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An End on Planet Earth

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Many of our readers to this blog have come with a mind set on explaining our being as a result of something material. We are born out of a biological and physical explanation. On the surface, and by a lot of scientific thinking, that might explain it. But it doesn’t hold much water in the face of some other facts. While this blog space is reserved more for the science side of the Window’s View, let’s mix it up a minute.

Calling Out © 2011 WindowView.org

The End Approaches

Why? Because of some biblical reason? Inherent in each of us is some kind of awareness that life, being alive, just existing right in the present moment, goes beyond reason. Like why is this even happening? Why am I in this? It all might not have happened, but is!

So, science is great at explaining the stage of life, but it just doesn’t give us the philosophical or the theological. Science is one part in three. But what is happening now on the world stage, right now in front of our very eyes, is also not philosophical. Biblical maybe, beyond mere philosophy, and in the material space science describes well in so many ways.

GLOBAL WARNINGS

The stock markets crash and tumble, again, and again. They are saying it’s just another cycle in the economy and it’ll turn around. Economies are weak, fragile, teetering on a brink of collapse, globally, nation to nation. Is there stability and if not who caused instability? The famine on the news will go away with the next rainy season. Rain comes and it’s not enough, it’s too much, floods, famine returns later. The scale is unprecedented! Intense storms, earthquakes, sea level rise, are just physics in reality. But on the flip side, everything described thus far is a spring board for our entering the last stretch of road to what the scriptural texts recorded a long way back. That truth, in truth, is catching up with us. But can you see the validity to this? Ah, the blog post is here for this very question.

Signs We Ignore or Bring Awe

Here are a series of SPIKES that have come in time. Let’s think of these in a logical series. Only in relatively recent time have the ranks of humanity grown. Not slowly now put in a population spike of alarming proportions. This unchecked progression of stratospheric growth means a crash is inevitable in biological terms. The spike of upward human numbers is unsustainable. We live in the microbiologist’s petri dish and the resources within are limited. Earth is limited. Resources are being burnt at a rapid clip and climate changes stress the reserves quickly, by flood, heat, fire, storm, and more. Read about the Population spike here.

Consuming OUR WAY to an End Time

The interesting thing is we could make materialism a culprit and say we are consuming ourselves into oblivion. Material markets only measure success in greater growth and greeter consumption.

The Consumption Spike grows along side and along with the Population Spike. As we turn to smart technologies and recycling materials, it looks hopeful, but just remember, the sins of consumption past have left the entire northern Pacific Ocean a sea of shredded plastic particles afloat without anyone concerned for the clean up or consequences. (read about the desperate state of our global oceans at OCEANA.org!) Materialism and global consumption made the ocean a wasteland of debris! You don’t see it, but it’s a consequence and it IS out there!

Consumption Drives Extinction

Ah, yes, one more spike for Extinction of species. We have stripped the ocean of species to feed ourselves. Over 1 billion people depend on ocean species for food. The rest of the world will eat of the same resource and the demand has not only over-fished the desirable species but driven nets to catch the less desirable and so we strip the food web of the seas’ diversity. But worse, we have changed the atmosphere by carbon inputs from fossil fuels (Carbon Spike) and that means carbon dioxide enters the oceans waters … and that means the acidity of the bottom waters now creates another complex threat to sea life. Fishing from the surface, acidity from within, the oceans are shrinking and we are headed to the end of this age.

The Coming Horizon © 2011 WindowView.org

STORM WARNINGS

The WindowView includes a series of articles that relate to change. The real storm warning puts the physical realm on a footing with the spiritual awareness we have all been given deep from within our being. Read about this added sense of what is really happening from the mix of warning signs recognized a while back.

Then think about the headlines today. The markets are in ever greater turmoil today because the global scenario and multiple weaknesses are revealing how humanity has made its own mess, but can’t clear it up. We have boxed ourselves in by famines we cannot respond to, wars that keep on going, banking and mortgage sins that rob the honest investors, shortages and stockpile inventories putting our being at risk … and all of a sudden we wonder, how do we get out of this mess.

There is one added scenario that was recorded well over 2000 years ago that actually describes the historical track we are now on–today! We will call this Chapter 15 and if you are interested, we recommend a read. If you are perceptive enough you’ll see that the world is ripe for a single leader who will tell you that if you give him complete control he’ll make life on earth work well. But this story is a wolf in sheep’s clothing … read why in Chapter 15 (Download the PDF document to read at your leaser, while the world continues on its present hectic course of events).

