Author: bill

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Testimony of Michael Crichton before the United States Senate

In essence, science is nothing more than a method of inquiry. The method says an assertion is valid-and merits universal acceptance-only if it can be independently verified. The impersonal rigor of the method means it is utterly apolitical. A truth in science is verifiable whether you are black or white, male or female, old or young. It’s verifiable whether you like the results of a study, or you don’t.

Thus, when adhered to, the scientific method can transcend politics. And the converse may also be true: when politics takes precedent over content, it is often because the primacy of independent verification has been overwhelmed by competing interests.

Verification may take several forms. I come from medicine, where the gold standard is the randomized double-blind study, which has been the paradigm of medical research since the 1940s.

Source: Testimony of Michael Crichton before the United States Senate

I found this link recently and eventually found my way over to Steve McIntyre’s blog, Climate Audit. Michael is the well know author of many books including Jurassic Park. In his testimony to the Senate he is critical of the scientific techniques used in putting together the hockey stick graph. The hockey stick graph is the keystone to showing that global warming is caused by human activity. I found his discussion of the data manipulation tricks used by Mann to be both interesting and worrisome. These are old statistical tricks that I have seen engineers try to use occasionally so I was surprised that scientists would even consider using them. Picking which data you want to use, excluding data that is “wrong”, and extrapolating new end points only leads to bad decisions. From my experience with engineers we eventually would agree that the data was not good enough to make a decision with and move on to different ways to solve the problem. To think that these techniques would pass as appropriate scientific techniques under peer review is astonishing. In reading Michael’s testimony before the Senate, I can see why global warming skeptics are so skeptical and the advocates have become even more vocal. The underlying issue driving the volume of global warming debate is professional pride. It is embarrassing to Mann to have your greatest scientific work exposed as “unscientific” by an economist and a mathematician. It is embarrassing and distracting to the climate scientific community that Mann’s work was published with such low scientific standards and now must be defended.  It is no wonder that this scientific debate has degraded into a pissing contest. Thank God Mann does not work for the pharmaceutical industry!

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Crime prevents Habit for Humanity from Building

Last week I was asked if I wanted to be interviewed by a television reporter about an upsurge in shootings in a local neighborhood. I am on the Board of Directors for the Habitat for Humanity affiliate that builds in this neighborhood. Half of all of the homes we have built over the last seventeen years have been in this neighborhood. This neighborhood is a major part of our mission. We have a housing lot near this shooting and the Board recently decided to not build on this lot for at least a year due to increased crime. The news story was going to be about how the upsurge in crime has caused our Habitat affiliate to postpone building.

I declined the interview. I knew some of the facts about the neighborhood but I was woefully short on wisdom on crime and our growing involvement in community activism. I voted to postpone building but I was uncomfortable with the decision. I was afraid that my discomfort with the decision might do more harm to the neighborhood than good. I felt guilty about my decision to forgo the interview but it was the right decision for the board. Our Development Director was available. He was reasonably informed on the facts and willing, so he did the interview. He did a nice job. Here is the link to the newscast.

Crime Prevents Habitat For Humanity From Building

Over the next couple of days I thought about my actions several times. The board’s decision to postpone building was a direct result of existing Habitat partner families questioning our wisdom of putting additional families on that street. On one hand I believe that adding families to the presently empty lots changes the neighborhood for the better. Our mission is to use decent, affordable houses to transform families and neighborhoods. The grace exhibited by the donors and volunteers can transform the character of the partner families in many positive ways. It also affects the neighbors who carefully watch the construction progress but it doesn’t stop there. Something magical occurs to families as they are transformed by the responsibility of home ownership. Financial discipline and responsibility become paramount family issues. Before they know it these families have climbed up the rungs of prosperity and new doors are opened for them. We have two families whose finances have improved enough that they traded up to a larger, conventionally financed house. Many others have acquired significant home equity. For families who cannot afford to save, their home is their nest egg.

