Psalm 89:46

How long, O Lord?  Will you hide yourself forever?

Listening (4)

He kept insisting that he *was* listening, and he *wanted* to hear, and I was finding it very odd that, even in the midst of insisting he was listening, he obviously wasn't.

And in trying to parse out what it was that proved that he wasn't listening, I realized he was like ELIZA.  ELIZA is an extremely simplistic attempt at artificial intelligence (more than six decades old, now), which appears to converse by discarding most common words in English, picking up only keywords.  So, it discards any detail or nuance.

But, whereas ELIZA uses the keywords to prompt the other side of the conversation to "Tell me more about [keyword]," he uses it as a prompt to his own version of generative AI.  Gen/AI uses keywords to generate a stream of text which is glib and plausible, even if it is wrong.  It is completely unconcerned with meaning, so it never knows when it is wrong.  He, basically, is always confident that he is correct, and it never occurs to him that his (often partial) idea may not be what the other party means.  As long as he is able to generate a stream of plausible words (with toxic positivity guardrails), he is doing his job.

It has been said that when we try to teach machines how to learn, it turns out that they don't, and we do.  I am aware that some of the pointed failures of large language models and generative AI have prompted those interested in neurology to question the neural network models which have informed both artificial intelligence, and neurobiology, for at least the past four decades.  The success of neural networks in some areas has prompted a fairly firm belief in the truth of the model.  In fact, there is relatively little actual evidence for the model, other than the fact that the black box that is the brain does seem to operate similarly to the output of neural networks, in very simple cases.  Science, however, is in the business of testing a hypothesis against all cases, and even a single failure may indicate that the hypothesis is flawed.  Sometimes fatally so.

But there is a possibility that we can learn from even our flawed attempts to understand the human brain, and psychology.  The errors and hallucinations that we are now seeing from gen/AI may point out common errors in psychology.

I have studied listening for more than five decades now.  I have attempted to put it into practice.  I can't say that my early practice and experiments were particularly good, but, even back then, they definitely provided benefits.  However, I can say that ELIZA, itself, even in those early days, provided me with some valuable lessons, and tools, in listening.  When I realized how very simple ELIZA was, and yet how effective it was, I used the utility of this simple matter of picking out keywords, and encouraging the respondent to tell me more about one or more keywords.  I also learned to identify multiple keywords, and to keep some in reserve, when a particular line of prompting remained unfruitful.

But that was early days, and simple stuff.  This recent experience, coupled with the enormous interest in generative AI, has provided new opportunities.  In the same way that we are trying to debug generative AI models, by identifying and examining the errors that generative AI make, we should be able to identify our own errors in the practice of listening, and other relational and psychological tools.  These tools are not yet a science.  Or, rather, the use of these tools is not yet a science.  It is still very much an art, and there are practitioners who are good at using the tools, such as listening, and those who, despite great professed interest in the tools, such as listening, are still unable to use them effectively.  If I had a nickel for every person who told me that they were a good listener, and then, immediately and very profoundly, demonstrated that they had no skill in listening at all, I would be an extremely rich man.

So it may possibly be that, probably much to the dismay of the individuals, venture capitalists, and corporations who are pouring billions of dollars into generative AI, that this is, once again a matter of finding out that the machines don't, and we do.  It may be that the greatest benefit of generative AI is in teaching us where some of our models of psychology are incorrect, and in prompting other, more useful tools, or instructions on the use of existing tools, such as listening and active listening.

MGG - 5.41 - HWYD - Cleveland ...

I got through to Thursday before the next disaster happened.  Thursday my pants went through in the crotch.  By this time I knew my class well enough to admit this happenstance to them.  Immediately, several of them mentioned a particular store name.  I figured that this was similar to a Moore's store in Canada: a menswear store, not too terribly expensive, with a wide range in stock.  And, generally speaking, a seamstress on site who could do minor alterations.  Like hemming pants.  Which I tend to need rather a lot, being shorter than average.

I didn't have a chance to put this to the test in Cleveland.  They told me you could find this particular store pretty much anywhere.  Although they didn't know where to find one in Cleveland.  And, as the travel office has made good on its promise, I was leaving fairly early after I finished the seminar on Friday.

So, I finished the seminar, drove back to the airport as fast as I could, and got on the flight to Florida.  It was a bit more difficult picking up my rental car in Florida, but I eventually got it, and drove to Cocoa Beach.  Where I have been told to book a hotel, and the travel office had.  By that time I was pretty tired, so I went to bed, and figured that I would search for this particular menswear store in the morning.

In the morning I looked out to a lovely summer day, in November, looked down the street, and, two blocks away, saw a sign with the name of this particular store.  I figured this was a promising indication.  I drove down to the mall that had this particular sign.  I parked the car.  I started walking to this particular store.  As I was walking towards the store, it looked a bit less promising.  It looked fairly small.  And it looked less like a Moore's than a Value Village.  As I got up to it, I determined that, yes, it *was* a Value Village.  It was a thrift store.  And a small one at that.  The odds of being able to obtain dress pants, in my size, at this store, had, in my opinion, plummeted.

But, having come this far, I walked in.  I found the section of men's wear, considerably smaller than the section of women's wear.  I walked to the only rack of pants.  I walked down to the end of the rack, where my waist size should be.  There were a few pants in my size.  One of them was black.  I figured this was it.  I picked up the pair of pants, and took them to a fitting room, first to see if I could get them on, and then to see how much I would have to have the hem taken up.

