If you attended the Radical Orthodoxy and Process Theology panel at the 2007 AAR in San Diego, one of the interesting commonalities between the two sensibilities was an embrace of a return to metaphysics.  In 2006, the Centre of Theology and Philosophy hosted a conference called ‘Belief and Metaphysics’ (CoTP report here) around this issue (although not related to process) and subsequently published a collection of essays from the conference by the same title.

At this year’s AAR in Chicago, Nate Kerr is moderating a panel on the recently-released Belief and Metaphysics volume in the Veritas series entitled “The Return of Metaphysics: A dialogue on the occasion of the publication of Belief and Metaphysics.”  The panel is graciously sponsored by SCM Press‘ Veritas Series and The Centre of Theology and Philosophy.  Click on the poster above to see the larger version which lists all the details for the event, including the list of panelists.  If you received your AAR book in the mail this past week, you will also find these details listed on page 151. It looks to be a pretty exciting panel!

Regrettably, chances are very likely that I will not be able to attend the AAR this year because of our upcoming move to Nottingham in the fall.  We have a bit too much going on and not enough money to fly everywhere and attend everything.  However, I will be going to and presenting at this, which will be much easier to get to from Nottingham.  Still, if you can make it to the AAR, I highly encourage attendance at this this panel.  It looks to be quite interesting and a lot of fun with a good diverse response to the book.  The book itself is very diverse so we’ll see what happens!

I couldn’t find a description for this video, but it’s pretty cool. More videos documenting the trial and error process before arriving at this stage can be found here.

Well hoo-dawgies that was a crazy episode!  Agreeing with Jay & Jack, I think while this season finale didn’t quite have the jaw-dropping wow factor that season 3’s finale had, but I think this one was a better-written episode.  My first thoughts in bulleted form are:

• Yes, I was surprised that Locke was in the coffin.  I kept thinking it would be Ben.  It had to be a non-”Oceanic 6″ person or else the funeral would have most likely been well-attended by at least the paparazzi.   How awesome is it that Ben walks in the room with Jack, surprising probably a majority of people.  I have a hunch, though, that Locke (”Jeremy Bentham“) might not be really dead: see the original “Orchid video” for the doubling effect (but is it a true doubling or just the same thing in a time shift?).
• Speaking of Bentham, Jeremy Bentham was a philosopher of the utilitarianism bent who was influenced by–ehem–the philosopher John Locke.  (First time I heard of Bentham was in reading Hilary Putnam.)  It would be curious to see if Locke’s head in the casket was a wax one!
• I’m absolutely incredibly happy that Desmond and Penny found each other!  That was probably my most favorite part of the whole episode.  Awesome, awesome.  I’ve always been a huge fan of Desmond, and especially after “The Constant” that has been solidified.  [I think "The Constant" is probably hands-down the best hour of TV I've ever seen on so many levels, but especially the sci-fi + romance level.  The fact that they were able to wed complex story-telling with a really good story about a troubled relationship in a compelling way is sick.]
• I thought the fight scene between Keamy and Sayid was awesome.
• I’m actually quite bummed that Michael died (see more below).
• I actually don’t think Jin is dead.  My guess is that he got blown off the boat or jumped in the water just in time.
• I have a feeling that Desmond and Ben will probably have a showdown at some point.  Some of the callers on this episode of the Jay & Jack show have suggested that when Ben told Jack that “everybody” has to return to the island, that “everybody” included Desmond.  Considering Desmond will not leave Penny’s side ever again, Penny would then have to accompany Desmond, and since we know Ben is now on a hunt to kill Widmore’s daughter Penny, maybe there will be a showdown there.  Continuing to think aloud, I’m not sure if that would work if, according to Ben’s announcement of the rules, Ben can’t ever return to the island if he moves it.  Self-debunking theories for sale!
• Jennifer raises an excellent point: after Claire disappears, how on earth was Aaron getting fed?  My suggestion: Dharma formula?
• I’m glad that a lot of questions were answered, but am of course not disappointed that more questions were raised.  How else would they get people to look forward to the start of the fifth season?

Here’s a couple of links:

This one comes from Popular Mechanics and it’s entitled “Physicist: Einstein Would Approve of Moving the Island on Lost.”  This stuff is nearly all over my head, but the final graph is interesting:

The Season Four finale also makes reference to the Casimir Effect. This is a well known phenomenon in quantum mechanics, and has been measured experimentally. The Casimir effect is a consequence of the fact that the vacuum contains energy. Some people speculate that one could draw on this vacuum energy for an unlimited supply. I don’t think so, but maybe I am wrong, and Ben has figured out a way to do that. I suspect that Ben, too, is a physicist—the one person who has figured out how to understand the connection between quantum theory and relativity, and to manipulate them—at least to some degree, just as he manipulates people. That’s why Charles Widmore is so anxious to capture Ben alive. Only Ben really understands the physics.

