Life's a beech.
Miniscule and Majuscule; catholic and Catholic
I am too catholic to be much of a Catholic.
But if one needs institutionalized religion, one could do far worse, assuming one can stomach the secular-humanist liberal namby-pambification and wussification that the post-Vatican II church can't seem to resist, the dilution of doctrine and tradition that empties into the nauseating Church of Nice.
There was something profoundly stupid about the Vatican II 'reforms' even if we view matters from a purely immanent 'sociological' point of view. Suppose Roman Catholicism is, metaphysically, buncombe to its core, nothing but an elaborate human construction in the face of a meaningless universe, a construction kept going by human needs and desires noble and base. Suppose there is no God, no soul, no post-mortem reward or punishment, no moral world order. Suppose we are nothing but a species of clever land mammal thrown up on the shores of life by blind evolutionary processes, and that everything that makes us normatively human and thus persons (consciousness, self-consciousness, conscience, reason, and the rest) are nothing but cosmic accidents. Suppose all that.
Still, religion would have its immanent life-enhancing role to play, and one would have to be as superficial and ignorant of the human heart as a New Atheist to think it would ever wither away: it inspires and guides, comforts and consoles; it provides our noble impulses with an outlet while giving suffering a meaning. Suffering can be borne, Nietzsche says somewhere, if it has a meaning; what is unbearable is meaningless suffering. Now the deep meaning that the Roman church provides is tied to its profundity, mystery, and reference to the Transcendent. Anything that degrades it into a namby-pamby secular humanism, just another brand of liberal feel-goodism and do-goodism, destroys it, making of it just another piece of dubious cultural junk. Degrading factors: switching from Latin to the vernacular; the introduction of sappy pseudo-folk music sung by pimply-faced adolescents strumming gut-stringed guitars; leftist politics and political correctness; the priest facing the congregation; the '60s obsession with 'relevance.'
People who take religion seriously tend to be conservatives and traditionalists; they are not change-for-the-sake-of-change leftist utopians. The stupidity of the Vatican II 'reforms,' therefore, consists in estranging its very clienetele, the conservatives and traditionalists. The church should be a liberal-free zone.
The Actuarial Absurdity of Obamacare
For Obamacare to work, the young must sign up. But will they? Why should they? Jeffrey H. Anderson:
In its government-run exchanges, Obamacare raises premiums for the young by suspending actuarial science. It forbids insurers from considering some variables that are actuarially relevant to health care, such as sex and health, while also limiting their ability to take age into account in an actuarially based way. Under ordinary principles of insurance, a healthy young person pays a lot less than a person nearing retirement. Under Obamacare, that’s not so. Yet President Obama’s centerpiece legislation depends upon young people’s willingness to pay these artificially inflated premiums.
Another reason the young are unlikely to show up in sufficient numbers is that Obamacare gives many of them an easy out: They can stay on their parents’ insurance free of charge until they’re 26. As for the rest, with the elimination of preexisting conditions as a barrier to buying health insurance, many will choose to go without coverage until they’re sick or injured.
In other words, Obama-care makes insurance more costly while simultaneously making it less necessary—especially for the young.
You ought to read the entire piece, especially if you are young and healthy.
The more I know about Obamacare, the more crack-brained (you can take that word in two senses) it appears. The burden of redistribution is to be borne by the young, precisely those least capable of carrying it.
Recent Publications of Mine
A couple of long review articles of mine have recently appeared:
Constituent versus Relational Ontology, Studia Neoaristotelica, vol. 10, no. 1 (2013), pp. 99-115.
Hugh McCann on the Implications of Divine Sovereignty, American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly, online now (by subscription), print version forthcoming 2014.
My PhilPapers page with an incomplete list of my publications.
The Disaster Named ‘Obama’
More brilliant columns by Victor Davis Hanson:
Obama and the Suspension of Disbelief
The Politicization of Everything
This is an extremely penetrating analysis, worthy of careful study. Excerpt (emphasis added):
Again, note the nature of the “foremost” ideological mandate: if Muslim nations do not feel “good” about their historical contributions to science and engineering, such depression could not be attributed to their present scientific ossification or Islam’s often historical subordination to Western science, especially after the fifteenth century. Instead, the discontent over the absence of scientific parity might be due to other more nefarious causes—and thus in part rectified by the power, wealth, and influence of a properly sensitive U.S. federal government.
