The usefulness of emotion

Dear reader, today it has come to be within my mind's landscape that I should be addressing the age-old issue, or rather not, of emotion within society. Without much in the way of further ado I shall ensue writing that of today's post!
First of all many of us sleep, eat, drink water etc... (do what Maslow's pyramid seems to echo in a diagram) in order to survive. We do those things without really giving them that much of a thought, and at times that is somewhat akin to us just existing. We are "beings" and we are to "be." Oftentimes the inevitable action of existing that we seem to do so effortlessly can cause us to question "why are we to be?" We may look out of the window and seek such things to detest: injustice within society, the trivial structure of modern culture, apathetic people etc... and we may ponder upon our desire to see people care more about entertaining notions regarding issues & ideas, and less about how they present themselves, how well figures (money, grades etc...) represent them etc... Would even having such a train of thought bestow upon us the right to be labelled as a freak, a weirdo? I wonder to myself, that train of thought is a good way to isolate oneself from the blob that British society is: a herd of people subconsciously walking over each other in order to find themselves associated with the greatest figures - almost as if nothing transcends this reality. If we keep thinking like that then perhaps our thoughts will go through some metamorphosis so that there is a change into something more profound. Relationships may become insubstantial and therefore foreign. Perhaps we may anticipated a connection that will never come again.
Furthermore to the point, should we be duped up on some kind of medication? Perhaps Zoloft or Prozac? Professionals would label what our aforementioned thinking has led us to as a "problem." Am I being unreasonable when I sarcastically mock the pharmaceutical solutions? Of course these shiny capsules have to pass all kinds of test before being released into the wild, and the man who's thoughts had rendered him to self-harming could have been rescued from the abyss by something like fluxetine or a MAO inhibitor. Does this mean that having a pseudo-philosophical conversation about the issue of depression is even worth the time and energy to contemplate upon? Why should we even hope for a change in society? We'll never change it. Furthermore some people think slavery is a thing of the past; something that caused the Israelties to build pyramids for the Egyptians in the Pentriach (Exodus) I think. No, these days it still rife. Although human trafficking exists to some extent, slavery exists in the form of coercion by the government right here in the first world. Fear bondages people; well emotion does. Whether it comes from deity or man, we always feel an obligation towards something. 
However my questioning may not even anticipate that or frame of mind that must be loosened by some drug. Depression is really caused by a suspicion in the pipeline of one's thought process that there may be no point to their existence, or rather other people have created some kind of society, a matrix if you will, that isn't even worth taking part in. I doubt Dali or Damien Hurst would have much in common with the "artist" who could only draw stick-men or that Chopin or Vivaldi would have much in common with the "musician" who could only belt out a chant for Andy Murray as he swings his racket for Scotland; a person with an incredibly high IQ who could think out of the box to almost an exponential level and observe the futility of society, and what it is driving people towards, will feel as if they have nothing in common with the average person, and that's depressing for it's unsatisfying as we're naturally inclined to be social creatures - and believe me even talking with a group of like-minded people can be incredibly therapeutic!
Nonetheless it can be observed that depression can be manifested from within the same hypothetical crossroad junction of the human psyche as genius, or intellect if you prefer that term. So the practical conclusion so far? Society is collectively hung up in addressing symptoms rather than addressing root causes of psychological disorders, and that there is clearly no drug or whatever that can eradicate the ill nature of British society. What is the goal of filling the void prepared for you in society?
Alas loneliness is pretty much unavoidable by us all to some extent or another. Change, tragedy, joy, pleasure, upheaval, grief etc... can allow us to feel as if we're unrelatable towards other people who can't seem to relate to us. Oftentimes, as we're social creatures, loneliness can lead us to thinking about life and death, and whether the first or the latter seems appealing  Many of us may wish for some transcendent void (between life and death, almost as if the relationship isn't to be binary) that we can transcend our conciseness to, in order to escape the inevitable labyrinth that society tries so hard to entrap around our mortal bodies. Loneliness to a smaller extent, however, is ontologically necessary in order for our human existence to become coherent. Lonliness is never something that defines what one happens to be lacking in, but rather the name given to the experience of what one truly is. The truly crazy thing, however, is that there is an element of irony as to how our freedom seems to expend on power, mostly by overcoming decay, disease etc... whilst we conceal from each other our loneliness  If it were to become something we shared as a topic of discussion then we would really start to have a deep understanding of each other. Oh well!
Furthermore the philosopher and nihilist Nietzsche once looked into the abyss of nonbeing in the complete loneliness of him who accepted the maxim that "God is dead." The statement of God being dead is existential, for God anyway, in the heart as God being dead is somewhat akin to a blind man being able to see - in the anime entitled "Serial Experiments: Lain" the question was posed like so: "what if God asked what it felt like to die?" Unlike the anime entitled "The Disappearance of Hahuri Suzimeyia," which featured the existence of a "human" interface to the deity-like "data-thought integration" entity whose existence passed the five ways of Aquinas, the anime mentioned first deals more with the actual nature of God. Both aforementioned anime shows, however, featured God parallels who might make the nature of God a bit more fathomable, or reachable - interpret it in any way you wish. God is infinite, a concept foreign to those who exist within a mortal body constrained by the finite universe. Referring back to the line about God being dead, we can see that the nihilist is trying to tell us that all the pressures forced upon us (physical & emotional) for leading a life deemed to be meaningful lies on our shoulders. We, not God, are the deciders of what we will become according to Nietzsche  Perhaps such a viewpoint could be extended to incorporate moral values, but the main point is really that existence will precede essence - how scary, I guess!
However I had previously entertained the notion of loneliness bringing us to the hypothetical abyss, and how this can force us into making decisions. There exists a temptation to eradicate such subjectivity. Anyway many find that definition and fulfillment in their material associations like their job or whatever, or do they? Is the constant cycle of the week leading them into an inescapable condition until retirement is granted? Who knows? Perhaps the God transcendent to this reality has plans larger for us than this society, and perhaps He can allow us, mostly unrelatable to other people, to express ourselves via talent or creativity to bring more people to Him!
Anyway, that's enough waffle for one night ha...! :P

