The anti-secular

As a default position, I would say that I’d consider secularism to be a reasonable notion. That is, if we are to understand the notion of secularism as the separation of the influence of religious groups onto social and civic institutions. That said, it has come to my attention of two things that seem interesting cases.

1. Judaism has a system of ethics which is referred to as ‘law’. The significance of Jewish law that makes it really distinct is that a great many issues are considered under the Jewish framework of beliefs. Whether to turn a light on or off on the Sabbath is considered to some, a difficult issue. What kind of car should one buy, what food to eat and so on. It would be absurd to say that one should not be allowed to be informed by a religious conviction or doctrine or system of beliefs, but this seems to stand in a tension (but by no means a contradiction), with the notion that religious institutions should have no influence over social and civic affairs. There seems an important sense in which the notion of the secular is lacking in acknowledging this.

2. There is such a thing as an Islamic bank. I don’t know too much about it but I do understand that it has different problems and different benefits. In the current climate where finance and the financial system is in turmoil, it may seem an interesting and perhaps welcome difference to consider doing things differently. What makes an Islamic bank ‘Islamic’? The early bankers (so Max Weber will have us believe) were Calvinist protestants, we wouldn’t say that those early banks were ‘calvinist banks’ or ‘religious banks’, but happened to be in such and such a social background and situation that most of the banking founders were protestant calvinists afraid of going to hell*.

*Caveat: Consider the Weber thought as a counterfactual, in the sense that Weber’s actual historical evidence and account is wholly questionable.

We need more terminology about the notion of the secular.

Sinistre

25 things about you

I have noticed a few dozen people in my facebook network to be taking part in this ‘25 things about you’ craze.

It goes something like this:

tag 25 people in a note,
say 25 things about yourself
those 25 people (if they are fuckwits) will say something about themselves

It’s kind of a self-indulgence thing, or only interesting if you want to bone the other person, or tell someone you want to bone something about you.

Michael was going to write an article on this, but actually say 25 things about himself, I suitably chastised him, and am putting this article in its place

Antisophie (edited by last laugh Michael)

Fuck fuck shit Kelly Clarkson (on the recent interest in offensive language)

A note about the title

Okay, two notes here. The first ‘Kelly Clarkson’ remark is a reference to The 40 year old virgin (in the male chest waxing scene, as it was said as an expletive). The second thing was that I decidedly did not put any racist or homophobic language in the title, as I thought the title might be too offputting for readers to actually read the article (so I’m putting in this video instead to highlight what my piece today is about):

A list of gaffes

I have found a lot of interest in offensive language and gestures, the notion of offense and political correctness lately. Here’s a list of stories I’ve found:

1. Prince Harry’s use of the word Paki (yeah I said it!)
2. Prince Charles’ use of the word Sooty as a noun for a friend
3. Carol Thatcher (Journalist, Broadcaster and daughter of former PM) and her offstage use of the word golliwog
4. Miley Cyrus’ slant-eyed gesture
5. Jeremy Clarkson being himself, see also this, and also this

I can find more if I really wanted to, oh yes, there is the all-famous Christian Bale incident, where the BBC had broadcast it uncensored.

Clearly, all of these incidents have unique features to them (Miley Cyrus, for instance, has a desire to want to be contraversial (such as wearing that Iron Maiden shirt the other day; Jeremy Clarkson is just being Jeremy Clarkson, and the Royals and Thatcher seem to represent an upper class of the political elite (at least, of their families, anyway.

Howeverr, there is a general moral panic about offensiveness and political correctness. Anyone Tsar or Romanov in broadcasting and media should be shitting themselves, cos the villagers could be burning their homes any time now. Question is, why is it happening now? I think it’s the economy, this seems to be a referred pain of social ills, like in the film Children of Men, when the extinction of humanity reminds the British about the ills of….terrorism and illegal immigration?

Antisophie (source material provided by Michael)

A fascination with the ‘new’

Aquinas (or someone medieval) was right to believe that all actions contain an element of being good and bad; the proportion of which, depends, ultimately upon what the action is. We may draw good or positive consequences from evil, or horrific, or distressing acts and conversely, we may find unexpected and negative effects from what were intended to be good actions. That concludes my preamble.

