2007 Templeton Prize

This year's Templeton Prize for Progress Toward Research or Discoveries about Spiritual Realities has been awarded to the Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor. It's a nice change - the last 8 recipients of the prize have been scientists.

The Templeton Prize is the world's largest monetary prize awarded to an individual, valued at £800,000. Given the area I work in, it's an aim (or rather, a dream) of mine to win this prize some day. Although, I was more keen when it was called the Templeton Prize for Progress in Science and Religion.

Charles Taylor has also achieved one of my other aims - he presented the Gifford Lectures in 1999.

You can read Professor Taylor's statement upon receiving the prize here.

A new superhero and a new calling

Inspired by an email conversation with Matt, and reading a couple of articles with titles* that reminded me of Harry Potter books, I have decided that I should write a series of books about a new superhero called Henry More. I've already dreamt about looking for action figures of the Cambridge Platonists, so this is only a small step further!

Here are my titles so far:

• Henry More and the Spirit of Nature
• Henry More and the Judaic Cabbala
• Henry More and the Antidote Against Atheism
• Henry More and the Materialist Hobbists
• Henry More and the Theistic Pagans

I think I've found my new calling!

---
Update: I've just come up with another title! "Henry More and the Latitude-Men." Maybe the Latitude-Men can be his faithful sidekicks...

I think my PhD is starting to have an effect on my sanity. Starting to? Maybe not...

* "Henry More and the limits of mechanism" by Alan Gabbey, and "Henry More and the Scientific Revolution" by A. Rupert Hall, both in Sarah Hutton (ed.), Henry More (1614-1687): Tercentenary Studies, Kluwer, Dordrecht, 1990.

Celebrating International Women's Day

My mother's cousin, Valya, called from the Ukraine this evening to with Mum and I a happy International Women's Day. I was a little surprised until my mother explained to me that it's a big deal in Russia - it's a national holiday, women are honoured and receive gifts... Russia was one of the earliest countries to celebrate International Women's Day, and it was a strike by Russian women leading to the abdication the Czar and women receiving the right to vote that led to March 8 being declared International Women's Day. What a wonderful country!


Some highlights of the history of International Women's Day:

The idea of an international women's day was proposed at a Socialist convention in Geneva in 1910. In 1911, International Women's Day (IWD) was honoured the first time in Austria, Denmark, Germany and Switzerland on 19 March. More than one million women and men attended IWD rallies campaigning for women's rights to work, vote, be trained, to hold public office and end discrimination.


On the eve of World War I campaigning for peace, Russian women observed their first International Women's Day on the last Sunday in February 1913. In 1914 further women across Europe held rallies to campaign against the war and to express women's solidarity.

On the last Sunday of February 1917, Russian women began a strike for "bread and peace" in response to the death over 2 million Russian soldiers in war. Opposed by political leaders the women continued to strike until four days later the Czar was forced to abdicate and the provisional Government granted women the right to vote. The date the women's strike commenced was Sunday 23 February on the Julian calendar then in use in Russia. This day on the Gregorian calendar in use elsewhere was 8 March.



IWD is now an official holiday in Armenia, Russia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Macedonia, Moldova, Mongolia, Tajikistan, Ukraine, Uzbekistan and Vietnam. The tradition sees men honouring their mothers, wives, girlfriends, colleagues, etc with flowers and small gifts. In some countries IWD has the equivalent status of Mother's Day where children give small presents to their mothers and grandmothers.


The new millennium has witnessed a significant change and attitudinal shift in both women's and society's thoughts about women's equality and emancipation. Many from a younger generation feel that 'all the battles have been won for women' while many feminists from the 1970's know only too well the longevity and ingrained complexity of patriarchy. With more women in the boardroom, greater equality in legislative rights, and an increased critical mass of women's visibility as impressive role models in every aspect of life, one could think that women have gained true equality. The unfortunate fact is that women are still not paid equally to that of their male counterparts, women still are not present in equal numbers in business or politics, and globally women's education, health and the violence against them is worse than that of men.


However, great improvements have been made. We do have female astronauts and prime ministers, school girls are welcomed into university, women can work and have a family, women have real choices. And so the tone and nature of IWD has, for the past few years, moved from being a reminder about the negatives to a celebration of the positives.

International Women's Day

What a fantastic opportunity for a few posts on one of my favourite soapbox topics - feminism.

Women's rights are human rights

Ainsley Hayes (from the West Wing) on why she opposes the Equal Rights Amendment:

Because it's humiliating. A new amendment we vote on declaring that I am equal under the law to a man? I'm mortified to discover there's reason to believe I wasn't before. I am a citizen of this country. I am not a special subset in need of your protection. I do not have to have my rights handed down to me by a bunch of old, white men. The same Article 14 that protects you protects me, and I went to law school just to make sure.



Jo March (from Little Women) on why women should vote:

I find it poor logic to say that women should vote because they are good. Men do not vote because they are good; they vote because they are male, and women should vote, not because we are angels and men are animals, but because we are human beings and citizens of this country.

Is feminism dead?

Craig has a post titled "The Death of Feminism" with the text "It's the left's fault, of course" and a link to an opinion piece from today's Australian. I know that Craig is generally not complimentary to either feminism or the left, but I thought this article raised some good points.

Pamela Bone writes "Let it be recorded that in the last decade of the 20th century the brave and great movement of Western feminism ended, not with a bang but with a whimper" and asks "On International Women's Day, where are the protests in our cities against stonings, honour killings or any other persecutions to which women are still subjected?"

Good question. Here are some more choice excerpts:

While a US administration that refused to fund programs against AIDS unless they taught about chastity instead of condoms could rightly be criticised, the mullahs whose abuses of women's rights were very many degrees worse could not.

Was it before or after September 11 that thinkers of the Left - for feminism was a movement of the Left - decided that racism was a far more serious crime than sexism? When did cultural sensitivity trump women's rights?

I don't hold much hope on this International Women's Day of seeing big protests in Australian cities against female genital mutilation; or against honour killings, stonings, child marriages, forced seclusion or any of the other persecutions to which women are still subjected. The fire of Western feminism has quietly died away, first as a victim of its success, lately as a victim of cultural relativism, of anti-Americanism and reluctance to be seen to be condemning the enemies of the enemy.

Yet as Western women take their rights for granted, other women are just beginning to demand theirs. There will be marches in Europe this International Women's Day, organised by Muslim (or ex-Muslim) women reformers. They will march through Germany and France to present a grievance to the European Parliament in Brussels, saying that the veil is "a manifestation of political Islam and a symbol of the oppression of women".

In Pakistan, the Prevention of Anti-Women Practices Bill, which would ban forced marriages and give women rights over property, is before the national assembly. In Syria, the murder of a 16-year-old girl by her brother, at her family's request, has prompted a national debate about the leniency shown to perpetrators of honour killings.

In Saudi Arabia, Bill Gates, addressing a recent business seminar, told the segregated audience - women, their faces and bodies shrouded in black, behind a large partition - that the country would not achieve its ambition to become an economic power while it failed to use the talents of half the population. "One side of the audience loved it," he quipped later.

