Cox, Harvey, The Future of Faith, HarperOne 2009 Amazon editorial review from Publishers Weekly Starred Review. What shape will the Christian faith take in the 21st century? In the midst of fast-paced global changes and in the face of an apparent resurgence of fundamentalism, can Christianity survive as a living and vital faith? With his typical brilliance and lively insight, Cox explores these and other questions in a dazzling blend of memoir, church history and theological commentary. He divides Christian history into three periods: the Age of Faith, during the first Christian centuries, when the earliest followers of Jesus lived in his Spirit, embraced his hope and followed him in the work he had begun; the Age of Belief, from the Council of Nicaea to the late 20th century, during which the church replaced faith in Jesus with dogma about him; and the Age of the Spirit, in which we're now living, in which Christians are rediscovering the awe and wonder of faith in the tremendous mystery of God. According to Cox, the return to the Spirit that so enlivened the Age of Faith is now enlivening a global Christianity, through movements like Pentecostalism and liberation theology, yearning for the dawning of God's reign of shalom. Cox remains our most thoughtful commentator on the religious scene, and his spirited portrait of our religious landscape challenges us to think in new ways about faith.' Copyright © Reed Business Information 
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Debray, Regis, God, An Itinerary, Verso 2004 Amazon Product Description 'God, who has changed the lives—and deaths—of men and women, has in turn changed His face and His meaning several times over since His birth three thousand years ago. He may have kept the same name throughout, but God has been addressed in many different ways and cannot be said to have the same characteristics in the year 500 BC as in AD 400 or in the twenty-first century, nor is He the same entity in Jerusalem or Constantinople as in Rome or New York. The omnipotent and punitive God of the Hebrews is not the consoling and intimate God of the Christians, and is certainly not identical with the impersonal cosmic Energy of the New Agers.

Régis Debray's purpose in this major new book is to trace the episodes of the genesis of God, His itinerary and the costs of His survival. Debray shifts the spotlight away from the theological foreground and moves it backstage to the machinery of divine production by going back, from the Law, to the Tablets themselves and by scrutinizing Heaven at its most down-to-earth. Throughout this beautifully illustrated book, he is able to focus his attention not just on what was written, but on how it was written: with what tools, on what surface, for what social purpose and in what physical environment. Debray contends that, in order to discover how God's fire was transferred from the desert to the prairie, we ought first to bracket the philosophical questions and focus on empirical information. However, he claims that this does not lessen its significance, but rather gives new life to spiritual issues. God: An Itinerary uses the histories of the Eternal and of the West to illuminate one another and to throw light on contemporary civilization itself. 50 b/w illustrations.'  
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Hobson, M P, and G. P. Efstathiou, A. N. Lasenby, General Relativity: An Introduction for Physicists, Cambridge University Press 2006 Amazon Editorial Reviews Book Description 'After reviewing the basic concept of general relativity, this introduction discusses its mathematical background, including the necessary tools of tensor calculus and differential geometry. These tools are used to develop the topic of special relativity and to discuss electromagnetism in Minkowski spacetime. Gravitation as spacetime curvature is introduced and the field equations of general relativity derived. After applying the theory to a wide range of physical situations, the book concludes with a brief discussion of classical field theory and the derivation of general relativity from a variational principle.'  
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Joseph (2010), George Gheverghese, The Crest of the Peacock: Non-European Roots of Mathematics, Princeton University Press 2010 'From the Ishango Bone of central Africa and the Inca quipu of South America to the dawn of modern mathematics, The Crest of the Peacock makes it clear that human beings everywhere have been capable of advanced and innovative mathematical thinking. George Gheverghese Joseph takes us on a breathtaking multicultural tour of the roots and shoots of non-European mathematics. He shows us the deep influence that the Egyptians and Babylonians had on the Greeks, the Arabs' major creative contributions, and the astounding range of successes of the great civilizations of India and China.' 
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Peacock, John A, Cosmological Physics, Cambridge University Press 1999 Nature Book Review: ' The intermingling of observational detail and fundamental theory has made cosmology an exceptionally rich, exciting and controversial science. Students in the field — whether observers or particle theorists — are expected to be acquainted with matters ranging from the Supernova Ia distance scale, Big Bang nucleosynthesis theory, scale-free quantum fluctuations during inflation, the galaxy two-point correlation function, particle theory candidates for the dark matter, and the star formation history of the Universe. Several general science books, conference proceedings and specialized monographs have addressed these issues. Peacock's Cosmological Physics ambitiously fills the void for introducing students with a strong undergraduate background in physics to the entire world of current physical cosmology. The majestic sweep of his discussion of this vast terrain is awesome, and is bound to capture the imagination of most students.' Ray Carlberg, Nature 399:322 
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Prothero, Stephen, God Is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions that Run the World - and Why Their Differences Matter, HarperOne 2010 'Introduction: . . . The world's religious rivals do converge when it comes to ethics, but they diverge sharply on doctrine, ritual, mythology, experience and law. These differences may not matter to mystics of philosophers of religion, but they matter to ordinary religious people.' 
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Russell, Bertrand, A History of Western Philosophy, and its Connection with Political and Social Circumstances from Earliest Times to the Present Day, Routledge 1946, 1991 Amazon ditorial reviews: Ray Monk: 'A History of Western Philosophy remains unchallenged as the perfect introduction to its subject. Russell . . . writes with the kind of verve, freshness and personal engagement that lesser spirits would never have permitted themselves. This boldness, together with the astonishing breadth of his general historical knowledge, allows him to put philosophers into their social and cultural context . . . The result is exactly the kind of philosophy that most people would like to read, but which only Russell could possibly have written.'  
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Safi, Omid, Progressive Muslims: On Justice, Gender and Pluralism, Oneworld Publications 2003 Amazon editorial review From Publishers Weekly 'Safi, a Colgate University professor, assembles a diverse set of essays by and about "progressive" Muslims. The essays vary in topic and in effectiveness, but generally seek to challenge the images of Islam held by both xenophobic Westerners and extremist Muslims. Safi's introduction, though showing insight into many problems today's Muslims face but rarely discuss publicly, is clunky, citing sources from Gandhi to Bob Dylan. Part I offers hard-hitting essays that are sure to be controversial in their discussion of what scholar Tazim Kassam claims is a "curtailment... of civil liberties such as freedom of inquiry and the expression of dissenting opinions" in the U.S. after September 11. There are also some triumphant essays. Scott Siraj al-Haqq Kugle superbly analyzes Islam's categorization of homosexuality as a sin in an essay that is long overdue and probably the only scholarly work of its kind. Gwendolyn Simmons's piece demands the establishment of feminism as Islamic in a touching essay-cum-memoir that connects her growth as a Muslim female to her experience as a young African-American during the Civil Rights era. The incomparable Amina Wadud offers an excellent article on racial tensions between immigrant and indigenous Muslims, while Marcia Hermansen pens the volume's bravest and most honest contribution, addressing the increasing conservatism of her American Muslim students-a topic previously not discussed outside the Muslim community. This collection is recommended for those who yearn for realistic information about Muslims, and for Muslims who are disgruntled with current Islamic leadership.' Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. 
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Smith, Wilfred Cantwell Cantwell Smith, Islam in Modern History, Princeton University Press 1977  
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Adi Shankara - Wikipedia, Adi Shankara - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, Adi Shankara (788 CE - 821 CE?), also known as Śaṅkara Bhagavatpādācārya and Ādi Śaṅkarācārya, was an Indian philosopher who consolidated the doctrine of Advaita Vedanta, a sub-school of Vedanta.

His works in Sanskrit, all of which are extant today, concern themselves with establishing the doctrine of Advaita (Nondualism). He also established the importance of monastic life as sanctioned in the Upanishads and Brahma Sutra, in a time when the Mimamsa school established strict ritualism and ridiculed monasticism.' back

Albert Einstein (2000), Thermodynamics - Wikiquote, ' "A theory is the more impressive the greater the simplicity of its premises, the more different kinds of things it relates, and the more extended its area of applicability. Therefore the deep impression that classical thermodynamics made upon me. It is the only physical theory of universal content which I am convinced will never be overthrown, within the framework of applicability of its basic concepts." Albert Einstein (author), Paul Arthur, Schilpp (editor). Autobiographical Notes. A Centennial Edition. Open Court Publishing Company. 1979. p. 31 [As quoted by Don Howard, John Stachel. Einstein: The Formative Years, 1879-1909 (Einstein Studies, vol. 8). Birkhäuser Boston. 2000. p. 1]' back

Amnesty Inernational, Mobile Verification Toolkit, ' Mobile Verification Toolkit (MVT) is a collection of utilities to simplify and automate the process of gathering forensic traces helpful to identify a potential compromise of Android and iOS devices.' back

Amnesty International, Forensic Methodology Report: How to catch NSO Group’s Pegasus, ' NSO Group claims that its Pegasus spyware is only used to “investigate terrorism and crime” and “leaves no traces whatsoever”. This Forensic Methodology Report shows that neither of these statements are true. This report accompanies the release of the Pegasus Project, a collaborative investigation that involves more than 80 journalists from 17 media organizations in 10 countries coordinated by Forbidden Stories with technical support of Amnesty International’s Security Lab.' back