Similarly, homeland security is no longer just about ensuring the safety of the United States. In a series of bizarre euphemisms—overseas contingency operations, man-caused disasters, work-place violence—Islamic terrorism was redefined as a spontaneous tragedy without specified causation. To the degree that the issue of radical Islam was unavoidable in the debate over U.S. domestic and foreign policy, the contortions only grew worse: we should not allow the mass murderer Major Hasan to prejudice the Army’s diversity program; the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt was largely secular; and jihad is a legitimate tenet of Islam properly characterized as a “holy struggle,” and therefore improperly associated with radical Islamic terrorists.
The politicization of almost every aspect of American culture and politics over the last five years could easily be expanded. Traditional employment background checks are now “racist” given that minorities with higher crime records might be unduly affected. The 2009 reordering of the Chrysler creditors leap-frogged junior union creditors over senior bondholders—as enforcement of existing legislation becomes predicated on perceptions of social justice rather than faithfully executing settled laws on the books. Each new tropical storm launches a fresh debate about “climate change,” despite no evidence that recent weather is more prone to hurricanes or the planet has heated up over the last 15 years. Almost every new mass shooting offers occasion for mobilization to enhance existing gun control legislation.
An Untenable Analysis of ‘Sherlock Holmes is a Purely Fictional Character’
London Ed claims that
1. Sherlock Holmes is a purely fictional character
means
2. Someone made up a story about a person called ‘Sherlock Holmes.'
I don't think this is right. Even if (1) and (2) are intersubstitutable salva veritate in all actual and possible contexts, they are not intersubstitutable salva significatione. They are not intersubstitutable in such a manner as to preserve meaning or sense. (1) and (2) don't have the same meaning.
First of all, it is not in dispute that Sherlock Holmes is a purely fictional person, unlike, say, the 19th century American chess prodigy, Paul Morphy, who is the main character in Francis Parkinson Keyes' historical novel, The Chess Players. (Available from Amazon.com for only a penny! The perfect Christmas gift from and to impecunious chess players.) A fictional object need not be a nonexistent object: Morphy is a fictional object inasmuch as he figures in the novel just mentioned, but he existed. Holmes never existed and never will. Hence the need to distinguish between the purely fictional and the fictional, and the fictional and the nonexistent.
Now let us assume that some fom of 'creationism' or 'artifactualism' is true: purely fictional objects are the mental creations of finite minds, human or not. They are literally made up, thought up, excogitated, invented not discovered. They are literally ficta (from L. fingere). On this approach, internally logically consistent ficta cannot be reduced to real, albeit mere, possibilia. For the merely possible belongs to the real, and cannot be made up; the purely fictional, however, is unreal and made-up.
Let us further assume that artifactualism about purely fictional items, if true, is true of metaphysical necessity. It will then be the case that (1) and (2) will be either both true or both false across all possible worlds. But they don't have the same meaning since one who understands (1) may easily reject (2) by holding some other theory of fictional objects, say, a Meinongian theory according to which Sherlock Holmes and his colleagues are mind-independent nonentities.
London Ed is making the following mistake. He thinks that 'x is mind-made' follows analytically from 'x is purely fictional' in the way that (to introduce a brand-new example) 'x is male' follows analytically from 'x is a bachelor.' 'Tom is a bachelor' and 'Tom is an umarried adult male' have the same meaning; the latter merely unpacks or makes explicit the meaning of the former. But (2) does not unpack the meaning of (1): it goes beyond it. It adds the controversial idea that purely fictional objects have no status whatsoever apart from the mental activities of novelists and other artistically creative persons.
Ed may be misled by the etymology of 'fictional.' Pace Heidegger, etymology is no sure guide to philosophical insight.
If you say that Tom is a bachelor but not an unmarried adult male, then you contradict yourself, not formally, but materially. But if you affirm both (1) and the negation of (2), then you involve yourself in no sort of contradiction. Some maintain that purely fictional objects are mind-created abstract objects. People who hold this do not violate the meaning of (1).
Why are the Corners of Buddha’s Apartment so Dirty?
The Tathagata has no attachments.
(He has no theories about the nirvanic Vacuum either.)
(I got the idea from this guy.)
Saturday Night at the Oldies: Spencer’s Picks
Spencer Case thinks I need to expand my musical horizons. I don't disagree. He writes,
O.K. here are my five picks for good folk/rock music within the last ten years.
