Metacentricities

If you’ve read this blog for any length of time, you probably have picked up that the classic Christian theological concept of the trinity: Father, Son (who was an embodiment of the Father, and died, and was resurrected, etc.) and Holy Spirit is a construct of God that I find hard to embrace.

In some ways, I still am pretty much a Unitarian Christian, even though I now attend a church that is part of a trinitarian denomination (UCC). And because of that, the Trinity is in my consciousness quite often. During service, we always sing that Doxology (thankfully, using inclusive language) “Glory be to the Creator, and to the Christ and to the Holy Ghost …”

Today, the pastor of my lovely church, Rev. Andrea Ayvazian, preached a great sermon (as usual) and in it was this nugget: The qualities of water at what is called the “triple point” of water (which is 0.01 degrees C) is where the three phases can coexist in an equilibrium.

I love the metaphor - the idea of God, and the qualities of God, being in equilibrium - present all at once - it’s all the same substance, like water, but it has three different qualities.

I once wrote a paper in seminary about the concept of the Trinity by Julian of Norwich. About one of Julian’s metaphors of the Trinity, I wrote:

The triad nature, mercy and grace is very much how I experience God, and God’s love. I see God everyday in the natural world. I see the love of God in every leaf, in every rock, in the moo of a cow, the babble of a brook, the flame of a candle. God’s nature is what is so close to my eyes and ears, on a daily basis. God’s grace I experience in my life. When I find myself in the right place at the right time, I see that as grace. When it’s winter (in New England), and I hate the cold, and I look up in the sky, and see the constellation Orion, I feel God’s grace.

It seems like this is a theological concept that I’ll be chewing on for a while.

• Antioxidant supplements may not be all that good for you. Hmmm, might be time to trim the doses of Vitamin A.
• Most Americans want universal health care. Looks like accusations of “socialized medicine” that conservatives throw about aren’t going to work.
• Michael Jackson converted to Islam.
• Republican candidates who governed left-leaning constituencies (Guliani and Romney) try their best to convince conservatives that they are on their side.
• A new magazine, called “Conserve” is launched, which proposes to be a voice of “doing more with less.” Um, a new magazine? Don’t magazines make their money with advertising? Don’t advertisers expect people to buy stuff? What’s wrong with this picture? (It reminds me of the magazine “Real Simple.” Why do people need to buy a magazine to make their lives simpler, or do more with less?)
• The graphs are a bit eye-bending, but check out this post in the Oil Drum about the decrease in Saudi Arabian oil production last year. By the way, Saudi Arabia has 1/4 of the world’s oil reserves. Looks like we’re at Peak Oil. There are, by the way, some very interesting comments in that post.
• The USDA preliminarily approved the production of rice engineered with human genes, which are hoped to help treat diarrheal infections in the developing world, but could have completely unpredictable effects. In addition, the genes won’t stay in the rice fields they originally put them in.

People say they “know the truth” about Jesus and the press hypes it. Christians get up in arms because this “truth” goes against their belief. Actual real authorities in the field suggest that this “truth” isn’t supported by any real evidence.

The DaVinci Code? No. The DaVinci Code rewarmed. Recently, a documentary filmmaker takes the old news (ossuaries found in 1980 in Jerusalem) and decides that the idea that Jesus married Mary Magdalene, and had a child, was, well, so compelling, that they’d twist the truth. There were ossuaries found, with the names of Jesus, Mary, and Judas son of Jesus. Sounds mighty convincing, except, well, it’s not. An archeologist weighed in:

She said Jesus came from a poor family that, like most Jews of the time, probably buried their dead in ordinary graves. “If Jesus’ family had been wealthy enough to afford a rock-cut tomb, it would have been in Nazareth, not Jerusalem,” she said.

Magness also said the names on the Talpiyot ossuaries indicate that the tomb belonged to a family from Judea, the area around Jerusalem, where people were known by their first name and father’s name. As Galileans, Jesus and his family members would have used their first name and home town, she said.

“This whole case [for the tomb of Jesus] is flawed from beginning to end,” she said.

