The Musings Of The Consensus

 It's been a while since I wrote a Bible post, but since I like the Bible and roasting fallacious logic, I figured a time when Jesus did just that was optimal for this post. I will be adding commentary in bold text, the original will be in italics  ( courtesy of esv.org, Luke 11: 14-20 ) 14 y Now he was casting out a demon that was mute . When the demon had gone out , the mute man spoke , and the people marveled .   This was pretty common if you know Jesus. Telling demons to get bent was what he did. Being the literal Son of God, they tended to listen. 15 But some of them said , “ He casts out demons z by Beelzebul , the prince of demons ,” 16 while others , a to test him , kept seeking from him a sign from heaven . 17 b This, unfortunately, was way more common than it should have been. Jesus was performing an obviously good thing, and as far as they could see and hear, did so with no ulterior motives. However, sadly proving som...

 In my last post on  Gundam tech nerding, I mentioned a few examples of fictional tech from the Gundam universe with real-world analogs. In this post, I'd like to discuss a few more examples. 1. Mobile Suit Gundam 00 - E-Carbon One bit of technology that does not get discussed as much by casual fans of the show is the E-Carbon material used as armor plating, a building material for the in-universe orbital elevators, and some that, in truth, already exists largely in real life right now. First, Carbon is one of the most common elements in the Periodic Table of Elements. Second, carbon is an interesting element in that it's not that special in its purest form (not to mention highly unstable), but when used in allotropes, or combinations of carbon with other substances, they can form many interesting and useful things. Two of special note are graphite, used in many industrial processes, and diamonds, which are basically a crystallized form of carbon and valuable in both industry ...

 I've watched quite a few Gundam shows and read some of the manga as well. While I enjoy the robots going at it in combat and the drama of the people involved, I'm a bit of a nerd and enjoy it when real-world principles are applied to making certain things in Gundam work.  Below is a list of my favorite instances of tech realism. 1. Mobile Suit Gundam - Magnet Coating The original Mobile Suit Gundam's titular machine ran into a problem towards the latter end of the show. While it had taken a while to master, its pilot, Amuro Rei, had gotten to the point where he was outpacing the machine. To put it simply, the Gundam could only move so fast without damaging its joints, but Amuro's brain was faster, and he thus could not push the Gundam to its limits without wrecking the internals. The solution was to apply "magnet coating". Real-world arms and legs are connected to joints, and the flexibility of those joints determines how well the limb can move. Magnet coatin...

Original source: https://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/riseofhitler/25points.htm A long time ago, I wrote a blog post on the 25 main points of the core platform of the Nazi party. Recent adventures in scholarship have made me want to revisit that theme, this time focusing on how well they implemented each point once they were in power. If you are a German and/or Russian reader, please discontinue reading now if the laws of your nation prohibit even academic and scholarly reading of the Nazi platform. This is neither endorsement nor condemnation of Nazis below, merely my observations on how well they pulled off these points when they had an actual government to implement them.  My responses will be in bolded text, in between each point. 1. We demand the union of all Germans in a Great Germany on the basis of the principle of self-determination of all peoples. The Nazis definitely made an effort to do this, and then some. 2. We demand that the German people have rights equal to...

 I, in my official capacity as a writer for Christ Centered Gamer, have reviewed both FF7 Remake and Rebirth. Being a veteran of the OG FF7 on PS1, I have been overall pleased with both. Before I cover what they've done right, I'm going to mention two annoying things first as a form of preemptive balance. Also, I shall avoid dropping major spoilers except where absolutely necessary. First, being effectively a stealth sequel of the original, I find the remakes to be, for a total series noob, to be a bit too indulgent on assuming the player knows how the original story goes at times, especially all the side materials. I gather the developers want to streamline the bloated original canon and the remakes are a distilled version of it, but you have to go out of your way to get the full context for some of it. Second, Rebirth's pacing is bogged down with its open world mechanics. I got to the point where, outside of the bare minimum, I went out of my way to speedrun through its U...

 And now, for another round of cheese taste testing and my results. The first cheese I tried was goat log, a cylinder-shaped soft cheese log made of goat's milk. While the taste was not bad, it was VERY lactic and acidic, so if you want a mild cheese, this will not be your thing. Would be a good base for a cheese sauce though. The second cheese I tried is Calabro Ricotta. It is produced in the United States, but caters heavily to Italian customers, with its base in Connecticut. Like any true ricotta, this had a very soft and creamy texture and a mild flavor that makes it go well with practically any meal. My mother and grandmother practically inhaled theirs due to liking it that much. Be advised, ricotta is very soft and does not last long, so have a container to store it in and keep it well refrigerated. The last cheese, however, was the most interesting of all. It's another cheese like the Manchego I tried a while back, but where I found Manchego not fun for eating by itself ...