In considering all the ‘fad’ things of the past few years, they seem to all point to some large global database that is accessible to all. It almost seems dictatorial in a way, but what seems more disturbing is that the forces of the free consumer has led to its wide proliferation, it is a ‘voting by feet’, if you would.

What kind of things do I refer to? Well, all sorts: iTunes, with its local area network capacities; Facebook, for being, well, Facebook-ey; Twitter, Linkdin, publically accessable RSS feeds. While the positives of these things are seemingly obvious, greater interconnectedness, the establishment of communities, interests and relations that are not constructed by geographical location but by shared interests, beliefs, or practices; breaking down of social barriers, particularly for the severely physically disabled (I am considering Second Life in particular); and, well, a more accessible face to contemporary technology.

This sounds all good right? Well, consider that each small ‘innovation’ does have an effect on privacy and the possibility of being monitored. The debate about policing the internet will inevitably rise (as it does in all sorts of other issues), a discussion which must be had. As people wholeheartedly embrace so many of these interesting innovations and dotcoms, we may find our rights and privacies slowly diminishing, and once this occurs, we have no-one to blame but ourselves. Perhaps a Leviathan appeal can be made: that the individual is at their most fundamental, stupid and ambivalent to the security and welfare of the whole such that an outside agency representing the manifold of individuals holds to protect all.

The fascination with the new should be seen with disdain and interest, while excess in either element may hinder us; a more critical use of the internet is crucial; the question is, how do we teach or foster this kind of attitude? I could assume that more familiar internet users (e.g. those who have been involved with or users of the web since the 1980’s or 90’s) have a native savvy about them; those who have grown up taking the internet, and new technologies for granted often have an uncritical acceptance of what it can do.

Sinistre

That age-old platitude…

…of “history repeats itself” comes to mind;
think 1930s,
think art deco and inaccessible music,
think prohibition,
think dancehalls,
think recession,
think drink and drugs,
think depression,
think socialism,
think ideological warfare,

remember a death of an empire,
remember the folk ideology,
remember Romanticism? the bricolage of postmodern nostalgia has turned on itself
remember Modernity? only left-wing intellectuals and the avant-garde do…
remember the problem of consumption,
over-buying,
we can sell and sell and sell, but the profit stops when we all have that latest thing

remember the cult of personality,
remember censorship,
remember when we had new ideas,
remember old ideas,
remember that age-old platitude…
ah, forget about it…

S*

Reading Foucault: Some observations

Reading Foucault is difficult; but one questions how it is that Foucault shall be read: for this question determines the latterly question: how shall Foucault be judged?

It is, despite my confidence about social theory, a whole minefield, of which I admit nothing interesting I can say about Foucault; comparatively however, the observations can be made:

1. It is strangely familiar to read Foucault, not in the writing style, nor even in the context; but in the conclusions made.

2. This is for a few reasons: Foucault’s terminology and work has been dispersed even if not by name unto many subjects: literary studies, social sciences, the humanities, (continental) philosophy..

3. There is a strange parallel to be made between Goffman (of whom I know a little bit more about) and Foucault:

i. Both seem to have interests in control mechanisms
ii. Both have ‘campaigning’ elements to them
iii. Both leer into the more morbid and dark and ‘outside’ (to use Goffmanian terminology) subjects of social relations and social structure; stigma, homosexuality, the ‘total institution’.

4. This parallel isvery unsubtle and there are many complexities to Foucault that I am not acknowledging.Very much, it is to say that Foucault’s work took place in the intellectually isolated environment of France, where little outside of it came through (except, of course, for the real ‘titans’ of the past – Freud, Marx, Hegel etc.)

5. It is interesting to read Foucault as a historian for two reasons:

i. If we understand Foucault as a historian, it sets a prospect for the kind of thing history can be: social commentary of the past to understand the present and future. I hold this wider perspective of our social and natural history to be ‘history par excellance’.
ii. Seeing Foucault as making a statement about our understanding as a result of, or in context of, past social beliefs/attitudes and institutional build makes Foucault look very favourable (much more so, than if we were to consider him a ’social theorist’, or ‘philosopher’).

