text:
Some of you may recall our prior Round Table, on Women in the Church. Encouraged by the interesting conversation and great commenting from that event, we decided to replicate the experiment, this time with a different cast of characters and a different topic: "Historicity and Revelation." Sounds fun, no?
This time, participants included:
- Scott Gordon, President of FAIR (bio available here );
- Dennis Potter, professor of philosophy at UVSC (bio available here);
- John Hatch, former Managing Editor of Sunstone and researcher (bio here);
- Nate
Oman, attorney, author, and blogger at Times and Seasons (bio here);
- Rosalynde Welch, scholar, author, and Times and Seasons blogger (bio here);
- Ronan James Head, FARMS scholar, blogger, and specialist in
beekeeping (bio here);
- Me, Steve Evans, lawyer, blogger, and all-around great guy (bio here).
The rules: a question is emailed, everyone responds and conversation ensues. It's long, but it's an interesting conversation, and I think you'll enjoy it. On with the show:
From: Steve
To: Scott Gordon, John Hatch, Nate Oman, Rosalynde Welch, Dennis Potter, Ronan
James Head
Date: Apr 15, 2005 11:03
Subject: Round Table —
First Question
Hi gang,
First let me say that I feel slightly intimidated, posing a question to a group whose knowledge vastly surpasses my own.
So here is the first question for you: when does historicity matter?
Let me frame that question a bit, since it's potentially quite broad. One of the challenges of the restored gospel is the introduction of new scripture with an historical basis: the Book of Mormon, the Pearl of Great Price, and (to a lesser extent) the JST. What are we to do with the historical claims of these documents? To what extent must a reader assimilate historicity as part of his or her testimony of the text? I think, for example of the Pearl of Great Price: in order for that document to bring me closer to Christ, in order for me to believe it to be true, must I also believe that the Papyri actually say what Joseph says it does?
Another example of the issue is found in limited geography theories of the Book of Mormon. I was taught, growing up, that Nephites and Lamanites were the (exclusive) ancestors of the American Indians, both in North and South America; it's my understanding that this is still the widely-held teaching. Clearly, believing Mormons need not interpret the historical claims of the Book of Mormon in their broadest sense in order to believe in the Book and come unto Christ. Does this put us on some sort of slippery slope of ever-narrowing historical claims? How much of the history need be fact for the Book to still be true?
I expect definitive and universal answers from each of you, of course. This question is a bit of a well-worn chestnut, but it's still fascinating.
From: John Hatch
To: Scott Gordon, Steve Evans, Nate Oman, Rosalynde Welch, Dennis Potter, Ronan
James Head
Date: Apr 15, 2005 12:05PM
Subject: Round Table —
First Question
First response – take that, Steve!
I can only speak for myself, but I find historicity to be of little importance in its relationship to the value of scripture in my life. I still talk about historicity a lot, and am fascinated by the topic, but its interaction with my actual use of scripture teachings seems small.
If we focus on the Book of Abraham, for example, we see that the scrolls have nothing to do with Abraham. For the sake of argument, let's say that the book will never be vindicated, and it will continue to appear that there's no possible way the book is an actual translation. Where do we go from there? The book contains some of Mormonism's best doctrines, and I'm not about to toss those out the window over the translation issues.
On the other hand, I'm a bit uncomfortable with simply dismissing any challenge that comes along. Speaking frankly, I see it as entirely wishful thinking that Joseph didn't think he was translating the Book of Abraham. He seems to have believed the book was a translation, or he at least presented it to followers as such. I find I can't ignore that part of the story and must incorporate it into my belief system, just as I can't ignore Joseph's obvious belief in the hemispheric model of the Book of Mormon, and his pattern of telling stories about Nephites and Lamanites who wandered the western U.S. plains.
As Latter-day Saints, we tend to focus exclusively on the Book of Mormon and the Book of Abraham when discussing scripture historicity. The debate has raged for a long, long time in the larger Christian community over the Bible. I won't pretend to know much about this; I'm largely ignorant on the
issues. Suffice it to say, both the Old and the New Testaments face plenty of their own dilemmas. Like the Book of Abraham, what do we do if we find out the four Gospels are largely political propaganda, meant to denounce the ruling classes? Does it make the teachings of Jesus any less valid on our
lives? I'd hope not.
A question of my own: Why is it (seemingly) acceptable for Latter-day Saints to believe that the story of Adam and Eve is not literal, or the flood, or the story of Jonah, or of Job (and so on) but unacceptable for Church members to believe the Book of Mormon is not historical? Is it the implications for Joseph Smith, or is it because the Book of Mormon is our own exclusive book of scripture?
From: Nate Oman
To: Scott Gordon, John Hatch, Steve Evans, Rosalynde Welch, Dennis Potter, Ronan
James Head
Date: Apr 15, 2005 12:05PM
Subject: Round Table —
First Question
Here is my response:
I think that questions of historicity have very little to do with our exegesis of the scriptures. To be sure, if we can locate a particular text as the product of a particular time, then we will get different interpretations on some issues. A good example of this, I think, is how we understand the Gaddianton robbers. If the Book of Mormon is entirely a product of upstate New York in the 1820s, then the Gaddianton robbers rather easily become Masons. On the other hand, if the Book of Mormon is largely a product of an ancient civilization, then the meaning of the Gaddianton robbers shifts. My sense is that these shifts in meaning are generally not all that important spiritually. Obviously, one might come up with shifts in meaning based on historical context that are spiritually significant, but my sense is that they are fairly rare.
On the other hand, historicity does have very important implications for how we understand the authority of scriptural texts. Our traditional account of scriptural authority rests on the notion that the scriptures give us some sort of privileged access to the divine. They teach us something about the purposes and mind of God that we cannot learn elsewhere and are regarded as more reliable sources of divine truth. The miraculous story of the coming forth of the Book of Mormon becomes important because it warrants this authority. Historicity becomes important because it underwrites the miraculous story. (Incidentally, I think this also explains differences in LDS attitudes toward the historicity of the Bible and the Book of Mormon. The authority of the Bible is ultimately warranted by the Book of Mormon and the Restoration, while the authority of the Book of Mormon is warranted in part by its historicity. The historicity of the Bible is thus not particularly important for warranting its authority to Latter-day Saints, something that is in stark contrast to the role of biblical historicity for conservative protestants.) The point of historicity is not that it necessarily changes the message of the text, but that it provides a reason to care particularly about the message of these texts rather than some other set of texts.
Various folks have tried to rescue authority without historicity by arguing for some sort of inspired fiction theory. There are two problems with this approach. The first is the question of whether or not such theories actually do provide some account of scriptural authority, or if they ultimately amount to a denial of scriptural authority, the claim that scripture does not provide us with any privileged access to the divine unavailable in other great literature on God. The second question, assuming that such theories really do (or attempt) to underwrite scriptural authority, is how one then understands the narrative of the Restoration. There is a crude response to this concern that goes something like this, "Because Mormons believe in continuing revelation, the past doesn't really matter. We can turn on a dime." Proponents of this response point to something like the end of polygamy as support for their thesis. It is mistaken, I think, for two reasons. First, as a historical matter Mormonism has not in fact turned on a dime. The end of polygamy was a long, drawn-out, messy, and traumatic affair. Second, continuing revelation itself must have its authority warranted, and this comes at least in part by showing its continuity with past revelation. Again, polygamy is an excellent example, in that the break caused something of a crisis of religious authority, particularly for Joseph F. Smith who actually ended the practice once and for all, which required a huge effort to show that current prophets and revelations partook of the same authority as past prophets and revelations. Hence, the problem of change cannot simply be dismissed by airy and glib gestures at continuing revelation. After all, change can also be evidence of apostasy. To bring this back to historicity, the question becomes whether it is possible for "continuing revelation" to reject historicity, while simultaneously maintaining sufficient continuity to warrant its own religious authority.
From: Steve
To: Scott Gordon, John Hatch, Nate Oman, Rosalynde Welch, Dennis Potter, Ronan
James Head
Date: Apr 15, 2005 1:03 PM
Subject: Round Table —
First Question
Nate, just as a follow-up: do histories as recounted by leaders of the Church have historical authority be mere virtue of the speaker? In other words, if President Hinckley declared in Conference (arguendo,
speaking as a Prophet) that the Book of Mormon inhabitants were in fact in Guatemala, would we as Church members be duty-bound to accept that history?
From: Nate Oman
To: Scott Gordon, John Hatch, Steve Evans, Rosalynde Welch, Dennis Potter, Ronan
James Head
Date: Apr 15, 2005 12:05PM
Subject: Round Table —
First Question
My sense is probably not. (Remember that my opinions are probably worth about what you are paying for them.) First, I don't think we have any clear rule or procedure that defines when a prophet is speaking as a prophet and hence it is almost always possible to "distinguish away" any single prophetic statement. Prophet authority, I think, is always enmeshed in the broader story of the Restoration and it is this story that ultimately warrants the authority of particular prophetic statements, which become authoritative not simply by virtue of who said them, when they were said, or how they were said, but also by reference to their relationship to broader stories of the Restoration.. My model here is Ronald Dworkin's theory of law vs. HLA Hart's theory of law. Second, I think that your hypo reverses what I see as the importance of the historicity debates. Historicity is not something that is warranted by prophetic statements, but rather is an assumption of the story that warrants those statements. It seems to me that we are "duty-bound" (whatever that means) to accept historical statements that are sufficient to warrant the religious authority of the scriptures and the Restoration. I take it that this universe of historical claims is smaller than the universe of historical claims made by church leaders.
From: Ronan
To: Scott Gordon, John Hatch, Steve Evans, Rosalynde Welch, Dennis Potter, Nate Oman
Date: Apr 15, 2005 6:54PM
Subject: Round Table —
First Question
I think historicity is important, but there are a few times when it can be a little annoying.
Let me start with the Old Testament as that's where I'm most comfortable. I understand the need to have many of the events and people in the OT to be considered "historical". As Paul Hoskisson at BYU is wont to say, you can't have an Abrahamic covenant without Abraham. So let's say that we need the Exodus to be historical. It's a great story, and a pivotal moment in God's covenant with man. I am uncomfortable imagining that it didn't really happen. I'm familiar with the arguments for and against it, but I feel compelled to believe in some kind of Moses, some kind of Exodus, some kind of Mosaic Law, rooted in actual events and not just scribal whimsy. Because if the foundational events of the OT are "not true", how is the OT any better than any other ancient philosophy, many of which are ennobling and moral.
So, because I like what it means for me now (God's actual appearance in human events is very comforting), I take the Exodus as being largely "historical" (even if it's largely historical memory in its biblical version).
But what happens when I don't like the consequences of a historical act? God said, "kill all the Ammonites, man, woman, and child". Now, my God wouldn't say such a horrible thing. So I can easily tell myself that probably this didn't really happen, that the "conquest" of Canaan stems from the militaristic tales of patriotic Israelites.
Another example: was Job a real person? Let's say he was. If we take that at face value then we have to also take the whole package: that God and Satan make bargains over human souls.
Blanket notions of biblical historicity are a double-edged sword, so beware.
Two final, random thoughts:
Was there really a Good Samaritan or is he just a fictional figure used to teach a moral truth? If so, how are Jesus's stories any different from OT stories?
How do we know whether the Book of Mormon is striclty "historical"? I'm not talking here of whether it's an ancient book or not (I believe that it has to be for the Joseph Smith story to have any value), but whether Mormon was a good 21st century academic historian, or a Herodotus, working from ancient sources (the Large Plates) but fleshing things out a little. Did Captain Moroni really say all those things. If he didn't, is the Book of Mormon any less true?
From: Rosalynde
To: Scott Gordon, John Hatch, Steve Evans, Ronan Head, Dennis Potter, Nate Oman
Date: Apr 17, 2005 10:44AM
Subject: Round Table —
First Question
Well, then, let me be the first to say it: yes, historicity matters, a great deal. But scripture doesn't have it. "Historicity" is not a particular quality or origin that some texts have and others don't: all scripture originates in history somehow and somewhere, even if the specifics of that origin belie the claims made for it; thus all scripture is "historical" in this sense. "Historicity," by contrast, describes the accuracy of our accounts of those origins–and this, I maintain, matters a great deal in the relationship of scripture to the truth claims of institutional religion. This is not to say that those institutions will necessarily fail if the origins of their scripture are shown to diverge from the authoritative claims made for those origins. On the contrary, I think that as the church more accurately understands the historical origins of its scripture, it will more accurately understand the processes of revelation, the workings of God in history, the meaning of prophetic authority–and this will ultimately work to its benefit, not its detriment. (Let me state here for the record that I believe that the Book of Mormon really does have ancient origins, as it claims–and that, because Joseph staked his prophetic authority on the book, this is central to the church's self-identity–but that we ought not shy away from a greater understanding of the historical conditions of its emergence.)
From: Scott Gordon
To: Rosalynde Welch, John Hatch, Steve Evans, Ronan Head, Dennis Potter, Nate Oman
Date: Apr 18, 2005 6:45 PM
Subject: Round Table —
First Question
I believe there are usually three issues that are related to historicity.
1) Are the Book of Mormon and the Book of Abraham ancient documents translated by Joseph Smith?
2) Are ancient documents (The Book of Mormon, the Bible, the Book of Abraham) completely "historical?
3) If prophets or apostles comment on these books of scripture, do they have the definitive word on it?
The first issue is of primary importance to members of the LDS Church as it reflects our belief in the divine calling of Joseph Smith. While there are members who do not accept the historicity of the Book of Mormon, I believe it would be very difficult to maintain faith in the literal restoration of the gospel without it. Many questions find their root in the primary question of whether or not Joseph Smith was a prophet of God. This is a question one must be comfortable with in order to enter the temple.
To testify of Joseph's prophetic calling, we have reports of multiple visits of multiple heavenly messengers to multiple people. The existence of the messengers would testify of Joseph Smith and therefore the authenticity of the Book of Mormon. Some of these messengers testified directly to the divinity (dare we say historicity?) of the Book of Mormon.
