TrueTomHarley

Gasp!!!! A conspiratorially-minded person could take this confession for an admission that MM IS The Librarian!!!! Now, that would be a puzzle piece to crow about! Just like I have progressed from being rebuked years ago for shamelessly promoting my first book, Tom Irregardless and Me, to participating here to such a degree that some think I actually own the site. When the number of my comments surpassed those of the formerly dominating @Pudgy (under a different name) I said, ‘What’s wrong—cat got your tongue? I never thought they would surpass those of @JW Insider, but that too eventually happened. A few dark and paranoid persons began insisting I was the owner. I denied it, but there is a certain type of person who once they get something into their heads, you can forget about ever getting it out. So I began to play along with the notion, and will continue to do so until this site shuts down, which you never know if that will happen or not. @admin was sweating it a while back about some proposed legislation that would make it hot for webmasters. Apparently, the storm blew over. Meantime, I put most of my writing on my own platform, so if this ever does go up in smoke, I go up to a lesser degree. I dedicated In the Last of the Last Days: Faith in the Age of Dysfunction to @The Librarian. A writer needs more than a muse. He also needs a villain—and she has provided a playground where villains roam freely, as well as others falling in diverse places on the spiritual spectrum. It’s not always clear where they fall, but it sure is engrossing to put together the puzzle—just know, if you find you have stepped into it, you have to back out for a time. Not every one on a mission is actually on one. Sometimes, they just so closely resemble a person on one that you can’t tell the difference. Avant-garde to carry on in this way? The entire system is avant-garde, from the slippery one who chuckles hehehe))))) as he is cast down from the heavens, to the brother who rebadges the WaPo byline as ‘Theocracy Dies in Darkness,’ to the brother who cries ‘There is not a righteous man, not even one; there is no one who has any insight; there is no one who searches for God—except me.’

Oh, stuff it. You got your licks in. Let that be enough for you. Time to move on. It’s a little like @The Librarian, aptly named, whining on about the defilement of her card catalog that exists to keep order! Then someone like Pudgy comes along, and says, ‘Hey, forget order; let ‘er rip. You can be organized to such a degree that it starts to come out of your pores, like the brothers whose gestures are so similar that they begin to resemble synchronized swimming.

Loosely speaking, Srecko is my template for the character Vic Vomodog, sort of a Wily E. Coyote figure who lurks in wait of any comment about anything and converts it into yet another attempt to catch the Road Runner. Thus far, Road Runner thwarts him every time, but we do not know what tomorrow will hold. If we did, the gag would have lost its enduring appeal long ago. Vic’s perpetual attacks on the faith are not logically consistent, but I don’t worry about it because neither are Srecko’s. Anything that comes up—how can it be used against the faith? Nevermind if it is consistent with prior criticisms. It probably never would have occurred to me but for reflection upon the inane, ‘hehehe )))))))’ he used to append to comments, ceasing the practice only after Nana Fofana (who does not appear to be here any more) began imitating the style so mercilessly, even meanly overacting a chopped style that stems from English being a second language, that he could endure it no more. Oh, yeah: hehehe ))))))). How can one not think of Wily E. Coyote cooking up another scheme with some Acme products?

