2007 in Review (Second Installment)

Care to know the minutiae of what and when people clicked on links I’ve posted during 2007? Then this post will be a dream come true!

2007 in Review

Apparently 2007 is just about over. Wow. The time just flies on by. Anyway, I thought I’d post summaries of how my blog did in its first year of life. I mean, technically I still have about a month to go before this blog gets its first birthday, but, who gives a rip about the technicalities, right? Shout out to WhoreChurch for the idea.

Top Posts for 365 days ending 2007-12-31 (Summarized)

Summarize: 7 Days 30 Days

2006-12-31 to Today

Title	Views
Pekka-Erik Auvinen’s Manifesto: A Commen	886
Image Macros for Forum Debates	348
St. John, the Beloved Desciple, has been	280
Quotes	172
I Lit My Armpit Hair on Fire Today	148
About Me	123
RPG Maker	106
Facts	100
Abyssal vs. the Pedophile	83
Soulstorm Legacy Logo Designed (Graphics	78
How I got into RPG Maker: Prologue, Part	74
My Grandma had a Stroke and Latin isn’t	71
Some Fractals I Generated	54
Religious Quotes	53
Random Soulstorm Legacy Screenshots (Sin	47
Another Fractal Wallpaper	36
I’ve Lost my Muse!	34
Fractal Wallpapers: Third Iteration	29
Links	27
A follow up on the “List of Ammonites”	26
Antlions in my Backyard!	25
Quick Thoughts on the New Nessie Footage	22
The Baraminology of Negroes	21
Fractal Wallpapers: Fourth Iteration	21
Fractal Wallpapers: Second Iteration	20
I Visited CARM Yesterday…	19
I Updated my Banner	18
Advertising, Industry, and Economics	15
The General Epistle of Jude	15
Symptoms of Mental Illness? Cho’s Girlfr	13
Fractal Wallpapers: Fifth Iteration	13
My Heart Goes Out to Virginia Tech	12
AiG’s Goals –Proof or Promotion?	11
Woohoo, my Clustr Map’s First Update!	11
Society for Scientific Exploration	10
RPG Maker Links	10
Update on the Ol’ Clustr Map	9
You are an IDIOT!	9
“Let There be Lists!”	9
Gotta Love War!	9
You Might be a Fundie…	8
Resources	8
Blogging The Bible!	6
More Fractals!	6
Evolution	5
I’ve been searched!	4
“As Spammy as my Namesake” -Abyssal_levi	4
Creation/Evolution Links	4
Soulstorm Trilogy	3
Something Crucial I Forgot	3
Science, Nature, and Technology	3
The Computer Labs are Open	3
I Like Acanthodians, too…	2
You might be a… (part deuce)	2
Non-Fiction	2
I’m not slacking off…	1
UFOs	1
Stuff I’ve Read	1

Curious as to how you can do this yourself? Here is…

The Procedure

Step 1 Copy the following link (In a new tab! Don’t leave my site!):

http://abyssalleviathin.wordpress.com/wp-admin/index.php?page=stats&blog=705353&view=postviews&numdays
=365&summarize

Just don’t forget to fix the two spaces that will appear after “numdays”!

Step 2 Replace “abyssalleviathin” with your WordPress username.

Step 3 Open the resulting page’s source code.

Step 4 Copy from “
Top Posts for 365 days ending 2007-12-31 (Summarized)

” to “lessthanslashtablegreaterthan” Sorry that looks weird, I had to stop the html from parsing. somehow.

Step 5 Start a new post.

Step 6 Paste into the “code” tab of the new post page.

Step 7 Pat self on back.

Something Crucial I Forgot

Something crucial I forgot: People on the internet can be assholes.

A Brief Thought on Free Will and Foreknowledge

One of the more common objections I hear to Christianity is “If God knows everything in advance, how can we possibly have free will?” This always seemed like a strange objection to me. So, when I stumbled on it being made in a blog today, I figured I’d respond. I’ve copied a brief snippet of the objection along with my response. Hope it’s helpful to someone.

Hollow Earth Philosophy Wrote:
The bible tells us that there is a definite end and there is nothing we can do to change this end. WAIT JUST A MINUTE! If there is a definite end how can you have freewill? He tells me that he can still make his own choices it just will not matter in the end.

---

Abyssal Wrote:
Your friend doesn’t seemed to have articulated a point very clearly, but I think he may be on the right track and that your objection is somewhat illogical. There would be a definite end whether there is a God or not. What I mean to say is that you will, by definition, make the choices that you are going to make. If you can choose between A and B, and you’re going to choose A, then A will result.

This is true regardless of the veracity of the idea of God. It’s just reality. Although having an omniscient God, who knows everything in advance, sort of drains the meaning out of speculating about “what could have been,” because He knows with absolute certainty what would happen. Speculation is therefore useless, as there’s no conceivable way to get around His foreknowledge.

Nothing can be changed because if you would have taken the alternate route He would have known in advance. And, then we’d be talking about whether you were forced into making that decision.

God’s knowledge of the end result didn’t hinder your ability to actually make the choice, or diminish its moral significance, so I’m not sure that your (very common) objection has merit.

Creationist Museum Lies About Archaeopteryx

I was going to write a lengthy critique of the blatantly dishonest portrayal of Archaeoptery at the Creation Museum. But, I got tired of it, and it ended up just sitting there and stagnating for month after month. So, I decided to post a short “Cliff’s Notes” version of the original even though the whole Creation Museum thing is old news.