Maybe my report on the death of Western feminism is greatly exaggerated. I hope so. "Don't be so polite, girls!" the old feminists used to sing. "Show a little fight, girls, show a little fight!" ...Human rights are universal. And women's rights are human rights.

I don't agree with everything Pamela Bone writes, particularly on "sexual rights" and a woman's "right" to control her own body, but I think she has some good points. It seems to me that many young women of my generation do take their rights for granted, and forget that women had to fight to work outside the home, to vote, and to own property. While maybe these aren't all necessarily rights but privileges, men (white men, anyway) did not have to fight in the same way. Many opportunities were denied to women simply because they were women.

I remember an email debate with some uni friends about whether feminism was still necessary. I think I was the only person arguing that it was. The general argument from the other girls seemed to be that since there were more women than men in their workplace (medical science), feminism was no longer needed. OK, so perhaps you are not suffering from any discrimination or limitation of opportunities, but what about other women?

I started to become much more interested in feminism (and, I guess, more passionate about the issue) at the end of my honours year. As I was leaving for uni to hand in my thesis, I grabbed a book off the shelf to read on the train. It was a book called DIY Feminism that my mother had given me a few years earlier, but I hadn't had a chance (or perhaps hadn't been motivated enough) to read it. I can't remember now exactly what was in it, except for the general idea that there is no "Feminism" - it's what women make of it - and the fact that many women were struggling with gender discrimination. This alerted me to the fact that while my life had been all fine so far, not every woman is so lucky.

And this was just in Australia. When you start thinking about things that happen to women all around the world, the situation is more desperate. And Pamela Bone mentions some of these things - honour killings, genital mutilation and stonings for adultery. This last one is particularly unfair for women. In some countries, when a woman is raped it is considered adultery, unless more than one reputable male witness will come forward to say that it is rape. The woman is punished for the adultery, but what happens to the man?

I suppose that's enough of a rant for the time being. I'm not sure what the point of this rant is anyway. I guess it would just be nice to see more women getting angry and upset about the treatment of other women around the world.

Donna's new nickname

I have decided that Donna's new nickname shall be "Chipper."

What is Romans about?

An essay I wrote for the Moore College External Studies unit on Romans:

Paul’s Letter to the Romans concerns two main questions: how salvation can be achieved and how a person can be part of the people of God. In the course of the letter, Paul argues that both Jew and Gentile need to be justified by faith in order to be saved from God’s wrath and to belong to the people of God.

In Romans 1:16-17, Paul states that the gospel is the power of salvation for both the Jew and the Greek, and in the following section he explains why salvation is needed. 1:18-32 describes the sinfulness of the Gentile world, and 2:1-3:20 shows that the Jews are in just as dire a state. All have sinned and are therefore facing God’s wrath. However, in 3:21, Paul begins to explain the hope of the gospel. God’s righteousness is being revealed in the world – not through the law, which no one has been able to keep, but through faith in Jesus Christ (3:22).

Paul brings this point home to the Jews by using the example of Abraham, the great patriarch of Israel, showing how his righteousness before God was based on faith, not works. For this reason, Gentiles can also take part in the promises God made to Israel through Abraham, if they have faith in God. Paul makes this crystal clear in 10:9: “if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your hear that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” There is no distinction between Jew and Greek, he states, “for everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (10:13).

One may ask whether salvation is the same thing as belonging to the people of God, or whether something else is needed. Paul makes it clear that this is not the case. “God shows no partiality,” he declares in 2:11. Even the Jews’ privilege of being “entrusted with the oracles of God” (3:2) does not save them, since they have still broken God’s Law. However, Paul goes beyond the issue of salvation to show that both Jew and Gentile can belong to God. There is only one God, Paul states in 3:29-30, and he is God of the Jews and of the Gentiles. Even more dramatically, Paul argues that the promises made to Abraham apply to all who are his descendents by faith – he is the “father of all who believe without being circumcised” (4:11). It is not enough for a Jew simply to be circumcised (2:28-29), and a Gentile can become one of God’s people without being circumcised. The necessary step is justification by faith.

In addition, the Spirit of God, received after justification by faith, marks people out as belonging to God. “Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him” (8:9), but “all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God” (8:14). This, then, applies to both Jew and Gentile. Although the Jews were chosen by God to be a light to the nations, the salvation of the Gentiles was always part of God’s plan (11:11-12). Even as Paul mourns Israel’s unbelief, he acknowledges that it is the “children of the promise” who are counted as children of God. Finally, the change in a person’s life that happens after salvation – the way to live that Paul sets out in chapters 12-15 – also marks that person out as belonging to God.

Thus, the answers to the two main questions of Romans – how salvation is to be achieved and how entry into God’s people is to be obtained – are determined by the one act of righteousness on the part of Jesus, which allows all people who believe to be justified by faith.

Beautiful

One of my favourite songs by the Christian singer-songwriter Bethany Dillon:

I was so unique
Now I feel skin deep
Count on the makeup to cover it all
Crying myself to sleep
Because I cannot keep their attention
Thought I could be strong
But it’s killing me

Does someone hear my cry
I’m dying for new life

I want to be beautiful
And make you stand in awe
Look inside my heart
And be amazed
I want to hear you say
Who I am is quite enough
Just want to be worthy of love
And beautiful

Sometimes I wish I was someone other than me
Fighting to make the mirror happy
Trying to find whatever is missing
Won’t you help me back to glory

You make me beautiful
You make me stand in awe
You step inside my heart
And I am amazed
I love to hear You say
Who I am is quite enough
You make me worthy of love
And beautiful

And this is what Bethany Dillon has to say about why she wrote the song:

I wrote this song following a series of talks with my youth group about what it is to be a woman—how we reflect God’s glory and what our hearts desire most. “Beautiful” was both easy and tough to write. Easy because I fight those battles almost every second—“Am I enough? Do they think I’m beautiful?” – tough because it was almost shameful to admit those are often my thoughts and fears. Though it’s not something neatly packaged that I can cure, my heart is deeply burdened to just be in the struggle alongside women… to feel vulnerable together… to win the battles together… to finally come to understand that we are intensely pursued by the Strong and Rescuing Jesus—what we have wanted all along.

Judgment and Mercy

People sometimes suppose that judgment is an "Old Testament" idea, whereas in the New Testament you find only mercy. This isn't even a caricature; it's simple fiction.

Tom Wright, Romans for Everyone, Part 1, p. 29.

I hate wait

Before Christmas, I submitted an abstract for a Science and Religion conference being held in the UK in July. It would be a great conference to go to - it's my area of research; it's being held in honour of one of the foremost science and religion scholars in the world, whose work has been important in the development of my own ideas; there will be lots of other top-class scholars there, whose work I have also used extensively; it will be a great opportunity to network and share my research just before finalising my PhD thesis; and it's in England. I love England!

