Tag: mailvox

Mailvox: the divine metric

G asks a question that is much easier than many who ask it suppose it to be:

I was brought up in a Presbyterian church and settled in Church of God (national headquarters to boot). I have been a staunch believer and keeper of the faith for well over 30 years. I have begun to question why the Bible is the Truth. I’ve spoken with members of more than a few faiths (and others without faith) & as we know they all KNOW their God is the true & powerful force in the universe, all galaxies, clusters, solar systems, planets, but most significantly our lil inhabitable asteroid. I was raised a Christian and the only way to get to the promise land is through Christ. Allah and others have a different plan for the ultimate prize. Folks are dieing and have killed for gods that their parents told them was real and true. Why am I blessed to have parents that taught me the “right” religion. My Jewish pal & atheist pals are more than pleased with what they have been taught.

As far as the Bible,(noted that I did not do the research myself) tis my understanding that several books were left out or added to the original work? That a group of men decided which books would be in the teachings that the world would learn and preach as the truth. Some say they were guided by a divine hand (no free will?). Also, I know it is a tired argument but I have not ever received a answer that quite satisfies me- the talking serpents, forbidden fruit, adam and eve- who recorded they info,a rib, much of Jesus’ time written about was well after his death (accuracy?). Some things are to be taken litteraly & some are fables – which ones – who decides – each church and divisions within have different interpretations. I seem to get the “He works in mysterious ways & some things we’ll never know”. That is a whole cart load of bison dung. I don’t know- guess im rambling now with errant thoughts but I’m beginning to question my faith as measured by others faiths & those with a lack of a belief in a god or gods. Using Occams Razor, it is pretty well deduced that I well have been wasting my time. I non-trivially pray that I’m wrong and will once again see the light.

First, G reveals that his “research”, such as it is, doesn’t even rise to the level of reading Wikipedia about the major world religions. He hasn’t actually spoken to “members of more than a few faiths”; we know this because only a very small number of religions are even monotheistic and therefore make the sort of claim of God that G erroneously declares they do. Of the five religions with a globally significant number of faithful, precisely two of them believe in a ruling divinity, Christianity and Islam.

And it is a tremendous misapplication of Occam’s Razor to think that it favors atheism in any way. The correct divine metric is to compare the truth claims of a religion or anti-religion with observable reality. Is it true, for example, that the poor will always be with us or was Marx correct and the elimination of poverty is merely a matter of first establishing the worker’s paradise? Does Man have free will, as the Bible teaches, or are two of the leading New Atheists right to declare, like the Muslims, that he does not? Is Sam Harris correct in insisting that religion is the greatest current threat to human existence, and if so, how has it failed to destroy the planet for the previous 8,000 years of recorded human history?

The Bible says “seek and ye shall find”. But, of course, it is necessary to do so in a genuine spirit of honest inquiry. If it is patently obvious to me that G’s “search” has hitherto been superficial and unserious, I tend to doubt it is capable of fooling God. Furthermore, before attempting to wrestle with the queen of all sciences, I strongly suggest G cut his teeth on some easier ones. The fact that he appears to believe that he presently dwells upon an “inhabitable asteroid” suggests that his ability to correctly distinguish between fact and fiction is rather limited.

Mailvox: the benefits of immigration

In which a historical objection is raised:

I’ve read that the two migrations of Greeks into Italy (the first around Cato the Younger’s time IIRC, and the second after the fall of Constantinople) were beneficial for Italian society because of the Greek learning and culture they brought with them. Are these relevant to your thesis about the negative effect of immigration on receiving societies? As an immigrant to Italy, what is your opinion?

Cato the Younger lived from 95 to 46 BC. Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon in 49 BC. The Roman Republic is considered to have ended in 29 BC. I submit that this specific example is very relevant to my thesis, insofar as decades of civil war followed by a collapse into one-man dictatorship would generally be considered to be a societal negative.

As for the second wave of Greek immigration, those were Greeks in the Byzantine sense, not the Hellenic. Since Byzantium was still somewhat more civilized than thrice-sacked Rome or the oft-invaded Italian peninsula, this is rather like asking if immigration from the United States to some of the more war-torn African societies would be beneficial. And remember, the difference between Byzantium and the Italian peninsula would likely have been even starker were it not for the Venetian conquest and sack of Constantinople in 1204.

