'Transsexuality gene' ?

This article in the New Scientist may have important ramifications for some areas of debate about gender, 'Transsexuality gene' boosts male hormones: "A gene variant has been identified that appears to be associated with female-to-male transsexuality ... While such complex behaviour is likely the result of multiple genes, environmental and cultural factors, the researchers say the discovery suggests that transsexuality does have a genetic component.". I do hope the accumulation of this kind of evidence helps to decouple (if you'll pardon the expression) transgenderedness from other gender issues. It is becoming quite clear that this is a condition with roots in pre-birth hormone effects on the brain, our moral responses really do need to start from that point.

Space time and structural evil

Another worthwhile article in Cultural Encounters: Volume 1. This time a brief article meditating on, well, what the title of this post says: "'The Sorcerer's Apprentice and the Savior of the World: Space, Time, and Structural Evil' Paul Louis Metzger"
The Abstract goes thus: "Drawing from Goethe's poem, "The Sorcerer's Apprentice," this essay claims that human creations often get the better of us. For example, we often become possessed with going faster and faster and become isolated from one another when we get behind the wheel of a car. It is important to restructure reality, including our use of space and time. As firstborn over all creation and firstborn from among the dead, Jesus restructures all things, including our creaturely framing of space and time so as to serve others rather than enslave them. Jesus' reconciling activity of making time and space for us bears implications for the church's own use of space. Whereas our commuter churches often look more like self-contained structures of metallic monads lost in space, city buses bear greater similarities to the kingdom of God: the gate of entry into the bus is narrow; yet the demographic base is very wide, made up of various sectors of society. Jesus has made it possible for us to make space and time for those we would otherwise disregard."
Again there is some good reflection using the 'powers that be' as a thinking -foil. I only wanted a bit more thinking from this article in the sense of developing the ideas further. But as a stimulus to thought it's nice. The focus reflection on driving is helpful. I was surprised that it didn't reference Marshall McLuhan, because one of the core insights was very remniscent of perspectives developed in Understanding Media; particularly concerning the way that technologies extend our capabilities but in doing so reconstruct our perspectives.

One thought that has stayed with me from this is the use of the term perichoresis to describe not only the relation-ing of the Trinity but the relatedness of all creation. It seems this is owed to Gunton. But it is helpful in helping to draw a comparison between God and God's creation in terms of a characteristic. It also prompts me to enquire further about the relationship between haAdam being made in God's image and the degree to which creation itself can be said or thought of as imaging God ...

Clash of Cultures or of Theologies?

I've just been catching up with some reading and realised that I'd missed this one in the first issue of Cultural Encounters journal, which is shaping up nicely to have some really helpful articles on the interface between Christianity and Culture, particularly from evangelical perspectives. As such, this article really deserves a look and it's going onto my bibliography for a couple of courses next academic year. You can find the abstract here: Cultural Encounters: Volume 1: and look for the article; "Clash of Cultures or Clash of Theologies? A Critique of Some Contemporary Evangelical Responses to Islam' Daniel W. Brown". However, I'll save you the clicking, here's the abstract: "This article describes approaches to Islam by evangelical authors after 9/11, and argues that the polemical tendencies in the writings of evangelical authors including R.C. Sproul, John MacArthur, and Don Richardson are missiologically imprudent, a distortion of history, and a betrayal of biblical theology. A responsible evangelical approach to Islam, by contrast, will take account of the presence of evil in all civilizations, the sovereignty of God over all cultures, and the doctrine of common grace. Evangelicals should disengage from the so-called "clash of civilizations" which pits Western civilization against Islamic civilization and should instead focus their efforts on theological engagement with Muslims. The article concludes by suggesting some directions that a theologically informed evangelical engagement with Islam might take."
It's a good article in that it takes on an exposes some 'popular' Evangelical responses to Islam as not only ill-informed (possibly culpably so) but inconsistent. It's helpful in that it is relatively short, gets to the heart of the matter quickly and has some nice bibliographic follow-ups.

I was also pleasantly suprprised to find some useful cultural analysis based on the idea of 'the powers that be', an interest of mine. It raises the challenge in that way of seeking to see the positive aspects of Islamic cultures and civilisation; what are the providential dimensions of it? I'm thinking of turning that consideration into an essay question for next year.

