Charles Darwin to receive apology from the Church of England

[Avatar]

Easy on man, a little tact costs nothing and goes a long way.

I do however agree that modern philosophy differs in especially one substantial way...it attempts to derive its answers, (of which there are almost as many as religions), from reason.

Now I don't believe in absolutes. But I think reason is a far more effective way of determining answers than revelation. (And I must of missed something, but where did the idea that reason exists seperately from the human organism come? (And for that matter, shouldn't religion argue the opposite? That it can be independant of the human mind? (Since the idea of religion is based on non-human consciousness I mean?) ) )

--A

[rusmeister]

rusmeister,

I'm tired of you assuming I don't believe in absolute truth when I've stated over and over again that I do. It's insulting. And calling modern philosophy "sophistic" and a knock-off of religion basically proves that you know nothing about contemporary or near-contemporary philosophy.

Considering that it was required college courses in contemporary philosophy that got me started on my understandings of it, it's equally an assumption to say that I know nothing of the subject. I still have a couple of my oldest friend's college philosophy books (it had been his major) - when I flip through them the sophistry amazes me - but it's good to go back and see what drivel has developed. (Subjective opinion from objective source)

That is by no means an insult to you. Neither have I said that you do not believe in absolute truth. The closest I came to that was this:

there can be no truths that are not a product of the scientific method. Maybe you wouldn't say that at all, but that's what I read into it

I had hoped that it was clear that I was admitting that I do not know your actual position.

I certainly hope that nothing I have said is being construed as a personal attack. I do willfully attack ideas, but not people.

[rusmeister]

Easy on man, a little tact costs nothing and goes a long way.

I do however agree that modern philosophy differs in especially one substantial way...it attempts to derive its answers, (of which there are almost as many as religions), from reason.

Now I don't believe in absolutes. But I think reason is a far more effective way of determining answers than revelation. (And I must of missed something, but where did the idea that reason exists seperately from the human organism come? (And for that matter, shouldn't religion argue the opposite? That it can be independant of the human mind? (Since the idea of religion is based on non-human consciousness I mean?) ) )

--A

Yes on tact, yes on philosophy attempting to derive answers from reason.
This, by the way, is where the idea (reason existing separately...) came from, and that is what I object to - the idea of reason being the only source from which we can determine anything. There are two extremes, and that is the one that is purely objective. Our reality is NOT purely objective, any more than it is purely subjective. Arguments that would exclude anything that is not scientifically provable (which I have seen here again and again) err on the side of the former, even while those people accuse religion of erring on the side of the latter.

Speaking only for Christianity, no, it does not argue for reason/mind as independent of the body. We are a hybrid of body and soul, and both are important. Death is the ripping apart of two things that were designed to be together - thus, death is a genuine tragedy, and something to mourn. (This is why dead bodies and ghosts are unpopular - either way, something is missing.) At the same time, as Christians, who believe in a universal resurrection of all - to salvation or damnation - we have faith and hope in being saved, through baptism and a life of striving to draw closer to God (Orthodox note: the Church tells us how to do this). And the absolutely unique thing about Christianity is the Incarnation of God - God became Man (Christ) - so we don't speak about "non-human consciousness" - because God became, and is, ultimate Man. He experienced a definite human life, in a specific place and time in history.

In any event, I don't believe that we are, or can become, pure reason. There is always what they call "the human factor". IOW, there must be room for accepting subjective input. You can do it consciously, via religion or deliberate adoption of some doctrine or other, or superstitiously, via (often subconscious) practices, habits and thought. I, for one, prefer to know exactly what my biases are.

A brief comment on Sherlock Holmes (that seems to have a little bearing on the topic):

[...] to realize that Sherlock Holmes is not really a real logician. He is an ideal logician imagined by an illogical person. [...] But Sherlock Holmes is an ideal figure, and in an imaginative sense a very effective one. He does embody the notion which unreasonable people entertain of what pure reason would be like. GKC, 1/5/27

[rusmeister]

The shorthand is that you can have no progress unless you can define absolutes

Only if you have an absolute definition of the word progress.

