"In my view, morality must be viewed in the context of our growing scientific understanding of the mind. If there truths to be known about the mind, there will be truths to be known about how minds flourish; consequently, there will be truths to be known about good and evil."
Harris continues: "Many critics claim that my reliance on the concept of 'well-being' is arbitrary and philosophically indefensible. Who's to say that well-being is important at all or that other things aren't far more important?
.................................................................................................................................
"It seems to be that there are three, distinct challenges to my thesis, put forward thus far:
1.There is no scientific basis to say that we should value well-being, our own or anyone else's. (The Value Problem)
2. Hence, if someone does not care about well-being, or cares only about his own and not about the well-being of others, there is no way to argue that he is wrong from the point of view of science. (The Persuasion Problem)
3. Even if we did agree to grant "well-being" primacy in any discussion of morality, it is difficult or impossible to define it with rigor. It is, therefore, impossible to measure well-being scientifically. Thus, there can be no science of morality. (The Measurement Problem)
"I believe all of these challenges are the product of philosophical confusion. The simplest way to see this is by analogy to medicine and the mysterious quantity we call 'health." Let's swap 'morality' for 'medicine' and 'well-being' for 'health' and see how things look:
1. There is no scientific basis to say we should value health, our own or anyone else's. (The Value Problem)
2. Hence, if someones does not care about health, or cares only about his own and not about the health of others, there is no way to argue that he is wrong from the point of view of science. (The Persuasion Problem)
3. Even if we did agree to grant"health" primacy in any discussion of medicine, it is difficult or impossible to define it with rigor. It is, therefore, impossible to measure health scientifically. Thus, there can be no science of medicine. (The Measurement Problem).
Harris adds, "While the analogy may not be perfect, I maintain that it is good enough to nullify these three criticisms.
___________________________________________________________________
*The Moral Langscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values, by Sam Harris, pp.198-199. Note: Sam Harris, apparently, is the first scientist to claim that science does not only provide facts, but it can also provide or "determine" human values.
Monday, April 29, 2013
Sunday, April 28, 2013
THE SCIENTIST FRANCIS COLLINS FEW PEOPLE KNOW*
Francis Collins, currently the director of the National Institutes of Health, having been appointed by President Obama: he is a physical chemist, a medical geneticist, and former head of the Genome Project. He is also, by his own account, living proof that there can be no conflict between science and religion.
In 2006, Collins published a bestselling book, The Language of God, in which he claimed to demonstrate a "consistent and profoundly satisfying harmony between twnety-first century science and Evangelical Christianity. The Language of God is a genuinely astonishing book. To read it is to witness nothing less than an intellectual suicide. It is, however, a suicide that has gone almost entirely unacknowledged.
Collins is regularly praised by his fellow scientists for what he is not: he is not a "young earth creationist," nor is he a proponent of "intelligent design." Given the state of the evidence for evolution, these are both very good things for a scientist not to be. But as director of NIH, Collins now has more responsibility for biomedical and health-related research than any person on earth, controlling an annual budget of more than $30 billion. He is also one of the foremost representative of science in the United States.
Here is how Collins, as a scientist and educator, summarizes his understanding of the universe for the general public (what follows are a series of slides, presented during his lecture at the University of California, Berkeley, in 2008:
Slide 1: Almighty God who is not limited in space and time, created a universe 13.7 billion years ago
with its parameters precisely tuned to allow the development of complexity over long periods
of time.
Slide 2: God's plan included the mechanism of evolution to create the marvelous diversity of living
things on our planet. Most especially. that creative plan included human beings.
Slide 3: After evolution had prepared a sufficiently advanced "house" (our human brain), God gifted
humanity with the knowledge of good and evil (the Moral Law), with free will, and with an
immortal soul.
Slide 4: We humans use our free will to breal the moral law, leading to our estrangement from God.
For Christians, Jesus is the solution to our estrangement.
Slide 5: If the Moral Law is just a side effect of evolution, then there is no such thing as good and
evil. It's all an illusion. We've been hoodwinked. Are any of us, especially strong atheists,
really prepared to live our lives within this worldview?
....................................................................
Here is Collins story about his Christian conversion:
"A full year had passed since I decided to believe in some sort of God, and now I was being called to account. On a beautiful fall day, as I was hiking in the Cascade Mountains during my first trip west of the Mississippi, the majesty and beauty of God's creation overwhelmed my resistance. As I rounded a corner and saw a beautiful and unexpected frozen waterfall, hundreds of feet high, I knew the search was over. The next morning, I knelt in the dewy grass as the sun rose and surrendered to Jesus Christ." Here is another statement of Collins:
"As believers, you are right to hold fast to the concept of God as Creator; you are right to hold
fast to the truths of the Bible; you are right to hold fast to the conclusion that science offers no
answers to the most pressing questions of human existence; and you are right to hold fast to the
certainty that the claims of atheistic materialism must be steadfastly resisted.
God, who is not limited to space and time, created a universe and established natural laws that
govern it. Seeking to populate this otherwise sterile universe with living creatures, plants, and
animals of all sorts. Most remarkably, God intentionally chose the same mechanism to give rise
to special creatures who would have intelligence, a knowledge of right and wrong, free will, and
a desire to seek fellowship with Him. He also knew these creatures would ultimately choose to
disobey the Moral Law.
Here's what Collins said before he accepted the chairmanship of the Human Genome Project:
"I spent a long afternoon in a little chapel, seeking guidance about this decision. I did not 'hear'
God speak - in fact, I've never had that experience. During those hours, ending in an evening
service that I had not expected, a peace settled over me. A few days later, I accepted the offer."
Collins argues that science makes belief in God "intensely plausible" --the Big Bang, the fine-tuning of nature's constants, the emergence of complex life, the effectiveness of mathematics, all suggest to him that a "loving, logical and consistent" God exists. But when challenged with alternate (and far more plausible) accounts of these phenomena -- or with evidence that suggest that God might be unloving, illogical, inconsistent, or, indeed, absent - Collins declares that God stands outside of Nature, and thus science nannot address the question of His existence at all. Similarly, Collins insists that our moral intuitions attest to God's existence, to His perfectly moral character, and to His desire to have fellowship with every member of our species; but when our moral intuitions recoil at the casual destruction of innocent children by tidal wave or earthquake, Collins assures us that our time-bound notions of good and evil cannot be trusted and that God's will is a perfect mystery. As is often the case with religious apology, it is a case of heads, faith wins; tails, reason loses.
Like most Chrsitians, Collins believes in a suite of canonical miracles, including the virgin birth and literal resurrection(bodily) of Jesus Christ."
