The Holy Grail for computer programming in terms of developing artificial intelligence is known as neural networking, which strives to program computers to mimic the capabilities of the human brain. This always struck me as a lofty but probably an unrealistic goal, to say the least. A more realistic aspiration might be to develop computer software that successfully emulates the capability of a bee's brain, which has only a handful of neurons and a brain mass approximately the size of a pinhead. Yet bees somehow effortlessly manage to solve problems humans consider to be incredibly difficult and complex. Are you familiar with "The Traveling Salesman Problem?" Basically, it goes like this: Given a list of cities and the distances between each pair of cities, what is the shortest possible route that visits each city exactly once and returns to the origin city? Consider this story found in the UK Daily Mail: "Bees' tiny brains able to beat computer at complex mathematical problems," the headline reads. Brutal! For those critical minds prone to "shoot the messenger" by challenging the source, please note that CBS News relied on different experts to reach the same conclusion -- bees are a lot more intelligent than one might naturally assume, given the size of their brain. To be fair (to the inanimate object) the computer cannot be blamed for struggling to calculate the best way to do what a bee does every day, because humans programmed the code for the computer, and humans are, well, human. We make mistakes. Lots of them. The creator of bees … [Read more...]
Fibonacci’s spirals
Mathematician Arthur Benjamin said, "Mathematics is the science of patterns, and we study it to learn how to think logically, critically, and creatively." Not only do patterns exist in nature, they are clearly ubiquitous. Mandelbrot's fractals (often called the thumbprint of God) are but one example of a mathematical pattern repeated on a scale ranging from the micro world to the cosmos. Another extraordinary pattern is known as the Fibonacci sequence, which graphically translates into Fibonacci's spirals (often referred to as the fingerprints of God.) Leonardo Bonacci (a.k.a. Leonardo of Pisa and Fibonacci) was an Italian mathematician most famous for his discovery of what has been called the "golden sequence" of numbers. The famous Fibonacci sequence is simply the following, repeated to infinity. The next number in the sequence is always the sum of the previous two numbers: 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144, 233, 377, 610, 987, 1597, 2584, 4181... This reasonably short video demonstrates how the pattern can be found everywhere from DNA to clouds in the sky. This slightly longer documentary claims to find the golden sequence everywhere in nature, art, music, and even the Mandelbrot set. Of course, not everyone agrees with mathematicians who claim the Fibonacci sequence can be found in virtually everything in the universe. For example, physicist Donald Simanek offers harsh criticism of Fibonacci on a page at his website called the "Fibonacci Flim-Flam." Professor Simanek described people (like me) who found the pro-Fibonacci video interesting as … [Read more...]
Mandelbrot’s fractals
Patterns are models, or plans, used to produce nearly perfect copies of a specific design. In fact, the ability to discern a pattern from raw data is usually considered an indicator of advanced intelligence. Some scientists (who happen to be avowed atheists, and curiously not agnostic) will argue that when words like "models", "plans", and "design" are used to describe an organic, natural process, those words don't mean what they would ordinarily mean. These experts also claim the appearance of design in a living organism is nothing more than an overwhelmingly convincing optical illusion. In his book The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution, biologist (and renowned atheist) Richard Dawkins wrote, Perhaps it was religious indoctrination that held us back (from believing in evolution). Or perhaps it was the daunting complexity of a living organ such as an eye, freighted as it is with the beguiling illusion of design by a master engineer. Why does Mr. Dawkins believe that our eyes have deceived us, and the intuitively obvious appearance of design in our bodies only an illusion? It's because he perceives design flaws in the human eye, probably due to the fact that the photoreceptor cells in the retina are allegedly placed backward. Dawkins has also been quite adamant about his belief that the vas deferens tube in humans and the laryngeal nerve in a giraffe are also examples of "poor" design which, as this website suggests, commits the logical fallacy of personal incredulity. This argument of Dawkins depends upon our making the assumption … [Read more...]
Miracle at Cokeville
If someone said "Cokeville" here in north Georgia, the listener might think the speaker was making a joke about living the city of Atlanta, home of the Coca Cola company -- even home of the World of Coke. But Cokeville is a real place, a small town in Wyoming not much bigger than the World of Coke, with a population of a little more than 500 people. Five times more people visit the World of Coke in Atlanta on an average day than live in Cokeville, Wyoming. But why haven't we heard of Cokeville before? If our hypothetical speaker were to say "Columbine" instead, most listeners will immediately be reminded of the horrible massacre planned and executed by Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold that took place at Columbine High School in Colorado, not the flower. Twelve innocent high school students and one heroic teacher were murdered by two deranged teenagers, and twenty-four more people wounded. Then Michael Moore’s movie Bowling for Columbine famously took advantage of the tragedy to advocate for stricter gun control, making sure we never forget the horrific massacre that took place on April 20, 1999. What we've learned from modern terrorists is that if you take away all the guns, the lunatics will learn how to make bombs. Or they'll steal a truck or bus, and run over people. If someone wants to commit murder and create terror and mayhem, they will find a way. Back to Cokeville -- what makes Cokeville, Wyoming so special? It's special because of the tragedy that didn't happen there. On May 16, 1986, David and Doris Young took more than 150 children and teachers as hostages … [Read more...]
Do miracles really occur?
[SPOILER ALERT: if you haven't seen the movie Miracles from Heaven and don't know the story but want to see it, this article will spoil the ending, so you might not want to read it yet.] Some people don't believe in miracles, because they don't believe in a supernatural God. However, only the first dictionary definition of "miracle" refers to divine intervention; it offers a more secular alternate definition that describes miracles merely as any extremely unusual event or accomplishment. Samuel Clemens (a.k.a. "Mark Twain") wrote: Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities. Truth isn't. And what is the truth? Quid est veritas? As the author of three novels and three nonfiction books and articles, let me assure you that writing non-ficton is considerably easier than creating the plot of a novel from scratch. The fictional story must appear to be plausible enough to the reader that he or she becomes willing to suspend his or her disbelief. The same isn't the case for stories purported to be true -- they simply require verifiable evidence to support any claims being made in the account. Take the plot of the movie Miracles from Heaven, for example. The main story simply sounds ludicrous -- a young girl suffering terribly from a rare, incurable stomach disease falls thirty feet inside a rotted tree, landing on her head. But the fall that should have killed young Anna Beam allegedly cured her. Though her neck should have been broken, and her skull smashed in pieces, not only does she survive with only … [Read more...]
