Category Archives: Keeping It Real

Pay toll. Do not use bridge.

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I get a couple of local rags, the weekly Kapi-Mana News and the monthly Whitby Newsbrief. Yesterday they both arrived together.

The Kapi-Mana News told me that some 20,000 motorists per year are legally obliged to pay a road toll for driving on Whitford Brown Avenue.

The Whitby Newsbrief told me that NZTA has a “commitment to the local community” that they will “demolish the existing Paremata Bridge and remove the clearways through Mana in conjunction with the opening of Transmission Gully motorway, and following appropriate public process,” according to a Paremata Residents Association Inc. report.

Without government, who will demolish the road bridges?!

This is crazy stuff. Notwithstanding that NZTA isn’t actually committed to the bridge demolition, it’s only committed to considering it as a serious option! Read the full Whitby Newsbrief article here.

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Now let’s cut to the chase. What really needs to be demolished immediately is the speed camera installation on Whitford Brown Avenue.

Whitford Brown speed camera NZ’s busiest

The Whitford Brown Ave speed camera is the country’s busiest, having clocked up more than $1 million in fines in nine months last year.

Figures released by New Zealand Police show that in the first nine months of 2015, 15,273 infringement notices were given to motorists caught travelling faster than 54kmh. That put $1,139,490 into the Government coffers.

The second most lucrative camera in New Zealand was the one in Ngaruanga Gorge. It collected $1,070,000 from 14,200 notices.

After complaints from residents, Kapi-Mana News last February asked police for the number of fines resulting from the Whitford Brown camera, and the highest speed clocked along the road, but we were refused that information.

We were told that “due to a technical recording error, [police] could not provide information relating to specific cameras”.

Also, releasing data on speeds risked “glorifying such behaviour and could promote copycat behaviour… thereby creating a public safety risk”, even though incidents of speeding was regularly in the media”.

The police have now chosen to release the information.

I.e., the police lied initially about being unable to provide the information. But I digress.

I’m a safer than average driver. (I collect 1 speeding ticket per 7 years on the road on average.)

I seldom drive Whitford Brown Avenue but I’ve been pinged once. Whereas, I often drive the Ngauranga Gorge and I’ve never been pinged once.

YMMV but, arguably, the speed camera in the gorge has less to do with extorting revenue from the citizenry and more to do with road safety. Whereas, arguably, the speed camera on Whitford Brown Avenue has next to nothing to do with road safety and everything to do with replenishing the troughers’ coffers by means of an arbitrary road tax.

The speed camera on Whitford Brown Avenue must go.

I fantasise about how to wreck the wretched thing as a service to the community.

A hacksaw at the base would surely fell it, but I might be seen sawing and also I’d risk electrocution.

Some explosives wrapped around the base and detonated remotely would see it go out with a bang, but I’d risk the loss of life and limb if I were to dabble in recipes from the Anarchist Cookbook.

A large truck would come off best in any collision with the installation, even at the legal speed limit of 50 kph. If stolen (from the government), it could be abandoned for a quick getaway. So this would be my preferred option.

Lord, lead me not into temptation, but deliver me from evil!

(See also Bridge jumping fun.)

The Word of God is inerrant. His scribes, not so much.


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Jesus is inerrant, but the Bible isn’t.

Anyone who’s spent any time in serious study of the Bible (or even someone who’s only delved into it intermittently) will have discovered, for themselves, apparent contradictions, of which there are very, very many.

Just for example, Ezekiel 33:11 (and Ezekiel 18:32) and Psalm 37:13 seem rather at odds.

Say to them, ‘As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live. Turn! Turn from your evil ways! Why will you die, people of Israel?’ (NIV)

but the Lord laughs at the wicked, for he knows their day is coming. (NIV)

How should a Christian respond to such apparent contradictions? It’s not easy maintaining contradictions. Maintaining a contradiction is surely the very essence of cognitive dissonance, and cognitive dissonance is something we all naturally seek to minimise.

Of particular concern are the apparent contradictions in Bible verses about salvation. Is justification through good works or by faith alone? Enquiring minds want to know.

