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New Bishop for Southern Virginia: Herman Hollerith October 1, 2008 in technology, theology | Tags: episcopal church, herman hollerith, bishops | No comments The Episcopal Diocese of Southern Virginia has elected the Rev. Herman “Holly” Hollerith IV as their next bishop. Episcopal Life carries the story. From his bio, he sounds like a guy I would like: Hollerith holds a bachelor of science degree from Denison University and a master of divinity degree from Yale Divinity School. In his leisure time, he enjoys “building things,” especially boats, and is a devotee of maritime archeology with a special interest in early marine steam technology. He is married to Elizabeth Salmons and they have three children. The news index at Anglicans Online asserts that he is the direct descendant of Herman Hollerith (1860-1929), the German-American who invented machines that calculate using punched cards. In many computer quarters, punched cards were long called Hollerith cards in his honor. For the exceptionally geeky, one author has described Hollerith’s method over against various IBM and UNIVAC methods. I always suspected that technology and theology had deep and intimate connections! Who would guess that Hollerith I’s method used to compute the 1890 census would be so intimately tied to the method used to calculate Hollerith IV’s episcopal election?
I don’t see the resemblance. Do you? September 25, 2008 in technology, theology | Tags: mdg, millennium development goals | 1 comment Today is the day to blog about the Millennium Development Goals. For those unfamiliar with the Goals, they are the United Nations’ commitment to end poverty, begun in the year 2000. Their eight goals are Each of these goals is broken down into quantifiable steps with descriptive indicators. The entire program is very concrete, but depends on local actions. As a priest of the Episcopal Diocese of New Hampshire, I’m happy that we have committed to supporting the MDGs at several levels. As a diocese, we have committed funding to KWIHEED and Masiphumelele Corporation. At Grace Episcopal Church, we support the Rest for the Nations Church, a congregation of Rwandan refugees in Concord, NH. Further, we support their families back in Rwanda and sell traditional baskets to develop employment opportunites in Africa. Personally, I have gotten involved with Hackers for Charity, which I have written about before. They have recently opened a new computer lab for AOET. Through their school, children are offered primary education (goal 2) and given opportunity for employment after school (one computer-related job in Uganda can feed five families, goal 1). By keeping the children in full-time school, mothers can gain job skills and even form their own companies (goal 3). If I stretch, Hackers for Charity can cover almost all of the MDGs. It’s an easy and fun way to be involved in transforming the world! Powered By Ringsurf September 24, 2008 in technology, theology | Tags: stopsoftwarepatents | 1 comment The Patent Problem Today is the World Day to Stop Software Patents. Software truth about enzyte patents attempt to offer protection to a company for particular computer programs. One common example is the Amazon One-Click Shopping Patent. Amazon attempted to patent their one-click shopping method. Doing so makes any other online store using one-click shopping a patent violator and in danger of legal action. These patents typically protect large corporations who patent what are usually common, well-known programs (e.g., clicking to purchase books). The patents are often used offensively to bring legal action against smaller companies also using these methods, thereby pushing them out of the market. Generally, these patents limit innovation by providing this chilling effect on small companies that would be unable to defend themselves against such legal action. Thankfully, the US Patent Office overturned Amazon’s request for the one-click patent, but many other examples still pose problems for computer programmers. Groups like the Free Software Foundation (FSF) have been working against software patents. They have filed amicus briefs in court cases and have been pro-active in developing software free of patents. In doing so they further the freedoms that they outlined in this article: Patenting software inhibits all of these freedoms. As a result the aims of free software encourage basic moral precepts like the love and help of neighbor and improving the world around you for its own sake. The Christian concept of liturgy isn’t too different from a computer program. Both are prescribed and carefully designed. Both offer an abstract method that is given life in its praying/running. Both promise concrete changes in finite time. Both have parts that are variable and parts that are unchanging. The Episcopal Church’s Book of Common Prayer is free from copyright and patent. As a result, all of the four freedoms above apply. Anyone can access its contents and use it. Anyone can study it openly, without permission. Anyone can duplicate copies–this is frequently done in making worship booklets. Importantly, anyone can alter it and re-publish their changes. The Episcopal Church did this with its revisions in 1789, 1892, 1928 and 1979. WIthout the ability to do this, they would not have been able to adapt the 1662 prayer book to their situation in a free America. Independent of the British Crown, the first Episcopalians needed to remove prayers for the monarch and oaths to the king and replace them. The Roman Catholic Church has adapted the current Book of Common Prayer for their own use as the Book of Divine Worship. A parish in Rosemont, PA has adapted it as the Anglican Service Book. The Anglican Mission in the Americas has used sections of it in developing their own prayer book. All of these “forks” were made possible because there is no patent, no copyright on the existing BCP–it is simple free for use. Having litrugy and religious texts free of patent and copyright is a Christian principle that is widely regarded as offering more opportunity for prayer, for evangelism and for churches that take their surrounding culture seriously. The same principles hold when it comes to software: sharing, studying and adapting software is an act of love of neighbor. Having software patents acts against basic Christian witness. September 3, 2008 in technology, theology | Tags: methodism, privacy | No comments Bruce Schneier points out this piece from the BBC, “The secret code of diaries.” With the recent attention to Charles Wesley’s 18th-century diary, they’ve described several others of historical note. Read the whole article, but here’s the digest version: September 2, 2008 in Uncategorized | Tags: journal, spiritual discipline, methodism, cryptography | 2 comments A follow-up to this post: Early Methodism depended on making journals as a spiritual discipline. One would write about spiritual highs and lows, joys and concerns, struggles and sins. It’s a method that works well in therapeutic psychology: journal your life and look for patterns of problematic behavior. Within Wesley’s method, the holy clubs shared their journals with each other. By handing over a journal to a trusted club member, you could get a viewpoint outside yourself as well as an accountability that depends on having trusted peers. This method has parallel to contemporary fitness schemes: write down everything you eat, write down every exercise you do and hand that journal over to a trainer, coach or partner for the sake of the accountability. Unlike weight loss journals, spiritual journals contain exceptionally personal and private information. As was recently shown in Charles Wesley’s journal, the early Methodists often write in code to keep personal spiritual struggles private, as they should be. Each club member seems to have known the key to decrypting other journals so that members and only members could read them and offer counsel and advice to one another. This informative LiveJournal entry has a good summary of the Methodist method, with information about the encrypted journals: |