Month: July 2008

Wonder

By Patrick Appel

A reader writes:

James Carse’s categorical statement about atheists – "to be an atheist is not to be stunned by the mystery of things or to walk around in wonder about the universe" – is so utterly, absurdly false that one would think that he has never actually spoken to an atheist. Or read any of the books by the "trendy atheists" he criticizes. A great deal of writing by atheists, particularly scientists who happen to be atheists, speaks with great eloquence about precisely this feeling of wonder. Atheists simply don’t feel the need to explain away the wonder by calling it "God."

Carse has redefined key words (or declared them indefinable) – religion, atheism, God – and then uses his new, idiosyncratic definitions to demonstrate his points. He’s really only having this conversation with himself. In particular, by redefining religion and God, he can castigate atheists for their lack of belief in both, as though it were his version of religion and his version of God that they don’t believe in. But that’s more absurdity. Atheists, and most other people, are busy using the ordinary definitions of the words in their discussions.

The funny thing is, I believe that religion ought to be considered in the way Carse defines it – like a poem, or a song, or a spiritual practice, that can uplift one’s spirits and bring one to a sense of a higher purpose and a higher power, without getting tangled up in unanswerable questions of whether or not it’s "true." Is Beethoven’s 9th factually true? The question is meaningless. But they symphony is still beautiful and meaningful. A religion could be approached that way too.

But that’s not what religion means, and is not the way religions are generally practiced, in our society. For Carse to dismiss atheists, or anyone else, for not implicitly accepting his definition of religion borders on solipsism.

Tolstoy Vs. The Wire

By Jessie Roberts

W. Daniel Hillis tries to take books down a notch:

Yet, as much as I love books, I understand that my bibliophilia is not a virtue, but an indulgence. I associate books with insight and knowledge, but my respect is for ideas, not format. Shirky is right to call out the cargo-cult of literature. For many years books were the primary means by which important ideas were conveyed to us, we came to associate them with thoughtful insight. This association is out of date. As much as I liked War and Peace, I probably got more out of the The Wire. And why should that be surprising? More human effort can be put into a television series than a novel and more time is spent consuming it. If both are executed to their highest standards, with equal care, skill and insight, we might well expect less from the book.

Hmm, I don’t follow. How does it call out the “cargo-cult of literature” to note that other media are enjoyable and useful? Snobbery is unappealing, period, whether it’s accompanying a book or a TV show. But Hillis really loses me at “More human effort can be put into a TV series…” — why should man hours devoted to a work’s creation or consumption factor into our enjoyment of it? By that measure, “Ode to a Nightingale” becomes practically worthless if you buy that Keats wrote it in one sitting. I agree that dead-tree purists are missing out, but I don’t see the logic here for why someone might expect to “get more out of” a superbly-executed TV series than a superbly-executed novel or poem.

Blame The Media!

By Patrick Appel

McCain really is taking tips from the Clinton campaign:

I agree with Ben Smith:

In truth, and while there are other dynamics going on, the central issue is just sheer volume. There’s vastly more public interest in, and coverage of, Obama. His rise is a better, newer, story. That means that McCain’s message has been muted; but his missteps are too. He’s been able, in particular, to make it this far with a domestic policy agenda whose sheer vagueness wouldn’t have made it through the Democratic primary.

Now This Is Funny…

by hilzoy

After I wrote my post on McCain and Obama’s websites, I got an email pointing out that McCain’s website seems to be having some issues with its comment filters. I tried to check it out for myself, but after spending something like twenty minutes trying to post a comment, without being able to get far enough to so much as engage the comment filters, I gave up. (Even after I got an account, an ordeal in itself, clicking ‘Post a comment’ or ‘Reply’ made the ‘Take Action!’ page appear.) So I’ll have to let those determined souls who somehow managed to post comments describe the problem. One writes:

“If someone can help me understand, there seems to be an automatic moderation in place. The most innocuous of words seem to be off limits, but I’m having a hard time figuring out which ones. I find myself editing my posts until they become almost meaningless and barren of information. Any ideas anyone?”

And gets this reply:

“The filters are indeed very frustrating and incomprehensible! I am pretty good at finding the offending words after many, many hours of practice. Many of us have complained to the folks who run this site, but for whatever reason, the problem has not been completely resolved. It seems they do not like words that contain common URL suffixes, like plan et, Geor ge, intern et, or ganize, etc…Other common words iclude treat ment an ni ght. There are too many for me to list here.One way to isolate the offending word is to post a comment piecemeal. In time, you will learn the taboo words. If you would like me to help you, you can e-mail a comment to me at [Email address deleted] and I will try to fix it for you and send it back. Good luck.”

Apparently, any word containing combinations of letters like ‘net’ or ‘org’ or ‘gov’ gets rejected. Likewise: “Just to add a couple more that trip the filter: words that contain the three letters such as in com.p.a.s.s as well as anything requiring an .a.n.a.l.ysis.” This leads to considerable frustration: people find themselves posting comments like this:

“Y e p, h e a r d i t a c o u p l e d a y s a g o. S e e m s t h e y w a n t t o a d d m o r e t a x e s to f i x r o a d s. The s a d p a r t i s, i f y o u c a n ‘t a f f o r d t o d r iv e, r o a d s a r e k i n d o f a m o o t p o i n t, d o n ‘t y o u t h i n k? Y e t t h e y w o n’ t r e l e a s e t h e b u d g e t on w h a t h a s b e e n s p e n t o f t h e r o a d s, n o r w h a t i s a c t u a l l y n e e d e d m o n e t a r i l y t o f i x t h e m.”

Which got the following reply:

“Armymom: Filtered word is n.e.t. in mon.e.t.arily”

We have comment filter problems over at Obsidian Wings. But we don’t control our own software, and we certainly don’t have people on our nonexistent staff who are paid to sort these things out. The McCain campaign does. And that makes this pretty inexplicable.

Elections Are Simple

By Patrick Appel

Michael Grunwald  comments:

The media will try to preserve the illusion of a toss-up; you’ll keep seeing "Obama Leads, But Voters Have Concerns" headlines. But when Democrats are winning blood-red congressional districts in Mississippi and Louisiana, when the Republican president is down to 28 percent, when the economy is tanking and world affairs keep breaking Obama’s way, it shouldn’t be heresy to recognize that McCain needs an improbable series of breaks. Analysts get paid to analyze, and cable news has airtime to fill, so pundits have an incentive to make politics seem complicated. In the end, though, it’s usually pretty simple. Everyone seems to agree that 2008 is a change election. Which of these guys looks like change?

Eating Their Seed Corn

By Patrick Appel
Larison hopes Jindal won’t take veep:

As I have said several times before, selecting Jindal would be a grave mistake for McCain and it would be bad news for Jindal, Louisiana and the Republican Party.  It would be the Republicans’ political equivalent of eating their seed corn.  Bobby Jindal will do a lot of people an enormous service, not least to the people who voted for him, if he turns down any McCain offer he may receive.