Suboptimist
I’m not quite a pessimist. I’m more of a suboptimist.

A couple things on my mind today. Has anybody (in Utah) heard the referendum 1 (school vouchers) ads on the radio? I find them really irritating. It makes me wonder if there are options aside from “Yes” and “No” on the ballot. The logic the ads are employing is pretty ridiculous. For example, from the “Yes” side: “More money for public schools.” How? Seriously, how? Giving money that could be used for public schooling to people to use in private schooling equals more money for public schools?

From the “No” side: “…Teachers at private schools don’t need a teaching certificate or even a college degree.” How is that even relevant to the discussion? It’s not, it’s just a swipe against private schools and a misconception of what a teaching certificate is, a credential required only for teaching in government schools in Utah. The college degree thing is trumped up. Most private school teachers have degrees. The ones that don’t probably won’t be found teaching math, science, or English either.

The other thing is Julie Beck’s LDS General Conference talk. I know, I’m late to the game here, but I don’t pay attention to General Conference, so I have to catch all of the uproar second hand. I recall some complaints over at FMH about it. As I read it, yeah, I found a few examples of what I would consider an antiquated attitude of what women should do, like:

Mothers who know are nurturers. This is their special assignment and role under the plan of happiness.5 To nurture means to cultivate, care for, and make grow. Therefore, mothers who know create a climate for spiritual and temporal growth in their homes. Another word for nurturing is homemaking. Homemaking includes cooking, washing clothes and dishes, and keeping an orderly home. Home is where women have the most power and influence; therefore, Latter-day Saint women should be the best homemakers in the world. Working beside children in homemaking tasks creates opportunities to teach and model qualities children should emulate. Nurturing mothers are knowledgeable, but all the education women attain will avail them nothing if they do not have the skill to make a home that creates a climate for spiritual growth. Growth happens best in a “house of order,” and women should pattern their homes after the Lord’s house (see D&C 109). Nurturing requires organization, patience, love, and work. Helping growth occur through nurturing is truly a powerful and influential role bestowed on women.

Really though, aside from this and the children thing she said, it wasn’t that inflammatory of a talk. Kind of I’m tired of talking now. I think I need to go to class anyway. Why couldn’t Helen Keller drive? Sorry, sorry, I had to say that.

I find it terribly ironic when fan clubs devoted to Sam Harris pop up on Facebook. A group of followers of an atheist thinker to gather and rally against theism with evangelical zeal seems remarkably odd to me. One of the discussions in the Facebook group I linked to I found particularly interesting. The thread is entitled, “Harris vs. Dawkins.” The first paragraph of the first post reads:

While Dawkins has impressive credentials (with his seat at Oxford), his most recent book The God Delusion falls down hard when making coherant [sic] arguments against the faithful. While I respect the mans effort in organizing the non-religious (especially atheists) politically, his most recent work is just not as intellectually robust as Harris’s The End of Faith.

When I read this paragraph, I don’t see a reasoned discussion about the arguments made by Sam Harris as opposed to Richard Dawkins. What I see is a discussion about the comparative writing and reasoning ability of the two men. This is the way critics write (I am writing as a critic now). This is also the way competing religious polemicists write. I can’t help but wonder what the world would be like if their dream came true.

There is an old saying: the masses are asses. If you have a group of, say, one hundred people off the streets, I would wager that five to ten are capable of leading intellectually. The other ninety would only be capable of following. The followers become the most zealous. This is the way religions progress within fifty years of their founding, and is the way secular movements are prone to develop. Honestly, religion may be baloney (I personally believe it has plenty to offer), but it is baloney with a future. It can be seen in the way opponents of religion need their own organizations to counter it. Perhaps dogmatism aids in perpetuating the species.

In other news, I was thinking about game theory applied to player-versus-player combat in MMOs while driving between Huntsville and Salt Lake. There is a great debate among the player-bases of these games about survivability and damage dealing. For example, the mage (an offensive spell caster) class in World of Warcraft has, hands down, the lowest survivability in the game, and should be able to trade survivability for the ability to introduce other players to a world of pain. In reality, the mage class is gimped. Other classes can put out comparable or more damage but have far greater survivability and utility. Players who roll mage like to cry about this, really, it isn’t that big of a problem.

There is a concept called first-mover advantage. In PVP, this can be interpreted that in world play (as opposed to controlled battleground play), your chances of victory (here defined as reducing your opponent’s HP to zero while keeping yours greater than zero), all things being equal, are greatly increased if you engage an enemy player. If he engages you, your chance of survival, all things being equal, is greatly decreased. If a mage keeps this in mind, meaning he makes the first move, his survivability is no greater than that of a healing, damage-dealing shadow priest.

