Accommodationism Accommodating Science overview 13 Mar 2014 I have done quite a lot of blogging under this heading lately so I thought it might be useful to get all the posts used in order: On beliefs Why do believers believe silly things? The function of denialism Why do believers believe THOSE silly things? The “developmental hypothesis” of… Continue Reading
Accommodationism Accommodating science: Geology and Time 27 Feb 20142 Mar 2014 Some religions have no real view of history, while others hold to some kind of eternal cycle, but the western religions have a narrative with a beginning middle and end. And in the best known version of this – Christianity, what else? – history is given as a very short… Continue Reading
Accommodationism Accommodating science: Astronomy 27 Feb 201427 Feb 2014 If science and religion do conflict, what are the points of conflict that have occurred? These tend to have arisen in historical contexts as the science evolved. I shall consider five sciences and how religion has responded to them: astronomy, or cosmology, geology, evolutionary biology and biology in general, medicine,… Continue Reading
Accommodationism How to argue with silly thing believers 30 Jan 201420 Feb 2014 [Apologies this took a while; I’ve been rather sick] So, given all this [Why believers believe silly things, why they believe the particular silly things they do, and the developmental hypothesis of belief acquisition], how can you change a believer’s mind? It is tempting to say that you cannot, or… Continue Reading
Australian stuff Why anti science? 23 Nov 2013 Over the past few decades there has been an increasingly negative attitude by governments, pundits, religiosi and faux philosophers against science. We have seen an increase in denialism about climate change (one of the most well supported scientific models of the day), vaccination, evolution, medical research in general, and the… Continue Reading
Creationism and Intelligent Design The origin of “intelligent design” in the 18th and 19th centuries 9 Nov 20139 Nov 2013 A question asked on the talk.origins group by reader Garamond Lethe led me to do some reading and writing, which I do below the fold. He asked: I’m looking for an article that detailed the history of the term “intelligent design” prior to its use by the DI. I have… Continue Reading
Epistemology Scientists and history 12 Jul 2013 Recently, historian of medicine Edward Shorter made the following comment [follow link for a good discussion]: Historians aren’t as interested [in his work] because they aren’t intellectually equipped to study that kind of thing. Most of them don’t have a scientific background. They can’t get into detailed discussions of therapies because… Continue Reading
Creationism and Intelligent Design God and evolution 1 1 Apr 201322 Jun 2018 [I have decided to restart ET for a bit, but given my circumstances, it will be sporadic at best. This is the first in a series that will be tagged “Living with Evolution”, and is the first rough draft of what I hope will be a book.] The common view… Continue Reading
History Chocolate history 20 Jan 2013 Reader Jeb McLeish has brought to my attention an early attempt to do the metaphysics of chocolate: The Natural History of Chocolate by D. de Quelus (1730): The Spaniards, who were first acquainted with Chocolate after the Conquest of the new World, have laid it down for an undoubted Truth, that Chocolate is cold and… Continue Reading
Epistemology Classification and the DSM 24 Dec 201227 Jan 2013 More from my forthcoming book with Malte Ebach. Last post for the year, folks. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders This text, known by its acronym the DSM (-I, -II-, III or -IV, and -V due in 2013), is the main standard classification of mental illness and disorders… Continue Reading