The inerrantist response is to hold that the Bible is inerrant. On the premiss (due to Douglas Stauffer) that

God will preserve His word, and not allow it to pass away.

And then try to explain away the apparent contradictions. All of them. One attempt to do this (with particular emphasis on what the Bible says about salvation) is the doctrine of Dispensationalism due to John Nelson Darby.

Now, I can see that the above premiss has merit and that Dispensationalism is, in some sense, a reasonable response to the apparent contradictions in the Bible.

But doesn’t God operate according to the KISS principle?

“Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” (NIV)

Dispensationalism is complicated. Doesn’t God’s fundamental message have to be intelligible to little children and simpletons? Because Dispensationalism isn’t.

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The errantist response is to hold that the Bible is not inerrant. To concede that it’s full of contradictions, some of which cannot be adequately explained away. But that, nonetheless

All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness (KJV)

and that Jesus’s fundamental message remains intact, which it does.

Master, which is the great commandment in the law?

Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.

This is the first and great commandment.

And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. (KJV)

My reason for writing this post is my concern that those who hold that the Bible is inerrant are fooling themselves. In a bad way. Notwithstanding that Douglas Stauffer (already quoted above) tells us that

Satan has reveled in creating doubt concerning the authority of the words of God.

the simple fact is that there is doubt concerning the authority of scripture as it has been handed down to us. Not to acknowledge and to express doubt such as this is to deceive oneself and maybe others too. It’s my considered opinion that those who persist in maintaining that the Bible is inerrant are involved in more convolutions and contortions than David Bain trying to explain his movements on the morning of 20 June 1994, more turns than a sluggard on his bed, more preposterous suspensions of disbelief than an atheist proclaiming that this blog post is an anticipated result of the Big Bang. They’re playing the exegetical version of Twister—the game that ties you up in knots.

twister

Salt is a four-letter word

[WARNING: This blog post contains lots of very strong language and is practically guaranteed to give offence to weak-minded prudes. Please proceed at your own risk.]

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The use–mention distinction is a foundational concept of (Western analytic) philosophy. To fail to recognise the distinction is, at best, to invite disaster.

The following true statements illustrate the distinction.

(1) Salt is an ionic compound, viz., sodium chloride (NaCl).
(2) ‘Salt’ is a four-letter word.

The first sentence is a statement about the substance called “salt”—it uses the word ‘salt’ to refer to that substance. The second is a statement about the word ‘salt’—it mentions the word without using it to refer to anything other than itself.

‘Salt’ is a four-letter word. Salt is not a four-letter word. And neither salt nor ‘salt’ is a four-letter word in the usual idiomatic (and only incidentally numeric) sense of the term. It’s perfectly polite and indeed good table manners to ask someone please to the pass the salt!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMkNsMMvrqk

In this post I want to say a few words about four-letter words (e.g., ‘fuck‘ and ‘shit‘) and their cognates (e.g. ‘fucking shit‘) and briefly discuss whether (and in what contexts) Christians ought or ought not to be using such vulgarities and profanities.

And it struck me that the perfect way to make the main point I want to make is to recycle the metaphor that Jesus uses in Matthew 5:13 right after the Beatitudes in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus says to his followers

You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot. (NIV)

George Carlin aptly refers to the words I’m talking about as “just words which we’ve decided not to use all the time.” And “that’s about the only thing you can say about them for sure.” Carlin’s bang on the money! Because, if we used the words all the time, they’d lose their “saltiness”! They’d no longer be effective cuss words and they’d no longer be good for anything more than just plain old communication. Which would be a dingleberry of a disappointment.

(Or would it? If we no longer had an inventory of “reserved” words with which to insult others effectively, we’d have to relearn the art of the insult. And our prose would begin to be colourful like Bill Shakespeare‘s or Martin Luther‘s prose is colourful. And actually that would be fucking awesome!)