On the other hand I do not want to see a partner family or volunteer shot. The upsurge in shootings makes the property unattractive to both the potential home owners and the volunteers. Something bad is going on in the neighborhood. Ignoring the problem will probably get someone we know shot. Postponing building and increasing our community activism on reducing crime is our Plan B. It is uncharted territory for us. Our communications with the city leaders have always been good but they will increase as we search for ways to reduce crime. We are both striving for the same goals though I doubt we will bring any additional wisdom to the table. It is hard to be truly helpful when you are an outsider. The city leaders have some big problems to deal with. Maybe the increased public awareness will attract some outside help that will be helpful.

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RE: 15 rules for understanding the Middle East

For a long time, I let my hopes for a decent outcome in Iraq triumph over what I had learned reporting from Lebanon during its civil war. Those hopes vanished last summer. So, I’d like to offer President Bush my updated rules of Middle East reporting, which also apply to diplomacy, in hopes they’ll help him figure out what to do next in Iraq.

Rule 10: Mideast civil wars end in one of three ways: a) like the U.S. civil war, with one side vanquishing the other; b) like the Cyprus civil war, with a hard partition and a wall dividing the parties; or c) like the Lebanon civil war, with a soft partition under an iron fist (Syria) that keeps everyone in line. Saddam used to be the iron fist in Iraq. Now it is us. If we don’t want to play that role, Iraq’s civil war will end with A or B.

Rule 11: The most underestimated emotion in Arab politics is humiliation. The Israeli-Arab conflict, for instance, is not just about borders. Israel’s mere existence is a daily humiliation to Muslims, who can’t understand how, if they have the superior religion, Israel can be so powerful. Al Jazeera’s editor, Ahmed Sheikh, said it best when he recently told the Swiss weekly Die Weltwoche: “It gnaws at the people in the Middle East that such a small country as Israel, with only about 7 million inhabitants, can defeat the Arab nation with its 350 million. That hurts our collective ego. The Palestinian problem is in the genes of every Arab. The West’s problem is that it does not understand this.”

Rule 12: Thus, the Israelis will always win, and the Palestinians will always make sure they never enjoy it. Everything else is just commentary.

Rule 13: Our first priority is democracy, but the Arabs’ first priority is “justice.” The oft-warring Arab tribes are all wounded souls, who really have been hurt by colonial powers, by Jewish settlements on Palestinian land, by Arab kings and dictators, and, most of all, by each other in endless tribal wars. For Iraq’s long-abused Shiite majority, democracy is first and foremost a vehicle to get justice. Ditto the Kurds. For the minority Sunnis, democracy in Iraq is a vehicle of injustice. For us, democracy is all about protecting minority rights. For them, democracy is first about consolidating majority rights and getting justice.

Rule 14: The Lebanese historian Kamal Salibi had it right: “Great powers should never get involved in the politics of small tribes.”

Rule 15: Whether it is Arab-Israeli peace or democracy in Iraq, you can’t want it more than they do.

Read the rest of the Rules.

timesunion.com
20 December 2006

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RE: The Blog Mob(revised)

The blog mob: “Written by fools to be read by imbeciles.”

Link to The Blog Mob

This is a piece I decided to read because Chris Muir made fun of it in his cartoon. In this painful discourse on how journalists write better than bloggers, his piece had a grammatical error. A period was missing from the end of a sentence. I found the piece interesting for another reason. His sentence structure and choice of words had me gasping for air. Here is a sample.

Every conceivable belief is on the scene, but the collective prose, by and large, is homogeneous: A tone of careless informality prevails; posts oscillate between the uselessly brief and the uselessly logorrheic; complexity and complication are eschewed; the humor is cringe-making, with irony present only in its conspicuous absence; arguments are solipsistic; writers traffic more in pronouncement than persuasion . . .

