Civil Commotion

Really, the corruption is open and brazen here. Even Donald Trump could learn a thing or two.

Southern Baptist Theological Seminary is now “Trusted for Truth.”

Trust. It’s something that’s earned. It doesn’t come quickly. It’s the result of being time tested. When the trustworthiness of God’s Word was being challenged, we stood for truth. We place our trust on the truth that endures. We are The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, and we are Trusted for Truth.

The most trusted name in theological education.

The ministry leaders of the 21st century won’t need less theological training — they’ll need more. That’s why when many seminaries offer faster, easier, simpler, we’ll embrace deeper, richer, and stronger.

The American Association for the Advancement of Science made a splash a few weeks ago when it publicized an about-to-be-published study which found that sexual behavior is influenced by genes, environment, and social milieu, garnering front-page features in the New York Times and Washington Post. Unfortunately, the news was at once overtaken by that ambulatory excrescence in the White House and, so far as I can tell, there haven’t been any thoughtful second-day stories or much coverage in regional and local newspapers.

In other words, an important story relevant to some of the most fractious issues before the public has gone … POOF!

As it happens, my own issue of Science didn’t show-up until Wednesday for some reason, more than a week late. Worse, the study is introduced in the magazine, but not published there; it’s online, which is the worst way ever conceived by the mind of man for reading technical material. All of which I remark to explain why I haven’t yet kept my promise to read and digest the study and explain it here.

But maybe I’m just slow. After all, there are a lot of folks out there who haven’t had the slightest difficulty tweeting a précis:

So the look of things is that once Science proves there is no gay gene! got out, a lot of people were happy to decide that (1) science can be trusted, sometimes, after all, and (2) there is no need to know any more. So, as some of the authors feared, the publication of the study has had the result of ending the discussion for some people. Reality persists, but it’s going to seep into public consciousness more slowly than I hoped.

At least part of the problem is a metaphor that all of us were introduced to in grade school: The gene is like a blueprint, it specifies your eye-color, your height, your hair color, et cetera, et cetera. The more complicated truth is that genes have more in common with the familiar IF-THEN-ELSE statement used to program computers:

IF (condition)
    THEN (actions)
    ELSE (actions)

and the condition being queried is the chemical environment of the womb. The rest of the problem, of course, is that this leads into intellectual subtleties that are inaccessible to a lot of people and, worse, the complex truth offends the resolute ignorance demanded by Eternal Truth.

Science and technology have created a world in which a lot of people will never feel comfortable, a world with more uncertainties than simplistic certitudes. That is the engine that powers the global fundamentalist rebellion against modernity, and we’re going to be living with it for a long time to come.

No, the House Judiciary Committee did not vote to take away Americans’ guns; it approved a red-flag bill for vote on the floor. Nor did it vote to impeach Trump; it voted to open an impeachment inquiry. To put the point a bit differently, Jordan is lying to the American people, and lying in a way certain to stoke anger among the sort of ignoramuses who mainline FOX News’ lies. This is demagoguery, plain and simple, and shame on Ohio’s 4th Congressional District if they aren’t embarrassed that they’ve sent this man to do the country’s business.

The New York Times is reporting that the National Weather Service’s retraction of its correction of Trump originated in the Oval Office.

President Trump, seeking to justify his claim of a hurricane threat to Alabama, pressed aides to intervene with a federal scientific agency, leading to a highly unusual public rebuke of the forecasters who contradicted him, according to people familiar with the events.

In response to the president’s request, Mick Mulvaney, the acting White House chief of staff, told Wilbur Ross, the commerce secretary, to have the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration publicly correct the forecasters, who had insisted that Alabama was not actually at risk from Hurricane Dorian.

I don’t have the slightest difficulty believing this. I worked as a geotechnical engineer in central Florida during the 1980s, a period of spectacular growth there following the opening of Epcot, and much of the work involved Trump-like land developers. Few of them believed that facts ought to get in the way of the good times, and a lot of engineering firms and architects were totally willing to be … expedient … to keep them happy. I don’t know about New York City, but it probably isn’t much different there.

So it wouldn’t surprise me a bit if Donald Trump believes facts are mutable, and has never been told otherwise by the technical people in his orbit.