Religious Debate: A Surprising End?

For most of the 20th century, there was a trend to liberalism, toward science, away from colonialism and exploitation of people. And this trend was also hurting fundamentalist religions that denied science. It did appear that the steamroller of progressive thought was unstoppable, and so the various believers in cult-like end of the world scenarios were kind of ignored or joked about.

Suddenly it didn't seem so funny any more when the conservative fundamentalist Christians put together a political movement that ended up with one of their own as president of the United States. The liberals, and scientists were taken by surprise. Then on TV, the radio, and the Internet came an onslaught of well-funded Christian propaganda design to win over more converts and strengthen their cause further.

As this phenomenon developed, most liberals became alarmed at where it was going. This Christianity was a new breed of anti-liberal fundamentalist religion. The new conservative Christianity has a broad platform:

• Opposition to liberal political parties
• Opposition to science, specifically global warming research and evolution
• Opposition to the secular public school system
• Support for unregulated capitalism
• Belief in faith healing miracles and praying for monetary wealth
• Support for Israel's claim to Palestinian land, and opposition to the UN mandated boundaries
• Opposition to the UN as an ungodly organization
• Opposition to gun control
• Support for war and torture, including calls to bomb Iran, and a holy war against Muslims.

For a while it seemed like the conservative Christians had the momentum on their side, winning converts and debates against better educated intellectuals. But this situation was only temporary as many hundreds if not thousands of liberals began to organise their opposition. They started taking the time to understand the arguments of the conservative Christians. At first the conservative viewpoints seemed so contrary to common sense that it was not possible to have a real debate.

Gradually that has turned around, and now the Christians are on the ropes. Their strategy is better understood, and so are their weaknesses. But mainly, I think, a lot of scientists and liberals were disturbed enough by what they saw happening, that they made a huge effort do some research about fundamentalism and speak up.

The scientific evidence is pretty much overwhelming, for example, that species evolve into new species, and the world is over 6000 years old. But the religious extremists have produced mountains of "proof" that they are right and science is wrong. And with their political clout, they were beginning to undermine the liberal foundations of western civilization.

Both sides are diametrically opposed, and no common ground exists for rational debate except in one area. In the last few years, the debate has developed along these lines, which I will describe from my own point of view (though many others have argued the same way)

Liberals have found that they are pretty much in agreement with many of Jesus's teaching on loving your neighbour, and there is a goldmine of quotes in the Bible that are left-wing or at least liberal. I mentioned one in this blog back in March 2009.

I have had a field day with the Bible in that there are tons of anti-Republican, anti-war, anti-torture quotes in the Bible. Obviously I was not the only one having fun with this, as I noticed Christian fundamentalists were getting on television to counter these quotes, usually starting off with "Atheists and liberals love to misquote Jesus, especially .... (insert any liberal/Marxist quote from Jesus here)..... But actually.. chose one.. (a) Jesus did not mean this to apply to his chosen people (b) Jesus later contradicted this with .... (insert another pro-Bush quote)... (c)The actual meaning of peace/war/torture/riches/ etc. was ... Insert a rich Capitalist phrase here....

I was kind of pleasantly surprised at this defense tactic from the Evangelicals, because it left an easy response: "You are the ones who say you believe in every word of the Bible is the word of God, so if this quote by Jesus is not correct, then please remove the phrase from the Bible. Otherwise, it's still in there in black and white, and everybody who can read should be able to do it on their own without a Republican party translator looking over their shoulder."

I never expected the fundamentalists would take the liberals up on this offer, because it was mostly a rhetorical point. But the Conservapedia people are trying to do exactly that: write a new Bible for the Pro-war pro-Republican Jesus.

Who could have ever guessed they were so easy to bait? That religion must have their backs to the wall if this is being seriously considered.

http://spectator.org/archives/2009/10/08/is-your-bible-too-liberal

Picture shows prominent anti-fundamentalist Richard Dawkins, with last summer's bus advertising campaign by atheists.

