Blogs. What's the point?
Facebook. What's the point?
Twitter. What's the point?
You tell me.
Facebook. What's the point?
Twitter. What's the point?
You tell me.
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A forum for discussing matters of moment, from a curmudgeonly perspective. (The ideas posted here do not necessarily represent those of any organization with which I am a part). Rude and insulting remarks will not be published, but civil disagreement is welcome.
Blog Archive
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2009
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November
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- "Facebook Exit"
- Ella Live!
- The End of Christianity
- The Fruit Fell Far from the Tree
- Flow TV: 24/7 Portable TV!
- Social Darwinism Lamented
- Thomas Nagel from The Times Literary Supplement
- The Letter: Do Something to Save my Father
- Letter to National Public Radio
- Whose Sacrifice?
- Why Do It?
- Hope from a Pro-Life Activist and Apologist
- Look Who is in Charge Now
- Message at Denver Seminary
- Lament
- From National Right to Life
- Defeat: What Now, Christians?
- Prayer
- No, in the name of God
- Obama Team Catering to Terrorists, Again
- From The NY Times
- To My Senators: On Tax-Supported Abortion
- Converting to Christianity
- An Open Letter to George Will, Also Posted on his ...
- Insane
- Obama's Strategic Brilliance
- The Deniable Darwin
- How Do You Live?
- The Deniable Darwin
- Learning How to Fight
- Question
- Another Guru Gone
- Bernard Ramm on Nietzsche and Evangelicals
- Water on the Moon
- Curmudgeon's Cry
- Can You Do This?
- Is ID Viable?
- Doug Groothuis on Spiritual Warfare at Denver Semi...
- The Posters are Going up at Metro State
- Groothuis Apologetics Articles
- Truth Obama and the Military Needs to Hear
- Abortion and Obama
- Once Again: Wake Up!
- Darwin's Children: Run for Cover
- Classic Ad hominem Fallacy
- This just in from National Right to Life
- Groothuis Talk at Auraria Campus, November 16 at 1...
- "Collision" DVD Review
- On Not Speaking Truth to Power
- Truth: Act!
- Whence Mind? No Matter!
- #$%^*(_*)_
- Defining Terrorism Down
- Spiritual Warfare: The Belt of Truth and Breastpla...
- Another Obama-nation
- Rule: Publication of the Civil
- Fear it. Oppose it.
- "Live and Love as We Like"--Sounds like a 1960s Po...
- Twitter Query
- Pot Shots, Cheap Shots, and More!
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November
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About Me
- Douglas Groothuis, Ph.D.
- Nothing on this blog represents the position of Denver Seminary. I am a Christian, philosopher, teacher, writer, and preacher, who is Professor of Philosophy at Denver Seminary. My most recent of my twelve books is Philosophy in Seven Sentences. My magnum opus is Christian Apologetics: A Comprehensive Case for Biblical Faith (InterVarsity Press, 2011). I have published ten others, including Truth Decay and On Jesus. I direct the Christian Apologetics and Ethics MA program at Denver Seminary.
18 comments:
Blogs - It said in the blogosphere that there are linkers and thinkers. If you are thinker a blog is a good method to do philosophy, theology, etc. You can gain instant critiques to your thought via comments. It also gives you a chance to tag your thinking and give you a way to organize your thoughts. I often wonder if Pascal would have been a blogger. I like reading your blog when you have a post that is well thought out and well written. I don't so much like random links and am more disinclined to click on them.
Facebook - Again can be used to meet and keep in touch with many people. It can be a distraction, but it can also be a way to communicate to others important things going on.
Twitter - I believe was created by Satan himself. There is only a few things that I can see using it for and most of the time it is not worth the time to read or know.
That's an easy one for me to answer.
Blogging helps me get feedback on my writing - even those who don't comment publicly will email me with comments, suggestions, etc.
Commenting on other's blogs has helped me make new friends and connections and sometimes even dates (grins!). In this year alone I stayed with one blogging friend on a trip to WDC, had a meeting with a publisher/writer I'd met through another blog and had a girls' weekend on Cape Cod with a friend from an email group.
Blogging has also netted me some small writing commissions, though none are paid commissions as yet and an offer to publish my nonfiction book (if I ever get around to writing it).
Blogging has helped me network with other writers for encouragement and fun.
Facebook is a tool that I find helpful for keeping up with friends when our disparate schedules don't always permit phone calls.
But most importantly of all - the predecessor of blogging, a message board, brought me to the attention of two dear brothers in Christ whose prayers lifted me out of deep rebellion and into something I never could have imagined would bless me so very deeply. I've extracted promises from my two dear brothers in the faith that, should I ever marry, one of them will give me away and one of them will officiate.
Kamilla
Blogging is a beneficial avenue for expression of thoughts and for feedback. Primarily, I enjoy blogging to process thoughts on religion, philosophy, and ID. However I do not see any value in Twitter, so I deleted my account. Perhaps I'm missing how Twitter is effective or beneficial in any way. Essentially, Facebook not only provides a connection point to address interesting issues between atheists, theists, ect....If one is going to to spread the message of Christ, I think blogging is at least worth the energy and effort.
Sarah
Blogs are, for me, a way of journaling. Sometimes people that just want to bust my chops or correct me in my pain feel a need to post, but often it's friends who are there with me in it.
FaceBook. Love it and hate it. I've found people from lives long forgotten and it's been great. And as a stay-at-home dad it's a way to waste time.
