tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9479398.post3775377153542110862..comments2024-03-28T11:33:16.271-05:00Comments on Adventus: I'm not sure what it means....Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9479398.post-44253890024029484852011-06-26T14:25:08.357-05:002011-06-26T14:25:08.357-05:00Anthony--Interesting discussion on an NPR (?) prog...Anthony--Interesting discussion on an NPR (?) program this morning (my local NPR has split to two stations, one of which runs all talk all the time; I'm still figuring out the schedule), one about belief in which prominent scientists and, one hopes, theologians and other religious are interviewed.<br /><br />Anyway, the "guest" was a neurologist who started studying compassion as an emotion at the behest of the Dalai Lama (seems the classic emotions Western psychology recognized were only 6, of which the only positive was "happiness." Things have changed a bit since then (less than 20 years), but Eastern thinkers were amazed, he said, at the limits of Western thought in the realm.<br /><br />Anyway, he's done a lot of work with the Dalai Lama since then, and he said the Dalai Lama has said if any thing science has proven contradicts Buddhist thought, he (the Lama) would renounce it as contrary to science. The guest pointed out this meant there was a wide distinction between science fact and science assumption (his terms).<br /><br />There's a lot of blinkered nonsense out there, and then there are a few thoughtful people.Rmjhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06811456254443706479noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9479398.post-28359207542015901652011-06-26T09:37:55.636-05:002011-06-26T09:37:55.636-05:00A huge amount of Anglo-American intellectual life ...A huge amount of Anglo-American intellectual life has been the promotion of atheism in the guise of promoting science and rationality. I've been testing what happens when you use scientific epistemology to undermine the intellectual basis of that and to expose the real motivation of it. The reaction couldn't be less rational, less scientific or more obviously ideological. <br /><br />I'm convinced that even among those whose basic inclination is towards the better side of liberalism inevitably undermine that through their ideological holding that people are just more complex organic chemistry. Reductionism and scientism inevitably support that ideology that prefers separating people from their inherent rights, as having a status other than and higher than inert matter. I've been curious about the X-Club which had Spenser and Thomas Huxley as members and the ideological activities they were engaged in even as they explicitly tried to push the elimination of religion in public life.<br /><br />One of the ironic things I saw pointed out was that even as Francis Galton was promoting the view that the "priestly mindset" was incapable of science and as he and his cousin puzzled over the mechanism of inheritance, Fr. Gregor Mendel was doing the basic research to find what would elude both of those eminent Brits. <br /><br />I would like to mention this in a post this week. <br /><br />Anthony McCarthyThe Thought Criminalhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01381376556757084468noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9479398.post-15942296658096845792011-06-25T17:29:18.487-05:002011-06-25T17:29:18.487-05:00Robert, I was much struck by the quote from Adams ...Robert, I was much struck by the quote from Adams on power and the quote by Niebuhr on the "vast religious-political movement" which results in harm rather than good.<br /><br />What would be left of public discourse if all religious influence were expunged? It's simply an impossibility. That would be like saying, lets expunge the influence of the Reformation from all religious discourse. It's pie in the sky that can't get past the imagination. We're back with Alice and the Queen, who says, "Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast."June Butlerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01723016934182800437noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9479398.post-34420603584394799342011-06-24T16:37:10.009-05:002011-06-24T16:37:10.009-05:00Just consider that quote from Adama - BSG-Filter? ...<strong>Just consider that quote from Adama</strong> - BSG-Filter? ;-)<br /><br />I think the Admiral would actually have a few pertinent things to say here, actually. And I don't doubt that if he were a real person and not a science fiction character, and somehow came in contact with our culture, might also find Niebuhr an interesting read.<br /><br />Cheers -Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com