One other thing... Don't wear your seat belt.
That way "you'll be thrown clear of the car."
Thanks for your email.
I agree with you. By and large, the world is a reliable place.
It is this same reliability which moved me to observe that the world functions quite dependably on "mere" scientific "theory" without even considering the relative unbreachability of scientific Law.
My apprehension over "certitude" arises from another source.
For example, you may know of my personal belief in levitation and my consequent belief that "The Law of Gravity" is not absolutely inviolable. http://www.ewtn.com/library/MARY/COPERTIN.htm
Even so, I always align my political and personal behavior with "the preponderance of scientific evidence" which, in this case, supports The Law of Gravity.
In the end, we are called upon to "do what reasonable people would do" and,very often science tells us, with relative certainty, what lies on "the safe side" of "reasonable doubt."
However, many American conservatives - and virtually all Christian conservatives - disdain any scientific principle that threatens them ideologically, and as soon as they've located (or think they've located) "an exception to a scientific rule" they argue (or at least imply) that Scientific Rule be supplanted (or at least be overthrown) by the The Exception.
A revealing aside...
Decades ago, I met a San Franciscan who -- convinced he could fly -- jumped off the upper deck of the Bay Bridge and was blown back on the lower deck where he snapped his spinal cord, leaving him paraplegic.
In the end, we are called upon to "do what reasonable people would do" and,very often science tells us, with relative certainty, what lies on "the safe side" of "reasonable doubt."
However, many American conservatives - and virtually all Christian conservatives - disdain any scientific principle that threatens them ideologically, and as soon as they've located (or think they've located) "an exception to a scientific rule" they argue (or at least imply) that Scientific Rule be supplanted (or at least be overthrown) by the The Exception.
A revealing aside...
Decades ago, I met a San Franciscan who -- convinced he could fly -- jumped off the upper deck of the Bay Bridge and was blown back on the lower deck where he snapped his spinal cord, leaving him paraplegic.
Self-arrogation of the "right" to manipulate epistemological outcomes according to pre-existing beliefs is as dangerous as leaping from the upper deck.
Truth is what it is.
We discover it.
We do not invent Truth or "tailor" it to our liking.
"The Death of Epistemology"
"The Rules" are "The Rules."
And "Exceptions to Rules" are "Exceptions to Rules" - statistical outliers void of scientific significance.
It is benighted (as only The Prince of Darkness can be) to believe -- and, even worse, to preach/promote -- that "Exceptions to Rules" are grounds for "New Rules" or reason to disregard old ones.
The Guardian: John Olivers' Viral Video Is The Best Climate Debate You'll Ever See
Stewart, Colbert, Oliver Probe The Spectacular Idiocy Of Climate Change Deniers
Take for example the conservative chestnut that 1934 was an exceptionally hot year in the United States.
Yes, it was.
However, that year's anomalous heat is not an argument against the massive (and growing) body of evidence that demonstrate the reality of global warming and, more specifically, anthropogenic global warming.
"1934 Is The Hottest Year On Record." What Science Says Vs. Dodgy Lies
Global Warming Deniers Are Full Of It. Here Comes The Enema!
Consider Christian conservatism's twin objections to global warming.
On one hand it is believed that God -- as a function of his "meta-level oversight" -- would "take out the garbage" for us so that we humans needn't bother de-toxifying our waste.
On the other hand, once "we" determine that humans are responsible for "taking out the garbage," immediately there is inexorable need for collective, political action to undertake "de-toxification," a fact that contradicts the primary conservative Christian belief in Individual Conscience as "supreme and inviolable." And so conservative Christianity refuses countenance any appeal to moral mandate under aegis of collective decision-making.
Pope Francis: Moving The Moral Compass From "The Individual" Toward "The Collective"
Pro-Science Pontiff: Pope Francis On Climate Change, Evolution And The Big Bang
http://paxonbothhouses.Pope Francis: What Christianity Looks Like When Believers Realize "God Is Love"
The quest for "certitude" presumes an underlying absolute and therefore I am wary of all references to certitude since they infuse absolutists with a brittle sense of self-certainty that makes them cantankerous, uncompromising and murderously angry. (Hence their fondness for war and the zeal with which they damn to people to The Unquenchable Lake Of Eternal Fire.)
