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Tag Archives: Socrates
Why was Socrates Put to Death?
At Slate, David Auerbach summarizes philosopher Rebecca Goldstein’s take on why Socrates died: Goldstein [in her new book, Plato at the Googleplex] argues that Socrates was ultimately executed because he deferred to no one’s authority and tore down Athens’ idealized … Continue reading
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Tagged authority, Dostoevsky, mystification, philosophy, Socrates
5 Comments
In Memoriam of Christopher Hitchens
On hearing of Christopher Hitchens’s death this morning, my first thoughts went to something he had once said as a play on Socrates: The unlived life is not worth examining. Christopher Hitchens lived a life worth examining. May his future … Continue reading
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Tagged atheism, atheist, Christopher Hitchens, death, George Orwell, God, hitch, Jesus, life, Socrates
3 Comments
A Sign from Zeus: Andre Glucksmann on Textual Interpretation and Emphasis
A quote doesn’t get more profound than this, so I’ll post it twice (so that you’ll read it twice). It comes from the French philosopher, Andre Glucksmann: Socrates’s uncertainty revealed a rupture that gave birth to philosophy. The divine word is … Continue reading
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Tagged ancient Greece, interpretation, love, Oedipus, reading, reason, Socrates, texts, the Bible
5 Comments
Damon Linker Owns the New Atheists
Damon Linker, a contributor to the New Republic, is, to my mind, one of the more insightful writers on religion and irreligion writing in the United States today. In a recent interview with The Economist, Linker offers what I can only describe … Continue reading
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Tagged atheism, atheists, Camus, damon linker, freedom, jerry coyne, new atheism, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Socrates, Voltaire
17 Comments
Chris Hedges, Noam Chomsky, and Critical Thinking
At TruthDig last week, Chris Hedges reported on his interview with Noam Chomsky. Here’s what Chomsky told Hedges about the importance of critical thinking: “I try to encourage people to think for themselves, to question standard assumptions,” Chomsky said when … Continue reading
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Tagged Chris Hedges, critical thinking, dialogue, justice, noam chomsky, philosophy, reason, Richard Dawkins, Socrates, thinking, William F. Buckley
2 Comments
Rhetorical Honey v. Rhetorical Vinegar: Jerry Coyne in the Light of Thomas Paine and Martha Nussbaum
Rhetorical honey v. rhetorical vinegar? Evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne thinks that atheists shouldn’t be shy about what they believe, guarding the feelings of religious believers. As an agnostic, do I think that he is he right? I think that he is. … Continue reading
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Tagged apologetics, atheism, atheists, free speech, Islam, jerry coyne, Jesus, martha nussbaum, nay bears, Socrates, the Bible, Thomas Paine
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Why I blog
Here’s my list of reasons for blogging: Contingency. Blogging is a rather pure way of embracing contingency (chance). Like dropping a marble down a pachinko machine, I put a random thought out into the world and see what associations it provokes in me and anyone … Continue reading
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Tagged aphorism, blogging, contingency, existentialism, free speech, irony, Kafka, life, Socrates, solidarity, why i blog, writing
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The Eight Ways of Being in the World
It’s hard to live in the world. Suffering happens. Then more suffering happens. Then you die. In the face of these facts, Albert Camus wrote that the first question of philosophy is suicide. But if you’re not going to do … Continue reading
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Tagged Albert Camus, apologetics, atheism, Buddhism, Darwin, don quixote, Jesus, life, Oedipus, philosophy, sisyphus, Socrates
18 Comments
Would I Mind Being Called an Atheist?
I wouldn’t mind the atheist tag—if that is what I was. Atheism has a more than respectable intellectual pedigree and it has brought enormous levels of freedom and intellectual intelligence into the world. I wouldn’t want to be in a … Continue reading
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Tagged agnostic, agnosticism, atheism, atheist, evolution, Genesis, philosophy, Plato, psychology, science, Socrates
5 Comments
Today’s Question
If “God is dead,” the madman in Nietzsche’s The Joyful Wisdom (1882) asks this question: Do we not now wander through an endless nothingness? Does not empty space breathe upon us? Has it not become colder? Does not night come … Continue reading
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Tagged agnosticism, apologetics, atheism, Christianity, existentialism, Nietzsche, philosophy, Politics, religion, Richard Dawkins, science, Socrates
2 Comments
“FAMILIES in crisis that are preyed upon by charlatans with faith magic and false solutions”: A Scary Scene from the Film “Poltergeist”—with an Ironic Admonition to Use CRITICAL THINKING
As we head into a recession (or worse) a lot of religious charlatans will be out preying upon people who are hitting bottom—and bamboozling them with thought magic, simplistic reasoning, and threats of hell. This scene (from the movie Poltergeist) has long … Continue reading
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Tagged agnosticism, critical thinking, economy, film, fundamentalism, ghosts, jonathan edwards, philosophy, poltergeist, puritanism, skepticism, Socrates
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America’s Comedic Socrates: Bill Maher on “Religulous” and His “I don’t know” Agnosticism
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Tagged America, apologetics, Bill Maher, Catholicism, Christianity, creationism, Genesis, Jesus, Judaism, philosophy, Socrates
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“And if I claim to be a wise man, well, it surely means that I don’t know”: Socratic Skepticism in a Kansas Song (1976)
Rising above the noise and confusion of the herd—to other noises and other confusions?:
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Tagged cool cats, Kansas, music, mystical states, philosophy, Plato, poetry, psychology, reason, Socrates, the Enlightenment
2 Comments
The Passion of the Agnostic? “The Death of Socrates” by Jacques-Louis David
From Plato’s Apology (Socrates speaking): “I am wiser than this man: neither of us knows anything that is really worth knowing, but he thinks that he has knowledge when he has not, while I, having no knowledge, do not think … Continue reading
The Significance of The “Gabriel Revelation” Tablet—Explained Through an Imaginary Dialogue Between Socrates and a Student
Student: Why, exactly, is the recently discovered “Gabriel Revelation” tablet supposedly so important to our understanding of Christian origins? If some people were already thinking, a generation before Jesus, about Isaiah 53 in messianic terms, why is this such a big … Continue reading
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Tagged agnostic, apologetics, atheist, Christianity, James Dobson, John Macarthur, literature, philosophy, religion, Santi Tafarella, Socrates
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“The Vision of Christ That Thou Dost See”: William Blake on the Many Faces of Jesus
Here are the last fourteen lines of William Blake’s “The Everlasting Gospel”: The Vision of Christ that thou dost see Is my Vision’s Greatest Enemy. Thine has a great hook nose like thine; Mine has a snub nose like to … Continue reading
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Tagged apologetics, atheist, Bible, Christianity, James Dobson, Jesus Christ, John Macarthur, literature, poetry, Santi Tafarella, Socrates, William Blake
3 Comments
Doubters of the World Unite: Peter Ustinov on Belief and Doubt
The British actor Peter Ustinov, who died in 2004, made this rather astute observation: Beliefs are what divide people. Doubt unites them. The quote is taken from Jack Huberman’s The Quotable Atheist, p.306. The way I read the quote is that … Continue reading
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Tagged religion, Santi Tafarella, science, skepticism, Socrates, socratic school, St. Paul, the apostle Paul, theater, walking, walking in the shoes of others
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Prometheus Unbound 