Good morning. You are with the Vermont House Government Operations Committee. We are meeting this morning to hear a bit about H-196, which is an act relating to supporting the work of the Executive Director of Racial Equity. And so we have with us this morning, Susanna Davis, who is the Executive Director of Racial Equity. And we are seeing if we can pull the bill's sponsor out of his committee meeting this morning to see if he would like to come and speak to this as well. But Susanna, since we have you with us this morning, I would like to invite you to help us understand what H-196 calls for and what that would mean for the work of your office. Yes. Thank you. Buenos dias. I am Susanna Davis, Racial Equity Director for the state. And H-196, effectively based on my last read of it, would create two full-time positions to support the work of the Racial Equity Office. I have heard a lot of people refer to the Racial Equity Office over the last year and a half since I've been here. The office is just me. It's just this guy in a room. So it would effectively create something of an office by adding two staff. So this is something that does appear in the governor's proposed budget as a line item for $250,000 of FY22 money. And I suppose one of the questions that I often get asked is what is this going to do? And what is it going to mean? And there is, I suppose, a simple answer that I could give. This is money or rather the money that this would be, sorry, this funding allocation would lead to staffing that is a huge assist for pretty much everyone around the state. And I remember telling other cabinet members that this proposal is exciting for me, but it's more exciting for them. Because what it does is increase the capacity for their work to be more equity informed and to receive additional assistance that is sometimes difficult for one person to provide. So there are a lot of different aspects of this work and the enabling statute, which is Act 9 of 2018 outlines a number of duties for the Racial Equity Director, including but not limited to overseeing the statewide collection of race data, and developing performance targets and metrics for racial equity, developing and conducting trainings for state agencies, overseeing the state. Sorry, I said that one already. Doing a top to bottom overview of all three branches of state government to identify systemic racism, develop model policies and mitigation practices, etc. Additionally, over the last roughly a year and a half since I've been in the role, a long list of items have been added to that charge by various statutes in order. The person in this role sits on nine committees formally. And also I interact with about I think 17 total, and I serve as liaison between two for the enabling statute. So, you know, it was a little bit more difficult. And the before time before everything went virtual because of course if there was a one o'clock in Burlington, and the three o'clock in Bennington you couldn't do both you have to choose. These days because everything is virtual, I think you all would agree we all find ourselves bouncing from one meeting to the next. And it's actually created an additional workload because it's been so much more permissive of people being in more places at the same time. And that's an opportunity that I greatly appreciate because it permits this, it permits our work to have broader reach around the state, which became especially important in the summer of 2012. After another person in the United States was murdered on camera by the government. And the nation this time really felt it felt it very deeply. And it caused an incredible ground swell of renewed energy around equity, not just in criminal justice but in all sectors of American life. And so what that meant for my work and I imagine for the work of equity practitioners around the state is that we were absolutely flooded with more inquiries and requests and offers. And please for help. And it became something that was both exhilarating and overwhelming. I say exhilarating, because in some places, the hardest part of every work is convincing people that it matters, and that they should give it down. In Vermont that has not been the case in Vermont I have rarely had to convince anybody that this work was necessary or meaningful, because what I what I really appreciate about the state is that folks get it. And if they don't get it they want to get it. So it's never been about convincing people that it mattered but rather last year what we really saw was so many more people who were willing not just to acknowledge that it mattered but we're willing to actually do something and who reached out to the state for that assistance. So that means added things like training and lecturers and appearances and deep dive policies reviews I've been contacted by numerous municipalities around the state looking for assistance with creating things like foods of conduct or model policies on equity. Locality is looking to hold events or create funding streams who are looking to do equity based reforms people who want to do more recruitment and hiring people who are looking for training opportunities. People who are forming new committees or new advisory boards and wants guidance or membership. And so, so, so it's really been very positive and it's been, I mean it's disappointing that the circumstances were what they were that led to that. But, but it's absolutely a good thing that more and more people are on board and see the urgency of this work. Now that's the exhilarating part of it. The overwhelming part of it comes about because there are only so many of us who are who are doing this work formally. And I do always tell people when they say well you have such a big job I say no we have a big job because it can't be one person or a handful of people's job so in effect it really is everyone's work. But having the role formally and having this carved out in statute and the admin means that there's a certain level of oversight a certain level of eyes and ears that that we want to be able to have around the state and so it brings me back to H196 and to the Governor's proposed budget item which would permit all of that work and more to happen and not just to continue happening but to expand. So I'm going to give three examples of those work streams that would be improved through funding but before I do I am going to pause I know that the bill sponsor has joined and I want to stop in case there's any questions so far. I'm not not seeing any hands raised. All right, continuing the monologue. So one of the main work streams is committee work I already mentioned I interact with about 17 committees I formally sit online and I liaise between to and the cabinet. So having additional staff is going to permit this office to be in all of those places as required by law or as required by good practice or common sense. It allows us to be able to have a presence in spaces like hearings and community meetings. I have to make this a point with my great disappointment that I have to sometimes pick and choose which legislative hearings to attend, because racial equity has a role in every topic. And sometimes it's difficult to decide. Should I go talk about brown people dying across the state or brown people getting arrested across the state. It's a very difficult decision when when hearings are happening simultaneously. So having additional staff means that we can be in more places, provide that real time guidance to flow, attend all of the community meetings, whether they're happening evenings, weekends, early mornings or during the day. Another work stream is training. That is something that is mandated by the enabling statute. It's also one of my favorite parts of the job actually. Being able to develop and conduct training for agencies is technically the only bit that is actually required of this role. But state agencies of course aren't the only ones who really, really need to understand the underlying issue grapple with them and work equity into their work. This is a job for individuals, communities, select boards, school, faculty, administrators, corporations, not for profit, you name it. And so really the training while only mandated for agencies are really morally necessary for everyone. I've been conducting training for all of those kinds of organizations that I just listed. And again, it really is just about how many different places can you be at once. How many different topics can you lecture or present on how many different ways and places can you deliver this important and sometimes life-saving information to people. So additional staff is also going to permit this office to provide those trainings. And another important piece of this is that I think a lot of times people assume that you're just going to do the round with all the agencies. Everyone's been trained on equity and that's it. But we've got decades of data that show us that learning is not one and done. It needs to be refreshed. It needs to be re-up. And it happens most effectively when we receive information in smaller bits over a consistent period of time rather than just doing a half-day session for four hours and then saying, you know everything and we're going to retain all the information forever. So the training really is an ongoing piece. Of course, there's also data that show that training alone is not going to solve systemic racism. So we acknowledge that training is one piece of the pie, but it is an incredibly important piece of the pie. And so having additional staff also permits us to be able to do that to reach effectively people in education institutions at all grade levels, to reach professionals in all sectors, and to make sure that we're delivering a consistent message across the state. One that is not sort of piecemeal or patchwork, but rather that we are unified in our messaging and that people are being consistently shown where the state's values are and what the state's plan is. The third work stream that