Monday, March 18th 2024

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Author iconMeeting The Masters
William Wildblood

The full quote from Matthew 24 is "For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect."

Jesus is talking about the end times. It seems to some that our times are the end times, and even if they are ...

1.5m (480 words)
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Author iconFrancis Berger - Blog
Francis Berger

What kind of world will we leave our children?

Many proclaim this to be the most pressing question of this time and place.

Some counter this question with another.

The most pressing question is not what kind of world we will leave our children but what kind of children we will leave the world.

Both miss the ...

Author iconBruce Charlton's Notions
Bruce Charlton

The only valid place from which to proceed, is a conscious apprehension of the real self: a direct-knowing without words, pictures, symbols, feelings, or logic.

Negative learning can never point in a positive direction.

Disillusion is only valuable when it leads to reality - not to another illusion.

Cynicism ...

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Author iconFrom the Narrow Desert
Wm Jas Tychonievich

Some unmanned untethered free association here. It's a constitutional right, after all.

My last post, "Eclipse skull and crossbones" called up a vague memory of a meme in which He-Man's arch-enemy Skeletor was standing with the sun directly behind his head, making it look as if he had a halo -- or an eclipse with a ...

2m (600 words)
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Author iconFrom the Narrow Desert
Wm Jas Tychonievich

Besides Makanda, the "eclipse crossroads" in Southern Illinois also includes Carbondale -- which has an interesting city logo:

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That design looks a little too perfect to be a coincidence, and sure enough, it's not. It was introduced months after the 2017 eclipse and explicitly references the two ...

1.5m (420 words)

Sunday, March 17th 2024

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Author iconFrom the Narrow Desert
Wm Jas Tychonievich

This theme came up in "Human skull on the ground, turn around." Today I ran across it again on /pol/:

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This was posted 22 days before the upcoming eclipse on April 8, 2024, so that's what it's referring to. My recent post "Makanda" showed how the path of that eclipse crosses that of the August 21, ...

Author iconBruce Charlton's Notions
Bruce Charlton

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Maheesh Theekshana - The Sri Lankan who is Chennai Super Kings's resident "mystery spinner" - in the midst of bowling one of his incomprehensible deliveries

Last year, my most enjoyable cricket included watching almost all of the IPL - Indian Premier League.

It is quite surprising how much I ...

1m (310 words)
Author iconBruce Charlton's Notions
Bruce Charlton

It used to be almost universal that becoming more-good, a better person, was a thing that was imposed from externally.

Society imposed values in a mandatory and exclusive fashion; or maybe the individual's role was to choose (from available external options) what set-of-values he would impose on himself.

And when ...

1.5m (500 words)
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Author iconFrom the Narrow Desert
Wm Jas Tychonievich

I dreamed that I visited Francis Berger’s blog and found that he had posted a long series of images tiled in a grid layout. These consisted of maybe 8 to 12 unique images, which occurred again and again in an unpredictable sequence like the digits of an irrational number. If the same image occurred two or three ...

2m (540 words)

Saturday, March 16th 2024

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Author iconFrancis Berger - Blog
Francis Berger

Making oneself familiar with or revisiting William Arkle’s core thoughts concerning the true self and false selves (A Geography of Consciousness) has never been more urgent.

The more the world and the West in particular descend into chaos, the more pressing Arkle’s insights become. I will defer to Dr. ...

3m (920 words)
Author iconBruce Charlton's Notions
Bruce Charlton

A couple of days ago I devised another new name for the almost universal basis of moral discourse and assertions of moral behaviour in the world today: hedonic pragmatism.

What is striking about this, is that - although almost everybody talks (almost all the time) about practical measures to improve human happiness ...

1.5m (380 words)

Friday, March 15th 2024

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Author iconFrancis Berger - Blog
Francis Berger

The spiritual war in mortal life is not about the sinners versus the sinless. If it was, there would be no war of which to speak.

Sinners comprise the side for God and Creation and the side opposed to God and Creation. At its core, the spiritual war in mortal life pits sinners against sinners, including the various ...

4.5m (1,400 words)
Author iconSecret Fire
John Fitzgerald

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The Romans were never convinced that conquering what we now know as Scotland was worth the time and trouble. The terrain was harsher than in the South and there were no clear strategic advantages to be gained. The inhabitants – Picts, Caledonians, and other Bronze Age tribes – were ...

3.5m (1,000 words)
Author iconBruce Charlton's Notions
Bruce Charlton

A while ago I wrote a little book about the corruption of science for which I devised the title Not Even Trying - with respect to scientists and truth.

But, except at the highest levels - where the agenda is actively evil - the strategic and inbuilt attitude of not even trying to perform one's designated function; ...

1.5m (510 words)
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Author iconFrom the Narrow Desert
Wm Jas Tychonievich

In my last post, I quote the passage in Colin Wilson's Shadowland where Typhon tells Niall that he plans to introduce him as Colonel Niall despite the fact that he is not a colonel. A few paragraphs later, Niall's spider companion -- heretofore known only as "the captain," reveals his name for the first time:Typhon ...