______________________________________________________________________________
*Excerpts taken from Sam Harris's book, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Moral Values, pp.160-66. Sam Harris is a neuroscientist and the author of the New York Times bestsellers The End of Faith (Winner of the PEN Award for nonfiction) and Letters to a Chrstian Nation. His writings has appeared in Newsweek, The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, The Times (London), The Boston Globe, The Atlantic, The Annals of Neurology, Foreign Policy, and many other publications. Dr. Harris holds a degree in philosophy from Stanford University, and a Ph.D. in neuroscience from UCLA. He is cofounder and chairman of Project Reason. Please visit his website at www.samharris.org.
Posted April 28, 2013 (for my other readings/reflections,etc., you can type either one of these: YouTube-John Riingen; john riingen/google; juan riingen/facebook)
In 2006, Collins published a bestselling book, The Language of God, in which he claimed to demonstrate a "consistent and profoundly satisfying harmony between twnety-first century science and Evangelical Christianity. The Language of God is a genuinely astonishing book. To read it is to witness nothing less than an intellectual suicide. It is, however, a suicide that has gone almost entirely unacknowledged.
Collins is regularly praised by his fellow scientists for what he is not: he is not a "young earth creationist," nor is he a proponent of "intelligent design." Given the state of the evidence for evolution, these are both very good things for a scientist not to be. But as director of NIH, Collins now has more responsibility for biomedical and health-related research than any person on earth, controlling an annual budget of more than $30 billion. He is also one of the foremost representative of science in the United States.
Here is how Collins, as a scientist and educator, summarizes his understanding of the universe for the general public (what follows are a series of slides, presented during his lecture at the University of California, Berkeley, in 2008:
Slide 1: Almighty God who is not limited in space and time, created a universe 13.7 billion years ago
with its parameters precisely tuned to allow the development of complexity over long periods
of time.
Slide 2: God's plan included the mechanism of evolution to create the marvelous diversity of living
things on our planet. Most especially. that creative plan included human beings.
Slide 3: After evolution had prepared a sufficiently advanced "house" (our human brain), God gifted
humanity with the knowledge of good and evil (the Moral Law), with free will, and with an
immortal soul.
Slide 4: We humans use our free will to breal the moral law, leading to our estrangement from God.
For Christians, Jesus is the solution to our estrangement.
Slide 5: If the Moral Law is just a side effect of evolution, then there is no such thing as good and
evil. It's all an illusion. We've been hoodwinked. Are any of us, especially strong atheists,
really prepared to live our lives within this worldview?
....................................................................
Here is Collins story about his Christian conversion:
"A full year had passed since I decided to believe in some sort of God, and now I was being called to account. On a beautiful fall day, as I was hiking in the Cascade Mountains during my first trip west of the Mississippi, the majesty and beauty of God's creation overwhelmed my resistance. As I rounded a corner and saw a beautiful and unexpected frozen waterfall, hundreds of feet high, I knew the search was over. The next morning, I knelt in the dewy grass as the sun rose and surrendered to Jesus Christ." Here is another statement of Collins:
"As believers, you are right to hold fast to the concept of God as Creator; you are right to hold
fast to the truths of the Bible; you are right to hold fast to the conclusion that science offers no
answers to the most pressing questions of human existence; and you are right to hold fast to the
certainty that the claims of atheistic materialism must be steadfastly resisted.
God, who is not limited to space and time, created a universe and established natural laws that
govern it. Seeking to populate this otherwise sterile universe with living creatures, plants, and
animals of all sorts. Most remarkably, God intentionally chose the same mechanism to give rise
to special creatures who would have intelligence, a knowledge of right and wrong, free will, and
a desire to seek fellowship with Him. He also knew these creatures would ultimately choose to
disobey the Moral Law.
Here's what Collins said before he accepted the chairmanship of the Human Genome Project:
"I spent a long afternoon in a little chapel, seeking guidance about this decision. I did not 'hear'
God speak - in fact, I've never had that experience. During those hours, ending in an evening
service that I had not expected, a peace settled over me. A few days later, I accepted the offer."
Collins argues that science makes belief in God "intensely plausible" --the Big Bang, the fine-tuning of nature's constants, the emergence of complex life, the effectiveness of mathematics, all suggest to him that a "loving, logical and consistent" God exists. But when challenged with alternate (and far more plausible) accounts of these phenomena -- or with evidence that suggest that God might be unloving, illogical, inconsistent, or, indeed, absent - Collins declares that God stands outside of Nature, and thus science nannot address the question of His existence at all. Similarly, Collins insists that our moral intuitions attest to God's existence, to His perfectly moral character, and to His desire to have fellowship with every member of our species; but when our moral intuitions recoil at the casual destruction of innocent children by tidal wave or earthquake, Collins assures us that our time-bound notions of good and evil cannot be trusted and that God's will is a perfect mystery. As is often the case with religious apology, it is a case of heads, faith wins; tails, reason loses.
Like most Chrsitians, Collins believes in a suite of canonical miracles, including the virgin birth and literal resurrection(bodily) of Jesus Christ."
______________________________________________________________________________
*Excerpts taken from Sam Harris's book, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Moral Values, pp.160-66. Sam Harris is a neuroscientist and the author of the New York Times bestsellers The End of Faith (Winner of the PEN Award for nonfiction) and Letters to a Chrstian Nation. His writings has appeared in Newsweek, The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, The Times (London), The Boston Globe, The Atlantic, The Annals of Neurology, Foreign Policy, and many other publications. Dr. Harris holds a degree in philosophy from Stanford University, and a Ph.D. in neuroscience from UCLA. He is cofounder and chairman of Project Reason. Please visit his website at www.samharris.org.
Posted April 28, 2013 (for my other readings/reflections,etc., you can type either one of these: YouTube-John Riingen; john riingen/google; juan riingen/facebook)
Friday, April 26, 2013
THE MARTIN LUTHER VERY FEW KNEW*
Dr. Martin Luther (1483-1546)
Luther, a German theologian and religious reformer, initiated the Protestant Reformation through his controversial writings. His theology and writings not only challenged the authority of the Roman Catholic Church but his writings reached France, England and Italy, and the Reformation eventually split Western Christianity and forever weakened the power of the Catholic Church. His influence extends beyond religion to politics, economics, education and language. In 1505, after receiving a bachelor's and master's degree, he suddenly abandoned studies, entered the Augustinian monastery in Erfurt and became a monk. In 1517, Luther became a controversial figure when he published his Ninety-Five Theses, opposing the indulgences (release from the penalties for sin through the payment of money by the Catholic Church). His refusal to retract his writings at the demand of the Pope led to his excommunication. His influence resulted in the major Protestant denomination of Lutheranism where their churches today use Luther's name. Protestant Christians so admire Martin Luther that he stands as a respected "Patron Saint" to their beliefs and morals. Christians often quote him, theologians write books on him, and many people use his name as theirs (Martin Luther King, Jr., for example).
