The Questioning Christian

Veggie goop - a tasty, healthy, low-cal snack (or meal)

[UPDATED] This afternoon I made my second big batch of vegetable goop:

• a lot of chopped-up veggies and fruits — whatever you like;
• almonds;[UPDATE: leave the almonds out, and add them to a bowl of the goop when you eat it] 
• sunflower seeds; [Ditto]
• a couple of cans of tuna (or cut-up pre-cooked turkey Kielbasa);
• a dollop of mayonnaise [UPDATE: or yogurt, or sour cream, or a mixture thereof];
• optional:  a little bit of horse radish;
• optional:  some garlic salt.

Mix well. Refrigerate the left-overs.

It's not much to look at, but boy does it taste good, and the veggies and nuts are good for you.

When you think about it, we're talking a variation on vegetable stew.

[UPDATE: Next time I'm going to try leaving out the almonds and sunflower seeds, because I suspect that something in them is what causes the goop to taste just a little bitter after a day or two in the refrigerator. I'll try sprinkling the nuts and seeds on a bowlful of the glop just before eating it.]

A phrase bubbles out of my memory from high school:  Nutritious, delicious, and good for you too!

[UPDATE: The goop is great on a piece of toast for breakfast, and also for a mid-morning or -afternoon snack.]

The first time I made the goop was a month or so ago. I wanted something to snack on that was healthier than cheese and crackers. It turned out that a small bowl of the goop filled me up for hours without making me sleepy. When my wife was out of town on business, I ate it for meals, and dropped a couple of pounds. So it's going to become a staple of my diet.

How to judge the claims of testimony

In looking up something I'd written awhile back, I ran across this comment, which I posted in another thread two years ago, in response to a query whether I categorically disbelieved all testimony. I've done some light editing, mostly to change from first-person to third-person.

* * *

In a nutshell, my view of testimony is basically that of my profession, viz., Anglo-American jurisprudence.

We should be initially skeptical of all testimony, and should indeed initially doubt it on principle. We shouldn't take any consequential action in reliance on particular testimony until we're shown sufficient other evidence to persuade us that, for the matter in question, the potential consequences of error make it reasonably safe to take a chance on the testimony.

Circumstances alter the case, of course. For a decision with comparatively little downside, it should take less to persuade us of the testimony's reliability.

At a minimum, though, we shouldn't credit someone's testimony, allowing it to influence our decisions — and even that's not the same as giving the testimony conclusive weight, that is, letting it make up our minds for us about what to do — unless at least the following conditions are met:

(a) Does the testimony have sufficient foundation? Before we rely on testimony in a consequential matter, we should insist on being presented with sufficient evidence to persuade us that the witness has reason to know what s/he's talking about. This is called "laying a foundation"; a common event in trial work is "objection, your honor, lack of foundation."

We impose the foundation requirement because we want to know how the witness came to know what s/he claims to know. From millennia of experience, we know that people can readily say things that they think they "know," whereas on closer scrutiny it turns out that they really didn't know it at all; instead, they were imagining things, or they were repeating what they'd heard from someone else, or they were simply remembering incorrectly.

Here's a canonical example: If the witness wants to testify that the light was green, the other lawyer will object, and the judge won't allow the jury to hear the testimony, unless it's first established — e.g., by the witness's own sworn testimony — that the witness was in fact in a position to see the light at the time in question. If the witness is wearing glasses while testifying, we're going to ask whether he was wearing glasses at the time in question (cf. the cross-examination scene from the movie My Cousin Vinnie). And so on.

Now of course, in everyday non-courtroom life, we routinely apply a looser variation of the foundation requirement — assuming, that is, that the evidence otherwise seems sufficiently trustworthy for its intended purpose.

Here's an example. Suppose my wife says "take your umbrella, it's going to rain." Normally I'm not going to cross-examine her about how she came to that conclusion. I'm going to assume that she looked at the newspaper, or heard the weather report on the radio, or looked outside and saw threatening clouds.  In that case, I'm willing to get by with less foundational evidence because the downside of an error is essentially zero. (If my wife is on an out-of-town business trip when she says it's going to rain, I'm going to be at least mildly curious how she knows what she's talking about.)

