ASM048 Christmas Lights, Santa Claus, and the Dangers of Science Mike

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christmas lights santa claus and the dangers of science mike all that and more on this week's episode of ask science mike

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science faith welcome to ask science mike the weekly podcast where i answer your questions about science faith and life and this week the questions are almost all about christmas we'll also have several ask science mike mini episodes this week getting ready for the holiday slowdown where we'll be completely shut down with no new episodes until january 11th but for now let's get it started [Music] also a quick announcement at the top of this show we do have some christmas questions and uh the first couple are fun and jovial and holiday themed but then they get more mature and a little darker as we move through the program so this isn't necessarily an entirely kid-free episode the first two questions should be just fine for any child but after that parents please use discretion and listen before you listen with your kids and our first question this week comes from bros bibles beer on twitter who says my eight-year-old daughter asks theoretically how could santa visit every house on earth in one night hashtag ask science mike and this is a really interesting question because if you start to do the math santa claus gets even more miraculous because there's so many homes that would have to be visited even when you compensate for the fact that not all cultures celebrate christmas and that even cultures that celebrate christmas don't necessarily do so on the same dates there's still incredible ground to cover and not that long to do it and if you start to do the math of which many physicists have done online you'd find that santa sleigh would have to accelerate so quickly that it would likely kill santa claus which would be a terrible christmas and even without the acceleration the atmospheric friction from the speed the sleigh would have to go would burn the sleigh up in the same way that a meteor burns up when it enters the earth atmosphere because of the friction with molecules in the air so when i looked at the physics of how santa claus could be possible i think old saint nick has a three prong physics solution for getting guests to every home at the right time when they celebrate christmas so the first thing i'd say is that reindeer probably don't fly in any conventional sense reindeer aren't using propulsion to fly and they aren't even levitating because the velocity required for santa to visit every house is just too fast and so there's something in physics that's theoretical that was actually born in science fiction but is finding some conventional scientific support as a plausible scientific idea and that's a warp field and warp fields are theoretical fields that can dramatically bend space-time using something called negative energy and when you have a warp field it actually lets you travel faster than light speed from an external reference frame but in your own reference frame you are not traveling at all so even if santa sleigh can fly conventionally at speeds and acceleration rates appropriate for both reindeer and santa in order to do what santa does on christmas eve you would probably need some form of travel that's both faster than light and doesn't cause atmospheric friction and i think warp driven reindeer could do the trick now there's another problem with santa getting house to house and that's he has to carry so much cargo how on earth can we get this much weight and this much capacity on a sly and i think what happens is that santa's bag is probably not a conventional bag at all but instead a portable wormhole portal so scientists are aware that there's something in physics called wormholes that we mainly understand to be quantum phenomenon meaning smaller than adam but i think some of santa's elves might be incredible physicists in fact their engineering capacity is probably centuries beyond normal humanity and that allows them to create a large macro wormhole in santa's bag that's large enough to pass presents directly from the north pole to whatever house santa claus is in so we solved the speed issue and we solved the cargo issue but one problem remains in santa's incredible voyage on christmas eve and that's their you have to spend time in every house and given the millions of houses that santa has to visit there's just not enough time well there's a man named albert einstein who discovered something called the theory of relativity and relativity tells us that time isn't some universal constant it's not linear in all places but the time flows at different rates from different perspectives or reference frames and we've learned that what affects the flow of time is both the speed two things are going relative to each other and the pull of gravity gravity can actually bend space time enough to slow it down so if santa was moving at light speed for example time wouldn't pass for santa at all and he would be bending space time so i suspect also very large black holes can make time almost stop from an external reference frame so these are two things in physics that show we can bend and warp time so i think probably the same understanding of really advanced new physics that the elves have to create wormholes and warp drive also allows them to change the flow of time in a localized manner via means that are beyond our