#American naturalist and mathematician

[panafrocore]

The Legacy of Benjamin Banneker: Black-American Naturalist, Mathematician, and Astronomer

Benjamin Banneker, a remarkable Black-American naturalist, mathematician, astronomer, and almanac author, left an indelible mark on history with his extraordinary intellect and contributions to science and society. Born on November 9, 1731, in Baltimore County, Maryland, Banneker’s life is a testament to resilience, determination, and the power of self-education. Raised by a free…

[mbti-sorted]

Any academics in the esfj tag?

Dian Fossey - primatologist (gorillas)

Jamie Dutcher - naturalist/documentarian (wolves)

David Wilson - criminologist

Jennifer Chang - english and creative writing

Nadine Harker-Burnhams - public health research scientist

Tai-Danae Bradley - mathematician

Maria Yakerson - mathematician

May-Britt Moser - psychologist and neuroscientist with her very shiny nobel for her part in discovering grid cells and how rat brains process where their bodies are in space

Shoshanna Zuboff - social psychologist, philosopher

Mary Trump - psychologist

Lynn Margulis - evolutionary biologist (proposed endosymbiosis - cells swallow bacteria to make... plants! animals!)

Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic - organizational psychologist (business psychology, personality profiling)

Mary Karr - english lit prof

Laila Lalami - creative writing prof

Tracy K. Smith - professor of English and of African and African American Studies

I forgot until about halfway through the tag that sometimes the writers and poets are also professors...

[brookstonalmanac]

Birthdays 6.14

Beer Birthdays

George Schmitt (1833)

John Seiler (1833)

Bob Brown (1886)

Warren Pawsey (1963)

John Bryant (1966)

Rick Kempen (1969)

James Costa (1972)

Five Favorite Birthdays

John Bartlett; quotation collector (1820)

Margaret Bourke-White; photographer (1904)

Diablo Cody; writer (1978)

Che Guevara; physician, Argentine revolutionary (1928)

Jerzy Kosinski; writer (1933)

Famous Birthdays

May Allison; actress (1890)

Rod Argent; rock keyboardist (1945)

Gene Barry; actor (1919)

John Bartlett; author & publisher (1820)

Nicolas Bentley; English author & illustrator (1907)

James Black; Scottish pharmacologist (1924)

Yasmine Bleeth; model, actor (1968)

Alan Carr; English comedian, actor & screenwriter (1976)

René Char; French poet & author (1907)

Cy Coleman; pianist, songwriter (1929)

Laurie Colwin; novelist & short story writer (1944)

Arthur Davis; animator & director (1904)

Ben Davidson; Oakland Raiders DE (1940)

Julie Felix; American-English singer-songwriter(1938)

Theobald Wolfe Tone FitzGerald; Irish Army Officer & painter (1898)

Boy George; pop singer (1961)

Marla Gibbs; actor (1931)

Giglio Gregorio Giraldi; Italian poet (1479)

Steffi Graf; tennis player (1969)

James Gurney; artist and author (1958)

Lucy Hale; actress & singer-songwriter (1989)

Eric Heiden; speed skater (1958)

James Hutton; Scottish naturalist (1726)

Johann Abraham Ihle; German astronomer (1627)

Burl Ives; singer (1909)

Rudolf Kempe; German pianist & conductor (1910)

Judith Kerr; German-English author & illustrator (1923)

Karl Landsteiner; Austrian biologist & physician (1868)

Irmelin Sandman Lilius; Finnish author & poet (1936)

Ida MacLean; British biochemist (1877)

Peter Mayle; English author and screenwriter (1939)

Heather McDonald; comedian, actress & author (1970)

Dorothy McGuire; actor (1916)

Kevin McHale; actor (1988)

Marcus Miller; bass player & composer (1959)

Lise Nørgaard; Danish journalist, author & screenwriter (1917)

Will Patton; actor (1954)

Thomas Pennant; Welsh ornithologist and historian (1726)

Kevin Roche; architect (1922)

W. W. E. Ross; Canadian geophysicist and poet (1894)

Pierre Salinger; journalist (1925)

Nilakantha Somayaji; Indian astronomer & mathematician (1444)

Harriet Beecher Stowe; writer (1811)

Superman; comic book character (1938)

Donald Trump; gazillionaire blowhard (1946)

Harry Turtledove; writer (1949)

June Walker; stage & film actress (1900)

Junior Walker; singer, saxophonist (1931)

Sam Wanamaker; actor (1919)

Harold Wheeler; composer (1943)

Alan White; rock drummer (1949)

Laurence Yep; author & playwright (1948)

[doc8692]

Benjamin Banneker- Black Heroes We Must Remember!!

