Blog Stats
- 2,758,756 readers since June 2008
Recent Comments
- Jim Loving on Robert Wright on Osiris, Jesus, Dives, and Lazarus
- longviewhypnosis on What, Exactly, Is Wrong With Bestiality?
- frauposaune on Emily Dickinson, Lesbian?: Her Letter to Susan Gilbert, in June of 1852, Might Tell Us Less Than You Think
- Andre Fruge on Emily Dickinson, Lesbian?: Her Letter to Susan Gilbert, in June of 1852, Might Tell Us Less Than You Think
- Dave on Barack Obama: The Leopard in the Book of Daniel?
- Aletha Balke on Emily Dickinson, Lesbian?: Her Letter to Susan Gilbert, in June of 1852, Might Tell Us Less Than You Think
- De Seksuele Sociale Norm - ilvy.com on What, Exactly, Is Wrong With Bestiality?
- Kelsey on Emily Dickinson, Lesbian?: Her Letter to Susan Gilbert, in June of 1852, Might Tell Us Less Than You Think
- Fake People, Pure Product - Ordinary Times on Emily Dickinson, Lesbian?: Her Letter to Susan Gilbert, in June of 1852, Might Tell Us Less Than You Think
- Hailee Steinfeld’s ‘Afterlife’ Debuts in New ‘Dickinson’ Trailer - Screen Times on Emily Dickinson, Lesbian?: Her Letter to Susan Gilbert, in June of 1852, Might Tell Us Less Than You Think
- fred on Have Yourself a Maoist Little Christmas?
- Les on Lancaster Mayor R. Rex Parris: Is This What a Rising Christian Political Star Looks Like?
- Anonymous on Emily Dickinson, Lesbian?: Her Letter to Susan Gilbert, in June of 1852, Might Tell Us Less Than You Think
- Pandora on Emily Dickinson, Lesbian?: Her Letter to Susan Gilbert, in June of 1852, Might Tell Us Less Than You Think
- Pandora on Emily Dickinson, Lesbian?: Her Letter to Susan Gilbert, in June of 1852, Might Tell Us Less Than You Think
Top Posts
- Emily Dickinson, Lesbian?: Her Letter to Susan Gilbert, in June of 1852, Might Tell Us Less Than You Think
- What, Exactly, Is Wrong With Bestiality?
- Walt Whitman: "To be indeed a God!"
- Clit Rubbing Bonobos: A Clue to the Evolutionary Origin of Human Homosexuality?
- "Assassins of the Mind": Christopher Hitchens's Essay on Muslim Fundamentalist Violence, and Threats of Violence, Toward Authors and Publishers, Is a Must Read
- "The Future Has Been Shown to Me to the Year 2037": Jeane Dixon and the Marketing of Miracle, Mystery, and Authority
- "Courtly Love, Or, Woman As Thing": How To Do Lacanian Analysis Like Slavoj Zizek (Or, At Least Understand What He's Getting At When He Does)
- "The Vision of Christ That Thou Dost See": William Blake on the Many Faces of Jesus
- A Golden Rule for the 21st Century? And a Quote That Rivals Anything in Shakespeare or the Bible?
- Lancaster Mayor R. Rex Parris: Is This What a Rising Christian Political Star Looks Like?
-
Recent Posts
- Woke Fanatics? Essentialists vs. Nominalists
- A Mini-Course In Rhetoric For Writers. Concept 2.10: Emerson’s “Circles”
- A Mini-Course In Rhetoric For Writers. Concept 2.9: Imitation And Emulation With An Eye On Competition
- A Mini-Course In Rhetoric For Writers. Concept 2.8: Selection And Editing
- A Mini-Course In Rhetoric For Writers. Concept 2.7: Audience And Rhetorical Strategy
Recent Haiku Tweets
- AOC says it well. twitter.com/CNN/status/108… 1 year ago
- nytimes.com/interactive/20… 1 year ago
- RT @mrchan: So much has changed in America, and yet so much hasn't https://t.co/x2mthUr4Kc 1 year ago
- Perfect. twitter.com/newsundayheral… 3 years ago
- RT @goldenglobes: At tonight's #GoldenGlobes we honor Hollywood legend Meryl Streep with the prestigious Cecil B. Demille Award. https://t.… 3 years ago
Tag Archives: truth
Three Things I Think Are True
At this point in my life, I think there are three things that are true–the first one being rather obvious: I am a limited being, embedded in the system I’m trying to explain. This means I cannot be wholly confident that … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged atheism, Buddhism, God, life, meditation, now, philosophy, psychology, truth
2 Comments
Does the Truth Matter or Not?