And this second link is an interview with Harold Perrineau.  Basically, Perrineau is pretty disappointed with the writer’s decision to bring Michael back only to have him killed off to (he guesses) satiate the fans’ bloodlust for killing Libby and Ana Lucia.  He would have wanted there to be at least some happy resolution between Michael and Walt.  Well, while it’s true that the writers can always bring a character back in some form in either ghost or flashback form, I too am disappointed by this writing decision.  I know not many people like Michael, but I warmed up to him after he and Jin became friends.  True, he died while saving a bunch of other people and clearly, that is noble, but still, I’m pretty bummed about that writing choice.

Some questions:

• Claire?  Is she dead?  What’s up with her?
• Locke: obviously, this is is everybody’s question as he showed up in the coffin.  What happened in between the future and the end of season 4?
• Is Sawyer’s chest naturally hairless?
• Do Sawyer and Juliette hook up?  If so how much more mad would Ben be? (”You’re mine!”)
• So grown-up Walt is definitely back, but what will his continuing role be?  He clearly had a weird mystery about him that used to freak people out, but since leaving the island, that part of his story has mainly been dropped.
• When they re-shot the future flash with bearded Jack, couldn’t they have made his beard look more convincing this time around?
• What is up with Richard Alpert and his non-aging, eyeliner-wearing self?  What is his connection to Locke?  Will Locke ever remember that he met Alpert when he was younger?  One caller on the J&J show suggested that that meeting might have actually been in the future somehow.  That would explain why Alpert says to pick out what Locke “already” owns, but it sure doesn’t explain why he is (or appears) five years old.
• Will the final episode of season six (before season 7 — the Zombie Season) have the remaining living characters dancing around and singing like Ewoks on the island, surrounded by all the ghosts of their friends a la Return of the Jedi?

Your thoughts?

This comes from my friend Dave-O. Just watch.

The new Weezer video has tons of references to a bunch of popular Youtube videos. Well, more than references: they got most of these people to show up in their video. The only thing about the song that weirds me out is that the verse sounds a bit like Sugar Ray while the chorus sounds like Weezer. Although maybe the verse is closer to Pinkerton-era style. Anyway, time for some Mentos and Diet Coke.

John Wright was my adviser, and my two readers were Dr. Rob Thompson and Chris Simpson (my ‘external’ reader at LCCS). The defense went rather well, and it was oddly a lot of fun. My committee asked some great critical questions, and they tell me I handled them well. Turns out they are passing the thesis “with distinction,” which I’m extremely humbled about, as apparently I didn’t think this was even an option.

I know many have already asked to read the thesis, but I may have forgotten a few names. If you’re still interested, please leave me a comment below and I’ll e-mail it your direction (just put your e-mail address in the e-mail box, no need to put it in the comment itself–I’ll see it). The thesis is around 110 pages double-spaced, ~41,000 words. I’d love to hear your thoughts, further questions and criticism.

The evening after the defense, we had a small, casual graduation reception. The purpose of this particular reception was to allow our parents to meet the professors in the department. I introduced my parents to all the professors and it was a really pleasant time, enjoying finger foods and the like. As time was getting short with my parents needing to help my sister Jenna move out of her dorm, we had just enough time to introduce my parents to one remaining prof, Dr. Rob Thompson — one of my thesis readers. With apologies to Dr. Rob Thompson, Hegel, Schelling, and most of all my parents, the conversation ended with something that very much sounded like this:

My Dad: I have to commute a total of 3 hours every work day. It really puts a strain on my back. Of course Janet here only –

My Mom (Janet): Yeah, I only have to commute about 6 miles to work!

Dr. Thompson: When I was in Nampa, Idaho [at NNU] I would get annoyed if it took me longer than 5 minutes to get to work.

Me: Wow, yeah, it takes me 25-30 minutes to get to work in the mornings.

Dr. Thompson: The delays were almost always caused by a cow in the road. There’s another cow in the road this time–it was always a cow.

Dad: That happens a lot where we live too, and it gets incredibly dangerous. Not too long ago a whole heard of Blank Angus got out and were on the road — and you couldn’t see them!

Me: Whoa! That’s like the “black ice” of cows!

Them: [laughter]

Me again: Even better, it’s like “the night in which all cows are black!!!”

Them: [crickets]

Graduation the day after the defense was really cool. Apparently, graduating makes people forget awful philosophy jokes. To tell you the truth, I didn’t really think much about graduation until I was actually there. I was so focused on just getting the thesis done, and then trying to not focus on much at all in the week and a half of relaxation before the defense, that I kind of forgot that graduation is a big deal. That, and the PLNU campus turns into a crazy zoo. They have split the graduation up in to one graduate graduation and two undergraduate graduations, so it smooths things over a bit regarding the zoo factor. I must admit that it was nice to feel young at graduation: most of the people were slightly older than me, if not twice my age who were graduating. Aside from a friend of mine who is 65 years old in the MA theology program (and he has the energy and heart of a 20-year-old!), most of the students in our program are about 3 years younger than me, at least.