In contrast, if my doctor tells me I've got cancer of the testicles and need to have them immediately cut off, you can bet I'm going to explore the foundation for his assertion before I let the surgeon take a scalpel to me.

The Prologue of the Gospel of John is a classic example of lack of foundation. The author asserts that certain things happened at the beginning of time. But we have no evidence, direct or indirect, to suggest that "John" knew what he was talking about. Scripturalists want us to rely on that passage from John (and many, many other foundationless passages in the Bible), in making perhaps the biggest decision of our lives, namely to accept the assertion that Jesus was God incarnate. IMHO, that decision is far too important to base on foundationless assertions like that.

The factual testimony of the New Testament documents is replete with similar examples of lack of foundation. Some of the testimony I'm willing to accept, despite its lack of foundation, for reasons I'd have to look at on a case-by-case basis. As to other foundationless testimony, however, I'm not willing to accept it.

(b) Is the likelihood of unacceptable distortion sufficiently low?  Before we rely on testimony, the surrounding evidence should make us comfortable that the testimony is likely to be "sufficiently" free from distortion to be trustworthy for its intended purpose.

Again from long experience, we know that testimony can often be distorted, in a variety of ways.

(i) Testimony can be distorted as it is passed along from person to person, such as in the "telephone game" — that's why we have a hearsay rule; or

(ii) Testimony can be distorted by the witness having an apparent bias, or an agenda, or an axe to grind, or any of a number of possible memory problems — that's why we have a requirement for cross-examination, so that we can explore these possibilities to get the complete picture. Cf. the rule in Numbers and Deut. prohibiting putting anyone to death except on the testimony of at least two witnesses, as well as the Commandment against bearing false witness against thy neighbor.

(Elsewhere, I've written about indications of possible distortion in the various New Testament documents, including for example indications of possible bias in the Gospel of John and in Paul's letters.)

Again, circumstances alter the case. For a highly consequential decision, though, we should want to be very confident that the testimony hasn't been distorted. (Cf. again the OT rule about not putting someone to death except on the testimony of at least two witnesses.) For a less-consequential decision, we needn't be quite so cautious.

(c) Have alternative possibilities been given sufficient weight? When a doctor diagnoses an illness and prescribes treatment, she normally tries to rule out problematic alternatives. When a patient comes in and "testifies" that his throat is sore, it could be just a symptom of a common cold that can be treated by gargling with salt water. But it could also be strep throat, so the doctor will often order a strep culture, and sometimes will preemptively put the patient on an antibiotic just in case.

Similarly, when a New Testament witness offers the conclusory testimony that (for example) Jesus was raised from the dead, we need to identify exactly what the witnesses perceived, and to explore possible alternative explanations for the evidence, before we make major, life-changing decisions on that basis.

Doubt is one of our noblest capacities

Bishop Don Wimberly presided and preached this morning.  Great sermon, based on the story of Doubting Thomas in today's Gospel reading. 

Some of the things he said (I paraphrase):

• Jesus was a doubter. He was a doubter about the Judaic notion of a warlord messiah. He was a doubter that without strict adherence to the Law it was impossible to be in a right relationship with God.

• Don't despise your doubt: Honor it; it's one of your noblest capacities.

• The faith you merely inherit, without ever questioning and struggling with it, will never truly be your own.

• An honest doubter, by subjecting his own doubts to the process of doubt, can come to faith by process of elimination.

* * *

I jotted down some thoughts of my own while listening to the bishop. Here's an edited version:

Doubt arises from a willingness to admit we don't know it all; a willingness to remain open to the reality that God wrought, instead of claiming (in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary) that we already know everything we'll ever need to know.

Doubt is thus an important contributor to faith as defined by the Rev. Barbara Brown Taylor: "[An] openness to truth, whatever truth may turn out to be."

