Jiminger.Com

Bloomberg is reporting that the SEC is investigating Chicago-based Wextrust Capital LLC and actually going after the executives personally, claiming they are operating a “Ponzi Scheme.” I had always wondered if Ponzi Schemes were illegal or not. I had been told that they were but this is the first time I’ve seen one prosecuted. The article defines a Ponzi Scheme as:

Operators of so-called Ponzi schemes use money from new investors to pay off old ones.

Funny, I thought that was basically the definition of Social Security. I hope the SEC moves against the Federal Government next. Not only is Social Security the biggest Ponzi Scheme on the planet, it employs forced participation.

Another great weekend at Hyner. Here are a few videos that were shot.

This one shows Lukas’ first tandem flight.

Hyner 4th of July, 2008 from Jim Carroll on Vimeo.

Here are a few more put together by others:

Hang Gliding at Hyner View, July 4th Weekend from DanTuck on Vimeo.

And one from our Russian visitors staying in camp “Moscow.”

Sitting here sipping wine and watching the movie “Underdog” (my kid’s pick) seems like a fitting end to the day that I first saw “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed.” The juxtaposition is a fitting analogy. When I first left the movie I was elated, thinking “someone finally got it right.” Upon a bit more reflection I now think I have more criticism than praise. For this post I’d like to deal with some of the other criticisms I’ve read.

Ben Stein’s movie “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed” has already made an impression on a large number of people. Having just been released the criticisms are legion (pun intended). Even though I think the movie is flawed for reasons I will deal with later, the criticisms are often more flawed than the movie, that is, where they’re not outright false.

One of the points the movie tries to make is that ID is not Creationism. More importantly the movie makes the point that the “tried and true” tactic of critics of ID is to confound it with Creationism. Right on queue enter, The Orlando Sentinel editorial:

How do you re-package that tried and untrue, untested and untestable faith-without-facts warhorse, “Creationism” after its nearly-annual beat-down by an increasingly exasperated scientific community?

After you’ve tried renaming it “Intelligent Design,” I mean.

One wonders if the writer saw the movie. The article goes on to answer the question it posed:

With comedy. Mock your “Darwinist” foes the way comics, thinkers, scientists and educated people everywhere have been mocking creationism since Scopes took that monkey off our back.

One now wonders if the author read their own first two paragraphs - or a history book that contained an assessment of the Scopes trial which was won by the Creationists - it took a longer protracted fight to finally get that “monkey off our back.”

For a more reasonable critique (other than my forthcoming review, which is coming from an ID sympathizer) see “No intelligence allowed in ‘Expelled’.”

Another mischaracterization of what ID is includes the following from beliefnet.com:

Intelligent Design is based the fact that (1) there are questions that natural selection does not answer — which Darwinian scientists admit, and (2) therefore, some intelligent force must be behind creation — which cannot be proven by scientific means and therefore is more appropriately considered within the fields of philosophy or religion.

As the movie states (though perhaps all to briefly and unclearly), ID is, at its core, based on the idea that “design” or “intentionality,” (i.e. intelligent purpose) has certain attributes that allow it to be distinguished from undirected randomness. Several of these attributes that have been popular include: Michael Behe’s “Irreducible Complexity” (a good overview and recent defense can be found here) as well as A.E. Wilder Smith (and somewhat William Dembski’s) application of information theory to the genetic code and biological systems. The idea behind the later is that information theory can be used to distinguish randomness from non-randomness. This idea has wide use in the Electrical Engineering discipline of Signal Processing, Cryptography and Cryptanalysis, and even in SETI (Carl Sagan’s pet project, “The Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence”).

Another oft-repeated criticism is that the movie doesn’t deal with the facts of the case for ID or evolution. However, from both the title and the extended trailer I’m surprised anyone thought that the movie would. That the movie never intended to was clear from both. From both I expected exactly what I got, an expose on the political correctness embedded in the scientific establishment that punishes dissent.

Finally, in several places I found the simply false statement that the movie doesn’t provide a definition of “Evolution.” In fact it does so carefully in order to to explain exactly what the disenfranchised scientists are questioning. I found this criticism puzzling because it was so patently false that I can only assume that some of the pre-screenings didn’t have this particular scene.

I will follow this up with my own review of the movie.

