This is not a bad course, and Prof. Larson is an excellent lecturer, one of the better ones that I've listened to. I bought this series because the reviews were pretty good, and I generally have enjoyed the science oriented lectures that I've purchased. I also have steered away from lectures dealing with evolution because I'm pretty sure I'll disagree with them, but I did buy the series Biology: The Science of Life, which I quite enjoyed it and learned a lot from it. There was a lot of hand waving in the parts where it talked about evolution but when it talked about the current trends in Biology it was fascinating. In fact I would suggest Prof. Larson might benefit from listening to it.
One good thing did happen from this series was for myself. Prof. Larsen talked about the "red eyed fruit fly" and that's something that I'd never heard of. A little background checking to see what he was talking about and it appears that Prof. Larsen made a mistake and meant the white eyed fruit fly. That's OK we all make mistakes but I'm somewhat surprised that this wasn't found and edited out some how. It seems that I've noticed things that sound like edits on other series (when the sound quality changes somewhat from the surrounding lecture). Well I'd heard of the white eyed fruit fly before, but didn't know very much about it and while I was checking on it I read a lot more about it. That was very interesting.
Then Prof. Larsen talked about the peppered moth in England and I said to myself; "What the heck, that study's been discredited and he's using it?" Now the funny thing is, that I'm nearly 100% sure that the first time I'd heard about the discrediting of that study was on another Great Courses series because that pretty much all I listen to anymore and it's not something that I remember reading. It was most probably in Science Wars: What Scientists Know and How They Know It by Prof. Steven Goldman or Philosophy of Science by Jeffery Kasser. If I had to guess it is probably the first series, Science Wars, one of my favorite series. He also talked about the fossil record of the horse as being proof of evolution, and I knew that had been discredited as well. This caused me to look around for more information about the peppered moth studies and that caused me to finally read The Icons of Evolution by Jonathan Wells. I'd pretty much decided I wasn't going to read that book, because from the reviews I'd read I thought it was going to be a strident discourse about how evil evolution is and why it shouldn't be taught in schools. I was pleasantly surprised that it wasn't that. All it was was a critique of the way evolution is taught as dogma in schools, and how all the examples taught as dogma have been discredited. This course by Prof. Larsen proves Prof Wells case perfectly as far as I'm concerned.
After reading the book by Prof. Wells I went back and listened to the lectures again just to make sure that I'd heard everything correctly and it was just my imagination. I found that Prof. Larsen used even more icons of evolution in his lectures and I hadn't known they'd been discredited so I had heard correctly, it was just worse than I thought.
Obviously I'm a person who finds the way evolution is taught is a travesty, so why would I buy this course? Well first the title was Theory of Evolution: A History of a Controversy and I was hoping that the course might actually explain why there is still a controversy about evolution. However, the only thing that I got from the series is that the only reason there is a controversy is because of benighted fundamentalist Christians don't accept evolution. That may be a little polemical but that's how I felt. However, I do have to give Prof. Larson points for admitting that Julian Huxley pushed a humanist atheist religion that was based on evolution. Probably because Julian Huxley was honest enough to admit that that was what he was doing as opposed to Richard Dawkins who teaches the dogma just as strongly but doesn't claim to be doing that, he claims he's doing science. Also, I have to give Prof. Larsen credit that when he talked about Intelligent Design (ID) he was honest enough to, seemingly grudgingly, admit that those who support ID are "mostly" Christian. Most people who don't agree with ID just say that it's a bunch of Christian Creationist's and that it is only "Creationism in a tuxedo". At least Dr. Larson's statement allows those who might be interested to know that there are atheists, agnostics, Indian Hindi's and people of other philosophical beliefs involved with it, who often don't like to be described as Christian Creationists. Phillip Johnson may have started the Discovery Institute and came up with the idea of using ID as a wedge, but there are many others who find the ID arguments compelling and the Discovery Institute is practically the only place people can do ID research because everywhere else they are censored by the establishment. The discovery Institute accepts fellow travelers even if they're not Christians.
The other reason I bought the series was because it was on sale and I had a coupon code that made it even cheaper.
Over all listening was a good experience and I learned a lot, not so much from the content of the lectures, but just from the fact that the lectures prove a point. This has actually decided me on buying the other course on evolution that others reviewers have recommended as being more in depth just to see if it confirms my suspicions on college level teaching of evolution.
Tuesday, December 2, 2014
Saturday, November 22, 2014
Book Review: The Man Who Knew Infinity
I had heard about Ramanujan before, but not enough to know his name, just that his case was used in arguments to show that the education system is a failure and that genius can come from anywhere. I agree that genius can come from anywhere, but this book puts paid to the fact that it is a failure of the education system. At one point the question is asked, are there other Ramanujan's out there. The book points out that Ramanujan's brilliance is a once in a life time, or century. That with all of the success of the Western European educational system a genius like Ramanujan only rises occasionally.
There is a question in science, and I suppose other fields, that talks about the effect of the genius. In this book there is a person who states the differences in genius. There is the regular genius who is very good at doing the normal things. When he shows you what he did you can understand it, you just realize that the genius is just very much better than you are. Then there is the magician, when the magician shows you what he or she did you still can't understnad how they did it. Magicians change they way the world sees itself. Magicians are men like Kepler who sees that orbits are eliptical, or Einstien and brownian motion, and Newton and gravitational force. Not anyone could see what they saw, but once they point the way the world is a better place.
According to this book that is Ramanujan who kept notebooks, three of them, during the years when only he believed in himself, but which are still being studied and proved many years after his death.
This book is also about the other type of genius G. H. Hardy who was a mathematician that Ramanuhan wrote to who recognized his genius and nutured it and brought Ramanujan to the attention of the world. Some would say that anyone could have discovered Ramanujan but Hardy is the third mathmatician that Ramanujan wrote and the other two didn't discover him. From the book it said that since Ramanujan didn't have a lot of formal training his notation was hard to understand. Not wrong just different and it takes some time to see what he was actually saying. The book said it was like instead of saying "Penny wise and dollar foolish." you say "Quater wise and two dollars and fifty cents foolish" Same thing but doesn't ring right.
Fascinating book about two fascinating men. Very good read.
There is a question in science, and I suppose other fields, that talks about the effect of the genius. In this book there is a person who states the differences in genius. There is the regular genius who is very good at doing the normal things. When he shows you what he did you can understand it, you just realize that the genius is just very much better than you are. Then there is the magician, when the magician shows you what he or she did you still can't understnad how they did it. Magicians change they way the world sees itself. Magicians are men like Kepler who sees that orbits are eliptical, or Einstien and brownian motion, and Newton and gravitational force. Not anyone could see what they saw, but once they point the way the world is a better place.
According to this book that is Ramanujan who kept notebooks, three of them, during the years when only he believed in himself, but which are still being studied and proved many years after his death.
This book is also about the other type of genius G. H. Hardy who was a mathematician that Ramanuhan wrote to who recognized his genius and nutured it and brought Ramanujan to the attention of the world. Some would say that anyone could have discovered Ramanujan but Hardy is the third mathmatician that Ramanujan wrote and the other two didn't discover him. From the book it said that since Ramanujan didn't have a lot of formal training his notation was hard to understand. Not wrong just different and it takes some time to see what he was actually saying. The book said it was like instead of saying "Penny wise and dollar foolish." you say "Quater wise and two dollars and fifty cents foolish" Same thing but doesn't ring right.
Fascinating book about two fascinating men. Very good read.
Book Review: Amazing Grace
This is a book about a great man, and I'm glad that I read it. It was recommended to me by a dear friend, and I'm glad she recommended it because reading the book has really has really given me some profound insights.
I think that the most important part of the book was the introduction. In it it points out that William Wilberforce and the Claptham Sect really changed the world in a profound way. Before them the world had always accepted slavery, after words slavery was no longer acceptable. Before them the world just accepted that there were poor in the world, even Christians accepted that, and that the poor were responsible for their condition. After the Claptham Sect became the social conscience for society it was no longer acceptable that society should do nothing to help the unfortunate amongst us. This book shows how this great change came about and introduces the reader to the man who was a driving force behind the changes.
It's too bad we don't know more about men like this today. I would highly recommend everyone to learn more about William Wilberforce and this book is a good way to do it.
I think that the most important part of the book was the introduction. In it it points out that William Wilberforce and the Claptham Sect really changed the world in a profound way. Before them the world had always accepted slavery, after words slavery was no longer acceptable. Before them the world just accepted that there were poor in the world, even Christians accepted that, and that the poor were responsible for their condition. After the Claptham Sect became the social conscience for society it was no longer acceptable that society should do nothing to help the unfortunate amongst us. This book shows how this great change came about and introduces the reader to the man who was a driving force behind the changes.
It's too bad we don't know more about men like this today. I would highly recommend everyone to learn more about William Wilberforce and this book is a good way to do it.
Wednesday, July 2, 2014
Great Courses Review: American Religious History
I was very pleased with this series as I began listening to it. Despite what Peirs Morgan says Americans love foreign accents and I really loved listening to Dr. Allit's accent. Religious history is something of a hobby of mine, and I've listened to a lot of the religion and history courses offered by The Great Courses. I was excited when Dr. Allit gave his history about how impressed he was with the religiosity of the US when he came here as a student, and especially when he said he was one of the few observant people in England.
As I said, I do a lot of reading about Christian History. One of my favorite authors on the subject is Rodney Stark. He claims that Christianity in America revitalized Christianity, and I have to agree with him. I was hoping that this might give me some more insight into that. For the first 7 lectures things sounded pretty good. Then he got to Onieda and Mormons.
Now I'm a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints more commonly called Mormons. I don't expect Dr. Allit to know as much about Mormon history as I do because I read a lot about it, and he actually references one of my favorite Mormon authors Richard Bushman. And I know that it's OK to mock the Mormon religion, after all a big hit on Broadway was basically mocking our religion and no one really seemed to care. However, I expected more from a lecture series from The Great Courses.
The LDS Church has an official account of Joseph Smith's First Vision that is considered scripture. I as a well read in the history of Mormonism know that there are other accounts as well. However, I wondered why Dr. Allit chose not to use the official version, or to at least point out that he was not using the official account. That was a small point but it seems to set the tone. He says that there were rumors of polygamy were being practiced in the Missouri period. Something I've never heard before, and don't think it's true. Then he said a sentence that can only be construed as misleading. He said 6 of the 11 witnesses of the Golden Plates left the Church, and immediately launched into the account of John C. Bennett. The way he said it "I" thought John C. Bennett was one of the witnesses of the Golden Plates. I had to go back an re-listen to the account to make sure I'd heard it right it was such an egregious implication. John C. Bennett is a problem for Mormon history but this presentation was ridiculous. So the main thing about the Mormons is polygamy, and just to make sure that everyone gets the point he reads from Mark Twain's account of the Mormons in "Roughing It". Now I have now problem with Mark Twain's account and it is funny, but I do have a problem when it is used in a lecture course for mocking purposes. I realized that that was how it was being used as I heard his audience laughing at the account. Nothing was said to put it in context. Dr. Allit's point was that some American Religions had strange sexual practices and Onieda and the Mormons were two of them.