To support our belief in Joseph Smith and the scriptures, we have the testimony of the witnesses, we have the books themselves to study and compare in a rigorous, scholarly fashion, and we have our own divine manifestations of the Spirit.
The second issue goes to the question of scriptural inerrancy. Is it possible that the Book of Mormon is an ancient document, but that Nephi or Mormon wrote something down that is incorrect? We see this issue argued about the Old Testament quite frequently. Did the flood really happen on a global scale? Did God really have a contest with Satan over Job? Members of the LDS Church hold a variety of positions on this, and there is no litmus test of belief on any of these issues to be called to high positions within the Church or to attend the temple.
Because of the eighth article of faith we don't seem to have a problem with the idea of mistakes in Bible. But, many members may squirm a bit when we think of the Book of Mormon in this fashion. Interestingly enough, the title page of the Book of Mormon addresses this by stating, "And now, if there are faults they are the mistakes of men."
Would God allow scripture to come forward that contains errors? One possible example is in the Old Testament. Deut 14:7 talks about the hare being unclean because it chews cud. Obviously hares don't chew their cud, but it probably is a reflection of what man believed in Old Testament times. Is it material to our salvation? No. Was it material to the salvation of man during Old Testament times? Again, no. Therefore, it is a non-issue. Some may argue this is God speaking so it must be perfect or "God breathed." While that may be true, it is still God's words coming through man. Errors can creep in through the speaker, through transmission and through translation. There were no video cameras rolling, no tape recorders, no transcriptionists or court reporters present at most (may we safely say all?) of these events.
The third area is one that has been receiving some press recently and goes to the discussion of prophetic infallibility. If the prophet or an apostle comments on Book of Mormon geography, or even comments on a scripture during public discourse, is that the final word? If it is, it becomes very difficult to explain how we can have apostles and prophets who have differing opinions. Claiming that any prophet's comment is "final" violates our fundamental beliefs in continuing revelation. It goes against the "line upon line" belief.
We have a direct example from Joseph Smith who stopped translating when he came across a verse describing the walls of Jerusalem and asked, "Emma, does Jerusalem have walls?" He clearly didn't know!
I am a firm advocate in not looking just at what others have said about the scriptures, but to really look to see what the books themselves say. The Church teaches that the Spirit must come to every man, and it teaches that each can be educated through the Spirit.
Seeking the Spirit helps us the most with these three questions of historicity.
From: John Hatch
To: Rosalynde Welch, Scott Gordon, Steve Evans, Ronan Head, Dennis Potter, Nate Oman
Date: Apr 19, 2005 11:57 AM
Subject: Round Table —
First Question
Both Nate and Scott have touched on an important issue with regards to historicity of the Book of Mormon. We have almost no way to verify the book itself – it gives us few details of exactly where it took place and what we might be looking for if we are going to confirm its claims. The fact that members can believe the book took place over the whole hemisphere or that it took place in a small area in a small locale testifies to its ambiguity.
Therefore, we largely rely on the Joseph Smith story to support our claims of Book of Mormon historicity; we rely on one history to support another history. I find this creates several dilemmas, both in favor of and against historicity. The existence of gold plates has long been a challenge for critics; I find Dan Vogel's argument that Joseph made the plates to be far, far too inadequate. Although Grant Palmer has an interesting perspective on the Three Witnesses, I too find his argument lacking. The Three Witnesses are a nasty stumbling block for naturalists. And then there's the staggering results of the Book of Mormon – the millions of lives changed and converted is nothing to sneeze at. All this and more is pretty convincing in favor of the book.
On the other hand, however, there are countless challenges that are not easily resolved. Whether it's Biblical plagiarism, overt 19th-century themes, or the overwhelming lack of physical evidence of the existence of a culture, these things are hard for me to waive a dismissive hand at. And while I'm aware that apologists over the years have gotten very good at offering plausible explanations for just about everything, I can't shake the feeling that by the time we're done answering every charge, we're left with a book where nothing is actually what it says. When I step back and see the forest of apologetics through the trees of individual responses, I'm a bit bothered that: Horses aren't really horses, sheep aren't really sheep, swords aren't really swords, millions of people aren't really millions, the Hill Cumorah isn't really the same Hill Cumorah, (if you use John Sorensen's model) north isn't really north, south isn't really south, a narrow neck of land isn't all that narrow, cities aren't really cities, Lamanites aren't really Lamanites, and so on.
Then there's Joseph himself, the greatest dilemma of all. Nate pointed out the importance of authority, and Scott concurred by noting the importance of Joseph as a prophet. With authority seeming to be the central question, at what point do we accept authority despite Joseph's obvious shortcomings, or at what point do we reject authority despite Joseph's obvious prophetic abilities, and is there ground in between? In other words, does Joseph's ability to invent stories surrounding the Book of Mormon (such as Zelph and the Kinderhook plates – I love Stan Kimball but find his explanation pretty wanting) and his teachings of a hemispheric model negate that authority? What about things outside of the Book of Mormon – his deception over polygamy, his retroactive changing of revelations, etc? (In short, does it follow that since he lied about some things, he could have lied about the Book of Mormon?) Do we just ignore these issues because they threaten the claims of authority? Or de we embrace them and reject authority altogether.
My hope would be that there's something in between absolute claims of authority that make Mormonism "the one true Church" and absolute rejection of authority that says Mormonism is an invention of Joseph "the pious fraud," as Dan Vogel labels him. That middle ground is what I'm trying to find, but it's also admittedly difficult to do so without reducing Mormonism to just another nice Protestant church with nice old men for leaders. Regardless of ones belief, it's pretty hard to deny that the claims of authority and the literal belief in scripture are what make Mormonism so fascinating, appealing, and for me, maddening all at the same time.
From: Ronan
To: Scott Gordon, John Hatch, Steve Evans, Rosalynde Welch, Dennis Potter, Nate Oman
Date: Apr 20, 2005 9:25AM
Subject: Round Table —
First Question
It is obvious from what John says that the pursuit of absolute historicity can only take us so far. Is this where faith kicks in?
Of course, let us not imagine that Mormonism is the only religion where historicity is a thorny issue. Perhaps we just care about it more because ours is a modern religion whose historical records are easily scrutinised.
From: Steve
To: Scott Gordon, John Hatch, Nate Oman, Rosalynde Welch, Dennis Potter, Ronan
James Head
Date: Apr 20, 2005 9:42AM
Subject: Round Table —
First Question
Ronan, interesting point. I don't know where faith kicks in, but in my mind I've secretly been afraid that the research and historical studies we perform are crutches of sorts: why do we need them? Shouldn't our faith be sufficient on all these intersections of history and scripture?
From: Rosalynde
To: Scott Gordon, John Hatch, Steve Evans, Ronan Head, Dennis Potter, Nate Oman
Date: Apr 20 2005 2:40PM
Subject: Round Table —
First Question
Steve, I'm not sure that there's an inherent virtue in faith when considering the origins of texts. I think you're conflating 1) the initial faith necessary for sincere consideration the Book of Mormon, say, with 2) the faith that can result from that sincere consideration. Yes, the purpose of the Book of Mormon is to produce faith in Christ–the second kind, above–and if one comes away from the book without that faith, then any historicizing has been in vain. And at the moment, because there is not sufficient external or internal evidence to prove the origins of the Book of Mormon in ancient meso-America, faith (the first kind) is also necessary in accepting the book as a genuine historical record rather than a fraud. But if there were to appear sufficient evidence to prove the book's historical claims–that is, if faith were not initially necessary for a sincere consideration of the book on its own terms–I don't think that would take away from the book's power, or from the moral choice necessary to faith: readers would still read the book, accept the Nephite accounts of an apotheosis, and gain faith in Christ, or else they would read the book, think the Nephites were crazy, and not gain faith in Christ. Historicizing scripture is not a substitute for developing faith in its message, nor can it be.
From: Dennis Potter
To: Rosalynde Welch, John Hatch, Steve Evans, Ronan Head, Dennis Potter, Nate Oman
Date: Apr 22 2005 4:13
Subject: Round Table —
First Question
As philosopher, I want to answer the question as to whether and when historicity matters by trying to do something to get clear on what historicity might be. Also, as a philosopher I fear that I might not be capable of actually giving a definitive and complete answer to your questions. Hopefully, something I say may help to further the conversation.
I take it that a claim is historical just in case it is a claim couched in the past tense and it happens to be true. The truth or falsity of claims about the past is problematic on the traditional correspondence theory of truth. This theory says that truth is a relationship between states of affairs that obtain (facts) and propositions. A proposition is true if and only if what it expresses is indeed a fact. But it seems that facts are in part dependent on the existence of the objects about which they are facts. So, the fact that Brutus killed Caesar is dependent on the existence of Brutus and Caesar and a relationship between them in which Brutus does something that is sufficient for causing Caesar to die. These things no longer exist. So, the truth conditions for claims about the past are problematic.
There is also another problem to consider. The above theory of truth seems to assume that there is a set of all possible propositions that can be expressed. These propositions are related to all possible facts that could obtain. It assumes that what can be expressed exists ontologically prior to any means of expression. Language is just a tool to get at these abstract objects that can be expressed. This view of meaning in language faces a severe challenge identified by Michael Dummett. It doesn't explain how linguistic meaning can be learned. We cannot point to abstract states of affairs that do not obtain. We also cannot be sure that we really mean the same thing if the meaning is something that transcends material reality and observable conditions.
I think that the upshot of this kind of discussion (although there is a lot more to say about the above two problems) is that linguistic meaning must be determined by publicly observable circumstances of our linguistic practice. And, to proceed rather quickly, I believe that this means that we ought to look at the circumstances in which we take ourselves to be appropriately applying past tense utterances in order to understand their meaning and role in our linguistic practice. So, the question about historicity turns into a question about the conditions in which we make claims using the past tense.
But notice that along with the assumption that there is a unique set of possible facts and a corresponding set of possible propositions comes an assumption that there is a universal set of criteria for their proper expression. This assumption of the homogeneity of reason seems to be essential to 20th century scientism. I am not at all sure that we should accept it.
If we reject the idea of a transcendental repository of propositional contents for the taking, then we may be able to embrace a heterogeneous notion of reason. This is one in which the appropriate criteria of the application of a particular linguistic express may differ depending on the time and place of the application. This is similar to Wittgenstein's view that different language games have different criteria for the use of the "same" terms. Given this, it seems that we might also assert that some historical claims have one set of criteria for application and other may have another set of criteria. Could it be that religious historical claims are of a radically different sort than political historical claims or even scientific historical claims?
At the same time, it seems to me that we should reject the traditional "dead" metaphysics of post-enlightenment thought. This is the idea that dead matter is the paradigm case on which we build our concept of doing ontology. By this, I mean things like rocks or elements. Their essence is identified with the properties they have. It is static essence that has nothing to do with their story or historical location. Science works within the ontology of dead matter and so does Modern philosophy. The upshot is that history, as a branch of science, is supposed to subordinate the story/narrative to the metaphysics of dead matter. Any story is reducible to a series of metaphysical states of affairs that obtain in four-dimensional space-time matter. We look at other "present" dead objects (as dead objects with various properties) and determine the extent to which they "verify" or "falsify" our story. In the end the story doesn't have its own ontology, but is reduced to the ontology of "stuff" with properties.
I believe that there is an alternative to dead ontology. Let's call it narrative ontology. This is a view that refuses to reduce the narrative to properties of dead matter. It asserts the relations of being in or playing a role in a certain life (i.e., set of stories) as being fundamental. So, for example, this old beaten wooden chair is the one in which my dad sat while he did his paper work. This makes it a radically different object (and object for me) than another chair whose "dead matter" analysis would say is identical.
Ok, I know that the foregoing was fast and loose, but it's a start and I could say more. But here's the implication for the historicity question. The historicity question as it is approached by most anti-mormons and by most apologists assumes the homogeneity of reason and the ontology of dead matter. It assumes that we can adjudicate the correctness of historical claims in science and religion in the same way and that this will be based on finding current "evidence" of what material states obtained at such and such a time in the past. It reduces the story/narrative of religious life to the ontology of dead matter, and commits "blasphemy" by allowing theoretical science a place in religious story telling.
Is the Book of Mormon historical? Well, it uses the past tense. And we must look at the religious practice of how we handle that past tense to let us know about the criteria for this particular usage. Will the Book of Mormon stand up to the scrutiny of scientific studies in archeology or the history of DNA? To ask that question is to misunderstand the religious narrative as something that could be parasitic on a more fundamental ontology of "stuff" and its properties that we can scrutinize and analyze with instruments. Where did the Nephites actually live? To try to pinpoint this or even to assume that there is a fact of the matter that can be stated in terms not germane to the story itself is to misunderstand the story and its role in our religious life.
We need an ontology of life and this will be an ontology in which a story can be as fundamental as a scientific theory. Given this, we need an approach to thinking the history of scripture that refuses the current field of play (anti and apologetic). Among other things, this will show that we just cannot disconnect the theology of a text from its story, as if the former were a set of propositions that could have been stated in logical form but weren't. The past tense of the story matters for every telling of the story and so its historicity is always present in the ways we should think through the text.