There is a psychological motivation behind the entire blogging enterprise. I remember having my first blog: a sense of euphoria. I had a spot on the web where I could share my thoughts. Soon however, people started to respond. I became a columnist for two Christian websites and a regular writer for a Christian newspaper. So maybe there was something useful to my blogging after all.
In any case, blogging for me is an effective way to learn to write, to sharpen my thoughts and to learn to express them concisely. Also blogging is somehow a ministry in that people really come to read (and reread) all those short articles on apologetics and phil of rel. It could potentially be a bridge between the academic and the popular realm. It certainly is the only the place I get bashed by atheists.
Facebook is a crude tool to have a sense of staying in touch with a lot of people. It's best feature is to jot a quick note or share some pics with far away relatives.
Twitter has slowly become a more useful tool since I got a piece of Twitter software that unobstrusively notifies my of the thoughts of some key people and friends. (It's nice to get a tweet during a boring class. It keeps one awake).
Let me speak from the reader only .perspective
I love to read blog posts from credible people like Doug. I learn so much in an easy 2 hr. daily trip through them. They are also great resources for me to teach/discuss my 2 mens small groups.
How else would I ever have access to scholars, Seminary profs.,etc.
The service that guys like Justin Taylor and Tim Challies is tremendously helpful.
Whom else in cyberland do I have but you?
Blogging is a great way to stimulate thinking, and have one's thinking stimulated.
Facebook is a great way to reconnect with friends, and once one "finds" them, one will (in theory, at least) be connected with them from now on.
Twitter is a great way to waste a lot of time and showcase one's narcissism.
It's all good. Social networking helps enable and encourage the exchange of ideas and information, as well as goods and services.
Just look at what happened in Iran a few months back for a good example of the benefits of social networking in circumventing an oppressive regime. (And Paul Revere could have simply twittered that the 'British were coming'!)
Sure, people abuse it and get addicted to triviality and vain pursuits online. But so what? People have their vices.
With all respect to Postman, the medium is *not* necessarily the message here.
I could care less about Twitter. I do Facebook to keep in touch with people I don't regularly interact with.
I blog on Examiner as a way to hone my writing skills, to reach an audience interested in spiritual matters but not necessarily Christian, and to think through new ideas in written form.
Yoss:
You could not--ethically--get a Tweet in my class. I ban such things!
Doug, I know. That's why I just had to put it in there ;-) (And you're right!)
Blog: Sharpen writing skills, vent, learn to think more clearly, spread the Gospel, meet people.
Facebook: Keep up with your kids, share pictures, keep up with friends.
Twitter: I'm avoiding Twitter.
Blogging:
I blog for several reasons:
1) the occasional journal entry;
2) refining my thinking;
3) accountability to my thinking to those at church inclined to read my more thought-provoking posts;
4) Informational posts regarding activities. I - er, my wife - likes to decorate tables for a Festival of Tables at church. It's a fun evangelistic event for women. The husbands serve the meals and there is a special speaker and special music. But the tables are creative and artsy and fun for women to fellowship around. Posts where I have taken photos of the tables have the highest traffic by far by women looking for ideas for FoT events at their churches.
Facebook: I have a warm and loving church. We like hanging out with each other and networking even outside of church. FB is a great way to do this. We post photos of church events and activities, and support each other in various ways. For example, I suffer depression and have several church members who keep an eye on me. I have a simple code for letting them know via my status where I am any given day. I have instant prayer from them as well as more tangible action if necessary. Knowing that this support is there by posting a single number online has really helped break the emotional cycle of depression.
These things are tools. Tools can either be used constructively or destructively, but otherwise are morally neutral. It's our usage that is either sanctified or sinful.
Ditto with Neil. I can honestly say I'm not the same person now that I was when I started blogging. I have learned:
1. that you don't have to be stupid to be wrong, nor does being wrong make you stupid.
2. to detect fallacious arguments, first in writing, then in hearing.
3. to avoid my own fallacious arguments.
4. to be nice and respectful to those with whom I disagree.
5. to avoid over-"reacting".
6. to think more clearly.
7. to be more confident in my interactions with people twice as well read and intelligent as myself by merely clinging to the basics of truth.
8. to more clearly challenge presuppositions without being offensive.
9. to better express myself by the written word, I hope.
And to strengthen my own belief system and worldview by defending them, to name just a few. So thanks very much.
*FB, I have an account and have renewed high school acquaintances because of it, which is why I signed up.
*I do not, nor dare I say it, never will tweet.
I've thought about this question, and I always come up with the same thing: relationship. Pure and simple. We were created for it, and we want it.The desire to be heard and to be understood.(Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't, but we seem to be willing to keep taking the risk.)
Twitter and Facebook seem silly and somewhat narcissistic to me.
Blogs can be different. Where else could an unknown person's writing be published for free and information, opinions and research flow like this?
Before, you had to go through the process of becoming accepted by the powers or famous to get published. Even in Christian circles, we developed a celebrity hierarchy and the result of the Christian book market over the past 30 years proves this. But you had to have some sort of celebrity or acceptance to get your writing into the hands of people.
Not anymore.
I am praying that this new medium is teaching us to be Bereans. We accepted what was taught to us if the person was well known without much checking. Now we can present another interpretation and anyone with a computer can read it and respond.
Because there are the people.
I blog, therefore I am.
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