OK fair enough I'm used to that. After all I'm a Mormon and I've been on a mission. I've been abused for my religion. I was going to ignore it.
Then he talked about Aimee Semple McPherson as part of the Fundamentalist movement. After he talked about her I thought she was simply a scam artist who was involved sex scandal. The way Dr. Allit talked about it I was sure she was hypocrite. However, since I never had heard of her, I decided to do some research my self. Dr. Allit said that she'd ran away with a technician and was in a love nest with him on the coast of California, while Aimee said she'd been kidnapped and held in Mexico. He didn't say it was alleged that that was what happened but that that was what had happened. I thought she was a scamming slut. However, it turns out that Dr. Allit apparently just likes to present the most salacious case possible religious figures. My research was not in depth, but I did learn that Aimee went to trial twice and was found not guilty over this event. I also found out that the technician she was supposedly with said that he was never with her, and that he turned down a great deal of money that he could have gotten from the tabloids of the time had he said it. He always spoke highly of her. Also, after this event Aimee continued to have a successful ministry. I don't know what Dr. Allit was trying to do with Aimee McPherson but his presentation of her in this lecture was abominable.
After I found that out I just had to let people know just how bad these two presentation were. I don't really have the time to research everything that Dr. Allit says but with these two statements my thoughts are that he is very prejudicial against religious beliefes he doesn't agree with like Mormons and Pentecostals.
Book Review: The Meaning of Jesus
This is a book that is co-written by Marcus Borg and Bishop N. T. Wright. I found it on scribd and was very excited to read it. Marcus Borg is probably my favorite liberal theologian. I disagree with just about everything that he says about Jesus and the Bible, but really like the way that he says we should live our lives as Christians. Bishop N. T. Wright is my favorite conservative Christian theologian. I've read a number of his books.
In the introduction of the book describes how Bishop Wright read a book by Marcus called "Conflict, Holiness, and Politics in the Teachings of Jesus". Bishop Wright sought out Marcus to congratulate him on as well as to explore some "matters arising" and to ask why the book ended as it did rather than in certain other possible ways. A friendship arose out of the fascinating study of Jesus within his historical context. The result of that friendship is this book. It is a book that discusses the different ways that they see Jesus. The book is not meant to be scholarly, and both writers refer readers to other books it the reader is interested.
I first learned about Bishop Wright a few years ago when I learned about NPP, or the New Perspective on Paul. Bishop Wright wrote a book about that called "Paul: In Fresh Perspective." I liked that book and then found that Bishop Wright was a part of the so called "Third Wave of Historical Jesus Studies." Strangely enough Bishop Wright defends the Bible and interprets the historical Jesus as if they Gospels are historically accurate. Reading his interpretation was like a breath of fresh air. Also, his thoughts were deep and his arguments well thought out, not like the general popular treatments, like the execrable books by Lee Strobel. Although if you like his books I'm not saying that I think they're wrong, just that they're not very scholarly and they make what I feel are stupid arguments.
Basically Marcus takes the general scholarly interpretation of the Gospels and Jesus. In fact Marcus is part of the Jesus Seminar. As far as I can tell the Jesus Seminar thinks that Jesus was a historical figure, but that he didn't perform any miracles and all the miracle stories were made up about him by his followers. They try to go a little more in depth than that, but that's the gist of it, and this is the idea that Marcus defends. He talks about a pre-Easter Jesus and a post-Easter Jesus. He feels by careful study of the Gospel sources, which include the Synoptic Gospels but not John, the so called Q document and the Gospel of Thomas that he can tell what Jesus really did and said, which he calls history remembered, and what his followers made up about Jesus which he calls history metaphorized. However, while I totally disagree with what he says about Jesus and the way the Gospels were created, I really like the way that he teaches that we should live the Christian life.
So here's a great example about what I mean. Marcus doesn't think that there was an empty tomb on Easter morning. The resurrections accounts are history metophorized (made up). However, quoting "My position is that experiences of the risen Christ as a continuing presence generated the claim that 'Jesus lives and is Lord'". Marcus sees the resurrection as a metaphor for the fact that Christ's presence, or resurrection, ought to be a continuing presence in our lives. I agree that Christ's presence should be an ongoing experience in every Christians life, but I also think that it's important that there was an empty tomb.
Because I consider myself a conservative Christian I tend to agree more with Bishop Wright's portrayal of the historic Jesus than I do Marcus'. In fact I think that the ideas that Marcus shares is the reason that the mainline Christian denominations are losing members in droves. However, since Bishop Wright is an Anglican Bishop it's hard to account for him. It seems to me, as an outsider of the Anglican confession, I think there is a fight for the soul of the Anglican Confession between conservatives and liberal Christians. At least that was the view that I got when the controversy over gay clergy erupted a few years ago. I guess if it's true then Bishop Wright must be in the camp of the conservatives camp.
That being said I enjoyed both of the wrap up chapters that talk about the way that the ideas that were shared should effect the Christian Church and Christian life. That has always been the thing that amazes me about Marcus, I disagree with everything he says except about the way he says that a Christian should live. I guess I could disagree with a few points that he has but overall I very much like what he has to say about living the Christian life.
Marcus agrees with the findings of the critical scholars for the last 200 years as he constantly refrains. He also claims to want to find a Jesus that is able to fit in with the modern world. The question I always wonder about this is does he realize that if he were alive 100 years ago, or 50 years ago the findings of the critical scholars were very much different/mistaken about a lot of things. Does that mean Marcus would have different views about Jesus depending upon the most current ideas about Jesus Scholarship? That's just something that I can't countenance, a changeable Jesus, and that is all that critical scholarship gives you is changes.
Here is the state of critical Jesus Scholarship as I understand it. The Gospel of Mark came first. It's the shortest and seems to make the least amounts of claims for Jesus' divinity. Matthew used Mark as a source and expanded it to beef up Jesus' credentials. Luke used Mark and Matthew to again beef up Jesus' credentials. So here's what they're asking people to swallow.
1) Jesus was just another great teacher, or healer or whatever.
2)After he died his followers got together and make up stories so that he would appear to be more fantastic and people would believe that he was the divine Son of God.
However, what these people never answer, and Bishop Wright asks this question, is why would the followers of Jesus ever make this decision? That's not how any other messianic movement, or any other movement, ever works. When the leader is killed after making fantastic claims he is dropped as a movement leader and the followers look for other leaders or disband. Sometimes a leader that accomplishes a lot during his or her lifetime he is honored after their death, but they have to accomplish something, and usually they have many years of leadership under their belt. One recent example of this might be Ronald Reagan who is now a conservative political icon (and probably looks much better in retrospect than he actually was), but he was in politics for over 30 years and rose to the pinnacle of his profession and did things like spearhead an economic resurgence, and rebuilt the military and restored their honor. Buddha was a religious leader for 30 years and had created a following of monks called the sangha that followed and recorded his teachings. Mohammad, if he existed, was a military, political leader, and prophets for over 30 years and built up the ummah to follow after him and they recorded his life and teachings. Jesus didn't do anything like that. According to the synoptic gospels he was active for about a year, and in John he was active for maybe 3 years, then he was killed by the Romans as a traitor, by crucifixion the worst thing that could happen to a Jew. Why in the world would anyone follow such a person, especially when, by their own admission, they all scattered after Jesus' death, which is the natural thing to do and to be expected? There is no reason: unless there was a real resurrection, and other miracles to testify of Christ's divinity. Of course since there is no answer, except the obvious that Jesus really was the Son of God and a miracle worker, no one tries to answer it, they just come up with things that could possibly have happened and say this is the best idea that we can come up with and leave it at that.
This is a good book and I would recommend it to anyone interested in two divergent views of Jesus.
Friday, June 27, 2014
Book Review: There Is A God
This is a book that I found out about while reading the book "Signature in the Cell". Of course I'd heard of the amazing conversion of Dr. Antony Flew, a world famous atheist to theism as he describes it. Not Christianity, but theism. However, he does say that if you have to choose a religion you can't go too far wrong with a religion that has such a charismatic figure as Jesus and a world class intellect such a Paul as your founders.
Much of this book went completely over my head. Even though this book was probably written for a general audience, only parts of it could I completely understand. The reason was because Dr. Flew is talking about very precise philosophy arguments, and the books that make them. However, the parts that I could understand well were well worth reading.
Roy Abraham Varghese, who is the co-author, also wrote the introduction, and the first appendix. He takes apart the so called new atheism which he says isn't new and doesn't even rise to the level of logical positivism, and ignores all the arguments being made for theism today. Basically they just rail against organized religion of any kind and are trumpeted by the media as something new, although they are not. The whole book was worth reading for the way that he took apart Richard Dawkin's, my favorite atheist to despise. After Dr. Flew, an eminent philosopher and proponent for atheism for many years, Richard Dawkin's apparently went ballistic, and went for the "ad hominem" attack. Dawkins first said that Bertrand Russel "was an exaggeratedly fair-minded atheist, over-eager to be disillusioned if logic seemed to require it," He added in a footnote "We might be seeing something similar today in the over-publicized tergiversation of the philosopher Antony Flew, who announced in his old age that he had been converted to belief in some sort of deity (triggering a frenzy of eager repetition all around the Internet). On the other hand, Russell was a great philosopher. Russell won the Nobel Prize."
Varghese writes
"The puerile petulance of the contrast with the "great philosopher" Russell and the contemptible reference to Flew's "old age" are par for the course in Dawkins's epistles to the enlightened. But what is interesting here is Dawkins's choice of words, one by which he unwittingly reveals the way his mind works.
"Tergiversation means "apostasy." So Flew's principle sin was that of apostatizing from the faith of the fathers."
"Tergiversation means "apostasy." So Flew's principle sin was that of apostatizing from the faith of the fathers."
That's funny writing as far as I'm concerned and it only gets better.
He related a statement made by Dr. John Barrows an English cosmologist, theoretical physicist,and mathematician who is a Research Professor of Mathematical Sciences at Cambridge University, said, regarding Dr. Dawkins disregarding the fine tuning of the Universe, "You have a problem with these ideas Richard, because your not really a scientist. You're a biologist." Julia Vitullo-Martin says that Dr. Barrow feels that biology is little more than a branch of natural history. Dr. Barrow has said; "Biologists have a limited intuitive understanding of complexity. They're stuck with an inherited conflict from the nineteenth century, and are only interested in outcomes, in what wins out over others. But outcomes tell you almost nothing about the laws that govern the universe."
