Claritas: Power, Spring 2020

CLARITAS A JOURNAL OF CHRISTIAN THOUGHT

POWER

FEATURING: OWNING UP IS THE SKY THE LIMIT? BLESSED ARE LES MISERABLES

FALL 2019 ISSUE 9

C L A R I TA S

is the Latin word for

“clarity,” “vividness,” or “renown.” For us, Claritas represents a life-giving truth that can only be found through God.

WHO ARE WE? The Cornell Claritas is a Christian thought journal that reviews ideas and cultural commentary. Launched in the spring semester of 2015, it is written and produced by students attending Cornell University.

The Cornell Claritas is ecumenical, drawing writers and editors from all denominations around a common creedal vision. Its vision is to articulate and connect the truth of Christ to every person and every study, and it strives to begin conversations that

Cornell Claritas Fall 2019

involve faith, reason, and vocation.

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IS THE SKY THE LIMIT? Approaching Perfection in an Imperfect World Carley Eschliman

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INCREDIBLE POWER, INCREDIBLE RESPONSIBILITY The Incredibles and the Power of the Gospel Seth Bollinger

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TWISTED COMMUNION Brooke Lindsey

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SALVATION BY CREATION? An Interview with Dr. Nathan Matias on Artificial Intelligence Zachary Lee

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OWNING UP The Other Half of Reconciliation Joseph Reigle

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THE BATTLE OVER ME Olivia Simoni

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BLESSED ARE LES MISERABLES Victor Hugo and the Upside-Down Miracle of Power Amy Crouch

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NAMES OF POWER Charles Nystrom

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WHY BEAUTY? Seeking the Power Behind the Panorama Abigail Bezrutczyk

DUMBSTRUCK John Nystrom Cornell Claritas Fall 2019

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CLARITAS STAFF Advisory Board: Nicole Riley Special Thanks to the Chesterton House

Contributors: John Nystrom DVM ‘22 Charles Nystrom DVM ‘22 Zachary Lee ‘20 Olivia Simoni ‘21 Seth Bollinger ‘22

Photography: Grace Choi ‘22 Carley Eschliman ‘20

Web Designers: Clara Song ‘21 Matthew Suh ‘21

Editorial Board Production Board

Abigail Bezrutczyk ‘20 Editor-in-Chief Amy Crouch ‘22 Production Manager

Ashley Kim ‘21 Business Manager Carley Eschliman ‘20 Blog Editor

Design Board

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Joseph Reigle ‘19 Design Manager

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Brooke Lindsey ‘21 Managing Editor

Paola MéndezGarcía ‘21 Assistant Blog Editor

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR Sitting in lecture, standing in church, and in moments where my attention should be on the speaker, my attention instead drifts to my checklist. The list has become an essential part of my life as a Cornell student, populated with endless ritual tasks like “Tuesday problem set,” but also, “schedule meeting,” “buy bread,” “laundry,” “eat dinner,” and my personal favorite, “relax.”

Working with the list is a marathon, and it’s all on me to cross the ever-moving finish line. I’m independent—that means I should be able to do everything on my own. But as the list lengthens and time dwindles, my tasks start to feel insurmountable. Mary Oliver has her own phrasing for this phenomenon: “With growth into adulthood, responsibilities claimed me, so many heavy coats. I didn’t choose them, I don’t fault them, but it took time to reject them.”1 I’ve found that despite my expectation of independence, the coats weigh me down; I can’t do everything by myself. And I’ve realized that, under these heavy coats, I am weak.

This idea of doing it all on my own is also impractical. Had I tried as Editor-in-Chief to create this issue on my own, I surely would have failed. Claritas is a team of students who have sacrificed their time to come together, write, create, design, and construct a semesterly publication. Instead of through sheer independence, it is through collaborative effort—leaning on, learning from, and loving others—that this journal’s creation is possible. The result? Something we’re all proud of.

The realization of weakness is just one way that power intersects with every area of our lives. In this Claritas issue, our writers explore power within a variety of realms: technology, novels, apologies, beauty, weather prediction, superpowers, and more. While diverse in their approach to our semester’s topic, these vantage points are bound by a common thread, one that we all know all too well: our human power isn’t all we want it to be.

But it doesn’t end there. This journal is also rooted in the belief in a higher power: the God of the Christian faith. In contrast to our weaknesses and inability to do it all on our own, we believe that this God is omnipotent, or all-powerful. And not only that– He is lovingly concerned with our lives. He takes our heavy coats upon Himself, He strengthens the person we are underneath, and He relinquishes His power out of love for the weak.

Throughout this journey, perhaps we can be reminded that nothing we’ve ever accomplished has been solely from our power– a realization both humbling and comforting. This also means that everything we hope to accomplish is not solely on our shoulders. We have people to lean on, teachers to teach us, partners to work with– but also a God who created all things, who is in all things, who has a plan, who takes our coats.

Sincerely, Abigail Bezrutczyk Editor-in-Chief

1. Oliver, M. (2016). Upstream: Selected Essays. New York: Penguin Press. 7.

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As we confront the uses, abuses, and limitations of powers big and small in this issue, I invite you to think about the role of power in your life by bringing your honest self to the room. How do you use power? How do you confront your weaknesses? Leave your winter clothes at the door; you are welcome here.

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IS THE SKY THE LIMIT? approaching perfection in an imperfect world

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BY CARLEY ESCHLIMAN

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lthough your morning forecast did not call for rain, one look outside the window provides evidence to the contrary. Thick sheets of water pour down, tracks of droplets obscure the glass, and, to make matters worse, you left your umbrella at home.

We’ve all found ourselves in this situation: underprepared, rain-soaked, dashing through the deluge, and desperately wishing that meteorologists would get their acts together.

Honestly, just how hard can it be to predict the weather?

Simply put, the weather is difficult to predict because the future is far from predictable. While meteorological forecasts are based upon rigorous computations and statistical methods, these equations and their outputs can only get so close to complete accuracy. At their best, these models should be thought of as extremely educated guesses, not truths about the future.

There are two main difficulties facing weather prediction accuracy: the spatial resolution of the prediction model (i.e., how close together predictive calculations are being made on a map, be it a couple of kilometers or a hundred) and the quality of the model’s initial conditions.

Minute changes to initial conditions— such as the shifting of a storm system a few miles or an incorrect measure of wind speeds—can lead to drastic changes. If the true nature of the atmosphere— both spatially and quantitatively—isn’t fully reflected in these models’ calculations, the resulting errors only magnify as the forecast model predicts further into the future. This process, known as “the butterfly effect,” was coined by famed mathematician and meteorologist Edward Lorenz in the late 1960s.1 His work in early atmospheric modeling allowed him to lay the foundations for chaos theory, a theory that formally captures the futility of predicting the future. When applied in meteorological contexts, this theory suggests that weather prediction accuracy is capped at around two weeks due to the natural chaos of the universe.

of Lorenz’s theory, meteorology has made tremendous progress. Now, equipped with more computing power, more accurate measurements, and more observations, weather models operate at incredible short-term accuracy. Today’s models are making millions of calculations, accounting for changes in topography and land cover, and incorporating global data.

One model, in particular, the Global Forecast System (GFS), has recently undergone intensive changes. Although the GFS set industry standards at its inception in 1980, the model has recently been under fire from the meteorological community for its inaccuracy.2 Its most devastating blunder occurred in 2015 when GFS failed to predict the path of Hurricane Sandy until four days before landfall. According to the GFS model outputs, Hurricane Sandy was predicted to turn eastward, out into the Atlantic, missing the major population centers on the east coast of the United States.3 This prediction from the GFS gave emergency managers a false sense of security, leading them to be less proactive in their disaster planning. However, to make matters worse, not only was the GFS inaccurate, but other weather models (such as the European

Honestly, just how hard can it be to predict the weather?

1. Dennis L. Hartmann, Global Physical Climatology, Second edition. (Amsterdam: Elsevier, 2016), 233.

However, despite the victories seen in the GFS and models worldwide in prediction accuracy, models are still most accurate in the short-term. Meteorologists today continue to stand by Lorenz’s limit and are doubtful that 2. “Global Forecast System,” accessed June 19, 2019, https://nomads.ncep.noaa.gov/txt_descriptions/GFS_doc.shtml.

3. Henry Fountain, “A Software Upgrade (After 40 Years) Aims to Improve U.S. Weather Forecasts,” The New York Times, June 12, 2019, sec. Climate, https://www.nytimes. com/2019/06/12/climate/noaa-weather-forecast-gfs.html.

4. Fountain.

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In the fifty-plus years since the publication

Model) correctly predicted the storm’s path much earlier.4 In response to this particular error (as well as a history of lower-than-average accuracy), the largest changes to the GFS in the model’s history were implemented in June of 2019. Now, new methods have brought new life to a model that was previously pushed aside.

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accuracy could ever exceed two weeks.5 Given this cumbersome limitation to weather model prediction accuracy, one question arises: Why do we bother to improve forecasts at all?

As demonstrated by the improvement of the GFS model, increasing weather model accuracy not only advances the field of meteorology, but it also has the capability to change lives! With increased model reliability, residents in storm paths can have greater lead-time to seek shelter, farmers can better protect their crops from hail, city governments can receive earlier notices for extreme heat and create cooling centers, airlines can cancel flights with more confidence…and the list goes on. Just as all are affected by the weather, all are also affected by more accurate weather models—even if the models are never going to be perfect.