You need to define a point from (or toward) which development moves. But that point needn't be absolute. I.e. what's progress today is not necessarily defined as progress tomorrow.

You can accept the biblical moral definitions as an absolute. But you must remain focused on that it is a definition that is not based on observable data, and that it is a definition that does not sit well with everyone.

My challenge to that idea (particularly the part I highlighted) is this (from "The Suicide of Thought"):

Akin to these is the false theory of progress, which maintains that we alter the test instead of trying to pass the test. We often hear it said, for instance, "What is right in one age is wrong in another." This is quite reasonable, if it means that there is a fixed aim, and that certain methods attain at certain times and not at other times. If women, say, desire to be elegant, it may be that they are improved at one time by growing fatter and at another time by growing thinner. But you cannot say that they are improved by ceasing to wish to be elegant and beginning to wish to be oblong. If the standard changes, how can there be improvement, which implies a standard? Nietzsche started a nonsensical idea that men had once sought as good what we now call evil; if it were so, we could not talk of surpassing or even falling short of them. How can you overtake Jones if you walk in the other direction? You cannot discuss whether one people has succeeded more in being miserable than another succeeded in being happy. It would be like discussing whether Milton was more puritanical than a pig is fat.

It is true that a man (a silly man) might make change itself his object or ideal. But as an ideal, change itself becomes unchangeable. If the change-worshipper wishes to estimate his own progress, he must be sternly loyal to the ideal of change; he must not begin to flirt gaily with the ideal of monotony. Progress itself cannot progress. It is worth remark, in passing, that when Tennyson, in a wild and rather weak manner, welcomed the idea of infinite alteration in society, he instinctively took a metaphor which suggests an imprisoned tedium. He wrote --

"Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change."

He thought of change itself as an unchangeable groove; and so it is. Change is about the narrowest and hardest groove that a man can get into.

The main point here, however, is that this idea of a fundamental alteration in the standard is one of the things that make thought about the past or future simply impossible. The theory of a complete change of standards in human history does not merely deprive us of the pleasure of honouring our fathers; it deprives us even of the more modern and aristocratic pleasure of despising them.

This bald summary of the thought-destroying forces of our time would not be complete without some reference to pragmatism; for though I have here used and should everywhere defend the pragmatist method as a preliminary guide to truth, there is an extreme application of it which involves the absence of all truth whatever. My meaning can be put shortly thus. I agree with the pragmatists that apparent objective truth is not the whole matter; that there is an authoritative need to believe the things that are necessary to the human mind. But I say that one of those necessities precisely is a belief in objective truth. The pragmatist tells a man to think what he must think and never mind the Absolute. But precisely one of the things that he must think is the Absolute. This philosophy, indeed, is a kind of verbal paradox. Pragmatism is a matter of human needs; and one of the first of human needs is to be something more than a pragmatist. Extreme pragmatism is just as inhuman as the determinism it so powerfully attacks. The determinist (who, to do him justice, does not pretend to be a human being) makes nonsense of the human sense of actual choice. The pragmatist, who professes to be specially human, makes nonsense of the human sense of actual fact.

To sum up our contention so far, we may say that the most characteristic current philosophies have not only a touch of mania, but a touch of suicidal mania. The mere questioner has knocked his head against the limits of human thought; and cracked it. This is what makes so futile the warnings of the orthodox and the boasts of the advanced about the dangerous boyhood of free thought. What we are looking at is not the boyhood of free thought; it is the old age and ultimate dissolution of free thought. It is vain for bishops and pious bigwigs to discuss what dreadful things will happen if wild scepticism runs its course. It has run its course. It is vain for eloquent atheists to talk of the great truths that will be revealed if once we see free thought begin. We have seen it end. It has no more questions to ask; it has questioned itself. You cannot call up any wilder vision than a city in which men ask themselves if they have any selves. You cannot fancy a more sceptical world than that in which men doubt if there is a world. It might certainly have reached its bankruptcy more quickly and cleanly if it had not been feebly hampered by the application of indefensible laws of blasphemy or by the absurd pretence that modern England is Christian. But it would have reached the bankruptcy anyhow. Militant atheists are still unjustly persecuted; but rather because they are an old minority than because they are a new one. Free thought has exhausted its own freedom.