Mailvox: awaiting enlightenment

I am sure we all await, with no little interest, the enlightenment that Freddy, the Calvinist, is sure to shed upon the arrogant, and yet somehow feeble little brains of the “Arminians” here at Vox Popoli:

The Arminians here act just like Jehovah Witnesses. They deny Trinity and the Diety of Christ because they can’t wrap their feeble little brains around those concepts…just like what the fundy Arminians do with the Sovereignty of God. The height of arrogance and intellectual pride.

Well, Freddy, since you have apparently been able to wrap your powerful and enormous, yet humble and not-at-all intellectual brain around the Trinity, the Diety of Christ, and the Sovereignty of God, I can’t imagine that you will have any trouble whatsoever in explicating the true and correct theology of those three concepts, slowly and patiently, for the edification of the less capable minds here.

I certainly look forward to hearing your explanation of how a man can be held responsible for something he cannot do, for how God can simultaneously know and not know the hour, (still less forsake Himself), and to hear your opinion on whether it was God, in His Sovereignty, who personally contemplated the issue before finally deciding how many times your pair of anal sphincters would constrict in the process of your daily defecations over the previous 24 hours. I am also curious to know if you believe a Calvinist, who by his own assertion cannot choose to worship God, will be damned or saved in the event that human action is required for salvation. Perhaps we can call it Jamsco’s Wager, the idea that the Calvinist who claims he is incapable of making a choice has nevertheless made it in the event that he is wrong about his incapability.

We’ve long assumed that Calvinism isn’t a salvation issue, but I am not so sure in this one regard. After all, how can someone claim to have done something they simultaneously claim cannot be done? Perhaps it was this dichotomy, and not his panoply of evil actions, that explains why the Robispierre of Geneva went to his grave wondering if he was not one of God’s Elect after all.

The “Arminian”, after all, needs fear nothing. What is it to him if God laughs at his illusion of ability and tells him, “you did not choose me, my friend, I chose you!” The Calvinist, on the other hand, is once more in exactly the same position as the atheist, in attempting to explain to the Almighty why he did not choose to submit himself to the Lord Jesus Christ when he had the opportunity.

The atheist will say: “It’s not my fault! I didn’t choose to worship you because I didn’t believe you existed!” The Calvinist will say: “It’s not my fault! I didn’t choose to worship you because John Calvin, and RC Sproul, and John Piper told me I couldn’t!”

I’m a little choked up

I’m not sure anyone has ever said anything quite so nice to a humble award-winning cruelty artist. Munson writes:

BRAVISSIMO! (Munson rises from his chair, enraptured, vigorously applauding)

Such nuanced invective! “You’re a maleducated twit, Sigrid.” Channeling James Kilpatrick no less! Keynesian/Mises Institute-man, that Dennis Miller-like slider caught me looking; couldn’t even take a swing at it. You have the precision of a coiled cobra, with much less empathy. In an age that honors meaty roundhouse rhetoric, you show the skill of an AWACS directed surgical strike, killing only those necessary, leaving the rest to their dreary lives of drinking curdling sour goat milk and fucking their grub-like mustachioed women. Your writing is a delight sir. I could not find the post that started the exchange; no matter, the artist rises above his inspiration. And you are no less than that VD.

The true artist creates only for himself, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t take deep satisfaction in encountering those Umberto Eco describes as his Ideal Readers. In case you’re interested, both the art and the inspiration can be found here.

Another commenter, one Odds, notes what makes puncturing academic gasbags so intrinsically worthwhile in addition to the sheer entertainment value provided:

It’s that “intellectual” style of speech that does it. So many kids, especially in worthless fields like women’s studies, think it makes them sound smart. There must be some course for liberal arts children where they tell them, “communication isn’t about conveying your position in the most precise and succinct way, but about illustrating your fantabulous credentials.” Then they end up saying far more than they meant to and it reads less like an original argument than a quote mined from an obscure, little-regarded essay. And deep down, in what’s left of their soul, they fervently hope that no one will notice they’ve presented their ideas through vocabulary rather than through arguments, and that they’ve made no argument at all.

It’s always amusing to see that the worst offenders in the great game of credentialist competition are the larval academics who don’t actually possess any credentials yet. There is nothing wrong with an extensive vocabulary or complicated sentence structure. But it is a grotesquely false to believe that the mere use of either is sufficient to make an argument convincing, and it is contemptible to knowingly use such things to try rhetorically intimidating those who possess dialectically stronger arguments into submissive acquiescence.

