Pandemic Lockdown Result of Bad Software

The following is an article published by The Institute for Creation Research, under the name of William West, M.C.Ed. (reviewed by Dr. Randy J. Guliuzza.).

As I am currently banned from Facebook, please feel free to copy the article there - with the full acknowledgement, above!

"One of the most frustrating things a person can go through is for their normally stable computer system, tablet, or phone, to suddenly stop working—a bad patch, a bad virus, or just old age. Whatever the case, the level of stress rises considerably when your tool for information stops.

One of the main reasons that software fails is that the software is designed for a specific set of hardware, and usually that software is developed on systems that are higher end so that it can be tested in an optimal situation. The problem is that sometimes software gets put into old systems. Sometimes the software gets used in a completely wrong way.

An interesting example of this is the software used to help predict the fallout of our current coronavirus pandemic. At the Imperial College in London, Neil Ferguson and his team used software that they had used previously to predict other high-risk outbreaks.1 The problem is that the software is flawed—very flawed. When developing software, it is imperative that you run that software through so many iterations that, when you finish, you would be certain that it is going to come up with the same thing over and over. Except that this software, when ran more than once with the same input, would come up with different numbers every time. If you can’t duplicate the results of the original number, then there must be something wrong with the software’s code.

This is basic science 101. In order to have a successful experiment, you must be able to repeat what you did over and over. You would also need other people to be able to duplicate the experiment and get the same results. This did not happen. Not only were they not able to duplicate the results on their own systems, they did not share the code to the rest of the community so that other people could scrutinize their work.

This software is 13 years old and was originally used to predict an influenza outbreak. Neil and his team used this software to predict other outbreaks, and all of his predictions from this software were way over-estimated. In 2002, he predicted that there would be 150,000 deaths from mad cow disease by the year 2080. But the death count was well short of that at 177 in Britain. In 2005, Ferguson predicted that 150 million people would die from the bird flu. Once again, we see that the numbers did not come even close. Over a 6-year period, only 282 people died from contracting it. In 2009, a government prediction based on Neil’s input predicted that 65,000 British people would die from the swine flu, and yet only 457 died.2

One has to wonder why anyone would even listen to a person who consistently gets the number wrong. Yet, Britain and the United States went into full lockdown, costing trillions of dollars—partly based on old code that never worked in the first place.

Now, when you are sitting at your desk, or looking at your tablet or phone, and it starts to slow down and maybe even freeze up a bit, you can feel a little better knowing that at least your gadget isn’t going to cost the world trillions of dollars if it doesn’t finish loading fast enough.

At the Institute for Creation Research, science is important to us. It is equally important to us that people know when bad science is being done. So many people have fallen for the information that Ferguson and his team provided, and so many people fall for science that talks of an old Earth and evolution. A lot of this is because many people fall for the idea of “consensus” science—if certain “elite” scientists say something, then it must be true.3 They will also believe scientists because of data that is cherry picked.4

If nothing else comes of COVID-19, maybe a few more people will stop trusting every scientist they hear and start questioning the “science” that has kept them away from God.

References
1. Fund, J. ‘Professor Lockdown’ Modeler Resigns in Disgrace. National Review. Posted on nationalreview.com May 6, 2020, accessed May 20, 2020.
2. Williams, T. Telegraph: UK Lockdown a Result of the “Most Devastating Software Mistake of all time.” Breitbart. Posted on breitbart.com May 18, 2020, accessed May 20, 2020.
3. Guliuzza, R. Consensus Science: The Rise of a Scientific Elite. Acts & Facts. 38 (5): 4.
4. Johnson, J. J. S. Cherry Picking Data Is the Pits. Acts & Facts. 42 (2): 9. "

Playing with prophecy.

You may have read, or heard, of Pastor Salazar, from the Global Church of the King of Israel, in Tokyo, Japan, who claims in an online video that is going viral that, on May 16 2016, a five-mile wide "murderous" asteroid will crash into the Earth - wiping out life on the planet as we know it!

The horrific event will, he informs, initially kill 1,200 million people and leave a world at the mercy of famine and disease for four years before the Antichrist descends to Earth!

According to the predictions by an American preacher in the past few days, the world was to end on, I think, Wednesday.  Well, that one was wrong - as have been so many over the years.  Now, a serious study of end-time events can be fascinating; and novels such as those that were popular in the 1960s and 70s (In the Twinkling of an Eye; The Mark of the Beast; The Late Great Planet Earth: etc.) can make for enjoyable, and even challenging, reading.  However, trying to predict the precise date on which the world will end, or the Rapture take place, or any other cataclysmic event occur, is foolishness of the first order!

At the height of World War II, the German protestant pastor and theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, was imprisoned for having taken a stand against Hitler and the Nazis.  A group of Christians, who believed that Hitler was the Antichrist, asked Bonhoeffer, "Why do you expose yourself to all of this danger?  Jesus will return any day, and all of your work and suffering will have been for nothing!"  The pastor replied: "If Jesus returns tomorrow, then tomorrow I will rest from my labour.  But today I have work to do.  I must continue the struggle until it is finished."

Jesus told the disciples, in advance, about his death, so that they wouldn't be alarmed by it, but they missed the message.  They didn't understand that HaMaschiach (the Messiah) had to die before He could reign as King.  Even after the resurrection, they wanted a Kingdom timetable (Acts 1:6ff).  Jesus informed them that such knowledge was the Father's, and His alone.

Prophecy is not for playing - and seeking to predict that which is only in the Father's domain is, surely, tantamount to blasphemy.  Prophecy is to keep us working, confident that God is in control.   Someone has said that we should, "Plan as if Christ's return were years away; but live as if it were today!"  That's not a bad position to take!

