Cutting Losses By Cashiering Losers

UPDATE: The John Edwards presidential campaign has apparently chosen to deflect the inevitable firestorm of criticism headed their way by firing the foul-mouthed blogger Amanda Marcotte and another equally vile colleague, Melissa McEwan. This is not earning them points with the Democratic base who are evidently outraged (aren't they always) that Edwards would dismiss these exemplars of liberal values, but to have kept these two on would have been to subject the campaign to constant distractions and criticism to which it would have been difficult to effectively respond.

The question we have is why on earth did Edwards' people hire them in the first place? Is the Edwards campaign so tone-deaf to decency that they didn't see Marcotte and McEwan as a problem until people in the blogosphere started quoting them?

For an example of Marcotte's general disposition go here and scroll down. Caution: Not for children.

UPDATE on the UPDATE: It appears that reports that Mr. Edwards was going to relieve himself, so to speak, of the execrable blogger duo were a bit premature:

The [Edwards]campaign distributed written apologies from the two women, who stressed they were writing on personal blogs and not on behalf of the campaign. Edwards said he believes in giving everyone a "fair shake."

"I've talked to Amanda and Melissa; they have both assured me that it was never their intention to malign anyone's faith, and I take them at their word," Edwards said. Mr. Edwards is either incredibly gullible or incredibly stupid.

Here's a sample of what appears on Ms. Marcotte's blog, Pandagon in one of her screeds against pro-life Christians:

Q: What if Mary had taken Plan B [a contraceptive]after the Lord filled her with his hot, white, sticky Holy Spirit?

A: You'd have to justify your misogyny with another ancient mythology.

That Ms. Marcotte would claim to have not intended to offend anyone's religious faith with this remark tells us something about the sort of cesspools she likes to swim in, I suppose. That Mr. Edwards would take her at her word when she claims to have not intended to malign anyone's faith with remarks like this tells us that he is afraid to alienate the left-wing bloggers who find this sort of sleaze perfectly compatible with their own standards of decency, and who would have his political scalp were he to toss overboard two of their own.

HT: Captain's Quarters.

RLC

Stopping Iran's Nukes

Here's one way, perhaps, to stop Iran's nuclear weapons program. Question for the ethicists among our readers: Are such measures, assuming they successfully avert a war, moral?

RLC

Hitchens Gets Rich

There's no more skillful writer, or effective advocate of the struggle in Iraq, than Christopher Hitchens. Nor is there anyone an opponent of the war would want reviewing his book less than he would want Mr. Hitchens to critique it. So, the New York Times' culture critic, Frank Rich, who churned out an apparently shallow screed against the conduct of the Bush administration since 9/11, must have winced when he saw that Hitchens was reviewing his effort for The Claremont Institute's Review of Books.

After having read the review Rich probably felt that he had been mugged, which indeed he had. Here's some of the drubbing Hitchens metes out to the hapless Mr. Rich:

For another instance of Rich's pseudo-forensic style, you might try the following: "I don't think we ever said-at least I know I didn't say that there was a direct connection between September the 11th and Saddam Hussein," Bush said in the spring of 2006. That is technically true, but it is really just truthiness: Bush struck 9/11 like a gong in every fear-instilling speech about Iraq he could.

Now, "truthiness" is a laugh-word invented by Steven Colbert who (along with his friend Jon Stewart and the other heroes of Comedy Central) is the beau ideal of what Rich considers to be the ironic. In this book and in his regular column, he gives "truthiness" a workout whenever he can. He clearly wishes he had coined it himself, and he has kept it going for perhaps a touch longer-may I hint?-than even Colbert might wish. Let us examine it in the present case. The administration did not, in point of fact and as Rich concedes, ever make the case that Saddam Hussein had sponsored the assault of 9/11. It did, however, strongly imply that he might have an interest in, or enthusiasm for, this kind of activity. And many Americans when polled were found to suspect him of an even more direct connection.

Well, Saddam Hussein had sheltered the Iraqi-American fugitive who mixed the chemicals for the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center. He had allowed the internationally-wanted criminal Abu Nidal to use Baghdad as his headquarters. He had boasted of paying a bounty to the suicide-murderers of Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The man who hijacked the Achille Lauro cruise ship, a certain Abu Abbas, who was responsible for rolling Leon Klinghoffer in his wheelchair off the vessel's deck and into the Mediterranean, had to be released when apprehended because he was traveling on an Iraqi passport. A diplomatic passport. The Baghdad state-run press had exulted at the revenge taken on America on 9/11.

