A reason to be thankful for the Internet...

The Internet is a segment of human life, and so includes all its dross; but here's the kind of resource that makes the Internet great: http://www.math-aids.com

Someone appears to have done this for free. It's high-quality, and well thought-out - and with the power of the Internet, anyone can do that, and anyone can benefit from it, with a few clicks. I just hope they'll make sure it doesn't die with them, if they're just an individual. You couldn't do that without the Internet: the dead wood would cost paper, and publishers have their expenses, etc.

Have you got any useful stuff you could stick online and share with the world? I've been pleasantly surprised to find people coming across stuff I did years ago, and sending a "thank you" note. It doesn't happen often - but in my reckoning, if you put the work in to produce something once, then you may as well squeeze everything you can out of it. If I stick it up there now, it might benefit someone in 20 years time. There's enough trivia on the Internet - do you have something, whether in the things of this world only, or things of the kingdom, that could be a blessing?

Why oppose the techniques involved in "3-parent babies"?

http://www.stopgm3parentbabies.com/why-are-we-opposed-to-mitochondrial-donation/

Waiting until the facts are in

This news story excellently illustrates a Christian teaching - of charity in judgment: waiting until the facts are in, and until the other side has had a full opportunity to explain themselves, before rushing to judgment: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/11379383/How-an-incredible-coincidence-sparked-a-Facebook-plagiarism-row.html. Note how one of the photographers involved made a public fool of himself by not doing so.

Dangerous case of boy who still had an imagination thankfully clamped down upon

Children who learn how to use their imagination risk not growing up to be compliant tools of whoever's in power. This can't be allowed. Thankfully, the authorities are alert to the dangers, and doing all they can to make sure it can't happen.

I'd love to assume that the following news story is a spoof, or that it's April 1st. It does, however, appear to be deadly serious. Make sure you read to the end to get the full list of the boy's various infractions...

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/texas-boy-suspended-bringing-ring-power-school-article-1.2099103

The myth of 1%

Human and chimp DNA are very different - http://creation.com/1-percent-myth

Something to chew over...

Fact: West Africa has dire spiritual and material needs.

Fact: Christians have a mandate, from the Lord God, and from the Saviour who bled for us and bought us, to do something about both of these.

I read about the material needs in secular sources often, with at-least-implicit encouragements to do more to help.

Concerning the small part of the Christian web that I look at from time to time (broadly conservative evangelicalism), I hear almost nothing about either.

Why is this?

A higher law

This article is a very interesting discussion of the concept of "joint enterprise" in UK criminal law:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-30817269

I don't want to discuss that particularly - save the minimal observation that the concept is valid, but, as the article demonstrates, leads to complexity and needs nuancing to get right.

Note, though, what the whole article is doing - appealing beyond the law, to higher conceptions of what is just and fair. There is some higher standard, assumed to exist, and assumed to be accessible by us, that the law needs to conform to.

This, of course, is ultimately the basis of all law - we're trying to set the rules so that they fit both a) our society and b) the higher, objective notions.

Without both human society in its diversity, and objective norms which ought to always apply, you can't have laws at all.

And hence I observe again that you can't have laws, without a de facto state-approved religion. The "higher, objective notions" must be based on something. There must be some final values, beyond which there is no appeal, and which are not subject to man's whim to change when he feels like it. The only question is *which* religion, not whether we have them at all. In the West today, the de facto state religion is state-centric secular humanism.

And a second observation - everybody, whatever they profess, ultimately either acts consistently with the fact that they are created beings, under some ultimate law - or they act as insane people. I have no idea whether the author of the article loves God or acknowledges him at all. But I do know that he can't help behaving as if objective laws and higher notions of justice and righteousness exist, and that it's the duty of law-makers not to pass whatever laws they please, but to conform to them.

God is, and we are either lovers of God, or rebels against him - no neutral position exists.