Faith according to our Lord’s teaching in [Matthew 6:30], is primarily thinking; and the whole trouble with a man of little faith is that he does not think. He allows circumstances to bludgeon him… . We must spend more time in studying our Lord’s lessons in observation and deduction. The Bible is full of logic, [Read More…]
Kierkegaard on the Bible
October 4, 2012 by Leave a Comment
From Provocations: Spiritual Writings of Kierkegaard (edited by Charles Moore): The matter is quite simple. The Bible is very easy to understand. But we Christians are a bunch of scheming swindlers. We pretend to be unable to understand it because we know very well that the minute we understand we are obliged to act accordingly. Take any [Read More…]
Why Liberal Arts Majors Wouldn’t Want to Live on a Space Colony
October 4, 2012 by Leave a Comment
Think about what life in a space colony would be like: a hermetically sealed, climate-controlled little nothing of a place. Refrigerated air, synthetic materials, and no exit. It would be like living in an airport. An airport in Antarctica. Forever. When I hear someone talking about space colonies, I think, that’s a person who has [Read More…]
25 Favorite Short Stories
October 3, 2012 by Leave a Comment
In his Devil’s Dictionary, Ambrose Pierce defined a novel as “a short story padded.” This is an all too apt description. The inability to prune a story to its essential story is an unfortunate quality shared by many modern writers and the primary reason that bookshelves are filled with bloated novels. William Faulkner once wondered if [Read More…]
Tallis’s Daily Hallucinating Delusional Syndrome
October 3, 2012 by Leave a Comment
If I told you that I had a neurological disease which meant that for eight or more hours a day I lost control of my faculties, bade farewell to the outside world, and was subject to complex hallucinations and delusions – such as being chased by a grizzly bear at Stockport Railway Station – you [Read More…]
Why We Cannot Be the Source of Our Own Existential Meaning
October 3, 2012 by Leave a Comment
“There is not one big cosmic meaning for all,” said writer Anaïs Nin, expressing an absurd but frequently touted idea, “there is only the meaning we each give to our life.” Philosopher Bill Vallicella explains why such claims are nonsense: Note that if I must first give my life meaning, if it is to have [Read More…]
Racial Segregation’s Lasting Influence on Sign Language
October 3, 2012 by Leave a Comment
Black American sign language and American sign language are different languages: Some differences result from a familiar history of privation in black education. Schools for black deaf children — the first of them opened some 50 years after the Hartford school was founded, and most resisted integration until well after the Brown v. Board of Education decision [Read More…]
Aircraft Carriers in Space
October 3, 2012 by Leave a Comment
Naval analyst Chris Weuve explains how naval warfare is portrayed in the literature and television of outer-space: Foreign Policy: Let’s reverse the question. Has sci-fi affected the way that our navies conduct warfare? Chris Weuve: This is a question that I occasionally think about. Many people point to the development of the shipboard Combat Information [Read More…]
More Deaths From Suicides Than Car Crashes
October 2, 2012 by Leave a Comment
Depressing statistic of the week: More Americans now commit suicide than die in car crashes, making suicide the leading cause of injury deaths, according to a new study. What’s even more distressing is that, as bioethicist Wesley Smith notes, “some states some suicides aren’t even included in the suicide statistics–such mendacity thanks to the assisted [Read More…]
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