This does not exhaust the "truthiness" of the suggestion that Saddam Hussein might have to be taken seriously as a sponsor of nihilistic violence. Could one even suggest that those who thought so might be intuitively and even objectively wiser than those who thought it crass to mention Saddam Hussein and "terrorism" in the same breath? Not without being jeered at by Rich, who either does not know any of the above facts or who chooses not to include any of them in his proudly truth-centered narrative.

Here's another important passage, though it's not directed specifically at Rich's book:

Once the [1991] war was over, the U.N. inspectors discovered something that has been erased from many memories. Saddam Hussein had built an enormous secret nuclear reactor at Tuwaitha, and had acquired most of the elements of a nuclear weapon. Had he waited to develop this, and only then moved to take Kuwait, that small yet incredibly wealthy country would be a part of Iraq to this day, and we would all be living-as, unknowingly, we did then-partly at the pleasure of a psychopathic dictator. Accommodations would soon enough have been made to this reality by many powers, perhaps including our own.

It is astonishing how those who scoff at Bush for believing Saddam had WMD and was interested in developing nuclear weapons, never seem to think to mention this. Nor do they ever seem to contemplate that had we not invaded Saddam would certasinly have developed nuclear weapons at the first opportunity in order to offset the Iranian nuclear program. Such details are easily set aside, however, when there are political points to be made by beating up George Bush for "lying" to us about Iraq's WMD.

RLC

Endangered Species

The Daily Mail shows us this picture of polar bears on an ice floe

and runs this story:

They cling precariously to the top of what is left of the ice floe, their fragile grip the perfect symbol of the tragedy of global warming.

Captured on film by Canadian environmentalists, the pair of polar bears look stranded on chunks of broken ice.

Although the magnificent creatures are well adapted to the water, and can swim scores of miles to solid land, the distance is getting ever greater as the Arctic ice diminishes.

The story gives the impression that these bears are stranded far from land, clinging desperately to the ice lest they fall into the sea and drown, all because of global warming. What they don't tell us is where the photographers were perched who took the photo. Were they standing on a pier or were they on a boat hundreds of miles out? They also don't tell us that polar bears often cavort on ice floes, and that these two, being excellent swimmers, are in no danger at all. The story is a good example of how the media has lost all sense of an obligation to be objective and unbiased in reporting the news.

Nevertheless, there is solid evidence that polar bear populations are in decline, but though the story strongly suggests the decline is due to global warming it never really makes the connection clear. The reader is left wondering exactly how the bears' sagging population numbers are related to climate change, but there's not much doubt that the writers of the story want us to think they are.

Anyway, it doesn't appear that there's much that can be done about it since a study on climate change released Friday observes that even if we stopped pumping greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere today the earth will continue to warm for centuries more. The best we can hope for is that we can minimize the damage. Pretty depressing.

It's a nice picture, though.

RLC

Myths About Atheism (Pt. IX)

In this installment in our series on anti-theist Sam Harris' debunking of ten myths about atheism we'll consider "myth" number 9. Harris writes that this myth states that:

Atheists ignore the fact that religion is extremely beneficial to society.

Those who emphasize the good effects of religion never seem to realize that such effects fail to demonstrate the truth of any religious doctrine. This is why we have terms such as "wishful thinking" and "self-deception." There is a profound distinction between a consoling delusion and the truth.

In any case, the good effects of religion can surely be disputed. In most cases, it seems that religion gives people bad reasons to behave well, when good reasons are actually available. Ask yourself, which is more moral, helping the poor out of concern for their suffering, or doing so because you think the creator of the universe wants you to do it, will reward you for doing it or will punish you for not doing it?

Among other shortcomings in Harris' reply is the fact that he has a much too pinched view of the this-world benefits of Christianity, thinking them to be limited solely to the moral sphere. Many scholars agree, however, that Christianity provided far more benefit than just a moral basis, as important as that is, to Western civilization and eventually to the world. For example, Christianity provided the only cultural milieu in which modern science could and did develop. It also gave rise to a rich tradition in the arts, especially music, unmatched by any other culture. It fostered a high view of women and of the value of education, and was the motivating force behind the development of the university system in Europe and the United States.

None of these things ever really emerged in any other cultural setting. They only arose among people who believed that God was personal, rational, and that He had laid down certain standards for the treatment of other people. The appearance of these benefits also required that it be widely believed that individuals are created in the image of God and are loved by Him. Only this conviction, as John Locke reminds us, can support and sustain a belief in human dignity and worth.

