Friday Miscellaneous: Books, Science and Other Things I've Been Thinking About

Today it's Friday. Here in the Northland we've been celebrating our annual Duluth Dylan Fest all week, which kicked off in Hibbing at the home young Robert Zimmerman grew up in there. Music by Geno, Amy and Pat was followed by a tour of the Hibbing High School where Bob first began to make a name for himself.

This was followed by a string of events here in Duluth throughout the week, culminating in the annual Front Porch Birthday Party at the house where Dylan spent the first six years of his life. We'll be gathering there from 11:00 a.m. till 1:00 p.m. on Sunday, Bob's birthday, with music by Greg Tiburzi. If you missed Wednesday's performance at Sir Ben's, you really missed a stupendous rendition of Dylan's Desire album. Big shout out to Greg, Erin Aldridge and Sonja Bjordal. Thank you.

Last night Cowboy Angel Blue performed in the Depot Train Museum and tonight will be the traditional Singer/Songwriter Contest at Sacred Heart. Full schedule here.

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One of the exciting things in my life right now has been a renewed interest in math and science. As followers of my Substack know I have been sharing the Math Circles of James D. Nickel. (Example: The Wonders of the Fibonacci Sequence). This exploration lead to the discovery of new thinking about the world we live in from a physics perspective. 

There are so many things that have been discovered about the nature of reality and the universe that are downright astonishing. It's my hope to share some of these things. The implications of Watson and Crick's discovery of the genetic code will blow your mind. How did the Hubble telescope expand our understanding of the size of the cosmos? What does "trust the science" really mean? 

My interest in history has never abated. Niall Ferguson's The Pity of War is now in my pile, revisiting the Great War and how it was a mistake for Britain to get involved. How ironic that the war to end all war proved to be the springboard to a century of wars in every corner of the world. 

That whole period of history was startling when you see the emergence of Social Darwinism, the birth of the Eugenics movement and the arrogance of Western intellectuals. 

On a more positive side  I've recently been inspired by some new writers I've been introduced to including David Berlinski and Stephen C. Meyer. 

As we wind down into Memorial Day weekend, more than a few Northlanders wonder when summer will start to show its face. What are some things you're jazzed about right now? There's so much still to be discovered. Don't just drift. Get a PhD in Lifelong Learning.

Patterns, Fibonacci and Our Awesome Universe

While watching an episode of Rod Serling's Twilight Zone, "Night Call" (Episode 139 -- February 7, 1964) there is a scene where the old woman has been assisted into a wheelchair. The camera angle is from the viewpoint of an adult looking down to the woman. Across her lap is a knit afghan with a zigzag pattern similar to the kind my grandmother used to make, and for just a moment the camera lingers on the pattern.

One of the thoughts I had in that moment: what would an afghan look like if instead of being knit into a pattern, the colors and knitting were totally random? Isn't it the pattern or design that gives the afghan its interest?

In 2008 I wrote about color as a facet of making or appreciating art. Design and pattern could be added to the list of things which can make a drawing or painting interesting.

Nature is full of patterns, from atomic structure to the design of galaxies... from the incredible Fibonacci sequence to the rhythm of waves... from the phenomenon of day and night to the miracle of a heartbeat...

In the Renaissance, artists did not see beauty as accidental. They believed it could be discovered, studied, and deliberately constructed. Pattern—whether in proportion, repetition, or geometry—was one of their primary tools for doing so.

Figures like Leonardo da Vinci and Leon Battista Alberti were not only artists but thinkers who sought underlying order in the world. They were deeply influenced by classical ideas of harmony, especially the belief that mathematics revealed the structure of reality. This conviction shaped both painting and architecture.

One of the most intriguing patterns associated with Renaissance art is the Fibonacci sequence and its related “Golden Ratio.” While not always applied consciously in a strict numerical sense, its proportions—roughly 1:1.618—appear repeatedly in compositions. Painters arranged figures, horizons, and focal points along these invisible lines, creating balance that feels natural rather than forced. The eye is gently guided, not commanded.

In architecture, this pursuit of proportion becomes even more explicit. Alberti and others designed buildings where height, width, and spatial divisions followed harmonious ratios. The result is not merely structural integrity but a sense of calm coherence—spaces that feel “right” even if the observer cannot explain why.

