Diligently Seek

I'm a bit grumpy right now. I have written more calmly on this issue here . But today I am grumpy. I have this True Believer friend who constantly tries to reconvert me. He uses C. S. Lewis' Argument from Reason all the time, but he infects it (bad as it already was) with presuppositionalism. His contention is that atheism is solipsistic and therefore has no ontological ground for reasoning. This is precisely backward. Theism is solipsistic. Lewis was a solipsist. I get there in two ways. One is through Hitchens who so tersely demonstrated that the assumption that the cosmos was designed by a being with oneself in mind, and pretending that this is a humble belief, is irresolvably dissonant. The cosmos is not yours, and it is not your dad's, and it is not your inheritance. So much for solipsism. Now, as for presuppositional arguments from reason. Again, I can depend on the rigors of empiricism because that method makes no prior metaphysical claim. One s...

Hello Again, So I am going to do much more with my posts soon than just announce our new videos, I promise. I am going to use this blog as a supplement to the youtube channel . In the meantime, the second Potter Squad installment is ready! In this video we learned: Lucy is super cute Joseph is pretty clever about forming theories about the novels Potter Daddy knows too much about the anatomical temple The Pensieve complicates the mind/body problem Joseph's favorite lesson from this video was the explanation of the anatomical temple Lucy is a big fan of conflict We should have at least one more video and one of the supplementary blog posts done by the end of this week. Please like, subscribe, and share :)

I am writing this blog to promote and explain a new channel that my son and I are making, called Potter Squad . We have only one pos t so far, but we will be putting more up as soon as possible. Project: We are reading through every book of Harry Potter right now. Unfortunately, we got the idea to do this about halfway through Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire . Our project will be to do two things: share all of the lessons that we learned live while recording us reading the books, and elaborate on those lessons through new commentary.  What about the books we didn't record? When I upload the videos for all of the chapters Joseph and I recorded together, I will re-read the books with my daughter Lucy and record that, I will then turn those into videos as well, so you will have at least one Potter Squad video for each chapter of Harry Potter. If you have any questions or suggestions, please either comment here or in the comment section of our videos. Afte...

I used to think that Joseph Smith apologetics was a respectable way to spend one's time. Even one's career. Big names like Richard Bushman , Terryl Givens , and Margaret Barker were doing it, so there must be something there. Then I realized that Joseph Smith's early truth claims are as bogus as those of your local psychic. I'm not kidding. Yesterday I was listening to a symposium that took place in 2005 at the Library of Congress to commemorate the 200th birthday of "The Prophet." Nothing would make me happier than to link to this symposium here, but it seems to have been stripped. I have the audio and I will upload it to You Tube as soon as I can. The three academic heavy weights mentioned above were participants, along with many others whose credentials demand respect. Bushman was the first speaker. He made some terrific points about the malleability of history and the degree to which one’s starting context matters. I expected him to provide n...

Habit Instead of Happiness             It was my great pleasure to attend The Metropolitan Opera’s fathom events broadcast of Eugene Onegin on October 5. I have been a fan of Italian opera for years, and had not yet been introduced to Russian opera. I was extremely moved by the beautiful music, impeccable vocal performances, and the treatment within the play of the Romantic versus the Realistic outlook.             The event was broadcast in the middle of the day on October 5 th . I attended the broadcast at the Edwards Stadium 21 theatre on Overland Road. The story originated as a narrative poem by Alexander Pushkin. It was published serially 1825-1832, and a full publication was issued the following year. This novel in verse was adapted into an opera by Pyotr Tchaikovsky in 1879. The focus of the story is on the young woman Tatyana. Tatyana lives on a large estate i...

The Thirteenth Century Proto-Renaissance             To make history more approachable, it is often separated into certain definable epochs. This helps us to identify similarities between actions and works of art in a specific period as distinguished from an earlier or later period. The problem with identifying united movements within history is that human behavior is not linear. Eleventh century architects, for example, did not know that they were supposed to be Romanesque. We soon see that different historical movements overlap each other. Where the Renaissance is concerned, this overlap has been difficult to tie down. It is usually defined as taking place in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth centuries. Much of the artwork, however, from the Fourteenth century fits well into the modernistic Renaissance movements.             One way that Fourteenth century art coincides wit...

Artistic Legislation             Percy Bysshe Shelley said that poets are the “unacknowledged legislators of the worlds”  (Shelley, A Defence of Poetry 918) . His point was that poets crystallize the ideas of an age, and effect the movements of civilization. It seems that is only half of the story though. Poetry certainly does influence change, but it is also influenced by other movements. Throughout history this symbiotic relationship between poets, and the artistic periods they write in has been evident.             Poetry during the Renaissance, for example, was just as interested in a resurgence of Greek and Roman artwork as was painting. Francis Petrarch exhibited this impulse in certain of his sonnets, such as sonnet 78 from his Rime Sparse , in which he appeals to the mythical artist Pygmalion, who fell in love with his own sculpture, saying, “how happy you s...

My Evening at the Vedic Study Center             On the night of November 22, I attended a Baghavad Ghita study session at The Jewel of the Treasure Valley Hare Krshna Temple and Vedic Cultural Center. It was a great experience. I called ahead of time to inform them that I was coming, and they instructed me to bring my copy of the Baghavad Ghita with me to The Temple, to leave my shoes at the door, to arrive at 6:30 PM, and to expect to stay until 9:00 PM. When I arrived I was greeted by a man my age name Sri Arjuna, and told to pass through their shrine room into the main hall where the opening chants and study take place. I sat on the floor on a small rug. Sri Arjuna then led the group of about 20 people in a chant: “Hare Krshna Hare Krshna/Krshna Krshna Hare Hare/Hare Rama Hare Rama/Rama Rama Hare Hare” (Arjuna) .             After the chanting session was over, I was...

Tarzan Kills Cannibals Tarzan Kills Cannibals “It seems that uncorrupted nature is good, since these folk, instead of eating me, showed me a thousand kindnesses.” – Voltaire 403             Few practices in any culture fascinate and repulse westerners like cannibalism. The image of benign missionaries roasting in a pot, while savage persons of dark complexion prepare to feast is indelible.  It is a foundational part of the western image of Africa.  The picture has been painted by agenda driven European explorers, and novelists like Edgar Rice Burroughs.  In his novel Tarzan of the Apes, Burroughs uses cannibalism to place white, aristocratic, men of noble birth at the apex of civilization.  That view not only perpetuates false history, it comes with a heavy death toll.  When Christopher Columbus received word of the Caribales in the West Indies, no aspect of the...

Steak Steak makes me feel I am an animal. I become aware of my teeth, My marrow, That my jaws are bones, The potential of my flesh. I forget what it cost to get steak. Meat is a thing to me Alone. A cow is a thing to me Apart. I cannot mourn a thing I never saw, A thing that makes me visible. When I think back to the places I have been, Where steaks are raised to die, My nostrils flare in protest Of the stench of a fecal mixing bowl: Larger than my neighborhood, Deep enough to creep over the edge of my boot, A horror I cannot bring inside to meet my wife. So I enter barefoot into the grilling place. The gaseous corps of a steak, Oozing green, delicious to flies Makes me feel I am an animal .