For more on the contribution to human progress and well-being made by a Christian worldview see Rodney Stark's Victory of Reason: How Christianity Led to Freedom, Capitalism and Western Success, or Under the Influence: How Christianity Transformed Civilization by Alvin Schmidt

Moreover, Christian theism satisfies human yearnings that non-theistic peoples have no hope of satisfying. For example, if Harris is correct and there is no God then there's also no meaning to life, no ground for morality, no basis for human dignity or worth, and no real justice. Nor is there any basis for believing that we are a coherent self, that love is anything more than a chemical reaction in the brain, that there is such a thing as objective truth, or that we have any real basis for trusting our reason to lead us to that truth. In other words, the belief that there is a God gives us an existential hope that our deepest yearnings will not go unsatisfied forever. Atheism can only shrug its shoulders and admonish us to get over it.

Since Harris asks us to consider which is more moral - to help the poor out of concern for their suffering or because God wants us to do it, let's turn to that question.

We can begin by pointing out that the question is mis-framed. It should be stated thusly: What obligates us to be concerned about another person's suffering in the first place? Why would it be wrong to be indifferent to another man's pain? Mr. Harris may wish to help the man who suffers, but if he did not wish to help him, even if indeed he wished to cause the suffering, why would that be immoral? Where does an obligation to help those who suffer come from if there is no God? Surely Mr. Harris doesn't think that nature or evolution can impose obligations upon us, but then, if not, what does?

The desire to help another is, if atheism is true, nothing more than an arbitrary preference some people have and others lack. Those who have it are no more "moral" than those who don't. They're just different in the same way that those who have color vision are different from those who are color-blind.

So, the answer to Mr. Harris' question is that if he's right about God, neither concern for another's suffering nor a mistaken duty to obey a non-existent God is more moral because there simply is no moral right or wrong. There are just things that people, like other animals, do. To pose the question of which is more moral is like asking whether starfish are more emotional than clams. The question is nonsense because, on the assumption of atheism, moral right and wrong is not a property of human behavior any more than emotion is a property of starfish and clam behavior.

For the rest of our replies to Harris' Ten Myths go here for #8. The rest can be found by going here and following the links at the end of the post.

RLC

What Was He Thinking?

The Democratic presidential candidates certainly are fun to watch. First John Kerry put the kibosh on any hopes he had of reprising his 2004 run for the presidency by inadvertantly calling the troops in Iraq academic underachievers.

Then Joe Biden managed to insult the entire African-American community while trying to compliment Barack Obama, and now John Edwards, the man who demonstrates his deep concern for the poor by living in the most ostentatiously palatial digs in North Carolina, paid for by the obscene settlements he obtained chasing ambulances, has hired himself a spokesperson guaranteed to cause him to wonder what he could possibly have been thinking.

By itself, hiring a spokesperson would be of no moment, but this one, a "blogmaster," is Amanda Marcotte, one of the craziest, and vilest, of the left-wing crazies in the blogosphere. Her role as Edwards' internet presence can only eventuate in multiple embarrassments for the candidate. While Biden spends his days trying to explain to every black person he encounters on the street what he really meant, and Edwards spends his trying to explain why he would hire such a sleaze as Ms Marcotte to represent his campaign, Hillary and Obama float serenely above the fray.

To get a taste of Ms Marcotte's style check out Michelle Malkin's site, but be forewarned, it's neither pretty nor pleasant.

RLC

Nothing Left to Say

Victor David Hanson explains why the Democrats will have almost nothing helpful to say or do about the war in Iraq for the next several months. He gives four reasons altogether. Here's his first:

For all the talk of cutting off funds, redeployment, and pulling out, the new Democratic Congress will, at least for now, probably do nothing except speak impassioned words and make implicit threats. Here's why.

First, they have to digest what they have swallowed. Democratic critics had previously framed their opposition to the war in terms of a disastrous tenure of Defense Secretary Rumsfeld; a culpable indifference to the status quo in Baghdad and at Centcom; a failure to listen to the more intellectual generals such as David Petraeus; the "too few troops" mantra; and the lionization of Gens. Shinseki, Zinni, and other shunned military critics.

But now Abizaid, Casey, Khalilzad, and Rumsfeld are all absent - or about to be - from direct involvement in the war. The supposed villain cast of Cobra II and Fiasco has exited, and the purported good guys have entered. David Petraeus will, de facto, be in charge, not just in the strictly military sense, but, given the press and politics of the war, spiritually as well - in the manner that Grant by late summer 1864 had become symbolic of the entire Union military effort that was his to win or lose. Many of those officers involved in the "revolt of the generals" have now largely supported the surge - something Democrats themselves had inadvertently apparently called for when they serially lamented there were too few troops to win in Iraq.

All the old targets of the Democrats are no more, and it will take time for them to re-adjust the crosshairs to aim at men and policies that they have heretofore viewed sympathetically.

Read the rest. It's very good.

