
BETWEEN the FINITE and the INFINITE
By John Martin Ramsay

BETWEEN the FINITE and the INFINITEJul 28, 2021

#102, Politically Correct
I have provided some links in the printed version and will gladly send the printed version to you upon request.

#101, Finally!!!
For pictures and information about my sons, Martin and Loren, go to my website www.ShareInPrint.com. I will be updating information as I am able, including "Grandfathers' Learning Adventures" which will be added as each movie short is completed.

#100, The Cave Man In Me!
See the Ramsay Boys dancing a rapper sword dance in 1983 https://youtu.be/YzIHvBkweJ0

#99, The Ideal Cow!
Survival of the fittest and Covid 19.

#98, Crossroads Between Art and Science
Listen to why I no longer sing in a choir!

#97, A Thriller!
This one is timeless, in 4 minutes!

#96, Folk Education
The first Largest Windmill!

#95, Looking Two Ways
You have hold of the steering wheel!

#94, Word Nerd
Is my play with words fun or a distraction?

#93, You Be the Judge!
The world is at your fingertips, and that is speeding change!

#92, Inside the Cosmic Egg
Finding your place in the cosmos.

#91, Between the Poles
Thoughts on the Inauguration!

#90, Afterlife
My computer is now dependent on the "cloud" and it is nowhere close to heaven!

#89, A Capitol and a Book
Create or destroy?

#88, Goodness sakes!
Why are dogs man's best friend?

#87, Within and Between
What a year 2020 has been!

#86, Christmas in Faster, reprise
Can you separate past from present?

#85, Christmas in Faster
A Danish experience.

#84, Quandary
Diversity and Intersections are inescapable and desirable.

#83, What Does In Between Mean?
Check out: In the Eye of and Eagle, a free movie, https://www.amazon.com/dp/1733029133

#82, An Empty Page to Write On
A fluke becomes a podcast!

#81, All or Nothing
No half and half romance will do?

#80, Sacred Duty
How can we measure our divisions?

#79, Trust
A lifetime to create, an instant to lose!

#78, Try, Try, Try Again
Pease VOTE on Tuesday if you haven't already!

#77, Courage
The courage of non-violence.

#76, What Is Your Limit?
Life is a BIG puzzle, but we, like our ancestors, can take small pieces and add a bit to the picture.

#75, Stay-at-Home/Home-stay
Grateful to Zoom for taking me into so many homes!

#74, Transubstantiation
What is the connection between matter and mind? Does it matter?

#73, It's Your Choice!
Today is the first day of the rest of your life.

#72, Marvelous Arguments
Do you lean toward philosophers or scientists in the way you look at life? Can you have a leg in each? Ae you really able to do the "splits?"

#71, Comparing Two Books
O'Leary gains important insights from his four children!

#70, Are We Paarasites?
Ideas are difficult to put into words because they don't like to be put into straight-jackets!.

#69, Is Virtual Actually Real?
Step up and put the past underfoot to see further into the future!

#68, Are We Bipolar?
What about life between the poles?

#67, Loaves and Fishes
Answers Become Questions: a guide for living at the interface between the finite and the infinite
by Amazon.com
Learn more: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1733029168/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_a-FlFbVM4Q2D9

#66, Science and Religion
Much of this short podcast was lifted from my book ANSWERS BECOME QUESTIONS

#65 Truth Is Colorful!
Just four colors can be used to create an infinite number of colors! Colors illustrate what it means to live between finite four and infinity.

#64 On This Spot
A poem written by John Martin Ramsay after a year in Denmark, 1981-1982.

#63 We Are In This Together!
Is this coronal virus like a crown of thorns?

#62 Hmm!
Go to my Amazon author's page for my books, some are humorous!

# 61. Why? Because. Why? Because.
Two tales with no ending and then a surprise ending!

#60 Our Image of God

#59 Dilemma in Eden
A Fathers Day message in honor of my father!

#58 Has Human Nature Changed?
What will the world be like in 2050? I hope it will be up to today's youth!

#57 Orchestra Intraplay
What will the new normal be like???

#56 Stubborn
Language is like a squirrelly game!

#55 Pilgrim Thinking
My friend Roscoe Hill summarizes the insights of the most influential sages from BCE!

