The contemporary world is characterized, among other things, by the cult of the expert. It is widely and officially accepted that the expert and only the expert can speak authoritatively on a given subject. So extensive is this cult that once someone has become a certified expert in one field, they are often assumed to […]
The term “social libertarian” is an ambiguous term. Some have used it to mean a political philosophy that is socialist on most issues except certain matters which are considered private (e.g., a candidate for Minnesota Governor, Scott Raskiewicz). That is a primarily socialist position. Here the term “social libertarian” indicates someone who is primarily libertarian
Science historian John Schuler speaks of “hegemonic scholastic Aristotelianism” during the Middle Ages – lets unpack this a bit: hegemonic – it dominated society and excluded opposition scholastic – it resided in the schools, the universities that arose in the Middle Ages Aristotelianism – it is related to Aristotle’s writings Hegemonic scholastic Aristotelianism declined with the
It seems that when science in the 19th century separated from philosophy and joined the university curriculum on its own that science came to be subject to the same pressures that other academic subjects deal with. That includes the pressure to conform. Why conformity? If you’re a knowledge institution, there are two things you don’t
This website is focused on helping lay foundations for a new civilization, not following the decline and fall of an old civilization. But understanding weaknesses in the old civilization may provide insight into what to avoid. The problem is that most analyses of Western civilization do not go far enough. They either support mild reforms
Aren’t “secular” and “religious” mutually exclusive terms? Not necessarily. The term “religion” has two basic senses. The narrow sense of the term that means an historical religion, a self-identified religion, does not include secular religion. But religion in the broader sense is something that constitutes one’s life goal, the highest authority one recognizes, the self-existing
There are two key social movements in modern society: the movement to make society more subject to politics and the movement to make society less subject to politics. The former movement is called socialism (it would be better called “politicism”). The latter movement has no single name but is called conservatism more than other names.
It is recognized that manners are culture-bound, however, there are principles that are similar in different cultures and make good sense. 1. Show respect first to the host and then to the other guests. Defer to the host. Let the host go first or wait until the host asks you to go ahead. Sit up straight
What is love? Love is a discipline of word and deed comprised of denial of oneself and affirmation of one’s beloved. How can one legitimately say to another, “I love you”? That is, what basis is there for one to declare love to someone else (other than a previous vow)? Since love is comprised of
Like many people born after World War II, tradition doesn’t come easily to me. We’ve prided ourselves on making our parents justify every practice they tried to pass on to us. If it didn’t make sense to us, it was oppressive or foolish and should be stopped. Automatic acceptance of tradition was unthinkable. Tradition was
