I Don't Talk Politics

I don't talk politics.  I don't know anything about them.  But do you find it interesting that our nation is split pretty much 50/50 on political issues?  Rather, do you find it interesting that half of our nation identifies with one party and half with another?

Now, don't get caught up in semantics here, or you'll miss the point.  I'm not saying that there are exactly the same number of Democrats as there are Republicans, nor am I saying that these are the only two political factions.  What I'm saying is that there are two main political parties and the numbers are close enough that your vote counts.

Maybe that doesn't seem strange to you, but like... shouldn't it?  Shouldn't people generally agree on this kind of thing?  Or shouldn't one argument be more persuasive than another?  On one hand, it seems odd to me that we the people would be so evenly polarized on these issues, but on the other maybe it isn't so surprising.  I will now give several reasonable theories on why this even split exists-- the last is my favorite and the inspiration for writing this post.

One.

People have different circumstances, and one's circumstances play a huge role in one's opinions about what is best for the nation.  It's undeniable that we become biased because of our situations.  When it's cold, I imagine that I would take any heat over Jack Frost's nipping at my nose, yet, when summer rolls around, I reason that if it was winter, I could just bundle up and be a much happier camper.  It's been said that the goal of education should be to become conscious of these ideologies-- maybe that's another blog post.  Back to circumstances.

I find this idea difficult to agree with.  Circumstances are almost wholly dependent on wealth.  Right?  If your income is six digits, your house is probably bigger, your food is probably tastier, your clothes are probably nicer.  People say money can't but happiness, but no one actually believes that.  Now, we've all seen those graphs of "how many people hold what percentage of the nation's wealth," and from this illustration we can see that it's not a 50/50 split.  Few have very much.  Many have very little.  So if one's circumstances dictate one's voting habits and one's income dictates one's circumstances, then it doesn't make much sense to say that this is a reasonable explanation for the split.  That being said, there are factors other than the cash in your pocket that determine your quality of life, but we don't have time to explore every lurking variable, so we'll continue.

Two.

People have different ideologies.  I mentioned ideologies before.  If you're not voting on the basis of "what is best for the country" maybe you're voting on "who agrees most with my beliefs."  Maybe political issues equate to moral issues for some.  I mean, if a candidate for president thought that murder should be legal, would you vote for them?  Again, that's another blog post, but you understand what I'm trying to say: people don't vote based on what is objectively best for the nation, they vote based on what is most important to them.

This argument really isn't reasonable.  To say that this accounts for the even divide of our nation makes too many assumptions.  First, that most people vote based solely on ideology-- this likely isn't the case.  Second, that people are split evenly on a moral framework-- this seems counter-intuitive.  Third, that people with one belief will share a slew of others-- this makes sense for a religious nation which would be bound to some standardized moral code, but it is no longer popular (or accurate) to say that we are a particularly religious nation.

Three,

If you have a bag that contains 5 red marbles and 5 blue marbles, what are the odds that you will pick out a red marble if you randomly take 1 out?  This calculation is trivial.  There's a 50% chance.  What if it's random?

You're already mentally objecting.  Naturally.  People take pride in their team.  You like the Democrats because you believe in what they stand for!  Right?  You're a Republican because big government sucks!  Yeah?

I already told you I'm politically ignorant.  I will not engage in political debates over this post, but it seems to me that there are truths on both sides of this coin, and many people have just flipped it.

PS:  I didn't revise/edit this.  It wasn't worth it.  Thanks for not holding it against me.

Einstein, Bears, and Mental Health at William and Mary

Sit Einstein (not actual Einstein-- just the proverbial smart person) down in a room with a problem he or she couldn't hope to solve (we know they exist).  Never expose this person to anyone except the people overseeing the experiment, all of whom pretend as though they know the solution to the given problem and act as though it is simple.  Now, our proverbial smart person feels more like a proverbial dumb person.

Obviously, right?  Intelligence is relative.  I really haven't said anything profound, and, as is the case with most of my blog posts, I probably won't, but this is interesting, right?  Our Einstein doesn't even have to be the dumbest person in the room to feel like the dumbest person on earth-- as long as the only people he comes into contact with put on a convincing enough air of superior intelligence.

I feel like this happens all the time in the media, in conversation-- really in any mode of self-expression you could imagine.

I'm not going to give the speech about the digital age and being more concerned with our image than our actions.  I won't make the claim that we found our self-esteem on likes and shares.  Honestly, I'm kind of tired of that story, and I feel like it's age-old.  Haven't we been concerned with symbols of status for all of recorded history?  Like, I'm a complete idiot when it comes to stuff that happened a long time ago, but I'm pretty sure kings wore crowns and rich people wore purple.  The whole idea of compensating for insecurities by trying to paint a more perfect image of ourselves is nothing unique to the twenty-first century.

