Carborendum

Do we really need "modern day" examples? These things tend to be universal. Scriptures mention: Poverty Oppression Disease/Disability Death Consequences of sin The world has not changed much in this regard. New players. Same rules. One example from my life was when I was unemployed for over a year. As a depressive, I was seriously considering ending it. But the thing that kept me going was that my family would be left destitute. Let me tell you, I was humbled by that experience. Being destitute of all earthly security forced me to recognize the only true source of security -- the Lord.

Now you've just generated two more definitions of love. SQUISHY FEELINGS: When we tell someone "I love you", what, exactly is that supposed to convey? Nothing but a squishy feeling, really. But it does mean something. What does it mean? I really can't say. I've asked my wife many times why on earth she chose me over every guy she ever knew (and quite honestly, there were some better catches in our student ward where we met). All she can say is "because I loved you, and I didn't love anyone else." Whatever lack of meaning the squishy feeling may mean for anyone else, it was enough for her to choose me. And I'm grateful for that squishy feeling. BLESSINGS: I absolutely agree that this is one definiton. And by this definition, I absolutely agree that God's love is conditional. This was the primary message Elder Nelson was trying to convey when he said that God's love is conditional. And it is this primary message with which I agree whole-heartedly. (D&C 130:21 "Any blessing... obedience to that law...) UNIVERSAL: What exactly is "Universal love"? Nelson does state that His love is universal. The definition/examples he gives is that it is His invitation that is open to all. Whatever we gleen from this, it is for "all". I'm going to omit sons of Perdition for now. But when he says he loves everyone, doesn't that mean everyone? He invites all, but He does not invite everyone? There have to be some qualifiers (conditions). But then that means that the term "universal" doesn't apply. So, what exactly is he saying? I don't really understand this mindset of shoe-horning in this nebulous concept of "love" into a single, one-and-only, no nuances allowed definition. But whatever. If he says that love is not unconditional it is given to everyone What the heck? There have to be multiple types of love we're talking about. One type of love is conditional (Blessings). Another type of love from God is unconditional (His desire to enable us to do good/invitation). Again, my attempt is not to "do the interpreting of Elder Nelson's words for everyone else." My purpose is to try to make sense of it as I read it for myself. The way that I can reconcile everything I read there is that the Lord has a desire for good for everyone, regardless of who we are. But that doesn't mean that all the blessings are there for everyone. The thing that is available for everyone is the promise to give those blessings as we make the right choice to turn to the Savior and follow Him. BOTTOM LINE: My primary question is to ask: What is the purpose in telling people that God's love is conditional? According to Nelson's address, it to condemn the idea that people thought that they were going to receive Eternal Life regardless of what they do. And I agree with that condemnation. My interpretation that God will always "want what's best for us" is indeed unconditional and doesn't stray from Nelson's message. If there was some other purpose of his words which would be blunted by my interpretation that God's squishy feelings are unconditional, then let me know. SONS OF PERDITION: As far as the squishy feelings for Satan, et al, I have to believe that God preventing them from even attaining any level of glory is because if He did not do so, something even worse would happen to them. That is what the squishy feeling does for them. There is a benefit which we are not quite aware of. Maybe for them? Maybe for others? Maybe for all existence? The prophets have not said. But the very character of God lends itself to this conclusion.

I agree. And? We use all sorts of language to describe concepts that are certainly religious without using words found in scriptures. Regardless of a prophets words spoken 20 years ago or 2000 years ago, language evolves. I'm speaking in a manner that should be understood today while still staying true to the meaning of a statement 20 years ago. Yes, and I absolutely agree with this sentiment as I've stated before.

Well, you didn't actually answer his question. But I'll just address the Nelson address since it has now been brought up twice in this thread. ******************* Here's the problem: Semantics. If we're trying to argue about whether God's "love" is "unconditional" then we need to define both of those terms. My previous posts focused on determining what "love" actually means... specifically "Godly love". And I stand by it. Now Elder Nelson defines "unconditional" as I'd agree with that definition. But throughout his entire address, he did not explicitly define "love". And that is the problem with many in this world. Nelson even addresses this errant mindset. People today tend to think that "love" means granting of eternal life. And by that definition, yes, it is certainly conditional. And if that is what people are thinking "Godly love" means, then I'm on board with the doctrine that it is truly conditional. But then he points to a different concept. I'm going to try my best not to criticize. When he describes "love" here, he is no longer talking about granting Eternal Life. Now he is talking about "invitation to all" to come unto Him. That is a completely different aspect of "Divine Love." He didn't clarify that he's talking about a different aspect of love. But he made it a point to avoid using the term "unconditional" and uses the term "universal." I would submit that what he calls "universal love" is what most people would call "unconditional love." Semantics. In one of the Church videos on the Book of Mormon, a father has a wayward son. This idea that God will always want us to be happy is what I'm calling "unconditional love." What I call "unconditional love" is this unwavering desire for good in each of our lives. And that is something that I hope we all agree upon. If you don't like "love," substitute "Desire for good." But it is so sad that people take this unwavering desire for good as a promise of unconditional Eternal Life. That is what I disagree with.

