What if you could play the lottery with money in your savings account and even if you didn’t win, you wouldn’t lose any of your original money?

Sounds impossible, right?   I mean — playing the lottery is fun, but everyone knows the entry fee is flushed down the toilet.

Unless….

Freakonomics Radio (a podcast I highly recommend) recently ran a two-part podcast (Part 1 | Part 2) on “No-Lose Lotteries”, otherwise known as Prize-Linked Savings Accounts (PLSes).     I found the concept to be fascinating and intriguing and it left me wondering — man, how can we get it going here?

The essential idea is this: You open a savings account at a bank or credit union or somewhere.     Instead of meager interest payments which, as we all know, are next-to-nothing anyway, the interest is pooled from all other people saving into one lump sum and then, once a month, one person wins the entire pot of interest in a lottery.

If you don’t win, you have your original savings and haven’t lost a dime.   You haven’t gained anything, either, but not-losing in this economy is pretty nice.    And if you are one of the lucky ones that win, it could really change your life for awhile.    Prizes are not gigantic and depend on the number of people saving, but they range from $20,000 to $100,000.     If you’re like me, even a $10,000 windfall would make significant dents in my debt, lifestyle, etc.    $100,000 would be incredible.

PLSes have been around for years in Europe and Africa and other countries but have only recently been able to take a foothold in a few U.S. states, mostly due to the fact that the laws prevent lotteries that are not State-run from existing.    And, as you can imagine, the States are NOT fond of the idea of letting these in.

The podcasts and articles basically sum it up like this:    Americans are crap at saving.    Americans love to gamble in some form or another, mostly on lotteries.   (~$58 billion spent on lottery tickets last year)    Why not combine the two, increase our saving rate, and fulfill our need to dream a little?

Last night I attended the wedding of two very dear and wonderful people who completely and totally deserve to be together and who make a lovely couple.   The service was lovely, the groom belted out an awesome solo, the bride looked radiant, and the reception supper was incredibly tasty.

Only one problem:   The reception was dry.   There wasn’t even champagne.   Sigh.

A little bubbly goes a long way.

I think a common misconception with those who are skittish around the topic of alcohol is that having a wet wedding will result in a lot of rowdy folks getting totally sloshed and puking all over.    And depending on your family, this may be the case with a few people — everyone has at least one guy or gal who will go too far and need some help stumbling into bed at the end of the evening.

However, here’s what I’ve observed about the presence of alcohol in a social gathering setting such as a wedding:

In order to have a rip-roaring good time, people need to be comfortable enough to let down their hair and loosen up a bit, especially when the room is full of people who are, at best, acquaintances and family members that you don’t hang out with all the time.   Sure, you have a few friends, but the bulk of people at a wedding are folks you simply don’t see every day.   We humans have a HUGE ability to spend the bulk of our time in such a situation wondering what others are thinking of us.   It’s why we agonize over what to wear, how we walk, talk, and act, and who we are seen associating with or not.

In short, we’re pretty uptight and formal.

Given enough time, we’d get comfortable on our own and loosen up, but at a wedding reception, you only have a few hours to have fun and then it’s over and people have to go to bed.    The process has to be sped up.

Enter the powers of alcohol!

Despite the occasional semi-amusing person who will spend the evening replacing the bulk of their blood supply with whiskey, most folks will have a drink or three and call it good.   Even in this small amount, amazing things happen to the group dynamic.   One of alcohol’s first functions on the brain is to relax the body and mind and the second is to reduce inhibitions.    Of course, if you drink enough you might get REALLY wild, but the first inhibitions to be relaxed is to stop worrying so damned much about what others are thinking about what you’re doing and to just have fun.

This ends up being an essential key to creating a great party atmosphere in the time constraints allowed.    The quick way to get the folks that will have fun to HAVING FUN is to get a bit of booze in them.   Not so much that they can’t stand up, but enough that they can relax, loosen up, and start worrying more about having a good time than about comparing notes.    Nobody wants a bunch of drunks stumbling around and breaking tables, but we do want a great time to be had.    Having some adult beverages available will ensure this.   Tongues loosen, bodies loosen, minds shut up.   It’s a great formula for an awesome time.