What I find so fascinating about the whole thing is how much it seems to matter to people. Christians who believe in the literal biblical account feel that their faith is being attacked. A lot of people (honestly, me included) think that the idea that Jesus had an actual family life is kinda interesting and worth thinking about, and certainly doesn’t, in my mind, take one iota away from the impact of his words. Of course, in the end, it’s all about money - the money that the filmmaker and the Discovery channel can wrangle out of advertisers who think (rightly so) that people will watch the documentary, then go out and buy stuff.

You know about Tamiflu, right? Tamiflu is the anti-viral drug that many people are stocking up on, in case of a flu pandemic. Never mind that it’s not at all clear that it will work.

Well, there is worse yet. A new study suggests that the use of Tamiflu for a pandemic will have potentially damaging effects on the environment, as well as create the conditions for new, resistant strains of flu virus. This is pretty familiar - the reason we have so many antibiotic resistant bacteria is because of the widespread use of antibiotics.

So, here it is - we are doing something that makes us feel safer, but getting ourselves into worse trouble. Sound familiar? I think a blog post about that phenomenon might be in order, at some point.

• There’s a new, very heavy, kid on the block. Element #118 was created by a team from Russia and California.
• Bring in the clones. Er, in your refridgerator, that is. Thankfully, some people find it troubling.
• I’d probably drink out of this bottle. Whose brilliant idea was that?
• I want one of these! Just what I’ll need to go bopping to the store in W.Mass.
• If you want a really detailed look at oil production numbers, and predictions and such, here’s the best place to find it. It’s a little eye-bending, though.
• This is sweet. New polling data suggesting strongly that Dems might retake the house.
• Olberman in his usual style, blasts the bill that eliminates Habeas Corpus. And now that it’s signed, he has a special comment. Makes me want to cry.
• Speaking of our rights - who is Michael Chertoff really talking about? Why did he say that, today?

One of the things that I have always wondered about is what the effect of television would be on developing brains. I kinda thought that the rapid increase in the diagnosis of things like ADHD, for instance, might be related in some way. One of the hallmarks of TV is that no visual cut lasts for more than 30 seconds or so, which would seem, to me, to have a  potential effect on the developing brain.

The cause of Autism has been up in the air for a while. It is known that there are genetic factors at work, and some have suggested that vaccines might be a culprit. Now, three researchers are saying that early TV exposure in children might be a cause.

There are a couple of caviats here, right off the bat. None of the researchers seem to have medical, science, or public health backgrounds - they are economists. This raises a red flag for me. But, perhaps they are looking at it from a sufficiently fresh perspective. But it also has not gone through peer review, from what I can tell.

So, I’ve downloaded the article, and read it. Here is my analysis:

They state that the current view in the field is that Autism is caused by a genetic predisposition, and an environmental trigger. They are suggesting that the environmental trigger is television.

The way that they are getting to this is pretty indirect. They are looking at county-by-county rates of cable TV subscription, and, well, precipitation. Yes, precipitation. Apparently, according to some specific studies (American Time Use Survey) young children watch TV more when it rains.

They say that 40% of the autism cases are due to increased TV watching due to precipitation, and 17% of the growth in Autism cases in the states they studied are due to increases in cable TV subscriptions.

So problem #1: the data they use to correlate TV watching with precipitation is data that is self-reporting about how people spend their time, and who else in the household is present at the time. If they were people with public health backgrounds, they would know that self-reporting is problematic. They take the self-reports basically as gospel, and don’t really ask about how the self-reports might be biased.

Problem #2: They suggest that increases in use of cable TV in homes during the 1970s and 1980s would increase the amount of time that children watched TV. But there is no data to back this up. Since they are talking about children under 3, this seems a problematic assumption. Yes, rates of autism are correlated with increases in cable TV, but its pretty weak. So a weak correlation with something that isn’t backed up is, well, useless.

Bottom line: It’s a pretty flawed study, but I guess an argument can be made that it makes it worth looking into, at least. There needs to be a serious case-control study, etc. The public health mantra is: "correlation is not causation" (oh, right, they aren’t in public health) and this paper certainly only hints at a correlation. It’s not even a slam dunk for that.

