*
Anyone that reads England's two greatest Medieval poets who have names - Chaucer and Langland (the other great poet is of unknown identity, and gets called The Gawain Poet) - will know that one thing which unites them is a loathing for Friars.
*
This initially seems rather bizarre to modern Christians, since St Francis has a very high reputation indeed - as a Christ-like figure (at least among Roman Catholics - some Eastern Orthodox regard him as having been demonically deceived, and at any rate do not name him as a Saint).
St Dominic, founder of the other main branch of Friars, is perhaps less well known and loved, not least for the Dominican's role in the Inquisition (which is itself grossly misunderstood and wildly exaggerated) - nonetheless Thomas Aquinas was a Dominican, and he is certainly revered.
(Although, again, not in Eastern Orthodoxy - since they would regard Scholastic philosophy as one of the roots of modernity; as do I - although aside from this I would regard Aquinas as - whether or not a Saint - a man of great sanctity and humility, and the greatest of all philosophical synthesisers.)
*
But Friars were regarded with much loathing by many people - to such an extent that they (along with Pardoners, Summoners and the like) were a major factor in provoking the extremely damaging anti-religious-order backlash of the Reformation.
Why so loathed?
What I gather is that the main problem was 1. there were too many Friars and 2. their quality was too low, so that the average Friar was a corrupt exploiter.
*
The number of monks was capped by the fact that they had to live in monasteries, and if an Abbot created too many monks, then the monasteries would become crowded and disorderly.
Of course monks became corrupted by luxury, and new waves of ascetic monks were continually being created as the preceding orders were seduced by comfort - nonetheless monasticism did not really get 'out of hand'.
But Friars were mendicant, they depended on the general population for their support; so you could have more and more Friars, who relied upon the villagers to feed and house them.
*
But the Friars were great intellectuals also - Aquinas, Duns Scotus, William of Occam and Roger Bacon being some of the most famous.
Friars came to dominate teaching at the great universities like Paris and Oxford.
This was a deadly combination: un-restricted numbers of eloquent intellectuals, who could out-argue almost anybody on theological grounds, and who could and did wander around the country, officially dedicated to Holy Poverty; yet in reality free agents - out of reach of ecclesiastical discipline, using their rhetorical and logical skills (and supposed religious authority) to win board and lodging and whatever else comforts, luxuries and (ahem) excitements they could plausibly justify.
*
Since Friars constituted so many of the intellectuals of their day, the ignorant masses could not out-argue them and were thoroughly exploited by them - much as the present day masses are exploited and propagandised by the unrestricted numbers of intellectuals: teachers, advertisers, government officials, public relations experts, lawyers, charity and NGO organisers, scientist-entrepreneurs, media pundits and journalists...
Modern intellectuals are therefore much like Medieval Friars - posing as mendicants devoted to truth, beauty and virtue - but actually corrupted by selfishness and focused on using their rhetorical skills to win resources (funding, grants), status, comforts, excitement and luxuries.
This will, presumably, continue until some equivalent of the Reformation sweeps-away the intellectual classes, the good along with the bad - just as the high-minded and ascetic Cistercians and Carthusians were swept-away along with the corrupt and parasitic Friars and Summoners and Pardoners...
*
Thursday, 15 March 2012
Saving the environment by destroying the environment
*
The the lying, evil vacuosity of the concept of eco/ green or sustainable architecture can be seen by internet image searches on those phrases.
Just look at the results! There are several examples at my work. Walking past them is a visceral assault on human sensibility; like a punch to the solar plexus.
How about this 'award winning' example of grandiose pseudo-sustainability?
Front elevation:
What a scam!
Soul-destroyingly hideous, expensive to build, energetically wasteful and inefficient, almost unbearable to work in...
This sort of building is - in a small but significant way, in terms of the process of building it and its lasting effect on the environment - actively harmful, a perceptible force for evil in the world.
Especially when people are made to violate their natural instincts by pronouncing it beautiful and wholesome.
*
The the lying, evil vacuosity of the concept of eco/ green or sustainable architecture can be seen by internet image searches on those phrases.
Just look at the results! There are several examples at my work. Walking past them is a visceral assault on human sensibility; like a punch to the solar plexus.
How about this 'award winning' example of grandiose pseudo-sustainability?
Front elevation:
And rear view:
What a scam!
Soul-destroyingly hideous, expensive to build, energetically wasteful and inefficient, almost unbearable to work in...
This sort of building is - in a small but significant way, in terms of the process of building it and its lasting effect on the environment - actively harmful, a perceptible force for evil in the world.
Especially when people are made to violate their natural instincts by pronouncing it beautiful and wholesome.
*
Wednesday, 14 March 2012
Is natural selection open-ended, or constrained by forms?
*
One key question about Natural Selection is the potential scope of change it may cause.
It is relatively uncontroversial that selection processes can change organism within their basic form - so that different breeds and sub-species of dogs, cats or sheep - with different appearances and functional characteristics - can be bred by selection.
And such selection could be human or natural, as when sheep which bred on Northern Hills for many generations will be hardier than those bred in Southern Valleys.
What is uncertain is whether Natural Selection can create new forms.
*
I know that it is assumed that Natural Selection can lead to new forms, but this is an assumption; especially so because there is no answer in modern biology as to where forms come from in the first place.
*
Once there are forms, then selection can potentially change them by selection, absorption and combination of forms (for example) - but evolutionary theory typically does not recognise forms as qualitatively distinct - yet it is the reality of form which is assumed whenever we assert that evolution by natural selection has occurred.
Such forms might be a species, or a functional organ such as the eye, or something which is regarded as homologous across evolutionary history - such as the human anterior pituitary gland having evolved (by many steps) from a chemo-sensitive 'nose' in primitive chordates.
Natural selection has to assume the reality of such forms before it can theorise about them evolving - therefore it lacks the basis for explaining how forms arise and in what order and how to identify forms.
*
On this basis, it seems that it may be coherent to use natural selection only as an explanation of modification within the scope of a form which has already been assumed - and to look elsewhere for explanations of the creation of qualitatively new forms.
So, the scope of natural selection is therefore restricted to suggested explanations for modification of existing forms.
*
Of course, this leaves open arguments about when a form is indeed novel: for example is the bird a qualitatively new form compared with the reptile or merely a quantitative modification?
Is the chimpanzee a new form compared with the amphibian or merely a quantitative modification?
Is the human a new form compared with the amoeba or merely a quantitative modification?
Is there just one species modified tens of millions of times (hence tens of millions of forms), or tens of millions of qualitatively distinct species, each with a different form?
*
Forms are therefore assumed, not explained, by Natural Selection; and selection ought no to be used to explain novel forms.
?
*
One key question about Natural Selection is the potential scope of change it may cause.
It is relatively uncontroversial that selection processes can change organism within their basic form - so that different breeds and sub-species of dogs, cats or sheep - with different appearances and functional characteristics - can be bred by selection.
And such selection could be human or natural, as when sheep which bred on Northern Hills for many generations will be hardier than those bred in Southern Valleys.
What is uncertain is whether Natural Selection can create new forms.
*
I know that it is assumed that Natural Selection can lead to new forms, but this is an assumption; especially so because there is no answer in modern biology as to where forms come from in the first place.
*
Once there are forms, then selection can potentially change them by selection, absorption and combination of forms (for example) - but evolutionary theory typically does not recognise forms as qualitatively distinct - yet it is the reality of form which is assumed whenever we assert that evolution by natural selection has occurred.
Such forms might be a species, or a functional organ such as the eye, or something which is regarded as homologous across evolutionary history - such as the human anterior pituitary gland having evolved (by many steps) from a chemo-sensitive 'nose' in primitive chordates.
Natural selection has to assume the reality of such forms before it can theorise about them evolving - therefore it lacks the basis for explaining how forms arise and in what order and how to identify forms.
*
On this basis, it seems that it may be coherent to use natural selection only as an explanation of modification within the scope of a form which has already been assumed - and to look elsewhere for explanations of the creation of qualitatively new forms.
