Something to Write About

Clearly, this may stand a chance of being the slowest blog in the world. I had expected to be writing one or two pieces each month but somehow the back end of 2008 filled with other activities. Some of the activities I hope to write about in future posts.

Today, though, I just wanted to mark the inauguration of Barack Obama.

Though I'm British, like many other non-Americans I'm heartened by his apparent intellect and humanity. I watched the inaugural address on TV and then listened to American radio via the Internet for reactions.

I was moved not just by the President, but by the crowds. Something in the spectacle showed me an America in a more positive light than I have seen for a long time, certainly since 9/11.

Personally I was taken with the passages:

Talking about earlier generations

"They understood that our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please. Instead, they knew that our power grows through its prudent use; our security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint."

Talking about armed forces

"We honour them not only because they are guardians of our liberty, but because they embody the spirit of service; a willingness to find meaning in something greater than themselves. And yet, at this moment - a moment that will define a generation - it is precisely this spirit that must inhabit us all."

and 

"This is the source of our confidence - the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny."

I, like many others, hope that the new President is as remarkable a man as he now appears to be, and that others, in America and around the world suspend cynicism and take the opportunity to reach together for a brighter future.

"Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation ..." John F. Kennedy

Eclipse 01-August-2008

There's a solar eclipse tomorrow, partial here in the UK.

According to http://www.physorg.com/news136197476.html

"From the whole of the British Isles observers will see a partial solar eclipse, with between 1/10th and 1/3rd of the Sun obscured by the Moon. ...

In London the partial phase of the eclipse begins at 0933 BST (0833 GMT). Maximum eclipse is at 1018 BST (0918 GMT) when 12% of the Sun will be blocked. The partial eclipse ends at 1105 BST (1005 GMT)."

The further north you are in the UK, the more the Sun should be blocked.

There are also some rather wonderful diagrams and animations showing how the shadows travel for day/night, total and partial eclipses for the August 1 event at http://www.eclipse.org.uk/eclipse/0312008/ If you prefer static maps, you might like to look at the NASA maps at http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse.html

As you will gather as these posts progress, some strands which are likely to recur are teaching, science and something called the 'Theory of Knowledge' (TOK). TOK is a course which I am preparing to teach as part of the International Baccalaureate when it begins to be offered at the school where I work in 2009. The prediction made in this post is what TOK might call a 'Knowledge Claim'. TOK would encourage students to not necessarily take such a claim at face value but recognise the basis of the claim, which is often implicit. TOK asks ... "How do we know what we know?"

Well, as a scientist I'm pretty condfident that the models of the universe used to predict eclipses are robust enough for me to rely on. Of course there are elements of trust.

First there is the trust implicit in the scientific process. Does the fact that the day has followed night for as long as anyone can remember guarantee that day will break again tomorrow? If dawn didn't appear, science would be in some short-lived turmoil while it scrabbled around for a better model of the universe but the scientific process would not be broken ... at least, that's the way it seems to me. There's an implicit get out for all of scientific predictions that if the evidence doesn't fit, then we should look for a better model, or at least recognise the limitations of the ones that we are currently using.

There's another level of trust in the eclipse prediction though. While I know that science can apply reason to predict eclipses accurately, I'm not an astronomer myself. I haven't been making measurements of the moon's appearance over the past months in order to predict just when an eclipse will occur. I'm trusting that the culture that I live in is giving me accurate information based on the scientific reasoning; that there isn't some anarchic group behind the websites I've referred to in some bizarre global conspiracy to mislead me into believing that there will be an eclipse when there won't be.

In TOK we look for things called Knowledge Issues as the basis for interesting discussions, reflections ... and essays/presentations for assessment. A knwoledge issue here might be one that asked 'How do you judge whether a source of information is reliable?'

I'm still very new to TOK. I'm hoping that I can develop some ideas and resources through this blog. Feel free to feedback through comments.