Games!

Don't click if you've got deadlines. You've been warned.

Planarity.

Gridgame.

My high score on the grid game is 1524.

UPDATE: The Bourgeois Dad e-mails that he got 1807 on the grid game.

UPDATE 2: Thorgerson, who should have been grading essays, got 1867.

UPDATE 3: Mark, who should have been testing software, got 2138. He claims he was "testing" the grid game.

When It Rains, It Pours

We've received a glut of bathroom reading material lately. It seems we went for a month or two without anything new. Here's what we've gotten recently.

1. University alumni magazine.
2. Bourgeois Wife's undergraduate honors program newsletter.
3. JCPenney home catalog.
4. Church archdiocesan magazine.
5. Pottery Barn catalog.
6. AAA magazine.
7. California special election information guide.
8. Graduate school quarterly magazine.
9. Intercollegiate Review.
10. Crate and Barrel catalog.
11. Vision Forum catalog.
12. Touchstone magazine.

Quite a goodly supply of material to keep one occupied while taking care of business.

Caring about Moral Problems

I noticed (or remembered) today that many students in my class on moral problems do not care about moral problems. "Abortion? Whateve." (Some students cannot be bothered to complete their words.) "Animal rights? [Shrug.]" (Some cannot be bothered to use spoken language.)

What is surprising, perhaps, is that these are not typical slacker students. They are not apathetic about other aspects of their lives, even other aspects of their academic lives. They are very interested in, say, biology or chemistry. They just do not care about moral problems.

Such apathy is also not to be confused with moral relativism. That I can respond to. Apathy, however, is difficult to respond to. The student is asleep and needs to be woken up. Since apathetic students often appear to not pay attention in class, the teacher may try some antics to get their "attention." But this is just to send a jolt through their bodies.

What needs to be awakened is their soul. How is that done? Socrates tried to wake up the soul by refuting the person's opinions. Sometimes this is easy to do, but then the problem reasserts itself when the one who is refuted refuses to admit it. What do you do in that case? Antics?

The Winningest Team in College Football

That'd be Michigan. I find it really curious that Penn State has been unable to beat Michigan since it joined the Big Ten (making the Big Ten the big eleven). Despite the losses to Michigan, Joe Paterno is still a living legend.

Anyway, on to other, more serious matters. What's worse than hearing a bad argument for abortion? A bad presentation of the basic issues involved in abortion given as a lecture to a class at a public university. If you're a Christian and you've ever thought that perhaps Christians who go into philosophy (or sociology, psychology, etc.) are wasting their time, think about the kind of person you'd like to have teaching your child's college class covering abortion. You have four options:

1. Incompetent Christian philosopher
2. Incompetent non-Christian philosopher
3. Competent Christian philosopher
4. Competent non-Christian philosopher

("Competent" and "incompetent" refer to the person's ability to present clearly and fairly the issues in the abortion debate.) Clearly, the first two are out. And if the Christian philosopher is sufficiently incompetent, then that's often worse than an incompetent non-Christian philosopher discussing abortion.

You might think that there is no real difference between 3 and 4. But this isn't the case. True, I'd rather have a competent non-Christian philosopher than an incompetent non-Christian philosopher. But just because the non-Christian philosopher is competent doesn't mean he or she wouldn't tell the students his or her own position on abortion. Some professors don't tell -- at least in the public lecture; they might do so in private -- the students their position on controversial topics; some do. And this influences students. So, who would Christian parents rather have influencing their students?

I should note that I'm using the labels "Christian" and "non-Christian" arbitrarily here. There are some Christians who don't think abortion is wrong, and some non-Christians who don't think abortion is right (Jews and Muslims come readily to mind, but there are others).

Leo Strauss, Born September 20, 1899

"The flight to immortality requires an extreme discretion in the selection of one's luggage." (Persecution and the Art of Writing)

The Way Who Sees It?

The Bourgeois Wife informed me of Starbucks' "The Way I See It" campaign. The campaign consists of putting quotations on the side of their coffee cups. Starbucks says the quotations are meant to start conversations. Many conservatives are up in arms about some of the examples, which include the following from Armistead Maupin, a gay author commenting on why he didn't come out sooner:

I surrendered my youth to the people I feared when I could have been out there loving someone. Don't make that mistake yourself. Life's too damn short.

(See A Certain Slant of Light for more details.)