It’s been a while since I’ve written. I’ve gone through a few things (nothing life threatening) and keeping up with this blog was simply not a priority. I’m going to start writing a few things here and there. Firstly, I needed to post this response from a friend …

Jim,
I know that I have not participated in these debates for sometime, and that I risk missing the point due to the fact that I have not kept up on the ongoing debate. However, out of my love for you and my desire to see you progress spiritually I wanted to offer the following. Please accept it as a genuine offering of my love for you Jim. I think about you, and I pray for you. I believe, and I hope I am not wrong in this, that you genuinely and sincerely desire to know and encounter the truth; that is why I spent the time that I did in constructing this post. I believe that inwardly you are humble enough to truly communicate and interact, and so I believe this, my offering to you, will not be fruitless.

Jim, you wrote: Again, simplistically, the emphasis in the West is being right with God while the emphasis in the East is union with God.

For freedom Christ has set us free; stand fast therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. Now I, Paul, say to you that if you receive circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you. I testify again to every man who receives circumcision that he is bound to keep the whole law. You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace. Galatians 5:1-4

Paul is clearly not concerned with being right with God if by this we mean imprisoning ourselves to some kind of legal transaction (even if that transaction is based on some legalistic idea of faith or covenant). One Elder puts it beautifully: What is holy and beautiful and what gladdens the heart and frees the soul from every evil is the effort to unite yourself to Christ, to love Christ, to crave for Christ and to live in Christ, just as St. Paul said, Is is no longer I who live; Christ lives in me. This should be your aim. Let all other efforts be secret and hidden. What must dominate is love for Christ. Let this be in your head, your thought, your imagination, your heart and your will. Your most intense effort should be how you will encounter Christ, how you will be united to Him and how you will keep Him in your heart. (Elder Porphyrios, Wounded by Love. ppg. 136-37) This of course entails the spiritual ascesis (exercise) of the Orthodox Church, where through self denial, humility and painful self-emptying we are crucified with Christ. The constant repetition of the prayer and the invocation of Gods holy name: Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me. Man does not seek to be merely justified before God, He seeks to live with God, to feel God near Him, to suffer in love with God and to know that God is co-suffering with him in his pain. This is what restores your humanity and makes you feel truly alive, and being alive has nothing to do with legal categories. Faith must always mean personal trust and encounter; otherwise it is nothing more than another legalistic pharisaic system, a mere code of conduct, that creates a barrier and a wall between the human person and God, or between us and the other person.

Our neighbor is not simply an indispensable companion on the way of life. He is an integral part of our spiritual existence. Only in losing himself for God and for his fellow man, his brother, can man find the true dimension of his own life. He who loses finds. Only thus can the true glory of the human person be restored to him, a glory at once divine and human, without limits The other one is no longer the frontier which determines our individuality, which closes off our own living space, or simply flatters our complacency. He is not the shroud which envelopes our deadly isolation. He is not hell. The other is the true place of our life, he is my most dear and irreplaceable self who gives me here and now, through my gift of myself to him, the meaning and reality of eternal life, an eternal life which has already begun. (Archimandrite Vasileios, Hymn of Entry. pg. 125)

Jim, you wrote: So the main question is, and the point of my quotes was, does this ancient literary form create more support for the Reformed notion of covenant or an ontological understanding of union? To me the answer is obvious simply in the broad notion of covenant as the definition of union itself, contrary to an ontological interpretation.

It seems that there is a preoccupation with moving backward, from the reality, back to the type, and even back to the shadow. The fact that the Jews had, historically, a particular idea of covenant has little bearing on how we now encounter the fullness of Gods revelation in the absolute person of Jesus Christ. Whether or not their view of God supports a legalistic framework or not is irrelevant; their entire system was centered around the coming of the Messiah, the person Jesus Christ, and His coming has radically altered anything prior to it. This is what St. Paul means when he speaks in language of a new creation. This is precisely why John begins his gospel with the verses I pointed out to you some years back: And from his FULLNESS (pliromatos) we all received, grace upon grace. For the law WAS GIVEN (edothe) through Moses; grace and truth CAME (egeneto, lit. came to be) through Jesus Christ. (John 1:16-17) Notice the emphasis here, think about the meaning.

This is the crux of the whole argument, whether or not the Jews were ontologically minded (your terminology not mine) is irrelevant, the fact remains that Christ is that truth and that reality which the Jews awaited. The truth of Christ breaks down all barriers, shatters all catagories since having canceled the bond which stood against us with its legal demands; this he set aside, nailing it to the cross. Colossians 2:14 Orthodox theology isnt ontological, if by ontological you have some neo-Platonic schema concocted in your head, it is absolutely and only Christo-centric. Our continuity is with the Old Testament not the Republic of Plato, our saints are David, Moses, Isaiah, Elijah, etc., not Heraclitus, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus, etc.; nevertheless, Jesus Christ is the focus of our life, not the law.