science today so what basically happens is there's nothing magical about it santa is a miracle of new physics he jumps from house to house faster than light using a warp drive in the form of warp driven reindeer he teleports guests directly from the north pole via wormholes and he can bend time and slow it down once he's inside each house [Music] our next question also comes from twitter from cold folds who asks what's the estimated wattage used by clark griswold's 25 000 imported italian twinkle lights hashtag ask science mike well i went back and watched a clip of the film specifically the famous scene with all the lights and gathered a couple of pieces of information just by visual observation one is it looks like clark was using c9 bulbs that's an older light bulb standard that was used in christmas lights and c9 incandescent light bulbs draw about 7 watts each so a little bit of simple arithmetic lets us know that 25 000 c9 bulbs would draw 175 000 watts now that's a lot of electrical energy uh and i'll put that in perspective if clark ran those lights for four hours per night he'd use 700 kilowatt hours of electricity every night how much is that well the average american home in 2014 used 911 kilowatt hours for the month so those 25 000 c9 bulbs would use almost what the average american home uses in a month wow now this gets even weirder because the film showed that all those lights were connected to a single electrical outlet and a normal 15 amp 120 volt residential outlet can deliver about 1800 watts of power and you know you don't have to be great at math to realize that 1800 is a lot less than 175 000 and not only that for a 15 amp breaker 1800 watts isn't even sustainable to avoid overheating you're only supposed to use eighty percent of the amperage a breaker is capable of and that gives you 14 40 watts 1440. so again some simple arithmetic tells us that clark would need 122 independent 15 amp circuits to light his 25 000 c9 christmas lights now let's suppose he has some magical 200 000 watt 120 volt outlet it still wouldn't work because the extension cord running that power to the lights would overheat in a matter of seconds maybe even less than a second and catch fire because there'd be too much electrical energy traveling across that copper wire when engineers have to move power of that kind of capacity you have to use a lot higher gauge materials they have to have heat diffusers if you look at america's electrical grid if you pass by an electrical substation you'll find that because they're moving so much current they have you know radiating heat fins and cooling system and fans and all kind of stuff and uh it's just not possible to use a single traditional electrical cable to power that many christmas lights now there is one solution today clark could have used led c9 bulbs that's light emitting diodes and they're much more efficient at producing light via electricity than incandescent bulbs so compared to the 7 watts a traditional c9 bulb draws led bulbs draw only 0.088 watts per bulb and so 25 000 led italian twinkling lights would draw a total of 2200 watts which could be split across two standard residential circuit breaker outlets with absolute safety [Music] our next question came from one of my patrons on patreon named robert and he asks i have heard the idea of god explained is a type of santa claus where he knows what you're doing to young christians some people choose not to teach their children about a santa claus since the children may believe god to be made up as well are there any studies on the benefits or harmful effects of teaching kids about a magical person who is always watching and will bring them presents on their adult lives also a fun question what was your favorite christmas present you've ever received so i started looking up research to support my answer to this question and i found a couple of things really quickly one there's a profound disagreement among different sociologists and psychologists about how good or bad belief in santa is and i mean profound some say it's beneficial some say it's benign some say it's actively harmful and all present pretty good rhetorical arguments to support their claims based on their experiences as professionals however none of them referenced data or studies in any significant measure and when i tried to find studies on the effects of belief in santa claus the only ones i found were very old and they did not demonstrate any particular correlation between religiosity or religious belief and age inappropriate belief in santa claus and they spoke absolutely not at all to the idea that belief in santa claus could undermine belief in god now some psychologists say that believing in santa can undermine trust in parents and some disagree so in the light of any absence of good studies for me to reference i thought i'd share some thoughts based on science i've studied so first of all childhood mythologies likely emerged to mere human neurocognitive development kind of intuitively and here's what i mean very young children can't understand abstract concepts like democracy they need a face for any idea it's neurologically required so they can understand a president or a judge or a senator and by understanding those people and their jobs they can work to an understanding of democracy but they can't start with the abstract idea and you'll notice that many childhood mythologies like santa claus are rooted in an actual historical figure that came to represent