Just reading those parts of the book were worth reading the entire book.
Dr. Flew wrote and presented a paper called "Theology and Falsification" and presented it at the Socratic Club, that was sponsored by C.S.Lewis at Oxford university, in 1950. This has been one of the most quoted articles about atheism of the last half of the 20th century. It's a short article and it can be found on the web if you would like to read it. This article supposedly changed the entire dynamic of the argument against God. I didn't really see how it changed the argument, but that may be because the argument that he presented is now so well known that I've heard it before in other forms.
One of the things that Dr. Flew points out is that when he became and atheist in the middle of the 20th Century much of the evidence that he now considers important as evidence of a deity was not known. One example is that the DNA molecule shape was not determined until 1953, and it was after that that it was possible to determine how it worked. Also, a lot of the discoveries of the fine tuning of the Universe were not known at that time. After taking all of these new discoveries into consideration Dr. Flew decided that the best explanation of the Universe is that it is designed, and if it is designed then there must be a designer.
He also addressed the comments by the idiot Dr. Dawkins by saying that some people had accused him of getting old and changing his views because he was worried about the afterlife. However, Dr. Flew said that he has not changed his ideas of humans having an immortal soul. He doesn't think we do have a soul so he doesn't think anything will happen after he dies. He also said that he has always been willing to follow where the evidence leads and has changed his ideas in the past. He said that many people are supprised when they learn at one time he was a Marxist, and that he later became a supporter of capitolism.
Another interesting part of the book are the two appendices. One is by Roy Abraham Varghese who also wrote the forward. Dr. Flew says that he has recommended the book "The Wonder of the World" and that anyone who argues against theism "would need to take into account [The Wonder of the World] which provides an extremely extensive argument of the inductive argument from the order of nature." He appendix is a paper called "The 'New Athiesm': A Critical Appraisal of Dawkins, Dennett, Wolpert, Harris and Stenger". He basically says that their arguments are not new and that they are very shallow, but that the popular press is giving them a lot of press and attention. One of the great things he says is that the atheists are trying to say that if you sit at a marble table, the argument is that if you sit there long enough the table will start talking to you. He points out that the atheists are making that somehow inanimate matter became animate and then progressed until we are the results.
The second appendix is by Bishop N. T. Wright. Bishop Wright is one of my favorite Christian writers. Dr. Flew writes
"Appendix B concerns the claim that there is a self-revelation of God in human history in the person of Jesus Christ. The claim is defended by one of today's premier New Testament scholars, Bishop N. T. Wright. In my view, Wright's responses to my previous critiques of divine self-revelation, both in the present volume and in his books, comprise the most powerful case for Christianity that I have ever seen."
"Appendix B concerns the claim that there is a self-revelation of God in human history in the person of Jesus Christ. The claim is defended by one of today's premier New Testament scholars, Bishop N. T. Wright. In my view, Wright's responses to my previous critiques of divine self-revelation, both in the present volume and in his books, comprise the most powerful case for Christianity that I have ever seen."
Dr. Flew apparently is not convinced by Bishop but thinks his arguments are good. I concure. Of course I always like it when someone really smart agrees with my opinion. Still I think that's high praise for Bishop Wright. I didn't realize how good his arguments were. His appendix is excellent. It caused me to go and see if Bishop Wright has written anything new that I might read since I enjoyed the appendix so much.
Sunday, March 23, 2014
Great Courses Review: History of Science: Antiquity to 1700
I only got this course after listening to the others in the trilogy and then wondering if they had a course covering the time period not covered by the other courses. I'm glad I found it.
I've read some of the other reviews and it seems to me that people are mistaking science for technology. No one would mistake the Wright brothers for scientists. They owned a bike shop. However, they did build a flying machine when most "scientists" of the time were saying a heavier than air craft would never be built. Once the technology was proven scientists could then help improve the technology. It's possible that a course could be taught on the history of the science of aeronautics without ever mentioning airplanes or jets. It would probably be boring and depending on how far back you went it might be hard to explain just why the scientists switched from believing heavier than air flight wasn't possible to it was possible. In fact Dr. Principe alludes to this when he talked about the "Clock Work Age" and how those who built the mills were illiterate for the most part and not interested in natural philosophy (science) but made great strides in the technology of the time.
It amazes me how much people don't understand how closely Christianity and science are linked. Some reviewers have complained that Dr. Principe gives Christianity too much credit. I personally enjoyed his insights and the linking of advances in natural philosophy to Christian philosophy. In fact in my opinion it is exactly because Europeans were Christians that they developed "science" as we know it. Certainly the inhabitants of the Asian Peninsula — incorrectly referred to as the "Continent of Europe" because of continental envy when Western geography books were written — were behind the great cultures of the East for most of history, with the possible exception of the Roman Empire. Dr. Principe doesn't make a big deal of this but it's true only in the West did alchemy become chemistry, or astrology become astronomy. Europeans were introduced to gunpowder by the Muslims from the Chinese, and they perfected it so that when the Europeans went on the voyages of "discovery" they totally dominated the historically great cultures because they had perfected putting gunpowder in tubes and shooting projectiles, among other things. In fact Europeans took the ideas introduced to them and improved on them all. They were introduced to algebra and developed calculus. They were introduced to optics and developed telescopes, microscopes and glasses. I can go on but the point is already made.
Another reviewer was upset because so much time was given to Newtons writings and studies on theology and alchemy. Dr. Principe didn't make up the fact that Newton spent all his time studying and writing about those topics and ignoring the fact, like they did during the 18th century, doesn't make Newton a greater scientist — oops natural philosopher — it just makes him less interesting as a human. Many biographers of Newton have said that he thought his writings on theology were his most important works. That's just the way it is, most great scientists before the enlightenment were very devout Christians. Many still are today.
I really enjoyed this course. Dr. Principe covered a lot of ground and I thought he covered it as well as could be expected in 36 lectures. Just be sure you know what he's going to talk about.
I've read some of the other reviews and it seems to me that people are mistaking science for technology. No one would mistake the Wright brothers for scientists. They owned a bike shop. However, they did build a flying machine when most "scientists" of the time were saying a heavier than air craft would never be built. Once the technology was proven scientists could then help improve the technology. It's possible that a course could be taught on the history of the science of aeronautics without ever mentioning airplanes or jets. It would probably be boring and depending on how far back you went it might be hard to explain just why the scientists switched from believing heavier than air flight wasn't possible to it was possible. In fact Dr. Principe alludes to this when he talked about the "Clock Work Age" and how those who built the mills were illiterate for the most part and not interested in natural philosophy (science) but made great strides in the technology of the time.
It amazes me how much people don't understand how closely Christianity and science are linked. Some reviewers have complained that Dr. Principe gives Christianity too much credit. I personally enjoyed his insights and the linking of advances in natural philosophy to Christian philosophy. In fact in my opinion it is exactly because Europeans were Christians that they developed "science" as we know it. Certainly the inhabitants of the Asian Peninsula — incorrectly referred to as the "Continent of Europe" because of continental envy when Western geography books were written — were behind the great cultures of the East for most of history, with the possible exception of the Roman Empire. Dr. Principe doesn't make a big deal of this but it's true only in the West did alchemy become chemistry, or astrology become astronomy. Europeans were introduced to gunpowder by the Muslims from the Chinese, and they perfected it so that when the Europeans went on the voyages of "discovery" they totally dominated the historically great cultures because they had perfected putting gunpowder in tubes and shooting projectiles, among other things. In fact Europeans took the ideas introduced to them and improved on them all. They were introduced to algebra and developed calculus. They were introduced to optics and developed telescopes, microscopes and glasses. I can go on but the point is already made.
Another reviewer was upset because so much time was given to Newtons writings and studies on theology and alchemy. Dr. Principe didn't make up the fact that Newton spent all his time studying and writing about those topics and ignoring the fact, like they did during the 18th century, doesn't make Newton a greater scientist — oops natural philosopher — it just makes him less interesting as a human. Many biographers of Newton have said that he thought his writings on theology were his most important works. That's just the way it is, most great scientists before the enlightenment were very devout Christians. Many still are today.
I really enjoyed this course. Dr. Principe covered a lot of ground and I thought he covered it as well as could be expected in 36 lectures. Just be sure you know what he's going to talk about.
Tuesday, March 11, 2014
Great Courses Review: Turning Points in Medieval History
Professor Dorsey Armstrong is an excellent lecturer. I very much appreciated the way that she presented the information. At first I was annoyed by the way she tied lectures together at the end and beginning of each lecture. It takes up a lot of the time. I grew used to it, and other commentators on this series have said that it is helpful.
I have a daughter and son-in-law that attends Purdue University so I actually paid closer attention than usual when the professors experience was given at the first of the lectures. I thought it would be interesting to hear from a professor who was involved in "women studies." Turns out she's a professor of English and Medieval Literature, and Purdue does actually offer a minor in women's studies. Well that's disappointing but I'm not an alumni so I can't really be that disappointed.
I like the way she taught the course where she pulls in the way that different events are connected. I like documentaries and books that do it as well, so that's just a personal opinion. She seems to jump around a lot some people may not like that.
This series of lectures was definitely taught from a liberal viewpoint. And I mean liberal in the modern PC liberal view point. When she first said that Europe became a "persecuting society" I almost laughed out loud, especially when she said they persecuted "infidels, pagans, homosexuals, leprorers, and Jews". She emphasized that there were still pagans at that time in Europe. this is the first time that I've ever heard that people specifically persecuted homosexuals in the medieval times. I suppose it's true, since homosexuals have never been treated very well and there might even have been some pagans at that time, but not many. However, I've never heard of it before, and every example of persecution she gave was against the Jews. Still as I said I almost laughed the first time she said it, but she said it often after that. Very often. In fact it's impossible not to notice since it was a constant refrain.
She also presented a very positive view of Islam. I kept wondering if she would like to go to a persecuting society today where they still actually do persecute homosexuals and Jews, and consider Christians infidels. In fact in Iran, an Islamic society they hang you for being a homosexual. While I'm sure that might have been done sometime in the past, somewhere in the Christian West, I can guarantee you it's not done today. This point leads me to something I found absolutely astounding in her choice for a turning point in Meadival History. She only picked two battles, one the Battle of Lechfeld, and the other the Battle of Hattin. I've never heard of the Battle of Lechfeld before, which doesn't mean that much except that I do like history and have listened to a lot of Great Courses history tapes. I'm pretty sure that that battle might or might not have really had a great impact on the development of the "persecuting society" of Europe, but I'm totally sure that the Battle of Tours is an actual turning point because it stopped the Islamic advance into Europe, then we would probably would have been much more like Iran, and would really be persecuting homosexuals. She does give some credit to this battle because she mentions the Song of Roland a couple of times, which she would practically have to mention as a Prof. of Medieval Literature, and that take place in the Battle of Tours.
