Cribbing from the style of InstaPundit.com, I'm writing a short item here (rather than my usual long-winded ones) highlighting an interesting piece in First Things.
In it, physicist Stephen Barr suggests that the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) has to do more than discover the Higgs boson particle to be interesting. That's pretty much a given. Rather, it should also shed light on why the Higgs boson, in the Higgs wave, in the Higgs field, doesn't make life impossible. For Barr at least, to discover, via the LHC, some countervailing force to the Higgs stuff, if I may, provides support for an "anthropic" or human-life centered view of our little region of the multiverse. Hmm, can God be far behind?
P.S. To my students who might be visiting my blog. Please forgive yet another story about the LHC. I assure you I'm not a physics geek masquerading as a philosophy teacher.
Saturday, September 20, 2008
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
The Comedian Who Died, Literally
Perhaps because the weather is getting cooler toward the end of summer, I find myself remembering my visit one cool evening to a small Christian coffee house in East Northport, N.Y., where, not long ago, I heard a comedian give witness to life after death.
Samantha's Li'l Bit of Heaven hosted my friend Lenny Horowitz, the only Jewish act on the bill on its regular comedy nights. He was the resident non-believer, and he got lots of mileage out of his outsider status. When he told jokes that challenged the audience's delicate sensibilities, they would shake their bags of pretzels in disapproval.
As I had done a few times before, I visited one evening for Comedy Night, to see Lenny perform, and decide whether or not I could overcome my stage fright and do 5 minutes.
I decided against it. Lenny did well. But he was not the closer that evening. Another comedian, named Mike, whom I also know well from the local circuit, stood up to do his act.
Mike did many of his old bits, sanitized from when he would perform them at Governor's Comedy Club in Levittown.
But the one thing I expected least was when Mike decided to close his act by testifying to this eminently receptive audience about the time he "died" and went to heaven. Mike's heart had stopped beating during a heart attack years before. How long it stopped I don't remember him recounting. But, as he said, he "died on the table" at the hospital.
During this time, he told the rapt audience, he experienced an incredibly friendly and peaceful presence. It showed him that his wife and all of his children would be healthy and happy. And that they would join him someday. Most interestingly to me, he also got a rather immediate explanation for all of the suffering in the world.
But, alas, he was revived. And he told the medical staff saving his life, "Let me go! Let me go!" because he wanted to be in heaven.
And from that day forward, he said, although he did not know why he was still here, he did not fear death, or anything else for that matter. He "knows" that he will be happy after death, and that all is well with the world.
Out of respect for the man's story, I should have simply remained silent. It was a deeply moving moment. But I couldn't resist the urge, once the show was over, to question him more.
I congratulated him on a great performance. And then, I asked, "You don't happen to remember the explanation for all that suffering, do you?"
"No," he said, shaking his head.
A few days later, the inspiration of his story faded.
Samantha's Li'l Bit of Heaven hosted my friend Lenny Horowitz, the only Jewish act on the bill on its regular comedy nights. He was the resident non-believer, and he got lots of mileage out of his outsider status. When he told jokes that challenged the audience's delicate sensibilities, they would shake their bags of pretzels in disapproval.
As I had done a few times before, I visited one evening for Comedy Night, to see Lenny perform, and decide whether or not I could overcome my stage fright and do 5 minutes.
I decided against it. Lenny did well. But he was not the closer that evening. Another comedian, named Mike, whom I also know well from the local circuit, stood up to do his act.
Mike did many of his old bits, sanitized from when he would perform them at Governor's Comedy Club in Levittown.
But the one thing I expected least was when Mike decided to close his act by testifying to this eminently receptive audience about the time he "died" and went to heaven. Mike's heart had stopped beating during a heart attack years before. How long it stopped I don't remember him recounting. But, as he said, he "died on the table" at the hospital.
During this time, he told the rapt audience, he experienced an incredibly friendly and peaceful presence. It showed him that his wife and all of his children would be healthy and happy. And that they would join him someday. Most interestingly to me, he also got a rather immediate explanation for all of the suffering in the world.
But, alas, he was revived. And he told the medical staff saving his life, "Let me go! Let me go!" because he wanted to be in heaven.
And from that day forward, he said, although he did not know why he was still here, he did not fear death, or anything else for that matter. He "knows" that he will be happy after death, and that all is well with the world.
Out of respect for the man's story, I should have simply remained silent. It was a deeply moving moment. But I couldn't resist the urge, once the show was over, to question him more.
I congratulated him on a great performance. And then, I asked, "You don't happen to remember the explanation for all that suffering, do you?"
"No," he said, shaking his head.
A few days later, the inspiration of his story faded.
