While I’ve touched on this subject briefly before, I think it stands a better examination. The process of writing some of these posts has led to the contemplation of some of our cultural assumptions, and what’s become an interesting lesson from this is how useful it might be to contemplate words and ideas that we’ve taken for granted in this case, it’s the
Category: Critical Thinking
Nothing lives forever
This is actually a combination of two post ideas I had, because I realized that the perspective discussed in one had direct bearing on the other. And then, while this was in draft form, another related item came up. Bear with me as we wend through it all.
Every once in a while I hear something about a culture dying out, or a language on the verge of disappearing because only three people speak it,
But how? Part seven: Filling the hole
Walkabout podcast – But how? Part 7
I’m going to make a slight departure from the format of the previous ‘But How?‘ posts. So far, all of them dealt with how different concepts worked just fine without religion as an explanation, but this one will
What can you add?
The Richard Dawkins Foundation site pointed me to an article from The Raw Story concerning the rapid decay of the Galápagos due to eco-tourism, which I thought was worth a post, especially since it ties in with another that I’ve been working on that will be along soon.
Permit me to elaborate for a moment on what may be old news for three of my four readers. The Galápagos are a short string
Moral: you keep using that word…
While I can’t say anyone has ever had the temerity to attempt to express this to my face (I’m not a little or meek-looking guy,) there is a very prominent tendency to automatically equate “atheist” with “immoral,” one of the little triumphs of religious influence – in fact, it may come second only to “faith is a virtue” in the realm of common
Why would they lie?
There’s a common argument that crops up in discussions of UFO sightings, always from UFO proponents (which, for my purposes here, denotes those who feel that the large number of reports are indicative of something significant – there isn’t a consensus on exactly what.) It can also crop up in regards to paranormal and even religious experiences. Made in regards to eyewitness accounts
Followup: The artful dodger
In the previous post, I took Philosopher of Science Elliott Sober to task for a relatively simple question that he’s been flogging at the expense of huge amounts of oxygen and electrons – and at the same time, ripped philosophy in general. I’ll be honest and say that I would really like someone
Final answers aren’t
Over at EvolutionBlog and Why Evolution Is True, Drs. Rosenhouse and Coyne have taken down the same philosophical question posed by Dr. Elliot Sober, to wit: Can science establish that genetic mutations are not caused by god?
It is questions like this that have guided my abiding dislike of philosophy,
The road’s longer than it looks
Okay, let’s do a variation of an exercise I perform with my students sometimes. I’ll preface this by saying, this isn’t a trick question, nor is there a ‘right’ answer. It’s simple: look at this image and tell me what you can glean from it.
Well, it’s a stream or pond, with a rock at the edge or perhaps in the middle. The air appears reasonably still, from
How’s that sound?
This is a follow-up to the earlier book review of Brain Bugs, by Dean Buonomano. The author raised an interesting bit of speculation within that I wanted to examine – first noting that the likelihood to establish any such speculations as accurate or even worthwhile is pretty slim. This is more of a thought exercise.
In chapter 8, Buonomano admits to leading away from the clinically-supported