I'll talk about is data analysis. I am by no means a statistician, a mathematician, or anything of the sort, but data are so incredibly important when we're talking about equity work. And I don't just mean racial equity, any sort of equity, whether we're talking about disparities for the LGBTQIA plus community, people living with disabilities, seniors, young people, you name it. If we're talking about equity, then metrics matter and math matters. So having been in this role for about a year and a half, I have come to rely very heavily on state specific data, national data and highly localized data where it's available. But in order to really do any kind of analysis, I've often had to rely on data scientists and analysts from other agencies who's been willing to lend their time to do that analysis, or on organizations who have found the capacity to do certain analysis. A number of great reports and surveys and other findings have been conducted by community groups in Vermont, often uncompensated, but those data have proven tremendously valuable to us and to our work. So, again, additional staff will allow us to be able to not only receive the volume of data that is increasingly being collected in Vermont, but also to do the deep dive analysis that are necessary so that we can really surface those disparities. And more importantly, do something about them. So, I think I've gone on long enough. I'm going to stop there. And again, thank you for the invitation to be here. I'm happy to take any questions or speak for them. Thank you. Hal Colston. Good morning, Susanna. And I want to thank you for your, your service and your leadership and I do believe your office is making an impact. My question is, if these two positions are put in place, how will legislators benefit from this move. Well, that's the best part. You all are big winners in this. The, the additional position. So I have to say, this role is situated in the administration, but it is a statewide role and therefore requires collaboration and access to all three branches of state government. I have been extremely pleased and grateful with the level of interest and collaboration and commitment from the legislature and the, and the, oh my goodness. Oh my gosh. Why am I doing this judiciary. And, and so one of the, one of the inquiries that I've gotten most from legislators is review of policy responses to policy. How does this impact people of color in Vermont or rather, how can we make it impact people of color in Vermont. It's a big benefit to legislators with the traditional staff is having people who have that policy that dedicated focus on policy and data who can do deep dives with you all on how policy can be impacted with people of color. For example, in the executive agencies, we are required to do equity impact assessment for all budget and policy proposals that come out of the executive agency. But right now there's no such requirement for legislative proposals. And so we're kind of back filling that on our own by doing these analyses. Sometimes that can be overwhelming for agency folks, but additional staff in the racial equity office means that we can have people dedicated to doing those equity based analysis for a much broader swath of legislation. Additionally, I find that a lot of legislators who want to bring this work into their district and into their communities, often reach out for things like panel, seeking other kinds of speaking engagement or presentation, specific community work. And again, it can be a little bit different to be spread out across the state that way. But again, having additional staff here permit us to be able to work with legislators on more district specific measures that could move the needle on equity. Thank you. Mark Higley. Thank you madam chair. Thank you for being here today. You had mentioned the equity impact assessment tool. And it sounds like that's going to be rolled out over the next year. Is that correct. The one that we're using is already in effect. It has been since late last year. We've been conducting the equity impact assessment on proposals coming out of the admin and policy analysts in the various agencies have also been instructed to use them when they're doing bill reviews that come from legislature as well. We do understand that members of the social equity caucus are also in the process of creating an equity lens tool that's going to have a similar function. And we are really looking forward to that effort being completed in the legislature as well. I don't know the timeline on that one, but I can say that for the executive side, we are, we've already rolled that out. And I guess maybe the other question I've got is and I mentioned this and committee one day as far as, you know, we already have our results based accountability process and I'm wondering if you thought that maybe some of this, and you would talk about equity caucus also looking at another tool. Some of this couldn't be rolled into that as well because, as you had mentioned as well. It might be a little overwhelming for some of these departments but just just your thoughts on that. Yeah, that's an excellent point and one of the things that one of the people I'm most grateful to have is the chief performance officer. I'm really steep and well versed in this and she's somebody with whom I also have worked closely on a number of these items. I do agree that unfilowing this work is important. And as much as we can leverage RBA and some of the lean work that we've been doing. It's only going to make it's only going to make us stronger because it will ensure uniformity and consistency across our system. And I suppose the short answer is yes, I do see opportunities to blend these streams and I appreciate the comment because it's important. Thank you. Tonya Behovsky. Thank you Madam chair, the magnitude of the left that you're describing I think is probably bigger than than even three people can manage so I'm wondering what your priorities are with new staff people and where you would sort of deploy them first. But, you know, I think that if we're talking about to FTE then the vision that the vision that seems to make sense is to have one person dedicated to more policy and data analysis, and another person dedicated more to education and outreach. You could cut this work up in a million different ways but I see those as two major buckets that could probably be dedicated focus each. And now, of course, you could you could assign an army of people to this work and there would always be enough to do. But another important piece of of equity work is that it not be concentrated in a small team, but rather that it be spread across state government and done across agency so I think that this is a proposal that helps us to find a good balance between having folks who are dedicated to the equity piece, and ensuring that it's not only loaded into that unit but rather still being spread out across government. So, you know, it's, it's a modest team, but I think that that's for now I think that that's going to still bring us a lot more power behind the work that we've been doing. Thank you as a follow up to that given that you're really pointing to the need to spread out across state government do you think being housed under the administration is the best place for this work. I think that there are a lot of options that have been discussed, even during the formation of the initial amnesia statute, and I am going to respectfully dodge the question, because I think that I think that if states, if members of state government across the branches are sincere about equity work, then they're going to do this regardless of the formal structure. You know, if you're on board, you're going to do it whether the law makes you or not whether this is here or there or somewhere else or not and and so I care very much about the structure of it. The conversation maybe that quarter should be had. But I also think that regardless of the structure of it. That shouldn't stop our colleagues around state government from being part of this work, whether or not something is situated in a different place or whether or not they're formally required to. Thank you so much and sorry if I put you in a strange position I just thinking about all of this conversation we're having about independence and the importance of that kind of brought that to mind as you were talking so I apologize. Thank you. So, I'm going to invite the bill with us and please share with us your thoughts on on the bill that you've presented. Well thank you very much, Madam chair and my colleagues and especially Susanna. What can you say on top of what she said. This work that we're working on together. I've mentioned this a number of times. This is a marathon. It is not a sprint. And anybody that's trained or helped someone train for a marathon knows very well that there's pitfalls. There's rigor. And there's the need for commitment. So that kind of answers all of those questions that were asked along the way. Is Vermont committed. I think we are. I've been doing this work long enough to watch it grow over time. Is it growing fast enough. No. But it is growing. And that's positive. Just in our own body. I've only been here for 10 years. But what I've seen over that 10 year period is people change. Their hearts and minds. From where they thought they were to where they are now. And being an educator. And just another human being, you can tell when people are changing. And we are as a legislature. And that's why it's so important right now for us to recommit to this work. And I think what Susanna put it very well. I can't really add to the detail. And I would choose not to. Being one of the sponsors of the original legislation and having it vetoed, you know, and going through all of those phases that we went through. I understand change. But at the same time, it's working. And if we can give her more tools. Along this journey. We're going to get to where we want to be. And this isn't, this is just the beginning. And remember, it started with that position of the executive director and her advisory council. And as we continue to support the effort. We will get to that goal of making Vermont as inclusive as we want it to be. And I apologize for being a little late but that's, I had two other calls, one with the Chamber of Combers, and one with Vermont League of Cities and towns on this same discussion. So everything that Susanna talked about, that's what we do. You know, those of us that are doing the direct work do get called on, you know, a lot for support, but that's part of the work.  