This all being said, weddings are for the bride and groom and whatever they want on that day is law; everyone else can sit down and shut the hell up as far as I’m concerned.   Various religions or customs might take offense to having such beverages present.   I completely get the arguments against it, but if your event allows for it, take it as advice that it can be one of the best social lubricants known to man.

I had a wonderful time at the aforementioned wedding and would never say otherwise, but I walked away early in the night, wondering if it wouldn’t have been that much more impressive and memorable had a few of the tighter individuals simply had some liquid encouragement ingested in order to get down and groove.

With the recent happenings in Arizona concerning illegal immigration and the potential ramifications of their new law,  and with my sister, who rarely comments politically on anything, chiming in with a blog post about her views on the subject, I thought I’d ought to present a post on a subject that I find to be something I sit on the fence about and, frankly, haven’t formed a good opinion on yet.

And that is — how do we handle the plethora of languages spoken by the various inhabitants of the United States?

Tim James, candidate for governor of Alabama, recently made an advertisement about language usage.    It seems that Alabama currently gives driver’s license tests in 12 different languages.   He states that if elected, he would reduce this down to one — English — because that’s what they speak in Alabama and it will save a lot of money in not printing and administering forms and tests.

I watched this video with a great deal of mixed feelings.   On one hand, I completely see his point — English is the dominating language of this country.   Many other countries around the world now teach English as a matter of course in school simply so they can do business with us and others.  The fact is, road signs are in English, which makes you wonder exactly how well the drivers in Alabama that tested on another language can drive.

Of course, I can also see the point of multiculturalism.   Language is fundamental to how we think, act, and live.   Being a bit accomodating may cost a bit or be an inconvenience, but it preserves something for the foreign speaker.    Being exposed to more than one language broadens our own horizons, making us better, more well-rounded people and keeping our minds open.  How terrible if we had suppressed all music written in Latin!

Also, it could be argued that many that live here may not follow laws, use services, or participate as much should we cut off the language options.    There is also a very significant amount of Latino immigrants now living here, especially in the southwestern states and some parts of the Midwest.    If the town is 50% Spanish-speaking, should the languages used be 50/50 as well?

And then I come back to the fact that many businesses and government now employ translators as a matter of course to handle the load.   Signs are being printed in English and Spanish at least, if not more.   There is a lot of money, time, and effort spent on handling those who don’t have a mastery of English.  We are inundated by the, “press here for English” or “press 1 for English”, and any number of accommodations.   It is possible that we are more multi-linguistic now than ever in the history of this country.

The United States does not have an official, legal language, meaning that what is supported is up to a decision by individual, local governments and so forth.    There are plenty of movements out there to pass a law to make English official or maybe, like Quebec, make it a dual system.

To be honest, I’m simply on the fence over this.    My great-great-great grandparents had to learn English when they came over from Germany and didn’t get any leeway from the locals.    If I moved to France, I would be all but forced to learn the language to be successful at all.   But times change and perhaps the USA has outgrown its monolinguistic setting — should we be changing our attitudes towards language as well, or are we justified in holding to our English majority?

This is the second in a series of postings called, “Controversies”, which examine various sectors of my current beliefs, opening them up for the comments and criticisms of my readers. For a more explanation, please view The Introduction or my first writing, God.  I thought Easter Sunday an appropriate release time for this piece, don’t you think?

Jesus of Nazareth:  Did he exist?   If he did, what’s the true significance and influence on history, faith, and our understanding of God and the world?   If he didn’t, what’s the influence of the mythical person on today’s society?   These and many, many other questions surround this “historical” figure that, real or not, certainly can be said to have affected a great many aspects of our modern world.

For myself, the jury is out on the actual nature and existence of Jesus, either as historical or messianic figure, because there is a vast array of evidence for and against both his life and his acts, and sorting through this to find the kernels of truth, without influence or bias, is nearly impossible to do.    Too many people have a stake in the nature of Christ to let an investigation into the actual truth and evidence go without a hitch or an skewed interpretation.

That being said, I think examining Jesus is a worthwhile pursuit, for even if it’s an entirely made-up story, the way he has soaked into the world’s traditions, thoughts, and actions clearly means that there is something of significance in his teachings and attitudes that appeals to a great deal of humans, and that in and of itself is interesting enough to pursue a thought train about.