text:
Dickey, Francisco lead Blue Jays over Indians
TORONTO (AP) After throwing pitches into the seventh inning, R.A. Dickey hailed Melky Cabrera for his one perfect toss.
Dickey won for the third time in four starts, Juan Francisco homered and the Toronto Blue Jays beat the Cleveland Indians 5-4 on Tuesday night.
Cabrera made a one-hop throw from left field to get Carlos Santana at the plate to end the eighth inning, preserving Toronto's one-run lead.
''That was just heroic, is what that was,'' a grateful Dickey said. ''It saved the game.''
Catcher Josh Thole said Cabrera's throw was ''right on the money.''
''It was down the third base line so it made it easier for me,'' Thole said. ''Had it been anywhere else it would have been a bit of a tougher play. Melky knows that and he's just that good of a player to be able to do that.''
Santana said he had to alter his slide because Yan Gomes' bat was on the ground, just outside the batter's box.
''Melky made a great throw and the bat was in the middle,'' Santana said. ''I tried to go inside.''
Dickey (4-3) allowed two earned runs and four hits in six-plus innings. He walked two and struck out six.
''I had some good changeups tonight, a swing-and-miss knuckleball,'' Dickey said.
Casey Janssen, activated off the disabled list Sunday, finished for his first save.
''It's definitely good to have him back,'' Blue Jays manager John Gibbons said.
Justin Masterson (2-2) matched a season high by allowing five runs and six hits in 5 1-3 innings.
Dickey set down the first eight batters before the Indians opened the scoring in the third. Mike Aviles singled, Michael Bourn walked and Nick Swisher hit an RBI single that dropped just in front of a charging Jose Bautista in right.
Gibbons came out to argue the call by first base umpire Jerry Meals that Bautista had trapped the ball, but didn't challenge it.
Masterson was perfect through three innings before giving a leadoff triple to Jose Reyes in the fourth. Cabrera followed with a sacrifice fly to the warning track in center.
Francisco put the Blue Jays in front with a one-out homer in the fifth, a drive into the second deck.
Toronto chased Masterson and added three more runs in the sixth. Adam Lind hit a two-run double and scored on Francisco's double.
''He got a couple of balls up that they stayed on pretty well,'' Indians manager Terry Francona said.
Josh Outman came on after Masterson walked Brett Lawrie but got out of it by retiring Josh Thole on a grounder and striking out Kevin Pillar.
Cleveland closed to within one with a three-run seventh. Asdrubal Cabrera singled, David Murphy reached on a fielding error by Lawrie at second base and Yan Gomes walked to load the bases before Dickey hit Lonnie Chisenhall with the first pitch.
Aaron Loup relieved and got Aviles to fly out, but Bourn hit an RBI single and Swisher added a sacrifice fly. Michael Brantley lined out to end the inning.
''We just couldn't get one big hit,'' Francona said.
Santana singled off Brett Cecil to begin the eighth and advanced on a passed ball. Asdrubal Cabrera and Murphy struck out before Gomes lined a single to left, setting the stage for Cabrera's inning-ending assist.
NOTES: Francona has been added to John Farrell's staff for the All-Star game. Minnesota's Ron Gardenhire will also assist Farrell. ... Bautista was called out on strikes after his request for time was not granted by plate umpire Jordan Baker in the seventh. Bautista backed out as John Axford threw a strike. ... Reyes returned to the lineup after getting the day off Monday. ... Toronto OF Colby Rasmus, who left Monday's game after six innings with a tight right hamstring, did not start. Gibbons said he hopes Rasmus will be ready to return after two days off. ... The Blue Jays recalled Pillar from Triple-A Buffalo and optioned INF Jonathan Diaz to Triple-A. ... Toronto has hit at least one homer in 17 of 19 home games this season. ... Cleveland has lost nine of 11 on the road. ... Indians RH Corey Kluber (3-3) faces Blue Jays RH Dustin McGowan (2-1) on Wednesday.