Andrew McGowan, Radicalism mixed with openness: how Desmond Tutu used his gifts to help end Apartheid, ' Tutu’s contribution to the end of Apartheid has been so remarkable in part because of its strong grounding in his faith. Tutu’s work suggests every culture and tradition may dig deep for what it brings to present divisions, and that the way to address oppositions based on identity may be to embrace our own. That way, we can understand that others can be embraced and listened to as well.' back

Ann Davies, Why are Facebook and Amazon afraid of Lina Khan?, ' In the past, trust regulation focused on price. Monopolies would potentially have the power to raise prices, which would harm a consumer. But as companies like Amazon use cut-rate prices to best the competition, Khan argues that this behaviour is also harmful. Lower prices give it an outsize share of the market, which allows it to influence the economy and create an environment where even competitors must become dependent on Amazon and its platform to succeed.. . . Khan argued that Amazon was a monopoly comparable to US railroads at the turn of the 20th century. And monopolies are bad because while low prices may make consumers happy in the short term, they are bad for the economy and for individual consumers over the long term because they stifle competition – which can eventually harm innovation – and innovation is what keeps economies competitive.' back

Aquinas 160, Summa: I 27 1 Is there procession in God?, 'Our Lord says, "From God I proceeded" (Jn. 8:42).' back

Aquinas, Summa, I, 27, 1, Is there procession in God?, 'As God is above all things, we should understand what is said of God, not according to the mode of the lowest creatures, namely bodies, but from the similitude of the highest creatures, the intellectual substances; while even the similitudes derived from these fall short in the representation of divine objects. Procession, therefore, is not to be understood from what it is in bodies, either according to local movement or by way of a cause proceeding forth to its exterior effect, as, for instance, like heat from the agent to the thing made hot. Rather it is to be understood by way of an intelligible emanation, for example, of the intelligible word which proceeds from the speaker, yet remains in him. In that sense the Catholic Faith understands procession as existing in God.' back

Asuza Street Revival - Wikipedia, Asuza Street Revival - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'The Azusa Street Revival was an historic Pentecostal revival meeting that took place in Los Angeles, California, and was led by William J. Seymour, an African American preacher. It began with a meeting on April 14, 1906, and continued until roughly 1915. The revival was characterized by ecstatic spiritual experiences accompanied by speaking in tongues, dramatic worship services, and inter-racial mingling. The participants received criticism from secular media and Christian theologians for behaviors considered to be outrageous and unorthodox, especially at the time. Today, the revival is considered by historians to be the primary catalyst for the spread of Pentecostalism in the 20th century.' back

Axial Age - Wikipedia, Axial Age - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'German philosopher Karl Jaspers coined the term the axial age (Ger. Achsenzeit, "axistime") to describe the period from 800 BCE to 200 BCE, during which, according to Jaspers, similar revolutionary thinking appeared in China, India and the Occident. The period is also sometimes referred to as the axis age.

Jaspers, in his Vom Ursprung und Ziel der Geschichte (The Origin and Goal of History), identified a number of key axial age thinkers as having had a profound influence on future philosophy and religion, and identified characteristics common to each area from which those thinkers emerged. Jaspers saw in these developments in religion and philosophy a striking parallel without any obvious direct transmission of ideas from one region to the other, having found no recorded proof of any extensive intercommunication between Ancient Greece, the Middle East, India, and China. Jaspers held up this age as unique, and one to which the rest of the history of human thought might be compared. Jaspers' approach to the culture of the middle of the first millennium BC has been adopted by other scholars and academics, and has become a point of discussion in the history of religion.' back

Carlo Rovelli (2008), Relational Quantum Mechanics, ' I suggest that the common unease with taking quantum mechanics as a fundamental description ofnature (the measurement problem) could derive from the use of an incorrect notion, as the uneasewith the Lorentz transformations before Einstein derived from the notion of observer-independenttime. I suggest that this incorrect notion that generates the unease with quantum mechanics isthe notion of observer-independent state of a system, or observer-independent values of physicalquantities. I reformulate the problem of the interpretation of quantum mechanics as the problemof deriving the formalism from a set of simple physical postulates. I consider a reformulation ofquantum mechanics in terms of information theory. All systems are assumed to be equivalent, thereis no observer-observed distinction, and the theory describes only the information that systems haveabout each other; nevertheless, the theory is complete.' back