a notable idea children should be educated on like charity or generosity now other mythological figures or child mythology figures like the tooth fairy probably emerged to create anticipation for something positive following an event that can be frightening or traumatic like losing a tooth or something like the boogeyman to keep naughty children in line and not exploring dark or dangerous places so with that understanding that very young children can't explore abstract ideas i was fine going along with child mythologies with my children we we gathered our teeth and left uh money under the pillow and we've done presents for santa claus we do all those things but i also don't push too hard to perpetuate this belief as children as my children outgrew them neurocognitively so we used to go to disney world all the time and at first my children thought that was really cinderella or really mickey mouse and as they grew they came to understand that it was people playing those roles and they still appreciated the experience of going to disney world in fact we just went a couple of weeks ago and had a blast now in terms of santa if my kids asked me if santa was real i'd say it's a sign that they're starting to outgrow the mythology so i would turn the question around and ask them why they wonder if santa is real i encourage them to think critically and if they can provide some justification for their beliefs i tend to say good job you figured it out but as they begin to take those apart i don't work hard to prop up the fantasy i let kids grow out of those beliefs when they're age appropriate i think it's fine to go along with the social ethos the social mythology of santa claus and that the harm comes in when we work too hard to create an illusion to create too much evidence that santa is real and push belief beyond an age-appropriate level of development most kids are naturally going to leave santa behind between ages 5 and 8 some a little later many earlier and like it's also just fine to not teach your kids about santa claus to tell people you can leave gifts like santa wood and encourage that spirit of generosity and honor the social tradition you probably want to tell your kids not to spoil the surprise for other children though but i don't think this is um this is something that is deeply scarring to most children now it does happen some kids feel deeply betrayed when they find out their parents lied to them about santa claus and that's why i think it's so essential to really be in touch with where your children are developmentally and just don't do too much to push the illusion too hard hi science mike this is naomi from atlanta i love listening to your show you're one of the few christians that i still um listen to at all at this point and as i've left the church this year um i've been wrestling with a lot of questions and anger at the church for the past six years or so um but my question to you today relates to mary and the virgin birth even when i was a child i found that narrative to be terrifying and would cry myself to sleep on christmas eve for a number of years in a row thinking about god impregnating me against my will because to me it's always seemed like god decided mary would be pregnant and then had an angel come and tell her and then men wrote her story down in the bible it strikes me as very patriarchal and somewhat oppressive and also i'm not sure what the science would be behind that so i was wondering if you could share some thoughts on that related to the science of it and then also the idea of the virgin birth and and whether that violates mary's free will thank you so much well hi naomi uh you know i was really surprised when i asked people to send in christmas questions i expected a lot more questions about christmas lights and santa claus and kind of funny things and then i thought the theological questions might be more about you know the star of bethlehem which i addressed a little bit last week you know other other ideas science related to the christmas story what i didn't expect was for a third of all the questions submitted to be about immaculate conception that completely blindsided me and i was a little hesitant to weigh in on that at all despite me saying that you know i like to foster you know completely open and honest conversations about science and faith i'll be honest i was scared to tackle this one and then when i got your message uh i got really afraid to tackle it um so i just want to i want to name that i was going to be honest i i'm a little scared to go where we are about to go because we have one story here this idea of a virgin birth and to some people it's essential to their faith it's a huge component of understanding the divinity of jesus and to other people it's a ridiculous bit of mythology and to other people still it's actually hurtful and oppressive in the way that you've experienced and so no matter what i say some people are going to be challenged by any idea i present possibly upset so the first thing i want to say is don't panic if this discussion makes you uncomfortable we're going to walk a delicate line and try to talk about the merits and drawbacks of all these positions if i can now i often say that the existence of jesus as a person isn't very controversial in academics but that the true controversy lies in the resurrection of christ from the grave but if you think about it as i have today the resurrection isn't actually the most extraordinary claim about jesus