This is a bit of an aside, but if you're reading it, then it probably comes full circle in good time.  I think it's interesting to look at the way this makes other people feel.  Right?  Like, I've posted several pictures of my physics homework on social media in the past.  The average bear can't make heads or tails of it (half the time, neither can I).  It looks complicated and foreign.  This probably affects said bear in some way!  The bear probably doesn't like looking at what his fellow forest-beasts are doing and thinking "Hmm.  Well, I have no idea what that means."  Do I think about that when I hit post?  Hopefully not.  You'll have to take my word that I don't.  But I when I see Suzy's Computer Science test or Jimmy's Arabic homework, it opens my eyes to the things I don't know.  When I listen to sports analysts, I have no idea what they're talking about-- I don't speak their vernacular.

So now we get to be psychologists.  How does that make us feel?  It's a good question, and I think everyone has a different answer.  I don't feel dumb when I see everything Suzy and Jimmy know that I don't.  But I do feel kind of small.  I know a lot about some things.  Physics.  Math.  A few video games.  Euchre.  But I know very little of most others.  Language.  Culture.  History.  Now, I said I don't feel dumb when I see what other people know about the things I don't have much experience with, but what about our Einstein?  Let's say math is his thing, and the problem his overseers give him is to discover the lost proof of Fermat's Last Theorem.  No one has done this, yet, but they're pretending this problem is elementary (Watson)!  Poor Einstein would feel destroyed by this, wouldn't he?  Yet I'm not destroyed by the fact that my friend Jacob knows a lot more about history than I do.  I guess the difference is context.  Our experiment kind of assumes some level of naivete, limited exposure, etc...  We're all pretty well aware that we're not the dumbest person in the world, right?  Now we're getting to the point.  You feel it, don't you.

Our final stop on this intellectual journey brings us to academia.  I rarely post a Facebook status saying "I got a 54 on my Classical Mechanics exam!"  That's not really a thing.  But I might post that "I had a rough semester in Class Mech II, but I managed to pull out an A in the course!  Praise God!"  Why post one and not the other?  Obviously, the first makes me look like an idiot and the second makes me look like a hard-working, successful student who doesn't crumble in the face of hardship. I don't need to belabor that point-- you get why we publish what we do.  But what does this do to others?  Let's go back to our bear!  Let's say some other furry beast didn't end up with an A in Class Mech.  They see that I did and now they feel belittled.  In fact, anyone who posted much of anything about their grades probably talked about their good ones.  Now the sad bear is practically in Einstein's position because everyone is pretending like they know the proof to the Fermat problem.  Little does the grizzly know, I got a C+ to his or her A- in Electronics or a B- to his or her B+ in Quantum.

I feel as though this is the biggest issue at William and Mary.  I love my college.  Ask me one day to tell you about all of the good things.  But one thing we do poorly is portraying ourselves in a realistic light.  Here comes my psychoanalysis-- ready?  We all came from the top 10% of some high school somewhere.  We had good grades.  We had good SAT scores.  We were big fishes relative to our tiny ponds.  All of a sudden, someone drops us in the ocean, and we realize that we're not as big as we thought we were.  We question whether we can even survive in salt water.  We struggle to beat the average.  It's a shock!  It is!  It's scary.  It's unnerving.  Many of us went from success without effort to failure with blood, sweat, and tears in just one year.  So how do we compensate?  We tell all of our friends how much work we have to do and how hard our tests are, omitting the lazy Saturdays we've spent watching Netflix, then we post to Facebook about our amazing grades, neglecting to mention our failures.  The result?  Everyone feels like they're drowning.  If we were just honest with each other about success and failure alike, if we were just truthful about how many hours we actually spend studying versus wasting daylight, if we were just realistic in the way we portrayed ourselves, I believe it would do wonders for the mental health of this campus-- and I have a feeling that William and Mary is just a microcosm of the world at large.

Surround Einstein with enough convincing actors, and he might just lose hope before he ever has the chance to achieve something great.

"The Best Summer of Your Life"

     On May 24, 2015, I received an email from Liz Holohan that began: "June 14th is getting closer! Only a few more weeks till the best summer of your life."  Following this statement was about what you would expect from an email detailing what you should and shouldn't bring to UVA when packing for your seven week experience as a counselor at the Summer Enrichment Program.  But that statement was so bold!  "The best summer of your life."  Really?

But believe me when I say that it was.