I think before we give ourselves over to outrage or boycott, it would be necessary to look at the list of people quoted, which Starbucks lists on their website. (It would also be nice to see an explanation of why certain quotations were chosen.) Starbucks says it was "it was hoping to inspire old-fashioned coffee-house conversations" by the campaign; so one quotation does not an agenda make.

The list of contributors includes Jonah Goldberg and Michael Medved, which means that there is a conservative voice in the campaign. In fact, Goldberg is featured on the "The Way I See It" portion of Starbucks' website.

So we have the quotation from Maupin; we have a quotation from Goldberg. (There's also one from John Wooden, but it's not listed. Does anyone know what it is?) In this context, giving a quotation from Maupin about how he wished he'd been more confident being gay doesn't seem to be promoting an agenda. It actually seems to be a good conversation starter: "Do you think Maupin is doing something wrong by being gay? Is it simply a 'lifestyle decision' which everyone should agree is okay?" Etc. etc. etc. Now, of course, we probably won't see a quotation by a former homosexual saying "All that time I spent being gay when I wanted to be straight was a waste; don't let peer pressure keep you gay"; so if you think such a quotation is necessary to balance Maupin's, then you probably won't be satisfied with Starbucks' campaign.

But as long as the opinion expressed by a quotation is taken to start the conversation and not to settle the issue, then I don't see a problem.

I'm making this judgment based on the Starbucks website, but the campaign doesn't seem biased. Of course, someone will probably develop a conspiracy theory discovering that more coffee cups are produced with liberal quotations than with conservative. Until there's proof of that, I'll keep drinking coffee from Starbucks.

Michigan Hands It to the Irish

Stupid Michigan.

But this is how they started last year. Lost to N---- D---. Won a lot of games. Lost to O--- S----. (Certain names should not be uttered.)

UPDATE: This certainly removes a little of the sting.

You've Gotta Hand It to the Irish

Newt Emerson. Irish Times. On Katrina. Thanks to Slugger O'Toole the article is now posted for general consumption.

Enjoy.

My favorite lines:

As the full horror of this sinks in, thousands of desperate columnist are asking how a civilised city can descend into anarchy.

The answer is that only a civilised city can descend into anarchy.

HT: Hugh / Instapundit

Something that should be said ...

Already I feel strange writing about this, but I'm inspired by the openness of Jonathans Health Bar. Have you ever had a conversation with a male friend about birth control and pregnancy? Of course not, but maybe you should have. Maybe at least with Dad. Perhaps you will say that conversation should occur off the record and behind closed doors, but you're reading the blog of a married man, and I am no longer afraid.

I am going to try to present this in a non-polemical way. Of all the couples Rose and I know from growing up, college, etc., there are less than half a dozen who even think partly like we do. So, I'm not trying to win any arguments. I simply think people should know about these things and think about the implications of what they do. If after that you still disagree, that is fine and lets go have a beer.

A thought for consideration: until 1930 every Christian church condemned the use of artificial methods of birth control or "child spacing." That is not an argument, though it is often brought up by those in favor of natural methods (or no methods) as such. It should simply make you wonder why and how it came to be universally accepted so quickly. Forms of sterilization have existed since ancient times, so though we are unique in the ease of access, use and effectiveness, modern man is not the first to encounter this issue.

More thoughts for consideration:
Read the labels on the pill. Every chemical birth control method has major side effects for someone, and those side effects are nasty, and studies are beginning to wonder if they do not make you universally more prone to certain cancers. No one seems to really know yet. Are you sure you want to rick THAT in your system, or your spouse's system, even if it doesn't seem to be having any effect?

A woman's hormonal cycle is a huge part of her psyche. One of the most common problems with chemical controls is that it makes women depressed. How many women fight that and don't say anything ... or don't stop to realize what is going on?

According to studies, the only 99% effective methods are pill, IUD and Natural Family Planning style natural method. All of these are really more like 100% when used correctly (note that the NFP method is effective because it combines all of the methods of naturally identifying the fertility cycle, thereby leaving no room for question).

Natural Family Planning requires the participation of both people. It is a beautiful thing to really understand the natural cycle of your wife's body and to let your love life reflect that (I'm not only talking about sex). It also helps a husband who is not naturally sensitive to the fluxes in a woman's emotions have some data to work with.

