Sarah Glidden's How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less

Recently, I dropped into a comic book store that specialized in indie comics. I felt bad about spending so much time in there and not buying anything, so I picked up Sarah Glidden's How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less. It's about a young Jewish woman going on the Birthright tour to Israel. The tour is meant to expose expat Jews to their homeland and culture.

I enjoyed it for its thoughtfulness and the personal nature of the work. One of the best graphic novels I've read in a long time. There is a similar tour sponsored by the Taiwanese government, nicknamed "The Love Boat." Surprisingly, I found a lot to relate to in Glidden's novel despite not knowing much about Jewish culture. I identified strongly with the struggle to decide "what side you're on", whether or not to agree with the politics of your homeland. Maybe it's not surprising. One of my family friends said that there's a lot of similarity between Chinese and Jewish culture, which is why many Chinese-Americans and Jewish-Americans marry.

A physicist encounters the curious laywoman

While at a recent physics conference, I met a 54 year old Southern woman who asked me lots of questions about what physicists do and whether physics had anything to say about the existence of God. I was trying to grab a quick dinner in the hotel sports bar and she was at the same hotel for a homeowner's (?) conference. We talked for an hour. She seemed a little drunk because she'd forget facts I had told her. Sometimes she didn't seem to quite understand what I was trying to tell her. Nonetheless, I did my utmost be respectful and sympathetic and I think I did a good job for public relations between physicists and the public. She thanked me many times for taking the time to talk to her.

Later, I described this episode to a physicist friend and he thought the fact she asked me the "existence of God" question shows that the public doesn't know anything about the boundaries of scientific inquiry. In his opinion, it would be like asking "are there any paintings that are unartistic?"

So maybe ... because of the abstractions and the high level education required to experience scientific research, the public doesn't have any intuition for what questions scientists ask. Or maybe it was legitimate of her to ask about God and physics? I'm not sure.

Song of the day: "Down to the river to pray" performed by Alison Krauss

A sweet and beautiful song. I first heard this song in the film O Brother Where Art Thou?.

As I went down in the river to pray
Studying about that good old way
And who shall wear the starry crown
Good Lord, show me the way!

O sisters let's go down,
Let's go down, come on down,
O sisters let's go down,
Down in the river to pray.

As I went down in the river to pray
Studying about that good old way
And who shall wear the robe and crown
Good Lord, show me the way!

O brothers let's go down,
Let's go down, come on down,
Come on brothers let's go down,
Down in the river to pray.

As I went down in the river to pray
Studying about that good old way
And who shall wear the starry crown
Good Lord, show me the way!

O fathers let's go down,
Let's go down, come on down,
O fathers let's go down,
Down in the river to pray.

As I went down in the river to pray
Studying about that good old way
And who shall wear the robe and crown
Good Lord, show me the way!

O mothers let's go down,
Let's go down, don't you want to go down,
Come on mothers let's go down,
Down in the river to pray.

As I went down in the river to pray
Studying about that good old way
And who shall wear the starry crown
Good Lord, show me the way!

O sinners let's go down,
Let's go down, come on down,
O sinners let's go down,
Down in the river to pray.

As I went down in the river to pray
Studying about that good old way
And who shall wear the robe and crown
Good Lord, show me the way!

Link of the day: The Atheon

I recently read about the erection of a "temple to science" called the Atheon in Berkeley, California. It sounds pretty cool. The artist used WMAP cosmological data in stained glass windows!

There is also an official site for the Atheon, but there isn't much information there yet.

Tiger Woods, Buddhism, and Asian culture

Since my laptop is away on repair, I've been reading a book called The Best American Sports Writing of the Century, edited by David Halberstam and Glenn Stout. One of the stories is a piece on Tiger Woods called "The Chosen One" which you can also find online at Sports Illustrated.

There are many great quotes in this article.

A nice discussion of the conscious versus the unconscious mind:

"I've learned to trust the subconscious," says Tiger. "My instincts have never lied to me."

The mother radiates this: the Eastern proclivity to let life happen, rather than the Western one to make it happen. The father comes to it in his own way, through fire. To kill a man, to conduct oneself calmly and efficiently when one's own death is imminent -- a skill Earl learns in Green Berets psychological training and then again and again in jungles and rice paddies -- one removes the conscious mind from the task and yields to the subconscious. "It's the more powerful of the two minds," Earl says. "It works faster than the conscious mind, yet it's patterned enough to handle routine tasks over and over, like driving a car or making a putt. It knows what to do.

"Allow yourself the freedom of emotion and feeling. Don't try to control them and trap them. Acknowledge them and become the beneficiary of them. Let it all outflow."