because you can plausibly scientifically explain a resurrection we've had situations where people have been apparently dead and then have come back that usually involves a hypothermia but you could imagine for example that let's assume god's not real for a second okay or let's assume that jesus isn't god's son let's just i just go there with me for a second let's look at this like a skeptic someone who doesn't see justification that god exists and you could imagine that jesus just had a really weak heartbeat for three days and that he healed in the tomb and then that creates the accounts of a resurrection there's at least some remotely plausible scientific idea for the resurrection but immaculate conception is a completely different league of claim scientifically it just doesn't happen in humans there are some animals primarily invertebrates but a few fish i think amphibians as well that can occasionally or as part of the reproduction conceive without a separate father but it's just not a thing we see in humans or even have any theoretical basis for how it could happen in humans and so this is an idea that's completely off the rails scientifically and many people ask me about the scientific mechanisms that could allow immaculate conception to occur well first of all if you have an all-powerful interventionist god all bets are off anything could happen so you can imagine that god could have placed a completely fertilized egg in mary and simply had mary be a surrogate mother for jesus or god could have placed dna in her womb that then bonded with the egg and half the dna was created by god of course we don't really imagine that god has cells right so god wouldn't have dna this would be something that god created could have even used joseph dna back when i was a younger person and thought about this uh in my baptist days i suspected that you know if you somehow found tissue of jesus and tested it you might find joseph's dna that would necessarily eliminate faith in the immaculate conception because god could use whatever materials god wanted but as you've noticed this story rings strange to modern ears in fact this whole line of thinking about the scientific plausibility of immaculate conception is misreading the bible it's that simple we're taking the bible an ancient bit of literature an ancient collection of writings and reading it with a modernist lens a lens that did not even exist when the bible was written so you know some people skeptics hear immaculate conception and i've actually heard the term divine rape used as you've kind of alluded to in your question the idea that god was violating mary's consent via this act and that's also a modernist way to read an ancient text in the time that the gospels were written women were property and bearing a child was a sign of honor and privilege and distinction and so through that lens even women hearing the scriptures would have thought of mary as blessed by god in this conception now we've grown a lot in the way we view women thank goodness today we honor the rights and personhood of women and that's that's moral progress that's ethically good but the ancients didn't have that lens to look through that was a completely alien idea had never really been presented and uh historians tell us that virgin births were a sign of divinity in first century rome when people wrote down accounts at this point of history they used literary devices to support their claims and virgin birth was a literary device so reading it as some consent violation probably it's it's reading a modernist interpretation of an ancient text it just doesn't work it makes the bible fall apart you can't read any ancient literature that way you have to kind of judge things in the context of their time and that brings us to a point remember the gospels were written to specific audiences and i've read historians that say the virgin birth of christ was a literary device that described his divinity primarily to greek and roman audiences in the same way that the accounts of his lineage was a sign of his valid claims to messiah hood to jewish audiences both of these things are literary devices and the understanding of secular historians so that kind of begs the question is belief in a literal virgin birth essential to christianity and i think it depends on who you ask it's certainly part of the creeds and essential doctrine in most christian denominations and in fact the idea that i would openly question or or accept the validity of skepticism regarding the virgin birth would actually put me outside christianity in the eyes of many christian scholars which frankly i'm pretty used to that i don't worry very much about that but i totally disagree that the virgin birth is somehow essential to being a christian because exhibit a is the gospels themselves the gospels portray people who followed jesus we call them the disciples but fundamentally misunderstood his dfinity and did not understand what the messiah was really about so would we say that peter was a christian or james or john of course we would they were literally the followers of christ the first followers of christ and among the first 12. now of course paul comes along and places more of an emphasis on doctrine and i honor that what we believe is important but the fact is the movement christianity originally called the way started with something as simple as people dropping their nets and deciding to follow and i say a good reading an ancient reading if you will of