I put them on. They fit.  Not just for the waist, they fit for length.  What are the odds?

So, I went back to the hotel.  And realized, on the way, that I could, in fact, visit the NASA visitor's centre, since I didn't have to find a dry cleaner to get my pants hemmed.  So I asked how far it was to the visitor's centre.  And got directions.  And drove there.  And parked.

And, walking across the parking lot towards the gates, noted various packages, at various prices.  And figured this is the only time I'm going to be able to do this in my life, so why not go whole hog?  So I got to the gate, and asked for the most expensive package.  The cashier started throwing slips of paper at me, and as she threw one of the last pieces of paper at me, said, "And, of course, that's good for tomorrow as well."  I had no idea what she was talking about.  I took the various pieces of paper, got to some place where I could sit down and spread them out on a table, and started reading.  Because I had picked the most expensive package, my entry was good for two consecutive days.  If I had decided to wait until Sunday to go, it would have been of no use to me, because I would have been teaching on Monday, and I would not have been able to take advantage of the two consecutive days.  But, as it was, I could spend the entire weekend at the NASA visitor's centre.   So I did.

It is rather impressive that, taking what is arguably the greatest single technological achievement of mankind, in the entire world, they have turned it into an amusement park.  It takes some doing to trivialize an event like that down to a theme park.

But, I enjoyed it as best I could.  When I stood under the Saturn 5 rocket, in the Saturn 5 building, I started to cry.  I just couldn't help it.

Now, of course, you cannot walk to the Saturn 5 building from the visitor's centre.  You have to take a bus.  There are buses that run you to some tours where they can walk you through some of the other buildings, but while you can walk in the Saturn 5 Hall at will, you cannot get there at will.  Cape Canaveral is a military installation.  They have a .50 calibre machine gun at the gate, for anyone who thinks that they can just drive in.

But Meares Island, which is also Cape Canaveral, is a wildlife sanctuary.  In case something blows up, they need a lot of room.  But as long as things aren't blowing up, they need the space, but they have no use for it.  So, it's a wildlife sanctuary.

Americans are very big on seeing the American Eagle, which is what they call a bald eagle.  There are, apparently, fourteen nesting pairs on Meares Island.  But only one nesting site is close enough to a road that the buses can use.  And it's a fair distance from the road.  And when the bus driver calls out that we are stopped so that they can see the nesting pair, in their nest, at the tree on the left side of the bus, everybody rushes to the left side of the bus, and the bus rocks, heeling over to the left.

I think it was the same trip, and I was seated right behind the driver, when the driver, somewhat carelessly, let out the comment that, "Oh, there's an alligator in the ditch."  Once again, everybody in the bus rushed to the right side, to see the alligator.  I could hear the bus driver mutter, under his breath, "Ten billion dollars worth of technology, and everyone wants to see the alligator in the ditch."

Previous: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/09/mgg-540-hwyd-dublin-etc.html

Introduction and ToC: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2023/10/mgg-introduction.html

Next: TBA

Starry, starry zoomed in night?

Another in the series of explorations with my new phone camera.  It has a high-resolution setting, which, for some reason, won't do anything with zoom or flash.  (Why it won't use flash I find *really* weird.)  But it, generally, still provides an acceptable picture if you take the hi-res shot and crop it.  So, in exploring cropping at various levels, I have found not only the acceptable cropping ranges, but also that, beyond those ranges, the limitations of the images sometimes provide some interesting effects.  I have, for example, found some that start to look like watercolours, and others that start to look pointalistic.  This one gave me a Van-Gogh-ish impression (get it? never mind).

CISSP Seminar (still free!) update

My weird experiment of providing the CISSP review seminar online, free, on social media, is almost complete.

Well, in a sense it *is* complete.  Yesterday I recorded the last of the video entries, completing the ethics part of the Law, Investigation, and Ethics domain.  So, it's all "in the can," and, if I stick to the same schedule of posting, in a month it'll all be available online.  As of yesterday, all of the seminar materials: the introduction [CISSP 0.xx], security management [CISSP 1.xx] , access control [CISSP 2.xx, security architecture [CISSP 3.xx], applications security [CISSP 4.xx], cryptology [CISSP 5.xx], physical security [CISSP 6.xx], BCP [CISSP 7.xx], Telecommunications and networking [CISSP 8.xx], operations security [CISSP 9.xx], and law, investigations, and ethics [CISSP 10.xx]; are recorded.

The original announcement posting, with details of extra resources, is at

https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2023/02/cissp-seminar-free.html

The main repository, a playlist on YouTube, is at

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLUuvftvRsRv7D5PiHIULhhd9M032ej4_i

This "semi-completion" notice is at

https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/09/cissp-seminar-still-free-update.html

MGG - 5.40 - HWYD - Dublin (etc ...)

This, and the next few postings, sort of make up one long story, and the breaks are kind of arbitrary ...

One time they sent me to Dublin.  I was only supposed to be facilitating in Dublin for one week.  So, I had packed for one week.  At this stage, I was still doing the book reviews.  So, when I say "I packed," I packed the technical gear, and what I figured would be enough books for a long flight, and a week's worth of reviewing.  Because of a long flight there, and home, I wanted to pack more books.  When I was faced with a long flight, it was a constant battle between Gloria, and myself, as to the space in the suitcase for shirts, versus the space in the suitcase for books.  But we had pretty much worked out a compromise, at that point, for a one week trip.