RLC

Hope For a Miracle Cure

Many of us know people who have had, or who are presently struggling with, cancer. There appears now to be hope that a simple, inexpensive chemical compound might hold the key to a cure. Here are a couple of excerpts from a story that's appearing in almost every major news outlet:

It sounds almost too good to be true: a cheap and simple drug that kills almost all cancers by switching off their "immortality". The drug, dichloroacetate (DCA), has already been used for years to treat rare metabolic disorders and so is known to be relatively safe.

It also has no patent, meaning it could be manufactured for a fraction of the cost of newly developed drugs.

Evangelos Michelakis of the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada, and his colleagues tested DCA on human cells cultured outside the body and found that it killed lung, breast and brain cancer cells, but not healthy cells. Tumours in rats deliberately infected with human cancer also shrank drastically when they were fed DCA-laced water for several weeks.

DCA attacks a unique feature of cancer cells: the fact that they make their energy throughout the main body of the cell, rather than in distinct organelles called mitochondria. This process, called glycolysis, is inefficient and uses up vast amounts of sugar.

Until now it had been assumed that cancer cells used glycolysis because their mitochondria were irreparably damaged. However, Michelakis's experiments prove this is not the case, because DCA reawakened the mitochondria in cancer cells. The cells then withered and died.

Read the rest of the details here.

RLC

How to Beat Iran

Dick Morris explains how to defeat Iran without firing a shot:

Deterrence won't work. You cannot deter a suicide bomber by threatening to kill him. The nihilistic and apocalyptic worldview echoed in Tehran does not make retaliation a serious deterrent.

Instead, Bush should continue and accelerate his efforts to destroy Iran's economy by cutting off investments to companies that invest there. Frank Gaffney's disinvestterrror.org campaign says that 87 state-administered pension funds in the United States have invested $188 billion in one of 500 publicly traded companies that "partner with terrorist-sponsoring states."

These 500 companies among them "have $73 billion invested in Iran, Syria, Libya, and North Korea." (This 2004 data includes investments in Saddam's Iraq).

Among these companies are: Alcatal SA, BNP Paribas, Hyundai, Linden Petroleum, Oil and Natural Gas Corp, Siemens AG, Statoil ASA, Stolt Nielsen, Technip Coflexip, and Total SA. UBS, which was once on the list, has divested itself of all such investments.

The economic weakness of Iran makes disinvestment its Achilles' heel. With its non-oil and gas economy falling apart and its oil exports dropping while domestic demand is rising, Tehran already totters atop a mountain of popular discontent, as evidenced by the trouncing the establishment took in the local elections a few weeks ago.

So President Bush should mobilize the American people to disinvest in Iran and other terrorist states. He should ratchet up his efforts to persuade states and unions to adopt terror-free investment policies and urge Wall Street mutual funds to do likewise. No public action is required, but massive private action, catalyzed by Bush, can have a huge effect.

Two decades ago the left was demanding that American universities and corporations disinvest from South Africa because they practiced apartheid. Iran is a threat to the entire world. We're waiting for the left to rouse themselves from their slumbering indifference and campaign as vigorously for the economic punishment of this enemy of the United States as they once did against an ally.

RLC

Philosophers in Love

Jennifer Hart Weed has a fine essay on being in love with philosophy at Comment. She stresses that when we love philosophy it loves us in return:

In a lengthy discussion of God's love in the Summa theologiae, Aquinas argues that love is recognizing the good in someone else and desiring that good. More specifically, when you love a person you desire the good for that person. If this is correct, then to love philosophy would be to desire the goodness that is in it. This goodness could include moral goodness, such as ethics, as well as intellectual goodness, such as wisdom and truth. A lover of philosophy is someone who desires goodness and is passionately committed to knowing the good and to doing the good. Understood in this way, then, we can ask whether any human being has ever loved philosophy and what has philosophy offered in return? If we love philosophy, will she love us back?

She loves you back by showing you the truth about yourself and the people around you. She loves you back by helping you to develop your God-given ability to reason and to think. The pursuit of philosophy is intrinsically valuable because of the transformative nature of philosophy as a way of life. As philosophy pointed out to Boethius, human beings alone are rational animals. If human beings do not exercise and develop their rational capacities, they sink below their God-given potentials and purposes to the level of the brute animals (Consolation Book IV, chapter 3). In loving philosophy, we are loved in return because she makes us better human beings, and she points us to the ultimate good, God, whom we should love with all our being.

Read the whole thing, especially the titles of the four works she recommends at the end. Boethius' Consolation of Philosophy is short and filled with wonderful insights. She also lists her four favorite philosophers among whom is Eleanore Stump. Dr. Stump, coincidentally for those of you living in the Lancaster Co. area of Pennsylvania, will be speaking at F&M College on February 9th at 4:30 in Spahr auditorium. Her theme is "Love By All Accounts."