 For some reason, I had a weird thought about the Rapture involving books and media I've read, and in that moment, I realized a lot of them make little sense to varying degrees. Their premise is conceptually sound, as a fictional end-times apocalyptic fiction hook, but most media (invariably Christian-sponsored per the premise) always have some gaping plot holes and a lack of logic. For those who are not Christian, the basic premise goes like this. Presuming the events of the final book of the Bible (Revelation) speak nigh exclusively of some time in the future of humanity after the founding of the Church as depicted in Acts, the premise is that, in the twinkling of an eye, all who believe in God and His Son Jesus will be yeeted off Earth, leaving behind nothing save what was on their bodies, but they will just vanish. The rest of the world will naturally panic for a while after, until a smooth-talking liar unites the world, comes up with some elaborate lie to explain away the vani...

 I recently acquired two cheeses, one an American-made Italian style cheese, and the other a Swiss. I plan to go back to some of my more favored varieties of cheese in later posts, but I decided this month to still expand my horizons. And both of these cheeses will do that job just fine. Satori Bourbon BellVitano is an American Italian-style cheese, and as the name suggests, incorporates Bourbon, specifically Kentucky Bourbon. It's washed in the bourbon to incorporate the yeasty taste of the alcohol into the final flavor.  Now, I must admit, while this cheese tastes fine, and my fellow cheese tasters (mom and grandma) unanimously agreed on two things. One, it was better suited for being part of a dish than cooked in anything, and two, while the taste was a pleasant blend of Parmigiano and Swiss, the yeasty aftertaste of the bourbon was a bit strong for our liking.  As part of a meal, this would be a fine ingredient for a pasta dish. There is nowhere near enough alcohol to...

 I decided to get two cheeses on opposite ends of the texture scale: Smoked Mozzarella for the softer side, and Fiore Sardo for the harder. I've had several other Italian cheeses and regular Mozzarella, but I was intrigued by both of the cheeses above, hence this review. Fiore Sardo is a somewhat lesser-known cheese than other Pecorino (sheep) cheeses. The name stems from the original method of curdling the cheese via cardoon thistle flowers (much like how vinegar is an alternative source of curdling to rennet). Modern Fiore Sardo is however made using regular animal rennet. The original variety is said to date back to the Bronze Age, ergo this is a cheese with a very long historical pedigree. The name is, loosely translated, "Flower of Sardinia", since Fiore means flower and the Sardo is short for Sardinia. Legally, only Fiore Sardo can be sold outside of Italy, it has an alternative version of itself that is combined with cheese fly larvae, which is banned outside of It...

Note : I have had angry political and social cause types hurl abuse and insult my way because they cannot handle civil disagreement on any topic they hold dear. One of those simpering cowards even ran to FSTDT to make me look villainous because I disagreed with them politically instead of having the common courtesy to try to change my views with reason. The below is my personal views and I will not apologize for them in the slightest. I welcome any civil remarks, even those that disagree, and will respectfully acknowledge dissent so long as it's delivered as politely as I tried to phrase the below.  I've generally kept my mouth shut since Trump got elected because I wanted to see just what he had in mind exactly, and to be perfectly honest, I expected nigh all of his programs. https://apnews.com/article/what-has-trump-done-trump-executive-orders-f061fbe7f08c08d81509a6af20ef8fc0 Here is an itemized list of what he implemented above, and while I'm not entirely sanguine on all...

I was recommended this cheese by a native of Norway, and from the way they described it, I was interested. Did some research, was even more interested. Once I tried it, I was all "man, the rave reviews were ABSOLUTELY JUSTIFIED!" First, a little background. Gjetost (also called several other names depending on the variant like Brunost) is a national staple of Norway. It's made via the boiling of cheese whey with added cream until it goes below 80% fluid to solid ratio. The resulting cheese, with a very distinct sweet taste due to the caramelization of the cheese (which results in the brownish color due to the cooking of the milk sugars), is a very soft and spreadable cheese. This cheese is a common breakfast staple, going well with coffee, toast, pancakes/waffles, and can also be good for sandwiches or even a sweet snacking cheese by itself. Now, it can be made with cow's milk, but goat's milk is what most Norwegians would consider authentic. I managed to get so...