So, the scope of natural selection is therefore restricted to suggested explanations for modification of existing forms.
*
Of course, this leaves open arguments about when a form is indeed novel: for example is the bird a qualitatively new form compared with the reptile or merely a quantitative modification?
Is the chimpanzee a new form compared with the amphibian or merely a quantitative modification?
Is the human a new form compared with the amoeba or merely a quantitative modification?
Is there just one species modified tens of millions of times (hence tens of millions of forms), or tens of millions of qualitatively distinct species, each with a different form?
*
Forms are therefore assumed, not explained, by Natural Selection; and selection ought no to be used to explain novel forms.
?
*
Who are the Leftists in Lord of the Rings?
*
Lord of the Rings is a profoundly reactionary work, which is one reason I love it so much, but there are Leftist, or proto-Leftist, characters and attitudes.
The most obvious (pointed out by Tom Shippey) is Saruman, who talks much like a modern bureaucrat/ public relations specialist.
But Denethor is perhaps another - he has abandoned the religion of his fathers and become a utilitarian who, when the prospects seem bleak, chooses assisted suicide and euthanasia of Faramir as a means of avoiding further suffering.
(Although, admittedly, burning yourself and your son to death is not what a modern Leftist would call an 'easy way out'.)
Any other suggestions (with explanations)?
*
Lord of the Rings is a profoundly reactionary work, which is one reason I love it so much, but there are Leftist, or proto-Leftist, characters and attitudes.
The most obvious (pointed out by Tom Shippey) is Saruman, who talks much like a modern bureaucrat/ public relations specialist.
But Denethor is perhaps another - he has abandoned the religion of his fathers and become a utilitarian who, when the prospects seem bleak, chooses assisted suicide and euthanasia of Faramir as a means of avoiding further suffering.
(Although, admittedly, burning yourself and your son to death is not what a modern Leftist would call an 'easy way out'.)
Any other suggestions (with explanations)?
*
Monday, 12 March 2012
Best ever description of political correctness in a nutshell?
*
From John C Wright
http://www.scifiwright.com/2012/03/thought-police-and-the-poets/
Excerpted and edited for emphasis:
*
Political Correctness is cultural Marxism, that is, the Marxist analysis of all human history into a single factor: the Darwinian war between oppressor-class and oppressed-class.
Everything is a power struggle; all human relations are power relations.
In the case of Political Correctness, it is culture rather than economics which is said to be determined by power struggles.
*
The idea that all cultural values and expressions, from literature to institutions to language to sacraments, are determined by power struggles means that anything, anything at all, can be accused of being a type of oppression.
A racial slur becomes not merely rudeness, but an act tantamount to thousands of years of violence against the oppressed.
A cartoon showing a teenaged superheroine using her mutant powers to do housework becomes tantamount to forbidding the women from entering the workforce, backed with social and legal sanctions.
Or, to use an example from the current headlines, Catholic charities and hospitals and radio stations who demur on religious grounds from paying for the contraceptives, abortion-inducing drugs, or medical sterilization of their employees becomes tantamount to an attempt impose by force the laws of the Dark Ages upon women, when they were bought and sold like chattel.
The accusation is unanswerable...
*
Political Correctness is not merely false, it is moonbat-barkingly, outrageously, openly, in-your-face false...
But it is deliberately, knowingly false.
That is the significant fact to grasp.
*
Because it is false, it naturally lends itself to totalitarianism, that is, to the policing of every aspect of thought and life, and this for two reasons:
first, normal people will not utter endless falsehood about everything and anything unless they are forced or pressured;
second, normal people, once they yield to the force or the pressure and utter lies they themselves know to be false, naturally tend to lack the will to resist further impositions, and lack the strength to repent of the practice.
*
A third factor which also plays a role is that once everyone in your environment is a liar, and repeats whatever lies the Big Brother demands, the bonds of faith between individuals are severed, and a man has no family, no Church, no brotherhood, no community to whom he can turn for support. He is alone and naked before the stark power of Big Brother.
*
Because it is false, it can be changed at will.
The pious slogans repeated from yesterday become thoughtcrimes tomorrow. Yesterday, in the name of fighting sexism, the pious slogans denounced the hideous abuses of women under Sharia Law, because it was fashionable, but tomorrow, when the fashion changes, that same slogan is Islamophobia ergo thoughtcrime.
Because a falsehood can be changed at will, anyone can be denounced at any time no matter how pure his PC credentials.
*
Why should anyone volunteer for this bizarre system of make believe? There are several reasons:
First, the method of analysis sounds smart, and uses big words but does not require any brains to use, so a person adopting PC can pass himself off as a smart person while not having to do any thinking.
Second, and related, the answers are simple. The method of analysis always yields the desired result. The oppressor groups are simply devils and the oppressed groups are simply angels.
Third, the answers are actionable. The method of analysis cannot come to the conclusion that Man is Fallen, that his nature is utterly depraved, or that there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch. There are no necessarily evils or even opportunity costs. Every problem is soluble.
Fourth, the solution of problems is effortless. All we need do is change our language, and it will change our thinking; our thinking creates reality, and so politically correct language will create goodthink which will make all problems, economic and social and personal, vanish by magic.
Fifth, the motive is always benevolent. The motive for the deeply committed PCnik is to end all human suffering and bring about utopia. No one aside from a villain of the blackest heart or dimmest brain would oppose paradise, unless he were afraid. Consequently, the PCnik regard all their opponents as brainless dupes, gutless cowards, conscienceless henchmen, or as heartless villains...
*
Sixth, the system is infinitely flexible. Because anything can be deconstructed at will to mean anything, asking someone to call ‘marriage’ a ‘gay marriage ban’ and to call support for marriage sexism, and heteronormalism, and homophobia, becomes tantamount to asking someone not to call a Black man by a racial slur.
Better still, even a complimentary stereotype, such as saying Chinamen are hard-working or Jews are good at book-learning, becomes tantamount to a slur.
Even better again, perfectly normal words that have never been meant nor taken as offensive, such as ‘Oriental’, or ‘Native’, or ‘Indian’ become tantamount to slurs. Even when the spokesmen for the group involved say that word in question does not offend them, once the PC accusation is made, there is no defense and no trial.
*
Finally, the system always allows the PC-nik to conclude that he is the moral and not just the mental superior to all other men, and grants him the palm of the martyr without the mess of martyrdom, the halo of sanctity without the effort of being saintly, or even decent.
The Christians may have abolished slavery world-wide, but you refuse to use the word ‘Eskimo’ and refuse to condemn sadomasochism as a sexual perversion, and so this enables you to look down your nose at the moral teachings of Socrates, Buddha, Confucius, and Christ.
http://www.scifiwright.com/2012/03/thought-police-and-the-poets/
***
From John C Wright
http://www.scifiwright.com/2012/03/thought-police-and-the-poets/
Excerpted and edited for emphasis:
*
Political Correctness is cultural Marxism, that is, the Marxist analysis of all human history into a single factor: the Darwinian war between oppressor-class and oppressed-class.
Everything is a power struggle; all human relations are power relations.
In the case of Political Correctness, it is culture rather than economics which is said to be determined by power struggles.
*
The idea that all cultural values and expressions, from literature to institutions to language to sacraments, are determined by power struggles means that anything, anything at all, can be accused of being a type of oppression.
A racial slur becomes not merely rudeness, but an act tantamount to thousands of years of violence against the oppressed.
A cartoon showing a teenaged superheroine using her mutant powers to do housework becomes tantamount to forbidding the women from entering the workforce, backed with social and legal sanctions.
Or, to use an example from the current headlines, Catholic charities and hospitals and radio stations who demur on religious grounds from paying for the contraceptives, abortion-inducing drugs, or medical sterilization of their employees becomes tantamount to an attempt impose by force the laws of the Dark Ages upon women, when they were bought and sold like chattel.
The accusation is unanswerable...
*
Political Correctness is not merely false, it is moonbat-barkingly, outrageously, openly, in-your-face false...
But it is deliberately, knowingly false.
That is the significant fact to grasp.