subset: commoncrawl


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SCHUYLKILL – The 8th Annual Archery Distance Competition was held July 27 on the lower field of the Phoenixville Area YMCA.
A total of 21 archers, ages 6 to adult, participated in the event using recurve, compound and the longbow. No sights were used on the bows.
All participants received medals with gold medals going to the first-place winners in each age group.
This year's overall winner was first-time archer John Hotalen, hitting at 55 yards.
Second place overall of the second year in a row went to 7-year-old Olivia Mulligan, who hit at 50 yards. In 2012, Mulligan surprised everyone with her skill as an archer by hitting 55 yards. Coach Joe Grejdus expects a first-place medal for Olivia next year.
Third place went to last year's first-place winner, Jennifer Forte. Jenn hit at 45 yards using the longbow.
Grejdus thanked parents and grandparents who helped to set up and take down the field and move targets.
Results were as follows with age, archer and stiance shot in yards:
6, Haylen Lawrence, 10 yards; 7, Olivia Mulligan, 50 yards; Lawson Finger, 25; Ian Pennypacker, 25; Daniel Birkbeck, 20. 8, Julia Grosso, 25; 9, Jessica Donovan, 40; Austin Pencak, 30; Jessica Westervelt, 30; Declan Woodall, 25; Aidan Zottola, 25; Leo Sereni, 15. 10, Paul Grosso, 25; Gavin Stevens, 20; 11, Olivia Sheridan, 35. 12, Lee Keele, 25; Jackson Wertz, 20. 13, Jay Mitchell, 35. 14-17, Mia Senese, 35. 18-Adult, John Hotalen, 55; Jenn Forte, 45.


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Met museum hails Super Bowl with football card exhibit
NEW YORK (AP) – Football at the Met. No, not Metlife Stadium where the Super Bowl will be played next month. The Met, as in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
The venerable institution is presenting a pop-up exhibition celebrating football's history through the ages with vintage trading cards. It opens Jan. 24 and runs through Feb. 10.
The 150 cards, beginning with a series from 1894, are part of approximately 600 football cards from the museum's vast collection of 300,000 trading cards donated to the Met by the late card collector and cataloger Jefferson Burdick. All predate the founding of a national football league in 1920 and the first Super Bowl in 1967.
The cards – which feature football greats, lesser-known collegiate players, owners and teams – were inserted into such products as candy, gum and tobacco.
With the Super Bowl being played Feb. 2 in nearby East Rutherford, N.J., the first time the game is being held outdoors in a cold-weather city, organizing the "Gridiron Greats" exhibition was a natural, said Freyda Spira, the Met's assistant curator of the department of drawings and prints.
While some may view such an exhibition at the Met as an anomaly, the Burdick collection is part of the museum's mission to include printed material "for a mass public," Spira said.
"Commercially printed lithographs are part of our printed visual culture," she added. "It's viewed within the spectrum of what art is."
The earliest cards, produced by the P.H. Mayo Tobacco company, featured black and white photos of Ivy League football stars in collegiate sweaters.
The rarest card in the exhibition is of John Dunlop from Harvard. He is the only player in the series whose name and school affiliation were inexplicably omitted.
It's not known how many Dunlop cards are in existence but one in perfect condition can sell for $15,000 to $20,000, said Bob Swick, publisher and editor of Gridirons Greats magazine.
Among the greats, the collection features Notre Dame coach Knute Rockne, whose career included six national college championships and entry into the Hall of Fame in 1951, the first year of induction.
The cards "present a very historical view of where the game of football came from," Swick said.
The sport began as an intercollegiate game that fused soccer and rugby. Athletic clubs eventually formed football leagues. The most powerful, the Ohio League, became the American Professional Football Conference in 1920 before changing its name to the National Football League two years later. The first Super Bowl came about only after the formation of the American Football League in 1960.
Many of the sets are beautiful color lithographs that depict the players in action. A 1935 National Chicle Gum Co. set includes Hall of Famer Turk Edwards, a Washington State tackle whose nine-year NFL career with the Washington Redskins ended after an injury during a coin toss in a 1940 game against the New York Giants.
There's also a 1936 Chicle luxury set of black and white photos that includes University of Illinois running back Harold "Red" Grange, who went on to play with the Chicago Bears and whose speed earned him the moniker "The Galloping Ghost."
Other notable players include Kenneth Washington, the first black player in the NFL who broke the color barrier, and Hall of Famer Sid Luckman, one of the first Jewish players in professional football. There's also a 1952 rookie card of Frank Gifford, who was the New York Giants' No. 1 draft pick.
Burdick, an electrician from Syracuse, N.Y., began donating his 300,000-card collection to the Met in 1947. In organizing the material at the Met over a 15-year period, Burdick devised a classification system that has become the standard for cataloging trading cards. He died in 1963.
Burdick's collection has offered the museum ample material for special exhibitions over the years, including one on baseball cards, of which he amassed 30,000.
Other museums in and around the city presenting Super Bowl-related exhibitions include The Children's Museum of Manhattan, the Museum of the Moving Image in Queens and the Liberty Science Center in Jersey City, N.J.
Copyright 2014 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.


