Science Mondays---- trusting one's data

Last Monday I wrote about using NASA's cosmic times curriculum for 1919. This morning I finsihed 1919 then took a side route away from what is next... 1929. Reading up on Red Shift made it clear to me that I better teach a unit on electromagnetic radiation (light) before moving on to Hubble's findings.

Today we discussed Maxwell, who came up with equations to study how magnetism and electricity can induce each other (think coal, nuclear, hydro energy spinning huge magnets surrounded by copper wires fueling our life style).

Anyway, Maxwell's equations (see photo above) found that when one of the fields induces the other, then waves traveling at the speed of light would be created. It took him a moment or two or three before he realized that he had redefined light as electromagnetic radiation.

Last Friday in class, we spoke of Einstein and how he did not trust his data and that later he called it his greatest blunder... which led to a discussion of what we consider our greatest blunder will likely change as we get older unless we do a great blunder early on in our years.

Anyway, when Einstein plugged numbers in his Theory of General Relativity it told him the universe was far from static. But he could not wrap his mind about a universe that was growing or shrinking, so he did what any good scientist would do... add a constant to keep reality and the equation balanced. By 1929 Hubble will provide evidence for an expanding universe, but Einstein will still have some doubts. Guess he wasn't quite up to facing that blunder yet.

How are your self doubts doing these days? Beginning of school years can always make me wonder if I am capable of getting all required tasks completed ... I get to what has to be gotten and go from there.


and so much depends upon Henrietta Leavitt...

Doubt-- being of two minds

last night...

I wrote a post which I can't quite get myself to publish, maybe later.

I turned on fans, opened windows, put on my mask, and cranked up a pre-jazz era CD. I hate soldering, but maybe one day I will get better at it. for now I have to hope that my designs and my color choices will impress folk.

I took it to the bathroom sink to wash off the flux. In my studio, I held it up to the light, and I struggled to see it. It was dark outside so I couldn't hang it in a window and back up. It was inspired by a friend's grief. And until that moment it was just an idea. It is the light that brings it to life.

as I struggled to see it as a whole, this song came on.... Mary by Patty Griffin

I came down to fit some prayer time in before Mosaic Woman got home, and skipped my opening ways. The Jesuits taught me that one should start prayer by saying hi to God. So I breathe, In and Out.... Here..... I am.

I skipped to writing down blessings and it started dark... Thanks for the challenging job, turned to the sweet peppers brought in for dinner, then I wrote... "Do I want my job? what went wrong today?"

I look back now and just see it as being tired. so so many emotional fires to put out for one stoic guy to handle.

I am a man of doubt. Every Sunday I sit in church and wonder how I can believe such stuff, then it passes. A hymn touches my heart. The Eucharist touches my soul. Most days at work I wonder if I will last long at my job, then it passes as I have fun with a class. Today I ran into an amazingly bright student, who just can't get his thoughts on paper, as he gathered to go to his off campus apartment. I told him he was running out of time to prove to me he was as bright was we both thought he was. I told him I would be in my room. He showed up after making a deal with his residential staff. He knew his stuff as I asked him questions. We brainstormed ways to get him to college. Like I said he is bright and he could list several things holding him back. When I told him to head back. He rose and put out his hand to me. He frustrates me greatly at times, but I will go back tomorrow, and at some point ask the Lord, who I don't always believe in, to help me through. I will remember that hand. That gesture.

strains credulity

The Bible should be shocking. The charge given by Jesus that ends Matthew should make my head spin. A man who was dead is alive and setting up meetings. There have always been those of two minds... the doubters. Jesus claims the authority of God, thus revealing his true nature. And those 11 folk who showed up to worship and/or doubt, led to the Reverend John Touchberry becoming a disciple, and thus turning me into a disciple.

We are a varied group that meet on Mondays to speak about our journey.... what is the punch line to this joke... 3 ex-catholics, 2 life time Episcopalians, a protestant mutt, and an ex- Lutheran meet to discuss how they were made into Christians...

I remember a few things from my youth at church (keep in mind I do not have one memory of elementary school).... I loved the end of the worship service. As we stood after having sung the last hymn, the organist would play through one more time. In the silence of the music I would make up lyrics in my head. I remember thinking about becoming a minister, but by the time I was to be confirmed, I was going through the motions. It was a fake confirmation. I was on my way out of church, away from belief, beyond doubts. 20 years or so pass.

Then a few weeks after moving to Lansdale we walked into a UCC church, and the man mentioned above caught my spirit on fire. Who would think that a ex-Southern Baptist minister would do that to the likes of me? It wasn't what I expected. I don't know what I expected.

What those early years as a Lutheran did was to "make" a Christian out of me. It seems right to me that God loves all humans and sees no perfect path to take on a journey. If born to folk of another faith, I would not have been made a Christian. I still may have been made a Christian later in life.

Today in Biology class I started with all of life and kept drawing branches till humans were standing alone on the evolutionary tree. I try to imagine a tree going back in time from those disciples who made a Christian out of me--- my parents, ministers, friends, authors strangers. It is as mind blowing as the tree that would take humans back to the bacteria we are most related to on that tree of life. In the case of my disciples they would take many a different journey, but it would lead to one of those 11 who were charged by Jesus, then to Jesus.

Today in geology I wrote "strains credulity" on the board. We had just finished speaking about the first 0.0000000000000000000000000000000000000000001 of a second of the universe. densities and temperatures beyond imagination, unification of matter and energy, expansion rates beyond compare.

Even one who believes too easily would have doubts.