     I love working with kids.  I truly do.  Kids of all ages.  I've been involved with nursery, Vacation Bible School, Mathnasium, you name it.  I love kids, and for good reason!  I love their energy.  Even when it's 5:00 AM and they've been up since 7:00 the morning before, they'll still be dancing around the hall singing all of their favorite songs from High School Musical.  I love their honesty.  When they don't want to go to the pool and claim that they would rather "just read a book instead," they'll pack one instead of a towel and spend three hours of the most beautiful day of the year turning pages under a tree while all of their friends are splashing around in the water.  I love their thoughtfulness.  When dinner is almost over, and they stand up to get dessert, they'll often ask you if you want anything while they're up.  I love their spontaneity.  When they're quietly reading a book about the Periodic Table, they'll decide after a page on Sodium that it's the perfect time to claim that they can do The Shuffle and insist on standing up and proving it, even though you never said they couldn't.  I love their loyalty.  Even after you've taken away 20 minutes of their favorite part of the day and, as punishment for some form of inappropriate behavior, forced them to do a "blob of paint" puzzle that's all one color and has no corners, they'll still wish you a good night before bed and tell you jokes over breakfast the next morning.  I love everything about kids, and if I tried to list all of my favorite things I would never get to the rest of this post, so forgive me for cutting this short, but there's just too much more to say.

     Okay, you get it.  I love kids.  Now I should explain to you a bit about what I did with them this summer.  The Summer Enrichment Program (SEP) at the University of Virginia is a program for gifted high school and middle school kids.  They have to go through a rigorous application process in order to attend the camp, and all of the applicants are the naturally curious, academic type to begin with, so the campers who end up attending truly are the best of the best as far as middle and high school scholars go.  My job was to be the counselor of eight rising Freshman.  What does it mean to be their counselor?  That's a huge question, but I'll explain it to you the same way I explained it to them.  I have two jobs as a counselor: to keep my campers safe and to help them have a good time.  Keeping them safe means that I maintain an environment that is saturated with kindness and respect and void of both physical and emotional danger.  Helping them have a good time means being relate-able, building relationships with them, and leading by example and having a good time myself.  Over the summer, I saw 312 high school campers and was responsible for 24 of my own (there were three sessions, and each two-week session I had eight out of 104 of the high school campers in my suite).

     As far as writing this post goes, I'm brought to the most difficult part.  I could not decide how I wanted to try and capture my SEP experience.  Through narrative?  I have plenty of stories to tell, but I can't use names or pictures of campers, and I don't want to ruin surprises for potential future campers who might stumble across this as their sibling or friend is reading it.  Through summary?  Every session was too different-- there were common themes, but it would not do each justice to try and lump them all together.  No, I can't narrate and I can't summarize.  Instead, I'm going to do it like I would if I was still back at SEP.  Every session, in the high school camp, we have what's called a "Junior Farewell" on the last day.  Junior year is the last year that you can attend SEP, so at the end of each session, we give our Juniors the opportunity to tell all of their fellow campers and counselors what SEP has meant to them.  I'm the type to choke up, stumble over my words, and flounder in those kinds of situations, so I would have prepared a written statement (and I still would have read it through tears, as any camper reading this knows).

This would be my speech at a Junior Farewell.