To be fair and honest, I place the same onus and emphasis on all messianic characters found throughout the world’s religions — Islam with Mohammad, Mormonism with Joseph Smith, and so forth — they are all considered transformative people within their own frameworks, and I think they each deserve attention; if not for belief, to glean the wisdom and intelligence they presented to their peoples.   As a philosopher, I must gain knowledge and insight from any well that happens to have a bucket hanging above it.     But that being said, I’m only there for the good bits — just because it’s full of water, I don’t have to tip the bucket over my head to get the point.

Jesus’ historical existence seems to have a great deal of followers although there are always dissenters, especially where the accurate historical record is concerned; however, when debating his influence, it’s the manner of his nature that is always in question.   His chroniclers recorded the events many years after the actual events, after having been passed around via the typical oral tradition of that time, and after a significant number of people had become believers in the movement, it certainly wouldn’t have been the first instance of “embellishment of the press” or “literary license” that we’ve seen.

All that being said, biblically speaking, Jesus is a very interesting character. He is an advocate of peace, but he is not a

Buddy Christ

wimp — there are too many impressions of Christ as a pacifist when, in reality, he is often calling for action more than discouraging it. The scene in the temple with the moneychangers proves that he is not against taking action in the correct circumstances.  Remember his preaching about, “if he slaps you on the cheek, turn the other one to him also”? It seems a pretty pacifist statement until you look at the underlying history and context (which is why it’s infinitely important to do so with everything in the book, not just this example.)

Jesus was not silent and calm all the time, although he certainly had his moments. He was a great storyteller and a very charismatic individual, as he seemed to charm huge crowds. From what I can see, he was a lover of parties and friends, as evidenced by his participation in the famous wedding where the water was turned into wine. Regardless of whether the miracle occurred, the story reveals some character of the man. I envision him either up and dancing to the music or reclining on cushions in some corner with a circle of friends around, engaged in a huge belly laugh at somebody’s joke. Some of the wisest people in the world were great partyers and I don’t think this was an exception. Socrates was off his nut most of the time and yet had extreme moments of profoundness.

I think this speaks to his understanding for a need for balance in one’s life, juggling the important with the amusing, responsibility with recreation, friends and family with good work ethic.  Reading through the books, you get the feeling that he didn’t always want to go traipsing off to the next town, spending days on a dusty road, but at the same time, he realized the importance of it, and the draw of the people was always in him.    For myself, I can reflect and understand what that’s like, to find the thing that takes you forward and motivates you, whatever the circumstances, simply because you must.

Jesus spoke of leaving behind standard conventions and reaching for higher understanding of God, the world, and human interaction. He could see beyond the day-to-day activities of people and their default needs and deeds. The people of Israel in that day were locked into years and years of tradition and were handling issues and thoughts the same way they always had…or the way they were told by the priests. Jesus urged them to think for themselves, to examine each situation and respond as they think an intelligent, morally-engaged person would, not as they always had traditionally. “He who is without sin throw the first stone.” Breaking the default paradigm was very much Jesus’ credo.

Personally, I am all over this, and adore opportunities in life where I can challenge the status quo and be the advocate that questions the real purpose in it.   I do not do it often enough, and that is my fault, but I try to find ways to say, “Look, just because you’ve always thought that doesn’t make it so, and tradition isn’t necessarily fostered out of something that is applicable today — why not re-evaluate?”

Christ of Saint John of the Cross -- Salvador Dali

I like to think of Jesus as the human-aspect of God as a whole; in a sense, a distilled version of God, extruding the human aspects thereof while yet retaining the essence of Godness. Hence, if Jesus is God-in-a-man, then it was used to translate the nature and attitude of God to the human masses at their level.

Of course, the concepts weren’t always clear to his followers; I think this is for two reasons: One, at that point, everyone’s minds were still reeling from the idea that they could possibly be doing something different than the way they were, and Two, because metaphysical, moral, and ethical concepts require a great deal of higher thought and intelligence, something we take more for granted nowadays but that had to be incredibly uncommon in that world. To wrap your head around complex ideas like these when previously your entire life has been about how many fish you caught and whose boat you were on is — well — very difficult.