His over the top word selection had me reaching for my dictionary, too. Logorrheic is a great word for the crossword puzzle writers. Maybe the most interesting aspect of this article is that I think he was writing for a specific group, bloggers. Who else would spend the mental effort to find the humor and irony in this piece? His serious sounding rant about bloggers actually pokes fun at the self-importance expressed by both journalist and bloggers.

The demise of newspapers has been foretold for many years. Radio and television won the war for people’s minds a long time ago. Somehow newspapers adapt and survive. Bloggers are just another competitor to arrive on the scene. The publicizing of original news stories has become more democratic because of the internet. The internet has dramatically lowered the barriers and encouraged the amateur journalists. What we are seeing is the gradual dismantling of the information monopolies enjoyed by television, radio, and newspapers. In this environment the mob has a greater voice on what is a good story than they ever had in the traditional media. The craft of writing has always had a supporting role. Photographs, video, and the spoken word share this supporting role. A good story is still the king.

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8 Virginia flocks break away (Julia Duin / THE WASHINGTON TIMES)

Eight Northern Virginia churches announced yesterday they will leave the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia after their congregations voted overwhelmingly to depart because of liberal trends in the 2.2-million-member Episcopal Church.

Link to 8 Virginia flocks break away (Julia Duin / THE WASHINGTON TIMES)

I grew up in Northern Virginia and our family went to an Episcopalian church. My parents still live in the area and go to the same church. It is a nice church with about fifty to hundred people at a service though I slept through many of the services. I got baptized in this church but it did not mean much to me. Almost all of my teenage memories of going to church involves this church and a group called Young Life. A friend got me to go a Pentecostal church one time. Although that was an unfortunate experience, I did not “get” church like some of my friends.  As I grew older the only time I went to church was for marriages and deaths. Yet I was always surrounded by people with faith. I do not remember any of them pushing their faith on me but I was cognizant that their faith was important to them. To me they were very normal with occasional quirks. I remember being mildly amused that my room-mate methodically evaluated several different churches before deciding on one. I kidded him that he put more effort in his church selection than his job selection. 

Later in life my wife and I decided to make a major life decision and move to Cincinnati. My wife and my son moved up there early to get my son enrolled in elementary school. While I was still in Houston my wife, her sister, and their mother decided we should all go to a church together and they had decided to try out a contemporary style church. I really did not know about the decision until I arrived. I found it a curious decision. We had been married in an Episcopalian church nearby. It was a nice church and going to the Episcopalian church would have been a safe decision. I was afraid this unknown church would be a cultist, fundamental church that would try and get you to do strange things to show your faith. I had a fear of Pentecostals. Since my mother-in-law and her two daughters were already showing the early signs of dysfunctionality I decided to go with the flow. I was shocked to find that this church was fun, entertaining, educational, and laid back. The idea of using the words “fun” and “entertaining” to describe a church was a new experience for me. The service was very simple and the place was packed. Probably more surprising to me was that over the next couple of weeks I learned that the Bible was readable and relevant to me and my family. Earlier that year I had pulled an old Bible off the bookshelf and had tried to read it.  I was doomed to failure. My reading comprehension of Old English was pretty low and I did not have a plan on how to read the Bible. I failed miserably. After a couple of weeks of going to this new church I bought my first Bible, a NIV Study bible. I did not realize it at the time but I had set out on a spiritual journey and it did not involve the church of my youth.