Why help those in need?

Dear reader, you may be one of many people of whom are residents of the first world society. From birth you have been granted the "gift of life,"and what you do with it is more or less up to you, my friend. Society has weakened you to accept that you're nobody special, you may not be particularly attractive and the constant cycle of the day can, and sometimes is, a trudge no thanks to the gears of our society (which - by the way - forces a numerical value on our strengths and weaknesses). We're conditioned to believe that everything has to be measured like that of our intellect  through exams/qualifications, the car we drive, and even how we run our daily lives by the human constraint of "time." During the course of this blog post, I'm hopefully going to enlighten you on my recent thought processes regarding people living in this world today.

 First and foremost what makes your success so important when compared to that of a fellow "person's?" I can't really fathom this: why strive for a career when it's going to be stressful? Well that may be a tad dismissive, but "working" 9 to 5 for five days a week for my entire life is something I don't think I could comfortably do. It really can become increasingly more daunting when I'm supposed to create a family and be sociable. How am I supposed to do all of this and why should I? Who makes these rules? Man does, and man wants to entrap us into these padded bubbles, isolated from "unsafe" thoughts.

Furthermore there is nothing more than an illusion of the "perfect life," as portrayed by the media. However I'm wondering about what is this "perfect" life? Wow, I think it's subjective and changes from person to person! The fact that there should be some sort of absolute maxim forced into us from the cradle to the grave by first world  indoctrination causes me to see what society is and how we are nothing but numbers and statistics, and some of us are, sadly, reflected by better statistics than others. Oftentimes we're measured by attributes that we cannot directly control: viz. our attractiveness and out intelligence. 

Furthermore this can cause us to sometimes view life as an incredibly unfair process! Where is the solace? Where is the peace? A lot of us are turning to Christianity as a safety net these days, you could reckon, but not in the first world. There exists an element of hope in Christianity, a light that will never go out. Most of all there exists in the heart of Christianity equality. What does this do for our so-called "imperfections?" Well, I see it as a comfort, a rest-bite like the service station on the motorway ;) ! Science can be very methodical, calculating actually! There would exist the assumption that everything must be measured and by default, society compares these measurements against another: A person against another person; almost as if there exists some kind of control for this experiment: namely a well-conditioned, well-behaved, good-looking, moderately - but not lethally - intelligent human being! If the temporal continuum were to reach it's end point then causality would stop, since Einstein's theory of general relativity proves that matter, space and time are co-dependent entities. This would mean no law (how do you govern an immaterial land?) and all that would remain is either you and your memories (if the mind and matter are of distinct realities) or nothing. If you're nowhere then what? How can you be if there's no temporal continuum to support the material you once were, along with all of it's associated entities? How can you possibly meet the eye of any destiny, pre-destined or not?
However this is the harrowing kernel of a first world life. We've always lived in a place where numbers (money) have precedence over happiness itself. I have seen that money, dosh, wonga, cash etc...  is the sole driving force of society. Does this mean that we've been conditioned to believe that the ultimate goal in life is to be "quintessential?" For what? Buying a house, car etc..? Is being happy and content not a more soothing goal to go for? I've got to step outside my bubble for a moment.