Atmospheric models’ approach of perfection is paralleled in our daily lives as we work on self-improvement. While weather forecasts and humans become “better” through different means, both types of improvements fundamentally rely on power. In the case of forecasts, computational power; in the case of self-help, personal willpower. And, also like weather models, self-improvement seems to be “capped” at some limit; despite millennia of

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5.“Here’s Why Predicting the Weather Is Still So Difficult,” Observer (blog), March 7, 2018, https://observer. com/2018/03/ weather-forecast-predictions-stilldifficult/.

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striving towards being better, human beings are still far from perfect. Why is this?

The teachings of Christianity offer an answer to why perfection continues to be evasive. In the Christian tradition, human existence is marred by the Fall—the choice of first Eve and then Adam to rebel against God by eating the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

All elements of earthly existence bear witness to and perpetuate the Fall. In short, life is not as it should be. Christians believe that while we were created to live in relationship with God, the evil that was allowed to enter into the world through the Fall prevents us from living in perfect community with the Lord and others. As people who bear the mark of the Fall, sin limits our personal journeys towards perfection, just as chaos theory limits weather models’ quest for perfection.

Yet, despite this acknowledged limit on perfection, Jesus, as recorded in the Gospel of Matthew, commands the people of God to “be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”6 At first glance, this directive seems to be an unreasonable goal, a command contrary to the existence of sin. However, while our humanness and sinful nature may prevent us from being perfect, there was someone who was able to fulfill this command. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, became fully man and yet lived perfectly. Through Jesus’ sacrificial death, He made a way for us—as broken as we are—to have the burden of perfection lifted from us.

Christ’s death after a perfect life was what was necessary to atone for every human failing, and only through a relationship with God can we then access Christ’s perfection and approach God as righteous.

Given that Christ makes us perfect in the eyes of God, it may seem as if the work of selfimprovement is finished, and those self-help books can stay uncracked and dusty on the shelf. But, don’t get too comfortable—there’s still work to do. By allowing Christ’s sacrifice to atone for our sins, we are partaking in personal restoration. However, the Fall, the sin on earth, means that bad things affect more than just our person; sin changes everything, from our legal systems to our business practices...even our weather models.

In the Christian tradition, being a follower of God means becoming an active force in 6. Matthew 5:48 (NIV).

In short, God—and His unlimited power—works through us as we work towards both personal & collective perfection.

Through our mini-restorative acts, we are able to improve the lives of the people around us and care rightly for the material world. These acts, such as naming and addressing injustice, rectifying systems of environmental abuse, and dealing fairly with others, bring the world closer to a perfect place to live. Even if these changes do not provide the full picture of the restored Earth, the tiny steps towards more virtuous lives can be as impactful on humankind as a newly improved—but not yet perfect—weather model.

While there are many parallels between the personal and the meteorological pursuit of perfection, it is crucial to highlight the differences. Meteorologists consult peerreviewed research (human knowledge) and rely on computing power (human strength) to provide model upgrades, while Christians pursue “life upgrades” with knowledge and strength given

by God. In fact, in the book of Psalms, we are called to “cease striving” and acknowledge God’s ability to bring about growth in our lives.7 In short, God—and His unlimited power—works through us as we work towards both personal and collective perfection. The Apostle Paul talks 7. Psalm 46:10 (NIV).

about this access to God’s power, saying that he “struggl[es] with all his [God’s] energy that he [God] powerfully works within me” as he works to evangelize to the Ancient Near East.8 Given that it is God who supplies our power, the Bible states that we can “do all things through him [God] who strengthens [us].”9 While sin may limit our ability to be perfect on our own strength, God’s ability to work through us allows us to achieve incredible things.

As we find ourselves facing a less than perfect world, it’s often daunting to think of all the ways in which we—and the people around us—can be better. In the face of this, the Christian tradition provides a helpful option for approaching a more perfect world. Instead of relying on the flawed judgment and limited power of humans, Christianity offers a relationship with Christ, a loving God who freely shares His knowledge and power. This power equips us for personal and universal restoration, and that changes everything from our interactions with others to our atmospheric models.

8. Colossians 1:29 (NIV).

9. Philippians 4:13 (ESV).

Carley Eschliman is a senior studying both Atmospheric Science and Communication. Her majors guide her love of beautiful sunsets and intelligently designed infographics. You can find her most days in Bradfield, arguably the most beautiful campus building.

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His mission of making things perfect again, or Restoration. The Christian Bible follows a metanarrative arc: Creation (God creating all things), Fall (sin affecting all things), Redemption (Christ atoning for all things), and Restoration (God making all things new and right again).

While humankind is promised Restoration in the Bible, we have not yet experienced it. In the meantime, Christians have been commanded to be mini-restorers, doing what we can during our lives to bring about glimpses of the goodness of the fully restored, perfect universe.

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INCREDIBLE POW INCREDIBLE RES The Incredibles and the Power of the Gospel

by Seth Bollinger

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ooking through the tiny eye-holes in my black cardboard mask, I remember sitting mesmerized in front of my family’s small television watching my brand new copy of The Incredibles on Christmas morning. Ever since I saw the movie trailer a few months earlier, I had a newfound obsession of dressing up in a red t-shirt, an Incredibles symbol taped to the front, running around the house with my sister, and pretending to be a family of superheroes.

It’s a common childhood fantasy; the ability to have god-like powers gives us a higher purpose and a feeling of power that we can’t achieve in the real world. It sure did for me.

Feelings of insecurity? Gone. The threat of incompetence? Didn’t matter. When I was a superhero, I had no worries. I was able to do momentous good—such as saving the city or stopping robberies—using my hidden powers of super-strength, super-speed, or whatever other super ability I felt like having that day.

I remember how the power of a superhero invigorated me in my quest of stopping evil.

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Through the eyes of a child, The Incredibles posed a fantastic picture of the struggle of good and evil. Syndrome, the antagonist, is hell-bent

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on the destruction of the town of Metroville, and the Parr family is determined to stop him.

While it obviously portrays this tension, The Incredibles is more nuanced than this, offering a deeper portrait into the personal struggles of the heroes. Viewing the film from a more mature perspective now, it is clear that the character’s personal dilemmas are influenced by the world that they inhabit.

Metroville, the retro-futuristic setting of the film, has laws in place to outlaw superheroes.

Because of past events, where heroes were sued for helping those who didn’t want to be saved, the occupation of “superhero” is illegal; those with powers must stay hidden behind secret identities. To be super is to be an outcast, a stranger in a familiar land, with internal power that one possesses but is unable to use. The main struggle in the film is not primarily between good and evil, but within the family’s decision between whether to use their powers in public or to stay hidden in the culture that disregards their powers. Faced with this struggle, the Parr family chooses to strike a balance, using their powers to help others in times of need while still hiding their true identities in the background.

They mesh with society as quiet influencers who act without drawing attention to themselves. It is this concept of “quiet influencers” that may

ER, PONSIBILITY actually contain the most power.

American militia which he talked to.

In reality, there have been several “quiet influencers” throughout history, and not all of them have worn spandex. Malcolm Gladwell, a renowned journalist at The New Yorker, makes the case for “The Law of the Few” in his book The Tipping Point, in which social epidemics— such as fashion trends or the decline in crime in New York City—are “heavily dependent on the involvement of people with a particular and rare set of gifts.”1 These types of people, Gladwell suggests, have immense power; through its use, they are able to catalyze great change… even right under our noses.

How can this be? Gladwell says that the difference must be in the personalities of the two men. Revere, he suspects, is a prime example of a connector––somebody who knows a lot of people. Records from Revere’s life show he was involved in dozens of organizations, and a local newspaper reported that his funeral was attended by “troops of people.”2 Rather than using a large display of public power, it was the hidden power of Revere that ended up aiding America during the Revolutionary War. While Revere’s ride was nothing special, he possessed the hidden power of connection that influenced the word-of-mouth epidemic on the night of the British invasion. Longfellow would eventually describe Revere’s message as “a word that shall echo forevermore!”3

1. Malcom Gladwell, The Tipping Point: How little things can make a big difference. (Boston: Little, Brown, 2000), 33.

The difference between a public display of power and the use of hidden power is found in its purpose. Public power can be defined as any type of position where one has influence over 2. Gladwell, 56.

3. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Paul Revere’s Ride. (United States: Houghton Mifflin, 1907), 43.

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Take the ride of Paul Revere, for example.

Gladwell analyzes how on April 18th, 1775, the night of Revere’s historic ride, another rider by the name of William Dawes was tasked with the same role as Revere. While Dawes and Reveres’ spread the same message—The British are coming!—Dawes knocked on doors on the opposite side of town. But, think back to elementary school––which one have you heard of? Revere’s ride, although virtually the same as Dawes’, shows greater mobilization of the

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the power of salvation through Jesus Christ is available to all. Paul, the author of many biblical books, stands behind the power of the Gospel in his writing, saying, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes.”4 How do we use this power of salvation that we’ve been given? With the existence of this internal superpower, we are faced with the same dilemma as the Parr family––use our power in public or use it quietly in a culture where the power of the Gospel is constantly undermined?

others who are unintentionally subject to that authority, such as the power gained from jobs in politics or business. In some senses, public power can do a lot of good; it can order effective mandates, establish religious freedom laws, and give voting power to marginalized groups.

