How did Brigham Young University do?  Did it make the rankings at all?  Should Church members and friends of the University be embarrassed?  How can we explain these results?   https://www.forbes.com/value-colleges/list/#tab:rank   Posted from Grindelwald, Switzerland     Read more

      A liberal is someone who feels a great debt to his fellow man, which debt he proposes to pay off with your money. G. Gordon Liddy       Let me tell you how it will be: There’s one for you, nineteen for me. Cuz I’m the taxman.  Yeah, I’m the taxman. Should five per cent appear too small, Be thankful I don’t take it all. Cuz I’m the taxman.  Yeah, I’m the taxman. If you drive a car,... Read more

    An interesting example suggesting once again that American journalists, on the whole, don’t get (or don’t know what to do with) religion, faith, and religious commitment:   https://www.getreligion.org/getreligion/2017/6/9/top-us-diplomat-quits-china-post-because-of-his-faith-journalists-ignore-the-story   Posted from Grindelwald, Switzerland     Read more

    “Mormon growth rate falls to lowest level in 80 years, but ups and downs vary by region”   It’s not at all clear, though, that the drop in growth rate is peculiar to Latter-day Saints.  Others are also experiencing a slowdown:   “Hundreds of New Churches Not Enough to Satisfy Southern Baptists: Baptisms are at a 70-year low, while Sunday worshipers are at a 20-year low”   There are, no doubt, many factors involved.   And, on one centrally... Read more

    It would be gratifying to have an Interpreter author in the Senate of the United States:   http://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/10/mitt-romney-senate-speculation-239387?cmpid=sf   Will he do it?  Should he do it?   Posted from Grindelwald, Switzerland     Read more

    A curious little piece:   http://www.science20.com/raul_isea/we_are_not_living_in_a_simulation_how_to_prove_it-225124   Posted from Grindelwald, Switzerland     Read more

    There is very much to think about — very much — in this article by Stephen Kinder:   https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2017/06/10/saudi-arabia-destabilizing-world/ivMeb7TWGk1fQaVjZWWKGP/story.html   His comments about missing longterm trends while focusing on superficial headlines and on the importance of cultural diplomacy merit attention alongside his specific discussion of Saudi Arabia’s influence around the Islamic world.  America has withdrawn, to a large extent, from engaging in cultural advocacy, perhaps because we’ve lost confidence in our own culture.  In this context, it’s difficult... Read more

    From what I’ve read of his work, Joel Kotkin is one of the more interesting thinkers out there on social and economic trends.  If he’s right in this article — and my own impressions suggest to me that he is — I can only lament the ongoing destruction of my wonderful native California by egregious misrule:   California’s descent to socialism   Posted from Grindelwald, Switzerland     Read more

    A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices. William James (1842-1910)   We spent some time in Harvard’s art museums on Saturday, particularly concentrating on Impressionism and on artifacts from the Islamic world.   But my real purpose for being there was to examine the original, handwritten manuscript of William James’s famous Gifford Lectures on the Varieties of Religious Experience, which is preserved in Harvard University’s Houghton Library.  It was for... Read more

    Another interesting item from the seemingly indefatigable and definitely indispensable Jeff Lindsay:   http://mormanity.blogspot.ch/2017/06/bible-scholar-breaks-ranks-and-reverses.html   The issue is important in its own right, of course, as well as for its relevance to the Book of Mormon — but also because it demonstrates just how flimsy positions expressing “academic consensus” can sometimes turn out to be, when carefully examined rather than merely unquestioningly assumed to be true.   Posted from Grindelwald, Switzerland     Read more