What makes this especially compelling is that these patterns mirror those found in nature: the spiral of a shell, the arrangement of leaves, the unfolding of galaxies. Renaissance artists believed they were not imposing order but participating in it—echoing a design already embedded in creation.

In this sense, pattern is not decoration. It is revelation. It is the quiet framework beneath the visible surface, the hidden scaffolding that gives a work of art its unity and power. And once you begin to see it, it is hard to unsee—the world itself starts to look like a carefully composed canvas.

Elton Trueblood once suggested that if the world is the product of an Infinite Mind, its beauty should not surprise us. That idea becomes more than philosophical speculation when you begin to trace patterns—not just in art or music, but in mathematics itself.

Educator/mathematician James Nickel describes how for him this realization did not come through formal schooling, but almost by accident. While preparing to teach high school mathematics in the early 1980s, he began exploring resources that connected numbers to the real world—books on geometry in art, the growth patterns of nature, and the Fibonacci sequence. What struck him was not merely the elegance of the numbers, but their recurrence—in shells, architecture, spirals, and proportions that seemed to echo across creation.

What had been presented in school as isolated facts suddenly revealed itself as something cohesive, even luminous. Fibonacci—Leonardo of Pisa—was no longer just a historical figure attached to a number sequence, but a doorway into what Nickel called “an opulent beauty,” a harmony linking human creativity with the structure of the natural world, and ultimately pointing the Creator God of All, all nature declaring His glory.

Equally striking was what had been missed. Traditional math education, with its emphasis on deduction and abstraction, often stripped away this sense of wonder. Geometry became a system of proofs rather than a language describing reality. The “pattern” was still there, but the meaning had been muted.

And so the rediscovery of pattern becomes, in a sense, a recovery of vision—learning again to see what was always present.

Check out this interview with author/mathematician James Nickel on The Wonders of the Fibonacci Sequence.

James Nickel on Stanley Jaki and the Worldview Behind Science and Discovery

The Soil That Grew Science

We tend to think of the rise science as inevitable—as something that would have arisen anywhere, given enough time and curiosity. But what if that assumption is incorrect?

That question animates an essay by James Nickel, who revisits the work of physicis Stanley L. Jaki, historian of science, and Templeton Prize winner. Jaki’s claim is striking: modern science had only one true beginning—and it happened within a culture shaped by belief in a rational Creator.

“I was drawn to Jaki because he challenges things we take for granted,” Nickel told me. “He asks not just what science has achieved, but why it arose at all.”

Jaki argued that science depends on a set of underlying convictions: that the universe is orderly, that it operates according to consistent laws, and that the human mind is capable of understanding it. Those assumptions, he believed, were not universally held across civilizations.

Nickel is careful to clarify the point. “Jaki isn’t saying other cultures lacked intelligence or ingenuity,” he said. “But their efforts didn’t develop into a self-sustaining, ever-advancing enterprise in the way science did in the West.”

The difference, in Jaki’s view, comes down to worldview. If the universe is seen as cyclical or ultimately impersonal, the search for universal laws may never fully take hold. But if the world is the creation of a rational mind, then it invites investigation—and rewards it.

That raises an uncomfortable question for modern readers: Do scientists today still rely on those same assumptions, even if they no longer recognize their origins?

“You can’t do science without trusting that the universe is intelligible,” Nickel said. “The question is whether we understand where that trust comes from.”

Jaki also warned that certain philosophical trends—whether reducing knowledge to raw data or dissolving reality into perception—can quietly undermine science by weakening that trust. (I think here of Sowell's Is Reality Optional? and notions suggesting that reality is a projection of our minds and doesn't really exist.)

At the same time, science has limits. It deals in measurement and prediction, not meaning or purpose. Those questions, Jaki insisted, belong to philosophy and theology.

“When science becomes the dominant voice,” Nickel observed, “there’s a tendency to act as if those larger questions don’t matter.” 

Perhaps the deeper point is this: science did not emerge in a vacuum. It grew out of a particular way of seeing the world.

And if that is true, its future may depend on whether that vision still endures.