The Creation Museum had a model of a life restoration of Archaeopteryx present in their Garden of Eden exhibit where they deliberately reconstructed its anatomy inaccurately to make it look much more like a modern bird than it actually would have. The following is a list of just a few of the ommissions and alterations of Archaeopteryx’s anatomy present in their model:

Its reptillian jaws were replaced with a beak.

Its teeth were removed.

The place where the neck joins the skull was changed, removing Archaeopteryx’s nice, S-shaped theropod-like neck.

It was given a keeled breast, making its flight muscles look much bigger (and less primitive).

Its legs were shortened to make them look less like a predatory dinosaur’s.

Archaeopteryx’s hyper extensible toe (think Velociraptor’s big claw) was removed.

Archaeopteryx’s long dinosaurian tail was shorted drastically.

Lastly, and most absurdly: Archaeopteryx was given the same plumage coloration as a modern pidgeon!

The items on this list, of course, make the claim touted by many creationists that Archaeopteryx was “fully a bird” (instead of a transitional form) seem much more believeable to someone not familiar with the animal’s anatomy.But as someone who is somewhat familiar with Archaeopteryx, I have to just say “Wow.” This level of dishonesty is a new low even for creationists.

Maybe AiG or the sculptor of the model could claim the anatomical inaccuracies were a mistake. That would be convenient, though, as lots of creationist “mistakes” seem to “accidentally” lend support to creationism. More on the Creation Museum’s treatment of Archaeopteryx can be found here.

I Watched Bruce Almighty Yesterday

I watched Bruce Almighty yesterday. OK, it wasn’t really yesterday. More like three months ago, or something. I just thought I’d say that I was pleasantly surprised both at the movie’s quality, and, that it wasn’t nearly as irreverent or mocking towards religion and God as I expected. If anything it was the opposite of that, but hey, I’m sure it was terribly offensive to someone out there.

That being said, I have no intention of seeing the spin-off.

So… why do YOU hate liberals?

Hmm… I stumbled on this in the draft page of my dashboard. I’m not sure what it was supposed to be, but I think I was just going to ask the question in the title. So, uh, I’ll just take that and run with it. See, Conservatives seem to hate liberals really really bad. Bad to the point that to me, a liberal, it appears to be irrational.

I’ve read a decent amount from both left and right wing sources, and it seems that from the highest levels of Republican leadership, to Joe Conservative down the street, there is an absurd, foaming-at-the-mouth hatred present in conservatives that I never seem to find an analog to on the leftist side of the field.

Anybody care to explain exactly what it is all about? Just what about liberals is so evil that it should cause you to hate them with every fiber of your being the way you apparently do?

Things I’ve Learned in Church Part 1: The Truth About Churches and Christians

The following is a list of things I’ve “learned” in church. This is not some sort of parody of Christianity, not even of the fundamentalist variety. All of these are things I have actually heard in sermons, or during conversations with people that attend or associate with the church(es) I go to.

I thought that writing this and making it publicly available would help ease some of the tension it induced in my brain. Hopefully this will reduce my chances of getting a fundy-induced aneurysm. Today’s addition is “The Truth About Churches and Christians.” Enjoy. And pity me for having to put up with this garbage.

The Truth About Churches and Christians

---

Jesus and the apostles were Southern Baptists.

True Borned Agyin Christians^TM don’t have different opinions. They will also dress and behave exactly the same.

The Catholic Church crucified St. Peter.

No True Borned Agyin Christian^TM can ever lose their salvation.

Look, I’ve spent every Sunday for the past 3 years telling you, for emphasis, that no Borned Agyin Christian^TM can ever lose their salvation.

No True Borned Agyin Christian^TM can ever lose their salvation.

Going to churches that aren’t super-fundie, with women in the congregation who may wear pants, jewelry, short hair, and/or make up is a really bad idea. I once knew a Borned Agyin Christian^TM who started fooling around with that brand of spiritual adultry, and one day he came to me in tears saying he lost the Joy of his Salvation.

No True Borned Agyin Christian^TM can ever lose their salvation.

Churches with Sunday School programs are Satanic mockeries of the true Christian Church.

It’s pronounced “Borned Agyin,” I don’t care how you high falutin’ northern types say it!

Pastors who give “sermons” composed solely of scriptural readings are going to hell and so is everyone in their congregation.

Pastors who plan their “sermons” in advance are going to hell and so is everyone in their congregation.

Pastors who acquire their position due to theological education or training are going to hell and so is everyone in their congregation.

Pastors that are females are going to hell and so is everyone in their congregation.

Pastors that get paid for their work are going to hell and so is everyone in their congregation.

People that roll around on the floor, squealing in a state of religious ecstasy are insincere phonies. People that jump around and stomp and scream and throw their hats off are the saints of God.

Everyone inside of a church with a big congregation is going to hell.

Yeah, this was kind of a short entry, but don’t worry. My church has plenty more knee slappers to go around. Next time, we’ll discuss the evils of Science and the Intellect.

You might be a… (part deuce)

If you believe that an atheistic evolutionary world view, where man has no intrinsic value or worth is humanistic, but the idea that God made the world for the pleasure and benefit of humanity is not… then you might be a fundie.

If you believe that “Goddidit!” is a cop-out answer, but “It just happened!” is not… then you might just be an athiest.