But public power also has the ability to harm, especially when orders are imposed on others who do not believe or agree. The balance of public power is a delicate dance, with the weight of personal interests swaying the movements of social responsibility, with the potential for collapse. Public power—whether through politics, activism, and enforcement—is prone to misconceptions, conflicting principles, and possible cultural warfare. This doesn’t mean it is all bad, but it also means that this form of power can sometimes be ineffective in causing change or carrying a message.

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What The Incredibles and Paul Revere show us is that hidden power also has the potential for immense changes, but without the tradeoffs. Evil villains can be destroyed and cultural movements can spawn from those who stay in the background, doing seemingly unimportant things that have large impacts. The Incredibles enact change by wearing masks and social influencers by personality, but they both interact on an interpersonal level. Hidden power is really not hidden, but deployed frequently in small doses. By spreading the word here and making strong connections there, hidden power slowly grows and influences people, one by one.

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Unlike the power of super-strength, superflexibility, and super-speed, the power of the Gospel is different than physical superpowers.

Its amazing power lies in our powerlessness; Christians believe that through simple faith in Jesus, we are saved from death. This good news, the power of salvation, has the ability to transform lives. As Christians, we believe that

My superhero-loving inclinations want to turn this struggle into a good versus evil argument, with a culture that is indifferent to Christianity playing the part of the enemy, while Christianity itself acts as the hero. But that would be an oversimplification; culture is not an enemy, but rather an opportunity. The problem with using public power to advance a “Christian” agenda is that we end up villainizing those who disagree with our ideas.

HIDDEN POWER IS REALLY NOT HIDDEN, BUT DEPLOYED FREQUENTLY IN SMALL DOSES. The current evangelical church has a strong association with political influence. Currently, they use their platform to advance legislation, such as laws surrounding abortion and the inclusion of prayer in schools. The issue is not necessarily in the ideas themselves, but in the approach; their use of public power to make these changes is problematic. The idea that the United States needs to get back to being a “Christian nation” also undermines the need to love our neighbors regardless of their beliefs.

Public power is willing to push forth a message of liberty and freedom while also alienating and rejecting individuals who disagree.

But hidden power, as Gladwell shows, doesn’t include these large-scale trade-offs. Hidden power is personal, a quiet influence that affects individuals. The greatest example of this is Jesus’ ministry, a movement that flipped the 4. Romans 1:16 (NIV).

expectations of the role of the Jewish messiah.

Jesus was expected to come as a king, using his public sphere of influence to return Israel to a world power and rescuing them from Roman rule. Instead, God sent his son as a carpenter, a common man, walking among the everyday misfits along the dusty and dirty roads. Jesus’ interactions with beggars, prostitutes, and tax collectors illustrate how the power of the Gospel is personal and small but can create great change. The idea that the ministry of a few in a relatively small Middle Eastern area could transform into the largest religion in the world seems ridiculous, and yet that is what happened.

Christians need to be ready to serve others no matter the circumstances. With the incredible power of the Gospel we possess, we have an incredible responsibility to use it.

Seth Bollinger is a sophomore studying Applied Economics and Management with an interest in marketing. A lover of writing music, listening to podcasts, attempting to run, and watching movies, you can normally find Seth discussing theology or superheroes with friends.

Jesus had a public witness, there is no doubt; he would stand upon hilltops and preach His good news to all.5 The difference is that Jesus’ public power was not instituted through systems or politics but through His daily witness. If we, as Christians, are able to live lives that show the power of the Gospel through our daily interactions and conversations, we can cause greater change than if we were to use public power—because our interactions could reach people where they are.

At the end of The Incredibles, the Parr family goes back to normal life after stopping Syndrome from his mass destruction of Metroville. But they are no longer confused about who they are, having recognized their role in society as quiet influencers who are always ready to serve those in need. With this revelation, they participate in culture by using their powers subtly (like how Dash slowly increased his speed to get second place in the track meet). But when danger occurs, they keep their super-suits underneath what they wear, ready to stand up for those who are oppressed by some kind of evil. As a child, I saw this as an excuse to carry a superhero mask with me at all times; but now, seeing the film for the brilliance it contains, I see how we as 5. Matthew 5:1-7:29 (NIV).

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Do you want to see greater religious freedom in America? Interact with those of different religions from you, learning about what they believe and loving them for who they are. Are you concerned with the American view of sexuality and gender? Learn to love those who see things differently, showing them how the power of the Gospel changed your life. Our goal should not be to change people’s political views, but instead their lives––but only through Jesus.

Political views are fleeting, but the condition of the soul is eternal.

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Twisted Communion

by Brooke Lindsey She swings the sloppy bottle to her lips: intoxicating neck, meet open kiss The taste of tartest fruit left to decay; the union brings the sweetest, cheapest bliss Back and forth in rhythmic dance floor daze her arms fling high, she sings her dizzy praise The power of the drink drowns out the sound and wine-glazed eyes meet mine in easy gaze She stretches out her arm across the round: an offering, a bottle in the crowd “I’ll share this bottle with you,” says her grin as bodies draw a drumbeat from the ground— What can be forgotten when we spin: the things we’ve done, the places that we’ve been and every word we’ve spoken that’s not true— We twist and toast a repertoire of sin The ritual tonight is nothing new: the weekly offering, the oldest tune I shake my head and try not to offend I ask not should I drink?, I ask for whom?

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The thirst will die, the dance will end We circle back and swing again

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Brooke Lindsey is a junior from Phoenix, Arizona majoring in Philosophy and minoring in Spanish. She is passionate about ethics, espresso, and her family dog named Mr. Pettibone.

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SALVATION

by CREATION ?

AN INTERVIEW WITH DR. NATHAN MATIAS ON ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

BY ZACHARY LEE

Cornell Claritas Fall 2019

The official Oxford English Dictionary definition of artificial intelligence reads: “The

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capacity of computers or other machines to exhibit or simulate intelligent behaviour.”1 While this statement is vaguely descriptive and purposely neutral in chronicling the range of AI’s functionality, modern on-screen manifestations of AI are not so impartial. From the terrifyingly persistent T-800 in the Terminator franchise to Tony Stark’s rebellious creation Ultron in Avengers: Age of Ultron, the future belongs to the machine, and they seek to wipe us out with vengeance rather than entertain the thought of co-existence. While artificial intelligence and robots are now built to help with tasks ranging from the mundane (turning on the lights) to the more complex (self-driving cars), there is an underlying fear that they will become too clever

1. Oxford English Dictionary, s.v. “Artificial

Intelligence (n.),” 6 November 2019, <https:// www.oed.com/view/Entry/271625?redirectedIntelligence (n.),”

for their own good and will take advantage of our increasing dependence on them. However, contemporary culture’s histrionic obsession and fascination with “killer robots” detracts from the reality that artificial intelligence is in its relative infancy and shrouds the actual dangers and consequences of its widespread usage and implementation.

I had the opportunity to speak to Dr. Nathan Matias, the founder of CivilServant, a nonprofit that organizes citizen behavioral science and behavioral consumer protection research for the internet. CivilServant has worked with “tens of millions of people on reddit and Twitter to test ideas for preventing harassment, broadening gender diversity on social media, responding to human and

During our interview, Dr. Matias spoke about the current state of artificial intelligence and why the Christian worldview is essential in helping process through questions of stewarding technological power. From the start, he shared how factors like over-enthusiasm for AI accomplishing basic humanlike tasks feed into this sensationalized view that robots will one day “take over the world.”

In his article “Artificial Intelligence in Christian Thought and Practice,” Dr. Matias writes, “When an AI outperforms humans at a task like driving or playing a board game, many assume it will achieve similar wonders on other tasks. Yet most AI systems are designed to do one thing, such as drive a car, diagnose an illness, make predictions based on the past, or recognise faces…. For example, when someone says that their AI can do ‘planning’ or ‘reasoning,’ their definition can be much narrower than common meanings. As a result, media coverage of AI tends to occur in cycles that swing between dramatic optimism, fear, or both.”3 Yet AI in its current manifestation does not warrant such histrionic binaries.

For example, one of the more advanced uses of AI is being done by fast food restaurants for their drive-through stations. In his article “Would You Like Fries With That? McDonald’s Already Knows the Answer,” author David Yaffe-Bellany writes of McDonalds: “In the coming years, the company’s machine learning technology could change how consumers decide what to eat—and, 2. Nathan Matias, “About Nathan Matias,” 6 November 2019, <https://natematias.com/>.

3. Nathan Matias, “Artificial Intelligence in Christian Thought and Practice”, medium. com, 2 November, 2019, <https://medium. com/ai-and-christianity/artificial-intelligence-in-christian-thought-and-practice-20ec8635a94f>.

in a potentially ominous development for their waistlines, make them eat more…Now, the chain has digital boards programmed to market that food more strategically, taking into account such factors as the time of day, the weather, the popularity of certain menu items and the length of the wait... At some drive-throughs, McDonald’s has tested technology that can recognize license-plate numbers, allowing the company to tailor a list of suggested purchases to a customer’s previous orders, as long as the person agrees to sign away the data.”4 While these developments are certainly alarming to some extent, AI is clearly not as avant-garde as the movies portray; trying to get you to upgrade from a medium to a large fry is a far cry from a replicants walking the Earth à la Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner films.

