Lesson 3 is available on my blog. I discuss several concepts provided by scholar Gerhard Von Rad on the Creation. I hope you like it.
http://joelsmonastery.blogspot.com/2014/01/ot-3-creation.html
read there / comment here
Church Instructs Leaders on same-sex marriage
The Church put out this statement today on same-sex marriage.
Some highlights:
Changes in the civil law do not, indeed cannot, change the moral law that God has established. God expects us to uphold and keep His commandments regardless of divergent opinions or trends in society. His law of chastity is clear: sexual relations are proper only between a man and a woman who are legally and lawfully wedded as husband and wife. We urge you to review and teach Church members the doctrine contained in “The Family: A Proclamation to the World.”
And this:
Consistent with our fundamental beliefs, Church officers will not employ their ecclesiastical authority to perform marriages between two people of the same sex, and the Church does not permit its meetinghouses or other properties to be used for ceremonies, receptions, or other activities associated with same-sex marriages. Nevertheless, all visitors are welcome to our chapels and premises so long as they respect our standards of conduct while there.
And this:
Just as those who promote same-sex marriage are entitled to civility, the same is true for those who oppose it. The Church insists on its leaders’ and members’ constitutionally protected right to express and advocate religious convictions on marriage, family, and morality free from retaliation or retribution. The Church is also entitled to maintain its standards of moral conduct and good standing for members.
I am sure we will have further discussions on this issue in the coming days.
Letting the dead bury their dead
This is a guest post by IDIAT, a M* commenter.
January’s Ensign has two articles – one on the grieving and mourning process, the other introducing us to President Joseph Fielding Smith. I had already looked over JFS’s time line in the priesthood manual. Let me summarize some milestones in his life, drawing from the manual, Ensign article and Family Search.
Born 7/19//1876. Marries Louie Emily Shurtliff 04/26/1898. They have two children, then she dies during her third pregnancy 03/30/1908. (Married about 10 years). Marries Ethel Georgina Reynolds on 11/02/1908. They have 7 more children and she dies 08/26/1937 after a four year illness. (Married second time about 29 years). Marries Jessie Ella Evans 04/12/1938, no children born of this marriage, and she dies 08/13/1971. (Married about 33 years). JFS was sealed to all three wives.
A couple of things stand out. First, in both his second and third marriages, he re-married about 7 months after the death of deceased wife. I think by most people’s standards, that’s pretty quick. The first remarriage he had two children, ages 6 and 2. Our sympathies would be with a young father aged 32 (or mother for that matter) who needed help raising children. Still, JFS was the first son of a polygamous father who ultimately had many children. In fact, JFS wasn’t about the same age as his father’s last wives. Surely, with all that extended family around, someone could have stepped in and helped raise the children. Sister Reynolds was only 19 when she married JFS. Perhaps he already knew Sister Reynolds, so that they skipped through much of the courtship stuff. Anyway, when Sister Reynolds dies at age 48, their youngest of 7 children is 16.
Continue reading
Introduction to Computational Theory: Areas of Research
In my last post I started explaining the theory of computation, starting with its central principle: The Church-Turing Thesis. In this post, I’m going to explain several areas of research in computational theory that, as per the Church-Turing Thesis, are based on the realization that all (full featured) computers are equivalent.
Turing Machines as Simplified Computers
Since Turing Machines are known to be equivalent in expressive power to modern computers, it turns out this means that Turing Machines can serve as a very simplified version of a modern computer — or any conceivable computer!
This makes Turing Machines quite useful for exploration of the Theory of Computation. Mathematicians have been able to come up with ‘programs’ written for Turing machines and then – because Turing Machines are so simple – come up with consistent ways of how to measure how fast the program runs given any number of inputs. Continue reading
An Introduction to the Theory of Computation: The Church-Turing Thesis
One scientific/philosophical point that all three of my favourite authors loved to delve into was Computational Theory and, in particular, something called “The Church-Turing Thesis” and it’s related thesis: The Turing Principle [1]
I remember, back when I was working on my computer science degree, studying about Turing machines and the Church-Turing Thesis in my Intro to Computational Theory class. Back then I thought it was a big waste of time. I just wanted to program computers and I could care less about this long dead Turing-guy (or this Church-guy) nor his stupid theoretical machines.
Now that I understand the philosophical ramifications of the Church-Turing Thesis, I wish I had paid attention in class! Because the Church-Turing Thesis, if true, has some profound philosophical ramifications and it might also tell us something about the deep — and special — nature of reality.
In a series of posts I will attempt to do a short summary of Computational Theory. This serves as the basis for many other topics to come, so it will be nice to have a series of posts I can easily reference back to. (I’ll also do a summary at the end if I get that far.) I’ll do my best to make it as easy as possible and as interesting as possible. But if this just isn’t your cup of tea, you may need to move on or just skim it for general ideas or wait for the quick summary. [2] Continue reading