That being the case, it saves swaths of time if we can discover what are the glasses another is using. It has been mentioned before that if one is atheist, it will so heavily influence anything they utter that you simply waste your time addressing them—unless you are speaking specifically of atheism or if you are speaking to those beyond them. Atheism is for them the force that refreshes, and if you could demonstrate that each and every accusation against human organized worship is false, they still would say, ‘Well, there’s no god anyway.’ So why should you go there with them? What you as a Christian view as commendable delayed gratification they view as a woeful and willful flushing of one’s life down the toilet. When you say, ‘Well, every project needs headship, so I’ll cooperate with these people,’ they say, ‘They’re even more deluded than you! Cult leaders, through and through! The farther you can get from them, the better.’ Within the realm of religion, find out if the other believes we’re in the last days, for it will so heavily influence anything they say as to make any other criticism of theirs irrelevant. There is no sense swatting the water downstream, for it is immediately replaced. Unless you go to the source—are we in the last days or not?—any subsequent conversation, unless it is directed at those lying beyond, is fruitless. The entire ‘life boat’ scenario that so much Witness action and thinking depends upon is absurdity to them. Addressing some controversy about ‘Tight Pants Tony’ as though that was something that really troubled them, is just spitting into the wind. Even if you win, you haven’t gotten anywhere. I’ll wear pants the size of parachutes if it fits in with lifeboat protocol. Find out, as soon as possible, how they feel about ‘the revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven with his powerful angels in a flaming fire, as he brings vengeance on those who do not know God and those who do not obey the good news about our Lord Jesus.’ Many people, even those religious, are repelled by the thought—how could God be so mean! they say. Find this out as soon as you can, because it will determine much of what they subsequently say and, again, you can find yourself quibbling with a point so far downstream—critiques over how Witnesses do this or that—as to quibble all day over a comparative nothing. And, Lord knows, find out whenever you can if the person is ‘Proud to have come out of the closet’ gay, because if he or she is, you don’t stand a chance in discussing anything involving traditional morals as found in the Bible. Whatever you are debating, with you thinking that if you can make the point it may stick will not. Their ‘sexuality’ trumps all else. All the above are largely matters of the heart, not the head. The heart makes a grab for what it wants, then charges the head to devise a convincing rationale. This leads the unobservant to think the head is calling the shots, but it is the heart all along. This is why one might buck at ‘rationality’ as the be-all and end-all. Rationality offers good insight into the head, but poor insight into the heart. The best talks and writings are those that, while not ignoring the head, appeal primarily to the heart. Jesus did things that would infuriate any strict devotee of reason. He routinely spun parables that he declined to explain—let the heart figure it out. If it doesn’t, it doesn’t. He answered questions with counter-questions. Try doing that with a modern ‘critical thinker.’ He launched ad hominem attacks. People may say that the ad hominem attacks of Matthew 23 are not really ad hominem attacks because the scribes and Pharisees actually were that way, but this wlll be said by anyone launching such an attack. Allen Guelzo the historian lectures about how subjective history is, not at all how most of us suppose it. We get a hint he may be right when we recall the expression, ‘History is written by the victors,’ but he greatly expands on the idea by including new trends and waves of thinking among the ‘victors.’ That’s why (he does not make this point, but likely would if his lectures were given today) Americans pull down statues of Columbus and the forefathers that they once put up. History has (once again) flipped. The good guys have become the bad guys. But doesn’t our modern day critical thinking solve the problem of subjectivity? he asks. No, it only makes the situation worse, he says, because it repackages our dubious biases as laudable critical thinking. “When dealing with people, let us remember we are not dealing with creatures of logic. We are dealing with creatures of emotion, creatures bristling with prejudices and motivated by pride and vanity,” Dale Carnegie said. The trouble with critical thinking is that those who most heavily advocate it too often assume they have a lock on the stuff. Accordingly, while your remarks must make sense so as not to explode the head, to go exclusively there is to miss where the action is. It is the heart that is the seat of motivation. One may be dubious of a discussion that appears purely intellectual, as though coming across ones fighting a battle that does not matter.

It is not commonly recognized how smart beavers are. Most of them are graduates of Dam U.

Yes. Whereas there were once about 7 shots required for pre-school age children, now there are around 70 (some of them boosters of the same thing).

Yes.