What the Presiding Bishop ought to be saying about the constructive resignation of San Joaquin's (former) standing committee

This weekend the Diocese of San Joaquin held a reorganization meeting in the wake of the departure of its former bishop, John-David Schofield. Some conservatives have protested that the meeting was supposedly illegal. Their argument is that a majority of the San Joaquin standing-committee members did not resign, nor did they leave the Episcopal Church; therefore, the protestors claim, the standing committee continues to be the Ecclesiastical Authority in the diocese, meaning that the national church has no authority to replace the elected standing committee nor otherwise to interfere in diocesan affairs.

In trying to justify the national church's action, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori goofed: She relied (1) on the supposed deposition of Bishop Schofield from ordained ministry, and (2) on the argument that the former standing committee members took action inconsistent with their fiduciary responsibilities.

That was a mistake as to the first point because the deposition of Bishop Schofield never happened (the deposition motion having failed to achieve the canonically-required number of votes). 

And it was a mistake as to the second point because "group guilt" is unacceptable. The national church should not be tarring the DSJ standing committee members with the brush of breach of fiduciary responsibilities until, for each individual member, the church makes a determination (involving at least some sort of notice and opportunity to be heard), that the member's personal conduct warranted such action.

What the PB should have done was to take a simpler approach, namely declaring that:

• Bishop Schofield had indisputably resigned;
• the standing-committee members had constructively resigned by failing to dissent publicly from the San Joaquin diocese's purported secession;
• the canons do not contain an express procedure for dealing with such an extraordinary situation; and
• the Presiding Bishop and Executive Council, acting under their general canonical authority, are going to do what needs to be done to deal with these situations.

Specifically, the PB should have gotten the Executive Council, and also the House of Bishops, to approve the following resolution: 

1. It's beyond peradventure that Bishop Schofield has resigned his see in TEC. He walked off the job, publicly announced his intention not to return, and submitted a letter of resignation from the House of Bishops.

The fact of his resignation was not altered by the House of Bishop's failure to muster the required votes to impose a particular consequence, namely complete deposition from ordained ministry.

Nor was the fact of the resignation altered by absence of approval by the House of Bishops. The approval requirement is not a prerequisite to the effectiveness of a resignation (in legal terms, a condition precedent). Bishop Schofield's resignation was unauthorized, and therefore constituted a breach of the canons, but it was effective even without authorization.

Bishop Schofield is thus still technically an ordained bishop, because the motion in the House of Bishops to depose him from ordained ministry did not achieve the required number of votes. But, by virtue of his actions, he is no longer bishop of TEC's diocese of San Joaquin. 

2. Few if any members of the San Joaquin standing committee timely dissented publicly from the ultra vires action of the diocesan convention on December 8 last, which purported to secede from the Episcopal Church. (I don't know whether this statement is true; anyone know otherwise? Link, please?)

3. Every member of the San Joaquin standing committee who did not timely dissent to secession, publicly and on the record, is deemed to have constructively resigned, even if individual members later professed their desire to remain in the Episcopal Church.  In the extraordinary circumstances presented by the December meeting of the diocesan convention, the burden was on each individual standing-committee member to make a clear, timely statement of his dissent. This borrows from corporate- and securities law, in which each individual member of a board of directors is deemed liable for certain corporate actions, regardless whether she personally favored it, unless she timely stated her dissent on the record.

4. As a result, the San Joaquin standing committee can no longer muster a quorum and is legally incapable of taking any action whatsoever. (I have no idea whether this statement is true under the diocesan canons.)

5. The extraordinary situation described above is not expressly addressed by TEC's constitution and canons.  The Presiding Bishop and Executive Committee will therefore take such action as is necessary to replace the DSJ's former leadership, proceeding under their general canonical responsibility "for leadership in initiating and developing the policy and strategy in the Church ..." (Canon I.2.4(a)((1), concerning the Presiding Bishop) and "[to] have charge of the coordination, development, and implementation of the ministry and mission of the Church ...." (Canon I.4.1(a), concerning the Executive Council).

Are we smarter than the ancients?