It's been nearly 7 weeks since the abstracts were due, and I still haven't heard whether mine has been accepted or rejected. I received an email from the organiser in early January, saying that he's received my abstract and that decisions should be made by the beginning of February. I waited until more than a week of February had passed, and sent a very nice email inquiring about when I might hear something. He said Monday. It's now Saturday. Well, in the UK, it's nearly Saturday. And I still haven't heard anything.

I'm not a very patient person, and I'm getting quite frustrated!

Maybe I could give him my word as a Spaniard? No good, he's probably known too many Spaniards...

I hate wait.

The Great Debate?

Chaser headline on the back of today's Herald:

Even worm refuses to watch Debnam-Iemma debate

I was watching it with my dad, and there wasn't even enough interest to have us making fun of the politicians (not for long, anyway). I resorted to tossing grapes at my dad.

Can I vote for Quentin Dempster?

Looking at the moon, thinking of the universe

About this time I started to read an article in a magazine, on the subject of the basic difference between the male and female habits of thought, relating chiefly to their experience of sex (the title of the article made you think it would tell a great deal more about sex than it actually did). The author was a famous New York psychiatrist, a disciple of Freud. He said that the difference between the male and female modes of through were easily illustrated by the thoughts of a boy and girl, sitting on a park bench, looking at the full moon. The boy thinks of the universe, its immensity and mystery; the girl thinks, "I must wash my hair." When I read this I was frantically upset; I had to put the magazine down. It was clear to me at once that I was not thinking as the girl thought; the full moon would never as long as I lived remind me to wash my hair... I wanted men to love me, and I wanted to think of the universe when I looked at the moon.

Alice Munro, Lives of Girls and Woman

Baptism

He pushed me down again but this time I was expecting it. I held my breath and fought him. I fought strongly and naturally, as anybody does, held down in the water, and without thinking much about who was holding me. But when he let me come up just long enough to hear him say, "Now say you'll do it," I saw his face streaming with water I had splashed over him and I felt amazement, not that I was fighting with Garnet but that anybody could have made such a mistake, to think he had real power over me. I was too amazed to be angry, I forgot to be frightened, it seemed to me impossible that he should not understand that all the powers I granted him were in play.

Alice Munro, Lives of Girls and Women

Happy Birthday Galileo!

On this day in 1564, Galileo Galilei was born at Pisa.

Galileo and the so-called "Galileo Affair" have been favourite soap-boxes of mine for quite some time. People who know me well generally know not to get me started. People who don't know me well and make the mistake of commenting on how badly the Church treated Galileo generally regret it. I'm not exactly sure when this interest of mine began, however. The earliest exposure I had to the name of Galileo, as far as I can remember, would have been a song by the Christian pop singer Amy Grant. This would have been back when I was in primary school, when I was about 10 years old. I remember going to a concert of hers - she was touring after the release of her album Heart in Motion. One of my favourite songs on the album (I still enjoy it!) is called "Galileo." It has cute lyrics:

In the year of fourteen ninety-two
When Columbus sailed the ocean blue
Had he landed on India's shore
You might never have come to knock on my door.

Who needs a rhyme or a reason?
Some dreams were made to find
So I know that I must follow

Ask me just how much I love you
You are starlight, I'm Galileo
Even on the darkest night oh
I will find the shining light of our love.

I'm not sure if I found out much more about Galileo during primary school. The next time I encountered his story, as far as I can remember, was in my first year at university. I was enrolled in a Bachelor of Medical Science, but I decided to take some Science and Technology Studies subjects as electives. (It sounded more interesting than physics, psychology or computer science, and it turned out to be one of the best decisions I've ever made!) The first subject I took was called Cosmos and Culture, and it was an overview of the history of science from the ancient Greeks to the 20th century. It was all very new to me, but I was loving it. We got to the Copernican Revolution and Galileo the week before our major essay was due, but I was fascinated enough to abandon my research on Aristotle in order to write about whether the Copernican Revolution was indeed a revolution. I'm still amused that I relied heavily on Thomas Kuhn's 1957 classic The Copernican Revolution without knowing anything of its significance or that of the follow-up, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. But that's another story.

The main thing I remember hearing about Galileo is this class was how the Church had condemned him as a heretic on the basis of just one short passage from Scripture:

Joshua 10:12-14 - At that time Joshua spoke to the LORD in the day when the LORD gave the Amorites over to the sons of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, "Sun, stand still at Gibeon, and moon, in the Valley of Aijalon." And the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, until the nation took vengeance on their enemies. Is this not written in the Book of Jashar? The sun stopped in the midst of heaven and did not hurry to set for about a whole day. There has been no day like it before or since, when the LORD obeyed the voice of a man, for the LORD fought for Israel.

The message I received from this class was the Galileo was condemned as a heretic because the Church insisted on a literal interpretation of this passage. Of course the sun moves! Joshua wouldn't have told the sun to stop moving if it had actually been the earth that was moving - he would have told the earth to stop spinning! And because of this, science and religion became mortal enemies, as they still are. I remember thinking how stupid the Church was, and how it was responsible for the conflict between science and religion, just because they insisted on a literal interpretation of a verse that was obviously not meant to be taken as a scientific statement.

Such was my initial understanding of the "Galileo Affair." I was 18 years old, a first-year university student who had not yet even embarked on my career as an aspiring historian of science. I was still planning to study medicine to become an anaesthesiologist at that stage! But just as my continuing studies convinced me that I should head down a different path, so they also showed me that the "Galileo Affair" was not as straightforward as it first seemed.

While Galileo is often referred to as the "father of modern science," it is difficult to classify him as a scientist, or even a natural philosopher, as the people who studied the natural world were known at that time. Galileo was primarily a mathematician, although he sought the title of "philosopher" as they were more highly paid.

Galileo excelled at cultivating favour with the aristocracy, through his performances in debates, dedications of important works, and gifts of instruments such as the telescope. Contrary to popular belief, Galileo did not invent the telescope, nor was he the first person to use it in looking at the heavens - just perhaps the most outspoken! However good Galileo was at increasing his public profile, he was also very good at making enemies. His performances in debates often left his opponents looking stupid - a good thing for his patrons, but not when he needed crucial support from the academic community.

In his short book, Galileo, Stillman Drake argued that Galileo's condemnation by the Inquisition in 1633 was not a result of his defiance of the Church, but was rather caused by the hostility of contemporary philosophers. We are so conditioned to view the "Galileo Affair" as the result of an inevitable conflict between science and religion that this may come as a shock, but this is not a new perspective. Drake's book was first released in 1980, though the 2001 "Very Short Introduction" edition still labelled this as "a startling reinterpretation of the evidence."

If I go into too much detail here, this post will become far too long. I suspect that many people have already stopped reading! But here's a few points, just to whet your appetite.

We need to remember that this was a troubled time for the Church. The Reformation had challenged the authority of the Catholic Church, particularly with regard to the interpretation of Scripture. However, Pope Urban VIII, the one who eventually unleashed the Inquisition on to Galileo, was initially a huge fan. He even wrote a poem about Galileo, and gave him permission to write the Dialogue on the Two Chief World Systems which eventually landed Galileo in hot water. Galileo made the mistake of putting the Pope's favourite argument into the mouth of Simplicio - the character in the dialogue who is indeed shown to be a simpleton. Urged on by Galileo's philosophical enemies, the Pope was not pleased. Even Cardinal Bellarmine - arch-Counter-Reformationist - who was intimately involved in the early years of the "Galileo Affair" but who had passed away before the 1633 trial, was prepared to at least consider reinterpreting certain passages of the Bible, so long as there was good reason... but Galileo had no real evidence.

