Nov 12, 2003

Sowing what I reap
Today I'm awake before most Toronto people. Go figure.

Nov 9, 2003

Procrastinating again
At the moment, I should be working on the paper for last week's class, not to mention the paper for this week's class. Oh well.

Pet peeve of the Year
It seems far enough along into the year to have a pet peeve of the year. I doubt anything, within the last month and a half of the year could be quite as aggravating (other than perhaps Christmas marketting, but unfortunately, that's an annual frustration). I'm not a big fan of euphemisms, in fact I think they're downright dishonest. Why invent a new word to make you feel better just when the existing terminology doesn't meet your tastes? Here's the old word, you can figure out what the annoying new word is:

Main Entry: dan·dy
Pronunciation: 'dan-dE
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural dandies
Etymology: probably short for jack-a-dandy, from jack + a (of) + dandy (origin unknown)
Date: circa 1780
1 : a man who gives exaggerated attention to personal appearance
2 : something excellent in its class
- dan·dy·ish /-dE-ish/ adjective
- dan·dy·ish·ly adverb

Download Free Music Legally!
I like the idea of downloading music. There's no real reason I should need to go to the store to buy a metallic piece of plastic when what I really want is the abstract data on the CD. I also have nothing against paying for music if it's reasonably priced. So I've been trying out Apple's iTunes.

I've been pretty much instantly hooked. I'll readily admit it's not quite perfect - you can't listen and try out discs like you can at HMV - but it's pretty well polished. You enter your credit card data once, after that it's just a few clicks to browse available albums (decent selection, though not as good as HMV). It's just a two mouse clicks to download either an entire album or a single song. Downloads were pretty spiffy, and track order is preserved. It took a few minutes to download an entire album. It took another few clicks and a few more minutes to burn the album to CD.

I haven't tried copying the audio files around. The downloaded files are DRM protected, supposedly limiting you to playing the files on 3 PCs. I haven't run into instances where this has gotten to be a problem, but if I ever get an mp3 player I'm sure I'll have to find some way around it. At the moment, my main concern is to not bankrupt myself given the ease to buy music now.

The perils of impulse buying
So the headphones of my aging discman have been in some stage of dying for some time now. Either there's something loose or there's some excessive capacitance somewhere because anything with a reasonable amount of bass - basically any music at all - causes a very annoying static-y type noise.

I normally don't use the discman often. Practically the only time I do use it is on plane trips, and I have been on a good number this year. I stopped off at Fry's the morning before a flight to find some earbut style headphones. The cheapest ones were $7.99. I figured I could afford a little more than that, I did want some decent sounding buds. I browsed the shelves and my eyes resed on Sony's MDR-NC11 Noise Canceling Fontopia Ear-Bud Headphones. Huge whooshing sounds coming out of my wallet, but unfortunately I liked them too much to return them.

I'll be the first to admit they're wildly overpriced. However, after using them I do find them very useful. The best feature of these headphones are the in-ear design. Unlike most earbuds I've used, these ones actually seal your ear and act as earplugs, blocking out most, but not all outside noise. The headphones come with 3 sizes of earplugs, with the medium size as the default. Initially I thought the headphones didn't do much, since the medium size didn't form much of a seal in my ears. The large size fit quite well, with a little adjustment the seal is good while remaining comfortable. Since maybe 80% of the quieting effect is due to the physical blockage rather than the noise-cancelling circutry, I would say the MDR-EX71SL headphones, that have the same earplug but no noise-cancelling circuit is a much better deal.

Out of the box I realized the headphones need an AAA battery to work. You can use them as regular headphones without, but then that'd be a waste, and the big plastic box that holds the circutry would also be really annoying. Luckily I happened to have some spare AAAs lying around at work. The noise-canceling effect works rather well for low frequency hums. A significant portion of the hum on a plane goes away, making plane rides significantly more comfortable. Normally, I have my discman turned way up on the plane (I'm sure this is a BAD thing for my ears). With the headphones, the volume was turned down significantly. The circuitry does amplify the music, but subjectively, it did feel quieter and more comfortable. However, most of the computer fan noise at work wasn't filtered out. I'm guessing it's too high frequency.

Overall there's too many minuses to make these worthwhile. The headphones stick out of your ears pretty far because of the microphones for the noise cancelling functionality. It means you can't sleep on your ears. Also when your ears are plugged up, you can hear minute noises transmitted physically by the headphone wires, ie moving around. For everyday use, it just doesn't cancel out enough noise to be worthwhile. However, on my last flight, with the headphones on, the baby crying at the front of the plane practically disappeared, and the engine hum faded significantly. I got a *lot* more rest than normal. I'm keeping them.

