Wednesday, November 16, 2005
Q & A to N.T. Wright on the Historical Jesus
What advice do you have to help the conservative believer understand the value of the search for the historical Jesus?
A "conservative believer" must be someone who believes that Jesus was truly human as well as truly divine. (Anything else is radically unorthodox.) That true humanity was a first-century Palestinian Jew. If God decided to become a first-century Palestinian Jew, anything I can do to find what makes first-century Palestinian Jews tick is part of my 'conservative believer's' theological quest and personal pilgrimage. From my own books, I would recommend The Way of the Lord and The Challenge of Jesus. And perhaps The Lord and his Prayer.
A "conservative believer" must be someone who believes that Jesus was truly human as well as truly divine. (Anything else is radically unorthodox.) That true humanity was a first-century Palestinian Jew. If God decided to become a first-century Palestinian Jew, anything I can do to find what makes first-century Palestinian Jews tick is part of my 'conservative believer's' theological quest and personal pilgrimage. From my own books, I would recommend The Way of the Lord and The Challenge of Jesus. And perhaps The Lord and his Prayer.
# posted by ErinW @ 10:45 AM
Monday, November 14, 2005
My key analysis
Chapter 3 of Global Transformations
Page 184 – This discussion on welfare I think is relevant to our economics discussion. “erosion of the employment prospects for the low-skilled workers as a result of trade places a significantly higher burden on the welfare system… thus global trade has had contradictory impacts in so far as it has increased the demands on the welfare state while undermining the political basis for funding it.” This strikes me as critical to our web-blog if we want to tie in global trade to U.S. economics. It seems we burn the lower skilled in our country twice. We trade with other countries to get cheaper goods for the upper and middle classes. And then the upper and middle classes tend to vote politically against any aid or assistance for those that don't have low skilled jobs as a result. How interesting and enlightening! Makes me go "hmmm"....
Page 184 – This discussion on welfare I think is relevant to our economics discussion. “erosion of the employment prospects for the low-skilled workers as a result of trade places a significantly higher burden on the welfare system… thus global trade has had contradictory impacts in so far as it has increased the demands on the welfare state while undermining the political basis for funding it.” This strikes me as critical to our web-blog if we want to tie in global trade to U.S. economics. It seems we burn the lower skilled in our country twice. We trade with other countries to get cheaper goods for the upper and middle classes. And then the upper and middle classes tend to vote politically against any aid or assistance for those that don't have low skilled jobs as a result. How interesting and enlightening! Makes me go "hmmm"....
# posted by ErinW @ 8:00 AM
Week 7
Analysis and Reading
Global Transformations… chapters 3 & 4
Does anyone else have to look up GDP, MFN or WTO while reading in the abbreviations section? Or is it just me? I was a literature major in college and not an economics major… and despite the fascination with this subject… reading this book makes me think I made the right choice! But… I digress….
Pg. 149 – It opens with an interesting thought on global trading which shows how technology has affected trading. We can get a book across the world to us in days. In the West “seasonal” fruit has become almost non existent. I have actually already noticed that in the last few years. However, a good point here would be is having strawberries all year round worth the extra resources it takes to get them here? I am thinking of oil in particular. They are probably flown in on a cargo jet. Would growers in South America be hurting if North American’s didn’t by their strawberries in January?
Page 153 – “Regular trade needs institutional structures to secure property rights in exchange.” It seems this would indicate the need for politics and diplomacy. I mean I can physically by Cuban cigars but I don’t have the “right” to them in our country. There needs to be agreements that are beneficial and reasonable for trade to work, I would think. It also makes me think that as this part of the chapter gives a brief history of trade. Merchant towns would be pivotal to this growth and they would need to be near the influx of transportation of products. This would also need some sort of banking system. In general global and intercontinental trading (ie: money) is at the root of much of our homogeneity as a world. It was not until trains came about in our country that people starting looking at time tables. Industry and trade is what shapes how we view money, our culture and how our culture compares to other cultures. When we share trade, we also share the best and worst of our culture. So what starts as money becomes a social endeavor.
Page 161 – Makes the connection I mused about above. How trade is a significant determinant of the incomes within countries and has impact on key domestic politics. This economic shift then brought about two different types of countries during and after the industrial revolution: countries with natural resources and countries that specialize in manufacturing those resources. “This international division of labor had profound effects on the fortunes of different sectors and groups in industrial and developing countries.”
Box 3.1 – assumption of standard economic theory: when a country opens up for trade it then has to deal with a world price that may be different than a domestic price for whatever resource/good it has to sell or buy. Thus countries will specialize in whatever they have in the most abundance or whatever they can get the best price for. This continues to lead to the stratification of wealth. This causes also countries to major on what they have a comparative advantage in and almost stop production of what they don’t have good competition in. Therefore countries become dependent on other countries for the goods they cannot provide for themselves. I think this has the potential to be disastrous in the future if we are ever cut off from other parts of the world.
