This thought came to me a few days ago while listening to some pretty flimsy data analysis from a marketer and a journalist…
All modern philosophy is a philosophy of doubt. You can’t explain things away forever. At the same time, when, historically, a LOT of your data can be explained away as crap or “noise” (as in “signal versus noise”), then you get an eye for that sort of thing. If you run into someone who has absolutely NO eye on the noise, how can you not help but seriously doubt their conclusions?
When tracking down a difficult IT problem, parsing millions of lines of log files can often yield nothing but a stack of false leads. There are innumerable variables and we are just poking around trying to isolate something useful. A clever person with a lot of experience can hopefully come up with something solid to work from.
On the other hand, should major policy decisions, involving hundreds of thousands of dollars and good people’s jobs, should these things be decided upon by milling around the food-court and collecting some anecdotal evidence from passerbys? Should one angry email from a customer cause you to ignore hours of careful data collection to the contrary?
We use the latter method all the time though. We must, given the constraints of life. However, I propose that we should ALWAYS keep a humble and healthy eye on the noise and the potential for noise. There are so many ways in which our observations can turn out to be crap. Watch out.
What philosophers say about actuality is often just as disappointing as it is when one reads on a sign in a secondhand shop: Pressing Done Here. If a person were to bring his clothes to be pressed, he would be duped, for the sign is merely for sale.
Some Christians like to argue a lot over their interpretations of various passages of scripture. I don’t like to get into the these arguments, but it doesn’t mean I don’t care or have an opinion about the topic at hand. Eschatology is probably the worst, followed by (at least in the last 20 years) by what is the proper handling of Genesis.
I don’t like positions that try to shoe-horn the biblical narrative into a very modern scientific framework. That would include most variations of theistic evolution. On the other hand, I find cases of literalist one-upmanship to be equally obnoxious. Fighting to see how astonishingly concrete we can interpret each verse is, in my opinion, a terrible guiding principal, despite the fact that it nearly always finds itself contra liberalism, which is usually commendable.
So what the heck do I believe? Well, I had to stop and think about it. It’s change a fair amount over the years. I’ve left my fundamentalist YEC roots, but not too far behind. I don’t believe the discoveries of science are opposed to anything God tells us. They simply reveal the mechanics of God’s design. That doesn’t mean there isn’t a lot of bad science out there. Bleh. Nobody should use that stuff. Not even my worst enemy. I’ve also been exposed to several much more metaphorical and poetic ways of reading scripture and discovered some of them to make a lot more sense without diminishing any of the truth and power of the special revelation. I feel like I’ve picked up a lot of ideas about reality from Tolkien as well, despite that he never deals with this sort of thing directly. Oh, and Occam’s Razor. I know it get’s a bad rap in some circles, but I dig it. Why come up with a really complicated explanation when a simple one works and is still orthodox?
Explaining where all of these ideas come from would probably take to long. I’m not quite sure myself. For my own record keeping though, here is my current version of creationism. This will probably be a bit different if you were to ask me in a few years.
1. Very old universe (Doesn’t need to be young. Old is more interesting anyway (Possibility of other worlds around billions of stars, etc.). Not so self-centered, easiest explanation to it’s massive size and the problems with speed of light and observable distance.)
2. Old earth. (Again, doesn’t need to be young. Easiest explanation to old geology.)
3. Young animals. (Special creation relatively recently, though still an age before man.)
4. Virtually no macro-evolution of species. (Darwinism is a joke. Virtually no archeological or contemporary biological evidence for anything of the sort.)
5. Very young man. (6000 years. Adam and Eve. Special creation. Man is not a retooled earlier species.)
6. Civilizations formed almost immediately (Cain building the first City. Record of 6000-year old Mesopotamian cities, followed quickly by civilization in India and North Africa. No long period of cave-men, etc.)
7. Noah’s flood was regional. (Doesn’t need to be global to accomplish everything important.)
So there it is. I should have just skipped the intro. I need to see if I can do this with the problem of evil too. Hmm, trickier.
I’ll end with a very relevant quote from my recent reading:
Let us now examine the narrative in Genesis more carefully as we attempt to dismiss the fixed idea that it is a myth, and as we remind ourselves that no age has been more skillful than our own in producing myths of the understanding, an age that produces myths and at the same time wants to eradicate all myths.
-Soren Kierkegaard, The Concept of Anxiety, EK p.142
I believe S.K. is correct in his description here of the mechanics of memory.
