Gizmodo reports that lightning kills more trees than we thought.
CBS News, and other sources, reports that corn plants release water vapor into the air, which contributes to the uncomfortable humidity you may be feeling now.
Musings on science, the Bible, and fantastic literature (and sometimes basketball and other stuff).
God speaks to us through the Bible and the findings of science, and we should listen to both types of revelation.
The title is from Psalm 84:11.
The Wikipedia is usually a pretty good reference. I mostly use the World English Bible (WEB), because it is public domain. I am grateful.
License
I have written an e-book, Does the Bible Really Say That?, which is free to anyone. To download that book, in several formats, go here.
The posts in this blog are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. You can copy and use this material, as long as you aren't making money from it. If you give me credit, thanks. If not, OK.
The posts in this blog are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. You can copy and use this material, as long as you aren't making money from it. If you give me credit, thanks. If not, OK.
Showing posts with label trees. Show all posts
Showing posts with label trees. Show all posts
Thursday, July 24, 2025
Wednesday, September 09, 2015
Sunspots 537
The Arts: (or something) Lego-like blocks have been produced, only they are large enough to build real furniture and buildings.
Christianity: Relevant on "How Worry Warps Your View of God," and how to get the right view back.
Benjamin L. Corey gives 12 signs that you got your "Biblical" Worldview from Fox News (not the Bible).
Computing: Gizmo's Freeware reviews free Virtual Private Networks.
Finance: From the New York Times, an interactive web site that helps you decide whether to rent or purchase a home, based on your own data.
Health: Relevant wants to know "Why Don't Churches Ever Talk About Physical Health."
Politics: Benjamin L. Corey also thinks that some people go way too far in their defense of gun rights.
Science: In a report published this week in Nature, we learn that there are about three trillion trees on the earth.
Wired reports that royal jelly doesn't result in queen bees in the way we have thought it did.
Image source (public domain)
Wednesday, February 09, 2005
How do you understand a tree? (or under stand it)
How do you understand a tree?
In simplest terms, there are two methods.
1) Holism (Here's the Wikipedia article on the subject)
Stand under a tree. Feel its bark, smell the tree, listen to the wind through the leaves and twigs. Watch the bugs climbing it. Look at how the tree affects other plants.
2) Reductionism (Here's the Wikipedia article on Scientific Reductionism)
The other method is to analyze the tree by destroying it. Take the tree's square root. Count the twigs, branches and buds. Analyze its DNA. Measure its photosynthesis rate.
Both of these methods have their strengths. Holistic tree observation could be taught in college as Tree Appreciation. It may lead to poetry and devotional thoughts. Scientifically, this method sees the tree in context. What is the value of the tree to surrounding organisms? What do the fungi connected to its roots do for the tree? What is the effect of climate and soil? Are the tree's neighbors like it? Are they its offspring, or parents, or siblings?
Robert A. Laughlin, a Nobel Prize-winning physicist, has recently written the following, which shows that he is not satisfied with reductionisn:
What physical science thus has to tell us is that the whole being more than the sum of its parts is not merely a concept but a physical phenomenon. Nature is regulated not only by a microscopic rule base but by powerful and general principles of organization. Some of these principles are known, but the vast majority are not. New ones are being discovered all the time. At higher levels of sophistication the cause-and-effect relationships are harder to document, but there is no evidence that the hierarchical descent of law found in the primitive world is superseded by anything else. Thus if a simple physical phenomenon can become effectively independent of the more fundamental laws from which it descends, so can we. I am carbon, but I need not have been. I have a meaning transcending the atoms from which I am made.
Reductionistic tree observation is seldom practiced. Trees are too big, and their generation time is way too slow. (Some such is being done. See also here.) Reductionistic observation is more likely practiced on microorganisms, like Escherichia coli. (There's an E. coli encyclopedia, and its genome has been sequenced.)
What good is reductionistic observation? Well, it tells us something about ourselves. Western medicine is often reductionistic. Treat the disease as if it were in isolation, not the patient. This clearly has some problems, but it has also helped to cut way down on deaths from infection, treat nutritional disorders, help people with depression, and done a lot of other good things. Reductionistic observation of tree tissues, and tree genetics, may make paper manufacture more efficient, or lead to increased fruit production, or cure tree diseases.
We need to see trees, and ourselves, in context, and as whole beings. It's also good if someone can see our blood sugar levels, and what we are producing in our urine. Reductionism and holism both have their place. Both trees, and the atoms from which they are made, have meanings.
In simplest terms, there are two methods.