 Christians who are "allowed" to share the gospel with others are, perhaps, experiencing one of the most breathtaking events that this life has to offer, namely that of entering an undeveloped nation, stripping back the inevitable crutch of modernity and exposing the potential that the divine has to offer! The saddening truth, however, about life is that first world society "henpecks" us into conveyor belts by the methods of coercion and guilt. To only fill the gap of this sad, materialistic, predominantly atheist society that is probably as easy to program, by a select few idols such as "the stereotypical episode of an American sitcom," as a mere "biological computer." Life can be frequent, you might be tempted just to autoamputate your hand just to break the cycle and feel something - anything distinct - for a mere moment before the government's antibiotics kick in, but it doesn't have to be that way! Society may make you feel like another mindless drone when you're working at the insignificant supermarket in the humdrum town, but if you can bring someone to Christ then you can be sure that you would really be making a difference! So what if your wage packet doesn't brim? Does it matter? ;)

Thanks for reading! :)

Ways we can develop and share our faith

I understand that it is not always easy for people to adopt and subscribe to a new belief  especially when it is that of Christianity. However I ask you to fear not for I am willing to place before you some pieces of advice:
>>Look out for fellow Christians, they may be lurking somewhere! If you're still attending school then it couldn't hurt to ask of the "scripture union," as most schools (in Northern Europe anyway) run a SU of some description anyway. Here, for one hour usually set aside at one lunchtime per week, fellow students can meet a pastor or youth worker and discuss motivational Psalms etc... Oftentimes these groups can create newsletters, blogs, booklets, sketches, paintings, music, food and craft (all in the name of Christ)! Usually there is something somewhat akin to the aforementioned that will run at colleges and universities, the institution's "student union" would perhaps be the best place to inquire about that at.
>>Workplaces, however, can be less forgiving when it comes to your faith. The typical city-center office can adopt some kind of "George Orwell's 1984"-type policy that will cause it to be costly for you to even mention the fact that you're a Christian; your fate there really depends upon whether or not you choose to be a partisan about it, they're hardly going to care about what you get up to on a Sunday morning - I hope...

There are awesome ways in which Christians, once they can get together, can share their faith:
>>Give a compliment to everyone in your group! Basically to do this all you need is coloured felt-tipped pens, a sheet of paper for each member of the group and some Christians! Ideally each member should write their name on the back of the first sheet of paper that they receive and then pass it on, with each person checking the name on each piece of paper that is passed to them. Upon reading the name, a group member should write a sincere compliment! Now the compliments can range from the simple and subjective - such as "you're so smart" to "you're so pretty" - to that of some words of wisdom if you know the person has been recently getting to grips with some emotional turmoil...
>>How about sharing some motivational Bible verses?
>>Have a prayer buddy for the evening, this can work wonders within larger group settings! Remember that a stranger is just a friend you've not made yet!
>>Make something together to build spirits! Music, art, a video, a blog, a book etc... just something that will last! Something that will make you smile when you look back at it in ten, maybe twenty, years from now...
>>Build spirits by going on day-outs together! Visit a church in your local town, arrange to go together to some city or just build up spirits by arranging some bizarre road-trip! When you're young the world really can be your oyster...
>>Create a Facebook/Twitter page and use it to share motivational Bible verses with each other! Mix it up by sharing motivational YouTube videos too!
>>Share the love. Easier said than done in this day and age, I know. Offer home-baking, hot food etc.. to people - for free/donation - with the chance to share some words of wisdom! Kindnesses can go a long way...
>>Be there for each other through the thick and thin!
>>Listen to Christian music together! By that I mean worship-type songs, I don't mean that you should go all Morrissey and declare that "Heaven knows I'm miserable now" or Thom Yorke just so that you can declare that "God loves his children" whilst ignoring the remainder of the song Paranoid Android!! Whilst those songs are amazing to listen to if you're by yourself, they really don't do much to build up your faith in Christ with your fellow Christians...

