Winter beach sand

To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour.”

William Blake

I took this picture during a beach walk last week for the claw–I’ve been fascinated by the feistiness, the vivid colors, and the tastiness of blue crabs since I was little. The more I know about them the harder they are to eat.

And now, looking at the photograph, I marvel at the sand. Pieces of rock, thousand to millions to billions of years old , broken into tiny pieces, mixed with mortal shells, a mishmash of shapes and colors.

The edge of the bay tells stories of time, of mortality, of the unimaginable power of eons of time and tides. Each particle has a history and will continue to be long after the me of me is long gone.

A manchild brought in his VR Oculus headset to class right before the break. He danced around the back of the classroom firing missiles at targets as real to him as the sun itself.

And the sound of the sand rolling under the waves will never be heard.

Nagasaki

On August 9, 1945, just over 2 1/2 pounds of plutonium was converted to energy 1650 feet over Nagasaki.

Two and a half pounds–about the weight of a 28 week premature newborn baby.

Yosuke Yamahata, A Japanese army photographer, took this picture the day after the Fat Man fell over Nagasaki.

More of Mr. Yamahata’s photography can be seen here.

広島市

Sixteen hours ago an American airplane dropped one bomb on Hiroshima, an important Japanese army base. … It is an atomic bomb. It is a harnessing of the basic power of the universe. . . . What has been done is the greatest achievement of organized science in history.

Harry S. Truman

It happened on this date, this “greatest achievement.”

New technology used to “solve” an old problem. We cannot help ourselves.

Wes Jackson, founder of the Land Institute, suggested “we ought to stay out of the nuclei.” Until we have a clue what we want, sounds like good advice.

You cannot separate tools from the critters who use them. Teaching science as some compartmentalized thought process without cultural context is a dangerous game.

What is our responsibility as teachers of science?
As citizens of the United States?
As human beings

We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried, most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad-Gita. Vishnu is trying to persuade the Prince that he should do his duty and to impress him takes on his multi-armed form and says, ‘Now, I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.’ I suppose we all thought that one way or another.

-J. Robert Oppenheimer

And now I teach science to (very) young adults. I have a responsibility to them, to the state, to myself.

Harry S. Truman called the bombing of Hiroshima “the greatest achievement of organized science.” If that does not give you pause, you should not be teaching science.

You should not be teaching anything at all.