First, "The Wrote and the Writ" by Johnny Flynn, an artist I've just discovered. I chose it because of the syncopated guitar and the outstanding lyrics.
Second, "Right Moves" by Idaho's own Josh Ritter. Ritter been one of my favorites for about six years. He isn't instrumentally out of this world like some of the other artists here, but he's a great songwriter. It's hard to find a representative song for him for a first exposure, but this seems like a safe bet.
Third, "Simple as This" by Jake Bugg, another new discovery. Great lyrics.
Fourth, "Don't Need No" by Punch Brothers. I've seen these guys live and they are amazing.
Fifth, "Big Parade" by Lumineers. These guys are from Denver and actually, they are quite popular now. So not everything on this list is obscure.
As far as I'm concerned, these artists prove good music is alive and well, if under-appreciated. Interested to hear how you think they stack up.
It's good stuff, Spencer. I enjoyed 'em all. Here are some obscure tunes/renditions I think you'll enjoy if you haven't heard them already. I won't make any invidious comparisons. It's all good.
Fred Neil, The Other Side of this Life
Fred Neil, I've Got a Secret
Ry Cooder, Jesus on the Main Line
Ry Cooder, He'll Have to Go
Doc Watson, Tom Dooley
Nanci Griffith, Boots of Spanish Leather
Kate Wolf and Don Lange, Rock Salt and Nails
Why Would Obama Say He is not Ideological?
Ed Rogers speculates:
The president’s belief that little of what he does is ideologically driven suggests he is living with a pampered, unchallenged mind. He has been told he is so smart for so long that he sees only clarity in his actions and unchallengeable reason in his conclusions. The president’s belief in his own intellect makes him think that whatever he does is simply the only thing a thinking person would do. Nothing ideological about that.
Roger's reading is possible, but not likely. I incline to a darker view. Obama knows that he is a leftist and that leftism is not the only option. He knows that there are sincere, highly intelligent, principled people who oppose the leftist agenda with an impressive armamentarium of facts and arguments. Although Obama hangs with his sycophantic own for the most part, he cannot not know about the black conservative Thomas Sowell, for example, and his views. And given how smart Obama is supposed to be, he will have discerned that Sowell and other black conservatives cannot be dismissed as Uncle Toms.
When Obama said that he is not ideological he was simply lying. He was stating something he knows to be false with the intent to deceive.
It is right in line with what he said last month:
As soon as I took office, I asked this Congress to send me a recovery plan by President's Day that would put people back to work and put money in their pockets. Not because I believe in bigger government — I don't.
In this example, Obama's mendacity enters the Orwellian. Opposing bigger government, he is for smaller government. Bigger government is smaller government.
The truth is that the man is thoroughly untruthful. Why does he so brazenly lie, bullshit, prevaricate? Because he believes that there is nothing wrong with mendacity in the service of a noble cause. I don't think the man is simply out for his own wealth and power: he sincerely believes in the leftist agenda and that the glorious end justifies and requires the mendacious means.
For this reason he never comes clean about his real goals and values.
If you think about it this way, it all makes sense. He had to lie again and again about the content of the ACA. Otherwise it would not have passed. He knows best what is good for us, and his lies are for our own good.
It’s about Liberty, not Race
Opposition to Obama's policies is precisely that, opposition to his policies. If you think race has anything to do with it, you are either delusional or lying. One must realize that for a leftist, lying is not wrong if it is in the service of what they take to be a noble end. Mendacity's affront to 'bourgeois' morality is as nothing compared to the wonderful achievement of what they call 'social justice.' This is why Obama and his supporters brazenly lie and lie about their lying, as well as deploying the other modes of untruthfulness. The end justifies the means. They have no qualms of conscience because they don't see what they are doing as wrong. The distress of the five and a half million who have had their insurance policies cancelled is taken in stride as part of the cost of implementing a system that they imagine will serve the common good.
A government big enough and powerful enough to control health care delivery will be in an excellent position to demand ‘appropriate’ behavior from its citizens – and to enforce its demand. Suppose you enjoy risky sports such as motorcycling, hang gliding, mountain climbing and the like. Or perhaps you just like to drink or smoke or eat red meat. A government that pays for the treatment of your injuries and ailments can easily decide, on economic grounds alone, to forbid such activites under the bogus justification, ‘for your own good.’