Making Sense of Canada: Alberta Has No Rats

At a recent motorcycle camp out, I was given a book called "A Nation of Serfs", by Mark Milke which I have since read through in my typical way. I start at the end, then work my way back, skipping sections that don't seem too interesting until I arrive at the foreword. You may think that is not a good way to read a book, and you may be right. Now I'm going to write about this book, which I probably do not really understand. That is why I nearly failed literature 101.

The first thing I notice about the book is that this nation of "serfs" is Canada. Then there is an alternate title, "How Canada's political culture corrupts Canadian values." So even before I open the cover, I feel kind of defensive. Who would write such nasty stuff about Canada? I wonder, and checking the back I find that the author is from Alberta, so it makes a bit more sense. Then, since I am still at the camp out I ask the donor where he got this book, and he replied that he bought it for $0.50 at a bargain bin, just to see what the "enemy" was up to.

Just as some background for those who may not understand, Alberta has become Canada's centre of conservatism. Our Conservative Prime Minister is from Alberta, and his main political, financial, and popular support is in Alberta. Alberta is also Canada's oil province, meaning it is rich, and has been for about the 50 years since oil has become big business. In Canada we call that a "Have" province as opposed to some others that are "Have not". Hopefully that terminology is not too confusing, because Canadians like to talk that way.

In Canada we take some money from "Have" provinces and give it to "Have not" provinces. So in the eighties, there was the beginning of a separatist movement in Alberta, when they discovered that some of the money from the oil would be taken to shore up the Have not provinces budgets. Apparently the Albertan separatist mentality has died down, especially as Albertans remain the richest people in Canada.

In my opinion, Albertans also are the people in Canada most like Texans in the USA, which is understandable since most of the oil companies have headquarters in Texas. Albertans were the people in Canada who liked George W. Bush the most (or should I say disliked him least). Albertans supported the Iraq war the most, and wanted to send Canadian soldiers on combat rather than peacekeeping missions. If our Albertan Prime Minister had his way, we would have been heavily involved in combat in Iraq as well as Afghanistan. But he only has a minority government, so he his power is severely limited.

That should be enough background to put the title of the book into perspective. I can figure out now that it is the left-leaning liberals in the east of Canada who are the serfs. And that the values which have been corrupted are probably the conservative family values of Alberta. Although the cover does say "corrupts Canadian values", I will just mentally substitute "corrupts Alberta values".

As I flip through the book I see a lot of it is complaining about taxes, and about redistribution of wealth. One chapter explains why Enron (a big Texas energy/oil company that went bankrupt due to corruption) is not as corrupt as the Canadian federal government (referring to a particular scandal called Adscam)

A particularly interesting chapter examines why the people of Eastern Canada love big government so much, and hate America. I like this chapter because it goes into the history of the American War of Independence, and how the original Ontario settlers were actually Americans driven out of their homes and country for loyalty to the British government. Mark simply reminds us that they developed a survivalist garrison mentality as a result of their ill treatment, that survives to this day. And this garrison mentality results in them supporting an inept federal government, and opposing Americanism.

So that's my comment on this book. It probably has not sold well in Ontario, judging from the 50 cent price. Even though it was only printed in 2006, it is already looking out of date now that capitalism and the free enterprise system have collapsed, and that Obama is the new US president.

I did a lookup of Alberta in Wikipedia because I have not visited Alberta recently. I do have a nephew living there though, and coincidentally he is in the military. So in my research I turned up the interesting fact that Alberta has no rats! We have a lot in Ontario though.

Motorcycling: Riding in Cold Weather

Riding a motorcycle in cold weather is possible. So I'm going to go through it for anyone who wants to know.

There are many cold days when the roads are clear and dry, pick one of those days if you feel the need to ride in cold weather. And only go out when it's daylight, you don't need two problems at the same time. Don't go on snow and ice at all, it is not safe enough with a two wheeled vehicle, even with studded winter tires.

If you just go for a short ride, say a half hour, you don't need anything special, just dress nice and warm, for example a full snowmobile suit, and hope for the best. But watch out for fogging of the faceshield (yes, you need a faceshield, unfortunately). Flip it up a notch when you stop at a traffic light, because in still air it fogs up the most. If you're careful you can get by without a heated faceshield or a snowmobile helmet, because you should not wear those on the road. Apparently it's better to be blinded and hit something with a street helmet than to see where you're going with a snowmobile helmet, I don't pretend to understand Ministry of Transport rules.