So, I think I see why it hasn’t been peer reviewed.

• If you are a woman, you might want to put that coke down!
• Yes, indeed, there seem to be lots of planets in the galaxy.
• Are elephants suffering from PTSD? Maybe they are just sick of us.
• Here’s a new system for using sink greywater to flush the toilet. Why did it take so long?
• Yay, NYU! They are buying wind power.
• The Weather Channel (one of my favorite stations when I had a TV) launches a new broadband internet video website, called One Degree, which has some great stuff.

Here are today’s links for ya:

• I keep coming across information about this new "Jack 2" oil well in the Gulf of Mexico. There is talk about how this could increase the US oil reserves, and keep the price of oil down for a long time. People who have poo-pooed peak oil think it’s evidence that there is no such phenomenon. There’s a great article in a new blog I found called "The Oil Drum" about the realities of this new discovery.
• The New York Times has an interesting series about the water crisis in India.
• Transition Culture has a great article about the potential dangers of any biofuels (yeah, including biodeisel.) It is primarily around the fact that biofuels depend on industrial agriculture, and industrial agriculture is probably one of the most environmentally damaging practices that exist.
• Juan Cole has an interesting analysis about that National Intelligence Estimate document that got partially declassified and leaked. He says, among many other things:

The NIE clearly says that the Iraq War is now the main generator of
terrorism against the US and its allies. It certainly caused the Madrid
train bombings of March, 2004 and the London subway bombings of July
2005. The reaction against the US attack on and occupation of a major
Arab Muslim country like Iraq has been anger throughout the Muslim
world.

There is another take by Michael Scheuer, who was the former head of the Bin Laden desk at the CIA (yes, the Bin Laden desk!)

• Lots and lots of feathers are flying in Washington. Glad I’m not there.
• I hadn’t realized that Bush was a Methodist. Garrison Keillor says:

The Methodists of Dallas can be fairly sure
that none of them will be snatched off the streets, flown to
Guantanamo, stripped naked, forced to stand for 48 hours in a freezing
room with deafening noise, so why should they worry? It’s only the Jews
who are in danger, and the homosexuals and gypsies. The Christians are
doing just fine. If you can’t trust a Methodist with absolute power to
arrest people and not have to say why, then whom can you trust?

Ouch.

Here’s a bunch of things I came across that I think are useful, with a bit of commentary.

• The unintended consequences of human action often provide the need for huge remediation projects. Case in point: the Mississippi River. Years and years of levee projects has caused problems for the Mississippi, and where the water would have flowed. Scientists say, apparently, that it’s time to move the Mississippi.
• This is a great list of foods you should try to eat organically, because of the amounts of pesticides used in growing them conventionally. Ooops. Too bad I didn’t read this list yesterday.
• Al Gore (why, oh why won’t he run for President again?) says to tax CO2 emmisions, not payrolls. I like the idea.
• In the Very Old News department: Acadmic institutions, not ability, hinders academic women in science and technology. Duh. I hate when some "new" report states the patently obvious (and well known for decades), and then a news organization picks it up as news. Sigh.
• Karen Armstrong has her typically fabulous words to say about the Pope’s comments on Islam.

These are some science and environment stuff that I found in my RSS feeds over the past few days.

• Scientists discover that endogenous retroviruses are necessary for sheep pregnancy. Talk about symbiosis. Endogenous retroviruses are segments of our genome that for a long time were thought of as "junk" DNA, and were incorporated into our genome a long time ago by what used to be an exogenous retrovirus. I think just about every thing that used to be called "junk" DNA, and not useful, is turning out to have a lot of uses.
• James Lovelock, the originator of the "Gaia hypothesis" is interviewed about his new book, “The Revenge of Gaia: Why the Earth Is Fighting Back — and How We Can Still Save Humanity". He is a proponent of nuclear energy.
• John Michael Greer has a relatively rational set of predictions for life after big oil.
• Astronomers are beginning to figure out more about when galaxies were born after the big bang.
• I knew there was some reason I like green tea so much. Drink up.