Catholic Andrew Sullivan, in the context of reading the biblical scholar Bart Erhman’s new book, How Jesus Became God (Harper 2014), makes a crisp and refreshingly direct statement to his fellow biblical religionists who ignore expert consensus and the general … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged apologetics, critical thinking, God, Jesus, philosophy, the Bible, truth
11 Comments
What is Information? A Three Word Definition
The three word definition. The physicist Brian Greene, in his book The Hidden Reality (Knopf 2011), gives the best definition of information I’ve ever encountered: So, you start to ponder. What actually is information, and what does it do? Your … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged atheism, critical thinking, david hume, entropy, God, information, philosophy, science, truth
Leave a comment
Howard Kurtz is My Hero
Journalist Howard Kurtz has been goofing up lately, but the way he addressed it this past weekend is incredibly impressive (as can be seen in the below video). It’s rare, almost unheard of in any context, for someone to so … Continue reading
Ludwig Wittgenstein for Beginners
First thought. To get a handle on the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, one can start with a simple question: what does the scientist (as opposed to the philosopher) do and accomplish? The answer seems pretty straightforward. The scientist reasons and experiments … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged language games, Ludwig Wittgenstein, philosophy, rhizomes, richard rorty, science, truth
13 Comments
You Don’t Know What Work Is
John Churchill has a contrarian take on work: Is there no intrinsic value ─ no good in itself ─ in the work of a life that does not rise, in its own span, above the level of the mop and … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged blindness, life, love, philip levine, truth, what's hard, work
Leave a comment
Three Grandmas Watch Something Naughty
Very naughty. A nice reminder that adults can see and hear things without the least harm. __________ I love the display of irony here because we all know that this is exactly how individuals tend to respond to “shocking” images … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged beauty, comedy, free speech, grandmas, humor, irony, offense, solidarity, truth
1 Comment
Appearances vs. Reality
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged 20-something, America, appearances, Darwin, evolutionary psychology, living at home, narcissism, reality, truth
Leave a comment
Critical Thinking as a Spiritual Path: Prepare Ye the Way of the Truth?
Yale Divinity School graduate, and former evangelical, Jonathan Dudley, explains, in a recent essay, how lay evangelicals tend to evaluate expert testimony (and so arrive at ridiculous conclusions): Lay evangelicals evaluate the arguments made by “experts” in a manner different from many non-evangelicals. … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged apologetics, atheism, atheist, critical thinking, evangelicalism, Jesus, philosophy, truth
3 Comments
Neutrinos Faster than the Speed of Light: Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence
Or, as the New York Times put it today, “Incredible claims require incredible evidence.” The reference is to the mind-blowing (apparent) discovery that there are neutrinos that can outpace the speed of light. Here’s more from the New York Times: According … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged critical thinking, einstein, epistemology, lizard lick towing, physics, science, speed of light, truth
Leave a comment
If You’re Angry, And Words Fail
Don’t shoot! Try gesture: . Or, how about this? (Buddhist equanimity.) . The above painting is from a Laotian monastery. It’s an image of the Buddha leading monks through a treacherous path. He is silent and calm, walking through … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged anger, Buddha, Buddhism, grace, Hinduism, life, light, love, meditation, revenge, truth, yoga
Leave a comment
In the Free Will Debate, Does the Truth Matter?
According to the New York Times this morning, researchers have discovered a curious correlation between belief (or disbelief) in free will and behavior: [W]hen people doubt free will, they do worse at their jobs and are less honest. This raises … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged arthur schopenhauer, atheism, critical thinking, determinism, free will, God, materialism, philosophy, pragmatism, psychology, truth
6 Comments
Chris Hedges the Prophet on Print Culture Turning to Image Culture
Former New York Times war correspondent, Chris Hedges, has, over the past couple of years, taken on the mantle of a secular prophet—an emperor has no clothes truthteller—writing scathing (and I think powerful) books and essays documenting the messes that we find ourselves … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged America, books, Chris Hedges, Fox News, illiteracy, intellectuals, life, literacy, propaganda, reading, truth
4 Comments
Was Keats Right? Surfer-Physicist Garrett Lisi’s TED Talk
The poet John Keats famously wrote, at the end of his “Ode on a Grecian Urn”, the following: Beauty is truth, truth beauty—that is all / Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know. I’m not sure this … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged beauty, Garrett Lisi, John Keats, philosophy, physics, poetry, truth
Leave a comment
The Human Bones Discovered at Masada: An Example of Religion Hindering Science
At the academic web magazine, Bible and Interpretation, anthropologist Joe Zias complains about ultra-orthodox Jews hindering archaeology and anthropology: For several decades self-appointed groups of the ultra-orthodox have been waging an all out cultural war against the archaeological community in general and … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged apologetics, atheism, Bill Maher, fundamentalism, Islam, Judaism, masada, orthodoxy, philosophes, pilate, the Enlightenment, truth
8 Comments
Ground Zero Mosque Fact Check
Not that the facts matter (for the right in this country makes up its own facts exactly as it pleases), but some AP reporters actually went to the bother of fact checking some of the claims that prominent Republicans like … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged bill of rights, dignity, fact check, freedom, ground zero, Islam, lies, mosque, truth
4 Comments
Quote of the Day
From an interview with Rutgers philosopher and cognitive scientist, Jerry Fodor: God provided us with tenure so we could do our best to say what’s true. I’m doing my best.
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Charles Darwin, evolution, free speech, God, integrity, jerry fodor, philosophy, speaking truth to power, tenure, truth
Leave a comment