*
Because it is false, it naturally lends itself to totalitarianism, that is, to the policing of every aspect of thought and life, and this for two reasons:
first, normal people will not utter endless falsehood about everything and anything unless they are forced or pressured;
second, normal people, once they yield to the force or the pressure and utter lies they themselves know to be false, naturally tend to lack the will to resist further impositions, and lack the strength to repent of the practice.
*
A third factor which also plays a role is that once everyone in your environment is a liar, and repeats whatever lies the Big Brother demands, the bonds of faith between individuals are severed, and a man has no family, no Church, no brotherhood, no community to whom he can turn for support. He is alone and naked before the stark power of Big Brother.
*
Because it is false, it can be changed at will.
The pious slogans repeated from yesterday become thoughtcrimes tomorrow. Yesterday, in the name of fighting sexism, the pious slogans denounced the hideous abuses of women under Sharia Law, because it was fashionable, but tomorrow, when the fashion changes, that same slogan is Islamophobia ergo thoughtcrime.
Because a falsehood can be changed at will, anyone can be denounced at any time no matter how pure his PC credentials.
*
Why should anyone volunteer for this bizarre system of make believe? There are several reasons:
First, the method of analysis sounds smart, and uses big words but does not require any brains to use, so a person adopting PC can pass himself off as a smart person while not having to do any thinking.
Second, and related, the answers are simple. The method of analysis always yields the desired result. The oppressor groups are simply devils and the oppressed groups are simply angels.
Third, the answers are actionable. The method of analysis cannot come to the conclusion that Man is Fallen, that his nature is utterly depraved, or that there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch. There are no necessarily evils or even opportunity costs. Every problem is soluble.
Fourth, the solution of problems is effortless. All we need do is change our language, and it will change our thinking; our thinking creates reality, and so politically correct language will create goodthink which will make all problems, economic and social and personal, vanish by magic.
Fifth, the motive is always benevolent. The motive for the deeply committed PCnik is to end all human suffering and bring about utopia. No one aside from a villain of the blackest heart or dimmest brain would oppose paradise, unless he were afraid. Consequently, the PCnik regard all their opponents as brainless dupes, gutless cowards, conscienceless henchmen, or as heartless villains...
*
Sixth, the system is infinitely flexible. Because anything can be deconstructed at will to mean anything, asking someone to call ‘marriage’ a ‘gay marriage ban’ and to call support for marriage sexism, and heteronormalism, and homophobia, becomes tantamount to asking someone not to call a Black man by a racial slur.
Better still, even a complimentary stereotype, such as saying Chinamen are hard-working or Jews are good at book-learning, becomes tantamount to a slur.
Even better again, perfectly normal words that have never been meant nor taken as offensive, such as ‘Oriental’, or ‘Native’, or ‘Indian’ become tantamount to slurs. Even when the spokesmen for the group involved say that word in question does not offend them, once the PC accusation is made, there is no defense and no trial.
*
Finally, the system always allows the PC-nik to conclude that he is the moral and not just the mental superior to all other men, and grants him the palm of the martyr without the mess of martyrdom, the halo of sanctity without the effort of being saintly, or even decent.
The Christians may have abolished slavery world-wide, but you refuse to use the word ‘Eskimo’ and refuse to condemn sadomasochism as a sexual perversion, and so this enables you to look down your nose at the moral teachings of Socrates, Buddha, Confucius, and Christ.
http://www.scifiwright.com/2012/03/thought-police-and-the-poets/
***
A new model of causality necessary: fields versus causal chains
*
Perhaps the single most important thing I am getting from my readings of Rupert Sheldrake and ideas of morphogenetic fields, morphic resonance etc - is an awareness of how limited was my view of causation.
I had a very linear view of causation resembling a series of idealized billiard balls colliding: A hits B making it move and hit C; or A causes B causes C.
I term these causal chains.
*
This was always at the back of my mind when doing science - that for science to be potentially testable and potentially useful it ought to have clear causal chains.
As a theorist it was my function to suggest causal chains which were aimed at being reasonably correct descriptions of highly selected bits of reality; but much simpler than reality therefore being comprehensible and predictive.
*
I don't think there is anything wrong with trying to do this, except that - in the usual way for humans - I come to believe that what I did was the only thing that could properly be done; so that I would evaluate all knowledge on whether or not I could reduce it to clear, simple causal chains; and to assume that that which could not be so reduced was not comprehended and so was useless.
*
(This seems to me the great hazard of expertise of any sort - but especially intellectual expertise. That having trained oneself into specialist cognitive expertise, that becomes the dominant and most authoritative mode of thought, and the exclusions and assumptions which underpin that mode of thought fail to be recognised as exclusions and assumptions; such that they are taken to be facts and discoveries. So the scientist who excludes divine causes as a matter of assumption, and learns a mode of thought which proceeds without reference to divine causes, gradually comes to believe that science has discovered that God does not exist.)
*
But I have found that there is another way of thinking, in terms of fields, which is qualitatively different from causal chain thinking, yet is similarly clear and simple and predictive.
It is not that field thinking is more true, necessarily, nor better (both causal chains and fields are extremely simplified models of reality, both are gross reductions of reality) - but that field thinking is at least as true, and has different applicabilities - so that problems not amenable to causal chain thinking may yield to field thinking.
*
However, field thinking is qualitatively different from causal chain thinking, and they cannot be combined; one can merely decide which mode to use in a specific situation; or use them hierarchically (typically with fields regarded as primary and general, and causal chains as secondary, specific, and local).
*
This is the deepest reason which Sheldrake's ideas are not as influential as one might expect them to be.
Even when a scientist is convinced of the validity of this mode of thinking, he finds that it is incommensurable with his existing knowledge - which is in the form of causal chain thinking.
The scientist can place his own causal chain thinking inside a larger, inclusive framework of field thinking, perhaps - but that will not affect the nature of his own specific knowledge and work.
Field thinking is thus experienced as abstract and optional with respect to his day-to-day practise.
*
The alternative is, for someone with experience and expertise, too radical to contemplate - to discard everything he 'knows' and re-explain it in terms of fields.
To give-up and start again!
Yet this seems neither necessary nor sensible; since causal chain thinking has been very useful in many situations.
*
The answer is that both field thinking and causal chain thinking are metaphysical assumptions, metaphysical descriptions - they are not discoveries, they come before science, they frame science.
And the proper realm for discussing their relationship is explicitly metaphysical - and in detachment from science, which confuses the issue.
*
What then is the metaphysical reflection for? (...Since metaphysics is clearly optional - optional not least because it is cognitively impossible for most people in the world.)
I would say metaphysics is for its value in everyday experience and common sense.
From this perspective metaphysics will vary between individuals, and probably both causal chain thinking and field thinking are much too abstract for most people - which does not mean they are worthless or wrong, but they are incomplete and distorting, necessarily and in an ultimate sense.
*
What then is the most fundamental 'metaphysics'?
Maybe it is the story...
*
Perhaps the single most important thing I am getting from my readings of Rupert Sheldrake and ideas of morphogenetic fields, morphic resonance etc - is an awareness of how limited was my view of causation.
I had a very linear view of causation resembling a series of idealized billiard balls colliding: A hits B making it move and hit C; or A causes B causes C.
I term these causal chains.
*
This was always at the back of my mind when doing science - that for science to be potentially testable and potentially useful it ought to have clear causal chains.
As a theorist it was my function to suggest causal chains which were aimed at being reasonably correct descriptions of highly selected bits of reality; but much simpler than reality therefore being comprehensible and predictive.
*
I don't think there is anything wrong with trying to do this, except that - in the usual way for humans - I come to believe that what I did was the only thing that could properly be done; so that I would evaluate all knowledge on whether or not I could reduce it to clear, simple causal chains; and to assume that that which could not be so reduced was not comprehended and so was useless.