It's only when you take a longer trip that things get complicated. Because you will occasionally need to stop for gas, pee breaks, food etc. At these breaks you need clothing that does not get in the way too much. Also, when you are out longer, your core body temperature will drop, which can cause hypothermia (in simple English, death). On a motorcycle, death comes quicker because of (A) wind chill (B) brain freezes up causing lack of judgment leading to an accident.

To combat hypothermia without making the clothing too cumbersome, you need a varied approach. Yes, there are other things you can do to stay warm besides clothing. Car drivers do it all the time. First, block the wind with your vehicle, you can add a windshield and leg or feet guards. Also, it is possible to mount temporary handlebar muffs that actually allow you remove your hands from the controls and put them back on while moving. These muffs block the air on your hands.

The second tactic car drivers use is turning on the heater. With a motorcycle, you can get heated grips, a heated seat, and a heated vest. (gloves, socks, pants, helmet, too, but I'm going to explain why not). I actually find the most effective is the heated vest, and that's the only one you really need. If you have too many electrical things, you will get too hot, and run down the battery. Also it's a good idea not put all the anti-cold eggs in one basket. Diversification is best. Then when you blow out the wire to the vest, you won't freeze immediately. (I have done that three times so far, all far from home on different trips.) The vest is surprisingly good, because it counteracts the one place exposed to cold air that you cannot cover with clothing. It is the inside of your lungs. And if you have a source of heat, in addition to clothing, you can go indefinitely in reasonable cold without hypothermia.

So balance everything out. Some electric heat, quality cold weather clothing, and motorcycle accessories to block the air.

Then you need to practice a bit and find out how it works in the cold, and where the drafty parts are. Be sure to be aware of the real air temperature every time you go out, and just forget about "wind chill" readings, they mean nothing on a motorcycle. Upgrade any equipment found wanting. Don't strike out for Florida before you are sure everything works.

Maybe you would be satisfied just reading about riding a motorcycle in the cold, if so here is the most extreme story I have ever read. It starts out bad and gets worse as Paul Mondor gets into Labrador in the middle of winter.

Or maybe you want to skip over the motorcycle ride across Canada in winter, and just jump to the start of the road to Labrador here.

Bringing Religion and Science Back Together

Steven Colbert is a comedian who pretends to be a right wing talk show host on the Comedy Network. Richard Dawkins is a real scientist who wrote "The God Delusion" and more recently, a book supporting evolution for the masses "The Greatest Show on Earth".

Once again, in this interview, Steven destroyed Richard Dawkin's logic. Although Richard did make one very interesting point, that no matter where in the universe life evolves, it would have to evolve using the same principles of evolution as it did on Earth, such as natural selection. I never heard that idea expressed before, and I would like to know more about it. Questions that spring to mind are: would life on another planet always involve the reproduction and death cycle? Or could one creature accidentally be formed first and then continuously change, grow, improve, and live more or less forever? Anyway that's just a sidetrack.

This is how Steven Colbert destroyed Dawkins. With the simple question "If we have evolved millions of years to be beautiful and to pass on our genes, how come there are still ugly people?" Dawkins was floored, you can watch the episode here

I think I might be able to help out Richard Dawkins, as I have come across this idea before, that the existence of beauty proves God exists. The logic goes like this: because beauty exists, therefore God exists. The fundamentalists take it a little further, and explain human existence this way: God created Adam and Adam was beautiful, therefore he must have been a white skinned European because all those other people (and especially the Neanderthals) were afflicted with major uglies.

I have often argued in the past that there is no proof of what Adam looked like, if he did exist, as there are no photos in the Bible. Creationists counter that he must have been very beautiful, because God created him. And I argue back: but were there not certain parts of his body that maybe weren't so beautiful, and need to be hidden from sight, therefore proving that God could not have created him? Not so, say the creationists, those ugly parts are only ugly because Man has sinned in the eyes of the Lord, thereby bringing us into a state where we are unable to judge the true beauty of the Lord's work, therefore we simply cover up those parts with a Speedo or possibly Fruit of the Looms.