Wait a minute! No evidence? Didn't Galileo have his telescope? Common sense? The scientific method?? Well... that's going to take too long to explain thoroughly. Stay tuned for details on where you can find out more!

So there was a context of religious upheaval, and the Church was anxious to retain its authority. But what is "the Church"? There was no such monolithic institution. For starters, there were the Protestant and Catholic churches (emphasis on the plural), and even within each of these, there were differing viewpoints. And the idea of "the Church" suppressing science? What is this "science" you speak of? There was "natural philosophy" - a mode of natural inquiry much broader than what we view science as - and there were many varieties of this as well. And there were the mechanical sciences (again, emphasis on the plural) which weren't considered to be on the same explanatory level as natural philosophy. A conflict between science and religion? Which science? Which religion? You can see how it gets complicated.

It's probably more accurate to view the Galileo Affair as a conflict between "old science" and "new science" than between "science" and "religion." The academic establishment of the day, which happened to be closely aligned with the Catholic Church, but by no means homogeneous theologically, resisted Galileo's attempts to change the accepted view of how the universe worked. And since Galileo's evidence was rather less than compelling, perhaps they were the really "scientific" or "rational" ones after all.

But still, Galileo was a great thinker, and I am a big fan. I particularly like his way of looking at nature as the work of God, and seeking to understand it better in this context. And the "Galileo Affair" and his work and ideas are important for striving to understand how religious belief and scientific understanding of the natural world relate to each other.

Some key quotes:

Take note, theologians, that in your desire to makes matters of faith out of propositions relating to the fixity of the sun and earth you run the risk of eventually having to condemn as heretics those who would declare the earth to stand still and the sun to change position - eventually, I say, at such a time as it might be physically or logically proved that the earth moves and the sun stands still.
- Note added by Galileo in the preliminary leaves of his copy of Dialogue on the Great World Systems (1632)

Philosophy is written in this grand book, the universe, which stands continually open to our gaze. But the book cannot be understood unless one first learns to comprehend the language and read the letters in which it is composed. It is written in the language of mathematics, and its characters are triangles, circles, and other geometric figures without which it is humanly impossible to understand a single word of it; without these, one wanders about in a dark labyrinth.
- The Assayer (1623)

But I do not feel obliged to believe that that same God who has endowed us with senses, reason, and intellect has intended to forgo their use and by some other means to give us knowledge which we can attain by them
- Letter to Madame Christina of Lorraine, Grand Duchess of Tuscany (1615)

That's all for now, folks, but if you should wish to hear more, I will be "Revisiting the Galileo Affair" on Tuesday, April 17, as part of the CASE Christianity and Contemporary Thought lecture series. I hope to see you all there (although those who live in a different hemisphere will, of course, be excused).

Lame Science, Blind Religion

Separate but equal? Faith versus evidence? Not convinced.

Click here.

Does Dawkins exist?

A parable.

If I had a hammer...

My dad just walked through the house holding a hammer and some nails.

Ah, you've got a hammer! Are you going to hammer in the morning?

Well, no, it's the afternoon now.

Are you going to hammer in the evening?

I hope to be finished before then.

Are you going to hammer all over this land?

No, just the back step.

Is it a hammer of justice?

No, it's a claw hammer.

Are you going to hammer out justice?

No.

Are you going to hammer out warning?

No.

Love between your brothers and your sisters all over this land?

Nope, I'm just going to fix the step.

He's now finished hammering...

Wine writers show that facts don't exist

Click here.

Sargeant Pepper

A stylish way to defend oneself from attackers. Too bad it's illegal here!

Loving it

Michael Jensen on blogging

Click here.

Putting 9/11 into perspective

Imagine that on 9/11, six hours after the assault on the twin towers and the Pentagon, terrorists had carried out a second wave of attacks on the United States, taking an additional 3,000 lives. Imagine that six hours after that, there had been yet another wave. Now imagine that the attacks had continued, every six hours, for another four years, until nearly 20 million Americans were dead. This is roughly what the Soviet Union suffered during World War II, and contemplating these numbers may help put in perspective what the United States has so far experienced during the war against terrorism.

Continue reading here.

Education or Indoctrination?

Nick has written a post about a movie called Jesus Camp. I thought my comment was going to get too long, so I'm posting it here instead.

Where do you draw the line between education and indoctrination? Can you give children a choice without educating them about religion anyway? I was a Christian from a young age, but I don't think I was indoctrinated. Do you? I didn't have a full understanding of what it meant to be a Christian. I "asked Jesus into my heart" when I was about 3 or 4 (maybe older, I can't remember), but I didn't really know what it meant. I did it just after my bath - I thought he'd be able to get in more easily if I wasn't wearing any clothes! But just because I only had a child's understanding doesn't mean I was indoctrinated. It wasn't something I was forced to do. I wanted to do it, and my parents weren't even in the room at the time.

My understanding of Christianity grew gradually as I got older. I don't know exactly when I understood different things, but I remember trying to evangelise my friends when I was about 6 or 7 (I was a very cute little girl back then, by the way). I organised a group of my friends at school into a little singing group and we performed some Sunday School songs for the rest of the class (and we were invited next door to sing to the other class as well). I used to invite friends to Sunday School. No one told me to. I just wanted my friends to know what I knew about Jesus. Does this sound like indoctrination?

When I was 12 (only 2 years older than your cut-off of 10), at Easter time, it really hit me just how significant and important it was that Jesus died for me. I count this as the time that I made a real commitment to Christ, and took my parents' faith on for myself. But that doesn't mean that I didn't believe it before, or that I just believed because my parents did. If that was the case, I might not have stayed a Christian. No one would have forced me to. My parents might not have been happy, but I'm sure they would have respected my decision.

Yes, my parents "forced" me to go to Sunday School when I was a kid. Mostly I enjoyed it, but sometimes I wanted to sleep in on Sunday mornings. But they forced me to do a lot of other things too - eat vegetables, go to school, practise piano - I'm grateful for all of it. Except for the brussels sprouts.

I'm a Christian, and I consider that I have been one pretty much my whole life. Although my understanding has changed, there was never a time that I didn't believe in God or what he has done. But I've always had a choice. I've had plenty of chances to change my mind. I've had my faith and beliefs challenged. I haven't shied away from such challenges - I read books by authors such as Dawkins, and I get into debates with people like Peter Slezak. I am not a Christian out of ignorance. The more I read and the more I think about it, the more it makes sense. This, I think, is what Dawkins just doesn't get. He seems to think that the only Christians who aren't ignorant, indoctrinated and blind are the ones whose beliefs hardly resemble Christianity any more. He's wrong.

