Category Archives: Philosophy

How Marxism evolved

Jordan Peterson and James Lindsay discuss

From the video (1 h 50 min) description:

Dr. Jordan B. Peterson and Dr. James Lindsay break down how Marxism evolved from a singular ideology into a genus, spawning many oppressor/oppressed dogmas across modern culture such as equity, critical race theory, and queer theory. They trace these sub-Marxist doctrines back past fundamental narrative into the theological realm, and detail their utility in the acquisition of power. Dr. Peterson and Dr. Lindsay also discuss the Grievance Studies Affair, of which Dr. Lindsay was a co-author and which casts a spotlight on the Marxist capture of our academic and scientific institutions.

An author, mathematician, and political commentator, Dr. James Lindsay has written eight books spanning a range of subjects including education, postmodern theory, and critical race theory. Dr. Lindsay is the founder of New Discourses, an organization dedicated to shining the light of objective truth in subjective darkness. Dr. Lindsay is the co-author of “Cynical Theories: How Activist Scholarship Made Everything about Race, Gender, and Identity―and Why This Harms Everybody” and the author of “Race Marxism,” as well as, “The Marxification of Education.” Dr. Lindsay has been a featured guest on Fox News, Glenn Beck, Joe Rogan, and NPR, and he has spoken at the Oxford Union and the EU Parliament.

See also Lindsay’s recent talk in the EU parliament.

Europe, Immigration, and Merkel’s Christian Values

"Multiculturalism has utterly failed"

Samuel Gregg writes in this commentary, that when Merkel said the above in 2010, she added that “the issue was not “too much Islam” but “too little Christianity.””

Gregg continues: “We have too few discussions about the Christian view of mankind,” Merkel claimed in a recent speech. She then stressed that Germany needs to reflect more upon “the values that guide us, about our Judeo-Christian tradition.” It was one way, Merkel maintained, of bringing “about cohesion in our society.”

Gregg, who at the time of writing was Research Director at the Acton Institute, comments:

Yet it is hardly a secret that the Judeo-Christian heritage sits very loosely on many European societies. We find this in a type of secular-fundamentalism—exemplified by Spain’s current Socialist government—that has become fashionable among sections of the European Left. But the ambiguity also manifests itself in the persistence of historical legends that diminish, distort, and denigrate Christianity’s contributions to European civilization.

A good example is the mythology of the so-called “Dark Ages” that permeates popular and elite discussion of European history. Most of the moral, political, and legal foundations of modern market economies, for instance, were established in Europe well before the sixteenth century. Likewise the scientific method was born in the Middle Ages. Medieval thinkers such as Albertus Magnus made crucial contributions to the development of the natural sciences. Yet despite these facts, many persist in claiming that market economies are essentially a post-Enlightenment phenomenon, or that Christianity is essentially “anti-science.”

But the problem is not only with secular opinion. Since the 1950s, many European Christians have gradually reduced their Christian faith to a vacuous humanitarianism worthy of the best EU-funded NGO. One difficulty with “liberal Christianity” (or whatever’s left of it) is that it isn’t especially interested in affirming any Christian values that go beyond sentimental platitudes about tolerance and equality which are routinely emptied of any specific Christian content. It’s goodbye Thomas Aquinas, hello John Rawls.

This makes it even more ironic that increasing numbers of secular European thinkers believe Europe can only reinvigorate its distinct identity and values through reengaging its Judeo-Christian heritage. This is certainly the conclusion of one of Germany’s most prominent intellectuals, Jürgen Habermas.

A self-described “methodological atheist,” Habermas has been insisting for some time that Europe no longer has the luxury of wallowing in historical denial. As Habermas wrote in his 2006 book, A Time of Transitions: “Christianity, and nothing else [is] the ultimate foundation of liberty, conscience, human rights, and democracy, the benchmarks of western civilization. To this day we have no other options. We continue to nourish ourselves from this source. Everything else is postmodern chatter.”

It follows that any serious discussion of Europe’s Christian values in the context of contemporary immigration and identity debates will require many Europeans to go beyond their often-truncated understandings of European history and Christianity. There’s something paradoxical about this being facilitated by the increasing numbers of Muslims living in Europe. But such an engagement is arguably being made even more urgent by the economic reality that Europe will need even more immigrants if its present demographic winter persists for any significant period of time.

What Chancellor Merkel herself understands by “the Christian view of mankind” was not clear from her remarks. Nor is it evident that particular Christian ideas are always compatible with some Muslim positions. Despite the interfaith babble to the contrary, there are some fundamental theological differences between Christianity and Islam, many of which have implications for subjects ranging from religious liberty to the nature of the state. Merkel, however, is undoubtedly correct to insist that any discussion of immigration in Europe should involve Europeans worrying a little less about Islam and paying far more attention to knowing the truth about their own heritage and Christianity’s place in it.

The truth doesn’t just set us free. There’s no future without it.

On Broken Science

"More research is needed."

Paper published by Net Zero Watch (PDF).