Page 173 – “Trade competition in the world economy has led to diverging income levels… many of the poorer states confront declining terms of trade… the new international division of labour embodies a polarization of economic fortunes in the global economy and new patterns of stratification.” I doubt that this reflects illegal substances traded. Every day people make money off of the sale of illegal substances, weapons and human trafficking, I would imagine. It seems to me that many of those trades happen on the first level at the poorer nations who are trying to find some way to make up that stratification difference. Some of the poorer developed nations are were child prostitution and slavery runs rampant and American business men often reap the “benefits” of it as they travel.
Page 184 – This discussion on welfare I think is relevant to our economics discussion. “erosion of the employment prospects for the low-skilled workers as a result of trade places a significantly higher burden on the welfare system… thus global trade has had contradictory impacts in so far as it has increased the demands on the welfare state while undermining the political basis for funding it.” This strikes me as critical to our web-blog if we want to tie in global trade to U.S. economics.
Page 210 – International banking and the world trade stock market stuff so confuses me. However, this section I think hits us. It is the global banking and lending system’s effect on the continued stratification of the global financial system. Basically what that means is that poorer countries rarely have access to international banks or banking/lending institutions. They rely on aid given to them by richer nations. However, many of the richer of the poor can get access to international banking systems.
Global Transformations… chapters 3 & 4
Does anyone else have to look up GDP, MFN or WTO while reading in the abbreviations section? Or is it just me? I was a literature major in college and not an economics major… and despite the fascination with this subject… reading this book makes me think I made the right choice! But… I digress….
Pg. 149 – It opens with an interesting thought on global trading which shows how technology has affected trading. We can get a book across the world to us in days. In the West “seasonal” fruit has become almost non existent. I have actually already noticed that in the last few years. However, a good point here would be is having strawberries all year round worth the extra resources it takes to get them here? I am thinking of oil in particular. They are probably flown in on a cargo jet. Would growers in South America be hurting if North American’s didn’t by their strawberries in January?
Page 153 – “Regular trade needs institutional structures to secure property rights in exchange.” It seems this would indicate the need for politics and diplomacy. I mean I can physically by Cuban cigars but I don’t have the “right” to them in our country. There needs to be agreements that are beneficial and reasonable for trade to work, I would think. It also makes me think that as this part of the chapter gives a brief history of trade. Merchant towns would be pivotal to this growth and they would need to be near the influx of transportation of products. This would also need some sort of banking system. In general global and intercontinental trading (ie: money) is at the root of much of our homogeneity as a world. It was not until trains came about in our country that people starting looking at time tables. Industry and trade is what shapes how we view money, our culture and how our culture compares to other cultures. When we share trade, we also share the best and worst of our culture. So what starts as money becomes a social endeavor.
Page 161 – Makes the connection I mused about above. How trade is a significant determinant of the incomes within countries and has impact on key domestic politics. This economic shift then brought about two different types of countries during and after the industrial revolution: countries with natural resources and countries that specialize in manufacturing those resources. “This international division of labor had profound effects on the fortunes of different sectors and groups in industrial and developing countries.”
Box 3.1 – assumption of standard economic theory: when a country opens up for trade it then has to deal with a world price that may be different than a domestic price for whatever resource/good it has to sell or buy. Thus countries will specialize in whatever they have in the most abundance or whatever they can get the best price for. This continues to lead to the stratification of wealth. This causes also countries to major on what they have a comparative advantage in and almost stop production of what they don’t have good competition in. Therefore countries become dependent on other countries for the goods they cannot provide for themselves. I think this has the potential to be disastrous in the future if we are ever cut off from other parts of the world.
Page 173 – “Trade competition in the world economy has led to diverging income levels… many of the poorer states confront declining terms of trade… the new international division of labour embodies a polarization of economic fortunes in the global economy and new patterns of stratification.” I doubt that this reflects illegal substances traded. Every day people make money off of the sale of illegal substances, weapons and human trafficking, I would imagine. It seems to me that many of those trades happen on the first level at the poorer nations who are trying to find some way to make up that stratification difference. Some of the poorer developed nations are were child prostitution and slavery runs rampant and American business men often reap the “benefits” of it as they travel.
Page 184 – This discussion on welfare I think is relevant to our economics discussion. “erosion of the employment prospects for the low-skilled workers as a result of trade places a significantly higher burden on the welfare system… thus global trade has had contradictory impacts in so far as it has increased the demands on the welfare state while undermining the political basis for funding it.” This strikes me as critical to our web-blog if we want to tie in global trade to U.S. economics.
Page 210 – International banking and the world trade stock market stuff so confuses me. However, this section I think hits us. It is the global banking and lending system’s effect on the continued stratification of the global financial system. Basically what that means is that poorer countries rarely have access to international banks or banking/lending institutions. They rely on aid given to them by richer nations. However, many of the richer of the poor can get access to international banking systems.
# posted by ErinW @ 8:00 AM
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