John Hudson Tiner
Autor de Johannes Kepler: Giant of Faith and Science (Sowers)
Sobre El Autor
Series
Obras de John Hudson Tiner
Etiquetado
Conocimiento común
- Fecha de nacimiento
- 1944-10-08
- Género
- male
- Nacionalidad
- USA
- Lugar de nacimiento
- Pocahontas, Arkansas, USA
- Educación
- Harding College (BS)
Duke University (MAT) - Ocupaciones
- teacher
cartographer - Biografía breve
- Tiber attended Harding College, where he received his bachelor of science degree, then went on to earn his M.A.T. from Duke University. Subsequently, Tiner taught junior high, high school, and college students math or science.
Now a cartographer and freelance author, Tiner writes textbooks, science curriculum material, character-building biographies, and books on a variety of other subjects, including mysteries, science fiction, astronomy, photography, biographies of historical people, and religious works.
Tiner's material has been translated into a variety of languages including Spanish, Russian, and German. He currently lives with his wife in Missouri.
(biography excerpted from publisher author page, http://www.exodusbooks.com/author.aspx?id=520 on 2013-12-15)
Miembros
Reseñas
When science fails por John Hudson Tiner
Part of ACE Science urriculum for Home Schooling
This book is part of a series by Tiner "Exploring the world of ..."; others are on Medicine, Planet Earth, Chemistry, Physics and The World Around You. The book is obviously written for the Christian market and the American market.
In a sense this book aims to do too much. It covers a wide historical period and a wide range of mathematical concepts for 'students of several different ages and skill levels'.
Tiner starts off by looking at measuring the years and then the hours. Measurement is dependent upon number, so I would have thought a better first place to start would be the numerical aspect but that isn't dealt with until chapter 7.
There are one or two math errors: eg 'Every time a number is multiplied by 1,000, three zeros are added, and a new name is given'. Not if the number is 1.3! Such an approach destroys place value concepts - not a great idea in an introductory maths book!
Bible verses are interspersed - sometimes without apparent reason. This approach tends to view Christianity as an icing on the mathematics cake. There are side boxes on topics such as Hebrew and Jewish Calandar of the Old Testament and Cubit in the Bible. Peter's catch of 153 fish (Jn 21:11) is examined - 153 = 1^3 5^3 3^3. However, little attempt is made to fully integrate Christianity and mathematics.
There are a number of missed opportunities. For example, on the decimal system, Tiner applauds the United States for being the first country to adopt a decimal money system and showed its advantages and yet they haven't embraced full metrification - it would have been interesting to have explored why not. And in the context of decimals how are we, in light of a Christian worldview, to interpret Tobias Dantzig's assertion in Number The Language of Science (1930):
... man counts by tens, his ten fingers will remind him of the human origin of this most important phase of his mental life. So may the decimal system stand as a living monument to the proposition: Man is the measure of all things."
There is a helpful discussion on the Golden ratio - Tiner noted that the dimensions of Noah's Ark in (Gn 6:15) and the Ark of the Covenant are close to the Golden ratio; but why is 1.618 so prevalent in creation?
Pythagras' absolutisation of number and the Greek rationalisation of proof are not really explored - this would have been a good opportunity to show how worldviews shape mathematics.
The Christian faith of mathematicians is also largely absent. Some mathematicians who are Christians are mentioned, but little is made of their faith and in the portrayal of Newton one could be forgiven for thinking that Newton was an orthodox evangelical rather than a unitarian.
I have perhaps been a little over critical; and it is undoubtably much better than the Christian maths book I haven't written!! There is much of use in this book and it may provide the Christian teacher with some useful ideas. It is well laid out and illustrated with line drawings and photographs. It would make for a good resource for the school library or Christian teacher.
… (más)
In a sense this book aims to do too much. It covers a wide historical period and a wide range of mathematical concepts for 'students of several different ages and skill levels'.
Tiner starts off by looking at measuring the years and then the hours. Measurement is dependent upon number, so I would have thought a better first place to start would be the numerical aspect but that isn't dealt with until chapter 7.