Clearly, artificial intelligence is many years from being as advanced as science-fiction would depict but there are still consequences and problems posed by it. Yet its perceived lack of magnitude is why those ramifications are rarely talked about. Dr. Matias joked that Arvind Narayanan, a computer scientist and an associate professor at Princeton University, asked, “Would we be even having the same conversation if people said or used the term ‘function optimizers’ instead of artificial intelligence?” “Artificial intelligence” has all the wrong connotations attached to it in the current zeitgeist. Dr. Matias stated that “for every conversation that we have about Terminator, there is a new system being put in place without our knowledge that is deciding who gets a job. I think the biggest concern I have about misconceptions is not that people misunderstand what the systems are but that the fun, sci-fi conversation actually distracts us from where the real power lies. I think that has become more prevalent the past couple of years as we’ve seen lots of cities and states in the US considering facial recognition

4. David Yaffe-Bellany, “Would You Like Fries

With That? McDonald’s Already Knows the Answer,” New York Times, 2 November 2019, <https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/22/business/mcdonalds-tech-artificial-intelligence-machine-learning-fast-food.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share>.

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algorithmic misinformation, managing political conflict, and auditing social technologies.”2 In 2019, CivilServant “integrated its operations with Cornell University,” where Dr. Matias is now a professor in the Communication Department.

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bans...there’s still more work to be done.”

One poignant case study and example of this was in the paper “Gender Shades: Intersectional Accuracy Disparities in Commercial Gender Classification,” in which Joy Buolamwini and Timnit Gebru explored how artificial intelligence only reinforces the ideas that it is fed. For example, because a facial recognition software was trained only with reading the faces of majority white men, “some face recognition systems have been shown to misidentify people of color, women, and young people at high rates.”

Buolamwini and Gebru write that “without a dataset that has labels for various skin characteristics such as color, thickness, and the amount of hair, one cannot measure the accuracy

“TECHNOLOGY CAN ONLY EVER REFLECT INSTEAD OF USURPING THEM.” of such automated skin cancer detection systems for individuals with different skin types.”5 Thus, the problems with artificial intelligence are now rooted not necessarily in what their programmed actions are, but who has done the programing.

In this lies the true danger of artificial intelligence; human beings have always tried to seek salvation in some algorithmic form and are always all too willing to gloss over their potential damaging power. Thus the fantasies of Hal 9000, RoboCop, and the machines of the Matrix can be read as parables of warning against humanity’s belief that technology will improve society; technology can only ever reflect our biases instead of usurping them.

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In light of this, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein comes to mind—the story about Dr. Frankenstein who creates a monster with immense strength, but quickly abandons it and leaves the monster to its own devices. While the monster goes on a destructive rampage, Shelley raises poignant questions of culpability: is the monster inherently evil, or has it adopted its murderous tendencies from its imperfect master, in whose

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5. Joy Buolamwini and Timnit Gebru, “Gender

Shades: Intersectional Accuracy Disparities in Commercial Gender Classification,” Conference on fairness, accountability and transparency, 2018, <http://proceedings.mlr.press/v81/buolamwini18a/buolamwini18a.pdf>.

image it was made?6 Indeed, an artificial intelligence model is often shaped and molded in our image and any of their faults cannot be traced to a fault in the machine but to a fault in its creator. Artificial intelligence can only be as good as the data it was trained on and human beings will always bring their own biases into a machine. Dr. Matias shared numerous cases of how programs only extend our biases. AIs that specialize in language tend to promote stereotypes demeaning women since “they have learned from a long history of texts in many languages that devalue women’s lives.”

Additionally, “algorithms designed to detect bullying in English over-enforce on AfricanAmerican vernacular. There are a range of vernaculars in the United States that different cultures use and some of the training OUR BIASES datasets tend to be based on what white Americans think are “unkind.” And when you then deploy a system for detecting or policing bullying across a whole population, it will make systematic errors and those errors will be culturally discriminatory.”

Lastly, some training datasets for fundamental language processing and models have exhibited all sorts of gender biases. When a system tries to predict a sentence or autocomplete a phrase, the models assume certain roles in society for women and others for men.

For Dr. Matias, this is exactly why we need to be critical about artificial intelligence systems; the power lies not in what they will do in the future, but what they are doing now. He shared that Virginia Eubanks, an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University at Albany, wrote how human beings have always had and used algorithms to relate with one another.

The algorithms we use have only gotten more sophisticated and come with their own blindspots and limitations. Thus, we must take a hard look at the systems we use for decision making, the values behind those systems, and then ask if those values are good for us to champion as a society.

Dr. Matias added, “We should also recognize that A.I. is just an extension of these deeper ideas, that only some people are preserving.

This is just one area in public services and charity but across the board, machine learning systems are being most easily deployed where

6. Mary Shelley, Frankenstein, (New York: Barnes and Noble Books, 2003).

there is already a set of assumptions, structures, and power that is just extending or just scaling or making more efficient.”

technology may simply be abstinence, at least for brief fragments of time. In The Tech-Wise Family: Everyday Steps for Putting Technology in Its Proper Place, Andy Crouch argues that

One part of the solution to the power of

7. Romans 3:23 (ESV).

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Here, the voice of the Christian community is essential to the discussion of artificial intelligence.

“HUMAN BEINGS HAVE ALWAYS TRIED TO SEEK While the world at large thinks that there will always be an algorithm or SALVATION IN SOME ALGORITHMIC FORM AND machine that can save humanity, ARE ALWAYS ALL TOO WILLING TO GLOSS OVER the Christian worldview instead states that “all have sinned and THEIR POTENTIAL DAMAGING POWER.” fallen short of the glory of God.”7 Christians know that the most AI can do is reflect human biases, and this is exemplified over and over again in our “our homes aren’t meant to be refueling stations, fallen and broken world. Dr. Matias suggested, places where we and our devices rest briefly, contrary to popular opinion, that the solution top up our charge, and then go back to frantic is not for Christians to take over Silicon Valley activity. They are meant to be places where and be in charge of these companies of artificial the very best of life happens. No matter what intelligence. Rather, because Christians know advertising says (even those beautiful, tearthat human beings can only exacerbate the jerking Apple ads), the very best of life has problems of AI, this is exactly the opposite of almost nothing to do with the devices we buy. It how the Christian community should act. has a lot to do with the choices we make, choices that our devices often make more difficult...it is Dr. Matias shared, “I get requests from possible to love and use all kinds of technology Christians in the tech industry who want to ask but still make radical choices to prevent questions about faith and technology, but they technology from taking over our lives.”8 Thus in always want the same answer: we need to be this new age of exciting development in artificial able to demonstrate that if Christians are doing intelligence, perhaps this is an attitude that the the thinking then it is more wholesome and less Christian community can ever so meekly bring damaging. My understanding from Scripture is to the conversation, holding both the reality of that we are all fallen. Christians make mistakes limitations and the excitement of possibility in like anyone. This is why we turn to Christ. These both hands. are powerful tools and we need to know how to steward them well. We need God’s forgiveness, 8. Andy Crouch, Tech-Wise Family: Everyday grace, and guidance. If we go into these Steps for Putting Technology in Its Proper conversations with Place, (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2017), 29. the expectation that Christian technology is better, then we might actually be Zachary Lee is a senior studying making ourselves English and Spanish. When he is even less prepared not writing poetry or performing to wrestle with the it at open mics, you can find him real consequences of critically analyzing summer these very powerful blockbusters, listening to Christian systems. We need to hip-hop, and hopelessly attempting enter with humility. to catch up on his continuously Seek to examine, expanding reading list (on book #9 confess, and grow and be reminded of our own of 77+!) Last year he studied abroad limitations. That’s one thing that is hard to hold at Oxford and founded the very first on to even as we aspire to follow Christ wisely journal of Christian thought there, and well.”

Through a Glass Darkly.

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OWNING UP

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the other half of reconciliation

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by Joseph Reigle

“I came of age in the 60s and 70s, when all the rules about behaviour and the workplaces were different. That was the culture then.

I have since learned it is not an excuse, in the office—or out of it. To anyone.

I realized some time ago that I needed to be a better person and my interactions with the people I work with have changed.

I appreciate the way I’ve behaved with colleagues in the past has caused a lot of pain, and I sincerely apologize for it.”

1. Harvey Weinstein, “Statement From Harvey Weinstein,” New York Times, October 5, 2017, <https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/10/05/us/statement-from-harvey-weinstein.html>.

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- Harvey Weinstein1

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O

n October 5, 2017, journalists at The New Yorker and The New York Times published investigations into the Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein.1 For years he had paid off women who accused him of sexual abuse. The above is an excerpt of his response to the Times.

If you are familiar with the Weinstein story you know that this public gesture towards apology did little to improve his reputation. Perhaps Weinstein’s sins were too large and numerous to receive public forgiveness. His incredulous attempt at “reconciliation” raises the question: in an age when apologies seem more and more necessary, why do so many fall flat?

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The flood of similar inculpations that followed after the Weinstein revelation provide abundant examples of powerful men faltering to make amends, quell controversy, or refute accusations of abuse. The responses range on a spectrum from sincere contrition to flat-out denials.