Unfortunately few popular books or television documentaries on Luther go into detail about Luther's anti-Jewishness, or even mention that he had a hatred for Jews at all. This has resulted in a biased outlook towards Martin Luther and Christianity. This unawareness of Luther's sinister side, while honoring his "righteousness" leads to a ratcheting promotion of Luther which supports a "good" public image while also transporting his Jewish beliefs to those who carry the seeds of anti-Semitism. This will present an unwanted dilemma for many Christians because Luther represents the birth of Protestant Christianity as well as the genesis of the special brand of Jewish hatred that flourished only in Germany.
Although Luther did not invent anti-Jewishness, he promoted it to a level never before see in Europe. Luther bore the influence of his upbringing and from anti-Jewish theologians such as Lyra, Burgensis, (and John Chrysostom, before him). But Luther's 1543 book, "On the Jews and their lies" took Jewish hatred to a new level when he proposed to set fire to their synagogues and schools, to take away their homes, forbade them to pray or tech, or even utter God's name. Luther wanted to "be rid of them" and requested that the government and ministers deal with the problem. He requested pastors and preachers to follow his example of issuing warnings against the Jews. He goes so far as to claim that "We are at fault in not slaying them" for avenging the death of Jesus Christ. Hitler's Nazi government in the 1930s and 40s fit Luther's desires to a tee.
So vehemently did Luther speak against the Jews, and the fact that Luther represented an honorable and admired Christian to Protestants, that this written words carried the "memetic" seeds of anti-Jewishness up until the 20th century and into the Third Reich. Luther's Jewish eliminationist rhetoric virtually matches the beliefs held by Hitler and much of the German populace in the 1930s. Luther unconsciously set the stage for the future of German nationalistic fanaticism. William L. Shirer in his "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich," puts it succintly:
"Through his sermons and his magnificent translations of the Bible, Luther creatred the modern German language, aroused in the people not only a new Protestant vision of
Christianity by a fervent German nationalism and taught them, at least in religion, the supremacy of the individual conscience. But tragically for them, Luther's siding with the princes in the peasant uprising, which he had largely inspired, and his passion for political autocracy ensured a mindless and provincial political absolutism which reduced the vast majority of the German people to poverty, to a horrible torpor and a demeaning subservience. Even worse perhaps, it helped to perpetuate and indeed to sharpen the hopeless divisions not only between classes but also between the various dynastic and political groupings of the German people. It doomed for centuries the possibility of the unification of
Germany."
____________________________________________________________________________
*Excerpts taken online: "Martin Luther's dirty little book: On the Jews and their lies: A Precursor of Nazism, by Jim Walker. Originated: 07 Aug. 1996' additions: 20 Nov. 2005.
Luther, a German theologian and religious reformer, initiated the Protestant Reformation through his controversial writings. His theology and writings not only challenged the authority of the Roman Catholic Church but his writings reached France, England and Italy, and the Reformation eventually split Western Christianity and forever weakened the power of the Catholic Church. His influence extends beyond religion to politics, economics, education and language. In 1505, after receiving a bachelor's and master's degree, he suddenly abandoned studies, entered the Augustinian monastery in Erfurt and became a monk. In 1517, Luther became a controversial figure when he published his Ninety-Five Theses, opposing the indulgences (release from the penalties for sin through the payment of money by the Catholic Church). His refusal to retract his writings at the demand of the Pope led to his excommunication. His influence resulted in the major Protestant denomination of Lutheranism where their churches today use Luther's name. Protestant Christians so admire Martin Luther that he stands as a respected "Patron Saint" to their beliefs and morals. Christians often quote him, theologians write books on him, and many people use his name as theirs (Martin Luther King, Jr., for example).
Unfortunately few popular books or television documentaries on Luther go into detail about Luther's anti-Jewishness, or even mention that he had a hatred for Jews at all. This has resulted in a biased outlook towards Martin Luther and Christianity. This unawareness of Luther's sinister side, while honoring his "righteousness" leads to a ratcheting promotion of Luther which supports a "good" public image while also transporting his Jewish beliefs to those who carry the seeds of anti-Semitism. This will present an unwanted dilemma for many Christians because Luther represents the birth of Protestant Christianity as well as the genesis of the special brand of Jewish hatred that flourished only in Germany.
Although Luther did not invent anti-Jewishness, he promoted it to a level never before see in Europe. Luther bore the influence of his upbringing and from anti-Jewish theologians such as Lyra, Burgensis, (and John Chrysostom, before him). But Luther's 1543 book, "On the Jews and their lies" took Jewish hatred to a new level when he proposed to set fire to their synagogues and schools, to take away their homes, forbade them to pray or tech, or even utter God's name. Luther wanted to "be rid of them" and requested that the government and ministers deal with the problem. He requested pastors and preachers to follow his example of issuing warnings against the Jews. He goes so far as to claim that "We are at fault in not slaying them" for avenging the death of Jesus Christ. Hitler's Nazi government in the 1930s and 40s fit Luther's desires to a tee.
So vehemently did Luther speak against the Jews, and the fact that Luther represented an honorable and admired Christian to Protestants, that this written words carried the "memetic" seeds of anti-Jewishness up until the 20th century and into the Third Reich. Luther's Jewish eliminationist rhetoric virtually matches the beliefs held by Hitler and much of the German populace in the 1930s. Luther unconsciously set the stage for the future of German nationalistic fanaticism. William L. Shirer in his "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich," puts it succintly:
"Through his sermons and his magnificent translations of the Bible, Luther creatred the modern German language, aroused in the people not only a new Protestant vision of
Christianity by a fervent German nationalism and taught them, at least in religion, the supremacy of the individual conscience. But tragically for them, Luther's siding with the princes in the peasant uprising, which he had largely inspired, and his passion for political autocracy ensured a mindless and provincial political absolutism which reduced the vast majority of the German people to poverty, to a horrible torpor and a demeaning subservience. Even worse perhaps, it helped to perpetuate and indeed to sharpen the hopeless divisions not only between classes but also between the various dynastic and political groupings of the German people. It doomed for centuries the possibility of the unification of
Germany."
____________________________________________________________________________
*Excerpts taken online: "Martin Luther's dirty little book: On the Jews and their lies: A Precursor of Nazism, by Jim Walker. Originated: 07 Aug. 1996' additions: 20 Nov. 2005.