[space-life]

Origin

The Beagle 5 spaceship takes its name from the HMS Beagle ship. The HMS Beagle on her second voyage hosted the then young naturalist Charles Darwin on board, whose work made the Beagle one of the most famous ships in history. Number 5 is a tribute to Eagle 5 (which also has a certain similarity with the name Beagle) spaceship of Spaceballs (A 1987 american science fiction comedy film co-written, produced and directed by Mel Brooks).

AL is a tribute to Alan Turing. Philosopher, mathematician and cryptographer. The test that bears his name is still considered today a valid tool to ascertain whether a machine is able to compete with human intelligence.

AL also remembers HAL 9000, the supercomputer aboard the spacecraft Discovery in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey and Arthur C. Clarke's book of the same name. In 2003, the American Film Institute placed HAL 9000 in 13th place on its list of the 50 Best Movie Villains of All Time. What surprises will AL have in store for us?

The work break raises the question about the future of work and about human-machine interaction. For further information see Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow by Yuval Noah Harari and Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies by Nick Bostrom

The game of chess proposed by Tom in "Origin" is a tribute to the great chess challenges between man and computer. Chess and computers have gone hand in hand since the dawn of information technology. Between the end of the 40s and the beginning of the 50s the first articles appeared (with signatures of illustrious scientists such as Claude Shannon, Norbert Wiener and above all the aforementioned Alan Turing) that designed algorithms capable of playing. Memorable were the challenges between Kasparov and IBM's Deep Blue.

[yasbxxgie]

A Black Scientist Was An Early Cicada Researcher. His Work Has Been Mostly Overlooked [MP3]

Benjamin Banneker – a free Black man born in 1731 – is best known for a land survey that established the original borders of Washington, D.C. But the naturalist also broke ground in another field: cicada research.

Banneker first observed the cicadas at his Maryland home as a teenager in 1740s. He spent the next 50 years documenting their unique life cycles — the bugs come out of the ground for only a few weeks every 17 years. His observations were among the earliest known to be documented.

Janet Barber and her husband, Asamoah Nkwanta, researched his handwritten notes from 1800 on the insects. Barber is an independent researcher and Nkwanta is with Morgan State University in Baltimore.

"He had not really had a formal education in the sciences," Barber told NPR. "Yet he was just very brilliant to understand that something very different and phenomenal is going on."

But his work documenting the cicadas has been largely overlooked because of his race, say Barber and Nkwanta.

"There's a lot of stories about the cicada, but very seldom do you hear any mention of Benjamin Banneker connected to the discovery of the 17 year periodic cycle," Nkwanta said.

Banneker's notes are housed at the Maryland Center for History and Culture, and the Baltimore Sun recently featured Barber and Nkwanta's 2014 paper about them.

Soon billions of cicadas will emerge from the ground in more than a dozen states, including Maryland, where Banneker's farm would be engulfed every 17 years. When he first witnessed them as a teenager, he was worried.

"I then imagined they came to eat and destroy the fruit of the Earth, and would occation (sic) a famine in the land," Banneker writes. "I therefore began to kill and destroy them, but soon saw that my labor was in vain..."

Once he realized the cicadas were relatively harmless, "that's where his fascination came and he began to study," Barber said.

Besides noticing their 17 year life cycles, Banneker also observed cicadas' behavior. The bugs are only above ground for a few weeks, which they spend mating and screaming.

As Banneker put it, "if their lives are short, they are merry," noting that "they still continue on Singing till they die."

[h/t]

Image:

An illustrated portrait of American author, astronomer and farmer Benjamin Banneker from the mid- to late-18th century. He's credited as being a surveyor, farmer, mathematician and astronomer.

[chaotictommy]

Something happened last night that completely pissed me off... so I’m going to write about it...

So for me, being on the Autism Spectrum is kinda like being in a bubble, your own personal bubble, you can here everything that’s being said, but understanding is hard... it‘s like being on a rollercoaster that you can’t get off of... you can go from extremely calm to very scared, angry, Et. and mostly that’s because of pressure, change, or anxiety. It’s like being in a crowd and no one understands you. Sometimes it makes me feel like an outsider... It’s kind of lonely actually in many instances. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great too, you can focus on a subject (poetry) completely and learn so much about it that you become an expert, you can see things in different ways than other people and that can help you, but also there’s weird habits, nervous ticks (mine were facial expressions, not looking people in the eye, chewing hair, nails, Etc.) - fear of change, and putting up with being marked as different, putting up with the occasional death threat, and possibly being called weird, stupid, retarded, or a freak like I was... I basically was the kid no one wanted to play with and my sister, my little sister always had to stick up for me and tell other kids that I wasn’t a freak because I was different. I didn’t find out that I was on the Autism Spectrum till I was about twelve or thirteen... and I was just diagnosed a year ago... I really don’t know why I am writing this, but I guess I just want people to understand that calling someone a freak or weird because they are different, it hurts the person more than anyone knows... people are different for a reason, and before anyone says anything... here’s a few people who were or are on the Autism Spectrum and thrived in a society that tried to label them as strange or weird:

John Keats — Poet

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart – Classical Composer.

