Letters to the Editor
rightly
Published Letters: 25 Editor's Choice: 2
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I think therefore I believe
[Read the article: The atheist delusion]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]" 'But Haught is also a fierce critic of hardcore atheists like Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett, who claim that evolution leads logically to atheism. He says both sides place too much faith in science. "Ironically," Haught writes, "ID advocates share with their ideological enemies, the evolutionary materialists, the assumption that science itself can provide ultimate explanations.' "
How we think is the reason we believe. We learn from repeated successful response to stimuli what we percieve as reality. From this virtual reality of "nows" we devise a linear continuity out of which we develop the conviction of personal identification and extra personal relationships. "We" are not past or future. We deduce such experience from the physical existence of nerve cells and the influence of emotional gate keeping through which we access 'memory bits' from existing nerve cells.
The experience of now creates the anticipation of continuity. From the idea of continuity we develop hope. Hope, and the ability to relate to any possible combination of memories, results in the desire for control of future experience.
Supernatural intervention and the laws of nature have the same physiological foundation.
Both require conviction through continuing successful predictable experiences. Both fulfill the requirements of the belief process. Neither accepts the obvious conclusion that how we believe is the way that we know. What we know is how we believe. We cannot escape our virtual reality. It is a leap of faith to say that the sun will rise, whether it is by physical laws or the will of a creator.
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Why Wall Street should be more like a cockroach
[Read the article: Why Wall Street should be more like a cockroach]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]There is an old saying: Every financial maven should stick to his last.
The analogy to the cockroach is more appeopriate than you intended.
"Cockroaches Are Morons In The morning, Geniuses In The Evening", Vandebilt biologists report daily variations in the cockroach's learning ability is controlled by its biological clock.
Another report finds that cockroaches avoid light, but will follow another into dangerous situations because it uses a scent trail, in this case pheromones on a robotic roach.
The biologic answer is that herd animals, walking, crawling, flying, swimming, or burrowing, and most cellular creatures, are followers. Leadership is an accidental position. It simply means that an indivisual is being followed. If the group that follows becomes too ungainly, one may lose contact and become a leader who will retain those that were following, not from any desire to be led, but by an instinct to follow.
Only humans have the ability to add ego to the needs for sex and safety in numbers in an accidental and tempory leadership position - because they are not following as they should.
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Maybe Romney had a Dream
[Read the article: Maybe Romney had a dream]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]If a politician can't speak figuratively, then what's a metaphor?
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Which Democrat is a winner
[Read the article: Which Democrat is a winner?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Ask not what your candidate will do for you. Ask for whom you would not vote and why he might be electable.
Electability must be a political compromise. The failure of universal suffrage it to allow people to vote for whom they like. We have devolved to a level where we look upon a presidential candidate to enact laws (previously a power of Congress), to decide which laws to enforce and decide foreign policy and judicial appointmetnts, (formally a power shared with the Senate). and to set policy by fiat, (we nominate and elect a candidate without the presentation of a party policy).
The nominee is an unknown, delegated with powers formerly held by autocrats. We have, by our apathy and ignorance, lodt the revolution.
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A penny for your thoughts
[Read the article: A penny for your deepest thoughts]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Here's my two cents:
Something is missing in the reasoning of the philosopher and the information of the psychologist.
They both assume that consciousness and self awareness is a human trait, a typical trap of the belief system of the brain to organize and associate bits of date. Chimps, rats, and three year old children develop the capacity to relate to "other", confirming the sense of self.
We, for lack of understanding, fail to understand that all life responds, and is in that sense "aware". Even atoms interact. Consciousness is not a separate "state" of mind. It is the evolutionary form that began as life responded to light, heat, pressure, sound and all the forces of nature to develop receptors and response mechanism.
Do the authors believe that plants have no "Intelligence", that bacteria do not communicate, that animals do not feel?
Their questions are based on ignorance and outdated beliefs. Their answers are as comical and indefensible as their questions.
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Holy Constitution
[Read the article: Holy Constitution!]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Huckabee needs to appoint one more Christian constructionist to the Supreme Court to turn the United States into a third world nation. The only thing that keeps nations with immense natural resources, like Kenya, Congo, Indonesia, the Middle East and the Banana Republics of Central and South America is the belief culture of the people. These are countries committed to religious standards of conduct, the very beliefs that prevent individual freedom, free speech, and freedom of expression. These are the cultures that are prewired for heirarchy, class differences, and elite power structures.
Belief in any deity is a personsl matter. Belief in the authority of a deity as interpreted by government, religious authority, or as the basis for morality prevents the free communication of ideas and promotes repression .
The most successful Islamic Caliphate flourished in Cordova under an absolute ruler who protected those of other religious beliefs and invited them to come to Andalusia to share their knowledge. The result was the beginning of the end of the dark ages in Europe. The creativity in arts and sciences closed down within one generation, but the embers were enough to light up our modern world.
There is not enough oil or candles in all the churches, mosques, and synagogues of the world to create such a light as burned with free discussion of ideas in the palace of Abd al-Rahman III in the middle of the tenth century on the banks of the Guadalquivir.