"Us" & "Them"

It seems to me that everybody wants to be with the group “Us” and we want as many people on our team as possible. Whether that be a church group, a local football team or just cricket appreciators in general. Of all the groups I have been in very few have failed to winge about lack of numbers. Why do people always want their group to be more popular? Apparently everybody should learn to surf because it’s great fun. I’ve also been told “Why wouldn’t you want to go sky diving?”



It seems to me that groups large enough to be not actively complaining about a lack of members are too large. Their members form into unofficial sub groups. Ie, within my subgroup of the 10:30 service at church I usually get into the social circle where one of these five people are talking. If none of them are nearby then I will mill around by myself, a part of the general group. It’s not that I particularly dislike anybody, jut that I prefer the company of some people over that of others. Hmm that sounds a bit discriminatory, I should put some effort into saying hi to everybody, it is church after all.



I recall my grandmother is rather racist towards aboriginals. Particularly as a group, all Australian aboriginals in general. But she now has some aboriginal neighbors, and they are quite nice and easy to get along with. See, because she has associated with some people they moved from being “one of them” to being “one of us”.



We want there to be more of our type of people. Isn’t it obvious that people like me, like me? But once there are lots of people like me then there are too many and we start dividing them again between us and them. I know it sounds draconic but I’m aiming for perfection here. But if everybody were the same then I would rebel against the norm and revel in my uniqueness, maybe I’m just confused?



I remember being told that “Any radical movement needs to become mainstream in order to survive.” Also “any social/political movement could be revolutionary depending on the time and place” I suppose that everything is relative, once a new idea is formed people may or may not jump on the bandwagon (if nothing happens it will fade in to obscurity and not be worth mentioning) and as the community grows rules need to be formed so that everybody is on the same page and follows the same belief system. When there is only one person they are always right and a free radical by default. The larger the community is the more defined its ideals are the more mainstream it will become. What may starts as a revolutionary concept, like the abolition of slavery. Eventually becomes the norm. I only know about slavery from books and movies.



And again I have slid from one rant unto another. But to get back to the start, how many times have you heard the words? “How can we engage the young people?” I know from playing RTS games that you can never have to many people in your community/Civilization/race if you get near the population limit and they are becoming impoverished then it’s time to use Slavery to finish the Pyramids in Civ4 or to go to war with your neighbors in AoE. With more members you get more resources to spend doing more fun things. With more fun more people want to be members. The reverse is also true, if your community lack a critical mass it will become stale and members will gradually leave.



Small towns are a good example of this. One town will be slightly large that the others around it, so people for the region will travel there for shopping. Then the town will start getting more shops because the potential clientele is larger. Then the Backer & Butcher in the smaller towns may be forced to move because they have insufficient customers. Thus the larger town gets larger and like a sponge it leaches people from the region, then all the other towns become satellites of the sponge. Larger communities always grow larger and smaller communities always shrink. When there are so many options of places to live (or sports clubs to join) the benefits of any one of them are hard to see and so the population distribution will remain average, and every one of the communities will complain about lack of numbers. Why are more people like us, we are much better than them.



It seems to me that the discrimination between “Us” and “Them” was the same in WWII as it is in my Fencing club. There are too many of “Them” and not enough “Us”. What can we do show them how much better we are?



I should stop writing now otherwise I’ll start talking about the Preconception Bias :( I really should derail my train more often rather than changing track all the time.

The Glory of Revenge

I recently saw the movie Avengers at the Cinima. I'll recomend it, its more like watching a comic book than an action movie and hase a host of good one liners. Here is my Fathers take onthe plot.

