“There are three things I have learned never to discuss with people…religion, politics, and the Great Pumpkin.” Linus from Peanuts.
Author: lenbilen
Retired engineer, graduated from Chalmers Technical University a long time ago with a degree in Technical Physics. Career in Aerospace, Analytical Chemistry, computer chip manufacturing and finally adjunct faculty at Pennsylvania State University, taught just one course in Computer Engineering, the Capstone Course.
Acts 14. Paul went to Iconium, preached the Gospel and they threatened to stone him, so he fled to Lystra and they did. He and Barnabas escaped to Derbe. From there they returned to Lystra, Iconium and Antioch where Paul strengthened the converts, after which they went back to Attalia and sailed back to Antioch where they gave a report on their first missionary journey.
2 Samuel 1, David got the report of Saul’s death. David lamented of the death of Saul and his son, known as the Song of the Bow.
In 2 Samuel 2 David was Anointed King of Judah and Ishboseth, son of Saul was made King of Israel, which led Israel and Judah to go to war against each other.
Acts 13, Barnabas and Saul begin their first missionary journey with preaching at Cyprus where Saul’s name was changed to Paul. From there they went to the Pisidian Antioch. A lot happened there, and the Jews expelled them from the region and they continued on their journey to Iconium.
1 Samuel 29, the Philistines rejected David.
1 Samuel 30, David defeated the Amalekites but his two wives were taken hostage and had to be rescued.
1 Samuel 31 tells of the death of Saul’s sons, and how Saul himself fell on his own sword.
Acts 12. Herod persecuted the Church putting many in prison, even Peter. Peter miraculously escaped from Prison. Herod’s suffered a violent death after giving a speech without giving glory to God.
In 1 Samuel 26 David Spared Saul’s Life a second time.
1 Samuel 27. David allied himself with the Philistines.
In 1 Samuel 28 David was among the Philistines and Saul consults a medium, the medium at En Dor. The medium did bring up Samuel!
Acts 11. The Jews did not like that gentiles could receive the Holy Spirit, but Peter explains God’s Grace. Barnabas went looking for Saul and they went to Antioch. It was there the believers were first called Christians. first in Antioch, and it was from there they sent relief to fellow believers in Judea by Barnabas and Saul.
1 Samuel 23. David Saved the City of Keilah, was pursued by Saul, and spending most of the time in the wilderness strongholds.
In 1 Samuel 24 David Spares Saul’s life, staying true to God.
1 Samuel 25 records Samuel’s Death. It also tells the vivid story of David and Abigail, the Wife of Nabal.
Acts 10. Cornelius, a Roman centurion called for Peter to come. That same day Peter had a vision about eating all food, including unclean food. Peter protested, but the voice in the vision told him “What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common.“ Peter followed Cornelius’ servants from Joppa to Caesarea, where he met Cornelius and presented the Gospel to Cornelius’ household. They all believed, the Holy Spirit fell on them and they were baptized, the first gentiles converted.
1 Samuel 20, Jonathan and David vowed an oath of loyalty, saying: “The Lord be between me and thee, and between my seed and thy seed for ever.”
In 1 Samuel 21 David and his men ate from the Holy Showbread. After that David fled to Gath and pretended to be insane to stay alive.
1 Samuel 22, David gathered four hundred men and went back into Judah. Because the LORD’s priests had helped David, Saul had Doeg the Edomite murder the priests, eighty-five in all.
Acts 9. On the road to Damascus Saul was Converted. Ananias met up with Saul and from that time on Saul Preached Christ. The Jews decided to kill Saul, but he escaped at night by being lowered out the window, hidden in a basket. Saul then went to Jerusalem. The believers were at first suspicious of him, but Barnabas told what had happened to Saul, and the Church Prospers. Later Saul healed the paralytic Aeneas and in Joppa a woman named Tabitha (or Dorcas) died. The believers immediately called for Peter, and he uttered the words “Tabitha cumi” and she rose up again.
1 Samuel 18. Saul began to resent David, and no wonder, women started chanting “Saul hath slain his thousands, and David his ten thousands.” Saul’s daughter Michal fell in love with David, and Saul let them marry after a rather unusual dowry, but he became more and more suspicious and afraid of David.
In 1 Samuel 19 the feud is on, and Saul Persecuted David, trying to kill him over and over again.