Rapture tomorrow??

If the prediction of 89-year-old Mr Harold Camping is correct, this may well be the final post that I place on this (or any other!) blog.  Mr Camping has predicted, and has been doing so for a couple of months, that the apocalypse will take place at 1800 hours on Saturday May 21st, 2011.  He has not, as far as I know, identified the specific time-zone that is involved - meaning that, if it is 1800 hours Pacific Standard Time, then I have some eight additional hours with which to play (and to get a final, final post out!).

It is, of course, perfectly possible that the Rapture of the saints of God (all who, having recognised and confessed their sinful nature, and their sins, have placed their trust, personally, in the Lord Jesus Christ, for full salvation) will take place at 1800 hrs PST on May 21st, 2011.  It is equally possible that it will not.  Mr Camping, like so many before him (and he already has one false prediction to his 'credit'), appears to have missed out the clear statement of the Lord Jesus, as recorded in Matt.24:36 and Mark 13:32.  No interpretation is necessary.  The statement is as clear as crystal.  Referring to that tumultuous event, the Lord says: "...  no one knows the day or hour when these things will happen, not even the angels in heaven or the Son himself. Only the Father knows." (Matt.24:36; NLT).  One wonders which part of "... no one knows ..." Mr Camping has not yet understood.  His claim that those words do not preclude knowing the month does not hold any theological, or hermeneutical, water.  And, of course, this time, he has given 'an hour'!

Of course, such brash announcements are also doing a disservice to the Lord, causing the unbelievers great merriment.  One such has already posted on a newspaper forum that he will be interested in the 'back-peddling' that Mr Camping will have to do when his second prediction is shown to have been as false as his first.  Mr Camping's problem, there, is that he has also declared that his earlier failure was due to his not having factored in all of the relevant information to his calculations, but that this time "There's no possibility - none, none, none - that it will not happen." (The Philadelphia Enquirer, 17-01-11).  

Although placing no confidence in either Mr Camping or his predictions, it is good to be reminded that there will be a rapture, and a judgement.  However, rather than spend precious time trying to discover the undiscoverable, we are better to ensure that we are prepared for that event - whenever it may occur.  We do this by a deliberate and conscious acceptance that we are, by nature, sinners; that we are unable, ourselves, to do anything about our sinful state; that Almighty God, in His great mercy, has provided an escape from the penalty and power of sin through the sacrifice of Himself, in the Persona of the Son (Jesus) on the cross at Calvary; and by accepting that salvation, by handing over control of our lives to Him.

If we've done that, then we enter eternal life and are assured that, at the end of our time on this earth (which may, or may not, be coincidental with the Rapture) we will slip through that fine curtain that separates time from eternity, and dwell in the nearer presence of the Lord for ever.

The Resurrection of Jesus - Part 2

The Bible is full of prophecy - not just that which is "forthtelling" (i.e. "This is the Word of the Lord"), but also "foretelling" (i.e. predictive: "This is what is going to happen").  A study of the latter group will show that many of them have been fulfilled, although there are some that have yet to be realised.  However, one 'sub-group' that can be easily checked out, is that which comprises the claims of the Lord Jesus that he would rise from the dead.  Indeed, John Stott, in his useful little volume, Basic Christianity, writes that "Jesus Himself never predicted His death without adding that He would rise, and described His coming resurrection as a 'sign'" (my emphasis).

Think about it!  If you, or I, were to go around and inform our friends that, not only would we die a violent death, but that three days later we would rise from the dead, we would be instant candidates for a prolonged stay in an institution for the mentally unstable!  And this would be right and proper.  Only a mentally unstable person would go around talking like that unless that person knew that what was being claimed would actually take place.  Only One Who is God could speak thus, with the certainty with which Jesus spoke.

There are too many of these instances for me to give them all in a single post, but here are just a few examples:  "Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to Him, 'Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you.'  But He answered them, 'An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign; but no sign shall be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the whale, so will the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.'" (Matt 12:38-40; my emphasis).  "... after I am raised up, I will go before you to Galilee." (Matt 26:32).  "... He was teaching His disciples, saying to them, "The Son of man will be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill Him; and when He is killed, after three days He will rise." (Mark 9:31).  ""The Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised." (Luke 9:22).  "Jesus answered them, 'Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.'  The Jews then said, 'It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will You raise it up in three days?' But He spoke of the temple of His body. When therefore He was raised from the dead, His disciples remembered that He had said this; and they believed the scripture and the word which Jesus had spoken." (John 2:19-22).

Of course, there were also many others who testified to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus - many of them in circumstances in which it is highly unlikely that they would have been merely "making something up"!  Ignatius, who became the Bishop of Antioch, was born less than 20 years after the death and resurrection of Jeus so, while he was not himself a contemporary of the Lord, he would have known people who were alive at that time.  He was martyred by being thrown to wild beasts, in the Colosseum in Rome.  On his journey there, when he would undoubtedly have been in a most sober frame of mind, he wrote his Epistles. Referring to his Saviour, he wrote, "He was crucified, and died, under Pontius Pilate.  He really, and not merely in appearance, was crucified, and died, in the sight of beings in heaven, and on earth, and under the earth.  He also rose again in three days."

The resurrection  of Jesus, the Christ, is an event in history, every bit as much as is the Battle of Bannockburn, the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo, or the destruction of the Space Shuttle Columbia.  We may discuss the meaning of it - that is theology; but the historical event is a matter of looking at the evidence.  The nature of the resurrection Body of Jesus may be a mystery (although I do have my own theory!), but its disappearance from the tomb is also a matter to be decided upon by examining the historical evidence.

Until tomorrow - and Part 3!!