Edward J. Pluchar - The Blogsplitter

I picked up a copy of “American Scientist” while at the library today, and sat down for a while to read a number of the articles in the “Evolution” issue.

One of them was the answer to the question, “Why does my voice sound so different when it’s recorded and played back?”  Interesting answer, which is somewhat intuitive - Your voice sounds deeper to you because some of the sound waves are transmitted through “the mechanism of your head,” namely your bones.  Obviously the vibrations coming off your skull, jawbone are not involved when your voice is played back to you externally, so the deeper pitches are “missing.”

There was also a lot of biographical information on Charles Darwin, much of it new to me:  I didn’t realize he narrowly avoided entering the clergy, nor did I realize that he was considered mediocre in school.  He reportedly considered his 5 year journey in the HMS Beagle the first true education of his mind.

A related article focused on his theory (and the subsequent scientific support) of Natural Selection.  What a fascinating phenomenon!

Of course, you know something, because you learned it in school and it’s just one of those facts that lingers in your mind, undergoing little or no further examination.  But to read an article like that, you could almost see the mutations in an organism’s DNA, see the generations pass and the adaptations form, and watch as the “fittest” survived to reproduce.

The issue also bore a good deal of hostility toward “the Creationists,” and I believe they’re right to be opposed but not necessarily to be hostile (because it isn’t constructive).

Why hostile?

I think I can understand the frustration of numberless persons and committees coming together, demanding that an idea be taught as scientific when it is not - simply to call something that which it is not - and that might lead to hostility.

But I kept wondering, as I read.  Admittedly, my head started to hurt (from the content as much as the shrinking blood sugar levels), so there may have been material to answer my question.  If so, maybe it’ll be easy…

Is it really irreconciliable to believe that evolution and natural selection are biological realities, and simultaneously to believe that there is also a God?  I’m not saying we should teach it, I’m just asking the common rationality:  Can’t God be behind natural selection?  Why should scientists be so ready to see a quality like “beauty” in these processes, while believing they are the smartest beings in the world?

Continuing with the quest for feedback:

If you have an e-mail account with Google, I’m curious to know what percentage of your available storage space you are currently using.  I am at 6%.

If you do not use Gmail, why not?

(Fish does use Gmail, currently used 8% of space).

An article from the BBC.

I’d like to know:  Do/would you shop on Christmas day?  Why or why not?

My answer is that I do not, and probably would not.  Even though we’re away from family and friends this year, Christmas is still a day for reflection, soaking in any sense of peace there may be, and spending time with loved ones, even if it’s only one or two loved ones.

And playing with toys.

Since the day I learned there was a Facebook group called, “Say Yes to Jason Statham,” I decided that I approved of Statham’s seeming iconic status as an action star in off-beat films.

Some of you know that when Marcy miscarried, I had to work during the day, then decided to pick up a movie to watch with her that evening.  Comedies were out - nothing was going to be funny that day.  Dramas were out - who wants to add the emotional weight of a fictional story to real-life sorrow?

There’s our pick - The Transporter, starring Jason Statham.  What better way to grieve than living vicariously through a heartless getaway driver whose character arc leads him to care for a gorgeous young woman while more than once finding a way to take his shirt off during fight scenes?

So it began, the sort-of inside joke between Marcy and I, and her constant, though light, reluctance to see anymore movies with Jason Statham in them, though we’ve seen two more as of yesterday.

Yesterday.  The movie was “Crank,” which I noticed in the store and thought, “Yes, Jason Statham.  Yes.”

I didn’t ask Marcy to watch, but when “Scoop” became totally disappointing for her, “Crank” looked like the antedote.

Have no doubt.  This was Jason Statham, amplified, and it’s my opinion that he’s really good in his niche:  The gimmicky though interesting dilemma (he’s been injected with a poison that will kill him unless he can keep his adrenaline steadily flowing), the man familiar with every underground establishment in the city, who knows all the crackheads, whose “job” is intimately tied with killing people, and now that he’s fighting against all those jerks he used to hang with, you’re cheering him on because he’s killing bad guys (though he’s always been a bad guy).

Let me run through the list in another way.  In “Crank,” you will see and/or hear:  Statham snorting coke, cutting off a man’s hand and subsequently blowing his brains out, having sex with his girlfriend in the middle of crowded Chinatown, injecting himself with or otherwise ingesting all kinds of substances to keep his heart rate up, catching and mutilating another man’s hand in a sewing machine, a man is hung with a plastic bag around his head, and all kinds of other violence.  Oh, and everyone with a speaking part finds room for a curse or two in every sentence.

Now, I kid you not - On the back of the DVD case, the following special feature is described thusly:

Family-Friendly Audio! Enjoy the film without the usual expletives…should you so wish.

WHAT?!

Wait, wait.  Do you know what this means?  This means that someone involved in the production of this movie thought, “All we have to do to make this movie family-friendly is remove the swears!”

Wow.  Jason Statham, you never cease to amaze.

Listening to NPR, there was a segment on authors called, “The Writer’s Almanac,” spoken by Garrison Keillor.  He quoted an author who was either born or died on December 11, and I will paraphrase below:

Happiness is a commercial invention, something that can never be attained and ought not to be pursued.  Instead, we should pursue affection.  Of all the common traits we share with animals, only affection is uniquely human, and therefore the highest pursuit.

What do you think?

In a previous post I shared the two bios I offered my editor at the Greenbrier Valley Quarterly, which I have now read and enjoyed.  I’m proud to write for him.  This time around, I did a story on Bethlehem Farm and the local hardware/lumber store, Neathawk, and both are reasonably well done.  I was also asked to submit a new bio, and sent the following for consideration: