cogito

It wasn’t an intentional hiatus, but I just realized it has been seven months since I wrote my last post. Statistically speaking, a break that long should have cost me all of my subscribers, but a surprising number of loyal (or lazy?) readers have stuck with me through the downtime.

But I’m back and I’m looking forward to writing regularly as well as trying to more precisely define the content of Cogito. I encourage everyone to subscribe to the RSS feed, and I will be enabling subscription by e-mail for those that prefer that medium. If all goes as planned posts will generally fall under the following topics:

• Science & Faith - Historically I have written on the topic of “apologetics”, or what has become widely (and politically) known as “Intelligent Design.” While I think this topic is very important in certain contexts, my views concerning the purpose of so-called “apologetics” has changed quite a bit. I will expound on this more in a future post, but it essentially comes down to Romans 1:20:
  

  For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.

  That is, the evidence is there and - like the parables Christ used as teaching tools - the information itself naturally provokes polar reactions (faith vs. skepticism). Those that want to disbelieve will always find ways to do so; therefore, I don’t know that an evangelistic focus should be given to disproving theories that exist solely as reasons to disbelieve. On the other hand, we should consider the evidence in light of our belief in God and let it further kindle the faith of those who have seeking hearts. I plan to write more about this soon. I don’t believe the creation vs. evolution debate is directly constructive to the salvation of souls; Overall, it is nothing more than an ingenious distraction.

• Religion & Current Events - Religion is in the news on a daily basis. Sadly, the great majority of this news is negative. Wrong-headed and false religion is responsible for more turmoil in this world than skepticism and unbelief. What has gone wrong? What are the sources of all the violence, misunderstanding and vastly different “interpretations” of a single book? These are all things I’d like to analyze as they arise in mainstream news.
• Getting at the heart of what it means to be a Christian - I’ve witnessed a lot of politics, scriptural dishonesty and downright hatred of brethren in my young life and it has disquieted me to a point of questioning everything and re-examining/re-tooling my beliefs in light of scripture. It is so easy to become comfortable in what you are taught, regardless of it’s validity. So, I count desire to question and prove as a great blessing. As a young, newly-married, American male I face mountains of spiritual struggles. I don’t intend to hide those as I explore what it means to be a Christian in this modern age. We are all human and fallible at best. Until we recognize that as a fundamental fact, we will always proceed with unrealistic expectations met by inevitable disappointment. I want this blog to be a place of honesty as well as encouragement. Being a Christian in a corrupt and materialistic world isn’t easy and none of us should pretend it is.

I will also be posting the occasional links to things I find of general interest, but for the most part this is my roadmap for the future of Cogito. As far as the reasons for my extended silence, I have been extraordinarily busy with a variety of exciting ventures. Among them are two soon-to-launch websites that I encourage you to check out (and share with your friends)

• For iPhone owners there is iPhonicka.com, which is a resource for all things iPhone (software and accessorie reviews, guides, news, contests and more).
• For coffee lovers (like myself) we will soon be launching Perk-O-Late, a collection of news, reviews, brewing techniques and more.

Both sites should be fun and informative.

As always, thanks for reading Cogito and your comments are always welcome!

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Rep. Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, will use a Quran once owned by Thomas Jefferson during his ceremonial swearing-in today.

According to CNN.com, Ellison spokesman Rick Jauert said the new congressman “wants this to be a special day, and using Thomas Jefferson’s Quran makes it even more special.”

“Jefferson’s Quran dates religious tolerance to the founders of our country,” he added.

The fact that Jefferson owned a Quran doesn’t necessarily speak to his tolerance at all. Jefferson also owned several Bibles (and even created his own), but had very little tolerance for “clergy” of any stripe. He didn’t believe Jesus to be the son of God or believe in miracles. Jefferson is best known for his desire to isolate religion, and an honest look at this nation’s history reveals a lot about his relationship to Islam. It isn’t what I would call tolerance.
[Read more →]

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I am amazed at the fact that one can be an astronomer and an atheist. As technology enables us to behold beauty once hidden hundreds of light-years away, it reminds us how vast this universe really is. My faith is continually bolstered by the Divine creativity on display in the the heavens, and the scale on which God has stretched his canvas. Conversely, it should give us pause to think about how incredibly finite we are.

Consider our galaxy, the Milky Way. It’s between 80,000 and 100,000 light-years in diameter. One light-year is 5,878,625,373,183 miles. To put it in perspective, if you shrunk the Milky Way to 80 miles, our solar system would be 2 millimeters wide.

The Milky Way has numerous smaller “satellite galaxies”, and one of them is called the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). Apparently, the LMC is easily visible to the naked eye far south of the Equator (e.g., Australia, etc.). Through a telescope, however, the LMC is dominated by a cloud of gas called the Tarantula Nebula. The Tarantula Nebula was thought to be a star until 1751, when Nicolas Louis de Lacaille said hey, that’s a nebula!

This nebula is 160,000 light-years away, but is still about as bright to the eye as the Orion Nebula (which is 30 light-years away). It’s huge; approximately 1700 light-years across, (50x Orion)! If the Tarantula were placed at the distance of the Orion nebula, it would fill half the sky. And, to get back to my point, it’s beautiful:

That photo above is from the European Southern Observatory. They stitched together a 256 megapixel image of the nebula and have a variety of sizes available to download. It definitely confirms Psalm 19:1:

The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.

I recommend heading over there and checking out a larger version of the image. Spend a moment considering the magnitude of that masterwork, so vast to us, yet just a little speck in the cosmos.

(via Bad Astronomy.)

Related: The Big Bang & Blind Faith

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UPDATE: I do not think that soy is linked to homosexuality. It seems I may not have been clear enough on that fact. That said, I’m in the process of writing a clearer, better researched piece about soy and its effects on hormones and development. Check back soon.

You’re probably thinking what I first thought: “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

I just came across a post at Right Wing Watch that criticizes WorldNetDaily.com for publishing this article about soy being linked to femininity and - in men - homosexuality. [Read more →]

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