Bugbee and the Tillage of the Soul
In the opening entry of The Inward Morning, Henry Bugbee writes
"Come, Let Us Reason Together": Thinking About God
"To have more is not to be more"
In Lewis's novel Out of the Silent Planet, the antagonist Weston attempts to explain why his civilization is superior to another. He says,
For Weston, the annihilation of space and time is proof of advancement. I am reminded of Rabbi Heschel's words about the Sabbath in his book Between God and Man, where he advances a quite different view:
"Technical civilization is man's conquest of space. It is a triumph frequently achieved by sacrificing an essential ingredient of existence, namely time. In technical civilization, we expend time to gain space. To enhance our power in the world of space is our main objective. Yet to have more does not mean to be more. The power we attain in the world of space terminates abruptly at the borderline of time. But time is the heart of existence."
The conquest of space - that is, of gaining power over things and making them our servants - comes always at the expense of time, which we often expend as though we could withdraw from that deposit infinite sums without deficit.
Crime, Punishment, and the Great Community
-- Charles S. Peirce, 4 May, 1892
Peirce's Parable of the Puritan
On judgment day, a Puritan was called before God to give account of his life. The Puritan admitted his faults, and then pulled from his breast pocket a document that he claimed contained a justification of "hard-heartedness." When he handed this to God, someone laughed aloud at the possibility of making such a justification. The scoffer was seized by angels and taken to kneel before God, where "he will be told by the Judge that He considered it worthwhile to see what the Puritan had to say. But that he the scoffer as he judged shall be judged."
Puritans and Vaccinations
Of course, there are other issues at stake here, like the ethical question of whether vaccines should ever be mandated, and whether the facts about the HPV vaccine are being reported accurately.
But what strikes me about Edwards' death is the possibility that in choosing to receive a vaccine, Edwards risked--and lost--his own life for the sake of others. I would not require others to follow his example, but I think that Christians (and especially those who revere the memory of the Puritans) might take his example to heart.
Scientia Cordis
-- Charles Peirce, "Some Consequences of Four Incapacities," (1868).
Do You Know The Phase Of The Moon?
I like to begin my class on ancient and medieval philosophy with two questions: (1) Do we know more about the moon than they knew five centuries ago? (2) Do you know what phase the moon is in right now?
Of course, most of us would say "yes" to the first question, and with good reason. After all, we've been to the moon several times, and we've brought samples back. We have remarkable technologies for remote sensing. The sciences have gone beyond what most people even a century ago could have imagined.
The second question might be harder to answer without looking up the answer somewhere. When I ask my students, usually none of them know the current phase of the moon. A recent facebook poll I gave my friends yielded many more positive replies to the second question. Not a very scientific poll, since it might be that many who did not know simply chose not to reply out of shame. Still, fewer than half of those who replied said they did know the moon's current phase.
I can think of no reason to be ashamed of not knowing the phase of the moon. Most of us have no need to know it, and I don't ask the question in order to scold my students, but to point out something about how our knowledge has changed. It seems likely to me that five hundred years ago many more people would have been aware of the phase of the moon. Children who play outside, farmers, fishers, sailors, and soldiers all wind up depending on the moon, or at least having considerable exposure to it. Today, very few of us have reason to notice it, because our lives have changed so much.
This brings me back to my first question: do we know more about the moon today than they knew five centuries ago? In one sense, the answer is still obviously "yes." But in another way, it has to be "no." Most of us (myself included) don't pay much attention to the moon. Our knowledge of its phase is not the knowledge of familiarity but rather confidence that, if we needed to know, we could look it up somewhere. We have confidence in the knowledge of our community, and of its possession of data.
Which leads me to a third question: Is it enough to know that someone else knows the answer? Sure, we don't need to know what the moon looks like right now. But if you haven't taken a little time to stare at it lately, you might have forgotten something worth knowing: the moon is beautiful. Go have a look.
******
Photos: (top) Full moon over Sioux Falls, SD, summer, 2011. (middle) The moon rises over the Atlantic and shines through mangroves in Belize, January, 2011. (bottom) The moon rises over Buenos Aires, August 2010.
The Ethics of Hunting
Just as there are many versions of the myth, so there are many interpretations, and many things that Actaeon and Artemis might symbolize. The divinity of Artemis suggests to some that hunters seek something much loftier than meat for their table. Her femininity and virginity suggest to others that hunting represents sexual violence in another guise.
Both of these may be correct, but let me offer a third possibility: perhaps this is a story about virtue. Actaeon acts without virtue, and he then becomes the victim of his own plans. He makes the mistake of thinking that a hunter is the rightful possessor of all he sees, and so he fails to act with humility and gratitude. As a result, he loses everything, including those relationships that were most dear to him.
The myth of Actaeon is a vivid picture of what good hunters know: the hunter is not lord of the forest nor master of nature. Most of us live our lives as far from predation as we can arrange. A certain type of hunter attempts to erase some of that distance. The best hunters may be those who, in doing so, discover their true place in nature and emerge from the forest and field remembering their place with humility and gratitude. Actaeon forgets who he is when he attempts to take Artemis as his own, and his forgetfulness is absolute.