To forget — this is the desire of all people, and when they encounter something unpleasant, they always say: If only I could forget! But to forget is an art that must be practiced in advance. To be able to forget always depends upon how one remembers, but how one remembers depends upon how one experiences actuality. The person who runs aground with the speed of hope will recollect in such a way that he will be unable to forget. Thus nil admirari [marvel at nothing] is the proper wisdom of life. No part of life ought to have so much meaning for a person that he cannot forget it any moment he wants to; on the other hand, every single part of life ought to have so much meaning for a person that he can remember it at any moment.
-Soren Kierkegaard, Either/Or, EK p.56
The wise advice amounts to “don’t take anything that happens TOO seriously, lest you discover later that you wish to forget it. On the other hand, still try to take life somewhat seriously. There are lots of things you may wish to remember too.”
In this passage, Kierkegaard, with tongue-in-cheek, discusses the evils of boredom and then proposes a wonderful idea to borrow money to pay off our debts. It’s all pretty funny, especially the last part. When you realize that this is exactly what the U.S. Federal Reserve is in fact doing right now, it perhaps is not quite as hilarious.
Since boredom advances and boredom is the root of all evil, no wonder, then, that the world goes backwards, that evil spreads. This can be traced back to the very beginning of the world. The gods were bored; therefore they created man. Adam was bored because he was alone; thus Eve was created. Since that moment, boredom entered the world and grew in quantity in exact proportion to the growth of the population. Adam was bored alone; then Adam and Eve were bored together; then Adam and Eve and Cain and Abel were bored en famille. After that, the population of the world increased and the nations were bored en masse. To amuse themselves, they hit upon the notion of building a tower so high that it would reach the sky. The idea itself is just as boring as the tower was high, and provides a terrible demonstration of how boredom gained the upper hand. Then the peoples were dispersed around the world, just as people now travel abroad, but they continued to be bored. And what consequences this boredom had!–mankind stood tall and fell far, first through Eve, then from the Babylonian tower.
On the other hand, what was it that delayed the fall of Rome? Was it not bread and circuses? And what is being done now? Is consideration being given to any means of amusement? On the contrary, our doom is being expedited. There is the idea of convening a consultative assembly. Can anything more boring be imagined, both for the honorable delegates as well as for one who will read and hear about them? The country’s financial situation is to be improved by economizing. Can anything more boring be imagined?
Instead of increasing the debt, they propose to pay it off in installments. From what I know about the current political situation, it would be an easy matter for Denmark to borrow fifteen million rix-dollars. Why does no one consider this? Now and then we hear that someone is a genius and therefore does not pay his debts; why should a nation not do the same, provided we are all agreed? Borrow the fifteen million; use it not to pay off our debts but for public entertainment. Let us celebrate the millennium with in games and merriment. Just as currently there are boxes everywhere for contributions of money, there should be bowls everywhere filled with money. Everything would be gratis: the theater gratis, the women of easy virtue gratis, rides to Deer Park gratis, funerals gratis, one’s funeral eulogy gratis. I say “gratis” for when money is always available, everything is in a certain sense free.
No one should be allowed to own any property. Only in my case would there be an exception. I shall reserve for myself an allowance of one hundred rix-dollars a day deposited in a London bank, partly because I cannot manage on less, partly because I am the one who provided the idea, and finally because who knows whether I shall be able to think up a new idea when the fifteen million are gone.
Why does C.S. Lewis’s writing seem so original? Why is it so darn good?
Keeping Girard in mind, it seems that Lewis, unlike the vast majority of Christian writers, does not start with the Other as his launchpad.
So so so much theological writing is polemical. It is defined by what it is opposing. Pick up any book advocating a “Christian Worldview” and you’ll find most of the ink is spilled in the act of being contra this or contra that. Now that doesn’t make any of the ideas presented true or otherwise, but it is the form the discourse takes. I think this is more than just a writing style, but the evidence of a deeper philosophy – one of mimetic rivalry. Mere Christianity is more different from these than I previously realized.
So often, Lewis rarely gives his “opponents” the time of day. You barely even know they are there. His ideas are not slave to the Other. He sets the tone and in the process opens doors and sounds so positive, without the ideas losing any of their power. I think he proves that this CAN be done by simply doing it well, at least most of the time.
This is a note to myself to keep this in mind when writing int he future. Can you turn a piece of criticism on it’s head?