On Wednesday, the office called and said they wanted me to do a seminar in Cleveland, after Dublin.  So, I said okay, and got on the phone to Gloria to inform her of the change.  Gloria was predictably put out.  I had four shirts.  Gloria didn't think that that was enough for two weeks.  Well, I told her, I have never yet been in a hotel that didn't have laundry service.  And, because the office had made a change to the schedule, I was allowed to expense the laundry service.

Remember, I'm still in Dublin.  I haven't even gotten to Cleveland yet.  And on Friday, the office calls, and says they want to me to add Florida after I finish in Cleveland.  I speak to the travel office, once again, pointing out that if it's a choice between Cleveland and Florida, I'd rather be in Florida.  So my new itinerary, for some reason, has me flying to Toronto, and then changing planes in Toronto, and flying to Cleveland.  All of which is happening on Saturday, once you account for the time change difference, when flying westbound for a considerable distance over an ocean.  The travel office has, apparently, booked me into the last hotel room available in Cleveland.  Why this is so I have no idea.

So, I get on the plane on Friday night, in Dublin.  And they land in Toronto about noonish on Saturday.  As I am landing at Pearson Airport, and changing planes, and, in particular, flying to the United States, I have to change terminals.  Not only do I have to change terminals, but I have to pick up my luggage at my original terminal (which means that I have to wait for my luggage to get off the plane), and get over to the other terminal, where I can depart to the United States.  This is, of course, because you clear US Customs in Pearson airport.

I finally get my bag.  I travel to the other terminal.  I find US Customs.  I find the lineup for US Customs.  I contact one of the people managing the line, and give her my flight number.  She looks up my flight number.  Even though my flight is now fairly close, she decides that I can stay in the lineup.  Eventually I get near the front of the lineup.  At this point the same agent has moved to a different occupation, managing the front of the lineup.  She is asking everyone what their flight numbers are.  I tell her my flight number.  Again.  She practically shrieks, "Why didn't you tell somebody that before!"  She takes me out of the lineup, and puts me in a shorter lineup, for people whose planes are getting ready to depart.  I get to a border agent.  I explained the situation to the border agent.  The border agent is interested in the fact that I am teaching information security.  How did you get started in that? he asks.  I explain about doing research into computer viruses.  The border agent gets *really* interested, and wants to ask me all kinds of questions about computer viruses.  Finally he lets me go.

I run to the gate.  There is absolutely no one there, except a gate agent.  And a door, which, fortunately, is open.  I tell the gate agent my flight number.  The gate agent points at the door.  I run out onto the tarmac and over to the nearest airplane, which happens to be a Twin Otter.  I run up the steps.  As soon as I set foot in the aircraft the flight attendant hauls the door closed.  I find a seat and sit down.  We get to Cleveland.

My suitcase doesn't.

A huge number of people are going to Cleveland and wanting to get taxis and rental cars to go to Cleveland.  Despite the huge lineup for people getting rental cars, when I do get to the front of the line, the travel office has booked me a car, so it's reserved, and I get my car.  I drive to my hotel.

When I get to my hotel, the parking lot is absolutely crammed.  I finally find a parking spot, and walk over to the lobby of the hotel.  There is a huge crowd of people outside the door, and a huger crowd inside the lobby.  There is an amazing volume of noise coming out of the restaurant.  I fight my way, very slowly, through, but finally make it up to the desk.  People around me are being told no they have no rooms, no they have no rooms.  When I finally get to the desk, and give my name, the person admits that yes, they do have a room reserved for me.  I get up to my room.  It is a smoking room.  You can definitely tell that it is a smoking room.  I go back down to the desk, fight my way back through the (by now *slightly* less crowded) lobby to the desk, and point out that my reservation was for a non-smoking room.  The front desk person admits that, yes, my reservation is for a non-smoking room, but that this room is all that is available.  There are no other rooms available in the hotel.

I take the smoking room. I open all the windows, and crack the heat.

The second time that I visited the front desk, the lobby was slightly less frantic, and so I was able to ask a few questions.  No, they had no other rooms available that night, but I could be moved the following day, Sunday, since they would not have as much activity and as many bookings and reservations.  It was the front desk staff who, when I asked why tonight was so busy but tomorrow night wouldn't be, that explained that the Cleveland Browns (if the Cleveland Browns play football, and I've got the right team name), were playing a game, and everybody was coming into town for the football game.

I find it hard to express my lack of interest in this type of event.

I noted the noise in the hotel, and the noise coming out of the restaurant, and was told that the restaurant was currently occupied by a birthday party, and, again, things would be much quieter the following day.

Apparently, Cleveland has a very good hospital.  Apparently, people come to it from far and wide for treatment.  And, apparently, an awful lot of people who come to the hospital stay at this particular hotel, which is the closest hotel to the hospital.  This particular hotel didn't seem very much like a hotel.  It seemed more like a fifteen storey high Motel 6.  Yes, it did have a restaurant.  However, no, it had no laundry service.  At all.  When I indicated to the staff that I had a rather desperate need for laundry service, they did offer to allow me to use the washer and dryer which they used for certain amounts of linen cleaning.  However, it didn't seem like that was going to work.  I would have to find a dry cleaner, and a dry cleaner that was open early enough that I could drop off my shirts before I had to make it to the teaching venue, and teach, so that I could get my shirts done.  (And I need to do socks and underwear as well, by this point.)