People Of The Waters That Are Never Still
My family has since lost the languages those ancestors spoke, and this fusion of tribes has adopted the linguistic fusion of English. I have no intention of claiming a legal place among either of the nations from which I am descended, nor even to name them here. But I find that the memory of both, and of the lands they lived on, is rooted deeply in my consciousness of who I am. Last year, while visiting the British Museum, I saw a display of various Native American peoples, including my own. It was the only time a museum has moved me to tears. The words and ways of my forebears may be mostly gone, but they are not forgotten. My father taught me to remember them and what they knew of the land we lived on, and often, while teaching me to know the woods, he would remind me that those woods were old family acquaintances.
Jacob Wawatie and Stephanie Pyne, in their article "Tracking in Pursuit of Knowledge," cite Russell Barsh as saying that "what is 'traditional' about traditional knowledge is not its antiquity but the way in which it is acquired and used." Our word "tradition" comes from Latin roots that mean something like "giving over" or "handing down." Traditional knowledge is knowledge that is a gift from one generation to the next, a gift we give because we ourselves were given it. I am grateful to my father, in ways that I may never have told him - in ways that perhaps words cannot begin to tell - for the traditions he learned and loved and passed on to me. I'm grateful that he has not let me forget.
There is, of course danger in emphasizing one's heritage and one's roots, especially if we make that the source of a distinction between ourselves and others, or a way of diminishing the lives and traditions of others. Just as much as it matters to me that I am from the people of the waters of the Catskills, it matters to me that my ancestors shared those waters with one another, people from two continents recognizing, each in the other, the waters from which both arose.
For all that I have received, for the traditions like waters pouring over the cliffs, gifts like the Kaaterskill Creek, let me give thanks. Let me give thanks with my life, offering to those who come after me, a taste of the sweetness of those same waters.
Taxing Mileage
On the one hand, this is a fair way of making sure that drivers of electric vehicles share the cost of maintaining roads.
But if it is to be enacted fairly, any such law will have to:
- avoid placing an unfair burden on rural drivers, who generally must drive further to work and school, and earn less than their urban counterparts; and
- ensure Americans that the GPS devices that would track mileage are not also used inappropriately by government to track the locations and movements of citizens.
Pay-to-Play and Democracy
Wittgenstein, contra Hawking
“Philosophy has made no progress? If somebody scratches where it itches, does that count as progress? If not, does that mean it wasn’t an authentic scratch? Not an authentic itch? Couldn’t this response to the stimulus go on for a long time until a remedy for itching is found?”
No Room In The South Dakota Inn? An unjust and ironic law.
Manny Steele and two other SD legislators are apparently proposing that we criminalize hospitality. Their proposed law would make it illegal to offer a ride or lodging to illegal immigrants, and it would also make it a crime for an illegal immigrant to ask for work.
Putting aside the fact that this would be a very difficult law to obey and to enforce (Would bus drivers and cab drivers need to verify citizenship before taking on fares? Would it be illegal to offer a ride to a stranger? Would shelters be forced to turn aside illegal immigrants on freezing nights?) this is ironic news to appear on the first Sunday of Advent, the season in which we prepare to celebrate the birth of Jesus. This is the Jesus who was born to poor immigrants who had no place to live in their hometown. Who was born in a barn. Whose parents were forced to flee their homeland to escape politically motivated violence.
I propose that our legislators take some time this Advent to try to put themselves in the shoes of other poor migrants. Think about it: if you lived in Mexico, would you willingly give up that climate for South Dakota winters if you could avoid it? Would you give up your hometown, your family, your language, your familiar food - in short, everything - to come to South Dakota if you could avoid it?
More to the point: Would you make Mary give birth in your barn or your garage? I understand why you’re concerned about jobs and about enforcing our laws. We have a great country, and we should work to keep it great. But we will not make our country greater by making our hearts harder.
Meanwhile, as for me and my family, we would rather stand with Mary and Joseph. And we will continue to say, as Christians and Jews have said for millennia, that an unjust law is no law at all.
María y José, bienvenidos en nuestro pueblo.
Reading and Writing and Gratitude
It’s easy to get too busy to read, and too busy to write. My sporadic blog posting reflects the cycles of the academic year: some times I’m full of time to post and full of ideas for writing; other times, I’m simply too busy to write. Those too-busy-to-write times seem to come more often than the other times.
Still, I make myself promise to write – books, articles, reviews, essays – as a means of self-discipline. If I’m reading, I’m learning. If I’m writing, I’m learning even more.
But I am busy. So all this posting will do is acknowledge the giants upon whose shoulders I have been sitting this past week: Plato’s Phaedrus; Augustine’s City of God; Mooney’s Lost Intimacy in American Thought; West’s Prophetic Fragments and American Evasion of Philosophy; Apuleius' De Deo Socratis and his Asinus; a handful of Rorty’s essays; Royce’s Problem of Christianity; a handful of books on environmental philosophy (trying to sort out both some ethical issues and the practical matter of next spring’s syllabus!); and, as always, a smattering of Peirce.