I further note that habitual reliance upon rhetorical bullying is a relatively reliable indicator that one is susceptible to such techniques.

Mailvox: a near-first

Oregon Mouse complains:

My husband used to live in Colorado. He took his family out for a small hike and a rock tumbled down out of nowhere and hit his 9 year old on the head. It knocked her out cold but perhaps feminism is the real culprit? How dare a 9 year old girl walk around outside!!

What a remarkable near-accomplishment! And at an even younger age than the famous Grand Canyon hiker! Do send us the link to the international newspaper accounts of her deed!

Mailvox: the autoneurotic atheist

EC wonders who is reading whom:

I love the blog and your book TIA; TIA is actually the best polemic I’ve ever read. Anyway, I saw that Edward Feser recently posted a blog article in which he says that the New Atheists engage in “mutual mental onanism”. That’s pretty close to your “atheist circle jerk”. So, who owes whom a royalty check here?

I think it is readily apparent that the use of the similar phrase – and it says much about the difference between Mr. Feser and me, mostly to his advantage, that he prefers the relatively genteel description “mutual mental onanism” to “bukkakelypse” – is nothing more than straightforward observation. It is simply an obvious metaphor for the autoneurotic activities of the leading New Atheists. The only significant difference between Mr. Feser’s independent observations and my own is my preference for the vulgate. It’s interesting to note that he also pins down the intrinsic anti-intellectualism of the Fowl Atheist’s misguided foray into philosophy.

“[T]hat Dawkins’ arguments are directed at ludicrous straw men has been demonstrated time and again (for example, here). Yet he resolutely declines to answer those who have exposed the numerous errors and fallacies in his writings — dismissing them as “fleas,” without explaining how exactly they have got his arguments wrong — or, in general, to debate anyone with expertise in the philosophy of religion. Meanwhile, the even more vitriolic P. Z. Myers’ main claim to New Atheist fame is his “Courtier’s reply” dodge, a shamelessly question-begging rationalization for remaining ignorant of what the other side actually says. New Atheists will ridicule their opponents, but actually read only each others’ work. Hence Christopher Hitchens derives his main arguments from Dawkins, Lawrence Krauss learns everything he needs to know from Hitchens, and Dawkins has his confidence in the atheist worldview bolstered from reading Krauss. And now this mutual mental onanism will be expanded across the National Mall. Somewhere Joycelyn Elders is smiling.”

Mailvox: Why they hate

Feminists absolutely hate this blog, although not for the reasons they claim. It’s not because I hate women, because I don’t, or because I openly display contempt for women, although I do. It’s not because I’m afraid of strong independent women, because I don’t fear unicorns either, or because I don’t believe in sexual equality, even though I don’t.

The real reason they hate this blog, and fear it, is because they understand on some level that it is convincing. A ruthless commitment to logic and truth tends to be persuasive over time because the human mind can only stand so much cognitive dissonance before it either begins to break down or accept the observable truth. And there is nothing that feminists fear so much as women being exposed to the unvarnished truth and seeing through the vast accumulation of the Sisterhood’s many lies.

SarahsDaughter comments:

The worst challenge to our marriage occurred three years ago. Looking back at it, I am so disappointed in myself that leaving him entered my mind. And again I was reminded that my replacement was out there. They (the replacements) are quite eager to proclaim their availability. In a desire to fix our problems, I went to a psychologist. He completely agreed with me, offered no valuable advice, and creeped me out. My husband suggested I start reading this crazy, misogynist (my words, at first) blog (VP). Really, I’d like to tell you that my faith, relationship with God, profound books, and wisdom made the difference in how I deal with conflict. I’d be lying. It was because of men and women on VP speaking of logic and shaming the irrational nature of women that I began a journey to root out feminism in my thoughts and truly understand and accept the vows I made before God.

While I don’t write this blog for anyone but myself, I’m always pleased to hear that others consider it to be in some way beneficial to themselves as well, particularly when it helps them break out of the intellectual chains that have been holding them mentally captive. We all have them. We are unthinking Republicans who believe God blesses the USA despite its corporate abjuration of Him, we are equalitarians who believe in many equalities that have never been observed in the wild or in captivity. We are science fetishists who have never noticed that there is no method in the peer reviewed madness. We are progressives against progress, feminists without femininity and Christians who believe Christ sins for us.

But whatever the chains are, they can be broken.

