Rafe describes to Harry the second part of his 8-week summer school, in particular, a trip to the Strasburg cathedral and meeting craftsmen in Alsace. Discussion of church literacy, coffee shops and pubs, odd temperature scales, limestone, stone carving, woodworking, clay tiles, and much more follows as the Buf continues in telling the summer school tale.Link to La Table Ronde de l'Architecture website: here.Link to French newspaper article discussing the visit of the summer school to B...
Rafe describes to Harry the first part of his 8-week summer school, in particular, the first part of the course in Barr, Alsace, France. Discussion of vernacular architecture, storks, arches, Barr's "Golden Book", the metric system, and much more follows as the Buf begins to make a dent in telling the summer school tale.Link to La Table Ronde de l'Architecture website: here.Link to French newspaper article discussing the visit of the summer school to Barr: here.
Harry and Rafe get back together to discuss how things have been for the last eight weeks. What follows is a typical Buf conversation about where the show will be headed for the next couple of weeks. Shenanigans abound, of course.
Harry hosts Nick Sledge, founder of the Catholic Manhood social media site. Think of it as two young redneck fathers discussing Aristotle, Aquinas, architecture, and working to help get their families to heaven.Nick Sledge can be found at:https://x.com/bethecreedhttps://www.instagram.com/catholic.manhood/https://catholicmanhood.substack.com
Rafe goes solo from a secret remote location (and apologizes for the sound quality) and discusses the grand cathedral in Strasbourg, its square, its facade, its masses, and its restaurants.Are we building things today that will cause generations a thousand years from now to gather and bask in their glory?
With at least 200 episodes now produced, the Buf team looks back on their favorite episodes of the last 100, what they each have learned, and how it has helped shape their understanding of a consistent world view.
Harry and Rafe conclude the discussion around coming to understand the nature of light. In this episode they discuss some of the consequences of Einstein's Special Relativity and, in particular, how it implies that a clock moving very very fast appears, to a stationary observer, to be running slow.
Rafe quotes a recent twitter post about how to re-enchant the world, starting with simple things like elegant dinner parties. Harry joins in to discuss ways to bring about more Truth, Beauty, and Goodness to what you do on a daily basis by fully embracing enchantment and delight.
Harry and Rafe continue the discussion around coming to understand the nature of light. In this episode they discuss the concepts of Einstein's Special Relativity, the basic concept that ALL laws of physics must be consistent in any inertial reference frame.The outcome of this statement is that the measurement of the speed of light (c=3x10^8 m/s) is the same for ANY observer, at any time in ANY inertial reference frame. And the concept of "sitting still" has no meaning, since ALL ...
Rafe surprises Harry with an ad lib topic: let's talk about Independence Day. While the conversation could have been a scripted lesson in the history of the holiday and the American founding, instead the hosts meander through a broad range of topics, all inspired by the July 4th Independence Day holiday in the USA.Along the way, the Bufnaglers discuss other countries' independences, variety being the spice of life, creativity and boundaries, fireworks and sparklers, and anything that co...
Harry and Rafe roll out a warm welcome to Fr. Elliot Zak, Associate Pastor at Our Lady of Mount Carmel in Carmel, IN.Displaying remarkable poise under the intensely complicated theological questions posed by our hosts, Fr. Zak walks them through a classic Bufnaglian wandering of topics, from sacraments in the age of telecommunication, to the perfection of Christ's sacrifice, to the problem of Evil, understanding Mary's Immaculate Conception, and a host of other items.
Harry and Rafe continue the discussion around coming to understand the nature of light. In this episode they discuss the properties of waves (interferences and such) and how the nature of light is like the nature of sound except for the fact that light waves seem to be able to travel without any medium to support them. In the end, our friend Albert Michelson will again show up to finally put the ether to rest setting the stage another Albert to come to the front with Special Relat...
Rafe is joined by Big Brain Smart Head™ Bob Luzenski, America's Favorite Rocket Scientist™, to discuss recent launches of SpaceX' Starship Superheavy and Boeing's Starliner, just one day apart.A review of the flights and what went wrong and what went right ensues; the team is joined late by Harry who dropped by unexpectedly; Rafe goes off on a tangent about helium; and a question arises about whether or not "mega" is a legitimate SI unit prefix. So, yeah, this was just your typical Buf ...
Big Brain Smart Head™ and past co-host Zach Donahue returns to the show (he was never really gone) to discuss the state of men's mental health and strategies to help you get to where you need to go.More Zach can be found at his substack at https://zachdonahue.substack.com or you can reach him by email at zach@zachdonahue.com.
Harry and Rafe continue the discussion around coming to understand the nature of light. In this episode they discuss Fizeau, Foucault, and Michelson and how they used the technologies of the 18th and 19th centuries to zero in on the universal speed limit.Along the way we run into some characters we have seen before and stumble across some serendipity that is just too good not to mention.
Harry and Rafe present the first part of a series on the the speed of light and special relativity.In this episode, they discuss basic Galilean relativity and discuss how the speed of light was actually measured prior to the year 1700 using eclipses of the moons of Jupiter.
Harry and Rafe welcome Big Brain Smart Head™ Matthew Donahue, a current PhD student studying one of the Buf's favorite insect friends: bees!Matthew holds up supremely well under the heat of unrelenting questioning at the Buf and educates our hosts on all sorts of bee things.Remember to buy local honey!!!
Harry and Rafe respond to some listener questions about the Buf in general, about Harry's time in the army, and about why Rafe is going to Europe this summer.As usual it probably turns out exactly as you might imagine, which means it's not going to be what you think.
A simple observation from a photo on the interwebs leads to a question, and then lots of Bufnagely discussion, about space and orbits and rockets and garage projects, marketing, and much, much more!Harry and Rafe are joined by not one but TWO (!) Big Brain Smart Heads™: Bob Luzenski, America's Favorite Rocket Scientist™, and Dr Brian Donahue, America's Favorite Time-Traveling Ham Radio Anesthesiologist™, as they try to figure out how to get the Buf into orbit (and other similarly import...
Harry and Rafe discuss summer school and other summer activities and finish with a big announcement from Rafe about this coming summer and what it means to the Buf!