Over the last couple of years I thought a lot about traditional churches and especially the Episcopalian church. This recent division in the church of my youth is fascinating and painful. When I inventory my beliefs I am a fundamentalist. The church I go to now is a fundamentalist church and is huge compared to the average church. My spiritual journey has been many things to me and it is difficult to describe the ups and downs of the journey. I know that I am far from finished but without reservation I recommend others to follow their natural curiosity about God and follow up on the opportunities presented you. My spiritual journey had been very important to me. Part of the painful side of my journey is that I doubt that I would be writing or thinking about religion now if the ladies had decided on going to the local Episcopalian church. Statistics tell us that traditional churches are losing membership. Some are trying to keep people by adding “contemporary” services. Some churches are returning to their theological roots and some are reaching out to be more inclusive to those who have been left out. All of these directions are good for churches to pursue but which direction will stem the tide and save the church from becoming a historical artifact? That is the dilemma faced by the traditional churches. I believe that God presents us opportunities to build our character. We don’t like it because it typically involves change and it hurts. We try our hardest to avoid the change but sometimes when we embrace the change we are amazed at the results. I don’t know the answer for the Episcopalians but I know in my heart that they will survive, it will be painful, and it will not involve me. They are on my prayer list.

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Christmas Quiz answers

Here are the answers to my Christmas Quiz:

1. True: The Jewish Scriptures prophesied that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem.

Christians have said from the beginning that this verse, written several hundred years before Jesus was born, prophesied his birth in Bethlehem:

Mic 5:2 – But you, O Bethlehem of Ephrathah, who are one of the little clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to rule in Israel, whose origin is from of old, from ancient days.

2. False: The Jewish Scriptures prophesied that the Messiah would be born in December.

3. True: The prophet Isaiah foretold that the Messiah would be born of a virgin mother.

Matthew’s Gospel (1:23) says thus: “Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,” which means, “God is with us.” However, Matthew is quoting a Greek translation (the Septuagint) of Isa. 7:14, which says (NRSV), “Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Look, the young woman is with child and shall bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel.”

The Septuagint translated the Hebrew word, “almah,” (young woman, maiden) using the Greek word, “parthenos.” (virgin). So the answer might be, “True, sort of.” OTOH, the 70 scholars who translated the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek were no dummies and were all Jews besides, so their interpretation of “almah” as “virgin” should carry a lot of weight.

4. False: The early church began the tradition of the Christmas tree.

5. False: Saint Nicholas figures prominently in our Christmas celebrations because he was the church leader who made Christmas a Catholic festival day.

Christmas was celebrated from the early days of the Church in various localities (the nearer to Jerusalem, the more likely the celebration). Several church leaders promoted the day, including Chrysostom and St. Ambrose, and the day appeared on all Western Church calendars no later than the mid-300s and on Eastern Church calendars a couple of decades later.

6. Which of the following figures does not appear in the Gospels’ narratives of the birth of Jesus?
a. Shepherds
b. Angels
c. Astrologers
d. A drummer boy

7. True: Christmas gets its name because for centuries the Catholic church celebrated a Mass at midnight on Christmas Eve called the “Christ Mass.”

This word dates to 1038’s Old English, “Cristes Maess.” Other languages use different words and word origins.

8. False: In colonial America, the Puritans were well known for celebrating Christmas as a major church holiday.

Puritans actually outlawed Christmas in Boston during part of the 17th century. English Protestantism generally resisted celebrating Christmas. Puritans also got Christmas outlawed in England during the Interregnum, resulting in pro-Christmas rioting, even in Canterbury. The ban was lifted in 1660 with the Restoration.

9. The Romans celebrated which of the following on Dec. 25?

a. The winter solstice, the shortest day of the year.
b. The birthday of the Roman deity Mithra, the god of the regenerating sun.
c. The feast of Saturnalia.

Mithra, a deity imported from Persia by the Roman military, became an important member of the Roman pantheon as time went on. By the middle of the third century, Mithraism was the main religion of Rome.

10. True: The early church set Dec. 25 as the celebration of the nativity of Jesus so that it would occur between the Roman feast of Saturnalia, Dec. 19, and the Roman feast of Kalends, which occurred on January 1.