Sir Isaac Newton – Mathematician, Astronomer, & Physicist.

Jerry Seinfeld – Comedian.

Satoshi Tajiri – Creator of Nintendo's Pokémon (C)

Nikola Tesla – Inventor

Emily Dickinson – Poet

Paul Dirac – Physicist Albert Einstein – Scientist & Mathematician

Bobby Fischer – Chess Grandmaster

Bill Gates – Co-founder of the Microsoft Corporation

Temple Grandin – Animal Scientist (C)

Daryl Hannah – Actress & Environmental Activist (C)

Thomas Jefferson – Early American Politician

Steve Jobs – Former CEO of Apple

James Joyce – Author of “Ulysses”

Alfred Kinsey – Sexologist & Biologist

Stanley Kubrick – Film Director

Barbara McClintock – Scientist and Cytogeneticist

Michelangelo – Sculptor, Painter, Architect, Poet

Chris Packham - naturalist, TV presenter (C)

Gary Numan - singer and songwriter

some pretty great people are on the spectrum and thrived in a society that called them largely Outsiders... so please, before attacking someone who is different, to make yourselves feel better about your little lives (this is only for the haters out there) think before you open your mouth... the world would be a better place if you would just shut up and stop the unnecessary hate... thank you.

And to the kid who is being picked on for being ‘weird’ THERE ISN’T ANYTHING WRONG WITH YOU...

[professorfaber]

INTP Historical Figures

Socrates, Ancient Greek philosopher

Isaac Newton, English physicist, mathematician, and astronomer

Thomas Jefferson, 3rd President of the United States, and Founding Father

James Madison, 4th President of the United States, and Founding Father

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, English author

Abraham Lincoln, American politician and lawyer, and 16th President of the United States

Charles Darwin, English naturalist

Marie Curie, French-Polish physicist and chemist

Albert Einstein, German-born theoretical physicist

George Orwell, English novelist, essayist, and journalist

[scotianostra]

On 26 March 1797, James Hutton, the Scottish chemist and geologist, died.

Farmer and naturalist James Hutton is credited with being the founder of modern geology. The first to determine that the Earth is millions of years old, Hutton believed our planet is continually being formed.James Hutton was born in Edinburgh in 1726. He went on to study medicine and chemistry at Edinburgh University, and in Paris and Leiden. He took his degree in 1749.

In 1750 he returned to Edinburgh and resumed chemical experiments with friend James Davie. Their work on the production of sal ammoniac – a salt used for dying and working with brass and tin – led to a profitable partnership.Hutton moved to Slighhouses, a lowland family farm, in the 1750s. He spent 14 years running the farm. This gave him an interest in how land changed with the forces of wind and rain.

In 1753 Hutton became interested in studying the surface of the earth. He went on to devote his scientific knowledge, powers of observation and philosophical mind to the newly-named subject of 'geology'.

Hutton went on a geological tour of the north of Scotland with George Maxwell-Clerk (the great-grandfather of the famous physicist James ) in 1764. He let his farms to tenants in 1768 and returned to Edinburgh. Between 1767 and 1774 he was closely involved with the construction of the Forth and Clyde canal.

Travels in Britain and abroad, as well as a time farming in Berwickshire, gave Hutton the opportunity to observe different rocks. He was intrigued to find fossilised shells high above sea level, and puzzled over other geological features. Hutton's thinking was then influenced by reading about Joseph Black's experiments with heated limestone, and by the proof of the power of heat demonstrated by James Watt's steam engines. Hutton began considering the centre of the Earth as a massive heat source, where continuous processes destroy and reform rocks — the 'uniformitarian' theory of geology. That led to his belief that the Earth was millions of years old.

Other scientists and philosophers vehemently disagreed with him. Many of these were 'catastrophists' who believed that changes in geology happened as a result of natural disasters such as volcanic eruptions or floods. The debate continued for several decades during the 19th century, until finally geologists became reconciled to Hutton's theory.

In 1785 Hutton presented his findings to the newly formed Royal Society of Edinburgh. He died on 26 March 1797 and was buried in Greyfriars Kirkyard in Edinburgh in the part of the graveyard known as the "Covenanters Prison" Five years after Hutton's death, mathematician John Playfair published 'Illustrations of the Huttonian Theory of the Earth'. This volume contained a summary of Hutton's 'Theory of the Earth' alongside numerous additional illustrations and arguments.

In a poll, James Hutton was voted the seventh most popular Scottish scientist from the past. It is remarkable that men like Hutton , David Hume, Adam Smith, Dugald Stewart, Thomas Reid, and countless others all came out of Scotland in the same era, all within less than a hundred year period, their thoughts and works were spread throughout an ever growing world as part of the Scottish diaspora, and by American students who studied in Scotland.