Lastly, I was reading something just today that touches on the conversation. In their essence Christs commandments are the Self-revelation of God. Though expressed in seemingly relative terms, whoever would rightly obey them finds himself on the frontier between the relative and the absolute, the finite and the infinite, the determined and the arbitrary. (Sophrony, We Shall See Him as He is. pg. 72) In my own opinion, this is because love values the person above all else, the command to love God and neighbor mysteriously warps the universal into a non-universal. Each individual person has infinite value, Christ died for the collective, but also for the individual. Each person is absolutely free in love: Gods great gift of love, our uncategorized freedom. All things are lawful for me, but not all things are helpful. All things are lawful, but not all things build up, (1 Corinthians 10:23) and again, For you were called to freedom, brethren; only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love be servants of one another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: you shall love your neighbor as yourself. (Galatians 5:14) Why, then, do you imprison yourself once again to a system of predetermined justification and legal codes and covenants? O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. (I Corinthians 15:56-7)

Lastly, remember the words of our Lord Jesus Christ Himself: The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath; so the Son of man is Lord even of the Sabbath. (Mark 2:27-28)

Your servant in Christ - Christopher

Thank you Christopher. And God bless.

My apologies for the many month hiatus. I’ve been swamped with other concerns lately. I do plan on posting a few pictures of our recent camping trip to Hyner, where Danny got his first tandem flight.

This series of posts has been years in the making and will take years to complete. While I intend to take issue with the Eastern Church, I’m saying up front, like what happened to the recently departed scholar Dr. Jaroslav Pelikan as he wrote his multi volume treatise on the early church, I may very well end up there before the series is finished. I don’t claim to have all of the answers nor do I claim my issues are insurmountable - incredulity is not a virtue.

A cautionary note: I am no scholar and since this is not a scholarly outlet I have every intention of straying into the realm of personal impression and perhaps without qualification. I have no doubt that what follows will be vague to many as it assumes a minimal background and at the same time rather basic and imprecise to others.

The occasion for this post is a conversation I was participating in on Perry Robinson’s blog energeticprocession, combined with the fact that I’ve been asked to stop “hi-jacking” threads by posting off topic comments - and I must admit to my detriment that’s what my comments became.

The Current Issue

Since the 1950’s various scholars of ancient, second millennium BC, near-eastern culture, have recognized a common form shared among what’s called the “Suzerain-Vassal Treaty” literature of the period and the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible. These discoveries have shed light on various passages of the old testament and broadened our understanding about how Israel viewed itself in relation to God. These “treaties” or “covenants” were not “law” in the sense we normally think about “law.” They were solemn and binding agreements that established the conditions for a relationship between a greater king (suzerain) and the people of a lesser king (vassal). The terminology is borrowed from a feudal system but this understanding doesn’t fully capture the relationship.

As Meredith Kline points out, when we hear the phrase, “the law” in reference to Israel, we more rightly understand it as “covenant” which is much broader than a simple legal statute. “Not law, covenant” he writes in his book Treaty of the Great King (partially reproduced in The Structure of Biblical Authority).

Keeping in mind this background, the pertinent portion of the previously mentioned conversation follows:

I had said:

That has no bearing on whether or not [the discovery of the Suzerain-vassal treaties of the 2nd millennium BC] shed more light on the covenant relationship between God and Israel by way of providing more meaning and context to “the law” so often referred to by Paul. My rhetorical point should have been clear; the Reformers view of covenant is strengthened by this *later* understanding, while the Eastern is weakened.

Mr Robinson responded:

And I just have to laugh at the suggestion that suh evidence weakens the Orthodox notion of Covenant. What great works on ORthodox notion of Covenant have you read? Please explicate the Orthodox view of Covenant for me and then contrast it with the Reformed view. I haven’t even mentioned on this blog what the Orthodox view of Covenant is and so I think you are confusing it with theosis. Seriously, it is obvious to me that you are blowing smoke.

To cast one of the major distinctions between the Protestant West and Eastern Orthodoxy in the simplest of terms (which surely will not do justice to the issues), Orthodox Catholic interpretation of all doctrines are almost exclusively in terms of ontological categories, while the West (including Protestants), though not exclusively, will view many doctrines within a “legal” or “judicial” framework.

In subsequent posts on this topic I will highlight the end results of this distinction but by way of explanation of my comments, this was primarily what I had in mind. Again, simplistically, the emphasis in the West is “being right with God” while the emphasis in the East is “union with God.” In the West the pivotal event in history would be the Crucifixion (and for a covenantally minded Reformed Christian, this event would include the Resurrection). In the East it’s the Incarnation; God’s nature united with human nature in the Person of Jesus Christ.

