Subject: Re: logic and Fishers
From: Tim O'Connor (oconnort@nyu.edu)
Date: Mon Jan 10 2000 - 14:31:04 EST
On Sun, Jan 09, 2000 at 03:30:59PM -0500, erespess@nji.com wrote:
> My point, which may or may not have been Steven's, is that the
> universe is a pretty complicated place, and has many elements which
> do not always follow the same rules as other elements. I think most
> people would argue that everything follows some fundamental rule,
> what is funny to me is that rule ends up being either 1) nature, 2)
> science, or 3) God's law.
Kurt Vonnegut made a pretty good case in an essay collected in "Palm
Sunday" that there is another kind of law aside from natural law and
divine law, and that is human law. He said he finds himself on the outs
with people who disagree with this, because he elevates human law above
divine law, and it gets him some heat from, among other things, the
people who like to ban his books. (This, I confess, is a rough
paraphrase, because I don't have the book at hand.)
> I know of one person who considers himself not an atheist or a
> theist, but a nontheist, and I am very curious about how he would see
> this. His beliefs curiously delight me, regardless of how different
> they may be from mine.
I myself haven't been following this thread carefully because I think I
am the culprit in question. For some people, religion IS or it ISN'T.
But I do not consider spiritual matters and more often than, say, I
bemoan my inability to buy absinthe. That doesn't mean I don't try to
live an ethical life (I try, often failing), but I don't link it to a
religious system, except, perhaps, to the Hippocratic Oath: First, do no
harm. That's a pretty hard goal to achieve, whether or not you're a
doctor.
> Personally, I come from a spiritual tradition which asserts as one of
> it's main tenets, that science and religion agree, and if they do not
> seem to in any given area it is because we do not fully understand
> one or the other, or both.
I was raised strictly Roman Catholic, which meant that there was only
one answer and it was that which was handed down from the pulpit on
Sundays and holy days. Is it any wonder I fled to the ... jello ... of
non-religious thought?
> I'm glad that people on this list find it a place to discuss matters
> so intelligently, and are able to do so with some amount of respect
> for the people involved. It is very heartrending to me.
It's nice to see that this did not devolve into a mudslinging war.
--tim
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