THE EARLY STRUGGLES OF THE ABOLITIONIST MOVEMENT: "THEY DID NOT KNOW THAT THEY DID NOT KNOW WHAT FORM IT SHOULD TAKE"
The abolitionist movement was based upon a moral frenzy, not an economic discontent. After about 1830 almost all abolitionists were resident in the North. For the most part they were middle-class people who had no material stake in the conservation or destruction of the slave system, which was in the most literal sense none of their business. Since slavery was a moral rather than an economic injury to them, they came to look upon it as an economic institution but as a breach of the ordinations of God. Abolitionism was a religious movement, emerging from the ferment of evangelical Protestantism, psychologically akin to other reforms - women's rights, temperance, and pacifism - which agitated the spirits of the Northern middle classes during the three decades before the Civil War. Its philosophy was essentially a theology, its technique similar to the techniques of revivalism, its agencies the church congregations of the towns. "Our enterprise," declared Wendell Phillips, "is eminently a religious one, dependent for success entirely on the religious sentiment of the people." The conviction that SLAVERY IS A SIN is the Gibraltar of the cause." Theodore Weld, one of the most effective leaders of the Western wing of the movement, once wrote:
In discussing the subject of slavery, I have always presented it as pre-eminently a moral question,
arresting the conscience of the nation. . . .As a question of politics and national economy, I have
passed it with scarce a look or a word, believing that the business of the abolitionists is with the
heart of the nation, rather than with its purse strings."
They had, to be sure, originally planned to make their campaign an appeal to the conscience of the slave-owners themselves, but sober observation of the Southern minds soon showed the hopelessness of such an effort. The minds of the masters were closed, and the abolitionists had precious little access to the minds of the slaves - nor did they want to incite insurrection.
.................................................................................................................................................Other abolitionists, feeling that it would be impossible to make a quick jump from slavery into freedom, and realizing that slavery in the United States was not legally a national but a state institution, which might be dropped in one place while it was flourishing in another, played with the metaphysics of "immediatism" by calling for "immediate emancipation which is gradually accomplished." Gradual methods, in short, should be immediately begun. Thus James Thome receded from the high ground of the Garrisonians: "We did not wish (the slaves) turned loose, nor even to be governed by the same Code of Laws which are adapted to intelligent citizens." To Garrison's followers this sounded like a proposal to leave the Negroes in some kind of subject condition, like a plan for forced labor --"the substitution of one type of slavery for another."
...................................................................................................................................................
The abolitionists were even less clear on how the Negro was to become an independent human being after he was freed (188). Southern proslavery apologists were quick to seize upon this weakness of the abolition case; they grasped all too well the anticipated difficulties of emancipation, and expounded them with the tenacity of the obsessed. Lincoln, who struggled conscientiously to imagine what could be done about slavery, confessed sadly that even if he had full power to dispose of it he would not know how. The abolitionists likewise did not know, but THEY DID NOT KNOW THAT THEY DID NOT KNOW (caps mine-jnr :-) The result was that when formal freedom did finally come to the Negro, many abolitionists failed entirely to realize how much more help he would need or what form it should take. Wendell Phillips, however, had learned to transcend Garrison thought. In the critical hour of Reconstruction he dropped the veil of dogma and turned to the realities.
_____________________________________________________________________
*Excerpts taken from The American Political Tradition and the Men Who Made It, by Richard Hofstadter, pp.185-188
In discussing the subject of slavery, I have always presented it as pre-eminently a moral question,
arresting the conscience of the nation. . . .As a question of politics and national economy, I have
passed it with scarce a look or a word, believing that the business of the abolitionists is with the
heart of the nation, rather than with its purse strings."
They had, to be sure, originally planned to make their campaign an appeal to the conscience of the slave-owners themselves, but sober observation of the Southern minds soon showed the hopelessness of such an effort. The minds of the masters were closed, and the abolitionists had precious little access to the minds of the slaves - nor did they want to incite insurrection.
.................................................................................................................................................Other abolitionists, feeling that it would be impossible to make a quick jump from slavery into freedom, and realizing that slavery in the United States was not legally a national but a state institution, which might be dropped in one place while it was flourishing in another, played with the metaphysics of "immediatism" by calling for "immediate emancipation which is gradually accomplished." Gradual methods, in short, should be immediately begun. Thus James Thome receded from the high ground of the Garrisonians: "We did not wish (the slaves) turned loose, nor even to be governed by the same Code of Laws which are adapted to intelligent citizens." To Garrison's followers this sounded like a proposal to leave the Negroes in some kind of subject condition, like a plan for forced labor --"the substitution of one type of slavery for another."
...................................................................................................................................................
The abolitionists were even less clear on how the Negro was to become an independent human being after he was freed (188). Southern proslavery apologists were quick to seize upon this weakness of the abolition case; they grasped all too well the anticipated difficulties of emancipation, and expounded them with the tenacity of the obsessed. Lincoln, who struggled conscientiously to imagine what could be done about slavery, confessed sadly that even if he had full power to dispose of it he would not know how. The abolitionists likewise did not know, but THEY DID NOT KNOW THAT THEY DID NOT KNOW (caps mine-jnr :-) The result was that when formal freedom did finally come to the Negro, many abolitionists failed entirely to realize how much more help he would need or what form it should take. Wendell Phillips, however, had learned to transcend Garrison thought. In the critical hour of Reconstruction he dropped the veil of dogma and turned to the realities.
_____________________________________________________________________
*Excerpts taken from The American Political Tradition and the Men Who Made It, by Richard Hofstadter, pp.185-188
Thursday, April 25, 2013
WHY THE CULTURE WARS BETWEEN RELIGION AND SCIENCE ALWAYS ENDS IN IMPASSE?*
"Both sides present what they take to be excellent arguments to support their positions. Both sides expect the other side to be responsive to such reasons. When the other side fails to be affected by such good reasons, each side concludes that the other side must be closed minded or insincere. In this way the culture wars over issues such as homosexuality and abortion can generate morally motivated players on both sides who believe that their opponents are not morally motivated."
________________________________________
*The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values, by Sam Harris, p. 88.
Posted April 25, 2013 (for my other readings/reflections,etc., go to one of these: YouTube-John Riingen; john riingen/google; juan riingen/facebook)
________________________________________
*The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values, by Sam Harris, p. 88.
Posted April 25, 2013 (for my other readings/reflections,etc., go to one of these: YouTube-John Riingen; john riingen/google; juan riingen/facebook)
GENETICIST FRANCIS COLLINS BELIEVES IN EVOLUTION AND GOD
During a lecture Collins gave at University of California, Berkeley in 2008, he presented a series of slides, presented in order:
Slide 1: Almighty God, who is not limited in space or time, created a universe 13.7 billion years ago with its parameters precisely tuned to allow the development of complexity over long periods of time.
