This ad for Gil Fulbright for Senate is very funny and poignant. I’ve been having my students write about how to achieve utopian aims for the final papers in my First Year Seminar course. One student mentioned making politicians more honest, and I immediately thought that that was unrealistic. But the truth is, we could have consequences for dishonesty. What if there were a rule that a politician who is shown to have misrepresented things becomes ineligible for reelection? We can... Read more
This tutorial comes to you courtesy of PhD Comics. If you are not sure why it is funny, don't ask…it's in the syllabus. Read more
The quote is from Zack Hunt’s blog post, “Why Proof-Texting Is Not Like Other Sins.” It was hard to choose an excerpt to feature in the image. The whole thing is wonderful, powerful stuff, that deserves to be widely read. And so below it is quoted in its entirety, in the hope that it will lead more regular readers here to subscribe to or otherwise regularly read Hunt’s blog: There’s a post you might have seen that has unfortunately been popping... Read more
Since it is the end of the semester, and exams are in the minds of many, it seems appropriate to return to a topic I put on hold. Rutgers University made the news when the New York Times published an article about software that was used in online courses to prevent cheating. Students are of course already trying to find ways to hack, bypass, and otherwise deceive the distance proctoring software, which is called Proctortrack. The Wabash Center featured an article a few... Read more
I had toyed with some reworked versions of 80s songs for use in church before – “Hosanna” to the tune of Rosanna by Toto, and “Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone)” to the tune of Open Arms by Journey. My pastor left a comment on my wall on Facebook, suggesting that we do a whole service, perhaps calling the genre “Grace Rock.” Here are some other songs I suggested might be included. A few I am serious about – can you... Read more
The episode begins with Jacob’s visit to Ilana in the hospital. The continuation shows Jacob asking her to protect the six remaining candidates. She asks what she should do after bringing them to the temple, what she should do next, and he tells her to ask Ricardus. On the island, Richard says that he has no idea what they should do next. He says they are all dead and in hell. He says maybe it is time to stop listening... Read more
Not a good planet for humanity’s overall survival. But perhaps a good place for a university? Or better yet, what if you get to enroll in a university on this planet, but do your research on Earth or in space, so that you can earn a PhD in an hour or less, local relative time? Read more
The picture above was taken by Ryan Bonfiglio and came to my attention via Ancient Near Eastern Studies at Fuller on Facebook. But what does it mean? Does the “A” stand for Asherah, in which case this tree service is caring for trees in the name of Mrs. A. Yahweh who was often represented by a tree herself? Or is this a company that cuts down Asherah trees in Yahweh’s name? Or something out? Read more
I thought I would wish everyone a happy Earth Day. The music in the video above is by Mike Oldfield, whose album The Songs of Distant Earth is taken from a novel by Arthur C. Clarke. Science fiction plays a particularly useful role in getting us to think about the environment, as it makes us imagine futures in which we ruin our Earth, futures in which we make do in less hospitable environments here and/or on other planets. For now,... Read more
IO9 recently shared a list of the nine weirdest implications of the many worlds viewpoint. One is that you are, in essence, immortal. I’ve blogged before about ways that parallel universes might provide some of the comfort traditionally offered by hope for an afterlife. But immortality comes with a price: there are countless different versions of you and I, some good and some evil, some wonderfully happy and some terribly unhappy. And so, if the science of many worlds pans... Read more
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