com) provide good sites for interaction between and collaborations among individuals. Of course, the first hit that comes out when one ‘googles’ something is from Wikipedia! And who has not heard about Wiki leaks? It’s pretty much in the news lately.
In addition to being a powerful tool to reconnect with friends and families who have been separated by space and time, Face book also provides a place to store pictures or videos for friends and families to enjoy. Also, there is flickr (flickr.com) and Picasa (Picasa.com), to name a couple, for photo sharing! Speaking of videos, you tube has it all! Many times, I watched and listened to great lectures given by professors from topnotch universities in you tube. Great talks can also be heard and watched at TED.com, or can be downloaded from iTunes (iTunes.com) as PODcasts.
Instinct makes us bookmark every URL or site we frequently visit. Chances are, we got favorited sites in our home computer and in our office computer as well. And the list is getting bottomless (for lack of organization, lol!) Using delicious (delicious.com), it is possible to consolidate these bookmarked sites, making the best of both worlds, home and work! Have you done cloud computing lately? Google docs (docs.google.com) allows collaboration of multiple users. You can have one document edited by many at the same time! It also has a functionality to create an interactive webform for, say, to sign up for a registration or a survey. Things to do... or stuff to buy in the next grocery visit. Got the list? Have it written on evernote (evernote.com)!
I got so interested with Prezi (prezi.com), a presention software! It seems to have some unique functionalities compared to PowerPoint (I thought!). Will see.
This list is NO WAY complete!! There's a gazillion of them out there. These tools are user-friendly, easy to follow and best of all, they are available for free - major criteria for choosing any tool according to the facilitator of the workshop, Mr. Edwards Smith (edwards@alc.org).
***************
I was so glad I attended the training! Have a good weekend everyone!
I got so interested with Prezi (prezi.com), a presention software! It seems to have some unique functionalities compared to PowerPoint (I thought!). Will see.
This list is NO WAY complete!! There's a gazillion of them out there. These tools are user-friendly, easy to follow and best of all, they are available for free - major criteria for choosing any tool according to the facilitator of the workshop, Mr. Edwards Smith (edwards@alc.org).
***************
I was so glad I attended the training! Have a good weekend everyone!
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