RLC

Waiting On God

In what appears to be an instant society that expects instant solutions, instant answers, and instant gratification, we find a very different message throughout the Old Testament and particularly from the Psalms. It's a message of patience and persistence, of waiting on God. Here's just a few references:

3. Yea, let none that wait on thee be ashamed:
let them be ashamed which transgress without cause.
4. Show me thy ways, O LORD;
teach me thy paths.
5. Lead me in thy truth, and teach me:
for thou art the God of my salvation;
on thee do I wait all the day.
Psalm 25:3-5

21. Let integrity and uprightness preserve me;
for I wait on thee.
Psalm 25:21

14. Wait on the LORD:
be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart:
wait, I say, on the LORD.
Psalm 27:14

34. Wait on the LORD, and keep his way,
and he shall exalt thee to inherit the land:
Psalm 27:34

20. Our soul waiteth for the LORD:
he is our help and our shield.
Psalm 33:20

7. Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for him:
fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way,
because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass.
8. Cease from anger, and forsake wrath:
fret not thyself in any wise to do evil.
9. For evildoers shall be cut off:
but those that wait upon the LORD, they shall inherit the earth.
Psalm 37:7-9

7. And now, Lord, what wait I for?
My hope is in thee.
Psalm 39:7

1. I waited patiently for the LORD;
and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry.
Psalm 40:1

18. I have waited for thy salvation, O LORD.
Genesis 49:18

1. Truly my soul waiteth upon God: from him cometh my salvation.
2. He only is my rock and my salvation; he is my defense;
I shall not be greatly moved.
Psalm 62:1-2

5. My soul, wait thou only upon God;
Psalm 62:5

27. These wait all upon thee;
that thou mayest give them their meat in due season.
Psalm 104:27

13. They soon forgat his works;
they waited not for his counsel:
Psalm 106:13

5. I wait for the LORD,
my soul doth wait,
and in his word do I hope.
6. My soul waiteth for the Lord
more than they that watch for the morning: I say, more than they that watch for the morning.
Psalm 130:5-6

14. The LORD upholdeth all that fall,
and raiseth up all those that be bowed down.
15. The eyes of all wait upon thee;
and thou givest them their meat in due season.
Psalm 145:14-15

9 And it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is the LORD; we have waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in his salvation.
Isaiah 25:9

It might help to read the text that leads up to these next two references to get the context of the events about to unfold. These are interesting because the people are beside themselves and with apparent good reason. They're about to be consumed by the enemy in both cases and they don't appear to be taking comfort in the Psalms. Any chance for survival appears dim and total destruction seems imminent. And then the explicit commands to "stand still"...

13. And Moses said unto the people, Fear ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD, which he will show to you today: for the Egyptians whom ye have seen today, ye shall see them again no more for ever.
Exodus 14: 13

15. and he said, Hearken ye, all Judah, and ye inhabitants of Jerusalem, and thou king Jehosh'aphat, Thus saith the LORD unto you, Be not afraid nor dismayed by reason of this great multitude; for the battle is not yours, but God's.
17. Ye shall not need to fight in this battle: set yourselves, stand ye still, and see the salvation of the LORD with you, O Judah and Jerusalem: fear not, nor be dismayed; tomorrow go out against them: for the LORD will be with you.
2 Chronicles 20: 15, 17

Waiting on God and standing still...very difficult things to do. It may seem that we have the option of waiting on God. We can choose to or not. The circumstances that elicit a "stand still" seem to have more of a sense of urgency about them. I wonder how many times we've been admonished to "stand still" and experience the salvation of God but were too busy in our own devices to hear.

The Dawkins Delusion

Dr. Terry Tommyrot has written a book titled The Dawkins Delusion, and is interviewed about the book here. Apparently Tommyrot doesn't think Dawkins really exists and finds arguments to the contrary woefully inane.

Dr. Tommyrot actually sounds exactly like Dawkins himself, or what Dawkins would sound like if he really existed. Anyone familiar with Dawkins' writings, or at least those writings attributed to him, especially The God Delusion, will find the interview pretty funny.

HT: Uncommon Descent.