*
(This seems to me the great hazard of expertise of any sort - but especially intellectual expertise. That having trained oneself into specialist cognitive expertise, that becomes the dominant and most authoritative mode of thought, and the exclusions and assumptions which underpin that mode of thought fail to be recognised as exclusions and assumptions; such that they are taken to be facts and discoveries. So the scientist who excludes divine causes as a matter of assumption, and learns a mode of thought which proceeds without reference to divine causes, gradually comes to believe that science has discovered that God does not exist.)
*
But I have found that there is another way of thinking, in terms of fields, which is qualitatively different from causal chain thinking, yet is similarly clear and simple and predictive.
It is not that field thinking is more true, necessarily, nor better (both causal chains and fields are extremely simplified models of reality, both are gross reductions of reality) - but that field thinking is at least as true, and has different applicabilities - so that problems not amenable to causal chain thinking may yield to field thinking.
*
However, field thinking is qualitatively different from causal chain thinking, and they cannot be combined; one can merely decide which mode to use in a specific situation; or use them hierarchically (typically with fields regarded as primary and general, and causal chains as secondary, specific, and local).
*
This is the deepest reason which Sheldrake's ideas are not as influential as one might expect them to be.
Even when a scientist is convinced of the validity of this mode of thinking, he finds that it is incommensurable with his existing knowledge - which is in the form of causal chain thinking.
The scientist can place his own causal chain thinking inside a larger, inclusive framework of field thinking, perhaps - but that will not affect the nature of his own specific knowledge and work.
Field thinking is thus experienced as abstract and optional with respect to his day-to-day practise.
*
The alternative is, for someone with experience and expertise, too radical to contemplate - to discard everything he 'knows' and re-explain it in terms of fields.
To give-up and start again!
Yet this seems neither necessary nor sensible; since causal chain thinking has been very useful in many situations.
*
The answer is that both field thinking and causal chain thinking are metaphysical assumptions, metaphysical descriptions - they are not discoveries, they come before science, they frame science.
And the proper realm for discussing their relationship is explicitly metaphysical - and in detachment from science, which confuses the issue.
*
What then is the metaphysical reflection for? (...Since metaphysics is clearly optional - optional not least because it is cognitively impossible for most people in the world.)
I would say metaphysics is for its value in everyday experience and common sense.
From this perspective metaphysics will vary between individuals, and probably both causal chain thinking and field thinking are much too abstract for most people - which does not mean they are worthless or wrong, but they are incomplete and distorting, necessarily and in an ultimate sense.
*
What then is the most fundamental 'metaphysics'?
Maybe it is the story...
*
Sunday, 11 March 2012
C.S Lewis on Charles Williams on salvation of the good pagan via eternity
*
http://notionclubpapers.blogspot.com/2012/03/cs-lewis-on-substituted-love-and.html
*
http://notionclubpapers.blogspot.com/2012/03/cs-lewis-on-substituted-love-and.html
*
Saturday, 10 March 2012
Simplicity leading to complexity? Does it really happen?
*
Can the more complex really arise spontaneously from the simpler?
Does it ever?
That is what a selection mechanism is supposed to do, to increase complexity incrementally and spontaneously because the more complex is better at reproducing itself (because complexity is potentially more efficient at using resources).
But the evidence to support this vision of complexity arising spontaneously seems to be embedded in either theoretical or various scientific disciplines - and is thus only as valid as those academic disciplines, which may mean there is zero intrinsic validity in these claims when disciplines are incompetent, corrupt or ineffective.
Are there any common sense examples known from common experience.
*
Can the more complex really arise spontaneously from the simpler?
Does it ever?
That is what a selection mechanism is supposed to do, to increase complexity incrementally and spontaneously because the more complex is better at reproducing itself (because complexity is potentially more efficient at using resources).
But the evidence to support this vision of complexity arising spontaneously seems to be embedded in either theoretical or various scientific disciplines - and is thus only as valid as those academic disciplines, which may mean there is zero intrinsic validity in these claims when disciplines are incompetent, corrupt or ineffective.
Are there any common sense examples known from common experience.
*
Friday, 9 March 2012
What should we call 'Liberal Christians'? Unbelieving.
*
Excerpted from Rev. Peter Mullen's column in the Church of England Newspaper:
*
Rome forgot what had made it and came to deny what it was for. Therefore, it must needs perish. This is our condition in Britain today.
I don’t blame the aggressive secularists who are trying to undermine traditional society and the values on which our society was built. They have their agenda, their point of view. And we shouldn’t complain about persecution: Our Lord told us to rejoice and be glad in it.
What is truly foul, though, is the spectacle of those who were ordained and commissioned to promote and uphold Christian civilization as most prominent among its destroyers. Principal among them are the so-called “liberal” clergy and theologians.
We should no longer refer to them as “liberal.” They are actually unbelieving.
*
And their unbelief is more treacherous than that of the atheist Richard Dawkins who to his credit has the honesty to come right out with it and tell us he doesn’t believe. But these liberal Christians are more sinister by far. For they cling to traditional religious language while abandoning or traducing its content and meaning.
For example, they will cheerfully read the story of the feeding of the five thousand but they will not respect it as a miracle of compassion by Our Lord Jesus Christ. No, for modern liberals, it is just about “sharing.” The feeding of the multitude is reduced to nothing more than a socialist picnic. Thus secular enthusiasms are shrouded in the half-light of a sickening false piety.
All those sayings in the gospels about our Lord’s love for the poor are, in the modern agenda, translated into the divisive politics of social welfarism...
*
They excuse and apologise for their insane obsession with progress and change by referring to every brazen innovation as a sign of the movement of the Holy Spirit. That particular delusion is so serious that it comes close to the unforgiveable sin: blasphemy against the Holy Spirit...
*
And in this iconoclastic climate, if you actually believe the truth of Christian doctrine, you are dismissed as a “fundamentalist.”
So many who should be in the front line of Christianity’s defence are in fact apostates aiding its enemies.
Too many of the shepherds are hirelings. They do not defend the sheep from the ravenous wolves. Instead they are feeding us to the wolves.
*
Excerpted from Rev. Peter Mullen's column in the Church of England Newspaper:
*
Rome forgot what had made it and came to deny what it was for. Therefore, it must needs perish. This is our condition in Britain today.
I don’t blame the aggressive secularists who are trying to undermine traditional society and the values on which our society was built. They have their agenda, their point of view. And we shouldn’t complain about persecution: Our Lord told us to rejoice and be glad in it.
What is truly foul, though, is the spectacle of those who were ordained and commissioned to promote and uphold Christian civilization as most prominent among its destroyers. Principal among them are the so-called “liberal” clergy and theologians.
We should no longer refer to them as “liberal.” They are actually unbelieving.
*
And their unbelief is more treacherous than that of the atheist Richard Dawkins who to his credit has the honesty to come right out with it and tell us he doesn’t believe. But these liberal Christians are more sinister by far. For they cling to traditional religious language while abandoning or traducing its content and meaning.
For example, they will cheerfully read the story of the feeding of the five thousand but they will not respect it as a miracle of compassion by Our Lord Jesus Christ. No, for modern liberals, it is just about “sharing.” The feeding of the multitude is reduced to nothing more than a socialist picnic. Thus secular enthusiasms are shrouded in the half-light of a sickening false piety.
All those sayings in the gospels about our Lord’s love for the poor are, in the modern agenda, translated into the divisive politics of social welfarism...
*
They excuse and apologise for their insane obsession with progress and change by referring to every brazen innovation as a sign of the movement of the Holy Spirit. That particular delusion is so serious that it comes close to the unforgiveable sin: blasphemy against the Holy Spirit...
*
And in this iconoclastic climate, if you actually believe the truth of Christian doctrine, you are dismissed as a “fundamentalist.”
So many who should be in the front line of Christianity’s defence are in fact apostates aiding its enemies.
Too many of the shepherds are hirelings. They do not defend the sheep from the ravenous wolves. Instead they are feeding us to the wolves.
*
Can the media defeat the media?
*
Can the reactionary Christian Right use the modern mass media to defeat the dominant secular Leftist ideology?
Errr - no, we can't.
Can the reactionary Christian Right use the democratic political system to defeat the dominant secular Leftist ideology?
Errr - no we can't.
