Tag Archives: Magic

News

New study finds that women choose mates based on appearance

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From the UK Daily Mail. (H/T Vox Day)

Excerpt:

It takes a woman just three minutes to make up her mind about whether she likes a man or not, a study has revealed.

The average female spends the time sizing up looks, physique and dress-sense as well as taking in scent, accent and eloquence of a potential suitor.

Women also quickly judge how he interacts with her friends and whether he is successful or ambitious.

It also emerged most women believe 180 seconds is long enough to gauge whether or not he is Mr Right, or Mr Wrong.

The study also found women rarely change their mind about a man after their initial reaction – and believe they are ‘always right’ in their assumptions and judgments.

The report which was commissioned among 3,000 adults to mark the release of Instinct, a new book by Ben Kay.

Kay said: ‘I think a lot of people believe in trusting their instincts when dating. It makes it seem more magical, like it’s coming from somewhere deeper.

I am not sure if this method of choosing mates should be used by Christian women. If the goal of a relationship is to please God and serve him, then our feelings should not be the guide. God is the customer of the relationship, not the woman, and not the man. The goal of a relationship is not primarily to have happy feelings – because that can lead to being selfish and destructive. It makes no sense to say that you are driving drunk in order to please God, or playing Russian roulette in order to please God – pleasing God needs to be done intelligently, with preparation, and respecting strict moral boundaries, if it is going to stand the chance of being effective at achieving his goals. It’s so easy to think that God is just interested in our happiness, but he isn’t. He is interested in us knowing him, serving him, suffering with him and understanding him.

Also, think of the harm that can be caused if women use emotions to choose men for the role of making them happy, instead of the role of making God happy. Men are designed by God to be protectors, providers and moral/spiritual leaders. According to this study, women are completely disinterested in whether a man can perform these traditional male roles. Because it is clear that nothing at all can be known about a man’s ability to perform these roles by looking at his appearance and style. Even if a man has a confident way of saying what a great provider he is, it doesn’t mean anything – he could be lying. The only way to know for sure is to see his investment portfolio. You can’t see the size of his portfolio by looking at his shoes.

Here are some ideas about what women should be doing to assess men for these roles:

  • protector: does he understand which ideologies and policies oppose marriage, faith and family? is he good at defending his views against secular leftists?
  • provider: what does his balance sheet look like? what does his resume look like? what does his university transcript look like? does he give to charity?
  • moral leader: what has he written or spoken about related to moral issues like abortion, marriage, parental rights, etc.?
  • spiritual leader: what has he written or spoken about related to theology and apologetics? does he have long-term mentoring relationships with other committed Christians?

None of these ways of judging a man can be accomplished in 180 seconds, and probably not even in 180 hours. It takes time.

Related posts on sex and feminism

Related posts on courting

News

How Stephen Hawking’s materialism drives him into irrationality

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From Evolution News.

Excerpt:

In a documentary from the Discovery Channel on the search for extraterrestrial life, Stephen Hawking provides an extraordinarily candid example of the fallacious materialist logic for why extraterrestrial life “must” be possible.

Around 1:15 of the clip below, Hawking states:

The life we have on earth must have spontaneously generated itself. It must therefore be possible for life to be generated spontaneously elsewhere in the universe.

The gaping hole in Hawking’s logic should be immediately apparent to anyone willing to think critically and skeptically: If we haven’t yet explained how life could have spontaneously generated on earth, how do we know that it can be generated spontaneously elsewhere in the universe?

What makes Hawking’s position even worse is that in this clip he admits that “we don’t understand how life formed.”

So according to Hawking, “we don’t understand how life formed,” but he knows that “the life we have on earth must have spontaneously generated itself.” Hawking might be, as the documentary puts it, “one of the greatest minds of our generation,” but as anti-ID biochemist Russell Doolittle once said to me in grad school (when attacking Michael Behe), smart guys are great rationalizers.

Here’s the clip:

I would not want to be a materialist. I would have to believe in magic and defend a lot of nonsensical things. Then I would lose a lot of arguments. I wouldn’t like it. I guess I haven’t believed in the Flying Spaghetti Monster of materialism since I learned about the Big Bang. Abandoning materialism is just part of growing up. You put the science fiction down, and start reading science.

Anyway, there is a conference on science and materialism.

Excerpt:

Conference sessions will examine the conflicting worldviews of theism and materialism; the widespread impact of materialism on science, ethics, society, Biblical studies and theology; the latest scientific evidence against materialism and for intelligent design in biology and cosmology; and the positive implications of modern science for theism.

Speakers will include Westminster faculty Vern Poythress, author of Redeeming Science; K. Scott Oliphint, author of Reasons for Faith; Jeffrey Jue, author of Heaven Upon Earth; Brandon Crowe, Lecturer in the New Testament; and Westminster President Peter Lillback, author of George Washington’s Sacred Fire. Speakers will also include Discovery Institute Fellows such as astronomer Guillermo Gonzalez, co-author of The Privileged Planet; molecular and cell biologist Jonathan Wells, co-author of The Design of Life and author of The Myth of Junk DNA (forthcoming, 2011); philosopher of biology Paul Nelson; philosopher and theologian Jay Richards, editor of God and Evolution: Protestants, Catholics, and Jews Explore Darwin’s Challenge to Faith; and social scientist John West, author of Darwin Day in America: How Our Politics and Culture Have Been Dehumanized in the Name of Science.

If any of my readers are interested in seeing how science is at war with the religion of materialism, please get the book “Who Made God?” by Edgar Andrews, which is suitable for readers of virtually any experience level. I also loved “The Case for a Creator” by Lee Strobel, which is also good for beginners.

Videos

Atheist explains why Christians ought to evangelize him

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Here’s a neat video from a normally mean atheist, named Penn. Since I don’t own a TV, I have no idea who he is, but this is a thoughtful talk. Penn does not expect Christians to act like atheists in public.

From this, we learn two things:

  1. Making fun of atheists on the Internet is one thing, but if you have atheists that you relate to in person, be nice.
  2. Some atheists are grown-ups. They admire authentic, consistent Christianity, boldly expressed.

I will be surveying Christians soon to see why we don’t do what Penn says, and I’ll publish the results.

By the way, blogging is light today, because I had to work on a guest post for someone.

If you haven’t read any of my mentoring posts, you can read some of those to keep busy!

Mentoring

Apologetics advocacy

The challenge of postmodernism

My testimony is here, in case you missed it.