Hence the context of another sarcastic jab of mine in the same thread, of which the above quote is simply a restatement:

After all, any honest interpretation of these legal documents would lead one inexorably to the conclusion that they are treatises on the mystical union between the suzerain and the people of the vassal.

As a side: there are other ancient, near-eastern, 2nd millennium BC, documents that better approximate the modern understanding of “judicial” and “legal.” As Kline also points out, the most famous of these is “The Code of Hammurabi.” But this code doesn’t match the form of the literature of the Pentateuch nearly as well as the “covenant” literature of the period.

So the main question is, and the point of my quotes was, does this ancient literary form create more support for the Reformed notion of covenant or an ontological understanding of union? To me the answer is obvious simply in the broad notion of “covenant” as the definition of “union” itself, contrary to an ontological interpretation.

I will expound in future posts.

Egalitarian - asserting, resulting from, or characterized by belief in the equality of all people, esp. in political, economic, or social life.

Misanthropy - hatred, dislike, or distrust of humankind.

Well why not? If a devout Greek Orthodox with one of the pillars of his worldview resting on the concept of community in the mystical union of the church through the Eucharist could name his blog “The Ochlophobist” (which mean “one who has an aversion to a crowd”), why can’t I use the name “Egalitarian Misanthropy?”

This phrase struck me like a joke whose punch line takes a moment of reflection. But as much as I’ve been captivated by it in the way that it seems to so efficiently capture a cleanly delineated concept, and in the way that it seems to apply to my view of the contemporary political scene - at least I’m “egalitarian” in my criticism - I don’t think that I can leave it as the title of this blog.

One of Dostoevsky’s themes that’s stuck with me was the portrayal of the “caring” leftist who’s compassion extends to humanity in the abstract while it falls far short when considering particular individuals. In a sense then, I guess I am “misanthropic” in that I have a revulsion to the reification (see also, the fallacy of reification) of “mankind” as an abstract entity. Real individual people are much harder to have real compassion for, but that’s what really matters.

Of course, another friend recommended the name “a bunch of crap” which is probably more accurate.

In the meantime I’ll leave the title for a short while.

These posts should form a “tutorial of tutorials” of sorts. There are so many good tutorials out there that rather than simply create another one, I’m going to try to help navigate some of the ones that are already available. One of the shortcommings of the existing tutorials is that they don’t always explain why certain steps are taken. Nor do they provide the background information necessary to understand the bigger picture. I hope that these sets of posts will contribute in specifically these areas.

Some background

The XBox was simply not intended to run software that wasn’t condoned (approved, signed, sealed and delivered) by Microsoft, that is, it’s not meant to run “homebrew” (also called “unsigned code”), which the “XBox Media Center” is the premier example of. Microsoft took steps to prevent people from being able to run homebrew applications in the design of the XBox itself.

And so, here is one of the paths you can take to circumvent all of Microsoft’s efforts …

Microsoft designed the XBox with two main hurdles preventing the running of homebrew. One is that the BIOS prevents the running of any unauthorized programs. The BIOS is the program that runs when the XBox starts up. It’s stored in a chip on the motherboard refered to as the EEPROM or Flash ROM. A good review of what the XBox BIOS does can be found in this article: Xbox Bios Introduction. The BIOS (which contains the kernel) makes sure that any program that runs is “digitally signed” by Microsoft.

In the EEPROM, along with (or embedded in, depending on how you look at it) the BIOS itself, is the “kernel.”

The kernel is the central component of most computer operating systems (OSs). Its responsibilities include managing the system’s resources and the communication between hardware and software components.

With respect to the XBox, the BIOS and the kernel are referred to interchangeably though this is technically not correct. Technically the BIOS is the start up program that, upon finishing, initiates and passes control to the kernel. In the case of the XBox the kernel is stored in the chip with the BIOS in an encrypted form. Part of what the BIOS does is decrypt the kernel stored in the chip and then run it.

Please keep in mind there is ambiguity, or at least overlapping concepts, in the usage of some of these terms in the tutorials, though in this writeup, I will try to be consistent in my terminology.

The second impediment designed by Microsoft is that the hard drive is locked to the BIOS. That means that the hard drive cannot be read from, or written to, unless it is first unlocked with the right password and key. The password and key are generated from some internal information like the serial number and version and some other pieces of information, resulting in a different password and key for every XBox out there.

The technique outlined below will circumvent both of these impediments.