Without again copying @Pudgy’s cartoon, which reveals a certain — ahem—cynicism of social media that leans left, which is practically all of it . . . the founder of the BITE model that is used to recognize ‘cults’ is very political, active on Twitter (sigh…X) and invariably comes down on the left side of most (if not all) issues. He has a book out called, ‘The Cult of Trump.’ It could be argued that when you think half the country has fallen victim to a cult, it is evidence that you have drunk too much of the KoolAid yourself. BITE stands for all methods of ‘control,’ behavioral, informational, thought, and emotional. Ironically, nobody seeks to control information like many of these social media companies, going so far as to ban large swaths of communication, and those who engage in them, on the grounds of being ‘misinformation.’ I read Walter Isaacson’s biography of Elon Musk. He described the latter as very enamored with Asimov’s three laws of robotics—but also very concerned that most of his competitors are not. He has developed a feud with one of the Google heads (Page or Brin, I forget which), who has accused him of being a ‘specist.’ (one who favors his species) They used to be tight. ‘Um yeah, I kind of like humanity,’ says Musk, accounting for why he is fond of Asimov’s laws. He is in the minority. Most of these other guys want to let AI rip, go where it goes, go as fast as it can be developed, and if it one day outsmarts and outmaneuvers humans, swatting them as one might swat a bug that gets in your way, well—that’s evolution for you, survival of the fittest.

This is true of Isaac Asimov, who died of AIDS from a blood transfusion. I discovered this in writing up a post about him. It wasn’t widely known—his family hushed it up. And it was not acquired until his later years. All the same, it’s not a nice way to go, it probably shaved a dozen or more years from his life, and who knows what he might have written in that time: https://www.tomsheepandgoats.com/2007/07/isaac-asimov-an.html

Mine too. Maybe if I had the experiences you report I would feel as you do. I have had calamity in my life, but not that one. Isn’t this your 6th or 7th mention of The Fugitive? Though there is tragedy in the world, those not immediate victims continue to go to the movies, to concerts, to plays, to read books, to surf the internet, until in Eliphaz’s words, ‘it becomes your turn.’ Maybe all such activity should end until there is no more pain, but it does not.

I think you are not big on the movies, for there is an allusion that you did not pick up. I don’t know how else to account for this bit of pique on your part.

I meant to be colloquial. I did not mean to be irreverent. Comparing life to a game is among the oldest metaphors in the book. Those persons understandably might sour on the metaphor, You did not say that you were one of them. The fact is, people put their lives on the line for any number of causes—for country, for science, for exploration, even for extreme sports, and they are generally praised for it. Only if the motivation is religious conviction is their loss tainted by accusations they were manipulated. In all other cases, life, including wordplay, goes on. Not long ago, Juan said some do not like his style of writing. Same here with mine. It was not my intention to dishonor anyone and I don’t think the comment did. Since you specifically mentioned children, that recalled a blog post I wrote on a 1994 Awake Magazine that dealt with the issue. An excerpt: “I also thought it well to take a look at that May 1994 Awake quote which Matt uses to advance the notion JW youths are dropping like flies for their transfusion refusals: “In former times thousands of youths died for putting God first. They are still doing it, only today the drama is played out in hospitals and courtrooms, with blood transfusions the issue.” “Not that I accuse Matt of anything devious. I've no doubt he used the quotation in good faith. It's likely from a web source purporting to be informative, but in reality existing only to denigrate a faith its author dislikes, trying to make JWs look as fanatical as possible, and doing so for philosophical reasons, rather than anything having to do with medicine or lives. So is the statement taken out of context or not? “It's a little difficult to tell, for there is no context. The quote is a one-line blurb on the magazine's table of contents designed to pique interest in the articles to follow. The articles to follow describe the cases of five Witness youngsters in North America. Each was admitted into a hospital for aggressive cancer or leukemia. Each fought battles with hospitals, courts, and child welfare agencies determined to administer blood against the patient's will. Each eventually prevailed in court, being recognized as “mature minors” with the right to decide upon their own treatment (though in two cases, a forced transfusion was given prior to that decision). Three of the children did die. Two lived. It's rather wrenching stuff, with court transcripts and statements of the children involved, and those of the participating doctors, lawyers, and judges. In no case do you get the sense that blood transfusions offered a permanent cure, only a possible prolonging of life, ideally long enough for some cure to be discovered (which has not yet happened). One of the children, who did die, was told that blood would enable her to live only three to six months longer, during which time she might “do many things,” such as “visit Disney World.” There's little here to suggest that “thousands of youths are dying for putting God first” who would otherwise live. Frankly, I think the quote is sloppily written. “They are still doing it,” says the quote. Doing what? Dying? Dying in the thousands? Or putting God first without regard for the immediate consequences?”

