How well do you really know scripture.... Superstar!

I got the star idea from Orac, but he's not really going to like the rest of this post.

Three short quizzes on the scripture. [via]

I got 9/10 on the basic, 4/10 on intermediate, and 5/10 on advanced.

For a less nuanced version:

You know the Bible 95%!

 

Wow! You are awesome! You are a true Biblical scholar, not just a hearer but a personal reader! The books, the characters, the events, the verses - you know it all! You are fantastic!

Ultimate Bible Quiz
Create MySpace Quizzes

Considering that "Bible" and "Scripture" in both quizzes includes both Jewish and Christian texts, and that I'm Jewish, I think I did pretty well.

Finally, for giggles, the Landover Baptist Bible Sex Quiz (don't miss part two and part three, complete with pop-up answers! Out of ten questions on each one, I got 4, 6, and a shameless 1.

Quotations #094

"Truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it." -- Flanner O'Connor

"No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong." -- Albert Einstein

"False history gets made all day, any day; the truth of the new is never on the news." -- Adrienne Rich

"I never give them hell. I just tell the truth and they think it's hell." -- Harry S. Truman

“The truth is rarely pure and never simple." -- Oscar Wilde

"How many legs does a dog have if you call the tail a leg? Four; calling a tail a leg doesn't make it a leg." -- Abraham Lincoln

Copper in the wild

I'm a sucker for accidental color.

Quotations #093

“Abstinence works better than birth control, really,” she said. “It’s just that people don’t do it.” -- Rhonda Arias, NYT Magazine, 1/21/2007

"[History is] the slaughter-bench at which the happiness of peoples, the wisdom of States, and the virtue of individuals have been victimized." -- Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of History.

"A lie which is half a truth is ever the blackest of lies." -- Alfred Lord Tennyson

"There are truths on this side of the Pyranees, which are falsehoods on the other." -- Blaise Pascal

"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident." -- Arthur Schopenhauer

Existentialist Cyberpunk Commando

I wasn't expecting William Gibson at all: I really ought to read some one of these days, I guess. The Existentialist and Special Ops results are pretty solid, though.

I am: William Gibson The chief instigator of the "cyberpunk" wave of the 1980s, his razzle-dazzle futuristic intrigues were, for a while, the most imitated work in science fiction.

Which science fiction writer are you? [via]

You scored as Existentialism. Your life is guided by the concept of Existentialism: You choose the meaning and purpose of your life. "Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does." "It is up to you to give [life] a meaning." --Jean-Paul Sartre "It is man's natural sickness to believe that he possesses the Truth." --Blaise Pascal More info at Arocoun's Wikipedia User Page... Existentialism 80% Utilitarianism 60% Justice (Fairness) 60% Kantianism 60% Hedonism 55% Strong Egoism 35% Divine Command 25% Apathy 10% Nihilism 10% What philosophy do you follow? (v1.03) created with QuizFarm.com [via]

You scored as Special Ops. Special ops. You're sneaky, tactful, and a loner. You prefer to do your jobs alone, working where you don't come into contact with people. But every once in a while you hit it big and are noticed and given fame. You're given the more sensitive problems. You get things done, and do what has to be done. "VULCAN NECK PINCH!!!" "owww.......(slump)" Engineer 75% Combat Infantry 75% Special Ops 75% Medic 63% Support Gunner 56% Officer 50% Artillery/Armor 38% Civilian 13% Which soldier type are you? created with QuizFarm.com [via]

Principled Pragmatism wasn't an option....

Relativism You scored 50 Objectivism, 47 Naturalism, and 73 Cognitivism!

You believe in moral propositions, but not moral facts or reduction of moral talk. You may be a relativist. Don't be scared by the fact that "relativist" is usually an accusation, spoken with a sneer - just because it's not in vogue doesn't mean it's wrong, which you know doubt know. "The term ‘moral relativism’ is understood in a variety of ways. Most often it is associated with an empirical thesis that there are deep and widespread moral disagreements and a metaethical thesis that the truth or justification of moral judgments is not absolute, but relative to some group of persons. Sometimes ‘moral relativism’ is connected with a normative position about how we ought to think about or act towards those with whom we morally disagree, most commonly that we should tolerate them."

Link: The Meta-ethical Theories Test written by jacostyle on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test [via]

I'm a little surprised by the overall result, but the components are more or less all right (which is remarkable, considering that it's only a 15-question quiz).

Look at Clouds....

Quotations #092

"In societies where men are truly confident of their own worth, women are not merely tolerated but valued." -- Aung San Suu Kyi, September 1995

"After mourning for the dead, we must swear to get rid of meaningless suffering which blights our lives. We must do away with all the stupidity and tyranny which create and relish the sufferings of others." -- Lu Xun, "My Views on Chastity" (1918)

"I was discovering something marriage does: it defines you, in part, as the sort of person who'd marry whoever your spouse was." -- Alice Mattison, The Wedding of the Two-Headed Woman (2004)

"How does it feel to be a problem?" -- W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk

"If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein. If there are any circumstances which permit an exception, they do not now occur to us." -­West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624 (1943)

Picture: Baking Blondies

Best wishes for a happy and healthy New Year!

Pictures: Kitchen Beauty

Sometimes something just happens, like these bowls, just lands perfectly without help and waits patiently for you to notice how lovely it is.


Sometimes there's a bit of intervention: we got a bunch of fair trade grains for Hanukkah, which we've been enjoying. This is the Purple Jasmine, and it tasted great (sweet, but not sticky) and came out almost entirely purple (if you're looking to weird out your dinner guests).