— 1 — The wheels have been set in motion for this year’s Ideological Turing Test, where Christians and Atheists imitate each other in order to understand each other better. You can contribute to the giant brainstorming thread and help pick the topic and format. (In year one, we did standards of evidence, year two: authority and aesthetics). — 2 — But speaking of shibboleths, I was delighted by the final word in the Scripps Spelling Bee: knaidel (meaning matzo ball... Read more
There are specialized comment rules for this post, make sure to read them before commenting. In the inaugural Atheist/Christian Ideological Turing Test, I asked the participants to answer questions about evidence (What shapes your current beliefs? What would convince you otherwise?). That prompt turned out to elicit pretty dull and easy to predict answers, so, in 2012, I switched to a weirder theme and asked contestants to talk about authority and aesthetics. And now “Sumer Is Icumen In/Lhude sing cuccu!”... Read more
Yesterday, Mark Shea posted a mea culpa about the way he’s interacted with some of his ideological sparring partners. And, for me, there was one part that really hit home: [M]y attitude toward Public Figures is much the same. I tend not to see them as human beings, but as sort of semi-fictional characters. People who don’t fully exist but who are In the News and therefore symbols or representatives of ideas. The upshot is this: Irony of ironies, a friend... Read more
A number of my friends have gotten more interested in Stoicism of late and have been reading A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy by William B. Irvine for a practical introduction. I give Irvine total credit for writing a philosophy book that’s meant to be actionable, not a historical survey. But, as a recovering Stoic, I’d like to couple any praise with a warning about the philosophy. The Good A Stoic avoids becoming... Read more
In Strange Gods: Unmasking the Idols in Everyday Life, Elizabeth Scalia has a simple definition of an idol. In the decalogue, we are warned by God to have no other/foreign/strange gods before Him. So, in our modern age, Scalia points out, our idols are less likely to be something like, say a giant golden calf that give burt offerings, and more likely to be letting Reddit usurp our prayer time. An idol doesn’t have to be worshiped to impose itself... Read more
— 1 — This evening, at 6pm ET, I’ll be on Relevant Radio for “A Closer Look with Sheila Liaugminas.” A whole mess of the Catholic Patheos bloggers are going to turn up to talk about purity culture and the problems with most abstinence sex-ed programs. (A bunch of them got a head start last week, and I’m joining in for round two). You can tune in online, or stream it after the fact. — 2 — And, elsewhere on the... Read more
Libby Ann and Daniel Finke are running another installment of their Forward Thinking series, where they ask bloggers to contribute their thoughts on a topic. This fortnight, it’s cruelty. Daniel kicks us off with this quote from Nietzsche: Cruelty constituted the great festival pleasure of more primitive men and was indeed an ingredient of almost every one of their pleasures. […] [I]t is not long since princely weddings and public festivals of the more magnificent kind were unthinkable without executions, torturings, or... Read more
Over at Popehat (despite the name, not a religion blog), the proprietor is trying to test his Turing Test acumen: Today we’ve secretly replaced your regular Clark with Folger’s Clark; let’s see if you notice the difference. Please ask me anything about politics, religion, culture, economics, the family, gay marriage, the Obama scandals, immigration, the Republican party, libertarians, etc. I will answer it as a mainstream liberal US Democrat. Then you may judge how well I do. I assume... Read more
Yesterday, Chris Hallquist put up a post in the Atheism channel titled “Everyone in America should fail to learn a foreign language” which I quite enjoyed, especially this section: So they can have the experience of failing to learn a foreign language. You can learn a lot from failing to learn a foreign language. You learn about how languages work. About the features of English you never thought about before even though they’re around you constantly. About the ways in which English... Read more
Tomorrow, I get to watch my brother graduate, and I’m quite excited for him, and, well, for the commencement speaker: Joss Whedon. Since my brother is not a public figure, and Whedon is, I’ll limit the content of this post to only one of these awesome people. There were two quite interesting pieces on the arts in The New York Times this weekend. A feature on Whedon mentioned his delightful habit of having Shakespeare parties while shooting Buffy and Angel, and the... Read more
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