{"id":73,"date":"2007-07-01T19:44:10","date_gmt":"2007-07-01T19:44:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hammerport.com\/?p=73"},"modified":"2007-07-01T19:44:10","modified_gmt":"2007-07-01T19:44:10","slug":"the-identity-operator","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hammerport.com\/?p=73","title":{"rendered":"The Identity Operator"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\u2018Hmm, something is a-bothering me now, buzzin&#8217; around in my head like a hornet&#8217;s nest.\u2019 Earl stood up. \u2018So off you go and make, well, everything&#8230; but you tie your hands like you say, promising not to get involved. Things are set in motion because that&#8217;s all they needed, like, a gentle push.&#8217;<\/p>\n<p>He hesitated; he didn&#8217;t like to <em>challenge<\/em> God, but God seemed to be doing his best to actively encourage this sort of behaviour. \u2018And so, well, there ain&#8217;t no evidence of your existence. That rule you mentioned &#8211; Occam&#8217;s razor \u2013 it then says you don&#8217;t exist.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>God was unperturbed. \u2018Occam&#8217;s razor is a logical device, Earl. It means don&#8217;t assume any more than you have to. I don&#8217;t need to explain the choices of your life with an assumption that the number of cookies you&#8217;ve consumed since birth totals 732, but it&#8217;s true, nonetheless. Occam&#8217;s razor doesn&#8217;t dispute truth. It keeps things simple, melts things down to the bare necessities.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>\u2018Will you stop with the cookies?\u2019 Earl was tired of the cookie metaphor, but couldn\u2019t ignore the count. \u2018732 cookies? Are you sure? Can I demand a recount?\u2019 He pinched his side, checking for fat. There was plenty there.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018Fact and logic never disagree,\u2019 God replied, \u2018but sometimes they won&#8217;t see eye to eye. Anyway, you should ask yourself the real hard question, here, Earl. Why would I bother putting in obvious evidence of my existence <em>before<\/em> you good people have reached your peak? That, pardon my language, would pretty much screw things up.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>The hornets were in a frenzy. Earl was moments away from <em>the<\/em> question, the one that had been sizzling away like a barbecue steak ever since God had made his first appearance. &#8216;So you&#8217;re no believer of divine intervention?&#8217;<\/p>\n<p>\u2018Absolutely not. Intervention would be an almighty mistake. And the Almighty does not make mistakes. Did you ever see the end of <em>Quantum Leap?<\/em> Dean Stockwell was really good in that show like he always is. Spoiler alert, Earl. It was revealed that Sam was leaping around in time fixing God&#8217;s mistakes. Can you believe that? Holy son of moley, <em>I<\/em> make mistakes?\u2019<\/p>\n<p>\u2018Well, sir, pardon me for saying, but what we have right here in this shed is intervention.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>God pulled down his <em>NY Mets<\/em> cap, as if about to catch a little shuteye. \u2018You&#8217;re catching on fast, kid.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>The question came out, reckless and uninhibited. \u2018Why, sir, are you here talkin&#8217; to me?\u2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u2018Hmm, something is a-bothering me now, buzzin&#8217; around in my head like a hornet&#8217;s nest.\u2019 Earl stood up. \u2018So off you go and make, well, everything&#8230; but you tie your hands like you say, promising not to get involved. Things are set in motion because that&#8217;s all they needed, like, a gentle push.&#8217; He hesitated; [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hammerport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hammerport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hammerport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hammerport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hammerport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=73"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.hammerport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hammerport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=73"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hammerport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=73"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hammerport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=73"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}