|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Posts
 Recent Posts
I can't believe 1) this film was a direct-to-DVD release and 2) it's three years old. An absolute gem; you will not be displeased. This is my new favorite Hallowe'en movie. It is absolutely perfect. 5 out of 5.
Games to be run:
Shared-worlds:
Willing to play D&D 4E, you must GM I have most of the manuals for all versions, and a ridiculous number of adventures/modules if you are interested in DM. Contact me on the Global, Andrew.lee.turner
After stumbling across the Blizzard patches for OS X, I reinstalled this on my iMac today. Great fun to be had by all, and I'm surprised at that, too. I mean, the game is over ten years old at this point. Nonetheless, does anyone know of any way to use the keyboard to move and pick up items? Using the mouse is beyond easy, but while I have a spare wired keyboard, I haven't owned a wired mouse in years--batteries aren't cheap, and I can imagine replacing them pretty quickly if I'm constantly depressing that left button for hours on end.
No, this is a completely different tale--ghosts and tunnels and time weirdness and Lovecraft and Nyarlathotep and Alaska and stuff.
Not about monsters at all; and you'll either love it or hate it. Amazing film--budget: $15,000. Absolutely, this film is the epitome of creative resourcing and demonstrates what can be done for, literally, a few pennies and a lot of motivation.
I've found that I need at least a couple hours by myself after I awake in the morning, else I'm ineffective at everything until late afternoon. Anyone else seemingly unable to function without such a long period of gearing up? I'm able to sleep on command--no issues of insomnia. I dream immediately, which I know is not generally healthy. A five minute doze can leave me feeling like I slept for hours, mentally, but does nothing for me physically. Left to my own devices, I can easily sleep for 12 hours or more. Less than seven hours is simply not enough.
I thought it was an interesting statement. Is this universally true? Are atheists the same way? People who don't care -- will they never care? So is the predisposition to remain steadfast, no matter the issue, or is it to the issue itself?
The key difference in D&D and all your examples is that in D&D magic might rule the world and be actively used to benefit others. In your examples, magic is always either very understated or very negatively portrayed. I think many Christians might disagree with associating a divine miracle with divine magic. Just my opinion.
Therein lies a chief concern--is a devout Christian one who emulates the teachings of Christ or one who worships Christ/God? There must be a fundamental distinction between believing in Christ and believing in the teachings of Christ; which is not to say you can't do both. However, if you believe in Christ, you accept the supernatural as a matter of course. It's not much of a stretch to take the next step and agree that if you therefore accept the supernatural, then Scriptural admonitions to remove yourself from all trappings of the Occult are not metaphorical warnings designed to protect the naive from charlatans and conmen, but genuine warnings against trafficing with supernatural entities and associating with mysticism--for this set, magic is physically real. Does a devout Christian believe in loving his fellow man, or evangelizing to his fellow man in order to save his soul? Many might argue they're one and the same. If you're Christian, I think it's a bit of a contradiction to call yourself devout but not believe that 'the only way to Heaven is through Christ.' I might ask, does 'through Christ' mean emulation of the Christ-like behavior, or literally belief in Christ the Supernatural?
Moving along, now... There's another recent thread around here asking whether Christians should play Pathfinder (and D&D, in general); an argument I thought was pretty much put to bed. Nonetheless, I mentioned the topic to one of my players this afternoon (we went to his house for a BBQ), and he said, rather without much apparent thought, "It's doubtful devout Christians would actively play the game. The basic elements are pretty anti-scripture." He paused. "Unless they turned the game into a kind of evangelical roleplay--mini-crusades and Paladins spreading the Gospel." "What about me?" I asked, a bit miffed. He gave me a half-sardonic look as he turned the burgers on the grill, grease sizzling and spitting, and raised one incredulous eyebrow. "Andy...when was the last time you went to Mass? Easter?" OK, so I'm not exactly devout, and my 'position improvement' on Life, the Universe and Everything continues to chip away at any notions of faith, as defined by my upbringing and the Church. My wife, herself a lapsed CoE / Anglican, tells me I'm a hair's-breadth from secular humanist / atheist. So maybe, for me, it's a non-question because I've simply stopped asking it. If Christians are, Scripturally, supposed to abjure all things Occult and associated with the Occult, wouldn't any positive representation of magic or witchcraft be counterproductive? If gods and the like are identified by Scripture as devils and demons who led previous generations of man astray, wouldn't playing a game where you pretend to worship, of all things, the God of Magic, significantly undermine the very precept itself? I could actually go on and on like this, but we here have heard these exact arguments before. I remain unfazed; and the issue, for me, remains a nonissue. My friend's final comment on the subject went something like this-- "Do you really believe there are so many Christians--Sunday-Go-To-Church Christians--playing D&D? Wouldn't it be a grand coup if they were all Pretend-Christians, just going through the motions, saying the right words, making the right gestures? What better way to mainstream the hobby than by converting the naysayers of the 80s into the players of today? Wolves in Sheep's clothing, and all that jazz..."
