Why Can't People be Computers?

The best thing about a computer is that it only does exactly what you teach it to do.  No more, no less.  To programmers, this can also be one of the biggest frustrations.  Sometimes I'll be up at 2 a.m. yelling at my computer, wishing it would do the correct thing instead of what I've programmed it to do.

Sometimes I wish that I were a computer programmed by God and that I always did the right thing.  Then I remember that I WAS created and programmed by God, but he didn't program me to always do the right thing...  So God must be evil right?  Wrong.  He created us in His image and allows us to make our own choices.

A lot of groups and organizations like the ACM try to teach us what choices to make.  They even encourage us to spread their doctrine and encourage others to make similar choices.  This can be a good thing, but God has already laid out His doctrine and we can learn about  it in the Book of Mormon and the Holy Bible.

If you are a Mormon programmer, start spreading what the Book of Mormon teaches like you spread your nerdy computer science beliefs.  If you aren't a Mormon programmer then read the Book of Mormon and contact the missionaries.  Then learn to code.

Be Here Now

When I was growing up, my brother-in-law would tell me to "be here now" whenever family was over and I was texting my friends.  I would grudgingly put my phone away and pretend to be bored with the family conversation.  I grew to love that time spent with family and I learned many valuable life lessons from those simple conversations.  My brother-in-law might have saved me from a lot of trouble with those three simple words "be here now."  Text conversations can be useful at times but a face to face conversations are always more meaningful and will always build better relationships.  The same holds for all other forms of virtual communication.  Living in such a technological world it is tempting to do all of our communication through virtual channels but if we succumb to this temptation, we will gravely regret it.