#322 The Resurrected Christ As The Outcome of History

"The pain of our memories is something of a false memory, in that it will not last forever. Only memory that is grounded in the End of things – memory that is eschatological – has true significance. There are forces that are seeking to re-write history at this very moment. There are false believers who imagine that acts of violence can shape the outcome of history.

This is not so. The outcome of history took place in the Resurrection of Christ. Regardless of whatever madness we may imagine year by year, the Resurrected Christ is at the center of all things, He is the Alpha and Omega. He cannot be seen with eyes of hatred and anger. That vision is normatively given to the pure in heart ...

For tears to be wiped away, they must also be shed. For the dead to rise again, they have to die. To remember the truth is, finally, to remember the End of all things when the Truth shall be revealed. The former things – which were always distortions – will pass away. What remains will abide forever."

-- Orthodox priest Fr. Stephen Freeman

#321 Never to Be Broken

I saw the following list in an article about Pete Rose on ESPN.com.  I'd say they're probably right that all of these are unbreakable.

Ten Unbreakable Career Records

1. Cy Young's 749 complete games
2. Cy Young's 511 wins
3. Connie Mack's 53 seasons as a manager
4. Walter Johnson's 110 shutouts
5. Sam Crawford's 309 triples
6. Barry Bonds' 688 intentional walks
7. Pete Rose's 4,256 hits
8. Vin Scully's 61 (and counting) seasons with one team
9. Nolan Ryan's 5,714 strikeouts
10. Rickey Henderson's 1,406 steals

I don't see how 749 complete games is even humanly possible without a man's arm falling off.  Considering that Greg Maddux finished with right around 350 wins, no one will ever come close to Young's record.  I wouldn't say Mack's or Scully's records are out of reach considering they're not player records.  Johnson's, Crawford's, and Bond's records seem to be reachable, but I've never thought of those stats before, so I'm not sure if any active player is close.  Like Young's pitching records, I think Rose's hits record is equally unreachable considering that even a player who gets 200 hits a year for 20 years would still not be there.  That's unbelievable.  John Smoltz was a strikeout kind of guy who played for nearly 20 years and barely made it across the 3,000 line.  How could Ryan have had nearly 6,000.  Hard to imagine.  A lot of these records are no longer reachable because the game has changed in fundamental ways.  But I see no reason why Henderson's steals record couldn't be broken were the right player to play for the right manager(s) long enough.  Then I realize that 20 years at 50 steals would only get you a third of the way there and I realize how impossible that is.

#320 Studying Well

The New York Times presents new research into how to make information stick in your head:

"'When students see a list of problems, all of the same kind, they know the strategy to use before they even read the problem,' said Dr. Rohrer. 'That’s like riding a bike with training wheels.' With mixed practice, he added, 'each problem is different from the last one, which means kids must learn how to choose the appropriate procedure — just like they had to do on the test.'

These findings extend well beyond math, even to aesthetic intuitive learning. In an experiment published last month in the journal Psychology and Aging, researchers found that college students and adults of retirement age were better able to distinguish the painting styles of 12 unfamiliar artists after viewing mixed collections (assortments, including works from all 12) than after viewing a dozen works from one artist, all together, then moving on to the next painter."

I can't figure out why, but I've found the same technique to work well for me, i.e. using mixed sets when trying to learn something.  The reason may be found later in the article:

"The process of retrieving an idea is not like pulling a book from a shelf; it seems to fundamentally alter the way the information is subsequently stored, making it far more accessible in the future.  Dr. Roediger uses the analogy of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle in physics, which holds that the act of measuring a property of a particle alters that property: 'Testing not only measures knowledge but changes it,' he says — and, happily, in the direction of more certainty, not less."

I think that's why doing randomized practice problems while I was studying for the CPA exam helped me far more than reading the material as it was presented.  Here's more:

"In one of his own experiments, Dr. Roediger and Jeffrey Karpicke, also of Washington University, had college students study science passages from a reading comprehension test, in short study periods. When students studied the same material twice, in back-to-back sessions, they did very well on a test given immediately afterward, then began to forget the material.  But if they studied the passage just once and did a practice test in the second session, they did very well on one test two days later, and another given a week later.  'Testing has such bad connotation; people think of standardized testing or teaching to the test,' Dr. Roediger said. 'Maybe we need to call it something else, but this is one of the most powerful learning tools we have.'"

#319 Sparta and Athens III

Diodotus son of Eucrates:

"I think the two things most opposed to good counsel are haste and passion; haste usually goes hand in hand with folly, passion with coarseness and narrowness of mind.  As for the argument that speech ought not be the exponent of action, the man who uses it must be either senseless or personally interested: senseless if he believes it possible to deal with the uncertain future through any other medium; interested if wishing to carry a disgraceful measure and doubting his ability to speak well in a bad cause, he thinks to frighten opponents and hears by well-aimed calumny... The good citizen ought to triumph not by frightening his opponents but by beating them fairly in argument." (Thucydides, War, 3.42.1-2, 5)

I thought of three things when I read this quote: 1) myself and other supporters of the Iraq War during late 2002/early 2003 telling those on the fence the world was going to end if we didn't act, and 2) Hank Paulson breathlessly going from Sunday talk show to Sunday talk show during prior to the big bailout telling those on the fence that the world was going to end if we didn't act, and 3) LBJ's "daisy" ad which assisted him in achieving a landslide victory over Barry Goldwater in the 1964 presidential election, which showed a picture of the world ending if viewers didn't act.  All of these were cases of haste and passion being the enemies of conservatism.  The implication?  By definition, it is occasionally better not to triumph.  Why?  Because good is better than triumph.