It’s not surprising that a world of sound and fury would produce a widespread sense that none of it signifies. Nor is it surprising that in such a world, devoted to spectacle and stripped of purpose, every institution has a “mission statement.” On paper, the idea of a mission statement makes sense, in the sense…

Americans waste food on a grand scale. Though figures are appalling–30-40% of our food supply gets wasted, by USDA estimates, about 60 million tons a year, worth over $200 billion – big numbers fail to change behavior. First-year students in a seminar I teach on the history of American diet trends are reliably conscientious about…

Anniversaries matter. If you’re a cancer survivor, each year of remission offers a fresh lease on life. If you’re married, every annual commemoration of your wedding is an opportunity to recommit to your vows. Your work anniversary may include a bonus or raise. The anniversary of a loved one’s death summons both grief and remembrance.…

In his work Wayfaring: A Christian Approach to Mental Health Care, Warren Kinghorn explores a non-­mechanistic approach to the understanding and treatment of mental illness, framing this view within a Thomistic accountKinghorn draws from a range of primary source documents from Thomas Aquinas, including the Summa Theologiae, his commentary on the Gospel of John, and…

The most important activity that helped refine my view of character education was not taking classes on epistemology and ethics from Dallas Willard. Nor was it taking all my other Ph.D. classes that addressed virtue or moral development. It was coaching youth league sports. Granted, readings in philosophy, ethics, and theology led me to recognize…

Recently, there’s been even more press than usual about AI proliferation and its associated risks. The hype has been driven, in part, by the now infamous Ross Douthat interview with Daniel Kokotajlo, executive director of the A.I. Futures Project, in which Kokotajlo suggests that AI could take over civilization—and “then kill all the humans”—by 2027.…

As a professor who researches the role of artificial intelligence in education, I’ve spent the past few years asking hard questions about how AI will shape teaching and learning. Will students learn less if they rely too heavily on generative tools like ChatGPT or Claude? How do we maintain academic integrity without becoming surveillance officers…

Not all value can be measured in dollars. Consider a cautionary tale shared by Harvard philosopher Michael Sandel. While he was studying as an Oxford Rhodes Scholar in the 1970s, one of the all-women’s colleges, St. Anne’s, became tangled in a debate over evolving sexual mores. Resident halls for men and women had traditionally been…

In 1526, William Tyndale’s ground-breaking translation of the English New Testament appeared. In this translation, Tyndale used a unique phrase that was not in John Wycliffe’s original English translation. Instead of translating a key passage from Paul’s sermon to the Athenians in Wycliffe’s original way, “ made of one all the kind of men” (Acts…

I’d like to propose a thought experiment -- one that may transform your understanding of something you see every day. Thought experiments can change the world, or at least your understanding of it. Einstein’s great scientific breakthroughs started with a thought experiment, something like this one. For our experiment, imagine how a mirror works. If…