In terms of life philosophy, Rose and I obviously hold to using invasive or chemical measures as an absolutely last recourse, when any natural method does not work. People react to this is as anywhere from silly to immoral, but mostly that it is not worth the time and effort. Natural methods have an effect on your life. Labor and childbirth are really, well, laborious. You don't get to have sex like a playboy. You don't get shots just because everyone else is. You don't eat just because you have a craving. But a life lived out intentionally, sacrificially, is a life well lived.

So, whether you are male or female, married or single, I encourage you to consider this issue, educate yourself (which can on a basic level be done with the help of nothing but Google), and do so before these choices are forced upon you, because you certainely won't know what to think when The Event (whatever that may be) is upon you.

That actually wasn't so bad.

Did You Forget about St. George?

The Bourgeois Wife pointed me here, where I found a statement from my church's annual convention denouncing

support for same-sex marriage, support for abortion, support for ordination of women to Holy Orders . . . , and the labeling of other faiths and their leaders with hateful terminology.

All fine and good. However, the part I elided was not so good:

support for the concept of war which is "pre-emptive" or "justifiable."

In the document, support for any of these things is unequivocally called an "extremist position," and any Christian group that supports them is un-Orthodox and promotes positions "contrary to the teachings of the Holy Orthodox Faith." (The RCC is extremist!?)

Why this clause is even included among the others is puzzling. To see why, consider the support from the Bible and tradition for (1) same-sex marriage, (2) abortion, (3) ordination of women, (4) pre-emptive and/or justifiable war, (5) calling others hateful names. I suggest that there is no evidence for (1), (2), and (5), and exeedingly scanty support for (3). (Though it seems that the ancient church had a role for the deaconess; so one would like some clarification on "Holy Orders." Note: in the Orthodox church, the position of deaconess is a good way down on the ladder. It is not the same as a deacon in a Baptist church where the deacon is responsible for a good deal of what goes on in the church and where the deacon board is often the final authority in the church, perhaps only beneath the self-rule of the people.)

The evidence of support for number (4) on the other hand is at worst ambiguous and at best supportive. As a case in point, St. Vladimir's Theological Journal (the premier journal of Orthodox theology in America) recently had an issue in which Orthodox theologians debated the concept of just war.

I can't imagine any Orthodox theologian even debating whether or not abortion or same-sex marriage is legitimate. Debate is beyond the pale. On the topic of just war, however, debate is not beyond the pale, and the convention should have noted this distinction instead of lumping just war in with abortion. Defense of just war, in any case, is certainly not an extremist position within the Orthodox church. My fellow Orthodox might disagree with it, but it is not extremist.

(To go on a bit more, how can it even be debated that pre-emptive war is not a defensible concept? Perhaps the pre-emptive war in Iraq was not justified, but that does not entail that the concept of pre-emptive war is indefensible. Pre-emptive strikes are first in temporal sequence, but defensive in nature.)

For a good rundown of the evidence that there is a concept of just war in the Orthodox church, see Alexander Webster's The Virtue of War.

The Edges of the Lord

I've never really been able to write one of those clever don't-give-anything-away-but-make-you-want-to-watch-it movie reviews, so I won't pretend to try. So, I'll call this a movie analysis: if you want to watch the flick for the suspense of the drama, stop now.

The Edges of the Lord is written and directed by Yurek Bogayevicz, who does indie stuff. The DVD box says "In the tradition of Life is Beautiful" which I think means its about Jewish redemption/survival in the midst of WWII. It was released in Europe in 2001, but in the US went straight to DVD and only recently came out (in my Blockbuster it was in the new releases section!). It is set in WWII rural Poland, post Blitzkrieg.

A Jew struggles to retain his identity (which literally means to not lose his life). Romic (Haley Joe Osment)'s Jewish parents find a polish farmer who is willing to take him as a cousin "from the city" and hide him by integrating him with his family. The story centers around the ongoing dramatic tension of avoiding discovery by the Nazi's and the struggles of Romic to be accepted by the other children of the village.

There are a lot of things that the film makes the viewer think about. Most bothersome to me is the issue of a movie on "disturbed children". Not only was there a "fast forward" scene (the female child lead gets raped), ie., bothersome for one to watch. But in these sorts of movies, all I can sit there and think about is the fact that these kids have now role-played raping, getting raped and watching it. Nice. It makes me ill to think about the effects of that on anyone's development, especially now as a parent: "Dear, lets send Johnny to role play in this nice movie with a few murder and rape scenes, I think he'll get a lot out of it, and it will probably help him to develop into a better person." This parent would, of course, think my spanking my child is also the greatest sin I could possibly commit upon their psyche. But, enough on the ethics of child-actors.