As tongue-in-cheek as this response is, I believe it only addresses one half of the equation. Poorer families may find the additional help worth the cost of food/clothing/shelter. But the other part of the equation... why don't more wealthy families have many children. And really, an intact first-marriage couple actually had at least three children, that would at least be something. But the more the merrier, really. If poor people can afford many children, why can't wealthy people afford many children? Even Trump has 5 children (albeit from three wives). The answer is that they can. But they choose to limit their children because of ... whatever. I know people have to limit because of health and many other reasons that are really out of our control. But so many are self-limiting to 2 or fewer children for a variety of reasons. And one of those is the belief that the earth is over-populated.

I have been a DM because no one else wanted to take the job. It was ok. I could run the campaign well. But I couldn't really come up with an engaging storyline. I can't think of any time I was a player with an engineer DM.

Yup, sounds like me... for engineering work. Again, it sounds like me. (Notice the strikethrough). For me, this means that I need all the upfront information and a clear directive. Then leave it to me and I will get it done. Well... with paper and pencil. But yeah. That sounds like me too. Oh, wait, that was a bad thing. Yes, sometimes I have problems when the right tools are not available. It is true that I can get the job done with brute force. But it will take a couple of days to do something by hand, that which I can do in under an hour with the proper tools. This is like asking a man to use a sledge hammer to break up a concrete block when we could utilize a jack-hammer to do the same thing much faster and without as much wear & tear on the worker. Yes, tools matter. But if I really have to, I can do it by hand.

Well... Since you brought it up. https://a-z-animals.com/blog/how-do-whales-die-7-common-causes-of-death-for-whales/

Well, that's a different take than what I gathered. I was considering Vort's post as a mere extension of what we read in the scriptures already. Ever since Adam, there have been people of God who fell away. Many of them had apostasies so complete that there was little to no continuation of priesthood. It had to be restored. These are called dispensations. What if there was something on a greater scale that paralleled such activity? For discussion purposes, let's call them "eons". The eon we're familiar with is the eon since Adam. In this eon, we've had many dispensations. And we only have a spiritual history since that Adam & Eve pairing. What if there were previous eons that had not been recorded within our known scriptures? How many dispensations did they go through? Why did they have a complete apocalypse with no continuation of seed? What if there were many eons in which this occurred? What if that was the reason Adam and Eve had to start all over again. The earth was formed. But mankind had an end multiple times. And each eon then had to begin again with a new creation of man and woman.

I wonder if the architectural discipline might inform the overall discussion. Architects would prefer a semi-transparent paper (vellum) whereby he might have one sheet for the foundation, another for the floor framing, another for the floorplan, another for the plumbing, another for the 2nd floor, etc. They could all be laid over each other to ensure that the same dimensions were being used for each floor. Chases (chimney, utilities, etc.) would line up from floor to floor. Vellum tended to be a plastic/paper mixture in the fiber matrix pressed into a sheet. It was fine for normal use. But young drafters made enough mistakes where erasing made it expensive. Eventually, they started using Mylar. The Mylar sheets were pretty hefty. They needed to be thick enough that they would not easily be distorted from rolling and unrolling all the time, not to mention the durability to withstand an architect's sharpened pencil -- or compass needle for that matter. One problem was getting the ink to stay on the plastic. If you've ever seen a Mylar balloon that had been handled heavily, you probably noticed that the silvery surface wore of rather easily, revealing a transparent membrane. Two solutions were used throughout the industry. They spread a sticky coating on the plastic to allow for ink to remain fast. This had the disadvantage of only allowing a single erasure. More than that, it tended to reveal the smooth, completely transparent substrate. They sand-blasted one side to allow the ink to remain fast within the valleys of the surface. This did allow for erasure with application of proper chemicals (for some inks, this meant plain water). But there was a ghost image that might remain. Regarding the vellum hypothesis you mentioned, this perspective changes why there may have been previous versions. Instead of "fixing a mistake" (which would most likely be the hypothesis commonly believed) we can look at it as a necessary step to designing the final product. A foundation design is required to define what can be placed upon it. If you have a perimeter footing, we need the 1st floor framing to match the edges of the concrete stemwalls. We can't really place a wood frame on top of earth directly. It has to be set on a solid foundation. Then the floor plan will dictate what we do on top of the floor framing. Walls are often framed in what is called "platform framing". So those walls are dictated by the floor framing below. Then that somewhat limits what second floor framing (and ultimately 2nd floor walls) can be built on top of that. Then the second floor dictates the roof design to some degree. But none of the portions can be properly built without having built the lower parts of the structure.

