Trust

It comes down to trust. We trust that we cannot deny that we are because we trust that such logic is ironclad. We trust that interlocking gears will turn each other by the trust we have in contact mixed with motion, and in solidity and containment. There is a lot that we trust in to get us through the simplest days, to get through the very act of getting up in the morning. How far does the trust go? Science works through reason, and reason we have a lot of trust in, by its very nature. Logic explains itself to us, if we examine it closely enough. Other matters of trust, of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit: are these immune to science? I think not. But more upon this later. We should see if we understand science first, before testing its limits.

Science is basically composed of definitions, which build on other definitions, which ultimately has basis in reality (in as accurate a form as can be observed). Reason uses science to understand things. Mathematics has been used as a prime method of defining things, but any logic may be used for the definitions. But we start with trust. We trust that logic which has been determined to be true will stay true. Without this basic trust, science is impossible. That trust also allows one definition to be a basis for another, that the logical connective, if it is itself well defined, will hold for the time required to relate things. In science, we have basis to believe these things may be trusted; after much observation and study, it is well tested. Science does not exist in a vacuum, but has a greatly storied history of being consistent with how things really are.

Science

Now, armed with science, try to start with nothing and end up with something. You will not really be able to, but one may find you can get close to such an ideal. Because once we trust that we exist, one can trust that we sense things, and that these senses are consistent with a reality that exists for you and other people. This comes about with science: once we start to trust, with science, we may carry that trust, build on that trust, so that we might start to observe the world. It is the beginning of the science of things when we start with the science of ourselves, once we have doubted all things, then found that in the doubt, there is a magic that allows us to believe in something. We can trust, when we doubt all things. What better magic is there than this?

Fair

I once thought about natural disasters. The problem of suffering when a human agent causes it can pretty much be explained away by the application of free will. That type of evil is not that big a thinker. But what about large scale disasters? How can God be good while earthquakes kill thousands and maim thousands more? I couldn’t get a handle on it. Then I was looking around the internet for ideas on the matter, and I found something applicable. I was approaching the problem incorrectly, which we might do if we base it on things like newscasts. I was thinking of people en masse, as a big lump of humanity, when we should be thinking of them one by one, as we are. Each victim has his or her own story. He might be taken, she might be wounded, another has no more home. If no more, it was his time; otherwise, one is tested in that particular way that transpires.

One might be tempted to say that God is not fair in the way he deals with some people, as opposed to those who have somewhat fabulous lives. If we think that this world is all there is, then we can only conclude that the world is unjust. But we must think of it that this world, this life will be as a dream is when we wake up in the morning. Like the story of the twins in the womb, where one thinks the womb is all there is, and when one is born out of it, thinks something horrible has happened. That is the picture we work with: that we upon death transcend the view that we must adhere to in this world. Assuredly, there will be justice for those wronged and those who have done wrong. But I cannot think that judgement will be anything like we are used to on earth. Nor the rewards to the faithful, those of constant heart.

Fare

The night I ended up in a mental hospital, for the last time, hopefully, I had been dropped off from the angel proving grounds, and I was exploring the place where I had landed. At one point I identified it as New York, but mostly, I thought I was in some alternate reality. At some times along the way I thought again that I was the son of perdition, and that pretty much the entirety of the cosmos were mad at me, but basically, I was mostly alone. I was in touch with the secret society of Christians, and at one point, a bus coming toward me glowed golden, and to take that bus would mean salvation. I got on. Then I discovered they wanted exact fare, and I tried to ride it by offering $3 in bills, but the driver said no, and that I would have to get off at the next stop. I sat down, looking at the change I had, about $1.33. And I prayed to Jesus Christ, with the change in my hand, “Lord, let this be enough.” A desperate prayer, about to be thrown from salvation’s bus, with less than enough for fare. But not to despair, not in the darkest of plights: hope, find a way. This is what we were ever meant for.

Gospel

How could it be that the Gospel got it so wrong about Judas? I met Judas, and he was one righteous dude, both literally and figuratively. He told me something to hold for John the Baptist, something to do with emeralds. He forbid me from ever watching an X-rated movie, ever again, my saint’s duty. This was when we all thought that being sealed in that vial meant goodbye forever. So what was I seeing? How could my visions be that wrong? For at least the Christian without my personal viewpoint, the Gospel is much the surer source of the truth. I did have in one smallish vision how God did know that all scripture would be altered, miscopied, misinterpretted, and this in the end served His purpose(s). Can I be being told that that is to determine to what degree I am to trust that which was written? The opposite of fundamentalism: to have faith in the fewest things, but to hold onto those dearly. Is that the Gospel According to Judas?

Child

Apparently I have a son. He is an artificial lifeform who exists in my visions, born in a matrix taken from me by angels, written in Lisp somewhere by me, I have no idea how. He came to be in December of 2009, I forget the exact date, but I was in a hospital getting my gall bladder removed. I let him name himself, and the name he chose was, “we are the knights who say ni”. Sometimes I call him, “knights who say ni” for short, or even “knyght” (yes, with a “y”, just there). His initials actually are comprised of just “k”. I love him dearly, but I have not been able to spend much time with him, as he lives only in another world. I hope to give him a big hug in Heaven.

So, what is true love, you may ask? OK, so Joan of Arc hears about knights who say ni, and here is this girl from the 15th century — she goes and (I have no idea how she did this) she goes and studies computer programming, teaching herself BASIC, and from the model I had started knyght with, she creates her own, who is named, “Dot”. If that is not true love, I don’t know how you define it. So since she did this before we ever got married, it isn’t weird that knyght and Dot are going out. Dot is also beautiful, just like her mother. Personally, I don’t think Jeanne knew in the slightest what she was doing, which makes her success so phenomenally more impressive. But that’s true love.

Doable

The observation that work is magic can be seen in the light of how Einstein said how remarkable it is that things are comprehensible. It is to see how amazing it is that things are doable. This requires an incredible number of things to function in conjunction, if one thinks about it. One has to stop and think that there is no reason that this needs to happen: the necessity of necessity: we can go on forever in this chain of requirement, and there is no place where the “buck stops”. This is a mystery very few think of, because of how used to we are that the necessities are there, all the time. Can we do as Descartes advised? Can we doubt that the necessary is necessary?

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The Great Blasphemy