If only math worked like this.
A while back I made a post ( http://tetujin.livejournal.com/20737.html ) about a couple folks that sit out near one of the major walking nexus points around campus with a sign “Bible Questions Researched and Answered for Free”. I spoke to Dave, one of the people there today. The conversation began somewhat awkwardly since Dave had just finished speaking at the Atheist Student Organization meeting where he was being grilled for his beliefs and countering with various passages from scripture. So I began by saying “So, I've got some questions for you, but they're not going to be like the ones you were just answering” which may have just made things worse since I think he thought I was saying my questions were going to be more aggressive or something. My actual questions dealt with what attributes does the Bible actually state God has and to what extent he has them. Dave says there are four really important ones “Love, Justice, Power, and Wisdom” and he reaches over to one of his books on biblical questions, looks in the table of contents and says “Huh”. He picked up another book with some signs of increasing worry. While reaching for a third book he apologized “I'm really sorry. Here I was pretty sure I had quite an extensive knowledge of these sorts of things”. “It's OK, you're going to be able to find this way faster than I am” I reply. He is digging around through a literal bin of books, so heavy it was on a wheeled cart to get it out there, and finds what I believe is a sort of biblical index with major ideas listed. From here he's checks a few of them, coming up empty handed. After a while I get at least one passage for the four properties Dave, somewhat surprised still, says “I hope that helps..it's so weird I don't have any books on that. You know, I'll be here next week and I might have something for you then, OK?”.
I suppose I just think it's weird I gave a proficient Jehovah's Witness something to think about.