# 54 Stir Crazy
Can we employ the brightest unemployed minds to design a new normal?

#53 Escape from the Morgue
Words allow us to communicate, but only when the communication is lively!

#52 Day to Day
There is ample room for each to find pleasant spots in which to feel at home, and also unlimited space in which to expend our curiosity.

#51 From Theist to Atheist and Vice Versa
After yesterday's draft of this podcast Rev Allen Grothe, in his online sermon, supplied me with a couple of choice sentences which just had to be added to the points I tried to make. Click on this link to see Allen's entire service on youtube; the quotes start at 28:00
You can order my own book Answers Become Questions. You can also link to a book review I quoted from The Catholic World Report which claims that what “Nick Ripatrazone portrays in Longing for an Absent God: Faith and Doubt in Great American Fiction is sorely needed in these days of social distancing filled with concern that physical closeness could breed infection. The Catholic literary tradition, like its religious traditions, is deeply tactile…Its practices, both inside churches and in the daily lives of the faithful, surround us in the conviction that God is among us—here, now.”
But first, listen to the podcast!

#50 A Virtual Party
Looking back and looking ahead! This podcast invitees you to help me celebrate my 90th birthday. Click on this link to see my birthday present:

#49 The Price of Death
Covid 19 is a wakeup call!

#48, Nonagenarian
My life has spanned the Industrial Revolution, the Electronic Revolution, and now ? Covid 19!

#47 Words Are The Clothing In Which We Dress Our Thoughts
You, I and squirrels live somewhat above the finite world of computers but somewhat below the realm of the infinite!

#46. Making Sense Of It All!
How do we humans convert what our ears hear into thoughts? Can humans create machines which will be able to think? The answers we have found thus far at the edge of what we know leave us with more questions!

#45 Common Sense
What is common sense?

#44 You Want Answers?
Here, in this podcast, is the crux of the matter which my book Answers Become Questions examines in much more detail. The book itself (ISBN 9781733029162) can now be printed on demand from major booksellers or downloaded as an ebook (ISBN 9781733029179).

#43 Cool!
Hot and cold, polar opposites, David Brooks and Donald J. Trump dealt with in a 3 minute podcast between the poles of finite and infinite!

#42 Hot Air
My book, Answers Become Questions, is getting closer to publication!

#41 Love of Money
The Impeachment trial has dominated our attention this past week. What else has been going on in the world?

#40 Lady With a Drum
What is infinity? What does a googol have to do with Google?

#39 What's Going On Backstage?
Flying between the finite and the infinite is an adventure; it can be invigorating or debilitating, filled with potential or constrained. This podcast urges the reader to fly!

#38 Letting Go of the Rope!
Letting go of the rope requires great faith but allows one to fly.

#37 Chagrin!
Did you know that methane is 28 times more potent as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide?

#35 Your Input solicited
Help me with a green anthem for the youth of the world! Their movement needs an anthem as a call to action!

#34 Action Needed!
I am looking for a composer to write the music for my lyrics for "A Green Anthem for the Youth of the World!"

#33 A Letter to Teenagers
Advice from an old man.

#32 History and Mystery
Is there a good reason to study world history? How about my-story? Spend a year living abroad, somewhere with a history different from your own!

#31 Attitude!
Let's get down to practical illustrations of ways to live at the interface between the finite and the infinite! Robert's Rules of Order?

#30 On the Fence
Do we have something to crow about?

#29 Rummikub
Have you got the game of life all figured out?

#28 Make up my mind!
When is it appropriate to keep an open mind and when is it appropriate to vacillate, procrastinate, or make up your mind and be decisive?

#27 Happiness
What is happiness? Can it be measured? What do you think of the United Nations' report which ranks the countries of the world by how happy they are? Can you be happy when your situation is terrible?

#26 Questionable Theology?
An open mind applied to both science and religion.

#25 What would health mean if there were no sickness?
Making a case for Questionable Theology.

#24 A. I. versus H. S.
We use humor as the antidote to being upset!

#23 Government
Living in the world at the interface between the finite and the infinite is neither complete with a finite set of rules by which we can govern nor is the chaos of anarchy acceptable. Where does that leave us?