Let me say positively about the movie that it is set in (I assume filmed where it pretends to be) the Polish countryside, which is really beautiful. I have only had one Polish friend with an authentic polish accent (ie., not raised in either US or UK), and it was delightful to hear the accent again (though I think the actors attempted to reflect a more countryside way of speaking). The acting itself was also quite good, especially for a movie that centers around kids. We recently watched (don't ask) 5 Children and It which had a lot of those moments where you feel like you need to help the kids say their lines, this one didn't have any of those.

Rose, who now has a NEW SITE -- the Earthlink Torg-us-borg is dead due to financial considerations (free versus not free)--and I spent over an hour discussing the central message/philosophy of the movie, and it is that which I will try to communicate.

The religious conflict of the movie is the Jewish boy trying to appear to be a Roman Catholic Pole. In that conflict, the two religions are presented in charicatures, which play out the theological theme of salvation. "Judaism" is a pratical religion which attempts to save by physically saving (ie., you literally save someone by stopping them from getting killed, or keeping them fed, etc.). This is set up in the initial scene when Romic's father is making him memorize the Rosary:

Fader, how can I say dis?

Do not vorry, Got vill unterstand.

Very practical: God is interested in preserving lives.

Christianity, on the other hand, is a very non-practical system. Early in the movie, Wilem Dafoe (the priest is never given a name in the movie besides "Fader") is instructing the children in the catechism when someone runs up saying that Germans are about to kill one of the kids' (Maria, the child female interest) parents. Apparently at this time you can get killed either for hiding Jews or for having pigs: this is a case of the latter. The priest rushes over, and the Nazi commander offers him a game: he has one minute to catch a pig: if he does, one of the parents live. If in the next minute he catches another pig the second parent can live. Dafoe feebly tries to catch a pig the first minute, fails and is so overwhelmed when the first parent is shot, he simply sits and stares as the second minute ticks by. In the next scene, Romic (Haley Joe's character, the Jewish boy) sees the priest whipping himself in penance. The priest may in some mystical sense be able to save his soul, but when it really matters he has no power (or will) to save his flock, his people, his family.

This is also played out by the youngest child in Romic's adopted family, Tolo. In the catechism class, the priest assigns a role-play and Tolo ends up being Jesus. He literally takes on the role, convincing the other children to let him baptize them (which of course Jesus never did but whatever) and then to crucify him (no they don't kill him). Tolo is innocence, or purity of heart, incarnate, which seems to be the writer/director's vision of the Christian message. But the whole point is that innocence really can't be incarnate: the priest is ethereal, and Tolo is half, if not fully, mad. More on how this plays out later.

On the other hand "Judaism" looks to the family and tries to save the family, again literally. I have "Judaism" in quotes because it is the writer's vision of, and because the Polish Farmer who adopts Romic lives out this vision, despite his creedal Catholicism. This father is shot by a neighbor in a complicated episode involving the sale of a contraband swine, but suffice it to say that he died trying to protect his family (it was getting too dangerous to keep the pig any longer) and feed his family: literal salvation. He only failed because he was betrayed by someone who should have been a friend. [[Aside: an interesting parallel to Judas: when you're really trying to save someone, a Judas can really stop you.]]

This neighbor family is the embodiment of the evil parallel to "Judaism": envy (whereas the Nazi's are the evil parallel to "Christianity": blind adherence to an ideology). They set up much of the story's drama, especially the final scene, which I will now skip to.

The two boys in the neighbor family spend their evenings hiding out by the train tracks, watching for Jews jumping from the concentration camp trains that go by. They then sneak up and rob them. When Vladek (the older brother in Romic's new family) learns that it is these boys' father who killed his own, he gets a gun and hides out also by the tracks. A robbery of Jews commences, Vladek steps out of the trees and demands that the Jews be let go, and ends up shooting the neighbor boy, partly in vengence for his fathers' death.

Romic is horrified and realizes what this will mean when people come (having heard shots). He grabs the gun and tells Vladek to run. In a quick series of events, the Nazis show up, but think that Romic has been robbing the Jews. He is acclaimed as a hero. The next day, Romic must choose between literally saving himself and robbing more Jews for the humor of the Nazi commanders, or spiritually saving himself and admitting his race. He chooses the former, which immediately puts him in a situation to save Vladek who had been mistakenly caught as a runaway Jew.

