Robots and Religion

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One of the constant duties I have as a “Robot Dad” (Soccer Mom just doesn’t apply here) is seeking funding for my daughter’s high school FIRST Robotics team. Always a supportive layman in the scientific venture to understand our world, I have encouraged this interest although I am pretty hopeless when it comes to understanding how it all works. So last night I found myself at a fund-raising, public-awareness event at the local minor league stadium. The Somerset Patriots stadium is just down the road, but I’d never been to a game before. I really don’t feel comfortable participating in crowd dynamics; I’d rather sit back and analyze than participate. And I have no real interest in sports. I wondered how I was going to survive being in such a foreign environment for several hours. Then my wife pointed out a, as it were, godsend.

Last night was “Faith Night” at the Somerset County Ballpark. The event was sponsored by Somerset Christian College, “the ONLY licensed and accredited Christ-centered, evangelical, undergraduate college in New Jersey.” Located in the appropriately denominated Zarephath, New Jersey, the small, extremely doctrinal college bought the privilege of a pre-game sermonette. Not too often does a public sporting event begin with references to “our Lord Jesus Christ;” I looked around for him but then remembered he’d been hit by a car just under two weeks ago. One of the administrators addressed the crowd and, trying to capture the elated, anticipatory feel of the moment, compared his college to a baseball game. I was busy handing out fliers and missed the early stages of his rhetoric, but when I heard him say, “third base is love,” my mind shifted to a more familiar baseball analogy I’d learned in high school. I imagined the prospective students’ interest when he went on to declare, “home base is Heaven!”

As two Christian motorcycle clubs solemnly rode their hogs around the field and local Catholic schools hawked their own fliers in competition, the sound system belted out any pop songs that had the word “faith” in them, no matter what the context. It was a circus-like atmosphere. I was surrounded by techies deeply immersed in science and human learning. We, in turn, were surrounded by an aggressive Christianity eager to claim as much territory as possible. Above it all wafted scents of searing flesh and deep-fried snacks. It seemed to me that a microcosm of American life was indeed evident at the stadium last night. Perhaps there is nothing as American as baseball after all.

Lead us not...

Suddenly the Bible

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Universities are generally reluctant to hire Bible faculty (except in the case of “Christian” colleges where Bible faculty must be a particular brand of “scholar” who has already decided the case before the evidence is presented). The stock reason given to department heads and deans is that religion just doesn’t make money. Universities thrive on the income from science grants and wealthy business and finance donors who want buildings named after them. Religion, it is claimed, doesn’t bring in money. The real problem is that universities don’t know how to market religion.

The other day I visited the local craft store to pick up supplies for a project my wife is working on. While in line I spotted this novelty item:

God in a box?

The shelf was full of them. When I returned later in the week, the supply was severely diminished. Someone had reasoned, correctly, that by putting a cheap length of paper-roll with “biblical” designs printed on it in a kit for making a throw-away mug, it would sell. Obviously universities and colleges couldn’t stoop to such a level, could they? Isn’t it far more respectable to draw your finest students into a mega-stadium to watch guys in tights throw around a fake pig-bladder and emerge drunk enough to vomit up all the costly snack foods they purchased? This is, after all, where the leaders of tomorrow are formed!

While looking up a troublesome word I can’t spell in an online dictionary, I was intrigued by this promotional inset (click to see). All I had done was type in a word on the Merriam-Webster site (it was not a biblical word), and when the answer popped up, so did this self promotional add for “Kiss of Death, Feet of Clay: Words From the Bible.” I don’t pretend to know how online advertising works, but it was clear that Merriam-Webster wanted the cyber-visitor to linger on their site, and the Bible was an effective way to achieve this.

The Bible is all around us. It would be difficult to nominate any other icon that would better illustrate American social self-consciousness. So immediately the sophisticated academic shuns it. Those of us who’ve put our lives into trying to understand the Bible phenomenon are deemed useless as money-makers while our counterparts in marketing and sales laugh biblically all the way to the bank.

