Category: Philosophy
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Playground Morality
Elementary school is a rather treacherous place to learn to navigate as a child. The first time I ever read Calvin and Hobbes, I discovered a kindred spirit. Calvin’s view of elementary school was akin to an intergalactic prison where the alien life forms torture you for what seems like their own pleasure—at times I…
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The Space of a Sonnet
Nuns fret not at their Convent’s narrow room; And Hermits are contented with their Cells; And Students with their pensive Citadels: Maids at the Wheel, the Weaver at his Loom, Sit blithe and happy; Bees that soar for bloom, High as the highest Peak of Furness Fells, Will murmur by the hour in Foxglove bells:…
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Today Martin Buber was Born (1878)
Martin Buber (1878-1965) was a Jewish philosopher who did a great deal to put classic documents of Hasidic tradition into wider circulation. He is most famous for his 1923 book I and Thou. I and Thou is a remarkable book, a masterpiece of simplicity and direct communication. I don’t know if it will ever seem…
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On Remembering Facebook Friends
Just the other night I was doing something that all middle-aged university professors do on a regular basis — maintaining my Facebook! Yes, I have a presence on Facebook and, yes, on occasion I visit the site to see what all of my “friends” are doing. I originally created my Facebook presence simply because my…
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Naturalism, Human Persons and Rationality: Admitting the Problem
The recalcitrant nature of human persons for scientific naturalism has been widely noticed. Thus, Berkeley philosopher John Searle recently observed, “There is exactly one overriding question in contemporary philosophy.” How do we fit in?….How can we square this self-conception of ourselves as mindful, meaning-creating, free, rational, etc., agents with a universe that consists entirely of…
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Human Persons and Equal Rights
It is a cherished belief of most people that human beings simply as such have equal value and rights and that they have significantly greater value than animals. However, this claim is difficult if not impossible to justify given a naturalist worldview. For many naturalists, the best, perhaps only, way to justify the belief that…
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Human Persons and the Self
Throughout its history, the Judeo-Christian tradition has been interpreted as giving an affirmative answer to questions about the reality of the three great topics of Western philosophy, viz., God, the soul, and life everlasting. For two thousand years, the vast majority of Christian thinkers have believed in the souls of men and beasts as it…
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The Argument from Consciousness
Consciousness is among the most mystifying features of the cosmos. Geoffrey Madell opines that “the emergence of consciousness, then is a mystery, and one to which materialism signally fails to provide an answer.”[i] Naturalist Colin McGinn claims that its arrival borders on sheer magic because there seems to be no naturalistic explanation for it: “How…
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Worldview Anomalies, Recalcitrant Facts and the Image of God
Once upon a time there was a man who thought he was dead. His wife tried everything she could to convince him he was very much alive. But try as she may, he would not change his mind. After several weeks of this, she finally took him to the doctor who assured the man he…
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Undergrad Conference on Good & Evil at Biola
One interesting sign of intelligent life in American colleges is the proliferation of academic conferences by, of, and for undergraduates. These undergrad conferences, where college students present arguments and research to each other, are popping up in more and more disciplines these days. Biola University’s student government, Associated Students, is calling for papers NOW for…
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Christianity and Non-Empirical Knowledge
Last time we looked at the nature of knowledge and we defined it in this way: It is to represent (i.e., experience or think about) reality the way it really is on the basis of adequate grounds, on a solid basis of evidence, experience, intuition, testimony and so forth. We also saw that there there…
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What is Knowledge?
Do we the disciples of Jesus possess through Scripture and other means a reliable source of knowledge of reality or do we not? We have seen that this is an important question. The possession of knowledge—especially religious and moral knowledge—is essential for a life of flourishing. To answer this question we must, first, answer another…