Art and Science

Title: In Saturn's Shadow
2006, NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

With giant Saturn hanging in the blackness and sheltering Cassini from the sun's blinding glare, the spacecraft viewed the rings as never before, revealing previously unknown faint rings and even glimpsing its home world.

Read more here.

Hello

I am your mind giving you someone to talk to
Hello...

Dr Zhivago published in Russian by the CIA

Click here.

Fundamentalism

We keep trying to explain away American fundamentalism. Those of us not engaged personally or emotionally in the biggest political and cultural movement of our times—those on the sidelines of history—keep trying to come up with theories with which to discredit the evident allure of this punishing yet oddly comforting idea of a deity, this strange god. His invisible hand is everywhere, say His citizen-theologians, caressing and fixing every outcome: Little League games, job searches, test scores, the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, the success or failure of terrorist attacks (also known as “signs”), victory or defeat in battle, at the ballot box, in bed. Those unable to feel His soothing touch at moments such as these snort at the notion of a god with the patience or the prurience to monitor every tick and twitch of desire, a supreme being able to make a lion and a lamb cuddle but unable to abide two men kissing. A divine love that speaks through hurricanes. Who would worship such a god? His followers must be dupes, or saps, or fools, their faith illiterate, insane, or misinformed, their strength fleeting, hollow, an aberration. A burp in American history. An unpleasant odor that will pass.

Even the inexorable facts of math are subject to His decree, as explained in homeschooling texts such as Mathematics: Is God Silent? Two plus two is four because God says so. If He chose, it could just as easily be five.

Interesting... that's exactly what Descartes, the great rationalist and founder of modern philosophy, said. Hmm.

The dupes, the saps, and the fools—the believers—prefer their re-enchanted past, alive to the dark magic with which all histories are constructed. For them America’s past merely charts God’s love, its meanings revealed to His key men, presidents and generals, preachers and a goy with a shofar. The rest of us are simply not part of the dream. Fundamentalism is writing us out of history.

Read the whole article here.

Should philosophers be more like scientists?

Is philosophy progressive?

I like butterflies

My favourite colour is blue.

And I love Polish Chocolate Walnut cake, which technically should be called Russian Chocolate Walnut cake, because the recipe came from Russia, though it passed into our family through Poland. I'm going to continue calling it Polish Chocolate Walnut cake, even though my brother insists on calling it Russian Chocolate Walnut Cake, because that's what it was always called and I think it recalls the anecdote about how we got the recipe quite nicely.

It's very, very, VERY good cake! Especially when my mum cooks it!

Angels for Hope

This is a sweet idea.

Hat tip: Daily Candy

Very interesting

Sydney Anglican Heretics.

See also the comments on Craig's post here.

More on religion and politics

This Government never has, never would and, in my view, never should adopt any policy because of religious arguments. Governments, unlike individuals, cannot act on the basis of faith, only reason. The difference between the Government and many of its critics is that its senior members think that the values of the Ten Commandments are as much common sense as religious dogma.

Read more here.

Do you like butterflies?

Grown-ups love figures. When you describe a new friend to them, they never ask you about the important things. They never say: 'What's his voice like? What are his favourite games? Does he collect butterflies?' Instead they demand: 'How old is he? How many brothers has he? How much does he weigh? How much does his father earn?' Only then do they feel they know him. If you say to the grown-ups: 'I've seen a lovely house made of pink brick, with geraniums in the windows and doves on the roof', they are unable to picture such a house. You must say: 'I saw a house that cost a hundred thousand francs.' Then they cry out: 'Oh, how pretty!'

Antoine de Saint-Exupery, The Little Prince

I am deeply indebted to my dear brother Tim for reminding me of this passage at Christmas.

See also Byron's post on Dickens on Butterflies.

FYI

Strike a match.

When is abortion racism?

An intense sermon from John Piper.

Simply Christian

Christian faith is not a general religious awareness. Nor is it the ability to believe several unlikely propositions. It is certainly not a kind of gullibility which would put us out of touch with any genuine reality. It is the faith which hears the story of Jesus, including the announcement that he is the world's true Lord, and responds from the heart with a surge of grateful love that says: "Yes. Jesus is Lord. He died for my sins. God raised him from the dead. This is the centre of everything." Whether you come to this faith in a blinding flash or by a long, slow, winding route, once you get to this point you are (whether you realize it or not) wearing the badge which marks you out as part of the church, on an equal footing with every other Christian who has ever lived. You are discovering what it means to wake up and find yourself in God's new world. [179]

Made for spirituality, we wallow in introspection. Made for joy, we settle for pleasure. Made for justice, we clamour for vengeance. Made for relationship, we insist on our own way. Made for beauty, we are satisfied with sentiment. But new creation has already begun. The sun has begun to rise. Christians are called to leave behind, in the tomb of Jesus Christ, all that belongs to the brokenness and incompleteness of the present world. It is time, in the power of the Spirit, to take up our proper role, our fully human role, as agents, heralds and stewards of the new day that is dawning. That, quite simply, is what it means to be Christian, to follow Jesus Christ into the new world, God's new world, which he has thrown open before us. [202]

Tom Wright, Simply Christian, Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, London, 2006.

Top 25

The top 25 most played songs in my iTunes library as of today - ranging from 39 plays down to 18.

1. We're Coming Home - Rogue Traders
2. Black Fingernails, Red Wine - Eskimo Joe
3. Together in Electric Dreams - The Human League
4. Revolution - The Veronicas
5. Come On Come On - Little Birdy
6. (Can't Get My) Head Around You - The Offspring
7. Ain't No Other Man - Christina Aguilera
8. Not Ready to Make Nice - Dixie Chicks
9. Throw Your Arms Around Me - Hunters & Collectors
10. Prisoner of Society - The Living End
11. How You Remind Me - Nickelback
12. Nothing At All - Kasey Chambers
13. Did It Again - Kylie Minogue
14. Miss Independent - Kelly Clarkson
15. The Ship Song - Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
16. Joker and the Thief - Wolfmother
17. Times Like These - Foo Fighters
18. Tonic - Pete Murray
19. Don't U Eva - Sarah Blasko
20. Mystery - Brooke Fraser
21. Are You Gonna Be My Girl - JET
22. This Is How It Goes - Missy Higgins
23. Amazing - Alex Lloyd
24. You Give Me Something - James Morrison
25. (Baby I've Got You) On My Mind – Powderfinger

I think this gives a nice indication of the range of my taste in music! Just keep in mind that this is only over the last 4 or 5 months that I've had my new laptop. Interesting... all but 7 of these were bought from the iTunes music store. That's a dangerous place...

Christianity in a Democracy

My brother Tim has a new blog called Christianity in a Democracy.

I recommend that you check it out.

(Nick, maybe you can argue some more with Tim over there!!)

I find it interesting that the link to this blog from Tim's other blog is the first in a list of "interesting blogs."

Strange

Thanks to my brother's influence, I have started using Google Analytics. According to the pie chart which analyses visits by source, one visitor last Friday came via the San Francisco Giants Blog.

I'm not sure how that works.

It's almost here!