Speaking about the disturbing fact that Christendom is full of non-Christians, Kierkegaard says:
On the assumption, then, that a religious author has from the ground up become aware of this illusion, Christendom, and to the limit of his ability with, note well, the help of God, wants to stamp it out – what is he to do then? Well, first and foremost, no impatience. If he becomes impatient, then he makes a direct assault and accomplishes – nothing. By a direct attack he only strengthens a person in the illusion and also infuriates him. Generally speaking, there is nothing that requires as gentle a treatment as the removal of an illusion. If one in any way causes the one ensnared to be antagonized, then all is lost. And this one does by a direct attack, which in addition also contains the presumptuousness of demanding that another person confess to one or face-to-face with one make the confession that actually is most beneficial when the person concerned makes it to himself secretly. The latter is achieved by the indirect method, which in the service of the love of truth dialectically arranges everything for the one ensnared and then, modest as love always is, avoids being witness to the confession that he makes alone before God, the confession that he has been living in an illusion.
-Kierkegaard, On my work as an author, The aesthetic writing, “Christendom is an enormous illusion”, Essential p.459
This may be the best thing I read in the whole book. I guess because it rings very true with my own perception of people and reality.
Must we assume that preaching the gospel faithfully will always involve some sort of “in your face” confrontation? As if your preaching against sodomy will strike conviction into the hearts of sodomites within earshot. Only the Holy Spirit can do such a thing and his voice is keen and quiet.
The hedonist and materialist surfing Amazon.com for a larger TV and eying the $80 Scotch at the liquor store on the way home – he is under a spell.
There are two ways to look at the sinner (and we’re all sinners). He can be a rebel – hateful and smearing at his creator. Or he can be seen as a slave – someone trapped and pitiable. God has hard words for the rebel indeed! But the imagery used to describe the whole life and ministry of Jesus Christ, even by himself directly, was one of “setting the captives free”, “those in darkness have seen a great light”. When Jesus weeps over Jerusalem, he says that he wished he could gather them under his wings like a protective hen. He could just have easily said that he wished to beat them straight with a rod for their rebellion and idolatry. But he didn’t say that. A few years later, in 73 A.D., they would be beaten down and crushed by Rome. But only a week after he said that, he died for a city – even a whole world and race – full of slaves.
As S.K. put it, “demanding a face-to-face confession” when what they really need is one in secret, in their heart of hearts – that is how you sabotage a conversion experience. Because we are more slaves than rebels.
“Awkward” is a surprisingly complex concept I think -very difficult to teach. You either get it or you don’t and probably never will. There are so many difficult things just like this though. Is the only change possible a hard-edge behavioral conditioning? Education through raw change of action? Teaching a fool to keep his mouth shut? Keeping enough police concerned neighbors around that a man doesn’t hit his wife? “Teaching to the test” instead of cultivating real understanding (since this is way too hard)? Play all the right notes fast but never talk about theory? Christianity with piety but no theology?
Is the only sort of change possible for hard things? With man, I think so. However, with the power of the holy spirit, anything is possible. Does that mean though that the only thing you can do is pray and put your hope in God to fix men? But O, God’s ways are always tangled up in the hands of man. What that means is that we still keep trying to teach the very difficult. We continuously refuse to settle for raw behavior management, but strive also for instilling understanding – for flying solo, with no safety net. (Though we must have healers, more than ever, to care for the ones who fall down.)
How is modeling still the best way to each? (I’m not convinced that it always is, but I’m going to assume that Girard’s thought applies to education more than most folks realize) So why modeling? Because you must start with DO. This way, you really do learn the behavior first, without any understanding. But the DO is holistic. So many of the periphery things reveal the how and why. The little conversations in between, the habits surrounding the true practitioners. When you are taught formally, you only see a little snapshot of how real people DO. It may be very important information, but it’s only part of the puzzle. It’s your job to connect all the other pieces and with difficult things, this can be impossible for non-genius folk.
Modeling music is, surprisingly enough for all it’s perceived challenges, one of the most obviously straight-forward activity to model and for the student to participate in. The student plays with the master. They participate in the ensemble. Reading together doesn’t work as well since it is only one little piece of the whole experience. Better would be practicing, reading, rehearsing, talking about, and performing. What it looks like with music is on the surface, very simple. Gosh, it’s so time intensive though!!!
A poem of sorts to a stay-at-home mother of toddlers.
I can feel your agony.
Here, stuck against the wall of the board room, power point droning on,
I watch the large red digital clock flick through the seconds.