Say what you mean and mean what you say. Is probably the one blog post of mine I regularly link to. It explains how (according to me, but I’m not wrong) words acquire their meanings. The meaning of a word (any word) is determined by the conventions that govern its use. And those conventions can and do vary between different communities of language users. Amongst the kind of people I usually hang out with, the words ‘fuck’ and ‘shit’ are used fairly indiscriminately. They’ve pretty much lost their saltiness in those contexts. (But I use those words extremely judiciously, if at all, if I’m having dinner with, say, my mum or any of her older friends.) Whereas both I and my peers still tend to hold back on using the terms ‘cunt’ and ‘motherfucker’. Those two words remain mostly reserved for when we need convenient terms to refer to truly despicable people, such as Peter Dunne.

But here’s the interesting thing. In the circles in which I usually move, the words ‘cunt’ and ‘motherfucker’ can cease to be insults at all simply by prefixing them with the words ‘good’ and ‘formidable’ respectively. To call someone a good cunt is to pay them a genuine compliment. And it is a mark of utmost respect to call someone a formidable motherfucker. Mohammed Ali was a formidable motherfucker. Vladimir Putin is a formidable motherfucker. Good or evil, you don’t want to cross such people! Not unless it’s from a safe distance, anyway. (I.e., well outside of Russia in the latter case.)

Let another praise you, and not your own mouth; a stranger, and not your own lips. (ESV)

Here’s a picture taken Wednesday evening of me (on the right) and a couple of good cunts. 🙂 🙂

good_cunts

Now to the question, ought Christians to be using the sort of language I’ve been using here? The answer is simple common sense, really. It depends on the context and the occasion and the company. None of the cuss words above is at all appropriate during a church service, for example. (But you may say “piss” if you’re reading from the KJV.) Such terms should be used sparingly, if at all, in polite company. Because they’re impolite. But in impolite company (such as on my Facebook page) they’re not impolite. Here’s what the Apostle Paul says

Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. (NIV)

Nor should there be obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking, which are out of place, but rather thanksgiving. (NIV)

It’s contextual, you see. Don’t go calling someone a good cunt if it’s “out of place” to do so. But do go calling them that if it’s “helpful for building them up according to their needs.”

I’ll finish by noting that there’s a big tension between being a good cunt and being a formidable motherfucker. If you succeed at being both simultaneously then you’re practically a saint.

BLACK SABBATH’s GEEZER BUTLER: ‘I Always Felt That God And Jesus Wanted Us To Love Each Other’: Blabbermouth. net

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“In a brand new interview with The Weeklings, BLACK SABBATH bassist Geezer Butler was asked if he got any backlash over SABBATH singing a message of repentance and God being the only way to love on the “Master Of Reality” album.

“No,” he responded. “People always like to find the ‘evil’ in the music, so they’d quote the ‘pope on a rope’ part out of context, as usual. People like to find negative in everything. We weren’t interested in writing songs about the ‘nice’ things in the world; everyone else was writing about that. We wanted to inject some reality into music. I think if we’d been called WHITE SUNDAY we’d have had a totally different reaction.

Butler also talked about his thought process behind writing the lyrics to the SABBATH song “After Forever”, which some historians have called the first real Christian rock song.

“A lot of it was because of the situation in Northern Ireland at the time,” he explained. “There were a lot of religious troubles between the Protestants against the Catholics.

“I was brought up strictly Catholic and I guess I was naïve in thinking that religion shouldn’t be fought over. I always felt that God and Jesus wanted us to love each other.”

He continued: “It was just a bad time in Northern Ireland, setting bombs off in England and such. We all believed in Jesus — and yet people were killing each other over it. To me, it was just ridiculous. I thought that if God could see us killing each other in his name, he’d be disgusted.”

Read more at http://www.blabbermouth.net/news/black-sabbaths-geezer-butler-i-always-felt-that-god-and-jesus-wanted-us-to-love-each-other/#qt9A5v4LbfASJwhk.99

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Me at the 2013 Black Sabbath concert. Auckland. New Zealand.
More posts from me….

Hell is for the Self Righteous, Heaven is for Sinners.

Brian Welch: From Korn to Jesus

Rock legend and good guy Glenn Hughes pays his respects at Ronnie James Dio 4th year memorial.