Obviously, once again we have entered the twilight zone of reason, and so I usually stop after Fruit of the Loom, and before things get out of hand. But just last week, scientists revealed the latest "Missing Link" a fossil which might be a human ancestor, "Ardi", 4.4 million years old. The surprise was that she was so human-like, although she would never be mistaken for a prom queen. That can be an indication that we have actually evolved from a human Eve-like figure, and not a monkey at all, and proving that parts of the Bible are correct. It turns out the monkey evolved from Man, and not the other way round.

Picture "Adam and Ardi Smoking Pot", I took the pot smoking pic off the Internet and added the chimp head to Eve with photoshop. My contribution to the advancement of understanding between scientists and religious extremists. Alternate title for the picture "Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder"

Propaganda: Poetry Appreciation 101

In combating propaganda, there are several traps you could fall into. The first trap is thinking that there is an easy way to sort out truth vs. propaganda. You will never figure out whether you are a brainwashed zombie or not by watching a three minute youtube video.

The second trap is thinking that a good education will protect you from being brainwashed by propaganda. If you think you are immune to propaganda just because you have travelled the world with a PhD in Current Affairs or whatever, you are almost surely mistaken.

So what is the answer? We need to spend a lot of time learning from what is going on and absorbing different sources of information. We also need to keep open minds and ask ourselves how this would look if we put ourselves in the other person's shoes. For example, if we are told Iran should be bombed because they may be making an atomic weapon, we must turn it around and ask ourselves if we would like Iran to bomb Canada because we tried to acquire a nuclear weapon. That's just an example.

The way propaganda works is first to make the world very difficult to understand, and the resulting confusion pushes people to want simple solutions. So the propaganda, of course provides those simple solutions.

Poetry Appreciation as it Relates to Propaganda

I am going to try to link some old literature to the theme of propaganda, just to show we can still learn from it. This literature was actually written before propaganda existed, but the best literature is that which continues to be relevant though times may change.

Lewis Carroll wrote "Alice in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking Glass" in the late 1800's. He wrote about a world of nonsense, which just happens to be what a world filled with propaganda feels like. It also happens to be what it feels like on mind altering drugs in the sixties, but I won't go into that right now.

In these two novels, a little girl named Alice enters a world where none of the assumptions she grew up with apply any more. She meets characters, trying to "explain" her the ways of their world. She is polite, and often confused, but sincerely tries to understand each person or animal she comes in contact with.

Carroll was ostensibly writing for children, and apparently children and stoned people do find his work entertaining, but it is possible to take a deeper meaning. The first, I would say is to learn what it is like to be confronted with propaganda, which typically tries to convince you that your previous world view was wrong, and this new one makes so much more sense, even though it turns upside down and backwards anything you knew before. You know, things like "Jesus approves of war", "Bears don't sh*t in the woods", and "The Pope is a Mennonite".

I want to interpret here a poem by Lewis Carroll that was read to Alice by the famous character Tweedledee. Who was the twin of Tweedledum, but a lot of people these days have forgotten his name and refer to the twins as Tweedledum and Tweedledumber. The poem was "The Walrus and the Carpenter", the most famous verse comes in the middle of the poem:

"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes--and ships--and sealing-wax--
Of cabbages--and kings--
And why the sea is boiling hot--
And whether pigs have wings."

This poem by Lewis Carrol is not so much about walruses as it is about oysters. The young, foolish oysters who go for a walk with the walrus thinking that they would learn much, but actually the walrus wanted to eat them for lunch. (spoiler alert!)

When I read the poem, I laughed because it is funny. But then I'm almost ready to cry for the poor little oysters. I wouldn't feel so bad for the oysters if they were just unthinking creatures to be gathered up and tossed in the soup. But these poor little things can talk and think! They are hungry for intellectual stimulation, with questions such as "why is the sea boiling hot" and "Do pigs have wings". But that is only because the Walrus has put these questions in their little heads, really the bigger question the oysters should be asking themselves is "Why is the walrus taking us for a walk on the beach?"