So this is the end of today's posting!
:)
>>...and I know that this is just the tip of the iceberg!

Proverbs 16:9 makes a point beautifully, like so: "we plan the way we want to live, but only God makes us able to do it!!"


Cheers!

Human ineraction

Naturally people are interconnected and marginalised into a system that connects people in the way that they do not want to be connected; nothing is improved for the lonely people by visiting the venues whereby social interactions are meant to happen - in fact it can cause a lonely person to feel more isolated than that of before. Throughout the course of this blog post my intention is to address why forming relationships can - of course - be a very difficult endeavor for lonely, reasonably intelligent people.
Firstly people are the products of their own presupposed shyness or will to be outgoing. What you'll come to recognise within shy people is that of the product of years upon years of being too scared of interacting with other people out of fear of being rejected from social circles (to over-analyse such requires time to oneself and the ability to engage at such a height of thought). Is it surprising how the failure to establish meaningful connections between people is often the culprit of depression? You may ponder upon life and death and neither of the two may seem appealing, life truly only has a meaning if there is something worth your death - however for the recluse that can believe - to some level - that things will improve, their present state of existence should exist in that, relatively transcendent, area between life and death. Quite often it is necessary for the person that has been grounded to shyness by the twist of the pessimistic coil to immerse themselves into a new culture, where one can re-invent their image, before they're able to adopt the outgoing frame of mind. This is because existence at this plane - the human - is only given the substance from within the minds of other people from within what would appear to be the space caused by the collision of heaven and hell; in physical existence there may be a lot of versions of a person per se, but that is only an existence as interpreted by the minds of other people, and the person may be approached by the by-product of thinking. Some people, however, are naturally deluded.
Furthermore to the point people can be deluded into believing that their lifestyles are what brings them satisfaction and perhaps joy at one level or another - the stereotypical, bland middle class lifestyle coupled with the occasional dilatation set in by little pleasures such as purchasing a new car, engaging in sexual intercourse or having coffee with a friend. Such people are neither right nor wrong in what they do, but it does raise a very valid point to my attention - these people are very well conditioned to the prisons for their minds, the social structure has within itself an axis which is a system of related objects - suggestible, seductive yet perishable and potent. To the person who can cast their attention to that which is out with the box this aforementioned truth can be distressing - it extends therefore that your existence is only meant to be geared towards goals that are superficial; can YOU be a unique snowflake in the blizzard? Your heart, it is slowly filling up like a landfill site. However if you wish to live the popular life then you have to be a likable person and that can mean appealing to what most people enjoy (ever envy people who enjoyed sport day at school?), you don't have to patronise if you're naturally a wordsmith (monosyllabic words and not a lot else in a sentence can become uninteresting quickly) yet you need not give a thesis to one as to how they can overcome their cataracts - even if you have a PHD and are a qualified clinical optician. The consensus here is that if you can be humble, warm and approachable in appearance and ever-so-slightly mysterious (few people like the recluse that hardly speaks a word yet is rumoured to read Being & Time and also Descartes) then people should come to you, yes? You could try, but do you ever just walk up to friendly looking people and let ad libbed conversation ensue between you both? Perhaps but there's only a handful of people who have this glow, this charm or this charisma. This glow appears to be an inherent factor, one hard coded right from the deoxyribonucleic acid but who knows? Commitment is a two-way street and both parties must be willing to do their bit if the association is to flourish, and what a way to bring me onto my next point of discussion - love.
Love is basically the act of desiring the whole, as both males and females would wish for - it concerns the neurology of we. Artistically love can be called the movement of the heart, however the difference between the who and the what (read some Derrida if this concept captivates you) causes a split in the presupposed heart of either the male or the female; does your heart shift itself because you fancy someone who is an absolute singularity, or because of what you love about the way that person is through their actions, their personality and possibly their fruition? Whoever starts to love, is loving or is ceasing to love someone else is really caught within the battleground, the void, between the who and the what of the fancied person. One wants nothing more to be irreplaceable and quintessentially attractive to the one they desire, but fidelity can be threatened by the division between the who and the what, of course. Relationships of any category, however, are at the base level the flow of information and energy between two people and love - after all - is a type of relationship. Genuine love derives itself from a person's vast knowledge of their beloved object, whether it is a person, representative entity of a human, at any plane, a music band, a TV show, some fetish or attraction to an inanimate object or a subject at school, but love on the level of a human relationship is a game of two players; oftentimes it can be difficult for socially challenged persons to display the desirable qualities to the opposite sex - as these attributes are crystallized within the somewhat painful chore of appearing confident within oneself. Perhaps if the two people walk far enough, with a decent pair of shoes, then a mutual attraction could occur - but let’s not regret what we were too scared to try. There's a myth perpetrated by the media and it is that of which tells us that "there's someone for everyone." This, of course, is a fallacy; it is like a doctrine of religious belief that single, confused people cling to because they're convinced that all that determination and hard work will pay off, some day. They're always receptive and vigilant towards the possibility that the next man or woman that they meet could be the one, but then again whoever is "the one" now may not be "the one" in - say - five years time from now. Love is something that appears to be disposable, but I blame first world society for that. These days it is all too easy for us to replace our broken kitchen appliances, computers and mobile phones without giving repair even a thought. As we look back to British history and we focus on the anthropological aspects of love, therefore commitment, we can conclude that people repaired what was broken.
In conclusion, to keep it short and snappy, my latest blog post hopefully threw some light on a neglected facet of the human condition. I know my point wasn't really theological on the surface, but I do - however - recommend that you do read Psalm 139 if you're a Christian.
Anyway, I've wrote more than I had an intention to write ;)