Director, WindowView.org

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CLIMATE CHANGE — Conference 2010

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What Does A War In Iraq Have to Do With Global Change?

What Does More Science Data Do For Us?

The November 30 San Diego Tribune states that progress at the recent Cancun IPCC conference on climate change is characterized by:  “Deep-seated disputes within the conference continue to block agreement on a new binding global accord requiring rich nations – and perhaps some emerging economies – to reduce emissions. At best, the delegates are expected to concur in a handful of decisions on secondary issues.”

If you view our WindowView introductory video on Change, you’ll see that it’s not climate or even global change that is the real issue!  So, what is?  We suggest it’s how humanity as a whole responds to change that IS the ISSUE!  But the question remains: Can we, all humanity, really respond?  Something IS happening …  the Tribune, quoting Rajendra Pachauri, the chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), reveals:

“The trend is very clear,” said the Indian engineer and researcher. “We have and will continue to have increasingly more floods, more droughts, more heat waves, more extreme precipitation events.”

One key response to change is EITHER collect more data on change OR just respond in some way that makes sense.  Can deciding not to go to war, but to make a move to head off climate change, be part of the real solution?  And was an opportunity missed when the war in Iraq started? Let’s consider the difference!

Watching Changes And Wondering

We should expect scientists to say more study is needed–that’s what scientists do.  This was the first cry from the scientific community in the late 80s and early 90s.  But back then, it was clear decisions needed to be made during the 1990s to have a real counter effect to the first of changes to come.  Now, scientists ask again for more data.  But what decision can be made now, such that we humans can counter changes before they grow further?

Go back to the quote at the top of this blog post … it says nations and organizations are in dispute.  Dispute is another word for friction, stalling, and failure to collaborate on a global scale.  And in the Window, we see that one day, according to the scriptural texts, there will be a one-world government.  Perhaps in the name of having global coordination? But this change will not be about coordinating a response to climate change!  Well, maybe in the name of making global responses, but the foundation of the one-world government will be about some other kind of power struggle–on a spiritual level.

The San Diego Tribune goes on to further describe the need for information.  It’s about thawing ground up north or the change in acid levels in all the world’s oceans.  This is all occurring to one degree or other … right now.  This comes in advance of a one-world government.  The environmental shift has started; again from the Tribune:

“It’s basically the fact that people have not carried out enough measurement so that we can get a handle on how this is going to change in the future, what sort of increase of temperature will occur with the melting of the permafrost,” Pachauri said.

Similarly, he said, “the oceans require a lot more concentrated attention.”

Researchers are growing deeply worried about the growing acidification of the oceans, from their absorption of excess atmospheric carbon dioxide. More acidic waters make it more difficult for coral, oysters and other undersea life to produce their calcium carbonate shells, threatening to blow holes in the oceanic food chain.

“We need to understand how this will affect marine life,” Pachauri said.

And beyond that, he said, scientists must try to gauge the oceans’ ultimate capacity to continue operating as a “sink,” absorbing carbon dioxide. If that stops – and researchers believe they have detected a slowing of absorption in the seas north of Antarctica – the planet will be in even deeper trouble.”

Climate change is wrapping up the whole Earth in its grip–all the oceans make this a big deal.  AGAIN, from the Window’s View we ask … how can humanity respond?  Isn’t our response so telling about our future–in the material and spiritual sense!

WAR or PEACE-full solution

Within the Window we have given thought to recent historical events.  Extremist terrorism has had an interesting counter effect to global climate change–consider this point and take a look at the Window’s TimeLine.  Think of it this way, had the US President had the courage to leave Iraq alone and to take all the Billions of dollars spent on war … and then offered these dollars to homeowners and businesses for solar power, wind power, or geo-thermal utilities, the entire world would have seen a very different result–more than dealing with extremism.  Sort of outside the box thinking! Progressive and forward thinking. But …

The Real Difference

On the one hand, investing in solutions, would take an energy-intensive country further off line–to be less vulnerable to extremists.  The underlying need for future Iraqi oil would diminished.  Electric cars would have, by now, been in the development and release stages of more than one American auto maker … and global climate change would have had a real response–especially by one consumer base that uses a lot of energy resources.  The expenditure of billions of dollars on solutions would have also created millions of jobs!

