According to a couple of dictionaries, an `explanation’ is “Something that explains” or equivalent definitions of the sort which would gain a failing grade on a junior high school test back in the days when American schools were so tough we had to write essays explaining how it was possible to walk uphill going to … [Read more…]
I’ve finished reading Thomas S. Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions but I continue to think about the issues he raised. Some of his attempts to make sense of these “scientific revolutions” involve efforts to make sense of the language used by various groups of scientists. When talking about the need to use a assumption-loaded … [Read more…]
There are those who passively accept what they’re taught and they are those who rebel as if instinctively, denying traditional beliefs and outlooks by denying conclusions without remembering that human thought is a process. It remains a process even when dealing with truths revealed by God — which are far fewer in number than many … [Read more…]
I’m still trying to sketch out better ways to view causation and the human moral situation, ways that recognize both Christian truths and modern empirical knowledge. The first step is to start a refounding of our understanding of our own human nature and of concrete being in general, a refounding based upon the richer understandings … [Read more…]
Pilgrims travel paths, journeying from one location on earth to another, sometimes those places are fictional but usually quite concrete. To be sure, Dante’s pilgrim found (as some of the more recent translations of The Inferno attest) that the path could wander away from him, a strange event from a fully concrete view of paths. … [Read more…]
Like most Christians, I believe that — if Christ choses me — I’ll be raised from the dead into a world that might be called ‘Heaven’ where I’ll live with Jesus Christ for time without end. I’ll take this as a typical schizophrenic Christian belief. See A Thomistic Take on Madness and Modernism for a … [Read more…]
Here is the beginning of a Vatican Information Service news-item: ROMANUS THE MELODIST: FAITH CREATES BEAUTY VATICAN CITY, 21 MAY 2008 (VIS) – During this morning’s general audience, Benedict XVI dedicated his catechesis to Romanus the Melodist, a Syrian “theologian, poet, composer and permanent deacon who resided in a monastery on the outskirts of Constantinople … [Read more…]
There’s a serious and insightful commentary on the debate between ‘Darwinists’ and ‘design-theorists’ on America Jones’ blog — Debating Popular Intelligent Design. The discussion is addressed to the difference between ‘hypothesis’ and ‘theory’.
Before commenting, I’ll quote an entire news item from the “WEDNESDAY, 14 MAY 2008” newsletter of the Vatican Information Service (EIGHTEENTH YEAR – N. 91): =============================================================== PSEUDO-DIONYSIUS THE AREOPAGITE: MEDIATION AND DIALOGUE VATICAN CITY, 14 MAY 2008 (VIS) – In today’s general audience, held in St. Peter’s Square, the Holy Father resumed his series of … [Read more…]
The usual mantra amongst Christian thinkers is faith and reason, implying that faith should be united to and disciplined by products of the human mind. The problem is that Christians are bound to believe that God was not only free to create or not, but also that — once He chose to create — He … [Read more…]