Didache

Recently I read the Didache for the first time. It is instruction for Christians in the early church and is generally dated to the first century (although some date it to the second century wiki ). I was confronted, again, with the fact that recent versions of protestantism are not a return to some pure original Christianity. Rather, Christianity before Constantine looks a lot more like Orthodox Christianity but with less pomp.

I am interested in understanding early Christianity, not only because I love history, but because I want to understand what the setting was when the canonical books of the Bible were selected. Christians then were a lot like Christians are now (and in the intervening centuries). Some spent a lot of time in study and thought very deeply, but many accepted and embraced the message but were (theologically) simple and their Christianity was acceptable to the disciples of the Apostles.

Reading the Didache has inspired me to again try and intenalize the reality that a relationship with God depends on continual revelation. Also, I have changed my practice to include the Lord’s Prayer every day. Many protestants assume we are sophisticated and truly understand prayer and do not pray the Lord’s Prayer often. The Didache instructs Christians to pray it 3 times a day and, humbly, I am taking on the practice of praying the Lord’s Prayer every day. I might be sophisticated and be drawn to theological sophistication but to grow I need to start simple.

(Didache)

Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily (needful) bread, and forgive us our debt as we also forgive our debtors. And bring us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one (or, evil); for Thine is the power and the glory for ever..

Graduate school

When I was a freshman, Freeman Dyson visited my college. He taught a class for non-majors and gave a couple of lectures for the physics students. One that I attended had a number of us, including Dyson, leave the lecture hall to go to the theater and watch the Matrix. One thing he said at the time stuck with me, at least the concept (since the words didn’t). That was that physics was something you do and not what you study, that you needed to get involved in research and not just take classes.

I didn’t truly understand this idea and internalize it until I almost dropped out of my third year of graduate school. It has become one of my guiding philosophies as a physicist and physics professor. 

I have observed that online graduate degrees are popular (universities withstood moocs but risk being outwitted by opms). I don’t see the point of them. Even a non-lab undergraduate degree loses out on a lot of value being online only and graduate degrees lose out on most of their value. I think that a good undergraduate degree should be 70-80% course work, a masters degree should be 30-50% coursework and a PhD should be around 10% coursework. The non-coursework component can be done with industrial mentors instead of academic mentors, but the good mentors will generally be at the same location as the good academic mentors. Who is going to do the legwork, and how is that legwork going to be valid, for industrial mentors in a location without the academic mentors?

I think the real signal with these online graduate degrees provide is that new things have been learned. But that isn’t the purpose of a graduate degree.

Since I graduated with my PhD, I have continually learned new things and worked in new fields. I have never taken a course, just reading papers (and books sometimes) to understand where the field is or to find a good technique. I think that instead of doing this that many people are taking a Masters (and spending money on it). They do get a certificate that others can see, but they don’t get the deep knowledge that traditionally comes from a Masters (or PhD).

Easter

This morning we read the Easter passages of Luke 24 and John 20.

One thing that struck me, beyond the wonder being related about seeing the risen savior, was how Jesus was repeatedly not truly seen until the eyes of the follower were opened.

In John:

14 At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus.

15 He asked her, “Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?”

Thinking he was the gardener, she said, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.”

16 Jesus said to her, “Mary.”

In Luke:

13 Now that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles[a] from Jerusalem. 14 They were talking with each other about everything that had happened. 15 As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus himself came up and walked along with them; 16 but they were kept from recognizing him.

And I thought about the Resurrection. In my spiritual journey there was a period of time where, despite not having a critical perspective (doubting biblical miracles), I still doubted the importance of the Resurrection. In some sense I agreed with Serene Jones (christian easter serene jones) that the good news was that God Loved us and that His Love would triumph. Also, that the focus on our future state was emblematic of a wobbly faith. I was challenged by some of the best Christians who I have read: Paul and C.S. Lewis, who both described the Resurrection as the crucial component of Christianity. Many good Christians who I know personally agreed.

My experience with other Christians, particularly those who fall under the Anabaptist (Greg Boyd) and Lutheran umbrella, changed my perspective. I have come to embrace the Christus Victor model and so have appreciated the Resurrection a lot more.