Can the reactionary Christian Right use overwhelming philosophical arguments or weight of scientific evidence to defeat the dominant secular Leftist ideology?
Errr - no, we can't.
Can the reactionary Christian Right use knock-down economic arguments, or a mass mobilisation of sensible people to defeat the dominant secular Leftist ideology?
Errr - no we can't.
And so on. We are too weak, they are too strong.
*
Can the reactionary Christian Right actually ever defeat the dominant secular Leftist ideology?
Oh yes, no problem at all, inevitably, it will happen.
Normal service will be resumed.
But the process by which the Left is destroyed and removed will not have anything to do with our worldly plans and schemes and tactics.
Our job is that we must pray (and I mean must pray) that the process comes into effect as soon as possible and the transition is no more painful than necessary.
*
Can the reactionary Christian Right use the modern mass media to defeat the dominant secular Leftist ideology?
Errr - no, we can't.
Can the reactionary Christian Right use the democratic political system to defeat the dominant secular Leftist ideology?
Errr - no we can't.
Can the reactionary Christian Right use overwhelming philosophical arguments or weight of scientific evidence to defeat the dominant secular Leftist ideology?
Errr - no, we can't.
Can the reactionary Christian Right use knock-down economic arguments, or a mass mobilisation of sensible people to defeat the dominant secular Leftist ideology?
Errr - no we can't.
And so on. We are too weak, they are too strong.
*
Can the reactionary Christian Right actually ever defeat the dominant secular Leftist ideology?
Oh yes, no problem at all, inevitably, it will happen.
Normal service will be resumed.
But the process by which the Left is destroyed and removed will not have anything to do with our worldly plans and schemes and tactics.
Our job is that we must pray (and I mean must pray) that the process comes into effect as soon as possible and the transition is no more painful than necessary.
*
Thursday, 8 March 2012
Schizophrenia in Harvard in 1980
*
Summer of 1980, a famous psychiatric hospital in the Harvard group, I was a medical student on a four week elective from Newcastle.
As usual, I asked the doctor in charge of the ward if I could interview a patient to discuss their condition - diagnosis, schizophrenia.
Answer: no you can't speak with him.
Pause.
You can't speak with him becuase he is paranoid, and you are a man; and paranoia is a fear of homosexual rape, so no male staff are allowed to speak with him.
Me - staring ahead, mouth open, groping for something to say. I could think of nothing to say.
Conversation ended.
This was 1980, Harvard Medical School - paranoia due to fear of homosexual rape?!
(Facepalm).
Summer of 1980, a famous psychiatric hospital in the Harvard group, I was a medical student on a four week elective from Newcastle.
As usual, I asked the doctor in charge of the ward if I could interview a patient to discuss their condition - diagnosis, schizophrenia.
Answer: no you can't speak with him.
Pause.
You can't speak with him becuase he is paranoid, and you are a man; and paranoia is a fear of homosexual rape, so no male staff are allowed to speak with him.
Me - staring ahead, mouth open, groping for something to say. I could think of nothing to say.
Conversation ended.
This was 1980, Harvard Medical School - paranoia due to fear of homosexual rape?!
(Facepalm).
What is modern freedom?
*
It is the freedom to doubt the reality of what has been regarded as Good, then to doubt the possibility of Good, then to subvert/ invert/ destroy/ (I mean reform) the Good in the name of the Better.
(There is nothing actually Good - not God, nor marriage, nor the family - but somehow there always is something Better than them.)
*
Unconstrained freedom to attack the Good is now regarded as the most important of all Human Rights.
Yet since the Good is Reality - this means that the ultimate modern freedom, defended with the full force of the modern state and mass media, is the Right to deny Reality.
A short term for the denial of reality is Psychoticism.
*
Thus modern freedom is a freedom to be psychotic; and an unconditional right to have this delusional state defended by all necessary means.
*
It is the freedom to doubt the reality of what has been regarded as Good, then to doubt the possibility of Good, then to subvert/ invert/ destroy/ (I mean reform) the Good in the name of the Better.
(There is nothing actually Good - not God, nor marriage, nor the family - but somehow there always is something Better than them.)
*
Unconstrained freedom to attack the Good is now regarded as the most important of all Human Rights.
Yet since the Good is Reality - this means that the ultimate modern freedom, defended with the full force of the modern state and mass media, is the Right to deny Reality.
A short term for the denial of reality is Psychoticism.
*
Thus modern freedom is a freedom to be psychotic; and an unconditional right to have this delusional state defended by all necessary means.
*
Fallen man - do you want to understand, or be convinced?
*
With regard to difficult doctrines like the Fall of Man - when you ask a question on the topic, do you want to understand it? Or is your attitude that you are challenging others to convince you of the fact?
*
With regard to difficult doctrines like the Fall of Man - when you ask a question on the topic, do you want to understand it? Or is your attitude that you are challenging others to convince you of the fact?
*
Wednesday, 7 March 2012
The reality of supernatural purposive evil in the world - why such belief is necessary
*
It is necessary for Christians to believe in the reality of supernatural purposive evil (as conceptualised, typically, in terms of Satan, demons, fallen angels etc.)
This is non-optional - however uncomfortable and embarrassing to the modern sensibility; because it is scriptural and the two millennium teaching of Holy Fathers and Saints.
It is also necessary in order to avoid serious misunderstanding.
*
People seem to talk as if supernatural purposive evil is either an unnecessary hypotheses or an hypothesis of last resort.
Both are errors.
*
The proper question is whether something is true, not whether an hypotheses is un-necessary - indeed, strictly, any hypotheses can be discarded, if you are prepared to accept the consequences.
Nor should it be an hypothesis of last resort - but it should be an hypothesis which is applied where and whenever it is applicable - whenever the proper explanation is that of supernatural purposive evil at work.
*
If, as most modern people have, we discard supernatural positive evil as a fact operative in the world - what are we left with?
Only two types of explanation for evil:
1. Selfish short-termism.
3. Well-intentioned error.
In other words we get the Leftist perception of evil as being due to stupid, ignorant, selfish, frightened, greedy people (ie. Right Wingers - such as Hitler) who therefore require more Leftist 'education'/ propaganda/ discipline; or else evil is excused as an accidental and unintentional result of well-meaning and nobly-motivated Leftists (such as Stalin and Mao).
*
Without the concept of supernatural purposive evil, evil is thus explained-away.
Since all are selfish and short-termist, discussion is merely a matter of unmasking this in others in order to distract from it in oneself.
Well-intentioned error is treated as a technocratic problem - the problem of evil is reduced to a five year plan to ensure than good intentions are effectively implemented.
*
In face of this pitifully flat, simplistic and impoverished vision of reality, we must acknowledge the active pursuit of evil for its own reasons, as the motivated destruction of Good.
Those who serve this evil intent (in varying degrees) may do so for selfish reasons of expediency, or through error, or deception - or may make the choice actively to destroy the Good.
(As have many modern intellectuals: artists who work to destroy Beauty; public relations people who work to destroy Truth; journalists and pressure groups who work to destroy Virtue - to be subversive and inverting of Good is mainstream modern intellectual life.)
The fact that such folk stand against the consensus of the ages and deny the reality or even the possibility of supernatural purposive evil is significant, indeed decisive.
*
Of course, as corrupt and imperfect creatures - we certainly will make errors in applying the hypothesis of supernatural purposive evil to any specific situation - as we make errors in applying science to any specific situation; and in a sense we can never be sure of anything.
Nonetheless, we must do our best; be aware of the possibility of error; and ready to correct it
And of course there are more concrete/ simple and more abstract/ complex ways of describing purposive evil - e.g. as personified devils or fields of influence.
But bear in mind abstraction is not all gain - it has a tendency to make things seem less real; also that abstraction is merely another kind of metaphor, but less obviously so than anthropomorphic metaphors.
*
But the point is that we should acknowledge the reality of supernatural purposive evil and be alert to the necessity of applying the hypothesis in order to understand the world accurately.
Not just 'should acknowledge' - we must.