Orthodoxy, ch 3 www.cse.dmu.ac.uk/~mward/gkc/books/orthodoxy/ch3.html

(Threat: If you don't read that I'll [scary font] print the whole chapter[/scary font] )

[Lord Mhoram]

rusmeister,

I still have a couple of my oldest friend's college philosophy books (it had been his major) - when I flip through them the sophistry amazes me - but it's good to go back and see what drivel has developed. (Subjective opinion from objective source)

You call philosophy "drivel" and a manifestation of "sophistry," and you expect me to answer in a balanced and neutral way? That's impossible for me to do when you employ such weasel-words and pejoratives.

[rusmeister]

rusmeister,

I still have a couple of my oldest friend's college philosophy books (it had been his major) - when I flip through them the sophistry amazes me - but it's good to go back and see what drivel has developed. (Subjective opinion from objective source)

You call philosophy "drivel" and a manifestation of "sophistry," and you expect me to answer in a balanced and neutral way? That's impossible for me to do when you employ such weasel-words and pejoratives.

Right. That's why I said "subjective opinion". I admit that drivel is a pejorative. A 'weasel word", though? That is a matter of opinion. I think the word to be an accurate description.

In academia the greatest danger is not of over-simplification, but of over-complication, for the sake of justifying that Asst Prof. paycheck. In the humanities, and probably in philosophy more than anywhere else, I have seen paths of twisted thought that deliberately and unnecessarily complicate a subject, in order to make it incomprehensible to all but an elite - or at least, other people with the patience to unravel the BS to arrive at what truth there is in a work. It is intellectual falsification, often intentional (for the sake of producing a longer paper or work, for example). tell me this is not a common problem in academia, and I will say "poppycock!". So yes, I dare say a lot of it is sophistry, whether the purpose is justifying works or to find any alternative except to admit the possibility of a Creator. I am a member of the school of simplification - if something can be said more simply, I will try to do so. I admit there is some valid thought in philosophy. But I do disdain a lot of the modern thought that modern philosophy has generated. Like I said, modern = temporary.

Of course, I expect you disagree. But that's what life has taught me. Maybe you can't respond to that.

[Lord Mhoram]

rusmeister,

If we are to continue a conversation on this, you'll need to provide examples of this "drivel." I will readily admit that there's been ridiculous obfuscation in contemporary philosophy. And to be fair there always has been. And I think this is primarily a Continental trend and has gotten particularly bad in literary theory, feminism and some social/political philosophy since the 1960s. But I would very much stop short of calling all modern philosophy "drivel." Especially the Anglo-American Analytic school which I think is doing the most important and worthwhile work.

[Zarathustra]

. . . I object to - the idea of reason being the only source from which we can determine anything. There are two extremes, and that is the one that is purely objective. Our reality is NOT purely objective, any more than it is purely subjective.

While I have disagreed with much that you've said, and probably disagree with the conclusions you draw from the above, I have to give you credit where credit is due, and state that I agree with the above. Kant failed in his attempt to ground morality (for one thing) on pure reason. Hume showed that reason alone isn't sufficient even to ground science. "Pure reason" is sophistry. It is tautology. It says nothing about the world. I agree.

I also agree that the world--or our participation in it--is neither solely objective or subjective. In fact, trying to force our conceptual framework into either of these extremes is what caused many of the problems in the history of philosophy. But this isn't something that modern philosophers would disagree with. It's pretty much common knowledge. Reality is more complicated.