     SEP.  Summer Enrichment Program.  "You're not wrong."  It's a program that happens in the summer, and I definitely feel enriched.  I definitely feel enriched.
     To enrich.  "To enhance the quality of."  To say that I am enriched is to say that I am better because of SEP.  But that's so vague. "Because of SEP."  What is SEP?  Who is SEP?  "Better."  Better how?
     From a counselor's perspective, SEP has nothing to do with classes and very little to do with any sort of activity.  Most of those things are, as each counselor has thought to themselves countless times, "for the kids." Yes, we walked you to your classes, but, for me, that was more about the chance to get to know you better and make sure that you got there safely than about the class itself.  And yes, we organized and participated in activities and had a lot of fun doing it, but my favorite part of the Counselor Dating Game and the Fashion Show was seeing the smiles on all of the campers' faces, not hearing about Pam's and Sam's sandbox or watching the baby Corticorn be born into this world.  To a counselor, or at least to this counselor, SEP is not about classes or activities, and I understand that many campers share this sentiment.  To me, SEP is about family.
     I would often greet both campers and counselors alike with: "hey, fam."  Why do you think that was?  "Fam" isn't just something that's convenient and fun to say.  It has meaning.  Obviously, it's short for family, and I meant it that way.  Some kids thought of their suite-mates as their brothers or sisters.  A few campers told me that they viewed their counselor as "the older sibling that gets left in charge, except more fun."  I know that several counselors thought of their campers as their kids.  I heard one counselor describe his job as "being a single father of eight," and multiple kids told me this summer that I "would make a great dad."  I think it's no coincidence that this theme of family came up so often this summer.  It's difficult to nail down exactly what part of the SEP family each member of the camp represents, but I think that most who were a part of the Summer Enrichment Program experience would agree that, in some way, we all grew to be one giant family.
     That's cute.  Really, it is.  It's a little cliche, but it's cute.  But how does that enrich someone?  A family isn't inherently enriching, but this one definitely had a positive influence on me.
I learned a lot about myself-- my strengths, my weaknesses.  I learned a lot about others-- their diversity, their complexity.  I learned a lot about responsibility-- the pressures, the rewards.  I feel as though these aren't things that I need to explore in great, long-winded detail.  Suffice to say these things.  A strength is that I have almost endless amounts of patience, but a weakness is that my passion for any given thing is very largely dependent on the passion of others; I could be more self-sustaining in that way.  Everyone is different, but they are equally complex and valuable.  The situations that are the most trying yield the greatest sense of satisfaction.  These three lessons have been very valuable to me, and I am better for them.
     I am walking away from this summer with countless amazing memories.  I will forever think back on the events that took place at SEP and smile.  To list a few that stand out, I will never forget my first paper plate award.  I will never forget about the two campers who sang "It's Raining Men" at Karaoke and absolutely killed it, even though I warned them that it might be difficult if they don't already know the song.  I will never forget the Junior who told me that he was up late just thinking about how he could apply everything he learned in my special topic to different aspects of his life.  I will never forget the twin who told me through tears at the Junior Farewell that I was her counselor crush, "not in a weird way, but because I just really think you're a great person."  I will never forget the times that one camper in particular smiled, even though she was always trying her hardest not to.  I will never forget the camper who rarely spoke, but who, when she opened her mouth to sing, got the entire camp on their feet in admiration and amazement.  I will never forget the secret handshakes that I had with campers.  I will never forget when one of my campers came up to me on five separate occasions within the same fifteen minute span to say goodbye after the Junior Farewell.  I'll never forget when a camper finally agreed to wear the matching outfit for our suite's performance of "Man in the Mirror," and how he ended up on his knees, singing into the microphone at the top of his lungs.  I will never forget the name of the camper that I forgot four times on the first two days (PS: I'm still sorry).  I will never forget answering questions, telling stories, dancing, or singing with the squam.  I will never forget the friendship bracelets and paper flowers that campers made me or the letters they wrote me.  I will never forget the conversations I had at social time and at the pool with campers who were gracious enough to spend that time talking to me.  There's a lot that I won't forget, and these few only begin to scratch the surface; I could write a book of all of the amazing things that I'll have the pleasure of remembering.
     Whew.  That was a lot to take in.  So I've been enriched with life lessons, I've been enriched with memories.  But there's one more way I've been enriched, and it's so obvious that I don't really even need to say it, but the way these things go is that I tell you it's "so obvious that I don't really even need to say it," and then I tell you anyway.  It's people.
     The people that I have met at SEP have truly changed my life.  I am a human of very few friends.  I will always prefer one or two very close relationships to many very shallow ones; however, the unique experience of connecting with hundreds of different people over such a short amount of time at such a deep level has left me a different human being than I was before.  I didn't just get to meet campers and counselors; we lived in the same building, we ate in the same dining halls, we did everything together.  I talked for hours with campers and counselors alike and forged relationships that will not end with my employment.  Thank you to every camper who took time out of your two short weeks to spend it with me.  Thank you to every counselor who put up with my antics and didn't ostracize me for not participating in every weekend activity.  Thank you to every member of the staff who doesn't get as much attention as the counselors for your invaluable work this summer.  I am not the person I was seven weeks ago; my quality has been enhanced-- I have been enriched.

Thank you, SEP.




**As always, please tell me if you find any spelling/formatting/whatever mistakes, so I can fix them!

God's Glory as a Function of Everything

What is the meaning of life?  Any Bible-believing Christian would say: "To bring God the most glory."  Okay.  Great.  The meaning of life, our purpose in this universe, the reason everything happens the way it does, is to bring the most glory possible to the God who created us.  I like that, I really do.  It makes sense, it provides a convenient and satisfying explanation to why confusing things happen, it establishes a greater good.  Perfect.

Now.  The most glory.  What does that mean?  Rather, what does that imply?  It's a truly profound question!  Including the word "most" implies a comparison.  This brings God this much glory, whereas that brings God that much glory, and this much is greater than that much.  It implies that glory is quantifiable-- if it wasn't, there would be no this much and that much, there would be no most.  But there is.  Therefore, if we accept that we exist to maximize glory, then we must accept that glory is some value that can be changed, increased or decreased-- it's a variable.  It's a variable in a function that takes into account everything that has happened, is happening, and will happen.  God's glory can be expressed as a function of everything.  Of course, we couldn't hope to solve this equation, but I deal with all kinds of functions that I can't solve.  It's not really about the solution-- we leave that to the computers.  It's about what the function says about the system it describes.

