Crude Awakening

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Or-TyPACK-g

Great Essay

Just found an essay I love--it's on the Templeton Foundation's website, posted in a series of responses to the question, "Does science make belief in God obsolete?"  Steven Pinker's is spot-on, I think, and I'd like to hear anyone else's take.

100th Post

Hi, all:

Just back from Florida, and I come bearing technological good news.  I've discovered, as some of you may have already, Thunderbird, Mozilla's email client.  Why is it awesome?  Because I have all of my email accounts in one place now--for free.  This means my AU email, my .Mac email, and my two Yahoo email accounts are all in one place, so I don't need to spend a few minutes checking various webpages and programs.  Also, I have it set up to view this blog, so I know when new posts arrive.  If you're interested in doing all this for yourself, I'll be happy to walk you through it all (it took me a bit of time to track down the various how-tos around the web, but now I feel pretty comfortable with it all).

I'm looking forward to watching that vid from the post below and responding.

UPS deliver for Pandora?

David Brooks has an intersting op-ed in the NY Times about religion, brain-science, and the ways we perceive of ourselves and our place in the universe. His opinion is that science won't trump a belief in God, but will rather provide a strong challenge to the belief in the Bible as the word of God. Perhaps along somewhat similar lines, 'Lis sent a really great link to Bri with a short talk about a neurologist's enlightened Stroke of Insight. How does all of this relate? What do you guys think about all this?

Also, I've been wondering about the Christian "mystery of faith" as a means of explaning several"'why?'s" of the world. Admitedly and maybe a bit ironically, faith in Christianity has become a bit of a mystery for me. But I still cling to a spiritual notion of what I would call God (energy, the universe, something bigger than us, etc.) I can't explain why. It's just something I feel and think. I suppose that's the mystery of faith. But, why must the constant mystery that is the universe as I experience it include a God? Can't the mystery also be that God doesn't exist? After all, if God caused the Big Bang, what caused God? Can't the answer just be that its the mystery of existence without an answer? Very mysterious.

Hooding

Here's a photo from the hooding ceremony for the MFT program. The woman in the middle is my supervisor, Jamie. The man on the right is Kevin, one of my professors. The man and woman on the left need no introduction.


This photo needs a short explanation. Music has been an important part of my cohort's experience at Antioch. So, I rewrote the words from the Thompson Twins' song "Hold Me Now" to express my version of "our" experience and as a thank you to Antioch and to our fams and friends. The other folks standing with me are some of my fellow graduates: Simone, Christian, I, Betty Anne, and Bunny. It was good stuff, and Dad E. hopefully got it on video. If you're interested, here are the lyrics I made up...

I can remember -- way back, two years
Twenty-some strangers and Janie and Bateson and Bertalanffy
A systemic perspective -- How do you see the world?
Do you see pieces or do you see parts of a much larger whole?

Hood me now
Woah-oh! Master of Arts
M F T
Let homework stop -- Let income start

So many changes -- old faces and new
Full-time or part-time or one-time, you each deserve our gratitude
A word to the first-years -- Before we eject
Beyond all the models and theories, do not forget to just connect

Hood me now
Woah-oh! Master of Arts
M F T
Let homework stop -- Let income start

Hood me now
Woah-oh! Master of Arts
M F T (A licensed MFT)
Let homework stop -- Let income start

No more reflections -- No more critiques
One more Basic Skills Evaluation, and I think I'd have freaked
Does it sound like we're ready -- Did we want these hoods?
Well, let us be honest -- The question is 'Does a bear crap in the woods?' (Yes, it does! Yes, it does!)

Hood me now
Woah-oh! Master of Arts
M F T (A licensed MFT)
Let homework stop -- Let income start

Hood me now
Woah-oh! Master of Arts
M F T (A licensed MFT)
Let homework stop -- Let income start

Emilys 30th B'day

Good morning.

Kelly I know you got the evite already - but wanted to throw this nugget out there. We're having a birthday party for Emily's 30th on June 7 - and while those who read this blog live scattered throughout the continental US, just in case anyone will be in or around columbus on that date, you are more than welcome to come by.

It's not a surprise party (Emily knows when her birthday is).

And as if you needed another reason to come, I will be there, so that's pretty kick ass. And Kelly will be too, shaking that thang up, down, and BAD.

Should She Stay or Should She Go?

How do people feel about whether and how long Hillary should stay in the race?

GreenFears, Then and Now?

Much of the recent history I’ve become interested in lately deals with the rise of environmentalism in the 1960s and 1970s, and I’m fascinated by its broad similarities with today’s heightened discourse on environmental issues.

The late 1960s/early 1970s was rife with apocalyptic environmental sentiments, like Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring or Paul Erlich’s Population Bomb, that called for a drastic shift in our resource-exploitative and consumer-oriented American Way of Life. American globalization was (and still is) fueled by this consumption ethic, and a remarkably diverse collection of people and groups in the 60s/70s rose to speak about alternative paths and issue warnings about what was (and still is?) our trajectory if we maintained the consumerist path. The environmental concerns of those days intersected deeply with ecological scientists who railed against the misuse of chemicals, with anti-war activists who were bitter about American imperialism fighting wars on the other side of the world against an “evil” force that was diametrically opposed to American Way of Life, and it found support amongst a contingent of youths who challenged the dominant culture and created a diverse and often contradictory movement inclusively labeled “counterculture.” The oil shocks and energy crises of the 1970s only seemed to elevate the importance of environmental concerns with other, negative aspects of the American Way of Life.

Today’s news and commentary is once again filled with such similar themes that it makes me wonder if someone simply cut-and-paste discussions from those years into today’s world. I’m especially interested in discussions about how overpopulation, the role oil plays in lubricating the cogs of the modern world, and climate change are all interrelated. (Speaking of which, this 6-part documentary by ABC Science called The End of Oil is amazing.)

It all makes me wonder: are we talking about all this stuff all over again because history is cyclical or because they are relevant issues that won’t go away? If they are issues that won’t go away, then what explains why the dire predictions about overpopulation and climate change from 30-40 years ago were crushed by the an expanding American economy, increased abundance in food supplies, and an earth that still seems to be able to maintain another doubling in the world population? Any thoughts?