My wife sent me a link today from a site that talks about making money blogging.
A bunch of the sites that were suggested were these "pay per post" deals where a company contacts you and asks you to do a positive review of their website or business and in return they pay you some lump sum. I'm guessing that a setup like that would completely knock away any neutrality or objective eye that the blogger had which means that it's a little misleading to do something like that (unless there were a clear disclaimer, or if the blogger TRULY liked the site, movie, or merchandise before being contacted about it). Then again, if you're going to make money on the blogosphere, you've gotta have advertising, or a product to sell, or some sort of setup like this. Otherwise, you're just a "Free"lancer like me who blogs in his free time and doesn't actually have as much time to research and write as I'd like. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this.
One thing I truly miss about Seattle was the church we went to. Bethany Community Church was a wonderful place for us to learn and grow.
And it wasn't just the community we got to be a part of, either. You just don't often find pastors like Richard Dalhstrom who are as intellectually stirring, relevant, applicable, and biblically based and able to cast vision and truth week after week in a way that makes you hungry for more. If it weren't for the fact that he would HATE Florida (and it would be a crime against Seattle to remove him from his ministry there) I wish we could have brought him with us... Here's an example: For the past week or so, Richard Dalhstrom has written a few posts outlining some thoughts on how the Church should be reacting to the issue of Homosexuality. After reading through his posts, I believe that they are pretty sensitive, compelling, and challenging to both heterosexual and homosexual readers. I especially enjoyed the way the he turned the issue into something bigger and more meaningful than just a conversation on whether or not the church should allow gay marriage. Rather, it should challenge each of us in our sexuality whether we're married or single, gay or straight. I'd encourage you to read through his ideas and join the discussion over at his site: Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four He's also got a pretty good book out that you should pick up if you haven't done so already. It's about spiritual practices (not sexuality), and I really enjoyed it. It's probably on par with Foster's Celebration of Discipline, but a little more accessible. Check it out below! What follows is NOT an accurate, word for word account of the conversation that Beth and I had this weekend. I'm an ENFJ. NF's gather up the big picture based on their values. What Beth said and what I heard are probably not the same... This is what I got out of the convesation regardless of how it actually went. * * * On the way back home from Osprey, where we were visiting my in-laws the other night, I told Beth that I feel like my relationship with God is a little rocky. I related a few things that seemed to be missing from my spiritual health and the frustration I’ve been dealing with over my lack of connection on spiritual matters. It just seems as though I’ve got a lot of brilliant ideas about who God is, but no fruit to speak of that transpires from a healthy relationship. An interview I did with Christopher Cocca on Googlewave and Technology was picked up by the site Watching The Watchers. About a year ago I ran across Micah Tillman's website, http://www.micahtillman.com, which espouses a very similar topic range as my own and after reading through a few of his posts, I discovered that he is indeed a most formidible scholar and a valuable voice regarding politics, religion, and philosophy. I immediately subcribed to his blog feed and I've been reading his posts ever since. Micah is a Lecturer in the School of Philosophy at the Catholic University of America and is currently writing a dissertation on Edmund Husserl’s theory of empty and filled intentions. He's also been kind enough to answer a number of my own personal questions through his blog and also by e-mail. The other day I asked if he's be willing to answer a few questions for my readers and he was kind enough to share his insights on life and his ideas on philosophy in the form of a casual interview. I'm really pleased that I'm able to post it here on my blog, today, and I'd encourage you to check out his website and his other writing if you enjoy what you read here. * * * Nathan Key: First question, you're teaching philosophy, which totally puts you in a different class than say, myself (I'm looking into grad schools for the future), but whenever I tell people about my own interest in philosophy, they always counter with some sort of "what are you going to do with a philosophy degree?" statement. So, let's go ahead and entertain that question for a moment. Other than just teach philosophy, what's the big goal of yours? What do you hope to accomplish with your PhD? Wow, I just read an article today that ripped into Abraham Lincoln. Here's an excerpt: Two weeks back, I wrote a rather fun post called Why Do the Rich Always Foot the Bill? and it got quite a lot of comments. One I especially enjoyed was from Jeff. He made a comment about the redistribution of wealth and how rich people tend to leave their kids big piles of money. He said that this is still redistributing wealth, it's just that it's within the family rather than to the entire community. His thought has stuck with me and I've been turning it over in my head during the past two weeks. 'Cause it's true. Willing your estate to another person in the event of one's death is a redistribution of wealth. Unless you bury your fortune in the ground, someone will make off with it after you die. * * * Honestly, there can be big problems with both of these ideals and I presented them both in such an extreme form that I highly doubt anyone truly falls completely into one side or the other.
But I did so to drive home a point. Our nation was founded on the rights of the individual, rather than the rights of the collective. There are other nations that have gone the other route and valued to collective above the individual (Russia and China come to mind). The main reason that our founders decided upon the rights of the individual is that as both individualistic and collectivist groups become institutionalized, governments that respect the rights of the individual usually end up being fairer to all people. The core property right is the right to one's self. Governments that respect the individual and the individual's property rights are almost always less likely to enslave the people they rule because they respect the fundamental rights of each person to their own person. Collectivist groups can rationalize almost anything as the "good of the people" which is why they can limit the amount of children a person is allowed to birth or tell someone where to work or how they can be educated. If it's for the "good of all" it often ends up being for the "good of none." That's why I'm pro property rights- even when the rich seem to be getting away with a fortune while the rest of us scrape and save for everything in life. Pork Projects are those little line items that creep into legislation as Congressmen fight to represent the people they've been elected by. Unfortunately, a process that was supposed to help Congress truly practice representative democracy has become a legalized system of bribery where Representatives are allowed to add their pet projects to a bill in order to make it more favorable to them- even if their own interests have little or nothing to do with the legislation in question. I was thinking about Jesus' statement, "Judge Not, Lest Thee Be Judged" the other day when I was sitting in a gathering at Summit Church in Orlando. I'll do the same for you. The government usually is the entity that take care of the roads for us- building and maintaining the highways, byways, and residential streets. They use part of our yearly tax money to pay for their upkeep and creation. |
About NathanNathan Key likes to think about faith and philosophy and talk about it with others. He lives with his family in New Hampshire. He doesn't always refer to himself in the third person. |