Okay.  Let's break this down.  We have an expression.  Our expression is "God's glory as a function of everything."  What are we trying to do?  We're trying to find a maximum.  This is no surprise!  Mathy people do this all the time.  I can't remember the last time I looked for anything other than a minimum or a maximum in an interesting equation.  This is because extrema imply a state of equilibrium, a static point where the function is happy.  I hope you're tracking.

How do we find a maximum?  We look at the rate of change (the derivative for you math nerds), and when that rate of change is zero, the function is at an extrema.  With some more mathematical voodoo, we can determine whether it's a minimum or a maximum, but I won't bore you with those details.  The point is that it's possible!

So where are we now?  The purpose of our existence is to bring God the most glory.  Glory is quantifiable.  God's glory can be expressed as a function of everything.  We can find the maximum of this function.  Good.  But what does this maximum represent?  It shows the discrete values of our independent variables at which our dependent variable, God's glory, reaches its greatest value.  In English, it describes a reality, a past, a present, and a future, in which God receives the most glory possible.  Now things are getting interesting.

What happens if we have multiple absolute maxima?  From a mathematical perspective, this means that there exist multiple values for our independent variables for which God's glory will be maximized.  That's straightforward enough, but what is our physical interpretation of this?  There can be multiple realities in which God receives a maximum amount of glory.  This might not seem that interesting at first, but this idea could go in two directions from here.  Theologically, it could be an exploration of free will manifested in mathematics.  Physically, it could be an explanation of the Multiverse Theory from a religious perspective.  We'll glance at both.

Free will.  Age old.  Often debated.  Never resolved.  My belief is that absolute sovereignty cannot coexist peacefully with free will the way most people define it.  However, the question of sovereignty aside, this whole maximization thing is a pretty elegant solution to a few of the other issues people have with free will.  How can God receive the most glory if we have any control over our destiny?  Wouldn't one shift in the independent variables cause a deviation from the maximum we talked about?  Well, anyone who has worked with differential equations knows that small perturbations about the extrema won't necessarily cause a shift from equilibrium, but the conclusion that we can draw from our exploration is that even a large deviation can drop us off at another absolute maximum, assuming the existence of multiple global extrema.  Long story short, if multiple absolute maxima exist in the function for God's glory, then it's possible that we could still bring God the most glory even with the flexibility to make our own decisions.

The second path relates to the theory of multiple universes, the Multiverse Theory.  Honestly, it doesn't quite fit, but perhaps many realities exist, each of which plays out to God's ultimate, maximum glory, and rather than making choices, all possible permutations of our decisions are played out on different stages.  I'm no supporter of the idea that multiple realities exist, and I'm pretty sure that the Multiverse Theory describes a system where all of the different universes have different physical laws.  It's the Multiverse Theory, after all, not the Parallel Universe Theory.  But it's still interesting to think about the theory as an explanation for multiple possible maxima of the function I described earlier.

Whew!  So a brief summary.  God's glory can be expressed as a function of everything, and reality is described by that function at its maximum.  This gets more complicated when multiple absolute maxima exist, but the implications of this complication provide some pretty convenient parallels to existing theories of both religion and physics.

And then I found five dollars.

A Break Through

            In order to discover something truly new, one of your fundamental assumptions has to change.

            This is an idea that I stole from a Ted Talk.  I mean, I kind of stole it from a Ted Talk.  It's not uncommon knowledge, but its implications are pretty profound.  This idea represents a barrier: the barrier between what you know and what you don't.  As a student, this is a barrier which I encounter often.  In fact, I claim that my full time job is to take a hammer to this barrier every day of the week.  However, students aren't the only people who run into this wall.  Have you ever put together a puzzle?  There comes a time in the piecing together of any puzzle when you feel like you've been given a bad box-- the puzzle-maker is out to get you, so he gave you a thousand ridiculously similar pieces that just don't fit together the way they should.  In the end, you're almost always wrong, and the feelings of frustration, hopelessness, and betrayal (because the puzzle-maker was supposed to be on your side) that you encountered at your lowest moment now contribute to the sense of accomplishment you feel when you've put together the picture that probably shouldn't have been broken up into a thousand tiny pieces to begin with.  That's what I want to talk about-- the dichotomy between despair and excitement and the way the former magnifies the latter once the barrier has been overcome.

             A topic of conversation that often comes up when I'm talking with my fellow science or math majors is the luxury which other students take for granted that is not needing to find a specific answer all the time.  Writing papers sucks.  It does.  But when I sit down with a blank Word Document in front of me, at least I know that in six hours I'll have about ten, sparkling pages that I can fork over to my professor, even if it's the worst paper I've ever written.  With science and math, you don't have that assurance.  There was an evening when Jacob and I sat down and spent hours struggling with a problem to which we never found the answer.  I filled three pages with algebraic manipulations for that one question, but eventually, we just had to move on.  There's something horribly depressing about sinking hours of time and energy into a problem which you never solve.  But I can guarantee that there was a physics student, we'll call him Jimjam Flimflam, sitting somewhere on the campus of William and Mary that same night who, after pulling out the majority of his hair while his roommate slept soundly in his warm, comfortable bed, landed on a solution that made sense-- and I'm sure it was glorious.  I bet Jimjam Flimflam gently set his books aside, stood up from his chair, ripped off his shirt, and quietly danced around the room punching the air and yelling silently in celebration, careful not to wake his snoring roommate.

