How much faster are pro athletes than the rest of us? A LOT faster. Check out this 2-minute video for some amazement and lots of laughs. And the normal dude didn't look all that slow at first . . .
We've all seen many Internet lists offering suggestions for improving one's life or state of happiness. This list, by a young man named Henrick Edberg at The Positivity Blog, caught my attention today, perhaps because it includes some of my own favorite bits of productivity reminders and folk wisdom, including the "80/20 rule" and the advice to not beat yourself up for making mistakes. His list also includes a nice twist to the golden rule: Give value to get value, not the other way around. Another item on his list reminds us to express gratitude to others in order to enrich our own lives, reminding us that expressing gratitude is socially contagious. What also intrigued me was Edberg's pre-list commentary: He laments that the nuggets of advice in his list aren't taught as part of the high school curriculum.
But I still think that taking a few hours from all those German language classes and use them for some personal development classes would have been a good idea. Perhaps for just an hour a week in high school. It would probably be useful for many students and on a larger scale quite helpful for society in general.
I think I know why there are no such classes in public schools. Teaching advice on how to navigate through the complexities of life in a positive state of mind would too often trigger discussions regarding "morality," which too often trigger discussions of specific religious teachings which, in turn, tend to anger at least some parents and students, which would then shut down the course (in public schools, anyway). I suspect that this causal chain is a big reason that so many schools tread lightly on teaching students how to navigate through life, even though there is an immense amount of information that needs to be discussed. Instead of vigorously teaching what the students need to know to be functional and virtuous, most schools ostensibly defer to families and churches (though they actually defer at least as much to pop culture, including magazines, "news" programs, television shows and movies) to fill that "moral" vacuum of students. In America, however, even "serious" teachers of morality often insist that the way to best live one's life is by obeying a standardized set of "moral" rules. Is the advice to follow any set of rules really the best approach for instructing us how to get along with each other down here on planet Earth? Is it even possible for any form of obedience to serve as the foundation for a high-functioning society? I think not. I'm going to digress at this point . . . [more . . . ]Michael Zimmerman is a biology professor at Butler University. In 2004, he decided that something needed to done about a big problem: Many well-funded politically-connected creationists were working hard to frame the evolution "controversy" in terms of "science versus religion," in an attempt to pit all religions against all scientists. This is a false divide, however. It is an undeniable fact that many millions of religious people have concluded that evolution by natural selection is an enormously useful and elegant approach to understanding biology, including the study of human animals. This religious support of Darwin's theory is clearly illustrated by stalwart scientists like Francis Collins and Kenneth Miller, who both happen to be religious. Zimmerman founded the Clergy Letter Project to allow members of religious clergy to express their support for teaching evolution.
For too long, the misperception that science and religion are inevitably in conflict has created unnecessary division and confusion, especially concerning the teaching of evolution. I wanted to let the public know that numerous clergy from most denominations have tremendous respect for evolutionary theory and have embraced it as a core component of human knowledge, fully harmonious with religious faith.How many members of the clergy have signed on as of today? More than 13,000. There are actually three versions of the letter (Christian, Jewish and Unitarian Universalism). The Christian version declares that the "overwhelming majority" of Christians do not read the Bible "as they would a science textbook." Therefore, for most Christians:
We believe that the theory of evolution is a foundational scientific truth, one that has stood up to rigorous scrutiny and upon which much of human knowledge and achievement rests. To reject this truth or to treat it as “one theory among others” is to deliberately embrace scientific ignorance and transmit such ignorance to our children. We believe that among God’s good gifts are human minds capable of critical thought and that the failure to fully employ this gift is a rejection of the will of our Creator. To argue that God’s loving plan of salvation for humanity precludes the full employment of the God-given faculty of reason is to attempt to limit God, an act of hubris. We urge school board members to preserve the integrity of the science curriculum by affirming the teaching of the theory of evolution as a core component of human knowledge. We ask that science remain science and that religion remain religion, two very different, but complementary, forms of truth.At the Clergy Letter Project Website, you can even hear sermons in favor of Darwin. At Huffpo, Michael Zimmerman uses this substantial religious support for the teaching of evolution by natural selection to combat claims by the Discovery Institute, and other creationists, that evolution supposedly pits science against religion:
I am completely opposed to them implying that all who are religious must agree with them. As I've said so often, the very existence of The Clergy Letter Project and the more than 13,000 clergy members who have affirmed that they are fully comfortable with both their faith and evolution makes a mockery of such ridiculous claims.The next time you hear a creationist claiming that "God opposes evolution" or that "The Bible disproves evolution," remind them that there are tens of thousands of sincere Christian clergy who treasure Darwin's magnificent insights, and who serve as living proof that the fault-line of the controversy is not drawn between religion and science. Rather, the opposite sides of that fault-line are A) motivated ignorance and fear versus B) Well-informed, rigorous and skeptical scientific inquiry.
Wanna check out the private parts of other people. I'm referring to their refrigerators. If so, check out this clever post where you can learn a bit about a persons personality and look straight into their refrigerator. I found this on StumbleUpon. The clever title: You are what you eat. Kudos to the one person who loads up on vegetables. Speaking of StumbleUpon, if you want to know what time it is, click here. And here's one more. Remember the kids' game of "telephone"? Here's a Google translator version.