RLC

The Slate in '08

According to the latest Fox News Opinion Dynamics Poll at this point in the contest it looks like Hillary vs. Rudy in 2008:

13. If the 2008 Democratic presidential primary were held today, for whom would you vote if the candidates were:

• Hillary Clinton 43%
• Barack Obama 15
• John Edwards 12
• Al Gore 11

14. If the 2008 Republican presidential primary were held today, for whom would you vote if the candidates were:

• Rudy Giuliani 34%
• John McCain 22
• Newt Gingrich 15
• Mitt Romney 3

I really don't think McCain has much of a chance of getting the Republican nomination. Too many conservatives just don't trust him and don't appreciate his shenanigans with the "gang of 14." Gingrich is probably the best of the candidates in terms of ideas and intellect, but he has too much personal baggage. Of course, so does Rudy. Moreover, Rudy is liberal on social issues like abortion, so it's a surprise that he ranks so high among Republicans. Perhaps it's because he's more likeable than McCain and has more charisma than Newt.

Hillary has the Democratic field to herself right now, but that would change if Gore mounted a serious effort. I think the left would dump Hillary in a nanosecond if Gore were to jump in, and I think he'd be harder for the Republicans to beat in November than Hillary would. The base of the Democratic party finds him more genuinely left than Hillary who they view as an unreliable opportunist.

We'll see.

RLC

Teach the Controversy

I was listening to NPR the other morning as they aired a feature on a struggling public school in Baltimore. They had their tape recorders in a biology class as the teacher tried to reconcile the upcoming lesson on Darwinian evolution with the Creationist convictions of some of her students. The lecture included this:

"You've got your area of faith. You've got the things your parents have taught you, your church has taught you. And all those things are good. But because we're in a science class, science is not based on faith. Science is based on fact. But I'm not saying this is right or wrong. All I'm telling you is this is on your [test]."

This is not a good approach. It sets up a false dichotomy between faith and fact, religion and science. In reality, it is a matter of faith, not fact, to believe that life could have arisen by purely material processes. and it is a matter of fact, not faith, that no one has been able to figure out how life could have ever originated as a consequence of the action of chance and physical forces.

What the teacher should have said, if she wanted to avoid controversy, is that "what we are going to be studying in class is the consensus view among scientists about how life arose. There are problems with this view and there are some scientists who think it is wrong. What we will not do is take a formal position on the question of whether or not the origin of life and the diversification of life required the input of an intelligent agent. We leave that question open. Our focus wil instead be on the physical evidence, both in support of the consensus view and against it, and allow you to draw your own conclusions about the philosophical questions. If the philosophical questions interest you, and they should, feel free to share your thoughts with the class."

That would have piqued the interest of at least some of her students, but, unfortunately, too many teachers know too little about this controversy to address it fairly, accurately and interestingly with their students.

RLC

A Friend of God

Alexandra Pelosi, daughter of the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, has put together a documentary on American evangelicalism to air on HBO throughout this month. Rebecca Cusey offers a critique of Pelosi's film at National Review Online. According to Cusey, the documentary could have been a lot worse than it is, and also a lot better. Nevertheless, Pelosi's film touches upon an interesting point. Here's Cusey's commentary:

The biggest lesson of the film is that normalcy is in the eye of the beholder. When Pelosi shows thousands of people singing "I am a friend of God," a club of skateboarders "skating for Christ," or even an impassioned sermon, those familiar with evangelicalism see nothing odd. However, your average New Yorker or San Franciscan, or even your suburban neighbor who has never walked through the door of a church, sees something very strange indeed.

Turning a hobby, such as skating or cruising cars, into an outlet for proselytizing may come across as artificial, even manipulative. The fervor of emotional worship, multiplied by thousands of worshippers, can leave those without that experience scratching their head. "There's something very strange about these people," says Pelosi to [Pastor Ted]Haggard [This was filmed before the revelations of Haggard's improprieties became public] about the enthusiastic worshippers, "They're so happy." Happy, perhaps, but disconcerting nonetheless - or all the more - to many liberals.

In an interview with the gay magazine The Advocate, she says, "A lot of New York liberal Democrats who go to the megachurches come back talking about how scary they are." To those who have never been a part of evangelicalism, the lingo, the constant referrals to the Bible, the personal lifestyles defined mainly by their biblically imposed limits, religious passion, even the pure power of thousands of people at a rally, can be terrifying.

Evangelicals would do well to understand this, not to conform to the broader culture, but to speak a language those outside the church can understand.

Cusey notes that Evangelicals don't see themselves as the rest of the country sees them, but the fact is, most Evangelicals don't care how the rest of the country sees them. They should, though, and for the reason that Cusey gives. A group that strikes those it would like to win to the faith as "scary" is not likely to enjoy much success. Like Paul, Christians should be prepared to become all things to all men that some of those might be persuaded that Christianity is true. Making oneself "scary," or presenting an image that seems completely alien to those whom Christians wish to persuade, seems an unpromising way to accomplish this. This is not to say that Evangelicals should not be who they are. It is to say, though, that they should be more alert to how they are perceived by others and the effect that perception has on the attractiveness of the Gospel they offer.