Some apologies add disclaimers, disputing the accuracy of allegations. Others express contrition and vow to act better. Still more deny allegations completely.

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The process of apology for Harmon came years later. It began on Twitter when Ganz called out her former boss for making a vague assertion about the positive nature of the #MeToo movement. Her tweet said, “Care to be more specific? Redemption follows allocution.”3 In the context of law, the word allocution is used in the process of plea bargains when one party admits, or allocutes, to their crime. In essence, Ganz gave Harmon an ultimatum: if you want to make amends you have to confess exactly what you did without obfuscating; an apology without specifics is a non-apology.

Following this exchange, Ganz and Harmon began a process of negotiation over Twitter.

Harmon said, “Tell me what I can do to make this right.” Ganz appreciated Harmon’s sincerity but was frustrated by his privilege; she didn’t have someone to coach her along the path of recovery after his emotional abuse. Succeeding a series of Twitter interactions Ganz gave Harmon an outline of what she needed from his apology: an acknowledgement of the specific harms Harmon caused her––loss of confidence, relentless emotional turmoil, the time she spent recovering and rebuilding her career––and most importantly a full account of what occurred.

Among the long, long list of recent public apologies, one rare successful example has been lauded as a model to follow. The fortuitous apology comes from Dan Harmon, who was the showrunner for the NBC sitcom Community and co-created the cartoon show Rick and Morty.

While working on Community Harmon was attracted to a female writer, essentially one of his employees. Harmon’s title as showrunner put him in a position of power over his crush, Megan Ganz. He leveraged his position by favoring her jokes and handed her opportunities that took other writers years to achieve. In addition to nepotism, Harmon made his feelings for Ganz known through comments that were at first subtle but became increasingly inappropriate.

When Ganz refused to reciprocate, Harmon retaliated, now denying her opportunities. It took Ganz years after the show to regain a sense of confidence in her writing and to overcome the fear that men favored her work for reasons other than its merit.2

One way to express an apology is to beat around the bush: using broad terms helps to relieve the residual pain and shame of specific actions.

Another way is to walk slowly and intentionally through the steps that lead to your actions, and

1. Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, “Harvey Weinstein Paid Off Sexual Harassment Accusers for Decades,” New York Times, October 5, 2017, <https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/05/us/ harvey-weinstein-harassment-allegations.html>.

2. Ira Glass, “674: Get a Spine!” This American Life, Podcast audio, May 10, 2019, <https:// www.thisamericanlife.org/674/get-a-spine>.

3. Megan Ganz (@meganganz), “ Care to be more specific?...” Tweet, January 2, 2018, <https:// twitter.com/meganganz/status/948134632037 462017?lang=en>.

4. Dan Harmon, “Episode: Don’t Let Him Wipe or Flush,” Harmontown, Podcast audio, January 10, 2018, 18:40-23:00, <https://www. harmontown.com/2018/01/episode-dont-lethim-wipe-or-flush/>.

Harmon gave a full apology on his podcast Harmontown. In all, the confession lasts about seven minutes. The showrunner walks his listeners through the gritty details of how he manipulated Ganz, leveraged his position of power over her, and resented her for not reciprocating. He ends his apology first by acknowledging the underlying misogyny that allowed him to justify his abuse, and second by admitting his privilege. With this privilege Harmon was able to leave the events behind until he was confronted, but Ganz couldn’t; she had to deal with what happened for years.4

the effects of your actions. Harmon’s example demonstrates the value of the second method.

If Harmon gave a blanket apology similar to Weinstein’s, we wouldn’t know how Harmon’s position of power allowed him to abuse Ganz; nor would we really understand the pain his actions caused if he didn’t spend the time to contemplate the pain and vocalize it.

Too often apologies are said hastily without much thought or left unsaid entirely. Recently the feminist playwright Eve Ensler wrote The

Ensler delves deeply into her father’s mind to explore the causes and motivations of his actions.

She imaginatively recounts his upbringing as the favorite child of his emotionally reticent parents. His desire to meet such high social and familial expectations created fathomless interior insecurities. From the idolized male heroes of classic Hollywood he learned to wall off his interior world with a charismatic facade.

But when Eve was born, Eve imagines that his heart melted with unexpected vulnerability which he interpreted as weakness and tried to

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To speak truthfully...one must To speak truthfully...one must look ttt look perceptively into theeui past. perceptively into the past.h smod tincidunt ut

In The Apology Ensler’s father lays out the goals of his apology, what he knows his daughter needs from his confession. They are: To recognize his actions as a crime, To face how deeply his actions and violations have impacted and devastated Ensler, To feel profound remorse and regret over his actions, and To take responsibility for his actions by working to understand their causes and motivations.

5. Marc Maron, “Episode 1028 - Eve Ensler,” WTF with Marc Maron, Podcast audio, June 17, 2019, <http://www.wtfpod.com/podcast/ episode-1028-eve-ensler>.

6. Eve Ensler, The Apology, (New York: Bloomsbury, 2019), 15.

compensate with sexual gratification. No single cause can explain his sexual abuse of Ensler.

His abuse is complicated like so many human actions by factors of upbringing, identity, insecurity, and desire.

Ensler’s storytelling demonstrates that proper apologies require a high level of self-reflection and insight. At the outset of the book Ensler’s father describes an apology as “exposing a truth that you would prefer to leave hidden from others and from God.”7 Implicit throughout Ensler’s book is the maxim that to speak truthfully of any significant human action, one must look perceptively into the past to tell the full story. In other words, an apology is a nuanced aesthetic and creative endeavour.

The psychologist Aaron Lazare concurs that the process of apology is as much an art as a science. In his book On Apology, Lazare details the anatomy of successful apologies and unsuccessful ones from the formal apologies of nation states, the public apologies of celebrities, to intimate apologies between old friends.

Lazare begins his analysis of apologies by clarifying several confusions that surround what we colloquially mean when we talk about apologies. The word apology finds its origin in the Greek word apologia, which means an argument or reasoned defense. Nowadays we use the word apology much differently than its 7. Ensler, 23.

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Apology, a book written in the voice of her father expressing his deep remorse for sexually abusing Ensler as a child. Ensler never received an apology from her father before he died, so she wrote one herself. In an interview on comedian Marc Maron’s podcast, Ensler describes the deep physical and psychic relief she felt after penning an apology through the voice of her father.5 Perhaps it is because Ensler knows the severe pain of abuse and the lingering pain of awaiting an apology (which too few women ever receive) that she dedicates her book “For every woman still waiting for an apology.”6

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etymological source. The casual phrases “sorry” and “apologies” express empathy, compassion, and regret, but don’t always entail remorse or personal culpability. For instance, I can say, “I’m sorry that you found what I said offensive but I am not sorry for saying it,” expressing that I empathize with your discomfort but I don’t regret my actions.8 Lazare doesn’t categorize these instances as proper apologies. For Lazare, proper apologies bridge gaps between parties where one party has seriously wronged the other. In most proper apologies one finds four essential ingredients: 1) Acknowledgment of the offense, 2) The explanation, 3) Various attitudes, including remorse, shame, humility and sincerity, and 4) Reparations.9 Through the process of apology, we create a shared story about reality. Apologies have the power to proclaim truth and diffuse lies. Most of all, apologies involve a transference of power from the accused to the accuser. When someone apologizes for a wrong they committed, they are handing any power they have over to the victim, in short saying, “I’m in your hands. It’s your choice to exact justice or give forgiveness.”

threats against accusers, hired interference, and continuously evaded repercussions.

Additionally, the apology’s vagueness thwarts its effectiveness. His descriptions of the sexual abuse he perpetrated––“the way I’ve behaved... has caused a lot of pain”––could just as easily be an apology for a Twitter post. No names are mentioned in the apology, neither are any reparations to the women he hurt. Nearly every sentence smacks of a calculated stunt to preserve his reputation. Not once throughout this scandal has Weinstein voluntarily made himself vulnerable to the women he hurt.

A better example of someone who exhibits the vulnerability of apologies is comedian Aziz Ansari. In his latest standup special, Right Now, Ansari addresses the sexual misconduct scandal that surrounded him in January 2018: Grace went on a date with Ansari during which he pressured her for sex, and described the encounter with the publication Babe.net.10 Ansari begins his special describing the effect of the scandal on his life. He felt scared and humiliated. As Ansari talks he embodies this vulnerability. Even through the screen you can feel the slow tension between him and the audience. Clearly this isn’t how Ansari would have preferred to begin his special.

Lazare maintains that one’s body language is a principal aspect of communication. Your posture, whether standing or sitting, and gestures, like

Through the process of apology, we create a shared story about reality. Apologies have the power to proclaim truth and diffues lies.

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Lazare acknowledges that apologies are never as simple as a checklist of points. Different situations call for the exclusion of some elements in an apology and increased emphasis on others.

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Recent public apologies provide abundant examples of the careful nuance needed to apologize. Returning to the case of Harvey Weinstein, one reason for the apology’s failure is the clear contradiction between Weinstein’s words and his actions. Throughout the investigation process Weinstein made 8. Aaron Lazare, On Apology, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 53.

9. Lazare, 34.

how long you keep eye-contact, can make or break apologies. According to Lazare, some apologies require the guilty to experience some form of pain or discomfort to truly make amends.

But one can contest whether Ansari truly owns up to his actions in this apology.