#22 Which One Are You?
We humans indeed hold a special place in the formation and development of the universe. But there are serious warning signs that we need to urgently change our exploitation of our earthly position if we intend to continue our life on earth. Think cosmically first and then adjust our earthly actions to match what is required of us to hold onto our position.

#21 Take a Yacht!
A solar powered yacht is one answer to airplanes.

#20 A Pot of Gold
Is a rainbow made up of different colors or are the colors just our perception of a rainbow?

#19 The Supreme Being
Do you believe in God?

#18 LGBTQQIP2SAA+
LGBTQQIP2SAA+...!!! Perhaps it all boils down to an important understanding that each individual is an individual never to be repeated. Perhaps, if we understand this, we humans will be more able to respect each other and work together in determining what the Almighty expects of us.

#17 It Makes a Huge Difference
At the interface between the finite and the infinite, human societies seem to polarize whether it be dividing North Korea and South Korea, choosing communism or democracy, and joining the Republican or Democrat Party in the United States. How does this polarization appear in the face of climate change?

#16 Oh Nuts!
Can a very simple concept be described in few words? In this podcast I try but quickly find that the few words are so deep that it is difficult to plumb the bottom, especially since there is no bottom to the Infinite! So, I chose to illustrate what it means to live at the interface between the finite and the infinite and used the question of gender to show how the concept of gender has changed over the years. Is gender a matter of genes? Is gender a choice? Are we asking the right questions? Can finite beings ever draw final conclusions? Other podcasts will deal with the implications of your answer to that last question!!!

#15 ME and WE
Hale Schroer, in his sermon yesterday at Samuel United Church of Christ in Clayton, Missouri, matched ME and WE with ID. That got me to thinking about "love thy neighbor as thyself," although that scripture was not the text for the sermon, "Christians and Made not Born." Living at the interface of the finite and the infinite begs for cultivated links and awareness between ME and WE. I end this podcast with a childhood song!

#14 This Very Moment
Now is the interface link between the past and the future!

#13 A Guy Dance
Listen to the entire podcast to decipher what is meant by "guy dance!"

#12 The Underbelly of Humans
#12 The Underbelly of Humans

#11 Do We Have a Choice?
This second podcast concerning climate change compares the situation faced by Harriet Tubman in her choice between liberty and death with the situation we face today between working together or death.

# 10 Jefferson and Climate Change
A message stimulated by considerations at the significance of Fourth of July.

#9 The Scientific Method
The Scientific Method is a powerful tool. But, like most other things living at the interface between the finite and the infinite, science can be misused. What use we make of science matters!

#8 The Truckers' Joke
People have bought into the revolution in electronic communication. Dr. Ramsay takes a look at one electronic joke hanging in the air in central Kentucky as truckers pass it from one to the other as they roll by. What are the implications for society?

#7 The Past is Gone?
Long hair started growing a long time ago, cell by cell, day by day. What can this tell us about how the past acts as a coiffed frame around our smiles or furrowed brows?

#6 Life is a Jigsaw Puzzle
#6 Life is a Jigsaw Puzzle. A message of diversity for Pentecost Sunday!

#5 So what!
Podcast #5 is about EDUCATION. N.F.S. Grundtvig understood that preparation for living at the interface between the finite and the infinite requires a different form of education—one in which there are no exams! The Scandinavian countries provide a case study of what a difference education can make in how we manage our lives.

#4 Bulging Biceps and Washboard Abs
In Episode #4, "Bulging Biceps and Washboard Abs," Dr. Ramsay states, "We need to use words and dictionaries as we fumble along through life. But, defining them is like pinning and mounting butterflies. Once mounted, life is gone and the butterfly no longer flies." Words are useful in the same way a cadaver is useful to a surgeon in learning how to enhance life!

#3 Don't Define it, Just Dance!
College students try to define what dance is and end up going beyond their assignment!

#2 Out of the Box!
This is the second of a series of podcasts about living at the interface between the finite and the infinite, This one tackles the problem of classifying people as either male or female.

#1 Between Black and White
Dr. Ramsay describes a 7th grade biology class considering what it means to classify people into black or white. He liked teaching 7th graders because they are wonderfully open minded and intelligent because they have not yet been brain washed by their adult world.