the biblical text is to understand that the most essential action in following the way or being a christian is to drop your nets and follow the man because something about his story and his claims fascinates you enough to put it all on the line and find out more so if you can't accept a virgin birth don't if the resurrection knocks you down i get it it's okay to follow jesus and be a part of christian community without knowing what you believe about ideas like these that even our theologians call a mystery our faith is not a set of propositions it's not a container of ideas it's not a list of things you have to believe following jesus is something that you do it comes to life in action i don't think you'll find jesus in taking apart immaculate conception or the resurrection i don't think trying to find scientific plausibility for gospel ideas or even a systematic understanding of christian theology will make you a follower of christ but instead walking down a dusty road and being the good samaritan are where the gospel comes to life in our world today [Music] our final question came in via the email inbox and it's a little long but i'm going to read the whole thing hello before i asked my questions i grew up baptist like you jesus was my best friend from the day i learned to pray i have prayed first thing when i wake up in the morning to when i fall asleep at night i went to a baptist college where girls were only allowed to be missionaries or teachers and could not attend the seminary then i attended and worked at mars hill bible church with rob bell and after listening to rob's teaching on women in ministry i felt called to be a pastor and was a youth pastor before i became a mom i have been a student of robbs oprah's and eckhart tolle and the like for the last 15 years i attended rob's doubt night this is all to say i have no problem with doubts and questions all the faith leaders i have had whether i agree with everything they teach or not have mainly expanded my view of god and scripture until you i started listening to you via the liturgists and i didn't care for the way you talked about creationists and other evangelicals it felt like you would say they could be really good stupid people my husband who recommended it to me told me not to listen to it anymore i stopped then i heard you on robcast and an interview with pete holmes because although i don't care for the way you talk about things i want to learn and grow and be a part of the conversation but the more i listen to you the more the god i have known in my life disappears what really did me in was hearing you talk about prayer on the pete holmes you made it weird podcast yes i know years ago but i just heard it a couple of weeks ago since then i have not been able to pray i feel like a fool trying to talk to god i don't remember the scientific terms or specifics about the way you described it but i do know it made me think that i just want to believe in a god that hears me i always thought i had the gift of faith because i never questioned god's existence until now not that i question if there's a great force out there but i'm having a hard time believing in a personal god who hears the thoughts in my head that i called prayer i feel like the rug was pulled out from under me almost depression-like and i sadly believe that you might be thinking that this is great more atheists the better they are your people so my questions are one do you think people are better off as atheists two i know you have your axiom about prayer but do you actually believe that god hears your prayers or are you just praying if you pray because there is scientific evidence to show that it is good for the body because praying and study show that their physical benefits to it feels empty and i have never felt this empty and separated from god before i don't want to pray anymore there is no god to hear or care about my prayers if i have misunderstood your stance on prayer please correct me of course i don't think i will be listening to your podcast i'm too afraid to write off faith even more plus both my pastor who recommended you to my husband and my husband who likes to listen to you have advised me not to listen to you anymore so i guess if you answer my question on air is there any way to be notified so that i can listen to that episode you may wonder why i even bothered to ask but i couldn't sleep last night and since i couldn't do what i normally do when i can't sleep which is pray i was writing this email to you in my head instead thank you gene thanks for emailing me gene thanks for being honest and sharing your heart uh about my work and how it's affected your faith i think i'd like to start by answering your two questions and then responding to some of your email if that's okay and hopefully your husband or your pastor will let you know where this is in this episode so first of all do i think people are better off as atheists no i think sometimes people are better off with atheists i think some ideas about god become harmful as people grow and change but i think other people are better off believing and it's never my goal to make someone atheist or to convince someone to believe in god it's never what i'm trying to do i'll talk more about that in a second i believe in the value of prayer and i pray literally every day now part of that you're right is because i understand that there are scientific benefits to prayer and meditation and that it's good for my brain but i've also had