After graduation, Tiana threw a graduation party for me at our good friend Ester’s house. It was a totally awesome time of relaxation and conversation with good friends and family. In addition to my parents and sister, Tiana’s mom, sister Shalina, brother Stephen, and sister-in-law Shannon where all there as well. I was really thankful for being surrounded with good, loving people.

Okay, now rewind a couple days to Thursday morning, the day before my thesis defense. It was already a roller coaster of a week. I wake up, check my e-mail and decide to check out this page (I’d been hitting the refresh button on it all week). My name is printed on that page on the bottom, which means… It’s official: I GOT THE OVERSEAS RESEARCH SCHOLARSHIP!!! This means that the funding for my PhD tuition is basically paid in full! (technically it’s for a year of funding but it ‘renews’ each year upon ’satisfactory progress’ or something like that). I was pretty emotional and immediately called Tiana who was still on her way to work to let her know the good news. She was super happy and relieved — we were not planning on taking out more loans on top of the undergraduate loans that we are still paying off. And then I called John Wright, who was also incredibly stoked. So, the next day I went into my thesis defense with the semester-long weight of worrying about the ORS lifted off my shoulders.

Tiana and I decided to wait until our parents arrived in San Diego before telling them. Now that they know and are super excited for us, they are all incredibly eager to visit us in Robin Hood country. So now, what remains is trying to figure out all the details on how exactly we can get over there so that they have somebody to visit. We’ve already received some extremely helpful tips from a couple of students already in the program (thanks Anthony and Aaron!). And, Tiana also found this incredible resource which, although that guy attends Durham University, should still apply pretty well to the UK in general.

By September 22, I will begin my PhD studies in theology at the University of Nottingham to study under Conor Cunningham. We hope to move to Nottingham a month ahead of that time to find a place to live and do some job hunting for Tiana. There will not be any employment restrictions placed upon on her from my student visa–the only restrictions will be on me. I will most likely continue doing work for The Centre of Theology and Philosophy, and perhaps some assorted side projects for some extra scratch, but my full-time computer programmer days are coming to an end. There’s a bunch of other details of the move to work out, of course, but this post has gone on long enough, and I’m sure we’ll figure those things out in due time.

Thanks to everybody for all the encouragement and conversations along the way. Special thanks to my wife Tiana for her encouragement, laughter, for reminding me what is really important, and most of all her love. She’s a keeper.

I honestly have no idea how we ended up in this position to be able to move to Nottingham for PhD work, but we are really very thankful for everything.

[Cross-posted to tianaanderic.com]

as a thank you to our fans for your continued support, we are giving away the new nine inch nails album one hundred percent free, exclusively via nin.com.

the music is available in a variety of formats including high-quality MP3, FLAC or M4A lossless at CD quality and even higher-than-CD quality 24/96 WAVE. your link will include all options - all free. all downloads include a PDF with artwork and credits.

for those of you interested in physical products, fear not. we plan to make a version of this release available on CD and vinyl in july. details coming soon.

Album info…

1. 999,999
2. 1,000,000
3. letting you
4. discipline
5. echoplex
6. head down
7. lights in the sky
8. corona radiata
9. the four of us are dying
10. demon seed

length: 43:45

streaming audio available at iLike.

the slip is licensed under a creative commons attribution non-commercial share alike license.

we encourage you to
remix it
share it with your friends,
post it on your blog,
play it on your podcast,
give it to strangers,
etc.

This is insane.  And already incredibly soon after Ghosts! Did he say creative commons?! Awesome!

Click here to download.

Local Heroes: Seattle Teacher Suspended for Refusing to Give Standardized Test

Carl Chew, a 6th grade science teacher at Nathan Eckstein Middle School in the Seattle School District, last week defied federal, state, and district regulations that require teachers to administer the Washington Assessment of Student Learning to students.

“I have let my administration know that I will no longer give the WASL to my students. I have done this because of the personal moral and ethical conviction that the WASL is harmful to students, teachers, schools, and families,” wrote Chew in an email to national supporters.

School District response to Mr. Chew’s refusal was immediate. After administrative attempts to dissuade his act of civil disobedience had failed, at the start of school on the first day of WASL testing, April 15, Mr. Chew was escorted from the school by the building principal and a district supervisor. Mr. Chew was told to report to the district Science Materials Center where he was put to work preparing student science kits while district administration and attorneys consulted on an appropriate penalty for what was labeled, “gross insubordination.”

Read the rest here.  Chew gives a helpful list of reasons why that particular standardized test is erroneous.