Over at TitusOneNine, some of the commenters are rehearsing their scorn for the so-called liberal notion that we today are supposedly smarter than the ancients.

We probably aren’t any more innately gifted than the ancients were. But it’s indisputable that the intellectual tools we have for observing and making sense of the universe are many orders of magnitude better than what the ancients had.  Those tools are the result of thousands of years of accumulated experience and insights, tested against the reality of the world that God wrought.

(We should certainly hope that our gifts of memory, reason, and skill would have improved our intellectual tools over all this time!)

At the controls of his personal jet plane, John Travolta can cover the 26+ miles of the marathon run in roughly 3 minutes.  It’s thought that Phidippides, the ancient Greek hero of Marathon, took about 3 hours. It’s not that Travolta is 60 times better as an athlete; he just has better transportation tools.

Ivan Dixon of "Hogan's Heroes" dies

"Kinch" was probably my favorite character in the old Hogan's Heroes series, which was one of my favorite shows when I was 10 years old. Ivan Dixon, who played Kinchloe, died this past Sunday:

CHARLOTTE, N.C. - Actor Ivan Dixon, who brought the problems and promise of contemporary blacks to life in the film "Nothing But a Man" and portrayed the levelheaded POW Kinchloe in TV's "Hogan's Heroes," has died. He was 76.

Dixon died Sunday at Presbyterian Hospital in Charlotte after a hemorrhage, said his daughter, Doris Nomathande Dixon of Charlotte. He had suffered complications from kidney failure, she said.

* * *

"As an actor, you had to be careful," said Sidney Poitier, star of "Patch of Blue" and a longtime friend. "He was quite likely to walk off with the scene."

* * *

Dixon was active in efforts to get better parts for blacks in movies and television, telling The New York Times in 1967: "Sponsors haven't wanted anything negative connected with their products. We must convince them that the Negro is not negative."

"Heretofore, people have thought that, to use a Negro, the story must pit black against white. Maybe we're getting to the problems of human beings who happen to be black."

* * *

In addition to his daughter, survivors include his wife of 53 years, Berlie Dixon of Charlotte, and a son, Alan Kimara Dixon of Oakland. At Dixon's request, no memorial or funeral is planned, the family said.

Evolutionary basis for Spitzer's adultery?

Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer Natalie Angier has a piece today in the NY Times about the rarity of monogamy in animal species:

... Sexual promiscuity is rampant throughout nature, and true faithfulness a fond fantasy.

Oh, there are plenty of animals in which males and females team up to raise young, as we do, that form “pair bonds” of impressive endurance and apparent mutual affection, spending hours reaffirming their partnership by snuggling together like prairie voles or singing hooty, doo-wop love songs like gibbons, or dancing goofily like blue-footed boobies.

Yet as biologists have discovered through the application of DNA paternity tests to the offspring of these bonded pairs, social monogamy is very rarely accompanied by sexual, or genetic, monogamy. Assay the kids in a given brood, whether of birds, voles, lesser apes, foxes or any other pair-bonding species, and anywhere from 10 to 70 percent will prove to have been sired by somebody other than the resident male.

(Extra paragraphing added.)

Evolutionary psychologists and social biologists tend to think that this furtive, uneasy coexistence of monogamy and promiscuity arises from a confluence of genetic- and social factors:

• All of us are descendants of ancestors who, by definition, did at least the minimum necessary to pass on copies of their genes to another generation.
• Statistically, a father who cheats on his mate is likely to pass on more copies of his genes than one who doesn't cheat (because he's more likely to have a greater number of offspring).
• Other things being equal, a mother who tries to enforce fidelity in her mate is more likely to have help, economic and otherwise, in raising her offspring; this ups the odds that her offspring will survive to reproductive age and pass on copies of her genes (and their fathers') to grandchildren.
• On average, mothers who cheat are likely to diversify the genetic risk portfolio of their offspring, because of the increased odds that their offspring will be fathered by several different males of varying genetic profiles.
• When parents stay together to help with the raising of their grandchildren, it enhances even further the odds of that parents' genes will survive into future generations.

