Quantum phenomena as shadows

My Yahoo groups have been very philosophical of late. Yesterday, I pulled my discussion on free will and omniscience from a discussion I was having on one group, and today I am going to pull another topic off of one of my groups for my post …

On free choice and omniscience

A recent conversation on one of my Yahoo groups has brought up an old issue for me, one that goes back to my university days. Ever since my early days in my first philosophy class, and even before, I’ve been fascinated by issues of free will …

Drowning in the Sea of Information

Seth Lloyd, over at Discover Magazine, writes a fascinating story, You Know Too Much, about the exponential increase of information in general, and science in particular, that we are subjected to in today’s world. Its fascinating to me not just because he uses one of my posts as an illustration of “The development of the [...]

I was hungry, did you feed me?

I haven’t raved much about The Hour this year … I like their new format, and I continue to enjoy George’s direct style (I do wish he’d get a bit more in-depth in some cases, but in others, he does fine), but he’s fallen into the curse of excellence … the expectations are so high, [...]

Stereotype thy neighbour?

For several weeks now, the town of Herouxville, Quebec has been embroiled in something of a controversy over some guidelines published by town council for immigrants to Canada. I’m the first person to be in favour of Canada, and supporting Canadian identity, but the tone of voice you use in that is vitally important, as [...]

The limits of religious and parental freedom

We tend to think of religious freedoms in the west as absolute, and on the face, we will defend very vigorously our right to believe whatever we want without criticism, without sanction, and the right to act on those beliefs in private reflection of our relationship with the divine. Even atheists claim this right, even [...]

Past and Future Paradigms

I haven’t raved lately about Modern Mechanix, that ultra-modern purveyor of the yesterday’s tomorrows for us, but day in and day out they put up articles from the past that are both fascinating and challenging, making us think about yesterday, as well as today and tomorrow. One of the key themes there that I find [...]

Pacifists as Cowards? Tell that to Gandhi and Jesus

Ian Robinson is a columnist for the Calgary Sun, and today he weighed in on his Remembrance Day yesterday, expressing his gratitude that he didn’t run into anyone wearing a white poppy. While I agree in general with his opinion that selling or wearing the white poppy at this time of year is insulting to [...]

The roots of fundamentalism

On the Big Picture with Avi Lewis this week, he had the Canadian premiere of Richard Dawkins‘ documentary, The Root of all Evil, discussing the dangers of religion in general. Unlike other authors on the subject, Dawkins doesn’t separate the radical fundamentalists in a religion from the moderates … in fact, he makes the point [...]

Be careful who you quote

BBC NEWS | Europe | Pope’s speech stirs Muslim anger
The Vatican is trying to backtrack today from a statement made earlier this week by Pope Benedict XVI. In a speech discussing the general role of reason and faith, and the use of violence to advance religious causes, the Pope quoted Manuel II Paleologos, a 14th [...]