Romic has thus, like his father and like Vladek's father, decided that "Judaism" is superior to "Christianity": you are responsible for your family and it is they who you must at all costs preserve from death. This is salvation. The littlest brother, Tolo, on the other hand volunteers for no reason to be a Jew (he has now fully accepted his role as Jesus the Jew) and goes off to concentration camp. He saves no one, but his spiritual innocence is absolutely perfect.

The title and central image of the movie has to do with communion. Verbally, throughout the beginning of the movie, communion is discussed with the emphasis that it is the literal body (the priest cuts himself in the catechism class to drive the point home). This is further developed in a beautifully shot scene: in the sacristy amid shafts of light, Romic and the priest discuss his situation while the priest makes communion wafers. This is done (I had never seen the process before) by taking perfectly square sheets of wafers and using a cookie cutter to press the circles out of them. This leaves behind funny shaped little crosses, x's, or stars from the left over bits. The priest casually offers one to Romic, who in great fear refuses (he has very carefully learned the lesson of real presence).

Don't vorry, I never bless de edges.

Romic then lays out a little piece of wafer (from the Edges)for all of those who have died so far: his parents, Vladek and Tolo's father, etc. etc. (Interestingly, this is a visual parallel to the Eastern rite preparation of communion). What is important is that all of these have lived in the category of "Judaism". At the end of the movie, in one of those scenes where the director slows down the frames to signal that he thinks this moment is really important, Romic is offered communion and the priest gives him one of the "star"-shaped Edges: keeping him on the Edge (ie., preserving his Judaism), another visual parallel to his Jewishness: being marked with a star.

Thus the point: Innocence, even innocence incarnate--in Jesus, Tolo, the Priest (though hes a bit questionable) and the Wafers--is inadequate to do anything in the world, and actually serves to indirectly damn people by convincing them that these ethereal rites have any meaning. Those who actually save others are not innocent: they have to make real choices, and select those they can save (primarily their family). But they can and will save you from untimely death by the sweat of their brow.

Of course the dichotomy that the director sets up is a false one, created by limiting Christianity to ideology. To use the terms of Jaroslav Pelikan, the Priests' Christianity is one of "traditionalism" rather than living tradition. Or put another (visual) way, the director sees the Priests' Christianity as worshipping an idol, because what is there is what is there: if you don't see how a wafer can save you from the Nazis (or from starvation or from murder or from rape) that's because it can't, and that is what matters.

Therefore, the pure essence of "Christianity" (ie., living like Jesus) is comprimised when you try to save anyone through blood sweat and tears: therefore such salvation is called "Judaism" as it can no longer be that of Jesus. The presentation is coherent but unfair because it entirely relies on its (debateable) premise: Christianity is an ideology, and like all ideologies (Nazism) it blinds one to the brotherhood of men and the implications of that.

As Rose pointed out to me, this presentation of Christianity is the same as that of those who said to Jesus, "If you claimed you could save others, why don't you come down and save yourself?!" Christianity has real-world power--the ultimate: resurrection--but it also has other-world concerns and goals that at times madden even those who profess the faith. This does not relegate Christianity to the mere ideological, but is the reality of the sacramental: divine and human.

An artisticly brilliant film that should be seen as a challenge (in both senses of the word) to believers in an Incarnate God.

Real Reporting from Iraq

You've probably already seen Michael Yon's latest dispatch, "Gates of Fire." If you haven't read it, do so. Wow. One of the best lines: "I was going to run into the shop and shoot every man with a gun. And I was scared to death."

LTC Kurilla was wounded in the firefight Yon describes. He is currently doing well, but no word on when/if he'll return. Here is one of the speeches Kurilla gave at a memorial for some of his soldiers. (HT: Blackfive)

Where does the courage exemplified by Yon and Kurilla come from? It is an amazing thing.

Unexpected Part of the Democracy Learning Curve

From a CNN story about a television show in Iraq modeled on "COPS" (cue "Bad Boys" music). A portion of the show is devoted to answering calls from viewers. However,

It took Iraqis a while to master the art of the phone-in.

Further skills to focus on in the burgeoning democracy:

(1) Getting low introductory rates on credit card balance transfers.
(2) Checking out books from local library.
(3) Ordering pizza delivery.
(4) Learning the characters' names on "The Simpsons."