I recently saw a great movie. It was great for all sorts of reasons. It did not have extreme violence. It did not have explicit romantic scenes. It did not use Jesus’ name in a bad way. It had dialogue concerning free will, courage, guilt and shame. There was also a lot of focus on power. What was the movie? The Avengers! While it could have been a little shorter I loved that movie. Thor with his mighty hammer. Captain America with his shield and old fashioned values. Hawkeye with his bow. Iron man with his heart of power and wonderful armoury. The Incredible Hulk- powered by anger and gamma radiation. And of course there was the bad guy- Loki- the brother of Thor. Three things struck me in the movie. There was a scene when Loki said to the Hulk, “You can’t hurt me. I am a god!” The Hulk proceeded to smash him around like a rag doll and finished off by saying, “Puny god!” There was a scene where the Avengers were talking about gods here, there and everywhere. Captain America stormed out saying, “There is only one God”. And as I watched I reflected on the power that the Avengers used- mostly to destroy. And I thought of the power of God which is used mainly to create. Our God does not need a hammer or a steel suit or a fancy bow or gamma induced anger. God simply speaks and as He speaks wonderful things happen. “Let there be light” and there was light. “Be still” and the wind and the waves obeyed. “Your sins are forgiven”. The word of God is living and active sharper than any double edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit (Hebrews 4:12). The word of God with the Spirit of God is powerful and they enable us to believe and to live as God’s holy and beloved children. May the Word of God richly dwell within you so that you may experience His mighty power through His Son Jesus Christ. Cheers Pastor Greg.

Beta

For a while I have been intending to make a list of the games I have beta tested. Just now it seems I am beta testing Orion: Dino Beatdown. I wasn't expecting to but it is nearly as buggy as a GFWL game. I'll flesh out this list at a later date but here goes:

Warhammer age of reckoning.
Bought the collectors edition and played for ~2 years, went on nearly every testing server available.

Minecraft
Got the alpha version like a third of the world.

WAR Inc
enjoyed it until it became polished and everybody was better than me.

Tribes: Ascend
Skiing is fun. Never found any bugs in this one.

Windows 7
I'm still using XP though.

Hydrophobia Prophesy
the water game


Phillip of Macedon

Acts 4:32-35

Acts 4:32-35. All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles’ continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and much grace was upon them. There were no needy persons among them. From time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, bought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need.

In 1989 the wall fell down. What wall? The Berlin wall which had divided the city of Berlin in two since 1961. The wall epitomised the division in the world at the time- the East from the West, Communism from Democracy, Russia and the USA. It was the time of the Cold War and many of you who are older than me will remember the tension and fear at that time. Would there be a nuclear war? And if so would anyone survive? But in 1989 the wall came down. And as it came down so did Communism. There was great rejoicing all over the world. It signalled a huge change, it signalled a new optimism. Even in the church. Christians all over the world rejoiced in the opportunities that now lay before it- where it was once persecuted now the church could proclaim the wonderful message of Christ crucified and raised to millions upon millions of people who had never heard of it.

There was also great rejoicing and an air of victory. Now it seemed that democracy and the capitalist system was proved to be the best. And end to communism and a victory to capitalism!

As I heard all of this I had a sense of unease. The victorious cries of those who upheld western values seemed a little too strident to me. It seemed that the many problems in our society were completely put aside; to live well in this world it seemed that capitalism was the way- the only way.

But statistics tell us a different story. The USA is the third most populous country after China and India. But it has the highest percentage rate of prisoners in the world. For every 100,000 people there are 715 in prison. Our rate is 116 prisoners per 100,000 Australians. Our total population is about 23 million and that is about the number of prisoners in US prisons! Right now it is estimated that there are about 50 million people living in poverty in the USA. Here is another statistic. The USA has the greatest number of billionaires in the world- 34%.

And this is the best economic system in the world?

It is a worthy point to consider the beginning of communism in our modern time. It can be said to have began by Karl Marx in 1845. He believed in a free society with no division or alienation whatsoever. A society that was free from oppression and scarcity. He wrote at a time when the Industrial Revolution was in full swing. Traditional societies were in upheaval all over Europe. Thousands of people had left the life of peasant farmers to work in factories. Alcoholism, domestic violence, child labour were the side effects of the few who were becoming richer and richer. At the same time, the kings, the Czars and other such ruling families in need ate cake while their citizens starved. It was a time of great advances and huge increase in wealth but also a time of much pain and suffering.  This was capitalism in full swing. The communist ideal has much to be said for it but of course human sin always plays its part. So often good and wonderful deals crash against the harsh reality of human sin and Satan’s lies.  Most of us have grown up believing that communism was and is a terrible evil – and what we have seen in the last hundred years has proven this to be true but we must always remember that it grew out of a desire for a better society.

