What Rug Thinks

I've read the bible many times and recently I've been thinking a lot about some of the things found in the bible, what religious people find deplorable, and how many of the things they hate are in the bible. Here are a few examples based solely on word definitions and characters and their actions in the bible. Bastard - a person born of parents not married to each other. Is it just me or does this describe Jesus? Adultery - voluntary sexual intercourse between a married person and a person who is not his or her spouse. This may or may not describe God and Mary. While the bible never says if God and Mary had sex, she did get pregnant by God and I only know of one way that is possible. There is also the conflicting passages saying she was married to Joseph and wasn't married yet in a different book of the new testament. Sinner - a person who transgresses against divine law by committing an immoral act or acts. I find this one to be the oddest. One of God's laws is...

Every year we have to hear about how it's so wrong to say Happy Holidays and we should all be saying Merry Christmas instead. I have news for you Christmas people. The holidays is not just Christmas. Here is a short list of some common holidays that are celebrated around the same time of year. New Year - Celebrated December 31st on into the early hours of January 1st. Hogmanay - Same as new year in the Scottish tradition. Berchtoldstag - Same as new year in the  Switzerland and Liechtenstein traditions. Malanka - The Russian new year celebrated January 13th. Hanukkah - While it varies a bit, it falls somewhere from late November to late December. Kwanzaa - Celebrated December 26th to January 1st. Chalica - Starts the first Monday in December and lasts seven days according to Unitarian Universalists. Winter Solstice - Celebrated whenever the winter solstice takes place. This year it happens to be on December 22nd. Dydd Santes Dwynwen - The Welsh equivalent to ...

There comes a time in some people's lives when they are faced with something that seems impossible to get through. No matter what the something is you are left with two choices, give up or keep going. The choice is yours and yours alone. You can consider all the pros and cons of each option. You can debate about it until you are blue in the face, but you still have to choose if you are going to quit or persevere. There is a song by the Mighty Mighty Bosstones called Tragedy that has some interesting things to think about these types of situations. While the entire song is really relevant to this discussion, the line that really gets me is this one. "Have you ever felt the odds stacked up so high, you need a strength most don't possess? Or has it come down to do or die? You've got to rise above the rest." One of our former presidents has this to say. "Patience and perseverance have a magical effect before which difficulties disappear and obstacles van...

Words have meaning. I know that comes as a shock to some people, but it is true. Words don't have intrinsic meaning, but they do have meanings we have come to agree upon to enable communication. I have been told on a number of occasions that the dictionary is not the arbiter of definitions. While I do agree with this there seems to be something that a lot of people are forgetting. Dictionaries get updated. I know it's a bit shocking, but dictionaries get updated with definitions for words as they are used in modern languages. Sure, you can use words in new ways that may change the meaning. However, when you start using different definitions for words you can't expect people to understand what you meant to say. Here is an example. If I said, "The nuptials the cops used were titillating." Everyone would have a different understanding than if I said, "The handcuffs the cops used where painful." Even if the second is what I meant by the first statement, I ...

I have been seeing all kinds of post across the internet trying to make fun of the idea of banning guns. Instead of explaining these goofy post, I'll simply show you one. This one comes to us from  Freedom Daily with Brian Kolfage  with the caption. "Common sense, isn't so common these days." Let's take a moment here and think this through logically for just a moment. Currently in many (if not all) states the two masked gunmen in this image are not breaking any laws. Even if that was an elementary school property they are not breaking any laws. Therefore, if the cops show up all they could do is ask to see the registration for the guns and the open carry permits. Assuming both of these upstanding citizens can provide the documentation the cops would have to let them go. The cops cannot do anything until they shoot someone. Even at that point they could not be charged until evidence was provided it was not in self defence. How much common sense does it take ...

I have been to fighting keep religious teachings out of the public school systems for a long time now. One such part of religious teachings is creationism. Many creationist have been trying to get Intelligent Design taught in science classes for years. Even though every time it has been taken to court it has been proven wrong, not to be science, and violating the constitution. A part of my fight is to keep track of creationist posting on the internet. This allows me to know what their arguments are so I can be well prepared. However, when I came across J. Warner Wallace post today over at  christianity.com . I got a little irritated by the second line of this post. Therefore, I thought it would be nice to do a thorough point by point debunking of this quote mined rhetoric. Mr. Wallace starts off showing bias and ignorance right from the start when he quotes Richard Dawkins.  "Much has been written about the evidence for design in biological organisms. In fact, the a...

Way back in April of 2015 at the RSA Conference in San Francisco Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson made some interesting comments. You can read the entire thing here . I'm going to quote a bit of his talk here and then give my view on it. "The Department of Homeland Security has both the cybersecurity mission and a law enforcement/counterterrorism mission for the American people. We have feet in both camps. I therefore believe I have a good perspective on this issue. The current course we are on, toward deeper and deeper encryption in response to the demands of the marketplace, is one that presents real challenges for those in law enforcement and national security." I agree, the people demand stronger encryption and the most talented of the encryption tech community responded in kind. While it may never be perfect, the encryption techniques in use today are the best that have ever been used. However, law enforcement would have a much harder time seeing the da...