[famous-aces]

Benjamin Banneker

Who: Benjamin Banneker

What: Author, Scientist (Naturalist and Astronomer), Mathematician, Urban Planner, and Proto-Abolitionist

Where: American (active in the US)

When: November 9, 1731 – October 9, 1806

(Image Description: the front page of one of Banneker's famous almanacs [this one from 1795]. It reads "Benjamin Banneker's Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and Virgina Almanac, for the Year of Our Lord 1795; Being the Third after a Leap Year" [end title] then there is a simple ink portrait of Banneker as a young man. He is a Black man with short tightly curled hair and wearing clothes typical [if formal] to the late 18th century. The portrait is labeled "Banneker" in all caps. Banneker is spelled as it sometimes was with the first two vowels being A's rather than A and E. Below the drawing is written the words "Printed for and sold by John Fisher, Stationer. Baltimore.". End ID)

Banneker is often regarded as the first African-American scientist and potentially the first American-born Queer scientist (he was born in Maryland). He became one of the most accomplished and recognized Black men in 18th century America.

He was a largely self-taught freeman who spent most of his life observing, writing, and theorizing.  He often put his exceptional brain to public use.

He was one of the surveyors of Washington DC, but was best known for his highly sought after and extremely accurate almanacs (the title page from the 1795 edition above). In 1791 Banneker began correspondence with Thomas Jefferson, using Jefferson's own writing to try to sway him to the abolitionist cause, pointing out how hollow the Declaration of Independence was while slavery was legal and common as well as pointing out the slave-owning Jefferson's hypocricy.

In Banneker's private life he constructed an all wooden clock (gears included) that kept time from its construction when he was a young man until at least his death. He kept journals much of his life, in which Banneker documented many natural phenomenon both astronomical and of the earthbound natural world. This includes keeping track of 17 year cicadas (one of the first to do so) and behaviors of honey bees.  

His almanacs were extremely popular and ran annually from 1792 to 1797. He did all the observations and calculations for them himself without any outside assistance. He also included literature as well as humanitarian and political commentaries in the almanacs. For example, in 1793 he included his letters with Jefferson (and challenged the racism of the statesman) and in 1795 he included a report on the 1793 Philadelphia Yellow Fever epidemic (bringing information to Philly citizens who may have survived the plague but not known the official findings). Banneker made his own race increasingly obvious over time, for a very clear reason: to show white people that Black people were every bit as intelligent and capable as they were, indeed Banneker was very clearly smarter and more accomplished than most of them could ever hope to be.  As his personal friend Statesman James McHenry put it in a poem dedicated to Banneker, "Long may thou live an evidence to shew, / That Afric's sable race have talents too."

Probable Orientation: gay ace, perhaps gay grace or aroace

There is basically no evidence of Banneker being interested in sex or romance on much of any level. He never married, his surviving journals never make mention of any particular partners in his life, romantic, sexual, or queerplatonic. He expresses no real distinct interest (sexual or romantic) in anyone either. He did have close familial bonds with his grandmother, parents, and sisters. The only evidence he may have been gay is one offhand comment that may have implied his having interest in men, but that is really just speculation, and nothing about the entry is innately sexual. He never seems to have expressed or shown interest in anyone in particular, not even in the journals no one else was ever supposed to read. The quote reads

"...[G]uilty passions dart into the heart..."

He is disgusted by this attraction, seemingly his own, but there is nothing actually sexual about it. It is merely some form of attraction, probably to men, given era and context. Again, it is not a lot to go on. However, I argue that because he lived alone all his adult life and there was never a particular object of his affections these feelings (whatever they were) were not overwhelming.

(Image Description: a stamp featuring Banneker. It used art by Jerry Pickney and released by the USPS in 1980. It has a green background and at the top it says "Benjamin Banneker" (spelled the conventional modern way, i.e. A, E). In the background is a bust portrait of Banneker. He is a black man probably middle aged. His face is unlined but either his hair or wig is snow white. It is tightly curled in the way natural African American/Black people's hair is rather than the style of a powdered wig. His eyebrows are black and his expression is calm and thoughtful. He looks out at the viewer. He is wearing a purple/wine red suit with a white cravat. In the midground are some trees/bushes. In the foreground is Banneker with his surveying equipment. He is wearing a green suit and a black tricorner hat. He has one hand on his hip and the other holding some plans at his side. On the bottom of the stamp it reads "Black Heritage, USA" and the stamp's worth at the time, 15 cents. End ID)

[protestant-christian]

Six reasons atheism is dead wrong

I. The universe had a beginning.

Atheists believe that the universe is eternal. We see from Edwin Hubble’s work at the Palomar Observatory (on Mt. Wilson near Los Angeles) that the universe is expanding. This expansion is confirmed through observation of the “red shift.” In physics (especially astrophysics) redshift happens when light seen coming from an object that is moving away is proportionally increased in wavelength, or shifted to the red end of the spectrum. Albert Einstein traveled to see Hubble’s work and famously said “I now see the necessity of a beginning.” Since the universe is expanding, it follows that reversing the expansion would ultimately lead to a contraction or what physicists call “the singularity” known as the beginning of the universe. The Kalam Cosmological argument (widely accepted in professional philosophy and logic communities) states that:

Everything that began to exist, has a cause.

