Author: OneTrueStudent

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Thought Experiment

I’m still turning over some CS Lewis, and I have another thought experiment. How can the idea of Hell be reconciled with Christian theology?

After death comes an afterlife. The veils pull aside, and you meet God. He gives you 100% of joy. All the euphoria, all the happiness, all of all good feelings are yours forever. You get Heaven, and all sins forgiven, all mistakes pardoned, all failings blessed. You get it.

And so does everyone else.

There is no judgement, no condemnation, and no ruin. Everyone meets the same end on the other side of the veil: Heaven. All the good people, all the bad people, everyone is given the glory of a kind and purely munificent God.

For eternity, you will see everyone granted the same euphoria you have. Everyone who’s ever done you wrong, hurt you, or disregarded you through callous feelings is given the exact same euphoria as yourself, and you get to witness it forever. Every vile human being, every murderer, rapist, abuser, Nazi, everyone is given the same joy. And you will witness it forever. Hell is thus your own jealousy and ill feeling, not lakes of fire or tormenting demons.

I see only two choices. The first is that you delight in Heaven, delight that suffering has been wiped away from everyone, and rejoice. Forever is a long time, and it’s full of joy.

Or the fury that those people who don’t deserve it are in Heaven too will eat you, forever, and you’ll never be free of them. Because God gave you nothing but happiness, and the only limit is what you bring with you. I think that would destroy many people, and they would make for themselves Hell in Heaven.

Aside, it matches up pretty closely with Judeo-Christian Theology. The workers in the vinyard speaks of everyone being treated the same. The prodigal son talks about this as well.

The counter argument is that for all the supposed kindness involved, this afterlife does indeed incorporate many people who will suffer forever. Regardless of whether or not it’s their fault, the people who won’t forgive others with still suffer in agony. Sure, for the sake of argument, they’re suffering because of their own jealousy, pride, or what have you. But that is no less suffering. Why would a kind and loving God, the fundamental basis of any Christian belief, allow for such a thing to happen?

Which returns us to the initial question, though perhaps a more simplified version of it. How can any idea of Hell be reconciled with Christian theology? If the failing is not in the mechanics but in the end result, then can any suffering coexist with Christianity?

That’s really my problem with suffering and Christianity as a whole. Sophistry aside, people do suffer, and Christianity postulates a kind, loving God. I don’t see how that could ever be combined.

However, the question itself can be avoided.

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Pelosi’s Trip to Taiwan

Good on her. This was well done. Pelosi has been a strong supporter of Taiwan and critic of the CCP, and she handled this right.

She had an op-ed in WaPo laying out her reasons, and that was cogent, nonprovocative but firm, and aware of the realities of the situation.

There are people doing good things on both sides if you look for them.

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World Building vs Setting

I got about 60k words into something before really internalizing that setting and world aren’t the same.

The setting is the scene. It’s the hotel, the dragon’s lair, battlefield, or bar. The world is the connection between settings. The world dictates whether the hotel takes payment in dollars, doubloons, or credits. It determines the species of dragon, whether they are multitude or singular. Why are the armies battling? What kind of people are in the bar?

The best way to get to the world is through settings. If the hotel has some people, those people tell the readers concrete specifics about who lives in the world. If the old guys at the bar are complaining about passage rates to Alpha Proxima or the recent profusion of dragons, we know even more.

But the setting tells us more, things that can be in any world. Are A and B having a relationship argument? That’s common to all worlds with people as we know them. Their specifics are useful to the world, but we can’t have their argument about forces of nature, light speed, and good versus evil. They need to be mad about needs, who keeps eating the leftover cake, and why A keeps looking at C. Your story is based on setting. It takes place in the world.

They’re close but not the same.

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Games

When I’m feeling run down and sleepy, ready for bed, but need to wake up and work for a little while, I play this game.

I go to bed.

Fifteen minutes later I’m wired, wide awake, and ready for the day. It works every time, provided that time is night time.

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6 Weeks

I read somewhere that stress can be turned to excitement and vice versa largely through mental activity. The claim seems a little excessive, but the cost of trying it is low. Changing my internal monologue from ‘This is going to be rough’ to ‘This is going to be exciting’ is a low-cost activity, and if it works, even a little, good.

Of course I’m not really expecting this to do a whole lot by itself, but I compare it to drinking more water. If you need water, just drink more water (provided you can, yadda yadda). There’s low cost.

Anyway, I’ve got 6 weeks before things get crazy again. 6 weeks. I’m really going to try to knock out my Kindle Vella project and make some progress on the research. With luck I can get the first done and out my door, and if I can finish the FPGA work and segue into the physical detector, the latter will have made big gains.

6 weeks.

This is going to be exciting.

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Editting/Cutting for Length

Some cuts from LotR obviously had to be made for the movies. Tom Bombadil is the one people mention, and it’s obviously. He and Goldberry just wouldn’t translate, and the mystery of them would be lost. Those two characters wouldn’t work in film.

But another area that should be cut is the ride from Minas Tirith to the Morannon. That just wouldn’t work in a movie as long as it is in a book, because movies need a bit more focus. That long sequence of exploration and travel is world building. It’s development. It’s character. It’s way too long, and should be cut down to two or three short cuts, like in the movies. If you want more of that, the books are the place for it.

P Jackson did that right.