Papers by Sean J Costello
ACM Journal on Emerging Technologies in Computing Systems, Jul 3, 2023
For successful printed circuit board (PCB) reverse engineering (RE), the resulting device must re... more For successful printed circuit board (PCB) reverse engineering (RE), the resulting device must retain the physical characteristics and functionality of the original. Although the applications of RE are within the discretion of the executing party, establishing a viable, non-destructive framework for analysis is vital for any stakeholder in the PCB industry. A widely-regarded approach in PCB RE uses non-destructive x-ray computed tomography (CT) to produce three-dimensional volumes with several slices of data corresponding to multi-layered PCBs. However, the noise sources speciic to x-ray CT and variability from designers hampers the thorough acquisition of features necessary for successful RE. This article investigates a deep learning approach as a successor to the current state-of-the-art for detecting vias on PCB x-ray CT images; vias are a key building block of PCB designs. During RE, vias ofer an understanding of the PCB's electrical connections across multiple layers. Our method is an improvement on an earlier iteration which demonstrates signiicantly faster runtime with quality of results comparable to or better than the current state-of-the-art, unsupervised iterative Hough-based method. Compared with the Hough-based method, the current framework is 4.5 times faster for the discrete image scenario and 24.1 times faster for the volumetric image scenario. The upgrades to the prior deep learning version include faster feature-based detection for real-world usability and adaptive post-processing methods to improve the quality of detections. CCS Concepts: • Hardware → PCB design and layout; • Computing methodologies → Object detection.
Trinity Theological Seminary, 2023
Holding that Scripture is the inspired, inerrant, sufficient, necessary, and clear Word of God, t... more Holding that Scripture is the inspired, inerrant, sufficient, necessary, and clear Word of God, this paper documents the history of eschatological positions held by the church, and when those varying eschatological positions came to be.
Trinity Theological Seminary, 2023
Many think of Scripture's human process of inspiration as little more than robotic autowriting. I... more Many think of Scripture's human process of inspiration as little more than robotic autowriting. In this paper, I examine a hopefully representative portion of scholarly work on the subject of the inspiration of Scripture to discern whether our understanding of the Biblical process of inspiration demands a real human being functioning as a real human being or whether our understanding of the process of inspiration can tolerate the inspired text’s author functioning as an autowriting robot – the worst-case understanding of mechanical dictation – at the time of the inspired text’s authorship.
We conclude God used the whole human being to author the inspired text. According to Michael Heiser, Scripture's human authors wrote based on their abilities, education, styles, worldviews, backgrounds, and idiosyncrasies. God
providentially prepared each writer, through time spent listening to the incarnate Christ, formal education, the reading of Scripture already extant, insight given by the Spirit, religious training, and sensitivity to the working of God in their own lives through spiritual devotion. The process of inspiration does not require us to contend that God verbally dictated the words of the Bible to the authors, though God did so on rare occasions, at times directly or through a divine agent. The process also does not require us to embrace the idea that God impressed each word on the mind of the author through some silent, mental process, as though God somehow overtook the author’s mind.
Trinity Theological Seminary ThD Thesis, 2024
2 Peter 3:8 is part of the inspired canon, and says, “But do not overlook this one fact, beloved,... more 2 Peter 3:8 is part of the inspired canon, and says, “But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (ESV).
2 Peter 3:8 hermeneutical option #1 is based on a figurative understanding of the phrase “thousand years,” similar to Wayne Grudem’s definition, “’a thousand years’ is a figurative expression for ‘as long a time as we can imagine,’ or ‘all history.’” According to Grudem, “This has been the dominant view of Christian orthodoxy throughout the history of the church, though it has been frequently challenged, and even today many theologians deny it.” In his early fifth century AD book City of God, Augustine postulated hermeneutical option #1 when he used the phrase “thousand years” as an allegory, equivalent to the whole duration of this world.
2 Peter 3:8 hermeneutical option #2 is based on the holy prophets preexistent 7,000 year plan for the earth’s history. Typically, the creation week served as a prophecy of the world’s chronology; six days of creation corresponds to six thousand years, with Messiah returning in the world’s 6,000th year, followed by a seventh day, a Sabbath one thousand year rest for the world. Ancient Israel understood the seven thousand years as being divided into three two thousand year ages; the two thousand year Age of Chaos, the two thousand year Age of Torah and the two thousand year Age of Messiah, or the Church Age, to be followed by the coming Millennium.