Here's a suggestion for the far future, when you have absolutely nothing else to do... Under 'Recent Posts' for an individual member, organize the posts by thread showing the most recent thread contributions, rather than individual in sequence posts. Then, drop downs for each thread contribution showing the posts; finally, drop downs showing specific replies to those posts.
I understand you to be saying, and I'm rephrasing here, "The majority of people agree this is an important question [therefore, it must be]." That is the epitome of an appeal to the people. I'm just saying...
All of us write professionally some 5000-10000 words a day as it is... I'd be leery to start requiring adventure journals. I'm also, as I mentioned before, a little concerned regarding his motives for joining the group... I'm not sure I want to encourage further departures from his real life issues, or to encourage intellectual escape when he's away from the gaming table.
So... If you've allowed for an open account, and friended everyone who asks for it... how can watching your status be stalking? If you didn't friend a person, but they continue to watch your page, on an open forum...how is that stalking? I mean, if I routinely sit on my front porch, which has a direct view of your living room window, and you don't have any curtains...am I a Peeping Tom when you saunter naked across the room? Am I a digital stalker because I routinely visit your unprotected public facebook page? Mind you, I cancelled my account some time ago...
She apparently has biweekly sessions, and I've suggested he might want to be sure her analyst is aware she's hit-and-miss with the meds.
As a teen, I played D&D because I enjoyed (and still do) fantasy stories. I loved theatre and enjoyed acting and telling stories. I never played as an escape from anything. He tells me that's the only reason he played D&D. I suppose that's therapeutic, and if by pretending he was something more than himself he was able to work through his real world home issues, so much the better. He has, however, indicated that this is the chief reason he responded to my flyer last month. I'm not sure I'm comfortable with the idea, now that it's upon me. Suggestions on this are welcome, as well. Thanks, all. Edit: I should also mention that this person is a contract English teacher here in Korea, not a current service member, so he's a little limited in available military resources, since he's not a retiree.
Exactly what I said to him! In fact, I told him he should figure this out right now, while he's only worried about his own symptoms, rather than wait until they develop. He's not very receptive, though.
After several years hiatus, I've finally found myself in a position to start a gaming group. We've enjoyed three sessions so far, all the players are having fun, I'm having fun, and things look to be shaping up nicely. Then, yesterday, one of my players lays this one on me: As a child he lived with an emotionally abusive mother who was also clinically depressed. Apparently, his situation was so bad that he became suicidal, almost reaching commitment on several occasions. Once he graduated high school and moved out of the house, that is, changed his environment, his entire outlook on life changed. After college, he moved back home for some time and found himself right back where he was as a teenager--actually suicidal. Fortunately, he recognized what was happening, and that's when he joined the army. This was all a good fifteen years ago, and he's lived a healthy, productive life since, with nary a depressed thought. Last year, he got married. He has enjoyed a full year of happy marriage and they've just had their first child. His wife is now suffering from Postpartum Depression and is on medication. He's having a tough time, though, getting her to regularly take her meds. According to him, she's the woman he married when she's taking her prescription, but if she skips for two or three days, her mood immediately darkens. Here's the crux--he's beginning to notice signs of the old depression in himself and he's worried he won't be able to hold it in check. I told him to make an appointment for himself, but he's of the belief he can manage himself so long as his wife manages her meds. I have absolutely no experience with this sort of thing. I've dealt with depressed subordinates before, but never with peers, and certainly never with this kind of situation. Suggestions?
