We, as a society, are killing our self and it is largely through non-critical thinking and embracing ignorance. Not only is it killing the country, it is killing the Christian church.
Really, Crabtown, when the whole world is laughing at the American politicization of evolution, it is remarkable that you claim that opposition to evolution on scientific grounds is anti-intellectual.
You sound like the Pope saying that the world is flat and that global warming (that is what he said "global warming") was a scientific fact.
Now I have to ask if you agree with the gays and lesbians who want the death penalty for those who oppose gay marriage and think that s0d0my is wrong?
Or would it be anti-intellectual for you to address the issues raised by your political opponents?
No,good religion is not the problem. People using religion to promote ignorance in an effort to avoid solving big societal and environmental issues is a problem Ignorance, in general, is a problem. Being satisfied to remain ignorant because it is comfortable is a problem.
No,good religion is not the problem. People using religion to promote ignorance in an effort to avoid solving big societal and environmental issues is a problem. Ignorance, in general, is a problem. Being satisfied to remain ignorant because it is comfortable is a problem. Cherry picking scripture to promote ignorance and milktoast Christianity is a problem.
I got thrown off the WXPN message boards when I dared to say I was pro-life.
That's all I said. Really. I didn't judge anybody who isn't. I didn't say other people should be.
Another poster asked me why I hated women so much and I explained why I am pro-life by citing several Bible verses.
I got a PM from the Administrator telling me, "We don't have a problem with you being a Christian and you're welcome to talk about Christianity here. But if you're going to stay here, you're going to have to leave all the Jesus stuff at home".
Christianity without Christ. Reminds me of the Paul Washer quote: "Of course the wicked want to go to Heaven. They just don't want Jesus to be there when they get there."
I did not take the article that way (the examples provided brought to my mind the notion that a belief in at least the authority of a scripture as truth is anti-intellectual). But I agree that critical thinking is quickly becoming a lost art.
American Anti-Intellectualism and the Theological Left
...And so it is with some shock that I find that the Evangelical left, at least much of it, has abandoned reason. Arguments consist of special pleading, history is ignored, and exegesis is embarrassingly bad. I am always dubious when people today read the Greek of the New Testament better than, or in “new ways,” that the generation after the apostles missed.
Dialogue is becoming harder. Recently, I was in a discussion where my interlocutor asserted that no matter what I said or did, my views had to be motivated by hate or lack of reason. If I gave reasons, then they were mere cover ups to my hate or lack of reasons. This is getting worse.
One good test: see how often the Evangelical left claims that the ancient world was unaware of people “born that way.” This lets them claim that the concept was unknown to ancients and that now we know better. Of course, Plato had a character describe men and women “born that way” in Symposium. Plato is not an obscure writer and Symposium is not an obscure book.
And yet whatever argument is made, whatever counter-example is given, nothing will matter. In fact, if an argument is persuasive enough, the new anti-intellectual left will simply appeal to first principles or some sort of mystical knowledge. They just know they are right and are not going to discuss their truth with people who do not first concede it.
They practice the equivalent of the old “testimony” their liberal ancestors parodied in the fundamentalists. Don’t have anything to say? Losing an argument? Just appeal to your personal experience, pull emotional strings, and victory was secured.
The Anti-Intellectualism, Ignorance, and Intolerance at Our American Universities
.....But Murray isn’t the only one that liberal professors have prevented or tried to prevent from speaking at a university. Just to provide a very short list, such well-known conservatives as columnist and author Ann Coulter, conservative activist David Horowitz, Women’s right activist and Muslim critic Ayaan Hirsi Ali, writer Star Parker, Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol, writer Daniel Pipes, and a host of others have been prevented from speaking by either left-wing professors, left-wing administrators, or rioting, anti-intellectual students (and often all three at once).
For another example,a study by Campus Reform shows that students are twice as likely to be forced to sit through a liberal commencement speaker than one perceived as a conservative.
Our system of education, or mis-education as it should more rightfully be termed, needs to be torn down and re-made again in the image of America instead of Stalinist Russia as it is currently.
We will not be able to return this country to the constitutional republic it was intended to be until we eliminate the control that extremist, left-wingers infesting and destroying our education have on the system.
Our kids are taught from the earliest grades to hate America. They are told that our history is evil. They are trained to think that the U.S.A. is a blot on mankind. They are trained that every other system of government is better than ours. They are taught racism against white is “OK.” They are also inculcated with the idea that listening to contrary opinions and to stretch their understanding of others is something to be abhorred.
It is amazing in the age of scientific explosion that people such as Crabtown say that opposition to evolution is anti-intellectual.
A better case could be made that Darwin was ignorant of science and that Darwinism is ignorant of science.
To say that scientific disagreement is anti-intellectualism is the epitome of ignorance.
I have seen more often than not the opposite happen (a reliance on reason without emotion or a genuine change of heart).
But you are right that the Christian Church needs critical thinking and reasoning.
I think that this has diminished as some ask questions such as "what does this mean to you" rather than "what does this mean?"
At the same time, I have attended churches that were very focused on critical thinking and reason to the extent that love itself lost meaning.
I don't claim to have answers.
But I can caution that emphasizing reason alone will not produce better disciples of Christ.
You should begin with looking up the definition of religion, me east coast brother?! You may consider yourself "religious" and that would explain why you are so off base in you premises, like this one.
If you think well thought out, and intellectual religion is the answer to society, I forgive you. As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord, not religion, because born-again equals nothing less than possessing a RELATIONSHIP with the Father who sent us His Son to cover our sins in the cleansing blood shed for the repentant at the cross.
:jesus:
I would think it is more the decline of Western
Civilisation , America is not the only nation that has gone all spineless in kowtowing to all and sundry.