Out of Touch

Ever since my father-in-law planted his church this past April (www.therockwired.org), my wife and I have been members.  And its great; I enjoy his messages, the style of worship, and stuff, and its exciting to get to be part of a new church.

But we came from a church with a thriving young adult population, with monthly get-togethers and fun times several times a month.  We went from being part of this huge group of friends to being on the fringe of things.

Many of our friends are great about keeping in touch.  We have a rotating dinner party group that gets together on major holidays, but aside from that we really don’t get together very much.

I’m not really complaining, and this isn’t aimed at anyone.  We really don’t have the time or money to go out a lot (and we have a kid!!).  But it still makes me sad sometimes that we don’t have that weekly fellowship like we used to at our previous church.  I guess I just get lonely (thank heaven for Todd and Nathan who keep in touch a lot!!).

We would love to have a thriving young adult ministry at our new church.  We are located in the Dupont area of Fort Wayne, Indiana, so if you are looking for a place to come, you are welcome!

Toyota Prius Harms the Environment More than a Hummer

Sounds strange, I know, but here’s a link to the article.

With the new, more realistic, and stricter EPA guidelines for how fuel economy is calculated, the highway economy for the Prius drops to 45 mpg, compared to 37 mpg for the Chevrolet Aveo, which costs around $13,000 nicely equipped, before rebates.  The Prius?  Similarly equipped, around $23,000 before rebates.  To recoup the cost of a Prius over an Aveo, lets take a look at the math.  Both vehicles have a nearly 12-gallon tank (both at 11.9) so we’ll use 12 for the sake of ease.  The average person drives 12,000 miles per year, or not quite 231 miles a week.  Again, let’s use 231 for ease of math.

So, on one tank of gas, at $3 a gallon (12 gallons X $3 = $36):

Prius:   540 miles (45 mpg X 12 gallon fuel capacity)  for $36, refill every 2.34 weeks (540 miles/ tank divided by 231 miles driven/week), total refills 22.22 times $36 /refill: total yearly cost for fuel:  approx $800

Aveo:  444 miles (37 mpg X 12 gallon fuel capacity)  for $36, refill every  1.92 weeks (444 miles/ tank divided by 231 miles driven/week), total refills 27.1 times $36 / refill:  total yearly cost for fuel:  approx $975

So the yearly fuel savings of the Prius over the Aveo is approximately $175.  You’d have to drive it for 63 years to recoup the cost of the vehicle.  Not so good a deal, anymore. (of course, the numbers I used here are “perfect world” numbers; they are a guideline, nothing more.  Your mileage and savings may vary.  So don’t sue me.)

But what about those folks who bought one because its better for the environment to use less fuel?

That’s true.  But the problem is with the nickel in the Prius’ electric battery.  This metal is  mined and smelted at a plant in Ontario, in a town called Sudbury.  The area around Sudbury has become a “dead zone” completely devoid of plant life. The acid rain from the plant is the cause.

Also, for one battery, the nickel goes from Ontario, then to a refinery in Europe, then to China, then to Japan.  Each step of the way, some new step is performed in the process of making the battery.  Finally it returns to the US to be installed in a shiny new Prius for some poor naive person to buy.

The Aveo is not, to my knowledge, considered a “green car”, I was using it for comparison because the article mentioned it in conjunction with the Prius, and because I work for a General Motors dealership, I had tons of info on the Aveo to use and double-check.  So I am not advocating the Aveo as a viable green alternative.

Please, don’t believe the hype touted by Toyota commercials (see my previous post about education).  Do the research for yourself, and figure out which vehicles truly are better for the environment.  Better yet, find people at work with whom to carpool.  Use public transportation when possible.  Walk whenever possible.  Do whatever you can to lessen your impact.  Small steps, put together, equal big gains.

A Good Education….

I will be graduating in just a few days with my Bachelor’s degree. It has been a long process; I started it back in 1997 after I graduated from high school. After I failed out in 2000, I didn’t re-enter until 2005. My last three semesters were full-time while having a full-time job and a wife and son. No way could I have done this without the support of my wonderful wife (thanks, Sweetie!), family (thanks, Mom!) and friends. And of course, God.

Anyway, the point of this post was to be the most valuable thing I am taking with me from my education: the ability to think critically.

Critical thinking is not necessarily critiquing someone else’s thoughts or work, although that is part of it. Critical thinking is rather the ability to stop and think logically and as objectively as possible about an idea or thought, and evaluate it on its own terms without shades of personal bias or prejudice.

I think that this is a skill that is sadly lacking in America. Too many people simply swallow whatever the news media or their political and religious leaders tell them because they are either too lazy or naive to check out the facts for themselves, and form their own opinions, or they do not realize that everyone has an agenda, and a person’s perception of facts or events may not be accurate.

Part of what helped develop this skill was my exposure to ideas that are antithetical to my conservative evangelical Christian faith and worldview. By having my beliefs challenged, I was forced to dig deeper and understand where many of my beliefs came from, and what the philosophical underpinnings of them were. This in turn helped me to discard or modify those that were based upon faulty premises or reasoning (I am not going to get specific here, but if any of you are curious, email me and we’ll chat).

The point here is that my education was not important because of the information I acquired, but because I gained the ability to think critically about my thoughts and the thoughts of others.

In the words of Western novelist Louis L’Amour (one of my favorite authors!!!!), “Education is not important for what you learn, but for what it makes you think.”