Of course, not everything is necessarily equal. The PVP system in WoW is, at least in part, gear based. A well geared player can own another’s face, even if he is taken by surprise. Ganking, or engaging a player while he is engaged in PVE doesn’t really count. The player being ganked stands no chance.

As for a quick update on my summer reading: I am reading through the Lord of the Rings series again. I am about half-way through the second book right now. I am also reading two biographies. On about General William Tecumseh Sherman, and the other about abolitionist John Brown. I am working on my Arabic so I can take the CASA exam for a fellowship in Syria in 2008, and would like to find time to work on some Hebrew. Time time time.

I finally got to watch the Frontline documentary The Mormons (I was too busy to watch it when it first aired two weeks ago). I was reasonably impressed with it. It seemed to attempt a fair portrayal, covering the history and culture and interviewing the rank and file and the dissidents. My one complaint was that it didn’t cover early Mormonism’s connections to Freemasonry. Surely that would have been relevant, either in the section on Joseph Smith, Mormon beginnings, or the temple ceremonies. Perhaps it would have taken too much time.

I discussed the documentary with a friend of mine. He asked how I felt about Mormonism, having been raised a Latter-day Saint, growing up in the culture, and being inactive (a term frequently applied to those who do not attend LDS meetings). What can be said is that I have had little exposure to Mormonism as it exists outside of Utah, the sole exceptions being visits to family in Seattle and Minneapolis and the summer I spent with a small group of Jordanian Mormons. Thus, what I can say about my feelings toward LDS culture is limited. I believe the culture is different here since Mormons comprise the majority religious group. This is probably the reason many Utahans identify themselves as being either Mormon or non-Mormon, an aspect of Utah may lead to my ultimate demise. Concerning Utah Mormon culture specifically, it’s can be a little irritating at times, but it’s not as bad as people think. It would be the same with any religious majority (even a non-religious majority).

As per Mormon doctrine and history, it’s a mixed bag for me. Do I believe Joseph Smith was a prophet? No, at least not in the commonly understood meaning of the term. Do I believe Joseph Smith was a fraud? Again, no. I think he was a sincere religious founder. Charlatan? All religious founders (including businessmen, scholars, anyone who has to use persuasions regularly) has to have a little bit of that in him, but I don’t believe Smith was trying to mislead people. Do I believe the Book of Mormon documents the pre-Columbian Americas? No, in fact Joseph Smith listed himself as the ‘Author and Proprietor’ of the first edition. Do I like some of the things Smith did? Yes. I’ll leave it at that.

Do I like Brigham Young? Not particularly. I think he was a dictator, a racist, and a philanderer. While Joseph Smith appointed a black man, Elijah Abel, to hold the priesthood office of Seventy, Young insisted that black men could not hold the priesthood, saying the only reason the ‘Negro race’ survived the flood was so Satan could maintain his presence on earth. He also called slavery a divine institution. I do, however, like the fact that he basically told American to f*** itself when he moved the early Saints west. That is certainly admirable.

Do I believe the Church is the only way to God? No. Do I believe it is one of many ways to God? Yes, the same way I believe Catholicism, Protestantism, Islam, Buddhism, etc. are ways to God or whatever supreme entity is there. I believe the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has a positive influence in the lives of millions of its members. That is something I will never deny. For me, however, it isn’t what it claims to be. I have to take a different path. So the final question is whether I consider myself ‘Mormon.’ The answer is yes, the same way a Jew can be a Jew while practicing Buddhism. I was raised Mormon, I come from pioneer stock on my mother’s side, my family is Mormon, and it will always be part of me and something I will never deny. Am I a Latter-day Saint? No, at least I can’t call myself one.

In other news, to break the awkward silence that may be permeating the area around your computer right now, I am sick of how the people leading us in this war the US is engaged in can’t pronounce the name of the country we are occupying. It isn’t iRaq, it’s Iraq. Get it right, n00bs. I heard an NPR interview the other day with a guy talking about how difficult it is to find insurgents from helicopters, because iRaq is nothing but palm trees, palm tree farms and sand. Jeez, people. Get with it.

If moral relativists have anything going for them, it is that morals considered good to one social group contradict with those good morals of others. I have been thinking about this a lot lately. I don’t consider myself a moral relativist, but I do think that other than a few things, absolute morals are generally rather elusive. Anyway, enough about me, let’s go over a couple of interesting contradictions.