But these could wait until they figure out how to draft a constitution. Amid all the clamor that "the process is taking too long," have people forgotten how long it took to draft the American constitution? (Here's a hint: more than a month. And though there was some pressure at the Constitutional Convention to develop some rules that worked (i.e., not the Articles of Confederation), it wasn't anything like the unrest in Iraq today.)

Willard on Science & Religion

Dallas Willard’s Web site is a treasure chest for Christians of any stripe (and non-Christians, too). This is from an article on science and religion.

The impasse of authorities confronting authorities (or intimidating others) begins to dissolve when prepared and thoughtful people devote themselves to the humble examination of facts and evidence rather than to defending their positions. It is difficult to imagine anything more necessary and Godlike than this. We must escape the cultural deadlock that is turning universities—and churches—into places of “right views,” rather than thought and knowledge, and producing a Christian personality split into a religious side and a professional, intellectual side which never come into contact.

Reppert on Motives of Christians and Non-Christians

Victor Reppert has an interesting post on the motives for belief and nonbelief. It addresses the question Do Christians or non-Christians have more nonrational motivation for their belief?

One of the commenters rightly noted: "The truth is permitted to have psychological advantages."

There's a related post from a while back at Bill Vallicella's site. Be sure to read all the comments (esp. from Reppert).

Philosophers Who Know How to Party

The Maverick Philosopher has a post on why he likes parties:

I like parties. I derive considerable satisfaction from not attending them. There is such a thing as the pleasure of conscious avoidance, of knowing that one has wisely escaped a frustrating and unpleasant situation. If others are offended by my nonattendance, that I regret. But peace of mind is a higher value than social dissipation -- which is no value at all.

I agree with him, but I think it's important to point out that parties and peace of mind are not mutually exclusive. Consider the example of Socrates.

So Agathon was getting up in order to seat himself by Socrates, when suddenly a great crowd of revellers arrived at the door, which they found just opened for some one who was going out. They marched straight into the party and seated themselves: the whole place was in an uproar and, losing all order, they were forced to drink a vast amount of wine. Then, as Aristodemus related, Eryximachus, Phaedrus, and some others took their leave and departed; while he himself fell asleep, and slumbered a great while, for the nights were long. He awoke towards dawn, as the cocks were crowing; and immediately he saw that all the company were either sleeping or gone, except Agathon, Aristophanes, and Socrates, who alone remained awake and were drinking out of a large vessel, from left to right; and Socrates was arguing with them. As to most of the talk, Aristodemus had no recollection, for he had missed the beginning and was also rather drowsy; but the substance of it was, he said, that Socrates was driving them to the admission that the same man could have the knowledge required for writing comedy and tragedy -- that the fully skilled tragedian could be a comedian as well. While they were being driven to this, and were but feebly following it, they began to nod; first Aristophanes dropped into a slumber, and then, as day began to dawn, Agathon also. When Socrates had seen them comfortable, he rose and went away -- followed in the usual manner by my friend; on arriving at the Lyceum, he washed himself, and then spent the rest of the day in his ordinary fashion; and so, when the day was done, he went home for the evening and reposed. (Symposium, 223b-d; trans. Fowler)

Socrates, the consummate philosopher, is the only one left awake at the end of a raucous party in which he has given a beautiful speech (outdoing all the other speeches) on love. He had gone eagerly to the party (though he had been distracted by something on the way) and had even dressed up for the occasion. Here we see Socrates as both the paradigmatic party animal and rational animal.

However, at least in my case (and perhaps in the Maverick Philosopher's case, too), I am too feeble a soul to be both; so I try to live up to my nature as a rational animal and leave the partying to others.

Feeling Old?

So my twenty-ninth birthday is coming in a month or so. And the other day someone asked me what happened on a certain day (August 5, I think) fifteen years ago. So I started thinking: fifteen years ago . . . hmmm . . . that would be 1980 . . . not much happened that year . . . except wasn't Reagan shot that year? . . . so, yeah, I'll go with Reagan getting shot.

Then I realized: fifteen years ago was 1990. Saddam had just invaded Kuwait. I'm stuck thinking that everything that happened more than ten years ago happened in the 80s. I'm not sure I feel old, just confused.