Alice Cooper Goes to Hell. Nek Minnit!

Alice Cooper; ‘My life is dedicated to follow Christ’

Megadeths Dave Mustaine is a Christian.

Is God Dead? Black Sabbath.

Head Games. Three Dog Night, Foreigner, and Heart rock out in Whitianga New Zealand 25-1-15

HFT

The Three Dog Night / Foreigner / Heart Concert in Whitianga last Sunday was AWESOME! … a fact completely wasted on NZ media … with it’s severe lack of coverage of this event… and so I’m writing this post to in some small way REPRESENT the appreciation We Kiwi fans have for the Musical Genius these Folk spread about our Country … a show in Taupo… one up the Coromandal peninsula, and one more due to kick off in Queenstown on the 31st.

During the Show my mind was buzzing…. I had been waiting 30 years to hear Heart and Foreigner… not that I really thought I ever would see them…. And yet there they were!
I was experiencing a very special moment in my life…
I was back in the 80’s … West Auckland…. sitting on the floor…. Back against the wall of my friend Terry’s sleep out… Smoking Bags of Weed… drinking as much of the cheapest nastiest piss as we could afford… Wall to Wall Wasted Wallies head bangin to a scratchy rendition of ‘Cold as Ice’… on the cheapest Crappiest portable turntable ….
Life is Grand!

My Blog tribute may not be the greatest they have ever received, yet I Hope they know just how special this Day was for thousands of people just like me… We were humbled by their presence.
It may have just been just one more show to them… yet for us fans… it’is something we will remember with immense happiness..

During the Gig… several different ideas for a blog post lighted upon me…. Each better than the last…. Yet because I did not bring a pen and paper… they divorced me almost as quickly as they arrived… do you think I can remember any of them now?
Nope!

It was Hot…. and I was Drinking…. A lot…. 🙂
So was everybody else yet the mood was sooo cruizie … peace reigned… the only spoiler was a silly fat bitch sitting beside me who complained that Joy (my wife) was partially blocking her view of the big screen… even though we were sitting in the very best possie available… a mere 70 feet from the stage!
Monster!
I told her to get a life.

That was the only ill spirit that appeared that day… I didn’t even see one Coppa… the crowd were havin a Lazy Sunday…. Well done all!
I got Jiggy.

Three Dog Night were Cool as…. Absolute Maestros…. 15 albums.
They joked with the crowd and told yarns about their Heydays…. How they came to write their songs… what was the stimuli… the expedience.
I leaned over to my friend and expressed my wonder… Gob smacked…. “Never did I ever expect to hear them playing these Classic Famous songs”.
Their spoof ‘modern/ Rap version’ of ‘Mama told me not to come’… had us wetting ourselves with Glee!
FANTASTIC!

Closing encores with their New Release… ‘The Prayers of the Children’ … about the children suffering in War Zones… had us Dumb struck with tears.

Flower Power mixed with the best Harmony…. They just don’t make music like that any more…. unless you are 3 Dog Night!
And that was something I noticed about all three of these Bands… a definite and purposeful spirituality… Even Lead Singer for Foreigner… Kelly Hansen… was calling for ‘Hallelujahs’ from the crowd!

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Foreigner Rockin out in Whitianga… Gig Photos by David Wolfe.

And what a Singer Kelly Hansen is!!!!!
BOOM!
He had all the woman fizzing at the bung!
His Voice is like he stepped out of a 70’s Time warp!
Classic Rock vocals worthy of the company of Paul Rogers, Peter Green, … Watch out Chris Cornel!
Foreigner songs are like a Male strip show… Provocatively Stud-ly… not just any wannabe can sing them with credibility…. Yet no problem for this showman!
He had a great rapport with the crowd.
My Girlfriends all tell me that Foreigner were the highlight of the Day… and I agree.
They Banged out Hit, after Hit, …

I was there especially to see Heart.
BOOM! Nancy Wilson walks on stage… Sun Glasses, Guitar… and Luscious Golden Blonde hair!!!
Stunning!
She’s only 60.