Computing and philosophy (and what this could mean for theology)

Today my intention is to relate this post to the science of computing. More importantly I will attempt to relate the theories explored by a computer scientist to that of a philosopher (and some of the following notes of philosophical pondering may have their theological implications, watch this space!)
Firstly I'd like to raise the notion of existence and identity to your attention. Within a computer, some entities are physical (like the processor, the RAM chips and the motherboard) whilst others are purely conceptual and immaterial (like the software, the algorithms and the operating system). Paradoxically a physical entity (like a CD-ROM) contains the immaterial entity (like the video game); therefore all the instruction for a computer game will be readable from a reflective disc-shaped piece of plastic! However we must realise that singed into the microscopic pits of a compact disc is not pictures, videos etc... But rather a base-two notation of files and software. This binary code is structured in such a way that the file allocation system of the targeted computer can translate the physical (ones and zeros) into a logical order (JPEGS, software, folders etc...) and actually make use of it. Everything required to reproduce the images and sound (a graphics card, a sound card, a processor with a decent pipelined architecture etc...) is within the computer, and the software on the disc, coupled with the computer's operating system, contains the instructions - the algorithms - to do such a task. A computer never thinks or reasons, it is just a machine - after all - that follows interpretable tasks. Computers are what we can refer to as finite-state automata, or rather two-way machines. Put it this way, presuppose there once was a healthy man who was able to walk and could read and understand the English language; if we were to give this man a sheet of paper that read: "walk to the local church" then he could do it, for he is equipped with such facilities to interpret and carry out such a task. However if this man was to apply reasoning then he could ask why or rather defend his right to do as he pleases - this is something a piece of automata will never do. Opinion is a by-product of thinking. This is strange as a piece of automata (like a computer) has a pseudo-brain entity (like a microprocessor) whereby its instructions are interpreted and carried out, by the rules of logic (like Boolean logic). Isn't the man's brain just like a biochemical microprocessor? This perspective of human cognition is called monism of the mind and matter, and infers that all thinking is the result of chemical reactions. Chemicals react, they do not reason - if monism is true then free will is a myth and you're driven by impersonal forces (read up on my article entitled "Is Free will a myth? Think Descartes..." please for more on this, you'll find it elsewhere on my blog!! I will now assume prior knowledge of it from this point onwards). Would you trust computer software that was just assembled by the interlocked system of nature (hypothetically, of course, unless you associate the binary with some pattern formation on some sort of animal or whatever)? No, software with an intelligent mind behind it would be far more trustworthy!
Furthermore the study of automatic computing has lead us to the design of algorithms. Algorithms are really just steps of the concurrent processes being contended with by a microprocessor, and are generally written in the notation of either a high-level programming language with scope for advanced syntactical structure (like C++)  or a low-level programming language (probably mnemonic-type instructions like LDA 56, STR 47 etc... for inner-processor orientated instructions associated with the registers, the MAR, the MDR etc...) and can be written to sort, search, stack, queue and heap data as well as that of other tasks! Oftentimes an academic programmer will use big-O notation, whereby O is an algebraic constant, to compare these algorithms together, as many are different by means but are mutual in end results (just to give you a heads-up on how seriously this field of research is taken!). One thing we can see from algorithm design is that it is difficult for us to build software that tells a computer to compute a random number! We can try by assigning each number to a tick of a timer, and stopping the timer once an event is triggered, but that would only seem random! What is randomness? Some event with no actual cause, or rather is there a cause but the cause is not apparent or even consensually appropriate? The absolute constraint of the law of cause and effect for the physical objects of reality supports the first two of St Thomas Aquinas' five ways - and in fact Bayes (a Presbyterian church minister and avid fan of mathematics) devised a formulae that could imply constraints onto certain computable events (like allowing the sweat of one's hand to influence how a dice they throw rolls). Anyway, algorithms are usually written in the syntax of a high-level programming language (like one of the C languages), oftentimes follow an implementation methodology (like object-orientation) and are not what a computer really works with: this is where a complex piece of computer software called a compiler comes into play. A compiler forms what is called a lexical analysis on the code and this parses all the lexemes etc... and turns them into a base-two notation of the software, ergo the software is now compatible with the computer architecture of the targeted system (oftentimes compiled software is referred to as a binary file). This is akin to the translation of a Bible, or rather not? Translators such as those who work for Wycliffe can either perform a static (word-by-word or verbatim) or dynamic (tailoring the translation for the targeted culture) translation. Static translations can be difficult to comprehend (the difference in sentence structure between English and many Romance languages, like French or Italian, is great - for example in French there is the formal version of "you," viz. "vous," but there is also an informal version of "you," viz. "tu") therefore most people desire a more dynamic translation for their Bible (the NIV and the KJV are both written in English, but are very different in sentence structure and vocabulary). However a dynamic translation does have the potential to be flawed by theological bias, and it would be apt to say that when a compiler compiles it is doing a static translation by parsing tokens of entities and swapping them for other entities (semantic version of source code) - only a programmer is to blame for faulty software.
In conclusion all I can say is that this is a really brief introduction to the overlap between computing and philosophy (and perhaps theology). For further reading I'd avoid anything that portrays machines to be partisan-like creatures that rule the human race (that should always be classified as science-fiction anyway) and I would recommend reading up on the Church-Turing thesis (Alan Turing often wrote about hypothetical Turing machines, which parallel the operation of microprocessors to this day), anything factual about artificial intelligence (you may wish to check out the algorithm for a game of the "towers of Hanoi") and also anything to do with the relationship between mammalian cognition and automata! Who knows, maybe that French philosopher called Descartes was on to something when he proposed hi theory of the dualism of the mind and matter? It could imply that all human reasoning derives from an ineffant soul... Some basic neurology such as the association of the different lobes to functions of the human body, the cerebral hemispheres, the automatic nature of the medulla oblongata etc... may also be worth some of your time to read.