Here's Tiger on the differences between American and Asian culture:

I like Buddhism because it's a whole way of being and living. It's based on discipline and respect and personal responsibility. I like Asian culture better than ours because of that. Asians are much more disciplined than we are. Look how well behaved their children are. It's how my mother raised me. You can question, but talk back? Never. In Thailand, once you've earned people's respect, you have it for life. Here it's, What have you done for me lately? So here you can never rest easy. In this country I have to be very careful. I'm easygoing, but I won't let you in completely. There, I'm Thai, and it feels very different. In many ways I consider that home.

Laying down your burdens and finding redemption

This past week's Battlestar Galactica episode "The Road Less Traveled" explores the theme of struggling with your past, laying down your burdens, and finding redemption.

Kara "Starbuck" Thrace is a hot shot pilot and the poster child for self-destruction. She draws good people to her like the Adamas (father and son), Anders, Helo, but she often abuses them and on the few occasions where she realizes what she's doing, she simply tells everyone "I frakked up" and goes back to her self-destructive behavior. In the end, it seems like her only redeeming quality is being the best pilot in the fleet. Starbuck is the female version of the prototypical abusive husband. Last aeason, we found out that her behavior had its roots in an overbearing, narcissistic, equally abusive mother.

Leoben, one of the Cylons, is the only "person" who understands her. In this episode, he appears in a badly damaged raider and is taken prisoner. Starbuck, the commanding officer of the ship Demetrius, brings him onboard. A crew member dies after the raider explodes in a seeming accident. Starbuck storms into Leoben's cell and punches him in a fury. Leoben tells her to finish it and kill him. She tries to continue beating up Leoben, but she can't bring herself to do it.

Leoben: It doesn't help, does it? Nothing feels quite like it did before, I know.

Starbuck: What are you doing to me?

Leoben: All of your life, you forced back the truth by lashing out at everyone. Anesthetizing yourself with ambrosia to empty your fears. But you've lost the taste for those petty things.

Starbuck: I'm the same person!

Leoben: No! The ... emptiness can only be filled by taking the next step on your journey.

Starbuck: What happened to me the two months I was missing?

Leoben: I don't know.

Starbuck: You recall? The pain, my mother, it had to mean something.

Leoben: You have to make peace with your past.

Starbuck: Why?

Leoben: Because that part of you is gone.

Starbuck isn't the only one with personal demons. Gaius Baltar, the anti-hero who played a major role in humanity's destruction, has become a preacher of the One-God religion in the past few episodes. Baltar reaches out to former flight deck chief Galen Tyrol who is having a very hard time coming to terms with his Cylon existence and his wife's death. Baltar tells Tyrol:

I know it's hard to...make sense of things sometimes. In my own life, I...in my own life I've joined the fleet as a scientist, as a skeptic, as a...supposedly a man of reason. Only to have fate turn that all on its head. But I understand now that there is a purpose to it. We change. We evolve. Maybe we even learn something along the way. (pauses) I have committed...unconscionable crimes. And I have been offered one last chance at redemption, because I chose to accept my fate and not fight it anymore.

Battlestar Galactica is very much about bad things happening to people (whether they did it to themselves or it happened to them) and how they deal with their problems. Starbuck seems to reach a turning point where she's left behind self-destructive behavior and looking for the next step: redemption. Baltar's already taken that step. And as Baltar and Leoben say, the key to finding redemption is to accept the past, accept that the past is part of who you are even if it's horrible and make peace with it. In the ministry, people often call this process "laying down your burdens" (this phrase incidentally is the title of an earlier Battlestar Galactica episode.)

Link of the day: A physicist talks to theologians

Via Blake Johnson's blog, I found this thoughtful speech about physics, religion, and what religion can learn from physics. I note that there isn't much discussion about what physics can learn from religion. Maybe I'll write something about that, when I know more.

Song of the day: "Doubting Thomas" by Nickel Creek

A very thoughtful song about religious faith. The lyrics are well-written enough that you could extend the metaphor to other kinds of trust.

What will be left when I've drawn my last breath,
Besides the folks I've met and the folks who know me,
Will I discover a soul saving love,
Or just the dirt above and below me,

I'm a doubting thomas,
I took a promise,
But I do not feel safe,
Oh me of little faith,

Sometimes I pray for a slap in the face,
Then I beg to be spared 'cause I'm a coward,
If there's a master of death I'll bet he's holding his breath,
As I show the blind and tell the deaf about his power,
I'm a doubting thomas,
I can't keep my promises,
'Cause i don't know what's safe,
oh me of little faith

Can I be used to help others find truth,
When I'm scared I'll find proof that its a lie,
Can I be lead down a trail dropping bread crumbs,
That prove I'm not ready to die,

Please give me time to decipher the signs,
Please forgive me for time that I've wasted,

I'm a doubting thomas,
I'll take your promise,
Though I know nothin's safe,
Oh me of little faith