Every few days or once a year or something like that. And that equates to the metaphor that Susanna was referring to about training. I like to call it professional development and enrichment, because that's truly what we're trying to do versus training trainings. Yeah, I did it. Got it done. No, no, we're talking about enriching and changing the hearts and minds of Vermonters. And that's what this work, you know, is really about. And we're up to the task. And it's very evident, because if we look at all of those bills in the last two years, since the inception of the position. We've said that department needs to be there. So we're saying that the emphasis is there. So we're at a point where we can support it. And I think that with Susanna's leadership in that area, we'll be able to achieve our goal. So I am in full support of whatever we can do from the policy side within our branch to support her efforts and the efforts of her department. Thank you so much for being with us this morning. We do have a couple witnesses waiting for our next committee segment but I want to call on how and also let you know that we will be coming back to this after the joint assembly this morning. So Susanna, I know I'm quite sure that you have a packed morning and may not be able to come back at approximately 11 or 1115 but we welcome you to come back if you can and and coach as well. So, Hal Colston go ahead. Thank you Madam chair. Susanna, given that this office continues to grow and develop. What might our state government look like in five to 10 years with regards to racial equity. What are your thoughts. Really good. So, in five to 10 years. I know I say this a lot apologies for repetition but in 10 years. It would be really great if you just didn't need me anymore to need this role anymore I should say, because we will have baked equity into everything that we do. And it will be so fundamental to our work that it doesn't necessarily need to be looked out for. But it's a long road to get to that place. And so, in the meantime, during that five to 10 years. It means that state government is going to have more opportunity to learn the practices that need to become second nature. For example, we've rolled out the equity impact assessment tool that I mentioned earlier. And right now, we're, we're getting accustomed to it for some folks it's a little easier others are sumbling through it because it's a new practice for them. Over these next few budget cycles legislative cycles we're going to get increasingly adept at using the form at recognizing its utility and at using it to be able to spot any potential unintended outcomes and anticipate more policies to make policies better. So it's definitely a journey. I don't pretend that any of this is going to put the switch over night, but that's one way that we're going to get to a place where equity becomes second nature. Another thing that I can envision is a lot of changes in numbers. A lot of numbers are going to go up that we want up and a lot of numbers are going to go down that we want down. For example, maybe in the next year or two we might implement a policy related to policing or criminal justice. We might, we may not see those impacts right away, but over time, we hope to see numbers trending in the right direction. And when they do that opens up more possibilities for us to make other changes. For example, Vermont in previous years was able to have its prison population incarcerated population. That allowed us to make a lot more discretionary calls, because we weren't incarcerating people for lower level offensive we weren't holding people unjustly. And because of that we have less need for things like that. We have lower needs for supervision than we would have had had we kept our population. I see a lot of opportunities for us to move the needle in the way we want. That's going to yield not only cost savings, but it's also going to make government just generally more efficient. And it's going to make Vermont it's going to continue, it's going to help Vermont continue to be a place that people want to go. And that's important because our population is dwindling and it is aging. And so being able to not only attract but also retain people to the state means we've got to be able to create an environment that is not just habitable, but that is genuinely desirable for folks and increasingly the demographic shift around is that people are becoming more racially diverse. And so it would be very concerning for Vermont to remain an unusual pocket that deviates from that otherwise generally universal. I don't know if I've actually answered the question but I suppose the vision for five to 10 years from now is, we're great now and we're going to be greater than and it's going to be the result of consistency, which is really steep. Thank you. So thank you.  I'm sorry I know that you said that we're going to cut it off but I just had one more thing that I wanted to say. Yeah, that that I don't, I say it often in in closed door situations but I think it's important to say it here, which is, I've been extremely grateful to have this opportunity to do this work. You wouldn't necessarily know it but I am kind of a private person I actually don't really like a lot of eyes. So, it's been it's been unusual for me this last year and a half to be very visible but one thing. So when you have a face to a role, especially a new role that no one else has had it's very easy to personalize decisions that get made about that role. And I just want to remind the group that when we make decisions about racial equity or make decisions about the role specifically. We're making them for Susanna. We're making them for the work and for the role and I think that that's really important right I've sometimes heard people referring to, well we'll just put Susanna on the committee or we'll just give Susanna some money or some staff and, and I just want to remind this isn't for me. It's for the continuation of the work. If I am running behind the ice cream truck and suffer a fatal injury doing so, which is very likely to happen because it's who I am as a person but if that happens and I'm not here with you anymore the work's got to continue and at that point I don't have a new racial equity director so I just want to make sure that I recognize that as grateful as I am to have made these relationships, relationships with everyone in government that I want to make sure that folks see this as serving a bigger goal and not just interacting with a person who you know. Thank you. I appreciate you reminding us of that and we, we have a tremendous amount of respect for, for the hard work you've done in standing up the, the office as we say, even though the office is one. We'll continue this conversation around each 196 and the support positions that are needed in order to continue this work and, and cover more of the projects that we know Vermonters are eagerly awaiting. Thank you for being with us. And thank you, Kevin Christie you're welcome to come back at after the joint assembly if you'd like to hear the next round of testimony on this will be the same link.


What's going on, everyone? Whoa, Sam here with late sports cards. We are gripping 20, 2023 Pne, National VIP Silver Packs for Jeff in. So let me count these up again for you, Jeff. We got 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20. Yep. Look, Jeff. Drops Kelsey, Quinton Johnson to 499 for the Chargers. Donovan Mitchell and Justin Fields, both base there. Okay, interesting. Russell Wilson, Anthony Richardson to 199 for the Colts. Nice. Jimmy Garoppolo and Deuce Vaughn to 99 for the Cowboys. It's so weird seeing Jimmy G as a raider. Those didn't seem right. Jalen Brown and Jameer Gibbs to 499 for the Lions. Kawhi and Jordan Love to 199 for the Packers. Timely that they put him in this set. Very timely. Christian McCaffery and Allen Iverson to 599 for the Sixers. Weird, they had him as a nugget last year. That was bizarre. Eric Risley, something weird. Carlyle to 30 Towns. There's a blue Dale Earnhardt Jr. for a 50. Out and due. Jordan Love and Bryce Sensible to 99 for Ohio State. They're drafty this past year. Kyle Busch and Brock Lesnar 30 to 50 on the blue. Cody Rhodes and Hinden Hooker to 499. Going to the Lions. Lions are going to be a really good team of breaks this year with Hooker and his kids. Yeah. They're going to be so nasty. Jamar Chase and Jackson Smith and Jigba to 499 for the Seahawks. Seahawks also with him and Sherbinette. Garbernet was from where? Damian UCLA I think. Kyrie Irving to 199 for the Mavs. I think it's UCLA. I don't know. Joellen Bede and Azar Thompson to 599. To and Purple 9 of 25. Jonathan Taylor the Colts and Bryce Sensible to 599 for Ohio State. The Ohio State. Micah Parsons. Orange. Jamar Chase color matched to 199 for the Bengals. Ooh, we got an auto. Trey McBride. Nice. Added from 22 the Rookie Premier. Very cool. On card. Trey McBride. Now the Cardinal of course. There you go. Congrats on that, Jeff. That's pretty cool. And Josh Allen base. First auto we've seen tonight at least out of these so far. Just pulling back to back. Jordan Love. Wow. Holy cow. 20 of 25. Congrats, Jeff. There you go, buddy.  And Kevin Harvick. James Harden and Kason Wallace to 199 on the Orange. I'm doing for your packs there. Jeff, thanks again for the support, buddy. We'll get him right out to you, my man.


