Photo-Finish Friday -- Morning

 

Morning on Lake Nasser, Egypt.

Abstraction

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

(Hamlet, Shakespeare, Act One, Scene 5)

I've been giving creation vs. evolution vs. intelligent design considerable thought lately. 

This is what I've concluded.

The chief problem with intelligent design is it is a compromise. Compromise is considered weak in our "I'm right" culture.

For an evolutionist the theory of evolution is an absolute. As a scientific theory it is provable. Things have been show to evolve.

For a creationist it is faith and the sure knowledge on a deep level that someone greater than us all is on the job looking after us. It is also an absolute.

As for proof, people create things every day.

Meanwhile, both sides maintain human beings are the top of the heap. We're the last word in evolution according to science. To a person who believes in a Creator, we are his best work.

My question to the creationists: Do you really believe we are the best God can do? Isn't that insulting to God?

To the evolutionists: What's next? In to whom, or what, are we evolving?

Intelligent design is the best of both views. It respects both of them and offers a logical, if faith-based, explanation for life.

In it, if I understand correctly, a Supreme Being invented all the ingredients the earth needs to sustain life and then let said ingredients have at it. In short, we're SB's science project.

It is a much broader view than either creationism or evolution, but it still stops at us. All three views have one thing in common: they are earth centric.

We're it. Not only have we either evolved as far as we're going to go, we're the top end of creation. For as vast and endless a being as SB's reputation would have it, we are as far as he got.

It's possible. We could be his latest work, but I have a hard time buying that we're his only like design. I am sure there are other people out there. I mean people in the broad sense of critters with whom we can identify including, but not restricted to Romulan, Gorn, or Ferengi.

This is what bothers me the most. Are our egos so fragile that we have to think we're the best? Or is it plain old gut –clenching fear?

Space does not end. Neither does it begin. Same with time. How can it?

What was before time? What was before space? Does it exist? Or do we have these measures as a way of coping with the infinite?

And may be that's what it is. My puny mind cannot conceive of many abstract concepts.

I can handle eternal because I see an implicit beginning to it. For me to cope I have to believe that eternal has a starting point. I can deal with no end if I have a beginning.

Infinite gives me trouble as there is no implicit beginning or end. It is impossible for me to put in words. I cannot conceive of no beginning

Perhaps that is why we like the evolution explanation. It gives us concrete measures. We can figure back to a beginning.

Maybe that's why we like to talk about the end of the world. It gives us a place to stop.

And maybe that's why both sides can't compromise on intelligent design. It gives an unfathomable infinity to science while taking away the infinite from creation.

I haven’t decided about it but it appeals to me for two reasons.

The first is it's a good compromise.

The second is we have a saying in the news business: if you get both sides mad at you, then you are doing something right.

Happy Birthday, Hatshepsut

Temple of Hatshepsut, Egypt.

Today is the female Pharaoh's birthday. 

Messymimi noted this over at her blog so I decided to steal it.

Gratitude Monday --Waterfalls

Waterfall along Premier Lake, B.C.

Waterfalls are wonderful things. The sound of rushing water is soothing and relaxing. It softens a mood. And even as it calms it gives a boost.
Plus, they are pretty.
Even the smallest, meanest bit of running water has its own beauty.
I can live without a great many things, but it wouldn't be the same without waterfalls.

Photo-Finish Friday --A Pretty Product of Summer

A columbine, grown and tended by my husband.

Two Sentence Tuesday -- Still Working on BloodLovers

I've managed to get a reasonable amount done on BloodLovers these last few days. I've found that if I get to it before breakfast I get something accomplished.
It seems to be about the only time lately as errands and whatnot stretch out to take up most of the rest of the day.
Here's a bit of conversation Merelani is having with her daughter Eury:
" 'You  haven't been interested in hunting anything. Is the silver tea working too well for you?' "
We're still reading Heidi  (Johanna Spyri, Witman Publishing Company  MCMXLIV, and MCMLV)as our bedtime story:
" On the fourth day, the cold was so bitter that it crackled with every footstep outdoors. Heidi, as she sat on her high stool eating her dinner, began her little speech again: "

Mountains and turkey vultures near sunset, for atmosphere.

Thanks for being here. For more or to get in on the fun please see the Women of Mystery.

Gratitude Monday -- The Bench That Mike Built

The bench that Mike built.

It looks like something you'd happen upon in a forest.

Mr. Slivovitz and Mr. Utopian  would like you to join them in the garden.

Mike carved this bench. He started work in the spring. It needed some lengthy curing.
It's done now and in its rightful spot in the back yard by the garden.
I think he did a magnificent job and I am so grateful to have it.

Photo - Finish Friday --Snoozing in the Souk

Kitties enjoy the late morning sun in the Khan El Khalili bazaar, Cairo.

Juicy Treat

Wren mom brings home lunch.

It's the season of the young, hungry birdies.
I've been playing with photo programs trying to teach myself proper cropping. It's coming along, but I need practice.

Scenes from a Tree

Red-shafted flicker assesses the situation before venturing out.

Back, and he brought food.

Feeding the hungry beaks.

That's it?

Daddy?

Two Sentence Tuesday -- Now With Goats

Heidi: You can't spell it without goats.