A final comment about the piece about Serene Jones. She sees a reformation or change in Christianity, and I agree. I also have seen that there seem to be roughly 500 year cycles (1000 BC, 500 BC, 0 AD, 500 AD, 1000 AD, 1500 AD, 2000 AD...) of spiritual change. I think the end of this period will be the return of Christ, and, especially if that doesn't happen, I don't pretend to guess what the change will be. I will note that at least right now, despite the increase in non-believers, it doesn't seem like the liberal forces (representing a critical perspective of miracles/etc) of Christianity are ascendent. Rather it seems that they are dying. Of course, a different conclusion would be made 50 years ago.

M87 Black Hole

Some are not scientifically impressed by the recent BH picture (black hole picture blues black hole picture is mainly triumph of engineering ). While I am interested in tabletop ideas to push GR, as an experimental nuclear physicist and experimental particle astro-physicist, my intuition is to look closely at scattering from an object where GR might break down (most likely a BH).

While there is currently poor resolution in this data, it is a first step towards looking closely at scattering off a BH and so, I think, a step in the right direction.

In a previous post I mentioned the idea of Science as being the intersection between Nature, Mathematics and Technology. This is obviously a scientific advance of Technology. Like with Gravitational Waves, with the current technology we still see Einstein's General Relativity. But it is a new technology and maybe we can push it to discovery. That is why it is promising physics, not just interesting engineering.

I haven’t read the scientific papers, so I don’t know what the limitations are in the resolution. Would we be able to increase resolution significantly with a 20 billion dollar investment? (Observatory on the Moon/Mars) Or is it something we could improve by just building better observatories here on Earth?

Science Budgets

A few years ago I wrote about how both Republicans and Democrats were generally pro-science funding, and that the problem with science funding is that it wasn’t a priority to either group and so would be left off at the negotiating table.

The Trump administration has been repeatedly and broadly anti-science and anti-education. The Republican Party has changed to match Trump on many of his positions, and while there has been push back, in the Republican Party, against Trump's broad anti-science and anti-education tilt, I am concerned that the Republican Party will become broadly anti-science and anti-education.

The Trump administration recent budget had cuts to Higher Education (10% cut) (trumps budget proposal would cancel public service loan forgiveness), the NSF (12% cut, 1 billion) (trump proposes cutting national science foundation budget by billion dollars) and NASA (3% cut, 550 million) (President Trump proposes 550 million cut to NASA).

I am suspicious that this is similar to his tax cuts which were design to hurt the upper middle class in blue states, and is based on transactional politics.

I can hope that the Republican Party in the senate continues to push back against this anti-science budget and the Democrats in the House continue to support Science.

Kim and Trump

I don’t usually make many predictions about the future, but I am going to predict that Trump and Kim come to an agreement in 2020. They will do this because Trump will want to boost his chances for reelection and Kim will want to have an agreement with Trump before he leaves office. The agreement will probably be more to Kim’s advantage than the one just discussed in Vietnam if Trump is seriously facing impeachment or his approval drops below 35%. It will probably be more to Trump’s advantage if it is rather happening in the context of Trump wanting to increase his approval in July, August or September (maybe even October).

Interesting links between Daniel 7, Newton and Christology

A couple weeks ago I continued my study of Daniel. While Catholics and Theologians (who generally don’t believe in supernatural revelation) clearly agree that Daniel was written about 50 years before it was used religiously in the Dead Sea community, many religious Protestants (including the denomination I was raised in and am a member of, Adventists, and Newton) are inclined to identify the fourth beast as Rome and the blasphemous little horn as the Middle Ages Catholic Church.

I haven’t yet read Newton’s writings about Daniel or detailed discussions of them, but in the sermon it was mentioned that the 3 barbarian groups which are identified as being extinguished by the early Catholic Church were Arian (and so not Trinitarian). Newton identified Trinitarianism as the great Apostasy and his date for the return of Christ in 2060 was based on the year for a day principle from the point where he identified Trinitarianism as becoming dominant in the Christian Church.

The Millerites, from whom the Adventists descended (along with other denominations like the Jehovah Witnesses and the Church of God (7th Day)), came up with the date of 1844 as the end of Daniels prophecy using the year for a day principle. Adventists were born out of the Great Disappointment when Christ did not return. While the Bahá'í also identify 1844 as the fulfillment of Daniel's prophecy, it isn't clear to me that the interpretation is preferred for any reason other than that it fits the life of the Báb.

Note that while many Adventists are not Trinitarian, most are and I am and was raised Trinitarian. I hope to write a blog post about Trinitarianism at some point in the future.