Hello everyone, it is Crypto Grounds here and welcome back to another video. This is the first episode of the brand new binary series I have started on YouTube and I'm very excited to be able to start this. So the first episode today is going to be the very basics of binary so I'm going to be explaining some basic terms, what binary numbers actually are, how to convert binary numbers to decimal numbers and I'll show you the math behind them. Anyways, let's jump right to the whiteboard. So on the whiteboard we have a very basic binary number and this has four digits in it. A digit in binary is called a bit so we have a four bit binary number. What does this actually mean? What is this actually equate to? Well this is just zero zero zero zero in binary. However, we can convert this into decimal form which is our standard number system. Let's come back to this example in a second. Let me write out another one. Okay, so we have a one in the first bit now. What does this mean? So when we add one to this zero zero zero zero binary number, we get this and this is actually equal to one. Okay, let's explore. Let's add another one to here. So bits can either be zero or one. There's no two, three, four, five binary. There's only two different numbers a bit can be zero or one. So when we add one to this binary number here, we get this binary number. So we know that this is two and when we look at this we can try to determine what each of these bits actually mean. So if this is one and these are all zeros except for this one, this first bit must equal to one. For this example, if these three bits, the fourth, third, and first are all zeros but the second one is a one, this must equal two. So this second bit is two. So now we're starting to get into a pattern here. So we can determine that if these bits each have values to them, this up here must equal zero. So these could be anything but since these are all zeros, this binary number must be zero and decimal. So let's try to figure out what this third bit actually is. So remember, I am adding one to every single binary number. So this right here is just this binary number plus one. So we know that this is going to be three. And we know that by the first two bits are ones and that is two plus one. And now when we add one to this three, we get four. So this is going to be four. And we now know what the third bit is worth. This is four. And we know this because the fourth, the second, and the first bit are zeros except for the third one. And this is the only one. So this must be four. So we can see we're starting to get a pattern here. For every bit, it's doubling its value. So we can say that this fourth bit is going to be eight because it is four times two. So why is it like this? Why does this work? I'm going to be showing you guys the math behind this. Okay, so I have written up a new number, 1011. Again, this is still a four bit binary number. Let's determine what this is in decimal. So let's rewrite the values of each bit, one, two, four, and eight. So now we just got to add these together. We have eight plus two plus one and we get 11. So this binary number is 11 in base 10 or a decimal. I like to clarify that the difference between this and this one is that this is base two. So we can add a little subscript here called two and a subscript of 10 here. But that's just optional. This is just determined that this is a base two number and this is base 10. We call this decimal and we call this binary. Let me write that up. So now that we know how to get the base 10 value of this binary number, I'm going to show you the math behind it and why this actually works. Because it's more than just saying, this is one, two, four, and eight. There's actually an equation behind it. So each bit is multiplied by two. So we know that, OK, so let's say this is the first bit. This is the second bit and this is the third bit and this is the fourth bit. When we plug an n into something, we are trying to get the value of this bit here. And remember, this multiplies by two. So how do we get this? Well, we take two to the power of n and we get this value. Except two to the power of one is two, not one. So we subtract this n by one. OK, so this first one, two to the power of one minus one. That would be right here. This would be the first bit. OK, so when we get that, we get two to the power of zero. And that is equal to one. Anything to the power of zero is always going to be one. All right, so two to the power of two minus one. That is going to be two to the power of one, which is equal to two. Two to the power of three minus one is going to be two to the power of two, which is equal to four. Two to the power of four minus one is going to be two to the power of three. And that is equal to eight. You see the pattern now? Is it all starting to make sense? Now let's plug this all together so we can somehow add all of these up and end up with 11. Because basically the base 10 version of the binary number is just a sum of these. But we multiply them by 0 or 1. That's why it gives us a value. If this bit is 0, this third bit is going to be worth 0, not 4. However, if this was 1 right here, we would have 8 plus 4 plus 2 plus 1, not 8 plus 2 plus 1, if that makes sense. So let me get rid of all this and let's write it all out. So let's go backwards for this one, because we're eventually going to write an equation where it actually goes backwards. And that's just how it's going to make sense in the future. So first, let's start with our bit. So that would be 1. We multiply this by 2 to the power of n minus 1, which is 0. So we do 1 times 2 to the power of 0. Let's write out the rest. So the second bit is going to be 1 or plus 1 times 2 to the power of 1. Next, we have plus 0 times 2 to the power of 2. And last but not least, we add 1 times 2 to the power of 3. OK, so we have a sequence here. Let's add these all up. So 1 times 2 to the power of 0, remember, 2 to the power of 0 is 1. So we're basically just multiplying 1 times 1. So we get 1. Then we add 1 times 2 to the power of 1, which is going to be 1 times 2. So we get 2. So we have a 0 here. So this is going to be 0 regardless of what this value is here. Because whenever we multiply anything by 0, we're going to get 0. So 0 times 2 to the power of 2 is going to be 0 times 4, which is 0. Last but not least, 1 times 2 to the power of 3. So that is going to be 1 times 8. And here we go. This is so clearly familiar. Let's add this all together, and we get 11. So things should start clicking now. Things are starting to kind of make sense on why this works. This is a lot of writing, especially when we have larger numbers. It's going to get more complex. I have a formula, so let's write that out. So it all starts with this symbol right here. And this is called the sigma. So what we're doing with this, we are making a sum of a sequence. So this is our sequence right here. So we have this little segment here. We add it to our sum equation here. And it can basically just perform this entire sequence with just a few parameters. And it saves us from having to write out a lot of stuff. So before we actually get to the parameters of this sum, let's write out this equation. So first we have our 1. So this is either 0 or 1. And I'm just going to write that as b for bit. All right, so next we multiply this by 2. So we're going to have this for everything, right? If we want to convert a base 2 number into base 10, we multiply the bit by 2. And we raise it to the power of whatever this number is. How do we get that number? Well, it's right here. It's n minus 1. So we have b times 2 to the power of n minus 1. And remember, b is whatever the value of the bit is. And also just to give some clarity on what bit this actually is, we can put a subscript for n minus 1 down here. Let me rewrite it so it looks a little better. All right, so here's our equation. Now let's figure out the parameters here. If you want to solve a 4-bit binary number like this one, we need to start at n equals 0. So that will be this one right here. But we subtract 1 from n. So we technically start at 1, the first bit. So we have n equals 1 at the bottom. This basically just tells us that we need to start at n equals 1. And that will start right here. So when do we want to end? We want to end at n equals 4. So we just put 4 at the top. This basically tells us we are going to loop through this sequence right here. And we're going to add up everything from n equals 1 to n equals 4. So it's going to go 4 times. And so there's another way of writing this. Whatever makes more sense to you. Let me write the other one. So please note that both of these are valid. They're just shifted a little differently. The only difference between this one and this one is that we start from 0 and we end at 3. And instead of subtracting 1 from both of these ends, we just use n. Basically, these are exactly the same thing. And as you could see, they both match all of these bit numbers here. So let's rewrite this as the long form right here. Just so I can show you what it actually looks like when it's in action. So this is a bit small. I apologize. But basically, when we unfold this sum, we get something like this. So we have our bit number. And this will be the first bit right here. We multiply it by 2 to the power of 1 minus 1. And we go all the way down to when n is equal to 4. So this is what it looks like. It looks very similar to this, except we just don't have the actual bit values. We have an 8-bit binary number now. And I'd like to clarify that this is considered 1 byte. A byte is equal to 8 bits. So when we have 2 bytes, we have a 16 bit binary number. So before converting this into a base 10 or decimal number, let's find out what each of these values are. So we know the first four bits. It's 8, 4, 2, and 1. But remember, each of these multiply by 2 for every bit. So we know that this is going to be 16. This 6-1 is going to be 32, 64, and the 8-bit is going to be 128. So we can now finally plug this all together. And I'm not going to do it like we did before. I'm just going to do the basic quick shortcut method. So we have 64 plus 8 plus 4 plus 1. And when we add all of this together, we get 72 plus 5. And that is 77. So this binary number is 77 in base 10. So now let's do a situation where they're all 1. When we add all of these together, we have 128, 64, 32, 16, and so on. When we add all of these together, we get the value of 255. So note that the max value for this specific type, and I'll explain later, this specific type of binary number, the max value of this is going to be 255. And that's when all of these are 1s. So what I mean by type is that we can treat this binary number in two different ways. We can treat it as a negative number or a positive number. We are treating this as a positive number. And now I'll explain that more in the next episode. So stay tuned for that. So before we start wrapping up, I'd like to show you guys some basic addition. So we have 0011 plus 0101. This first binary number in base 10 is going to be 3. The second one is going to be 4 plus 1, so this is going to be 5. So when we add these together, we should get the value of 8. So let's do some addition. So we need 1 plus 1, these two cancel out. So this becomes 0, and we carry over the 1. So we need 1 plus 1, we get 0 as well. And we bring and we carry over the 1. 1 plus 1 again, this is 0. And we carry the 1 to the last bit. And 1 plus all these 0s is going to be 1. So remember, this is 8, 4, 2, 1. So this is indeed 8. That's correct. Remember when I said earlier that we can treat this binary number in two different ways. Well, I didn't really specify too much for a reason. I made this fourth bit a 1. I'm going to treat this binary number as a negative value. So this is actually going to be negative 4. So we have all of these right here, which is 4. And then we have our negative number. This is our sign bit. So when we add these together, we should get negative 1. However, there's a problem here. We don't. And let me show you why. So let's add these together. So we have 1 plus 0. That is 1, 1, 1, and 1. So this would be all 1s. However, this is a negative 1. This is actually negative. We have 4, 2, 1. This is actually negative 7. And last time I checked, negative 7 actually is equal to negative 1, right? So we have an issue here. And we go over this in episode 2 and 3. We have to convert this binary number. Well, fundamentally, we have to convert this binary number into something else. And we will get into that in the next two episodes. If you enjoyed this episode of Learn Binary, make sure you leave a like, subscribe if you want to see more content like this. And if you want to be notified for whenever upload videos, hit that bell and turn on all notifications. If you want to support the channel, check out the Patreon link in the description below. And I just want to say thank you guys very much for watching this. And I really hope you guys learned something from this. It was really fun making this video. And I really enjoy talking about this kind of stuff. I will see you guys in episode 2, which will be on signed and unsigned binary numbers. I hope you guys all have a great rest of your day or night. And I can't wait to see you guys in episode 2. Peace. I'll be up in class, but my mind is in the clouds, though. Know the teacher's mad, because my music beating loud, ho. Tell me keep it down, say I kill it on the down low. And if I turn it up, then I'm bound to attract the crowd. So no wonder me and Tim be out of state, doing the things you can't imagine. Chris Angel on the mic and me a beat. I'll show you magic. We born in different planes.


