Resonance

Do re mi fa so...

Looking out the window this morning I see that the earth is beginning to resonate.

Let us not be unscientific in our language here. Strictly speaking, resonance occurs when you touch something in just the way it is meant to be touched and it breaks into song.

It has been six months since the sunlight took on the peculiarly golden slant it acquires every September. I know that the earth is only now emerging from the slumber to which that light alluded.

Yet resonance is no gentle phenomenon,* and March is no gentle month. I remember the teaching from kindergarten: even if March comes in like a lamb, you can bet it will go out like a lion.

Therein lies, I wonder, a principle of nature. New life arrives amid violence. April could not be born from February without a tumultuous March, just as babies cannot be born from their mother without labor pains. Positive feedback mechanisms, resonance, are required in order to overthrow the status quo.

Indeed, Paul the Apostle tells us in the passage called the high peak of Scripture that

"the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now", "in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God." (Romans 8: 22, 20b-21)

Even the freedom of glory which is the final restoration of humanity and of the world will require a tumultuous transition.

I further wonder: what sort of resonance does the human heart display?

* Just ask the Tacoma Narrows Bridge

Science on Spokes

Zadrejko stands tall.

Jon majored in biology. I majored in physics. We both went for a bike ride.

At the start we spontaneously took a few revolutions around a cul-de-sac. I remarked what an interesting frame of reference that had been - he stationary in front of me and the rest of the world spinning.

We stopped at an old one-room schoolhouse. He noticed a spider on the handle of an old pump, and we talked about how underrated spiders are.

On the way back a flock of geese suddenly passed overhead. Jon was surprised at how low they flew, and how large the flock was.

Soon after, I waxed poetic about the mystery of riding bikes with friends. Again, the frame of reference struck me. Riders are all moving, often at a pretty good clip, yet in each other's eyes they remain still. This exclusively shared frame of reference is a great source of bonding.

It was fun to see our disciplines come out in our observations.

True Education

Lasagna facilitates true education.**

The high school physics textbook from which I will be teaching next year begins with a philosophical treatise on the nature of science and its relation to religion, the arts, and technology.

Were I teaching a worldview class, this chapter would provide me with weeks of material. A pure physics course could probably skip the chapter without missing a beat. Fortunately, the philosophy of my school allows the former to supplement the latter.

Among many thought-provoking quotes, I find:

A truly educated person is knowledgeable in both the arts and the sciences.

I believe this summarizes the philosophy behind liberal arts education. Penn's College of Arts and Sciences, the school from which I have my degree, still practices this idea in theory: In addition to 18.5 courses in my major (physics), I had to take courses from seven varied sectors, in addition to language, writing, and quantitative data analysis requirements. In this way, no student gets out of the College without being exposed to the full spectrum of arts and sciences.

In theory.

It doesn't surprise me that the above quote would come from a physicist. Most physicists I've encountered are also students of the liberal arts. Many consider themselves philosophers, or so their actions indicate (like the writing of this chapter), and many have deep love for literature. Indeed, I feel I could have almost as easily majored in English or history as physics or biology, and I treasured the excursions into these other subjects which my requirements permitted me.

However, I can't help but feel that the reverse is considerably less true for most students of the liberal arts. While most of my colleagues in physics enjoy studies in music or philosophy or religious studies, friends majoring in liberal arts disciplines are likely to take the easiest and fewest courses in science and math possible.

Geology is a favorite because it fulfills two requirements simultaneously. So instead of plumbing the wonders of creation with the time permitted them, students suffer through a semester of rocks and plate tectonics (interesting, to be sure, but hardly at the top of the list) and learn very little.

I think this highlights a real failure. A popular excuse is that these students simply can't handle real science courses, but I'm skeptical. Students at Penn have demonstrated considerable aptitude in math and science before being admitted.

Instead, I think there is very little popular appreciation for the sciences. And it is quite possible that introductory courses for non-majors go about things the wrong way.

Perhaps physics courses for non-majors should include conceptual overviews of the great staggering truths of physics: To describe light as either a particle or a wave, or even as both, is inadequate. Time moves slower when you move faster. It is literally impossible to know exactly where something is at a specific time.