Instead, a President went to war … against a country and extremists, but not war against the larger overriding set of changes that continues to quietly grip the planet.  A huge opportunity was missed!  And let’s NOT depend on the world’s league of nations to come around to solutions … because like decades ago, today they are in dispute!

Yet as the world cries out because solutions are not coming quickly, we are not surprised.  The Window’s TimeLine looks to a horizon of events that are on the way–coming soon to visit all of humanity. It is not just one president who missed it … the entire human race is missing the point.  Did everyone chip in to create THE solution … or are we still waiting, watching, and wondering? Change is about how we do or don’t respond.  The WindowView is about seeing the big picture and understanding what lies ahead … come take a look through the Window!

Director, WindowView.org

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Material Naturalism, Old Earth, and Timelines

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An Interesting Focus to September and October Traffic To WindowView

A webmaster will look at the pages that are visited most at their web site and think about how this relates to the purpose of the web pages. In recent weeks there have been more hits on three areas than we’ve seen in the typical mix of traffic coming to the Window.

First, Material Naturalism is drawing attention.  At the heart of understanding a relationship between scientific evidence for our existence and any aspect of our being spiritual, this topic is central to an ongoing debate.  If you want to simplify this, at the Window we know that Scripture tells us a major component of humanity will continually clutch a hold of a material explanation for existence and hold to that view until the end of the current age.   You can count on academics and other thinkers who will just keep saying, the evidence for cause and effect, on a material basis, explains why you are here.  You can count on those voices always being present.

From a scientific view, however, the data are not so conclusive.  But you really have to be willing to be objective, open minded, and dig for the other side of the larger picture.  The evidence from an information science perspective tells us that the code in DNA and how this is processed is of such a high order of efficiency, that a material origin alone lacks explanatory power.  And this is perhaps the best place to begin to look at the topic of intelligent design.  And we have pages with related information in the Window.

Science And Earth’s Age

Well, we know that it’s a turn off to materially minded folks to think the Earth is young, say 6,000 years of age, or even 50,000 or 100,000 years old.

Our web page related to an Old Earth point of view has been getting some traffic.  What we’d like to point out from both the scientific and biblical perspectives is one key point: We need to keep an open mind here too.  How so?  Frankly it boils down to something of a mystery that science itself can solve; if you will allow it!

The concept of a young Earth may be something of a biblical interpretation.  If so, perhaps the text does not intend this.  But for a moment, let’s assume the Earth is young.  If so, Darwinian evolution would not have time to cause all of the biological diversity we see.  That’s it.  That’s really all the more a point we need to make here.  But, let’s go on a bit.

What if the Earth is 4.5 billion years old?  For some support we will call your attention to another apologetics web site at Reasons.Org.  If you explore the writings of the astronomer there, Dr. Hugh Ross, you’ll eventually come across information that reveals the newly forming earth was sterilized by bombardments of objects from space.  Soon after the earth cooled enough to even allow for life to exist, it appears to have shown up.  The earliest evidence from an old earth perspective gives no real time for either chemical or biological evolution to take place.

We’ll leave you to chew on the differences in these perspectives and that science on an old earth basis really presses material naturalism to the point of forcing a spiritual examination to life’s existence …. as well as all the remarkable material support systems that reveal some aspect of design.  And that evidence is scientific.  From there you can explore our Harmony pages and the other side of the equation.  But the simple message is that either a young or old earth leaves us with a similar conclusion.

Time and The End of the Age

We have added a time line to this web site to pull together two different perspectives.  One is more or less the science, material, technological, and the change side to human activity.  The other side focuses on biblical themes and even works its way forward to describe in outline form what the Bible projects for time ahead.  What is remarkable is that events in the Middle East convey us right into the latter part of the time line.  This is happening today.

The backdrop to the time line includes the present hope that humans can save themselves and the material world that supports our livelihood.  And yet, life is not designed to last forever in this material context.  In fact, the entire solar system and universe have limits and life cannot go on forever.  That leaves us to make a decision as to whether life has a purpose we can discover within a life time.  The Window is here simply to make that point available to you.

An Open Invitation

Could it be possible you are missing the opportunity to think about life having purpose?

In fact, is the synthesis between science and Scripture an explanation to what you might decide?