That Christmas was set to “take over” or Christianize the feast of Saturnalia is not supported by evidence. Christmas Day’s closest relationship with Roman practice is with Mithraism, which became officially a state-sponsored religion of Rome in the third century. It’s possible that Christians feared they would be persecuted if they refused to honor Mithra’s birthday on Dec. 25, and so decided to celebrate the Nativity on that date instead (for which there was already an existing tradition). Thus they could give the appearance of complying with Roman religion without actually doing so. Christians were already considered atheists by pagan Romans and were under widespread persecution in the 240s. Under Caesar Decius in 250, this persecution became quite severe.

11. True: Christmas Day is a legal holiday in Egypt.

It only became a holiday in 2003. I posted about it here.

12. Saint Nicholas was Bishop Nicholas of Myra, in what is modern Turkey, in the early 300s. He is considered the protector of what kinds of persons (include all that apply)?

a. Virgins
b. Thieves
c. Children
d. Sailors

All of the above. The legend of St. Nicholas was spread by mariners and took root in the Netherlands as Holland was becoming a great sea power. St. Nicholas was known in life to have been kind to maidens and children. Not sure how he became a protector of thieves, though!

13. True: Part of St. Nicholas is entombed in Flushing, NY.

Relics of the saint, including fragments of his skull, were brought to an Eastern Orthodox church there in 1972. See here, bottom of the page.

14. When did the first retail-store Santa Claus appear? 1851-1900

He was James Edgar and played the part in Brockton, Mass., in 1890, the same year that Katherine Lee Bates invented Mrs. Claus in “Sunshine and Other Verses for Children.” This makes St. Nicholas the only married saint, but of course neither the Roman church nor the Eastern church recognize Mrs. Claus.

15. False: The Christmas tree is actually of pagan origin, dating from pre-Christian times and adopted and Christianized by Christian missionaries.

The oak tree was sacred to pre-Christian Germans, not the evergreen. The Christmas tree as a symbol of new life in Christ supplanted the oak tree in Germany, probably from St. Boniface who evangelized Germany in the early 800s. Legend has it that Boniface stopped the sacrifice of young boy against an oak and then cut the oak down, whereupon a fir tree sprang up in its place. More historically, the fir tree is known to have been used in Christmas plays in Germany in the 1500s to represent the tree of knowledge of good and evil (the Genesis story). Decorating the Christmas tree probably began from the way apples were hung from this dramatic tree to represent the fruit of temptation that Adam and Eve ate. By the 1700s Christmas trees became widespread in German homes during Christmastime.

16. When did the Christmas tree come into widespread usage in the United States? The late 1800s.

17. In Old England, on what day of the year did masters and servants eat the same meal at the same table?

Christmas Day, in the spirit of humility before Christ’s incarnation, the act of divine condescension before which all persons are equal.

18. Which US president began the custom of lighting the public White House Christmas tree?

Calvin Coolidge, whose home state of Vermont sent him a tree.

19. True: Christmas carols were begun by church leaders 800 years ago, notably St. Francis of Assisi, because popular music had become too bawdy and impious.

A “carol” was a form of circle folk-singing and dancing. Beginning in the 700s, traveling minstrel shows spread the form across most of Europe and, like all pop musicians, had found great success with risque lyrics and movements, which only goes to show how long this sort of thing has been going on.

20. Christmas cards began ”“

During England’s Industrial Revolution in the 1840s (the latter part thereof), when wages rose enough for ordinary people to afford the penny postage cost and the steam press enabled inexpensive printing of the cards.

Also, as far as I can determine, the British penny was first minted in 1840 and the penny price for postage was set then, too.

21. Extra credit: What American economic occurrence is credited by historians with jump starting the commercialization of Christmas?

Many people decry the commercialization of Christmas. The commercial aspect of the holiday began at a low level in the 1820s with the publication of “The Night Before Christmas,” attributed (later) to Clement Moore. This poem is credited with making Christmas a children’s holiday and starting the practice of giving gifts to children by parents; before then, kids were given sweets and treats. But the commercialization of Christmas in the US really got a head of steam when gift-giving was promoted to overcome the depression of 1839-1840. It’s never looked back. In England the trend was accelerated by the publication of Dickens’, “A Christmas Story.”

