From: ian glendinning (psybertron@gmail.com)
Date: Mon May 02 2005 - 16:17:11 BST
Hmm, Sam,
I genuinely wasn't aiming the criticism at you personally, and I
genuinely was just supporting what DMB has said.
Anyway, since you draw in quotes from elsewhere ...
Obviously in this particular thread / few-sentence response to DMB I
was using a generality of "theologians" drawn from the specifics all
of my experience. That's language, and I was just using the word DMB
had used, to save brain cells and electrons.
I was also careful not to make a negative assertion - since I was
clearly using generalities - not my style, as you acknowledge I claim
consistently. I said "I do not see any ... " leaving open someone (you
perhaps) to show me.
Again, whilst you re-cast something "akin to what I might have said"
in those pernicious propaganda words - I did not say that.
As to what makes up my "general" view of theologians, where to start ... ?
I'm 50 years old, I've travelled the world - I've tripped over the
beggars in Karachi and Manila, I've seen a bit of life, I've read a
lot of books, worked in three or four different businesses, actively
pursue continuing education down several different avenuse, done my
share of church-based charity work - I think I'm pretty rounded,
balance is my middle-name.
In this debating forum - I have expressed my amazement many times over
several years at expressions of faith in literal or metaphorical
"gods" having any purposeful or causal connection with reality - over
many years. I certainly couldn't point to which of you specifically
over that time. I have said openly, faith based beliefs seem to be the
only ones in direct conflict with credible explanations.
In the global macro-politics I try hard to avoid on this forum - the
words of popes, archbishops, PM's and Presidents, and their publicly
quoted advisors.
BBC Radio 4's "Though for the day" and "In our time" would have to
figure in it. Numerous "rememberance" service sermons - it's a long
time since I've been to a church for any other reason.
Anyway - you're taking me into Catch-22 land - language is all
metaphors used to generalise prior particulars - so I'm not sure I
need to justify mine particularly. Back to specifics.
I did give you a very specific example - in response to your own
quoting of Girard - of an intellectual dishonesty, which you chose to
ignore.
Give me some more specifics to challenge, and I'll challenge them too.
Set the record straight on behalf of theologians I've not heard - on
matters of truth and reality (not global politics and war preferably)
"I don't see" I said - enlighten me.
Ian.
BTW - if your waiting for a response on the nature of science you'll
be disappointed - I made the point again in the quotes above - that it
is the nature of a "good explanation" I was referring to. Science
comes into it, only because I see physics as one of the few domains
where I see people taking the trouble to worry about what makes a good
explanation.
On 5/2/05, Sam Norton <elizaphanian@kohath.wanadoo.co.uk> wrote:
> Hi Ian,
>
> > Sam
> > You asked ..
> > Is there a place where I have been guilty of this [dishonest intellect] ?
> >
> > Possibly Sam, but none of us is innocent - it was actually me
> > apologising for my losing my cool, not me pointing the finger or
> > fishing for apologies from anyone else. DMB had articulated a response
> > to that which simply made me angry.
>
> I didn't understand that, so I may have got the wrong end of the stick.
>
> > (It's odd you picked on my words, when I was merely agreeing with DMB ?)
>
> That seems disingenuous. You were cheering him from the sidelines, and he
> and I have been in a long running dispute about all sorts of things, the
> nature of religious belief amongst them. And as, to me, it seems the core of
> the thread is Scott's question about whether science and 'contemporary
> non-fundamentalist theism' are in conflict, you seem to be arguing that they
> are. This is reinforced when you say
> > The thing that keeps angering me is seeing theologians using bad,
> > out-dated pseudo-science, dishonest-rhetoric to back up their
> > religious beliefs. As I said in my last post on this subject - whilst
> > I do indeed hold up "science" [good 20th & 21st century physics,
> > actually] as a paragon of high-quality expalantion - it's the
> > explanation (the honest use of intellect), not the science that has
> > quality, whether you are a scientist, a poet, or a philospher.
> >
> > Like you, I just do not see theologians moving in that direction.
>
> Which theologians are you referring to? As a large part of my worldview is
> formed by theologians I was wanting to know if you had something specific in
> mind that I had said (which could likely be traced to a particular
> theologian) or whether it was a generalised criticism, akin to saying
> 'regurgitated pernicious Christian propaganda' and therefore qualifying as
> "partisan politics, closer to anthroplogy than philosophy. It's yah boo
> sucks debate not worthy of intelligent beings. A waste of electrons and
> pixels" (a sentiment I basically agreed with).
>
> Looking forward to a response on the nature of science question.
>
> Cheers
> Sam
>
>
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