Arguments that would exclude anything that is not scientifically provable (which I have seen here again and again) err on the side of the former, even while those people accuse religion of erring on the side of the latter.

No. "Scientifically provable" doesn't eliminate the subjective. In fact, for the last 100 years with quantum mechanics, the subjective has been incorporated into science. There is nothing about "scientifically provable" that eliminates subjective from our consideration. Relativity is based on the idea that absolutes must be discarded in order for reality to make sense.

However, with that said, we cannot discount reason simply because it has flaws in determining the physical world. Reason is very good at showing contradictions in one's ideas . . . which is the sole arena in which "pure reason" is valid. We can use reason to show where our descriptions of reality are contradictory. Or the ways in which we develop our positions.

But religion is something different from either reason or empirical evidence. Religion is faith--which involves neither.

[rusmeister]

rusmeister,

If we are to continue a conversation on this, you'll need to provide examples of this "drivel." I will readily admit that there's been ridiculous obfuscation in contemporary philosophy. And to be fair there always has been. And I think this is primarily a Continental trend and has gotten particularly bad in literary theory, feminism and some social/political philosophy since the 1960s. But I would very much stop short of calling all modern philosophy "drivel." Especially the Anglo-American Analytic school which I think is doing the most important and worthwhile work.

I imagine that you know that it wouldn't be difficult for me to produce drivel, so I question the value of doing so.
I do not call "all modern philosophy" drivel, and actually said this:

I admit there is some valid thought in philosophy. But I do disdain a lot of the modern thought that modern philosophy has generated. Like I said, modern = temporary.

In addition (speaking subjectively), philosophy based on direct or indirect denial of Man's divine origin and subsequent Fall is something that I would find to be fatally flawed from the get-go. There would be no value to any development of such philosophy, so I would still see it to be wrong, however carefully crafted, as its initial assumptions are wrong. That's not useful for a dialog, but will explain my attitude.

Also, for me (like for Chesterton) 'modern' is a pejorative. It underlines the temporary nature of the thing admired. It says, "That which is 'today'". To put it another way, "That which is not eternal is eternally out of date." (CSL)

Looks like nobody cared to comment on what Washington had to say...

Hey, Malik looks like we almost agree! (I just can't keep up with all this posting. I have wanted to respond...)

[Prebe]

In academia the greatest danger is not of over-simplification, but of over-complication

"Let him who is without sin, etc. etc......"

[rusmeister]

DP

[rusmeister]

In academia the greatest danger is not of over-simplification, but of over-complication

"Let him who is without sin, etc. etc......"

Of course.
The only reason wordiness is normally required to is block the rabbit-holes of sophistry. If common sense prevailed more; ie, were really common, then we wouldn't tolerate the floods of nonsense flowing out of academia today. (In case you ask "what nonsense?", my specific experience was in the state school of Education - and as I said, it was enough to drive me back to faith.) I certainly learned how it is done. Teach (require) the teachers to spout nonsense and BS, and you can get a whole generation of kids - er, young adults - er, adults doing it, especially if said 'education' is compulsory.

[Lord Mhoram]

rusmeister,

Again, I can't discuss what is wrong with modern philosophy unless you produce examples. Otherwise we're only talking in generalities, and that isn't any good.

[Prebe]

I think you misunderstand me Rusmeister: you accuse philosophical academia of being over-complicated. I think that you are guilty of over-complicating things yourself from time to time. I suspect it might have something to do with the - at times - long winded excerpts from CS Lewis and RK Chesterton.

And you have made the exact point that the reason your post go well into (and often somewhat beyond) my normal - admittedly short - attention span is, that problems of a philosophical nature can't be expressed in one-liners.

[rusmeister]

I think you misunderstand me Rusmeister: you accuse philosophical academia of being over-complicated. I think that you are guilty of over-complicating things yourself from time to time. I suspect it might have something to do with the - at times - long winded excerpts from CS Lewis and RK Chesterton.