The debate over how science can tell us something that even leads to a scriptural vantage point is an option you have to consider!  Because it takes a bit of information on Science, Change, and what we call the Harmony, to pull together the WindowView, we recently added  video-based introductions to to help our visitors in each area of this web site.

Our open invitation to you is to be objective and to explore the basic concepts to each area within the Window … watch the introductory videos … and then see how this creates a bigger picture and that really does use scientific evidence to open the Window to exploring why we are alive!

Come take a look and see the larger WindowView!

Director, WindowView

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New Intro for the Window

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We are trying out a new introduction (an intro video) on the home page at WindowView.

This short video gives a general overview and with the help of a harpist and some melodic background notes, the introduction touches on all the elements that make the window a complete presentation.

In the past 20 years WindowView has grown from a wee web presence of a few pages to four full feature areas and a number of separate articles and various resources for downloading.

In this span of time we have seen staggering and significant developments in each of the main topic areas.  Scientific exploration of the universe and the minute details in living cells continually declare something special about this place we live in … and something incredibly detailed by complex structures and highly specified information (in our DNA).  It’s increasing more difficult to say all the complexity and specificity comes about by some material tendency to make or support life.  And while a debate rages on, no matter where scientists stand on the issues, we are all awed by the data and marvel at life’s existence.

The Change Area and Harmony Area also get us thinking in other ways.  Our most recent shift on change is not whether global changes are occurring, the real issue in a scientific and even biblical dimension is whether humans really know how to respond to change.  Maybe the real clue is how we treat each other more than just stopping global warming, if that is even possible.

The Harmony area looks into a combination of themes that describe a woven network of Scripture related topics.  The network makes for a harmonious overview and we believe all this reflects back on the issues in the Science and Change Areas.

Well, can we consider different perspectives describing one larger concern.  Does this help us see what comes in the future?  If the window gets us thinking along these lines, then perhaps the purpose to taking in the larger view has been set in motion.

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WindowView Press Blog Hacked and What Happened

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Hi to all our visitors,

If during April 2010 you visited this Blog only to see a warning that this site is infected with ‘Malware,’ please note this was NOT [not in this case] a real warning. Our blog was hacked into and the warning was fake.

If you want to really see the status of browsing this blog or any web site, according to Google’s “Safe Browsing” web tool, you can use your browser to visit their page plus by adding the URL to any web site you’ll get a status report … for example for WindowView, go to this link and view the report:
http://www.google.com/safebrowsing/diagnostic?site=windowview.org

We aplogize for any inconvenience and any misperception of the content at this web site!

Director, WindowView

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Evolution’s Popular Missing Pieces

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Okay, you keep hearing about the debate on evolution. And you may be one who just wants to say the evidence is just so convincing. And then you want to say it’s just a bunch of religious fanatics that say the other explanation is only biblical. Really? I’m a scientist in Life Sciences with a doctorate and I’m aware of a flaw in this thinking.

Time to step out of the rut. The Bible may hold some relevance, but what if the data from scientific pursuits remind us how evolution theory rests on other legs that aren’t “so there to begin with.” Like get real … and take a long look at all the evidence before you go off blasting the evolution trumpet.

Neglected Missing Pieces From Astronomy and Chemistry

Chemistry: Have you ever wondered why all the discussion on evolution focuses on events AFTER life appears in the fossil record? What about the formation of the very first life forms–from scratch. A cell from pre-biotic chemicals is the assumption.

Astronomy and Physics: What about the odds on the Universe being able to support life in the first place, that comes with a long list of ‘precise’ conditions. So many in fact to leave us with the sense that chance does not account for just right conditions. To make the assumption that’s “physics by chance” is also a “Just So Story.” We’re not talking luck, it’s probabilities that are so slim as to suggest it just shouldn’t be.

A Published Examination of Origins Scenarios–Chemistry’s Missing Piece

Let’s just go back in time for a minute and look at a book written by Thaxton, Bradley, and Olsen (all Ph.D. scientists), entitled “The Mystery of Life’s Origin.” The Forward to this book is written by a chemist, Dr. Dean Kenyon, who wrote a textbook on the topic of the assumed pre-destiny of life from pre-biotic chemicals. The striking thing about the Thaxton, et al., book is that the text examines as many conceivable scenarios, as was practical at the writing of their text, for the presumed chemical origin of life scenarios offered by other scientists. Their examination is a rigorous effort to consider every aspect to what might have occurred to allow any form of initial life to form from Earth’s early conditions and chemicals.

