Archive for February, 2009

Anyone who's met Nick S. knows he's smart, insightful, and delightfully droll. When he calls you out on something, it's worth taking a hard look at yourself. He left a comment on my last post, Three Vague Words on Pottery Prove the Bible True, in which I claimed it was a wild leap of exaggeration to take an archaeological artifact of dubious value and hold it up as evidence of the literal truth of a Biblical parable. (Read the comments thread here.)

His comment was:

Yes, religious minded people can accept silly things to support their view of the world. It's a consequence of a preference for convenience and comfort rather than truth, I suspect. But then, the non-believers accept equally silly "truths" in their longing to discredit a worldview driven by faith and powered by something bigger than themselves.

Isn't it just as silly when people say things like, "hey I read the The Da Vinci Code, so now I know the truth, and I can stop thinking about such things"? Scientists too, in their sometimes-mad quest for more knowledge can also believe silly things. (Eugenics anyone?) Last time I checked there wasn't a lot of compelling evidence to sustain string theories and an 11-dimension universe, but people still talk about those ideas, and ideas like them, as if they were uncontested fact.

I value both faith and science, but I think if you wish to point out the foolishness of some religious folks, then it is only fair to also point out the excesses and foolishness of the knowledge-worshiping or narcissistic non-believers.

Nick, I can always count on you for a thoughtful and challenging comment! I wrote a response but it was too long to go in the comments thread, so here goes:

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