The Battle of Hattin is a turning point, but Prof. Armstrong practically salivates over what a great guy Saladin was. I can't really blame her for that because that seems to be the PC version of the guy. Here's what I've written about Saladin on another Great Courses review that also thought he was a great guy. It's from my Great Courses review on Islam
"He then talks about how Saladin spared Jerusalem when he took it. He doesn't mention the account of Saladin taking Hattin. Saladin's secretary writes this account of how he treated the prisoners there: "[Saladin] ordered that they should be beheaded, choosing to have them dead rather than in prison. With him was a whole band of scholars and Sufis and a certain number of devout men and ascetics; each begged to be allowed to kill one of them, and drew his sword and rolled back his sleeve. Saladin, his face joyful, was sitting on his dais; the unbelievers showed black despair." He also doesn't mention that the Saladin planned to treat the prisoners at Jerusalem the same way. The reason he didn't it was because of an agreement he had reached with Christian commander of the city Balian of Ibelin who had threatened to kill all of the Muslims in the city of Jerusalem before Saladin could reach it if he didn't agree to spare the prisoners. He also only "spared" the prisoners that could be ransomed to freedom, the rest were sold as slaves. Nice guy Saladin. If you go to the Wikipedia account of the massacre of Ayyadieh it ends with this ironic sentence
"Aayadieh is perhaps the strongest refutation of Richard as a courteous and chivalrous warrior king. On this occasion his almost "theatrical" staging of the massacre showed that he was capable of using terror tactics in an attempt to terrify his opponents into submission. Ironically, Saladin's counter massacre did not hurt his reputation."
Many people point out how well Richard and Saladin got along even though they were adversaries. Saladin even sent his physician, who was probably much, much better than anything Richard had, to treat him when Richard was ill. They probably got along well because they were kindred spirits. Why does Dr. Espisito not tell this, if he "has" to tell about the villains of the plot why only the Christian villains? Muslims know Saladin, and not the happy charitable Saladin the west is told about by Dr. Esposito."
All that Prof. Tells us about Saladin and Hattin is he did behead was behead Raynald de Chatillon, who probably deserved it, and let King Guy go after giving him ice water. Well when supposedly knowledgeable people present facts like this no wonder everyone thinks Saladin was a paragon of virtue.
I liked some of the information she gave that came from her women studies background. I'd never heard of the women doctors before.
I'm always a little leery of taking professors to task here. After all they're professors and I'm a programmer. After reading some of the other reviews I see that I'm not the only one who finds her presentation one sided. However, I found her a most engaging lecturer. You can tell she loves the topic and she was very entertaining once you got used to her style. I'd recommend this this series to anyone, but I'd warn them of the biases, and after wards I'd want to see what they thought of it.
Sunday, February 23, 2014
Book Review: Muhammad: Prophet of God
I was hoping that this book might give me some clarity about Islam and Muhammad. Daniel Peterson is one of my author heroes and I generally enjoy his writing. He also has a reputation that he can be acerbic in his writing, especially in the defense of the LDS faith. He is also an Professor of Islamic Studies and the editor-in-chief of the BYU Islamic Translation Series, which is a series of translations of philosophical works by Islamic scholars to make them more accessible to the West. They are printed with the Arabic text on one side of the page and the English on the other side. From what I've been able to determine they are well accepted. So he's got to know a lot about Islam.
Dr. Peterson's writing in this book is as always good and I actually learned some things about Muhammad that I didn't know. I've read a couple of different accounts of Muhammad. In some he seems to be a really nice guy. In the other he seems to be a blood thirsty tyrant. I'm not sure where the truth lies, probably somewhere in the middle. My first reaction after reading this book by Dr. Peterson was that he was taking the apologist track, but then I started thinking about it a little more and realized that he really didn't take that track at all. He may not have talked about some of the more grizzly aspects of Muhammad's life, like Robert Spencer does, but he doesn't sugar coat them either.
The fact is that Muhammad really did accomplish something that is amazing. He started an Empire that rivaled any other great empire builder such as Alexander, and he did something that Alexander didn't do, his Empire stayed together and grew after he died. Alexander's didn't even survive the what would have been his life span had he lived. I think he did this by being a really good leader, and he was probably a pretty good religious leader as well for his time. And I think this is what Dr. Peterson shows in this book.
First off Muhammad would get 1/5 of all the booty from the raids and battles that the muslims had, and all indications are that he used this to support the people who came to Medina as emigrants. He didn't live in a lavish lifestyle. That's certainly different than most despots.
The Battle of Uhud which was a route of the Muslims. One of the main reasons was because of the calvary led by Khalid ibn al-Walid. Later he converted to Islam and became a great general in the rise of the Islamic caliphate both during Muhammad's life and after. This shows remarkable leadership. Another thing that I didn't know is somewhat ironic that Dr. Peterson pointed out.
"Less than three decades after Muhammad's death, the Ummayads, the descendants of Abu Sufyan, ruled the empire from Damascus. The strongest leader of that house was Mu'awiya, the son of Abu Sufyan and of Hind, who had torn out and eaten the liver of Muhammad's uncle following the Battle of Uhud."
After the defeat of Mecca many of Mohammad's former opponents converted to Islam and were allowed to, despite calls for revenge. If people were willing to follow Allah and his Messenger, the Messenger was willing to let them, and in the end, in many cases that turned out to work well for Islam.
Mohammad was probably not any more ruthless than any other great empire builder. Many people have talked about how Constantine was not a very good Christian and did what was necessary to hold his empire. And his lasted quite a while. Charlemagne was the same way. He could be ruthless when it was called for. His Empire didn't last to long after his death. The difference between these men and Muhammad is that a billion people don't look to them as the "perfect" example and they do to Muhammad. So while Charlemagne might have killed 2000 pagans in a day, no Christian thinks that should be emulated as a good thing to do. But when Muhammad did anything, like marry the wife of a man he had defeated and decapitated on the same day, or consummate a marriage with a nine year old wife, or kept slaves or etc. There are a lot of people in the world today who think it's perfectly fine to act that way today because Muhammad did it. Dr. Peterson doesn't point any of these things out, but they happened.
So I would recommend this book. It's well written and you can learn some things about Muhammad. I don't think he tells the whole story about Muhammad, but he does tell an important part of it.
Dr. Peterson's writing in this book is as always good and I actually learned some things about Muhammad that I didn't know. I've read a couple of different accounts of Muhammad. In some he seems to be a really nice guy. In the other he seems to be a blood thirsty tyrant. I'm not sure where the truth lies, probably somewhere in the middle. My first reaction after reading this book by Dr. Peterson was that he was taking the apologist track, but then I started thinking about it a little more and realized that he really didn't take that track at all. He may not have talked about some of the more grizzly aspects of Muhammad's life, like Robert Spencer does, but he doesn't sugar coat them either.
The fact is that Muhammad really did accomplish something that is amazing. He started an Empire that rivaled any other great empire builder such as Alexander, and he did something that Alexander didn't do, his Empire stayed together and grew after he died. Alexander's didn't even survive the what would have been his life span had he lived. I think he did this by being a really good leader, and he was probably a pretty good religious leader as well for his time. And I think this is what Dr. Peterson shows in this book.
First off Muhammad would get 1/5 of all the booty from the raids and battles that the muslims had, and all indications are that he used this to support the people who came to Medina as emigrants. He didn't live in a lavish lifestyle. That's certainly different than most despots.
The Battle of Uhud which was a route of the Muslims. One of the main reasons was because of the calvary led by Khalid ibn al-Walid. Later he converted to Islam and became a great general in the rise of the Islamic caliphate both during Muhammad's life and after. This shows remarkable leadership. Another thing that I didn't know is somewhat ironic that Dr. Peterson pointed out.
"Less than three decades after Muhammad's death, the Ummayads, the descendants of Abu Sufyan, ruled the empire from Damascus. The strongest leader of that house was Mu'awiya, the son of Abu Sufyan and of Hind, who had torn out and eaten the liver of Muhammad's uncle following the Battle of Uhud."
After the defeat of Mecca many of Mohammad's former opponents converted to Islam and were allowed to, despite calls for revenge. If people were willing to follow Allah and his Messenger, the Messenger was willing to let them, and in the end, in many cases that turned out to work well for Islam.
Mohammad was probably not any more ruthless than any other great empire builder. Many people have talked about how Constantine was not a very good Christian and did what was necessary to hold his empire. And his lasted quite a while. Charlemagne was the same way. He could be ruthless when it was called for. His Empire didn't last to long after his death. The difference between these men and Muhammad is that a billion people don't look to them as the "perfect" example and they do to Muhammad. So while Charlemagne might have killed 2000 pagans in a day, no Christian thinks that should be emulated as a good thing to do. But when Muhammad did anything, like marry the wife of a man he had defeated and decapitated on the same day, or consummate a marriage with a nine year old wife, or kept slaves or etc. There are a lot of people in the world today who think it's perfectly fine to act that way today because Muhammad did it. Dr. Peterson doesn't point any of these things out, but they happened.
So I would recommend this book. It's well written and you can learn some things about Muhammad. I don't think he tells the whole story about Muhammad, but he does tell an important part of it.
Saturday, February 22, 2014
Great Courses: Great World Religions: Judaism
This was an awesome course. This was the first course I've heard from Dr. Gafni, but it will not be my last because after hearing this course I searched for more lectures by Dr. Gafni and found that he has one more set. Consider me sold. I learned something during every lecture. That usually happens, but with Dr. Gafni it seemed enlightening to me. He obviously loves the topic and presented it well.
Highly recommended.
Monday, February 17, 2014
Great Courses: Great World Religions: Islam
When I saw who was giving this course I was prepared to hate the course. Dr. Espisito is a well know Islamic scholar who is an Islamic apologist. He will not even condemn Hezbollah or Hamas. He portrays them as a Sinn Fein type organization with an IRA arm. However, Sinn Fein never felt that the Northern Ireland shouldn't exist, just that Ireland shouldn't be under British Rule. Hezbollah and Hamas both think that Israel should not exist at all, and have that as a goal in the charters of their organizations. Granted some people in those organizations have thought they were violent enough against Israel and will broke away, but they are not like Sinn Fein.
With that being said I didn't actually dislike the course as much as I thought I would, and I actually learned a few things, although not many. I agree with many who have said that it probably would have been better to have a believer give the course than an outsider. Dr. Espisito is Roman Catholic, which doesn't really matter, except that he's not Muslim. Also, he does give a biased presentation of Islam, but to be fair, he gives the presentation that most people in academia give of Islam, which I think is disturbing.