Accidents tarnish nuclear dream

According to this report, there is a problem in the nuclear idyll that was France. 'It feels like a sci-fi film' - accidents tarnish nuclear dream | Environment | The Guardian: "Until now most locals have accepted the plant as a risk-free part of everyday life in nuclear-dependent France. More than 80% of France's electricity is generated by the country's 58 nuclear reactors - the world's highest ratio. But the leak has shaken French trust in nuclear safety and embarrassed Nicolas Sarkozy as he crusades for a French-led world renaissance in atomic power."
So yet another cautionary tale for those who would tell us that nuclear power is the only way to go ...

'Fuel battery' could take cars beyond petrol

'Fuel battery' could take cars beyond petrol - tech - 25 July 2008 - New Scientist Tech: "Batteries produce electricity from a closed chemical system that is eventually exhausted. Fuel cells use a constant supply of fuel, so they are continually topped up. Licht's cell has features of each.
Its negative electrode, or anode, is made from vanadium boride, which serves double-duty as a fuel too. But unlike the flowing fuel of a fuel cell, the material is held internally, like the anode material of a battery.
The vanadium boride reacts with a constant stream of oxygen, as in a fuel cell, provided by the positive electrode, or cathode. This brings in a supply of air from outside.
The cell has a theoretical energy capacity of 27 kilowatt hours per litre, compared to 9.7 kilowatt hours per litre for gasoline. But both approaches are limited by practical factors to smaller figures.
Licht says his new system would likely have a practical energy capacity of around 5 kilowatt hours per litre. 'But that's two-fold higher than the practical storage capacity of gasoline,' he says."

New deal green deal

NEF: "The most serious global crisis since the Great Depression calls for serious reform the like of which has not, yet, been considered by politicians. This entails re-regulating finance and taxation plus a huge transformational programme aimed at substantially reducing the use of fossil fuels and, in the process, tackling the unemployment and decline in demand caused by the credit crunch. It involves policies and new funding mechanisms that will reduce emissions and allow us to cope better with the coming energy shortages caused by peak oil.

The Green New Deal is a response to the credit crunch and wider energy and food crises, and to the lack of comprehensive, joined-up action from politicians. It calls for:

* Massive investment in renewable energy and wider environmental transformation in the UK, leading to,
* The creation of thousands of new green collar jobs
* Reining in reckless aspects of the finance sector – but making low-cost capital available to fund the UK’s green economic shift
* Building a new alliance between environmentalists, industry, agriculture, and unions to put the interests of the real economy ahead of those of footloose finance"
Check it out: a pdf file.

The End of the way we do knowledge

Joel Garreau's response to an article by Chris Anderson outlining how petabyet computing may fundamentally change the way we do knowledge contains the following important insight. "Data are an artifact of selection, which means they reflect an underlying hypothesis or they wouldn't have been collected. For example, in my work I discovered a frightening lack of timely data to 'prove' either my hypothesis that North America was behaving as if it were nine separate civilizations or economies that rarely were bounded by political jurisdictions of nation, state, or county. It was equally problematic coming up with the data to prove that places like Silicon Valley were becoming the modern iteration of 'city' even when the millions of square feet of big buildings were right before your eyes. It wasn't until those 'nine nations' or 'edge city' models began to be seen as useful by others that people started to go through the very great deal of trouble to verify them by collecting data in a fashion that ignored all previous boundaries. Life is not obligated to follow data and it frequently does not."
I've recently been musing on this as I'm reflecting on the models of theological reflection represented by the pastoral cycle and similar. And as I pointed out in a conversation with a student regarding writing a reflection, there is no uninterpreted data; the very selection of data implies a weighing of merit against stated or unstated criteria. It is this that the petabyte age may challenge and allow us to sidestep more fully. Sean Carroll summarises the potential import: "giant new petascale datasets that resist ordinary modes of analysis, but which we can use to uncover heretofore unexpected patterns lurking within torrents of information".
That said, we're still going to need to be able to hypothesise the correlations thrown up, but it's a potentially creative world opening up.
Chris Anderson's article.
Page of responses.