In this series, I lay out some "bones" for thinking about the way -- the why and the how -- the people we depend on for our survival, delectation, and companionship (our peeps) help us navigate the world. And we them. You might pick up these bones, if you find them interesting, and bring them…
What’s in a name? A face, a voice, laughter, habits….Series 5.1.
The names of the people we love are like beads on a Rosary, well-worn worry stones oft-fondled for comfort and reassurance. See also, The human GPS network: navigating our lives
Pam-Toons. Trust. Series 4.4.
I've here in mind the fist-pumping variety of politically vocal people, those certain that one side is leading us to another dark ages and the other to a totalitarian state. It appears that for some "left and right" thinking is characterized by black and white thinking. Nuance is lost. And with this loss, so too…
The Art of Rhetoric: Working through the challenges and disagreements that arise from our shared lives. Series 4.3.
In my previous post, I suggest Daniel Kahneman's Thinking, Fast and Slow and Jonathan Haidt's The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion are complementary reads. (See, Thinking, Fast and Slow. (And 2 worries.) and Just a Thought. 14. ) Why? Because a study of Haidt's moral theory alongside Kahneman's work on our cognitive/perceptual errors and biases might…
Thinking, Fast and Slow. (And 2 worries.)Series 4.2.
Some of my books have well-worn pages, others are falling apart from use. The books I use heavily are usually those I think worth giving others. And so I do. I peruse used-book shops and thrift stores to stock my library with multiple copies. This way, I often have a book on hand to share. If…
The Righteous Mind. Series 4.1.
My husband, Paul, and I host a weekly reading group. We read one book in the fall, another in the spring. This past spring we read Jonathan Haidt's The Righteous Mind which, week after week, generated the best discussions we've had to date. If you haven't yet read the book, here's a spoiler alert. I'm about…
Just a Thought. 13.
There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root, and it may be that he who bestows the largest time and money on the needy is doing the most by his mode of life to produce that misery which he strives in vain to relieve. --…
Just a thought. 8.
'Tis not solely in poetry and music, we must follow our taste and sentiment, but likewise in philosophy. -- David Hume. Ed. Ernest C. Mossner. A Treatise of Human Nature. Penguin Classics: New York. 1985 (First published 1739 and 1740). p 153 See also: Aristotle. We are sensing things. Series 1.1.
Just a thought. 7.
Who said the following: "I wanted to dispel the fictions of hearsay, and to ask people into whose hands my book may come not to prefer widely circulated and eagerly accepted fantasies over truth uncorrupted by sensationalism."* Did you guess Tacitus? Tacitus, the renowned Roman historian, writes these words in the Annals sometime around 117 CE.…
Introducing Theodicy. What on earth is a Theodicy?!
Loosely speaking, a theodicy is an attempt to explain why God allows evil in the world. More particularly, it's an attempt to answer The Problem of Evil; that is, to give an account of how the existence of God and of evil are not incompatible. So the problem is just this: 1) God is omnipotent…
