Empiricism and Spirituality        As a philosopher, I understand that logic alone cannot give us all the answers. Empirical experience has its limits, and so many philosophers have looked beyond scientific empiricism for answers. The 17th Century philosopher, Rene Descartes left us with the mind/body conundrum, the idea that the material and the immaterial worlds can never connect. This has caused the cognitive extremes of religious metaphysics and scientific reductionism to bookend the middle majority of people who want to believe in both, but cannot figure out how that would would work. Some so-called intellectuals are even saying that philosophy has come to an end, or is just irrelevant. Philosophy is being attacked from both sides and, if you will look at the budgets of most colleges and universities, the Philosophy Departments are getting the most severe cuts.
       However, philosophy is now more important than ever, because the relatively new subject of process philosophy, a subject on which I have written a textbook, has shown that the immaterial and the material are not mutually exclusive. (Hint: check out quantum mechanics.)
       Yesterday I ended my blog with the question: "So, who am I to criticize other people's religious beliefs?" My religious policy is "Don't ask, don't tell." And if everybody did that we wouldn't have so many problems with conflicting religious beliefs. It is nobody's business what my spiritual beliefs are, That is between me and my higher power, and I would not care about other people's beliefs if they were not violently stuffing it in our faces by their actions. Case in point: Today's Santa Rosa Press Democrat ran a story about two Mississippi state legislators, Tom Miles and Michael Evans, who are trying to make the Bible the official book of Mississippi. What? Nobody in Mississippi has ever read Kant, Kierkegaard, or Whitehead?
       The freedom to believe stupid ideas does not logically translate into the "right" to freedom of action. But more about that tomorrow.
       Religion is only one of many modules in the World Peace Algorithm and, using a calculus of economic opportunity costs, I find I cannot afford to waste anymore time on it. For those interested in my previous writings on Religion, here is a link to an article I wrote many years ago, Nailed To The Door of Faith. Stay tuned for more rants        In an upcoming blog, I will explore the differences between thought, speech, and action, and discuss the relationships among them. In my future blogs I will also be discussing my current research on the relationship of education and world peace that I have doing for MA in ED at SSU. Remember The Paris 12!!!        They cannot kill us all!!! If every journalist and cartoonist in the world just spent one week publishing diatribes,offensive or not, against stupid religious beliefs, maybe a clear message will be sent that those Paris 12 were real martyrs, not just for freedom of speech but for intellectual and cultural progress through mutual dialogue and non-violent action.