Transhumanism and Human Exceptionalism

Posted by on December 17, 2012 No comments

Sharon and I were honored to participate with Wesley J. Smith of the Discovery Institute and National Review Online in the Q & A session after this screening tonight via Google Hangout. People of faith can see where the transhuman techno-crusade leads — it’s a twisted theology that completely buys into the oldest lie in the Book (“ye shall be as gods”).

But as Wesley pointed out, if we frame the debate in theological terms, we lose. Most people will tune out any argument based on religion because they won’t be able to see past those differences. This is too important an issue to let it derail over the premise.

The bottom line is this: transhumanism is eugenics with a sci-fi veneer. Think Hitler with gene-splicing capability and you get the idea.

Pre-Crime

Posted by on December 15, 2012 No comments
The response to the tragedy in Newtown, Connecticut was a predictable jerk of the knee.  We don’t own a gun, although I took the training course to qualify for a concealed-carry permit when we lived in mid-Missouri five years ago.  I don’t have a problem with people owning them (and if we’d stayed in Columbia, Missouri, I would have given serious thought to buying one).  Given that the guns were purchased by and registered to the alleged shooter’s kindergarten teacher mother, the only change that would have helped in this case is a near-total ban on private gun ownership.
 
The big story to me is not the response of anti-gun activists, it is the growing call for an aggressively proactive approach to screening and treatment for mental illness.  Sounds like a practical solution until you consider that homosexuality was considered a mental illness not that long ago, and in the mid-19th century some physicians considered the desire of some African-American slaves to run away from the masters an illness.
 
In our enlightened modern age, the medical/pharmaceutical community officially considers resistance to authority figures a disease called Oppositional Defiant Disorder.  Rant too long and loud against the government and one of these days you may be medicated against your will–for the good of society, of course.
 
We’re seeing what could become the beginning of police Pre-Crime detection, a la Minority Report.

A small but annoying detail

Posted by on November 24, 2012 No comments

On a whim, Sharon and I decided to watch episodes from our boxed sets of the late, lamented Fox series Millennium.  A bleak way to spend a holiday weekend, to some; the series was a grim look at the battle between good and evil through the eyes of world-weary former FBI profiler Frank Black.  Black, as portrayed by the excellent Lance Henriksen, always looked like he was about one crime scene photo away from his next nervous breakdown.

The series ran three seasons and should have had a longer run.  At its best, Millennium produced some of the finest and most intelligent episodes of drama ever broadcast on television.

So given that, and considering that apocalyptic prophecy was a recurring theme, you’d think that a producer or script editor would have fixed the scripts at some point so that the characters quit calling the last book of the Bible Revelations!

Pink = Green

Posted by on October 13, 2012 4 comments

My “seemer” (as in, “Something doesn’t seem right about this”) is apparently right again — this time, about the flood of pink at NFL games this month:

It is Breast Cancer Awareness month, and the NFL is doing its part to support the cause as the league has become saturated in pink. However, off the field, it is a different story.

Many of the items seen on the field can also be purchased in the NFL’s online shop. But while the items on the field will be auctioned off with proceeds going to the American Cancer Society, it is less clear how much of the sales of pink gear in the NFL Shop go towards research.

According to the website, by purchasing pink items in the NFL Shop, fans can “support the fight against breast cancer with pink NFL breast cancer awareness gear.” Of course, there is a huge difference between supporting “awareness” and donating money to research. In the case of the former, most of the money ends up in the pockets of billionaire NFL owners.

“Awareness” is difficult to quantify. As the #2 cause of death among American adults, it’s a good bet that most of us are “aware” of cancer. And while it’s good to encourage women to be screened on a regular basis, I question the effectiveness of pink shoes on a 350-pound offensive lineman as a reminder.

It seems to me the pink tsunami every October has more to do with NFL owners creating more officially licensed inventory for their stores than with finding a cure.

“The Taliban is on the inside of the building”

Posted by on October 13, 2012 No comments

That’s the money quote from this bit of testimony at last week’s congressional hearing on the Benghazi attack: