happy tuesday?... and yay for books :-P

so the zoo didn't so much work out today... i showed up at mom's school at 4:15, as agreed upon, but her teachers and her head janitor were feeling chatty so we didn't leave until 4:45, arriving at the zoo at 5:05, and although it doesn't close til 6, the last admission is at 5... so here we were, 2/3 of the way downtown, and for nothing... oops... we'll try again earlier next week.

so, instead, we decided to run by the central memphis library (my idea)... the main location of the city/county library system is a really nice building... it was built while i was at college, and if i actually lived in town, i think i would be there several hours every week just because i love the place! mom didn't realize that there's a small bookstore just inside the front doors that sells old books for as low as 25 or 50 cents, so i showed her around that, then dropped her off in fiction, while i went up to scope out the math section.... given it's a public library, and not a math research library, but i do generally find interesting math history books on the shelves... of note this time: Mathematics in a Postmodern Age: A Christian Perspective... this book came out 4 years ago, and i'd never heard of it before... i got mom to check it out for me on her library card, and i'll return it before i head out of town, finished or not; if i like what i make it through, i'll just buy myself a copy off of amazon.

i think there need to be more books that explore the relationship between the sciences and religion. while it's very true and needful to remember that science explores the laws, relationships, and patterns of the physical world, and religion (at least Christianity) explores the relationship of people with God, so they're exploring different things, it's also true that religion can affect one's views of the philosophy of science, and science can affect one's views about religion. i've made an effort to read what i do find in this vein... for example things a computer scientist rarely talks about by don knuth, or the science of God by gerald schroeder... however, in schroeder's book for example, when i talk about it with non-religious friends, i feel compelled to add the coda "well, even if it's not all accurate, it's interesting food for thought"... the sad thing is, most literature that is on this cusp so far either "bends" science to match a religious philosophy or bends theology to match a scientific agenda, at least for some parts. biographies/autobiographies aside (i'd put knuth's book in this category -- even though it's transcripts of a lecture series, i got more of his personal attempts to meld his faith and his work as a computer scientist out of it than the tone of a book of research)... it's rare to find a book that both well-read theologians and well-read scientists will both acclaim as a good book.

in keeping with being mindful of that, here's a review by a grad student in a christian magazine (click here), and here's one by a non-Christian reviewer from one of the national math societies (the MAA) (click here). Notice that the first review seems to be wholeheartedly supportive, which doesn't surprise me, while the math one is favorable by also not willing to gloss over structural problems with the book... this is a general trend in this area of writing (christianity intersecting mathematics) (i.e. the christian reviews are glowing while the science reviews question the logic/validity of some arguments), however, unlike many reviews i've read where the science review calls the book rubbish, the MAA review comments that while it's not perfect, this book adds serious discussion to this area and it will be interesting to see what comes from this book's authors in the future. at any rate, i was excited to see that this book exists, and i'm very interested to see what it says.

oh! and here's something i didn't expect and was absolutely delighted to find out about. this book i'm rambling about and haven't read yet was written by a coalition of authors who are members of the Association for Christians in the Mathematical Sciences -- i never knew that such an organization existed! this makes my day! i've strongly felt for a long time that there needs to be more seriously scholarship and dialogue on the intersection of faith and mathematics that both sides of the coin (non-christian mathematicians as well as non-mathematician christians) respect. i was extremely excited to find out that there is a small but growing formal organization of people doing just that.

it's been a happy academic day :-P

now, dinner and scrubs :-P

later dudes