Well, now that you’ve established your position in the pecking order, no. You had me saying, ‘Oh, he’s not such a bad guy after all,’ until that line.

Sam: "Yeah, that's right! I don't care! I'm not trying to solve puzzles here!" Dr K: "Well, I am. And I just found a big piece!" Despite denials, he presents to me as a man on a mission. Nah. Overstated. If you cave on the issue or decide you can't conscientiously go along with it, you sit in the penalty box for a while until they let you out to resume the game. You do this even if you are firmly convinced the ref made a bad call. As long as you don't cuss the ref out publicly or visibly offer him eyeglasses, he will let you back in. "Ouch!! I'm not so sure about that call!" says Sportscaster Paul from the broadcast booth. They're sending Many Miles to the penalty box!! Oh, wow! It won't go well even with his temporary absence--he is one heckuva player, but--gasp! What's this? Many Miles is not heading to the box! He took off his skates, broke his stick, threw them at the ref, and is heading home! 'It is altogether a defeat that he has done this!'" We overestimate our importance. If it wasn't them providing headship, it would be someone else who would also reveal human foibles. Get in that penalty box with Pudgy; he's there every time you turn around. He even puts himself there before the ref calls a penalty, and thus reminds me of my own daughter long ago, who responded to my wife's scolding by putting herself in the corner unbidden. That may be the greatest understatement of all time.

Are you sure that your banjo-strumming, ‘I’m just here to learn, to help, certainly not to settle any disputes’ persona is not just a ruse? It sure seems like you are trying to settle one here: You might take into consideration that the teaching has, in all probability, saved far more lives than it has cost. This is because, here and there, courageous doctors have worked to accomomdate it. In doing so, they have both discovered and remedied previously unknown risks of transfusion. These remedies in turn have spread into the overall population, a thousand times more numerous than that of the Witnesses themselves. Seen in this light, it almost becomes a ‘no greater love’ situation—a small number die, many times more are saved. It is hard to come to any other conclusion upon consideration of a 2008 New Scientist article, ‘An Act of Faith in the Operating Room,’ which reviews study after study and finds that, for all but the most catastrophic of cases, blood transfusions harm more than they help. The referenced ‘act of faith’ is not refusing a transfusion. It is giving one. I reviewed the article here: https://www.tomsheepandgoats.com/2008/05/new-scientist-a.html See how it criticizes common practices less than 20 years ago, such as giving patients a bit of blood after operation to ‘perk them up a little.’ It is not only unnecessary, but dangerous. Having learned from this, progressive hospitals tighten the standards for transfusion, often simply by lowering the hematocrit level which once triggered one, often by making use when appropriate of safer blood substitutes, often by not simply ‘topping off the tank’ after operation, recognizing such a practice is both unnecessary and dangerous. They owe it all to Jehovah’s Witnesses. The above does not negate that some have died due to holding fast to their understanding of ‘abstain from blood.’ However, it could be argued that the overall world owes a great debt of gratitude to Jehovah’s Witnesses for putting them on the right track. Should not the Governing Body receive a Nobel Prize in medicine for the reform they have triggered?

Whoa! once again! Georgie, I fear you will not believe this, but I really did not know @JW Insiderhad employed the trick in the very message he was speaking of it! I even wondered why the quote box appeared too big for the words contained. Ah, well, it’s just some sort of pesky technical snafu, I told myself, and manually shortened the box. I mean, this is like finding a decoder ring in your Cocoa Puffs. I’m taking the next month to comb through all too-long text boxes in search of them.