Christopher Rhodes, The US embargo on Cuba has failed, ' The strongest reason to end the embargo against Cuba is the massive toll that the policy continues to enact on the Cuban population. Both the Cuban government and the United Nations have estimated that the embargo has cost the Cuban economy $130 billion over six decades. It’s also worth noting that the US Chamber of Commerce estimates that the embargo costs the US economy billions of dollars each year, as well. The human toll is harder to quantify, but has clearly been significant. Human rights experts at the UN have urged the US to ease sanctions during the COVID-19 pandemic, arguing that such a change will save lives by allowing Cuba greater access to medical supplies and equipment.' back

Complex number - Wikipedia, Complex number - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'IA complex number is a number that can be expressed in the form a + bi, where a and b are real numbers and i is the imaginary unit, which satisfies the equation i² = −1. In this expression, a is the real part and b is the imaginary part of the complex number. Complex numbers extend the concept of the one-dimensional number line to the two-dimensional complex plane (also called Argand plane) by using the horizontal axis for the real part and the vertical axis for the imaginary part.' back

Compton scattering - Wikipedia, Compton scattering - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Compton scattering is the inelastic scattering of a photon by a quasi-free charged particle, usually an electron. It results in a decrease in energy (increase in wavelength) of the photon (which may be an X-ray or gamma ray photon), called the Compton effect. Part of the energy of the photon is transferred to the recoiling electron. Inverse Compton scattering also exists, in which a charged particle transfers part of its energy to a photon.' back

David Bentley Hart, No Turning Back, ' Rather than an attempted retreat into an irrecuperable past, what Sloterdijk believes we really require is a new sphere of solidarity that can encompass all life, a shelter strong enough to create a robust co-immunity for the defenseless whole: global society, animal and vegetal life, nature, the earth itself. Religion has been irretrievably lost as a binding system of values, so we need a new piety devoted to, and sustained by, the oneness of the earth that we inhabit, share, and depend on.' back

Density matrix - Wikipedia, Density matrix - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'A density matrix is a matrix that describes a quantum system in a mixed state, a statistical ensemble of several quantum states. This should be contrasted with a single state vector that describes a quantum system in a pure state. The density matrix is the quantum-mechanical analogue to a phase-space probability measure (probability distribution of position and momentum) in classical statistical mechanics.' back

Dirac equation - Wikipedia, Dirac equation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'In particle physics, the Dirac equation is a relativistic wave equation derived by British physicist Paul Dirac in 1928. In its free form, or including electromagnetic interactions, it describes all spin-1⁄2 massive particles such as electrons and quarks, for which parity is a symmetry, and is consistent with both the principles of quantum mechanics and the theory of special relativity, and was the first theory to account fully for special relativity in the context of quantum mechanics. It accounted for the fine details of the hydrogen spectrum in a completely rigorous way.' back

E J Dionne Jr, Opinion: Joe Biden and the social democratic moment, ' By placing a premium on competent public administration and traditional forms of expertise, the pandemic undermined upstart ultranationalist parties before they had a chance to consolidate their gains. Voters faced with life-or-death questions have been reluctant to entrust their fate to demagogues more skilled at stoking resentments than solving problems. . . . Unprecedented, redistributive government spending across the wealthy countries prevented the pandemic downturn from becoming another Great Depression. At the same time, the seething social resentments that right-wing populists brought to the fore forced even the complacent to recognize the dislocations and injustices bred by rising inequality over the last half-century.' back

East-West Schism - Wikipedia, East-West Schism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'The East–West Schism, commonly referred to as the Great Schism of 1054, is the break of communion between what are now the Eastern Orthodox and Catholic Churches, which began in the 11th century and continues. . . . the Church split along doctrinal, theological, linguistic, political, and geographical lines, and the fundamental breach has never been healed, with each side sometimes accusing the other of having fallen into heresy and of having initiated the division.'' back

Ewen Calloway, DeepMind’s AI predicts structures for a vast trove of proteins, ' The human genome holds the instructions for more than 20,000 proteins. But only about one-third of those have had their 3D structures determined experimentally. And in many cases, those structures are only partially known. Now, a transformative artificial intelligence (AI) tool called AlphaFold, which has been developed by Google’s sister company DeepMind in London, has predicted the structure of nearly the entire human proteome (the full complement of proteins expressed by an organism).' back

Feynman, Leighton & Sands FLP III:01, Chapter 1: Quantum Behaviour, 'The gradual accumulation of information about atomic and small-scale behavior during the first quarter of the 20th century, which gave some indications about how small things do behave, produced an increasing confusion which was finally resolved in 1926 and 1927 by Schrödinger, Heisenberg, and Born. They finally obtained a consistent description of the behavior of matter on a small scale. We take up the main features of that description in this chapter.' back

