"As (Stephen) Hawking and Mlodinkow occasionally seem to realize, far from philosophy being dead, having been killed by science, the deepest arguments in this area are not scientific but philosophical. And if the philosophical reasoning runs in the direction I have suggested, it is not only philosophy but also natural theology that is alive and ready to bury its latest would-be undertakers."
--from Philosophy Lives by John Haldane in First Things Jan 2011
This is his concluding summary; to see how he got there, read the entire article.
As a practicing scientist, I get a frequent look in the kitchen and find lots of statistics, speculations, and assumptions that reflect our culture more than anything justifiable in any objective sense. And what we get is not a twice baked potato but one half baked--which is being way too generous. (My Flo used to eat raw potatos when she was little, from her uncle's store on Taylor Street--so it can be done--but it's the difference between hot, cold, and lukewarm--which I have on the very best Author-ity.) (Also think iced coffee, steaming coffee...and coffe at room temperature--that is, one that has adapted to its surroundings; read "culture."
Dennis: do you read First Things? My son Dr. Stephen can't get enough of it and finds it quite useful in his lines of work and thought. I prefer Touchstone because it is more Lewis-like; but both magazines are a meld of Catholic, Evangelical, and even Jewish authors.
I don't subscribe to "First Things" any longer but do go to their website from time to time to see if there is something that catches my curiosity.
ReplyDeleteI did like the recent article in Oct. 20, 2011 on death and hospice care.
A friend of mine recently died of liver cancer. His brother told me that a few weeks before his death that the local doctors sent him to Peoria for a liver biopsy. His cancer was so terminal all the Peoria doctors did was remove some fluid and sent him home to continue to die. He had already accepted he was dying. Because he had left the nursing home for a few days he lost his bed. By now he was so bad they put him back in IVCC where he shortly died. Not much dignity in dying for him.
I think the old Indians had it right. When they knew their end was near they just walked off into the woods or out on an ice floe.
Not familiar with "Touchstone" but checked it out and found a recent article that I enjoyed called "Married with Reservations". I see daily the harm done to children and ex spouses of this pseudogamy philosophy.