Geoff's Miscellany

Posts

The Case of Evolution and Education

January 12, 2019

Too long won't read:
In my experience, evolutionary theory holds a weird pride of place as the litmus test of a good education in common conversation. When one is discovered to be religious, they are often asked, "but you believe in evolution...don't you?" Darwinian theory and its modern permutations have their uses, but those uses are not practical for young people. On the other hand, learning basic home economics, learning about nutrition, gardening, andexercise in biology, how to read, basic civics, and logic.

Hedonism, Love, and Goodness

January 12, 2019

The things that shape who we are and how we think are pluriform and sometimes mysterious. This is especially so in the age of the internet stuff that may disappear forever after you read it. Every once in a while, the Internet sends it back to you.

Around 2008-2009, I was quite depressed. And while I was still known for being a social butterfly at work and school, and many people even called me for advice (I remember distinctly two women with doctorates in psychology contacting me for relationship advice), I was languishing. There are probably three main reasons for this:

Common Misconceptions Concerning Christian Discipleship

January 11, 2019

In Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis explains that knowing a bit of theology is important for Christians now, in a way that it was not in the past:

...In the old days, when there was less education and discussion, perhaps it was possible to get on with a very few simple ideas about God. But it is not so now. Everyone reads, everyone hears things discussed. Consequently, if you do not listen to theology, that will not mean that you have no ideas about God. It will mean that you have got a lot of wrong ones-bad, muddled, out-of-date ideas. For a great many of the ideas about God which are trotted about as novelties today, are simply the ones which real Theologians tried centuries ago and rejected... 

How to become a Christian

January 11, 2019

Religious conversion is difficult to describe in terms of choices and thought. This is largely because most famous conversion narratives include deep emotional or quasi mystical states. That's fine, but such experiences are simply not the norm. So if you've ever wondered how to become a Christian or what the Bible says about becoming a Christian so that you can help others do it here are my brief reflections. This is important because God offers us eternal life in Jesus Christ and a picture of the deepest human perfection and happiness.

Do Women Need Toxic Masculinity?

January 11, 2019

In the feminist literature, stoicism is central to Toxic Masculinity. But stoicism is a philosophy of using reason to interpret and control your emotions, it is similar to Cognitive Behavioral Therapy or Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy.

For feminists, controlling, regulating, or moderating your emotions is a form of freudian repression that somehow hurts men (or gives them an advantage in the free market).

How to Face Overwhelming Odds

January 11, 2019

Bruce Charlton explains:

But Christians are equipped with the infinite power of repentance; which means that no matter how many times we are 'broken', no matter how many times we are defeated and unconditionally surrender to evil - or actively support and promote evil. We can and should simply repent our sin, we will be forgiven, and we start over again: fighting and resisting. 

On Why We Need Logic

January 11, 2019

John Henry Newman was talking about his own era, but his thoughts are relevant today:

It were well if none remained boys all their lives; but what is more common than the sight of grown men, talking on political or moral or religious subjects, in that offhand, idle way, which we signify by the word unreal? “That they simply do not know what they are talking about” is the spontaneous silent remark of any man of sense who hears them. Hence such persons have no difficulty in contradicting themselves in successive sentences, without being conscious of it. John Henry Newman, The Idea of a University Defined and Illustrated (London: Basil Montagu Pickering, 1873), xvii.
Learning basic logic is crucial for training in moral, academic, and practical formation. For example, being able to infer what somebody else would find offensive or pleasant takes logic. Similarly, determining contradictions between behavior and ideals takes logic. This is why some of the Pharisees hated Jesus. He applied logic to them in order to point out their hypocrisy. Logic and simply processes of elimination are very important in various service industries and home repairs that very few people my age can do that I remember all adults being able to do when I was younger (case in point: I totally missed a very simple fact when working on my car, the radiator reservoir had water...but the radiator didn't, but I didn't check the radiator, I jumped straight to replacing the thermostat, thankfully my uncle solved the problem).

Yet, despite its advantages, logic is not typically a part of the curriculum in most fields. It was not a part of my training in seminary nor was it a part of my undergraduate degree. Logic is not a requirement for my engineering degree either (though you have to learn it intuitively in computer programming, circuits, and mathematics). I learned logic in high school from a rogue English teacher who was not following the curricular guidelines and it has been a study of mine since then. I talked to a logic professor just last year after watching a debate he moderated. We discussed how amazing it is that essentially the same syllogistic rules work for inference in all fields and apparently in all physical space. He said, “That is troubling for me as an atheist. But have you read about Graham Priest’s paraconsistent logic?” This is precisely the trouble. Instead of teaching the thing that works and is supremely useful, we find logic replaced by theoretical substitutes apparently for the rhetorical purpose of making the universe seem less orderly.

In all toil there is profit

January 10, 2019

In all toil there is profit, but mere talk tends only to poverty.

(Proverbs 14:23 ESV)

The proverb above is one I have always associated with one particular type of talk: talking about what you're going to do instead of doing it.

I think that this aspect is true, but incomplete. I have overly limited the meaning of talk.

Martial arts for your mind: thought kata

January 10, 2019

One of the great analogies for growing in virtue is that of a battle against the passions and appetites. The particular virtues which are like a battle to develop are temperance and fortitude.

John Wesley on Foreknowledge and Election

January 10, 2019

Below, you'll find 1 Peter 1:1-2 and John Wesley's comments on vs 2. Over all, I find what he says to be convincing. The idea that the descriptions of God's fore or after knowledge in the Bible are metaphorical is perfectly reasonable. It is just as much true that predestination is a metaphor as it is true that God's being surprised or ignorant is as well.