Seriously, the results discourage any plausible explanation from surfacing. The “Mystery of Life’s Origin” (Free here as a PDF book) may be hard to find today, it was published 1984 with a fourth printing in 1992 (ISBN 0-929510-02-8). The jacket includes comments from other scientists that indicate this is a “…valuable summary of evidence against chemical evolution …” and “The authors have made an important contribution to the origin of life field.”

Are there any other books that compliment the efforts by Thaxton and his coauthors? There are the occasional papers in science journals or news magazines to suggest possible avenues from chemicals to life, but a more recent summary by Rana and Ross in their book (“Origins of Life,” ISBN 1-57683-344-5, see book link at bottom of this article) goes the next step. This book was published in 2004. The striking thing about this text is the added perspective that an astronomer (Dr. Ross) and biologist (Dr. Rana) can give us … as soon as planet Earth cooled to the point of being hospitable enough for life to start …. evidence for life appears.

How then does one go from the assumption that chemical evolution requires time to give us the first form of life and thereafter it is time and progressive conditions that allow for life to evolve to an ever more complex state. Ironically, the assumption is life starts simple and then gets complex. Why then is it that we forget to credit the simplest of life forms with complex features (structural or chemical, either way complexity exists from the very start).

Go Back to the Beginning: First, Set The Stage for Life

We’d like to draw you back to the physics and astronomy that provides a wonderful inference that our place in the universe seems to be no insignificant placement.

Drs. Gonzalez and Richards have coauthored a book that compiles scientific perspectives based on current data that tell us, as their book’s titles says it well … we live on “The Privileged Planet.” The book sub-title is “How our place in the cosmos is designed for discovery.”

This publication tells us the data say some interesting things. The fact that the universe seems so vast is really no reason to say life on earth is simply by chance. The number of facts, principles, and conditions that point to what is required to support life counters the Copernican Principle–which essentially would lead us to think our planet, Earth, is really not so special. The Earth and Moon are mated in ways that drive the tides, influence seasons, and make for eclipses that make scientific data gathering a unique earthbound activity. In fact, the book by Gonzalez and Richards cites numerous conditions, natural laws, and physical properties that fine tune the entire cosmic system that sustains life. For those who like to watch better than read, there is a DVD presentation available by the same title as the book.

But hold on, Windowview is not about promoting books and videos, but rather we are interested in viewing and considering evidence that leads us to a greater understanding to our being human and our existence.

What are we driving at here? Simply put, by recognizing that the evolution viewpoint skips over ‘missing pieces’ to what should explain life’s natural origin, we run into a rather unnatural prospect. The scientific data we have is amazing! To think it merely provide an all material explanation for our being here … is not so. Thinking that one day a material explanation will be surfacing … is maybe not worth holding one’s breath for, for the data speak clearly today.

Strip Away The Assumptions And What Have We Got?

The data all say life can show changes and to a degree we can say there is something called evolution. But the evidence is clearly temporal, over short time frames, not long ones. Go back far enough and Chemistry and Astronomy are standing there with locked arms. It’s not just a gap. It’s a hurdle. Unless we jump from the base to the summit of the mountain, it’s best to remember that evolution’s supporters don’t want to address the big questions that precede any consideration of biological evolution “a la Darwin.”

At Windowview we encourage our visitors and viewers to read more and to explore the depths of the issues. Explore, look, read, and think … and if you like … the books mentioned above are listed on our book page.

A Note About Intelligent Design

Windowview was a web site in it’s infancy long before the concept of Intelligent Design was made popular. Our concern here is not so much in promoting a movement or a term coined to designate an interesting perspective on the topic of life’s origin. There is one added consideration that’s getting lost in the media and in the debates. Science evidence does have some eye-opeing aspects that institutional blinders have cut off. Even if it does not serve evolution well … drop the assumptions and look at what answers can be stated specifically without resting on ‘the presumed.’ This is a most important exercise simply because it forces us to think outside the box. This forces us to consider some explanations others just don’t want to even mention. But what if that gets us closer to the explanation for the question as asked! Objectivity comes with some creative, yet realistic, well grounded, non-reductionist thinking.

Director 11/19/2007

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