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The leads of the Star Wars and Star Trek franchises have come to verbal blows as of late, and a certain mellifluous Enterprise helmsman has attempted to ameliorate the situation. What this public spat ignores is that there's a superior Star film out there, one that eschews flights of fancy and makes your appreciate the grim, icy mechanics of our lousy reality. I am, of course, talking about the 1986 extraterrestrial-flan masterwork Star Crystal.
As you may have noticed, William Shatner fired the opening salvo back in September, which Carrie Fisher returned her own riposte. This in turn prompted a recent conciliatory video from George Takei, who urged Trek and Wars fans to focus their vitriol on the funfetti-pigmented wampyrs of Twilight.
Now, I'll be the first to admit that Mr. Takei's honeyed pipes can make even the most wretched topic eminently listenable. But rallying against Twilight seems, well, so 2010.
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Old bromides aside, it's also a bit of a false dichotomy: Twilight insanity is still fresh-faced compared to those decades-old warhorses of genre science fiction. It still has plenty of time to peter out and become a dusty school library staple like Superfudge. For all we know, commitment-phobic cyclopses could be the new hot shit come 2014. (Or at least they will be, when I pen my best-selling teenclops novel Iris: "A shy girl moves to Moscow, Idaho only to discover the hamlet is full of eyepatch-wearing boys-next-door.")
But I digress. Anyway, all of this internet posturing misses sight of the true battle lines. Trek versus War, Trek and War versus Twilight, and even the odd partisan of Tek War versus Twilight are but drops in the bucket compared to the unsung feud between Star Trek, Star Wars, and — the best film ever to bear the prefix Star — Lance Lindsay's 1986's extraterrestrial tour de force Star Crystal.
Now, I'm not expecting any of you to remember Star Crystal nor will I make the audacious claim that Star Crystal is a good film. Those of you who argue otherwise are likely familiar with entire corpus of Lance Lindsay's IMDB biography, which seemingly begins and ends with an episode of McCloud. No, what I will argue is that — unlike the pie-in-the-sky koans of Wars or the gooey communitarianism of Trek — Star Crystal gets to the pith of the human condition. It is a science fiction movie that squelches the imagination and makes the viewer grateful he or she does not live in Star Crystal one whit. The original trilogy and an episode of The Next Generation will make you wish you had Force powers and mad brass skills, respectively. Star Crystal inculcates no such yearning. It is the cod liver oil of movies that begin with the word Star — here's why.
1.) Star Crystal teaches you to never believe the hype
Above is the fucking rad poster for Star Crystal. At left, the trailer. Know that the above monster never appears in the film, nor does the film ever achieve the "new form of life...and death!" as promised in the preview.
2.) Similarly, Star Crystal teaches you Occam's Razor
Did you see that burbling pile of tapioca in the trailer? That is the juvenile form of "the Gar," or the space slug that appears in Star Crystal. But unlike, say, the facehugger from Alien, the young Gar looks exactly like the fully grown Gar who later terrorizes our protagonists. So yes, those poor souls who rented Star Crystal in hopes of seeing that tiny lump of smegma evolve into a saber-toothed killing machine must have been pretty chagrined to find that it becomes just a bigger lump of smegma.
3.) Star Crystal teaches you patience
For a ~90-minute film, Star Crystal is inordinately slow. Many facets of life, such as watching glaciers carve out mountain ranges, also require a certain cerebral steel. Think of Star Crystal as mental conditioning for waiting for 2020. Begin your training by witnessing the most demure space station explosion ever recorded.
4.) Star Crystal teaches you to appreciate the finer things in life
Some of you may have noticed that I've said nearly bupkis about Star Crystal's plot. Canny observer! In the 2030s, a group of astronauts discover a mysterious crystal/brag about playing football on Mars. They're immediately killed by the Gar, who farts out of the crystal. Fast forward two months, and the protagonists have discovered the dead astronauts' space station (see above). The Gar blows that up and begins hunting these new spacefarers in their escape vessel.
After most of that crew dies offscreen, the two remaining new astronauts investigate where the Gar came from. More importantly, they finally watch the foreshadowed football footage. Mind you, this scene occurs slightly after most of their friends have been strangled with tentacles.
5.) The Gar decides not to kill the heroes after reading the Bible
This isn't a life lesson. I just wanted to pay credence to one of the most left-field plot twists in the history of killer alien fiction.
6.) Nobody is evil, everyone is just misunderstood
After one of our stare-happy heroes is about to torch the Gar with a flamethrower, they realize that he's just an extremely confused cosmic blob. Then commences perhaps the greatest volte-face ever committed to celluloid, as the heroes befriend the Gar in the film's final five minutes. There's even a "friends doing stuff" montage!
This is the kind of spirit of togetherness firebrands embroiled in the current Trek-Wars feud need to embrace. Star Crystal even plays out the Gar with...
7.) Everything goes better with Daphne from Scooby-Doo
...a pop jam by Indira Stefanianna Christopherson, better known as the voice of scarf aficionado Daphne Anne Blake. Did Star Trek or Star Wars ever have a song by Daphne? Only in our wildest dreams.
Star Crystal poster via Wrong Side of the Art.