Scholarship holds that 2 Peter was pseudonymously written from 60-150 AD. This Research Project’s Thesis recognizes the author’s intended meaning is associated with the original autograph, and that the author was fully human. Accordingly, 2 Peter 3:8’s fully human author could never have meant what he could not have known at the time and place he authored the inspired text. Therefore, the author’s intended meaning for 2 Peter 3:8 should be discoverable in the primary source literature available in the 2nd Temple period through the early third century AD cognitive environment.
To discern the human author’s intended meaning for the phrase “thousand years” in 2 Peter 3:8, this Research Project performed a sufficiently comprehensive review of the available Second Temple period literature, including the Old Testament, Tanna Debe Eliyyahu, the Talmud, Apocrypha (Deuterocanon), Pseudepigrapha, Dead Sea Scrolls, and Septuagint, the available first and second century AD literature, ending with the extant writings of Caius (Gaius) and Origen in the early third century AD.
This Research Project found no evidence to support hermeneutical option #1 in the researched cognitive environments. All discovered evidence supports hermeneutical option 2. According to its Research Thesis and the discovered primary source evidence, this Research Project concludes that hermeneutical option #2 should be recognized as the best interpretation of the author’s intended meaning in 2 Peter 3:8, pending further research. In 2 Peter 3:8, the inspired author used the phrase “thousand years” literally as a part of the holy prophets preexistent 7,000 year plan for earth’s history according to Genesis 1:1-2:3, Genesis 2:16-17, Genesis 5:5, Psalm 90:4, the kingdom era prophets and sages, Jubilees 4:29-31, 2 Enoch 33:1, the 1st century Rabbis, 2 Peter 3:8, Revelation 20:1-7, and the many early church fathers who espoused this understanding.
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Papers by Sean J Costello
We conclude God used the whole human being to author the inspired text. According to Michael Heiser, Scripture's human authors wrote based on their abilities, education, styles, worldviews, backgrounds, and idiosyncrasies. God
providentially prepared each writer, through time spent listening to the incarnate Christ, formal education, the reading of Scripture already extant, insight given by the Spirit, religious training, and sensitivity to the working of God in their own lives through spiritual devotion. The process of inspiration does not require us to contend that God verbally dictated the words of the Bible to the authors, though God did so on rare occasions, at times directly or through a divine agent. The process also does not require us to embrace the idea that God impressed each word on the mind of the author through some silent, mental process, as though God somehow overtook the author’s mind.
2 Peter 3:8 hermeneutical option #1 is based on a figurative understanding of the phrase “thousand years,” similar to Wayne Grudem’s definition, “’a thousand years’ is a figurative expression for ‘as long a time as we can imagine,’ or ‘all history.’” According to Grudem, “This has been the dominant view of Christian orthodoxy throughout the history of the church, though it has been frequently challenged, and even today many theologians deny it.” In his early fifth century AD book City of God, Augustine postulated hermeneutical option #1 when he used the phrase “thousand years” as an allegory, equivalent to the whole duration of this world.
2 Peter 3:8 hermeneutical option #2 is based on the holy prophets preexistent 7,000 year plan for the earth’s history. Typically, the creation week served as a prophecy of the world’s chronology; six days of creation corresponds to six thousand years, with Messiah returning in the world’s 6,000th year, followed by a seventh day, a Sabbath one thousand year rest for the world. Ancient Israel understood the seven thousand years as being divided into three two thousand year ages; the two thousand year Age of Chaos, the two thousand year Age of Torah and the two thousand year Age of Messiah, or the Church Age, to be followed by the coming Millennium.
Scholarship holds that 2 Peter was pseudonymously written from 60-150 AD. This Research Project’s Thesis recognizes the author’s intended meaning is associated with the original autograph, and that the author was fully human. Accordingly, 2 Peter 3:8’s fully human author could never have meant what he could not have known at the time and place he authored the inspired text. Therefore, the author’s intended meaning for 2 Peter 3:8 should be discoverable in the primary source literature available in the 2nd Temple period through the early third century AD cognitive environment.
To discern the human author’s intended meaning for the phrase “thousand years” in 2 Peter 3:8, this Research Project performed a sufficiently comprehensive review of the available Second Temple period literature, including the Old Testament, Tanna Debe Eliyyahu, the Talmud, Apocrypha (Deuterocanon), Pseudepigrapha, Dead Sea Scrolls, and Septuagint, the available first and second century AD literature, ending with the extant writings of Caius (Gaius) and Origen in the early third century AD.