*
It is necessary for Christians to believe in the reality of supernatural purposive evil (as conceptualised, typically, in terms of Satan, demons, fallen angels etc.)
This is non-optional - however uncomfortable and embarrassing to the modern sensibility; because it is scriptural and the two millennium teaching of Holy Fathers and Saints.
It is also necessary in order to avoid serious misunderstanding.
*
People seem to talk as if supernatural purposive evil is either an unnecessary hypotheses or an hypothesis of last resort.
Both are errors.
*
The proper question is whether something is true, not whether an hypotheses is un-necessary - indeed, strictly, any hypotheses can be discarded, if you are prepared to accept the consequences.
Nor should it be an hypothesis of last resort - but it should be an hypothesis which is applied where and whenever it is applicable - whenever the proper explanation is that of supernatural purposive evil at work.
*
If, as most modern people have, we discard supernatural positive evil as a fact operative in the world - what are we left with?
Only two types of explanation for evil:
1. Selfish short-termism.
3. Well-intentioned error.
In other words we get the Leftist perception of evil as being due to stupid, ignorant, selfish, frightened, greedy people (ie. Right Wingers - such as Hitler) who therefore require more Leftist 'education'/ propaganda/ discipline; or else evil is excused as an accidental and unintentional result of well-meaning and nobly-motivated Leftists (such as Stalin and Mao).
*
Without the concept of supernatural purposive evil, evil is thus explained-away.
Since all are selfish and short-termist, discussion is merely a matter of unmasking this in others in order to distract from it in oneself.
Well-intentioned error is treated as a technocratic problem - the problem of evil is reduced to a five year plan to ensure than good intentions are effectively implemented.
*
In face of this pitifully flat, simplistic and impoverished vision of reality, we must acknowledge the active pursuit of evil for its own reasons, as the motivated destruction of Good.
Those who serve this evil intent (in varying degrees) may do so for selfish reasons of expediency, or through error, or deception - or may make the choice actively to destroy the Good.
(As have many modern intellectuals: artists who work to destroy Beauty; public relations people who work to destroy Truth; journalists and pressure groups who work to destroy Virtue - to be subversive and inverting of Good is mainstream modern intellectual life.)
The fact that such folk stand against the consensus of the ages and deny the reality or even the possibility of supernatural purposive evil is significant, indeed decisive.
*
Of course, as corrupt and imperfect creatures - we certainly will make errors in applying the hypothesis of supernatural purposive evil to any specific situation - as we make errors in applying science to any specific situation; and in a sense we can never be sure of anything.
Nonetheless, we must do our best; be aware of the possibility of error; and ready to correct it
And of course there are more concrete/ simple and more abstract/ complex ways of describing purposive evil - e.g. as personified devils or fields of influence.
But bear in mind abstraction is not all gain - it has a tendency to make things seem less real; also that abstraction is merely another kind of metaphor, but less obviously so than anthropomorphic metaphors.
*
But the point is that we should acknowledge the reality of supernatural purposive evil and be alert to the necessity of applying the hypothesis in order to understand the world accurately.
Not just 'should acknowledge' - we must.
*
Tuesday, 6 March 2012
Anglicans and return to Eastern Orthodoxy - a tragically lost opportunity
*
From a memoir by Bishop Kallistos (Ware):
In Britain in the 1950s it was a highly unusual step for a Western person to seek entry into the Orthodox Church, and most of my English friends did their best to dissuade me...
At the time this puzzled me. In my reading about Orthodoxy I had quickly discovered that it claims to be, not just one among many alternative “denominations,” but the true Church of Christ on earth. Yet it seemed as if the Orthodox themselves were telling me, “Yes, Orthodoxy is indeed the one true Church, but you should on no account join it. It is only for us Easterners, Greeks, Russians and the rest.” Adherence to the saving truth appeared to depend on the accidents of birth and geography...
With hindsight I can appreciate better why Bishop James spoke as he did. Forty or fifty years ago there were many Orthodox, and also many Anglicans, who sincerely hoped that the Anglican communion would be reconciled to Orthodoxy in a corporate way.
Individual conversions from Anglicanism to the Orthodox Church were therefore discouraged; Anglicans, it was felt, would do better to remain where they were, and to work for unity from within their present Church, acting as an “Anglo-Orthodox” leaven.
I fear that these hopes for corporate reunion were always unrealistic. But it has to be remembered that, during the first half of the twentieth century, the moderate “High Church” party within Anglicanism — which bases itself upon an appeal to the Ecumenical Councils and the Fathers — was far stronger than it is today, whereas the extreme “liberal” tendency, with its doctrinal and moral relativism, was much less pronounced, although already plainly in evidence.
At any rate Bishop James was by no means alone in his dream that High Anglicanism might eventually develop into the nucleus of a native-grown Western Orthodoxy...
While at Oxford, under the influence of my close friend from school days, Donald (A. M.) Allchin, I became an active member of the Fellowship of St Alban and St Sergius, whose aim is to promote rapprochement between Orthodoxy and Anglicanism.
The summer conferences of the Fellowship had a decisive effect on me. Here I listened to such Anglicans as Archbishop Michael Ramsey, Father Derwas Chitty, and Professor H. A. Hodges, all of whom regarded Orthodoxy as the integral fullness of the Christian tradition, to which Anglicanism needed to return.
As they saw it, Anglicans could hold the full Orthodox faith while still remaining in the Church of England, and in this manner we could help to bring our fellow-Anglicans nearer to Orthodoxy.
*
http://theorthodoxchurch.info/blog/ocrc/2009/06/strange-yet-familiar-my-journey-to-the-orthodox-church-bishop-kallistos-ware/
*
From a memoir by Bishop Kallistos (Ware):
In Britain in the 1950s it was a highly unusual step for a Western person to seek entry into the Orthodox Church, and most of my English friends did their best to dissuade me...
At the time this puzzled me. In my reading about Orthodoxy I had quickly discovered that it claims to be, not just one among many alternative “denominations,” but the true Church of Christ on earth. Yet it seemed as if the Orthodox themselves were telling me, “Yes, Orthodoxy is indeed the one true Church, but you should on no account join it. It is only for us Easterners, Greeks, Russians and the rest.” Adherence to the saving truth appeared to depend on the accidents of birth and geography...
With hindsight I can appreciate better why Bishop James spoke as he did. Forty or fifty years ago there were many Orthodox, and also many Anglicans, who sincerely hoped that the Anglican communion would be reconciled to Orthodoxy in a corporate way.
Individual conversions from Anglicanism to the Orthodox Church were therefore discouraged; Anglicans, it was felt, would do better to remain where they were, and to work for unity from within their present Church, acting as an “Anglo-Orthodox” leaven.
I fear that these hopes for corporate reunion were always unrealistic. But it has to be remembered that, during the first half of the twentieth century, the moderate “High Church” party within Anglicanism — which bases itself upon an appeal to the Ecumenical Councils and the Fathers — was far stronger than it is today, whereas the extreme “liberal” tendency, with its doctrinal and moral relativism, was much less pronounced, although already plainly in evidence.
At any rate Bishop James was by no means alone in his dream that High Anglicanism might eventually develop into the nucleus of a native-grown Western Orthodoxy...
While at Oxford, under the influence of my close friend from school days, Donald (A. M.) Allchin, I became an active member of the Fellowship of St Alban and St Sergius, whose aim is to promote rapprochement between Orthodoxy and Anglicanism.
The summer conferences of the Fellowship had a decisive effect on me. Here I listened to such Anglicans as Archbishop Michael Ramsey, Father Derwas Chitty, and Professor H. A. Hodges, all of whom regarded Orthodoxy as the integral fullness of the Christian tradition, to which Anglicanism needed to return.
As they saw it, Anglicans could hold the full Orthodox faith while still remaining in the Church of England, and in this manner we could help to bring our fellow-Anglicans nearer to Orthodoxy.
*
http://theorthodoxchurch.info/blog/ocrc/2009/06/strange-yet-familiar-my-journey-to-the-orthodox-church-bishop-kallistos-ware/
*
The perils of mysticism and magic
*
The Eastern Orthodox tradition regards mysticism as easy - all too easy – but as strongly tending towards demonic and not divine influence.