Nov 8, 2003

Genesis 3:1-24 (for Oct. 29 class)
The narrative in Genesis 3 changes drastically from the previous two chapters. This in itself is obvious, as it has been made clear that God has finished with the creation process. A sense of progression is natural and expected. As the subject matter changes from the initial 'good' creation to the fall of man, we also see a new role for God. Having completed His work as the Creator, He is forced to be the Judge. He issues three judgements within this passage, one for each character. God's role as the Judge is necessitated by the introduction of temptation and sin. Both of these themes are introduced here and expanded upon in scripture. They are also both indicative of man and not God. Hence also unlike the two previous chapters, this chapter is not focused solely on God but also on man, and the relationship between the two.

This chapter introduces a process in sin, one that becomes familiar early in life, even outside any biblical context. The procedure is as follows: there is an initial temptation to do something which we know we ought not to do, we do it, then we suffer some type of consequence or punishment. In the case of Genesis 3, the thing that ought not to be done is clear. God's rather ominous commandment was presented in Genesis 2:17. Ironically, this was immediately before the creation of the woman, who was to play a significant role in the whole fiasco. It is the sole prohibition that he had placed regarding anything at all. The description of the serpent's discourse with the woman shows how he is able to tempt her to eat this forbidden fruit. It is assumed that the thought had not crossed her mind until the serpent has suggested it. He tempts her by portraying it as something both forbidden and desireable. In this case, the thing to be desired is wisdom and knowledge, which, in itself is not negative. In fact, we see later in scripture that "Wisdom is supreme; therefore get wisdom. Though it cost all you have, get understanding" (Proverbs 4:7). The serpent aroused a desire for within the woman - a desire for something beneficial - and twisted it into challenging God's direct commandment. That desire to challenge God's commandment, edged on by the serpent's direct contradiction to God's warning with "You surely will not die!", precipitated into sin. The irony is that the woman, and man, could have demonstrated wisdom in obedience rather than turn to the fruit. "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom; all who follow his precepts have good understanding" (Psalm 111:10).

Though the serpent was responsible for manipulating the woman, she made the decision to eat herself. In the same way the man was responsible for his own disobedience despite being misled - God's commandment was clear enough when it was given. It seems that at some point in time (particularly, when they were eating), the man and woman believed that they would indeed gain only in wisdom and knowledge, and that there would be no reperecussion. However, they do in fact need to deal with the effects of their sin. In this passage the consequences are twofold. There is the direct consequence of their action of eating the fruit, and the consequence of judgement for breaking God's commandment. Again, as children we have learned this. Should we have played with some prohibitted heirloom and broken it, we would have had to deal with both the direct consequence - the broken item - as well as the judgement for having played where we were told not to - which usually comes in the form of parental punishment. As we grow older and more knowledgeable, we often find ways of avoiding or not having to deal with the direct consequences. Furthermore, we hope that by hiding our sin we can also escape judgement.

In this case the direct consequence of eating the fruit was realization of their nakedness. The consequence of their sin was that what was once good was twisted and became shameful. Although they were once able to walk openly with God, the result of sin was that they were only able to talk to God while hidden among the trees. The original direct relationship was replaced with one that had considerable distance. In this case, God's commandment had an ulterior motive - to protect the man and woman from shame. We might infer from the rest of scripture that in time, man would have gained the knowledge he desired in another manner that would not bring him shame, "for the LORD gives wisdom, and from his mouth come knowledge and understanding" (Proverbs 2:6).

As children, we often learn to fear punishment more than the results of our mistakes. In this narrative however, God shows considerable grace in his judgement of the man and the woman. For one, God's initial warning, "in the day that you eat from it you will surely die", has been eased - at least in the physical sense. Although they were separated from God and removed from the garden, they were allowed to continue to live for a while. By allowing them to multiply instead of destroying them immediately, God made a provision for man's eventual redemption through Christ. Furthermore, oddities in Genesis 3:16-17 suggests that even in His judgement, God has allowed room for grace. Although the woman is to suffer in painful childbirth for what she has done God adds "Yet your desire will be for your husband". God leaves a provision for the continued intimate relationship between the man and woman despite her punishment. The man however, is not cursed for his sin as the serpent was - instead the ground is cursed. Finally, like a good parent, God cleans up the mess that His children have created. He replaces their makeshift coverings of leaves with real clothing, thus partially redeeming them from the shame that they had brought upon themselves with the skins of animals. This foreshadows Christ's role in the future. Instead of covering over man's shame with a skin, God washes the sin away with blood.

The nature of sin that we see here is that it corrupts what was intended for good. It make take the desire for something that may potentially be good and extend it to an inappropriate level. Desire for security and comfort becomes greed. Desire for food becomes gluttony. Desire for intimacy becomes lust. These oerverse desires cause us to challenge the boundaries that God has set for our protection. In our reliance on our own wisdom over His we subvert His authority. The consequences of sin mars once good aspects of our lives. What may once have been beautiful might bring guilt, shame, and pain, affecting our relationships. Our relationships with others might suffer, but our relationship with God suffers more - He must judge us. It is here where God's defining characteristic is shown, "but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more" (Romans 5:20). We can see God's love for us in his judgements, and even more so in His desire to redeem us. Hence by the end of Genesis 3, we see God as Creator, Judge and Redeemer.

Nov 4, 2003