1) Holism (Here's the Wikipedia article on the subject)
Stand under a tree. Feel its bark, smell the tree, listen to the wind through the leaves and twigs. Watch the bugs climbing it. Look at how the tree affects other plants.
2) Reductionism (Here's the Wikipedia article on Scientific Reductionism)
The other method is to analyze the tree by destroying it. Take the tree's square root. Count the twigs, branches and buds. Analyze its DNA. Measure its photosynthesis rate.
Both of these methods have their strengths. Holistic tree observation could be taught in college as Tree Appreciation. It may lead to poetry and devotional thoughts. Scientifically, this method sees the tree in context. What is the value of the tree to surrounding organisms? What do the fungi connected to its roots do for the tree? What is the effect of climate and soil? Are the tree's neighbors like it? Are they its offspring, or parents, or siblings?
Robert A. Laughlin, a Nobel Prize-winning physicist, has recently written the following, which shows that he is not satisfied with reductionisn:
What physical science thus has to tell us is that the whole being more than the sum of its parts is not merely a concept but a physical phenomenon. Nature is regulated not only by a microscopic rule base but by powerful and general principles of organization. Some of these principles are known, but the vast majority are not. New ones are being discovered all the time. At higher levels of sophistication the cause-and-effect relationships are harder to document, but there is no evidence that the hierarchical descent of law found in the primitive world is superseded by anything else. Thus if a simple physical phenomenon can become effectively independent of the more fundamental laws from which it descends, so can we. I am carbon, but I need not have been. I have a meaning transcending the atoms from which I am made.
Reductionistic tree observation is seldom practiced. Trees are too big, and their generation time is way too slow. (Some such is being done. See also here.) Reductionistic observation is more likely practiced on microorganisms, like Escherichia coli. (There's an E. coli encyclopedia, and its genome has been sequenced.)
What good is reductionistic observation? Well, it tells us something about ourselves. Western medicine is often reductionistic. Treat the disease as if it were in isolation, not the patient. This clearly has some problems, but it has also helped to cut way down on deaths from infection, treat nutritional disorders, help people with depression, and done a lot of other good things. Reductionistic observation of tree tissues, and tree genetics, may make paper manufacture more efficient, or lead to increased fruit production, or cure tree diseases.
We need to see trees, and ourselves, in context, and as whole beings. It's also good if someone can see our blood sugar levels, and what we are producing in our urine. Reductionism and holism both have their place. Both trees, and the atoms from which they are made, have meanings.
Tuesday, February 08, 2005
How Trees Grow (Hint: not like us)
Trees don't grow like us.
Trees have many appealing features. One of them is that they seem to reach for the sky. Another is the texture of the bark. Both can be explained (at least on one level) in terms of the way trees grow.
We, and "higher" animals generally, grow by expansion. We start out small, and end up larger, by expanding each part. Our feet get larger, our liver gets larger, etc. Not exactly all in synchrony, but basically all parts get larger. In other words, we grow more or less like a balloon.
Not so trees. Trees add on to what is already there. If there's a forty-year old tree in our yard, the outside layer of the wood, the inside layer of the bark, and the tips of branches, are all new. The newest are 2004 vintage. (Assuming no growth yet this year.) Then, next to them, 2003's production, then 2002, etc.
One consequence of this pattern is that the oldest bark is on the outside. Since the oldest bark isn't as large as newer bark, it gets stretched, as the wood, and newer bark, push it out. That causes the cracks in bark, and causes it to come flaking off. The cracks, and the flaking off, differ considerably from species to species, but all the ways that they do it are wonderful, and give different species their character.
Meanwhile, back in the trunk, the oldest wood gets further and further from the outside, as new layers of wood and bark are built up outside it. In most trees, eventually it gets plugged up with various chemicals, naturally produced by the tree, and eventually is no longer useful for water transportation. This inner, older wood is usually darker than the outer, younger wood, and is called heartwood. It still is useful for support. Sometimes it's more useful for support than the outer wood. I remember some unhappy experiences trying to cut the heartwood of some types of trees with an axe. The outer wood, the sapwood, carries water and minerals up to the leaves, and also supports them, and the branches above.
As the inner wood isn't absolutely essential, in some trees, it is eaten away by various processes, such as fire or disease, and you get a live tree which is partly hollow.
Since trees don't grow by expansion, human markings on trees have an interesting history. Carving your initials into bark at, say, four feet off the ground, doesn't lead to the initials moving gradually up the tree as it grows. No, the initials will remain at the same height. But they won't stay as they were. The bark will expand, and eventually the initials, on the outermost bark, will fall off, leaving no trace of them, unless they are re-carved every few years.