There are one or two math errors: eg 'Every time a number is multiplied by 1,000, three zeros are added, and a new name is given'. Not if the number is 1.3! Such an approach destroys place value concepts - not a great idea in an introductory maths book!
Bible verses are interspersed - sometimes without apparent reason. This approach tends to view Christianity as an icing on the mathematics cake. There are side boxes on topics such as Hebrew and Jewish Calandar of the Old Testament and Cubit in the Bible. Peter's catch of 153 fish (Jn 21:11) is examined - 153 = 1^3 5^3 3^3. However, little attempt is made to fully integrate Christianity and mathematics.
There are a number of missed opportunities. For example, on the decimal system, Tiner applauds the United States for being the first country to adopt a decimal money system and showed its advantages and yet they haven't embraced full metrification - it would have been interesting to have explored why not. And in the context of decimals how are we, in light of a Christian worldview, to interpret Tobias Dantzig's assertion in Number The Language of Science (1930):
... man counts by tens, his ten fingers will remind him of the human origin of this most important phase of his mental life. So may the decimal system stand as a living monument to the proposition: Man is the measure of all things."
There is a helpful discussion on the Golden ratio - Tiner noted that the dimensions of Noah's Ark in (Gn 6:15) and the Ark of the Covenant are close to the Golden ratio; but why is 1.618 so prevalent in creation?
Pythagras' absolutisation of number and the Greek rationalisation of proof are not really explored - this would have been a good opportunity to show how worldviews shape mathematics.
The Christian faith of mathematicians is also largely absent. Some mathematicians who are Christians are mentioned, but little is made of their faith and in the portrayal of Newton one could be forgiven for thinking that Newton was an orthodox evangelical rather than a unitarian.
I have perhaps been a little over critical; and it is undoubtably much better than the Christian maths book I haven't written!! There is much of use in this book and it may provide the Christian teacher with some useful ideas. It is well laid out and illustrated with line drawings and photographs. It would make for a good resource for the school library or Christian teacher.
… (más)
The other review is pretty funny. I wouldn't read this book because it is written by a writer whose focus is the Christian homeschooling market. There are plenty of other similar books that collect stories about various scientists in one volume, I can read those if I want to.
However, the other reviewer hates on it for being so all-fired bend-over backward-PC; these characteristics are not usually supposed to define the Christian homeschooling movement. I would love for him to use the logic of his review to explain how Christian homeschooling texts must inevitably be the very dregs of PC revisionism, and so forth.
It's odd, but the reviewer doesn't really seem to have bothered to consider what a biography written for the Christian homeschool market ought to do. Or what biographies or collections of biographical sketches are intended to do generally. But, I think that, when written for the Christian homeschool market, their purpose is to edify (and emphasize "Christian values"). Does this book do that? I'm not going to take the time to find out, but I'm afraid this other reviewer didn't pay enough attention to even get around to considering that question.
It is wierd to include Edison among the scientists. He is worthy of inclusion in many books, some of which I have read, but "inventor", "businessman", possibly "engineer", would describe him better than "scientist".… (más)
However, the other reviewer hates on it for being so all-fired bend-over backward-PC; these characteristics are not usually supposed to define the Christian homeschooling movement. I would love for him to use the logic of his review to explain how Christian homeschooling texts must inevitably be the very dregs of PC revisionism, and so forth.
It's odd, but the reviewer doesn't really seem to have bothered to consider what a biography written for the Christian homeschool market ought to do. Or what biographies or collections of biographical sketches are intended to do generally. But, I think that, when written for the Christian homeschool market, their purpose is to edify (and emphasize "Christian values"). Does this book do that? I'm not going to take the time to find out, but I'm afraid this other reviewer didn't pay enough attention to even get around to considering that question.
It is wierd to include Edison among the scientists. He is worthy of inclusion in many books, some of which I have read, but "inventor", "businessman", possibly "engineer", would describe him better than "scientist".… (más)
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Estadísticas
- Obras
- 69
- Miembros
- 4,376
- Popularidad
- #5,732
- Valoración
- 4.0
- Reseñas
- 10
- ISBNs
- 94