The universe began to exist.

Therefore, the universe has a cause.

Time and space came into existence at the singularity. Since there was a cause to bring the universe into existence, it has to be a cause that is outside of time and space. As a result, the cause is both immaterial and transcendent. This is God.

II. A life-permitting universe requires that cosmology and physics are exactly tuned to support life.

This concept is called “the Anthropic Principle.” We currently understand that there are about 35 parameters that are perfectly harmonized to support life on our planet. These parameters must all be set within a very narrow range to support life. The probability of these 35 attributes being set at the correctly to support life is less than 1 in 1040 equating to essentially zero probability. Some examples of these parameters include:

The unique properties of water

Earth’s atmosphere (nitrogen, oxygen, and small amounts of other gases)

Earth’s reflectivity or “albedo”

Earth’s magnetic field

Earth’s place in the solar system

Our solar system’s place in the galaxy

The color of our sun

The force of gravity

The density of matter must equal the critical density needed to prevent the Big Crunch

The earth must be angled in its orbit perfectly to prevent temperature extremes.

Our moon must be its exact size to support the earth’s orbit.

The rate of universe expansion (cosmological constant).

This fine tuning requires a fine tuner. This is God.

III. The origin of life did not arise by chance.

There are 20 individual amino acids that are used in building proteins. Most proteins have a combination of approximately 450 amino acids. There are about 600 proteins in the most elementary cell. There are a total of about 30,000 proteins.

Darwin thought the cell was a globule and did not understand cell complexity. If you calculate the probability of individual amino acids combining to form one protein you would multiply (since sequence matters) 1/20 x 1/20 x 1/20 (for each protein) all the way out to 450 amino acids (an average protein length) equating to a probability of essentially zero. A protein that is 150 amino acids in length has a chance probability of 1 in 10145. There is zero probability that the origin of life came about by chance. When one adds the additional complexity of DNA (which goes beyond the complexity of amino acid formation), we must further reduce the probability of chance creating life. Dr. Francis Crick, Nobel Laureate and co-discoverer of DNA, acknowledged that chance played no role in creating DNA.[5] He was a philosophical atheist so he supported the idea of Panspermia (that life originated elsewhere in the universe and was transported through interstellar systems by some unknown space aliens.) Scientists agree that chance alone using matter alone has a zero probability of explaining life. The sequence hypothesis (DNA nucleotides) confirms this.

The origin of life requires both design and an animating force based on biogenesis. This force is God.

IV. The origin of information did not arise by chance.

Information is the immaterial foundation of all biological life yet it requires material to transmit through. Information requires an intelligent source. We saw this in the formation of proteins and DNA. How much does information weigh? It is a nonsensical question because information has zero weight since it has no physical properties. Highly intelligent people Don’t weigh more than others because they have more information. According to information scientist Dr. Werner Gitt, DNA is billions of times more densely packed information than is our most sophisticated technology. Darwin was ignorant about information coding. Neo-Darwinists believe that natural selection and mutation explain the advancement of new species. However, a new species requires new information. Mutations by definition are the loss of original information, not the creation of new information. Microevolution has existed for centuries (adaptation within a species, a.k.a. “breeding”). Macroevolution, one species creating a new life form, is without example in the fossil record (the Cambrian explosion showed a sudden appearance of all current life forms without transitional forms.) Darwin tried to use microevolution to explain macroevolution. His philosophical descendants today try the same trick. This deception is widely perpetrated throughout the American education system.

Information, by definition, requires a transmitter or source. There are 1080 elementary particles (electrons, etc.) in the known universe. The oldest estimate of the age of the earth is 1016 seconds[6], thereby creating 1043 number of particle interaction possibilities or 10139 maximum event probabilities in the history of the universe.

The intelligence behind the information that created the enormous but finite universe, the 30,000 proteins, the complexity and wonder of DNA, and life itself is called God. There is no naturalistic/materialist explanation that can fit within the event horizon of probabilities. Information requires intelligence. This intelligence is God.

V. Morality did not evolve physiologically by chemical or biological evolution. Morality requires a transcendent measure.