This Research Project found no evidence to support hermeneutical option #1 in the researched cognitive environments. All discovered evidence supports hermeneutical option 2. According to its Research Thesis and the discovered primary source evidence, this Research Project concludes that hermeneutical option #2 should be recognized as the best interpretation of the author’s intended meaning in 2 Peter 3:8, pending further research. In 2 Peter 3:8, the inspired author used the phrase “thousand years” literally as a part of the holy prophets preexistent 7,000 year plan for earth’s history according to Genesis 1:1-2:3, Genesis 2:16-17, Genesis 5:5, Psalm 90:4, the kingdom era prophets and sages, Jubilees 4:29-31, 2 Enoch 33:1, the 1st century Rabbis, 2 Peter 3:8, Revelation 20:1-7, and the many early church fathers who espoused this understanding.
We conclude God used the whole human being to author the inspired text. According to Michael Heiser, Scripture's human authors wrote based on their abilities, education, styles, worldviews, backgrounds, and idiosyncrasies. God
providentially prepared each writer, through time spent listening to the incarnate Christ, formal education, the reading of Scripture already extant, insight given by the Spirit, religious training, and sensitivity to the working of God in their own lives through spiritual devotion. The process of inspiration does not require us to contend that God verbally dictated the words of the Bible to the authors, though God did so on rare occasions, at times directly or through a divine agent. The process also does not require us to embrace the idea that God impressed each word on the mind of the author through some silent, mental process, as though God somehow overtook the author’s mind.
2 Peter 3:8 hermeneutical option #1 is based on a figurative understanding of the phrase “thousand years,” similar to Wayne Grudem’s definition, “’a thousand years’ is a figurative expression for ‘as long a time as we can imagine,’ or ‘all history.’” According to Grudem, “This has been the dominant view of Christian orthodoxy throughout the history of the church, though it has been frequently challenged, and even today many theologians deny it.” In his early fifth century AD book City of God, Augustine postulated hermeneutical option #1 when he used the phrase “thousand years” as an allegory, equivalent to the whole duration of this world.
2 Peter 3:8 hermeneutical option #2 is based on the holy prophets preexistent 7,000 year plan for the earth’s history. Typically, the creation week served as a prophecy of the world’s chronology; six days of creation corresponds to six thousand years, with Messiah returning in the world’s 6,000th year, followed by a seventh day, a Sabbath one thousand year rest for the world. Ancient Israel understood the seven thousand years as being divided into three two thousand year ages; the two thousand year Age of Chaos, the two thousand year Age of Torah and the two thousand year Age of Messiah, or the Church Age, to be followed by the coming Millennium.
Scholarship holds that 2 Peter was pseudonymously written from 60-150 AD. This Research Project’s Thesis recognizes the author’s intended meaning is associated with the original autograph, and that the author was fully human. Accordingly, 2 Peter 3:8’s fully human author could never have meant what he could not have known at the time and place he authored the inspired text. Therefore, the author’s intended meaning for 2 Peter 3:8 should be discoverable in the primary source literature available in the 2nd Temple period through the early third century AD cognitive environment.
To discern the human author’s intended meaning for the phrase “thousand years” in 2 Peter 3:8, this Research Project performed a sufficiently comprehensive review of the available Second Temple period literature, including the Old Testament, Tanna Debe Eliyyahu, the Talmud, Apocrypha (Deuterocanon), Pseudepigrapha, Dead Sea Scrolls, and Septuagint, the available first and second century AD literature, ending with the extant writings of Caius (Gaius) and Origen in the early third century AD.
This Research Project found no evidence to support hermeneutical option #1 in the researched cognitive environments. All discovered evidence supports hermeneutical option 2. According to its Research Thesis and the discovered primary source evidence, this Research Project concludes that hermeneutical option #2 should be recognized as the best interpretation of the author’s intended meaning in 2 Peter 3:8, pending further research. In 2 Peter 3:8, the inspired author used the phrase “thousand years” literally as a part of the holy prophets preexistent 7,000 year plan for earth’s history according to Genesis 1:1-2:3, Genesis 2:16-17, Genesis 5:5, Psalm 90:4, the kingdom era prophets and sages, Jubilees 4:29-31, 2 Enoch 33:1, the 1st century Rabbis, 2 Peter 3:8, Revelation 20:1-7, and the many early church fathers who espoused this understanding.