Robert G. Seeberger wrote, quoting John C Wright:
> An aside: For those of you interested in such questions, I am in the
> same school as Bishop Berkeley ("Esse est percipi") and Boethius
> (Consolatio Philosophiae). While mind and matter cannot be of the same
> substance, surely mind and perception can and must be: for reason is
> thought is about thought and perception is thought about objects.
> Perceived objects (whose existance we know only by induction) follow
> the laws of consistency for the same reason a syllogism follows the
> laws of logic. When we see perceptions that do not flow from one to
> another consistently, not shared in common with other men, we call it
> dreaming.
Bishop Berkeley? The one with a "proof of the existence of God" with a
glaring problem (glaring if you're sufficiently trained in logic,
anyway!)? Hm.
> Allow me to quote from that eminent Christian theologian, Puddleglum:
OK, quoting Puddleglum is a bit better than hitching one's wagon with
Berkeley's, IMO.
> Pagan philosophy, like that of Aristotle and Plato, urge men to live
> and die like great-souled men, like Stoics, and to live honestly and
> honorably, without fear: but their world is one where even Achilles is
> a shade in Hades, their universe is one where fear is rational, for
> the Unmoved Mover will not move itself to save you. Stoicism, the
> doctrine of Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius, Seneca and Cicero, shows
> logically why it is better to live a life in accordance with Nature,
> but it does not arm the soul with the tools needed to do so.
I've met plenty of pagans who had it together, for some reasonable
human-being-ness value of "together"; somewhat disorganized (and Pagan
Standard Time is not a joke, but an explanation of Why Things Are Always
A Little Late when pagans are involved), but less judgemental than a lot
of people I've run into who call themselves Christians.
> Christianity seems to fit better with the way human life actually is
> than other religions, at least in my humble estimation. There is a
> concern and a love for children I have not noticed in other religions,
> a sanctity toward marriage, a concern for human life, a concern for
> monogamy, for individual worth, more central to Christian tradition
> than to the traditions of other faiths. Christendom wiped out slavery
> world wide; Christendom invented science. If Christianity were the foe
> of science, the West would be the most backward of technological
> powers, and the Chinese, following the pragmatic and this-worldly
> Confucius, would be the leader.
Um. I know a number of people who suffered abuse as children in the
name of Christianity (and they're atheists or pagans now, most of them),
the divorce rate in some Christian denominations is higher than among
atheists, wars and their subsequent deaths have been waged in the name
of Christianity, the Christian Bible was used to justify slavery less
than 200 years ago, and the Church suppressed science at various times.
Something about that paragraph reminds me of this:
http://www.gracedbychrist.com/narrowgate/?p=14
only the bit I just gave the URL for is much narrower in focus and much
better argued. (Linux geeks should read it and form their own opinions
of it. And if any of them want to share those opinions with me, I'd be
glad to read what they have to say.)
> The Christian world-view is not only NOT incompatible with the
> scientific and logical one, they reinforce each other. You must
> imagine my befuddlement when I see science presented as somehow being
> the enemy of religion. Science is the enemy of Taoism or Buddhism,
> perhaps, but not the enemy of a religion that combines the rationalism
> of Athens with the mysticism of Jerusalem. We invented the University,
> for God's sake.
Um. Enemy of Taoism? Buddhism? I've seen popularizations of science
(some of them bad ones, to be sure) that used Buddhism or pieces of it
to help explain things!
[This was where I just wanted to throw my hands up. If I hadn't needed
one of them for scrolling further down, I would have.]
Science and Christianity are not incompatible, but science and extreme
bibliolatry are.
That's as much of a fisking job as I'm going to do on this right now.
Julia
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