RLC

Screwtape

Variety has a piece telling us that Walden Media and Ralph Winter Productions is going to release a movie based on C.S. Lewis' Screwtape Letters in 2008. Walden is the same outfit that did The Chronicles of Narnia, a sequel to which (Prince Caspian) is due out next year as well.

HT: Prosthesis

RLC

Pinker on the Brain

Steven Pinker closes his essay titled The Mystery of Consciousness at Time.com with this assertion:

.... the biology of consciousness offers a sounder basis for morality than the unprovable dogma of an immortal soul. It's not just that an understanding of the physiology of consciousness will reduce human suffering through new treatments for pain and depression. That understanding can also force us to recognize the interests of other beings--the core of morality.

Let us assume that he is correct that understanding that other people have the same experience I have when I experience pain. How does recognizing that fact impose an obligation upon me not to gratutitously cause another person to suffer this pain? Pinker assumes that just knowing that others suffer is enough to obligate me not to cause that suffering, but this is an unsupportable assumption. If there is no higher moral authority than my own conscience, or even the collective conscience of mankind, there's nothing immoral with hurting someone else.

As every student in Philosophy 101 learns, nothing can force me to believe that anyone except me is conscious. This power to deny that other people have feelings is not just an academic exercise but an all-too-common vice, as we see in the long history of human cruelty. Yet once we realize that our own consciousness is a product of our brains and that other people have brains like ours, a denial of other people's sentience becomes ludicrous. "Hath not a Jew eyes?" asked Shylock. Today the question is more pointed: Hath not a Jew--or an Arab, or an African, or a baby, or a dog--a cerebral cortex and a thalamus? The undeniable fact that we are all made of the same neural flesh makes it impossible to deny our common capacity to suffer.

Yes, no doubt others suffer the same way we would if exposed to the same stimuli, but what follows from that? Pinker's argument is missing a couple of premises. If these were supplied his argument would look something like this:

1. Other people suffer as we do.

2. We don't like to suffer.

3. So, we can assume others don't like it either.

4. We shouldn't cause what others don't like.

5. Therefore, we shouldn't cause others to suffer.

The argument fails because premise #4 needs to be demonstrated and Pinker simply assumes it, doubtless because, in fact, it can't be demonstrated.

He goes on to write this:

And when you think about it, the doctrine of a life-to-come is not such an uplifting idea after all because it necessarily devalues life on earth. Just remember the most famous people in recent memory who acted in expectation of a reward in the hereafter: the conspirators who hijacked the airliners on 9/11.

So far from devaluing life on earth, the doctrine of eternal life is the only thing that could possibly make life on earth meaningful or significant.

Pinker is evidently saying that it's better to believe in nothing so strongly that you're willing to die for it. Anything that a man is willing to die for necessarily is more important to him than is his own life, but if a man is willing to die for his friends, or for a cause, does that devalue his life? Why should being willing to die for God (setting aside the question of whether the 9/11 terrorists were really dying for God) devalue one's life on earth? Pinker doesn't say.

Think, too, about why we sometimes remind ourselves that "life is short." It is an impetus to extend a gesture of affection to a loved one, to bury the hatchet in a pointless dispute, to use time productively rather than squander it. I would argue that nothing gives life more purpose than the realization that every moment of consciousness is a precious and fragile gift.

Well, he's right that every moment of consciousness is a precious and fragile gift, but a gift is something which is given. Who or what bestows this gift in Pinker's view? If no one bestows it then it's just there and there's no purpose to it. It's just a brute fact of existence which ultimately means nothing.

More to the point he's mistaken when he says that the realization that consciousness is a precious gift endows life with more purpose than anything else could. The realization that consciousness extends beyond the death of the body invests life with far more purpose than the realization that we will enjoy the "gift" for a moment and then it will be gone for eternity. If existence ends at death then everything we do gets erased. It amounts to nothing. Only if what we do lasts forever does it have any real worth or significance.

Pinker's arguments are those of a naturalistic materialist who knows deep down that the logic of his beliefs leads to despair, an end he devoutly wishes to avoid. The arguments he employs to stave off the bitter conclusion are all like the wild rearward shots of an army in full retreat: ineffectual, pointless, and desperate.

See our comments on the first part of his essay here.