My examination of who and what Jesus is/was is still continuing as I haven’t completely decided what it’s all about. I get more and more discouraged about the traditional view as I go along; however, whether or not he was the Son of God, this much is true: There is much wisdom to be learned from his teachings, from his actions, and from his manner of interacting with his fellow humans. These are concepts and ideas that people that everyone of every faith or belief can take away to make a better, more conscious and wise world.

Instead of going on to the next topic in my Controversies series, I am going to post what would have been a reply to a comment but instead is big enough to warrant a separate posting.

So, here is the continuation of my original posting on the existence and nature of God. If you are new to this series, please read the Introduction and then catch up.

Becky brings up a good point that I did not properly expand upon the why, exactly, I came through experiences and logic to deduce that a god must exist, so I thought it a useful exercise to write it out, both for my readers as well as to concretize it within my own mind.

My original journey into the existence of God took a path very similar to Descartes’ own reduction, insomuch as I proceeded from what I thought I knew about God and proceeding to doubt that knowledge, and all proceeding foundations of that knowledge, down until I reached the point of saying that God did not, in fact, logically exist.

And here I began; wandering for hours lost as a freshman in college, seeing nothing but darkness before me and lies behind me. It was not, as I recall, one of my shining moments in my personal life. There were other factors at play during that time, of course; it was a formative year or two in my life when many things collided — friends, women, and schooling — but losing the religion that had governed and soaked my life for so long was extremely depressing and confusing for a long time.

So, having arrived at the point where there was no god whatsoever, I proceeded to think about this and decide what made logical sense, as that was the only tool left in my bag. I knew that during my life there had been various events that clued me into there being something beyond the standard physical world.

Visions of things that weren’t supposed to be there, or didn’t make sense given the circumstances (and no, I wasn’t under the influence), events of such extreme serendipity or otherwise impossible circumstances (items appearing where they weren’t a minute ago, certain events unfolding in a way that just wouldn’t happen randomly, etc.) — these and other things led me to conclude that there must be something behind this, and it must be outside of the defined world as we know it which, for all intents and purposes, is pretty much what we term the, “spiritual world”, whether or not it truly involves “spirits” or simply corporeal beings of a higher dimension. For now, it’s a useful term.

With the idea that there was something in the spiritual world propagating, as far as I could tell, random, small events of non-logical possibilities, it made me think further. If there are one or more higher-dimensional beings, then it is reasonable to say that they embody certain properties given their dimensional status — just as we are able to look at a sheet of paper and tell exactly what is happening to all 2-dimensional things upon it, so could a forth-or-higher being tell, simply by the nature of it, what’s going on in the 3^rd dimension. This gives both omnipresence and omniscience to this person (or persons).

Omnipotence comes in the form of being able to manipulate anything within a lower dimension. Much as we can draw a line on a sheet of paper, thus altering their reality, so could a higher-D being manipulate the 3^rd dimension without much trouble.

Omnipresence, omniscience, and omnipotence — if those three features don’t designate a god-figure as existing, I don’t know what does.

Moving on brings the argument for or against a monotheistic arrangement. While this is a bit of a leap, logically, it did seem as though the various events and happenings in my life that I would term, “spiritual”, were somehow coordinated. This may be only my perception, of course, but it seems logical for now to say that if they were indeed all synchronized that a single mind would be behind it. Hence, a single god.

That being said, I don’t think that it necessarily eliminates a polytheistic viewpoint nor do I think that should be eliminated. I don’t have a solid enough argument against it as yet. There is also the idea that perhaps, for simplistic reasons, it behooves us to group all of such beings into one category because they either think of like mind or the events appear coordinated simply because they are all viewing the same reality as each other.

So, that basically establishes the nature of god insomuch as I can argue it. Is it a foolproof argument? No. I’d even go so far as to say it’s kind of weak. Am I, as they say, seeing nails because I happen to hold a hammer? Maybe; it’s entirely possible that I’m unable to let go of the idea that God exists and therefore am trying overly hard to make one appear. I’ve thought about it a lot, and this doubt always corrodes my inner confidence that what I think is correct and true. At the moment, I simply don’t have a way to determine exactly what is going on with that except to simply say it might be a factor.

As always, your comments and reflections are appreciated.