Holy Amos, Holy Micah, Pray for Us

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The semesters when I teach the prophets invariably find me filled with a holy rage toward injustice of all stripes. Unfortunately there is plenty of cause for basic human indignation caused by greed, cupidity, and elitism. I see New Jersey, my current home, as a microcosm. In this little version of the universe, a highly diverse population with over-crowded highways and endless financial woes, I see reflected some of the great challenges facing the human race. When such a delicate balance is guided by a self-serving government the human cost will always be high.

Our current governor, Chris “Slash” Christie, has made himself a national reputation by cutting the basic services required to buoy up a state where the underprivileged seek an opportunity to get ahead. The governor’s favorite target, naturally, is public education. Public school and university funds have been chopped with a zeal to impress Vlad the Impaler (the governor’s children attend private school, thank you). The Associated Press today, however, reports that the number of the governor’s staff who “earn” more than six figures has nearly doubled since our last governor’s term ended. We the taxpayers are being asked to fork over an extra two million dollars to the state budget to support those who live in comfort while our children are being systematically targeted as luxuries the state simply can’t afford. When will people say “enough is enough”?

The Republican Party, since it has shamelessly crawled into bed with religious conservatism, has flouted the message of the Bible in the name of the Bible. Only by ignoring the biblical characters known as prophets, and one guy from Nazareth who went by the name of Joshua, is it possible to see any right in feathering the nest of public “servants” while stealing from the children of their constituencies. I am glad Amos and Micah are dead. If they were alive and in New Jersey they would be suffering torment beyond words.

The Danger of Books

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Yesterday the Hunterdon County Library booksale began. I did not grow up as a reader. As a child, television was my primary source of information. For reasons unclear to me, I took to books when I started junior high school. Suddenly I couldn’t get enough of them. I lived in a town with no bookstores, so I usually depended on what I could find on our periodic trips to Goodwill to look for clothes. While my mother was looking for apparel for my brothers and me, I hovered over the quarter-a-piece book bin, buying up to a dollar’s worth of used books at a time. I kept my books in a ratty old suitcase under the bed. There were no bookshelves at home, nor any room for them. Besides, I liked to keep my books separate from other aspects of my life. Perhaps it is an illness, but from that day on, I have not been able to resist the draw of books. It is perhaps natural that I would go into higher education (although my field might have been chosen a bit more wisely). In any case, yesterday I drove to Flemington, New Jersey, with, at least to judge by the traffic, three-quarters of the population of the county.

One of the books I purchased had a slip of paper tucked between the leaves. When I got home I read on it, “The naked witches have been regarded either as a jokey press gimmick or as a complete non-event. The truth of the matter is that the witches played a very important role in a whole series of monster invocations.” Intrigued, I wondered what the source of this unusual quote might be. Then I was struck by the religious imagery implicit in the piece: witches, no matter how defined, are a religious subject. Monsters, as I have frequently noted, share intense neural territory with religion. And invocation? It is a liturgical term! I can only wonder what the original context of this quote might have been, but the book in which it was stuck was in no sense religious. I am a very eclectic reader (so it is perhaps unusual that I would go into higher education) and no books I purchased had anything to do with religion. It seems that religion never fails to find me.

My devotion to books often reminds me of the day when Amazon used to include bookmarks when you purchased from them. My favorite bore a quote from Erasmus: “When I get a little money I buy books; and if any is left I buy food and clothes.” It sometimes drives my wife to frustration that I still wear clothes I purchased before we were married some twenty-two years ago. My informal student evaluations on Rate My Professor sometimes comment on my out-of-date fashion sense. The reason is, however, that I buy books before clothes, and yes, even food. And when you buy used books at a library book sale, you may learn that naked witches invoke monsters, and that may be valuable information. And my clothes are never in a condition Goodwill would consider accepting when I’m finally forced to relinquish them for lack of functionality.

