Global Warming: Human Made or Natural?

I read a couple of interesting articles today on state scientists/meteorologists that don't believe global warming is a human made phenomena, but part of a natural cycle. The articles are located here. Link, and here. Link.

I think it is kind of interesting that both articles surfaced at the same time. I have long been skeptical of the current mantra of human kind's responsiblilty for global warming. I don't think there is any hard core evidence that we are responsible, only circumstantial conjecture proposed by those with deep left wing political ties. Science is full of bias, and it just happens that those with a left wing political tie have the most politically correct bias at this time. Their voice happens to be strongest right now. I do believe it is in our best interest to limit all types of polution, and I consider myself to be an environmental activist, but I won't go as far as to blame humanity on global warming.

These two scientists are being persecuted for being "contrarian" and not going along with the crowd. Personally, I believe that not going along with the crowd is what makes for a good scientist. There needs to be a good dose of skepticism in any scientist's tool box. The Governor of Oregon needs to lighten up a little bit.

ORNL scores hit with National Geospatial Intelligence Agency

Thanks to the All Points Blog for directing us to an Oak Ridge National Laboratory News Release titled, ORNL scores hit with National Geospatial Intelligence Agency. The news release can be found here. Link. NGA was so enamored with the RFID technology that they plan to implement it at their St Louis facility to maintain 100% accountability of all personnel for emergency response operations and hands off inventory control.

Google Tailors Earth for DoD Users

Here's a great article on how Google Earth is creating the ability to fuse geospatial information layers for visualization purposes for the US Department of Defense. Link.

I'll have to admit, even as a die-hard former ESRI employee, that the Google Earth visualization platform is hard to beat. It is simple and easy to use, provides a good viewing tool, and Google seems to be able to responsively make changes to Google Earth rapidly to meet customer's needs. But, it still isn't useful as an analysis tool like ESRI's ArcGIS is. The DOD executive decision makers may be asking for Google Earth to help them visualize the information needed to make the tough decisions, but most of the information creating the layers behind what they see comes from ArcGIS users.

ESRI is marketing a Google Earth-like viewing platform that will work well with ArcGIS 9.2 called ArcGIS Explorer that blends good visualization tools and detailed analysis capabilities, but it still isn't quite there. I played with it extesively last week and it still has some bugs in it. ESRI is trying to compete with Google Earth, and it is sad to say, but I believe as the Google organization gets bigger and more cumbersome it should be easeir for ESRI to compete in the viewer market.

I Want To Die A Martyr For Christ

We kicked off the first Thursday Night Alive! at The Gate by having Noah Oldham, one of The Gate's charter members, come back and share with us last Thursday. Noah and his wife Heather took the 2 hour drive north to spend an incredible evening at The Gate. Noah graduated from McKendree College in 2005 and is serving as the Youth Pastor at Little Chapel Church in Harrisburg, Illinois. His program is very successful, and Noah has the opportunity to affect the lives of over 125 students that regularly attend his program on any given week. Noah has grown a lot over the last 5 years that I have known him, and the fire for Christ that he has in his heart pours out of every cell of his being. There are only 2 people I know personally who have a fire like that and Noah is one of them. He is truely an incredible person and brother in the Lord.

Whenever Noah visits us he always says something that is profound and keeps me thinking about my committment to Christ along after he is gone. This time he said something that I have been mulling over in my mind for the last 4 days. What he said was "I want to die a martyr for the Lord". Thursday night I took that to mean that he doesn't want to live a life that is comfortable and secure, but wants to push his dedication to the Lord in new and challenging ways that will cause him to live his life on "the edge."

But, over the weekend I really looked deeper into what Noah said. Here are a couple of my thoughts:

Most of the Apostles died as martyrs for their committment to the Lord. How did they live their lives when the Lord was with them? The Gospels describe them as a group of stumbling, disconnected, ineffective men devoted to a Lord they didn't fully believe or understand. Just look at the actions of Peter and Thomas in the final chapters of the Gospel of John. Peter boldly defends Christ by cutting off the ear of the high priest's slave (John 18:10-11), but then on the same night denies Christ three times (John 18:15-17, 25-27). Thomas truely didn't believe that Jesus had been resurrected until he sawHis hands and feet (John 20:24-29). The Apostles were in horrible shape when they gathered in the upper room After Christ was crucified and resurrected, and the Holy Spirit was poured out on them their lives were totally changed. The book of Acts records their lives as a bold, daring, committed, and effective group of men. They went from a group of individuals to a band of committed men. They lived their lives for the Lord as salt and light (Matthew 5:13-16) as a witness to the rest of the world to the extent that it cost most of them their lives.