you're here, but we also know that you're going to find this is a special place and if you would like to learn more about our special buildings, please gather after the service over here by the windows and we offer guided tours to give you a chance to learn more about our buildings again after the service. And speaking of the service, this would be a perfect time to silence those pesky electronic devices that might interfere with your ability to enjoy the service and that includes those of you in the balcony. And if you are accompanied this morning by a youngster, and that youngster would rather enjoy the service from a more private space, we have a couple options for you. One is our child haven at the back corner of the auditorium and there's also comfortable seating out in the commons from which you and your youngster can see and hear the service. The service is brought to us this morning by a dedicated team of shy volunteers, but I'm going to read their names anyway. Operating the sound system is Peter Daley, Tom Boykoff is our lay minister, Janine Nisbaum was our smiling greeter upstairs and I think she's still smiling up there. Our ushers include Marty Hollis, Nancy Daley, Bob Alt and Paula Alt. The all important hospitality and coffee are being served by Sandra Plitch and Gal Bliss after the service. And the flowers behind me have been provided generously by Mikayla Moy. Just a couple announcements before we get on with our service today. The first is that you might recall some comments that Michael made last month when he mentioned a t-shirt that had caught his eye and the slogan on the t-shirt was you can pretend to care, you can't pretend to show up. And that is the philosophy behind the FUS Moses Ministry team, which is planning a statewide action day on Wednesday, April 29, downtown Madison. And you can participate in that and if you do you'll hear from social justice advocates Hannah Rosenthal and Reverend Everett Mitchell. And you'll have a chance to meet with our state legislators urging them to increase state funding for treatment alternatives and diversion programs from prison. Even if you can only come for part of the April 29 event, you are welcome to attend and you can get more information by visiting the Moses table in the commons after the service. The final announcement includes one of my favorite events of the FUS calendar and that of course is cabaret and this year it's an old fashioned cabaret. There will be constant entertainment from this stage organized by Dan Broner and featuring people from within the FUS family. It's going to be a lively auction. You can see a sample of the preliminary catalog will be available in the commons after the service and as usual there's some exciting items offered by FUS members for the auction. It's a party. The party begins six o'clock on Friday evening, that's this Friday evening which means it's only about five and a half days until cabaret and I know I'm going to buy my ticket today because I'll save five dollars by buying it today and you can do the same. We can all save five dollars together after the service. So think about that and also think about the fact that cabaret is coming and it's really quite incredible. It's an auction, it's a party and the food is very edible. The talent is top notch and you'll be so impressed. You won't believe it's possible to have this much fun at FUS with constant entertainment both musical and otherwise. Fantastic auction items to fit a budget of any size. Oh soon we'll be at cabaret and when it's over we will say oh what fun for you and me at First Unitarian Society and soon we'll be at cabaret and when it's over we will say oh what fun for you and me at First Unitarian Society. Behave yourselves. So with that please sit back or lean forward to enjoy this morning's service. I know it will touch your heart, stir your spirit and trigger one or two new thoughts. See you at cabaret. We're glad you're here this morning. Our opening words are from the retired Unitarian Universalist minister Richard Gilbert who served our churches in Ithaca and Rochester, New York for many years. We summon ourselves from the demands and the delights of the daily round, from the dirty dishes, the unwaxed floors, the unmowed grass and the untrimmed bushes, from all incompleteness and not yet startedness, from all that is unholy and unresolved. And we summon ourselves here to attend to our vision, a vision of peace and justice, of cleanliness and health, of delight and devotion, of the lovely and the holy, of who we are and what we can do. Today we summon the power of tradition and the exhilaration of newness, the wisdom of the ages and the uncanny knowing of the very young. We summon beauty, eloquence, poetry, music to be bearers of our dreams and so we would open our eyes, our ears, our minds, our hearts to their amplest dimensions. We rejoice in all of life's manifold promises and its possibilities. I invite you to rise in body and spirit for the lighting of our chalice. And if you will join me now in reading our words of affirmation. The light of this chalice is a frail thing. It can be snuffed out by winds of cynicism and apathy. May its little flame be a reminder of the power of the spirit. Let us rededicate ourselves to providing light that lifts our hearts and increases the world's joy. And in keeping with that joy, please turn to your neighbor in exchange with them a wonderful and warm welcome. I'd love to be joined by some children up here. Are there any in the house? So today the children are going to help the grown-ups and the grown-ups need help. Today we're going to play a little bit. Okay. So we're going to ask the grown-ups to join us because we're going to go for a little walk in our imagination today.  Can you do that a little bit? Okay. We're going to go for a walk together.   And we can see way in the distance we can see a forest. So we're going to walk to the forest together. And I don't know what's between here and there. So you need to pay attention so that if we have to, if I forget how to get back, you can help me. Okay. So we're just going to start out together. So let's just walk. Let's just start walking. Isn't this fun? We'll walk through the, we'll walk through the, the, it's been all mowed nicely here and it's pretty nice. Like that nice mowed grass, the ground is kind of flat.  It's a beautiful spring day. What can you smell? You smell anything? Flowers. Flowers, yes.  And oh my goodness. Look. Look up in the sky. What do you see in the sky? Lights. Mm-hmm. They're lights. And what else? We're imagining now. We're out under what? What? Birdies. And what else? Clouds. Clouds. There's clouds in the sky. In the sky. Yes. Wow. Blue in the, blue in the sky. So, so now we're coming. We're coming now. We're now, oh we're coming up now on some tall grass. So now let's go through the glass. Come on grown-ups. Come on. Get with the program here. Here we go. So we're going through the tall grass. What's in the tall grass? What lives in the tall grass? Corn. Corn. Okay. What else in tall weeds? And what else? Are there bugs? Any bugs? Yeah. Bees. Bees and bugs in the tall grass. Okay. And ladybugs. Sometimes there's ladybugs in the, lots of worms. Can you see them? Can you see them? Okay. Okay. We're kind of coming to the edge of this. So now we're going to walk a little more. There's a little kind of. Okay. Here we go. Kind of a nice day for walking outside, isn't it? Okay. So now we have come to some mud. Okay. So here we go. Well, fortunately this is not a big patch of mud. So now we can kind of, let's rub our feet a little bit and walk a little bit more. Oh my goodness. You know what's up ahead of us? There's a stream. I think we're going to have to swim. Can you swim? Can we all swim? What's in, what's in the stream with us? What's in the stream? Fish. Fish. Sharks. Sharks. Sharks. I think there's sharks in the stream. I think we need to get out of this stream before the sharks. So now we're going to walk a little more. We're getting closer and closer and closer to the woods and the sun doesn't get through us. We're going to swim across the water. Really fast. Let's go really, really, really fast. Okay. Now we're going to run. Run some more. Run some more. Now we're going to go through the tall grass. And we're going to run some more. And run some more. We made it. We made it. And I don't, I don't see the bear coming. It's coming after us. That's a good thing. I think he probably could turn back at the, no, there's not. So you get to, you get to imagine the next bear. Okay. All right. Well, thank you for going on this. I think we got the, I think we got the grownups going a little bit here because what we were doing here wasn't it was we were having a little time of play together. And grownups and children play together sometimes and everybody is better for it, I think. When grownups and children play together. So now we're going to send you off to your classes because we're going to sing a song called, um, what are we going to sing? We're going to sing the sun that shines in the sky. That was an amusing little ditty, continuing on in the spirit of play. This from Robert Folgem's book, What on Earth Have I Done? And Robert Folgem, as you know, was a Unitarian Universalist minister before he became one of the country's best known humorists. This reading