Whoa! It’s sort of like discovering, not only that the hand really wrote, “Mene mene tekel parsin, You fink!” but that Belshazzer clandestinely downvoted the remark.

It is truly disheartening that you should have to do this, particularly for one who displays before all his lack of Bible education, thereby showing he should not stray from the Closed Club where all the other wayward Witnesses are, particularly a certain ex-Bethelite. Nonetheless, I appreciate the definitions. Thank you. Nine different subfields of ‘theology!’ And the thing is, you can doubtless earn degrees in each one! I’ll bet our guys at HQ don’t hold even one of them. No wonder they don’t like us roaming around online. They’re just jealous. It may be all as you say with rationality. I’ll have to give it more thought. You must excuse me. My head is swimming after hearing the Great Courses philosophy professor, who seems bent on atheism, lecture on how you know you are you. He considers numerical identity over time, psychological identity over time, and finds logical problems with each one. Well, maybe the problem is our definition of what is a person, he says. Maybe a person is like an interstate highway that if you were anywhere on it you could say this is you. In other words, you are not just one point in time, you are a road that goes many diverse places. ‘But!’ he says, seemingly for the 2 millionth time, ‘There’s a problem! Unlike an actual highway which is laid down, the highway that is you will continue to be laid down until you die. Thus, it would seem that, under this hypothesis, you are not you until you die, and that doesn’t square with our intuition. But! that problem is solved if we adhere to temporal omniscience, that is the notion that every moment of time, even the ones that are yet in the future, are already laid out somewhere. But!, he refers back to previous inconsistencies revealed when he discussed that burning topic of philosophy, so it can’t be that either. Well— maybe the entire notion of what is a person is wrong, he says, and goes off to explore that possibility. Most of these points are illustrated with various Star Trek or Dr. Who episodes, many involving the transporter, which is also used to indicate problems with any resurrection solution such as is common in religion. It is probably a good idea when you encounter someone like this in field service to wish him a good day and return to your car group, where the one next to you will make his quip for the umpteenth time that you are taking a great risk if you are cremated because what if you are resurrected on a windy day? This is a little tiresome, but infinitely preferable to the brother in the front seat who intones in his radio voice, “Friends, do you have bills to pay? You do? Well, please give it back. Bill’s head is getting cold.”

Yes. For me, if you pronounce Socrates with two syllables, thus making in shorter, I will appreciate the consideration. So-crates works just fine for me.

Step over into Macedonia, Mr Many Miles, and help us. ”No thank you, Having made that irresistible (to me) little quip, yeah. Me too. Ta da! Now we don’t either, just like you! Oh, I guess we still put converts on a slip, they won’t mind, I am sure, but not the time it takes to make them. Any time you change a practice dating back 100 years, it’s a gutsy move. I think counting time for so many years is a reflection of the lowly roots that Christianity came from and so far still is. It is the mark of the plebs who were accustomed to the factory model in which when there was nothing to do you’d better nonetheless look busy if you didn’t want the boss to fire you. Now that the model has been discarded (and good riddance!) probably all the educated people will come in.who were offended by the old way. Trouble is, when they do, they may say to the uneducated and ordinary, ‘Okay—you’ve done well. Amazingly well, really, considering your lack of education. But the smart people are here now. Step aside.’ We’ll have to see how it plays out. One thing for sure, dropping time requirements removes all sense of being ‘on duty’ or ‘off duty.’ It will vastly aid efforts to informal witness, as people will do what makes sense, not press on come heck or high water so that whoever is being spoken to ‘receives a thorough witness!’

Do you really not supplement your writing with AI? Say the word, if it is so, that will settle it for me. Otherwise, I truly can’t figure it out.