In our Western Judeo-Christian tradition, the act of Islamic terrorism is vehemently condemned for the killing of innocent men, women, and children. However, when we go to Sunday school, we read about the Holy Wars of the Old Testament. Example:

When the LORD your God delivers it into your hand, put to the sword all the men in it. As for the women, the children, the livestock and everything else in the city, you may take these as plunder for yourselves. And you may use the plunder the LORD your God gives you from your enemies. This is how you are to treat all the cities that are at a distance from you and do not belong to the nations nearby. However, in the cities of the nations the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance do not leave alive anything that breathes.

Deuteronomy 20: 14-16

Here, our sacred text lauds a genocidal slaughter, conceivably commanded by God. We may answer, “Well, God did command the Israelites to do that.” Maybe so, but consider for a moment that perhaps we are wrong and they are right. Is God commanding them to murder? Interesting, but more interesting would be the responses to the question when I go to Sunday school.

Here is another one: shortly after the 1972 Munich Massacre and shortly before the beginning of Operation Wrath of God, then prime minister of Israel Golda Meir stated, “We can forgive you for killing our sons. But we will never forgive you for making us kill yours.” Given the sometimes dark history of the establishment of the State of Israel, like Deir Yassin etc, it strikes me as odd that this was said. Is it inconceivable that mothers of Palestinian schoolboys killed, either intentionally or accidentally, by Jewish settlers thought the same thing? Who, then, is in the right?

One last one, and this one is more recent: in the storm of controversy regarding Jeff Nielsen of BYU’s de facto dismissal following his Tribune piece, I have noticed that an overwhelming majority of those defending BYU’s actions on the basis of it being a private university owned by the LDS Church are the same who criticize Yale — another private university — for stifling conservative speech. Interesting, indeed.

…I usually get at least four.

I am trying to think if there is anything worth writing about. I am failing, I am afraid, because I all I can come up with is this report on what I have been doing:

As always, I am continuing my language work. I have made progress in my Arabic, have gotten a great start in Syriac, worked through the initial orthographic difficulties of Biblical Hebrew, and picked up a book on Coptic for a little variety. This may seem difficult, but in reality it is rather simple. The only language from the above list that I have to speak is Arabic; the others are literary mediums. Besides, I am not bound by academic deadlines relating to any of them.

This evening, I watched Inspector Morse: Masonic Mysteries. I enjoyed it thoroughly. The plot is thus: a murder takes place at the inspector’s rehearsal of the Magic Flute. It appears that somebody is trying to frame Inspector Morse, and that somebody seems to be the Masons. I won’t spoil it for you, but I will tell you that it wasn’t the Masons — we don’t really do anything cool like framing British detectives. When I learned who the real villain was — Ian McDiarmid — I yelled, “I knew the Sith were involved!” The movie became all the more enjoyable.

Partially motivated by Debbie’s recent venture, I reinitiated my research into early Mormonism. My primary interest used to be the connections between the early Church and Freemasonry. Right now my focus is on polygamy. I, being a more liberal Mormon (though slightly less active), have always considered plural marriage to be a dark point in the Church’s history it needs to confront. I have strong doubts it was ever an inspired practice; at best, it was Joseph Smith’s attempt to reinstate ancient customs, at worst, it was a ploy. Though I hope it was the former, of course, I need to admit that I am utterly agnostic on this issue. What I learn will likely have no bearing on my feelings, which is what makes me a perfect candidate to research the subject. Readers on every side may feel free to flame me now.

*EDIT* I am going to create a permanent section devoted to my current research about whatever as soon as I create the documents page.

I could feel from the start that today was going to be unpleasant. I’ll not go into it. Pardon the shoddy workmanship:

I saw two (2) movies this week: The Da Vinci Code and X-Men III: The Last Stand. I can’t say that either were good, but at least the latter was enjoyable. I could barely sit through Da Vinci. Honestly, it was to be expected, as I hated the book’s premise for purely academic reasons, for example, using Holy Blood, Holy Grail as a source — a book scholars have discredited. Call me a snob, but I couldn’t find an enjoyable plot within the factual errors. The Sacred Feminine is an important theological question to be discussed, and frankly Dan Brown with his axe to grind against the Catholic Church does it a disservice. There were several things that irritated me in the story, but in interest of my splitting headache, here are a few things which annoyed me the most:

First, Brown’s Sacred Feminine is a pre-Christian, European ideal and one that would have had no place in a Semitic and monotheistic tradition. Indeed, in this tradition, God possesses feminine characteristics, an entirely different matter.

Brown’s portrayal of the early Christian history is false. Gnosticism was not proclaimed a heresy at the Council of Nicea, but in the 2^nd century, long before the church had the power to persecute anybody. Further, the primary conflict at the Council was between Arianism and Trinitarianism, not divinity and mortality.