Last night we started reading Heidi as our bedtime story. We had to get the awful memory of the sequel out of our minds.
It's my favourite book. I've read it several times mostly just because I wanted to though the last time was due to an unignorable urge.
It was 21 years ago. I'd just met my future husband and felt I had to a) read Heidi again and b) go to Peru. Got to the reading in a few weeks. Peru was our first trip together.
Meanwhile, back on the Alm, here are two from Heidi by Johanna Spyri (copyright MCVMXLIV, and MCMLV, Whitman Publishing Company.):
"From the pleasantly situated old town of Mayenfeld a footpath leads up through shady green meadows to the foot of the mountains. Any one who follows it will soon catch the pungent fragrance of grassy pasture lands, for the footpath goes straight and steep to the Alps."
#
As for me, the editing/rewriting/ torquing up of BloodLovers is coming along. It's slow, but I am trying to do a good job of it.
Here's a sample:
"Volga tightened his hold and stared into Dilleman's eyes.
'No.' "
 Thanks for being here. For more, or to get in on the fun, please see the Women of Mystery.

Gratitude Monday -- Of Biblical Proportions

I am grateful that I have read The Bible cover to cover.
It raises a great many questions for me to think about like who were "the giants in the earth in those days?" (Gen. 6:4 KJV) and wherever did anyone get the idea that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute? Doesn't say a word about in the New Testament.

Biblical references show up in books, movies, and television all the time. I had an Aha! moment when I got around to the bit about the witch of Endor. (1 Samuel 28:7)

It must have been in the inspiration for the character name Endora, Samantha's mother on Bewitched. Now that I get the reference I can truly appreciate the name.
(In a moderately interesting aside I found in the Wikipedia entry  I learned that in the Yalkut Shimoni  she is anonymous but referred to as the mother of Abner. Mr. Kravitz, anyone?)
Bits of it are really tough sledding. Other parts of The Bible are so filthy I should have read them with my eyes closed. But it is interesting and it helps me understand the world around me especially those parts that are filtered through Christianity.

I get why fish is a Christian symbol and why the Pope wears the fisherman's ring.
Understanding is good.

Casting about at Premier Lake. Photo by Mike Mayrl

Photo-Finish Friday--In The Mosque

Prayer Pose

A demonstration of praying at the Alabaster Mosque of Mohammed Ali, Cairo.

Chequing In

I've been writing abundance cheques for a few years now.

They work.

Sometimes it is hard to see how. One has to keep an open mind.

If you are expecting to win big at the lottery because you've been invoking the Law of Abundance and haven't, then you may think said cheques are a grand pile of hokum.

Such is your right.

I've noticed in my life that people who think this way come from a base of scarcity and lack. If you think you don't have enough, then that's what you get. In reality you may have more than you need, but as long as you think you don't, well, you'll be right.

There's not much can be done about those people except ignore them. I refuse to have whining, negative, toxic people in my life. They are poison. Their poison spreads and makes it easy to believe in an ever-dwindling supply of good food, clean water, and fresh air.

Who needs those people? They're energy thieves because they hate the idea that someone has what they don't.

I'd tell them to go to Hell, but they're already there.

Open you mind and-–this is more important—your heart and become aware of the abundance all around you.

If comes in many forms. You have to be open to seeing them and appreciating them both in the sense of gratitude and of understanding a thing's true worth.

One of the first forms of abundance I noticed was I had more money. Not a great lot, simply more of it, especially loonies and toonies. ($1 and $2 coins.)

This was the universe's literal way of telling me it had worked.

We've had many trips, time with friends, I've had several manuscript ideas, my husband's father has blessed us with as many fresh garden vegetables as we need and then some.

I have really good health. Yes, I have an irregular heartbeat, and yes it does get in my way occasionally, but I'm still healthy.

Yes, without writing abundance cheques I may still have had all this.

Would I have noticed?

Probably not.

But it is my position that by writing these cheques I have opened myself up to the Law of Abundance, plus opened my mind to the other Universal Laws.

These are my beliefs. You can share them or not as you see fit. But if you're writing abundance cheques and have been disappointed, then please step back and take an objective look  at your life since you started writing them.

Two Sentence Tuesday --Double Entendre To Go, Please

We went away to southern BC for the Canada Day long weekend. It's always good to get away. It shakes up the thinking, gets some different air into the lungs, and puts new new sights before the eyes.
Among the sights seen that can't be unseen was a billboard somewhere north of Invermere, BC.
I regret not getting a photo of it.
I saw it on the way down with the intention of shooting it on the way home.  But it was raining then and there'd been an accident in Invermere which held up the holiday traffic. Irate drivers and rain don't make for good stopping.
The billboard was an ad for Bull's Eye Barbecue Sauce.
The following slogan on the ad is my contribution to what I read this week:
"Sauce So Bold
Pork Will
Pull Itself."
The ad worked in that I'm writing about it, but I was so busy with the ad copy I didn't notice the sauce brand and had to look it up. That said, it did make me look.
My contribution to the cause is much tamer, and hope at least half as memorable.

From BloodLovers:

"An open place, an empty quarter but for the animals. A place where she could do as she pleased at the times she pleased and maybe there'd be a time when she'd be able to speak a coherent sentence to Jem again."
Thank you for your time. For more, or to get in on the fun, please see the Women of Mystery.

Gratitude Monday --The Neighbour

Yellowstone National Park, U.S.A.

I am so very grateful that my country has such a friendly, attractive neighbour.
Happy Fourth of July, America.

Photo-Finish Friday--Happy Canada Day!

Alberta Wild Rose

It's July 1st.
Happy Canada Day.