Due to some neglect or confusion between the booking office and the venue, the venue had not yet agreed to provide drinks and refreshments.  So, as happened more than once, the training office asked me to find and purchase comestibles and drinks so that there would at least be something in the training room.  This was actually a fairly important request.  The CISSP seminar was a fairly intense workshop.  The candidates were probably going to be fairly stressed.  it was therefore important that, at the very least, they have something to drink.  People who are under stress need something to eat and drink, and particularly to drink.  That is why we always insured that, at the very least, there was something to drink in the training room, and, by preference, coffee on the go at all times.

So, my Sunday off was not off.  On Sunday morning, I asked for directions to a grocery or convenience store.  The staff didn't have a clue.  I don't know if that was because they didn't frequent this part of town (which was a somewhat sketchy neighborhood, hospital notwithstanding), or whether, like so many front desk staff, they worked on the basis of single digit IQs.

So, I drove out, picked a road, picked a direction, and started driving.  And driving.  And driving.  I didn't pass anything that looked remotely like the grocery store.  I didn't pass anything that look conceivably like a convenience store.  Finally I passed what seemed to be a grocery store, although with wire grids, and chain link, and bars over the windows, it looked more like it was a pawn shop.  I confirmed that it was a grocery store, but also confirmed that it was going to be difficult getting a fair load of drinks and goodies from the store into the car, so I decided to travel on and see if I could do any better.  Apparently, I couldn't.  I drove for a considerable distance, without passing anything that was any better.  So, I drove back to the grocery store, bought various pastries, donuts, muffins, and juices, and made multiple trips out to the car to load up.

Having fulfilled my obligation to the training office, I did what I usually do when I'm in a strange town on a Sunday morning, and tried to find a church.  And tried.  And tried.  And tried.  Finally I found something that looked pretty church-like.  So, I parked there, and went in.  It was, in fact, a church.  A Black church.  So, I got to extend my research into the style of Black preaching.  Which, in this particular case, went on for three hours.

Following church, I went looking for dry cleaners.  I paid particular attention to hours.  I did find one that opened at 7:00 a.m.  As far as I was concerned, this was about the only possibility that would suit me.

By this time, the airline had delivered my suitcase.

So, I figured that I was prepared for Monday morning.  I had goodies in the car, and I had bagged up my shirts.  Except for the one that I was wearing that day for the seminar.

So, Monday morning, I headed first for the dry cleaner, dropped off my laundry, and went to the venue.  I lugged in all the juice and goodies.  I set up for the seminar.  And, somewhat more tired than usual, I delivered the seminar.

During the day, the booking office got in touch with the venue, and got them to agree to provide refreshments for the remainder of the seminar.  So, I was off the hook for heading back to that ridiculous grocery store, and hauling in juice and pastries every morning.

When I finally finished the seminar, Monday evening, I headed to the dry cleaners, having made sure that they were open long enough for me to pick up my laundry.  My laundry was done.  So was one of my shirts.  They had done a number on the collar, and even Gloria couldn't fix it.  So that shirt was done.

Previous: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/09/mgg-539-hwyd-regina-and-winterpeg.html

Introduction and ToC: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2023/10/mgg-introduction.html

Next: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/09/mgg-541-hwyd-cleveland.html

Ends of this world ...

The depression has gotten even worse, this summer, so both Numbers 11:15 and this meme I found on one of the grief accounts have both been pretty apt:

https://www.instagram.com/p/C_qK2DTumnK/

Fig propagation

I mentioned (on Facebook) that I've got rootlets on my fig propagation sticks.

I've noticed even more reliable signs of life on them. The one of the left is starting a new leaf bud/shoot, the one in the middle has a small-but-definite leaf, and the one of the left (whose leaves take up most of the picture, even though it is the smallest twig) has maintained two leaves, and grown a third.

PortAlberniHenge

Sermon 37 - Surreal

Sermon 37 - Surreal

Job 17:10

But come on, all of you, try again! I will not find a wise man among you.

Matthew 15:22-29

A Canaanite woman from that vicinity came to him, crying out, "Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is demon-possessed and suffering terribly."  Jesus did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him, "Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us.  He answered, "I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel."  The woman came and knelt before him.  "Lord, help me!" she said.  He replied, "It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs."  "Yes it is, Lord," she said. "Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table."

How many surrealists does it take to change a lightbulb?

Two.  One to hold the giraffe and the other to fill the bathtub with brightly colored machine tools.

How many surrealists does it take to change a lightbulb?

The fish!

How many surrealists does it take to change a lightbulb?

I don't know, AND IT'S NOT FUNNY!!!

The first sermon that I ever wrote, and which I worked on for about thirty years before ever writing it down, and which I still haven't preached, is entitled "Be Ye Hackers."  By extension, this sermon might be titled "Be Ye Surrealists."  So, I guess I've got to tell you what surrealists are, and why you should be like them.

