When I was in college, I was confronted with the idea that religious faith was dark, absurd, backward and superstitious. The basis for this accusation was that there was simply no evidence for God. That centuries of inquiry had turned up not a trace of evidence for His existence, and any person with an ounce of intellectual honesty would have to face up to this fact. Continue reading “Hidden in Plain Sight”
The scientist and inventor of the alternate time machine, which had the unique ability to travel not through the fabric of actual time but to traverse all possible worlds, was not satisfied with his first journey. Continue reading “The Alternate Time Machine Part 2”
There once was a scientist who during his research, having stumbled upon a fortuitous discovery, managed to invent a time machine. But this time machine was no ordinary time machine (if a time machine could be called ordinary). Instead of allowing one to travel through the fabric of actual history, it allowed its recipient to traverse, as the Philosopher would say, all possible worlds. Continue reading “The Alternate Time Machine”
We are taking a momentary departure from our present discussion to review the book: American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America by Chris Hedges.
This topic has come about as a direct result of an event close to home: My daughter being assigned the book for college reading. The course? Humanities. Not political science. Not world religions, either (it will be clear that the book is a an examination of, and no-holds barred attack upon, the Christian faith). Nope, just humanities.
Of course, humanities lends itself to, and has always allowed for, broad selection of reading material. Humanities professors use their own discretion in selecting reading material for these classes, and I cannot say that I blame them. But I find it both interesting and not surprising that the reading list for this course is pretty exclusively anti-Christian and left-wing with really no attempt to provide opposing viewpoints. As my own daughter has said, humanities courses seems to be “an excuse for professors to take their own personal views and force it upon their students.” Continue reading “A Review of American Fascists 1”
In my first year of college, where students join the real world of ideas, I was greeted with what seemed to be a unanimous consensus that God was dead, a mere human invention, and that faith was irrational. It appeared to be more than a just strong case; on the contrary, I got the impression from its proponents that God had been so undeniably proven to be false that it was beyond dispute, and I was very late to the party. I wondered whether my faith was in fact a lie.
But as I examined the arguments against God, I did not find what I expected. Instead of undeniable facts, I found arguments whose main force was found in their underlying assumptions: Assumptions which largely determined the conclusion. What’s more, it seemed for most people who held them, those assumptions went unchallenged.