experiences with god and they have all happened to me through prayer and so i still pray to a god that can listen to me even though i often question the logical and rational foundations of any ideas about god like that a god that doesn't intervene in reality often makes more sense to me but yet i still experience a god who knows me i just don't try to figure that out i'm comfortable looking at both sides of that perspective at the same time now in terms of the larger content of your email i have to be honest your email the content of your email is the reason i waited so long to start telling my story i started writing a book and i was afraid to publish it i wrote blog posts that i didn't publish and i was afraid to even talk to people one-on-one about my experience rediscovering god because i knew there were some people like the person who asked the last question who would find solidarity and comfort in my story of a post-atheism faith i often hear from people that they can't listen to the rest of the church anymore or other christians because they make too many assumptions about god but they can still listen to me because i take scientific claims and skeptical claims very seriously but in order to help people in that state with those beliefs i have to honestly and accurately convey the claims of atheism in order for someone to hear me too in their process of deconstruction i have to explain how i lost my faith and whenever i do that there is always the risk that someone is going to hear the ideas of new atheism skepticism or the free thought movement for the first time from me just because i'm explaining how those ideas affected me and something i do different from many christians i dare say most christians is i don't modify or water down those claims in any way when i tell my story or discuss doubt because the critiques of faith by atheist in my opinion have merit and if you weigh them carefully it can undermine some ideas about god and faith in fact for some people it undermines it entirely at some point i hit a tipping point i saw too many people struggling with the same questions i had that i had some answers to but i still worried about how i would affect people like you so honestly your email speaks to a deep fear of mine and the fear is that my work has the potential to be a catalyst in someone's faith deconstruction that i could take someone from a comfortable place with god to a position of very deep doubt even existential doubt my work is for people who want to believe in god but can't anymore that's the core of what i'm about that's who i'm trying to reach now a larger audience does come along for that discussion because i care so much about creating safe open and honest conversations everything i do is about knocking down taboos and the walls and barriers and the ways we discuss faith and god so a lot of pastors who disagree with me about theological ideas listen to the program because they want to get tips and an understanding about how create a an audience that is so evenly divided among very many different ideas about god or even people who reject belief in god all together and that action is very affirming to people some people but it's not that safe for other people many people that have conventional christian ideas about god who have traditional ideas about creation or biblical inheritism find my work to be too challenging and even offensive and for those people who you appear to be one i have great news i can help you take my work less seriously this might sound flippant but i mean it sincerely and genuinely first of all um i don't have any credentials i don't have any degrees i'm a completely self-educated person i have no qualification to discuss science or theology i literally just read a lot and think about it i'm not a pastor i'm not a physicist i'm not a neuroscientist i'm a guy who reads books and the internet and then talks in a microphone in my spare bedroom right now just sitting at a desk on a rainy december day while my kids play outside talking into a microphone so i don't have any authority so you can question anything i say anything i say could be wrong and in fact things i say are often wrong despite my best efforts sometimes i mess up the claims of atheism and my skeptical listeners are always there to kindly remind me of where i missed the mark i even misspeak about the fundamentals of science i did it on the pete holmes podcast that you heard i said that the uh earth rotated the sun at 105 000 miles per hour when the correct figure was 108 000 kilometers per hour it's a ridiculous mistake for that matter i can't even pronounce commonly known words there's a joke on the internet about eagletarians because i didn't know how to say egalitarian until a listener of the program told me it's not pronounced eagletarian i mean can you see why uh people shouldn't take my claims too seriously i'm just figuring this out as i go along now second i am never trying to get people to believe what i believe what i try to do is show people how i came to believe what i believe my goal is to equip people to find their own beliefs to make their own valuations about science and faith and to find peace in life i don't care anything at all about replicating my own personal beliefs i don't want you to believe what i believe about science and faith i want to help you find peace in life that's it if science is taking your faith apart i want to help throw you a lifeline if faith is tearing your life apart i want to