Generally speaking, are you talking about combined knowledge of our species? Are you talking about collaborative knowledge and the exchange of ideas and science? I have a feeling you're talking about philosophical or theosophical reasoning, and if that's the case, I'd not be so harsh with people in general.
Weekends are filled with all variety of activities. Outdoor events were easier in Alaska, year round, but are a bit more problematic here in Seoul. We do a lot of arts and crafts, games, etc. The problem with tv happens during the week. I head in to work at 0600 and usually get home around 1800. We eat, finish up homeworks, and then the kids are all off to bed by 2030. That period between 1430 and the end of school, and when I get home is where tv land comes in to play. I find it difficult to justify to my rather precoscious 8 year old reasons she shouldn't watch shows all her friends are watching; shows that aren't particularly objectionable, and especially when I notice intellectual benefit ( like improved vocabulary and reasoning skills).
My wife doesn't care for programming like The Wizards of Waverly Place or iCarly, shows which my 8 year old adores. Specifically, my wife sees the shows as nonsense with no redeeming qualities, and finds the scripts rife with anti-adult references and conceits (adults in general and parents in particular are often portrayed as bumbling idiots with no social grace or cultural sense). The children tend to use language, gestures and expressions consistent with more adult notions of self-assurance, self-confidence and self-reliance. I don't particularly enjoy the shows, but they're watchable and, to me, not objectionable. I notice a marked improvement in my daughter's cognitive reasoning and language skills when she watches these shows as opposed to standard children's fare like Dora or Sesame Street. My wife complains that when she (the little girl) watches Little Bear, she's polite and sweet, but when she watches iCarly or Wizards, she's snippy and acts like a 12 year old. Anyone else have any experience in this area? Suggestions or comments?
5 Questions every intelligent atheist must answer Very nicely done, Samnell.
Here's what I've picked up over the years: listen to the women in your life, and when they tell you or you overhear them say a certain person is attractive, pay attention to the physical aspects mentioned. Apply those aspects to men you see on the street. While you may not personally understand why a cleft chin is attractive, or a flat nose is not, you may at least be able to recognize what a woman is likely to find attractive. Another method is to recognize features in other men that you want to emulate or wish you could--that's essentially what women are doing when they compliment one another.
I thought it was funny. Here's a great film I watched last night--everyone here should check it out.
There was an article way back in the 90s, when the 'complete and uncut' edition was released, which spoke to the same thing--say there's some significant global event in the next five hundred years, which throws all of us into a Cormac McCarthy novel; then add another 200-500 years to that. It's a stretch to say that anyone would ever stumble across a hardcover of King's novel (or any of the hundreds of other similar books that would as aptly fit the bill), since not even Easton Press books are likely to survive exposure for a thousand years (despite their claims of 1,000-year paper). Nonetheless, it's absolutely plausible that King's tale, if available in some form, could be taken for a kind of religious history of The Long Ago... scholars and archaeologists arguing over whether the events of The Gunslinger occurred before or after events as described in The Stand...
New iPod shuffle
New Apple TV (my favorite end-of-year item) New iTunes interface Thoughts?
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/At_the_Mountains_of_Madness/fullI've been saying that for years, ever since I heard he wanted to do it. A faithful interpretation would be a bomb of ridiculous proportions.Can you elaborate? I've read the novella at least a dozen times since I was a kid. I think it's possible to make a good film. I also think some things will have to be changed, ala LotR. I was asking for some specifics of why you think it's likely to bomb.