Introduction:

A fascinating experiment was conducted not too long ago. An experiment about experiments. About how scientists came to conclusions in their own experiments. What happened was this: social scientist Nate Breznau and others handed out identical data to a large number of researchers and asked each group to answer the same question. The question was: Would immigration reduce or increase ‘public support for government provision of social policies’?

That can be difficult to remember, so let’s reframe this question in a way more memorable, and more widely applicable to our other examples. Does X affect Y? Does X, more immigration, affect Y, public support for certain policies?

That’s causal language, isn’t it? X affects Y? These are words about cause, about what causes what. Cause, and knowledge of cause, is of paramount importance in science. So much so that I claim – and I hope to defend the idea – that the goal of science is to
discover the cause of measurable things. We’ll get back to that later.

Just over 1200 models were handed in by researchers, all to answer whether X affected Y. I cannot stress enough that each researcher was given identical data and asked to solve the same question.

Breznau required each scientist to answer the question with a ‘No’, ‘Yes’, or ‘Cannot tell’. Only one group of researchers said they could not tell. Every other group produced a definite answer. About one quarter – a fraction we should all remember –answered ‘Yes’, that X affected Y – negatively. That is, more X, less Y.

Now researchers were also allowed to give some idea of the strength of the relationship, along with whether or not the relationship existed. And that one-quarter who said the relationship between X and Y was negative ranged anywhere from a strongly negative, to something weaker, but still ‘significant’. Significant. That
word we’ll also come back to.

You can see it coming…about another quarter of the models said ‘Yes’, X affects Y, but that the relation was positive! More X, more Y, not less! Again, the strength was anywhere from very strong to weak, but still ‘significant’.

The remaining half or so of the models couldn’t quite bring themselves to say ‘No’: they all still gave a tentative ‘Yes’, but said the relationship was not ‘significant’.

You see the problem. There is, in reality, only one right answer, and only one strength of association, if it exists. That a relationship does not exist may even be the right answer. I don’t know what the right answer is, but I do know only one can be. Yet the answers – the very confident, scientifically derived, expert-investigated answers –
were all over the place and in wild disagreement with each other.

Every one of the models was science. We are told we cannot deny science. We are commanded to Follow The Science.

But whose science?

Video: World Health Organisation ‘desperate’ to have global pandemic treaty

Sky News Australia

Sky News Australia discuss the WHO’s drive to a global pandemic treaty and correctly recognise that this is a crucial world government building block. A path towards a new Tower of Babel. They also correctly recognise the fact that the pattern resembles the discussion on climate change. It’s not left vs. right but authoritarianism vs. freedom. The collective “greater good” vs. individualism. (6 min)

The Proper Attitude Towards Truth

It exists, but is never fully knowable by humans

The Christian, or at least Christian-based attitude towards truth is that an objective truth exists, but is never fully knowable. Not by humans, that is. Only God knows the whole truth. However, truth is approachable. We can come close to it – or move away from it. We are called by God to come as close to it as we possibly can. As we say during baptism: “With the help of God, we will.”

Part of the age-old struggle against Christianity is to call this stance into question. It can be done in two ways. One is to insist that the objective truth is out there AND that it is knowable by humans. This is the enlightenment or “modern” stance. (The – usually unspoken – implication is that those who know the truth automatically have the right to rule over those who don’t – and be it only for benevolently guiding and protecting the latter.)

The other way to negate the Christian theory of truth is to deny the existence of an objective truth altogether. This is the “post-modern” stance. Ironically, this theory leads necessarily and immediately to the proclamation of an ostensible, incontrovertible “truth”, namely that there is only one driving force in society, and that is the will to power. (Everything else, including the Christian claim, is a clever ruse to cover up this will to power.)

Interestingly, the “modern” and “postmodern” stances complement each other: If there is no truth but power, then those who “know the truth”, i.e. “have the power”, have the right to use it no matter what.

Did anyone say “satanic”?

I was prompted to write the above after reading this. Thierry Breton, an EU commissioner, who unironically calls himself “the enforcer”, is going to the US to tell Big Tech companies to “join the [EU] code of practice on disinformation”. The author of the above linked article comments:

And who gets to decide the truth? Hunter Biden? Joe Biden? Dr. Anthony Fauci? Hillary Clinton and her totally discredited Russia campaign? I guess the answer of the day is Thierry Breton. As “The Enforcer”, he is apparently in a unique position to understand the truth about everything. 

When Pilate asked the famous question: “What is truth?” (John 18:38), Jesus chose not to answer the man of power.

Not to worry: We now have Thierry Breton.

Something smells of sulphur.

C. S. Lewis on “tyranny sincerely exercised”

Found here.

“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hell of earth. This very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be “cured” against one’s will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on a level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals.”