I will give some examples. He doesn't present the crusades as an outright attack by the Christians on the innocent Muslims, he does give some background and that the Byzantine Emperor had called for help with the Muslim attacks. He also said that one reason the Pope called for the crusades was to increase his political position. I haven't heard that before, and it's probably got some truth behind it. He also said that there were hero and villains on both side on the war. Then he proceeds to talk about the Crusaders sack of Jerusalem and King Richards massacre of the prisoners at Ayyadieh. He then talks about how Saladin spared Jerusalem when he took it. He doesn't mention the account of Saladin taking Hattin. Saladin's secretary writes this account of how he treated the prisoners there: "[Saladin] ordered that they should be beheaded, choosing to have them dead rather than in prison. With him was a whole band of scholars and Sufis and a certain number of devout men and ascetics; each begged to be allowed to kill one of them, and drew his sword and rolled back his sleeve. Saladin, his face joyful, was sitting on his dais; the unbelievers showed black despair." He also doesn't mention that the Saladin planned to treat the prisoners at Jerusalem the same way. The reason he didn't it was because of an agreement he had reached with Christian commander of the city Balian of Ibelin who had threatened to kill all of the Muslims in the city of Jerusalem before Saladin could reach it if he didn't agree to spare the prisoners. He also only "spared" the prisoners that could be ransomed to freedom, the rest were sold as slaves. Nice guy Saladin. If you go to the Wikipedia account of the massacre of Ayyadieh it ends with this ironic sentence
"Aayadieh is perhaps the strongest refutation of Richard as a courteous and chivalrous warrior king. On this occasion his almost "theatrical" staging of the massacre showed that he was capable of using terror tactics in an attempt to terrify his opponents into submission. Ironically, Saladin's counter massacre did not hurt his reputation."
Many people point out how well Richard and Saladin got along even though they were adversaries. Saladin even sent his physician, who was probably much, much better than anything Richard had, to treat him when Richard was ill. They probably got along well because they were kindred spirits. Why does Dr. Espisito not tell this, if he "has" to tell about the villains of the plot why only the Christian villians? Muslims know Saladin, and not the happy charitable Saladin the west is told about by Dr. Esposito.
Dr Espisto also says that every one of the suras, or chapters, of the Quran, starts with the bismillah "In the name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful" That's mostly true, except that it doesn't start the 9th Sura, or the "so called", as Dr. Esposito would say, Sword Sura. That's what the "critics" of Islam call it, the name that Muslims give it is "The Repentance" or "The Ultimatum." As Dr. Espisito says, "Many, not all consider this the last word of Mohammed..." He says this about Quran 9:71-72 and says that this is how a man should treat his wife, as an equal. I didn't know that those ayahs were interpreted that way and were applied to marriage. So I learned something there. Dr. Esposito also didn't mention that there is another ayah in the Quran 4:34 that says that it's OK to beat your wife if she's disobedient, but that since the 9th Sura comes later it abrogates the former ayah. It's good to know that some Islamic scholars interpret the Quran that way.
Dr. Esposito also talked about the ayahs that the "critics", as Dr. Esposito called them, always talk about. The so called "sword verses". I was actually surprised that he talked about these at all. Not to worry though. We just don't understand them in context. Many Christians understand that other Christians will rip proof texts out of the Bible and that when put in context they can sound different, so Dr. Esposito is going to set our minds at ease here. He quotes 9:5 "Then, when the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters wherever ye find them, and take them (captive), and besiege them and prepare for them each ambush." Yes you're right Dr. Esposito that sounds terrible, so here is the second line that puts it in context and makes it all OK. "But if they repent and establish worship and pay the poor-due, then leave their way free." Really Dr. Esposito, putting it in context makes it better!!!! If we convert and pay the zakat (which he talks about as one of the pillars of Islam) the Muslims are supposed to leave us alone, otherwise it's OK to ambush us idolaters? That doesn't seem to make it any better to me.
Also, although he mentioned it with respect to marriage he doesn't mention that these so called "sword verses" are also in the last word of Mohhamad, and the only sura that doesn't start with the bismillah, the 9th Sura. He also doesn't talk about the ayahs that say that Muslims should not be friends with Christians or Jews. It's things like this that make people say that Dr. Esposito is giving a slanted view of Islam.
Now that I've written how bad the lectures are, they actually aren't that bad. The lecture I learned the most on was lecture 4 about how the different law codes came about and the Sufis. Also, Dr. Esposito is a much better scholar of Islam than I am, or I hope he is, and he does seem anguished that there is no Islamic nation that is not plagued by terrorist unrest or civil war. He also seems to really believe that Islam has been hijacked by a violent minority. It does seem that way to me, however, I don't think that ignoring the reasons that there is that violent minority is the way to help reform Islam. Judaism and Christianity have changed over the years. Jews have worked out how their religion works without a temple. Christians, and Jews have worked out how to get around slavery and usury. There are plenty of ways that the Quran can be interpreted peacefully, and America should be a safe haven for all Muslims that want to take that path. Dr. Esposito says that is what he is doing, and I truly hope he is, but in my opinion, closing your eyes to all the bad things about Islam is not helping it reform, it's just letting the wolf into the sheepfold.
With that being said I didn't actually dislike the course as much as I thought I would, and I actually learned a few things, although not many. I agree with many who have said that it probably would have been better to have a believer give the course than an outsider. Dr. Espisito is Roman Catholic, which doesn't really matter, except that he's not Muslim. Also, he does give a biased presentation of Islam, but to be fair, he gives the presentation that most people in academia give of Islam, which I think is disturbing.
I will give some examples. He doesn't present the crusades as an outright attack by the Christians on the innocent Muslims, he does give some background and that the Byzantine Emperor had called for help with the Muslim attacks. He also said that one reason the Pope called for the crusades was to increase his political position. I haven't heard that before, and it's probably got some truth behind it. He also said that there were hero and villains on both side on the war. Then he proceeds to talk about the Crusaders sack of Jerusalem and King Richards massacre of the prisoners at Ayyadieh. He then talks about how Saladin spared Jerusalem when he took it. He doesn't mention the account of Saladin taking Hattin. Saladin's secretary writes this account of how he treated the prisoners there: "[Saladin] ordered that they should be beheaded, choosing to have them dead rather than in prison. With him was a whole band of scholars and Sufis and a certain number of devout men and ascetics; each begged to be allowed to kill one of them, and drew his sword and rolled back his sleeve. Saladin, his face joyful, was sitting on his dais; the unbelievers showed black despair." He also doesn't mention that the Saladin planned to treat the prisoners at Jerusalem the same way. The reason he didn't it was because of an agreement he had reached with Christian commander of the city Balian of Ibelin who had threatened to kill all of the Muslims in the city of Jerusalem before Saladin could reach it if he didn't agree to spare the prisoners. He also only "spared" the prisoners that could be ransomed to freedom, the rest were sold as slaves. Nice guy Saladin. If you go to the Wikipedia account of the massacre of Ayyadieh it ends with this ironic sentence
"Aayadieh is perhaps the strongest refutation of Richard as a courteous and chivalrous warrior king. On this occasion his almost "theatrical" staging of the massacre showed that he was capable of using terror tactics in an attempt to terrify his opponents into submission. Ironically, Saladin's counter massacre did not hurt his reputation."
Many people point out how well Richard and Saladin got along even though they were adversaries. Saladin even sent his physician, who was probably much, much better than anything Richard had, to treat him when Richard was ill. They probably got along well because they were kindred spirits. Why does Dr. Espisito not tell this, if he "has" to tell about the villains of the plot why only the Christian villians? Muslims know Saladin, and not the happy charitable Saladin the west is told about by Dr. Esposito.
Dr Espisto also says that every one of the suras, or chapters, of the Quran, starts with the bismillah "In the name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful" That's mostly true, except that it doesn't start the 9th Sura, or the "so called", as Dr. Esposito would say, Sword Sura. That's what the "critics" of Islam call it, the name that Muslims give it is "The Repentance" or "The Ultimatum." As Dr. Espisito says, "Many, not all consider this the last word of Mohammed..." He says this about Quran 9:71-72 and says that this is how a man should treat his wife, as an equal. I didn't know that those ayahs were interpreted that way and were applied to marriage. So I learned something there. Dr. Esposito also didn't mention that there is another ayah in the Quran 4:34 that says that it's OK to beat your wife if she's disobedient, but that since the 9th Sura comes later it abrogates the former ayah. It's good to know that some Islamic scholars interpret the Quran that way.
Dr. Esposito also talked about the ayahs that the "critics", as Dr. Esposito called them, always talk about. The so called "sword verses". I was actually surprised that he talked about these at all. Not to worry though. We just don't understand them in context. Many Christians understand that other Christians will rip proof texts out of the Bible and that when put in context they can sound different, so Dr. Esposito is going to set our minds at ease here. He quotes 9:5 "Then, when the sacred months have passed, slay the idolaters wherever ye find them, and take them (captive), and besiege them and prepare for them each ambush." Yes you're right Dr. Esposito that sounds terrible, so here is the second line that puts it in context and makes it all OK. "But if they repent and establish worship and pay the poor-due, then leave their way free." Really Dr. Esposito, putting it in context makes it better!!!! If we convert and pay the zakat (which he talks about as one of the pillars of Islam) the Muslims are supposed to leave us alone, otherwise it's OK to ambush us idolaters? That doesn't seem to make it any better to me.
Also, although he mentioned it with respect to marriage he doesn't mention that these so called "sword verses" are also in the last word of Mohhamad, and the only sura that doesn't start with the bismillah, the 9th Sura. He also doesn't talk about the ayahs that say that Muslims should not be friends with Christians or Jews. It's things like this that make people say that Dr. Esposito is giving a slanted view of Islam.
Now that I've written how bad the lectures are, they actually aren't that bad. The lecture I learned the most on was lecture 4 about how the different law codes came about and the Sufis. Also, Dr. Esposito is a much better scholar of Islam than I am, or I hope he is, and he does seem anguished that there is no Islamic nation that is not plagued by terrorist unrest or civil war. He also seems to really believe that Islam has been hijacked by a violent minority. It does seem that way to me, however, I don't think that ignoring the reasons that there is that violent minority is the way to help reform Islam. Judaism and Christianity have changed over the years. Jews have worked out how their religion works without a temple. Christians, and Jews have worked out how to get around slavery and usury. There are plenty of ways that the Quran can be interpreted peacefully, and America should be a safe haven for all Muslims that want to take that path. Dr. Esposito says that is what he is doing, and I truly hope he is, but in my opinion, closing your eyes to all the bad things about Islam is not helping it reform, it's just letting the wolf into the sheepfold.