*
(If you doubt the easy-ness and deceptiveness of mystical experience, talk with some of the users of psychedelic drugs: they are often convinced that the chemical has yielded esoteric insights of great value. And they believe that that those who have not had the drug experience cannot recognise the truth and validity of what they know. The cost of this 'enlightenment'? just a few micrograms of LSD. Why bother with prayer, fasting and meditation when 'truth' is so cheap... This condition of near-invincible, un-refutable self-regard is termed spiritual pride or delusion - prelest in Russian - and is the major hazard of spiritual striving for Christians because pride is cutting oneself off from God; and is thus the worst of sins.)
*
As fallen men in a corrupt world, most people will go into a search for spirituality and religious experiences with mixed motivations, or frankly bad motivations – from spiritual pride, sensation-seeking, or seeking knowledge to use for power.
Or, they may seek healing - for themselves (in their alienation), or for others (as in shamanic practices), or for society. This motivation is not so bad, but is yet corrupt - since it aims to use communion with God to achieve worldly ends - and the desire for healing is easily corrupted into the desire for happiness, for thrills.
*
(Like Faust or Paracelsus or Renaissance magicians generally – people who seek to use spiritual knowledge/ magic to manipulate the world, especially other people. Or like Charles Williams - who used magical and tantric techniques to fuel his poetic creativity. Most of us are more or less like this.)
*
The Orthodox belief is that in this world the mystic will quite possibly be given what he seeks - spiritual experiences, knowledge, signs, powers – but arising from encounters with demons (fallen angels) rather than God and therefore tending towards deception, damnation and working against the Good.
So the elaborate structures of monasteries, elders, startsy, Saints and so on is more a method of supervision (rather than apprenticeship) – to try and prevent the ascetic mystic from being corrupted by spiritual experiences (rather than training people to attain such experiences).
*
I think our age desperately needs the mystical dimension of Christianity, yet we lack the elaborate structures of supervision by advanced Holy persons.
The hazards of mysticism are thus greater for us than for past Christians.
And the desire for Christian mystical experience can be satisfied only if the hazards are appreciated.
*
And there is no safety in the path of outright rejection of mysticism, because the mystical hunger will come back in another form. Protestants have generally rejected monasticism and ascetic mysticism because of the kind of hazards described above.
Yet mysticism has returned to Protestantism in the Pentecostal and Charismatic denominations, which represent (supposedly) the fastest growing group of Christians in the world.
In some of these, mystical experiences are all-but mandatory and timetabled and apparently regarded (in practice) as necessarily Good and wholesome. Indeed, the mystical experience may be regarded as the necessary conversion experience.
Here there are all the hazards of monasticism - but in a more vulnerable context of Christian 'beginners' and recent converts, without the ascetic disciplines, without the supervision, without even the awareness that for fallen men in a corrupt world it is most likely that mystical experiences will be demonic than divine.
*
What to do?
The same as always. In the words of St Paul: work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. That is with humility, and self-doubt.
*
The Eastern Orthodox tradition regards mysticism as easy - all too easy – but as strongly tending towards demonic and not divine influence.
*
(If you doubt the easy-ness and deceptiveness of mystical experience, talk with some of the users of psychedelic drugs: they are often convinced that the chemical has yielded esoteric insights of great value. And they believe that that those who have not had the drug experience cannot recognise the truth and validity of what they know. The cost of this 'enlightenment'? just a few micrograms of LSD. Why bother with prayer, fasting and meditation when 'truth' is so cheap... This condition of near-invincible, un-refutable self-regard is termed spiritual pride or delusion - prelest in Russian - and is the major hazard of spiritual striving for Christians because pride is cutting oneself off from God; and is thus the worst of sins.)
*
As fallen men in a corrupt world, most people will go into a search for spirituality and religious experiences with mixed motivations, or frankly bad motivations – from spiritual pride, sensation-seeking, or seeking knowledge to use for power.
Or, they may seek healing - for themselves (in their alienation), or for others (as in shamanic practices), or for society. This motivation is not so bad, but is yet corrupt - since it aims to use communion with God to achieve worldly ends - and the desire for healing is easily corrupted into the desire for happiness, for thrills.
*
(Like Faust or Paracelsus or Renaissance magicians generally – people who seek to use spiritual knowledge/ magic to manipulate the world, especially other people. Or like Charles Williams - who used magical and tantric techniques to fuel his poetic creativity. Most of us are more or less like this.)
*
The Orthodox belief is that in this world the mystic will quite possibly be given what he seeks - spiritual experiences, knowledge, signs, powers – but arising from encounters with demons (fallen angels) rather than God and therefore tending towards deception, damnation and working against the Good.
So the elaborate structures of monasteries, elders, startsy, Saints and so on is more a method of supervision (rather than apprenticeship) – to try and prevent the ascetic mystic from being corrupted by spiritual experiences (rather than training people to attain such experiences).
*
I think our age desperately needs the mystical dimension of Christianity, yet we lack the elaborate structures of supervision by advanced Holy persons.
The hazards of mysticism are thus greater for us than for past Christians.
And the desire for Christian mystical experience can be satisfied only if the hazards are appreciated.
*
And there is no safety in the path of outright rejection of mysticism, because the mystical hunger will come back in another form. Protestants have generally rejected monasticism and ascetic mysticism because of the kind of hazards described above.
Yet mysticism has returned to Protestantism in the Pentecostal and Charismatic denominations, which represent (supposedly) the fastest growing group of Christians in the world.
In some of these, mystical experiences are all-but mandatory and timetabled and apparently regarded (in practice) as necessarily Good and wholesome. Indeed, the mystical experience may be regarded as the necessary conversion experience.
Here there are all the hazards of monasticism - but in a more vulnerable context of Christian 'beginners' and recent converts, without the ascetic disciplines, without the supervision, without even the awareness that for fallen men in a corrupt world it is most likely that mystical experiences will be demonic than divine.
*
What to do?
The same as always. In the words of St Paul: work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. That is with humility, and self-doubt.
*
Kristor on the perils of examining, grasping, doubting, fearing
*
Kristor writing in the comments at Orthosphere - edited by me.
The digital choice we face at every moment is, precisely, the choice between a grateful, happy awareness of the Divine flux in all things, that sanctifies them as it brings them into being – i.e., the state of grace – and a Fall into ..."examining; grasping; doubting; fearing..."
This is a vestibule (one among many) to alienation from God, and thus a Gate of Hell...
Once one begins to doubt and analyze and worry, one has ceased to pray or worship or love – even when the worrying is motivated by worship or love.
That's why a focus on Law or philosophy or system or procedure can be so deadly.
NB: can be, not must be.
*
Note added:
Kristor's comment reminded me of a passage I read on the same day in C.S Lewis's surprised by joy - this passage can be found at:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/questionofgod/ownwords/joy.html
*
Kristor writing in the comments at Orthosphere - edited by me.
The digital choice we face at every moment is, precisely, the choice between a grateful, happy awareness of the Divine flux in all things, that sanctifies them as it brings them into being – i.e., the state of grace – and a Fall into ..."examining; grasping; doubting; fearing..."
This is a vestibule (one among many) to alienation from God, and thus a Gate of Hell...
Once one begins to doubt and analyze and worry, one has ceased to pray or worship or love – even when the worrying is motivated by worship or love.
That's why a focus on Law or philosophy or system or procedure can be so deadly.
NB: can be, not must be.
*
Note added:
Kristor's comment reminded me of a passage I read on the same day in C.S Lewis's surprised by joy - this passage can be found at:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/questionofgod/ownwords/joy.html
*
Monday, 5 March 2012
"I'm not doing that."
*
Ideally, the proper attitude of a Christian Reactionary when confronted by any of the proliferating laws and regulations that attack the Good, would be the resolution "I'm not doing that".
This is the ultimate Christian 'politics'.
