![\"\"](\"https:\/\/4.bp.blogspot.com\/_b7Eh98KJ_qI\/TAmk4R2TaNI\/AAAAAAAAA-4\/3o9c7AYC5Cw\/s320\/7_quick_takes_sm.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nThis week feels like last week all over again. \u00a0Once again, I\u2019m due for another response<\/a> to Justin Martyr on gay adoption. \u00a0That post will run next week. \u00a0I\u2019m also still not quite done with my sequence of posts on the theology of Diane Duane\u2019s Young Wizards series<\/a>. \u00a0The last post in that sequence will go up some time this weekend.<\/p>\n That means that a new featured sequence<\/a> will start next week\u2026<\/p>\n And speaking of which: this week I ran into some representatives from Yale Students for Christ. \u00a0The organization gives away free copies of apologetic works (I\u2019m still grateful to them for my copy of Mere Christianity<\/em><\/a>) and is glad to have conversations with non-Christians about their faith. \u00a0I appreciated the patience of the boy I spoke to, but I was unsatisfied with some of his answers to my questions.<\/p>\n Therefore, this coming week, I\u2019m going to be posting about my three most basic questions and doubts about any religion. \u00a0I really look forward to your comments on these questions.<\/p>\n Earlier this week, I took issue with<\/a> a post by Bryan Caplan, but he had an excellent post this week that I\u2019d like to highlight. \u00a0Caplan takes aim<\/a> at the utilitarian ethics that too often guide our policy by standing the conventional wisdom on its head:<\/p>\n We almost never have ethical arguments about when it\u2019s morally permissible for\u00a0them\u00a0to do terrible things to\u00a0us.\u00a0 I don\u2019t think I\u2019ve ever heard a debate about:<\/p>\n I\u2019d love to hear Cheney, Rumsfeld, Bush, et al explain what American actions would justify the Taliban in torturing teenagers<\/a>.<\/p>\n Obama has plenty to answer for<\/a>, too.<\/p>\n And speaking of Obama\u2019s missteps, I have a column up at The Huffington Post<\/em>\u00a0about the Democratic Party\u2019s utter failure to take action on Don\u2019t Ask Don\u2019t Tell<\/a>. Here\u2019s a quote:<\/p>\n When progressives see ourselves as on the cutting edge of a new order, although change may be urgent, it feels inevitable. When conservatives define themselves as the \u201cman standing athwart history yelling stop<\/a>,\u201d their every chance is a last chance and impossibly important. No wonder there\u2019s an enthusiasm gap.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n There\u2019s an excellent post<\/a> on counterproductive math education at dy\/dan<\/a> that ought to be required reading for all math teachers (and for all parents so they can call this kind of behavior out). \u00a0Here\u2019s the money quote:<\/p>\n Instead of giving students realistic situations that they could analyze, textbook authors began to fill books with make-believe contexts \u2014 contexts that students were meant to believe but for which they should not use any of their real-world knowledge. Students are frequently asked to work on questions involving, for example, the price of food and clothes, the distribution of pizza, the numbers of people who can fit into an elevator, and the speeds of trains as they rush toward each other, but they are not meant to use any of their actual knowledge of clothing prices, people, or trains. Indeed, if they do engage in the questions and use their real-world knowledge, they will fail. Students come to know this about math class. They know that they are entering a realm in which common sense and real-world knowledge are not needed.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n He\u2019s running a contest for most egregious example of this technique, if you have old worksheets or textbooks handy.<\/p>\n Science is the process of discovering new questions we don\u2019t know the answer to. \u00a0The most pressing of these is, of course, What would happen if you stuck your hand in the Large Hadron Collider<\/a>? \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n Inquiring minds want to know!<\/p>\n Scientists take a crack at it below (h\/t Gizmodo<\/a>):<\/p>\n\n