Since most people are familiar with surrealism, if, indeed, they are familiar with surrealism at all, from the works of artists such as Salvador Dali, and his melting clocks, the average person could be forgiven for thinking that surrealism is an exploration of the *un*real.  However, if one looks at the French roots of surrealism, one notes the word "sur," which means above.  Also, since most people are at best familiar with surrealist paintings, they may not be aware of the other aspects of surrealism.  Surrealism was not only a movement, but almost a philosophy.  It was an attempt to explore reality, *real* reality, higher reality, *ultimate* reality.  It was an attempt to experience and explore reality that had been hidden, or biased, by the trammels of established thought, and even language.  Hence the attempts at surrealist prose and poetry, and the arguments among surrealists about whether words themselves had any meaning.  This is explored in pieces such as Madritte's painting "This is Not a Pipe (Ceci n'est pas une pipe)," which pointed out that the word pipe, and even an *image* of a pipe, was not an actual pipe.  Or, in another of Magritte's paintings, where he explores the possibility that it is just as true to call a bag the sky, rather than simply a bag.

One of the activities of the surrealists was to look for marvels.  And often the search for marvels was to search for marvels in the everyday.  The marvel of tiny growing things in the middle of the pavements of a city.  The marvel of the sparkles of crystals in a broken piece of rock in the masonry of a building.  (I have just discovered PortAlberniHenge sunrise.)  The surrealists were not bound simply by painting, but explored prose and poetry.  They also explored other fields of activity, although most of these were in the arts.  It might be a little bit dangerous to do surrealistic explorations of chemistry.

In terms of the search for marvels, the surrealists followed, and anticipated, a great many philosophers and writers of modern self-help books, who highly recommend the exploration of the everyday.  Finding the beauty in everyday things.  Finding the marvels in the everyday.  Looking for the beauty of the ultimate reality, in the most ordinary of things and circumstances.

I rather doubt that there was any agreement among the surrealists in regard to religion, since there was so much disagreement amongst them about so many other areas.  And because surrealists were fighting against, and trying to free thoughts from, the limitations and restrictions imposed by established ideas and social orders, they were frequently fighting against established religion.  However, I would make the case that the surrealist were all, even if they didn't realize it, at the very least deists.  Yes, I would say this, even in preference over theists.  The surrealists seemed to have a faith that the ultimate reality, whatever it was, was beautiful, and worth pursuing.  In this way they all seem to be searching for, and exploring the "God-shaped hole" in ourselves that C.S. Lewis posits.  If we are unfulfilled by what we can find in the world, it is because there is a hole in our lives, and the shape of that hole can only be filled by God.

Okay, you may be thinking that saying "God" is pushing things a bit.  However, consider.  The surrealists knew that they were looking for something that had been hidden by society.  They weren't exactly sure what they were searching for.  What "ultimate reality" it was that society, and the structures of society, and the rules and protocols of society, and even the restrictions of standard artistic formats, and the limitations and restrictions of words themselves, hid from them.  They had to go searching elsewhere.  They had to try automatic writing.  They had to try bringing images of opposite types of concepts together.  Of opposing concepts.  They didn't know what they were looking for, and they knew that they didn't know it.  It was, in the famous words of Rumsfeld, a known unknown.  They knew that society's structures and restrictions hid some important aspects of reality.  Of ultimate reality.  And they were not only willing, but even eager to explore something that they knew they didn't know.  They had faith.  They had faith that what they were looking for was worth finding.  That it was beautiful.  That it was good.  That it was worth dedicating themselves, their minds, their time, their thought, and a great deal of energy, to finding.  That requires a *lot* of faith.  You don't put that much energy into looking for something if you think that what you are going to find is going to be a disappointment.  You don't put that much effort into looking for something, if you feel that what you were going to find is going to be ordinary.  When you are dedicating that much of your life to finding something, you think that you are searching for a treasure, hidden in a field.  You think you are looking for a pearl of great price.  You think you are looking for an ultimate reality that is, in fact, buried treasure.  Buried by layers of strictures, limitations, structures, and restrictions of society.  But a buried treasure nonetheless, and, therefore, a treasure worth searching for and finding.

And do not a great many people tell us to look for God in the everyday?  Does not the Bible, itself, tell us to look for God in the everyday?  Consider the works of his hands.  That's what the surrealists were doing, even if they didn't know him, at the time.

So, I would submit that not only the surrealist, but everyone who is telling us to look for the beauty, and the marvels, and the treasures in the everyday, is actually telling us to look for God.

The surrealists would probably dispute this, and likely very strongly.  In terms of the established structures of society, and the restrictions on what you can and cannot think, the established church has got to be one of the most structured and restrictive.  The French Catholic Church was perhaps not as closely tied to the government as the Irish Catholic church, where the Irish Catholic Church essentially *was* the department of social welfare, and particularly for children and families.  But the Catholic church was a very strong, and often restrictive, force in society.  Therefore, the surrealists were, primarily, against it.

America, with its constitutional separation of church and state, does not, officially, have an established church.  Or, rather, *officially* America does not have an established church.  *Unofficially*, of course, a great many Americans consider that they live in a Christian country, and, indeed, see themselves as Christendom.  This is particularly true of the American religious right.  Indeed, it is interesting to note that the religious right, in America, has more to do with politics than it does with theology.  For example, in the 1980 election presidential election, the religious right did not support Jimmy Carter, who was a Christian, or John Anderson, who was a Christian, but Ronald Reagan, who never made any pretense of being a Christian.  The American religious right has, fairly consistently, followed this same pattern in terms of which political candidates to support.  This is even stronger in the case of American Christian Nationalism.

