22 FEB 2015 by ideonexus
Scent as Data in a Beehive
To shield her antennae from the many bruising signals in the air, she walked with her head low. Air currents and electrical pulses from thousands of bees rippled against her, but Flora ignored them all. The pulsing track alone held her focus, clear and simple across the perilously busy lobby, where she had to slow down because of the tempest of data underfoot.
A rush of workers came through in a tumult of scent and Flora lifted her head—then the rhythm of the foot-current drew her on. She ... 1 
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notes03 MAR 2014 by ideonexus
The Success of Science
One of the reasons for its success is that science has
built-in, self-correcting machinery at its very heart. It takes
account of human fallibility. One of its commandments is,
"Mistrust arguments from authority." Too many such arguments
have turned out to be painfully wrong. Authorities must prove
their contentions like anybody else. This independence of
science, its unwillingness to pay automatic obeisance to
conventional wisdom, makes it dangerous to doctrines less self-
critical. ... 1 notes
notesComes from its built-in self-criticism, its proven results, and the reverence and awe it inspires.
20 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Science Inspires a Love of Life and Morality
Science enhances the moral value of life, because it furthers a love of truth and reverence—love of truth displaying itself in the constant endeavor to arrive at a more exact knowledge of the world of mind and matter around us, and reverence, because every advance in knowledge brings us face to face with the mystery of our own being. 
1 Because knowledge brings us face to face with the mystery of our existence.
05 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
Roberto Bellarmino's Condemnaton of Galileo's Theory
It seems to me that your Reverence and Signor Galileo act prudently when you content yourselves with speaking hypothetically and not absolutely, as I have always understood that Copernicus spoke. To say that on the supposition of the Earth's movement and the Sun's quiescence all the celestial appearances are explained better than by the theory of eccentrics and epicycles is to speak with excellent good sense and to run no risk whatsoever. Such a manner of speaking is enough for a mathematicia... 1 notes
notesThe inquisitor responsible for Giordano Bruno's prosecution argues that Galileo's theory that the sun is the center of the Universe would refute scripture.
01 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
Sagan's Positive View of Advance Alien Civilizations
It is at this point that the ultimate significance of dolphins in the search for
extraterrestrial intelligence emerges. It is not a question of whether we are
emotionally prepared in the long run to confront a message from the stars. It is
whether we can develop a sense that beings with quite different evolutionary
histories, beings who may look far different from us, even "monstrous," may,
nevertheless, be worthy of friendship and reverence, brotherhood and trust. We
have far to go; while th... 1 notes
notesWe need to understand animal minds as practice for understanding alien ones.
09 JUN 2011 by ideonexus
Compute Simulations of DNA are Cathedrals
Some images of the molecules of life, as they are displayed on the color computer screen, resemble the gorgeous stained-glass windows and soaring architectural members of the Gothic cathedrals. A cross-section of the B DNA double helix, for example, bears a likeness to the magnificent rose window at Chartres. The webbed vaulting of the clathrin protein and the flying buttresses of the sugar-phosphate side chains of the DNA evoke the same sense of architectural deja vu. No medieval architect c...Folksonomies: spiritual naturalism wonder
Folksonomies: spiritual naturalism wonder
Just as stained glass tried to represent the hidden wonders of the world, our computer simulations represent wonders we cannot see with our own eyes to instill reverence and awe.
09 JUN 2011 by ideonexus
The Holiness of Monarch Butterflies
As we reached the tiny clump of trees festooned with butterflies as thick as jungle foliage, we Yanks buzzed about, snapping pics, taking notes, storing up impressions with which to later regale our friends back home. The Mexicans by and large sat silently in the forest, kids in laps, eyes somberly fixed on the massed monarchs. It was difficult to read their emotions, but 1 believe that many of the Mexican visitors to the Chincua Monarch Sanctuary were driven by the same urge that might have ... 1 notes
notesA reverence instilled by appreciating nature is the only thing that will save it.
04 JUN 2011 by ideonexus
Carl Sagan on the Belief in God
I think it's impossible to be a scientist and to confront, even occassionally, the grandure, subtlety, elegance and magnificience of the universe without feeling a sense of reverence and awe, but that's very different from concluding that there's a god who issues punishments and rewards after your dead or that prayer works or that the bible is written by anybody but fallible human beings.
[...]
The word god is used to cover so many different points of view... First of all, you can be religi...A very political commentary on the subject. Beautiful rhetorically.
29 MAY 2011 by ideonexus
Why "Spiritual Naturalism"?
Our response to the natural world is one of reverence and humility in the face of a mystery that transcends empirical knowing-now, certainly, and perhaps forever. "Agnostic" does not do justice to the celebratory aspect of our position. Nor does "pantheist" adequately express our sense of what nature hides. "Creation-based spirituality" has a respectable pedigree, although "creation" hints at an anthropomorphic Creator. "Religious naturalism" gets close to the mark.Because atheism and agnosticism don't convey they joy we take in the natural world.
18 MAY 2011 by ideonexus
Natural Laws are Universal
...the order of the Universe is not an
assumption; it's an observed fact. We detect the light from distant
quasars only because the laws of electromagnetism are the same
ten billion light years away as here. The spectra of those quasars
are recognizable only because the same chemical elements are
present there as here, and because the same laws of quantum
mechanics apply. The motion of galaxies around one another
follows familiar Newtonian gravity. Gravitational lenses and
binary pulsar spin-... 1 notes
notesThe laws of nature are comprehensible and the same across the Universe.
