The Secular Frontier

I am, once again, ashamed to be an American. We had a clear choice between a pair of decent, intelligent, democracy-loving, competent leaders (Harris and Walz) and a pair of racist, sexist, fascists who are incompetent (Trump and Vance), and yet we Americans made the wrong choice. There are two main possible reasons for this unbelievable and shameful outcome. First, most Americans are either racists, sexists, and/or fascists, or else most Americans are incredibly stupid and ignorant. Most likely, both of these reasons work together to yield the result that we are witnessing today. There are some Americans who are intelligent and well-informed, but who are racists, sexists, and/or fascists. There are some Americans who are stupid and ignorant, but who are not racists, sexists, and/or fascists. And, of course, there are some Americans who are stupid, ignorant, and also racists, sexists, and/or fascists. These three or four different kinds of Americans now constitute the majority in most states. ... Read Article

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qTwBn4vh1o If you're intellectually impatient like me, just start watching at 47:00 when they start to stretch out their hands to cast a magic spell. That the faith community is backing Trump is wonderful. If Trump loses, it will be a powerful argument for the futility of prayer. There are reasons hospitals don't have faith-healer departments. ... Read Article

The most important point made in the debate between Biden and Trump back in June was this point made by President Joe Biden: Donald Trump was the worst president in the history of the United States. Biden provided two good reasons in support of this strong claim: 1. Presidential historians ranked Donald Trump as the worst president in the history of the United States. Biden: Presidential historians "voted who was the worst president in American history. From best to worst. They said (Trump) was the worst in all of American history." True. The 2024 Presidential Greatness Project Expert Survey, released in February, collected responses from 154 presidential historians, which included current and recent members of the American Political Science Association. The survey ranked Biden as the 14th best president in U.S. history, and put Trump last. The historians were asked to give every president a score, from zero to 100. Abraham Lincoln topped the list with an average score ... Read Article

"In Leibniz's sense, a ratio sufficiens, a sufficient reason, isn't at all a ground capable of supporting a being so that it doesn't straightaway fall into nothing. A sufficient reason is one that reaches and offers to beings that which puts them in the position of fulfilling their full essence, that is, perfectio. " (Heidegger, The Principle of Reason, 71) In Western Philosophy "Will" became an important issue following Kant. Kant noticed that out of Freedom the Will unconsciously self-legislates a rule according to which I am responsible for my actions, unlike animals and certain mentally disabled people who are not thought of as personally accountable like we are. Later, Will became identified as the defining feature of beings in general with Schopenhauer and Nietzsche (along with eternal return) As with all previous philosophers Schopenhauer wanted to know the Being question, what is the ultimate foundation of all things that beings "point" toward.  Nowadays many would say that is the p ... Read Article

During the presidential debate between Trump and Harris, Donald Trump made a comment about crime in the United States: …all over the world crime is down. All over the world except here. Crime here is up and through the roof. … Crime in this country is through the roof. https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/harris-trump-presidential-debate-transcript/story?id=113560542 (Viewed 10-11-24) In my Part 1 post on this subject, I showed that Trump was implying the following claim: The rate of VIOLENT crime has drastically increased under the Biden administration AS COMPARED TO the rate of VIOLENT crime under the Trump administration. I also showed that this was a BIG FAT LIE by Donald Trump, despite the protestations of the legal scholar Jonathan Turley in his editorial in The Hill. Because the crime rate data both from the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting Program and from the National Crime Victimization Surveys conducted by the DOJ clearly indicate that the above claim by Trump was a ... Read Article

Previous Posts in this Series: (1/4) Christianity, A Question of Reasoning: The Continental/Analytic Philosophy Divide (Part 2 of 4) Christianity, A Question of Reasoning: The Continental/Analytic Philosophy Divide (Part 3/4, AFTERWORD) Christianity, A Question of Reasoning: The Christ Myth Theory and the Lord’s Supper (Part4/4 Appendix) Christianity, A Question of Reasoning: The Christ Myth Theory and the Lord’s Supper Last Time: Does Literary Imitation Suggest Christ Never Existed? Now, the Conclusion: Do the imitations in writing (typologies) the New Testament like Jesus as the New Moses in Matthew mean the gospel narratives are simply invented out of whole cloth, or do they contain a trace of the historical Jesus in them?  Probably both, and it is very tricky to pinpoint where on that spectrum a real story may reside.  So, McGrath notes some of the proposed typologies are very poor fits and so not the kind of story you would invent out of whole cloth if your primary int ... Read Article

Washington (CNN) —  Former President Donald Trump is littering his public remarks with fictional stories. ... the Republican presidential nominee is telling colorful lies that are completely untethered to reality. https://www.cnn.com/2024/09/19/politics/fact-check-donald-trump-fictional-stories Here is LIE #11 from Donald Trump: The jobs revision After the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics announced in August that its annual revision of jobs data found that the economy added about 818,000 fewer jobs than initially reported for the 12 months ending in March, Trump told a story about how the government had been planning to announce this downward revision “after November 5th,” Election Day, but was forced to do so before the election because of “a whistleblower” – “a patriot leaker.” Another fabrication. The Bureau of Labor Statistics regularly releases the preliminary revised data in August, and it had disclosed the precise ... Read Article

It's now more mainstream to acknowledge that the NT writers were rewriting OT scripture to flesh out the biography of Jesus, and so we have Mark create his crucifixion narrative out of Psalms and Isaiah since Paul doesn't record any details. Matthew presents Jesus as the New and greater Moses. Spong had actually written about this for years prior. Mark says “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ ; as it is written in the prophets.” Mark immediately interprets John the Baptist as a forerunner of the Messiah (a la Elijah in II Kings 1:8). Mark then clothes John similar to Elijah (Mark 1:6. II Kings 1:8.) He then says John ate locusts and wild honey,the food of the wilderness in which Elijah lived (and so on and so on). Dr. Kipp Davis recently noted the Dead Sea Scrolls writers did the same thing to flesh out a biography of their Teacher of Righteousness (who obviously existed) rewriting scripture because they saw their Teacher of Righteousness as realizing them. How did the Christians do it? ... Read Article