help you make a peaceful transition to something else that may include atheism you see the worst way to approach this program is to think of me as an authority there's no end goal for agreement here and in fact you'll find that most of the listeners to this program disagree with me on a multitude of issues even really important substantive things i'm very comfortable disagreeing with people in fact if you talk to my closest friends and family you would find there is little common agreement over who or what god is at all and i do want to say i am genuinely sorry i ever gave you the impression that i think creationists are stupid they aren't and i don't believe it for a second in fact i think some of the smartest people i know are creationists ultimately i decided to start writing and speaking and podcasting because there are so many resources for traditional christian ideas out there young earth creationists old earth creationists biblical and aaronis biblical progressives christian apologists and all the like are in great supply there's websites there's podcasts there's books heck there are entire chains of bookstores devoted to reinforcing traditional ideas about christianity but for people who have grown to understand the claims of skepticism and accepted them in a fundamental way there are very few resources not many people in the church are willing to accurately convey the criticism of skeptics against faith and so literally millions of people find themselves longing for faith and inclusion in the christian tradition but are unable to find someone who will walk with them all the way through their most intense deconstruction that's what my work is for those people so a couple of things if i'm destroying your ideas about god your husband and your pastor are completely right don't listen to my program don't listen to the liturgist it's okay it's just not for you if you're drawn to the progressive portrayal of the christian faith but are uncomfortable with the degree of skepticism that i portray and my friend michael gunger portrays no big deal check out rob bell he's super progressive he's comfortable discussing skepticism but much more embodies a non-skeptical view of faith rachel held evans is great at talking about doubt but in a way that ultimately fits more with an orthodox christianity richard rohr can tell you all about mysticism and other people like andre johnson nadia boltzweber and matthew vines can bring you different perspectives and different voices on progressive christian living and in fact if that's even too far for you if you need some really deep intringing on uh traditional ideas about god like biblical inheritism or creationism an old friend of mine named brian c graves has a podcast that literally takes apart my work and claims among others from the perspective of an old earth creationist is called unapologetic and you can find it on itunes and there's a ton of other traditional christian apologetics resources that will work to refute all the claims that i make that atheists make and even that progressive christians make you see there's a huge menu of options out there if you listen to those things and you still find that god feels distant or unreal i'd encourage you to come back i've got a doubt series on my website where i go through a justification for why god is real or why belief in god is reasonable and therefore it's okay to believe in god as long as you're defining god carefully because my work actually is helping people journey with god in the face of doubt and skepticism it sounds to me like you might need to do some soul searching maybe some grieving maybe some contemplation some prayer some hands-on activities in your church do the things that make god feel close to you talk to god about your doubts and stop listening to that idiot science mike but if you find that you know three months from now six months from now you're still in this pickle and you have more questions i'm always here well that does it for another episode of ask science mike as i mentioned at the beginning of the program there will not be another full episode until january 11th taking a couple weeks off for the holidays and frankly because i'm in the final stretch of working on my book and uh i should be done or very close to done with my book by the time that next episode comes out so wish me luck boy is it uh these these final rewrites are very challenging um with my publisher uh just because i feel like an idiot most days my editors are very smart and and bring a very interesting pushback and challenges in my writing i do have some events coming up and hoping to get the events page updated in the next few days 2016 is starting to fill up so if you'd like science mike to come to your faith community or college or conference you need to go to ask sciencemike.com and click book mike soon or you might not be able to get me in 2016. just how things are going i want to thank greg nordine for the amazing work he does producing the program it's been a great year greg thank you so much i want to thank jeb botterford for our theme song it is absolutely the best part of the show and i want to thank you all for listening especially those of you who are supporting me on patreon uh if you enjoy the program and have a couple of bucks to kick me every month you can go to ask sciencemike.com click the patreon button and keep us on the air i'm so thankful for all of you who do i wish you a happy advent season and a merry christmas [Music]