Does your faith isolate you?

When it is all said and done, one must realise that the likes of Twitter & Facebook are just mediums of communication - ways in which we can transfer information from one part of the world to another. This mustn't be confused with the real, empirical world though if one wishes to assert their place in reality from the perspective driven by the will of the almighty. The border between the two isn't always clear, I mean social networking is not but a mere transfer medium of something far greater and I intend to show you what that is.
Firstly you can consider the advent and evolution of social networking to be something that forms a layer that makes the previous state of reality seem subordinate; it is not but a holographic entity from within the conceptual relational schema of reality - simply put symbols are taken for reality thus the original entity of reality is replaced by some kind of substitute (probably because people deem it to be more satisfying than that of the original) - this is evident because a lot of young people these days are self-conscious about how they appear, what they do etc... and pretty much everyone that was in their class at school will know what their occupation is, what their field of study is and whether an exotic holiday for them is either a trip to Blackpool or Rhyll or a trip over to one of the Caribbean islands (hence self-conciseness can be a rather huge bane of the human existence!). As I've aforementioned elsewhere on my blog, this is affirmative to the parable of Lazarus and the rich man - it is easy for a rich man these days to become immersed by social media, icons, symbols, adverts, films, music etc... and that leaves little in the way for a man to realise that he may actually want God's salvation; the rich man feels a false glow of satisfaction from the likes of seeing a thumbs up on his latest Facebook posting to being a complete and utter perfectionist (thus distorting his perception of perfect, finitude will always be less than perfect). Subconsciously, most people become integrated into the entity of reality seen as the silent majority, symbolically recognised by the likes of market statistics and the like. Escaping the constraints (or being a deaf-mute, that is how JD Salinger puts it - maybe then he, or rather the protagonist of Catcher in the Rye, will not have to make the obligatory "small talk" as people come up to him to be served) that are seemingly unwillingly placed upon us by the media and realising the benefits of utilising the crutch that is God can seem like a foreign, and sometimes arcane, chore to those part of the silent majority (for a bit of further reading  look to the orders of simulacra as written by Jean Baudrillard. An anime called Stand Alone Complex, an extension to Ghost in the Shell, may also be worth a watch - the point conveyed isn't really theological, but it has a paralleled theological truth behind it once you delve into the implication of the whole "the laughing man" take over situation).
However I also feel as if you should realise that people will always judge you, no matter what. It is what we as humans do in order to assert who our allies and enemies are. These perceptions, however, are not exactly absolutes. People do only have substance from within the memories of other people. You may feel, at times, that there are different kinds of you. There isn't a lot of you per se, you are one person, all there is just a lot of conceptual ideas about you rooted from within the minds of your peers - they have to do this or else they couldn't build their immaterial map of reality thus navigate and actually survive. Your body exists in a totally different plane than your mind (Cartesian dualism) because if it didn't then how can you trust your reasoning? I can infer that chemicals only react, they do not reason. This, however, should only be used to show you that your potent body within reality will last for a finite amount of time only. You are the one staring into a shifting picture from within the transcendent gallery for the souls, but you take the picture as reality. Tell me, how do you define what is real? Anyway I'm digressing; I address that elsewhere on this blog you know! Oftentimes conditioned people will label you as an extremist, of some measure, if they do not agree with your point of view. Every one of us is conditioned anyway, for example one may associate the kitchen aromas with homeliness, kindness, comfort and cheeriness but take that at face value and you discover that one associates the unholy stench of blood coming from the juicy steak within the oven with comfort and cheeriness. If one gives you an insight into what they believe to be true for them then they are only trying to stick up for what they believe in. Now would not life be rather boring if we all shared the same ideas about things (do not confuse with morals though, those are absolute and if you want to know why then read some more of my blog - you'll discover your answer soon if you do that!!!)