Wandering Elder

Over the years, I have taken note of the changes in television channels and programming.  For example, TLC used to be known as "The Learning Channel."  It focused on education and was originally founded by NASA and the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare !  The channel was originally called the Appalachian Community Service Network but was then bought by a private company and the name was changed to The Learning Channel, whose focus was documentaries on space, science, how things were made, and medical studies. By the mid 2000's, the format had almost completely changed.  The channel that focused on genuine educational materials became "TLC" and switched from documentary to docu-drama to just plain garbage drama with shows like "Here Comes Honey Boo Boo."  Talk about devolving. But the same thing seems to be occurring on most of those kinds of channels.  Perhaps because education doesn't sell.  There has to be some twist, plot device,

It seems to be increasingly clear that society in the United States is becoming a nation whose level of discussion (certainly politically) has devolved to the level of false alternatives which assume there is no middle ground. This attitude is a logical fallacy.  What this fallacy of false alternatives does is to assume that there are, to any given situation or topic, only a few alternatives and, at the same time, assuming that only one of those alternative options is true.  Its a fallacy that operates in terms of black/white (or blue), either/or, or from the position of extremes.  What this line of thinking does is oversimplify a situation or problem: it's all  their fault; you are either  with us or  against us; it is either  hot or  cold. This way of thinking makes the assumption that there is no middle ground or no gray area in any given situation.  For example, and this example comes from the book Attacking Faulty Reasoning  by T. Edward Damer:  "Absolutist thinking o

The 137th Psalm is one that surprises and shocks the modern reader or hearer (if we can still be shocked).  Not initially, but perhaps that's why it is so shocking.  It starts out with the words, "By the rivers (or waters) of Babylon, there we sat down and wept, when we remembered Zion." This might just be me, but I hear that opening line and I am immediately put in the mind of Linda Ronstadt who had a song on her album "Hasten Down the Wind" (way back in 1976) entitled "Rivers of Babylon."  It is a short song that begins with words that are quite similar to Psalm 137: By the rivers of Babylon Where he sat down And there he went When he remembered Zion It changes the psalm in that it speaks of someone else  experiencing this.  The difference is that Psalm 137 is written from the point of view of one experiencing this exile.  "By the waters of Babylon, there we  sat down and wept." Now, here is the rest of the song. For the wicked ca

I mentioned last time that I had received a letter from Warren Jeffs, the president of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  The tricky part about that last sentence is whether or not Jeffs is  the president of that group or not.  He is currently in prison and there were some people who worked to get control of the FLDS, but Jeffs apparently resumed control of the denomination in 2011, though still in prison. I'm not going to go into the question (or fact) of his incarceration or the rationale behind it. Instead, I want to mention the fact that this letter from Jeffs to me care of the church to whom it was sent is not  a letter per se, but is a record of a revelation sent to Jeffs by Jesus Christ.  Confusingly, either this message was received by Jeffs in November of 2015 or this was when the letter was sent out and (according to the bottom of the letter), copyrighted. The letter is hard to read.  Mostly because it makes little sense.  For example, t