Gamma matrices - Wikipedia, Gamma matrices - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'In mathematical physics, the gamma matrices, {γ⁰, γ¹, γ²,γ³}, also known as the Dirac matrices, are a set of conventional matrices with specific anticommutation relations that ensure they generate a matrix representation of the Clifford algebra Cl_1,3(R). When interpreted as the matrices of the action of a set of orthogonal basis vectors for contravariant vectors in Minkowski space, the column vectors on which the matrices act become a space of spinors, on which the Clifford algebra of space time acts. This in turn makes it possible to represent infinitesimal spatial rotations and Lorentz boosts. Spinors facilitate space-time computations in general, and in particular are fundamental to the Dirac equation for relativistic spin-1/2particles.' back

Geodesics in general relativity - Wikipedia, Geodesics in general relativity - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' In general relativity, a geodesic generalizes the notion of a "straight line" to curved spacetime. Importantly, the world line of a particle free from all external, non-gravitational force, is a particular type of geodesic. In other words, a freely moving or falling particle always moves along a geodesic.' back

Haaretz Editorial, Editorial | They Took Their Ice Cream Away , ' Instead of demeaning oneself on social media with inane statements, posting ludicrous images and waging wars against ice cream parlors, Bennett and Lapid’s task is to advance a diplomatic solution to the most painful and burning issue on Israel’s agenda. The more they refuse to recognize this destructive reality, the more that reality will repeatedly remind them – by boycotts such as that of Ben & Jerry’s among other ways – that millions of Palestinians have been living under Israel’s military rule for 54 years, with no state or citizenship. Bennett and Lapid, it’s time to grow up and take action.' back

Isaiah Berlin, Positive versus Negative Liberty, From Two Concepts of Liberty, a lecture delivered in 1958 at Oxford University] 'One belief, more than any other, is responsible for the slaughter of individuals on the altars of the great historical ideals -- justice or progress or the happiness of future generations, or the sacred mission of emancipation of a nation or race or class, or even liberty itself, which demands the sacrifice of individuals for the freedom of society. This is the belief that somewhere, in the past or in the future, in divine revelation or in the mind of an individual thinker, in the pronouncements of history or science, or in the simple heart of an uncorrupted good man, there is a final solution.' back

John Paul II, Truth Cannot Contradict Truth, Address to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences October 22, 1996 , 'Consideration of the method used in the various branches of knowledge makes it possible to reconcile two points of view which would seem irreconcilable. The sciences of observation describe and measure the multiple manifestations of life with increasing precision and correlate them with the time line. The moment of transition to the spiritual cannot be the object of this kind of observation, which nevertheless can discover at the experimental level a series of very valuable signs indicating what is specific to the human being.' back

Klein-Gordon equation - Wikipedia, Klein-Gordon equation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'It is the equation of motion of a quantum scalar or pseudoscalar field, a field whose quanta are spinless particles. It cannot be straightforwardly interpreted as a Schrödinger equation for a quantum state, because it is second order in time and because it does not admit a positive definite conserved probability density. Still, with the appropriate interpretation, it does describe the quantum amplitude for finding a point particle in various places, the relativistic wavefunction, but the particle propagates both forwards and backwards in time. Any solution to the Dirac equation is automatically a solution to the Klein–Gordon equation, but the converse is not true.' back

Margaret Talbot, The Women who want to be Priests, ' John Paul went on, “I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church’s faithful.” Humbert told me that the Pope’s words were devastating: “It’s hard to describe how sort of violent, spiritually violent, that felt to me, because, after all, it’s a document. But it felt like it was intended to put an end to people like me—to any woman who had that sense of vocation. It felt like it was trying to kill what was most alive in us, what was bound up with the divine.” Humbert believed that a true vocation—whether religious or artistic or scientific—would always be coursing through you. If you were born to do something, she said, “you resist it at your own peril".' back

Martin Luther - Wikipedia, Martin Luther - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Martin Luther (10 November 1483 – 18 February 1546) was a German priest, professor of theology and iconic figure of the Protestant Reformation.He strongly disputed the claim that freedom from God's punishment for sin could be purchased with money. He confronted indulgence salesman Johann Tetzel with his Ninety-Five Theses in 1517. His refusal to retract all of his writings at the demand of Pope Leo X in 1520 and the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V at the Diet of Worms in 1521 resulted in his excommunication by the pope and condemnation as an outlaw by the Emperor.' back

Martin, Klump & Aplin, Clever cockatoos in southern Sydney have learned to open kerb-side bins — and it has global significance, back