Number of children per female is going down in virtually every nation on earth. This is no doubt caused by several factors. Career women: Women who specifically put career ahead of family. The hookup society: The default mentality is to have sex with no consequences (as if there ever was such a thing). Fertility/Infertility rates: This is an interesting statistic that is not very easy to unravel. Zeitgeist regarding the future: Dealing with historically normal problems is to be expected. But to raise a child "in this day and age" with all the problems in the world worsening That's child abuse. Cost-of-living: In much of the world, this is becoming more of a reality. But in the US, this is usually just an excuse for materialism. One major thing is that women who spend many years on the pill do damage that they are not aware of. Early testing for the pill was for short durations -- a few years at best. But some women are on it from adolescence to their late 30s and then wonder why they cannot carry to term. There is no such thing as any medical procedure without side-effects. And even after that, they only have time for one, maybe two children. Casual sex practitioners tend to have it in their minds that sex is just for pleasure. It's another form of recreation. Does this really lend itself to an unselfish attitude towards bringing new life into this world? Women think they can use this to find companions as they further their careers. Men just like to use women. And somehow, they feel like they have fulfilling lives. (If you say so...) The problem with detecting real rates of infertility is that there are so many women who simply don't want children. Some people also say that modern society (pesticides, pain relievers, common medications...) cause fertility issues with both men and women and we just aren't seeing it. The availability of and social pressure for abortions is high. Higher than we are normally aware of. Poll after poll shows that people are less happy in the current decade than most previous decades. Their outlook on the future is lower than it has been in my lifetime. Yes, we still find happiness here and there. And there are people who still have good lives where they are generally happy. But polls show that it is less and less common than in previous decades. People always talk about cost of living as an excuse to not have children anymore. Why then, is it common for poorer families to have more children? How often do you see wealthy families have large numbers of children? In my ward, we see exceptions to this rule. But it is certainly a rule for the population in general. Our ward has eight families with five or more children (some of them are adults who live elsewhere.) And one family from our neighboring ward had 12 children. They moved out recently. And every single one of these families were fairly wealthy. Why is this an exception to the rule?

My cat seems to be unusually happy for a cat. It seems that he's constantly purring except when he's afraid (when our dog comes around). He purrs when he sleeps. He purrs when he's stalking his item of interest. He purrs when he's chasing someone. He just constantly purrs. I've never seen that in all the cats I've had. What's up with that?

Well, there goes the idea of Guerrilla Proselyting.

Costs: I predict A mass outflow of large businesses A bankruptcy of small to medium businesses. One-man or family businesses will be all that remain. This kind of policy is simply unsustainable. Governments can do this for longer because they just need to raise taxes or deficit spend. Businesses can't do that.

There is a lot of give and take. My situation is a bit different. I'm an independent contractor. It's different being the only employee than it is to "run your own business" with employees. In that way, it is something between the employee/boss dichotomy. As a contractor, there are different pros and cons. PROS I make more per hour than if I were directly employed. My schedule is much more flexible. I don't have to pay nearly as much in FICA. I pay about $1,000/yr instead of around $10,000/yr. I get paid time-and-a-half for overtime. This is common for drafters. But engineers usually get either nothing, or straight time. I can work with more than one client at a time. This ups the total income, but it takes some juggling. I don't have to do those stupid yearly evaluations. (Think of De Niro's character in The Intern.) CONS No benefits. For now that's fine by me. We're healthy. We pay for our own services as we need them. And it is WAY less than insurance + deductibles+copays. No 401(k). While I can still contribute to my IRA, I don't have the company match. And the contribution limit is lower for IRAs. If the market goes down, I'm one of the first to get cut. This doesn't really happen to me. I'm not only a multi-faceted engineer, I'm also a specialist in several areas that... well, there aren't too many of my kind around. I was once laid off from one company, and they called me back in about a month. There is an interesting psychological twist to the pay gap. I get paid more per hour which usually more-than-makes-up-for a lack of PTO. But I still feel the psychological loss of income for those weeks I'm on vacation. Telling myself that I've worked enough hours to make up for it doesn't help. So, I have difficulty fully enjoying my vacations. I keep thinking about the money I could be making.

Pretty cool.

Luke 17:1 Luke 17:17 Mark 11:17 & Luke 19:46

That's not so far off from what I'm saying. And my sentiment is more real than you realize. As Mormons, we have built a shrine to St. Browning.