RLC

Muslim Valor

The Brits recently arrested nine Muslims who had been plotting to kidnap a pair of their co-religionists who serve in Her Majesty's armed forces and then behead them, probably as a way of intimidating other Muslims who might otherwise cooperate with the infidels. The two servicemen who had been chosen for the kidnapping showed tremendous bravery in allowing themselves to be used as bait in the attempt to apprehend their would-be killers:

Incredibly, the two men carried on with their daily routines but were secretly shadowed around the clock by police and intelligence personnel, using high-technology tracking and bugging techniques. Surveillance teams kept a constant watch, looking for any sign of the plotters.

The two men were fitted with discreet tracking devices, with similar beacons attached to their cars, and armed response teams were on permanent standby to stage a rescue mission in case a kidnap plot was sprung.

It is not clear, however, if the men were even allowed to tell their families.

A senior military source said yesterday: "We have been aware of the operation for a while, and working closely with West Midlands Police."

One insider added: "It was a brave thing to do. Effectively they agreed to act as bait - like tethered goats - without any way of knowing how real the danger was. They had to trust the police."

There has already been speculation that the men's bravery being recognised with a medal or other award, although Army chiefs are anxious to keep their identities under wraps.

This is the sort of courage and resolve on display every day in Iraq in the lives of the people who willingly put their lives on the line to serve their fellow Iraqis even though they know it makes them targets for the jihadis. That some want us to abandon such amazing people to those who would slaughter them in an instant were we to pull out is incomprehensible to me.

RLC

Taking Down the Bad Guys

Task Force 145, the special ops team tasked with hunting down al-Qaeda leaders around the world, appears, in Bill Roggio's opinion, to have taken down another bad guy:

Mohammed Jamal Khalifa, one of Osama bin Laden's brother-in-laws with deep roots in al-Qaeda as a financier and facilitator, has been reported to have been murdered in his bedroom in Madagascar. Khalifa, "who mined and traded precious stones in Madagascar," was reported to have been murdered by "a gang of 20 to 30 gunmen broke into his brother's bedroom, shot him dead 'in cold blood' and stole his belongings."

"I don't think [his death] was politically motivated," said Malek Khalifa, Mohammed Jamal's brother. But Khalifa's deep ties to al-Qaeda, coupled with his history of funding global terrorist operations, his operations in mining precious stones in Africa (a source of untraceable income), and the size of the 'gang' that murdered him, suggests otherwise. We suspect Khalifa was assassinated. "They stole everything - his computer, all of his things," said Khalifa's brother.

Task Force 145 has a mandate to hunt down senior al-Qaeda operatives world wide, and is known to have operated in Pakistan to destroy Osama bin Laden's Black Guard. Also, the U.S. recently deployed naval assets to the region, as well as Task Force 145, in the hunt for al-Qaeda and Islamic Courts leaders fleeing Somalia.

Roggio has more at the link.

RLC

Bigot or Bonehead?

In the course of an otherwise astute analysis of his Democratic rivals for the presidential nomination, Senator Joseph Biden delivered himself of this head-scratcher about Barack Obama:

"I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy," he said. "I mean, that's a storybook, man."

Either Senator Biden merely mangled the rules of syntax or he has let slip a racial faux pas that should elicits howls of outrage from a media that committed Trent Lott to a political immolation for allowing on the occasion of Strom Thurmond's 100th birthday that he'd have made a fine president back in 1948 and which pilloried George Allen for saying macaca until Allen eventually lost his senate seat. I'm reminded, too, of the brouhaha over Rush Limbaugh's assertion on ESPN that Donovan McNabb is treated more gently by the sports media because they're reluctant to criticize a black quarterback.

Now comes the maladroit Senator Biden seemingly suggesting, if words mean anything, that Barack Obama is the first mainstream black in history who is articulate (why is it that whites are rarely described as articulate?), bright, clean (!?) and "nice-looking." Could the senator from Delaware really have meant to imply that every other black who has appeared on the political stage was inarticulate, dumb, ugly and dirty?

The media have a test for answering such conundrums, of course. Their answer is "no," because, you see, Biden is a Democrat. Had he been a Republican the answer would have certainly been "yes," and the caterwauling over his racial bigotry and the demands for his political head would be even now coming to a boil. As it is we'll hear very little mention on the news of what is either boneheaded inarticulation or outright racism. We'll certainly not be reminded every night for weeks and months, as we were reminded for months that Senator Allen said macaca, that Biden's opinion was far uglier or, shining the best light on it, far more stupid than anything Allen said.

For what it's worth I don't think Senator Biden actually intended to give offense. That would have been incredibly dumb even for a man whose friends rarely mention mental acuity when praising his virtues. But that's the point. Neither did Trent Lott, George Allen, or Rush Limbaugh intend to give offense. Yet that didn't matter to a media which sees itself in a war of annihilation against its political enemies and which will do all it can to protect its friends and destroy its foes.

RLC