 This little blog post is about a bit of economic history that tends to be glossed over in many history books, at least those without a strong economic focus. In fact, it's both ingenious and moronic in equal measure, but the Nazis made heavy use of it to rearm for what would be World War II and I wanted to cover it. First some background. After World War I, Germany was forbidden to rebuild their military beyond a pitiful level, mostly because the guys who won did not want Germany trying to go for round 2. Of course, the Nazis had every intention of going for round 2, but they needed to find a way to pay for the rearmament expenses without getting caught, and also do so without scaring away people because they were a terrible credit risk. It's really hard to do both because credit requires public records of your ability to pay back debts to act as a basis for your ability to get credit. At least, that's how it usually works. The Nazis thus had to get a ton of money by hook ...

 Before I continue, please refer to this post, where I explain why I took my mods off Nexus Mods and why any further contributions there are permanently off the table as far as I'm concerned: https://gethn7.blogspot.com/2024/08/a-little-more-information-as-to-why-my.html With the above in mind, I have elected to restore some of my old Nexus work to Bethesda.net. Note, not all, because some were already there, and some I cannot be sure works now, and I wish to wait until I have time to do this. Bethesda.Net has not, to this date, given me the slightest hassle about what I post off their site that has to do with my personal worldviews, all they care about is game mods. I expect no trouble with them, unlike Nexus Mods, Bethesda just wants to make money and promote their games and I just want to make mods with the tools they graciously provide. I don't even make mods that touch on social or political topics, mostly just patches, gameplay alterations, and the rare model or texture m...

 This is going to be a short blog, but it's on a cheese I've long wanted to try and my sister again came in for the clutch and managed to find it for me. Without further ado, let's cover the first German cheese on my cheese-tasting journey, Butterkäse. Butterkäse ( pronounced as "boo-ter-kay-zuh" ) is a German semi-soft pasteurized cow milk cheese. Literally meaning "butter cheese" (because of its taste and texture being very butter-like) and "ladies cheese" (due to its very mild taste and appearance), this is a cheese of wide renown in Germany and Austria, and American cheesemongers in Wisconsin are also known to make their own. Here are some facts before I begin the taste testing. First off, this is a young cheese aged about a month at most with a high degree of milk fat. While it is made from the curd and the whey is drained off in the process, there is little attempt to drain any and all moisture from the curd, meaning the curd remains soft...

 I would like to dedicate my latest cheese-tasting blog to my sister, who was gracious enough to see about procuring the cheese I tested for this review from her local cheesemonger and sending some my way. This is not going to be an overly long post, as I only tasted two new varieties, but both are fairly unique and deserve some discussion. The first cheese I tasted was Westminister Rustic Red Cheddar. Red cheddar is a bit interesting in that its creation was the result of a happy accident. Specifically, it was originally created by the accidental mixture of Lactobacillus helveticus starter culture into what was meant to be a cheddar cheese. This starter culture is commonly used in Swiss and Emmental-style cheese, so the original cheesemaker was worried it would taste terrible. To their pleasant surprise, the final product tasted great. As the name suggests, it's distinctly dark orange-red in color. The texture is similar to cheddar but more crumbly like an Italian hard cheese. The...

 This is just a retrospective post on what I vowed to myself when I decided to become a regular games reviewer (and this applies to all other relevant media). This is NOT anything with official backing or sanction from my current employers at ChristCenteredGamer, this is just my personal code of honor, though to my knowledge none of it is in conflict with the expectations of my current employer. 1. The subject I'm reviewing must be the primary topic, and nothing else. These days, some of my more politically and socially partisan brethren in the games journalism business will typically derail a review about a game to complain about not enough people of some sort of minority group, how capitalism is evil incarnate, sexual identity and gender politics, and other things that are clearly more interesting to them. The game review part is practically a sidebar to what they actually want to talk about. Not me. I work as a volunteer, but even if I were paid, my first duty is to primarily di...

 I have been a longtime Bethesda game fan. Their Elder Scrolls and Fallout games haven't been the greatest, and often are deeply flawed, but each had its own unique charm that Starfield lacked, which is the core of why I just could not enjoy it, so let's do a retrospective. Be advised, will contain spoilers. Arena was the first Elder Scrolls, and I'll admit, never really got into it. It was clearly a game that was more a tech demo experiment repurposed from a completely different game concept (it was to be generic arena fighter before it became an open-world RPG prototype), and it had some really cool ideas married to horrible balance, a game engine that was clunky even when it first released for DOS, and wasn't even a true open world game, the open world being more a series of looping randomized maps with some unique dungeons. That said, even then it had a few good ideas I hope to see fleshed out in a better game. Daggerfall was my first RPG love. Sure, it was even MOR...