If we think deeply about evolution, we eventually will ask questions not about the origin of species but about the origin of life. For some theistic evolutionists, this is the point of Designer intervention. They find it hard to imagine that chemicals could combine in way that gives rise to life. For those less inclined [...]
Tags:Aleksandr Oparin·chemical origins·DNA·God in the Gaps·Harold Urey·origins of life·prebiotics·replication·RNA·Stanley Miller
If you haven’t been following 3:AM’s interview series, you should. The Brian Leiter interview was one of the most cogent assessments of philosophy I’ve read in years, and the recent Eric Schwitzgebel interview is on par. Both reward close reading and deserve extended comment, but I want to touch briefly on Schwitzgebel’s assessment of the [...]
Tags:Brian Leiter·commonsense·crazyism·Emerson·Eric Schwitzgebel·evolved mind·metaphysics·Nietzsche
Ever since humans began thinking and talking about the world, they have had ideas about its nature and cosmic placement. Cosmological thinking surely goes back to the Upper Paleolithic and has been fodder for debate for perhaps 45,000 years. Systematic thinking on the subject began 2,500 years ago when a group of thinkers (mostly in [...]
Tags:cosmology·directed evolution·directional evolution·Full House·mathematic fallacy·microbial world·mode of life·nature of universe·progressivism·progressivist·Stephen Jay Gould·teleology·Tim Maudlin
Over the past few weeks I’ve been thinking about creation myths. By calling them “myths” it allows us to overlook, dismiss, or ignore them. This is a mistake. We should think hard about what these myths do and how they work. They are not just quaint relics of a pre-scientific past. They are not just [...]
Tags:Adam and Eve·allegory·anchoring effect·creation myths·creationism·creationist·Garden of Eden·identity·orientation·origins stories·Roger Lewin·view from nowhere
Almost immediately after the German surrender in May 1945, people began trying to explain what had happened. The horrors of the Nazi regime were such that almost every explanation has been offered. The weakest of explanations is bewilderment. But Nazi depravity and German complicity is not inexplicable.
As the process of explication began to unfold, one [...]
Tags:anti-semitism·atheism·Coel Hellier·creationist·Darwinism·German Christianity·German theism·Hitler·materialist·Nazi religion·Nazism·race creation·racial ideology·special creation
When I hear atheists proclaiming their good news that gods are well and truly dead, I get the uneasy feeling they haven’t seriously considered or fully comprehended the implications of this apparent fact. In his justly famous “Parable of the Madman” Nietzsche cautions against underestimating the seriousness of killing gods:
The madman jumped into their midst [...]
Tags:American Nietzsche·Brian Leiter·Friedrich Nietzsche·gnu atheism·God is Dead·Jennifer Ratner-Rosenhagen·new atheists·Ralph Waldo Emerson·Ross Posnock·The Madman
Review: Masking Hegemony: A Genealogy of Liberalism, Religion and the Private Sphere, by Craig Martin (Equinox Pub. 2010)
“Separation of church and state.”
It is revealing that this phrase, a shibboleth of sorts, means so many things to so many different people. In law, there are endless arguments over the extent to which government may entangle itself [...]
Tags:Christian hegemony·Craig Martin·Establishment Clause·First Amendment·Genealogy of Liberalism·John Locke·Martin Luther·Masking Hegemony·public-private·secular-religious·separation of church and state·wall of separation
Over at Salon the MIT physicist and novelist Alan Lightman recently asked whether God exists, a question he poses in the service of reconciling science with religion and lambasting Richard Dawkins. Although he is an atheist, Lightman’s accomodationist query prompted a predictable response from Daniel Dennett, to which Lightman has responded.
It is a thoughtful exchange [...]
Tags:Abrahamic God·Alan Lightman·atheism·Christianity·Daniel Dennett·deism·existence of God·God·god concept·interventionist God·Islam·Judaism·monotheism·monotheistic God·Richard Dawkins
Following hard on the heels of a prominent Texas pastor’s Rick Perry supporting declaration that Mormonism is a cult, James Fallows over at The Atlantic was compelled to issue his own declaration: “To be against Mitt Romney (or Jon Huntsman or Harry Reid or Orrin Hatch) because of his religion is just plain bigotry.” Not [...]
Tags:anti-Mormonism·atheism·bigot·bigotry·cult·ethnicity·evangelicals·Fawn Brodie·gender·George Bush·Harry Reid·immutable·Jacob Weisberg·James Fallows·Jon Huntsman·Joseph Smith·Mitt Romney·Mormon·Mormonism·mutable·Orrin Hatch·politics·race·religion·religious test·Rick Perry
It is nice to see Lucretius finally getting his due. In The Swerve: How The World Became Modern, Stephen Greenblatt pays homage to the Roman poet (and his Greek predecessor Epicurus). A few years ago, I was thinking about the history of religious critiques and sketched these notes:
While it would be tempting to date the [...]
Tags:atheism·critiques of religion·David Hume·Epicurus·Greek gods·Lucretius·materialism·naturalism·On the Nature of Things·skepticism·Stephen Greenblatt·teleology·The Swerve
