April 2010

April 21, 2010

Robots with skin enter our touchy-feely world

For humanoid robots, a fleshy covering could be essential to making them socially acceptable, and a touch-sensitive coating could prevent such machines from accidentally injuring people. Robot skin designs are in the works. (Source: New Scientist)

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April 20, 2010

Sub-Zero Weather Threatens Chinese Earthquake Survivors

ADRA reports the April 14 earthquake in Qinghai Province, China, killed more than 1,700, injured tens of thousands, and displaced hundreds of thousands. ADRA teams have been dispatched to Chengdu, Sichuan (www.adra.org).

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April 18, 2010

Afghan women appalled by European burqa ban push

“A firm believer in women’s rights, the only thing Afghan lawmaker Shinkai Karokhail finds as appalling as being forced to wear a burqa is a law banning it.” Read more in Reuters.

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April 18, 2010

Africa: a clash of eschatologies is brewing?

A Pew survey shows that in every African country with a considerable Christian population, over 50% expect Jesus to return in their life time. Over 30% of Muslims in Muslim-dominated African countries expect the Caliphate (=golden age of Islamic rule) to be reestablished in their lifetime.

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April 18, 2010

Hidden martyrs in Egypt

The Assyrian International News Agency reports the growing number of attacks on the Egyptian Christian population by Islamic radicals: 24 in 2008, 29 in 2009. Coptic Christians number about 7 million or 10% of Egypt.

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April 18, 2010

Human trafficking for sacrifice

Ugandan children are trafficked and killed by the rich for ritual sacrifice to bring more success (Examiner). Just when you thought human trafficking couldn’t get worse. This is apparently a regular event in Uganda.

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April 18, 2010

Mexican Migrants flee crime into USA

Fleeing Drug Violence, Mexicans Pour Into U.S. (NYT). Churches, prepare to minister to a lot of physically, spiritually, mentally and emotionally wounded people. Post-traumatic stress disorder counseling will be the order of the day! Those who are a blessing will be blessed (Genesis 12)…

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April 18, 2010

Migrants majority in Australia in 2025

Migrants to become majority in Australia by 2025 – Economic Times. 14% from Britain, 11% from New Zealand, 11% India, 10% China, 5% South Africa, 4% Philippines. Many come to study and end up settling. In 2006, 40% either born overseas or had one parent who was born abroad. Likely to jump to 36 million [...]

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April 18, 2010

Breakaway conservative Anglicans are planting churches

Breakaway Anglican flock plants over 100 new churches (Christian Today). This is to be expected. In The Churching of America Rodney Stark explained how liberalization and conservatism would, if given an “open and free religious market,” compete with each other and cause waves of renewal over time. Breakaway conservatives will likely always be more vigorous [...]

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April 17, 2010

Rising Somalia Prostitution

Noticing an increase in searches to JustinLong.org on Somali prostitution, I began digging around. The UN last year reported a widespread rise in rape and prostitution in Somalia with the increasing chaos. This year, increasing piracy is disrupting the local fishing economy and introducing drugs, alcohol and prostitution. Human Rights Examiner likewise reported human trafficking [...]

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April 17, 2010

More Global Prostitution Statistics

URI.edu has a factbook on global trafficking which collects statistics on prostitution and human trafficking around the world. They don’t verify the stats and there are some contradictions but useful nonetheless.

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April 17, 2010

The passing of Chris Feucht

I just heard that Dr. Chris Feucht passed away. He was the missions director at the New Life Churches in Virginia Beach, Virginia. I was deeply saddened to hear this. Chris was one of the people who helped us figure out what we had to do when we first were planning to go overseas; he [...]

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April 17, 2010

Google Docs: New Views

I have been exploring Google Docs this morning, working on a spreadsheet of major historical events for my chronology of the world database, and have discovered two new views in the new version of GDocs: Compact and List. Compact simply removes most of the GDocs interface, leaving me with a lot more space for my [...]

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April 16, 2010

Balance evangelism & social work?

I’ve been thinking a lot today about two tensions: this world, and the next world. In any missionary activity, there seems to be a tension between helping people in the here-and-now and helping people in the what-is-to-come. If you, with any given ministry, put a “base” (a preaching point, a house church, a what-have-you) into [...]

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April 16, 2010

Africa: hub for drug traffickers

Africa’s Drug Problem – It doesn’t produce or consume much cocaine, but West Africa has become a critical hub for traffickers (NYT).

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April 16, 2010

New Collaborative tools in Google Docs

For all the swarmers out there: Google Docs’ new collaborative editor is phenomenal. They’ve taken a page from the Google Wave codebase and put it into its most natural environment. I used it yesterday to group edit a doc with 3 of us. Fantastic. If you haven’t tried it yet, look at this screenshot tour [...]

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April 16, 2010

Being a seed

“At some point to be a Christian you have to transition from ‘come and see’ to ‘go and die.’” -Mars Hill Pastor Mark Hill.

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April 16, 2010

Stats: Growth in Generational Prayer, more

Christianity Today has some great statistics from various sources on interesting topics (USA). Note the increase in prayer amongst all generational cohorts.

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April 16, 2010

Destroying Language Barriers

Google’s language toolbars now make it easier to translate individual words on a page. But remember it only works for major languages. Minor languages are still neglected (and probably will be for a very long time).

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April 16, 2010

Toward the Last Languages

Read about Wycliffe’s Vision 2025 campaign: a vision that all language communities needing a Bible translation would have a program in progress by 2025: Toward the Last Languages (Wycliffe USA)

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