Such is the danger of a little intelligence. The oysters are just intelligent enough to help the walrus (possibly symbolizing capitalism) eat them for dinner. If they were any dumber, the walrus would have to do the work himself of carrying the oysters home and throwing them in the pot. If they were any smarter, they would question the motives of the walrus in beseeching them to go with him for "A pleasant walk, a pleasant talk, along the briny beach"

This poem has the lesson that the greatest danger of having some intelligence and curiosity about the world, is in being tricked into working for our own demise.

The entire text of "Through the Looking Glass" can be found online here:

The picture is Grace Slick, of Jefferson Airplane, singing "White Rabbit" in the sixties. My favourite line that she wrote was "When the Truth is found.. To be lies", too bad it was not in this song.

Taking Stock of Zombies and Progress

Not only do I have over 200 blogs now, but this is the 40th anniversary of me leaving school and going to Africa. So it is an appropriate time for another re-evaluation of human progress. I might also mention that I went to Michael Moore's new movie "Capitalism: A Love Story" last night, and I liked it as much as "Fahrenheit 9/11" and "Canadian Bacon". And I had to fight may way through all the zombies in the lobby of the multiplex to get to it, but thankfully all the kids were going to "Zombieland" instead. Or maybe they should have been going to "Capitalism", but read this blog and then judge for yourself.

Just before I left for Africa I went on a 5 week orientation program in London Ontario, the first place I ever went where the weather was so hot you could not use a blanket while sleeping at night. We never had air conditioners in my home town of Baie Comeau, but maybe they do now, and maybe with global warming, they might even need them.

While in London that summer, I went to a movie called "2001: A Space Odyssey" with some other CUSO volunteers. The movie was oddly fitting, because the entire idea of CUSO was the development of third world countries, which I think at the time the politically correct term was "Developing" countries. Development and progress meant about the same thing. Development meaning more technology and science, more industry, more health care and education. In layman's terms, everybody gets a house with a TV and a car and enough packaged food to eat, then a clean hospital when you have your first heart attack from eating the packaged food.

From watching the movie "2001", it was obvious that in the future we would be flying to the moon regularly, as part of global development. And we expected that Africa would one day (maybe by 2001) also develop to a point where they had universal education, industries with jobs, roads everywhere, hospitals, schools, telephones, cars, and TV's. In that hope, I think we were disappointed. Africa today is in most ways worse off than in 1969. Not only is the wildlife endangered, but people are starving, wars are raging along with potential for holocausts such as Rwanda, and diseases such as the AIDS epidemic are killing millions. So that didn't actually turn out so well.

What about here at home? It seems that we have not really done too badly, but we are obviously nowhere near where we thought we would be by 2001. So was it all silly dream?

To help explain our progressive thinking, I will go back to my own childhood and put development in perspective. When I was born, Baie Comeau did not have a road to the outside world, not that I cared, as my pedal powered car could not reach the outskirts of town anyway. But everybody (not just the super-rich) had a hope for the future, mainly that the road from Quebec City would one day reach our little community, and we could be part of North America, and just drive wherever we wanted, especially Florida. We knew the road was coming. Every year, the road construction got closer. And every year, people in Baie Comeau bought newer and better cars in anticipation. We knew the cars were better because each year the tail fins were higher. In fact the only doubt that the road would ever be completed was because some people thought the cars would start flying first, and as soon as that happened we wouldn't even need roads. Those people were wrong, obviously. Today (is it 2009 already?) cars are still firmly planted on their rubber, the closest they come to flying is the SUV's flipping over. Just to show how we have given up on the hope for controlled automotive flight, there are no tail fins any more. The road reached Baie Comeau when I was in my early teens, just when I started taking an interest in gasoline powered cars. Now the road extends another 598 kilometers past Baie Comeau. Although it is still a dead end, one day it may be extended to Newfoundland and become a new Trans-Canada Highway.

What about progress in the rest of the world? Well, obviously in America, we are losing almost all our manufacturing jobs. While this helps China, in the long run it means a profoundly different Canada and United States. What about health care and education? Canada has a system of Health Care, the USA is still working on it.