Ah, rats! Now I have to look up the word ‘teleological.’ I’ve encountered it before, of course, and looked it up then, and said, ‘Oh, it’s that.’ Maybe I should have added it to my vocabulary—it has many syllables, more than rhinoceros—and unless you live in Africa, it comes up more frequently. But I think of that test Edison used to administer—I think his hiring of new staff depended upon it—consisting of myriad facts that he thought any contemporary person should know. Einstein took the test and failed it. Rather than being chagrined, he said the stuff was all in dictionaries, almanacs, and encyclopedias—you can look it up in two seconds if you need it. I also think of Bart Ehrman, the Bible thumper who became a theologian but you can still see the Bible thumper in the theologian. He said that if you know a Latin expression and also a perfectly fine English expression that means the same thing, you should always use the Latin; that way people know you are educated. I’d be happier considering Paul’s teleological or non-teleological view if Paul himself had used the term. It is not as though he was too uneducated to pick up the lingo of the day. He received the bee’s knees of education, at the feet of Gamaliel, that learned worthy who bended the Sanhedrin to his will. I’d be happier if Jesus used such terms, or any of Bible’s faithful, even Moses schooled in all the wisdom of Egypt, or Daniel in that of Babylon, or Nehemiah in that of Persia. None of them did. I get it that such words exist in order to facilitate knowledge, standardize the terms being the first step. Oh, it’s okay I suppose, but to lean too heavily on such vocabulary is to reveal a pursuit of knowledge different from how the Bible writers pursued it. A little might be okay, but I distrust a lot of it. I can’t help but think most (or all) GB members may not know what the word ‘theodicy’ means, even as (in my view) they have the only one that holds water. The Bible is not for the high-brow and intellectual. It is for the low-brow and working class. That is why there is barely a mention of it in early secular history; the doings of the working class are of scant concern to those learned ones who write history. Of course, they are not of scant concern when it comes to harnessing their power for some greater project, such as war, or winning an election, or as factory workers for the industrial age, but if is something they originate themselves, it is ‘Can anything good come out of Nazarus? Supplying the answer to their own question, historians record but two or three brief mentions in early secular history. I don’t think ‘rationality’ as a term should ever be used when discussing the veracity of spiritual things. It’s like playing on the gameboard and by the rules of your opponent; his first rule is that you can’t move any of your pieces. Use the terms ‘reasonable’ and ‘sensible’ instead. Witnesses subscribe to a way of worship that is backed by reasons—they can explain why they do this or that, and such reasons ‘make sense,’ they are not simply mysterious and incomprehensible dogma—beyond the mysteriousness and incomprehensibility that everyone faces—over the vastness of the universe, for example. A belief in God, say the Great Course professors, reflecting the way the world is today, is not rational. That doesn’t mean they disallow you doing it, but don’t go saying it is rational. They strive to examine all things via rationality, and the more they do so, the more unlikely they think God is. ‘Well, how can you account for what every child knows, that ‘all houses are created by someone, so there must be a someone who created greater things? you will ask. They will regard you a little pityingly and explain how you are positing a spiritual being, a major escalation that their tools cannot detect. Occam’s Razor, more meaningful to them than all the Ten Commandments put together, says you can’t do that. The simplest explanation wins. No, they haven’t figured out how life originated, they admit, but their certain it will happen without offending Occam. Possibly the meaning of ‘rationality’ has changed over the years, like that of ‘gay.’ My globetrotting cousin would grouse to no end that she could no longer use the word gay because the homosexuals had taken it. ‘I’m no prude,’ she would say. ‘If they want to ‘swing both ways’ (would she really wink just then?) I’m perfectly okay with that. But why couldn’t they have invented their own word? Why did they have to take the word ‘gay?’ “She’s just mad that she can no-longer say ‘gay Paree,’ I told my right wing brother. But this was in the days of the French Fries / Freedom Fries fiasco, and my right wing brother said, ‘Why can’t she?’But But rationality as defined today—my suspicion is that it was always that way— involves an attempt to prove faith by the standards of its advocate’s main tool, that of science. You cannot so prove it. Don’t try to play their game that says you should. It’s enough to ‘prove to yourself’ the good and perfect will of God. To the extent Christianity is an appear to the heart and not the head, it comes across as would a matter of taste. ‘Taste and see Jehovah is good,’ says the psalm. What if someone tastes and sees he is bad? Are you going to prove him wrong? No more than you can prove to the fellow who hates broccoli that it really tastes good. No, I don’t think any of this is right. It is an attempt to put Christianity into a realm where it does not belong. I read it as though you say, ‘A physical man attempts to solve the world through his reason and a spiritual man doubles-down on his attempt to solve the world through his reason. As for me, I will do my best to speak as did Jesus, as does the Watchtower in trying to imitate him. I will not strive to learn the educated world’s lofty language, as though seeking admittance to the club. As soon as they find out I believe in Adam and Eve, they will throw me out anyway. I will not seek that elevated plain. I will speak as does Jehovah’s organization, in full recognition that it is mostly the lowly and meek who respond to the good news. I will say—sigh—‘What do you say as to this, Many Miles? Do you agree? Yes, No, or Maybe?’

