Audiostretto 59/4/24 English

In mathematics and language brackets are used to express syntax. In mathematics, you group terms together that are to be calculated first, in language they serve as a kind of optional additional information. But one also speaks of clinging when people hold onto something or people in a perhaps unhealthy way. People who cling to others are not perceived as very pleasant, because one feels taken in...

You know the saying „kicking the bucktet“. Most etymologists agree that the "bucket" refers to a kind of yoke that was used to hold pigs by their heels so that they could be slaughtered. The subsequent death-throe spasms of the unfortunate animals created the impression that they were "kicking the bucket“. It is not a pleasant thing to imagine. However, sometimes we feel like put under a yoke with...

Ice cubes are wonderful when you have the desire for a cool drink. But they are used differently depending on the drink. For example, ice cubes are usually added directly to mineral water or sweet drinks, while for wine, a container is filled with ice and the wine bottle is placed inside. Cooling takes place in both cases, but in the former the drink is changed by the ice cubes because they dissol...

Education concerns us all. We have all experienced it more or less intensively and are perhaps even currently in a situation in which we are actively dealing with it. One thinks mainly of parents and children, but I understand education more broadly. Somewhere it is about imparting certain values, thus shaping a culture and, as a result, modeling and promoting appropriate behaviour that correspond...

Our microwave at home must not be placed in a box or too close to a wall. This is because it produces a lot of hot exhaust air during operation. This must be able to ventilate, otherwise it will overheat and ultimately cause the appliance to collapse. The unit does not radiate heat everywhere and at will, but rather specifically via an exhaust air outlet. Depending on the situation in life or ever...

In mobility we are familiar with shortcuts: getting from A to B faster, with less effort in terms of time or distance. But with shortcuts you also lose part of the way. Sometimes that is a pity, even if the whole way is more time-consuming. Sometimes, in difficult times, we long for shortcuts and then we wish we were already at our destination. I'm not a fan of "the way is the goal" because I don'...

We had it yesterday about the sun warming up cool places and that this is a good analogy for when people experience God's love and it warms their heart. It is similar with the fog. In places with surface water or in autumn, there is often fog in the morning, which impairs visibility or makes long-distance vision almost impossible. We know the saying that one walks as if in the fog when one does no...

In summer, something cool to drink, a cool shade or a cool breeze from a river are very pleasant against the heat. However, cool people are not perceived positively. We often mean that they are distant, inaccessible, unemotional. One does not necessarily seek a relationship with such people or want to spend time with them - because of their inaccessibility. When I think of nature, I think that a p...

I've written before about the good old vinyl records. I am fascinated by how they worked. So many things, or a whole system, had to function and be coordinated: the material, the system that imprinted the music on the vinyl, the pickup that could recognise these signals and also dechip them correctly, the playback system for playing the music, the record player that had to stand horizontally and t...

When we speak of seeing, we actually automatically assume the sense of sight and our eyes. But seeing is more comprehensive. It also means that we see something coming, an event or something similar.  Jesus once told his listeners: it is strange: you look at the sky, see the clouds, interpret them and predict the weather before tomorrow. But you cannot judge what else will happen. So he is ad...

We all know that due to climate change, glaciers are melting rapidly. They are one of the important indicators of rising temperatures caused by human behaviour. At first, we don't notice anything. We may even be happy that it is getting a little warmer, that we have to heat less and that it is really hot in summer for once. Other people on earth suffer existentially from the consequences. There wi...

Do you know those wonderful pictures of microscope images that show the smallest structures that we would never see with the naked eye? They are very often works of art, I think. They are often symmetrical and in my eyes just great, amazing. It reminds me that if there is such order and symmetry in such infinitesimally small things, how much more is the whole cosmos and we with it so wonderfully d...

Gliding means flying without an engine. This is made possible by thermals. When planning a flight, one looks for places where warm air rises. This is used to keep the glider in the air or to climb with it. A motor-driven aircraft first transports the glider to a certain altitude. Then it disengages and flies autonomously. This reminds me that in life I also depend on others to lead me first to pla...

A drilling rig can handle enormous loads. Small and medium-sized drilling rigs, for example, are a maximum of 30m high and capable of lifting loads of up to 200 tonnes. What power! Such drilling rigs extract material from the earth's interior that would not come to the surface on its own. In our parlance, we also talk about someone drilling down when they persistently or specifically ask questions...

When I think about all the processes that take place in my body to keep my organism alive, healthy and functioning and how little I feel of it - I can only marvel. It is completely beyond my imagination how individual enzymes work, how the lymphatic system functions or how the heart circulates oxygen and the intestines convert food into energy. But just because I can't imagine it doesn't mean it i...

We are all affected by the war in Ukraine and the unimaginable suffering caused by this war and others. The personal distress of individuals is unspeakable. A man named Jeremiah was also in such a situation and he wrote a book, Lamentations. In it he records how he fared in such times of war, how he suffered and how he turns to God in his distress with his lament. In the short book, in the third c...

A viaduct is a type of bridge - not necessarily over a river. It is a connection between two sides that are separated by a valley, for example. This means that you can also get from the starting point to the end point without the viaduct, but with much more effort. In our relationships, we can sometimes also be such connections between other people or even groups. We have the ability to understand...

I put my contact lenses in the evening the other day for overnight cleaning with a new cleaning agent. When I put the first lens in the next morning, my eye burned like fire. It was like I was burning my eye. I had no idea what kind of solution I had used. I just felt burning pain. Instinctively, I closed my eye as a reflex - but that was precisely the worst thing I could do. I had to force myself...

We in the West live in a world where we have above-average freedom of choice. This starts with food: in most cases we are free to choose what we want to cook or eat. There are hardly any restrictions on what is on offer. We also have enormous possibilities in other areas - in mobility or materially and with regard to the housing situation, education, etc. We have a lot of freedom of choice. But we...

You have probably already used a filter and a sieve in everyday life. It looks like a filter and a sieve are the same thing: you pour something in at the top and the same thing comes out filtered or sieved at the bottom. That's only partly true. With a sieve, what you put in at the top comes out without the coarser parts. With a filter, an additional substance - usually liquid - is needed to disso...

As a child, I thought that a crown made a person a king. In other words, that the crown makes a person a king not only on the outside, but in his whole being. I thought it and the sceptre were something magical. Today, of course, I know that this is not the case. The crown can either confirm what already is: the personality of the person wearing it - or: only imply a role for the person wearing it...

Moving forward is important to many of us and I would say that on the vast majority of days we are also moving forward in one way or another. Unless we are sick and have to spend the whole day in bed. For us, forward movement is clear: one step at a time, put one leg in front of the other, push off the back and do the same again. For certain animals, this looks different. The caterpillar, for exam...

When we talk, we don't use punctuation marks. Just by saying it, it becomes clear whether we are formulating a statement or a question. This is different with a text. There, punctuation marks are used to understand the text correctly, because neither pauses in speech nor pitch are represented. I got stuck with the question mark. It actually looks - with a little imagination - like a half - and the...

We sometimes say of people or ourselves that he or she or we have rough edges. By this we mean sides and qualities about us that we sometimes bump into. So in situations they lead to resistance and perhaps even conflicts, arguments. Especially for those in need of harmony, such moments or character traits are painful, unpleasant. But... I'm thinking of a screw or its counterpart, the nut: if it we...

Some say they believe only what they see. The conscious decision for the acceptance of a fact or a being convinced therefore involves a corresponding visible proof. So also in the God-relationship. God is invisible, so one does not believe in his existence. This was already the case for Jesus' closest friends: after his resurrection, his friend Thomas said the well-known words that he could only b...