            Do you know why he solved the problem and Jacob and I didn't?  He found a crack in the barrier, and he exploited it, smacking it with his hammer as it spider-webbed across the whole surface, until finally, he broke through.  That crack is the knowledge you have.  That hammer is your textbook and your notes.  And the other side of that barrier is a deeper level of understanding.  The thicker the wall, the greater your frustration, but the greater your frustration, the more magnificent your victory.  Some people go out and look for the thickest barrier they can find and start chipping away at it.  Some people start chiseling away without realizing just how deep they'll have to go.  Some people turn around at the first obstacle they encounter.  It's my job as a student and as a scientist to learn to see the barrier as a chance to accomplish something.  It's my job to embrace the challenge of a problem that I haven't solved.  One day, it will be my job to embrace the challenge of a problem that no one has solved. 

            However, embracing the challenge does not mean overcoming the obstacle.  There are humans who have spent their entire existence on problems that they never see solved, just like there are students who spend their entire evening on problems that they never see solved.  But that's okay.  There can be joy in the struggle.  I've never won a race, but I loved running track.  I've never finished writing a book, but I've had a great time writing chapter one.  I've never beaten Arjun in Melee, but I enjoy playing him.  You get the idea.

            Here's my advice to you: learn to appreciate the puzzle.  Have fun taking every likely candidate for the gap in your sky and twisting it every way possible before putting it back on the table.  Smile at the ridiculousness of the notion that the puzzle-maker is pitting himself against you (but don't completely discount the idea).  Laugh at the simplicity of the solution when you find it.  Breaking down the barrier isn't about scribbling down the correct numbers on the page-- it's about the understanding you gained from finding them, and that's something you can't get from an answer key.

            

Physics and Christianity Revisited

Last year around this time, I posted a thing.  That thing was a blog post entitled "Reconciling Physics with Christianity."  I posted it somewhat ignorantly and have done some exploration, both biblical and otherwise, of the big ideas addressed in that blog post.  This year, I'm going to give you all the re-evaluated version of that post exploring three specific ideas: the Big Bang Theory, the Theory of Evolution, and the concept of free will.  As a scientist and a Christian, these are ideas on which I have decided I need to take an educated stance.  That position is my own; it is ever-evolving, and I welcome alternative perspectives, whether in agreement or opposition, so do not hesitate to comment if you, the reader, have something you would like to share on any of these topics. 

The Big Bang Theory is the idea that the entire universe began as an infinitely hot, infinitely dense singularity which, at some point, began to expand rapidly.  During this expansion, particles collided, things happened, and, long story short, the universe as we know it was born.  The process that I have just crudely described is believed to have taken place over the course of roughly fourteen-and-a-half billion years.

Cool, we're all on the same page.

Last semester, I took a class called "Modern Physics."  It was basically an introduction to Quantum and Relativity.  In this class, I was exposed to the foundation upon which the Big Bang Theory was built.  I learned about the microwave background and about the history of our universe from a physicist's perspective.  I learned that there is a lot of evidence, both mathematical and empirical, for the Big Bang Theory.  I learned that there are many good reasons for the theory's popularity and lifespan.  The predictive calculations performed using this model for universal expansion have proven to be almost undeniably accurate.  If our universe expanded from a singularity, then it probably happened in this way.

All of that being said, I still can't subscribe to the theory.  The most outstanding detail, in my opinion, that the Big Bang Theory fails to shed light on is the very beginning of time.  Scientists have not been able to determine just what initiated the "Big Bang."  There are theories, but they are not provable, and any theory that cannot be experimentally proven falls under faith, not science.  Which brings me to what I believe.  I can't fathom an explanation for either eternal existence or spontaneous formation (also known as creation) without a prime mover.  In this way, and in many others, the Big Bang Theory points to intelligent design.

