World must race to develop green energy

Professor Rees suggests an exploration of alternative energy sources with at least 10 times the $1.5bn a year funding that goes into researching nuclear fusion, a cleaner and safer alternative to conventional nuclear power.

Guardian Unlimited | Science | World must race to develop green energy, urges Rees:

Head games, mind ****

This kind of stuff can be really worrying -makes you wonder how human beings managed to develop the means to destroy the world as we know it. Or in fact does is explain how once we can we are a danger to ourselves and everything else? Commenting on a new book (A Mind of Its Own: How Your Brain Distorts and Deceives by Cordelia Fine ) the author says;

“Your brain is vainglorious. It deludes you. It is emotional, pigheaded and secretive. Oh, and it’s also a bigot. This is more than a minor inconvenience.”

Theologically it is tempting to link this to the fall, but I fear that may be too simple since it would appear that this is actually part of good creation that is it is part of our nature in its innocency, although there may be ways of construing fallenness that could include it. I think that we actually have to start with the idea that the image of God is corporate in humanity and not primarily about individuals. It is corporate endeavour that mitigates the worst effects of the vainglorious brain. The corporate dimension of being human give us the tools to reflect on and to constrain the worst effects of a prejudicial brain, corporate discussion, peer-review etc enable us to filter ideas, concern for our place in social systems give us opposing inner forces to offset the worst potential effects of a narcissistic brain. However, we should probably note that this deluded and deluding brain is also, ipso facto, the source of originality, creativity, determination, courage etc. The real fallenness comes in when we have corporate structures that allow the vaingloriousness of a few with power to tread down others and which encourage the prejudiciality of the many to be expressed in scapegoating.

I will need to think about this more, but I suspect that the analysis is likely to be fruitful.
It may also be worth thinking about this article. One of the things that emerged from that study was,

Our study provides neurobiological evidence that an amygdala-based emotional system underpins this biasing of human decisions. Moreover, we found that people are rational, or irrational, to widely differing amounts. Interestingly, the amygdala was active across all participants, regardless of whether they behaved rationally or irrationally, suggesting that everyone experiences an emotional reaction when faced with such choices. However, we found that more rational individuals had greater activation in their orbitofrontal cortex (a region of prefrontal cortex) suggesting that rational individuals are able to better manage or perhaps override their emotional responses.

We need to think about this kind of stuff in relation to theological anthropology without getting back into seeing rationality as the pinnacle of the image of God or a naive creationism.
Science & Theology News - Head games:
Filed in: brain, mind, psychology, perception, prejudice, delusion, theolology, corporisation, fall, image_of_God,

Cropcircles

Now, I like a lot of these designs despite holding no brief for the big-eyed midgets from outer space as the authors. I've used designs taking from crop circles as table cloth designs for a low round communion table I used to preside at. So do have a look at these, some are really nice and the craft of the designs deserves recognition, especially as the human fabricators get no real recognition. Here are my 'pick of the crop'.



Wired News: Cropcircles
Filed in: crop_circles, art, new_age, mysteries

Prayer shieid: Lord’s Prayer Pattern

I've been working on a new design relating to the Lord's prayer pattern and here it is.

I'm having it printed up as postcards and have put the designs on CafePress products too. It's one of those designs that bears looking at and reflecting on for a little while.

If you would like a postcard or two and can wait for my personal stash to be printed, in about 5 weeks, let me know and I'll send you a couple. Limited offer during August! Then they go on sale.

All the world's a stage - especially classrooms

This is interesting to me because I'm going to train as a teacher in September and because, on reflection, I'm surprised it's not on the training curriculum already for teachers. Even clergy, who actually speak publically far less, have some kind of voice production training [cursory though it may be]. I actually found that the best training I got was doing a stint in local radio; it taught me to use pitch and pace more effectively and got me used to doing so in a public sort of way. A former colleague of mine who is an actor said that acting is learning how to be yourself in public, and I think there is a lot of truth in that; it's learning how to do what we do naturally in unnatural circumstances.

EducationGuardian.co.uk | News crumb | All the world's a stage - especially classrooms, says school union
Filed in: teaching, attention, voice, training

Yes we've moved

You may have realised, by the fact that a trickle of posts have begun to appear, that our move is over and we have mostly got stuff out of boxes and most of it has ended up roughly where we won't generally fall over it and in places that seem sensible for the time being anyway. It's good being back close to a bigger city; I really enjoyed visiting the exhibitions at the Baltic yesterday [especially Sam Taylor Wood's video art] and the Biscuit factory. By all means, if you are in the Newcastle-Gateshead area, get in touch and visit if you can.
Here's a picture about 400 metres from the road we now live.

It's a sin to fly, says church

There's a couple of things to notice about this story. One is the way that it is reported; note the headline which is what I've used for the title of this post, and the report of what was actually said by Bishop of London, Richard Chartres.

“There is now an overriding imperative to walk more lightly upon the earth and we need to make our lifestyle decisions in that light. Making selfish choices such as flying on holiday or buying a large car are a symptom of sin. Sin is not just a restricted list of moral mistakes. It is living a life turned in on itself where people ignore the consequences of their actions.”

It's just so hard to convey nuanced positions in headlines, especially when the editors are not minded to do anything but sensationalise using the typical 'positions' for filtering church related stories, ie finger-wagging against 'naughty but nice' activities or hypocritical behaviours.

The other thing to notice, of course, is the very sensible and helpful stance being articulated in actual fact.
It's a sin to fly, says church - Sunday Times - Times Online: Filed in: sin, environment, flying, Christian, ethics, choices