Greenflame

Jottings on science, religion, technology, pop culture, photography and faith from the Aotearoa New Zealand

  • Deep Time

    An idea for documenting the changes in urban landscapes in the US. It’s nice to see people thinking about the depth of time, rather than the fact that their email wasn’t delivered in 5 seconds. The concept is for cameras to capture 1000 years of history through time-lapse photography.

    I especially like the idea of having time-lapse cameras to track urban growth or wilderness destruction.Mara Vatz’ alternative looks good too.

    Instead of documenting the changes of already well-developed urban areas for a millennium, why not put a camera over America’s as-yet undeveloped open space for just one decade? That way people could see, in a three-minute film, just how quickly we are devouring the last of the American “wilderness.” Or, in keeping with Raimi’s urban theme, document a decade’s worth of growth for small- to medium-sized cities. The results might have interesting implications for city planning and urban development.

    See:

  • Myth of progress

    Just writing up some stuff on different approaches to technology. From those who see technology as liberator, to those who see it as oppressor, and those who see it as value-neutral. Then this popped up in the newsreader.

    Somedays a doctrine of total depravity seems to get it right.

    Wired News: Pursuing the Libido’s Dark Side

    And as for the comment by the developer that

    it’s vital to remember that what happens in the game stays in the game. Therefore, he added, people shouldn’t be afraid that the game’s players will step away from their computers filled with violent lust.

    I’m not convinced that people don’t take the thoughts of their hearts with them into the game. Mark 7:14-16 springs to mind:

    Again Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen to me, everyone, and understand this. Nothing outside a man can make him ‘unclean’ by going into him. Rather, it is what comes out of a man that makes him ‘unclean.’”

    What’s inside of human beings that would want to make them play this game?

    Obviously a case of technology building a better, brighter world for us all. (“sarcasm mode” there folks) Somedays you just despair of us ever doing the right thing.

    ++ Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy ++

  • Playing with NewNewsWire

    Just seeing if I can post nicely from NewNewsWire. If it works out okay I might upgrade from the Lite version to get the web log editing tools.

  • Film Festival: “Allie Eagle and me”

    Posting this on behalf of a friend who knows both the artist and the director. Looks really interesting. See bottom of the posting for dates and times as well as links to more detailed information.

    With refreshing honesty and directness Briar March’s debut film Allie Eagle and me depicts the life and work of New Zealand artist Allie Eagle. Structured around the preparation for Allie Eagle’s recent exhibition, Sudden Imperative, the young filmmaker reflects on how the older artist’ s feminist priorities have shifted. By exploring the issues of spirituality, and art-making, both women consider the impact of their own generation’s art and thinking.

    In New Zealand, Allie Eagle is recognised as a significant contributor to the Women’s Art Movement of the 1970s and 80s. At that time she was regarded as one of the most hardcore feminist activists of her generation, totally committed to political processes which celebrated and empowered women. In the film, Allie Eagle addresses her concern that audiences and critics have often locked her work into a feminist time warp. This concern is the driving force behind her new show, in which the artist now embraces the Christian faith of her childhood.

    You can see the film at the following times:

    Auckland (with Sheilas: 28 Years On)
    Academy Sunday 11 July at 1.00 pm
    Academy Monday 12 July at 6.00 pm
    Academy Thursday 15 July at 10.15 am

    Wellington
    Lunctime screenings:
    City Gallery Tuesday 27 July at 12.15 pm
    City Gallery Tuesday 27 July at 1.30 pm

    If you live in Christchurch or Dunedin then I believe Chrysalis Seed Trust in Christchurch are arranging special screenings down south. Check with them.

    Here’s the Press release.
    And the film festival web site.

  • Busy, busy, busy…

    Very busy this week. PhD chapter due, course marking and then off to Melbourne on Saturday. Plus all the other normal things that happen in a week.

    Anyway, back to the interaction of creation, humanity, eschatology and Christology with technoscience. And the coffee.

  • UserFriendly on blogging

    Couple of recent cartoon strips from UserFriendly on blogging.

    UserFriendly June 12, 2004
    UserFriendly June 13, 2004

  • Interview with Douglas Coupland

    Interesting first part of an interview with Douglas Coupland on God, life, death, meaning and Corinthians at the Damaris: Interview with Douglas Coupland.

  • Thinking about love

    Thinking about 1 Cor 13 for a group study in the next day or so and remembered this line by Mma Ramotswe in The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith.

    I love all the people whom God made, but I especially know how to love the people who live in this place.

    We are called to love God and our neighbour, to love our enemies and so on. But it’s hard to do that in a concrete way if we don’t know something of those people. And that knowledge, learnt in many ways, brings the insight to know how to love these people or this person in this place and at this time. It’s the how that moves love from the abstract to the practical and real.

  • Still marking…

    Trying hard to be constructive and encouraging.

    Trying hard not to be like a vitriolic American/NZ Idol judge.

    But at times it’s all so trying…

    Strands of U2’s song “Grace” keep running through my head – “Grace finds beauty in everything.”

    As an aside I had a classmate who had the following left on his Uni essays by the marker on two occasions.

    “An artist once painted an painting by lowering a running motorcycle into a bath of paint and splattering the paint onto the canvas – your essay resembles this.”

    And on another bad day all it had on it was the Bible reference Dan 5:7-8.

    Took him (and the door to our room) a while to recover.

  • Marking…

    Essay marking time again. Seems a bit like this lost manuscript of Zech 5:1-3.

    “Again I looked up and saw a pile of essays. And he said to me, ‘What do you see?’ I answered, ‘I see a pile of essays; its length is twenty cubits, and its width ten cubits.’ Then he said to me, ‘This is the curse that goes out over the face of the whole land…’”

    Teaching is great but marking sucks sometimes. Especially when you’ve got other things that need doing too.