With increasing regularity -- particularly in the three Abrahamic traditions -- self-certain absolutists have grown so disdainful of earthly existence that they don't care who they "take down" with them.
After all, they are going to heaven. (Tautology is seldom so exquisitely neat. And rarely so revealing.)
With increasing regularity -- particularly in the three Abrahamic traditions -- self-certain absolutists have grown so disdainful of earthly existence that they don't care who they "take down" with them.
After all, they are going to heaven. (Tautology is seldom so exquisitely neat. And rarely so revealing.)
At bottom, eschatological Abrahamics - whether Jewish, Christian or Islamic - are Armageddon Cheerleaders, so convinced of their personal glorification in the after-life that they play loose and recklessly with the only Life we know, the Life where Divine Incarnation is actually taking place.
- "Republicans For Revolution," A Study In Anarchic Apocalypticism
The wild-eyed radicals on The Religious Right might wisely ask themselves why God "plunged" Christendom into half a millennium of Dark Age at the very moment Christianity - still inspired by proximity to the incarnation of Yeshua - had been declared the official religion of The Roman Empire.
The Thinking Housewife: Marriage, Divorce And Absolutism
"Totalitarian Absolutism And The Thinking Housewife"
Nor would it hurt Christian conservatives to re-examine the story of Noah whose family survived The Flood, a catastrophe (purportedly) wrought by God to cleanse the earth of evil.
Remarkably, there is scant discussion of what came next: Noah's own children became more villainous than the generation swept away by "God's Plan" to restore virtue on earth!?!
Remarkably, there is scant discussion of what came next: Noah's own children became more villainous than the generation swept away by "God's Plan" to restore virtue on earth!?!
"Prohibition, Noah, Ham And The Curse Of Canaan"
Absolutism - and its Siamese twin, "perfectionism" - are more vicious than virtuous.
"Is Perfectionism A Curse? Paul Ryan Tells The Truth"
"Is Perfectionism A Curse? Paul Ryan Tells The Truth"
It is not coincidental that every major fascist society -- Germany, Italy and Spain in the 30s and 40s and Argentina, El Salvador, Guatemala and Chile in the 80s -- were launched by cradle Catholics.
This is not an esoteric "reading" of history like The Thinking Housewife's fanciful interpretation of Genesis.
Rather, it is a straightforward rendering of The Historical Record.
Here's how the last Crusade worked out.
Want your child to sign up for the next?
"Bush's Toxic Legacy In Iraq"
"The terrible thing about our time is precisely the ease with which theories can be put into practice. The more perfect, the more idealistic the theories, the more dreadful is their realization. We are at last beginning to rediscover what perhaps men knew better in very ancient times, in primitive times before utopias were thought of: that liberty is bound up with imperfection, and that limitations, imperfections, errors are not only unavoidable but also salutary. The best is not the ideal. Where what is theoretically best is imposed on everyone as the norm, then there is no longer any room even to be good. The best, imposed as a norm, becomes evil.”
"Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander,” by Trappist monk, Father Thomas Merton
More Merton Quotes
Pax tecum
Alan
White. Christian. Conservative.
You supply the other adjective.
"Wingnuts And President Obama"
Harris Poll Results
"Brazen Lies About Obama"
"Obama Hatred"
The American Conservative: "Obama Is A Republican"
On Mon, Jan 5, 2015 at 12:04 PM, Fred Owens <froghospital911@gmail.com> wrote:
You're making an academic argument against certitude. It does exist, although not to the nth decimal point. I just read a book about the construction of the Golden Gate Bridge, finished in 1937, built with certitude, almost 80 years now, and good for another 80 years. You drive across it, sure it might collapse, or you might get hit by a crashing meteorite, but I would say in terms of human understanding, the bridge was built with certitude.(The twin towers were struck and destroyed by fanatics in airplanes -- which proves their certitude was not absolute.)
--
My writing blog is Frog Hospital
send mail to:
Fred Owens
35 West Main St Suite B #391
Ventura CA 93001
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