I Have a Daydream

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I don’t often comment directly on politics because I don’t like to get beaten up. I’m not a poly-sci major who has statistically verified evidence to present, and many of the issues are simply too complex for a guy like me. I’m left scratching my head like a confused ape. Nevertheless, I’ve just finished covering Micah in my Prophets class, and the eighth century prophets have a way of firing up even the most passive of souls on the issue of social justice. Also, newspaper stories continue to demonstrate that most elected officials, living in their world of privilege and power, have lost touch with the average citizen. After reading the prophets and dreaming of a better world, I have a proposal to end oligarchy and institute democracy.

No person who earns more than $100,000 a year should be eligible to run for public office. Now I live in New Jersey where the cost of living is high. I have survived here for over three years with an income far less than half of that figure, so I know it can be done. Observing the abusive tactics of bishops first-hand, I had suggested a similar measure for the church some years ago. To become a bishop an individual should be forced to take a pay-cut, bringing their income below that of those they serve. Politicians are “public servants” who’ve grown fat on the generous salaries they devise for themselves alongside their perks, kick-backs, and expense accounts. The same also applies to politicians in higher education. You want a really excellent university president? Reduce the funding for the post. Only those truly committed to the ideals of education would be willing to take on the job. Posers and playboys would have to step down.

Corporate-style greed has a strangle-hold on democracy. Most people are content to let the wealthy rule as long as they are left alone – freedom in exchange for accepting the demands of the self-indulgent. My daydream is of a world where people can free themselves from the never-ending greed of the corporate climber. And my system would not exclude anyone for seeking office. All the wealthy would have to do is be willing to live on a middle-class or lower salary for a few years. Politicians have forgotten (if they ever even knew) what is like to struggle, worry, and fear that any month, week, or day you might not be able to meet your obligations. They don’t personally watch the prices increasing at the pump or at the grocery store or on the electric bill. Their Olympian existence is beyond human suffering. It is once more time to ask, “what would Micah do?”

Smile, You’re Condemned

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Yesterday at Montclair State University, I was sitting in the hallway (my office) prior to class. (Office hours are required, but space is limited for adjuncts such as myself.) While I was reading my book a student walked up and handed me a business card. “For you, sir,” she said politely. The card had a smiley face on it, and was designed to bring cheer.

Then I flipped the card over and found out I was going to Hell. A bit of a downer when you’re about to start class!

It isn’t the first time people have attempted to convert me without bothering to find out what I believe. It seems that if you already hold the zealot’s view you’ll appreciate the gesture of being condemned just to make sure your soul is saved. It is the thought that counts, after all.

The book I was reading was Joseph Campbell’s The Hero with a Thousand Faces – a book I’ve known since college but from which I have only taken a tipple until this year. Many scholars of mythology fault Campbell on being too much of a generalist and looking too much for connections where they are not obvious. His language can be florid and mystical, verging on “believer,” for those uncomfortable with any kind of faith. I find Campbell to be a welcome guide, although, as for any guide, I do not believe all he says! One nugget in particular stuck out at me: “Wherever the poetry of myth is interpreted as biography, history, or science, it is killed.” As we find ourselves on Good Friday, only those with eyes firmly shut will disregard Campbell’s wisdom.

I still remember my shock when I first learned that gods, centuries before Jesus, had been dying and rising. What had always been presented to me as a unique historical event actually had a long and venerable prehistory. It suddenly seemed as if the ministers I’d known hadn’t done their homework. Or perhaps they lacked the cognitive finesse to understand Orpheus, Adonis, Baal, Osiris, and even Ishtar, as types of either blatant or obscure resurrection. It is the Campbellian, or nearly universal hope: life prevails over death. As the young lady walked away, I sincerely wished her happiness in the quest she’s only beginning.

Naughty Religion is Bad Science

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In the continual struggle of Fundamentalist Christianity against the rest of the world, new Creationist grounds have been made in Connecticut. Connecticut is not exactly the first state to spring to mind when it comes to extremist conservative religion, but Fundamentalism knows no bounds. Perhaps the largest disappointment, from the point of view of a student of religion who knows the Fundamentalists a little too well, is that otherwise intelligent people simply accept what their clergy tell them. Having been a seminary student and professor, however, I know the kinds of training clergy receive and if the whole wide world knew things would be different.