I could go on. Having an inkling of these ideas changes fundamentally one's conception of reality, something which undoubtedly deserves expression in the arts. Intro courses should make them clear.

However, I think the core problem is that our culture somehow devalues science. Science is for geeks and mad professors, but only technology has relevance for the general public. It doesn't have nearly as much to teach about the human condition than literature or history. Or so the assumptions go.

Bunk, I say. As a science teacher, I hope to instill otherwise.

As for you who haven't filled your science requirements, do yourselves a favor. Don't take the boring way out.

*My old housemate Carlos is a notable exception. An English major, Carlos wishes he had done physics. Now there's a man with his head on straight.
**Gosh, by year's end two of these people will be married, and the other two likely aren't very far behind. Growing up is weird...

Worshiping At c

Ah, Physics 364. Those were the days.

You are moving at the speed of light.

So am I. So is everything.

If that sounds preposterous, you're only thinking in three dimensions, while neglecting the fourth: time.

If you're acquainted with Einstein's Theory of Special Relativity, or at least some decent science fiction, you know that the faster someone moves through space, the slower that person moves through time.*

The reason everyday experience doesn't reflect this truth is we never approach speeds through space where this is relevant. But if you were to travel at the speed of light (impossible, I know, but forget that for a moment), you would actually cease to move through time at all.

A technical way of phrasing this idea would be to say that the magnitude of our velocity through all four dimensions of space and time is a constant, c, the speed of light.

Why do I mention this? Well, for one I find it fascinating. Maybe you find it less fascinating, and that's why I'm the one with a physics degree. At any rate, the concept is directly analogous to one about which I thought in church today.

That other concept relates to worship. God commands, in both the Old and New Testaments, that his followers should love him with their entire being: heart, soul, mind, and strength. In short, their entire lives should be worship.**

Such demands of devotion are not unique to Christianity and Judaism. It is often noted that religious believers of all stripes have in common the desire to "open themselves" to a "higher power," whatever that means. And it is here that many atheists find a great advantage for themselves. That advantage is freedom from worship.

If there is no higher power, as atheists believe, then all worshipers are wasting their time and, if they're sincere enough, their lives. By sidestepping this flaw in human nature, atheists are free to invest their devotion elsewhere. They thus lead tremendously more efficient lives; rather than spend one hundred percent of their energies on a God, as the Bible would command, they spend zero.

Such is the atheist-humanist gospel. In this view, religion is the great problem, because people waste their lives on it and even kill each other over it. If people could simply accept that there is no God, they say, we would be able to build the true future of our species. (Not that we'll be able to enjoy it; by then any of us will be luxuriating in oblivion.)

However, such thinking is based on the flawed preconception that freedom from worshiping God is freedom from worshiping. It might seem to be true, just as it might seem that by sitting still one is not moving. However, just as a stationary person continues at the speed of light through time, we all give our entire being away. It is our choice whether that gift is to God or to something which ultimately perishes.

There are a host of things which people worship yet aren't God. Some devote themselves to the pursuit of money, or power, or a legacy, or another human being. We're all familiar with these things, yet we're perhaps not as familiar with calling them what they are: idols. Stand-ins for God.

Everyone, even those who profess to devote themselves to God, is affected by the idols' shiny allure. And I know by experience that silver and gold and all their kin are far harsher masters than is my God.

Atheists are correct to observe that fundamental to human nature is a desire to worship; they are incorrect to disregard it. Unfortunately, the belief that there is no God and ultimately no purpose to anything, precludes them from considering the purpose of this facet of nature.

The clues are right there. God has sewn them into every stitch of creation. When we resist following them to their natural conclusion, we gain not freedom but bondage. That is to say nothing of answering to a being who is owed our all and finds us delinquent in our account.

*If you're not familiar with that idea, you're certainly familiar of animations where characters stretch very long when they are moving very fast. That effect, called length contraction, is intimately related to the one of which I speak: time dilation.
**This doesn't mean that his people aren't to love anyone or anything else, as is made clear by the accompanying command to love one's neighbors as oneself. But that love and devotion must always fall under the heading of love for and devotion to God.
***In light of God's just demands for our entire being, John Piper has advice: Don't Waste Your Life.