The falling of the Berlin wall also was celebrated as a victory for the Democratic form of government. Which brings to mind a quote by Winston Churchill: "It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried."  We are so used to deciding all manner of things by voting that we forget that whenever there is a majority there is also a minority. All too often it is the minority that is often neglected and ultimately forgotten.

Why all this just a week after the key celebration of the Christian Church. Only seven days ago we cried out with great joy: The Lord is risen! He is risen indeed! Why all this talk of communism, capitalism, poverty and wealth?

So soon after his death, resurrection and then ascension the followers of Jesus Christ, lead by his disciples began to gather together in anticipation of his return. As they waited, they heard his words, heard of his life story, prayed to him, sang hymns of praise and shared a meal together. And that is not all they shared: All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles’ continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and much grace was upon them. There were no needy persons among them. From time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, bought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need.

It sounds a little like communism doesn’t it? But that was then, what about now? There is nothing wrong with wealth. It is out attitude to it that makes it good or evil. Are we honest in all our dealings? Do we give thanks to our Father in heaven for the blessings he gives to us? Do we share a portion of our income to further the work of the church and for the benefit of those who have less? How many hours do we devote to work and how many hours – or maybe minutes- do we devote to God? But there is more to sharing than simply sharing our wealth.

A wonderful Christian, John Scott has written that the early church was a learning church, a loving church, a worshipping church and an evangelistic church.

There is much to be said here but I want to briefly touch upon two aspects of what it is to be church.

To be a loving church. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another. How do we love one another?  

1 Cor 12. There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. There are different kinds of working, but the same God works all of them in all people. Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good.

Mark 10:45. For the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.

1 John 3:17. If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him?

We have all been given various gifts of the Spirit and they are all to be used for the building up of the Church. We are called to serve one another by respecting one another and not condemning each other- rather we are called to encourage each other. We don’t necessarily have to like each other and there will certainly be times when we will disagree but if we truly have the love of Christ in us then we will seek to overcome our differences and go forward with Christ to wherever he is leading us.

We want to grow. It was only a few short years that many of our Lutheran congregations had twice as many worshipping members as we do now. How do we grow? Only by being a learning church, a worshipping church and a loving church. If we are not then we will die.

We, you, I and our Risen Lord Jesus Christ can turn things around but it will take all of us. It will take hard work. It will take tears. It will take forgiveness. It will take humility. But there will also be great joy in this undertaking. The joy of knowing that our personal salvation is not dependent upon our success but always and only and ever on Christ. And there will be joy in trusting in the promise: 1 Cor 15: Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that you labour in the Lord is not in vain. The Lord is risen! He is risen indeed!

Fitness and versatility

Being fit is meaning that I don’t get worn out by doing the things that I want to do. But it also requires training over and above the normal workload to be able to easily achieve your regular tasks.

Eg I want to be fit enough to ride my bike to work with a speed of ~25kph for ~7km. So I train on weekends going ~30kph for >30k.

But being only bike fir is not enough, I also like to be swimming fit. Also since I am not just a physical entity I like to be mentally fit. This means reading scientific journals occasionally, and always learning new things.

So fitness should be versatile, easily adaptable to other sports or areas of life. Like a work life balance. One third of the day is dedicated to funding the rest of my endeavors; one third to recovering from what I have done; and one third for everything else.

There are four stats in which I want to build more stamina, five for greater versatility: mental/physical/spiritual/emotional/recovery.

But why do I desire this?

Well I figure my self and my life is a gift from God and like a good gift I should look after it properly. Neither sitting it on a shelf as though it were an ornament nor mistreating it and using it improperly.

So I want to use my life and use it well. But what does that mean? How can I know if I am keeping fit and versatile?

That would be 1-3,9,0 the way to live my life.


Life is a constant learning and revising. Lots of knowledge is gained and lost, specific knowledge may not be useful like Alt+14=♫, but sharing interesting things is always going to be something I want to remember.

Jesus is a good role model for this type of thing, not just because he is an integral part of the relevant religion.

1 Jesus certainly did plenty of sharing, like with the five loves and three fish. His first miracle involved making wine, and all his notable meals were with a group of people.

2 He was prepared to be unprepared, not phased in the slightest by getting stuck at sea in a storm. And he was willing to follow his dads plan, although in the garden of Gethsemane he was considering the alternatives.