Atheists pretend that God does not exist by using the intellectual arguments of science while the root cause of their opposition to confessing God’s existence is moral. By pretending that God doesn’t exist, the atheist deludes himself into thinking that he is not morally accountable to the God that created him. Evolutionary ethicists state that there is no free will; we are the products of time and chance. There is no concept of right or wrong or ought in DNA. If our morality is evolved, who can say that torturing children for fun is wrong? Who can say that the Nazis were wrong in killing Jews? Evolutionists must say they are just doing what their genes programmed them to do. If evolutionary ethics were true, how do you explain acts of courage, valor, and sacrifice that appear noble but would not lead to reproduction (they die in battle for example.) If evolutionary ethics and morality were true, the biggest, strongest, and smartest would do anything to advance their cause. This has happened occasionally with horrors such as eugenics, Nazi Germany, and other examples of genocide, etc. If everyone chose their own morality, there would be chaos and evil rampant with no punishment and no justice. Necessary conditions for moral objectives are:

A transcendent standard of measurement

A human free will or freedom to choose

The belief that humans have intrinsic, not instrumental, value

Moral evolutionist/relativists can not ascribe right or wrong or the word “ought.” They can’t complain about justice or evil. Everybody would do just what their genes programmed them to do, based upon chemistry and evolution. The contrasting reality is that humans are free will creatures who recognize moral right and wrong and therefore are free to choose beyond their genetic endowment. This is clearly indicated in the economic and social mobility of classes and individuals who operate as moral agents. This moral awareness comes from God.

VI. The life, death, resurrection, and fulfillment of prophecy by Jesus of Nazareth requires theism.

The life and impact of Jesus is corroborated through the eyewitness testimony contained in the Bible. The biblical manuscript evidence attests to its authenticity. Extra-biblical sources, e.g., Tacitus, Thallus, Pliny the Younger, Suetonious, Phlegon, Lucian, and Josephus are just a few examples of those that wrote of the historical veracity of Jesus’ existence. The evidence for the crucifixion, the empty tomb, the post-resurrection appearances, and the transformation of the early church all best explain the circumstances surrounding the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. Finally, there are approximately 100 prophecies in the Old Testament that relate to the first coming of Jesus. Mathematics professor Peter Stoner, author of Science Speaks, assembled other mathematicians to calculate the probability of one man fulfilling 48 of the 100 Old Testament prophecies. The resulting probability was estimated at 1 in 10157[8] This miraculous fulfillment is from God.

Conclusion The cumulative weight of evidence from cosmology, physics, biology, information science, ethics, and fulfillment of prophecy clearly establishes that God is the best explanation as the creator of the universe, of life, of information, of morality, and as the one who transcends time and space, thereby fulfilling prophecy without error.

[diazepamalprazolam]

20th Century Women in Logic and Philosophy

G.E.M. Anscombe

Gertrude Elizabeth Margaret Anscombe was a British philosopher who spent many years closely engaged with the widely considered greatest philosopher of the 20th century, Ludwig Wittgenstein. Anscombe specialized in philosophy of language and the philosophy of action, and became one of the most important and influential interpreters of Wittgenstein's work on the subject. Anscombes most significant contribution to philosophy is her centralizing arguments that intention, the property of someone's or something's mind to be about something, is what defines and chiefly determines our nature as rational agents. Intentional agency is the core property that most philosophers use to categorize humans as having a somewhat special place in the natural world.

Barbara Partee

Barbara Partee is an American philosopher and linguist who helped found our contemporary practice of formal semantics. Semantics is the area of language that deals with truth and meaning. Formal semantics treats questions of meaning as a formal question, subject to detailed logical scrutiny. Formal sematnics has practical implications for artificial intelligence as well as other general linguistic enterprises. The major thematic thread running across her work is her dedication to precise and formal mathematical accounts of semantic theory.

Ruth Barcan-Marcus

Ruth Barcan-Marcus was an American philosopher and logician who specailized in questions regarding modality. In philosophy, modality refers to the study of the nature of necessity and possibility. In the early 20th century, many philosophers rejected the notion of necessity, arguing that it led to paradoxes that were intractable and therefore must be dispensed of. Barcan-Marcus, however, was part of a very small vocal minority which tried to save necessity. She worked with another great philosopher, Saul Kripke, to create a formally satesfactory logical system of modality and then wrote many brilliant philosophical papers giving interpretations for those systems. Metaphysics today owes much to their work.

Rózsa Péter

Rózsa Péter was a Hungarian logician and mathematician who in the 1930s worked on what are called recursive functions. In that time, there was no agreed upon definition of what was meant by "an algorithm" or "a computation". Many logicians and mathematicians felt that there was a need to give a precise, formal definition of these terms in order to secure a stable foundation for our mathematical theories. Péter defined in her PhD dissertation a specific set of functions which are called recursive functions. In 1936, multiple logicians, including Alan Turing, gave formal definitions of abstract computing methods which all turned out to be exactly equivalent to each other, and furthermore, the class of functions computed by these formalisms was exactly the class of recursive funtions Péter helped to define. Péter, despite being forced to live in a Jewish ghetto under fascist rule in Hungary during World War II, would continue until her death in the 1970s to work on recursive function theory and apply her results to the new computing technology that was being invented.