Huh! Nobody has ever come to that conclusion before. (It is truly discouraging that ones should come here on the Open Club to advance that viewpoint, thereby revealing their lack of education in the scriptures, as though refugees from the Closed Club where all sorts of odd characters hang out.)

The devil is always in the ‘as I recall’ details. I recall it somewhat differently and probably the truth lies in a compromise between the two recollections. I have on my shelf James Hall’s GC lecture series ‘The Philosophy of Religion.’ I’ve probably listened to close to 100 of the Great Courses lecture series. ‘Imagine how much you will learn if you spend just a half hour each day in the company of some of the greatest minds in the world,’ the introduction to each course says, ignoring only the great minds at JWorg. I vouch for the intro. I have indeed learned a lot. I am far, far less dumb than I used to be. Usually, I get these GCs from the library. But the library didn’t have the one of James Hall, so I had to order it from eBay. No way would I ever ever have done that had you not put me on the trail. But now I think what you put me on the trail of was a conversational online snippet in which a Seventh Day Adventist pointed to that course, and said, ‘Yes! The professor covered our explanation of suffering and said it was the only one that made sense!’ So I plowed through the 36-lecture course, and sigh—will have to do it again, I suppose, if I am serious about this next writing project, and it is a dog and a half. Yes, it does cover his ‘theodicy.’ Yes, it does say it is the only one logically consistent. But it is not really ‘his’ theodicy. It is the only one Hall considers that posits ‘dualism,’ that is, that God has an opponent, a Satan, and that you can pin the blame on him. ‘That makes sense, the professor said. But he does not give any account as to how that situation came to pass, only that there is such a villain, so that it is somethng of a nothingburger. Quite frankly, it floored me that out of the many theodicies this fellow considered, only one of them took into account that God just might have an adversary who does, causes, or triggers the evil deeds. Every other theodicy assumes God holding all the cards in every way. I’m pretty sure I’ve reconstructed what happened. That said, memory is a slippery thing. I am chastened by @Pudgy correcting me long ago. I had not left 3 or 4 comments on ‘apostate’ sites, he said. It was more like 20. No, it was 3 or 4, I said. He repeated it was 20. I repeated it was 3 or 4. He insisted, not only that it was 20, but that during his career, he had been a highly trained engineer and was therefore accustomed to being precise. ‘If you were a highly trained engineer, and no longer are, possibly the reason is that you cannot count!’ I shot back. ‘Why on earth would I lie about it?!’ Sigh—he was right. I apologized when I realized it much later. I had only left 3 or 4 recently. But long ago, I had experimented on another sit, which brought the total to around 20. Of course, a search on social media makes little distinction between recent and some time ago. Memory is treacherous.