I am delighted to have been given the opportunity to review Richard Carrier’s latest book, Proving History: Bayes’s Theorem and the Quest for the Historical Jesus. I am grateful to Prometheus Books for sending me a free review copy. Carrier emphasizes from the outset that this is the first of two books, the second of which will focus on the evidence for there having been a historical figure of Jesus. In fact, quite a bit of attention to both the... Read more
Morgan Guyton has an excellent post on what should be the Christian approach to Scripture, namely approaching it as Jesus himself approached it. And so he takes Jesus’ Sabbath healing, and his principle that “the Sabbath was made for human beings, and not human beings for the Sabbath” as a criterion by which to evaluate the way Christians today use the Bible. Many are found wanting. Here are some highlights: “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the... Read more
From the post “Fred Phelps: Why it is not possible to believe that you ate Chick-fil-A because of ‘freedom of speech’” on the blog Slacktivist. Poster courtesy of “Christians Against the Tea Party” on Facebook. Read more
Power has been restored! I express gratitude on behalf of my family and my neighborhood to the hard-working folks from the Indianapolis Power and Light Company and other contractors they brought in. Here is a song in honor of the occasion: Blogging will be back to normal soon. Read more
While my excuse for most things today will be the fact that I am still without electricity at home, most of the rest of the world has an even better excuse they can use, as illustrated in this comic from XKCD: HT Jerry Coyne Read more
This Doctor Who episode from the Jon Pertwee era, “The Mind of Evil,” offers interesting explorations of religious themes, as well as some intriguing connections with (or perhaps disconnects from) more recent episodes. The Doctor and Jo Grant go to see a demonstration at a prison of a device called the Keller Machine, which supposedly removes “evil impulses” from a human being. The reference to “evil impulses” is reminiscent of the Rabbinic term yetzer ha-ra, and the episode raises the... Read more
I hope that everyone in the world is aware that the NASA Mars rover Curiosity is due to reach Mars in a matter of hours. I am writing this in a brief visit to my office at work, having no electricity at home, and thus no internet. Hopefully I will get back here sometime tomorrow morning, but until then, I will be filled with curiosity…about Curiosity. All of you who are able to watch live coverage tonight via TV or... Read more
A Facebook conversation (if one can call it that) in which I recently became embroiled reminds me of how I used to approach discussions with those who disagreed with me. It was OK to lump my opponents with the worst behavior among those who agreed with them, but any attempt to reverse that logic was dismissed. And it was no problem to deny that I had earlier said certain things, if it later became clear that they were problematic or... Read more
Last night a big storm passed through Indianapolis, bringing down trees and branches all throughout my neighborhood and many others. I had some blog posts already scheduled in advance, and so things have probably seemed to be normal. But how soon things will actually be normal depends on the power company. I will keep you posted, if and when I can! Until then, if my blogging ends up being unusually little in the coming days, please console yourselves with posts... Read more
I borrowed the movie Salmon Fishing in the Yemen from my local library, having seen the trailer on another DVD. I don’t remember hearing about the movie anywhere else, and so I suspect that many readers may likewise never have heard about it. The movie focused on religion and faith more than I expected it to. Two British characters mention (upon witnessing Yemeni public expression of religiosity) that neither knows anyone who goes to church any more, reflecting Britain’s increasing secularization.... Read more
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