oh yeah
Heart Rocks Whitianga New Zealand 25-1-15 (Photo by Wolfy… David Wolfe)

Hearing their songs… ‘What about Love’….. ‘Crazy on you’… brought tears to my eyes.
Stealing Lyrics from Foreigner “I’ve been waiting for you” Heart for 30 years… and now there you are… performing for me…. Thank you… thank you…. I love you! 🙂
Just fantastic.
The reason I give the day to Foreigner, and not Heart was because of the extra effort Kelly made to connect with the crowd… the fact that Heart didn’t even bother putting up any Backdrop… and that they finished off on Led Zep covers… which were bloody awesome… yet I would have rather herd more of their own stuff.

Unlike poor old Meatloaf… All these Old Rockers still have it!
They baked themselves for us… the stage facing the direct Sun.
We were blessed with a slight breeze which took some of the Heat Bite away, yet Anne Wilson was dressed in Black lace…

ferryyyy

Caught the Ferry across to the other side and within an hour we were back at my friends Bungalow… more music… more booze….
EPIC DAY!
Thank you Heart!
Thank you Foreigner.
Thank you Three Dog Night…. For taking the trouble to come all the way down to the bottom of the world to share your awesome Art…. And your awesome souls… with us Kiwis.
YOU ROCK!

Well done Greenstone Entertainment!
Very well organised events… very reasonable price!
Thanks for bringing these legends of Rock to God’s Own country.

Tim Wikiriwhi.
Music Critic Down Under.

The Superstitions of Materialist Orthodoxy, and their conflict with scientific progress and inquiry . Rupert Sheldrake – The Science Delusion BANNED TED TALK

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a more extensive (better) version of Sheldrake’s speech below…

Read more….

Knowledge Filters: All solid evidence against the Theory of Evolution is automatically rejected .

Defunct / Archaic Western Dogma blindly insists : ‘Whatever does not fit the Naturalistic Materialist Paradigm is Illusory’. Entity Attacks

Monism: Evolutionary Psychology and the Death of Morality, Reason and Freewill.

Superstition?

Russell’s Teapot really refutes Atheism not Theism!

The Rusty Cage: Scientism.

The Folly of Scientism. Austin L. Hughes

Spiel on brain washing, and socialist engines of confomity. State education.

Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed

Do you believe you have the Perfect Word of God? Theism vs Humanistic Rationalism. Seeing The Light! My Testimony.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMyohLFeEdU

Spineless Betrayal and Evil Prevail. Voting Idiots, Cowards, and Traitors.

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It’s Election season … The Zombies are hungry.

It’s election time…. time to abandon your heroes and cower like scared children tugging on the smock of your Mother Superiors.
Fucking Idealists make you sick?
Those arrogant little nobodies who think they can change things!
Why do those no-hopers bother to stand?
So what if they represent what I really believe…Nobody will will eva vote for them!

my meme tw 6

It’s election time… Hate the arseholes in power? Lets vote in the other arseholes who shafted us last time!…. that’s the only choice we have.

It’s election time… time to forget about your hopes and dreams for a better society…. lets take the safer course and re-elect our Jailers!

Politics is all about ‘strategy’…. ‘Compromise’…..

666 666 666.

my meme tw2

There is nothing worse for an Idealist Activist than to watch people who profess to support certain Ideals and values abandon them at election time, and make excuses as to why they are going to treacherously betray the Brave individuals who have heroically and at great personal cost put themselves forward to give Kiwis *Real choices* at election time…. and then have the audacity to say these heroes have no chance of being elected!
Who’s fault is that?
These people have put themselves in the Ring…. *it is up to the voters *who believe in the cause* to do their bit!!!
To fulfill their Moral Duty… and vote according to their consciences!

*BUT NO!!!!!!!! THESE DIZZY LAME LUKE WARM %^&*ERS turn tail like cowards and vote for freaks that *Dont support their values*

TALK ABOUT WASTED VOTES!!

mymeeme TW3

A Vote that is not according to your own conscience is a wasted vote!
To vote for a party out of Malice and hate… cheering at the promise of heavy handed persecutions of others is about as evil as it gets… and sadly Many people vote according to their wicked hearts!
Any Bullshit about ‘voting strategically’ is a lowlife and cowardly betrayal… of Fools whom are playing straight into the hands of the Powers that be.

