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Clearly, Harris wants "knowledge to count" -- that is, to have practical meaning for human lives -- but he confesses that in order to do so, "some facts must be excluded." Yet how can a scientific worldview exclude a fact? What are the criteria for doing so? Was an excluded datum ever a "fact" to begin with? Even under the time constraints of a TED presentation, this somewhat radical co-option of scientific credibility needed to be examined more closely, but Harris appears to have been uninterested in doing so.
It is likely that the points-of-view that he would like to exclude are those that take religion seriously. But beyond emotionally charged examples, Harris offers little truly compelling logical support for how excluding religion necessarily gets us any closer to recovering a grounded moral universe in the absence of God. In fact, while I personally suspect it is unlikely that the Taliban "have a point-of-view on physics that is worth considering" this suspicion is not empirically or experimentally grounded. If anything it...
Reifying the split between theism and science (or, for Harris, "life" itself) not only fails to get us anywhere truly new, but also cheapens the unique and truly useful aspects of the scientific (or in Kantian terms, reasonable) worldview. This may play well in the comfortable seats at TED -- after all, those people out there who take this stuff seriously are evidently far from cozy "Connecticut" -- but perhaps the tragedy of life on earth is that we don't all live in Connecticut. On the other hand, this diversity of opinion may be one of the glories of the human experience instead, because this is where the moral and scientific truths of our being are debated, tested, and refined.
Separation of Church and State: A Moral Dilemma Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution The First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States guarantees the right to
Jesus' Teachings, Prayer, & Christian Life "He (Jesus) Took the Bread. Giving Thanks Broke it. And gave it to his Disciples, saying, 'This is my Body, which is given to you.'" At Elevation time, during Catholic Mass, the priest establishes a mandate for Christian Living. Historically, at the Last Supper, Christ used bread and wine as a supreme metaphor for the rest of our lives. Jesus was in turmoil. He was
Another writer notes, "WHO considers the use of cloning for the replication of human individuals to be ethically unacceptable as it would violate some of the basic principles which govern medically assisted procreation. These include respect for the dignity of the human being..." (Harris, 2004, p. 34). Dignity is an important concept here, because the loss of human dignity goes against the concept of natural law and natural rights.
And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life" King James Version ( Exodus 21:22-23) This is an example of an abortion case which is minimal yet needs justice to be served by the civil authorities. In this example, there are four sensitive phrases which needs to be emphasized and interpreted in order to bring out the intensity of this abortion issues, the phrases/sentences are; "If men
Spear of Destany The history of civilization is full of legends and myths that have cut across cultural barriers and are nowadays some of the most well-known stories related to the old times of religion and civilization. One of these myths include, among others, the Holy Graal, the Shroud of Turin, or the Spear of Destiny, both of them linked to the life and death of Jesus Christ. The present research provides
Global warming has been an issue of debate for decades, however, today there seems to be more evidence pointing to its reality. Type in "global warming" on Google search engine and access to more than fifteen million web sites will appear. One such web site is "Natural Resource Defense Council" at http://www.nrdc.org/globalWarming/default.asp, which contains a wealth of information concerning global warming (Global pp). Those who believe in global warming assert