* * * * 

Check out my interview with James Nickel regarding the work of Stanley Jaki. Nickel's "Jaki Musings" is part of a series exploring  the the vistas and power of mathematics as seen through Biblical Christian eyes. Here is the series thus far:
Math Circle 1: Whither Mathematics Education in the 21st Century
Math Circle 2: Introduction: The One and the Many
Math Circle 2: Calculus, Meaning and Beyond
Math Circle 3: Quotable Quotes

Bonus Tracks by James D. Nickel
Science and Creation: A Rare Jewel of a Book
In Honor of Stanley L. Jaki (1924-2009)

A Dozen Quotes to Mull Over on a Dreary Day

The weather outside is dreary and grey. As for me, I draw my strength from the weather within. Right now it's blue skies and, yes, here comes the sun.

When I lived in Mexico I bought a notebook in which I began recording quotes from my readings. It was nice having them all in one place, like a personally curated Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, which every serious writer was encouraged to acquire before the Internet em
erged.

Wikiquote is a website that arranges quotes by both author and by theme. If you are a writer and unfamiliar with it, I believe you'd find it worth your while to explore. 

The quotes on this page are arranged neither by author nor by theme. Their common denominator is that I found them interesting because they give you something to ponder and mull over. It's a bite-sized list to be savored slowly, not gobbled up in a rush to get on with your day.

Recently I discovered an extremely interesting page of quotes about Mathematics that you might want to explore. Harvested and assembled by mathematician James Nickel it's titled Quotable Quotes in Mathematics. James is a longtime friend, and an author of numerous books pertaining to math from a Biblical Christian worldview perspective. This past week I interviewed him about his 30-page collection of math quotes. You can read the interview here.

Without further ado, here my dozen quotes to mull over. Read them all, pick one and roll it around in your mind till it yields fruit.

"Don't you ever wonder sometimes what might have happened if you tried?”

—Kazuo Ishiguro 

“The greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.” 

—Steve Jobs

“In science, there is only physics; all the rest is stamp collecting.”
--Lord Kelvin

“Don't pay any attention to the critics—don't even ignore them.” 
—Samuel Goldwyn

“More law, less justice.” 
— Marcus Tullius Cicero

"Quality is remembered long after price is forgotten."
—Aldo Gucci

"Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these, 'It might have been."
—John Greenleaf Whittier

"We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them."

—Albert Einstein

"A man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest."

—Paul Simon

"Behaviorism is a flat earth view of the mind."

—Marvin Minsky

"Love all, trust a few. Do wrong to none."

—William Shakespeare

"I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else."

—C.S. Lewis

Let the sunshine in!

Mathematics Isn't Just for Math Nuts: An Introduction to James Duane Nickel

James Duane Nickel is an American educator, author, and mathematician who integrates Christian perspectives into mathematics education. Holding a BA in Mathematics, BTh, BMiss, and MA in Education, he serves as a Senior Fellow at the Center for Cultural Leadership. He is best known for his book Mathematics: Is God Silent? (revised edition), which argues for a biblical foundation in math, and the curriculum series The Dance of Number.

Why Study Mathematics? It Is the Language of Creation
https://theimaginativeconservative.org/2013/08/mathematics-is-god-silent.html

Let's Talk Algebra: Ten Minutes with James D Nickel

https://pioneerproductions.blogspot.com/2012/02/math-guy-talks-about-algebra-interview.html

Book Review – Mathematics: Is God Silent?

https://www.kuyperian.com/p/book-review-mathematics-is-god-silent

Interview with the Author of Mathematics: Is God Silent?

https://pioneerproductions.blogspot.com/2009/08/interview-with-author-of-mathematics-is.html

Interview with James D. Nickel on Mathematics: Is God Silent? (Part 2)

https://pioneerproductions.blogspot.com/2009/08/interview-with-author-of-mathematics-is_27.html

Book Review: Mathematics – Is God Silent? (James Nickel)

https://relentlesspursuit.wordpress.com/2009/01/18/book-review-mathematics-is-god-silent-james-nickel/

Why James Nickel wrote "Mathematics: Is God Silent?"

https://biblicalchristianworldview.net/documents/whymathematicsisgodsilent.pdf

What others are saying about "Mathematics: Is God Silent?"

https://godandmath.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/review-of-mathematics-is-god-silent.pdf

"Every Christian teacher of mathematics should read this book."—Gene B. Chase

I would be remiss not to mention that James has been a long-time friend as well as a source of inspiration. At his Biblical Christian Worldview website you can see for yourself his dedication to the pursuit of God, love of mathematics and passion for educating future generations regarding the wonder and beauty of mathematics.