Random Thought #70

Awhile back, I wrote about fishes and why they have gills and how they work. My sister-in-law and her family has a small aquarium in their apartment and it never dawned on me before, but I wondered why aquariums constantly have bubbles blowing in their tank. Now after reading about gills ,I understand that in aquariums, there is no exposure to open air or a large amount of water, so oxygen has to be pumped into the water so that the fish can breathe. Ever wonder why little orange goldfish that they give away to people at the carnival die so soon? Most likely...asphyxiation.

Random Thought #69

Ask anyone to define revelation and you'll likely get a variety of answers, and that's good because revelation comes a number of different ways to different people and its a very personal thing so I thought I would offer my definition and how it happens to me. Whenever a thought connects to a bunch of other thoughts in a quick stream and they all make sense to me and they all relate to philosophical concepts that I've been taught all my life, and it is good or seems good to me, then I consider that to be truth and revelation from my Heavenly Father. It makes me feel good and gets me excited.

Random Thought #68

I was just thinking how girls and boys develop differently at a long age and just set off a barrage of thoughts. I think its fairly well established that girls develop faster than boys at a younger age. They mature faster, learn more earlier, and are in general more developed. Boys of course catch up and in some cases surpass their female counterparts at a later age. (Keep in mind I'm talking in general terms) I found a lot of similarities to this pattern in various philosophies. Its the concept of slow and steady versus wait and sprint; little picture vs big picture; yin/yang; complimentary forces; even career paths and natural roles. Let's use the tortoise and the hare to illustrate the first scenario. (a little backwards though) Let's pretend that the hare rests before sprinting ahead. In that case, the female is the tortoise. Slow and steady and consistent so they take the lead in development while the hare (male) rests and takes it easy. The hare then sprints ahead using all of his energy to make up the lost ground (huge sprint) and surpasses the tortoise and realizing he is so much further ahead, takes another rest. In the meantime, the tortoise passes the hare again and the hare has to sprint using all his energy to get ahead again. Females typically are even-keeled, consistent, strong and steady. Males are impulsive and lazy so they wax and wane. Which do you think is more suitable to raising children? That's where roles come into play. This plays out in ancient communities too. You have the nomads you roam and conquer and never settle down (male) and then you have the agrarian agriculturists (female) who are conquered and provide the sustenance to the conquering parties. The two cannot live without each other. They are complimentary to each other. The agriculturists provide the sustenance and structure while the conquerers provide the leadership and drive. That brings me to another point. This society is always comparing to determine a winner in the short-term. Instead they should be collaborating for the betterment of all in the long-term. Since we're dealing with males/females, let's do a simple comparison to see why 1+1=3 is plausible. Let's compare amount of hormones. We know that females have a small amount of testosterone and males have a small amount of estrogen in them, but obviously each has a dominant hormone. So, let's say that males have 1.8 of testosterone and 1.2 of estrogen and females have 1.8 of estrogen and 1.2 of testosterone. If comparing them directly to see who is the winner of testosterone, the male obviously wins, but if we compare to see who has more estrogen, the female clearly wins, but if we measure them together (collaborate), we find that they together have a hormone level of 3 no matter which one you measure. All are equal and greater than if we simply compare instead of collaborate. Ok, so maybe my math is all weird but it made sense to me in my head and I think you get the concept of collaborate instead of compete or compare. This illustrates the yin/yang principle and why opposites are necessary and complimentary. This explains the family as the natural unit of the eternities. What's funny is that all of these examples are philosophical principles that we are familiar with....which leads to my next thought

Random Thought #67

My dear sweet mother just bought me a couple more books for Christmas (Thanks Mom) and one of them is about what happened between the end of the Hebrew Old Testament and the beginning of the Greek New Testament. I've only read the first chapter because I couldn't resist but also because I need to finish the other book I'm reading first. I already learned something new. When the Israelites split into two kingdoms, the Northern Kingdom founded their new capital in Samaria while the Southern Kingdom remained in Jerusalem. We, of course, know that the Assyrians conquered the Northern Kingdom in 722 BC and took many away captive, but some returned. The Southern Kingdom was then conquered later by the Babylonians in 587 BC and trashed Jerusalem including destroying the temple. When the Jews were allowed to return to Jerusalem by Cyrus (Persian king who conquered the Babylonians) 50 years later, they were told after settling down a bit to re-build the temple both by Cyrus and by the Lord through his prophet Haggai. The Israelites from the Northern Kingdom asked if they could help as they remembered the importance of the temple of Solomon before the kingdoms were split. The Jews from the Southern Kingdom refused to let them help as they did not see them as being pure anymore. Many of them had intermarried with the Assyrians during their time of captivity and intermarrying with Gentiles was strictly forbidden under the Law of Moses. This irritated the Israelites of the Northern Kingdom and they have hated each other ever since. Remember how I mentioned that when the kingdoms split apart, the capital of the Northern Kingdom was Samaria? Well guess what they called themselves? Yup, Samaritans. Recall the story of the good samaritan? It says that a Jew was beaten and left for dead and nobody (not even of his own kind) would help, but a samaritan who hated the Jews and vice versa came to help. Does this background story help with the significance of that story? The basics of these stories and parables still mean something to us today and we can learn lessons from them, but they were not written at the time for us. They were written for the saints of the time. To get the full meaning of what these stories and parables are trying to tell us, we need to understand these people and this history and their language and mannerisms. There is a whole chapter on Samaritans in chapter 14 so I'll have to wait a little longer to get more details on these people but I'm excited. Doesn't this just make you want to read and learn and study?!!?!? LOVE IT LOVE IT!!

Random Thought #66

In my latest book, I just read a chapter about rhetoric. Its amazing how many people are fooled into believing in something and therefore think they are gaining knowledge just because they hear what they want to hear. I've even fallen into that trap before. Sometimes the truth hurts and we need to hear it and be open to it to truly gain pure knowledge and truth and grow. I also think its significant that we gain a testimony of the gospel (pure truth and knowledge) not by the convincing arguments of mankind, but by the Holy Ghost. What's even more special is that we can know for ourselves, we don't have to rely on someone like the Prophet to tell us what is true and what isn't. The gift of personal revelation is a glorious gift. As a side note, rhetoric is defined as the use of speech effectively. Hugh Nibley defines it a little more relevantly in that its use is to persuade or convince. Those who are experienced in using rhetoric were known mainly as orators (now they're called salesmen and marketers). That kind of makes me think, if rhetoric is used to persuade or convince, then what is the purpose of a rhetorical question? Are we supposed to convince ourselves of something? Hmm