It is apparently official now: I’ll be presenting a session called “Gods on Star Trek” at Starbase Indy this year. Here’s the blurb, which relates directly to a book chapter that I wrote and which is forthcoming in a volume on Star Trek and Theology: This presentation will explore the various godlike entities that appear throughout the Star Trek franchise, from Apollo and Trelane to Q, the Prophets, and the Red Angel. It will be suggested that it is not... Read more
I’ve not experienced the level of anxiety I have felt as the start of this semester drew near for quite some time. I’ve been telling people that I think I probably teach better when I have that anxiety that leads me to overthink, overprepare, and often find myself unable to sleep or waking up unduly early because of how anxious I am, as I continually think about what I am teaching. In case you haven’t heard, I’m teaching a class... Read more
This continues my recap of the “Future of Gen Ed” event that Inside Higher Ed hosted. Sorry that I have allowed such a long time to pass since part 1! Since I last wrote, Inside Higher Ed has had countless pieces related to the themes of this day workshop on general education and core curriculum requirements. These include: Articles Overstate Millennials’ Loss of Interest in Higher Ed Shape of Higher Ed to Come Study Student Learning Outcomes Beyond Distribution Requirements Finding... Read more
David Kyle Johnson writes in the Sci Phy Journal: Ironically, The Black Hole may have been more accurate than Interstellar regarding one aspect of black holes: what you would see if you entered one. Now, this may seem odd if you’ve seen both films. In Interstellar, Cooper enters Gargantua to find a tesseract—a 3 dimensional representation of a four dimensional object (in this case, his daughter bedroom) placed there by “five-dimensional bulk beings.” The idea that all black holes contain tesseracts is not suggested by... Read more
Call for Papers: Rethinking Media, Religion and Secularities Conference of the International Society for Media, Religion and Culture Conference location: Sigtuna Foundation, Sigtuna, Sweden Conference dates: 4-7 of August 2020 Deadline for Paper proposals: 6 December 2019 Notification of acceptances: Mid February 2020 The globalization of our lifeworld has brought attention to how we think about religion and non-religious contexts. The existence of secularity in contemporary society and culture is contested in many fields in which scholars of media, religion... Read more
Via John Morehead’s TheoFantastique blog: The Journal of Gods and Monsters Special Issue: The Monstrosity of Displacement We are pleased to announce the creation of a new double blind, peer-reviewed, open access journal exploring the relationships between religion, monsters, and the monstrous: The Journal of Gods and Monsters. Headed by editors Natasha Mikles, John Morehead, Michael E. Heyes, and Brandon Grafius, The Journal of Gods and Monsters will be digitally housed at Texas State University and can be accessed at https://godsandmonsters-ojs-txstate.tdl.org/godsandmonsters/index.php/godsandmonsters. Monsters are often... Read more
I was excited to see this science fiction writing contest. The closest I have to a story that would fit is already too long and so I don’t anticipate entering, even though the story addresses the very question of who land – or a planet – belongs to, and how if at all it relates to a group having been there first or been in closer proximity to the territory for longer. I’m tempted to try to write something new... Read more
The CUNY Games Network (City University of New York) invites all involved in higher education pedagogy — faculty, administrators, graduate students, undergraduates, and game designers — to submit a talk or posters on the theory and practice of play and games, including interactive classroom learning activities. We also welcome game demos and playtesting that focus on higher education. See the bottom of this page to submit your proposal. In your submission, you will be asked to choose from the following... Read more
One question in particular has grabbed my attention in this story: how did Jesus know that the woman had given all she had? Was he simply guessing, or was he using someone as an illustration whose story he knew? As with so many other stories in the Gospels that I explore in this book, this one raises a question for the reader that we who read too often fail to ask. Did Jesus not teach these things before? Was this... Read more
I debated what to call this post. “No silver bullet when it comes to gun control” was one of the ideas. Either way, I had the thought occur to me that there might be an alternative to the current focus on gun control. My first thought was that the Constitution says nothing about a right to bullets, much less bullets of a particular type. And so it might be constitutional to allow relatively free access to guns but have strict... Read more
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