Michael Polanyi proposed that the primary task of the scientist is to believe wisely. Himself a chemist, he had a great love for evidence and for due scientific process, but as a philosopher he recognized that evidence and process were the creations of the human imagination and, in turn, so were also human beliefs.
In a dramatic late-night appearance in the East Room of the White House, Mr. Obama declared that "justice has been done" as he disclosed that American military and C.I.A. operatives had finally cornered the Al Qaeda leader who had eluded them for nearly a decade and shot him to death at a compound in Pakistan.
The forces attacked the compound in what Mr. Obama called a "targeted operation" that left Mr. bin Laden dead. "No Americans were harmed," Mr. Obama said. "They took care to avoid civilian casualties. After a firefight they killed Osama bin Laden and took custody of his body."
The root word for "spiritual" has changed through the various ages, from translation from Hebrew (ruwach) to Greek (pneuma) to Latin (spiritus):
Even though the root concept of spirituality is rooted in the wind — God's breath, the physical manifestations of God's interactions with the elements of earth — the word has come to mean exactly the opposite of physical.
But,
Ancient spirituality was physical. God was not yet this immortal, invisible, inconceivable mystery: God could walk in a garden. God could be a pillar of fire, real fire. God could talk in a cloud. God had two hands. God had breath.
And He has breath. Breath that gives life, words that restore it, and love that redeems it.
For you Star Wars/economics nerds out there.
Doesn't the Empire take a huge economic loss from the lost productivity of an entire planet?
Chick-fil-A announced it will open 90 new stores this year and at least one of them will be here in the San Francisco Bay Area.Yeah, I'll probably be camping out in line.
If you're like me and you already hate fire ants, you probably don't need to read this article on how Georgia Tech researchers have published research findings on how fire ants can form watertight rafts that can float for months.
...are actually pretty true. Via Shawn Blanc.
No matter how you explain the world around you, your explanation is the nucleus and kernel of how you explain yourself.
— Believers and Skeptics by James Shelley
As I amusedly watched the price rise every day, I learned that Amazon retailers are increasingly using algorithmic pricing (something Amazon itself does on a large scale)Someone just didn't write their algorithm well enough...
Massachusetts Institute of Technology's decision to name a 44-year old Japanese venture capitalist who attended, but did not graduate, from two American colleges as the director of one of the world's top computing science laboratories an unusual choice.But they're certainly an unusual lab. The Junkyard Jumbotron is a pretty cool DIY project.