No, I don’t usually read quite that many books in a week. (Actually, I think I’m leaving out a half-dozen or so - oh, yeah, there was some Rauschenbusch in there, and some Martin Luther King, too. Lots of social and political thought about religion, politics, freedom, and creativity, mostly.)
Last week was a marathon of reading and writing. The result was a book chapter and sketches of about ten other articles. Not sure they’ll all get written - I only have so much time, remember? But the most important part of this has been not the words on the page, but the way those words have served as a tool for thinking. For that, and for the life that allows me to do that at all, I am very, very grateful.
On Writing Philosophy Essays
Writing a philosophy paper? Here are a few phrases you should probably avoid:
1) “Socrates* feels that X is true." (We don’t know much about his feelings, do we? Focus on what he said rather than on what you think he felt, unless you’re also prepared to explain your insight into his feelings, and the relevance of that insight and of those feelings.) (*Or any other philosopher who doesn’t tell us how she is feeling.)
2) “There is no answer to this question.” (Do you mean no correct answer? Why do you think I asked it, by the way? Let me suggest that, at a minimum, there is an answer given in the texts we read. If you think it’s wrong, I’d be delighted to hear why you think it’s wrong, once you’ve told me clearly what it is.)
3) “I’ve decided to ignore what the books say and focus on my own opinions here.” (Not that your opinions don’t matter, but they’re deucedly difficult to grade.)
They Know It When They See It
An inmate in the South Dakota State Penitentiary has been denied access to art-instruction books because they contain images of unclothed human bodies. (Original story here and here.) While not everything that could be called an art book is a good art book, shouldn’t we be doing everything we can to help felons improve their lives? And isn’t art one of the best things they can do while in prison? Let us grant the prison wardens their claim that pornography worsens prison conditions; does that mean that all nudity is obscenity? (Scroll down to the concurring position of Mr. Justice Stewart.)
St. Nicholas Society and "un-stealing"
I just read an article about German Catholics wanting a Santa Claus-free Christmas this year. It reminds me of something I have often spoken to students about: creating a “St. Nicholas Society.” The idea comes from the legend of the young St. Nicholas,
who was the orphaned son of wealthy parents. One day he overheard a father lamenting that he had to sell one of his three daughters into slavery in order for the rest of the family to survive. That night Nicholas threw some coins into the family's window to ensure the liberty of the girl, and returned the next two nights to repeat the gift on behalf of the other two girls. This is why the symbol of St. Nicholas is often three coins:
He wanted his gift to be done in secret, perhaps so that he knew he wasn't giving in order to receive gratitude and honor. I have come to think of this as the reverse of stealing, a secret giving or an "un-stealing."
Once, while I was teaching at Penn State, a student told me he was weighing an invitation to join a secret society. Some aspects of the society were appealing - friendship, loyalty, and a shared purpose, for instance - but he did not feel wholly comfortable with the idea. I suggested then (and have suggested to several others since) that they consider forming a secret society that was not inwardly-focused but outwardly-focused. They could call it the "St. Nicholas Society." Its purpose would be to do good in the world without seeking to receive anything in return.
Of course, I have no idea if any of them have formed a St. Nicholas Society. If they have, they have been successful at keeping it secret, at least from me! And you have no idea if I've formed one, or if I just like to talk about it to others.
New Bio-Itzá Website!
Check it out.
The Asociación Bio Itzá does great, inexpensive Spanish-language immersion programs for individuals or groups in Petén, Guatemala. It’s a short trip from the Flores airport to their school and homestays in San José:
and it's also a short trip to Tikal:
They also have a school for teaching indigenous Mayan languages like Itzá, Quiché, and Kekchí.
There are some slightly cheaper language schools in Guatemala, but this one makes your money go a long way, since they use the income to preserve and protect one of the largest unbroken stretches of rainforest North of the Amazon, and to preserve indigenous culture, protect archaeological sites, and promote sustainable agriculture. In addition to learning Spanish, you can learn about medicinal plants; local cooking, music, and culture; rainforest ecology; Mayan archaeology (they have a licensed archaeologist on their staff); and a lot more. Students interested in rural medicine can ask about arranging to work in the local medical clinic. Worth every penny.
(Thanks to Luke Lynass and the other Augustana College students who worked to get this new website up and running.)
On Enemies
Just heard a very thought-provoking talk by Augustana Professor Janet Blank-Libra on the story of Jonah. As she was talking, it occurred to me that in the story, God makes this disturbing analogy in Jonah 4.10-11:
Vine:Jonah::Nineveh:God
It's not the only possible interpretation of the verse, I admit, but it looks like at least one way to read it is that the people I think of as enemies might be as delightful to God as a shady spot in the hot desert was to Jonah.