But I can console myself with the knowledge that I now know more about, say, Reagan than any highschool student, not because I've learned something new; they just don't know. I'm starting to figure out how my parents knew so many of the right answers (er, questions) to Jeopardy! and Trivial Pursuit. They knew the answers to the questions involving Nixon and the 1970s because they were alive then. I used to be amazed at their knowledge; now I'm confused about how I came to know so much stuff without trying (and still amazed at my parents, mom).

Meta or Meta?

Peter Leithart has a post about method.

Jean-Luc Marion points out that "method" comes from the Greek meta+hodos, and explains why phenomenology is not methodological: "The method does not run ahead of the phenomenon, by fore-seeing it, pre-dicting it, and pro-ducing it, in order to await it from the outset at the end of the path (meta-hodos) onto which it has just barely set forth." Conversely, philosophy influenced by Descartes is governed by method, which means that all its conclusions were determined at the outset. Methodological philosophy (and its cousin prolegomenal theology) knows from the beginning where it is headed; it immanentizes the eschaton.

Apart from coming near to the etymological fallacy, it seems that Marion (and perhaps Leithart) have left out of consideration the multiple meanings of the Greek word meta. Marion's analysis indicates that he thinks meta means "after"; this is the meaning of the preposition in the title of Aristotle's Metaphysics: the work Metaphysics is so named because in the traditional Aristotelian corpus it was placed after the work Physics.

The problem with Marion's clever point is that meta can also mean "with." (When paired with the accusative case, meta means after; paired with the genitive case, it means with.) Given our common-sense notion of method, it seems more likely that meta means with, so that meta + hodos = "with a way." The ancient (Homeric) meaning of method is "pursuit." To this is added, by the philosophers, especially Plato, the meaning of a principled way of proceeding. (Note that hodos means way or path.) The point of method is not that it determines or knows everything ahead of time (and so can wait at the end of the path (of experience?) but that it provides us an organized (to mix in some Latin) way of moving through the world.

Leithart says that "philosophy influenced by Descartes is governed by method, which means that all its conclusions were determined at the outset." If I understand aright, he means that philosophy influenced by Descartes is deterministic in the sense that the principles (or, conclusions) of that philosophy are set down in stone by the method. But for Descartes especially (and maybe Leithart does not include Descartes in those "influenced by Descartes"), method is the harmonious way of moving through the rational structure of the universe in order to discover the truths about the universe. It is harmonious because it requires the "methodist" to take what the world gives and not invent or tear the world. It is necessary because it is the only way that we can be sure that our conclusions are true. A careful reader of the Meditations will, I think, realize that Descartes's insistence on following the method is for just that purpose.

Aside: for some reason (perhaps it's Gilson?), Descartes is the whipping boy for many people today. Most of those who beat him show only a surface familiarity with him. Further, Leithart's association of method with Descartes is not completely accurate. After all, method is from the Greek methodos, which figures prominently in, among other ancient works, Plato's Sophist and Statesman.

Leithart then says that "Methodological philosophy (and its cousin prolegomenal theology) knows from the beginning where it is headed," which is false. Presuming it's safe to substitute "methodological philosophers" for "methodological philosophy," it seems that Leithart has mixed ontology with epistemology. It is precisely because we do not know what the conclusions are that we must adhere to some method. Without method, according to Descartes, we have no way of knowing what the world is like. We might as well make it up as we go along.

Now, I am not saying that phenomenologists like Husserl (or Marion) make it up as they go along. But they do have a method; it just might not be the Cartesian one.

Slightly related point: I have a friend who once had a bumper sticker with an allusion to the quotation (to which Leithart refers in his last sentence) from Eric Voegelin: "Thou shalt not immanentize the eschaton." (Actually, the quotation from Voegelin is "When the attempt is made, first merely in principle, to immanentize the transcendent eschaton (in the Christian sense of the term), then everything follows from the logic of the approach, right down to the historical fact as the answer to the meaning of self-interpreting existence" [Faith and Political Philosophy, p. 73].) It seems that Voegelin's point is also related to some kind of fixity ("everything follows from the logic of the approach"), but I don't know Voegelin at all and so can't say anything about that.

The White Path

The Burglar has had this site on the Burgling list for quite some time now, but I wanted to further recommend perusing it. As usual, I discover a site about a month or more after the illlustrious Burglar, only to realize that it has been on the blogroll for ages. My web-surfing is indeed amateur.