As I pondered the changed lives of the Apostles I also thought about what it means to be a martyr. I thought about the terrorist suicide bombers in Iraq, and how crazy I believe they are, because they give up their lives so willingly for their cause. I don't believe they are true martyrs, because they chose to take their own lives. But their actions do cause me to stop and think about what it means to give up your life for a cause you believe in? Unless the Lord comes first, and I pray every day for it and believe it will happen soon, we will all die anyway. So, why not live our lives in a more meaningful way. If our time on earth is so short and we are all going to pass away like the grass (1 Peter 1:24-25) then living a cautious and safe life to a point where we never take any chances to step out in faith means our committment to the Lord is worth nothing to us. We may extend our time on earth and make us more popular with others, but what does living a safe life accomplish? Living a life that makes people think about their mortality, their personal relationship with a living God, and why they are not choosing to serve Him is a worthy cause. The Iraqi suicide bombers are giving up their lives pretty much because they don't like Americans. Our cause is so much more noble and important.

I just want to close with a quote from the Gospel of John. I think it sums up what I have been writing about so far today. John the Baptist's mission was to prepare the way of the Lord and to point to the coming Christ. His lived to see Jesus and his mission was almost finished here on earth when he said, He must increase, and I must decrease (John 3:30). I believe that is what living the life of a martyr is today. We must sacrifice our lives in order to live for Christ. It may or may not involve the giving of our physical bodies, but it surely involves the giving of our time on earth.

I don't mean to belittle Noah's comment about dying a martyr for the Lord, because, knowing Noah, I believe he sincerely meant it the way it came out. But, the concept of dying a martyr for Christ is so hard to grasp.

IEC Awarded DHS Contract for First Responder, Three Dimension Locator Systems

Here’s a link to good article on the ASD daily about GPS 3-D indoor use in emergency settings. Link. Maybe a new line of business for those of us involved in GIS?

U.S. Warns About Canadian Spy Coins

Yahoo has a great article on using RFID bugs in Canadian coins to track US Department of Defense contractors as they travel through Canada. Here's the link. Link.

NCAA Football Playoffs?

Yahoo has a good article on the most powerful man in college athletics and his stance on NCAA playoffs. Link. Doesn't sound like we are headed for a playoff any time soon.

Early Birthday Present

It is 2 weeks before my birthday, and today I received an early birthday present. We went down to Guitar Center to pick out a starter Electric Guitar set for our son Matthew. We found him a Fender Squire Strat starter set that includes the guitar, amp, strings, instruction booklet, and most importantly, headphones so we don't have to hear him practice. It was offered at a good price. It was such a good deal that after we picked out a set for him I picked out a Fender Squire Bass Guitar starter set for myself. I have played the Acoustic Guitar off and on for about 30 years, but have always wanted to learn the Bass Guitar. Happy Birthday Rick! I promise I'll learn how to play quickly. I promise!

Youth Encounter 2006

Wow! Marilyn, Matthew, Bethany, and I all attended Youth Encounter last Thursday and Friday in Springfield, Illinois. We went with our church's Youth Group. There were about 3,000 High School and Jr High School kids at Youth Encounter and aroound 200 came to know the Lord personally there. The speakers and the bands were all top quality.

The speaker was Doug Herman of Vertical Ministries and PureRevolution. What a great testimony Doug has. In addition to his testimony we was a very polished and captivating speaker. He had the youth riveted to and listening for every word. Very motivational and convicting.

The worship leader was Joel Engle. I've heard Joel a couple of times at our church, and thought he was good, but he was fantastic at YE. He truely is a gifted worship leader and his testimony had our youth talking late into the night.

Other music playing at YE were very good also:

Inhabited kicked things off and played again on Friday. I thought they were extremely talented, but our kids wished they had more audience interaction. Music was great!

The Afters closed things down on Thursday night with an hour concert. I thought the music from Inhabited was a little better, but our kids liked The Afters a lot more because of the way they interacted with the audience.

KJ-52 finsihed off YE on Friday afternoon. Although I am not a rap music fan he did a great job getting the crowd involved and building excitement. My daughter was part of the mosh pit and she couldn't quit jumping up and down all day. By far KJ-52 was the kids favorite act of the conference.

All in all the Illinois Baptist State Association put on a top quality event that provided entertainment for our High School and Jr High School youth and at the same time gave them an avenue to think about purity and loving God.

Good job Charles Campbell for putting on such a great event.

Christmas Movie Marathon

We spent a good part of this last weekend watching movies that had a Christmas theme. I think we may had OD'd on Christmas movies. Almost all of the one's we watched were made in the last 20 years or so. I can't believe how many movies are out there that are made in the last 20 years that have a Christmas setting. Here's a list of the ones we watched this weekend:

- Home Alone! 1
- Home Alone! 2
- Christmas With the Kranks
- The Santa Claus 1
- The Santa Claus 2
- Christmas Vacation
- Miracle on 34th Street
- Jingle All The Way
- Its a Wonderful Christmas, Charlie Brown
- The Grinch
- Elf!

My favorite Christmas movie of all time: Christmas Vacation

The Christmas movie that surprised me the most: Chrtistmas with the Kranks. I didn't think I would like it, but it is a great movie and it was a lot of fun to watch.

The Christmas movie that I don't care to see again: Jingle All The Way.

I still have not seen It's a Wonderful Life and I don't plan to. If our paths cross I will watch it, but whenever they run it on TV it seems like we are too busy to watch it.

What are your favorite Christmas movies?