My DVDs of Alias Season 5 should arrive from Amazon any day now...

The question is, do I watch them straight away, or do I watch the first four seasons again first, in order to appreciate the full impact of the final season??

Singstar

So 1, 2, 3, take my hand and come with me because you look so fine and I really wanna make you mine.
(Insert air guitar here)

I say you look so fine that I really wanna make you mine.
(More air guitar here)



(Yes, that's me underneath the hair!!)

Happy Birthday Pierre Gassendi!

On this day in 1592, Pierre Gassendi was born at Champtercier, near Digne, in France.

Gassendi was a mathematician, natural philosopher and theologian, most notable for his efforts in reviving and Christianising Epicurean atomism as an alternative to Aristotelianism. He was also a correspondent of Marin Mersenne - the postbox of the time - and of Rene Descartes. He wrote several objections to Descartes' Meditations on First Philosophy.

Barry Brundell, the Catholic priest/historian of science famous for impersonating the Pope and Cardinal Bellarmine in retrials of Galileo at UNSW, is an expert on Gassendi. He told me once about how he ended up as such. He said that he had an idea of the kind of argument he wanted to make in his PhD thesis, and the time period he was interested in. He didn't want to focus on anyone who had already been done to death by other historians, so he went searching through a library card catalogue (yes, it was back in those days) and came across Gassendi. Right time period, fitted the argument, had been neglected by historians... perfect! Ah, the wonders of academic research!

Happy Birthday Sir Francis Bacon!

On this day in 1561, Francis Bacon was born at York House in the Strand, London.

I would imagine that most people have at least heard of Francis Bacon. My first encounter with the name was as a young child listening to the hilarious Rinse the Blood Off My Toga by Wayne and Schuster - "with apologies to William Shakespeare... and Sir Francis Bacon, just in case." I laughed, of course, even though I didn't understand the joke!

My second encounter with Francis Bacon would have been an early History and Philosophy of Science class, most probably as the founder of the "scientific method."

I'm not too interested in "scientific method" - far too much influence from post-Kuhnian sociologists of science. My interest in Bacon lies in his thoughts on nature and religion.

The main point of my PhD thesis is to provide a re-interpretation or re-evaluation of natural theology - pointing out that it's a more complicated enterprise than historians have usually given it credit for, and suggesting a way forward for understanding it in all its complexities. (So really there is no 'it', but that's a topic for another time...)

One thing I've been struggling with is understanding what people actually meant by "natural" theology or "natural" religion. I'm not convinced that it's always framed in opposition to "revealed" religion or Scriptural theology. So, I was quite excited on the weekend when I finaly started reading Peter Harrison's 'Religion' and the religions in the English Enlightenment. The first chapter begins with a discussion of the various meanings of the term "nature" in the 17th and 18th centuries, reflected in different views on natural religion. For the Reformers, Harrison suggests, "natural" stood in stark contrast to "supernatural" and hence "natural religion" was a result of human sin, and was opposed to "revealed religion." For Francis Bacon, however, this opposition was invalid. Harrison quotes Bacon on the two senses of the "light of nature":

The one, that which springeth from reason, sense, induction, argument, according to the laws of heaven and earth; the other, that which is imprinted upon the spirit of man by an inward instinct, according to the law of conscience, which is a sparkle of purity of his first estate; in which the latter sense only he is participant of some light and discerning touching the perfection of the moral law.

That is, Bacon is using "natural" in the sense of something inherent to a person - not opposed to supernatural, since it is endowed by God. The Cambridge Platonists (still no action figures) adopted this use of natural reason, particularly evident in their favourite catchphrase - reason is "the Candle of the Lord" - derived from Proverbs 20:27. But again, that's a topic for another post.

In the near future, I'll try to write more about the Cambridge Platonists and the Candle of the Lord, and about the Reformers' views on nature and the supernatural. I'm intrigued by their dichtomy. But for the moment, suffice it to say, Happy Birthday Francis Bacon!


This is the second post in my series commemorating the birthdays of particular thinkers who I deem worthy of such an honour. (Actually, the thinkers are chosen from the Philosophers' Birthdays calendar I've subscribed to in iCal.) The first in this series was for Dr Samuel Clarke.

Reason and Religion

The role of reason in religion is a major theme in my research. As I read about attempts to solve 17th-century doctrinal conflict by appealing to reason, I can't help but think of our own society - appeals to tolerance, reasonableness, and a rejection of dogma; the view that all religions basically agree on the main points and that the details are not important; the conviction that the way a person lives is more important than what they believe.

Here is a quote from the article I'm currently reading, referring to attempts to find a middle ground between Anglicanism and Puritanism:

Through reason it was hoped that men might be induced to mitigate their stress on points of minor importance, tolerate the lesser differences of opinion, and come together on the great essentials concerning which there could be no reasonable doubt.1

Sounds good in theory, but who decides which points are of minor importance? How do we judge which differences of opinion to tolerate and which we should stand up against? What are the "great essentials" and how do we define "reasonable doubt"? And how did they ever think they could convince Puritans of the value of reason when Puritans thought it had been corrupted by the Fall?!

Hmm. Hopefully I'll have it figured out by the end of the year.

1. Sterling P. Lamprecht, “Innate Ideas in the Cambridge Platonists,” The Philosophical Review 35:6 (1926), 553-573.

A Deadly Certitude

Steven Weinberg's review of Dawkins.

Le Grand Content

Thanks to Tim.

Am I a heretic?

I'm reading an article at the moment on the Cambridge Platonist Henry More (I still haven't found that action figure, by the way). The author, John Henry, writes that one of More's motivations for developing his concept of the soul was to defeat (or convert) mortalists. Henry writes:

As is well know mortalism was an extremely prevalent heterodoxy in seventeenth-century England, and Henry More frequently wrote against it. Mortalists responded to the problem of soul-body interaction by taking a monistic view of the person. On death the person was held to lie 'asleep' in the grave until the general Resurrection on the Last Day. At the Resurrection, it was held, the whole person (body and soul, if they can be meaningfully distinguished) would be resuscitated by God.

I don't think the Bible tells us enough about this topic to make any absolute pronouncements, but I've thought for a while that this viewpoint makes sense and seems to fit with what the Bible does say. Except for the "resuscitation" bit. We will have a new body, not the old one pacthed up a bit. I think.

I've read about mortalism (also known as psychopannychism) before in an article about Isaac Newton, who apparently held this view. The other author (James Force, I think, or Richard Popkin) called it a "heresy." So... am I a heretic??

Past the 200 mark...

Very exciting.

Zadie Smith on writing and reading

A novel is a two-way street, in which the labour required on either side is, in the end, equal. Reading, done properly, is every bit as tough as writing - I really believe that. As for those people who align reading with the essentially passive experience of watching television, they only wish to debase reading and readers. The more accurate analogy is that of the amateur musician placing her sheet music on the stand and preparing to play. She must use her own, hard-won, skills to play this piece of music. The greater the skill, the greater the gift she gives the composer and the composer gives her.

Read the whole article here.