Jesus said that you cannot serve both God and money.  A great many Christians in the western world would vociferously dispute this.  A great many Christians have bought into the idea of a transactional religion, and the prosperity gospel.  If you do what God says, God will bless you, materially.  God will increase your business and your bank account.  God will make you rich.  And, in fact, it is often seen that the transaction is fairly one-sided.  You don't have to determine, in advance, what it is that God wants you to do.  If you become rich, then God has obviously blessed you.  You are, therefore, almost by definition, doing what God wants.  The proof is that God has blessed you, and you have a large bank account.

You only have to look at the American megachurches to see the strong case for this.  The megachurches have enormous budgets.  They have enormous costs, as well, which they mention when requesting people who listen to their broadcast to send them money.  Their revenues are enormous.  The pay, for their superstar preachers, is similarly enormous.  This is not seen as a problem.  This is simply seen as evidence that God loves the megachurches, and the superstar preachers, and the proof is, they are rich.  No further proof is needed.

Jesus statement that we are to render unto Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and unto God what belongs to God, is seen as a minor side issue.  The prosperity gospel is all important.  That we are rich proves the validity of the prosperity gospel, and proves that we are doing what God wants.  The fact that this is circular reasoning, and pretty much proves nothing, is lost on those who have confirmation bias in favor of the prosperity gospel.  So, while the surrealists might have reacted very strongly against the idea that they were looking for God, they certainly *did* have a good point to make about how established social structures prevents us from seeing the truth.

Surrealists had another unusual tactic for fighting against restrictions.  Surrealists had their own form of humour.  Predictably, this was humour which attempted to break away from traditional norms and forms of humour in the culture they came out of.  Surrealist humourists were not necessarily terribly funny.  It's difficult to take to create great humour and comedy when you take your self too seriously.

However, surrealist attempts at humor brought us the theater of the absurd, and absurdist humour, and subsequently the likes of such great comedy products as The Goon Show, Beyond the Fringe, and Monty Python.  The surrealists were absolutely correct about one thing.  Comedy is almost always subversive.  Comedy is one of the first things that authoritarian dictators try to stamp out.  Comedy tends to point out how silly, and how pompous, and how wrong, we often are.  I think it was more generally about art that various people have said it is a lie that tells the truth.  But it can equally apply to humor and comedy, and sometimes even more so.

Now, I may have lost some of you at this point, with the mere mention of Monty Python.  Some of you have never seen or listened to Monty Python.  To which I can only say, poor you.  But, yes, I am quite well aware that it is not to everyone's taste.  And I know that Christians, and church groups, and ministers, particularly, look at it somewhat askance.  It's dangerous stuff.  It's often rude.  (Although I wonder if it is as rude as music hall and vaudeville humour, which doesn't elicit quite the same negative reaction.  But we'll leave that for another time.)

I do remember one time at a summer, residential, Christian kids camp.  At this particular camp, the central lead staff had taken all the important tasks upon themselves, leaving us poor counselors with absolutely nothing to do except to bring the charges in our cabins to Jesus.  This was difficult to do, since it was obvious to our young charges that we were of absolutely no importance.  The lead Central camp staff were the important ones: they were the ones who did all the fun stuff.  This centralization extended even to skit night.  Skit night, traditionally, in most residential camps, has the campers coming up with skits.  But you can't really depend on campers not to perform some skit that might be a bit rude.  So the central lead staff had taken it upon themselves to write, create, and act in all of the skits for skit night.  The only thing for the campers, and we counselors, to do was to sit in the audience.  By this point in the week some of the counselors were feeling a bit rebellious, and asked if we might be allowed one slot to put on a skit.  The camp staff, very begrudgingly, allowed us to do that.  Having won the battle for a slot, we had exhausted our energy, and so nobody could come up with a good skit.  So I, from memory, wrote down Monty Python's "Dead Parrot sketch," and that's what we performed.

I should also mention that, over the course of the summer, the central lead staff had found that their skits weren't actually particularly funny.  They had, therefore, started to modify what they were doing in this case.  The skits had, over the course of the summer, and the different camps, gotten somewhat cruder.  By the time of the camp of which I am speaking, the skits were pretty raw.

The morning after skit night, the speaker for the week, who was, of course, one of the ministers of the denomination, felt the need to complain about skit night.  He noted that the skits were, for the most part, very rude and crude.  He went so far as to say that the only skit that was even mildly amusing was "that thing about the parrot."  I was rather surprised.  This was the only time I had ever heard a minister of our denomination praise Monty Python.  (I do have to note that I very much doubt that the minister recognized where the "Dead Parrot" sketch came from.)

Gloria mostly went along with the thought and opinion about Monty Python in our church.  She wasn't interested.  I didn't particularly mind: we talked about lots of other things.  But she had, pretty much from the beginning of our marriage, warned me that her first husband had found her embarrassing.  He was particularly embarrassed if she enjoyed something.  And particularly if she laughed out loud.  She warned me that, one time, they went to see a comedy movie, and she, Gloria, started laughing out loud, and so much, that her first husband left the theater, and wouldn't come back in.  I always told her that I never minded her enjoyment of something in life, or her expression of that enjoyment.  I always thought it was great, and that other people often enjoyed her enjoyment, and I never tried to shush her, if she was, even vocally, enjoying something.