Slide 2: God's plan included the mechanism of evolution to create the marvelous diversity of living things on our planet. Most especially, that creative plan included human beings.
Slide 3: After evolution had prepared a sufficiently advanced "house" (the human brain), God gifted humanity with the knowledge of good and evil (the Moral Law), with free will, and with an immortal soul.
Slide 4: We humans use our free will to break the moral law, leading to our estrangement from God. For Christians, Jesus is the solution to our estrangement.
Slide 5: If the Moral Law is just a slide effecdt of evolution, then there is no such thing as good or evil. It's all an illusion. We've been hoodwinked. Are any of us, especially strong atheists, really prepared to live our lives within that worldview?
...............................................................................................................................................................
But the pilgrim continues his progress: next, we learn that Collins' uncertainty about the identity of God could not survive a collision with C.S. Lewis. The following passage from Lewis proved decisive:
"I am trying to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him:
"I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God." That
is the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic -
on a level with the man who says He is a poached egg - or else He would be the Devil of Hell.
You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God; or else a madman or
something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit as Him and kill Him as a demon;
or you can fall at His feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing
nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left open to us. He did not intend
to."
Collins provides this pabulum for our contemplation and then describes how it irrevocably altered his view of the universe:
"Lewis was right. I had to make a choice. A full year had passed since I decided to believe in
some sort of God, and now I was being called to account. On a beautiful fall day, I was hiking
in the Cascade Mountains during my first trip west of the Mississippi, the majesty and beauty
of God's creation overwhelmed my resistance. As I rounded a corner and saw a beautiful and
unexpected frozen waterfall, hundreds of feet high, I knew the search was over. The next
morning, I knelt in the dewy grass as the sun rose and surrendered to Jesus Christ."
This is a self-deception at full gallop. It is simply astounding that this passage was written by a scientist with the intent of demonstrating the compatibility of faith and reason. And if we thought Collins's reasoning could grow no more labile, he has since divulged at the waterfall was frozen into three streams, which puts him in mind of the Holy Trinity.
It should go without saying that if a frozen waterfall can confirm the specific tenets of Christianity, anything can confirm anything. But this truth was not obvious to Collins as he "knelt in the dewy grass," and it is not obvious to him now. Nor was it obvious in the editors of Nature, which is the most important sceintific publication in any language. The journal praised Collins for engaging "with people of faith to explore how science - both in its mode of thought and its results - is consistent with their religious beliefs." According to Nature, Collins was engaged in the "moving" and "laudable" exercise of building "a bridge across the social and intellectual divide that exists between most of U.S. academia and the so-called heartlands." And here is Collin, hard at work on the bridge:
"As believers, you are right to hold fast to the concept of God as Creator, you are right to hold
fast to the truths of the Bible; you are right to hold fast to the conclusion that science offers no
answers to the most pressing questions of human existence; and you are right to hold fast to the
certainty that the claims of atheistic materialism must be steadfastly resisted.
God, who is not limitede to space and time, created the universe and established natural laws
that govern it. Seeking to populate this otherwise sterile universe with living creatures, God
chose the elegant mechanism of evolution to create microbes, plants, and animals of all sorts
. Most remarkably, God intentionally chose the same mechanism to give rise to special creatures
who would have intelligence, a knwoledge of right and wrong, free will, and a desire to seek
fellowship with Him. He also knew these creatures would ultimately choose to disobey the
Moral Law."
..............................................................................................................................................................
There is an epidemic of scientific ignorance in the United States. This isn't surprising, as very few scientific truths are seldom-evident and many are deeply counterintuitive. It is by no means obvious that empty space has structure or that we share a common ancestor with both the housefly and the banana. It can be difficult to think like a scientist (even, we have begun to see, when one is a scientist). But it would seem that few things make thinking like a scientist more difficult than an attachment to religion.
_______________________________________________________________________________
*The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values, by Sam Harris, pp.160-176.
Slide 1: Almighty God, who is not limited in space or time, created a universe 13.7 billion years ago with its parameters precisely tuned to allow the development of complexity over long periods of time.
Slide 2: God's plan included the mechanism of evolution to create the marvelous diversity of living things on our planet. Most especially, that creative plan included human beings.
Slide 3: After evolution had prepared a sufficiently advanced "house" (the human brain), God gifted humanity with the knowledge of good and evil (the Moral Law), with free will, and with an immortal soul.
Slide 4: We humans use our free will to break the moral law, leading to our estrangement from God. For Christians, Jesus is the solution to our estrangement.
Slide 5: If the Moral Law is just a slide effecdt of evolution, then there is no such thing as good or evil. It's all an illusion. We've been hoodwinked. Are any of us, especially strong atheists, really prepared to live our lives within that worldview?
...............................................................................................................................................................
But the pilgrim continues his progress: next, we learn that Collins' uncertainty about the identity of God could not survive a collision with C.S. Lewis. The following passage from Lewis proved decisive:
"I am trying to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him:
"I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God." That
is the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic -
on a level with the man who says He is a poached egg - or else He would be the Devil of Hell.
You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God; or else a madman or
something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit as Him and kill Him as a demon;
or you can fall at His feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing
nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left open to us. He did not intend
to."
Collins provides this pabulum for our contemplation and then describes how it irrevocably altered his view of the universe:
"Lewis was right. I had to make a choice. A full year had passed since I decided to believe in
some sort of God, and now I was being called to account. On a beautiful fall day, I was hiking
in the Cascade Mountains during my first trip west of the Mississippi, the majesty and beauty
of God's creation overwhelmed my resistance. As I rounded a corner and saw a beautiful and
unexpected frozen waterfall, hundreds of feet high, I knew the search was over. The next
morning, I knelt in the dewy grass as the sun rose and surrendered to Jesus Christ."
This is a self-deception at full gallop. It is simply astounding that this passage was written by a scientist with the intent of demonstrating the compatibility of faith and reason. And if we thought Collins's reasoning could grow no more labile, he has since divulged at the waterfall was frozen into three streams, which puts him in mind of the Holy Trinity.
It should go without saying that if a frozen waterfall can confirm the specific tenets of Christianity, anything can confirm anything. But this truth was not obvious to Collins as he "knelt in the dewy grass," and it is not obvious to him now. Nor was it obvious in the editors of Nature, which is the most important sceintific publication in any language. The journal praised Collins for engaging "with people of faith to explore how science - both in its mode of thought and its results - is consistent with their religious beliefs." According to Nature, Collins was engaged in the "moving" and "laudable" exercise of building "a bridge across the social and intellectual divide that exists between most of U.S. academia and the so-called heartlands." And here is Collin, hard at work on the bridge:
"As believers, you are right to hold fast to the concept of God as Creator, you are right to hold
fast to the truths of the Bible; you are right to hold fast to the conclusion that science offers no
answers to the most pressing questions of human existence; and you are right to hold fast to the
certainty that the claims of atheistic materialism must be steadfastly resisted.