Very scary

I don't know what's more disturbing: that some Muslims can respond with such violence to suggestions that their religion is violent, or that academic opinion is being censored to such a degree in a country like France.

Click here.

The truth is out there... and so are owls

Click here.

The Thrill of the Chaste

A very open and honest article from the UK Sunday Times. There should be more articles like this in the secular media.

Religion and politics

I recently received an email from Agnes, a friend from Iceland. She wrote:

There's a huge, ugly and public debate going on here about the fact that we have a national church and the two most vocal sides are getting really ugly. They're the hard-line right-wing Christians and the hard-line atheists. While I'm inclined to think that it's wrong for a democratic state to lend more financial support to one religion over the others and to give it's teachings prominence in elementary school religious classes I'm sad that the only voices heard in this debate are the loud rude ones. All they do is insult other peoples' choices, and thinking back on our conversations, I know it doesn't have to be that way. It's also ridiculous when you think about the ideology of each group: the Christians preach forgiveness and love thy neighbor while the atheists argue for freedom of choice and tolerance - none of this is apparent in the insults the groups are trading in the media : )

I just replied with some thoughts of my own about the issue, and figured I may as well post them here too. Maybe someone will have some comments to offer. My opinions are not very well researched or thought out (yet), so I would love to hear what others think.

Have a look also at my brother's new blog: Christianity in a Democracy.
---

That's a shame about the ugly debate going on in Iceland (though it's nice that it is making you think about me!) Extreme views always seem to get the most media attention - not just because the people are loud and rude, but because it's controversial and it sells. It's sad that people have to stereotype others into such black-and-white groups without realising that there is a range of opinion and a lot of room for understanding and perhaps compromise.

The separation of Church and State is an issue that arises in Australia from time to time as well. The separation is not enshrined in the Constitution like it is in America, but we don't have a national church. It was a big issue in the US because the founders escaped religious persecution in England because they didn't conform to the Established Church - hence, religious freedom was extremely important to them. It wasn't as much of an issue in Australia, though I'm not sure of the detailed history.

I don't think a national, state-established church is a good idea. I don't think it's the job of an elected government to legislate religious belief or practice. However, I do get annoyed at people who misuse the concept. It often gets trotted out when politicians have the nerve to express an opinion drawn from their religious beliefs. "We have a separation of church and state!" is the cry from secularists. Well, we don't have an established church, but that doesn't mean that politicians can't be religious. The separation of church and state means the absence of a state-sponsored church, not the absence of religious belief among the members of the government. Every politician has an ideology, worldview or over-arching belief system that guides their thinking. Why should religion be specifically excluded?

There was an interesting opinion piece in the Sydney Morning Herald on Saturday. Emily Maguire (an author whose recent book I really enjoyed) is complaining about Kevin Rudd (recently elected leader of the federal Labor party) and his religious opinions. The only arguments she deals with explicitly, however, are from Tony Abbott and John Anderson, both right-wing politicians. One paragraph worth quoting:

Rudd is on a self-declared mission to reclaim Christianity from the right, which would be fine if he were the elected leader of a Christian organisation. As leader of a secular party and potential leader of our nation he should be talking about the values that unite those on the left, not the specific faith from which some of them derive these values. Why create a chasm between those who are working for essentially the same end: a more just and compassionate world? Why emphasise your religious faith - something that separates you from others with the same goal - when you could be emphasising your commitment to social justice?

I don't see why one can't do both. In fact, I'm fairly sure that what Rudd means by "reclaiming Christianity from the right" involves an emphasis on social justice (an aspect of Christianity sometimes overlooked by more right-leaning people). Why can't Rudd emphasise social justice as an outworking of his religious beliefs? A Christian can work alongside a Muslim or a Jew or an atheist to achieve social justice, while acknowledging that the reasons behind doing so may be different. Differences don't have to divide. Besides, Rudd was elected by people who presumably knew what he stood for - he's never made a secret of it.

The Joyce of Science

It's amazing what people come up with. From a discussion on an email list for the history of the philosophy of science:

Counter-examples to Kuhn. I've deleted the original email, but here are a few highlights, the first three being from Steve Fuller:

With all due respect to Paul [Hoyningen-Huene, who proposed the original question], the main problem with Kuhn's model is that it's not clear that it was designed to be tested in some straightforward empirical manner... So, good luck cherry-picking the history of science to keep Kuhn alive! Yours in discourse...

A question about Merton drew this response:

Merton definitely has 'wit': he knows how to mark some thing brilliantly, and the systematic v. historical approach to a science (drawn from theology) is a good example. The more historical the approach to a science, the more critical you're likely to be of how much present has made over the past. In contrast, the systematic approach tends to make it look like everyone is contributing pieces to the same puzzle. Kuhn, in his uncanny vagueness, straddled this, and you can see historians and philosophers of science trying to draw him in one or the other direction. Paul Hoyningen-Huene would like to enable Kuhn to out-Kant Kant; others think time is better spent elsewhere.

Some more references to Merton, Sorokin and Myerson, then:

Are we in Finnegan's Wake country, here? Merton + Sorokin = Meyerson?

After 20 more emails in less than 24 hours (these "Hopoi" are rather hyperactive):

It is Finnegans Wake, as even people
know who haven't read it but have
only glanced at the title.

F.A. Muller
Amsterdam

(Too many syllables, but otherwise it looks like a haiku!)

And then this (from Jon Bennett), including a fascinating link:

What better example of a parallelism of ideas in science and literature than Finnegan's Wake - indicating a larger cultural metaparadigm - unless it would be the other works of Joyce. Proust is a good example of Einstein's ideas applied to literature. Here is a popular discussion of Joyce and science.

I just think it's amazing what people come up with. And I feel so inadequate. I barely finished The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man!

No willpower

I have no willpower. None at all. I'm supposed to be cutting back on "extra-curricular" activities this year - writing my thesis should be top priority. But I just couldn't resist. I came back from my holiday in Canberra to find a letter from Moore College regarding the evening course this year. While I had decided not to take any subjects this year, I didn't see any harm in seeing which subjects were offered at Miranda this year. Big mistake. Term 1 - Romans.

ROMANS!!

My favourite book of the Bible! The subject I've been waiting for, and with the four-year cycle and not knowing what I'll be doing for the next few years, I might not get another chance! So I've filled in the form already and will be sending it off tomorrow.

It's only 8 weeks. It finishes by the end of March, and I won't do any other subjects this year (Acts and Paul is tempting, but I'll likely be overseas for the first few weeks, and The Christian Life and Australian Christianity can wait) so surely it can't be too bad!

Hmm. It's going to be an interesting year!

I need to vent...

A more detailed and careful critique of Dawkins will be on its way when I've finished the book, but for now, I just need to vent a little. I'm up to chapter 7, page 243 (over half way!) and for the first time, I really would have thrown the book across the room, except that it cost me $31.50 and I don't want to damage it (at this point I'd like to include a comment from my Jesuit friend: "I've read unfavorable reviews of Dawkins, but would like to read it - however I can't see giving him any more money").