Conspicuously, Ansari doesn’t mention Grace.

You can see his vulnerability and remorse but they are nonspecific and self-focused. “I just felt terrible that this person felt this way...I hope I’ve 10. Katie Way, “I went on a date with Aziz Ansari. It turned into the worst night of my life,” babe.net, January 1, 2018, <https://babe. net/2018/01/13/aziz-ansari-28355>.

become a better person,” he says.11 Here Ansari makes a subtle, perhaps unintentional, reversal.

Lazare observes that when someone says “I’m sorry you felt that way” they shift the blame from themselves to the other person for feeling as if they were wronged. It’s a smooth way to express regret while denying one’s culpability.

For all its sincere vulnerability, Ansari’s apology isn’t about Grace– it’s about himself.

With all this talk of apologies, by now you may be wondering where forgiveness factors in. One could argue that forgiveness plays a far larger role in Christian dogma than apologies. “Forgive us our debts as we also forgive our debtors” goes the fourth stanza of the Lord’s Prayer.12 However, this emphasis on forgiveness can often obscure the need for justice. By demanding forgiveness and forgetting apologies, we risk putting the burden on the victim to make amends rather than the perpetrators.

One incident of radical forgiveness recently went viral, but the call for justice went relatively

Forgiveness is only one half of reconciliation.

The inclusion of apology makes a more complete picture. What’s missing in Weinstein’s glaring “non-apology” and Ansari’s more subtle statement is a genuine reckoning with justice, an explanation of the wrongs committed and their appropriate consequences. The apologies of Harmon and Ensler show a better way forward.

Neither apology seeks to escape the blame or social stigma they deserve. Instead they lean into the uncomfortable vulnerability that apologies require.

These truths aren’t far from the historic Christian tradition. One need only look at the practice of confession to find all the essential elements of apology followed by forgiveness— acknowledgement of sin, remorse, intention to act better, and forgiveness by the grace of God. How else do we expect to heal wounds of injustice except through the hard work of acknowledging difficult truths?

Forgiveness is only one half of reconciliation.

11. Aziz Ansari, Dir. Spike Jonze, Right Now, Netflix, July 9, 2019, 3:20-5:13, <https://www. netflix.com/>.

12. Matthew 6:9-13 (NIV).

13. Dorena Williamson, “Botham Jean’s Brother’s Offer of Forgiveness Went Viral. His Mother’s Calls for Justice Should Too,” Christianity Today, October, 4 2019, <https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2019/october-web-only/ botham-jean-forgiveness-amber-guyger.html>.

Joseph is a senior majoring in Urban and Regional Studies. You can usually find him reading The NewYorker, or talking with a friend about the latest filmmaker he’s just obsessed with.

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unheard. When Botham Jean’s brother offered forgiveness to Amber Guyger, the police officer who fatally shot Botham in his own apartment, the video of their reconciling embrace went viral. But Botham’s mother’s plea for justice fell on deaf ears. She told the court, “Forgiveness for us as Christians is a healing for us, but as my husband said, there are consequences. It does not mean that everything else we have suffered has to go unnoticed...”13As a culture we can easily empathize with forgiveness, but can we also share in a mother’s righteous anger?

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THE BATTLE OVER ME (on the death of Antonio Tsialas) A twisted, dripping darkness crawls up from down below.

Shifting and wading, it consumes all it touches, the sleeping valley sits firm in its clutches.

We do not see it coming; rushing in, yet creeping slow.

A weighty smoke, a murky pool, swallows up the ground.

We wake, limbs frozen—we watch, paralyzed, as evil prowls around us, unrestrained and undisguised.

“Jehovah…” we whisper, weakened, frail and bound.

Suddenly, a light; it shatters and surges through.

The darkness, in agony, is scattered and flees.

Angels—hundreds of thousands—come into view.

Pulled up from the dirt, we watch as they seize this war-torn ground, making it new.

How amazing is His love, that pain gives way to peace.

a Petrarchan sonnet

by Olivia Simoni

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Olivia Simoni is a junior from France and Dubai, majoring in English Literature. Among her greatest loves are curly fries, dogs with tiny legs, ‘Reckless Love’ by Cory Asbury, and snow storms.

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BLESSED ARE LES MISÉRABLES A

prostitute, a thief, a street gang, and a band of wannabe rebels. Sound like a prison lineup? Actually, it’s the cast of one of the longest-running musicals in the world.1 Les Misérables, the musical in question, seems an unlikely candidate to be one of the most popular shows ever. Based on a two-thousand-page book from 1862 by the French writer Victor Hugo, it’s crammed full of horrific stories of suffering under the corrupt French state, and every other page seems to be a digression about toothbrushes or Napoleon. It deserves the title Les Misérables, “the wretched ones” or “the dispossessed”— the characters are uniformly, yes, miserable.

(Spoiler alert: almost all of them are dead by the end.) They’re a bunch of criminals and lowlifes.

Who would care about their story?

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It turns out that many, many people care. But why? Hugo hardly whitewashes the characters’ actions, describing the crimes of the thief Jean Valjean and the gang man Thénardier with grim realism. The story’s heroes are shockingly unsavory.

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Yet while Hugo does not shy from his characters’ crimes, he questions the easy conclusion that anyone’s pain and error are due only to personal wrongdoing. In the world of Les Misérables, there is no clear link between a person’s crime and their suffering—these heroes are ensnared in a complex web of power and powerlessness.

1. “Les Misérables,” Music Theatre International, (accessed 08 Nov 2019), <https://www. mtishows.com/les-miserables-0>.

Take the novel’s central character, Jean Valjean.

A native of Faverolles, Valjean lives with his sister and her seven children; they eke out a living on his meager earnings as a pruner. But one day, his wages fail: “One very severe winter Jean had no work, the family had no bread.

Literally, no bread, and seven children.”2 Valjean breaks the window of a baker’s shop, snatches a loaf of bread, and is sentenced to five years in prison. Nineteen years later, after an additional fourteen years for escape attempts, he is free.

Hugo does not absolve him; as Valjean reflects later, “He recognized he was not an innocent man unjustly punished.”3 His crime was not strictly necessary; he could have begged the baker for bread or promised work in exchange for food. He bears some responsibility for his act.

But while the crime may be wrong, asks Hugo, might the punishment be worse?

“He asked himself if he were the only one who had done wrong in the course of his disastrous story. If, in the first place, it was not a serious thing that he, a workman, could not have found work and he, an industrious man, should have been without bread.” Valjean, a hardworking and devoted man, should not have been powerless to buy bread. It is “a sort of outrage of the stronger on the weaker, a crime of society upon 2. Victor Hugo, Les Misérables, trans. Lee Fahnestock, Norman MacAfee. (Signet Classics, 1987), 83.

3. Hugo, 87.

the individual.”4 Here, Valjean is not the one in power, but a weak man being preyed upon by the stronger. His individual agency is dwarfed by the powers and dominions greater than he.

These same powers and dominions ruin another character, the young orphan Fantine. When we meet her, she has been abandoned by her lover and left with her small daughter, Cosette. No employer would hire an unmarried mother, so she gives her daughter to another family and travels far away to work. Unfortunately the family begins extracting money from her by lying about Cosette’s needs. Fantine’s wages barely cover these false debts.

This prostitute dying of tuberculosis, Hugo suggests, is a mirror of the carpenter dying on the cross. Jesus of Nazareth, after all, was of little higher class than the peasants Valjean and Fantine; poetry in the biblical book of Isaiah describes him as having “no form or majesty that we should look at him… he was despised and rejected by men.”8 Like Hugo’s misérables, Jesus died a wretched and ignominious death, accused of being a criminal. Innocent, he was stripped of power and executed without a fair trial.

Something is clearly wrong, Hugo asserts, with this world. There is some absolute brokenness in the system. Society is crucifying Jesus all over again; men and women like Valjean and Fantine are driven to crimes they despise.

Somehow, it needs to be fixed. But how?

SOCIETY IS CRUCIFYING JESUS ALL OVER AGAIN.

Can we really witness this hairless, toothless prostitute and label her a sinful woman seeking to satisfy selfish desires? Is she responsible for her crimes? When she collapses of tuberculosis on her deathbed, weakened by months of starvation and exploitation, lonely for her daughter, is she the guilty one?

Hugo gives an emphatic no. “What is this story of Fantine about?” he asks. “It is about society buying a slave.”6 In his telling, Fantine’s errors are symptoms not of her guilt, but of her powerlessness.

As Fantine lies on her deathbed, Hugo draws an explicit parallel. Seeing Valjean pray to a crucifix, Fantine asks him what he is doing. “I was praying to the martyr on high,” he says, “and inwardly he added, ‘– for the martyr here below.’”7 4. Hugo, 88.

5. Hugo, 187.

6. Hugo, 187.

7. Hugo, 200.

Hugo gives these ideas voice through a small band of college rebels; they are the mouthpiece for his speeches about the earthly paradise to come. In his loving prose, they are knights and poets and princes and gods, with heartwrenching naïveté and a longing to see France redeemed and glorious. They fight in the streets with utopian hope. They prepare to fight the National Guard, confident they can take over Paris and lead in a new epoch.

And then Hugo kills them. Of every rebel we meet, only one survives.

Their goal collapses. They grasp a little power, enough to kill a few National Guards. But the bomb they tried to set blew up in their faces.