Friday, February 14, 2014
Great Courses: Comparitive Religions
One of my main interests in listening to Great Courses lectures is listening to the courses on religion and philosophy. I saw this lecture series and thought it would be interesting. I can only say that it's a very basic course. If you didn't know that humans are pretty much the same throughout time and history this series will show you that they are.
I only listen to the lectures, and I must say that Dr. Kimball's presentation was passionless. I had to listen to the first lecture over because I believed he said that he was a Christian minister. I kept wondering what a sermon by Dr. Kimball would be like if this was what his lectures were. I found it funny too because you can tell that he has been very involved in the ecumenical movement and had very interesting stories to tell, but he gave them in a very flat tone. I personally didn't find this lecture series very informative and couldn't really recommend it unless it was to someone who know nothing about comparative religious studies at all.
I only listen to the lectures, and I must say that Dr. Kimball's presentation was passionless. I had to listen to the first lecture over because I believed he said that he was a Christian minister. I kept wondering what a sermon by Dr. Kimball would be like if this was what his lectures were. I found it funny too because you can tell that he has been very involved in the ecumenical movement and had very interesting stories to tell, but he gave them in a very flat tone. I personally didn't find this lecture series very informative and couldn't really recommend it unless it was to someone who know nothing about comparative religious studies at all.
Sunday, February 9, 2014
Daniel Peterson and the Mormon Studies Review, A Nice Ending it Seems
Something funny happened a while ago. I got a check from the Maxwell Institute returning some money because I was not going to be getting a volume of the new "Mormon Studies Review". They'd just renamed it from FARMs Reviews. I didn't think much of it. Then I heard that Dan Peterson had been fired, and that was upsetting to me, and apparently it was upsetting to him. Then I received a volume of "Mormon Studies Review".
It seems like it's laying out the philosophy of the Review going forward. The editor wrote an introduction and he said that the guiding principle of the Review was going to be friendship. There was also an article by Brian D. Birch called "In Defense of Methodological Pluralism: Theology, Apologetics, and the Criticle Study of Mormonism." That's a mouthful. In the article he talked about the different methods of Mormon Studies, and he talks about how aplogetics would fit in. He says that one filed is called "negative aplologetics" and that is where critics are answered. He said that one of the main proponants of that field was Daniel Peterson and went on to say some good things about him. Also, Dr. Peterson had an article included as well. I was hoping that there wasn't going to be an enduring rift and it seems like there is not going to be one.
After getting the latest Review I did a search on google to see if I could find any more information on the firing. I did find that Dr. Peterson had supposedly written 100 page article on someone named John Dehlin who runs a web site called Mormon Stories where people who have left the Church can write their stories. Obviously it's an anti-Mormon site, and I haven't even visited it. It probably says that it's out to present all views, but it won't. Any way John apparently didn't like what was going to be said about him and called a General Authority and was able to get the article pulled, which threw off the publishing because now there was a 100 page hole. Then they stopped publishing and fired Dr. Peterson. After all of that I decided that I would really like to see that article.
I'll admit that Dr. Dan Peterson is a hero of mine. Mainly because of one article he wrote called "Nephi and his Asherah." I'd always wondered about the how Nephi goes from not know what the tree in his father's vision meant to knowing that it was the love of God after seeing the Saviour's birth. A vision of "A virgin, most beautiful and fair above all other virgins" that later has a baby. There had always been a disconnect there for me, and Dan made the connection powerfully. I once got to meet Dr. Peterson at a FAIR Conferance, and told him how much I liked that article. I asked him if many people have told him they liked it and he said I'm one of the few, and then I asked if it was controversial at all and he said it was a little. Any way I loved it, and after that I look for things that he's written and always enjoy them. I don't always agree with him, but I always enjoy his writing.
Anyway I liked what Dr. Peterson did in the old Review however I was sometimes surprised at the polemical tone that the book sometimes took. I don't think it's as bad as what is written in books about the LDS Church so I always took it with a grain of salt, but I could see how it might not be something that a scholarly journal produced by BYU would want to be associated with. Now I just hope that the Maxwell Institute doesn't kill the spirit of FARMS. I loved FARMS, for me it was a breath of fresh air, just the kind of stuff I loved and needed. I would wait for their books and publications and pounce on them when they came out. Pretty much anything they produced I bought and read. I don't know if I'm going to continue doing that anymore. I mean do I really want to read about Mormon Gender Studies? Maybe not, although the article I did read was not as bad as I thought. Maybe I'll have to take a wait and see attitude.
However, I do know that I want to support Dr. Peterson's new Journal, well over a year old now, "The Interpreter." When people have questions about the Church, and they've read some anti-Mormon liturature I'm pretty sure that the information I'm going to get from the Review might not help so much. It might help if it a professor that has a question, but I don't know many people like that. I'm pretty sure I will get some good information from the Interpreter though, just like I used to get good information from the old Review.
With all that being said I guess that I'm going to have to step up and read Dr. Peterson's "Muhommad: Prophet of God." I'm just aftaid that I'll find that I disagree with what he says and that he's an apologist for Islam. After all that is Dr. Peterson's main field of study. But then again I'll probably get a lot of good things from it. I should just read it and see what he says. Don't be a chicken.
It seems like it's laying out the philosophy of the Review going forward. The editor wrote an introduction and he said that the guiding principle of the Review was going to be friendship. There was also an article by Brian D. Birch called "In Defense of Methodological Pluralism: Theology, Apologetics, and the Criticle Study of Mormonism." That's a mouthful. In the article he talked about the different methods of Mormon Studies, and he talks about how aplogetics would fit in. He says that one filed is called "negative aplologetics" and that is where critics are answered. He said that one of the main proponants of that field was Daniel Peterson and went on to say some good things about him. Also, Dr. Peterson had an article included as well. I was hoping that there wasn't going to be an enduring rift and it seems like there is not going to be one.
After getting the latest Review I did a search on google to see if I could find any more information on the firing. I did find that Dr. Peterson had supposedly written 100 page article on someone named John Dehlin who runs a web site called Mormon Stories where people who have left the Church can write their stories. Obviously it's an anti-Mormon site, and I haven't even visited it. It probably says that it's out to present all views, but it won't. Any way John apparently didn't like what was going to be said about him and called a General Authority and was able to get the article pulled, which threw off the publishing because now there was a 100 page hole. Then they stopped publishing and fired Dr. Peterson. After all of that I decided that I would really like to see that article.
I'll admit that Dr. Dan Peterson is a hero of mine. Mainly because of one article he wrote called "Nephi and his Asherah." I'd always wondered about the how Nephi goes from not know what the tree in his father's vision meant to knowing that it was the love of God after seeing the Saviour's birth. A vision of "A virgin, most beautiful and fair above all other virgins" that later has a baby. There had always been a disconnect there for me, and Dan made the connection powerfully. I once got to meet Dr. Peterson at a FAIR Conferance, and told him how much I liked that article. I asked him if many people have told him they liked it and he said I'm one of the few, and then I asked if it was controversial at all and he said it was a little. Any way I loved it, and after that I look for things that he's written and always enjoy them. I don't always agree with him, but I always enjoy his writing.
Anyway I liked what Dr. Peterson did in the old Review however I was sometimes surprised at the polemical tone that the book sometimes took. I don't think it's as bad as what is written in books about the LDS Church so I always took it with a grain of salt, but I could see how it might not be something that a scholarly journal produced by BYU would want to be associated with. Now I just hope that the Maxwell Institute doesn't kill the spirit of FARMS. I loved FARMS, for me it was a breath of fresh air, just the kind of stuff I loved and needed. I would wait for their books and publications and pounce on them when they came out. Pretty much anything they produced I bought and read. I don't know if I'm going to continue doing that anymore. I mean do I really want to read about Mormon Gender Studies? Maybe not, although the article I did read was not as bad as I thought. Maybe I'll have to take a wait and see attitude.
However, I do know that I want to support Dr. Peterson's new Journal, well over a year old now, "The Interpreter." When people have questions about the Church, and they've read some anti-Mormon liturature I'm pretty sure that the information I'm going to get from the Review might not help so much. It might help if it a professor that has a question, but I don't know many people like that. I'm pretty sure I will get some good information from the Interpreter though, just like I used to get good information from the old Review.
With all that being said I guess that I'm going to have to step up and read Dr. Peterson's "Muhommad: Prophet of God." I'm just aftaid that I'll find that I disagree with what he says and that he's an apologist for Islam. After all that is Dr. Peterson's main field of study. But then again I'll probably get a lot of good things from it. I should just read it and see what he says. Don't be a chicken.
Science: It's Not What It's Cracked Up To Be part 2
Science doesn't really exist. Scientific beliefs are either proved wrong, or else they quickly become engineering. Everything else is untested speculation. — James P. Hogan
Since I wrote the first part of this series I went back and reread "Kicking the Sacred Cows." I figured since it seemed to be such an influential book I should maybe reread it. I was surprised at what was in it. Mostly I was surprised at what was not in it. It turns out that in my researches on the internet a lot of what I learned was beyond what Mr. Hogan was talking about and pointed me towards. However, he did say a lot of good things. I particularly like the quote above which is what he starts his book out with, right at the beginning of the introduction.
In my listening to the lectures on the Philosophy of Science I learned something that is amazing. Science is founded on a logical fallacy. At one time scientists, or natural philosophers as they were then known, knew this and worried about it. Today scientists don't seem worried about it at all, just the Philosophers of Science, and I'm pretty sure that most of the rest of us don't know anything about it. The fallacy is called Affirming the Consequent, or sometimes Affirming the Ascendant.
It goes like this, A therefore B, does not necessarily lead to B therefore A. Mr. Hogan gives the best example of this I think. If the sprinklers turn on the grass will be wet. Ok the sprinklers turn on and the grass is wet, that's true. Say the next morning you wake up and go outside and find that the grass is wet, does that mean the sprinklers turned on? No it doesn't. Maybe it rained, or maybe there was a hard dew last night, or maybe a UFO passed by and emptied it's cooling tanks on your lawn. See that last part is where Mr. Hogan's science fiction writing comes in and why I thinks his example is so great. Much better, I think that the wikipedia version which can be found HERE.
How does that apply to science. Well as I said it's foundational, but let me explain something first. There are two ways that we can come to knowledge. One is called deductive reasoning, and it is full proof and gives an excellent example from the history of philosophy. A standard example is
All ravens are black. P1
That is a raven P2
Therefore is is black. D1
As long as the premises are true the deduction is true. The history part is they used to say "All swans are white," but when Australia was discovered they found black swans and therefore the first premise was not true anymore. They've never, so far, found a raven that was not black. The problem with deductive reasoning is that it's not predictive so your limited in what you can learn.
The second kind of reasoning is inductive reasoning and it is where you reason from specific facts to general facts. It's power is that it's predictive. It goes like this
The sun has always risen in the morning.