Clergy of all stripes of all denominations of all religions are just as human as the rest of us. They do not have special physiognomic features in their brains or hearts or cellular structures that allow them to receive private messages from God/the gods. Many are trained in special schools where people like myself teach them, often against the blustering of their clergy supporters back home, what we factually know about the Bible and other aspects of religion. Many successfully block out what they are forced to hear and emerge just as ossified, if not more so, as when they entered. In other words, their “education” has been an exercise in learning to ignore the truth. They are then made into clergy who continue the deception. Even worse are the clergy who receive no training at all, frequently fresh from an overly-heavy-dinner-induced religious experience, who claim that the biological responses to overtaxed gastric juices is some message from beyond.

The average citizen naively accepts the religious credentials of their clergy, supposing that this “holy” person has had some special word from on high. That word is often factually wrong, especially concerning evolution and the origins of life, but it is accepted as gospel truth and disseminated among unsuspecting children. Religion is a matter of belief, not of fact. As America lags farther and farther behind even developing nations in science education, Fundamentalist clergy give a self-satisfied smile. They have become the gods of a nation that was once able to land some of its citizens on the silvery moon in that great literal dome that surrounds our flat earth.

Biblical Outlooks and Science Fiction

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Alumni magazines depress me. Between my wife and I, we receive a half-dozen every month. I thumb through and see the cheery faces of classmates, most of whom I don’t know, who’ve gone on to great things – writing books, world travel, scientific breakthroughs. They’re not on the couch Saturday afternoons in New Jersey watching 1950’s sci-fi and wandering what went wrong. Especially bad is Bostonia, since I attended Boston University with many noteworthy individuals. Being forced from academia early in my career because of petty religious differences, I just want to bury my head and grab the remote. An article in this month’s BU shame-fest, however, pictured a professor, younger than myself, who joined the school of theology after I left. The title of the piece is “Biblical Sexuality.” Well, the connection with this blog couldn’t be more obvious.

Dr. Jennifer Knust is a professor of Christian Scriptures at BU who has written a couple of books on sexuality and the Bible. I’ve read widely on this topic in the Hebrew Bible, and was curious as to what the post-Jesus crowd was saying these days. The article specifically addresses homosexuality, but I did applaud one of Dr. Knust’s statements: “My main argument is that biblical texts do not speak with one voice.” Amen. Bravo. Goal! Our society is so imbued with the bibliolatry of the Religious Right that it is difficult for most Americans to understand that the Bible was written by many people over a few centuries and these people did not always share the same outlook. The Bible is an exercise in multiple voice-overs. Specific religions, as many denominations of Christianity testify, have harmonized these divergent voices into a coherent, if biblically untrue, theology. Some voices must be stifled so that others may dominate.

We live in a religiously plural world. There are about as many religions as there are believing people. We experience the world through our own lenses and within our own gray-matter. Our perspectives are uniquely our own. And yet religious leaders bend, worry, and force views closer to their own so that they might have a theological quorum, a consensus that one viewpoint is right. They silence the Bible’s divergent voices and claim they do not exist. I wish Dr. Knust well. She’s got the right perspective, in the opinion of my own weary gray-matter. And speaking of gray, where did I put the remote?

Robo-god

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Yesterday I again found myself among the robots. After an early-morning school-bus ride to the New Jersey regional competition in Trenton, a mentor to a team known as the Gearheads, I felt a little out of my league. Soon, however, I fell into the spirit of the competition and watched with increasing interest as individuals highly regarded in the world of robotics lamented the lack of science education in the United States. Having just completed the nightmare of two terms with a creationist president, is it any wonder? In any case, the competition, a modified soccer match for robots – with two teams from Brazil, no less! – soon became as emotional as any sporting event. Well, for the human participants, anyway. I’m not qualified to assess robotic emotions. As the event wound down, a respected (human) member of FIRST Robotics, during a recognition ceremony, overcome with emotion, called out “God bless you!” to the adult volunteers.