God, who is not limitede to space and time, created the universe and established natural laws
that govern it. Seeking to populate this otherwise sterile universe with living creatures, God
chose the elegant mechanism of evolution to create microbes, plants, and animals of all sorts
. Most remarkably, God intentionally chose the same mechanism to give rise to special creatures
who would have intelligence, a knwoledge of right and wrong, free will, and a desire to seek
fellowship with Him. He also knew these creatures would ultimately choose to disobey the
Moral Law."
..............................................................................................................................................................
There is an epidemic of scientific ignorance in the United States. This isn't surprising, as very few scientific truths are seldom-evident and many are deeply counterintuitive. It is by no means obvious that empty space has structure or that we share a common ancestor with both the housefly and the banana. It can be difficult to think like a scientist (even, we have begun to see, when one is a scientist). But it would seem that few things make thinking like a scientist more difficult than an attachment to religion.
_______________________________________________________________________________
*The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values, by Sam Harris, pp.160-176.
Tuesday, April 23, 2013
THE MORAL LANDSCAPE: HOW SCIENCE CAN DETERMINE HUMAN VALUES, by NEUROSCIENTIST SAM HARRIS
WHY DID NEUROSCIENTIST SAM HARRIS WRITE HIS BOOK?
This is what he said:
"My goal is to convince you that human knowledge and human values can no longer be kept apart. The world of measurement and the world of meaning must eventually be reconciled. And science and religion --being antithetical ways of thinking about the same reality -- will never come to terms. As with all matters of fact, differences of opinion on moral questions merely reveal the incompleteness of our knowledge; they do not oblige us to respect a diversity of views in definitely."*
___________________________________
*The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Moral Values, Sam Harris, p. 10
Posted April 23, 2013 (for my other readings/reflections, etc., go to one of these sites: YouTube-John Riingen; john riingen/google; juan riingen'facebook)
This is what he said:
"My goal is to convince you that human knowledge and human values can no longer be kept apart. The world of measurement and the world of meaning must eventually be reconciled. And science and religion --being antithetical ways of thinking about the same reality -- will never come to terms. As with all matters of fact, differences of opinion on moral questions merely reveal the incompleteness of our knowledge; they do not oblige us to respect a diversity of views in definitely."*
___________________________________
*The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Moral Values, Sam Harris, p. 10
Posted April 23, 2013 (for my other readings/reflections, etc., go to one of these sites: YouTube-John Riingen; john riingen/google; juan riingen'facebook)
Monday, April 22, 2013
Book: The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values, By Sam Harris
Here are some what reviewers say about Sam Harris's book:
"I was one of those who had unthinkingly bought into the hectoring myth that science can say nothing about morals. To my surprise, The Moral Landscape has changed all that for me. It should change it for philosophers too. Philosophers of mind have discovered that they can't duck the study of neuroscience, and the best of them have raised their game as a result. Sam Harris shows that the same should be true of moral philosophers, and it will turn their world exhileratingly upside down. As for religion, and the preposterous idea that we need God to be good, nobody wields a sharper bayonet than Sam Harris."
--Richard Dawkins, Oxford University
"Reading Sam Harris is like drinking water from a cool stream on a hot day. He has the rare ability to frame arguments that are not only stimulating, they are downright nourishing, even if you don't always agree with him! In this new book he argues from a philosophical and neurobiological perspective that science can and should determine morality. His discussions will provoke different perspectives that there always will be an unbridgeable chasm between merely knowing what is and discerning what should be. As was the case with Harris/s previous books, readers are bound to come away with previously firm convictions about value of science and reason in our lives."
--Lawrence Krauss, Foundation Professor and Director of the
Origins Project at Arizona State University and author of the
Physics of Star Trek and Quantum Man: Richard Feynman's Life in
Science.
"This is an inspiring book, holding out as it does the possibility of a rational understanding of how to
construct the good life with the aid of science, free from the accretions of religious superstition and
cultural coercion."
--Financial Times
NOTE: I will be posting on this site some of the major ideas from this book. If you wish to read them, type this on your search engine: jnriingen@aol.com.post. I will also post them either here: "john riingen' google" or here: "juan riingen/facebook"; or here: "YouTube-John Riingen"
"I was one of those who had unthinkingly bought into the hectoring myth that science can say nothing about morals. To my surprise, The Moral Landscape has changed all that for me. It should change it for philosophers too. Philosophers of mind have discovered that they can't duck the study of neuroscience, and the best of them have raised their game as a result. Sam Harris shows that the same should be true of moral philosophers, and it will turn their world exhileratingly upside down. As for religion, and the preposterous idea that we need God to be good, nobody wields a sharper bayonet than Sam Harris."
--Richard Dawkins, Oxford University
"Reading Sam Harris is like drinking water from a cool stream on a hot day. He has the rare ability to frame arguments that are not only stimulating, they are downright nourishing, even if you don't always agree with him! In this new book he argues from a philosophical and neurobiological perspective that science can and should determine morality. His discussions will provoke different perspectives that there always will be an unbridgeable chasm between merely knowing what is and discerning what should be. As was the case with Harris/s previous books, readers are bound to come away with previously firm convictions about value of science and reason in our lives."
--Lawrence Krauss, Foundation Professor and Director of the
Origins Project at Arizona State University and author of the
Physics of Star Trek and Quantum Man: Richard Feynman's Life in
Science.
"This is an inspiring book, holding out as it does the possibility of a rational understanding of how to
construct the good life with the aid of science, free from the accretions of religious superstition and
cultural coercion."
--Financial Times
NOTE: I will be posting on this site some of the major ideas from this book. If you wish to read them, type this on your search engine: jnriingen@aol.com.post. I will also post them either here: "john riingen' google" or here: "juan riingen/facebook"; or here: "YouTube-John Riingen"
Saturday, April 20, 2013
THE REASON THE GOSPEL OF THOMAS WAS EXCLUDED IN THE NEW TESTAMENT CANON*
The Gospel of Thomas....claims to offer secret teaching - teaching quite different from that of Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John. According to Mark, for example, Jesus first appears proclaiming that "the time is at hand; the kingdom of God is drawing near. Repent, and believe in the gospel" (1:15) According to mark, the world is about to undergo cataclysmic transformation: Jesus predicts strife, war, conflict, and suffering, followed by a world-shattering event - the coming of the Kingdom of God (13:1-37).