Photos
There are lots of photos of trees out there. Also, for many of you, there are trees you can see by looking out the window, or by taking a few steps. You know what trees look like. Nonetheless, I recommend Bonnie's recent photo gallery, featuring collections on "Winter," "Fall," and "Leafless Trees."
I also recommend looking at real trees.
Trees have many appealing features. One of them is that they seem to reach for the sky. Another is the texture of the bark. Both can be explained (at least on one level) in terms of the way trees grow.
We, and "higher" animals generally, grow by expansion. We start out small, and end up larger, by expanding each part. Our feet get larger, our liver gets larger, etc. Not exactly all in synchrony, but basically all parts get larger. In other words, we grow more or less like a balloon.
Not so trees. Trees add on to what is already there. If there's a forty-year old tree in our yard, the outside layer of the wood, the inside layer of the bark, and the tips of branches, are all new. The newest are 2004 vintage. (Assuming no growth yet this year.) Then, next to them, 2003's production, then 2002, etc.
One consequence of this pattern is that the oldest bark is on the outside. Since the oldest bark isn't as large as newer bark, it gets stretched, as the wood, and newer bark, push it out. That causes the cracks in bark, and causes it to come flaking off. The cracks, and the flaking off, differ considerably from species to species, but all the ways that they do it are wonderful, and give different species their character.
Meanwhile, back in the trunk, the oldest wood gets further and further from the outside, as new layers of wood and bark are built up outside it. In most trees, eventually it gets plugged up with various chemicals, naturally produced by the tree, and eventually is no longer useful for water transportation. This inner, older wood is usually darker than the outer, younger wood, and is called heartwood. It still is useful for support. Sometimes it's more useful for support than the outer wood. I remember some unhappy experiences trying to cut the heartwood of some types of trees with an axe. The outer wood, the sapwood, carries water and minerals up to the leaves, and also supports them, and the branches above.
As the inner wood isn't absolutely essential, in some trees, it is eaten away by various processes, such as fire or disease, and you get a live tree which is partly hollow.
Since trees don't grow by expansion, human markings on trees have an interesting history. Carving your initials into bark at, say, four feet off the ground, doesn't lead to the initials moving gradually up the tree as it grows. No, the initials will remain at the same height. But they won't stay as they were. The bark will expand, and eventually the initials, on the outermost bark, will fall off, leaving no trace of them, unless they are re-carved every few years.
Photos
There are lots of photos of trees out there. Also, for many of you, there are trees you can see by looking out the window, or by taking a few steps. You know what trees look like. Nonetheless, I recommend Bonnie's recent photo gallery, featuring collections on "Winter," "Fall," and "Leafless Trees."
I also recommend looking at real trees.
Monday, February 07, 2005
Some quotations about trees
C. S. Lewis:
I am sure that some are born to write as trees are born to bear leaves: for these, writing is a necessary mode of their own development. If the impulse to write survives the hope of success, then one is among these. If not, then the impulse was at best only pardonable vanity, and it will certainly disappear when the hope is withdrawn. - C.S. Lewis to Arthur Greeves, The Letters of C.S. Lewis, (28 August 1930) (my web source is here)
William Dowie on J. R. R. Tolkien:
The Lord of the Rings is basically a rural book, even something of an ecological tract. The companions travel through forests, over mountains, marshes, and down rivers pursuing their quest. They are in contact with the rhythms of nature and the significance of places and events in a way that is impossible for man in the era of mass production and urban construction. Things have meaning for Frodo and his companions, things that looked at from afar might be called natural hierophanies. The principal of these which Tolkien employs are special places, stones, rings, narrow passes, underground tunnels, moon and sun, night and day, trees and foliage, ship and sea, and the changing seasons. William Dowie, "The Gospel of Middle-Earth according to J. R. R. Tolkien" in J. R. R. Tolkien, Scholar and Storyteller: Essays in Memoriam, Mary Salu and Robert T. Farrell, editors. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1979, pp. 265-285. Quote is from page 268.
A further symbol of the triumph of life is the cosmic tree, which is related of course to the whole renewal of nature that begins in spring and blossoms into summer. As Eliade points out, "for religious man, the appearance of life is the central mystery of the world," for "human life is not felt as a brief appearance in time, between one nothingness and another; it is preceded by a pre-existence and continued in a postexistence" (The Sacred and the Profane, p. 147). Because this mystery of the inexhaustible presence of life is bound up with the rhythmical regeneration of nature, the tree became a central symbol in religious traditions. So in The Lord of the Rings the figure of the tree carries something of this same mythic significance when the Eagle sings to the people of Gondor:
And the Tree that was withered shall be renewed,
and he shall plant it in the high places,
and the City shall be blessed. [III, 241]
William Dowie, "The Gospel of Middle-Earth according to J. R. R. Tolkien" in J. R. R. Tolkien, Scholar and Storyteller: Essays in Memoriam, Mary Salu and Robert T. Farrell, editors. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1979, pp. 265-285. Quote is from page 273.