Yes, my motivation for posting this stems from personal experience.  Mainly, I just don’t do well on standardized test.  I don’t flunk them, but, I do have an inability to do better on them the second time around.  It’s really disconcerting… they mess with my mind, to put it lightly.  I took the SAT twice in high school, and did about 100 points worse the second time around; I recently had a similar experience with the GRE, doing significantly worse the second time around.  But, I get pretty good grades in school, I think.  In high school, I was taught to write essays, not fill in bubbles.

I am aware that not everybody can even be in a financial position to take these tests a first time, let alone a second time.  My concern in posting this isn’t so much on college and graduate school entrance exams, but that around this country, most states start administering standardized tests like this when they are quite young, causing children around the nation to have warped views of their own ability to learn and perform in academic settings.  Kudos to Mr. Chew!

The absolute paradox would be if the Son of God became man, came to the world, went around in such a manner that absolutely no one recognized him; if he became an individual human being in the strictest sense of the world, a person who had a trade, got married, etc. . . . In that case God would not have been God and Father of mankind, but the greatest ironist. . . . The divine paradox is that he becomes noticed, if in no other fashion, then by being crucified, by performing miracles, etc., which means that he is recognizable, after all, by his divine authority, even if faith is required in order to solve its paradox.[1]

When I first read this, I missed the difference between absolute and divine. Wow. If this is a real difference, and I think it is, this is an extremely illuminating passage from Kierkegaard’s journals. I only wish that there were better citations in Garff’s biography so that I could find this passage easier for the full context. Although journals are often fragmentary, so maybe there is not much more (?).  Those are Garff’s ellipses above though, not mine, so I dunno.

This is really cool.  Guillermo del Toro is one of my all-time-favorite directors, so I am pleased.  Great picture of them up there too, eh?  But, every time I hear that del Toro is directing another remake or sequel, a smart part of me dies inside wondering if this will ever see the light of day…

(via)

As a follow up to the first “Nazbo Rap” made 2 years ago, I present to you “Nazbo Rap II.” This was released yesterday. Most of this video was shot on the PLNU campus and in the First Church Eclipse Chapel, and was made by current PLNU undergrads. I’d be interested to see a list of credits. It’s catchy, well-edited, but of course, dripping with ridiculous cheese! There’s some weird stuff here and there, but it’s entertaining nonetheless.

have been by a pseudonym, but by myself . . . Earlier, my idea had been that if the established order could be defended, this was the only way of doing so: by poetically (therefore, by a pseudonym) passing judgment upon it. . . . Now, on the other hand, I am completely convinced of two things: both that, from a Christian point of view, the established order is untenable and that every day it exists is, from the Christian point of view, a crime; and that one may not call upon grace in this manner.  Therefore, take the pseudonymity away; take away the thrice-repeated preface and the ‘Moral’ to the first section—then, from a Christian point of view, Practice in Christianity is an attack on the established order (As quoted in Joakim Garff, Søren Kierkegaard: A Biography, trans. Bruce H. Kirmmse [Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005], p. 751, emphasis mine).

Nonetheless, prior to this, Kierkegaard appended an unpaginated “A First and Last Declaration” to the end of Concluding Unscientific Postscript to Philosophical Fragments–where he ‘outs’ himself as the author behind the pseudonyms–which contains the request, “If it should occur to anyone to want to quote a particular passage from the [pseudonymous] books, it is my wish, my prayer, that he will do me the kindness of citing the respective pseudonymous author’s name, not mine.”

However, as Garff points out, when Practice in Christianity was originally sent to press, it was veronymously written by Kierkegaard.  It was only at the last minute that Kierkegaard changed the authorship to Anti-Climacus, “because Kierkegaard’s own ‘existence’ did not live up to the radical Christian requirements in the work” (p. 630-2).  As Garff points out, this change was fueled more but personal concerns regarding Kierkegaard and not maieutic considerations concerning the reader.

Even if Kierkegaard wants us to now read Practice in Christianity with the pseudonymity ‘taken away’, ultimately, Anti-Climacus’ point remains concerning indirect communication in the section on the “Categories of Offense.”  If we take Anti-Climacus off the title page and replace it with the original “S. Kierkegaard,” the case holds that we are still receiving a communication from an indirect communicator—the God-man.  Kierkegaard had exhausted—in fact literally and ironically emptied—the tool of pseudonymity of its usefulness.  Garff also states that toward the end, “Kierkegaard continually adjusted his [pseudonymous] writings so that they corresponded as precisely as possible to his own position.”  As Kierkegaard stated in the conclusion to his dissertation, “Irony as the negative is the way; it is not the truth but the way.”

[This has been adapted from part of my in-progress MA thesis.]

One of the oldest electronic instruments, the theremin in this video was used to do a cover of Gnarles Barkley’s “Crazy.”