Michael

Confused Questions

1. Does it make sense to construe norms into the discourse of epistemology?
2. What are the status of the theoretical norms?
3. What theoretical norms are there?

We could have:

i. Ontological unity (naturalism – strong)
ii. Methodological unity (naturalism – weak)
iii. Conceptual unity (Transcendental)
iv. Systematicity (Transcendental)
v. A set of peacemeal norms, induction, parsimony etc.

4. Question-begging, how is induction set into a norm? This relates to the following question

5. If we assume inductive behaviour is inevitable (which, it kind of is), then there is a fact of the matter about the fact that we do use it; further, there is an inevitability about our use of it. Given its inevitability, is there an ought implies can consideration to be made? I see contrary tendencies as to the question of the rationality of questioning the epistemic practice that we deem inevitable (Cf. Stern 2000)

6. We may have epistemic norms of differing graces: strong norms like induction, or systematicity is stronger still, but we may have rules of thumb like parsimony; it may seem that the image is far from systematic, but Quinean-web-like

Destre (and Michael)

David Mitchell on the public discourse of religion

Whatever happened to rigour?

M

The ship of Stratovarius (on ideology and semantics)

Preamble

Anyone who is familiar with the metal scene of Finland knows about the recent spat between Timo Tolkki and the rest of the members of Stratovarius. In a previous post, I reported the news that Stratovarius broke up; but then came a whole barrage of replies from two parties; Timo Tolkki, and the rest of Stratovarius. These recent events are much like the whole open letter affair with Nightwish and their former singer. Has Finnish heavy metal become so big, that it has taken on the mechanics and suave of modern bands, of having official fan clubs, official merchandise, PAs, photoshoots and open letters? It seems long from the harked days of underground bands playing in California who were known by their audiences bootlegging their gigs, but that’s a whole other point at hand…

The heart of Stratovarius

I can engage in a suitably philosophical discussion about the semantics and modality of ‘Stratovarius’; but I want to address a more human point.

Stratovarius is a band that, for me, and a lot of people I know, represents a mindset. It is, I thought quite clearly, until recently, a band that was in tune with a lot of the heavy metal scene in Europe; trying to come to terms with the bleakness, superficiality, conformism and fostered attitude of normative-heterogeneity, by replying either by an expression of despair [such as EToS]; fantasy; or perseverence. Stratovarius represented the most noble of these responses: perseverence, the strength to keep fighting on in a world of superficiality. How ironic, and how disturbing I find it that Stratovarius engages in this kind of dispute. Not to take any sides on the issue, but when a band that for me, represents perseverence and a way of coping with the modern world, has infighting, one kind of loses hope in the message they once represented.

Now, for a rather odd analysis of ‘Stratovarius’….

The semantics of ‘Stratovarius’

Timo Tolkki, de re, was not the original founder of the band, contrast this to Tuomas’ role in Nightwish. It is Tuomas’ baptism of the band, that makes him the essential feature of the band; the necessary condition for ‘Nightwish’ to refer is that Tuomas is in it. Can we say the same for Timo and Strato? The short answer is yes (because he is the lyrical and musical direction of the whole band since 1984); but the long answer is no he fails to fulfill the de re necessity Kripke designator.

There have been many bands (my first thought on this is the Norweigian band Mayhem) which have none of the de re original members present in their current lineup, yet the name of the band still refers. This is obviously like the philosophical problem of identity, the Ship of Theseus; if you replace every plank, is it still the same ship?

In the case of Mayhem; some of the original members have left, and then returned; much like Ozzy Osbourne in Black Sabbath (replaced by Dio, Tony Martin, etc.); however, unlike Mayhem, Black Sabbath maintained the essential feature, the conponent of Tommy Iommi; who has, rather significantly, maintained throughout the whole career of Sabbath; being the creative force behind it, despite how most people associate it with Ozzy (or, as some of the fan discourses argue, Dio, but that very fact points out the finitude of the lead singer as being core to the band).