Acts 8, Saul persecutes the Church, it was so severe that the believers scattered all over the nations. Thanks to that, the Gospel reaches Samaria where they meet Simon the Sorcerer, even he comes to believe, but he still thinks the Holy Spirit can be purchased with money! Finally Philip meets the Ethiopian eunuch. Thanks to God’s word in the scroll of Isaiah, he too came to believe and is baptized.
1 Samuel 16, Saul anoints David as King after rejecting all of David’s older brothers and David enters into Saul’s service, still being the titular King. Whenever Saul’s spirit troubles him David plays for him and that soothes Saul.
1 Samuel 17 tells the story of David and Goliath. Just read it, it is great reading.
Thursday, two days before finals was the PSU Engineering Capstone showcase. Even though I have been a lecturer there for the last seven years I didn’t realize it is by far the largest Capstone showcase of this type in the world, and it is growing year by year. This year there were 126 Senior Design course teams from the traditional engineering disciplines, but also the Nuclear, Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering teams participated, as well as the freshmen Engineering Design class, nearly 200 entries, in all around 1000 participants.
The set-up began at 10:30 a. m. in the Bryce Jordan main Arena, with 126 senior Capstone projects displaying their results. The other projects were displayed in the Southern Annex training area.
The success of the showcase is in part because of a large number of corporate sponsors, some who sponsor multiple projects. Some of these projects are at the very cutting edge of science and provide a real challenge for the students.
My role as an instructor is quite simple: To convert the engineering students from students to world class engineers in 16 short weeks. The engineering students are organized in teams of 4 or 5 persons. All of my teams this year consisted of engineers from at least 2 engineering majors, so the teams must get to know each other, work together as a functioning team, do the research, build a series of prototypes or a final product as a team, with deadlines to meet. This is quite different from cramming for an exam.
The projects are quite different: This spring I had the opportunity to coach 5 teams:
The first team tried to make sensor enabled athletic shoes, they took a shoe, put in a sensor that measured g-forces and temperature, added a transmitter to send the results to a computer for analysis. They also learned to 3D print a new sole for the shoe with the proper cavities for the sensors and battery. The challenge is to choose the best material for sole design. This project had three biomedical engineers and two computer engineers.
The next team made a contraption for taking muscle measurement during exercise. When exercise starts , blood flow increases and the muscles expand. As they dehydrate they slowly contracts again. The team made a band to fit around the thigh muscle of the one exercising with two time-of-flight sensors to measure the expansion and contraction of the muscle, sending the results to a computer for data collection, analysis and evaluation.
This was so successful that they won third prize for best project!
They also won fist prize for best 3 min video of their project!
The third team, investigating wearable exercises in Industry 4.0. Industry 4.0 is a nickname for the fourth industrial revolution where robots take over and the people are taking on a more supervisory role overseeing robots and not doing the work themselves. There are few safety regulations developed to deal with this new complexity. One of the concerns is the stress it induces on the operators. A little stress is good, too much can be catastrophic. This became my emotional favorite, since at the same time my heart decided to be more and more blocked, ending up getting a stent put in the so-called widow-maker heart artery and I found myself hooked up with a portable BioPac for one day much like their research version. In addition, during the showcase one student passed out from stress and excitement! Anyhow, here is the team:
The fourth team was charged with making a Wireless Valve Position Indicator for the Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission (WSSC). They were highly successful in their assigned task and functioned well as a team together. Here they are, all smiles, with their sponsor:
They won first prize for best poster!
Things do not always turn out as planned, and so was the case with team five.
They were charged with making an expensive piece of machinery, controlled by a Programmable Logic Controller work better. The PLC was from early 2000, Japanese proprietary, and the third-party vendor that had done the original coding was nowhere to be found anymore. The source code was finally delivered, but it took all the 16 weeks to secure a software license. The only contribution possible was making a better way of guiding sheet metal through the machine. However, they did what they could with the hand that was dealt them, and they learned a lot about how to deal with third-party vendors whose priority is to get another contract and not be helpful.
In all, a very successful Senior Design Showcase! As always, we are looking for more corporate sponsors to present challenges for the graduating class of future world-class engineers. This spring there were 88 sponsors, some with multiple projects.
Headline: NYC Vows to Start ‘Phasing Out’ Hot Dogs to Save the Planet as Part of Their Own $14B Green New Deal.
A favorite, low cost food in the U.S has always been hot dogs and beans. If NYC gets their way this is about to change, making life more difficult for the struggling people living from hand to mouth on a limited budget.
Len Bilén's blog, a blog about faith, politics and the environment. 