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Another One Page Refutation of Unbelief (Yawn)
I like the publication First Things. I respect the life's work of the theologian and philosopher Michael Novak. But, damn, and yawn, if I don't see simplistic, dismissive, curriculum vitae-padding arguments against unbelievers, like Novak's latest, too often in First Things and elsewhere on the Christian Right.
In a drive-by article, majestically titled "Atheism and Evil," Novak engages a friendly audience of First Things readers to quickly dismiss atheists and agnostics for their struggles with belief.
A good percentage of these unbelievers, according to a recent poll, have allowed the problem of evil to drive them away from the notion of a personal God. But, surprisingly, many of them cling to some notion of an ultimate force.
In the most insulting statement of the entire piece, Novak accuses all of them of possessing a "morose delectation" for the reality of evil. In other words, they should just get over their perverse hang-up with suffering. (Now break out the brandy.)
Novak reminds us, yawn, that Thomas Aquinas posited that evil was not a co-equal reality with good. Evil tends toward non-being rather than being. (Ah, how did millions of human beings miss that? It's all explained now!)
And, without the possibility of moral evil, the world could never reach its current heights of goodness.
Excuse me if I yawn, again. These arguments are repeated endlessly against modern unbelief like a Thomistic spell. And yet, unbelief doesn't seem to go away. Curious.
Of course, the reality of physical evil (hurricanes, cancers, etc.) is not addressed here. That would have required at least another page of strenuous quoting of the Church Fathers.
Or perhaps it is, encrusted within Novak's brief, metaphorical reference to the world as a "tapestry of human experience." Or in his sweeping notion that "[a]ll the stuff of a good story depends on creation being not just a world of iron logic and inflexible arithmetic, but also a world of immense crisscrossing variation and 'blooming, buzzing profusion.'”
There you have it. The whole thing, from Krakatoa to Katrina, is just another "good story," and "blooming, buzzing profusion." What?
I know that Michael Novak means better. Perhaps Christopher Hitchens' delectations have gotten too much under his skin.
But I think that if one were actually concerned with these issues, in a spirit of genuine solidarity with non-First Things subscribers, it might help to acknowledge the serious concerns of "unbelievers" -- and perhaps more "believers" than one might care to acknowledge -- with moral evil, physical evil, and even metaphysical evil -- where one grinds daily against the limits of one's own being.
In a media-mad world in which human beings are buffeted daily by images of untold suffering and cruelty, and even levels of human success and honor that they will never achieve, it will require more than a series of dusty syllogisms to ease the suffering and dissension caused by the "immense crisscrossing" within the human spirit of the problems of moral, natural and metaphysical evil.
In a drive-by article, majestically titled "Atheism and Evil," Novak engages a friendly audience of First Things readers to quickly dismiss atheists and agnostics for their struggles with belief.
A good percentage of these unbelievers, according to a recent poll, have allowed the problem of evil to drive them away from the notion of a personal God. But, surprisingly, many of them cling to some notion of an ultimate force.
In the most insulting statement of the entire piece, Novak accuses all of them of possessing a "morose delectation" for the reality of evil. In other words, they should just get over their perverse hang-up with suffering. (Now break out the brandy.)
Novak reminds us, yawn, that Thomas Aquinas posited that evil was not a co-equal reality with good. Evil tends toward non-being rather than being. (Ah, how did millions of human beings miss that? It's all explained now!)
And, without the possibility of moral evil, the world could never reach its current heights of goodness.
Excuse me if I yawn, again. These arguments are repeated endlessly against modern unbelief like a Thomistic spell. And yet, unbelief doesn't seem to go away. Curious.
Of course, the reality of physical evil (hurricanes, cancers, etc.) is not addressed here. That would have required at least another page of strenuous quoting of the Church Fathers.
Or perhaps it is, encrusted within Novak's brief, metaphorical reference to the world as a "tapestry of human experience." Or in his sweeping notion that "[a]ll the stuff of a good story depends on creation being not just a world of iron logic and inflexible arithmetic, but also a world of immense crisscrossing variation and 'blooming, buzzing profusion.'”
There you have it. The whole thing, from Krakatoa to Katrina, is just another "good story," and "blooming, buzzing profusion." What?
I know that Michael Novak means better. Perhaps Christopher Hitchens' delectations have gotten too much under his skin.
But I think that if one were actually concerned with these issues, in a spirit of genuine solidarity with non-First Things subscribers, it might help to acknowledge the serious concerns of "unbelievers" -- and perhaps more "believers" than one might care to acknowledge -- with moral evil, physical evil, and even metaphysical evil -- where one grinds daily against the limits of one's own being.
