Weekly Meanderings, 31 October 2015

Last updated on: October 31, 2015 at 12:02 am by Scot McKnight

Weekly Meanderings, 31 October 2015 2015-10-29T18:54:34-05:00 Scot McKnight

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What a beautiful story about the “grandma in the window.”

Depression relieved by gardening:

Antidepressant microbes in soil cause cytokine levels to rise, which results in the production of higher levels of serotonin. The bacterium was tested both by injection and ingestion on rats and the results were increased cognitive ability, lower stress and better concentration to tasks than a control group.

Gardeners inhale the bacteria, have topical contact with it and get it into their bloodstreams when there is a cut or other pathway for infection. The natural effects of the soil bacteria antidepressant can be felt for up to 3 weeks if the experiments with rats are any indication. So get out and play in the dirt and improve your mood and your life.

Ben Myers reduces each volume of Barth’s Dogmatics to a tweet:

Karl Barth’s Church Dogmatics

I/1: Before I ever thought of God, before I opened my mouth to speak, God is, God speaks, and what God says is “God!”

I/2: God’s mighty Word is humbly hidden in the human flesh of Jesus, the human words of scripture, and the boredom of the Sunday sermon.

II/1: God’s friendly Word is unconditioned by anything in us. That’s why God is better than anyone, because God is free to love everyone.

II/2: Why is God so good at freely loving us? Because God had so much practice before we ever existed.

III/1: We were summoned into being by God’s freely loving Word. From that day on, God has spared no expense in trying to befriend us.

III/2: Our nature fits God like a glove: God wore it first then let us try it on, and Jesus shows us how to wear it right.

III/3: God’s freely loving Word holds the world in being and keeps at bay the dreadful power of nonbeing. (P.S. There are angels.)

III/4: How good it is to be a creature! To be freely ourselves, never more or less, within the constraints that God has lovingly set for us.

IV/1: When I saw how Jesus used his deity to become small and humble for my sake, it took my breath away (and then my pride).

IV/2: When I saw Jesus triumphant in his humanity, it roused me from a deadly boredom: I became freely and fully human, almost a god.

IV/3: The human messenger is the divine Message: Jesus, the living truth that unmasks my self-deception and makes me a disciple of truth.

IV/4: So cheer up! God’s faithfulness frees us for faith. God’s loving address frees us to answer. God’s gift frees us for gratitude.

V: And the rest, my friends, is Mozart.

Kris and I loved our two times in Denmark and would go again, but Bernie Sanders needs to fill in the details, which this person living there does:

Presidential Candidate Bernie Sanders’ comments that the US should be like Denmark has gathered media attention including anarticle by Paul Krugman. This Presidential hopeful eager to win the election describes a Danish utopia with “free” education and health care and that the US would just do it like Denmark.

As an American who has lived in Denmark for the last 5 years, worked in Danish companies, attended Danish universities, and had 2 children in the country, I’d like to shed some light. There are many things the US can learn from Denmark and appreciate about the vital political and economic cooperation between our countries that dates from 1783, as well as the fact that the US has been enriched by many Danish immigrants. But, here are 10 reality checks for the senator from Vermont and the Nobel economist about the so-called Nordic utopia.

Our school kids are standing more:

“When I get into school, I like to stand up but after recess I like to sit down, rest my legs,” one student told NBC News’ Joe Fryer.

New standing desks being tested out in schools around the country are showing benefits in class and with test scores. At Alexandria Country Day School in Virginia, for example, they’re the new normal for 5th through 8th graders.

“The research is very clear that standing is far healthier than sitting, and we wanted to do something bold,” said school head Scott Baytosh.

Researcher James Levine (who created the first treadmill desk) says it’s important to have students move around during a school day, and it improves not just bodies but brains: Test scores are showing 10 to 15 percent jumps in schools with standing desks as an option.

“The data consistently demonstrate that when children are allowed to move during their school day, they learn better,” said Levine.

Newser:

NEWSER – The key to a happy and lasting marriage might be as simple as regularly expressing gratitude. So report researchers from the University of Georgiain a new study published in the journal Personal Relationships.

After interviewing 468 married individuals on relationship satisfaction, covering everything from communication habits to finances, they found that the “most consistent significant predictor” of happy marriages was whether one’s spouse expressed gratitude. “Feeling appreciated and believing that your spouse values you directly influences how you feel about your marriage, how committed you are to it, and your belief that it will last,” says study co-author Ted Futris.

Lyndsey Layton:

The number of standardized tests U.S. public school students take has exploded in the past decade, with most schools requiring too many tests of dubious value, according to the first comprehensive survey of the nation’s largest districts.

A typical student takes 112 mandated standardized tests between pre-kindergarten classes and 12th grade, a new Council of the Great City Schools study found. By contrast, most countries that outperform the United States on international exams test students three times during their school careers.

In a video posted to Facebook by the White House on Saturday, President Obama pledged to take steps to reduce testing overload.

Tara Bahrampour:

Retiring at 55 and spending the rest of your life relaxing on the front porch may sound appealing, but if you want your brain to keep working, it’s probably not a good idea. Mounting evidence shows that staying in the workforce into old age is good not only for our bank accounts, but also for our health and mental acuity.

That’s great news for Americans, who keep working further into old age on average than Europeans, and who will be retiring even later than previously, thanks to changes built in to Social Security benefits.

As medical advances extend the length of the human lifespan — and the number of healthy, active years — scientists, economists and policymakers are delving into the question of what the optimial time to stop working is.

One message is becoming clear: don’t stop too soon.

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