3 Timeliness was not an issue considering how much effect he had on the world in his mere 30 something years. Jesus also sent his disciples all over the country without a second set of sandals. That is defiantly an efficient purchase.

9 While it wasn’t all fun and games Jesus was a bit of a joker, telling riddles (parables) pulling coins out of fish. He must have been the life of the party for all the crowds that followed him, even climbing through a hole in the roof.

0 I don’t know why but I think Jesus was proud and humble at the same time. He certainly wasn’t ashamed of who he was or what he was doing. Like when he lost his temper and kicked all the merchants out of the temple. Then later when he gets arrested Jesus is a little sarcastic towards the guards asking “why didn’t they arrest him then, in the temple”, rather than sneaking up in the middle of the night like mafia trying to hide what they do.

His whole life was a bit of an escapade, gaining more momentum each day. As time went on he managed more and more of everything.



To start off with I was writing in one direction, now I found I went another, so I may as well jump the tracks a third time and get on a similar train.

Where else other than Jesus have I been inspired, such that I would write what I have written? It seems to me that most of my philosophies on life are founded on books.

Dune – series
Aesop’s Fables
Foundations edge
Isaac Asimov – various books
Discworld – series by Terry Pratchet.
Lion, witch, wardrobe – series
Bible, The
HHGTTG
The magician series, mostly Pug.
Socrates’ Pursuit of happiness (somebook like that forget the actual name)
+Also anime like TTGL and Infinite Revyus. The keep on keeping on bit.
Pilgrim’s progress

Maybe one day I’ll type why I find them inspirational.

Taste of Harmony

A taste of harmony, I like that idea. Actually I usually try to make each individual meal as culturally diverse as possible. Like putting pineapple in Irish stew, or making a curry with Beef and Greek yoghurt.

We have been talking about this for a while at work and I just now realized that we have a sojourn scheduled that week too. Currently at work we have representations from, Belgian, New Zealand, Italy, France and India. I dunno what background the other Technomancer’s have.

While I do like my food my lunch at work normally consists of fruit or vegetables, with the occasional sandwich or instant noodles. You see I have problems with what I should take for lunch:
There is limited space in the fridge.
The cooking equipment consists of: Kettle, sandwich press, microwave & coffee machine.
Lunch is scheduled to last 30min.
The average attendance is 12±12, so it can get crowded at the sink.
We are an alcohol free site.

So normally when people bring things to lunch for their birthday it’s a cake or slice that sits in the bottom of the fridge. Added to this my cultural heritage is ~9generations of Australians, proceeded by Prussian on my mums side and the rest of Europe on my dad’s side. I think I’m Scottish/Irish direct descendant. I’ve never made lamingtons before and it’s been a very long time since I endeavored to bake a pavlova.

The next complication is what foods am I confident enough to feed to other people? Golden Syrup Dumplings and Self saucing chocolate pudding are not possible to pre-prepare or make at work. Curries and Pasta would also be a challenge to serve. Maybe rely of the microwave to reheat the food?

Maybe it’s easier to just bite the bullet and go for LAN only, that was I can also sign up to be a part of the event officially. If our secretary hasn’t done a theme for the burning of Minecraft then I’ll derail that train and make it a food sojourn.



Quiché, cold pasta and salad are the only things that spring to mind, then I have to try to fit them into my heritage somehow.

Maybe I’ll have a Sunday session of afternoon cooking.

10 steps of progress

Have I succeeded?


1 Luxuries are to be shared:
As VRBones indicated this can be a curse as well as a blessing. I filled up my afternoons with other things and haven been inviting people for dinner much lately. I do still keep tea ~$10, and now that I am living alone that meal may last me half a week.
Currently I have given up coffee for lent although I also haven’t been drinking it much on my lonesome, I’ve had to many average coffees of late and it doesn’t have the allure that it used to. I’ve run out of beer because I kept sharing it.
Over the last year I’m pretty sure I spent more on computer games for other people than I did for myself. Since I have been back from PNG I’ve hardly played with myself at all. The occasional game of LOL with Levi and then there is the Thursday Sojourn.