― C.S. Lewis, God in the Dock: Essays on Theology (Making of Modern Theology)

The new brand of totalitarianism

Similar to fascism of old

Justo González in his book “The Story of Christianity” (Volume 2, p. 309), writes about the different “flavours” of fascism in the first half of the 20th century. There were many differences, but what united them was this:

“The glorification of war, dread of the free exchange of ideas, a totalitarian nationalism, and opposition to all forms of egalitarianism”

Today, we have the glorification of war (against Serbia, then Irak, then Syria, then Ukraine – and a denial that there is any glorification involved), dread of the free exchange of ideas (“cancel culture” – and a denial of its existence), a totalitarian globalisation, and a new form of racism (“whiteness is bad”), which is part of a “hierarchy of (alleged) victimhood”.

King Charles: a reactionary ruler

Our green, mystical monarch harbours a deep suspicion of modernity, science and freedom.

Article by Tim Black.

Excerpt:

The problem is that Charles’s ultra-reactionary worldview no longer provokes the ridicule it might once have done. Quite the opposite. Our political and media classes now seem in love with his reactionary rantings – albeit their more diluted versions. They may have no idea what Traditionalism means or stands for, but they certainly share his climate-change apocalypticism. They may not be yearning for a conservative revolution, but in the declinist ambience of Charles’s screeds and speeches, they see a dim reflection of their own green-tinged disillusionment with modernity. Their own disenchantment with liberalism and democracy. And so they have been actively calling for him to abandon the neutrality of his predecessor. They even claim that his views on the environment are ‘uncontroversial’ and that expressing them would not violate any constitutional protocols.

US president Joe Biden’s climate envoy, John Kerry, says he hopes Charles will continue to press for action on climate, claiming it ‘is a universal issue… not ideology’. ‘King Charles has been an environmentalist for 50 years’, opines the Washington Post. ‘Now is the time for him to make his case to the British people.’ Others have gone even further. ‘We are fortunate that our new king possesses a willingness to intercede in public life’, wrote one particularly excited ‘post-liberal’, just after Charles’s accession to the throne. ‘His instincts are good and just, and his decades-long critiques of globalisation, of our despoliation of our natural and built environments and our pell-mell rush towards the mythical horizon of progress have been tragically borne out by events’, he wrote.

This is what is most troubling. Not that Charles likes to think of himself as a 1920s-style conservative revolutionary, engaged in a project of often bizarre avant-gardist reaction. But the fact that these views chime so well with those of our political and cultural elites. His reactionary views, once the source of ridicule, are now theirs, too.

Decline of Christian faith during Covid

Some proof from the US

Chuck Baldwin is a conservative American Christian who has been heavily involved in politics in the past. He has recently written a piece commenting on a survey showing a sharp decline in faith among nominal Christians in his country: “America’s Pulpits Under Indictment: Let the Adjustments Begin!”

The findings of that survey confirm something I predicted based on what I learned from Gary North. When I saw how churches throughout the world, but particularly in the Western world, reacted to Covid, I predicted a further decline of faith. The clergy’s reaction was in principle identical to what they did, according to North, during the Plague or Black Death. Back then, they fled the towns for the countryside instead of ministering to the sick and dying. This cost the church a lot of credibility and paved the way for the Renaissance. The Renaissance was an intellectual movement that delved into the writings and philosophies of pre-Christian ancient Greece and Rome, looking for sources of truth other than the Bible. This ultimately led to thought centred on the human being instead of God.

The Renaissance in turn led to the enlightenment which first relegated God to a role of disinterested and distant Creator (so-called “Deism“), until essentially discarding God entirely. The “death of God” (Nietzsche) then led to the horrors of the French Revolution which, after having been defeated and staved off (just about) for a century (in which time the Industrial Revolution brought untold blessings to untold millions), led to the various horrific, ideologically driven mass slaughters by the millions in the 20th century, a phenomenon which essentially has to this day not yet abated.

During Covid, the clergy didn’t flee the towns. Instead, they locked the churches, implicitly declared their services “non-essential” and fled into cyberspace and Zoom services. They thus relinquished spiritual space, so to speak, which will now be populated by alternative beliefs of all sorts. They had been seeping in for some time, but this seepage is now becoming a torrent.

It will be interesting to watch how the churches recover from this blow.

Addendum: There is an interesting other recent survey with a somewhat contrary message: “Surprising Surge Of Young Americans Turn To Religion“.

Zero Hedge writes:

The story of religious trends in America has been one of increasing disaffiliation among younger generations. But a new study reveals an unexpected resurgence of faith among youngsters in a post-Covid era. 

Some young adults had an awakening during Covid as the entire world crumbled around them. They were in search of a higher power to get through the government-forced lockdowns and controlled demolition of the economy, as well as watching loved ones and friends contract Covid-19 that some federal government agencies believe leaked from a Chinese lab.

As reported by the Wall Street Journal, a new study commissioned by Springtide Research Institute found about one-third of 18-to-25-year-olds believe in a higher power, up from one-quarter in 2021. The findings were based on polling data from December. 

Continue reading here.

However: Will the churches be able to offer these young people a long-term spiritual home?