*It is this lunacy*… of the voting idiots which guarantees the Arseholes of the establishment stay in power… either Arsehole Team A or Arsehole team B.

Well you stupid sheeple have no one but yourselves to blame for the misery which continues to flow downhill.
When the Jackboots kick in your Door… just remember your ‘Strategic votes!’.

Satan Laughing spreads his wings.

Some people may think I’m being Rude… The truth is I am disgusted at the lack of moral backbone of many of my peers.

Then there are those Brave few whom are bravely carrying the Banners of freedom and reform to the Front!

I salute you!

Tim Wikiriwhi.
Libertarian Independent.

mymeme tw5

“One Day”. The Peace Song of Our Generation. Matisyahu.

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“One Day”

Sometimes I lay
Under the moon
And thank God I’m breathing
Then I pray
Don’t take me soon
‘Cause I am here for a reason

Sometimes in my tears I drown
But I never let it get me down
So when negativity surrounds
I know some day it’ll all turn around because…

All my life I’ve been waiting for
I’ve been praying for
For the people to say
That we don’t wanna fight no more
There will be no more wars
And our children will play
One day [x6]

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It’s not about
Win or lose
Because we all lose
When they feed on the souls of the innocent
Blood-drenched pavement
Keep on moving though the waters stay raging

In this maze you can lose your way (your way)
It might drive you crazy but don’t let it faze you no way (no way)

Sometimes in my tears I drown (I drown)
But I never let it get me down (get me down)
So when negativity surrounds (surrounds)
I know some day it’ll all turn around because…

All my life I’ve been waiting for
I’ve been praying for
For the people to say
That we don’t wanna fight no more
There will be no more wars
And our children will play
One day [x6]

anything-war-can-do-peace-can-do-better

One day this all will change
Treat people the same
Stop with the violence
Down with the hate

One day we’ll all be free
And proud to be
Under the same sun
Singing songs of freedom like
One day [x2]

All my life I’ve been waiting for
I’ve been praying for
For the people to say
That we don’t wanna fight no more
There will be no more wars
And our children will play
One day [x6]

435

Of 10 highest IQ’s on earth, at least 8 are Theists, at least 6 are Christians: Examiner.com.

Andrew Magdy Kamal – apparently the highest IQ ever recorded, at 231.734. This was accomplished last year (2013) just before he turned 17. This includes an adjustment made for his age (which is done routinely for minors), so only time will tell if he maintains his position, but he is listed in Record Holder’s Republic for Highest IQ and Highest IQ average, and it looks pretty good. He is a he is a staunch conservative and a member of the Republican Tea Party. He is also the founder of the Coptic Orthodox Messianicans Group. Andrew Magdy Kamal hopes to use his talents and intelligence to spread the news of Messiah Yeshua (Jesus Christ) his hero, and he lives in Michigan.

Abdessellam Jelloul – apparently the highest IQ ever scored by an adult in the “advanced IQ test” was by Jelloul, who scored an adult IQ of 198. This was in a 2012 test which included 13 dimensions of intelligence (analytical, spatial, logical, memory, musical, linguistic, philosophical, moral, spiritual, interpersonal, intra-personal, bodily and naturalist). Unlike other tests, the advanced IQ test includes more measures that other tests cannot assess. I tweeted Mr. Jelloul a question about his beliefs in September of last year, and he graciously replied to me that he does “believe in God, a Supreme Architect of the universe” (see a screenshot of this tweet in the slideshow).

Christopher Michael Langan – has a verified IQ of at least 195. Langan achieved a perfect score on the SAT, but dropped out of Montana State University after concluding his professors weren’t qualified to teach him anything. ABC’s 20/20 measured his IQ (as an adult) to be between 195 and 210. Langan has indicated in his writings numerous that he believes in God, for example, in William Dembski’s book “Uncommon Dissent”, he wrote: “…since Biblical accounts of the genesis of our world and species are true but metaphorical, our task is to correctly decipher the metaphor in light of scientific evidence also given to us by God”.