Ursula K. Le Guin, describing Ged:
From that time forth he believed that the wise man is one who never sets himself apart from other living things, whether they have speech or not, and in later years he strove long to learn what can be learned, in silence, from the eyes of animals, the flight of birds, the great slow gestures of trees. Ursula K. Le Guin, A Wizard of Earthsea, New York: Ace, 1968, p. 98.
Frances Schaeffer:
If God treats the tree like a tree, the machine like a machine, the man like a man, shouldn't I, as a fellow-creature, do the same -- treating each thing in integrity in its own order? And for the highest reason: because I love God -- I love the One who has made it! Loving the Lover who has made it, I have respect for the thing He has made. (Francis A. Schaeffer, Pollution and the Death of Man, 1972, Ch. 4)
John C. Polkinghorne:
In the cross of Christ we see a lonely figure, nailed to the tree, exposed to the most tortured and lingering death that Roman political ingenuity could devise, deserted by his friends and taunted by his enemies, experiencing also the depths of alienation from the God who had been the centre of his life, the One he knew as his dear Father, so that he cries, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Mk. 15:34; Mt. 27:46). Christians believe that in this bleak scene we see, not just a good man caught and destroyed by the system, but the one true God who, in the taut stretching of Christ's arms on the cross, embraces and accepts the bitterness of the world that is his divine creation. The Christian God is not a passionate spectator, looking down in sympathy on the sufferings of the world; the Christian God is truly the "fellow sufferer who understands," for in Christ God has known human suffering and death from the inside. The Christian God is the Crucified God. John C. Polkinghorne, Belief in God in an Age of Science. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1998. p. 43.
I am sure that some are born to write as trees are born to bear leaves: for these, writing is a necessary mode of their own development. If the impulse to write survives the hope of success, then one is among these. If not, then the impulse was at best only pardonable vanity, and it will certainly disappear when the hope is withdrawn. - C.S. Lewis to Arthur Greeves, The Letters of C.S. Lewis, (28 August 1930) (my web source is here)
William Dowie on J. R. R. Tolkien:
The Lord of the Rings is basically a rural book, even something of an ecological tract. The companions travel through forests, over mountains, marshes, and down rivers pursuing their quest. They are in contact with the rhythms of nature and the significance of places and events in a way that is impossible for man in the era of mass production and urban construction. Things have meaning for Frodo and his companions, things that looked at from afar might be called natural hierophanies. The principal of these which Tolkien employs are special places, stones, rings, narrow passes, underground tunnels, moon and sun, night and day, trees and foliage, ship and sea, and the changing seasons. William Dowie, "The Gospel of Middle-Earth according to J. R. R. Tolkien" in J. R. R. Tolkien, Scholar and Storyteller: Essays in Memoriam, Mary Salu and Robert T. Farrell, editors. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1979, pp. 265-285. Quote is from page 268.
A further symbol of the triumph of life is the cosmic tree, which is related of course to the whole renewal of nature that begins in spring and blossoms into summer. As Eliade points out, "for religious man, the appearance of life is the central mystery of the world," for "human life is not felt as a brief appearance in time, between one nothingness and another; it is preceded by a pre-existence and continued in a postexistence" (The Sacred and the Profane, p. 147). Because this mystery of the inexhaustible presence of life is bound up with the rhythmical regeneration of nature, the tree became a central symbol in religious traditions. So in The Lord of the Rings the figure of the tree carries something of this same mythic significance when the Eagle sings to the people of Gondor:
And the Tree that was withered shall be renewed,
and he shall plant it in the high places,
and the City shall be blessed. [III, 241]
William Dowie, "The Gospel of Middle-Earth according to J. R. R. Tolkien" in J. R. R. Tolkien, Scholar and Storyteller: Essays in Memoriam, Mary Salu and Robert T. Farrell, editors. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1979, pp. 265-285. Quote is from page 273.
Ursula K. Le Guin, describing Ged:
From that time forth he believed that the wise man is one who never sets himself apart from other living things, whether they have speech or not, and in later years he strove long to learn what can be learned, in silence, from the eyes of animals, the flight of birds, the great slow gestures of trees. Ursula K. Le Guin, A Wizard of Earthsea, New York: Ace, 1968, p. 98.