Therefore it will rise tomorrow, and every morning after.
Bertrand Russel who was a very smart man and wrote "Principia Mathmatica", liked to show that this type of reasoning is flawed and to show it he talked about a hen who reasoned, every morning the farmer brings me food, and went out to meet the farmer every morning for breakfast, until the farmer one morning cut her head off so that he could eat her for dinner.
However, while inductive reasoning is flawed, it's power is that it's predictive and allows us to do things in life and so we depend on it. So what does this mean? It means that we depend on the logical fallacy of Affirming the Consequent to do science. Lets go back to Mr. Hogans example
If the sprinklers turn on P1
The grass will be wet D1
In science we call P1 the hypothesis. So we give it a fancy name and then forget about it. The problem is that as a society we give science such a high level of credence, that we don't always question what they are saying when we should be questioning them a lot more. Karl Popper a famous philosopher of science saw this problem and said that a statement can only be meaningful if it can be falsified. The above statement could be falsified. I could cover the grass with a tarp and turn on the sprinklers then the grass wouldn't get wet. The scientist would then go back and either discard the hypothesis or alter it to fit the then known facts.
Now I think what the problem is really is that we, who live in the first world, live in a world that is a world of engineering marvels, and we falsely attribute it to science. I'm not saying that science is not part of engineering I'm just saying that we can't see science, but we can see engineering. Let me give a perfect example.
At the turn of the century, most "scientists" were saying that it was impossible for man to achieve heavier that air flight, or powered flight. Why? Because up till then all attempts at it had failed and they were explaining why. The a couple of bike mechanics ignored the scientists, the Wright Brothers, and built an airplane. Then the scientist got involved and started to improve on the Wright Brothers invention and in less that 70 years we went from powered flight is impossible, to putting a man on the moon. And that is pretty much how science works. However the scientists had to discard their hypothesis.
As I was thinking about this topic I was wondering if engineering, or technology, is still driving science. Now we have big science, which I think is a problem, and I wasn't sure. Then I serendiptiously read the December 2013 issue of the Smithsonian magazine. It was the issue where they were talking about the people they gave their innovation awards to. One of them was Professor John Rogers. For his PhD research he was doing research that could determine the properties of thin films by subjecting them to laser pulses. Before he was out of school chip manufacturers were interested in the research. The way they were then measuring the ultra thin layers of a microchips was by tapping them, which was not only slow but risked corrupting the chips. The laser system would be much better. Dr. Rogers and a classmate recruited students from the management school and came up with 100 page business proposal.
They were giving a presentation to an executive from Tencor and were showing many, many screens of equations and theories telling how the could determine the properties of the thin films stiffness, delamination, longitudinal sound velocity, thermal transfer etc. Finally the executive said I don't care about any of that can you tell me how thick the film is? Rogers said yes they could but it was something they hadn't even put in the business plan, because as a scientist it was probably the least interesting thing about thin films.
Matthew Banet, who was the friend who co-founded the startup said: "It was a seminal moment in all of our lives. We went back with our tails between our legs." They went back and worked on their equipment until it could measure variations in thin films as small as on tenth of an angstrom. Dr. Rogers said that "sometimes the technology push drives scientific understanding, rather than the other way around." He also said that Tencor's requirements forced them "to understand a lot more about the optics and physics and acoustic and signal processing. It put all scientific research into the context of something that could have value beyond publication in a scientific journal."
The startup, Active Impulse Systems raised $3 million in venture capital funding in 1995. They produced their first unit, the InSite300, in 1997, and sold the compony in August 1998 for $29 million.
That's how it works. Science turns into engineering that we can see and makes the world a better place. Science that never turns into engineering is just guessing. That's all it is. Here is something that I also learned in the lecture series. Every thing that science believed was true at the beginning of the 20th century turned out to be wrong by the end. Why should be believe that it will be any different at the end of the 21st Century?
Since I wrote the first part of this series I went back and reread "Kicking the Sacred Cows." I figured since it seemed to be such an influential book I should maybe reread it. I was surprised at what was in it. Mostly I was surprised at what was not in it. It turns out that in my researches on the internet a lot of what I learned was beyond what Mr. Hogan was talking about and pointed me towards. However, he did say a lot of good things. I particularly like the quote above which is what he starts his book out with, right at the beginning of the introduction.
In my listening to the lectures on the Philosophy of Science I learned something that is amazing. Science is founded on a logical fallacy. At one time scientists, or natural philosophers as they were then known, knew this and worried about it. Today scientists don't seem worried about it at all, just the Philosophers of Science, and I'm pretty sure that most of the rest of us don't know anything about it. The fallacy is called Affirming the Consequent, or sometimes Affirming the Ascendant.
It goes like this, A therefore B, does not necessarily lead to B therefore A. Mr. Hogan gives the best example of this I think. If the sprinklers turn on the grass will be wet. Ok the sprinklers turn on and the grass is wet, that's true. Say the next morning you wake up and go outside and find that the grass is wet, does that mean the sprinklers turned on? No it doesn't. Maybe it rained, or maybe there was a hard dew last night, or maybe a UFO passed by and emptied it's cooling tanks on your lawn. See that last part is where Mr. Hogan's science fiction writing comes in and why I thinks his example is so great. Much better, I think that the wikipedia version which can be found HERE.
How does that apply to science. Well as I said it's foundational, but let me explain something first. There are two ways that we can come to knowledge. One is called deductive reasoning, and it is full proof and gives an excellent example from the history of philosophy. A standard example is
All ravens are black. P1
That is a raven P2
Therefore is is black. D1
As long as the premises are true the deduction is true. The history part is they used to say "All swans are white," but when Australia was discovered they found black swans and therefore the first premise was not true anymore. They've never, so far, found a raven that was not black. The problem with deductive reasoning is that it's not predictive so your limited in what you can learn.
The second kind of reasoning is inductive reasoning and it is where you reason from specific facts to general facts. It's power is that it's predictive. It goes like this
The sun has always risen in the morning.
Therefore it will rise tomorrow, and every morning after.
Bertrand Russel who was a very smart man and wrote "Principia Mathmatica", liked to show that this type of reasoning is flawed and to show it he talked about a hen who reasoned, every morning the farmer brings me food, and went out to meet the farmer every morning for breakfast, until the farmer one morning cut her head off so that he could eat her for dinner.
However, while inductive reasoning is flawed, it's power is that it's predictive and allows us to do things in life and so we depend on it. So what does this mean? It means that we depend on the logical fallacy of Affirming the Consequent to do science. Lets go back to Mr. Hogans example
If the sprinklers turn on P1
The grass will be wet D1
In science we call P1 the hypothesis. So we give it a fancy name and then forget about it. The problem is that as a society we give science such a high level of credence, that we don't always question what they are saying when we should be questioning them a lot more. Karl Popper a famous philosopher of science saw this problem and said that a statement can only be meaningful if it can be falsified. The above statement could be falsified. I could cover the grass with a tarp and turn on the sprinklers then the grass wouldn't get wet. The scientist would then go back and either discard the hypothesis or alter it to fit the then known facts.
Now I think what the problem is really is that we, who live in the first world, live in a world that is a world of engineering marvels, and we falsely attribute it to science. I'm not saying that science is not part of engineering I'm just saying that we can't see science, but we can see engineering. Let me give a perfect example.
At the turn of the century, most "scientists" were saying that it was impossible for man to achieve heavier that air flight, or powered flight. Why? Because up till then all attempts at it had failed and they were explaining why. The a couple of bike mechanics ignored the scientists, the Wright Brothers, and built an airplane. Then the scientist got involved and started to improve on the Wright Brothers invention and in less that 70 years we went from powered flight is impossible, to putting a man on the moon. And that is pretty much how science works. However the scientists had to discard their hypothesis.
As I was thinking about this topic I was wondering if engineering, or technology, is still driving science. Now we have big science, which I think is a problem, and I wasn't sure. Then I serendiptiously read the December 2013 issue of the Smithsonian magazine. It was the issue where they were talking about the people they gave their innovation awards to. One of them was Professor John Rogers. For his PhD research he was doing research that could determine the properties of thin films by subjecting them to laser pulses. Before he was out of school chip manufacturers were interested in the research. The way they were then measuring the ultra thin layers of a microchips was by tapping them, which was not only slow but risked corrupting the chips. The laser system would be much better. Dr. Rogers and a classmate recruited students from the management school and came up with 100 page business proposal.
They were giving a presentation to an executive from Tencor and were showing many, many screens of equations and theories telling how the could determine the properties of the thin films stiffness, delamination, longitudinal sound velocity, thermal transfer etc. Finally the executive said I don't care about any of that can you tell me how thick the film is? Rogers said yes they could but it was something they hadn't even put in the business plan, because as a scientist it was probably the least interesting thing about thin films.
Matthew Banet, who was the friend who co-founded the startup said: "It was a seminal moment in all of our lives. We went back with our tails between our legs." They went back and worked on their equipment until it could measure variations in thin films as small as on tenth of an angstrom. Dr. Rogers said that "sometimes the technology push drives scientific understanding, rather than the other way around." He also said that Tencor's requirements forced them "to understand a lot more about the optics and physics and acoustic and signal processing. It put all scientific research into the context of something that could have value beyond publication in a scientific journal."
The startup, Active Impulse Systems raised $3 million in venture capital funding in 1995. They produced their first unit, the InSite300, in 1997, and sold the compony in August 1998 for $29 million.
That's how it works. Science turns into engineering that we can see and makes the world a better place. Science that never turns into engineering is just guessing. That's all it is. Here is something that I also learned in the lecture series. Every thing that science believed was true at the beginning of the 20th century turned out to be wrong by the end. Why should be believe that it will be any different at the end of the 21st Century?
Thursday, February 6, 2014
I'm Out to Improve Myself - And the Lord is Helping
Just before the New Year I was reading an article about a former missionary who'd gone to Hong Kong to expand his business. It was a Forbes magazine article and it really hit me that it was a pretty good article. He said that he was ADD and that he'd been stuck in a rut for the last 10 years of his life and needed to get out of it. He knew he could do better because he'd proven it to himself on his mission just how much he could accomplish when he stuck his mind to it. I'd been feeling that I was stuck in a rut and would like to improve myself, and I'd just recently found out that I might be dyslexic. This guy mentioned in his article that he depended on books like "Getting Things Done" and the "Power of Habit" to help him keep on track with his ADD. I'd read "Getting Things Done" and thought that it was a great book so I decided that I should read "The Power of Habit" since he'd recommended it. I was hoping that I could get some ideas from it and maybe start accomplishing a little more in my life.