Max Planck Institute of Animal Behaviour, Sulphur-crested cockatoos learn to open wheelie bins in Sydney – video , ' Sulphur-crested cockatoos are learning to pry open bins, with researchers finding the new skill has caught on in 44 Sydney suburbs in just two years. With help from the public, Australian and German ecologists have documented cockatoos learning the bin-diving behaviour through social interactions. The research, published in the journal Science, also found differences in the cockatoos’ bin-opening technique between different suburbs, arising from 'local subcultures'.' back

Measurement problem - Wikipedia, Measurement problem - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'The measurement problem in quantum mechanics is the problem of how (or whether) wave function collapse occurs. The inability to observe this process directly has given rise to different interpretations of quantum mechanics, and poses a key set of questions that each interpretation must answer. The wave function in quantum mechanics evolves deterministically according to the Schrödinger equation as a linear superposition of different states, but actual measurements always find the physical system in a definite state. Any future evolution is based on the state the system was discovered to be in when the measurement was made, meaning that the measurement "did something" to the system that is not obviously a consequence of Schrödinger evolution.' back

Minkowski space - Wikipedia, Minkowski space - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' In mathematical physics, Minkowski space or Minkowski spacetime is a combination of Euclidean space and time into a four-dimensional manifold where the spacetime interval between any two events is independent of the inertial frame of reference in which they are recorded. Although initially developed by mathematician Hermann Minkowski for Maxwell's equations of electromagnetism, the mathematical structure of Minkowski spacetime was shown to be an immediate consequence of the postulates of special relativity.' back

No-cloning theorem - Wikipedia, No-cloning theorem - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' In physics, the no-cloning theorem states that it is impossible to create an independent and identical copy of an arbitrary unknown quantum state, a statement which has profound implications in the field of quantum computing among others. The theorem is an evolution of the 1970 no-go theorem authored by James Park, in which he demonstrates that a non-disturbing measurement scheme which is both simple and perfect cannot exist . . .. The aforementioned theorems do not preclude the state of one system becoming entangled with the state of another as cloning specifically refers to the creation of a separable state with identical factors.' back

Prosperity theology - Wikipedia, Prosperity theology - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Prosperity theology (also known as prosperity doctrine, the health and wealth gospel, or the prosperity gospel) is a religious belief found among "tens of millions"[1] of Christians centered on the notion that God provides material prosperity for those he favors. It has been defined by the belief that "Jesus blesses believers with riches" or more specifically as the teaching that "believers have a right to the blessings of health and wealth and that they can obtain these blessings through positive confessions of faith and the 'sowing of seeds' through the faithful payments of tithes and offerings." In the words of journalist Hanna Rosin, the prosperity gospel "is not a clearly defined denomination, but a strain of belief that runs through the Pentecostal Church and a surprising number of mainstream evangelical churches, with varying degrees of intensity."[1][2] It arose in the United States after World War II championed by Oral Roberts and became particularly popular in the decade of the 1990s.[1] More recently, the theology has been exported to less prosperous areas of the world, with mixed results.' back

Protestant Reformation - Wikipedia, Protestant Reformation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'The Protestant Reformation was a 16th-century split within Western Christianity initiated by Martin Luther, John Calvin and other early Protestants. The efforts of the self-described "reformers", who objected to ("protested") the doctrines, rituals and ecclesiastical structure of the Roman Catholic Church, led to the creation of new national Protestant churches. The Reformation was precipitated by earlier events within Europe, such as the Black Death and the Western Schism, which eroded people's faith in the Roman Catholic Church. This, as well as many other factors, contributed to the growth of lay criticism in the church and the creation of Protestantism.' back

Quantum entanglement - Wikipedia, Quantum entanglement - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Quantum entanglement is a physical phenomenon which occurs when pairs or groups of particles are generated, interact, or share spatial proximity in ways such that the quantum state of each particle cannot be described independently of the state of the other(s), even when the particles are separated by a large distance—instead, a quantum state must be described for the system as a whole. . . . Entanglement is considered fundamental to quantum mechanics, even though it wasn't recognized in the beginning. Quantum entanglement has been demonstrated experimentally with photons, neutrinos, electrons, molecules as large as buckyballs, and even small diamonds. The utilization of entanglement in communication and computation is a very active area of research.' back