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If You Build It, They Will Come. . . But Will They Buy?
With few banks loaning money and a more competitive market, how can high-performance new-home builders market their homes? Here are some success stories.
Many home builders are experiencing a much slower construction schedule than that of five years ago. So with fewer mortgages being approved, many builders—if they are still in business—have time on their hands and are actually interested in learning what building scientists have been preaching all along. They are learning that high-performance homes don't have to cost more to build, compared to a code-minimum homes, given the fact that a high performance homes' monthly cost of ownership is less than that of a code-minimum home. They are learning that not only do they cost less to operate, these homes provide a better indoor environment. They are also learning that consumers want high-performance homes. So in a Field of Dreams, with few banks loaning money, and a more competitive market, how can high-performance builders market their homes?
This article discusses several Building America builders in Florida that are committed to constructing their homes to a HERS index of less than 60 and to meeting the Builders Challenge Quality Criteria (see "Builders Meeting the Challenge"). However, two of these builders (let's call them Builder A and Builder B) are more successful than others at selling homes in a market that has been depressed for nearly five years. Builder A has been outselling the competition by nearly two to one—and in the same subdivision! The successful builders market their homes by creating an emotional appeal to prospective home buyers. This appeal is based on positive monthly cash flow and low energy bills. When they make clear the other benefits, such as greater comfort and improved indoor air quality (IAQ), these successful builders can position their homes as a premium product that justifies a premium price.
Succeeding in a Depressed Market
The successful and not-so-successful builders in Florida are learning that energy-efficient measures alone do not attract new-home buyers in an economy where retrofits and renovations are now booming. One stagnant builder, Builder C, does build high-quality, high-performance homes. So why isn't Builder C experiencing the same success as Builder A and Builder B? Although working with a knowledgeable building scientist is a key element to building a successful marketing plan, which includes third-party certifications, making these claims is not enough to get people to buy today. Marketing is imperative, but builders make a mistake when they assume that every potential home buyer has the same beliefs and interests. Whether people buy a product that has a premium price tag because they see it as a status symbol, or whether they buy it for purely emotional reasons—such as that heart-fluttering feeling when we watch beautiful people drive elegant cars down ribbons of picturesque, coastal highways and we picture ourselves behind the wheel—they must first be convinced that the product is worth the investment. And whether or not they will be convinced depends largely on how the message is delivered.
Let's look at how Builder A delivers that message. This company has been building Builders Challenge-compliant homes for more than two years. They are one of the pioneer builders inducted into the program. Builder A identifies its target client; it does not make the mistake of being all things to all consumers. It has aimed its marketing to hit home with that target client and has tailored its advertising with a specific message: energy efficiency. However, the key message is not just that energy efficiency provides a benefit; it is that the benefit is one with emotional appeal. Saving money on your electric bill will leave you with money to spend vacationing with your kids, or even without them (see Figures 1 and 2).
Builder A also uses a powerful video within the Zero Energy Blog on its web site, complete with cute kids, bragging rights, one-liners, and captivating music. The pair of photos in Figure 3 depicts reduced electricity costs and amenities that are often the key selling features in new homes, such as granite countertops and high-end wooden cabinets.
Another successful marketing practice is using creative names for features. Often we engineers need to spend a day with Realtors to understand that scientifically supported high-performance home lingo (albeit legitimate) is just not mainstream. The Building America program uses research results to justify best-practice building standards. The program wholeheartedly encourages and highly recommends a systems engineering approach. I use this phrase often in my presentations to colleagues, builders, and architects, but until recently I didn't really look at the audience to see whether this approach was sinking in. It wasn't.
Here's an experiment to try at home. Tell a Realtor or sales executive to show a home to a potential client and say, "This home was built using a systems-engineered approach." What's the client's response? Now tell the Realtor to try it with words like, "This home is a holistic-built environment." What's the client's response now? It's got to be catchy. Here's another phrase we engineers love: positive-pressure ventilation system. Compare that phrase to Acoustimass Wave System (credit for this one goes to Todd Louis) or "Fresh Air System" (perhaps more technically accurate). Rather than suggest to marketing professionals that it is acceptable to just make up names, we are more in favor of trying to choose names that can also educate consumers as to the value of a component or measure. So, maybe the "Fresh Air System" isn't as enchanting, but we predict almost everyone would rather have a fresh air system than a "positive-presure ventilation system."
Fear tactics are also powerful marketing tools. Most Home Energy readers know now that high-performance windows reduce the solar degradation of furniture, carpeting, and so on, besides providing clear views and more comfortable and thermally efficient living spaces. You can highlight all these facts to the customer, though the fear of faded furniture may have the biggest impact. Marketing tactics can be technical or emotional (see Figure 4).
In this ever more aggressive and litigious era of greenwashing and warranting performance promises, home builders are concerned about possible legal implications and expensive callbacks from their clients; and clients are very concerned about the health of their families. You need to stress that a well designed home provides high indoor air quality and healthy living. Building high performance homes reduces a builder's liability exposure. One of Builder A's most notable successes was virtually eliminating callbacks and complaints associated with mechanical systems. One of the builder's biggest expenses before his involvement in the Building America program was callbacks due to the occurrence of hot and cold spots in houses caused by unbalanced air flows.
We are living in an era in which smart phones dominate our everyday lives. Even my five-year-old daughter will often say, "Let's Google on your phone for that," or "Just text Daddy where we are." And now there are mobile apps for almost everything you can think of. But even with the digital world at our fingertips, people still want to feel things and play with things. Ken Fonorow, energy and building science consultant to Builder A, says, "They won't know if you don't show them." Builder A and Builder B both use the show-and-tell techniques to sell more homes. Granted, when potential buyers are touring a home, they want to see crown molding on eggshell finish, painted drywall, and granite countertops instead of continuously sprayed, formaldehyde-free, R-15 fiberglass insulation in 2 x 4 framing with ladder T walls and insulated headers. Yet both Builder A and Builder B use see-for-yourself mock-ups in their model homes and sales offices. They have gadgets and gizmos that offer salespeople the chance to educate and bond with the customer. They even have stuff for the customer to play with (see Figure 5).
Builders Meeting the Challenge
Building America is an industry-driven, private-public partnership research program sponsored by DOE and designed to accelerate the development and adoption of advanced building energy technologies in new and existing homes. Builders Challenge is a program under Building America and a marketing tool for builders. It provides builders with a way to ensure that their homes are the most energy-efficient, durable, and safe homes available, with good IAQ, and built with environmental stewardship in mind. The program requires builders to use the Builders Challenge Quality Criteria (BCQC) Checklist. Once requirements are met, the builders are given an EnergySmart Home Scale (E-Scale) label to affix to the electrical panel of the home. The E-Scale is a credible label that demonstrates to a new or potential homeowner what the projected utility consumption will be for that home—much like a miles per gallon sticker that is affixed to new cars.
The number on the E-Scale is the home's HERS index. The HERS index is a scoring system established by RESNET. A home built to the specifications of the HERS reference home (based on the 2006 International Energy Conservation Code) scores a HERS index of 100, while a net zero energy home scores a HERS index of 0. The lower a home's HERS index or E-Scale, the more energy efficient it is in comparison to the HERS reference home. A 70 on the E-Scale indicates that a home is approximately 30% more energy efficient than a typical new home built to code. A 60 on the E-Scale would be 40% more energy efficient.
Marketing, Marketing, Marketing
To get people to come see the high-performance home you've built, you have to invest in marketing and advertising. The wise old saying is still true: You have to spend money to make money. Word of mouth is not good enough anymore, especially with more people communicating digitally and fewer people actually talking face to face. In the Facebook world we live in, where anyone can create any kind of page that shares information, the social media market is the avenue we use to get consumers to travel to us. Builder A and Builder B both spend significant marketing dollars to get their message across, using print advertising as well as online marketing. Builder A's first net zero energy home sold two weeks after completion. Creative and targeted audience advertising was vital to its success (see Figure 6 and photo above).
To achieve success, Builder A and Builder B also use incentives and effective branding. Builder A pays the homeowner's electricity bills for a year—on all the homes it builds, not just the zero energy ones. Builder B has developed its own brand initiative, called SunSmart, which touts the advantages of making best use of sunshine and an energy-efficient home. The two strategies accompany the more-popular and well-marketed Energy Star certification program but offer an additional feature or value-added component.
Both Builder A and Builder B have taken advantage of the EnergySmart Home Scale (E-Scale) and other marketing material, such logos, web banners, yard signs, press releases, and consumer and technical resources. One yard sign that displays the HERS index, or E-Scale, of the home is initiating a little friendly competition among new homeowners for bragging rights. The sign offers this company an opportunity to educate not just home buyers but their children as well.
Does High Performance Really Matter?
Has the construction industry begun to embrace and integrate green and energy-efficient features that can imply high performance? Or is it merely trying to increase sales by providing these features to customers who are asking for them? High-performance homes have transformed the market in new-home construction. Marketing strategies gave Builder A and Builder B the tools for success.
Success in the home-building market is measured by home sales. Table 1 documents sales data for Builder A and a less-successful competitor. Both companies are located in Gainesville, Florida. Each company is building homes in a community with 275 lots. Builder A is a Building America partner; the competitor builds regionally code-minimum homes. All the homes are very similar in style, footprint, and so on, but Builder A builds homes with improved envelope insulation, including T-stud walls and insulated headers, with less than 3% duct leakage, and with right-sized HVAC equipment with air handler and ducts located in conditioned space. These are standard features, not upgrades. The result is a sales price that is 8% higher per square foot than the other builder's sales price—and faster sales.
This comparison suggests that higher-performance homes can transform the new-home construction market. However, without effective marketing, Builder A might not have been so successful. Builder A's homes are in a community that is less than 2 miles from another Building America builder, Builder C. Builder C has employed all the same energy-efficient strategies, improved IAQ measures, and so on. However, Builder C has not experienced the same success as Builder A. The difference is that Builder C is not advertising, marketing, or expending adequate time, energy, and money to sell the value-added features of its homes. Builder C does have a model zero energy home, but it has very limited show-and-tell features and the sales staff are less involved in selling the energy efficiency features of its homes than Builder A's staff. Finally, Builder C is not yet heavily invested in social media.
The other Building America builder experiencing success (Builder B) is located in Melbourne, Florida. This company, like Builder A, attributes its increased sales to the value-added features of its homes. Builder B is considering plans to retrofit its older stock of homes to meet the Builders Challenge performance standard. Table 2 shows that this company sold fewer new homes between 2007 and 2008, when it was building code-minimum, standard homes. New-home sales increased by 92% between 2008 and 2009, when the company started to build to Builders Challenge performance standards. Builder B presold eight Builders Challenge homes in four months during 2010.
As the construction industry starts to acknowledge that a home's high-performance features set that home's builder apart from the pack, more builders are voluntarily practicing the quantifiable performance strategies that the Building America Builders Challenge brand offers.
So I'll end this article with a challenge to builders. Go the distance and challenge your team and business model to include some measures that will provide a quantifiable benefit. If you build it right (and market it appropriately), they will come—and they just might buy it.
How they will finance it is the subject of our next article in Home Energy.
Stephanie Thomas-Rees is a research architect in the Buildings Research Division at the Florida Solar Energy Center (FSEC), where she has been involved with high-performance buildings research since 2001. Todd Louis is vice president of Tommy Williams Homes. Ken Fonorow is president of Florida HERO, has been involved in building science and energy conservation for over 30 years as an energy analyst, consultant, and problem solver, and is experienced in residential mechanical systems design and installation.
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This week, the Supreme Court saw the light, or at least the apex of the rainbow, and granted gay Americans—at least federally—the right to dive into the matrimonial abyss. Because we value personal freedom, we applaud this. Of course, it raises an obvious question for us, answered herein by one of our favorite Car Gays—Brett Berk, Vanity Fair's "Stick Shift" columnist and a frequent Car and Driver contributor—of what to drive to your gay wedding. Miatas and Subarus need not apply.
Today's gays and lesbians raise families just as they always have but in ever increasing, and increasingly open, numbers. But Odysseys, Grand Caravans, or Siennas, as wonderful and capable as they are, don't have quite the necessary panache. This is the only minivan outside of a Renault Espace that does.
Gays love it for its name, with its inherent tension between pursuit and achievement. Lesbians love it because, well, it's a big, honking truck. Depending on your preference, fill the bed with ice and champagne or a futon and some candles, and you have yourself a mobile honeymoon.
You need a pair: one in white and one in black, preferably, for the groom/groom or the bride/bride. Cute, spunky, and, like Gucci itself, forever in vogue.
My urban, urbane gay and lesbian friends are forever plaguing me with questions of which car they should buy. So frequent are their queer queries that I've developed a standard questionnaire, which I e-mail to them. The first question is "What is the first thing that comes to mind when I say the words, 'Volkswagen Jetta diesel SportWagen?' "
Massaging, reclining, air-conditioned rear seats; a spectacular sound system; a profligate powerplant; and more than enough exclusivity to separate you from the rest of the masspirational homosexuals in their 7-series, S-classes, and A8s. Also, a champagne cooler with room for two bottles. If it were legal, I would gay-marry this car instead of my boyfriend.
There is an entire generation of gays out there, myself included, whose grandmothers owned one of these. For them, it is the height of glamour. And what is a wedding without glamour? (Answer: prom.)
Illusorily rugged, clad in a ludicrous set of chaps, lined with rubber, and capable of being hosed out. The ideal leather car for either gender.
Eighty-seven percent of professional-grade gays and lesbians already own these cars, so they might as well drive them to their wedding.
An orphan, an outcast, a screaming Hail Mary, and perhaps the most stylish vehicular embodiment of mid-century modernism, the Avanti was resolutely rejected by the majority but continued to live its life proudly for decades and is now accepted as a revolutionary and inspiring presence. Sound familiar?
A definitive "eff off" to those who would deprive us of our civil rights.