At home, the children flit around with ever increasing rigor.
Never napping, always desiring so much more than you can give them.
When my mind is bent on creation, the pain evaporates.
I run and grow tired but not weary.
Like God making the earth with joy and fervor, but resting on the seventh day.
How hard it must be to see your creation run wild, feeding back, sprouting inches every week!
They know no sabbath and hence neither do you.
Your husband is both a comfort and another complex variable.
Enough to drive our own maker mad, if we were more like him.
Lord have mercy and make us more like you.
Today, Seth Godin posted on the “internet as envy generator”. This is exactly right and, from the perspective of Rene Girard, has got to be the chief potential evil of the internet. All those recent studies on Facebook-induced depression have their root in the same thing. The internet makes it VERY easy to find someone just like you who is seemingly more successful and possessing a more meaningful life than you. This can be poison for your spirit.
This is a transcription of something I scribbled in my notebook a few days ago. It is a partially-worked-out in-progress piece of my philosophy of parenting.
The question:
What is the difference between training your children to walk on the right path and laying an oppressive burden on them?
Can you model this on some sort of continuum?
Hmmm, really? That doesn’t seem quite right. Too simple.
Let’s try again.
Alright. This is much better. At any particular moment, depending on the child, depending on the situation, it may look as if you are letting them do whatever they want or even ignoring them. Or, it could look as if you really have them under your thumb and are constraining or even disciplining them strongly. But the reality floats all along this line and changes with the context. You can get this backwards (and of course even the best parents sometimes do), but this is where good parenting lives.
How do you know where on the line to act? Wisdom and love. Wisdom comes primarily from time and experience, but having a good model to learn from (hopefully your own parents, if possible!) can be a great jump-start, even if you are only imitating their contextual actions without fully understanding why. Love is the unconditional love of God. This comes from God alone. It accompanies spiritual growth and most often looks like some form of denying selfishness.
Next, how about we place a few parenting styles on this line:
Liberal parenting (little to no discipline) lives to the left of center. Hippie/Rainbow variations are farther left.
“Christian” or “Conservative” parenting is going to live to the right. Shown are typical James Dobson-style parenting (popular in 1980-2000 American evangelicalism) and further right would be more old-school Puritan ideas. The “Tiger Chinese Mother” that caused such a stir recently in the Wall Street Journal would live even further to the right.
Now what do the kids actually look like?
On the one side we have total neglect. This is really bad. Kids starving and maybe carried away by Child Protective Services while their parents are strung out on the couch high on dope. (Please note that the fact that liberal parenting and neglect are close to each other on this line doesn’t mean that they look anything like each other. Sometimes just the opposite (see last diagram). Things are complicated. This is only one line and a first draft.)
On the farthest right, we have child as slave. Abused or extremely restricted. Likely unable to leave the house, even in adulthood. This is what some imagine Puritan children to look like (they don’t). When you read about tribal honor-killings in the news, it sure seems that maybe SOME Muslim cultures treat their daughters in a way that is close to this.
The spoiled brat is there in the middle-left. It is rare that anyone truly says “no” to him or her. On the other side, we have the child with the heavy burden. He/she does not hear “yes” very often. They are forced to conform in a thousand different ways.
Somewhere floating around the middle (again, depending on the child for more precision) will be a child who feels loved but who also has well-developed self-control.
How about one more?
This last one is kind of tricky. This is how much thought and emotional energy needs to be expended to pull it off.
Obviously the completely neglectful parent expends nothing. Oddly enough though, the very oppressive parent also doesn’t have to think much. They follow a draconian set of rules and simply execute it. That takes virtually no emotional energy or creative thought at all.
My wife pointed out that she thought the difficulty should peak over on the middle-left. That is, if you ever observe how much parents who never discipline have to expend SO much energy fighting with their bratty kids, it will sure seem as if they are running around the most. That is true. On the other hand, you may think a hovering and controlling parent (on the far-middle right) is obviously pouring tons of time and energy into their parenting. This is also true. That is why this graph doesn’t work very well. I guess I am graphing the amount of creative energy and emotional stability required of the parent to live in the wise middle zone. Nobody can do it of course, but an old and wise parent will probably be somewhere around here more often than not.
Us young parents, on the other hand, can just keep trying every day, sometimes getting it right and sometimes missing the mark badly. Let us be patient and wait for experience, and let us pray for Godliness! Then we may have both wisdom and love.
