It’s nice when people remind us not to be literal-minded, isn’t it – that’s always a helpful bit of advice. There’s nothing more dreary than people who can’t see a joke, unless it’s people who think a metaphor is a statement of fact, or perhaps people who think advertising is literally about causing people to pay money for products, or then again maybe people who think candidates for office ought to live up to the statements they’ve made about what they plan to do once elected. Pedants all; drones and killjoys. Jokes are jokes, soundbites are soundbites, metaphors are metaphors.

There are those witty and fascinating people for instance who traipse around embassies wearing masks and holding posters that say … Read the rest

A remark in Thomas Kida’s splendid book Don’t Believe Everything You Think (Prometheus) snagged my attention yesterday. Page 193:

However, overconfidence can also cause catastrophic results. Before the space shuttle Challenger exploded, NASA estimated the probability of a catastrophe to be one in one hundred thousand launches.

What?! thought I. They did!?! They can’t have! Can they? I was staggered at the idea, for many reasons. One, NASA is run by science types, it’s packed to the rafters with engineers, it couldn’t be so off. Two, I remember a lot of talk – after the explosion, to be sure – about the fact that everyone at NASA, emphatically including all astronauts, knows and has always known that the space shuttle … Read the rest

A little more on this question of ‘faith’ and cognitive disability – in hopes of provoking more foolish outbursts from angry Christian commenters. No not really; in hopes of exploring the issue further.

There’s a basic and important difference between ‘faith’ and inquiry. Their goals are different. The goal of faith is faith. The goal is confirmation, continuation, stability, loyalty. It’s Queen Elizabeth’s motto: semper eadem: always the same. It’s continuity. The goal is to have faith and go on having faith and go on going on having faith. It’s sameness, tenacity, clinging, stubbornness, persistence. The virtue is in resisting doubt. In inquiry, understanding, knowledge-seeking, research – science – that’s not the goal. There the goal is to get it … Read the rest

Science classes are one thing, religious education or comparative religion is another thing, or perhaps two other things.

The government has cleared the way for a form of creationism to be taught in Britain’s schools as part of the religious syllabus. Lord Adonis, an education minister, is to issue guidelines within two months for the teaching of “intelligent design” (ID), a theory being promoted by the religious right in America…Adonis said in a parliamentary answer: “Intelligent design can be explored in religious education as part of developing an understanding of different beliefs.”…The theory has gained a foothold in the American state school system, sparking legal challenges from secular groups seeking to oust it from science teaching.

From science teaching. … Read the rest