We're Moving!

With thoughtful consideration, we have decided to move the website to a new domain with a new title.  Instead of A Preacher & A Teacher, the new site will be called The Post-Modern Synthesis.  The premise will remain the same: the reconciliation of science and religion in the 21st century.

Please join us at our new location: postmodernsynthesis.blogspot.com.  All previous articles from this site have be transferred to the new blog.  Please continue to follow the commentary on science, religion, education, and culture at The Post-Modern Synthesis.

Thank you for joining us at A Teacher & A Preacher!

The Last 1000 Years of European History

I saw this awesome video which shows the changes to the European Map over the last 10 centuries.  It shows how empires have risen, conquered and fallen.  You can follow some of the major moments in history and see how things changed.  See if you can pick out the fall of the Roman Empire, the rise of Napoleon, World War I, World War II, and the Cold War.  Only down side is that it lacks any dates.
History buffs will enjoy this one.

Lyric of the Day: Zac Brown Band

Cause when she loves me 

Girl that's how I feel 

Cause when she loves me I'm on top of the world 

Cause when she loves me I can live forever 

And she loves me I am untouchable 

Zac Brown Band

Got Whatever It Is

Alchemy- An Important History

In the 1500 and 1600's, scientists dabbled in the often misunderstood art of alchemy.  The goal of alchemist's was to turn metals such as lead into gold.  Most notably, Robert Boyle and Isaac Newton devoted a lot of time to the question of the Philosopher's Stone.  Newton even thought he had unlocked the secret a a recently found manuscript from the pen of the Founder of Modern Physics.

Scientific American features an article on Newton's relationship to alchemy and the role that are played in the development of modern science. Alchemy was not based on some strange superstition, though maybe some faulty assumptions.   Interestingly, alchemists utilizing the modern scientific method in their quest were:

creating new alloys; manufacturing acids and pigments; inventing apparatus for distillation, the process used in making perfumes and whiskeys; conceiving of atoms centuries before modern atomic theory...

The idea that elements can transform isn't far from the truth and radioactive materials decay at a steady rate into lighter elements all the time.  Alchemists were not a strange, shadowy cult as they are often depicted.  They were modern chemists before modern chemistry had begun and an important story in the history of science.

Lyric of the Day: Blues Traveller

Oh I like coffee

And I like tea

I'd like to be able to enter a final plea

I still got this dream that you just can't shake

I love you to the point you can no longer take

Blues Traveller

Run Around

Robert Sapolsky on Our Metaphorical Brains

Robert Sapolsky, a Stanford professor, studies primates and what makes us human.  In an online commentary from the New York Times, Sapolsky explains how our brain differs from other animals.  The structure of our brains grow out of the same building blocks as everything else.  The neurons of all animals follow the same structure and work the same way.  Our main advantage is shear numbers.  


We have 100 billion neurons which create a seemingly infinite number of synapses and pathways.  Some scientists hope to build a connectome to show how each neuron communicates with another.  We have almost finished the complex connectome of model nematode, C. elegans.  The human connectome shows several orders of magnitude more complexity and is years away.  But even without visualizing every connection in the brain, we can understand the importance of these synapses to human capabilities.  Sapolsky notes our unique language center (Broca's Area), fine motor area, and neuron-dense frontal cortex.  Specifically, our frontal cortex controls emotional reactions, personalities, decision-making, and planning abilities.

Lyric of the Day: Journey

Runnin' out of self-control

Gettin' close to an overload

Up against a no win situation

Shoulder to shoulder, push and shove

I'm hangin' up my boxin' gloves

I'm ready for a long vacation

Journey

Be Good to Yourself

TED Talk Tuesday: Dean Ornish

Dean Ornish tells us that our genes are not our fate.  Our genes must interact with the environment we live in.  What we do and how we eat can have major effects on which genes get turned on in our cells and thus affect our health.

Enjoy!

Lyric of the Day: Blessid Union of Souls

That's the girl I've been telling you about 

She's been spinning in my head like a revolving door 

Her smile is like the sun and my whole world revovles around her 

Blessid Union of Souls

That's the Girl

Louisiana's Biology Textbooks Teach Evolution

Are you ready for a shocker?  The biology textbooks in Louisiana teach evolution to the high schools students.  For an even bigger shock, some people are not happy with that.  Louisiana may become the next battleground state in science education.  For a dose of irony, their governor, Bobby Jindal, actually majored in biology in college.


A complaint has been filed against the proposed biology textbooks by Winston White and others who said, "It's like Charles Darwin and his theory is a saint. You can't touch it." Besides the horrible grammar of the sentence, it also sounds the common refrain of anti-evolutionists.  They seem to think that "Darwinism" exists as a religion and tend to use such language to justify their points.  Less than a Saint, scientists revere Charles Darwin because of the enormous contribution he made to biology.  Such language also pretends that evolutionary biology has remained the same since 1859.  Countless experiments continue to confirm and refine Darwin's original theory- much of which eluded 19th century scientists.


Specifically, the complaint references the 2008 Louisiana Science Education Act which calls for science educators to instruction their classes in "critical thinking skills, logical analysis, and open and objective discussion of scientific theories being studied including, but not limited to, evolution, the origins of life, global warming, and human cloning."  White's group, Louisiana Family Forum, helped to push for the law under the guise of "Teach the Controversy".  They actually want us to teach Intelligent Design/Creationism in place of the science or simply to introduce warning labels to the textbooks.


If the science textbooks teach Darwin's dangerous idea, then they already adhere to the LSEA.  Any critical analysis and objective discussion of the data plainly dismiss Creationism and point to Evolution.  The writers of the LSEA meant to encourage doubt in the scientific process and rely on the ignorance of the population.  The side of science and education can win by using their own "ideas" against them.  On a good note, the advisory panel endorsed the biology textbooks, but the fight is far from over.