A Moment of Silence Please

The creator of Gold Medal Ribbon has left us.

“I just had the crazy idea that somebody ought to open a store that sold . . . nothing but ice cream, and could do it in an outstanding way.”

Nothin’ crazy about that.  Mission accomplished.

Studies Show

One of the follies of our age is our reliance on “studies”.  

Our reliance, I would argue, is a product of the scientism (i.e. science is the only source of truth and wisdom) and “metaphysical empiricism” (i.e. if it’s not discoverable by the senses, then it doesn’t exist) that infects so much of our thinking.  

In our day, “thus saith the Lord” has been replaced with “studies show”, or “experts say”.  We bend our knees to whatever follows those sacred words. 

Now, of course, studies can be useful and even true.  But they are open to distortion.  They are not divine pronouncements.  Take the following study:  Conservatives Happier Than Liberals.

This study confirms the findings of a 2006 study:

Individuals with conservative ideologies are happier than liberal-leaners, . . .Regardless of marital status, income or church attendance . . .

These, apparently, are the facts of the study.  However, those who conducted the study also reported this:

and new research pinpoints the reason: Conservatives rationalize social and economic inequalities.

. . .right-wing individuals reported greater life satisfaction and well-being than left-wingers, the new study found. Conservatives also scored highest on measures of rationalization, which gauge a person’s tendency to justify, or explain away, inequalities.

This, of course, is interpretation.  Rationalization is not always neutral term.  It can be an accusation.  A rationalization can be a distortion of logic.  It can be the attempt to justify something you know to be wrong or false.  So, conservatives are happier, but only because they are in denial?

The problem, of course, is that the study doesn’t necessarily show that at all.  From the study:

The rationalization measure included statements such as: “It is not really that big a problem if some people have more of a chance in life than others,” and “This country would be better off if we worried less about how equal people are.”

The researchers take it for granted that one should naturally find economic inequality to be morally unacceptable.  But why is that?  Why should that be assumed?  That’s not science, that’s belief.

Couldn’t we take the same data (that conservatives are, generally speaking, happier than liberals) and conclude that liberals are uncomfortable with liberty, or that they are intellectual adolescents?   After all, the more freedom you allow individuals, the greater the risk of inequality.  Or, when an adult becomes depressed because “things aren’t fair”, why can’t that be a sign of immaturity?

I’m not arguing that the study shows that liberals are averse to liberty, or intellectual adolescents.  The study doesn’t necessitate that conclusion.  But neither does it force us to the conclusion that conservatives rationalize inequalities.  

Beware of studies and men (and women) in white coats.  Thus saith Parise.

Lewis & Narnia

Fans of Lewis’ Narnia Chronicles should dig this.  I was always a bigger fan of his non-fiction.  Everyone should read Lewis’ A Grief Observed.  It is a profound book on evil and suffering.

But before Lewis, you should read Chesterton - the man who, according to Lewis himself, helped awaken him from his intellectual and spiritual sleep.  

But is it Beautiful?

I love art.  In fact, I don’t understand those who don’t love art.

If you love art too, then perhaps you are as puzzled as I am by certain kinds of “art”.   Alexa e-mailed this in, and I’m passing it along to you:  10 Dramatically Controversial Art Pieces. 

The question is, is it art?  If so, then what makes it art?  

Of the ten pieces only one has the potential to be art.  Can you guess which one?  The rest are entertaining, but not art.

My thesis:  art is beauty.  And beauty isn’t solely a matter of taste.  Or rather, beauty can’t be purely subjective.  There is an objective element to beauty.

America

Does the world hate America, because of George W. Bush?  

If so, then why do they keep electing Bush’s friends?

Boris Johnson becomes new conservative mayor of London

Silvio Berlusconi in Italy 

Nicolas Sarkozy in France

Angela Merkel in Germany

What’s your explanation?  Can you do justice to this question?  

Here is Dennis Prager’s take:  The World Doesn’t Hate America, The Left Does.

Mystery

Where’s Hercule Poirot (or Robert Goren) when you need him?

Murder as if from a novel. 

Humor

Some philosophers argue about possible worlds and the metaphysics of modality.  

Here’s a possibility to contemplate (via Libertas): If celebrities moved to Oklahoma.

Scientific Confusion

David Berlinski, who was on Tuesday interviewed by Dennis Prager, hits the nail on the head:

It’s ridiculous.  Science isn’t the only thing that’s provable, for the large reason that science isn’t provable at all.  Proof is a concept belonging to mathematics of extremely limited application, and is artifactual in its nature.  We contrive the notion of a proof.  

When we pass beyond the example of 2 + 2 = 4, or anything of equal sophistication in the mathematics literature, we deal with life as it’s presented to us: we grope, we fumble, we’re uncertain, we’re not clear.  

Sometimes, as in the magnificent physical theories, we have powerful intellectual structures, but they don’t answer to our deepest intellectual needs.  Other times, we do the best we can. Still other times we have resources that are just flagrantly not scientific, for example accounting, the law, business, social interactions, political science (misnamed because it has nothing to do with science).  

Most of our lives, most of our intellectual concerns, most of our allegiances are devoted to things that have nothing to do with the physical theories - the great physical theories.

So, to claim that these have a unique grasp on our intelligence and our allegiance strike me as utterly preposterous - it’s not true.

The abuse and misuse of the word “proof” is one of the great confusions of our day.

Scientific Confusion

At Chaffey College, where I sometimes teach (though probably not for too much longer), a debate was recently held.  Michael Shermer and Faz Rana, along with two Chaffey philosophy instructors, debated the relationship between science and religion.  

I, against my better judgment, allowed my critical thinking students to attend the debate for extra credit (I don’t usually give extra credit).  I didn’t attend. 

I don’t like science / religion debates.  They are evidence of confusion.  Science deals in the empirical.  Religion deals in the non-empirical.  How can there be a conflict?  We are talking two different realities here, are we not?  Further, the nature of science and the nature of religion is not a scientific issue, it’s a philosophical one.  Put differently, the issue isn’t an empirical one.  No amount of scientific training helps here.  Philosophers qua philosophers have no scientific training, and scientists qua scientists have no philosophical training.  Bad things happen when scientists play philosophers.

Such points, and many others, seem routinely ignored in these debates.  Such debates make things worse.

But is it beautiful (again)?

Last week we saw abortion as “art” -  the logical result of “my body, my business” + “no such thing as beauty”. This week we have death as “art.  Well, not death (that’s been done), but the dying.  Aus Deutschland:

The prizewinning artist Gregor Schneider . . .. . .He wants someone whose dying hours will be spent in an art gallery with the public admiring the way the light plays on the flesh of a person gasping for the last breath.

Again, is this not an implication of the view that art is whatever we want it to be, or rather, art is determined by “what it says”, or “how it challenges”?

But in addition to questions about aesthetics, this “art” raises other questions.  For example, at some point are we in danger of treating weighty things lightly?