But in the Gospel of Thomas the "kingdom of God" is not an event expected to happen in history, nor is it a "place." The author of Thomas seems to ridicule such views:
Jesus said, "If those who lead you to say, 'Lord, the kingdom of God is in the sky,' then the birds of the sky will precede you. If they say to you, 'It is in the sea,' then the fish will precede you.' (NHC II.32.19-24).
"Rather, the kingdom is inside of you, and it is outside of you. When you come to know yourselves, then you will become known, and you will realize that it is you who are the sons of the living Father" (NHC II.32.25-33.5).
But the disciples, mistaking that kingdom for a future event, persist in naive questioning:
"When will . . .the new world come?" Jesus said to them, "What you look forward to has
already come, but you do not recognize it: (NHC II.42.10-12).
According to the Gospel of Thomas, then, the kingdom of God symbolizes a state of transformed consciousness. One enters that kingdom when one attains self-knowledge. The Gospel of Thomas teaches that when one comes to know oneself, at the deepest level, one simultaneously comes to know God as the source of one's being.
____________________________________________________________
*Source: The Origin of Satan, by Elaine Pagels, pp. 70-71.
Posted April 20, 2013 (for my other readings/reflections,etc., you can go to: jnriingen@aol.com.post; YouTube-John Riingen; john riingen/google; juan riingen/facebook)
But in the Gospel of Thomas the "kingdom of God" is not an event expected to happen in history, nor is it a "place." The author of Thomas seems to ridicule such views:
Jesus said, "If those who lead you to say, 'Lord, the kingdom of God is in the sky,' then the birds of the sky will precede you. If they say to you, 'It is in the sea,' then the fish will precede you.' (NHC II.32.19-24).
"Rather, the kingdom is inside of you, and it is outside of you. When you come to know yourselves, then you will become known, and you will realize that it is you who are the sons of the living Father" (NHC II.32.25-33.5).
But the disciples, mistaking that kingdom for a future event, persist in naive questioning:
"When will . . .the new world come?" Jesus said to them, "What you look forward to has
already come, but you do not recognize it: (NHC II.42.10-12).
According to the Gospel of Thomas, then, the kingdom of God symbolizes a state of transformed consciousness. One enters that kingdom when one attains self-knowledge. The Gospel of Thomas teaches that when one comes to know oneself, at the deepest level, one simultaneously comes to know God as the source of one's being.
____________________________________________________________
*Source: The Origin of Satan, by Elaine Pagels, pp. 70-71.
Posted April 20, 2013 (for my other readings/reflections,etc., you can go to: jnriingen@aol.com.post; YouTube-John Riingen; john riingen/google; juan riingen/facebook)
WHY WAS THE GOSPEL OF THOMAS AND THE OTHER GOSPELS EXCLUDED IN THE NEW TESTAMENT CANON?*
Why was the Gospel of Thomas suppressed, along with many others that have remained virtually unknown for nearly two thousand years? Originally part of the sacred library of the oldest monastery in Egypt, these books were buried, apparently, around 370 C.E., after the archbishop of Alexandria ordered Christians all over Egypt to ban such books as heresy demanded thair destruction. Two hundred years earlier, such works had already been attacked by another zealously orthodox bishop, Irenaeus of Lyons. Irenaeus was the first, so far as we know, to identify the four gospels of the New Testament as canonical, and to exclude all the rest. Distressed that dozens of gospels were circulating among Christians throughout the world, including his own Greep-speaking immigrant congregation living in Gaul, Irenaeus denounced as heretics those who "boast that they have more gospels than there really are . . .but really, they have no gospels that are full of blasphemy." Only the four gospels of the New Testament, Irenaeus insisted, are authentic. What was his reasoning? Irenaeus declared that just as there are four principal winds, and four corners of the universe, and four pillars holding up the sky, so there can be only four gospels. Besides, he added, only the New Testament gospels were written by Jesus' own disciples (Matthew and John) or their followers (Mark, disciple of Peter, and Luke, disciple of Paul).
_________________________________________________________________
*Source: The Origin of Satan, by Elaine Pagels, p.69.
Posted April 20, 2013
_________________________________________________________________
*Source: The Origin of Satan, by Elaine Pagels, p.69.
Posted April 20, 2013
IS SALMAN RUSHDIE'S "SATANIC VERSES" FOUND IN THE KORAN?
The story of the Satanic Verses is not mentioned either in the Koran or in any of the early oral or written sources. It iss not included in Ibn Ishaq's Sira, the most authoritative biography of the Prophet, but only in the work of the tenth-century historian Aby Jafar at-Tahari (d.923). He tells us that Muhammad was distressed by the rift that had developed between him and most of his tribe after he had forbidden the cult of the goddesses and so, inspired by "Satan," he uttered some rogue verses which allowed the banat al-Lah to be venerated as intercessors, like the angels. In these so-called "Satanic" verses, the three goddesses were not on a par with al-Lah but were lesser spiritual beings who could intercede with him on behalf of mankind. Later, however, Tabari says that Gabriel told the Prophet that these verses were of "Satanic" origin and should be excised from the Koran to be replaced by these lines which declared that the banat al-Lah were projections and figments of the imagination:
Have you, then, ever considered (what you are worshipping in) al-Lah, al-Uzza, as well as (in
Manat, the third and last (of this triad)?. . . These (allegedly divine beings) are nothing but
empty names which you have invented - you and your forefathers- (and) for which God has
bestowed no warrant from on high. They (who worship them) follow nothing but surmise and
their own wishful thinking - although right guidance has now indeed come unto them from
their Sustainer.
This was the most radical of all Koranic condemnation of the ancestral pagan gods, and after these verses had been included in the Koran there was no chance of a reconciliation with the Quraysh. From this point, Muhammad became a jealous monotheist, and shirk (idolatry; literally associating other beings with al-Lah) became the greatest sin of Islam.
___________________________________________________________________
*Excerpt from the book A History of God: A 4,000 Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, by Karen Armstrong, pp.147-48.
Posted April 20, 2013
Have you, then, ever considered (what you are worshipping in) al-Lah, al-Uzza, as well as (in
Manat, the third and last (of this triad)?. . . These (allegedly divine beings) are nothing but
empty names which you have invented - you and your forefathers- (and) for which God has
bestowed no warrant from on high. They (who worship them) follow nothing but surmise and
their own wishful thinking - although right guidance has now indeed come unto them from
their Sustainer.
This was the most radical of all Koranic condemnation of the ancestral pagan gods, and after these verses had been included in the Koran there was no chance of a reconciliation with the Quraysh. From this point, Muhammad became a jealous monotheist, and shirk (idolatry; literally associating other beings with al-Lah) became the greatest sin of Islam.