Many scientists I know are personally religious people. There is no fortified gateway between scientific reasoning and the childhood teaching of religious belief. Nevertheless, an irony became apparent that has been bothering me all night long. I joined Team 102 as a mentor because of my daughter’s interest in robotics and engineering. My role is to help with editing, since I am a “humanities” type. The irony that leaves me sleepless is that Ph.D.s in the sciences are highly coveted and have an assurance for jobs. Ph.D.s in the “humanities,” however, are a sure way to block you from career success. Since I began this blog I have been officially unemployed (I pick up a course or two here and there, but no full-time offers have been presented). The people who have been most empathetic and helpful in this time of difficulty have been the robotics team. People there have tried to hook me up with people who might be able to help, but I am like an alien on the autopsy table among scientists – where do you begin? How do you help an overly qualified “humanities” ex-professor find a job? Meanwhile my co-“humanities” colleagues helplessly wring their hands and do nothing. Worse, they interview me and decide not to make a hire, based on “religious” reasons.

The past several years, as the recipient of calculated cruelty from many religious folks, stumbling along trying to find a means of reasonable support, I have come to trust the robots. The robotics team has demonstrated the most humanitarian attitude to a fellow human who has been suffering for several months. The religious tell me that God will work it out and go their righteous way. Yesterday, being blessed by a “high priest” of the robotics world, I felt that I finally found a place I belonged. Now it might be time to go back to school and find the real pulse of humanity in the sciences.

Kids building robots

Abuse of Power

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In many ways the naiveté of youth still clings to me. I was reared to respect authority and to trust those whom society placed in power over me. As skeptical experience wears away at this ancient veneer, I have become more retrospective of the whole enterprise of the social experiment. Perhaps I shouldn’t have read The Call of the Wild after all.

A few months back I wrote a post supporting a student at Butler University, Jess Zimmerman, who was being sued by the university for perceived slights against the administration on his anonymous blog. That post has forged a connection between Jess and myself, although I’ve never met him. That connection is one of justice and fairness, traits that should, above all, be upheld by institutions of higher learning. In an email last night, Jess updated me on his situation. The lawsuit has been dropped (my thanks to all of you who signed the electronic petition through this blog), but the recriminations continue. The details are available on Jess’ blog, but the short version is that in order to have a fair trial the university had placed him under a $100,000 bond. I am saddened, but not surprised, by this abuse of power.

Over the past several months I have wearily retrod this familiar path. I too have been the victim of institutional power in an episode that haunts me to this day. In slow motion I watch and rewatch men “in authority” dismantling the hopes and aspirations of a neophyte academic who was left wondering, like a dog, why he was being beaten so. There is no action to take. There is no club to wield. The only thing required is to be aware of the situation. Although I shouldn’t have done it, I did read Jack London’s Call of the Wild. And it is my hope that young students unfairly targeted, like Jess, have the resilience of Buck and will remember their pasts when they come to lead their companions in forging a better world.

Everything’s Better at Harvard (Except Religion)

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My wife pointed me to an important article in Newsweek on the plight of religious studies at Harvard. Now, I have to admit to a couple of bunches of sour grapes right up front. I was accepted at Harvard but elected not to go. Only after I had completed my doctorate at Edinburgh University after a lifetime of the study of religion and found that no jobs were available did I realize my mistake. I met colleagues who had jobs while attending academic conferences. All of those well settled in respectable positions had graduated from Harvard. A similar phenomenon exists in Great Britain. Those who actually find satisfactory positions hold doctorates from Oxford. Problem is, neither Harvard nor Oxford corner the market on good education (oh, the heresy!). People, however, are simplistically impressed by lineage.