Assuming... (That's an important condition). But I'll go along with it for this post. That is the genius of the US Constitution. (And I'm going to ask you politely to pay attention to the wording of my next sentence.) We are not allowed to have a particular religion/sect use governmental force to enforce their faith on people of other faiths. The free-market of ideas allows the blending of many view points via free speech to determine what is enforced by governmental authority. Religion is a free-trade consideration for every individual and family. No government force. People are allowed to change their religion at any time. This freedom is essential for preventing religion from getting into the "controlling" paradigm. Even from an atheist's perspective, religion is a necessary institution for codifying the collected wisdom of the ages for every day behaviors that it would be tyrannical for government to regulate. Un-codified religions aren't really effective since they can change what they believe at any time. Thus the role of religion in society as a whole is not satisfied. I'm not sure if you read my entire previous post. But I actually addressed this very issue. And you're confirming, not refuting my position. I'll say it more clearly: If you devote your time, talents, and means to a particular concept, idea, or being, that is your "god". All you're saying is that you believe in a temporary god that will die with you. All humans do this if they have any purpose/meaning at all. You may not want to admit it, but you're taking a step backwards in religion. These religions you mention are still steeped in this belief that "things" are "god" (for lack of a better word). A Buddhist from high school told me that an example of "everything is god" would be like the earth nourishing a tree. It's all part of one body that cycles through all the universe. We don't think of our body as separate parts unless we're specifically addressing it from a medical perspective or some such. The heart is me, the leg is me, the brain is me. It's all me. And we need it all. Gods can take on many forms in our minds and hearts. But there is little difference between our modern "gods" and the gods of the ancient pagans. Ancient pagan "gods" were not really "beings". Greeks didn't worship "Ares, the god of war." They worshiped war. "Ares" is simply the Greek word for war. So, if you worshiped Ares, you worshipped war. But they simply thought of them as personifications for the purpose of worship. Abrahamic religions were the first in the world to say, "Hey, those concepts that you worship? They are not conscious beings that you can bargain with or curry favor from. We have a Living God that actually does speak." That may seem like common sense today. But at the time of Abraham, this was truly revolutionary. The only difference is your mode of worship. Whatever you hold dear, you are worshipping it. The "prayers and oblations" are the hopes and dreams you have of accomplishing something towards that ideal. You talk to others with similar goals and aspirations to see if you can pool resources or knowledge/experience. You sacrifice your time, talents, and energy to achieve that ideal. That's worship. That's your god. That's a religion. And your chosen religion is more like the ancients than ours is.

Financially, it doesn't make sense. But psychologically, it's a big deal. The thing is that if it is part of your salary, it is considered something to "expect". Therefore, they don't get any credit for it. But if it is "free soda" -- even if it is understood as being available to everyone -- it is considered a "perk". But for the hospital that was so busy that most people didn't get to have any of the food anyway, it probably would have been better to hire more personnel.

Ends = Results/goals/requirements Jesus answered the requirement of the law to punish those who sin. Thus "He offereth himself a sacrifice for sin." But this needs to be informed by some interesting word play is between the Spanish & English. English: Atonement Spanish: expiación (And we have the English word: expiation.) Atonement originally came from the words at-one-ment. And it meant that people were being reconciled after some offense was healed. But because of religious usage of the word, it has come to refer to the payment that facilitates the reconciliation. Expiation refers to the payment of a penalty. While we revere and worship Jesus for the payment of the penalty (the requirements of the law), the resulting reconciliation with God is what we can look forward to (the results/goals).

We see that Spiderman removes his mask. But (despite the scene in ESB) Luke said that if Vader removed the mask, he'd die. And he didn't have his "chamber" available at the pot luck.

The principle you are describing is indeed correct. But I have some objections to the application. The phenomenon of dollars going out happens everywhere. But it is exaggerated in smaller communities because less money comes into the community. At least this has been the historical norm. But your application to transportation/commuting is still misplaced. 1. Smaller communities which have no money coming in automatically means that they would not be commuting. If one commutes, they are going to sell their goods/services to someone in the city. They then bring money into the community. But if they're not commuting, then your utopian idea of bicycling doesn't help. 2. Virtually all commerce nowadays causes money to drain out of a community. Gasoline is one such commodity. Other things like food, clothing, home maintenance, bicycles, home furnishings, etc. are no different. The issue here is collecting that power. Tesla didn't have a dependable way of measuring it with the technology available to him at the time. So, he made an educated guess based on what was available at the time. Since then we've developed the technology to measure it more accurately. It turns out that the reality was quite disappointing. The total energy is, indeed, quite significant. But that energy is spread out over so much of the earth that you'd have to cover hundreds of square miles to generate the energy at a rate required to light up a 100W light bulb. It's even worse at the poles. The magnetic field lines are up and down. Electric field would necessarily be bent to the horizontal. And then the direction varies throughout the day because the magnetic lines change orientation as the earth rotates. But let's say that we can get past all that. Forget cost. Forget technology. The sheer size of such an installation would be impossible to secure. It would be too easy for terrorists or other bad actors to cripple the infrastructure of an entire nation. There are many reasons why Tesla could never get it to work, even when his overall theory was correct.