Their desperate grab at power destroyed them.

Oddly, it seems that Hugo really believed that they could prevail. He was a staunch utopian himself, and the speeches he wrote seem to have come from his heart. But one hundred and fifty years after the novel’s publication, we know that this revolt has not brought peace. “It will come, 8. Isaiah 53:2-3 (ESV).

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Fantine’s employers quickly find out about her illegitimate daughter and fire her; she must find alternate ways to pay her debts. Her first step is to sell her hair to a barber, garnering ten francs to buy a winter skirt for her daughter.

Then, when she hears her daughter is dying from fever, she garners forty francs by selling her teeth. Finally, faced with impossible sums to pay, she cries, “‘All right! I’ll sell what’s left!’” and resorts to prostitution.5

Hugo and his contemporaries battled fiercely over this question.

Liberalizing influences like Émile Zola were trying to transform the previous systems of power through democratic rule; bureaucrats like Alphonse Berthillon were trying to craft a new one based on efficient state control. Hugo himself was deeply devoted to utopian ideals, and he spends pages and pages contemplating them. Could we fix the world by redistributing power? Could we ourselves create paradise?

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citizens, that day when all shall be concord, harmony, light, joy, and life,” says the rebel leader.9 It has not.

There is a logical question to ask here. If overthrowing the state is futile, might it be best to work within the state? To redeem the bureaucracy?

tracking Jean Valjean. Valjean has adopted Fantine’s daughter Cosette and fled from Javert time and time again. But as years pass in hiding, Valjean starts to fear that his convict past will endanger Cosette. She longs to marry; how can he sign her papers? Can he continue to include her in his fugitive life? And is it even ethical to keep escaping the law for his crimes?

The bureaucrats certainly hoped so. In the ideal state, efficient organization would produce justice. Giving the right people power would solve societal problems. To this end, in Hugo’s time, high-ranking officers were working hard on making the system as efficient as possible. It was less than twenty years after the publication of Les Misérables that the police surveillance system was invented, with pictures being taken of all criminals and used to catch them again.10 There were even hopes that by properly surveilling, police could identify—and stop—crime before it happened.

Officials were hopeful they could solve France’s problems within a few decades.

Matters come to a point at the very rebellion designed to usher in utopia. Cosette’s beloved is a rebel in the streets, and Valjean goes to rescue him from death. Javert, loyal to the state as always, has disguised himself as a rebel and prepared to spy on them. As the revolutionaries wage their desperate battle, they catch Javert.

Who would like to kill the spy? Jean Valjean volunteers.

Les Misérables puts this theory to the test with the state’s dream policeman, Officer Javert. Javert hunts the criminal Valjean for over twenty years with a combination of persistence, skill, and fanaticism. Burglars shudder when they hear his name; his ability to track down a trail is almost magical. However, Javert is no vigilante; he may be a hunter, but he is also a bureaucrat. He meticulously files cases with his superiors, and he sometimes avoids his own intuition if it jars with an order. He spares the innocent and he warns the guilty. In short, he holds perfectly organized power.

“Jean Valjean cut the harness that Javert had about his neck, then he cut the ropes on his wrists, then, stooping down, he cut the cord on his feet; and standing up, he said to him, ‘You are free.’

Valjean leads Javert to an empty alley, gun in hand. Javert walks, bound by a rope harness.

The two have not met face-to-face in forty years.

HOW CAN SACRIFICE AND MERCY OVERCOME GUNSHOTS AND CHAINS?

This paradigm of power is effective, even compelling. But toward the end of Les Misérables, Hugo turns the ideal on its head.

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Decades after Fantine’s death, Javert is still

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9. Hugo, 1116.

10. “Technologies; Visible Proofs: Forensic Views of the Body,” US National Library of Medicine. Name, 05 June 2014 (accessed 08 Nov 2019), <https://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/ visibleproofs/galleries/technologies/bertillon. html>.

Valjean takes out a knife.

...Javert stood aghast and motionless.

Jean Valjean continued, ‘I don’t expect to leave this place. Still, if by any chance I do, I live, under the name of Fauchelevent, in the Rue de l’Homme-Armé, Number Seven.’”11 Javert leaves. Valjean fires the pistol in the air.

Is Valjean powerful in this moment? It looks like a moment of surrender, in which the criminal submits to the laws of the state; the epitome of the bureaucratic ideal. A criminal handing himself in, false identity and address included, is surely the dream of the police state—the proper reordering of power.

Nor is Valjean upholding the revolutionary ideal.

Releasing Javert contradicts his clear order 11. Hugo, 1233.

from the rebels to kill him; he undermines the attempted coup. Indeed, never in his long, weary fugitive journey has Valjean tried to avenge himself on Javert. He has merely escaped.

But what happens next is something neither the rebels nor the state would expect.

Javert does find Valjean again. He escorts him home to gather belongings and stands guard outside. And then: “Either for a breath of fresh air or automatically, Jean Valjean stuck his head out of the window...

He was dumbfounded; there was nobody at all in the street. Javert had gone away.”12 Lost in horror and confusion, Javert abandons his prey. He is thrown into a tailspin by the mercy shown him. He walks the streets of Paris shuddering; his hope in bureaucracy has left him.

“Jean Valjean confused him. All the axioms that had served as the supports of his life crumbled away before this man.” Valjean’s innocent sacrifice takes a mysterious hold on him. “It was true then, that there were exceptions, that authority might be taken aback...that the virtue of a convict might set a snare for the virtue of a functionary.”13 The policeman becomes overcome by the thought that there might be another power beyond the power of the state. He becomes terrified that the neat order of bureaucracy—the wicked commit crimes, and the good dole out punishment— might be wrong. He is flabbergasted not by either revolt or authority on Valjean’s part, but a sacrifice of grace. The very thought of a free gift, unfettered by works and righteousness, strikes a deadly blow to his cherished beliefs.

The paradox is too much for Javert. The system of power he built his whole life on has been uprooted by another, totally subversive power: mercy. He sees no path ahead. Later that night, he dies by his own hand.

contradictory power. The power of Jesus—who is God himself—is not iron-fisted authority, but sacrifice and mercy. Jesus’s follower Paul explains the paradox: “Though he was in the form of God, he did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”14 Sacrificing and sacrificed, despised of men, beaten and scorned.

Is this power?

Paul does not stop there. Somehow, this wretchedness is power; somehow Jesus is worthy of the greatest glory and authority in the world. “Therefore,” he says, “God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”15 In the upside-down miracle of Christianity, the likes of Valjean and Fantine hold true power.

Their innocent sacrifice and tender mercy are not signs of weakness, to be replaced by revolt or democracy. This power is hard and terrible to wield; the strong trample on it day by day. Yet it will uproot all the princes and principalities of the world.

14. Philippians 2:6-9 (ESV).

15. Philippians 2: 9-11 (ESV).

Amy Crouch is a sophomore from Pennsylvania studying linguistics and English, but enthusiastic about everything. She can usually be found either frantically studying Greek verbs or singing in chorus rehearsal.

There is one parallel in human history, the one who suffered even more than Valjean.

In Christianity, it is God who wields this 12. Hugo, 1311.

13. Hugo, 1323-4.

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What is this mysterious power wielded by Valjean, the power that can outlast revolt and overturn the state? How can sacrifice and mercy overcome gunshots and chains?

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Before a word is given, Before a phrase is born, Imagination runs amok, unbound.

It cares not for tradition, It pays no mind to scorn, It flits and floats—it cannot settle down.

If you should seek to mold it Or wish to wield its power, Two disparate worlds you must weave into one: Summon your voice, your courage; Retreat with a pen to your bower; And name the thought—it cannot be undone.

To name is more than fancy; To name is more than wit; To name is to precipitate a thought.

A name implies a story; A name implores you fit The chaos round this name your mind has wrought.

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Names of power, watching, waiting, Anchored just beyond the veil Names of power, life obtaining, Wake to find this world is frail.

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Names

by Charles Nystrom

We glance about and name things— Our bones, our beasts, our babes— A name enchants this earth with deeper meaning.

We glean a truth, then fain sing— Write poems, myths, and plays— With each new name, we slow the world’s careening.

The power of a name….

To shape, to heal, to grow; Some shout it out in joyful ecstasy.

The power of a name….

The thrill of being known; A whispered secret, shared expectantly.

If many names are called to life, Then many return to dust: It’s nature’s way, that day gives in to night.

Now that the great god Pan is dead, The world awaits one name to thrust It out from ancient darkness into light.

Names of power, hungry, aching, Always yearning, never free, Names of wonder, power quaking All the cosmos long to see.

of Power Now you may say, “My name is weak!”

Or lament, “My name is long.”

To say such is to disregard a gift.

Your name defines, sets you apart; Your name connects, makes you belong; And forgotten names are sorrows, always missed.

A name has personality; Its presence pervades the room.

To speak a name is to unlock its cage.

The thespian sees clearly what The poet seldom presumes— Names come to life when put upon a stage:

Never quite a perfect fit, Always something missing....

Might the earthly names we get Exist to keep us itching?

Suppose we all had names of power Once....

Forgotten....lost at birth.

Perhaps to find our vanished names, we first must love these names of earth.

Of all the gifts our parents give, earth names are most important: We feed, we grow, we learn, we live, while names, in earth, lie dormant.