Modding technique - “Softmod” and “Hotswap” overview

The modding technique I used, and the one that I will lead you through, is called a “softmod.” It’s called a “softmod” because it doesn’t require any changes to the hardware or the addition of any new chips to the motherboard (this is as opposed to a “hardmod”) and is done by exploiting weaknesses in the XBox kernel. A softmod fools the system into loading an alternative BIOS off of the disk rather than from the BIOS chip and is accomplished by replacing some of the system system files on the disk (in this case, the Xbox fonts). Once we’re running our own alternative BIOS we can run “homebrew.”

Legality This is the first place where the question of legality comes in. The program that loads the alternative BIOS requires Microsoft licensed tools in order to be built, so its distribution is illegal (I suggest you don’t distribute it). Whether possessing it is illegal or not, I’m not sure – again, check with a lawyer if you’re concerned, I’m not one. Also, the BIOS that gets loaded is likely a modified BIOS that was originally produced by Microsoft. I think this is less of an issue since you own a legal copy of the BIOS (if you own an XBox). Though again, I’m no lawyer.

There remains the problem of getting the softmod (the alternative BIOS and the means to load it) to the Xbox in order to exploit the operating sytem flaws previously mentioned. In its “retail” state, there is no way to get your own software to the Xbox in order to run it. As mentioned, there is a security protocol which locks the hard-drive so that it cannot operate outside of the Xbox, and there is no straightforward means to add any files that you may want while it remains inside an unmodified Xbox. There are two known solutions to this problem. One is called a “gamesave exploit” and the other is called a “hotswap.”

There are advantages and drawback of each. I chose the “hotswap” technique because I had everything I needed on hand. It’s tougher to come by the things needed for a gamesave exploit. For those interested in a gamesave exploit tutorial, take a look at this article: “How to Go from Xbox to Xbox Media Center in 30 minutes.” Another tutorial is “Krazie’s NDURE 1.1 Softmod with Action Replay and a USB Flash Drive.”

The other option is a “hotswap” and only requires a PC and some guts, and has the added benefit, free of charge, of a small but finite risk of permanent hardware damage to the PC and the Xbox. It involves letting the Xbox unlock the hard drive, and then while it and the PC are powered up, swapping the hard drive into the PC. It’s easier than it sounds and if you’re willing to take the (very real) risk (you have been warned), I’ll lead you through it in the next post.

If you decide you don’t want to take the risk inherent in a “hotswap” or you don’t have a spare PC, then follow the tutorials linked to in the previous paragraph and try the “gamesave” exploit techniques.

Dr. Alvin Plantinga

Having previously briefly commented on Richard Dawkin’s latest foray into the realm of philosophy and (a-)theology, a friend recently sent me the following review:

The Dawkins Confusion

Of particular note, this response is from my all time favorite philosopher, Alvin Plantinga, who I’ve mentioned several times on this list. It has been my contention that Dr. Plantinga has put the last nail in the coffin of Logical Positivism; the epistemology of Modernism. Usually, when I pick up a book like Dawkins’ (or Sam Harris’, or Dennett’s, etc.), the first thing I do is check the index to see if they’ve dealt with Plantinga. I’ve yet to find him even mentioned. Not surprisingly each of these writers presents their case from a pathetic and naively Positivist set of presuppositions.

Plantinga is known for his sense of humor and wit (even in his treatises on Epistemology and Analytic Philosophy) and this article is replete with it. What else should we expect from someone that, while teaching at the Catholic University Notre Dame, once joked about possibly being the first Calvinist Pope, but then reasoned that he’d get more respect at the institution by being the head football coach?

In response to Daniel Dennett’s concern about receiving a “fist to the face” for writing his atheist polemic, Plantinga says:

religion-bashing in the current Western academy is about as dangerous as endorsing the party’s candidate at a Republican rally

Reflecting on some of the vitriol in Dawkins’ book he says:

one shouldn’t look to this book for evenhanded and thoughtful commentary. In fact the proportion of insult, ridicule, mockery, spleen, and vitriol is astounding. (Could it be that his mother, while carrying him, was frightened by an Anglican clergyman on the rampage?)

And, while admitting that Dawkins is “perhaps the world’s most popular science writer; [and] also an extremely gifted science writer,” of his philosophical pursuits Plantinga comments:

You might say that some of [Dawkins’] forays into philosophy are at best sophomoric, but that would be unfair to sophomores; the fact is (grade inflation aside), many of his arguments would receive a failing grade in a sophomore philosophy class.

Of course, Plantinga also deals with the thrust of Dawkins’ complaints (such as they are), with the same characteristic attitude so it’s worth the read even if your sensibilities are offended by such sentiments (of course - I’m not sure why you’d be reading this blog if that were the case).

Hat Tip: Mike Harnish