15: Been Awhile: Basics Review

(Memory Refresher! 😊)

JMJ

Glory to Jesus Christ, y'all, on this Byzantine Feast of the Venerable Theodora and the Roman Feast of the Martyrs Protus and Hyacinth!

I apologize for the long hiatus! Been a lot going on:

— Prep for the Kolbe Center Leadership Retreat in the hill country Northwest of Hickory, NC.

— Participation in said Retreat, wherein, for the grown-ups and teens, I presented a comparison between Catastrophic Plate Tectonics and the Hydroplate Theory. (Those are covered in the immediately previous two posts on this Substack.); for the children it was a brief presentation about the how and WHY of the Great Flood, followed by a very enthusiastically received rock, mineral, and fossil giveaway, most of the items from the buttes in Brusett, Montana.

— Maria Owen, wife Kolbe Center Director Hugh Owen, writes and puts on a play at the Retreat each year about a Creation-themed saint or saints. Its a suberb way of teaching youngsters the Truth of Creation in a very enjoyable, concrete way. This year, it was about St. Martin of Tours and about Leo DuPont of Holy Face devotion fame. I was given a delightfully simple (and keeping with my character 😂) role of a filthy, squalid, huckster, invalid, veteran beggar seeking funds from Monsieur DuPont for the bottle!

(Glasses came off for the performance!)

— And there was an hour-forty interview with Catholic journalist Stephen Kokx about the Great Flood, the Ark, the falsity of Evolution, and such:

https://kokxnews.substack.com/p/catholics-should-reject-evolution?utm_source=post-banner&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=posts-open-in-app&triedRedirect=true

— This was followed by much time spent notifying folks on my extensive contact list about it.

So, very good to be back “scribbling!”

Before we embark on subsequent posts, it behooves to review a few things so as to be clear-thinking.

First, regarding thinking itself:

DATA SET: any claim made about anything, ANY claim whatsoever, needs data to back it up. A data set is a collection of observations, and of basic principles, that are verifiable thus hard or impossible to contest.

PARADIGM: the interpretive framework that makes sense of the data set. At its root, it is theological (even if denying God's existence), and it encompasses under that umbrella metaphysical and other philosophical principles.

Second, the pitfalls that affect the paradigms:

TEMPORAL SNOBBERY, i.e. folks in the past were primitive dolts compared to us sophisticated moderns! Oh, yeah? You try rebuilding the Great Pyramid, and call me in the morning!

CREDENTIALISM: Oh, FATHER McGillicuddy said… Oh, DOCTOR Snodgrass said… Oh, the RESPECTED SCIENTISTS at Whatchamacallit University said…: Poppycock!! Without data, their credentials are (as we say in our pre-WW2 Galician Ukrainian dialect) “worth a pound of lint.!”

INCOMPLETENESS: Make sure your data set is as complete as possible! (Oh no, he's gonna say it! 🫨) DO YOUR HOMEWORK!!

Third, the effects of sin on one's data set and/or paradigm:

PRIDE: — “I say that gravity pulls upward! — “But, sir, Nature always shows that things fall downward.” --"So much for Nature! Huff!”

PRIVATE SINS: What private sins will I have to give up (but don't want to!!!!) if the data set shows that Sacred Scripture is true and that therefore God exists, and thus His moral law?!

Fourth, there is the pitfall, especially when dealing with observations of natural phenomena, of DISREGARDING ANECDOTES. Just because Mrs. Drushliak didn't make an audio recording of strange bird calls in her back yard doesn't mean her testimony is false, but just needs followed up on. It may be that the neighbors are hearing them, too, and it may turn out that a flock of cockatoos had escaped from a pet store miles away.

So there y'all have it.

The upcoming posts will be rather unusual, 16 being about LIVING pterosaurs. Stay tuned!

Mother of Perpetual Help, aid us!