No Coincidences

Tag: youtube

  • The Social Dilemma part 2

    The Social Dilemma part 2

    I am worried about the youth today.

    I don’t have a Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc, how many etceteras do I need nowadays?

    I’ve really tried to follow the advice I wrote about from my first post on The Social Dilemma (Netflix).  For a while I turned off suggested videos in YouTube, but I found the blank pages and the difficulty in finding what I was looking for to be too much to deal with.  Instead, I only go to YouTube with a purpose and try as best as I can to watch only the video I go there to watch. As of this writing the suggested videos in my YouTube has ballooned to 273 (273 videos!) since I’ve stopped looking at suggested videos. That’s a little red 273 on my phone home screen. That’s 273 times YouTube has said, “this video is just right for you.” That is countless hours (or hours I don’t want to count) of video footage YouTube has suggested to me. Yikes. I’m going to continue to avoid those videos and see how ludicrous that 273 number can become.

    I’ve also tried not to use Google which I’ve found to be way harder than I anticipated.  There’s a reason Google has the best search results, and that reason is they don’t care about your privacy.  With my job in IT support, I’ve found it impossible to use other search engines.  I still have the Qwant extension installed in my Google Chrome but find myself searching through Google anyway. 

    Like YouTube, I avoid Facebook as much as I can. As I write this, checking my battery usage, Facebook is still 11% of my total battery used.  When I do get on Facebook, the worst thing that can happen is I watch a video.  It’s the same reason I avoid YouTube as much as possible.  Facebook I find to be much worse than YouTube, at least for me.  Let me explain what happens when I get on Facebook and if I watch a video:

    1. I stumble upon a video title that I can’t avoid watching.  Something like, “The reason Donovan Mitchell will never win a championship for Utah.” 
      • Now I’m stuck.
    2. That video ends and is followed by, “I gave $1,000,000 to a stranger on the street!”
      •  I’m losing my free will.
    3. Next video, “I bought 10,000 black widows and put them in my mom’s bathroom!” 

    I’ll emerge from a sequence of videos like the above hours later and think to myself, “what just happened?”

    The above is only a slight exaggeration.

    The disconcerting, uncomfortable, and completely frightening truth is – once I watch that first, then second, then third video that has clearly been sent because they know it catches my attention – it’s really difficult for me to get away.  I’ll feel it happening.  Like, I’ll be on minute 6 of a 9-minute video and think, “after this one I’m done.”  Then as minute 8 starts to end I get this feeling, this urge.  Like – I have to watch another one.  I’ll feel this urge.  I’ll fight it.  And somehow, I end up watching another video.  I may sound dramatic, but it’s truly terrifying.

    Am I the only one?

    Beth and I have gotten into a routine with Ivy’s sleeping where I’m usually up briefly with Ivy around 11pm and Beth is up with her briefly around 4am. 

    Every once in a while (not often), I wake in the morning to a 4:15am text from Beth with some video or article.  I realize that, in a stupor, she was drawn to her phone.  This likely happened while she was lying in bed watching the baby monitor, waiting to see if Ivy would fall back asleep so she could go to sleep.

    Recently Beth took a picture of Ivy and I together on the couch.  I watched Beth open Facebook to share the picture.  I watched Beth somehow end up finding herself watching some video.  10 minutes later, talking to herself, Beth said something like, “what was I doing?…”

    I told her she likely looked at her phone to post a picture.

    “Oh yeah…” was her reply.

    I’m not the only one.

    Beth and I aren’t the only ones.

    Back to the first sentence I wrote for this post.  I am AFRAID for the youth today.  How do they survive in a world where advertisers know what they want to see, then put it directly into their hand over.. and over…and over…..and over……

    Something needs to be done for our youth, but I’m not sure what.  It’s too easy for them to be completely enveloped in this digital world.  We are frighteningly close to a Black Mirror-esc existence where kids only exist in their phones.  Maybe the only way we can help our youth is leading by example.

    I try to only be on my phone to read the scriptures. I’m not even great at responding to messages, as some of you know.  I read physical books.  I’m aware of Facebook’s and other social media companies’ pull on my attention, and I try to fight it.  I think it’s important we teach our kids the same thing.

    This must be the way we can help kids today. Lead by example. Read books. Show that the phone can be set aside. Go on day trips where the phone is not allowed to come. Set a requirement where there are no phones after dinner. I don’t know, anything! Something needs to be done and this is the first place to start.

    Otherwise the below picture is every family’s future. And that is a sad future.

    *Credit to photographer Eric Pickersgill who took these pictures depicting people with their mobile phones and devices removed from the photo.

  • Lectures on Faith – Lecture 2: The Object of Faith

    Lectures on Faith – Lecture 2: The Object of Faith

    A main theme throughout the Lectures on Faith is God’s perfect attributes.  Logically, for us to be able to have any faith in God He must be perfect.  We must know that we can trust God and, in turn, His Son, Jesus Christ. 

