Seven thin barrels of oil eat seven fat barrels of oil.
And we’re not at the beginning.
We’re half way through year seven.

“follow the whole of your nature and write the book that only you can write, and see what happens”

(Philip Pullman, a man with whom I have significant disagreements, but these words are displayed largely and prominently by my computer. In practice I omit ‘the book that’ and substitute ‘what’. Hence, ‘let us be human’ and all that shall follow from it.)

John Stott: “I said Christ and the biblical witness to Christ. But the really distinctive emphasis is on Christ. I want to shift conviction from a book, if you like, to a person. As Jesus himself said, the Scriptures bear witness to me. Their main function is to witness to Christ.”

I seem to recall being accused of ‘neo-Barthianism’ when I made the same argument a while back.

(HT BBA)

There was a really strange light on the beach this afternoon, opalescent. I suspect the air was saturated with moisture, as if it wanted to rain but couldn’t get its act together. Tried to capture something of it with these piccies, but as always, you can’t.

When I was taking a kids confirmation class once, I began it by teaching about ‘wow moments’ as times when God is (probably) present – when life seems to hang together with sense and energy and all the lights switch on.

Via BBA I discovered one: “played ‘heroes’ in my living room with david bowie”

which I’m sure was a wow moment for Moby.

It’d be a wow moment for me.

I’m not sure I’ve ever had a wow moment quite on that scale. I wonder what it would be.

Possibly: giving a Peak Oil presentation to the senior bishops of the Church of England (half of whom know me already). That would be a wow moment.

Not an unrealistic ambition either (grin).

You can listen to the first of my LC talks here.
(Many thanks to PB for technical support!)

I’ll put up a transcript at some point – but don’t hold your breath.

I bought the new refutation of the 9/11 conspiracy theories last week, and have been dipping into it. It’s rather disappointing. Destroys the lunatic ideas; largely ignores the weighty matters. Having got myself into a frame of mind where I was ready to be convinced that the conspiracy theories were all nonsense, I was wanting something really solid on which to base my views. It’s not there.

I really wanted it to be there.

Then today, whilst looking at some Peak Oil material, I came across this – and then used up an hour and a half watching the videos. Very lucid, very sober. Still with errors in, and things that I would disagree with, but they make the fundamental point, as described by the blogger like this:

If the aircraft had been the sole cause of the collapse the collapse should have happened “unevenly”, beginning on one side of the building, causing a sideways toppling effect which “pulled” on the still viable supports throughout the rest of the structure until they were compromised (which the film quotes WTC architects and engineers as saying it was designed so that that wouldn’t happen). In other words, the top of the buildings, if they fell at all, should have toppled sideways. And the resistance created by the still-structurally-sound lower levels would have been sufficient to retard the fall significantly, and further push the upper structure outward in one respect or another.

I don’t believe the “Hollywood perfect” collapse of not one but TWO massive structures rings true to anyone. I think it takes considerable self-convincing to make it seem like it does.