Cathy Young has a great (as always) piece up on identity politics which is (as usual) better than my response and well worth your time.
More here from David Schraub.
by John Cole| 6 Comments
This post is in: Excellent Links
Cathy Young has a great (as always) piece up on identity politics which is (as usual) better than my response and well worth your time.
More here from David Schraub.
by John Cole| 15 Comments
This post is in: Excellent Links
BTW, here is the new Open Source Media website, which seems pretty nicely put together and aesthetically pleasing.
by John Cole| 3 Comments
This post is in: Excellent Links, The War on Your Neighbor, aka the War on Drugs
Bill Ardolino has a long and interesting post up deflating a lot of the hype surrounding steroid use.
by John Cole| 29 Comments
This post is in: Excellent Links
Here is another one of those quizzes we all love. Paste your code in the comments.
You are one of life’s enjoyers, determined to get the most you can out of your brief spell on Earth. Probably what first attracted you to atheism was the prospect of liberation from the Ten Commandments, few of which are compatible with a life of pleasure. You play hard and work quite hard, have a strong sense of loyalty and a relaxed but consistent approach to your philosophy.
You can’t see the point of abstract principles and probably wouldn’t lay down your life for a concept though you might for a friend. Something of a champagne humanist, you admire George Bernard Shaw for his cheerful agnosticism and pursuit of sensual rewards and your Hollywood hero is Marlon Brando, who was beautiful, irascible and aimed for goodness in his own tortured way.
Sometimes you might be tempted to allow your own pleasures to take precedence over your ethics. But everyone is striving for that elusive balance between the good and the happy life. You’d probably open another bottle and say there’s no contest.
What kind of humanist are you? Click here to find out.
For those of you wondering about Tim, the results are in:
You go out of your way to build bridges with people of different views and beliefs and have quite a few religious friends. You believe in the essential goodness of people , which means you’re always looking for common ground even if that entails compromises. You would defend Salman Rushdie’s right to criticise Islam but you’re sorry he attacked it so viciously, just as you feel uncomfortable with some of the more outspoken and unkind views of religion in the pages of this magazine.
You prefer the inclusive approach of writers like Zadie Smith or the radical Christian values of Edward Said. Don’t fall into the same trap as super–naïve Lib Dem MP Jenny Tonge who declared it was okay for clerics like Yusuf al–Qaradawi to justify their monstrous prejudices as a legitimate interpretation of the Koran: a perfect example of how the will to understand can mean the sacrifice of fundamental principles. Sometimes, you just have to hold out for what you know is right even if it hurts someone’s feelings.
What kind of humanist are you? Click here to find out..
Via Lauren.
by John Cole| 20 Comments
This post is in: Excellent Links, Blogospheric Navel-Gazing
by Tim F| 15 Comments
This post is in: Open Threads
As John mentioned earlier, the Society for Neuroscience invited the Dalai Lama to keynote their (huge) annual conference in DC, and out of general interest I ponied up for a nonmember registration and drove down from Pittsburgh. The talk kicked off an annual series on the potential dialogue between neuroscience and ’empirical’ meditation knowledge bases such as Buddhism, although some neuroscientists protested what they saw as science inappropriately endorsing a particular religion.
Contrary to the critics, the Dalai Lama (known as His Holiness, HHDL, or by his original name Tenzin Gyatso) seems to me the perfect choice to keynote a discussion between neuroscience and traditional mind-body knowledge. HHDL’s Mind and Life Institute has facilitated dialogue between eastern and western students of the mind since 1987, and he has written two books that strongly argue in favor of accomodating modern science in spiritual life.
For those who are interested, here’s a brief rundown of what I gleaned from his talk.
HHDL started, smartly in my opinion, with the question of whether religion should accomodate science. A much younger HHDL discovered while experimenting with a gift telescope that the moon reflects light rather than making its own light, as one revered sanskrit text claimed. Rather than throw out the telescope, HHDL convinced his teacher that the ancient scholar was wrong. He used this to make the larger point that Buddhism’s attitude of open-minded skeptical inquiry should have no problem fitting in with modern science, although he acknowledged that some traditionalists might call him a bit of a rebel.
What can science gain from Buddhism? HHDL’s primary point would sound familiar to anybody who’s read Emmanuel Kant, that is to say that any human activity can be considered good if it has the effect of increasing the positive human qualities. In his view problems almost always come from a basic lack of understanding (ignorance) of the larger situation, which explains his enthusiasm for the research sciences. In his view the more we know about ourselves the less likely we are to misinderstand each other and act out of ignorance. [gratuitous self-shout out: Tim F’s law] He made the point that if and when science produces a simple surgery that removes the harmful emotions he would gladly sign up and save several hours of daily meditation. While he didn’t have lobotomy specifically in mind, neuroscientists can (understandably) misinterpret what he meant and he later was obliged to explain that one should never seek tranquility by numbing one’s critical faculties. In his view inner peace must come from exercising critical thinking rather than subduing it, which suggests that a primary goal of mind research ought to focus on understanding the positive and negative emotions so that we can control them better.
It’s clear that scientific progress is not by itself an unalloyed good thing. HHDL suggested that scientists working in sensitive fields such as neurobiology carry a ‘sense of responsibility’ in what they do [I would insert the observation that in science you’re far more likely to find a ‘sense of employment.’ If the NIH asked for grants to study TV-mediated mind control it’s safe to predict that they would not lack for qualified takers. That message would go more effectively to the civilian policymakers who set funding priorities]. In response to a tricky question about animal research he suggested that researchers who have a sense of empathy with the animals on which they experiment will incur less harm [in my experience they also do better research], and that one must always weigh the harm they do against the greater good.
HHDL reminded me a bit of the author and researcher Edward O. Wilson in that the most genial people sometimes have no problem setting off the real-world version of a board-crippling flame war. HHDL ended his short speech by declaring that any religious leader who doesn’t represent ‘fundamental human values’ (compassion, humility, affection) is irreligious and a hypocrite. That’s nearly a direct quote. His telescope story also constitutes an implicit criticism of the western fundamentalists who had every access to science that the insular Tibetans never had and nonetheless choose to throw away the telescope. In your face, Pat.
***Update***
New title has more zip.
by John Cole| 49 Comments
This post is in: Open Threads
I made chili last night, and I am having a bowl (after some tomatoes, mozerella, and basil- weird combo, right?), and thought maybe you all had some chili recipes you might want to share. This batch was so good, I think I am going to make another batch next weekend, so if you have anything interesting, let me know.