And then my little brother gave us tapes of two of the Monty Python movies.  For a long time they just sat there, on the shelf.  Gloria wasn't interested in watching them, and I had already seen them.  I have a pretty good memory, so it didn't bother me.  But it *did* bother Gloria that I wasn't getting to enjoy something that I enjoyed.  So, one night, she gritted her teeth, and suggested that we watch "And Now for Something Completely Different."

As soon as the movie started, Gloria sat bolt upright, and yelled out, "that's the movie!"  Apparently, this was the movie that had caused her to laugh out loud in the movie theater.  This was the movie that Gloria's first husband never got to see, because he was so embarrassed that she was enjoying it, and laughing out loud.

I never would have guessed it, and I'm still not exactly sure what it means.  But score one for Monty Python and absurdist humour.  At one point you made Gloria laugh out loud.  Thank you, surrealists.

As Solomon himself, in all his wisdom, said, don't take life too seriously, you'll never get out of it alive.  Subversive comedy may not appear to be Christian.  But look at the Bible.  We have lost some of the comedy.  We accept statements like "the Good Samaritan."  Samaritans were not considered good: they were considered evil apostates who had turned away from God.  And how then do we get a parable about a "good" samaritan?  There is the statement about the Good Shepherd.  Shepherds were not considered good.  Shepherds were considered to be so unreliable that they were not allowed to testify in court.  Consider the gentile woman who was asking for healing for her daughter, and Jesus replied that it was not right to take the food for the children and throw it to the dogs.  That's a pretty cruelly facetious statement!  There was the eye of the needle.  There are all *kinds* of jokes in Jesus' statements in the New Testament.  (My particular favorite is when the disciples ask when the end times will be, and Jesus leads them on and drags out the joke, telling them about all kinds of things that will happen but the end is not yet, and finally says and I'm not going to tell you.)  There is humour, and even subversive humour, in the Bible.

The book of Job is one long subversive joke.  Job had a really fine turn in sarcasm.  Read the book of Job.  Actually, you have probably dipped into the book of Job.  There's a lot of really good stuff in there.  There's a lot of stuff in there that you will be really comfortable with.  It's full of Christian cliches and platitudes.  Stuff like if you do the right thing, God will reward you.  If you are suffering it's because you have sinned!  Or maybe you don't have enough faith.  Or maybe you have some unacknowledged sin.

Oh, but wait.  You have to pay careful attention to who's saying what in the book of Job.  At first, nobody says much of anything.  Job's friends come, and they see his distress.  And they are distressed by his distress.  And they sit with him.  In silence!  For an entire week!  Now that's the good part of the book of Job.  They didn't try to fix his problems.  They just faced his distress with him.  For an entire week.

And then they ran out of steam.  They couldn't stay silent any longer.  They had to start giving advice.  If they had only kept quiet, we wouldn't have the phrase "Job's comforters."  But they had to start with the cliches.  So we do.  And they tell Job all of this stuff that we tell our friends who are in distress.  And pay attention to what Job says.  Not helpful, guys!  Oh, you are the people, and wisdom will die with you!  But I have a brain as well as you!  Job has a really nice turn in sarcasm.  That's another aspect of humour.

Oh, but don't take Job's word for it.  Skip to the end, where God speaks.  And does God praise the friends for retailing all of these cliches?  Nope.  God says, "you have not spoken the truth about me, as my servant Job has."  God has a few words for Job as well.  But the book of Job is really one long subversive joke.  And the joke's on us.

There is an author named Terry Pratchett.  He'd be with the surrealists in regard to the damage that established religion can do.  He'd definitely be with them in terms of looking for the wonders when you examine the ordinary close up and sideways.  In the book called "Monstrous Regiment," he says, "The presence of those seeking the truth is infinitely to be preferred to those who think they've found it."  We probably need to be less certain that we've found all of the truth.  It is undoubtedly true that however much we know about God, our God is too small.  We need, with the surrealists, to keep seeking.

https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2023/09/sermons.html

PortAlberniHenge sunrise

Given the wide streets, probably September 5-15-ish?  Roughly 7:15 am/0715H

PortAlberniHenge sunset probably October 1-10-ish?

Numbers 11:15

If you are going to treat me this way, then just kill me outright! — please, if you have any mercy toward me! — and don’t let me go on being this miserable!

MGG - 5.39 - HWYD - Regina and Winterpeg ...

I think I mentioned that I wasn't particularly concerned about the numbers that I got on the reviews that the candidates wrote on us, as facilitators for the CISSP review seminars.  It's not that I don't think that feedback is important: I do.  But it's hard to keep faith in the quality of the reviews, and particularly the scores that the candidates give you, when you know that people who don't know as much about security as you are getting higher marks than you because of tricks that they use to appear more valuable than they are.  At one point (ISC)^2 was able to assess the marks obtained on the exams, and compare them to whether or not candidates have taken a review seminar, prior to sitting the exam.  (When the certificate was, itself, certified under the ISO 17024 standard, they had to stop that.)  There was one particular instructor, instructing his own seminar, who managed to cram everything into two days.  His seminars were immensely popular, not only because they were shorter, but because he was an extremely entertaining presenter.  Unfortunately, what the numbers showed was that, while the candidates who went to his seminars all came away giving glowing reviews of how good the seminar was, it wasn't until they actually sat the exam that they realized that they hadn't actually learned anything.  In fact, according to the numbers that (ISC)^2 was able to obtain, you were better off not taking any reviews seminar at all, and not doing any review at all, than taking this particular seminar.  If you took his seminar, the chances were very strong that you would do worse on the exam then you would have done if you had done nothing at all to prepare for the exam.