___________________________________________________________________
*Excerpt from the book A History of God: A 4,000 Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, by Karen Armstrong, pp.147-48.
Posted April 20, 2013
THE MUSLIM SAUL OF TARSUS*
Qurayshi Umar ibn a-Khattab had been a virulent opponent of Mohammad, and ready to assassinate the Prophet. But this Muslim Saul of Tarsus was converted not by a vision of Jesus the Word but by the Koran. His conversion comes in two versions. The first has Umar discovering her sister, who had secretly become a Muslim, listening to a recitation of a new sura. "What was the balderdash?" he had roared angrily as he strode into the house, knocking poor Fatimah to the ground. But when he saw his sister was bleeding, he probably felt shamed because his face changed. He picked up the manuscript, which the visiting Koran reciter had dropped in the commotion, and being one of the few Qurayshis who were literate, he started to read. Umar was an acknowledged authority on Arabic oral poetry and was consulted by poets as to the precise significance of the language, but he had never come across anything like the Koran. "How fine and noble this speech!" he said wonderingly, and was instantly converted to the new religion of al-Lah" (Koran 75:17-19)In the other version of Umar's conversio, he encountered Muhammad one night at the Kabah, reciting the Koran quietly to himself before the shrine. Thinking that he would like to listen to the words, Umar crept under the damask cloth that covered the huge granite cube and edged his way around until he was standing directly in front of the Prophet. As he said, "There was nothing between us but the cover of the Kabah" - all his defenses but one were down. Then the magic of the Arabic did its work: "When I heard the Koran, my heart was softened and I wept and Islam entered into me." It was the Koran which prevented God from being a mighty reality "out there" and brought him into the mind, heart and being of each believer.
______________________________________________________________________
*Excerpt from the book A History of God: The 4,000 Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, by Karen Armstrong, pp.145-46.
Posted April 20, 2013
______________________________________________________________________
*Excerpt from the book A History of God: The 4,000 Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, by Karen Armstrong, pp.145-46.
Posted April 20, 2013
Friday, April 19, 2013
Is The United States of America a Christian Country?
It's just fitting that, with the increasing violence happening in many parts of the country today, we can ask: Is the United States of America a Christian country? Or, does religiosity correlates with morality?
In his Letter To a Christian Nation, neuroscientist Sam Harris says:
"While political party affiliation in the United States is not a perfect indicator of religiosity, it is no secret that the 'red (Republican) states' are primarily red due to the overwhelming political influence of conservative Christians. If there were strong correlation between Christian conservatism and societal health, we might expect to see some sign of it in red-state America. We don't. Of the twenty-five cities with the lowest rates of violent crime, 62 percent are in the 'blue' (Democrat) states, and 38 percent are in 'red' (Republican) states. Of the twenty-five most dangerous cities, 76 percent are in the red states, and 24 percent are in the blue states. In fact, three of the five most dangerous cities in the U.S. are in the pious state of Texas. The twelve states with the highest rates of burglary are red. Twenty-four of the twenty-nine states with the highest rates of theft are red. Of the twenty-two states with the highest rates of murder, seventeen are red."*
___________________________________________
*Cited by Richard Dawkins in his book, The God Delusion, p. 229. Note also that these colour conventions in America are exactly the opposite of those in Britain, where blue is the colour of the Conservative Party, and red, as in the rest of the world, is the colour traditionally associated with the political left.
Posted April 19, 2013 (for my other readings/reflections, etc., you can go to: "YouTube-John Riingen"; "john riingen/google"; "juan riingen/facebook")
In his Letter To a Christian Nation, neuroscientist Sam Harris says:
"While political party affiliation in the United States is not a perfect indicator of religiosity, it is no secret that the 'red (Republican) states' are primarily red due to the overwhelming political influence of conservative Christians. If there were strong correlation between Christian conservatism and societal health, we might expect to see some sign of it in red-state America. We don't. Of the twenty-five cities with the lowest rates of violent crime, 62 percent are in the 'blue' (Democrat) states, and 38 percent are in 'red' (Republican) states. Of the twenty-five most dangerous cities, 76 percent are in the red states, and 24 percent are in the blue states. In fact, three of the five most dangerous cities in the U.S. are in the pious state of Texas. The twelve states with the highest rates of burglary are red. Twenty-four of the twenty-nine states with the highest rates of theft are red. Of the twenty-two states with the highest rates of murder, seventeen are red."*
___________________________________________
*Cited by Richard Dawkins in his book, The God Delusion, p. 229. Note also that these colour conventions in America are exactly the opposite of those in Britain, where blue is the colour of the Conservative Party, and red, as in the rest of the world, is the colour traditionally associated with the political left.
Posted April 19, 2013 (for my other readings/reflections, etc., you can go to: "YouTube-John Riingen"; "john riingen/google"; "juan riingen/facebook")
WELCOME TO MY BLOGPOST
I will post here some of my personal readings and reflections for friends to read and also listen to their feedbacks/comments, which I believe enhances healthy interaction and exchange via the internet. I will include some significant excerpts from books, articles, written by some outstanding secular and religious authors (modern and post-modern) whose works include the following subjects: Religion and Ethics, Science, Politics, Economics, History, Sociology, and other related sciences. Occasionally, I will also post some ideas of Christian fundamentalist/conservative thinkers and try to highlight some of their ideas that need some redirection, and refer my readers to read some of their works.
In this blogpost, I will follow one simple dictum: Perception, ideas, then and now, no matter how great they are, are never written on stones. With this, I mean I believe in Tradition, but more importantly, in the Traditioning/reformulation process. I believe, finally, life is always in the "process of becoming". My hope is that someday all Christians, including other faith traditions, will finally see what Sam MacKintosh (and thinkers like him) calls in his blogpost, "the convergence of science and religion."
John Nalundasan Riingen
Revised/Posted April 19, 2013 (for my other readings/reflections you can go to: "YouTube-John Riingen"; "juan riingen/facebook"; "john riingen/google"
In this blogpost, I will follow one simple dictum: Perception, ideas, then and now, no matter how great they are, are never written on stones. With this, I mean I believe in Tradition, but more importantly, in the Traditioning/reformulation process. I believe, finally, life is always in the "process of becoming". My hope is that someday all Christians, including other faith traditions, will finally see what Sam MacKintosh (and thinkers like him) calls in his blogpost, "the convergence of science and religion."
John Nalundasan Riingen
Revised/Posted April 19, 2013 (for my other readings/reflections you can go to: "YouTube-John Riingen"; "juan riingen/facebook"; "john riingen/google"
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