I am under no illusion that I am always correct. But the challenges that others offer, particularly the serious and intelligent challenges, help me continually refine and strengthen my positions, which is why I particularly appreciate those critics who are able to force me to rethink my assumptions as well as my conclusions. And as for the anklebiters and those who harbor vehement hate for the blog, I would only be concerned if such intellectual cripples admired it.

Mailvox: omniderigistes

CM has two questions:

I find your anti-omni* arguments very compelling. It’s completely counter to everything I’ve been taught (Baptist upbringing, elder in the Reformed church, currently in Missouri-Synod Lutheran church).

Couple of simple questions for clarification:

1. I believe that God created time, and therefore must exist apart from it. So even if he’s _not_ omnipresent, he could insert himself into any location and any time whenever he wishes, making himself functionally omnipresent. Do you hold that God is a slave to an “external force” of time? If he is, wouldn’t that mean that he’s not the “ultimate force”?

2. If God is not omniscient, how does prophecy enter into your world-view? If you believe that it’s possible, how can God know what’s going to happen if he doesn’t “know all” at some level?

CM is making the same mistake in confusing capacity with action that Richard Dawkins makes in The God Delusion and which we see with regularity from Team Calvin. The fact that God “could insert himself into any location and any time whenever he wishes” doesn’t make him “functionally omnipresent”, but rather “potentially omnipresent”. This is the same difference and distinction that I draw between omniscience and voliscience, between God knowing everything at all times and God knowing whatever He decides He wants to know. As for the question, no, I don’t consider God to be a slave to the external force of time. For more thoughts on this, see the chapter on God as Game Designer in The Irrational Atheist.

As for prophecy, this is pretty simple. The fact that you don’t know everything doesn’t mean you don’t know something in advance, especially if you are the one who is arranging to make it happen. There is absolutely no need for omniscience to support the concept of accurate Divinely-inspired prophecy.

Mailvox: convinced by the consequences

No doubt many readers will be amused by the eventual outcome of YM’s experience in attempting to discuss a basic political principle with his mother:

My father arrived home from a business trip last night. Upon hearing what happened, he ungrounded me, and suggested to my mother that punishing a child for thought crime would only drive him further into misogyny. Then he took me aside and said “While you may be right about Santa Claus being not being real, you have to accept that a 6-year old will throw a tantrum at you when you tell him that.”

The funny thing is, I never actually told her women shouldn’t vote, only that it was an interesting idea, yet she still reacted like a child. Given my mother’s irrational response, I am now firmly on your side. I had seen this sort of behavior before, but mostly from younger, feminist women. I never thought in a million years that my evangelical, allegedly traditionalist mother would act the same way. You are right about learning a valuable lesson on women.

Ironic, and yet hardly surprising. YM is not only fortunate in having a strong male father in his life, but he is aware of it. Notice too that he didn’t react with outrage to his unfair and absurd grounding, but simply waited calmly for his father to rectify the situation. This is the way things are supposed to be.

As I have pointed out many times before, those who are capable of intellectually defending their position will do so calmly. Those who can’t always try to shut down the conversation one way or another. While the pro-suffrage side did have some effective hypothetical arguments in the early part of the 20th century, the subsequent 90 years of negative consequences have sufficed to destroy them utterly.

It’s interesting to note how female solipsism can trump a mother’s instinct to defend her son, which nevertheless is capable of detaching a woman from Team Woman at times.

Mailvox: try again, George

Unsurprisingly, yet another atheist demonstrates that he doesn’t know what “evidence” is.

“You have repeatedly asserted that voting is equivalent to liberty, now please either offer your evidence in support of the assertion or retract the claim.”

If there is no connection between liberty and voting, then how could women voting have negatively effected the amount of liberty in the country.

Furthermore it has been demonstrated throughout history that only way to undermine authoritarianism, to assure that the people and not the very few, define liberties is to assure that government is the result of the consent of the governed. The only way to assure all are able to consent is through democracy of one form or another.

You fail to understand the dynamics of basic political science. I believe your misogyny gets in the way in this case.

My purported misogyny and/or failure to understand the dynamics of basic political science are wholly irrelevant here. And even if we ignore its obvious flaws, it is imposible to deny that the logic presented by George here is not evidence.

So, I repeat the demand: You have repeatedly asserted that voting is equivalent to liberty, now please either offer your evidence in support of the assertion or retract the claim.”