But even if the government does not outlaw motorcycling, say, they can put a severe dent in your liberty to enjoy such a sport, say, by demanding that a 30% sales tax be slapped on all motorcycle purchases, or by outlawing bikes whose engines exceed a certain displacement, say 180 cc. In the same way that governments levy arbitrary taxes on tobacco products, they can do the same for anything they deem risky or unhealthy.
The situation is analogous to living with one’s parents. It is entirely appropriate for parents to say to a child: ‘As long as you live under our roof, eat at our table, and we pay the bills, then you must abide by our rules. When you are on your own, you may do as you please.’ The difference, of course, is that it is relatively easy to move out on one’s own, but difficult to forsake one’s homeland.
The nub of the issue is liberty. Do you value it or not? And how much? Which trumps which: liberty or equality of outcome?
Kathleen Parker agrees:
In other words, Republicans oppose Obama's policies, not the man, because they believe the president will so inexorably change the structure of our social and economic system by mandating and punishing human behavior that nothing less than individual freedom is at stake. Under present circumstances, this hardly seems delusional. Does anyone really believe that subsidized policyholders with pre-existing conditions won't eventually face other mandates and penalties related to their lifestyle choices?
Lot, Loot, and Light
It is in keeping with our lot that we should seek, not the loot of the lottery, but the light of the Lord.
An Outbreak of Lawlessness: Obama as Dictator
Krauthammer nails it once again. Excerpt:
What distinguishes an institution from a flash mob is that its rules endure. They can be changed, of course. But only by significant supermajorities. That’s why constitutional changes require two-thirds of both houses plus three-quarters of the states. If we could make constitutional changes by majority vote, there would be no Constitution.
As of today, the Senate effectively has no rules. Congratulations, Harry Reid. Finally, something you will be remembered for.
Barack Obama may be remembered for something similar. His violation of the proper limits of executive power has become breathtaking. It’s not just making recess appointments when the Senate is in session. It’s not just unilaterally imposing a law Congress had refused to pass — the Dream Act — by brazenly suspending large sections of the immigration laws.
We’ve now reached a point where a flailing president, desperate to deflect the opprobrium heaped upon him for the false promise that you could keep your health plan if you wanted to, calls a hasty news conference urging both insurers and the states to reinstate millions of such plans.
Except that he is asking them to break the law. His own law. Under Obamacare, no insurer may issue a policy after 2013 that does not meet the law’s minimum coverage requirements. These plans were canceled because they do not.
The law remains unchanged. The regulations governing that law remain unchanged. Nothing is changed except for a president proposing to unilaterally change his own law from the White House press room.
That’s banana republic stuff, except that there the dictator proclaims from the presidential balcony.
Thanksgivukkah 2013
The usual suspects enjoyed themselves immensely, three of whom are depicted below:
Word of the Day: Depauperate
I stumbled across this word on p. 539 of the heaviest, fattest, stompingest tome in my library, Richard Routley's Exploring Meinong's Jungle and Beyond (Ridgeview, 1980). The thing is 1,035 pages long. I could kill a cat with it, and you hope I won't. A mere $500 for an Amazon used copy. One copy available at the moment. No, I won't sell my copy unless you give me $500,000.00 for it. Cash on the barrel head.
In this way depauperate objects such as the present king of France can be seen as limiting cases of fictional items . . .
1. Arrested in growth or development; stunted.2. Severely diminished; impoverished: "But there were no pleasures in Australia. How could my friend admire so paleontologically depauperate a place?" (Jake Page).
Why did the Aussie Routley change his name to 'Sylvan'? Because of a love of forests? (L. silva, silvae) Because of a preference for Meinongian jungles over Quinean desert landscapes?
I don't know and it doesn't matter, but this tome does. I've slogged through most of it over the years. Very rich, very technical, very good.
A Christian Paradox
Man is godlike and therefore proud. He becomes even more godlike when he humbles himself.
The central thought of Christianity, true or not, is one so repellent to the natural human pride of life that one ought at least to entertain the unlikelihood of its having a merely human origin. The thought is that God humbled himself to the point of entering the world in the miserably helpless and indigent way we in fact do, inter faeces et urinam, and to the point of leaving it in the most horrendous way the brutal Romans could devise, and from a most undistinguished spot, a hill in an obscure desert outpost of their empire.