But I said the evidence of the Big Bang was "almost undeniably accurate"!  How could something so convincing be incorrect?  Honestly, it's a great model.  As I said, if our universe expanded from a singularity, the Big Bang Theory would likely be the one to correctly describe this expansion.  However, the acceptance of God as the creator of the universe throws a monkey wrench into the equation.  For God as I know him to be real, the Bible must be true.  Why?  Because God is omniscient and omnipotent; He says that the Bible is true, and He cannot be wrong.  For the Bible to be true, the universe cannot be fourteen-and-a-half billion years old because it reads that God created the earth as it is in seven days (I know many of you will disagree, so I will likely end up exploring the foundation for this belief in more detail in the near future).  If the earth is not fifteen billion years old, the Big Bang Theory breaks down from a mathematical perspective and cannot be true.  However, it is possible for the evidence of the Big Bang to exist without the occurrence of rapid universal expansion because God created the earth (and everything else) with apparent age.  Trees were not created as seeds nor were humans created as babies.  In the same way, our universe wasn't created a newborn; it was created with an apparent age of fourteen-and-a-half billion years which can be accurately modeled with an idea such as the Big Bang Theory.

In brief summary, the Big Bang Theory in conjunction with my Christian convictions leads me to the conclusion that God created the universe with apparent age in such a fashion that it matches a predictive model which obeys the physical laws He set in place.

Evolution is supported by a metric crap-ton of evidence as well.  I haven't done too much looking into it, though, to be completely honest, and I'll tell you why.  I have already come to the conclusion that God exists.  I could write a book describing all of the factors that have led me to this end, but I won't bother you with its pages now.  Instead, I will simply explain why, as a Bible-believing Christian, I cannot subscribe to the Theory of Evolution.  To reiterate, I'm taking the existence of God for granted and going from there.

There are two fundamental aspects of Genesis which make the Theory of Evolution impossible from a Christian perspective.  First, Genesis explicitly claims that God created the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and the beasts of the land.  If the Bible is accurate, then these creatures cannot have evolved from a single-celled organism; simply put: God says they didn't.  Second, Genesis claims the existence of a soul in humans.  The book does not mention God giving any other living creature a soul.  Man could not have evolved from any other species if God as I know him exists because there would be no defined line between beast and man.  This gradient between animals and humans, who were uniquely created in the image of God, makes the appointment of a soul impossible to make non-arbitrarily.

Simply, if the book of Genesis is true, then the Theory of Evolution cannot be accurate.

Free will.  I guess my stance on free will depends on how you define it.  God has many qualities-- among the first that come to mind are omnipotent and omniscient.  We could never surprise a God who is both of these things.  Lots of people get their panties all up in a bundle when they hear this and start protesting that "a loving God would give us a choice."  But what is a choice?  As far as any of us have the ability to see, our choices are our own.  God's inescapable will for each of us should not detract from the freedom of our choices from a human perspective.  I refer to this paradox as "the perfect illusion."  If God truly is in control, then our choices cannot be our own; however, if we are puppets, we don't feel the strings.  

Think about it, though.  I know the puppet illustration isn't agreeable, but if God's purpose on earth was really left in the hands of such broken people as we are, would we truly have the promise of victory?  How could we, who struggle with all multitudes of sins every day, hope to accomplish the work our God without his guiding hand?  I know this question lends itself to the response that "God's hand does guide us, but it doesn't force us," but consider the implications of that statement.  How many times, when you were faced with temptation, have you given in, despite the conviction that you felt even as it was happening?  We are totally depraved; we will always sin.  God's grace, however, is perfect, and it is sufficient in our weakness.  If God did not intervene on our behalf, we could never fulfill his will on earth.  

This conversation naturally leads to the question of the elect.  God's chosen people are often referred to throughout the Bible.  It's indicated with complete clarity that the elect were chosen before the beginning of time.  This doesn't sit well with people for all of the same reasons that the absence of free will doesn't.  The most common argument against the idea of the elect is that it contradicts God's loving nature.  I would argue, however, that it enhances it.  If the gift of salvation was awarded based on anything that we have done, everyone who has ever walked the earth aside from God's son would go to hell.  It is God's overwhelming love and grace and mercy that pardon's his elect.  Furthermore, if we can agree on God's omniscience, then we can't disagree on the existence of God's chosen people.  My cousin, Jeff, is quick to point out that the only reason his worship can be genuine is because God chose him, a sinner who doesn't deserve salvation, to be one of his adopted children.  If it was our choice or our merit that earned us our place in God's kingdom, then we could no longer earnestly sing about his mercy.

In short, God exists outside of time; there is nothing that surprises Him.  He is omniscient, omnipotent, and all-loving at the same time.  That being said, we are given the perfect illusion of free will, which, though it makes the hard times seem harder, it also makes the victory seem sweeter.

So that's what I've come to so far.  The Big Bang is an excellent model.  Evolution disagrees with the Bible on a fundamental level.  Free will is the perfect illusion.

The Christian Vernacular

          "I hope God imparts wisdom to your soul and adorns you with his blessings in this time of tribulation."

          It's weird to listen to the way Christians talk.  It's as though we feel the need to put on this facade whenever we're in religious circles.  You hear a lot about the way people act happy or "good" and about the way they lift their hands during worship, but I'm not going to talk about those things.  I'm going to talk about the words we use.  