? Anyone and everyone is an extremist of something in my opinion anyway, even if they are in denial of that - you cannot be a thinking being if you hold no opinion about anything at all (to think presupposes opinion). Some meat eaters would freak out at the thought of the likes of dogs and cats being killed for meat yet these commonly domesticated animals are often eaten in parts of Asia. Yet these same meat eaters may not think twice about visiting a McDonalds, a KFC or Burger King and tucking into some flavoured carcass (or whatever body part it happens to be) that was once part of a cow grazing in a controlled field or a chicken (either free or confined to a small cage whereby its lack of exercise and therefore obesity crushes its legs) eating birdseed or whatever. A lot of what we deem to be acceptable comes from society and the symbols we're exposed to. I can guarantee that someone brought up on the Isle of Arran lives a different life coupled with different ambitions when compared to someone of the same age brought up in inner-city Glasgow. The Glaswegian will be used to the melting pot society and the hustle and bustle of the large megastores selling expensive electronics and articles of clothing whereby in Brodick (relatively large town, albeit village by Scottish standards, on the Isle of Arran) all a person would really be exposed to is a post office, a small paper shop and not much else other than Scottish people and the occasional tourist. You can call someone an extremist though for not blindly following the norms of the localised society though, just remember that you sow what you reap - be cognizant of that!!
So on that note I think that there is indeed a stigma associated with anything you do. Computer programmers may be judged as geeks, history teachers may be judged as boring, knitters may be judged as old-fashioned, sailors may be judged as polygamists (a woman at every port?), unemployed people may be judged as lazy and/or unambitious, crying people may be judged as attention-seeking, Guns 'n' Roses fans may be judged as loud and shallow, Boney-M fans may be judged as feminine, wine boffins may be judged as alcoholics, bankers may be judged as greedy and as for Christians - does it matter (go read Psalm 83:16! The Psalmist here implies that hiding your faith from people will shame you and as a result you'll seek God anyway. Oh, and this may be yet another digression but Genesis 9 verse 20 onwards is about Noah getting into a drunken stupor and making a fool of himself in front of his son called Ham - need an ark? I Noah guy - OK that may not be that applicable, but the aforementioned verse does relate to embarrassment in general)? You can be what you be and yes it is possible to strip away the constraints society places on you if that is what you want to do for you have free will (but you sow what you reap, remember? I'm not saying that you should break the law or commit a sin or whatever!!!), you are always doing x because you are always chasing y and oftentimes society helps you to achieve your goals! Although people judge, you can get over it! :)
P.S. for a bit of food for thought, ask yourself about what you need. You may say something like food or clothes but do you really? Is this more of a want than a need? Do we need anything? Even air? Not really, man needs nothing because the concept of need without a defined - or more likely implied - goal is obsolete. Man needs air because he wants to live makes more sense than man needs air (but in most cases the living part is implied anyway). Man needs God? Unless you subscribe to the notions implied by nihilism, I will attempt to turn the whole aforementioned concept on its head by saying yes, from a theological perspective - man needs God's love because man was designed to be coupled with a soul that would eternally despise the alternative to heaven, and theologically this is an absolute rule of thumb.