In short, from a purely-pragmatic perspective, both monogamy and promiscuity have their evolutionary advantages.

I suspect this is another example of the watermelon-seed effect, in which opposing forces — in this case, the desire for both sexual freedom and a faithful mate — can unexpectedly result in progress (cf. the Hegelian dialectic).

Irish Catholics should remember potato-famine relief efforts by U.S. Protestants - WSJ article

From an article by Peter Duffy in today's Wall Street Journal:

Perhaps then, on this day of all days, the Irish Catholics of New York should do something that would've been unthinkable even a few years ago: raise a toast to the Protestants.

I am referring to the Protestants of New York City and their actions during the winter of 1847, an unjustly forgotten episode in the Irish history of this city.

* * *

... the pulpit was opened to speakers. Rev. Jonathan Wainwright of St. John's Episcopal Chapel, a future bishop, read several passages from foreign newspapers describing the sufferings in Skibbereen, County Cork, which had become infamous for the plight of its poor. He insisted that he did not attend the meeting to "speak of modes of faith," but to urge his fellow citizens to "share our loaf" and "contribute liberally from our ample store."

* * *

It appears that every minister in town sought donations from the pulpit. The list of churches that gave is impressive: Norfolk Street Methodist, the Reformed Dutch Church at the corner of Greene and Houston, the Church of the Ascension on Fifth Avenue, Trinity Episcopal, the Second Wesleyan Chapel on Mulberry Street, Duane Street Presbyterian, St. Matthew's Episcopal Church on Christopher Street, Mercer Street Presbyterian, Grace Church, and on and on.

Prayer as self-judgment

BLS at The Topmost Apple points us to this, from a piece in the Times of London, about an upcoming new Reform Jewish prayer book:

... While the English word “pray” comes from the Latin precare, meaning to address, to implore - talking to someone, God - the Hebrew word for prayer comes from a term meaning “to judge oneself”.

So rather than just looking outwards, Jewish payer is also focused inwards, and prayer is a matter of self-examination; not only asking God for this or that, but checking up on ourselves in God's presence, whether we are behaving properly and heading in the right direction.

It is an important distinction, because it means there is much less expectation of God answering our prayers, and appearing to fail if expectations are not realised. Instead we are asking ourselves to live up to ethical values, and it is then we who succeed or fail, depending on how committed or strong-willed we are.

Rumors about candidates hold lessons for Bible scholars

I learned yesterday about a vicious rumor that John McCain accidentally started the catastrophic 1967 fire aboard the aircraft carrier USS Forrestal, from which he barely escaped alive, by trying to play a prank on another pilot. The rumor is clearly false: The Navy, which is merciless when it comes to post-accident safety reviews, concluded that the fire started when an electrical malfunction, in an outdated Zuni missile on another aircraft, caused the missile to launch itself into McCain's bird.  (See page 2 of this NASA safety briefing about the accident; see also this Navy training film about the fire, "Learn or Burn," which I think I saw at least twice when I was on active duty.)

Then of course there's the persistent rumor that Barack Obama is supposedly a Muslim. Only he knows with 100% certainty, of course, but there's no credible evidence to suggest he is.

Tomorrow's NY Times Magazine has a piece about the social psychology of rumors.  Excerpt:

The Obama-is-a-Muslim rumor does not seem to have hurt the candidate’s fortunes, at least not yet. But the myth’s persistence illustrates a growing cultural vulnerability to rumor.

Journalists typically presume that facts matter: show the public what is true, and they will make decisions correctly.

Psychologists who study how we separate truth from fiction, however, have demonstrated that the process is not so simple.

And because digital technology fosters social networks that are both closely knit and far-flung, rumors are now free to travel widely within certain groups before they meet any opposition from the truth.

Farhad Manjoo, Rumor's Reasons, NY Times Magazine, March 16, 2008 (extra paragraphing added).

As Easter approaches, this brute fact of human existence should give us reason to be cautious about uncritically accepting extraordinary factual claims — such as some of the claims made in the New Testament.