What about education? If 25% of high school students in Oklahoma can't answer George Washington was the first president of the USA, I guess I don't need to say much more. But I will, of course since it's one of my favourite topics. When I was younger I thought superstition and black magic would gradually give way to reason and science, but just look at the Evangelical Christian movement in the USA and now spreading to other parts of the world. They don't believe in evolution, they teach that the end of the world is coming, and they believe in faith healing, they believe in praying for prosperity. It sounds like the Cargo Cult in Polynesia, but they are not some isolated cult that can be easily joked about: they have their own universities, and their own political party ran the USA for eight years, 2000 to 2008, causing untold harm to science and human rights. I use the term "Christian" in a loose sense, as they worship the pro-war Jesus, contrary to the historical perceptions of Christianity.

What about civil right and racism? I think we can put that down as a close win, with Barack Obama as the first black president of the USA, and South Africa's Apartheid dismantled. Not to mention the fall of the Soviet Union and the transformation of China into an economic power (although we can't tell if it's communist or capitalist, but we know for sure it's not democratic). But on the down side, Israel has adopted racist policies, and the USA has become the first democratic country to ever engage in an illegal war. So that's disappointing.

Scientific progress is the one real bright spot in all of this. We never even guessed that our kind of computers or the Internet could exist back in 1955. And scientific knowledge is expanding exponentially. This week alone we have had announcements of the oldest ever human fossil (Ardi) and the first discovery of a planet like Earth.

We always knew in our hearts that science would advance with time. It has always taken the lead in progress and development. Where we went wrong was thinking scientific knowledge always leads to progress in other ways. There are far greater forces shaping our future than scientific knowledge, and it's time we found out what they are before we all end up back in the dark ages burning witches and running around with pitchforks chasing zombies.

Motorcycling: The Sport-Touring Bike

There is actually no precisely defined Sport-Touring bike, it is more of a general concept that has evolved over the years. The definition is open to debate, and I have at times discussed the meaning of a sport touring bike with other riders. These are my own ideas because I don't want to leave it up to marketing people to tell me what a sport touring bike is. As you will see later, they can be wrong.

Before I got my Kawasaki Vulcan, which is a Cruiser type of bike, I had ridden sport-touring bikes for about 25 years. I think it is generally accepted that the Sport-Touring bike was invented by BMW in 1977 with the R100RS. And it's also obvious to me ever since, that despite one major misstep, BMW has maintained the lead in defining this type of bike, just as Harley Davidson has maintained the lead in defining the Cruiser bike. The key feature of a sport touring bike was a frame mounted fairing that provided good weather protection for the rider, luggage space and a big gas tank. In those days, you were expected to buy a basic bike then add accessories like a windshield and saddlebags yourself. BMW helped start the concept of fully equipped motorcycles sold off the dealer's floor.

The Sport Touring bike as originally defined by the R100RS was a new type of motorcycle. Powerful reliable engine and drive train. Weather protection from a fame mounted fairing is essential. A handlebar windshield is not good enough because it does not provide enough protection and it destabilises the bike at high speed. The Sport-Touring bike needs a comfortable upright seating position, with smooth ride and not too much vibration from the engine. Long distances between maintenance intervals, and a long range gas tank of at least 250 km, preferably 350. Some hard lockable saddlebags are usually included. The weight needs to be under 650 pounds, which I consider the upper limit for sport-touring, while pure touring bikes are now up to 900 lbs. Being a middleweight remains one of the characteristics of sport touring bikes today. This bike's main purpose seemed to be high speed long distance travel, combined with an ability to be fast through mountain curves. The reason Germany would likely be first to invent this type of bike is the unlimited speed autobahns. And second, the traffic goes fast through the twisty roads in the Alpine passes, and a German bike needs to be able to keep up in the curves. By contrast, in North America, you are slowed down by speed limits and radar traps on the straight open freeways, and the car drivers are actually even slower than bikes on the twisty roads, so there is not as much need for a fast bike. This alone explains why Cruisers are more popular than Sport-Touring bikes in North America.