Julia Robinson

Julia Robinson was an American logician who made significant contributions to one of the most vexxing logical problems of the 20th century. In 1900, a mathematician and logician named David Hilbert made a lost of the 23 most important problems facing the mathematical community for upcoming century. Number 10 on this problem asked if there was an algorithm to decide when a given specific type of mathematical equation has a solution or not. Of course, before this could be solved, a definition of algorithm, such as recursive function mentioned above, needed to be proven. In the 1950's and 1960's Robinson worked on this problem which many logicians had no inkling how to solve. She came to a breakthrough in the problem, she proved that if there is a specific subset of the equations in question that grow exponentially fast, then that would prove that there is no algorithm that would decide the question. Eventually, a Russian mathematician would prove that there are in fact exponentially growing equations of this type, and their combined work provides a negative solution to Hilbert's 10th problem. Robinson's other work involved proving similar results for many different kinds of equations.

Penelope Maddy

Penelope Maddy is an American logician and philosopher who specializes in set theory, the foundation of mathematics. Her work takes up a very interesting and unique position: mathematics is subject to empirical considerations. There is a long debate in the philosophy of mathematics about whether or not mathematical objects are real. If numbers and functions and sets are real, then they are abstract objects which seem far away from our immedate grasp. How then can we come to know them so well? If they are not real, however, then a similar question can be posed: why are they so useful to us? Maddy argues that we need to take a naturalistic approach to the philosophy of mathematics. She argues that science, and the empirical foundations it rests on, are our most effective epistemological enterprise, and therefore we should subject things that seem non empirical, such as mathematics and logic, to the same methodology that we use for things like physics and biology. Her main philosophical contribution has been giving arguments to revise our conception of logic as a prior science, and instead view it as a result of studying the human mind and learning the patterns that govern it's normative behavoir. Additionally, she applies this view to the foundation of mathematics by giving naturalistic and empirical arguments to support our adoption of certain foundational assumptions, or axioms, in set theory, the basis of our contemporary conception of mathematics, as well.

[meanwhileinstasiville]

Small reference pools and white supremacists

“So I was watching Seinfe-” “Sportsnight is awesome!”

“Tradewest made cool stu-” “American Technos was awesome!!”

“Black twitter is so on poi-” “Scottish Twitter rocks!!!!”

(See how one drowns out the other?)

“Larry David!” “Aaron Sorkin & Joss Whedon!!!!!!!”

(Ambiguously brown people are from Poland)

“The British empire existed!” “Anglo Saxons (capitalized for emphasis) were German!!!!!!!”

“Columbian government!” “Greeks wrote Plato’s Republic!!!!”

“Spanish copla tradition!” “The Bard!!!!!”

“Arabic lexicographers, naturalists, scientists, doctors....” “Scandinavians, Hungarians, The Czech Republic et al!!!!!!”

(Works this way because they’re so damn violent when taken as a demographic)

https://www.reddit.com/r/television/comments/5sdll7/the_great_madtv_vs_snl_debate/

(And, not in alphabetical order, MadTV was funnier but Saturday Night Live demanded to be watched) While we’re combating racism...

“Indian mathematicians by the numbers can’t be argued.” “LEIBNIZ!!!! Math begins with Gauss!!!”

(Some years are longer than others when racists are concerned)

The Nineteen Fifties was like four decades long while thousands of years of Southeast Asian mathematics is worth about one year of western europe. To say nothing of Arabs in ~600s inventing hospitals (but we bombed some by accident attacking *the terrorists*)

“Norwegians are happy!” “Norway was governed by DENMARK!” (Internal to Caucasian peoples, even)

“The Chechens are muslim” “Chechen terrorists!!!”

[brookstonalmanac]

Birthdays 4.30

Beer Birthdays

Gustav Hodel (1875)

Lawrence Steese (1912)

Bugs Bunny (1938)

Daniel Bradford (1950)

Five Favorite Birthdays

Kirsten Dunst; actor (1982)

Gal Gadot; Israeli actor (1985)

Larry Niven; writer (1938)

Bill Plympton; animator (1946)

Alice B. Tolkas; avant-garde leader (1877)

Famous Birthdays

Eve Arden; actor (1912)

Jane Campion; film director (1954)

Jill Clayburgh; actor (1944)

Gary Collins; actor (1938)

Saint John Baptist de la Salle; educator (1651)

Annie Dillard; writer (1945)

Johnny Galecki; actor (1975)

Carl Friedrich Gauss; German mathematician (1777)

Johnny Horton; singer (1925)

Dolores Huerta; activist (1930)

Perry King; actor (1948)

Franz Lehar; composer (1870)

Cloris Leachman; actor (1926)

John Lubbock; English naturalist (1834)

Willie Nelson; country singer (1933)

Amanda Palmer; American singer-songwriter (1976)

John Crowe Ransom; poet (1888)

Robert Shaw; orchestra conductor (1916)

Isiah Tomas; Detroit Pistons PG (1961)

Bobby Vee; singer (1943)

Lars von Trier; film director (1956)

Burt Young; actor (1940)

[guideclear]

Who got first Oscar award in India?