Quick thoughts before I head off to the office: Aristotle and Aquinas both argued that actions committed by animals are similar to actions committed by the mentally infirm--animals (as far as we know...) commit acts of violence as necessary to their survival, and those acts are either instinctual or learned processes derived from instinct; this is to say, animals are unreasoned aggressors. Man differs because of his capacity to reason, his ability to weigh a situation and choose a course of action. Thus, animals may cause harm, but they are relatively unable to do otherwise, being motivated by instinct untempered by any ability to reason. In the Western tradition, Soldiers have long been exonerated from the term 'murderer' so long as they have conducted themselves in accordance with the Just War theory.
And for certain devout, fundamentalist Christians, all the good works in the world won't help you when Judgement Day arrives--you must acknowledge Christ as the Savior and so on, ad naseum. For this set of believers, today's teens are in immortal danger of losing their preferred parking at Club Heavenly Passion. I jest, but there are those who are, indeed, quite passionate about all this.
My take is that church leaders are worried the next generation of believers will be more secular humanists than in-awed God-fearers. If today's Christian teens begin doing good for the sake of their fellow man (rather than as a means of spreading the Gospel), then they might naturally begin to forsake that most important mission of most Christian denominations--evangelism. It might seem a stretch to some, but the logical result of such a scenario is one where brick-and-mortar churches are literally unnecessary, since God will have become a personal and singularly identifiable idea to whom one may connect on an individual basis; and whom requires no acknowledgement of His omnipotence. Ultimately, if this concept of kindness-for-the-sake-of-kindness approach spread nationally (daresay, globally?), many might come to the conclusion that things are measurably better without God and church in mix.
"If you don't say you're doing it because of your faith, kids are going to say my parents are really nice people," Dean says. "It doesn't register that faith is supposed to make you live differently unless parents help their kids connect the dots." Most teens turn out to be 'fake Christians,' at least according to those interviewed for this CNN article. The above quote begs the question--wouldn't doing a good deed for absolutely no other reason that the good of another person represent the highest natural evolution of basic Christian philosophy; in fact, doesn't it coincide with Christ's own highest-priority message-- to love your fellow man. I might argue that saying you do a thing because God expects it implies that I might not do an otherwise good thing if God didn't necessarily expect it--essentially, I'm doing this because I've been told to rather than that I've come to see this thing as morally or even incidentally correct.
I normally answer this question with an immediate and resounding, "Beowulf!"---I mean, I did spend three years studying it to the near-exclusion of all else. But on aged reflection, I realize it's Ulysses by James Joyce. I really wanted to commit my dissertation on Joyce, but at the time there were some 16 other candidates reading for Joyce and I was advised to pick anything else. I loved Joyce; idolized him, and still do... my fiancée at the time, also in the English department at UNC, hated Joyce. I'm convinced to this day that we broke it off over Bloomsday 1997...I chose to make the trip to Dublin that summer instead of the NC Writers Conference, where she would be speaking. Today, I am happily married to a completely different woman from a completely different part of the world...and she adores Joyce.
Eye for an eye, spinal cord injury for a spinal cord injury... Just when I think the world is mostly a civilised place to live, there's something like this.
I agree, Monster Camp is much better. I actually wouldn't mind volunteering for the staff the next time I'm stationed at Lewis.
I really thought it was staged... If not, then the film does a lot to perpetuate negative stereotypes. Viewed as comedy, it comes off as pretty clever. I've never watched the credits, but I'm pretty sure the USAF would never have allowed cameras into a real formation and staff meeting, especially not for an rpg documentary.
Question really is have the couple worked it out for themselves by the time they committed to the marriage and family bit? That's where the answer lies. I'm RC, my wife is Episcopalian. We worked that out before we got married, and the kids have attended both Catholic Mass and CoE services--but my situation is very different from my friend's. He's a quiet atheist, his wife is Assembly of God (I'm not totally sure what that is, but he tells me they routinely have someone fall out and writhe around in the aisle, speak in Tongues, etc.) When he and his wife married, everything seemed fine--he's not a militant atheist, and not self-marketing either, no Darwin fish or Ban Religion bumper stickers. When they had kids, he had no problem sending them to a religious private school, until his 7 year old came home one day and asked him if he was worried about burning forever in the Lake of Fire... And when he brought this up with his wife, she told him, essentially, "from the mouths of babes..."
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