Frances Schaeffer:
If God treats the tree like a tree, the machine like a machine, the man like a man, shouldn't I, as a fellow-creature, do the same -- treating each thing in integrity in its own order? And for the highest reason: because I love God -- I love the One who has made it! Loving the Lover who has made it, I have respect for the thing He has made. (Francis A. Schaeffer, Pollution and the Death of Man, 1972, Ch. 4)
John C. Polkinghorne:
In the cross of Christ we see a lonely figure, nailed to the tree, exposed to the most tortured and lingering death that Roman political ingenuity could devise, deserted by his friends and taunted by his enemies, experiencing also the depths of alienation from the God who had been the centre of his life, the One he knew as his dear Father, so that he cries, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Mk. 15:34; Mt. 27:46). Christians believe that in this bleak scene we see, not just a good man caught and destroyed by the system, but the one true God who, in the taut stretching of Christ's arms on the cross, embraces and accepts the bitterness of the world that is his divine creation. The Christian God is not a passionate spectator, looking down in sympathy on the sufferings of the world; the Christian God is truly the "fellow sufferer who understands," for in Christ God has known human suffering and death from the inside. The Christian God is the Crucified God. John C. Polkinghorne, Belief in God in an Age of Science. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1998. p. 43.
Friday, February 04, 2005
Trees as a major theme in the Bible
Trees are a major theme in the Bible.
Close to the beginning, there were the Tree of Life, and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. At the end, there's the Tree of Life. The same Tree of Life? Maybe. Maybe not.
In between, a lot of trees. Here are a few.
Noah's ark was built from trees.
Moses had a staff, perhaps made from a tree.
Sacrifices were burned on wood.
David and Solomon had the builders use wood in the Temple, and in the palace.
Absalom was killed while hanging in a tree.
Psalm 1 compares a righteous person to a tree.
Zacchaeus climbed a tree.
Christ presented the Sermon on the Mount from a boat, presumably made of wood.
Boats played an important role in the New Testament. Jesus traveled on them, some of the apostles were fishermen, and Paul and co-workers made journeys in them.
Christ hung on a cross made of wood.
Why trees?
Probably several reasons.
There are a lot of them.
They are symbols of permanence. Living permanence, unlike that of rocks.
They are solid.
They provide housing for other plants, for animals, and for humans. For humans, the housing provided is usually after the death of the tree--they make excellent building materials.
They provide shade.
They have character. There are patterns in branches, in individual leaves, in bark, and in the grain, when it's exposed. No two trees are exactly alike in appearance.
They bear fruit.
They have flowers.
They can be climbed. We like to go higher. We like adventure. We like to see things we wouldn't otherwise see.
Their roots are anchoring systems.
They capture energy from the sun.
No doubt there are other reasons why God used them as symbols, and why they are prominent in scripture.
This posting doesn't follow some of what B. L. Ochman has to say, in her excellent article, "How to Write Killer Blog Posts . . ." Maybe it doesn't follow any of it.
Please comment on the things I should have included.
Close to the beginning, there were the Tree of Life, and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. At the end, there's the Tree of Life. The same Tree of Life? Maybe. Maybe not.
In between, a lot of trees. Here are a few.
Noah's ark was built from trees.
Moses had a staff, perhaps made from a tree.
Sacrifices were burned on wood.
David and Solomon had the builders use wood in the Temple, and in the palace.
Absalom was killed while hanging in a tree.
Psalm 1 compares a righteous person to a tree.
Zacchaeus climbed a tree.
Christ presented the Sermon on the Mount from a boat, presumably made of wood.
Boats played an important role in the New Testament. Jesus traveled on them, some of the apostles were fishermen, and Paul and co-workers made journeys in them.
Christ hung on a cross made of wood.
Why trees?
Probably several reasons.
There are a lot of them.
They are symbols of permanence. Living permanence, unlike that of rocks.
They are solid.
They provide housing for other plants, for animals, and for humans. For humans, the housing provided is usually after the death of the tree--they make excellent building materials.
They provide shade.
They have character. There are patterns in branches, in individual leaves, in bark, and in the grain, when it's exposed. No two trees are exactly alike in appearance.
They bear fruit.
They have flowers.
They can be climbed. We like to go higher. We like adventure. We like to see things we wouldn't otherwise see.
Their roots are anchoring systems.
They capture energy from the sun.
No doubt there are other reasons why God used them as symbols, and why they are prominent in scripture.
This posting doesn't follow some of what B. L. Ochman has to say, in her excellent article, "How to Write Killer Blog Posts . . ." Maybe it doesn't follow any of it.
Please comment on the things I should have included.
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