Who got first Oscar award in India?

Who got first Oscar award in India? Bhanu Athaiya Resul Pookutty A. R. Rahman Gulzar Answer – Bhanu Athaiya Who got first Oscar award in India? Indian ornithologist and naturalist. He is referred to as the “Birdman of India” First woman of Indian origin to go to space Indian mathematician who was known as “The man who knew the infinity” American former Stockbroker and now Author who is also…

[space-life]

Some things about Space Life

Space Life is a science fiction webcomic set in an indefinite future on a small spaceship traveling the cosmos. On board the spaceship we find Tom, an astronaut we always see with a suit and helmet and AL, the voice of an artificial intelligence. Welcome to spaceship Beagle 5. Sit back and enjoy following Tom and AL on an extravagant adventure among the stars. Try to find countless references to famous and little-known jewels from scifi, nerd and pop culture.

Some things about Space Life

The Beagle 5 spaceship takes its name from the HMS Beagle ship. The HMS Beagle on her second voyage hosted the then young naturalist Charles Darwin on board, whose work made the Beagle one of the most famous ships in history. Number 5 is a tribute to Eagle 5 (which also has a certain similarity with the name Beagle) spaceship of Spaceballs (A 1987 american science fiction comedy film co-written, produced and directed by Mel Brooks).

AL is a tribute to Alan Turing. Philosopher, mathematician and cryptographer. The test that bears his name is still considered today a valid tool to ascertain whether a machine is able to compete with human intelligence.

AL also remembers HAL 9000, the supercomputer aboard the spacecraft Discovery in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey and Arthur C. Clarke's book of the same name. In 2003, the American Film Institute placed HAL 9000 in 13th place on its list of the 50 Best Movie Villains of All Time. What surprises will AL have in store for us?

The work break raises the question about the future of work and about human-machine interaction. For further information see Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow by Yuval Noah Harari and Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies by Nick Bostrom

The game of chess proposed by Tom in "Origin" is a tribute to the great chess challenges between man and computer. Chess and computers have gone hand in hand since the dawn of information technology. Between the end of the 40s and the beginning of the 50s the first articles appeared (with signatures of illustrious scientists such as Claude Shannon, Norbert Wiener and above all the aforementioned Alan Turing) that designed algorithms capable of playing. Memorable were the challenges between Kasparov and IBM's Deep Blue.

In "Spoiler" Tom says he wants to start reading "War and Peace". The reference is to the Peanuts character Snoopy who loves War and Peace, but in order not to get tired he reads no more than one word a day.

After the Apollo 1 fire, Snoopy became the official mascot of the Apollo program's aerospace security, testing and rebuilding.

The Apollo 10 lunar module was named "Snoopy" and the command module "Charlie Brown".

The Silver Snoopy award is a special NASA award in the form of a silver pin engraved with Snoopy with a space helmet. It is given to an astronaut who works in the space program who has gone above and beyond on the pursuit of quality and safety.

In "Cultural evolution" we refer to the cultural evolution in animals. In recent decades, a burgeoning literature has documented the cultural transmission of behavior through social learning in numerous vertebrate and invertebrate species. A meaning of "cultural evolution in animals" refers to these findings and I present an overview of the key findings. I will then address the other meaning of the term focused on cultural changes within a lineage. Such changes in humans, described as "cumulative cultural evolution", have been spectacular, but relatively little attention has yet been paid to the subject in non-human animals, other than claiming that the process is unique to humans. A variety of evidence, including controlled experiments and field observations, has begun to challenge this view and in some behavioral domains, particularly birdsong, cultural evolution has been studied for many years. The scifi reference is to "Planet of the Apes" and compared to the bears to the short story "Bears Discover Fire" by American science fiction author Terry Bisson.

"Time" is set in the vicinity of the black hole M87 . It's the central black hole of the giant elliptical galaxy Galaxy Virgo A, encoded as "M87" (the largest galaxy in the "near" universe, located 56 million light years from us , in the Cluster of the Virgin). It has a mass approximately 6.6 billion times that of the Sun.

That the  time be one illusion is a mantra of many modern theoretical physicists. In the equations of the "loop quantum gravity model", with which Carlo Rovelli, Lee Smolin and others try to unify Einstein's general relativity and quantum mechanics, time disappears. What exists at the fundamental level are only "atoms of space". The universe and its history are nothing more than ways in which these "space atoms" are arranged. (Rovelli's Book)

Tom's answer - "Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so"- is a quote from "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" by Douglas Adams.

Have fun finding references and quotes in the next few episodes! feel free to write your ideas in the comments.