Mustafa Akyol is a Muslim who lives in Istanbul, and travels around Europe and occassionally the US for speaking engagements. He seems to be generally committed to Islam's incorporation with the ideals of the free-market of ideas and commerce in the West as far as can be accomplished without comprimising important doctrinal positions. I was directed to him by a comment from Phil Johnson, which I read in this month's Touchstone.

A couple of tidbits from this mornings read, and there are many more interesting looking posts I have yet to peruse like "In Defense of Mary the Virgin" and "Hating America Turkish Style -- This too shall pass" and The Parliament of this World's Religions and the Axis of Theism. Anyway, they all look interesting.

From Intelligent Decline, Revisited

"Actually it is members of the Darwinian camp who employ arguments from ignorance: "We don't know how this evolved, but it must have been somehow" is the kind of answer they give to many complex questions such as the origin of life, biochemical systems, genetic code or the animal phyla. What we find curious is why they ardently presume that every unsolved puzzle will definitely be solved through a materialistic explanation. The only reason is "an a priori commitment to materialism," as the arch-Darwinist Richard Lewontin famously acknowledged a few years ago."

See also, Akyol's Testimony to the Kansas State Education Board

"Most Darwinists have the opposite motive, which are non-theistic worldviews like secular humanism and atheism, which are all driven by the philosophy of Naturalism, also called materialism. And this is all fine; people on both sides of the debate might have motives derived from their philosophical convictions. The problem starts when they seek to impose those beliefs on the institutions of science and government so that their non-theistic worldviews will become the official state ideology. I think this is the current situation in American biology textbooks. Materialism has dominated them and does not allow other views to have a fair share, although it clearly lacks full scientific support."

Perhaps most bracing is "Bolshevism in a Headdress: Islamic fundamentalism has more to do with the hatred of the West than with faith"

Europe has turned out to be a perfect petri dish for growing Islamic radicalism. Muslim communities there consist mostly of poor immigrants living in closed communities. Such a social situation is fertile ground for radicalism, and disenchanted European Muslims have easily been recruited by radical groups. Antoine Sfeir, a French scholar studying Islamic radicalism in Europe, characterizes it as "a kind of combat against the rich and powerful by the poor men of the planet." Oliver Roy, another French expert on Islamic movements, notes, "To convert to Islam today is a way for a European rebel to find a cause; it has little to do with theology." Not surprisingly, Lionel Dumont, an Algerian-born French national suspected of links to al-Qaeda, said that he joined Islam because "the Muslims are the only ones to fight the system."

This fight against "the system" links Islamic radicalism to the Marxist-Leninist radicalism that preceded it. Marxism had a considerable influence on Islamic radicals like Sayyid Qutb, Sayyid Mawdudi, and Ali Shariati--architect of the Iranian Revolution. Shariati thought that Islam presented a better ideology and system than Marxism-Leninism for Muslims to topple the "imperialists."

It is thus not surprising to see ex-Marxists join the ranks of Islamic radicals. A compelling example is the recent "conversion" to Islam of Carlos the Jackal, the notorious Marxist terrorist now imprisoned in France. From his prison cell he has penned a book titled Revolutionary Islam. This brand of Islam, he argues, "attacks the ruling classes in order to achieve a more equitable redistribution of wealth" and is the only "transnational force capable of standing up to the enslavement of nations."

Here is my theory, and no its not very original. A-thiestic materialism has had its day. It has had a stranglehold on Western political, philosophical and scientific thought, but there is enough of a growing mass of intelligent, reasonable, educated people who have "tasted and seen and touched" and are tired of being ridiculed with "exclusivist rhetoric" (to turn a Berkeley phrase onto its head) into silence. Athiestic materialism will always be tolerated, but in a couple of decades people like Mustafa, and the current supporters of the ID movement will have won the day, and will themselves be in the position to be judged on their (our) ability to tolerate in the open marketplace of ideas. Advance the Day, I say.

When Disney Was Cool

From the CD insert "Brubeck on Columbia"

"... the 1957 album 'Dave Digs Disney' proved the jazz-worthiness of 'Some day my Prince will come,' 'Alice in Wonderland' and 'When You Wish Upon a Star.'

'That album came from Iola [Dave's wife] buying the yellow plastic 78's of Disney music for the kids,' Brubeck noted. 'We always had a turntable on the road, and the kids were always playing those tunes. We grew to love them, and Paul [Desmond - Sax] loved them too.'"

I'm going to have to check out this record. If anyone has heard it and has a review, drop me a line.