And you have made the exact point that the reason your post go well into (and often somewhat beyond) my normal - admittedly short - attention span is, that problems of a philosophical nature can't be expressed in one-liners.

To be exact, I accuse (a great deal of) phil. acad. of being over-complicated because of human selfishness that is not interested in cutting through BS to get to the truth, but is very interested in justifying one's own place in that academia. I also (subjective opinion here) believe that a lot of it is motivated by a desire to deny the idea of a Creator.

I agree very much on the one-liners.

On GKC, as with other great writers, i think that one-liner aphorisms is a great way to get a sense of the depth of his mind. It is humbling to realize that another, admittedly flawed, human still managed to reach depths that we only aspire to. And maybe it might intrigue you enough to check him out someday.
chesterton.org/discover/quotations.html
(I especially enjoy the ones on love, marriage and the sexes.)

[Avatar]

Isn't that based on the fundamental assumption that there is a truth?

And maybe it's a great flaw of philosophy that it can't yet be expressed, if not in one liners, at least more accessibly.

--A

[rusmeister]

rusmeister,

Again, I can't discuss what is wrong with modern philosophy unless you produce examples. Otherwise we're only talking in generalities, and that isn't any good.

Hi, LM!
I think an essential problem is that we both know that there is both drivel and serious academic inquiry in philosophy, so it is not difficult to produce examples of both. And demonstrating drivel seems a pointless exercise, as long as we both acknowledge that there is plenty of it.

What CAN be useful, though, is to show how the teaching of philosophy tends to start from unreasonably biased premises (at their root) - and the place to examine this is in introductory college courses - where budding philosophers get their start. If the bases on which they build their philosophy are wrong, then all development of the given line of philosophy will be flawed, probably fatally. This would also shore up my thesis of the unreasonable bias toward religion in general and Christianity in particular.

My best friend from childhood was a philosophy major - I have in my possession a book which he strongly recommended: "Philosophy: an introduction" by John Herman Randall, Jr. and Justus Buchler from the Barnes and Noble College Outline Series. It is exactly this sort of work that forms how most people in academia view philosophy. Now much of the book is taken up with definitions and avoiding positions (in an evident attempt to be impartial). The wordiness makes GKC by comparison to seem the very soul of brevity. However, the last chapter "The Interpretation of Religion" that reveals the authors' bias against it and sets up the false understandings of serious theology - ie, that such philosophers - who I would dare say compromise a majority - have fatal weaknesses in their basic arguments against religion, especially organized religion and most especially against organized traditional Christianity.

The unreasonable bias becomes apparent when the philosophy of religion is examined entirely from a naturalist-humanist perspective, and the authorities cited are Santayana and Dewey (I had already encountered Dewey’s drivel in my state teacher cert program)., hardly impartial interpreters of religion. The text assumes from the outset S+D’s view of faith, and from there its further pretenses of understanding religion become farcicial – if you attempt to make religion out to be merely a human construct, then of course you won’t see anything in, say, prayer, except superstition and attempts at magical manipulation. The idea that it might be communication, a form of learning and requests, praise, etc to God are not admitted. The same problem arises with Russell’s famous essay “Why I am not a Christian”. Russell clearly demonstrates a knowledge of Christianity that serious theologians of the traditional faiths - especially Catholicism and Orthodoxy - would largely deny – as I said before, “a second-grader’s understanding of Christianity”. They attack they know not what and proceed only from their own experience and biases. Understandable, but hardly defensible if you wish to demonstrate that you have understood the best arguments of the ‘enemy’.

[rusmeister]

Wow. Looks like I killed the thread.
Bones: "He's dead, Jim!"

[Fist and Faith]

There's Klingons on the starboard bow, starboard bow, starboard bow. There's Klingons on the the starboard bow, starboard bow, Jim.