So, I'm getting fed up with Dawkins. I don't know why I get so worked up (breathe in... breathe out... breathe in... breathe out...). It's not that I'm offended as such. He's not actually attacking anything I believe, though he is claiming to. He is trying to discredit the whole of religion by attacking a few examples, and he picks the easy targets, ignoring anything that might give his argument some trouble. So, US conservatives and TV evangelists become typical of evangelicals, while Dawkins only acknowledges as "sophisticated", "reflective", or "advanced" thinkers people like Bishop Spong and those whose beliefs barely resemble Christianity.

While ultra-conservatives, "Christians" who write hate letters and bomb abortion clinics, and people like Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson could be typical of Christianity in America (I don't have the numbers, but I'm not convinced), and while watered-down liberal theology may be typical of the Church of England or Episcopal Church in some parts of the world (also not convinced), there are many, many intelligent, reflective and sophisticated thinkers who have considered the issues that Dawkins raises against Christianity, and have some (but not all) answers. Does Dawkins genuinely believe that all Christians are either stupid or barely believers? Does he really think that we haven't considered issues such as the problem of evil or the historical origin of the biblical documents?

I'm not offended, because Dawkins is rejecting as Christianity something that I would also reject as Christianity. However, this is part of his larger project of eliminating all religion, and he is attempting to achieve this by knocking down a straw man and (though I can't comment on his intentions) assuming that his readers won't know the difference.

More on this in a week or so. Right now, I'm going to go to bed, finish my cup of tea, read some Tom Wright, get an early night, and perhaps in the morning I'll feel up to reading some more Dawkins!

Breathe in... breathe out... breathe in... breathe out...

What are deer pants?

I was playing some church songs on the piano this evening, and I was reminded of an old chorus we sang at church when I was a kid - "As the deer pants for the water so my soul longs after you; You alone are my heart's desire and I long to worship you." I used to always wonder what deer pants were.

November and December 2006

Books bought:

• Nick Hornby, The Complete Polysyllabic Spree
• Mark Tredennick, The Little Red Writing Book
• Jasper Fforde, The Big Over Easy
• Robert Harris, Enigma
• Robert Harris, Imperium
• Susanna Gregory, A Masterly Murder
• Alister McGrath, The Twilight of Atheism
• Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion
• Richard Dawkins, A Devil's Chaplain
• Katharine McMahon, The Alchemist's Daughter
• Edward O. Wilson (ed.), From So Simple A Beginning: The Four Great Books of Charles Darwin
• Janet Browne, Darwin's Origin of Species: A Biography

Books read:

• Nick Hornby, The Complete Polysyllabic Spree
• Alister McGrath, The Twilight of Atheism
• Jasper Fforde, The Big Over Easy
• Katharine McMahon, The Alchemist's Daughter
• Emily Maguire, The Gospel According to Luke
• Vashti Farrer, Plagues and Federation: The Diary of Kitty Barnes

After reading Hornby's The Complete Polysyllabic Spree, I was inspired to change slightly the format of these posts. I've enjoyed Hornby's novels (I've read all except Fever Pitch), and I'm also interested in reading what other people say about the books they've read. Last Christmas, my parents bought me a book called Classics: Books for Life, by Jane Gleeson-White. It contains short essays on 62 classic books, from Homer's Iliad to Ulysses by James Joyce to Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children. I'm aiming to read them all (well, unless there are any that sound particularly unenjoyable) at some point. I've also thought about buying 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die, but 62 books seems much more achieveable.

The Complete Polysyllabic Spree is a month-by-month account of what Hornby has bought and read, with a few complaints about his fictionalised editorial team (the Polysyllabic Spree) along the way. I was encouraged to know that I am not the only person who buys more books than I read. I don't buy books to read straight away. I like building up my personal library. I love lying in bed looking at my overpacked bookshelves, thinking about the books I've enjoyed in the past and wondering what to read next. I enjoy not needing to go out to buy a new book when I've just finished one - I just need to peruse my bookshelves and choose something.

My postgraduate study involves so much reading that once I get home of an evening, all I really have enough mental energy to do is flake out in front of the tv. So, I'm relishing being on holidays and being able to read as much as I want to - and to read books that are not related to my PhD! I'm also loving Borders' email updates - "The Shortlist" - and especially the "buy four books, get 40% off" vouchers that appear from time to time. Last week I decided to stock up on novels for my holiday - the next in Susanna Gregory's Matthew Bartholemew books, and a couple of Robert Harris novels - Enigma, because I enjoyed the movie, and Imperium, because it has Cicero in it. Unfortunately, I couldn't find the third Thursday Next book, so I got The Big Over Easy instead.

I spotted The Alchemist's Daughter in Berkelouw's, and was convinced by the phrase "natural philosophy" and the year 1725 on the back cover. It was going well for 50 pages or so, took a down turn, but then picked up again, and I ended up really enjoying it. I had a nice reading binge last week. I started The Alchemist's Daughter on Wednesday night before bed, and finished it on Thursday afternoon. Thursday evening I picked up The Gospel According to Luke, given to me for Christmas by my parents, at around 8:30pm. I couldn't put it down, and I finished it by midnight. Quite an amazing book - the central theme I guess was the difficulties of being attracted to someone who has completely contrary beliefs. Or maybe loving someone you know you cant have because your beliefs forbid it. Putting it like that reminds me of Jane Eyre, one of my favourite books and characters, though her response was much different.

At the moment I'm also about half-way through Dawkins' The God Delusion. Amazingly, it wasn't until page 5 that I wanted to throw the book across the room. I've already thought up the title for my critique... but I'm not going to reveal that yet!! I mentioned previously that I'd read Alister McGrath's critique of Dawkins. So far, everything he said has seemed very reasonable! Dawkins makes a brief mention of McGrath in The God Delusion, and shows that he hasn't understood the critique. McGrath is a fantastic writer. I also enjoyed The Twilight of Atheism. He traces the history of atheism from the Enlightenment, considering its connections with various social and political events and movements. It's intriguing to read alongside Dawkins. Dawkins wants to eliminate religion all together, but he doesn't say how (except that he things all thinking people should be convinced by his book). McGrath shows that any attempts at wholescale conversion to atheism have been accompanied by violence, which is just the thing Dawkins criticises religion for. I wonder what his plan is?

Plagues and Federation is a kids book that my mum suggested I read. I suppose my education was very poor in that I didn't know there was an outbreak of bubonic plague in The Rocks in 1900. It was a decent enough book, but not that exciting. It was written as a diary of a teenage girl growing up in The Rocks, dealing with the plague, financial hardship, her brother going to war and falling for the boy next door. Cute, and I suppose it would give kids some idea of what it was like to live in Sydney 100 years ago, but I'm not sure it would do much else. Oh well. I suppose books are for entertainment and don't always have to educate, but I get irritated reading people who can't write, even if it's intentional!

At the moment I'm in the middle of an Amir Aczel book about Descartes' Secret Notebook, a Susannah Gregory novel, Tom Wright's Simply Christian and Robert Harris' Imperium. Also on the list for the near future are more Michael Ruse, some books about history and finishing off Dawkins.