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Recycle for Gold
Special Olympics Massachusetts Vehicle Donation Program
Want to get more mileage out of your old car before buying a new one? Donate that old ride to Special Olympics Massachusetts and help support year-round training and athletic competitions for children and adults with intellectual disabilities in your community and across the state.
- Your contribution will help support year-round programming to Special Olympics athletes across Massachusetts.
- You'll be eligible for a tax deduction based on the value of your car.
Donating A Vehicle Step-By-Step
Or call:
1-800-590-1600 for Massachusetts
Cars from CT or RI are no longer able to be picked up.
1) You will receive a notice from the Special Olympics Donation Team, including the number of their retrieval company in your area.
2) The retrieval company will contact you to schedule a convenient pick-up. You don't have to be there when the car is picked up.
3) The vehicle is picked up and you are given an acknowledgement for your records.
Donating a Car to Charity: Tax Information
Upon pick-up of the vehicle, you receive a receipt that may be used to claim your charitable deduction on that year's taxes. If your vehicle sells for over $500, you will be notified of the sale. In that case, you will receive appropriate tax documents in the mail containing the actual gross sale price of the vehicle. All receipts and paperwork as well as scheduling pickup is done by Millis Tow 508-481-1919 or email firstname.lastname@example.com


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Wolf Blitzer delivers the most important breaking news and political, international, and national security stories of the day. Tune to The Situation Room weekdays 5-7pm ET on CNN.
The full Mitt Romney interview airs Monday 4-7pm ET on "The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer.
(CNN) – The American embassy in Israel, currently in Tel Aviv, should move to Jerusalem, presumptive GOP nominee Mitt Romney said in an interview Sunday.
"A nation has the capacity to choose its own capital city, and Jerusalem is Israel's capital," Romney told CNN's Wolf Blitzer in an interview set to air Monday. "I think it's long been the policy to ultimately have our embassy in the nation's capital of Jerusalem."
RELATED VIDEO: Romney: Rules don't make a lot of sense
This proposal would serve only to create instability in the region by inciting Arabs. Such a move would not be in the best interests of the US. I suggest Mitt stop focusing on his closet crusade and look at helping Americans first.
Now, I may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, and certainly not worthy of CNN employment, but I do know that Capital is money, and Capitol is the seat of government. Just sayin'.....
Where did this "capital" move to?
maybe the united states should move its capital to jerusalem since its foreign policy is dictated from there
You should run for president because you have it figured out! Our capital is indeed Jerusalem!! Few seem to know it!
Just watched the softball questions Wolf posed to Romney in Israel. It's no wonder that CNN has been in decline. Wolf & CNN has been in a free-fall in their ability to generate critical thinking and analysis since the first Gulf War coverage.
Not true, "watch dog".
Why does Romney think others need his opinion and we/they want him to change our lives and direction...
Wolf, this only prove to you that Romney goes only were the money is, the Palestine are Arabs which Romney has manege to upset them, he is going to lie to us, tell they have weapons of mass deconstructionism and start a war, I think we just had a president just do that?
Romney looks very defensive. He is going to worry even his most reliable supporters, if he carries this demeanor into the convention and on to the debates.
Wolf's teasing of this story is misleading. He keeps saying, no President has said that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel. However, President Obama said in 2008, then as Candidate Obama, that Jerusalem would stay the capital of Israel during his watch. So Wolf, you might be correct that no sitting President has said it, but of course our current President has called Jerusalem the capital. Now, moving the embassy is news, which does differentiate the current candidates. So why does Wolf go out of his way to imply that Romney's comment about Israel's capital is the controversial aspect of the story? Come-on Wolf, you make news with the embassy location remarks, but you chose to act like Romney is the first (controversial) Candidate to mention Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.
I'm not a Romney supporter...but Mike is dead on.
The biggest problem being, of course, would be where to put the embassy. The old city is split into four quarters, the Armenian, Christian, Jewish, and Muslim Quarters. All four quarters are going to anger somebody...this is the reason none of the other presidents have moved the embassy from Tel Aviv.
Armenians are christian. It's a nationality, not a religion.
, that the Democrats on their own cannot elect the next President, nor can the Republicans. They need the Independent votes to win. Polls show that the matriojy of Independents are moderate. And want someone to govern from the center, not from the wings.Mitt Romney is that person. If the conservative base doesn't get their head out and think clearly, it will be to late.
If I'm not mistaken every Presidential candidate since George G.W .Bush and with possible exception of Obama promised to move the US Embassy to Jerusalem. No news here.
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Alison asked if hormone-free milk was as good as organic.
As for as Organic milk vs hormone free, neither will have the hormone added, but the hormone "free"-only will still have pesticide residue. Organic milk comes from cows fed an organic diet – grain or grass. In most cases, organic cows are treated better (more room per cow, most organic cows graze in an open pasture), while conventional cows don't have much room to move around. So that to me even means healthier milk since cows treated better tend to be healthier anyway, thus not needing antibiotics, etc.
Hormone free vs organic – cows naturally produce hormones, so the milk is not entirely hormone free, however no synthetic hormones are added (which to me is still better than conventional milk). However, it seems as though "hormone-free" is more of a marketing term.
CNN also reported on this topic pointing out research has shown there is no difference in milk from cows treated with rbST and cows that were not. However, the author echos many who feel "science" and the FDA has let us down before and consumers are questioning the safety of, well everything.
But then again, Natural News debunks that and gives a glowing review of why adding hormones is not good, including pus getting into the milk from these cows who often get mastitis due to the overproduction of milk and these cows are then given antibiotics to treat the mastitis infection. Now, who wants all that in their milk?
Benefits of Organic Milk
Here is another very good article showing the benefits of organic milk vs conventional milk. Such benefits include less pesticide contamination, more vitamins and antioxidants, improves the quality of breastmilk and helps prevent asthma and eczema in children. Read the entire article for more benefits.
As for as choosing a good organic milk, first things first – Horizon milk is not really organic, which is really sad considering it is the best selling brand of organic milk. There are several links on there, one of which is a link to thorough research of many organic brands of milk rated on how "organic" they really are. So if you choose to stay/go organic, you can choose a good brand. Also, you can usually sign up on the manufacturer's website and get coupons — for example, Stonyfield Farm or Organic Valley may send out coupons in a newsletter.
We eat the "dirty dozen" fruits and veggies (mostly these are the ones where the outer skin is exposed like peaches, grapes, strawberries, potatoes, apples…) these are the ones that will have the most pesticides and bananas for example, do not have near as many pesticides since it is protected by a thick peel. So I get organic apples, but not bananas. I say that to give you an example that there are tradeoffs. You don't have to go 100% organic on everything. To me, milk is one of those areas where the benefit definitely shows organic to be better.
Certainly cost is a factor. I get our milk from Whole Foods. If you drink a lot of milk or you have room in your freezer, Whole Foods gives you 10% off if you purchase a case of milk (4 gallons). We go through that in about 10-14 days, so I do this sometimes, but it's a little hard to drink that much milk when we still give our 3 year old whole milk. And I am not sure about freezing milk, have not tried it, but know people who have with great success. And as mentioned, you can usually sign up to get newsletters which may contain coupons.
Related Articles
Food manufacturers confess they have no idea if their food is safe
Grass-fed beef is healthier
Is your organic food really organic?


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Pericles at Daily Kos has an amusing and enlightening history of shaving and capitalism.
So instead, the market has gone two ways. The mass market has kept research labs busy churning out phony "improvements" that generate market-protecting patents and give advertisers something to work with. And vast amounts of money have been spent persuading men (successfully!) that there's something new worth paying up for and something primitive about the double-edged safety razor.
For men who have caught on to that game, a connoisseur market sells expensive shaving paraphernalia to bolster an overclass identity. So whether you're a mass-market Gillette-Fusion-type guy or a connoisseur wielding a buffalo-horn-handle Damascus-steel-blade straight razor, you support a market with high profit margins.
What worries me is that I see exactly the same dynamic in the pharmaceutical industry. It takes a huge investment in time, money and expertise– with big risk– to patent a new drug that actually cures something, or even is measurably better than older, cheaper drugs. That's why you see existing drugs marketed in new forms– gel caps, dissolvable tabs– or new drugs that are almost the same as older ones in the same class.
Letting the free market lead is harmless enough when it produces a ten-blade disposable razor. When it comes to things that really matter, novelty does not reign supreme.


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Happy Birthday, Ulysses
On this day in 1822, the regal (and rather woeful) face that stares you down from your fifty-dollar bills--Hiram (after his granddad) Ulysses Grant--was born in Point Pleasant, OH. The future Union powerhouse and 18th U.S president suffered the childhood nickname "Useless"--sloughing it off when he enrolled in West Point at seventeen, where he proved a peerless horseman (a skill that earned him some notoriety later in life when he was ticketed $20 for driving his horse too fast). After serving as a lieutenant in the Mexican-American War (1846-48), he remained in the Army until abruptly resigning in 1854...Rumors abounded that Brevet Colonel Robert C. Buchanan was riding him for his heavy drinking--Grant was a purported fan of Old Crow. Grant was also a cigar aficionado who loved to herald a new day by munching on pickles. If you want to spend the weekend reliving Grant's Vicksburg Campaign, it's likely there's a Civil War reenactment event near you, but if that tribute's too much of a schlep, you can always head up NYC's Riverside Drive to Grant's Tomb (admission's free). And if anyone quizzes you on who's "buried" there, remember: entombed, not buried, and it's Grant and his wife.