    The major theme I took away from Lecture 2 specifically is how we have attained faith throughout history.  Lecture 2 presents the profound idea that our faith in God is always dependent, or comes initially, from the faith of another.  Consider this, if no one in your life ever mentioned any sort of higher being, any sort of God, any sort of creator, would you come up with the thought on your own?  You think about God because He is someone we have been taught about since Adam.

    Even if your parents aren’t the ones who teach you about God, you learn about God from someone.  I would venture to say that in the world today every single person on the face of it has heard of the concept of a supreme being.  Why is this?  Where does our innate belief/consideration of God come from?

    Lecture 2 points out that there was an unbroken chain of testimony that started from Adam and was handed down through Abraham.  If you read Genesis carefully and do the math you will see that ancient prophets handed the knowledge of God down for generations.  It continues today.

    Adam knew God in the Garden of Eden.  When he left the Garden Adam still knew God.  We know Adam’s sons knew God.  Abel provided sacrifices to God.  Cain spoke to God even after murdering his brother.  This shows us that God spoke to men even after the fall and continued to speak to them as they continued to fall into transgression.  There is something significant here that I’d never considered.  Abel first got his knowledge of God from his father, Adam, as did Cain.  After they were told about God by Adam, then they had to develop their own faith in God.  They had to learn, trust, and depend on Him, or not. 

    The important thing to remember from this: we all start our faith by leaning on the faith of another.  We possess dependent faith.  This leads to another profound truth: God possesses independent faith.  God’s faith is not reliant on any outside source.  As discussed in lecture one, God’s faith is perfect.

    I’ve been studying the lectures alongside a video series that I will link at the bottom.  There were many amazing thoughts and ideas presented in that video, related to this second Lecture on Faith.

    Faith is faith until it happens, then it is knowledge. Since God has perfect faith, He doesn’t need to wait for something to happen for Him to know it.  He knows it is going to happen.  His faith is perfect therefore His knowledge is perfect.  It’s simple when you think about it in these terms, but it’s so critical.  It’s why we can have perfect faith in Him, BECAUSE we know His faith is perfect.

    IMPORTANT:  God is not still progressing.  This is important for us to understand.  God is not still learning.  If He was, we couldn’t have perfect faith in Him.

    God is Perfect - Ottawa Church of Christ

    This leads to a question: isn’t life boring for God if He has mastered everything?

    In the video they gave an awesome analogy.  Imagine you’re an accountant.  You master every aspect of accounting there is.  You have a perfect knowledge and ability in accounting.  Would you get bored with accounting?  Probably.  So, what would you then do?  You would teach others how to also master accounting.  God is the master accountant.  He has attained all knowledge on life, faith, eternity, creation – so what does He do?  He teaches us.  What a thought!  We are being tutored by the God of the universe.  That’s what makes this life so important.  When we consider that we are learning and being personally groomed by God Himself, what power it adds to our existence here!

    This leads to another important thought.  What was Christ’s ultimate message while here?  I think it would be service.  Love through service.  Give through service.  Charity.  Without charity you are nothing (1 Corinthians 13:2, Moroni 7:44)  Why did Christ teach this ever-important principle?  Because His Father, our Father, God is the ultimate server.  He is doing everything He does to teach us.  We truly are “His work and His glory” (Moses 1:39).

    I want to conclude with two last realizations: 

    1. The scriptures help develop our faith by teaching us of God.  This is important.
    2. Faith comes by hearing the word of God through the testimony of the servants of God, that testimony is always attended by the spirit.

    You aren’t told to have a testimony.  You’re not made to know Jesus is the Christ.  These are things you must come to a knowledge of through the spirit.  Think about it.  Christ, in His whole ministry, never told anyone He was the Son of God.  He always let them come to that conclusion on their own.  One example is Peter who He told, “blessed art thou for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 16:17).   Another example is Christ to the woman at the well (John 4).  Christ didn’t go telling people who He was.  It had to be revealed by the spirit.  This is why signs come by faith, and not the other way around (D&C 63:7-12).

    Our hearts must be open for us to receive the testimony of Jesus Christ.  2 Nephi 33:1 “When a man speaketh by the power of the Holy Ghost the power of the Holy Ghost carrieth it UNTO the hearts of the children of men.”  Not INTO but UNTO.  It’s then on the heart of the individual to accept or reject the testimony.  The system is in place.  The system has been in place for God’s children to develop faith in Him from the beginning.  Once the testimony is carried to the heart It’s then on the agency of the individual to receive or reject that testimony. 

    God has perfect faith.  We are here to develop our faith so that we can be like Him.  He is the great accountant, and we are his protégés.  It is His hope, His glory that we can become like Him.  As we develop our faith here it will benefit us for the rest of eternity.  I know I say it a lot, but, what a thought.

    Video 3 (Lecture on Faith 2):  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-o59d9ioGA&list=PLc5yYrpPFm2umksQf3jgULxoV4YIXTd2h&index=3

    Lecture on Faith 2: http://lecturesonfaith.com/2/