The book of Romans: brief summary

The book of Romans is a book encapsulated within the new testament of the Christian Bible. It is by far the longest of the Pauline letters and it, in my opinion anyway, contains a lot of fine philosophy for one to ponder upon (even if you're atheist or agnostic, this book of The Bible sure is worth a read).
The first part (refer to 1 : 1 to 32): firstly we are reminded about Paul, his position as an apostle and also about what he intends to tell the people of Rome (hence the name). Paul does not set his limit to include only the Jewish people, rather he wants the Gentiles to take note as well! Paul also tells us about what stopped him from getting to the capital city of Italy sooner than he did as well (not to mention the fact that Paul implies that Jesus' human bloodline derives from David). As we progress past verse 16, we read that Paul is not ashamed of his gospel because it has a powerful impact on some people. After verse 18 we see that Paul is not shy to tell the Roman people about the wrath of God. Basically some people had taken the whole concept of God (who exists within infinite simplicity) and made it into something finite and potent (an idol). From the aforementioned point on-wards Paul makes reference to Solomon (who overtook David as king, some say Solomon was very wise), therefore allowing Paul to draw upon the nature of unnatural sexual behavioral problems and how that can result in an unhealthy frame of mind. Paul also opposes the worship of deity-type idols (which were apparently common in ancient Rome); although Paul does advocate that righteousness from God causes itself to be distinct from the law - the law from which the prophets seek their reason to testify from (and he also alerts us about the legacy of Jesus Christ!).
The second part (refer to 2 : 1 to 4): furthermore to the point, here we read Paul calling out to the Jewish people who are hypocritical of others. Some argue that Paul was not really writing to the Jews per say but was rather addressing a "typical and boastful person." (read up on Stanley Stowers for more on that).
However from chapters 5 to 11 we are basically reassured about the concept of salvation from our original sin. Paul also writes about the casting away of Israel and the conditions that will cause Israel to once again be God's chosen nation.
Moreover, from chapters 12 to 15 we read upon the point of believers being transformed. Paul declares that as a result of the crucifixion of Christ the believers will be "dead to the law." Paul also tells us that living a Christian lifestyle in the most stereotypical, quintessential way possible (i.e. frequently studying scripture instead of giving into the procrastination that results from the urge to find yourself playing computer games or checking Facebook; you should be going to church etc...) will leave us with no desire to ever want to commit a sin, by definition. It is also stated that the law has dominion over man for as long as he lives - arguably it does if it extends from God, the thing greater than all things conceivable as not everybody would feel obligated to follow a law not implemented by something absolute and personal (even the thieves make their excuses when they steal, have you noticed that?). The opposing viewpoint here is relative morality whereby comparing moral codes is like comparing foods or films, but that is self-refuting and I write that because an individual feels the need to hold such an opinion - and that is an absolute! If the law (or rather condition or parameter) extends from people then you only feel obligated to follow it if doing x gets you y and you desire y (read up on Kant's theory of the hypothetical imperative if the philosophy here is pulling you in!!!).
In the conclusion (refer to 15 : 14 to 16 : 27) Paul notifies us of his travel agenda, his greetings and also about his salutations. It should be noted that woman (approx. one third of the 21 Christians identified here) had an important role to play from within the church in Rome at that time. It was also interesting to see that Paul made no reference to Saint Peter (he was apparently the Pope at this time), and some theologians think that this was due to an incident that occurred at Antioch between Paul and Saint Peter!
So I hope you enjoyed that and I also hope that it entices you to read the book of Romans!