Explore your name, its latent fire, its etymology— Reveal, in time, your name of power, by asking, “Who named me?”

Charles Nystrom is a second year DVM candidate at Cornell’s vet school and a Wheaton College alumnus. He considers the natural world just as intriguing as faerie—he dreams of one day uniting the two by designing his own zoo. His loves include poisonous plants, paradoxes, and the novel Phantastes.

Cornell Claritas Fall 2019

“Persephone! Pandora!

Peter, Patrick! Pippin, Puck!”

A spoken name will pop to life upon your lips.

Thus empowered, names possess the means To pierce, implore, protect— Be perspicacious as you speak... your tongue may slip.

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Why Beauty?

E

ternities passed before we climbed the last stretch of rocky ground. Giant Mountain––a high peak in the Adirondacks––lived up to its name. My classmates had already been at the summit for half an hour, waiting for our slow bodies to catch up so we could head back down.

But all I wanted to do was soak in that reward: the panorama of the Adirondacks.

“We must endeavor to discover the laws governing the panorama.” This quote rang in my ears. Pasted in the PowerPoints before this forest ecology trip, Henry Cowles’ decree presented a beautiful vision of ecology. The laws governing the panorama––everything you can see in that 360-degree view from the mountain pinnacle––extend to every tree, rock, and insect. But for a human to understand all of its interconnectedness is both beautiful and impossible. How can I hold the entire skyline in my mind, when my class is telling me that it’s time to go?

Cornell Claritas Fall 2019

There is a mystery in natural beauty that holds our attention, that calls us to keep watching.

It is natural for us to want to soak it all in, to grasp it in our minds with scientific reasoning.

And science can tell us a lot about beauty, even increase our appreciation for it––but, ultimately, the experience of beauty transcends the scientific. Beauty has a religious power in its own right.

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I don’t think I need to paint a picture of beauty for you to understand what it is. We all have a sense of it, and while some beauty may truly be “in the eye of the beholder,” a lot of our sense of beauty is shared. When developers need to do an environmental impact report of the new structure they wish to build, one of the measures

One only needs to think of the beauty of Cornell’s campus and the surrounding areas to relate to these measures. The campus is bounded by water that rushes, falls, and freezes every year.

Its gorges have been carved by glaciers; its hills stand over the smooth finish line of Cayuga lake. Its beauty encompasses even the smallest details, from the magnolia that explodes with pink flowers in the spring, to the red maples that catch fire in the fall.

It is the joy of the ecologist to study how these different features of nature are related. Questioning nature’s interactions, hypothesizing, sampling, measuring, and drawing conclusions is exciting. But science can sometimes favor a reductionist approach, meaning that the properties of something can be reduced to its constituent parts.

Take those leaves on the red maple: they change color because the green chlorophyll pigment has disintegrated, revealing the secondary red and yellow pigments that had been previously masked by the green. We learn from this the function of pigments, the patterns of senescence, yet this kind of thinking does not give us answers about its fiery beauty. None of those pigments impart beauty on their own; the combination of them, changing over time, uniting at a large scale, is what grabs our attention. The property of beauty, in this case, is not reductionist, but emergent: the pieces come together to form something greater than their individual parts.

Similarly, if you break the panorama down to rocks, minerals, water, leaves, trees, and mountains, you will learn many things that may increase your appreciation of the cohesive picture. But in none of those things will you find what makes it beautiful.

And this beauty affects our human bodies in a physiological way. Beauty in nature can help us relax. Beauty in the form of a person can make our hearts race. Beauty can literally have the power to take our breath away. Why do we have this reaction? Why are people, paintings, and nature beautiful, when beauty is not strictly

necessary for survival?

Science does not address beauty, or aesthetics, in a way that speaks to our hearts, and ecologist Robin Wall Kimmerer agrees. As a college freshman, she chose botany “because I wanted to learn about why asters and goldenrod looked so beautiful together.”1 Her advisor told that what she described was not science, not botany; she should take a real botany class and forget such questions.

But there was a real question there: “Why is the world so beautiful? It could so easily be otherwise: flowers could be ugly to us and still fulfill their purpose.”2 After learning her college’s curriculum and departing from questions of beauty, she later found her way back to these questions that originally inspired her. She was thankful for scientific knowledge, but she still knew that in beauty there was something great that remained unexplained.

If science cannot give us satisfying answers to common beauty, there must be more to the world than is answerable by scientific reasoning.

This physical, tangible world that we live in has intangible properties. And, if that is true, perhaps we need different tools to understand it. We deal with these abstract ideas so much in our daily lives––from the extraordinary yet commonplace nature of love to our individual consciousness and imaginations. We do not put them up to scientific scrutiny, because we know that there are parts of our lives that don’t fit well in charts and figures.

Our experience of beauty can be more fully understood through the lens of faith. It answers our experience differently: calling beauty a gift, a message of something more, a story that we can actively take part in.

A friend of mine once talked about his experience sitting atop Ithaca Falls, at Ezra’s Tunnel. The rushing water and the danger of sitting on those concrete platforms at the base of an ancient gorge is full of terrifying beauty. He wished he could keep sitting there, facing the sunset, never growing tired of the sounds of dusk. But there was always something that drew him away from the experience. Maybe it was something important, like meeting with friends for dinner.

1. Kimmerer, R. W. (2015). Braiding sweetgrass: Indigenous wisdom, scientific knowledge and the teachings of plants. (Minneapolis: Milkweed Editions).

2. Kimmerer.

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they need to define is the aesthetic change to the landscape. Is your building going to obstruct a high-value view? Will it be the new focal point on a previously pristine lake? Through these assessments, they find commonalities in people’s aesthetic preferences; for starters, moving water and variation in topography generally add beauty to a landscape.

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But more often it was something annoyingly human, like being thirsty, or needing to use the bathroom.

C.S. Lewis, the author of the Chronicles of Narnia, wrote something that complements this experience: “We do not want merely to see beauty, though, God knows, even that is bounty enough. We want something else which can hardly be put into words—to be united with the beauty we see, to pass into it, to receive it into ourselves, to bathe in it, to become part of it.”3 I think that both my friend and Henry Cowles have this in common. This feeling—that you want to somehow be more connected with beauty—is evidence that we want to absorb it, or in Cowles case, absorb our understanding of it with scientific laws. We want to sit with such an experience and package it for when we have to leave. But, just as we can never fully wrap our heads around laws governing the panorama, we can never fully “be united with the beauty we see.” There is something that draws us on, or draws us away. The reward of reaching the top may never be all that we hope for—it is not fully satisfying.

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The beauty of such a panorama is not just a message, but it is a messenger of something more. This “more” is worth examining; while we cannot clearly look at beauty through the lens of science, perhaps we can look at it through the lens of faith. Faith is not a rationalization of acts that seem improbable, nor is it a denial of scientific truths. Instead, faith adds a dimension to our view. C.S. Lewis also famously said, “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.”4 We can ask, with this new lens, “Why is the world beautiful?”

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The existence of unnecessary beauty, imbedded at every scale from the palisade cells to the Hudson palisades, is a gift that shows God’s 3. Lewis, C. S. (2005). The Weight of Glory. (San Francisco: Harper).

4. Lewis, C.S. (1962). They Asked For A Paper.

(London: Geoffrey Bless), 164-165.

The beauty of such a panorama is not just a message, but it is a messenger of something more. love for us. And not only that, it shows God’s physical power to create. We wish to be united with beauty because we wish to be united with God; we cannot help but bask in the majesty and marvel of his powers. In this way, beauty has a functional and purposeful power; it is not only for us to appreciate, but it is also to connect us to Him.

Abigail Bezrutczyk is a senior from Long Island and is studying Environmental Science. She loves being outdoors, especially when it involves writing, tea, or goldfish crackers.

So often, we may notice something beautiful— an easy task for those with open eyes. We might take a picture and share it with others, we might sit and bask in the view. But with a lens of faith, we can do more than just sense; we can respond with thankfulness and love in return.

This response is possible precisely because there is someone to which to be thankful. Standing on Giant mountain, we can reason our way through the trees, we can marvel at the valleys, and we can glorify the one who made it.

Faith and science add layers to our understanding of the world. It is by the gift of scientific reasoning that we can understand pieces of the panorama, but it is by its beauty that we can see that there is something more to it than just the pieces. And then, it is by faith that we know what is more: that beauty exists because of love. Only with these added layers to our understanding—those of science and faith—can we walk away from the panorama with a beauty that does not leave.

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And the beauty that we had so long observed, now includes us. We become a part of the beauty we see, by knowing that one Creator made both the glory of the panorama and the little people that hike on its rocky face. Faith is something that dives into our hearts in a way that we wish beauty could on its own, but cannot. It gives the deeper meaning we are searching for when we find beauty lacking, because of how faith connects what we observe, understand, and experience with a greater reality.

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DUMB STRUCK The mighty mute speak By aching in their bones, Brimming with unsung tune, Waxed by the gaping moon, And bubbling into moans.

Waning, sink,

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Spent and weak.

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John Nystrom is a second year vet student hailing from Northwest Arkansas. Johnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s favorite authors include C. S. Lewis, G. K. Chesterton, George MacDonald, and Fyodor Dostoyevsky.

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cornell.claritas@gmail.com.

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