This bothers me the most as a linguist: in the book it is claimed that the name the name YHWH is a contraction of the masculine Jah and the pre-Hebraic name for Eve, Hawa. This could not be more wrong. YHWH is comprised of the consonants yod, heh, waw, and heh. The root for Eve cannot be found among those consonants, as her name begins with heth. Allophones of different phonemes — they are not interchangeable. Further, philologists believe that the word YHWH means, ‘He is,’ as to emphasize God’s absolute being.

That humans don’t see what is in front of them was a recurring theme in the book and the film. Brown isn’t an exception. It doesn’t take a symbologist [sic] to realize that Rome embellished the Sacred Feminine, not suppressed it. The Virgin Mary’s status, for instance, would never have come to be had it not been for European influence in Christianity. Finally, as a believer in sacred femininity per se, I think it is absurd to associate it with Mary Magdalene. Being the wife of Jesus Christ does not raise anybody to idol status.

Sorry, this update sucks, but I don’t feel well.

Unforunately in modern society when dealing with things of a spiritual nature, we tend to forget that God is the constant and we are the variable. Often we argue that God should be one way or another based on a temporal ideal. This is irritating.

Further, I need to hear a theologically and philosophically valid argument before I will accept these positions.

Judas priest, I am exhausted. I really haven’t had anything to do since Monday, but nevertheless I feel like I could collapse. Maybe it has something to do with yesterday being the first day I’ve worked out in months. You see, I am not running due to the stress it puts on my guts, so I used the elliptical and weights. I cannot overstate how foolish I feel when I am on the elliptical. I hate how my butt shakes while my legs are move without me being able to adjust their position. I really need to get a good, solid road bike or get into swimming — anything but the elliptical.

There have been surprising requests for more language updates. One was in a recent comment. Since I am too tired to right anything really interesting, I figure I will write about ‘organized religion.’ The word, mind you, not the concept. The term ‘organized religion’ is interesting to me, as it appears to be structured more like ‘hot chocolate’ than something like ‘green Jell-O.’ It’s a compound noun, not an adjective and a noun. ‘Hot chocolate’ isn’t necessarily hot. It also isn’t chocolate that’s been heated up, but chocolate base mixed with some kind of liquid. This is why Starbucks can get away with selling ‘frozen hot chocolate.’ When I look out onto the world of religion, I see a lot of religions, but very little organization. Perhaps individual religious sects are organized hierarchically, but the majority is loosely bound by some undefined principle. Thus, when we talk about or criticize ‘organized religion,’ we are probably referring to religious dogma rather than any particular religious structure. So, think about that.

If it weren’t for lodge tomorrow evening, I would be looking forward to the most boring, uneventful weekend of my existence. It seems like everybody is out of town, has some kind of work thing, or family function to attend to. Even the Reverend is out of town this weekend. I don’t even have any homework to do. See how bored I get when I am not in school? My life already lacks meaning… I need to get a life…

I would be willing to wager that most of you are aware that many young LDS men leave home for two years to perform missionary service. I did not go, nor am I planning on doing so in the near future. Nevertheless, a solid forty percent of my stress can likely be traced to mission-related irritants. Part of the reason I dislike attending church services is the constant barrage of questions I face, such as, “When are you putting your papers in?” Or, “So, are you still considering a mission?” Or, “What are your plans after the school year?” And of course, “Why aren’t you on a mission, Rob?”

When I engage in social activities with fellow Mormons, I can’t escape the topic. Even within my family everything is related to whether or not I will serve a mission. For example, until recently all discussions concerning my Crohn’s disease went something like this: “Rob, there is a great doctor who does a lot of work with missionaries with Crohn’s.” It’s infuriating.

I am often told that I would be a great missionary, which surprises me since I don’t think I would make a great anything, much less a missionary. I am theologically ‘liberal,’ an anti-traditionalist, and an individualist. I would probably chase people away rather than draw them in.

My situation becomes all the more frustrating with regards to dating. Most the girls I am interested in dating fall into one of two categories: Muslim or Mormon. There would be obvious conflicts with the former I need not discuss. Mormon girls my age, on the other hand, can be divided into a handful of other categories: those waiting for missionary boyfriends, those harvested by returned missionaries, and those who simply wouldn’t date a guy who hasn’t served a mission. So, here’s to ‘guy friends’ and ‘hanging out.’

Non-Mormons in Utah often say they feel like a candidate for conversion rather than a human being. I am beginning to empathize with that sentiment. I feel like a project sometimes, rather than a person. I feel as if the goals of those around me aren’t to get to know me as a person, but to reform me and put a nametag on my shirt.

There, I said it. And no, this doesn’t refer to anybody in particular.