Link to Christmas Quiz answers

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RE: A Christmas Quiz

As you may imagine, December is a pretty busy time for ministers, so yes, the free ice cream will be scarce for the next three weeks or so. In the spirit of the season, here is a Christmas quiz. I’ll post answers tomorrow. There are no trick questions. Have fun, and don’t go googling the answers until after you’ve tried to answer them all!

1. T F The Old Testament prophesied that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem.

2. T F The Old Testament prophesied that the Messiah would be born in December.

3. T F The prophet Isaiah foretold that the Messiah would be born of a virgin mother.

4. T F The early church began the tradition of the Christmas tree.

5. T F Saint Nicholas figures prominently in our Christmas celebrations because he was the church leader who made Christmas a Catholic festival day.

6. Which of the following figures does not appear in the Gospels’ narratives of the birth of Jesus?

a. Shepherds
b. Angels
c. Astrologers
d. A drummer boy

7. T F Christmas gets its name because for centuries the Catholic church celebrated a Mass at midnight on Christmas Eve called the “Christ Mass.”

8. T F In colonial America, the Puritans were well known for celebrating Christmas as a major church holiday.

9. The Romans celebrated which of the following on Dec. 25?

a. The winter solstice, the shortest day of the year.
b. The birthday of the Roman deity Mithra, the god of the regenerating sun.
c. The feast of Saturnalia.

10. T F The early church set Dec. 25 as the celebration of the nativity of Jesus so that it would occur between the Roman feast of Saturnalia, Dec. 19, and the Roman feast of Kalends, which occurred on January 1.

11. T F Christmas Day is a legal holiday in Egypt.

12. Saint Nicholas was Bishop Nicholas of Myra, in what is modern Turkey, in the early 300s. He is considered the protector of what kinds of persons (include all that apply)?

a. Virgins
b. Thieves
c. Children
d. Sailors

13. T F Part of St. Nicholas is entombed in Flushing, NY.

14. When did the first retail-store Santa Claus appear?

a. 1800-1850
b. 1851-1900
c. 1901-1950
d. Since 1950

15. T F The Christmas tree is actually of pagan origin, dating from pre-Christian Germany and Christianized by Christian missionaries.

16. When did the Christmas tree come into widespread usage in the United States?

a. Before the Revolutionary War
b. Between 1820-1840
c. The late 1800s.

17. In Old England, on what day of the year did masters and servants eat the same meal at the same table?

a. The monarch’s birthday, to signify that they were all alike subjects of the king or queen.
b. June 15, the date King John agreed to the terms of the Magna Carta in 1215, to signify that they all alike had their rights as Englishmen confirmed by the sovereign.
c. Thanksgiving Day, to signify together their common dependency on a gracious God.
d. Christmas Day, in the spirit of humility before Christ’s incarnation, the act of divine condescension before which all persons are equal.

18. Which US president began the custom of lighting the public White House Christmas tree?

a. Abraham Lincoln, who used candles
b. Grover Cleveland, in whose term the White House was wired for electricity
c. Calvin Coolidge, whose home state of Vermont sent him a tree.
d. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who began the custom as a beacon of hope during the Great Depression.

19. T F Christmas carols were begun by church leaders 800 years ago, notably St. Francis of Assisi, because popular music had become too bawdy and impious.

20. Christmas cards began ”“

a. In late Medieval times as a means by which the Pope sent Christmas blessings and instructions for the new year to the bishops in Europe.
b. In the Thirty Years War, 1618-1648, when generals offered to send soldiers’ Christmas letters home free of charge.
c. During England’s Industrial Revolution in the 1840s, when wages rose enough for ordinary people to afford the penny postage cost and the steam press enabled inexpensive printing of the cards.

21. Extra credit: What American economic occurrence is credited by historians with jump starting the commercialization of Christmas?

Link to A Christmas Quiz