So, I knew, with my background in education, as well as my background in test design and psychometrics, that there were instructors who were very popular and got very high scores on their evaluations, who did not, in fact, provide the best material and content when delivering the seminar.  I also knew, from my own experience, that sometimes I would get lower scores on the evaluation, simply on the basis of the fact that the coffee, provided by the hotel, was cold.

So, I make no apologies for the fact that I assessed how well I had done on a particular seminar by how many of the candidates actually passed the exam.  I had a number of seminars where 100% of the candidates past the exam.

I even had one *city* where 100% of the seminars I taught had a 100% pass rate.  Everybody that I ever taught in the city of Regina passed the exam and got their certificate.

And every time I taught in the city of Regina, it was in the winter.  I don't know: maybe this has something to do with the pass rate.  (Maybe there is nothing to do in Regina in the winter but study for your CISSP exam.  Then again, most of the candidates in the Regina seminars seemed to have lots of plans for winter activities.  Even when it was 30 below.  *And* snowing.)

And I taught seminars in Winnipeg, as well.  Sometimes when it was *fifty* below.  I remember one such seminar, where someone drove me to the venue.  For some reason the venue was not open when we got there, and the candidates were standing around outside, bundled up against the cold.  I only had a suit jacket on, but I figured that I should at least get out and welcome the candidates, and then pop back into the car.  Whereupon I realized that, even though I was back in the warm car, I wasn't going to warm up until the heat of the car had warmed up the cold air which had now built up inside my jacket.

We don't call it Winterpeg for nothing.

But, Winnipeg was possibly, my absolute favorite city in which to conduct a seminar.  At one seminar, they had me staying at the Fort Gary Hotel.  They had me staying over a weekend, and because I stayed over Saturday night to Sunday morning, apparently I qualified for a free Sunday morning buffet brunch.

I am a great fan of buffet brunches.  I think it is my possibly favorite meal of all time.  For one thing, I can eat far more than is good for me.  Okay, it's bad for me, but I really love it.  And the combination of foods that you can get had a really good brunch buffet is my favorite collection.  I can really do damage to a good brunch buffet.  I am a connoisseur of brunch buffets.  I have eaten brunch buffets that were extremely high in price, at extremely fancy hotels.  I have had the brunch buffet at Best Western hotels, which, despite its limitations, isn't half bad.

But nobody, and I mean nobody, can touch the Sunday brunch buffet at the Fort Gary Hotel.  It is truly amazing.  If you ever get to stay in Winnipeg over a Saturday night, book a room at the Fort Gary Hotel.  And have the brunch buffet for breakfast.  You will not regret it.

Previous: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/08/mgg-538-hwyd-famous-sleep-deprivation.html

Introduction and ToC: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2023/10/mgg-introduction.html

Next: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/09/mgg-540-hwyd-dublin-etc.html

Community Event

This feels like a bit of a dirty trick.  The one person who actually has something to say, and is actually doing something about the problem, is the last person on a speaker list full of politicians trying to score points and be "visible."

Some of the people from the event have just come through the "related groups" room, urging us to urge people to get out of the groups room and into the lecture hall where the politicians are going to be talking.  I think the current setup is absolutely perfect.  The politicians can all talk, as much as they want, to the empty lecture hall.  The people who are actually interested in doing something about the topic can stay here and carry on the discussions that they are having with the other community groups all working towards dealing with the crisis.

(Apparently, a lot of people agreed.  As the event wore on, with politician after politician droning on and trying to score points, more and more people drifted back into the groups room, and carried on conversations.  Unfortunately, that meant that the only person with something to say was left with reduced time, and a much emptier hall.)

Titus 2:15

Don’t let anyone think they can ignore you.

Review of "Finding Faith"

Sometimes I think "Christian" movies do a terrible disservice to the church, Christianity, and society as a whole.

I recently reviewed "Tiny Beautiful Things."  There are definite similarities.  "Tiny Beautiful Things" is non-fiction, and "Finding Faith" is definitely fictional.  But the core of both, supposedly, revolves around a woman writing an advice column.  Both talk about the death of a mother.  Both, supposedly, talk about relationships.

There the similarities end.  "Tiny Beautiful Things" is about reality and comfort.  "Finding Faith" is about commands, cliches, and platitudes.  I suppose I wouldn't be as disappointed in "Finding Faith" were it not for the stark contrast between them.  "Finding Faith" *could* be seen as a piece of fluff aimed at the Christian market: an evening's unimportant diversion.  (Diversions can be needful, at times.)  The thing is, it could, so easily, have been so much more.  It could be about grief, and the problem of pain, and comfort, and the purpose of pain.

And it isn't.

Jeremiah 15:6

I tell you this: You have turned away from me.  You continue to go further away from me.  So I will prepare to use my power to destroy you.  I can no longer grieve.

Runner beans?

Well, I *planted* purple runner beans, but I can't tell if this/these are runner beans, or kudzu!

Deuteronomy 8:3

Deuteronomy 8:3

He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

Matthew 4:4

Jesus answered, "It is written: 'Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.'"