is entitled, Players. The Sunday morning lady, she's a player, definition, persons with enough nimbleness of mind to accept a surprise invitation to jump into a quick game of imagination. People with a loosey-goosey sense of mischief. Players are also laughers. And you can't tell a player by the way they appear on the outside. Example, here's a uniformed city bus driver standing in the door of his vehicle staring out into the rain. An invitation from me passing by. Okay, I say to him, here's the deal. I'll pay for the gas. You'll drive us to California to the beach at Santa Monica. With a straight face, he replies, okay, meet me here at midnight. It's the end of my run and they won't miss me or the bus until morning. I'll get some barbecue. He smiles. He's a player. On the other hand, there's a tailor's shop on Queen Anne Avenue. Sign in the window says, alterations and repairs for men and women. The tailor is standing in the doorway. I stop and say, I'd like to get altered and repaired. She looks at me cautiously, goes inside, closes the door. Definitely not a player. Here's me again at a well-known company there to pick up copies of my manuscript. I'm visibly annoyed. This is my third trip to get what I was promised yesterday. The anxious clerk, Miss Saucer's eyes, is obviously new to the herd behind the counter. She does not know what to do with me or for me. The work is still not done, despite promises, but I know that getting mad at her is not going to help. Okay, I say, I will not make any trouble. Just give me a really clever off-the-wall creative excuse. The wildest thing you can think of, just make me laugh and I'll go away. Miss Saucer eyes retreats to the back of the shop and consults with her boss. Now she is a high-energy, sharply dressed woman who marches briskly toward me with a steely look. She leans over the counter and explains, sir, you may not know this, but this store has been a front for the Irish Republican Army for years. We're supposed to be turning in our firearms, and it seems that a bazooka is missing from our inventory. But when we find it, things will get back to normal. If I were you, I wouldn't make any trouble just now. I'd advise you to come back tomorrow.    This time the invitation comes from him. As I pass by, he says, hey, you look prosperous. Thank you, I say, I feel prosperous. You look like a guy who might have some frequent flyer miles. As a matter of fact, I do, quite a few of them. Listen, he says, I need enough of those frequent flyer miles to get me to Buenos Aires one way. I've got enough, I say, they're yours, but what's in it for me?  It's yours, and even trade. Yes, I've always had an urge to drive one of these things.  So it's a deal, I say. You got a license to drive a truck? Well, no. The deal's off. I can't be part of anything illegal.  As he drives off, I wonder how many other people on his route get the same offer every day. He has all the nervy characteristics of a non-stop all day player. He is an old favorite of mine, probably from high school speech, which I've always loved is by Robert Frost. It's called Two Tramps in Mud Time. Out of the mud, two strangers came and caught me splitting wood in the yard. And one of them put me off my aim by healing cheerfully, hit him hard. I knew pretty well why he'd drop behind and let the other go on his way. I knew pretty well what he had in mind. He wanted to take my job for pay. Good blocks of oak it was, I split as large around as chopping block, and every piece I squarely hit fell splinterless as a cloven rock. The blows that a life of self-control spares to strike for the common good that day, giving loose my soul, I spent on unimportant wood. The sun was warm, but the wind was chilled, you know how it is on an April day when the sun is out and the wind is still, your one month on in the middle of May. The time when I most love my task, the two make me love it more by coming with what they came to ask. You think I never felt before the weight of an axe head, poised aloft, the grip of earth, an outspread feet, the life of muscles rocking soft and smooth in the moist vernal heat. Out of the woods, two hulking tramps from sleeping God knows where last night, but not long since in the lumber camps. They thought that chopping wood was theirs of right.  Nothing on either side was said. They knew they had but to stay their stay and all their logic would fill my head as that I had no right to play with what was another man's work for gain. My right might be love, but theirs was need, and where the two exist entwined theirs was the better right, agreed. But yield to will, to their separation, my object in living is to unite my avocation with my vocation as my two eyes make one sight. Only where love and need are one and the work is play for mortal stakes is the deed ever really done for heaven and the future's sakes. Thank you. Well, in a parting gesture that now feels like 99 bottles of beer on the wall, I agreed to offer one last sermon for bid at the 2014 auction here at FUS. It was generously purchased by Makayla Moy, who offered the idea of a sermon on play. And I am grateful and delighted for this opportunity to be with you again. In his book, Play, author and psychiatrist Stuart Brown, MD, founder of the National Institute for Play, compares play to oxygen. He writes, it's all around us, yet goes almost completely unnoticed or unappreciated until it is missing. This might seem surprising until you consider everything that constitutes play. Play is art, books, music, movies, comedy, flirting, daydreaming. Play is a state of being, purposeless, fun and pleasurable. For the most part, the focus is on the actual experience and not really on accomplishing anything. Brown notes several kinds of play, object play, stuff you do with your hands. Social play that involves interaction with others like the play in Fulham's essay. The rough and tumble play, think baby animals or dad play. Later play, which involves not so much what goes on on the field as what goes on in the stands, so think Mallard's baseball. Ritual play, which is what goes on on the field. And imagination play, the telling of stories. So think five-year-old extrovert. I have one of those in my family right now who, when paired with her introverted cousin, elicits the response, oh Zoe, way too many words. In his TED talk, Stuart Brown encourages his audience to do a play history. Use a starting point in the memory of your most joyous moment and then build on that. And I would really encourage you to do that because I did that in preparation for this sermon. And it was really a delight for me. So I took his advice and I noticed that it is remarkable that it has taken me 30 years in the ministry to consider play and fun as topics for theological reflection. The reason this is remarkable to me is that play and fun have been prominent parts of my experience for my whole life. I was blessed to be the child of playful parents. Though my dad loved football and baseball, that had very little to do with his sense of play. Dad was like Folgem's description, a player. And that was the lens through which he viewed the world. In his youth, he was known at that time as what was called a practical joker. But then as he aged, he became more the trickster who in mythology, exhibits a great deal of intellect or secret knowledge and uses it to play tricks on otherwise disobey normal rules and conventional behavior to teach a lesson. His prey were often among the strong and the arrogant whose lack of self-awareness made them easy marks. I was the only child of my parents' second family born when the other children were in their teens. And from mid-September, as many of you know, until mid-May until mid-September, we lived on an island on Rainy Lake in northern Minnesota where we had a small fishing resort. In the early spring, when it was still really cold outside, we would spend the weekends starting to get the place ready. So around noon on that first Saturday, and this was the memory that I went to to start my play history, dad would come into the house and say, let's go on a picnic. So my mother and I would pack a basket with hot dogs and buns and marshmallows and condiments. And then my father would take us on an exhibition through the house to find the best spot to make a fire. So we would go down into the bedrooms and then through the kitchen and the dining room. And then we would find ourselves in the living room where the fireplace was. And we would agree that this was the best place. We would spread a blanket on the floor and we would gather firewood from the wood box, which we then built a fire with elaborate care. And we would roast our hot dogs and our marshmallows without ever braving the elements. Sometimes dad would read a story or we would play a game and then it would be back to work. And the rest of the summer help assembled, there was often singing and when we watched the dishes and card playing and swimming in the afternoons. When I saw Mary Poppins as an adult and heard her say, in every job that must be done there is an element of fun. You find the fun and snap the jobs a game. I had a lived sense that that was so. My father loved movies and we would often go together just the two of us leaving the theater for the car which often headed directly for the Dairy Queen. He would take my hand and say, let's run. And we would run to the car just for the pure joy of feeling the air on our bodies. Sometimes we would go for walks in the evening and dad, we lived on a rural road and dad would start to bark. And within minutes every dog for a country mile had joined in to the chorus. My experience of my mother and father is summed up in a quotation by LP Jax, a Unitarian minister who wrote in the 1930s. He says, a master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play. His labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his education and his recreation. