Reflect Eject

Prepare for psychic attacks. Install a big red button for your brain.

The duckstack in the mirror

Art: Endenii Loc, by Jeff Christensen

There’s only one explanation for what you’re reading right now. You clicked a link. At some point in your life, at some point in your interactions with the world wide web, a link brought you here. Or, someone typed the URL directly into your phone. Or this writing finds you in your email, and you have no idea how it got there. Maybe it is lost. Maybe you are being very inconsiderate by not offering it directions. How should I know, I’m just the narrator. I didn’t even get the number of explanations right. But if you thought really hard, I bet for you, there would only be one explanation. Those other possibilities are mere illusory paths for other people, and other yous, most of whom do not exist. You never were a different you, so there’s really no point trying to dunk on me for saying there was only one explanation, okay? Compromise: We’re both right.

The Parable of the Empty Newsletter Section

Wow, so deep

Epistegoguey

I’m a neoself-determined pseudoaristocrat with stoic-reductive tendencies and I won't fall for cheap tricks like “arguments”

Ever heard of the brain in a jar lame ugly boring philosophy thought experiment? It goes like this. If you were a brain in a jar hallucinating (or being induced to hallucnate) reality, how would you know? Like the problem of free will (another classic in piss-temology) the most common answer is “idk man things tend to work better if you act like its real”, a variant of pascals wager called “not being a stupid idiot”. If you're religious, the second most common answer to these is “God wouldn't do that to me” even though he obviously already has- your senses deceive you all the time, and addiction genetics and circumstance can coerce decisions in a way a straightforward thinker could hardly describe as “fair”. Thankfully, you don't need to be a philosopher to have a job and make a family and make money and socialize with people¹.

You can spend² a lot of time trying to untangle these philosophical problems if you're inclined to, but unless you invent some very clever sophistry they're essentially unsolvable. Fun plots for scifi horror, but in my opinion unless you've eaten something crazy recently its probably just as good to just go with your gut. Most of my greatest regrets in life have been when God clearly told me I needed to do something, and I procrastinated doing so far past when it would have been relevant. If something paralyzes you to the point of inaction and missed opportunities, you're better off just picking a path at random and sprinting down it. If its wrong you can always sprint back.

Why would God make things so open ended? Surely he could pop in at any time and say “here’s the correct religion and how to build rocket ships and also talk to the girl you see at the grocery store she’s your future wife”. He did this with Abraham Moses Jeremiah Peter James John and Paul, after all. If religion is SO SO important, doesn't God care about making everyone be the same religion?

I can think of a few “plausible” answers to this, depending on what assumptions you’re willing to do away with.

1. God is malicious and makes finding the right religion hard on purpose.

2. “All religions are equal and lead to heaven somehow”³

3. God is not powerful enough to reveal himself other than in short bursts when his faith meter is full

4. People are just so incredibly corrupt or gullible that false religions propagate and God can’t do anything without erasing free will (which you may or may not believe is even possible

5. God is having some sort of contest with Satan to see who can win the most converts and turning over the chessboard would “make the game less fun”

I don’t accept any of these. I think some of them may apply in limited situations but none are “good” explanations. What I believe, is that God has competing priorities not for free will but for our ability to grow. As God’s children, it must truly, absolutely, be up to us whether we want to become a baker, or an electrician⁴. I think God has contingency plans for nearly any type of person you might choose to be. As you choose one road or another, I believe you can pray for God to maximize your opportunities to do good, and he will work behind the scenes to make it possible.

This includes what you want to believe. Believing you can fly does not make it so- but you must be free to delude yourself. Things you cannot even delude yourself about are not only not on the table as options but they are not even possibilities to be wrong about. The truth of the matter is that Hell, inasmuch as it exists (Hell can refer to a lot of places and even more states), is a place that its residents want to go. For the self-punishment, for the culture, or most often for the lawlessness. Latter-Day Scripture reserves some of its strongest theoretical condemnation for this- “them without law”. Mercy can’t have hold on them, or justice, but they become “a law unto themselves.” God has a kingdom prepared for people like this. It is miserable compared to those who follow Christ, but it exists. The type of person who will never accept that you can’t get away with it⁵. The type of person who digs a pit of lies to cover up their last pit of lies, and intends to do so for eternity. If such a one understands light and truth, and truly rejects it, he commits blasphemy against the holy ghost, and this is the unpardonable sin⁶. God cannot save someone who does not want to be saved.

So as a mercy, he cannot force people into the one true religion. As a mercy. Because the more you know, the more you are accountable for, and the harder repentance is. Thankfully we will have all eternity to rely on Christ’s grace to get the hang of keeping the commandments, but this life is the time for us to determine our orientation. What you want to be true, what you spend time researching and learning about, innately reveals what you really care about, in a way that will be absolutely irrefutable at judgement. Thus many religions can compete- but to find the true (or even just true-er) religion, is a great benefit, both in this life and the next, it gives you needed aid, protection, and a head start.

So it is important, but its also important that people have this sort of choice in front of them. I’m not a liberty-maximalist for many reasons, I think it is up to us to institute laws that curtail negative behavior and make it easier to choose the right, but God isn’t going to intervene to solve the macro level, not until the end. The kind of laws we choose to implement (inasmuch as we have any control over that- at minimum, you have control over your family) are another thing that reveals our true selves to God, and revealing ourselves this way by trying the best we can aids in his plan.

Beyond that, I think things get hazy. Even talking about laws is throwing yourself on a scale most people have no control over. Ever heard of the trolley problem? Its designed to get you thinking like a communist, on this grand utilitarian scale using situations nobody will ever get into. Here’s a real situation you might get into: Should I return the shopping cart at the grocery store. Here’s another one: Should I play video games all day (or scroll instagram, or “work on my career”. Infinite possibilities major and trivial⁷. Think about situations you will actually get into. God is going to grill you on your habits. God cares about your acquired tastes.

Technology: Pullies

Very different from wheelies

Pull the rope to get the next section !
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History

We’re running out of times we can call the toddler a toddler and the baby a baby

The baby has started walking. She likes to hold things while she walks. I mean like picking up toys, not using objects to balance. Her favorite lately is a yoyo, which dangles in front of her as she toddles.

Found the toddler screaming in the middle of the night. Wedged underneath the baby’s crib. I don’t know why he was there. I don’t know how he got there. I don’t know how long he was there. But it had apparently become too much.

We put up a swing for the toddler in the yard and he spun around and around and tried to make all of us dizzy and had a great time.

Ducksnax

zzz

Ducksnax #073

^ Previous Duckstack v

1. in fact being a philosopher is actively against most of these

2. waste

3

4. These are the only two options

5. Mathew 7:²³ And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.

6. ^{Mark 3:28} Verily I say unto you, All sins shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, and blasphemies wherewith soever they shall blaspheme:

²⁹ But he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation:

7. Here’s another real life situation you might get into. “Should I make sure I am subscribed to The Duckstack.”