My Testimony – Page 4 – Matty (Headwind)

August 15, 2020August 15, 2020

Pumpkinhead

Hear another parable: There was a certain landowner who planted a vineyard and set a hedge around it, dug a winepress in it and built a tower. And he leased it to vinedressers and went into a far country.
(Matthew 21:33) NKJV

On arriving in Champaign, Illinois, in August 1988 our group of three from the University of Wales, Bangor, were taken to an apartment where three Sorority girls had offered to let us crash until the dorms opened. They were Tri Deltas, ΔΔΔ, although we had no idea what that meant at the time.

August 15, 2020August 15, 2020

1988: The Year Donald Lost His Mind

Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living.
(Luke 15:13) ESV

1988 was a pivotal year in our life. We went from life in a small English seaside town to life in a sprawling metropolitan area with a University campus with a population larger than our home town.

August 13, 2020August 13, 2021

The Things We See

Then He turned to His disciples and said privately, “Blessed are the eyes which see the things you see; for I tell you that many prophets and kings have desired to see what you see, and have not seen it, and to hear what you hear, and have not heard it.”
(Luke 10:23-24) NKJV

We have a very flippant attitude towards the “scientific” basis of the Christian establishment. That’s because it’s a half-baked capitulation with popular science (SciPop). It’s nothing personal.

August 10, 2020March 10, 2022

We All Love a Hero

Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying, “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it, for their evil has come up before me.” But Jonah rose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. He went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish. So he paid the fare and went down into it, to go with them to Tarshish, away from the presence of the Lord.
(Jonah 1:1-3) ESV

We went off on a bit of a tangent today as we drew a comparison between popular science (SciPop) and science fiction (SciFi). It was apt. That being said we’re huge SciFi fans and we spent may years writing trash in the hope that one day we would have a novel on the New York Times bestsellers list.

August 10, 2020August 10, 2021

How To Fly

This is an excerpt from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
© by Douglas Adams

There is an art, or rather, a knack to flying. The knack lies in learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss. Pick a nice day, the Guide suggests, and try it.

August 9, 2020March 1, 2021

A Phylogenetic Tree of Life

Get wisdom! Get understanding! Do not forget, nor turn away from the words of my mouth. Do not forsake her, and she will preserve you; Love her, and she will keep you. Wisdom is the principal thing; Therefore get wisdom. And in all your getting, get understanding.
(Proverbs 4:5-7) NKJV

Back in the early days of DNA sequencing in systematics, when PCR machines (polymerase chain reaction) were cool new toys, the data was fragmentary. We were a grad student in one of the molecular labs sequencing plant DNA.

August 9, 2020May 2, 2022

Cladistics and Circular Reasoning

(For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;) Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;
(2 Corinthians 10:4-5) KJV

Despite the rigorous application of philosophical ploys to guard against circular reasoning in cladistic analysis it’s a poster boy for circular reasoning because it’s based in a paradigm which is the result of personal bias. In this case the personal bias is: do you love or hate God?

August 9, 2020May 17, 2022

Induction vs. Deduction

But avoid foolish questions, and genealogies, and contentions, and strivings about the law; for they are unprofitable and vain.
(Titus 3:9) KJV

In the scientific method there’s a lot philosophy involved in constructing a logical framework which should produce an experimental result which is free from bias.

August 9, 2020August 9, 2020

What’s a Tarheel?

And the Lord said:
“Because this people draw near with their mouth
and honor me with their lips,
while their hearts are far from me,
and their fear of me is a commandment taught by men,
therefore, behold, I will again
do wonderful things with this people,
with wonder upon wonder;
and the wisdom of their wise men shall perish,
and the discernment of their discerning men shall be hidden.”
(Isaiah 29:13-14) NKJV

In the fall of 1990 we began the graduate program in Plant Biology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. On our first day we were shown around Coker Hall by a senior graduate student, Victor Albert.

August 8, 2020September 17, 2021

Worlds in Collision

The third angel blew his trumpet, and a great star fell from heaven, blazing like a torch, and it fell on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water. The name of the star is Wormwood. A third of the waters became wormwood, and many people died from the water, because it had been made bitter.
(Revelation 8:10-11) ESV

“Worlds in Collision” is the title of a book by Immanuel Velikovsky in which he proposes, that some of the Exodus plagues were caused by successive close approaches to Earth by the planet Venus.