If I have one gift in life it is that I have a love for learning, and in all my learning I try to get understanding about the gospel. I would like to think that I have a gift of being able to teach the things that I learn to others. I'm trying to share my ideas in writing more with this blog. To go along with that gift of learning I feel that I'm sometimes led to books, or topics where the spirit seems to whisper to me: "Buy this book it'll be a good one." That may be just the way I justify spending all the money I spend on books, but I really believe it happens and when I does I usually learn things, about the gospel generally and myself sometimes.
That's what happened when I read this article about this book. Then when I was looking at "The Power of Habit" I came across the book "The Willpower Instinct" and I felt I had to read that book as well. Then felt that I should read "Emotional Intelligence" and "Emotional Intelligence" and then I saw a Great Courses lecture series called the "The Spiritual Brain" and I felt I should get that as well. After I read the first two of these books it reminded me of "Feeling Good" which is a all time life changing book for me.
I started with "The Power of Habit" and it was pretty good in laying the ground work there's been a lot of study on the brain with new imaging techniques. Where people used to try and figure out what was going on in the head, they can now actually see. Well they can see where blood flow is, or electrical activity and they assume from that that that is where the activity is taking place. Three things I remember especially from this book is that: 1) Marketers use the power of habit to market to you. 2) Organizations have habits 3) That the brain can imprint habits without the conscious part of the brain helping.
Number three was especially fascinating. A man got some type of encephalitis that destroyed the part of his brain that consciously learns things. His wife was told that he needed exercise and that he could never leave the house alone because he wouldn't be able to find his way back. Well she took hime for a walk every day on the same path so that she could meet both of those conditions. One day the man left the house by his self and the wife freaked out, but the man came back on his own. Scientists who were interested in him would go on the walk with this guy and he would have no idea why he was turning on certain street, or where his house was when he was only a few houses away, but he would walk into the house sit in his chair and watch the history channel. His brain had created a habit he could follow although he no conscious memory of it. He could do the same thing with making himself breakfast. He would get up go to the kitchen and mage himself eggs and bacon, but he couldn't tell you where the kitchen was. The brain was building habits that could fire but he didn't consciously know what he was doing.
One key thing that I took away from this book, besides the interesting things I mentioned, is that their seem to be key habits that if someone will do they also start doing other things in their life as well. The classic example they give is that when someone starts exercising everyday as a habit it will start spilling over into other parts of their life. They might start saving more, or eating less or other things that they've wanted to do. He also says that you should examine your habits to see why you're doing something. He then gave an example about how he would always get up in the afternoon and go to the cafe at his work to get a cookie and then talk with coworkers. When he started to examine why he was doing this he found that he mainly was doing it as an excuse to talk to coworkers, so he started just visiting with coworkers instead. Something like that. However, he never tells you how to do this, what a key habit would be, or how to examine your emotions.
The second book, "The Willpower Instinct" was by far the most interesting, and some of the information in it was in the first as well I'm sure. The author of this book says that it's taken from a class that she gives as a extension course at Stanford University. When she first offered it she was worried that no one would show up, but they had to move the class 4 times that first semester until they were in the largest lecture hall at Stanford. I don't know how big that is, but I'm sure it's pretty big. She said that the way to use the book is to try and implement one chapter a week the way they do at Stanford. She said that you could obviously read it through at once to get an overall flavor, but that you should go back and do one chapter a week. So that's what I did.
One of the first things that the first two chapters teach if meditation and breathing practice. From my short experience with trying yoga I could see that both of these were simplified yoga practices without the religious aspects to them. In the meditation portion she said that people who practiced it after as little as 11 hours of practices imaging or their brain showed that the portions of the brain that control our willpower had become "thicker" meaning more connections had been made in those portions of the brain. This is pretty much the same thing that the professor in the "Spiritual Brain" had found and they'd had their participants do a meditation practice that was similar.
For years I've thought that the eastern religions with their knowledge and understanding of the spirit and body connection probably had a lot to teach the west. However, I never really understood what it was getting at and why it was important. This gives a great reason, and it might be a little different than the reason they teach the meditation practice, but all religions say that you should meditate, at least all the ones I know about.
Anyway as I've said I've tried the meditation and breathing practices and haven't really done them in a while, however I've started again and I find them very beneficial when I know what I'm doing them for, and they fit in my spiritual practices. I don't really want to try and have a nirvana experience by doing something that I consider in many ways a waste of time everyday. However, when she talked about controlling your breathing to help with relaxation and that you should shoot for 3-6 breaths a minute I thought that might be hard, but after doing it for a couple time the second week, because it's part of the second chapter, I found that I was able to do 3 breaths a minute already. So maybe somethings stuck with me after all.
Also, books talk about how the mind is wired with the amygdala, a part of the mind that is supposed to be very ancient. The amygdala controls the emotional part of the brain, and it starts to fire before your conscious part of the brain even gets the signals. It's also the part of the brain that seems to imprint emotional memory. Emotions turn out to be very important. There is a story about a man who had something happen so that his amygdala was damaged and he felt no emotion. Far from being a Spock or Data he couldn't make decisions any more because he couldn't feel that anything was important to do. Turns out that emotions are an important way to run our lives. Our prophets have always taught that one way the Lord, talks to us is through emotions and I think this shows that they're right.
One other thing that I found super interesting is in the 5th chapter which I re-read this week and that is the power of dopamine. The first indication of this was back in the '50s when some scientists were doing a test on some rats and had stuck an electrode into the rats brain. I turned out that when the rat was allowed to push a switch that would excite the electrode it would do it until it fell from exhaustion. When the made the rat run over an electrified field that would burn it's feet to push the switch they would do so until they could run anymore. The scientists thought they had found the reward center of the brain, but what they'd found was the anticipation portion of the brain, the place were dopamine was secreted. When they destroyed that part of the brain in the rats and then gave them sugar they would get the same dopey look on their face (that the authors words, she's very funny) they still got the reward, but now you couldn't get them to do anything to earn the reward because there was no dopamine.
Apparently the brain send out dopamine when it thinks you should be taking action to do something. So if there's some tasty food around the brain starts telling you to crave it so that you'll go get the food. Apparently when getting tasty fattening food was scarce it was a good thing that your brain would put you in the mood for doing what it took to get it. You became a risk taking machine. But it might not be so good when tasty fattening food is all around you. She also said that when you saw a pornographic image the same thing happened your brain floods with dopamine. She said it probably happened because in the past you usually saw something like that only when you had a chance to spread your genes not on a daily bases. However, they've shown that showing people sexy images does flood the brain making it a risk taking machine which will cause them to spend more money for example. Obviously something that advertisers have figured out. When I was reading about some of the information that Bro. Christopherson talked about in his talk at the Priesthood Session in Oct 2012 one of the things that I found was that young men can get addicted to pornography or video games but it was the same addiction and addiction to arousal, or dopamine.
One interesting thing that this book talks about that there are 3 types of willpower. The "I will," the "I won't," and the "I want." She says that sometimes we can change an "I won't" to an "I will" challenge or an "I want". I'd never really thought about it that way before. It seems like I've always concentrated on the "I won't" part.
Anyway this book has much more information on how to implement willpower in your life, and how it works. I've really enjoyed this book and the insights it gives.
"Emotional Intelligence" was not that great of a book. I got the 10th anniversary edition of it. It gave some interesting information and ideas. Basically it says that Emotional Intelligence or EQ is more important to your success than IQ or your personal outlook. He says that research has shown that your IQ is pretty much set for life at birth, and that people seem to have a personal set point in the way they look at things. Some people are just more outgoing and some are just more timid. These traits appear in children at about 8 months and are pretty much set for life. However, you can change your EQ and it can make a great difference in your life. However, he doesn't really say how to do this other than some ideas on how to raise kids. It's sad the way some kids are raised.
"Emotional Intelligence 2.0" is totally different. It give you 4 basic areas that you can work on in your EQ and then give 63 different ideas to work on. Many of these ideas I've read about in other books but not explaining why they were important or how they were going to help. This book lays out a little more refined plan with explanation. It also says that you should just work on a few ideas at a time and then move on. Trying to change to much at once is overwhelming. In fact all the books say the same thing about only changing small things at first, although "Power of Habit" doesn't really tell you what to change, just that if you get a key habit it will change your whole life. I guess "Willpower Instinct" doesn't say what to change, just that you should only take on one challenge at a time.
Finally I listened to the "Spiritual Brain." It covered a lot of these areas but in a different way. The first part of the lectures, I think, where basically saying that religion does effect your brain in positive ways and here are the positive things that it does for you. He also knows that his research is very going to be controversial and he spent a long time talking about how he took questions that people were going to raise about his research were going to bring up. I found it amazing. At one point he talked about research that shows that Mormon males live longer and healthier lives as evidence that living a religious life is good. He said that at one of his presentations that a minister stood up and said that he thought that what he was doing wasn't very good because people are going to start to try to be religious for the physical benefits not for the theological ones. He said that that's not what he's doing and he doesn't think it would work anyway that people are only religious for the same reasons they've always been, but that here's more information about why it works. I think he's right and I like to hear stuff like that.
That was the first half of the lectures the second half I think was more about neruotheology which is a new field of study and he's written a book about it. In this section he tries to explain why the brain would believe the theological things that it might believe and why. I didn't find this section as interesting as the first section, and it may have been because I really wasn't prepared for it. I'm going to have to listen to it again. One interesting thing is that he talks about mystical experiences, and I found this interesting. He tries to lump Joseph Smith in with other mystics, but I now really see what Author Henry King and Hugh Nibley mean when they say that Joseph's account is the exact opposite of a mystical experience. He just went into a forest and tells exactly what happened, noting ineffable at all about what happened. In fact that seems to be the most amazing thing about the accounts of all prophets visions. The things that happens may seem bizarre in the telling but they're tellable. None of this I was light and dark at the same time, or I could touch everything at once. However, as the professor says many people of different religions have these experiences and all of them, after they have them say that they're life changing. Also, at least to me they seem to be remarkably similar no matter what religion the person having them is. However, it seems like most people have to work to attain these visions through some sort of meditation technique, that also seem remarkably similar.
This is what I found unattractive about the Buddhist meditations. I didn't want to spend all the time emptying my mind of everything, so that I could achieve some state of nirvana, that I don't think is important. However, this seems to be an experience that many religions have and from the descriptions it seems to be an experience that's very important to the people that have them. I'd say they're important, but I'd like to know why. The prophets teach us that we should ponder on things that we want to understand better, and many people have talked about how they have sudden enlightenment but it's on topics that are of concern to them. Some prophets have talked about how they've had visions opened up to them, like Nephi and Joseph F. Smith, but these are indescribable accounts of lights and feelings etc. It something that I'm going to have to ponder about, and I'm going to look more into neurotheology.
For me it's been an enlightening few weeks. I know that these ideas are going to be helpful to me and they're very exciting.
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