In a media-mad world in which human beings are buffeted daily by images of untold suffering and cruelty, and even levels of human success and honor that they will never achieve, it will require more than a series of dusty syllogisms to ease the suffering and dissension caused by the "immense crisscrossing" within the human spirit of the problems of moral, natural and metaphysical evil.
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Back to Teaching Philosophy
After a six-month hiatus from teaching, I will be back teaching at Dowling College this fall.
I have at least one evening section of Western Philosophy; an introductory course covering from the Pre-Socratics all the way to Idealism and Empiricism. A second course may run if there are enough students. That's the killer course, I think, which starts later in the semester and goes for 3:45 each meeting. Which is way too long. I have to do cartwheels to keep the students interested.
Even though I took a break, I love to teach. I just hate the apathy of some students.
I don't take it personally. I get enough compliments from students. I just hate the lost opportunities the students have to make connections from philosophy to the rest of their lives, and to gain almost indescribable insights.
Philosophy is the most important subject you can study. I'll prove it.
What is a Ph.D. degree anyway? You know, as in Ph.D. in economics, chemistry, psychology, etc.? It is, a doctor of philosophy degree. In economics, or chemistry? Why?
Because the degree signifies not only that you know a lot of stuff. It also signifies that you have been to the boundaries of your field and seen all the things that you do not know the answers to. The same way Socrates, the model philosopher, did when he said he was only wise because he knew that he did not know. The university is built around the Socratic/Platonic model of knowledge and ignorance.
You're not "smart" (wise) if you don't know that you don't know. I hope to convince some students of that this fall, and help them see the "hidden blessings" of it, as Socrates notes in Plato's Apology. Wish me luck.
I have at least one evening section of Western Philosophy; an introductory course covering from the Pre-Socratics all the way to Idealism and Empiricism. A second course may run if there are enough students. That's the killer course, I think, which starts later in the semester and goes for 3:45 each meeting. Which is way too long. I have to do cartwheels to keep the students interested.
Even though I took a break, I love to teach. I just hate the apathy of some students.
I don't take it personally. I get enough compliments from students. I just hate the lost opportunities the students have to make connections from philosophy to the rest of their lives, and to gain almost indescribable insights.
Philosophy is the most important subject you can study. I'll prove it.
What is a Ph.D. degree anyway? You know, as in Ph.D. in economics, chemistry, psychology, etc.? It is, a doctor of philosophy degree. In economics, or chemistry? Why?
Because the degree signifies not only that you know a lot of stuff. It also signifies that you have been to the boundaries of your field and seen all the things that you do not know the answers to. The same way Socrates, the model philosopher, did when he said he was only wise because he knew that he did not know. The university is built around the Socratic/Platonic model of knowledge and ignorance.
You're not "smart" (wise) if you don't know that you don't know. I hope to convince some students of that this fall, and help them see the "hidden blessings" of it, as Socrates notes in Plato's Apology. Wish me luck.
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
On Supposedly Seeing Signs
Three times in the last two weeks friends have asked me whether I am going to return to stand up comedy. (For the record, I would like to. Just a matter, as always, of finding the time.)
When the second friend asked me, and I told her that she was the second person, she replied somewhat playfully, "See, it could be a sign."
I found myself surprised by my response, which was truthful, but so long as it remained publicly unspoken, more tentative: "I don't believe in signs anymore."
I have been pondering the implications of this, my belief, for some time now. (Note, this too, is a "belief.") A belief born of what I would call a personal backlash against my own pious self deceptions for many years.
Among these pious self deceptions: seeing signs about whom to date, what career to pursue, or even that my mother was not going to die of cancer at 48, as she did. (I saw signs for that on bumper stickers that happened to show up on cars at just the "right time." Her church friends saw other signs and gladly interpreted them for me both before and after her death.)
Does such a skeptical belief, born of dissatisfaction and sometimes even disgust with a particular culture's understanding of how God works in a particular time, and the wasted time it caused me, make me irreligious?
I would like to think not. I would like to think that I am looking for a more pure form of connection with the ultimate reality. And yet, I wonder, can one expect a pure intuition of the ultimate reality while living any kind of normal life? Is it really possible not to look for signs?
Maybe there are more pure "signs" than ambiguous bumper stickers seen at just the right time? For example, the beautiful face of a child. Is it a sign of God's love? Or, my persevering wife?
I have frequently wondered whether my new found semiotic deconstruction has a stopping point. Or, does it obliterate everything that is significant in my life -- everything that would mediate between me and the First Cause.
I have often wondered whether I can make decisions anymore, given this skepticism. Is any direction in life "important?" I have become deeply skeptical of having any "enthusiasms" about anything. This is very unlike what I used to be.