Is it possible, further, is it legitimate, semantically, for a band to have changed its whole membership and yet still refer by its original name? What of any organisation for that instance. Is the philosophy department of Cambridge still legitimate to claim heritage of Russell, Wittgenstein and Moore, even though they have long gone?

Michael

What is the real conflict, here?

Last night, Antisophie gave me a phonecall and told me that a Vatican astronomy expert said that the Church should not rule out the possibility that there could be life on Mars. I’ve often thought about how a Christian would consider the issue of extra-terrestrial life. My prima facie thoughts would be that a Christian has motivations not to accept such a possibility; but what kind of Christian would that be?

Such a Christian would maintain that Jesus is the source of all salvation; that humanity is the pinnacle of creation, and that as createes in Eden; we have taken on damnation by original sin. It would be those things, core to Christian belief, to which we would deny alien life; why?

Because Jesus is the source of all salvation; if (counterfactual) we entertained there was alien life who was conscious and aware and sentient like us; it too would require salvation. Or, would they? Would these aliens require Jesus’ salvation? Or would they go to hell because they never knew Jesus? Or, if we are really pushing it; did God have another son whom which he sacrificed for another terrestrial race? The latter is a very hard and challenging thought that, I suppose, a believer wouldn’t want to accept. I’m not asserting these questions are problems, but they are things a believer would want to answer; for the conceivability and overall cogency of their view.

If there was life outside of Earth; are we then the pinnacle of creation? If there is life outside of earth; are they tainted by original sin?

On the one hand; I don’t really think there should be much of a conflict; but then, Master Destre said to me; “Think harder, Magister”, his eyes, penetrated through me as his pupils sharpened and focused at me with his dry, icy gaze.

Think about the beliefs that we hold; and think about the comfort that we have when we believe them to be true. Of course, there are many beliefs to which we are uncomfortable about, that we hold true. The fact that we have things that we do not like to admit, but are nonetheless true, and we believe so, shows that we do not simply believe in things we want to.

Perhaps it is a sign of rationality or reflexivity if one demonstrates that their beliefs are subject to some experiential or rational tribunal; where the tribunal of truth and validity lies either outside of us (experience), or imbued within the laws outside of us (reasoning). Is it easy to believe that God loves us? No, it is not; to believe that God loves us, is hardly evidenced in the world. Where is God in the natural disasters of the world, our own personal tragedies, and the fundamental injustices that we inflicts upon our siblings. It is not easy to beleive that there will be a happy ending, especially for those who are heavily involved in the relief of the plight of others. What there is, is a hope, a hope that salvation will come; and this is seriously challenged by the presence of bad fortune and evil in the world. It is far from easy for the intelligent person to believe in God; or for the genuinely compassionate to have hope, in the face of utter despair. Yet, some still do…

What about the flexibility of scientific practice? Imagine to find your life’s work, celebrated by generations after you, being destroyed, or modified beyond your recognition, in the name of truth-preservation. What certainty or fortitude is there in physics? The scientific outlook is one based on shaky metaphysical grounds, shaky empirical methodology, and uncertain substantive conclusions. Rightly so, many would affirm. But, here we have a worldview very uncertain, always subject to change, in constant flux. It is this kind of worldview that tensely is distinct in form from that of the religious belief worldview. The world of the religious beliver is one that has a hope for certainty and truth, and underlying resolution; in the light of flux; and science, is the acknowledgment of flux, and perhaps, the search for similar certainty? We then might say, young charge, that this is not a difference in ideology. Cultural mindset perhaps? To challenge the sensibilities of how one live’s their lives and sees the world? We must always doubt; perhaps this is the test for believers; to find tthe most proper channel for their belief in the light of a powerful rational method. Do we oppose it, or try to find resolution? Or, better still, adopt the rational method as standard, and consider our epistemic norms; such as the good deontic conception of principles like “follow the conclusions to wherever they take you”.

Epistemic norms? Something I find quite interesting, myself…

Michael