2 Plan things:
Plan to be unprepared has been working well for me. I’ve also kept a rolling to do list, although many of the things have been on it for a year. One day I’ll post my Christmas photos from SA.
My trip to PNG helped a bit with my plan for cryogenic freezing. Being able to type at a computer was useless, but knowing a few card games and how to make a deck of carts is a good thing. Even if you speak a foreign language you can still have fun with pater recognition.


3 Spent more efficiently:
May need to rework this if I continue to live on my lonesome, although I have been doing a good job of paying off my house ~$1000 a month still works. I’d like to spend $2000 on the fun of Kite surfing, also to maintain my physical fitness. But that is a bit of a hurdle at the moment.


4 Exercise Mentally:
I’m learning typing good, and spelling too. Partially my blog but also email letters to people. I have much more confidence in my written language skill, but I’ve had to sacrifice some polysyllabic words. Also I have been talking to foreigners a bit of late, one day I hope to speak two languages. Maybe if everything on the computer is in one language and then English for everything else?
Still have a few games that I haven’t mastered and LOL always seems to have more champions.


5 Exercise Physically:
Between dancing on Monday and Tuesday nights for an hour each I think I now know:
Moonlight Tango – backwards dance
Midnight Tango – backwards dance
Argentine Tango
Salsa – spaghetti with the hands
Samba – horsy dance, with the Frisbee fling
Catherine Waltz
Alpha Waltz – the backwards one
Jive –cuddle, stop&go, chug, American spin
Cha
Paso Doble – bullfighting conquistador
Quickstep
Foxtrot
Rhumba
Quick Step


Then there is the weekly bike ride to the beach for a swim and coffee. I don’t think riding to work counts as I do that nearly every day. Snorkelling may be another new cheaper thing to do at the beach, although there is not much to see.


6 Exercise Spiritually:
I’ve been somewhat consistent in reading the bible before work and sleep, partway through David at the moment. Also there is a weekly bible study for Lent that has homework, so I do that when I get home from work at my computer.
Query to follow up: Is my Spirit different to my Soul? This may also delve into community development theory and the LAN Psizomaijitsu. Nope, thats mostly my greek logic backgroud, and I'm suffering from preconception bias.



7 Exercise Emotionally:
Maybe this should be socially? Although watching the movie Red Dog defiantly counts as an emotional exercise. Visiting foreign countries are great for empathy and broadening your horizons. Also in November I went back to SA to visit rellies for the second time in 9 years. There is a new girl at church Beth and a new one at work Aurore that I have been getting to know. Haven’t been to Wednesday trivia for since before Christmas.


8 Recovery:
Recently got some wired skin irritation from PNG and cut my hands and feet up whilst snorkelling, both a learning experience. I also ate very little in PNG and got heatstroke.


9 Have Fun:
The fun thing at work has been learning Citect programming and being the first in the world to calibrate an NIR on liquid sugars. Also playing cards with Kristina, Levi and Nicole in PNG was good. Plus incorporating Technomancers Sojourn is not work or a hassle and we are still sticking too it so I think that must be fun too.
Sleeping is more fun when I wake up before my alarm, which means I’ve had enough sleep too.


0 Regret Nothing:
This is sort of turning into a “how can I be a better ben” thing. I can’t learn unless I first make mistakes to lean from and when I see the worth in my failure then it becomes priceless. It seems this is as much a subtle afterthought as having fun is…
This one here needs some word smithing, possibly a biblical reference too.


Progressive advancement:
Need more of all the above.
More sharing of luxuries, this is the ideal of communism. (the sort without corruption)
More Plan so that when I do not know what is going on I still know what to do and why I am.
More efficiency of worldly possessions means that I require less worldly possessions. These things need to be expended to acquire more of everything else.
More fit in the four areas of exercise. To be fit it to be able to do all the things that I want to do, I do not need to be an athlete to be fit.
More recovery so that when inconveniences occur the recovery is quicker and I have more practice at recovering from them. It’s the bumps along the highway of life that make it interesting.
More fun, is there such a thing as too much fun?
More adaption, Improvements can be made everywhere. What next can I do better than I did yesterday.
More more, I’ve forgotten what happened last week, so it needs to be done again and better this time. (reference Rock Lee from Naruto)

The progressive advancement of more fun through these activities is a good measurement of the current success rate of that which is the goal of being Ben and grabbing life with both hands and squeezing it for all it is worthwhile we all go for another trip around the sun.