*
To spring into what people think is 'action' by raising awareness, creating petitions, funding pressure groups and lobbying political parties, by using the courts... well, this is organization, this is politics as usual - and the fact is we have lost that game and continue to lose it, and faith in that game is killing us.
If there was any powerful, active mobilizable constituency, then matters would not be as they are.
We cannot work together because there is not together to work with - not in political terms.
*
For a devout Christian, the baseline response is to do or not do what you should or should not.
And that's it.
Consequences may or may not follow, may or may not be predictable, but that ought to be irrelevant.
*
We don't know how the world works.
We never can.
*
(If it is helpful, think of the Good being propagated in terms of Sheldrake's morphic fields acting across space and time, or Charles Williams co-inherence of all humans in the work of salvation - we save others by Love, they save us by Love, in a vast and intricate web. Humans are necessarily joined - we do not need politics or organization to affect one another. We just do affect one another: end of story.)
*
A choice of Good by a single and apparently isolated person will have influence because nobody is alone and nothing is disregarded.
*
Ideally, the proper attitude of a Christian Reactionary when confronted by any of the proliferating laws and regulations that attack the Good, would be the resolution "I'm not doing that".
This is the ultimate Christian 'politics'.
*
To spring into what people think is 'action' by raising awareness, creating petitions, funding pressure groups and lobbying political parties, by using the courts... well, this is organization, this is politics as usual - and the fact is we have lost that game and continue to lose it, and faith in that game is killing us.
If there was any powerful, active mobilizable constituency, then matters would not be as they are.
We cannot work together because there is not together to work with - not in political terms.
*
For a devout Christian, the baseline response is to do or not do what you should or should not.
And that's it.
Consequences may or may not follow, may or may not be predictable, but that ought to be irrelevant.
*
We don't know how the world works.
We never can.
*
(If it is helpful, think of the Good being propagated in terms of Sheldrake's morphic fields acting across space and time, or Charles Williams co-inherence of all humans in the work of salvation - we save others by Love, they save us by Love, in a vast and intricate web. Humans are necessarily joined - we do not need politics or organization to affect one another. We just do affect one another: end of story.)
*
A choice of Good by a single and apparently isolated person will have influence because nobody is alone and nothing is disregarded.
*
Sunday, 4 March 2012
Evolutionary philosophy versus specific applications of evolution
*
Evolutionary philosophy - the application of evolution by whatever mechanism as the primary metaphysical reality - is false.
http://charltonteaching.blogspot.com/2012/03/fr-seraphim-rose-on-evolution-and.html
False because it is self-refuting nonsense (since it destroys any possibility of knowledge, including knowledge of its own truth), and wrong because it is anti-Christian (therefore anti-Truth).
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But it is also false to say that evolution cannot happen anywhere, ever.
Indeed we know by ordinary common sense that evolution really happens - the dispute is whether evolution happens in such and such a circumstance, and how far or fast it can go.
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The main common sense knowledge of evolution comes from animal and plant breeding - evolution gradually became common sense from the 1700s onward as ordinary people purposefully began to change the functional properties and appearance of crops, farm animals and pets such that these changes were inherited by future generations.
Animal breeding provides the major example of evolution in the Origin of Species precisely because it was - by that time - a matter of undeniable common knowledge that the properties of some living things could sometimes be shaped by artificial selection.
Darwin's primary argument was that if this could happen due to human purpose it could also sometimes happen without human purpose.
Which, once stated, seems obviously correct.
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Darwin's secondary argument was that if obvious but quantitative change could be produced in human lifetimes, then vastly greater and qualitative change could be produced over a much longer timescale (time now available to theorists as the estimates of the age of the earth became much greater).
But this secondary argument is not a matter of common sense or common experience - nobody in primary reality has seen qualitative change happen or experienced the age of the earth - it is instead an extrapolation, an assumption.
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That all complex adaptations (functionality) in biology and all the diversity of species, and indeed the reality of species differences could be explained by natural selection is a metaphysical assumption, logically incoherent and un-provable by common sense.
But also: that such and such a breed of pig or dog - with a relatively specified appearance and behavior and functionality transmissible by heredity - was produced by the breeding experiments of Farmer Giles or Mr Smith... this is a matter of appropriate knowledge: common experience evaluated by common sense.
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So evolutionary philosophy - e.g. the assertion that evolution is always and necessarily happening, or the assertion that adaptations are always and necessarily due to natural selection or chance variation - is false; but evolution as a specific phenomenon is true because humans have seen it, done it and continue to do it.
Science properly works in this area of specific and local - constructing simplified models that are understandable and have consequences and 'checking' these models by using them in interacting with the world, to attain human purposes.
Indeed, I would assert that, since the capacity for human deception including self-deception is so very great, the understandings of science are ultimately worth nothing unless or until they are brought to the level of evaluation by common sense and common experience.
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Once we step away from common sense and common experience, reality can be constructed - and these constructions may be utterly false.
However, evolution passes the test of common sense and common experience - therefore it has potential validity in some situations.
Therefore evolution cannot (and should not) be ruled-out altogether.
*
We operate in the space between these bounds: on the one hand evolution is not intrinsically true because it is not the ultimate reality; but on the other hand evolution may sometimes be true with respect to certain situations.
*
Evolutionary philosophy - the application of evolution by whatever mechanism as the primary metaphysical reality - is false.
http://charltonteaching.blogspot.com/2012/03/fr-seraphim-rose-on-evolution-and.html
False because it is self-refuting nonsense (since it destroys any possibility of knowledge, including knowledge of its own truth), and wrong because it is anti-Christian (therefore anti-Truth).
*
But it is also false to say that evolution cannot happen anywhere, ever.
Indeed we know by ordinary common sense that evolution really happens - the dispute is whether evolution happens in such and such a circumstance, and how far or fast it can go.
*
The main common sense knowledge of evolution comes from animal and plant breeding - evolution gradually became common sense from the 1700s onward as ordinary people purposefully began to change the functional properties and appearance of crops, farm animals and pets such that these changes were inherited by future generations.
Animal breeding provides the major example of evolution in the Origin of Species precisely because it was - by that time - a matter of undeniable common knowledge that the properties of some living things could sometimes be shaped by artificial selection.
Darwin's primary argument was that if this could happen due to human purpose it could also sometimes happen without human purpose.
Which, once stated, seems obviously correct.
*
Darwin's secondary argument was that if obvious but quantitative change could be produced in human lifetimes, then vastly greater and qualitative change could be produced over a much longer timescale (time now available to theorists as the estimates of the age of the earth became much greater).
But this secondary argument is not a matter of common sense or common experience - nobody in primary reality has seen qualitative change happen or experienced the age of the earth - it is instead an extrapolation, an assumption.
*
That all complex adaptations (functionality) in biology and all the diversity of species, and indeed the reality of species differences could be explained by natural selection is a metaphysical assumption, logically incoherent and un-provable by common sense.
But also: that such and such a breed of pig or dog - with a relatively specified appearance and behavior and functionality transmissible by heredity - was produced by the breeding experiments of Farmer Giles or Mr Smith... this is a matter of appropriate knowledge: common experience evaluated by common sense.
*
So evolutionary philosophy - e.g. the assertion that evolution is always and necessarily happening, or the assertion that adaptations are always and necessarily due to natural selection or chance variation - is false; but evolution as a specific phenomenon is true because humans have seen it, done it and continue to do it.
Science properly works in this area of specific and local - constructing simplified models that are understandable and have consequences and 'checking' these models by using them in interacting with the world, to attain human purposes.
Indeed, I would assert that, since the capacity for human deception including self-deception is so very great, the understandings of science are ultimately worth nothing unless or until they are brought to the level of evaluation by common sense and common experience.
*
Once we step away from common sense and common experience, reality can be constructed - and these constructions may be utterly false.
However, evolution passes the test of common sense and common experience - therefore it has potential validity in some situations.
Therefore evolution cannot (and should not) be ruled-out altogether.
*
We operate in the space between these bounds: on the one hand evolution is not intrinsically true because it is not the ultimate reality; but on the other hand evolution may sometimes be true with respect to certain situations.
*
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