In any case, this article by Lisa Miller points out the high drama of academic discord at the Shangri-La of American institutions. The famous linguist, Steven Pinker, who personally believes religion to be a severely faulty means of seeking enlightenment, has worked to prevent a required course in religion at the famed secular university on the grounds that faith and reason do not share the same status. Miller goes on to express how small colleges and state universities are picking up on the slack. My limited experience at Rutgers bears out her observations. In this large, rambling, decidedly secular school, my classes in the religion department are always full and I have to turn students away. Yet the university refuses to allow for a full-time hire. Secular America is deep in a state of denial. Because many academics reject religion personally, they simply can’t see how vital it is to understand it. I personally believe no one should be allowed to hold public office without having completed a course in Bible and its political abuse.

Meanwhile, Harvard still holds back. Its reticence will not prevent misinformed people from using their religion as a means of power and destruction. Pretending that since religion is not personally important it is not important at all has deadly consequences. To me it seems obvious that it is not the school you attend that is important, but what you learn while you are there.

Gray New World

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A few months back I purchased a book entitled One Thousand Languages by Peter Austin. Not a “reading book,” this is more of a reference manual to the often bewildering profusion of languages in the world. Having dabbled in the study of about a dozen languages over the course of my academic career, I was interested in seeing what tongues are being spoken in places I’ve only dreamed about. After introducing a plethora of different communication systems, the book dedicates a significant section to endangered and extinct languages. There is a sadness about a language dying; it marks the end of an important aspect of a culture and a move towards a bland universality.

O say what did you say?

Then a Rutgers student sent me this link. It is a video of Wade Davis lecturing on the topic of the rapid disappearance of minority cultures around the world. Initially Davis begins by telling the students that when they were born (this lecture was delivered in 2003), there were 6000 spoken languages in the world. As of 2003, there were only 3000. The rate of language extinction is (was) about one tongue dying out every two weeks. What makes this degeneration so unfortunate, as Davis explains, is that many are dying unnatural deaths. Cultures are obliterated because of exploitation. More powerful members of nations (artificial constructs, all!) ensure compliance by encouraging uniform languages and monochromatic cultures. It is culturocide.

I would encourage my readers to view this video; it is 20 minutes well spent. A major component of these dying cultures is religion, naturally. Davis makes very important observations about this aspect of cultural non-diversity as well. And I can’t help adding that one of the phenomena he addresses is how zombies are made! Quite apart from my fascination with the monstrous aspect of religions, Davis’ cautions are essential to recognizing the plight of the once diverse human cultural domain. You won’t regret seeing this – it is nutritious food for thought.

Prosperity Update

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I didn’t have the opportunity to write a post yesterday because my PowerPoint file for my class had been deleted. I still don’t know how. I’ve been using varieties of the same computer I have now for about 20 years and I’ve never lost a file before. I discovered this, of course, just before I began packing the car with the sherpa-load of equipment that I need to haul the 50 miles to Montclair with me to teach my class twice a week. The loss of the day’s lecture notes weighed heavily on my mind as I climbed into my car and discovered a problem with the electrical system – the blinker lights on the right wouldn’t shut off. (They finally started to behave normally half-way to the university.) And a blizzard was on the way. At times like this my thoughts turn to my prosperity cross.

I wrote about the cross in a previous post where I indicated that I was going to try a good-faith experiment to see if God really wants me to prosper. The last 17 years haven’t been good financially, so I tried my best to believe, and I have been carrying the cross around with me for a few weeks now. In that time I have had a publication rejected, did not get a full-time job after a very good interview, didn’t win the lottery (I bought a ticket as an experiment although I never play normally), my wife had more hours added to her job with no increase in compensation, my health insurance company politely declined to pay for an expensive dental procedure, and I have yet to be paid for my four weeks of teaching at Montclair. Oh, and two cars very nearly collided with me yesterday (not because of my blinker! One tried to pass me on the left as I was making a left turn into a parking spot in a parking lot, the other passed me on a single-lane entry ramp onto the Garden State Parkway while I was merging at the posted speed limit). I’m beginning to think they sent me a defective artifact.