And yet, the strongest enthusiasm that I have is love. I shudder to think that I could part with the enthusiasm for my child. Yet, I shudder a little less to think that buying into the child as sign means I have to buy into the bumper sticker too.
Perhaps all signs that come forward to mediate must themselves be mediated and tested? But where does that stop (thank you, Charles Peirce), and what is to stop the self deception one would impose on any sign? Grace? (Which we often "discover" in signs.)
I don't know.
When the second friend asked me, and I told her that she was the second person, she replied somewhat playfully, "See, it could be a sign."
I found myself surprised by my response, which was truthful, but so long as it remained publicly unspoken, more tentative: "I don't believe in signs anymore."
I have been pondering the implications of this, my belief, for some time now. (Note, this too, is a "belief.") A belief born of what I would call a personal backlash against my own pious self deceptions for many years.
Among these pious self deceptions: seeing signs about whom to date, what career to pursue, or even that my mother was not going to die of cancer at 48, as she did. (I saw signs for that on bumper stickers that happened to show up on cars at just the "right time." Her church friends saw other signs and gladly interpreted them for me both before and after her death.)
Does such a skeptical belief, born of dissatisfaction and sometimes even disgust with a particular culture's understanding of how God works in a particular time, and the wasted time it caused me, make me irreligious?
I would like to think not. I would like to think that I am looking for a more pure form of connection with the ultimate reality. And yet, I wonder, can one expect a pure intuition of the ultimate reality while living any kind of normal life? Is it really possible not to look for signs?
Maybe there are more pure "signs" than ambiguous bumper stickers seen at just the right time? For example, the beautiful face of a child. Is it a sign of God's love? Or, my persevering wife?
I have frequently wondered whether my new found semiotic deconstruction has a stopping point. Or, does it obliterate everything that is significant in my life -- everything that would mediate between me and the First Cause.
I have often wondered whether I can make decisions anymore, given this skepticism. Is any direction in life "important?" I have become deeply skeptical of having any "enthusiasms" about anything. This is very unlike what I used to be.
And yet, the strongest enthusiasm that I have is love. I shudder to think that I could part with the enthusiasm for my child. Yet, I shudder a little less to think that buying into the child as sign means I have to buy into the bumper sticker too.
Perhaps all signs that come forward to mediate must themselves be mediated and tested? But where does that stop (thank you, Charles Peirce), and what is to stop the self deception one would impose on any sign? Grace? (Which we often "discover" in signs.)
I don't know.
Monday, March 31, 2008
Dawkins Tweaked in New Music Video
I had to share this humorous little item from YouTube about Richard Dawkins - a very smart and very condescending man, leading a modern "posse" of pugnacious atheists.
Humor helps put things in perspective.
Humor helps put things in perspective.
Tuesday, December 4, 2007
Mathematicians In Search of Infinity
Someday I will write the book entitled "The Best and Worst Cases for God." The worst case is well known: The Problem of Evil, and is a particular obsession of this blog.
The best case is less known, I think, and is to be found rolling somewhere around in this marvelous documentary from the BBC entitled "Dangerous Knowledge."
The mysterious power of mathematics, which so fascinated Plato and contributed to his Theory of the Forms, is also one of my fascinations.
I don't claim to have the analytical and logical power of a mathematician. One of the great regrets of my life is that I did not pay enough attention in my high school's experimental "Unified Mathematics" course, despite the solicitous concern for my success there by Sister Higgins. (I was too interested in analyzing the various properties of 1653 girls in my new high school.)
But like many philosophers and mathematicians, I am compelled to ask "Why the Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics?" (Kurt Godel is a particular fascination. What are the implications of his famous Theorem?)
I have found my way back to mathematics somehow. I hope that somewhere Sister Higgins is smiling.
The best case is less known, I think, and is to be found rolling somewhere around in this marvelous documentary from the BBC entitled "Dangerous Knowledge."
The mysterious power of mathematics, which so fascinated Plato and contributed to his Theory of the Forms, is also one of my fascinations.
I don't claim to have the analytical and logical power of a mathematician. One of the great regrets of my life is that I did not pay enough attention in my high school's experimental "Unified Mathematics" course, despite the solicitous concern for my success there by Sister Higgins. (I was too interested in analyzing the various properties of 1653 girls in my new high school.)
But like many philosophers and mathematicians, I am compelled to ask "Why the Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics?" (Kurt Godel is a particular fascination. What are the implications of his famous Theorem?)
I have found my way back to mathematics somehow. I hope that somewhere Sister Higgins is smiling.
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