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The Medieval Music & Arts Foundation is an incorporated non-profit public charity. The present activities of the foundation center on online publishing. We have readers and supporters around the world.
To new essay (2022): Thirty years on the web.
To some older & founding materials:
The activities of the foundation grew from those of Todd M. McComb to include contributions from other valued colleagues. Dr. McComb continues to direct the foundation and edit the web site.
The Medieval Music & Arts Foundation welcomes a wide variety of viewpoints. We make every effort to check facts for accuracy, as well as to correct any errors brought to our attention.
Some content areas were developed online as early as 1991. Our formal incorporation to serve as an umbrella for these resources was in 1999. Thank you for your interest.
To main index.Todd M. McComb


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Women who feel moody or grouchy before getting their periods shouldn't blame it all on their hormones, say researchers from the University of Toronto. According to a new meta-analysis of PMS studies, the research team concluded that it is not real — that there is no clear link between women's negative moods and the premenstrual phase of their cycles. The time has come, they say, to put the myth aside.
The researchers, a team lead by psychologist Gillian Einstein, took a look at 47 English language studies found on PubMed, PsycINFO, and various article bibliographies. They conducted a critical analysis of the daily mood data presented in these studies, but could not find any clear evidence that premenstrual syndrome exists.
Specifically, here's what they found:
- 18 studies (38.3%) found no association of mood with any negative emotion phase (MC phase)
- 18 studies (38.3%) found an association of negative mood in the premenstrual phase — but combined with another MC phase
- 7 studies (14.9%) found an association of negative mood and the premenstrual phase
- The remaining 4 studies (8.5%) showed an association between negative mood and non-premenstrual phases
It's pretty revealing that only 14.9% studies could link a negative emotional phase with the premenstrual phase, and that 8.5% could link negative emotions with other non-premenstrual phases.
Likewise, Einstein's own research on women's hormonal levels could not establish any kind of association. She concluded that, with a few exceptions, neither absolute hormone levels nor menstrual cycle phases were responsible for altering the moods of women.
Speaking through a release, Einstein had this to say: "Before women even get their first period, they have heard about PMS. The notion is so ingrained in our culture that some of these studies are actually biased because women know the study is about PMS." And just as bad, she feels that the "PMS myth" is perpetuating negative concepts that link female reproduction with negative emotions.
It's important to note that the review did not look into the existence of premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) — a clinical mood disorder associated with the menstrual cycle (one that is characterized by severe physical and behavioural symptoms in the latter half of the menstrual cycle). The study also did not discount the existence of physical symptoms such as bloating and cramping related to the premenstrual phase.
The entire study can be read at Gender Medicine.
Image: CREATISTA/Shutterstock. Inset image via UofT.


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Queenstown Lakes Community Housing Trust Privacy Statement
The collection and use of personal information by the Queenstown Lakes Communty Housing is regulated by the Privacy Act 1993. Under this Act, personal information may be collected only for a lawful purpose connected with a function or activity of the Trust and only if necessary for that purpose. Such information must, as a general rule, be collected directly from the individual concerned and that person must be told why the information is needed.
Queenstown Lakes Community Housing Trust will use personal information provided by website visitors only for the reasons it was given. The Trust will not share personal information with any third parties unless written permission is given by the website visitor concerned.
All enquiries about or formal requests for information in terms of the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987, or the Privacy Act 1993 should be in writing to:
Queenstown Lakes Community Housing Trust
PO Box 1748
Queenstown 9348
For more detailed information about the Privacy Act you can refer to the Privacy Commissioner's website.
Summary of the Privacy Act 1993 - Privacy Commissioner's Website
If you are concerned that the Trust may have breached the Privacy Act or if you are not sure of our obligations, you can call the Privacy Commissioner's Privacy Hotline: 0800 803 909.
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One Libertarian Philosopher Outnumbers Legions
|Posted on March 28, 2012 at 10:50 PM
Dr. Palmer challenges the often self-serving misidentification of moral capitalism with cronyism by officials in this excerpt from a talk at the Locke Foundation.
LIO Fellow Dr. Tom Palmer is travelling the world to share views on Libertarianism, encourage young scholars, and promote study societies and think tanks. His book Morality of Capitalism (Free e-book, please share) is an entertaining, paradigm-busting set of essays being translated into many languages.
The Liberatarian advocate and educative philosopher travels to many countries with his book as a core text shared in translation with local workshops. The book introduces key information and helps the reader who challenges common false choices and myths--such as identification of free capitalism with cronyism--needed for those in countries where information is often hard to obtain or effectively censored. Usrs say the book is suitable for preparation towards more advanced awareness of Libertarian themes, while stimulating interest in historical mythologies, economics and policy in general.
Topics handled include the concept of capitalism as a moral tool for empowering individuals and voluntary and effective co-operation; common misconceptions; themes of application beyond usual business ones; and extensive recommendations for additional research bibliography and refrences for young scholars and informed citizens.Many feel the work is an an excellent companion to LIO Fellow Ayn Rand's Capitalism, the Unknown Ideal or Economics in One Lesson (Free e-book) but is also being provided as a book free to students.
Dr. Palmer earned his B.A. in liberal arts from St. John's College, his M.A. in philosophy from The Catholic University of America, and his doctorate in political science from Oxford University, where he was an H. B. Earhart Fellow at Hertford College. During the late 1980s and the very early 1990s he worked with the Institute for Humane Studies and other organizations to spread classical-liberal/libertarian ideas in Eastern Europe. He traveled throughout the region to hold seminars and smuggled books, cash, photocopiers, and fax machines from an office in Vienna, Austria.
Palmer is currently attempting to duplicate in the Middle East some of the work he did in Eastern Europe. He has commissioned translation into Middle Eastern languages (Arabic, Kurdish, Persian, and Azeri) and publication of works by Frederic Bastiat, F. A. Hayek, James Madison, and other libertarian influences, and has published essays in Middle Eastern languages on such topics as "Challenges of Democratization" and "Religion and the Law."
In April 2005 Palmer addressed members of the Iraqi parliament in the parliamentary assembly hall on constitutionalism and has written on Iraq.] He has also promoted the creation of a libertarian web site, lampofliberty.org, where it is available in Arabic, Azerbaijani, Kurdish, and Persian; and started an Arabic publishing venture. He continues to lecture in the Middle East and works closely with Arabic and Persian bloggers. He has been actively involved in campaigning for free speech rights in the Middle East, notably with the campaign to free Abdelkareem Nabil Soliman, through articles in the Washington Post, the Daily Star of Lebanon, and other activities.
Palmer's political activities include being founding member and national secretary of the Committee Against Registration and the Draft (1979–81), president of the Oxford Civil Liberties Society (1993–94), and manager or communications director for several political campaigns. He was a plaintiff in Parker v. District of Columbia, a successful lawsuit in Washington, D.C. to secure the right to own a handgun in one's home, based on the text of the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
- To contribute to his project and watch free videos, http://atlasnetwork.org/blog/2011/02/the-morality-of-free-enterprise/
- Learn of his latest work, please see: http://tomgpalmer.com/
Categories: ALL, Devolve, IMPROVE Lifestyle


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Sno Caps
Sno Caps History
The Blumenthal Brothers Chocolate & Cocoa Company, started in 1911 in the Philadelphia area, manufactured its first candy product in 1922.
It was called the Bob White, a large (2 1/2 inch in diameter) nonpareil. In the late 1920's, the size of the Bob White was reduced drastically to small, rounded wafers of chocolate covered with tine pellets of sugar. These were marketed under the trade name of Sno-Caps. Today they are made by the Nestle' Company.
Sno Caps Memories
Oh, the memories that Sno Caps bring to mind... Ever since I was a little girl the best thing about going to the movies has been Sno Caps. My best friend has always bought a box of Raisinets, and I've always bought a box of Sno Caps. My sister and my friend's brothers always tease us about it. I've even been known to go to a movie I had no interest in seeing, just so I could get some Sno Caps! My sister once offered to pay for my candy herself if I'd just eat something besides Sno Caps, but I refused. The guy at the candy counter looked at me like I was crazy! I guess he just doesn't appreciate how good dark chocolate and little white sprinkles can really be.
Of course, I'd be crazy if I just gobbled down those delicious candies all in the space of an hour or two. When I was little I couldn't resist that temptation, but now I find myself drawing one box out for days, eating just a few little Sno Caps at a time. The only drawback is when I forget that I've stuffed the box into my purse. Do you have any idea how hard it is to explain to someone why there are sprinkles all over their freshly cleaned kitchen floor because you've dropped your purse? It's a little bit awkward, to say the least, but people are usually amused in cases like that. And when they're not, well, sometimes you get lucky and find out that they can be talked into forgiveness with whatever Sno Caps survived the spill!
Anyway, it's so great to see Sno Caps available on your site! I can't find them at any of the stores in town, and a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do to get her candy. Which, in this case, happens to be prowling the web until finding your site. I can't wait to show this site to my dad, especially; I'll bet he hasn't seen some of these candies since he was in elementary school way back when! ~ Crystal from Texas


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The RS Series suspension kit is our most popular coilover. Featuring a 36-way damping and rebound adjustable monotube design, RS Series coilovers are perfect for the modified street car that also sees occasional track days. This coilover has separate height and preload adjustments allowing for optimal suspension tuning while maintaining full strut travel at all times.
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