Hi Mati, I don't see how the extreme Islamists are any more at odds with intellect than the extreme (average) US Christians. Fear driven thinking. Faith in anything but our own humanity.
Like Ant, the thing I found interesting (apart from the sheer inspiration of positive optimism in that humanity) is the US contradiction - the home of such excellent philosophical pragmatism amidst the culture of conservative denial and dogma. Ask not. Ian On 4/26/07, Mati Palm-Leis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > Ant and others, > > I think the comments are insightful, but as a whole this pragmatism is > largely based on the established social level of the American psyche. If > there is hope in ending the war, then yes I believe Sachs is right about > American Pragmatism. My greater concern is that there is another war that > needs to be considered, that of the social level trying to resist the > intellectual domination of it. My take on it is that in the United States > the intellectual insight of understanding of the war is largely ignored, > which is typical in our mainstream culture. Also one of the peripheral > issues is to deal with the social reality of Islam which, when you analyze > what Islam is resistant to, it is everything that the intellectual level > tends to support, ie. Democracy, capitalism etc.. Our nations retreat from > the war is inevitable, but the problem of extreme Islamic culture will > continually be at War at the intellectual level, which the United States has > most benefited from. Then it begs the question, what next. > Mati > > Ant McWatt comments: > > Ian, > > I also thought this lecture by Jeffrey Sachs (the Professor of Health Policy > > and Management at Columbia University) made considerable sense and, as far > as the MOQ is concerned, especially his following comment about pragmatism: > > "One thing I think we can say about the American people is that they are > pragmatic. We see that while Americans largely supported the Iraq war, as > patently misguided as it was, before the war ever commenced, Americans now > see it doesn't work. And I think that pragmatism is certainly our best > hope." > > Best wishes, > Anthony > > > > moq_discuss mailing list > Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. > http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org > Archives: > http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ > http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/ > moq_discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