          I find that it happens most often when we pray or when we give advice.  How often have you bowed your head and closed your eyes, then felt like you were listening to another language?  I'm not talking about tongues-- that's another topic.  I'm talking about the words that people might use once every couple of months in everyday conversation that they manage to squeeze into every sentence of their prayers.  I'm talking about storm analogies and generic, out-of-context references to scripture.  We weave together all of these things into a tapestry that, when it's done, looks nothing like we do.  If you're getting defensive: don't.  It's nothing that I'm not guilty of, and it's not an idea that's specific to Christianity-- we try and fit in everywhere we go (for some reason).  However, I feel like it's particularly noticeable in religious spheres, so that's what I'm going to spend most of my words exploring.

          So that's the Christian Vernacular.  The words and generic turns of phrase that Christians use around their "brothers and sisters in Christ."  But let's talk about why anyone should care.  It's a free country, right?  Talk how you want to (talk) when you want to (talk that way)!  Sure, sure.  But I have some concerns.  The Christian Vernacular is indicative of training that has happened over the course of our lives; it shows that much of our speech in these circles is habitual.  This is... largely unavoidable, right?  Religion is a very routine thing for many people.  It shouldn't be.  But it is.  And when you let your religion become something that happens at church on Sundays, you come face to face with the real danger at work here.  The real danger is not habit of speech; it's habit of thought.  Water that is stagnant becomes polluted and gross.  An athlete who doesn't improve can't compete.  A Christian who limits himself to a weekly routine suffers a similar fate.  If you aren't getting better, you're getting worse, and it's important to avoid habit of thought if we truly want to improve as students of the Bible and as followers of Christ.  

          "My thought isn't habitual, Calvin.  Who are YOU to tell ME that just because I talk differently at church than I do at home, I'm becoming a routine Christian?"  No one, of course.  But that's not the only issue with the Christian Vernacular.  Think of the non-believer who comes to church on Sunday and gets little to nothing out of the sermon because it's so littered with our oddities that they can hardly follow along?  Think of the friend to whom you're trying to reach out who can't understand the ideas your trying to convey because your phraseology in relation to Christian topics has always been tainted by the Christian Vernacular that your friend doesn't speak?  It's difficult to break from the way you do anything you've been trained your whole life to do.  People don't bother to try and listen in or follow along when Jeff and I talk about Yu-Gi-Oh or Super Smash because it sounds like a foreign language to them-- we've been told this on multiple occasions.  We're commanded to spread the gospel; how will we do that when even those with ears to hear trip over our exclusive language?  Now, to be fair, I'm being a little ridiculous.  People aren't stupid; they know what you're trying to say.  However, there are important subtleties that can be lost in translation, and I think that's worth noting.

          My main concern, though, is sincerity.  Maybe not even sincerity, but at LEAST the appearance of sincerity.  It is important both to be genuine and to appear genuine in religious spheres.  However, I think that in an attempt to sound genuine, we sacrifice our sincerity, if that makes any sense.  I'll try to explain.  People roll up to church and want to sound like they've been they've been there before, so they use all of these classic "I can do all things" and "for God so loved the world" deals when they talk with their friends.  Then, it comes time to pray, and they want to sound like they're good at praying (whatever that means), so they use all these fancy-pants words that they hear other people say when their eyes are closed.  There's clearly a disconnect between the heart and the mouth there, right?  And I know what you're thinking "I don't do that."  But, in truth, we all do.  It may not be conscious, but we do it, and I think that we would be better off if we didn't.

          I think it would behoove Christians to try to marry their speech in and out of the church building.  It's a good exercise to, when you're praying alone in your room, make an effort to say what you're thinking and what you want to communicate to God rather than what you've been trained to say to him.  I often find myself using the same structure day after day when I'm praying, and I've found that, when I do this, I'm usually distracted or thinking about other things.  This is a habit I'm trying to break.  The next step is to make the same changes when you're talking to your Christian friends.  It's all about intentionality-- something I've been working on lately.  I don't want to tell anyone what to do, but if you feel like this is something you're struggling with, as I have been, then these are just some ideas to get you started on making some changes for the better.

That's a lot to chew on, but here is the tl;dr version:

-Christians talk funny; I call this the Christian Vernacular.

-Habits of speech often reflect habits of thought, and these are dangerous.

-People don't want to listen to a bunch of stuff they don't really understand.

-Sincerity matters.

          I want to leave you guys with a challenge that I was faced with last week at InterVarsity, adapted slightly.  What is one positive change that you could make in your life?  What is keeping you from making that change?  If you ask yourself this every day and make a genuine effort to be intentional about making those changes, imagine the person you could become.