30 DEC 2013 by ideonexus
The Silos in "Wool"
The silo was something she had always taken for granted. The priests say it had always been here, that it was lovingly created by a caring God, that everything they would ever need had been provided for. Juliette had a hard time with this story. A few years ago, she had been on the first team to drill past 10,000 feet and hit new oil reserves. She had a sense of the size and scope of the world below them. And then she had seen with her own eyes the view of the outside with its phantom-like sh...Folksonomies: science fiction imagination
Folksonomies: science fiction imagination
1 
notes
notesDescription of the hints of a world beyond the silos.
12 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Geometry Seems Disconnected from Reality
Why is geometry often described as 'cold' and 'dry?' One reason lies in its inability to describe the shape of a cloud, a mountain, a coastline, or a tree. Clouds are not spheres, mountains are not cones, coastlines are not circles, and bark is not smooth, nor does lightning travel in a straight line... Nature exhibits not simply a higher degree but an altogether different level of complexity. Folksonomies: complexity geometry
Folksonomies: complexity geometry
1 notes
notesIt deals with orbs and squares, but clouds and trees are much more complex.
15 DEC 2011 by ideonexus
Fractal Geometry Changes One's Perspective of the World
Fractal geometry will make you see everything differently. There is a danger in reading further. You risk the loss of your childhood vision of clouds, forests, flowers, galaxies, leaves, feathers, rocks, mountains, torrents of water, carpet, bricks, and much else besides. Never again will your interpretation of these things be quite the same. Folksonomies: perspective fractals
Folksonomies: perspective fractals
1 notes
notesYou see fractals in much of the natural world after learning of them.
21 SEP 2011 by ideonexus
Seeing How Species Arise is Similar to Understanding Star...
The way we discovered how species arise resembles the way
astronomers discovered how stars “evolve” over time. Both processes
occur too slowly for us to see them happening over our lifetime. But we
can still understand how they work by finding snapshots of the process
at different evolutionary stages and putting these snapshots together
into a conceptual movie. For stars, astronomers saw dispersed clouds
of matter (“star nurseries”) in galaxies. Elsewhere they saw those clouds condens... 1 notes
notesJust as astronomers search the skies for stars in varying stages of life, biologists look for species in varying degrees development.
30 AUG 2011 by ideonexus
The Need to Cross-Pollinate Knowledge
When chemists have brought their knowledge out of their special laboratories into the laboratory of the world, where chemical combinations are and have been through all time going on in such vast proportions,—when physicists study the laws of moisture, of clouds and storms, in past periods as well as in the present,—when, in short, geologists and zoologists are chemists and physicists, and vice versa,—then we shall learn more of the changes the world has undergone than is possible now t...Folksonomies: progress cross-pollination
Folksonomies: progress cross-pollination
1 Chemsits and physicists must come out and study nature, while geologists and zoologists must go into the lab, so that scientific progress may multiply.
09 JUN 2011 by ideonexus
Teaching Children Science by Drawing Nature
The British and Irish emphasis on drawing from nature (which has lessened in those places, too) helped develop powers of observation and reinforced curiosity about the natural world. A child who has watched whirligigs and water striders on the surface of a stream will appreciate the importance of clean water. A child who has observed the clouds, their heapings and tumblings, their dark massings and silver linings, will be better prepared to understand the relationship between cloud cover and ...American schoolchildren aren't pushed to draw and immerse themselves in nature; therefore, they don't get the appreciation for it and desire for biodiversity.
20 MAY 2011 by ideonexus
There are Fairies of Science in Everything
There are forces around us, and among us, which I shall ask you to allow me to call fairies, and these are ten thousand times more wonderful, more magical, and more beautiful in their work, than those of the old fairy tales. They, too, are invisible, and many people live and die without ever seeing them or caring to see them. These people go about with their eyes shut, either because they will not open them, or because no one has taught them how to see. They fret and worry over their own litt... 1 notes
notesand with patient observation, we can see them.
12 APR 2011 by ideonexus
Defects in Christ's Teachings
I am concerned with Christ as He appears in the Gospels, taking the Gospel narrative as it stands, and there one does find some things that do not seem to be very wise. For one thing, he certainly thought that His second coming would occur in clouds of glory before the death of all the people who were living at that time. There are a great many texts that prove that. He says, for instance, "Ye shall not have gone over the cities of Israel till the Son of Man be come." Then he says, "There ar... 1 notes
notesThere are some serious flaws in the teachings of Jesus Christ that clearly indicate he thought he would return in the lifetimes of those he was preaching to.