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues a vision of excellence through whatever he is doing and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing. To himself he always appears to be doing both. My parents were by necessity hard workers and by disposition inclined toward the golden rule. But the seriousness that characterized some of the religious churchgoing folks that we knew, the concern for wasting time, the quest for perfection, the guilt and shame, the fear of failure, the sense of judgment and the withholding of generosity seemed to me always to be in stark contrast to what I had experienced in my family. Neither risk takers or risk avoiders, my parents raised me to see mistakes as learning opportunities instead of failures and sources of guilt or shame. They also lived in the north woods on the lakes of northern Minnesota where a relationship with the natural world and the Harvard classics and a parade of summer people and small town life shaped their world view. I often wonder if the complete lack of formal religious affiliation did not figure prominently in my parents' capacity to see places for playfulness and fun. Though they clearly had their own work ethic, it was neither definable nor in reaction to what I came to know as the Protestant work ethic. Here now from the Gospel according to Wikipedia. The Protestant work ethic or Puritan work ethic is a concept in theology, sociology, economics and history which emphasizes hard work, frugality and diligence as a constant display of a person's salvation in the Christian faith in contrast to the focus upon religious attendance, confession and ceremonial sacrament in the Catholic church. The Calvinist theologians taught that only those who were predestined could be saved. Since it was impossible to know who was predestined, the notion developed that it might be possible to discern that a person was elect by observing their way of life. Hard work and frugality as well as social success and wealth were thought to be the two important consequences of one being part of the elect. Protestants were thus attracted to these qualities and supposed to strive for reaching them. This was the lens through which much of the dominant church going culture viewed itself. This was a wholly different lens than that of my heathen parents. This ethic planted in the psyche of generations growing up in the 19th and early 20th century was that the idea that work and achievement themselves were of highest value. All that with the popularization of modern science which posits an approach to rational, linear, measurable approach to problem solving. The concept of play associated with recreational pleasure and enjoyment was viewed among real grownups as the purview of children. The social scientist and writer Barbara Ehrenreich poses the question, why has it been so difficult for observers especially perhaps white bourgeois Europeans to recognize play as a time-honored category of experience? Her reflection continues with a quotation from American anthropologist David Graber who blames laissez-faire economic theory which emphasizes productivity as the dominant value. Ehrenreich goes beyond this to assert that for the past hundred years Western scientists has been on a mission to crush all forms of agency. Scientists never allowed that hydrogen atoms might lust after oxygen atoms or that living creatures might swim or run or fly just for the fun of it. The goal of science was to replace agency or whim or desire with deterministic mechanisms. Birds flew to find food or escape predators and the ones who failed to do so were eliminated by natural selection. The science of economics as viewed by Ehrenreich sees all human actions springing from the rational calculations performed to fulfill biological needs. Add this to the industrial revolution which began to change the nature and understanding of work. And yet among the working class the idea of leisure and fun persisted in neighborhood bars and in some homes and even that got curtailed by an amendment to the U.S. Constitution which outlawed the sale and transportation and use of alcohol. This was promoted by the dry crusader movement, think of that, by rural protestants and social progressives and Democrats and Republicans and was coordinated by the Anti-Saloon League and the Women's Christian Temperance Union. Now a conspiracy theorist might identify all this as a cultural campaign against any manifestation of fun. But in spite of all of this a few counter-cultural strains have persisted. The pleasure seeking excesses among the upper class throughout the ages, the persistent playfulness of children and animals and the universal cross-class and cross-cultural influence of the creative spirit reaching, stretching, striving across hardship and suffering and defying economic pressure and religious fervor and manifesting over and over in art and books and music and movies and comedy and flirtatiousness and daydreaming. In all times and in all places humans have defied limitations and rules to engage in a range of voluntary intrinsically motivated activities. I contend that play and laughter, the fun-seeking part of each of us, the surprising power of art of all kind, the awe in the face of the extravagance of the natural world, the ways in which we participate in holes that are greater than the sum of their parts. All of this comprises the substance of the spirit. It is what connects us as secularists to that which is greater than ourselves and gives us life and sustains us. Many years ago I was visited, I was a new minister and I was visited by a man who was in obvious emotional pain. He said he had been depressed. He had left the Lutheran church in his youth and was feeling a great spiritual emptiness. After a litany of woes he paused and then posed the question I had hoped never ever in my ministry to hear, what he said is the meaning of life. I suppose he really thought that I might know. I mean I was what, 42 years old. I was a minister. I wisely decided to help him focus on what was the meaning of his life and the source of his spiritual emptiness. Clearly he was feeling a lack of connection to that which was life giving and sustaining. Where I asked, did he feel most happy and fulfilled and free? And after a moment he said it was when he was playing hockey with his old guys league team. It was the act of play, of teamwork if you will, where he knew himself to be in a relationship with a whole that was greater than the sum of the parts connected by ritual and structure and yet free to respond and create and engage. For him it was play that was the generative activity that brought meaning to his life. This is the theology that is suggested in the work of Martin Buber in the I-Thou relationship and in the concept of the creative encounter in the work of Henry Nelson Wyman. Play by its very nature is interactive, relational, generative to the degree that it can remain separate from the dominant cultures, cultural forces of competition and achievement and outcome and hold its center as a voluntary intrinsically motivated activity. It retains a certain transformative power. When play loses its focus on fun or joy or creativity and leads to violence and injury and pain and rejection or even fame and fortune, it is no longer play but a corruption of play which has been co-opted by the dominant culture. Paul Koacic, author of Babylon Mesopotamia and the Birth of Civilization writes, those societies in which seriousness, tradition, conformity and adherence to long established, often God prescribed ways of doing things are the strictly enforced rule have always been the majority across time and through the world. Such people are not known for their sense of humor and lightness of touch. They rarely break a smile. To them change is always suspect and usually damnable and they hardly ever contribute to human development. By contrast, social, artistic and scientific progress as well as technological advances are most evident where the ruling culture and ideology give men and women permission to play, whether with ideas, beliefs, principles or materials and where playful science changes people's understanding of the way of the physical world works, political change, even revolution is rarely far behind. This contrasting view is the undercurrent of the millennial culture. For example, we see it invading the workplace. Many large companies, especially those looking to innovate and to create like Google and Yahoo and Epic, have drastically altered their workspaces allowing time for more collaboration, flexibility, unorthodox, and non-existent. This is a very important part of the work space that we see in projects, meeting strategies. One has only to visit the campus of Epic systems in Verona to see the