In my prophecy class we’ve been discussing divination. From ancient times people have attempted to discern the will of the gods through a wide variety of techniques. Watching birds in the sky, smoke from altars, oil on water (haven’t discovered smoke on the water yet), casting lots, reading animal livers, and having significant dreams – any of these might reveal the hidden will of the gods. And ancients carried talismans at times to hedge the odds in their favor. We like to think of ourselves as more sophisticated than that, relying on more updated and civilized ways of influencing the almighty. My pocket cross is one of those modern means to induce divine favor my way. Perhaps I am reporting too soon, since I’ve got a backlog of nearly two decades of financial woes to overcome. In the short term, however, it looks like a real blizzard is on the way.

Secrets of my sucess

Noah in the Underworld

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I recently was subjected to the 1940 sci-fi/western film Radio Ranch (a compilation of the series Phantom Empire). This happy-go-lucky story with Gene Autry in his first starring role is a romp through the unbelievable in just about any sense of the word. Based on the premise that there is an underground world called Murania, the film pits Autry against evil scientists who want to get a “bushel load” of radium from Murania, the “Thunder Riders,” or national guard of Murania, and indeed, against his corporate sponsors who will cancel his contract if he ever fails to get to Radio Ranch by 2 p.m. for his singing broadcast! This creative approach to early science fiction will be reincarnated more successfully in The Mole People, a movie that I wrote about a few weeks back.

The connections between the two films do not stop at an underground world with humanoids wearing Egyptian costumes (there is an unmistakable uraeus on the helmet of Argo in Radio Ranch), but go as far as the associations with the Flood Myth. I pointed out the flood connections in my post on The Mole People, and it was startling to note that Radio Ranch begins (and ends) with Gene Autry singing “Uncle Noah’s Ark.” That coincidence is, in itself, barely worth noticing. When the evil scientists invade Radio Ranch, however, they are shown an artifact from the Thunder Riders (whose thunder-producing horses are, admittedly, pretty cool) and they immediately identify it as an “antediluvian” idol. At this point it became clear how deeply embedded the biblical flood story has been in our culture, and how freely it was used in early science fiction films.

At a guest lecture in the Middle East Studies Program at Rutgers on Friday, I mentioned that the flood story goes all the way back to Sumer, making it among the earliest religious stories in the world. Several students had difficulty with this and began asking, “but when was Noah actually alive?” These college students, well educated in science, engineering, or political science, can’t get beyond the biblical literalism they were raised with. It is no wonder that America is falling behind much of the world in science education: we haven’t moved beyond Gene Autry’s overly cheerful belief in a deluge that never occurred.

Black Job Market

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An article in the paper has launched me into a curmudgeonly mood. The bright-eyed journalist, eyes full of statistics, was writing about how college graduates make one-and-a-half times higher salaries than their high school diploma holding classmates. I laughed then cried when I saw the standard salary of a diploma holder was higher than my salary with a Ph.D. My thoughts migrated to Mark Twain’s quip about “lies, damn lies, and statistics.” Something is very wrong with our system.

Granted, those of us with higher degrees (especially in the humanities) do not enter the profession driven by aspirations of wealth. We do hope, however, to be able to afford to pay the rent. Instead the university world, with a casuistry that would do even a Jesuit proud, has found ways of wringing years of cheap labor out of those who are educating the next generation for those good paying jobs. It is a position that Sisyphus himself would despair to face.

When will we, as a society, fess up to what we know is true? Every industry is driven by money. Hospitals encourage surgery even when it is not necessary to bring in the extra income. Churches hit the guilt or eternal damnation buttons and cash flows in. University presidents ride around in limousines while those who are dangled along by their Ph.D.s beg for the bare minimum of fair treatment. No, I have to disagree with our affable journalist. I believe in education – it is the only way out of this money-hungry mess we’ve evolved ourselves into – but I don’t believe in education for good pay. It just doesn’t ring true.