Terence Tao – his IQ was estimated to be between 220 and 230 by the Davidson Institute when he was about ten years old. At eight years old, Tao achieved a score of 760 on the pre-1995 SAT, received a Ph.D from Princeton at 20 and at 24 became the youngest ever full professor at UCLA. I couldn’t find anything about Tao’s metaphysical views. He’s obviously a tremendous mathematician, but doesn’t seem to post much outside of mathematics.

Christopher Hirata – has a verified IQ of 225, calculated when he was in his teens. Hirata skipped middle school, and at 16 was working with NASA on a project exploring the possibility of colonizing Mars. The Daily Princetonian, Princeton’s student paper, where Hirata began attending for his PhD in Astrophysics at 18, reported that his IQ is around 225. Hirata posted the following to his Facebook on October 31, 2013: “Today’s experience: saying the Lord’s prayer with a homeless couple on Colorado Boulevard. It may not feed or shelter them, but I hope that it made a difference in their lives.” So he is clearly both a Theist and a Christian.

Evangelos Katsioulis – has apparently scored a 198 as an adult. Katsioulis is a Greek Doctor/Psychiatrist/Philosopher who has publicly referred to his belief in human souls several times. For example, he did a lecture in 2008 called “BODY AND SOUL”, and made clear that he wasn’t speaking metaphorically in it with lines like: “The soul is not the body. It is not the flesh. It is the spirit.” He is apparently a follower of a strand of Christianity influenced by Teilhard de Chardin.

Rick Rosner – has apparently scored a 192 as an adult, after years of honing his IQ test-taking skills. Has been a writer for the Jimmy Kimmel Show, and appeared on “So You Want to be A Millionaire”. Rosner denied that he was an atheist on Twitter, after an inquiry. He also retweeted this Einstein quote: “God does not care about our mathematical difficulties. He integrates empirically” and in answer to the question “You know there’s a God?” he answered “Maybe. Suspect there’s an infinity of gods”.

Mislav Predavec – has apparently scored a 192 as an adult. [Update – I initially had the wrong quote linked here]. His Christianity can easily be confirmed by a beautiful response he wrote to a friend who had become a Christian in one of the groups he belongs to and which was posted online:

“David, I am so glad hearing good news about your convalescence, and more about your enlightenment, you are aware now that your suffer and pain, your giftedness and sense are a part of plan. Truly, all this can´t exist without being leading it intentionally. Atheistic explanation that everything is accidental progress is full of holes. Stay well my friend.

Mislav”

Gary Kasparov – is alleged to have an IQ of 190. He was perhaps the most universally attested-to as a top-shelf intellect, so it was unthinkable to leave him off of this list. In 2003 Kasparov played to a draw against a chess computer that could calculate three million positions per second. He is considered by many to be the greatest chess player of all time. Kasparov has described himself as a “self-appointed Christian”

Kenneth Ferrell – has apparently scored a 190 as an adult. If I have located the right Kenneth Ferrell online, it’s abundantly clear from his own words that he’s a Christian. Since I’m not sure, I didn’t include him in my count of believers.

So you can see that the brightest of the bright have not foreclosed on the possibility of the existence of an Intelligent Designer. Juxtaposed with the fact that most Scientists are not atheists, I’d say that the Appeal to Authority on which atheist debators have long relied has dissolved.

Steve J. Williams is the author of What Your Atheist Professor Doesn’t Know (But Should)

Read full article >>>Here<<< Read more.... Atheism. The Philosophy of Small Minds.

Pasteur’s Law, Creation Science vs Nose Bone Atheism.

Faith, Science, and Reason. The Pomposity of Atheism.

David Berlinski—Atheism and its Scientific Pretensions

The Walls are closing in on Atheism… not Theism.

Rapturous Amazement! The Advance of Science Converts The High Priest of Atheism to Deism. A Flew.