Quantum state - Wikipedia, Quantum state - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'In quantum physics, a quantum state is a mathematical entity that provides a probability distribution for the outcomes of each possible measurement on a system. Knowledge of the quantum state together with the rules for the system's evolution in time exhausts all that can be predicted about the system's behavior. A mixture of quantum states is again a quantum state. Quantum states that cannot be written as a mixture of other states are called pure quantum states, while all other states are called mixed quantum states. A pure quantum state can be represented by a ray in a Hilbert space over the complex numbers, while mixed states are represented by density matrices, which are positive semidefinite operators that act on Hilbert spaces.' back

Quantum superposition - Wikipedia, Quantum superposition - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Quantum superposition is the application of the superposition principle to quantum mechanics. The superposition principle is the addition of the amplitudes of waves from interference. In quantum mechanics it is the sum of wavefunction amplitudes, or state vectors. It occurs when an object simultaneously "possesses" two or more possible values for an observable quantity (e.g. the position or energy of a particle)' back

Roger Cohen, A Rap Song Lays Bare Israel’s Jewish-Arab Fracture — and Goes Viral, ' BEIT YEHOSHUA, Israel — Uriya Rosenman grew up on Israeli military bases and served as an officer in an elite unit of the army. His father was a combat pilot. . . .. Sameh Zakout, a Palestinian citizen of Israel, grew up in the mixed Arab-Jewish town of Ramla. His family was driven out of its home in the 1948 war of Israeli independence, known to Palestinians as the “Nakba,” or catastrophe. . . . Facing each other in a garage over a small plastic table, the two hurl ethnic insults and clichés at each other, tearing away the veneer of civility overlaying the seething resentments between the Jewish state and its Palestinian minority in a rap video that has gone viral in Israel. LET'S TALK STRAIGHT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuUxnfL9I_Y ' back

S-L-M - Wikipedia, S-L-M - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Shin-Lamedh-Mem (Arabic: س ل م‎ S-L-M; Hebrew: שלם‎ Š-L-M; Maltese: S-L-M) is the triconsonantal root of many Semitic words, and many of those words are used as names. The root itself translates as "whole, safe, intact"' back

Solemn vow - Wikipedia, Solemn vow - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'In Roman Catholic canon law, a solemn vow is a vow ("a deliberate and free promise made to God about a possible and better good") that the Church has recognized as such.

Any other vow, public or private, individual or collective, concerned with an action or with abstaining from an action, is a simple vow.

In canon law a vow is public (concerning the Church itself directly) only if a legitimate superior accepts it in the name of the Church; all other vows, no matter how much publicity is given to them, are classified as private vows (concerning directly only those who make them). The vow taken at profession as a member of any religious institute is a public vow, but in recent centuries can be either solemn or simple.' back

Susan B. Glasser, “You’re Gonna Have a Fucking War”: Mark Milley’s Fight to Stop Trump from Striking Iran, ' This account of a behind-the-scenes struggle over Iran involving Milley and Trump—a secret backdrop to the public drama unleashed by Trump’s unprecedented refusal to accept the Presidential-election results—comes from some of the nearly two hundred interviews, with a variety of sources, that I have conducted along with my husband, the Times reporter Peter Baker, for a book on the Trump Presidency that will be published next year.' back

Sweet spot - Wikipedia, Sweet spot - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'A sweet spot is a place, often numerical as opposed to physical, where a combination of factors suggest a particularly suitable solution. In the context of a racquet, bat or similar sporting instrument, sweet spot is often believed to be the same as the center of percussion.' back

Teske, Briggs, Hemer, Marsh & Langdon, Wind turbines off the coast could help Australia become an energy superpower, research finds, ' Our study sought to examine the potential of offshore wind energy for Australia. First, we examined locations considered feasible for offshore wind projects, namely those that were: less than 100km from shore within 100km of substations and transmission lines (excluding environmentally restricted areas) in water depths less than 1,000 metres. Wind resources at those locations totalled 2,233GW of capacity and would generate far more than current and projected electricity demand across Australia.' back

The Brights' Network, The Brights' Net - Home Page, 'What is a bright?

A bright is a person who has a naturalistic worldview

A bright's worldview is free of supernatural and mystical elements

The ethics and actions of a bright are based on a naturalistic worldview' back

The JESUS Film Project, The JESUS Film Project, 'Called by some "one of the best-kept secrets in Christian missions," a number of mission experts have acclaimed the film as one of the greatest evangelistic tools of all time. Since 1979 the "JESUS" film has been viewed by several billion people all across the globe, and has resulted in more than 225 million men, women and children indicating decisions to follow Jesus.' back

Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra Gentilred, ' Contra singulorum autem errores difficile est procedere, propter duo. Primo, quia non ita sunt nobis nota singulorum errantium dicta sacrilega ut ex his quae dicunt possimus rationes assumere ad eorum errores destruendos. Hoc enim modo usi sunt antiqui doctores in destructionem errorum gentilium quorum positiones scire poterant quia et ipsi gentiles fuerant, vel saltem inter gentiles conversati et in eorum doctrinis eruditi. Secundo, quia quidam eorum, ut Mahumetistae et Pagani, non conveniunt nobiscum in auctoritate alicuius Scripturae, per quam possint convinci, sicut contra Iudaeos disputare possumus per vetus testamentum, contra haereticos per novum. Hi vero neutrum recipiunt. Unde necesse est ad naturalem rationem recurrere, cui omnes assentire coguntur. Quae tamen in rebus divinis deficiens est. back

Thomas Aquinas (1955), Summa Contra Gentiles (English Translation), ' To proceed against individual errors, however, is a difficult business, and this for two reasons. . . . In the second place, it is difficult because some of them, such as the Mohammedans and the pagans, do not agree with us in accepting the authority of any Scripture, by which they may be convinced of their error. Thus, against the Jews we are able to argue by means of the Old Testament, while against heretics we are able to argue by means of the New Testament. But the Muslims and the pagans accept neither the one nor the other. We must, therefore, have recourse to the natural reason, to which all men are forced to give their assent. However, it is true, in divine matters the natural reason has its failings. ' back

Unitary operator - Wikipedia, Unitary operator - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' In functional analysis, a branch of mathematics, a unitary operator . . . is a bounded linear operator U : H → H on a Hilbert space H satisfying UU* = U*U = I where U* is the adjoint of U, and I : H → H is the identity operator. This property is equivalent to the following: 1. U preserves the inner product ( , ) of the Hilbert space, ie for all vectors x and y in the Hilbert space, (Ux, Uy) = (x, y) and
2. U is surjective.' back

Uranium-238 - Wikipedia, Uranium-238 - Wikipedia, 'Around 99.284% of natural uranium's mass is uranium-238, which has a half-life of 1.41×10^17 seconds (4.468×10^9 years, or 4.468 billion years). Due to its natural abundance and half-life relative to other radioactive elements, 238U produces ~40% of the radioactive heat produced within the Earth. The 238U decay chain contributes 6 electron anti-neutrinos per 238U nucleus (1 per beta decay), resulting in a large detectable geoneutrino signal when decays occur within the Earth. The decay of 238U to daughter isotopes is extensively used in radiometric dating, particularly for material older than ~ 1 million years.' back

Venus' flower basket - Wikipedia, Venus' flower basket - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' The Venus' flower basket (Euplectella aspergillum) is a glass sponge in the phylum Porifera. It is a marine sponge found in the deep waters of the Pacific ocean. As other glass sponges, they build their skeletons out of silica, which is of great interest in materials science as their optical and mechanical properties are in some ways superior to man-made materials. Like other sponges, they feed by filtering sea water to capture plankton. back

Western Geophysical, Western Profile, back

William Blake, All Religions are One (1788 A): electronic edition, 'Through aphoristic declarations and accompanying emblem-like designs, Blake argues for the essential unity of all religions as expressions of the "Poetic Genius" within all human beings. As the quoted phrase suggests, All Religions are One implies the unity of the artistic and religious imagination. Several of the numbered "Principle[s]," the term used as a heading to each text plate, assert a causal connection between inner spirit and outer body. Because of shared graphic styles, themes, and genre, All Religions are One is closely associated with There is No Natural Religion of the same year.' back

Wojciech Hubert Zurek (2008), Quantum origin of quantum jumps: breaking of unitary symmetry induced by information transfer and the transition from quantum to classical, 'Submitted on 17 Mar 2007 (v1), last revised 18 Mar 2008 (this version, v3)) Measurements transfer information about a system to the apparatus, and then further on – to observers and (often inadvertently) to the environment. I show that even imperfect copying essential in such situations restricts possible unperturbed outcomes to an orthogonal subset of all possible states of the system, thus breaking the unitary symmetry of its Hilbert space implied by the quantum superposition principle. Preferred outcome states emerge as a result. They provide framework for the “wavepacket collapse”, designating terminal points of quantum jumps, and defining the measured observable by specifying its eigenstates.' back

Yoido Full Gospel Church - Wikipedia, Yoido Full Gospel Church - Wikipedia, 'Yoido Full Gospel Church is a Pentecostal church on Yeouido Island in Seoul, South Korea. With about 1,000,000 members (2007), it is the largest Protestant Christian congregation in South Korea, and in the whole world. Founded and led by David Yonggi Cho since 1958, it is one of the most internationally visible manifestations of Korean Christianity.' back