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Author iconFrom the Narrow Desert
Wm Jas Tychonievich

A recent post by William Wright, "March 12 and 13 timelines: Shelob's Lair and a change in the wind," mentions both the Tolkien characters Merry and Pippin and the P. L. Travers character Mary Poppins, but without noting the similarity of the names. I had a vague memory of having posted something about that similarity ...

4.5m (1,300 words)

Thursday, March 14th 2024

Author iconBruce Charlton's Notions
Bruce Charlton

That's it really...

(Just a reminder.)

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Author iconMeeting The Masters
William Wildblood

I have noticed that quite a few writers on the Internet whose main focus is spiritual are getting increasingly drawn into commenting on and analysing current affairs. I understand why people do this especially with each new development revealing an ever greater descent into insanity. But the danger is that too much ...

3m (940 words)
Author iconBruce Charlton's Notions
Bruce Charlton

It has become a commonplace observation that Modern people tend to lose faith when they experience pain, suffering - in a word evil.

It is therefore assumed - and this appears to be true quite often - that such experiences as bereavement, illness, famine, war... will tend to induce Christians to lose their faith on ...

3m (900 words)

Wednesday, March 13th 2024

Author iconBruce Charlton's Notions
Bruce Charlton

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She's crying because I wasn't invited - presumably

I noticed, rather belatedly, that "my" movie (which I haven't actually seen) seems to have scooped-up most of the 2024 Oscars that were left-over from Oppenheimer (which also I haven't seen).

Since the movie was based-on the work by Alasdair ...

Author iconBruce Charlton's Notions
Bruce Charlton

It is understandable that people would want to do practical and maybe-effective things intended to make themselves (or other people they care about) happier, or suffer less - this could be termed hedonic pragmatism.

Understandable... But this isn't Christian morality - it's just what any animal would do. In an ...

1m (340 words)
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Author iconFrancis Berger - Blog
Francis Berger

...because they align with Truth and Reality.

Unlike the unrepented lies and deceit on the other side, the unrepented lies and deceit on our side are driven by good motivations to un-invert evil inversions and return the world to some semblance of Truth and Reality.

Sure, it's not perfect, but this is a fallen ...

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Author iconFrancis Berger - Blog
Francis Berger

... and be grateful that they are putting themselves out there on the front line to lie and manipulate on our behalf.

We should do nothing but support, endorse, and promote their unrepented lies and manipulations because endorsing and promoting the unrepented lies and manipulations of our side is the only way we can ...

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Author iconFrom the Narrow Desert
Wm Jas Tychonievich

I was trying to generate some line-drawing illustrations for Aesop's fable of the Tortoise and the Hare. Stable Diffusion had other ideas:

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Actually, that looks like a much more interesting story.

Tuesday, March 12th 2024

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Author iconFrancis Berger - Blog
Francis Berger

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The plum trees in my yard are blossoming, which means it's time to start planning this season’s garden. Last year’s harvest was very successful. Going down to the cellar this afternoon, I noticed we still have two plastic crates of sweet potatoes and two squashes, down from the ...

Author iconBruce Charlton's Notions
Bruce Charlton

Assume you are a blacksmith and slave to an evil Lord...

(If it helps, you might imagine yourself a Saxon under the Norman yoke.)

The Lord is evil in the sense that he organizes his entire estate to provide-for a gang dedicated to theft, arson, rape, torture and (just plain) murder.

(Pretty much your standard ...

2m (570 words)
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Author iconFrom the Narrow Desert
Wm Jas Tychonievich

The upcoming total eclipse of the sun has been in the sync-stream of late, which is probably what put Bonnie Tyler's 1983 song "Total Eclipse of the Heart" in my head.

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That in turn made me think of the audition scene from the 2010 movie Diary of a Wimpy Kid, where the sing the ...

1.5m (450 words)
Author iconBruce Charlton's Notions
Bruce Charlton

If we are honest; we know that our civilization is so deeply rotten, in so many ways, that it cannot be reformed.

Not only is their no significant desire for Goodness (for virtue, truth and beauty - for honesty and coherence); but even if there were, effectiveness changes to reform our kind of society - to base it ...

2m (600 words)
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Author iconFrom the Narrow Desert
Wm Jas Tychonievich

This morning I taught an adult English class. Their reading assignment had been an article about the Terracotta Army, and I had to explain the meaning of the term booby trap:

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Three hours later, I ran across this meme online:

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Author iconFrom the Narrow Desert
Wm Jas Tychonievich

I dreamed I was somewhere away from home -- in a hotel room, I think, with some family members -- and I was reading a book. This was a very thick blue or green paperback, and on the cover was nothing but an oval-shaped black-and-white photograph of James Joyce. I don't think the book was actually by Joyce, though, ...

3.5m (990 words)