Trump is polling well with conservative Christians but is really trying to overcome the problem that conservative Christians often stay at home on election day. ... Read Article

Heraclius: “physis kryptesthai philei” (Being/The Nature of things loves to hide) Hegel, in his inaugural address, Heidelberg, 1816, says “The Being of the universe, at first hidden and concealed, has no power which can offer resistance to the search for knowledge; it has to lay itself open before the seeker — to set before his eyes and give for his enjoyment, its riches and its depths.” Heidegger: “Both scientific and prescientific comportments are a knowing in the sense of uncovering what is previously concealed, of revealing what was previously covered up, of disclosing what so far was closed off.” For the Greeks, "Truth" was “Aletheia (un-hiding)” with the grammatical alpha privative ("A-letheia" = disclosing from hiddenness"). For example, in circumspection, a doctor deliberates about all the patient's symptoms and possible causes and remedies until the doctor comes to an "insight (noein)" in a blink of an eye about how to proceed, after which the doctor acts (carry out ... Read Article

Washington (CNN) —Former President Donald Trump is littering his public remarks with fictional stories. ... the Republican presidential nominee is telling colorful lies that are completely untethered to reality. https://www.cnn.com/2024/09/19/politics/fact-check-donald-trump-fictional-stories Here is LIE #10 from Donald Trump: Migrants, prisons and ‘the Congo’ For months, Trump has told a story about how “the Congo” has deliberately emptied prisons to somehow get its criminals to come to the United States as migrants. “Many prisoners let go from the Congo in Africa, rough prisoners,” he said at an August event in Arizona. At an August rally in Pennsylvania the week after, he said, “In the Congo, in Africa: 22 people deposited into our country. ‘Where do you come from?’ ‘The Congo.’ ‘Where in the Congo?’ ‘Jail.’” But Trump has presented zero evidence that “the Congo” has actually emptied any prisons for migration purposes. Representatives ... Read Article

I've been talking about how Paul introduced the Lord's Supper into the Jesus movement tradition as miming Jesus did alone in prison that represented a ritual meal for future Christians. The importance of Paul having this vision is it solidifies the idea that Jesus saw his own death as salvific and central to the religion. This is very important because it is contrary to the message the historical Jesus taught of repentance and charitable works as the key to salvation, not himself. Paul says 3 For I handed on to you as of first importance what I in turn had received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures 4 and that he was buried and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures 5 and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. (1 Corinthians 15:3-5) The disciples, who Mark said got violent at the arrest and all fled, came to frame Jesus’ fate through an allegorical and mystical reading of scripture.  As I said bef ... Read Article

For the first post in this series, see HERE For the second post in this series, see HERE (Appendix) Christianity, A Question of Reasoning: The Christ Myth Theory and the Lord’s Supper (1/2) Does Literary Imitation Suggest Christ Never Existed? Does Literary Imitation Suggest Christ Never Existed: The Trump Lens (2/2)? (1) Last time one of the things I talked about was the crucifixion seems to frame the evidence in a way that shows the Christ Myth theory is false.  I wrote: One popular idea is Jesus started out as a vague dying/rising savior myth who was later placed in historical fictions/gospels (Euhemerized). But the key point is that the dying/rising salvation theme of the Jesus tale is a later development, and so is not at our earliest level of the Jesus salvation message. Against Christ-mythicism, Prof Bart Ehrman notes for Paul righteousness came through the cross/resurrection, that if it came through the law Chris died for nothing (Gal 2:21). Mark wrote a Paul-inspired pro ... Read Article

For my previous post see HERE! For the Afterword in this series CLICK HERE (Appendix) Christianity, A Question of Reasoning: The Christ Myth Theory and the Lord’s Supper (1/2) Does Literary Imitation Suggest Christ Never Existed? Does Literary Imitation Suggest Christ Never Existed: The Trump Lens (2/2)? (Depictions of the Last Supper in Christian art have been undertaken by artistic masters for centuries, Leonardo da Vinci's late-1490s mural painting in Milan, Italy, being the best-known example. Wiki) Last time I noted: One popular idea is Jesus started out as a vague dying/rising savior myth who was later placed in historical fictions/gospels (Euhemerized). But the key point is that the dying/rising salvation theme of the Jesus tale is a later development, and so is not at our earliest level of the Jesus salvation message. Against Christ-mythicism, Prof Bart Ehrman notes for Paul righteousness came through the cross/resurrection, that if it came through the law Chris died ... Read Article

As someone who focuses on the history of Philosophy in the Continental tradition, perhaps the main style of reasoning you see is phenomenology/phenomenalizing.  Hegel gives the example that a torn sock phenomenalizes the previously hidden invisible category of Unity belonging to the sock, precisely “as” a lost unity.  This little word “as” is the key to phenomenology, which Aristotle thought of with the logos apophantikos, something “as” something else, e.g., The Dog “taken as” brown.  And so, if I hear a living thing in the forest near my legs only to look down and see it was dead leaves rustling in the wind, this “mis-taking” phenomenalizes our basic stance toward the world is “taking-as,” taking something "as" something.  Phenomenology in Continental philosophy is dis-closing / un-hiding the hidden.  See for example HERE.   The important part of analytic philosophy I’ve been looking at recently is probability reasoning, and so for examp ... Read Article