A little publicity

I just found out that my grad school wrote about my DC experience in the recent newsletter. I was pretty stoked! However, they threw in a picture of me with Feinstein taken in SD, making it a little out of sync in terms of location.

http://irps.ucsd.edu/documents/Newsvol1no1.pdf

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God deserves all of the credit

Early on, ever since I read about God granting Solomon's desire for wisdom, I have asked for the same. In the midst of my ignorance, I ask him to shape this useless piece of clay which embodies all of me. Throughout the years of my life, I try to obey his commands and I grow. I disobey and I suffer at the hands of a good Father who teaches his son the path of wisdom. In the Bible, he tells us to ask him for anything so I him to bless me. I continue to seek him and ask his blessings even though I am so undeserving of His favor. He blesses me anyways.

I look at what I have and who I have become. Yet I am sometimes tempted to think that I am self made and that what I have came from the work of my hands. How utterly untrue this is! I simply look back at where I've come from and remember my foolishness. Yes, all that I have - current grad school, future work, future research abroad - all comes from Him. It's another reminder that He is so good to me.

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The evolutionists aren't in the sciences, they're in the liberal arts (and they're dumb)

I go to the philosophy / literature class I TA every other day to hear some God, Jesus, and creationism bashing. It's true. I'll send you my lecture notes if you want me to prove it, but I teach Nietzche (who said "God is dead"), Vasari, Heidegger, etc. They always point to "scientific principles" as their justification for evolution, which (pardon me) is a bunch of crap! Those philosophy / literature Ph.D's don't have a scientific bone in them.

I never heard so much anti-creationist talk before while I studies and worked in immunology and molecular biology. Back then I was on the cutting edge of co-stimulatory molecule research. I can draw cladograms (cladistic analysis) for microevolutionary phylogeny off of the top of my head. These liberal arts professors wouldn't even know what I'm talking about! Yet they are such proponents of "scientifically" backed evolution.

In a staff TA meeting yesterday, the lecturer talked to the director of the philosophy program.

The lecturer said, "I can't believe that people would still subscribe to creation... in this day and age. The Christians call it... what is it? 'Intelligent Design.'" My ears perked up because he was finally something that made sense to me - intelligent design.

The director responds, "Yeah, can you believe it? 30% of our students believe in God and creation!" If 30% of students believe in creation, surely there will be one student (me) out of 5 TAs that isn't athiest. Why have this judgmental conversation in my face? They were literally sitting 2 feet directly across from me at the table.

I wanted to say, "I believe in God, his creation, and Jesus who went to the cross for my sins." But I was too much of a wimp. Plus, they'd act all weird around me from then on. But it would have been 10 seconds of glory! His glory as well as mine for having the guts.

The truth is that science can only get us so far, and real scientists know the limits of modern science. It's the non-scientist who will put blind faith into science. The astrophysicist recognizes that the in the beginning there was the Big Bang, which is another way to say that something came from nothing (or more precisely - a small spatial point containing all of the mass in our universe, since there is conservation of mass). A cutting edge astrophysicist would correct the original Big Bang to say it was the "Hot" Big Bang, since Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation (CMBR) shows residue of current temperatures in space that points to extreme temperatures as the conception of our world. This is all junk off of the top of my mind from when I took Astrophysics at Berkeley or when I researched at NASA. The point is the science confirms and even points to the Bible. Science cannot explain how the world can come into being, but just that it became - parallel to the explanation in the Bible.

It's obvious to you by now how I get frustrated with people who really don't know what they're talking (my TAs, liberal arts professors, and my sister) about thinking that they know what they're talking about (proving evolution through science; discounting creation). People who do know what they talk about (scientist) wouldn't say the things that the people who don't know what they're talking (mentioned earlier) about would say. I went back and added the helps in parens. In short: (1) evolution is not as scientifically sound as people think and (2) science points to creation anyways (Big Bang).

I spent the day thinking about writing this as an article in Discipleship Journal. I think it will help people gain a scientific understanding against evolution.

That's my schpeal.

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By the way. After 8 months of preparing mentors, proposals, recommendations, I just found out that I was awarded the Fulbright! Glory to God! I am going to Taiwan for a year to research Taiwanese electoral policy with NTU professors, National Academy of Sciences researchers, and the Chief of the Political Section at the US Embassy (AIT). I put this announcement at the end so people won't get to it. Then I enshrouded it in words to cover it, since I kinda want my friends to find out but also don't want a big head about it. Let my pride fall down, I'm a little man (Supertones song).

Someone just called me "Leslie."

What the heck?! That was definitely a first. I've usually heard "Daniel" or "Andy" but never a girl's name. The person who said it is one of my TA coworkers, not even just an acquaintance or something. Sad.

Ok... my student Kim is here to talk to me about essay writing, gotta go.