commitment to an aesthetic of whimsy and playfulness in the work space. Models have been changing to intentionally develop a sense that employees are a part of something greater. Millennials are known for seeking or even demanding a sense of greater purpose in the workplace, open to seeking even projects with learning components. They are developing a better sense of work and play by pursuing work places that provide for opportunities for the divine spark that is generated by play. At best, motivated by more creativity and generative relationships rather than a more narrowly defined ethic of productivity and competition and moral obligation, our younger generations are providing us with a hope for a more spirit and joy filled future. People who are playing are not at war. People who are laughing with others are in touch with their common humanity. As I reflect on the seeds of playfulness that were planted in me by the whimsy of my father and sustained by the same spirit that's present in my husband and our children and their children, I have come to appreciate this potential in a deeper way. In his novel, Jitterbug Perfume, the author, philosopher Tom Robbins writes, very well, he would lighten up. As a matter of fact, he felt as light and bubbly as the froth that flew from the lips of the waves. Whatever else his long unprecedented life might have been, it had been fun. Fun if others should find that appraisal shallow frivolous so be it. To him it seemed now to largely have been some form of play. And he vowed that in the future he would strive to keep that sense of play more in mind, for he'd grown convinced that play more than piety, more than charity or vigilance was what allowed human beings to transcend evil. May it be so. We will continue our service now with the receiving of our offering. It is through the gifts that we support the work of this beloved community. We do gather each week as a community of memory and a community of hope. To this time and this place, we bring our whole and occasionally our broken selves. We carry with us the joys and sorrows of the recent past and seek here a place where they might be received and celebrated and shared. So we would pause now to send prayers, good wishes, support to Sarah and Sean Goodman. Sarah, as many even know, was our intern last year. Their daughter, Carolyn Elizabeth Goodman, was born on April the 11th and passed away on April the 12th. A memorial service will be held here in the Atrium Auditorium on May the 2nd at 10 o'clock in the morning. And the Goodmans would ask that if you do plan to attend that you wear bright colors to the service. In addition to that sadness just mentioned we would also acknowledge any unarticulated joys or sorrows that remain among us and that as a community we hold with equal concern in our hearts. Let us sit silently for just a moment or two in the spirit of empathy and of hope. And so by virtue of our brief time together this morning may our burdens be lightened and our joys expanded. And Karen has a word or two because we're going to do a slightly different version of hymn number 1024 in the Teal hymnals. So we're just going to do, we'll sing four verses and we'll do, do, play, laugh, do. Got it? Do, play, laugh, do. All right, let's put the grave. But the lives we have lived and the time we have spent are treasures too precious to say. What can we do with our lives but work and hope let our works by our work bind our dreams to let our dreams bind our work to our play. What can we do with each moment of our life but love till we've loved it away. Love till we've loved it away. Go in peace.


Hi everyone, Joe for jaspyscasebreaks.com with 2019 Gold Rush, Hall of Fame, Autograph, Jersey, Multisport Edition, Three Box, Random Player Break number two. As the second half of the case we popped open earlier today, there it is right there. Three more jerseys to do. I'm going to play a couple of a few quick rounds of America's favorite game, Who Am I? Now one spot gets you six players from this big list below right here, so let's copy these names right here and then we'll go one, two, three, four, five, six, and let's roll it and randomize each list five into three eight times. Your names first. Eighth and final time, after eight we got Scott all the way down to TJ Leonard. Eight times for the players. Eighth and final time we've got Howie Long down to Julius Irving. Alright, so I'm going to show you the list as is and then I'll alphabetize by your first name so you can keep track of the players that you have. Alright, so Aaron Pettit, there are all of your players right there. Brian Dunn, Chris Perez, Edwin, Jack, John, Lott there, Kurt, Lee, Logan, Marty, Nicholas Stone, Rob, Ryan, Scott, TJ Leonard, and Tyler. I'm going to pause the video and allow a few moments for trades, maybe see if anybody needs to see their players again and then we will come back and break. Stick around. Alright, welcome back folks. There was a trade. Look at this. Bobby who does not like Martin Brudor was happy to trade with Brian and Tony Gwynn. Brian now has the Martin Brudor spot. Let's put a T next to there for trade so we can keep track of, keep track at home to see if, see if anybody draws first blood in this trade, any blood in this trade. There's only three jerseys in here. Alright, so let's flip to this green right here and grab the final three jerseys out of here. Good luck. I think this is, yeah, I think this is this person. Alright, quick round of who am I. Alright, I'm a retired football player, defensive and outside linebacker born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 45 years old, 66-244. Went to Akron for college, played for one, two, three teams my entire career, six-time pro bowler, third, three-time first team all-pro, NFL sacks leader in the early 2000s, two-time AFC defensive player of the year, NFL defensive player of the year, Walton Payton, NFL man of the year, Hall of Famer, 775 tackles, he's pretty good, 139 and a half quarterback sacks, eight interceptions, 46 fourths fumbles, 29 fumbles recovered, nine touchdowns for that. Then I learned recently, this I did not know, maybe a lot of you may have known, maybe this is common knowledge, my sister is a co-host on the Colin Cowherd show. Yep, Jens has got it. Matthew as well, it is Jason Taylor. Joy Taylor is Jason's sister. There it is, nice. You got the JSA right here, nice Dolphins colors. These are replica jerseys, I'm just going to leave it folded up in here, but you got Taylor on the back right there as well. So pretty cool, who's got the Jason Taylor spot? That goes to Logan, Logan Collister with Jason Taylor. Next up, I showed you your players, Logan, should have known, there's too many players, Logan just got too many spots. Get your hockey helmets on folks. A former retired ice hockey center for the NHL, Canadian, currently 59 years old, 6-2-2-10. I'm a lefty, shoot left, played for a long time, played for one, two, three, three teams my entire career. Want some gold medals with Canada, I need more information on, Wikipedia is not giving me enough information on this guy. I'm a Hall of Famer, all of these guys are Hall of Famers. I'm considered to be one of the greatest ice hockey players of all time. I am second on the all-time careers list for playoff points and regular season games played. Third for regular season points, I'm a six-time Stanley Cup champion and the only player to captain two professional teams to championships. And I ended a 54-year Stanley Cup drought for this team, earning the nickname, this is going to give it away, earning the nickname, the Messiah. Yep, Jack B's got it, Adam's got it, Rusty's got it, Brian's got it, it's Marc Messier, which goes to Nicholas Stone. Is this Rangers colors or Oilers colors? So he was on both. There you go. And there's the name right there. There's his autograph right there, looks pretty cool. You got the JSA right there. Is this an Oilers jersey? These are Oilers colors? Like I said, these are not authentic jerseys, they're replica jerseys, so they won't have the logos on them. But I guess, yeah, the colors are closer to Oilers on this. Rangers have more red, I guess. Nice. So Nicholas, congrats, there's Nick S in the chat. Sweet, he says. Yeah, this guy's pretty good. Even I've heard of this guy. Ah, no orange and ranger uniforms, all right. Red, white and blue. America. All right. Cody, what's up? All right. Here. All right. Who am I? I'm a retired basketball player, coach and analyst, played for one team my entire career in the Hall of Fame and regarded as one of the best power forwards of all time. I was born in Hibbing, Minnesota, first round pick and a three-time NBA champion, seven-time NBA All-Star, three times. How did you get that so quickly, Jack? What gave it away? Yeah. It's Kevin McHale, yeah. Hall of Famer, two times six man of the year, all rookie team, 50th anniversary, all time team, round one, pick three overall. My eyes, the look of disgust. Kevin McHale goes to Aaron Pettit. There's a JSA right there. There's the McHale autograph, the JSA, the McHale name printed on here. This is also a replica jersey. You can tell. I'll keep it folded here. All right. And that goes to Aaron Pettit. And there you have it. Thanks very much for getting into it, ladies and gentlemen. Joe for jazbyscasewrakes.com. I'll see you next time. Bye-bye.