In the days of the R100RS, air cooling was normal on bikes. Unfortunately, air cooling is not the best for a high horsepower motorcycle because it will overheat. Although the BMW was air cooled, both cylinders were out in the airstream, which meant that the engine temperature could stabilize at high speeds, like an airplane. So they could travel at 80 mph all day long. Very few other air cooled bikes could do this. Even today, I doubt if a Harley Davidson (still with the same basic design as 1977) could do it.

Back in the mid-eighties, I might have wanted this type of bike, but I couldn't afford it. So I bought a frame mounted fairing for my 1982 Honda GL500, then added leg shields, and Krauser saddlebags (like the BMW at the time). This bike had water cooling, so it probably could travel all day at 80 mph, even though it was approaching top speed. And it had another BMW feature, shaft drive, to eliminate the messy chain which got rusty whenever you drove in rain.

The resulting bike was maybe not "sport touring" in the sense of high horsepower, but it was in every other way. With it, my motorcycling needs progressed. One is that I needed a bike that could go in cold or rain. A touring rider cannot always pick a day with perfect weather. To that end, the fairing helped a lot, and leg shields kept the splashing water off my feet, and my feet stayed warm. Also, when it's raining is not when you want to be lubing and tightening the chain, so shaft drive seemed to be worth while.

A few years later, I bought a Honda CBX, which I think was the first non-BMW Sport Touring bike on the market. Although it was air cooled, it could maintain very high speeds because of its six cylinder design. And even though it had no shaft, it was using one of the early o-ring chains, which seemed almost impervious to rain. The only problem was the very uncomfortable seat, and I suppose I could have fixed that with an aftermarket seat, but never did.

My longest run with the CBX was a high speed 9-day trip from Kitchener to Redondo Beach California, coincidentally the pier at the end of the Cannonball Run. The 9 days included the trip back, we didn't stay very long in Los Angeles. Many of the days were 900 plus kilometers, and some days we spent the whole day on twisty roads in Arizona and California. We started the trip in mid-April, with the snow plows out on the 401. We ran into rain and hot weather too. And that was the trip that confirmed my liking of the sport touring type bike.

I knew after that trip, that I did not want a bike heavier than the 650 pound CBX. And it was just as obvious that I did not have any use for speeds greater than the CBX either. So from then on I knew I didn't need a heavy touring bike, and I would have no use for a lightweight high speed pure sport bike either.

By 1992, BMW had radically improved their flagship sport touring bike. It was now up to about 600 pounds, it was four cylinders and water cooled. The power was up to about 90 horsepower, similar to the CBX. It still had shaft drive, but now also anti-lock brakes, a stereo, a trunk, a passenger backrest, a comfortable seat, and most amazingly, an electrically adjustable windscreen. The price had also gone up, but I happened to have the money then, and traded in my CBX for one. Actually BMW marketing people incorrectly classified my bike (The K1100LT) as a pure touring bike, and also sold another slightly more sporty model. But I chose the 1992 K1100LT as my sport-touring bike because it was still under 650 pounds, more comfortable, and had the electric windshield. By the way, that electric windshield has since become another defining characteristic of the Sport-Touring bike. BMW's "official" sport touring bike, the 1992 K1100RS had no electric windshield. Obviously the marketing people misunderstood the Sport-Touring riders, but all the Japanese sport-touring bikes adopted the electric windshields, and now so has BMW for their definition of sport-touring.

A sport-touring bike is not really a compromise between a heavy slow touring bike and a light uncomfortable sport bike. In spite of the hyphenated name, it is very much a single function machine. The function is to go from here to California and back in April in 9 days, and be able to enjoy the scenic roads on the way.

The BMW allowed me to travel all over Canada and the USA, and even down the Baja Peninsula in Mexico (picture). But when I traded it in, I didn't replace it with another sport-touring bike. For one thing, I didn't feel as much need for the high speed long distance runs any more. Mary Ann had her Burgman scooter, which could never keep up to a Sport-Touring motorcycle. And my limiting factor on long rides was a backache, which could only be solved by a backrest. Sport touring bikes are not an ideal platform for a rider backrest, which partly explains why I went to a cruising type bike.