Barnabas File

When I did denominational work, I frequently traveled by car and got into the habit of listening to audio-books, first on cassette tapes and then DVDs.     Now, of course, these are available as digital downloads on your iPhone or iPad.     Since the beginning of the year, I have had the opportunity to listen to four complete audio books.     As you will note, they cover a variety of topics and all provide interesting insights about people and culture. J. D. Vance, Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis Vance’s writing style is poignant, abrupt, and down-to-earth.  His memoir includes plenty of salty language that clearly expresses both his attitude and that of his family and friends growing up.  Vance is a success story.  Coming out of a declining area of southeast Ohio, he survived a difficult childhood to enter the Marines and eventually graduate from Yale Law School.  A Republican, h...

In his book a bout billionaire business man Elon Musk, author Ashlee Vance often compares Musk to Tony Stark (aka Iron Man) from the Marvel Comics universe.   To me, he seems much more like Delos D. Harriman, the protagonist of Robert Heinlein’s The Man Who Sold the Moon (1949).   Like Harriman, Musk is driven to take humanity into space and establish a permanent colony--not on the moon but on Mars.   Growing up in South Africa, Musk was not only a computer nerd but a voracious reader of science fiction.  During a difficult childhood, this literature was formative for Musk, shaping his worldview and his values. More of a physicist than a business man, Musk is a polymath who learns things quickly and has a vivid imagination.  He has used these skills to launch not only internet businesses like PayPal, but industrial companies such as SpaceX, a rocket builder; Tesla, an electric automobile manufacturer; and SolarCity, th...