Tag: philosophy

Defeatism

I am currently reading The Dark Forest by Cixin Liu, a Chinese science fiction novel. In the story, the leaders of what is called the space force, are concerned that the greatest threat to their force is defeatism. They study the problem and come up with a list of what defeatist attitudes look like among their troops. I found the list to be quite profound and applicable to real life. I will share it here, but I will change and remove some elements so that you can fill in the blanks for your own life….*

  1. Treating one’s duty in _________________ as an ordinary job: despite working with dedication and responsibility, lacking enthusiasm and a sense of mission, and doubting the ultimate significance of one’s work.
  2. Passive waiting: believing that the outcome of __________________ depends on [certain special people]; believing that prior to breakthroughs [in advancing your field of work], _________________ is just a pipe dream, and subsequent confusion about the importance of [your] present work; being satisfied simply with completing tasks related to establishing ________________; lacking innovation.
  3. Harboring unrealistic fantasies: … On the surface, this is a positive state of mind, a desire to throw oneself onto the front lines [of what is perceived to be a losing battle], but it is essentially just another form of defeatism. Lacking confidence in victory and doubting the significance of [the] present work, [your] dignity becomes the only pillar sustaining work and life.
  4. The opposite of the above: doubts about [your dignity in your work] … and that fighting to the end has no meaning; the belief that [your] dignity [in your work] only exists when there is someone to see it, and [if your work] ends in defeat [or failure] … your dignity loses its significance.

* Taken from: Cixin Liu, 2008, The Dark Forest, New York, TOR, pg. 78

We More Stupider Now?

Are we getting more stupid? Have we always been stupid? If we are stupid, how would we know if we were stupid?

the-basic-laws-of-human-stupdityDownload

As I often do, I dropped some content into a blog post so that I can find it for myself easily later. If for no one else, a blog can be written for your future self. If you’ve stumbled onto this article, enjoy.

Above, I’ve included two videos and one PDF file titled The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity written by Carlo Cipolla.

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The Sovereignty of God and Douglas Wilson – Expanded Thoughts

Two plus two equals four. Why does 2+2=4? Because God is God. God created the universe ex nihilo. God did not consult any preexisting laws or rules before creating. God did not consult any preexisting law of mathematics in order to discover what kind of universe He could create. The only thing God consulted and had to conform to when creating was Himself (see John 1:3 and Hebrews 1:2). Therefore, 2+2=4 because the very nature of God demands that it does. Two plus two equals four because “I AM WHO I AM” (Exodus 3:14).

Because God created ex nihilo, the universe is a reflection of His nature and character. There is nothing outside of God which influenced creation. Evil then, is either a reflection of God’s nature and character, or a deprivation of it. God’s word tells us that God is good (Psalm 25:8, 27:13, 31:19-20, 33:5, 34:8, 86:5, 100:5, 107:1, 8-9, 135:3, 145:5-9 — and that’s just some of the Psalms. There are many verses throughout the bible declaring God’s goodness.) Nowhere in the bible do we get a sense that God is evil or acts out in evil ways. Even a verse like Isaiah 45:7 is not saying God created evil as the devil would do evil, rather the evil (or calamity) there is a judgment from a good and just God against demonic and human evil.

In Doug Wilson’s video, he tries to reconcile God’s predestining of all humanity’s actions with human freedom. God has the sovereign power to predestine all a man’s choices while at the same time giving that man freedom to make uncoerced decisions. This is not a contradiction according to Wilson and the Westminster Confession because…. well just because. Wilson actually does not say anything to support this claim in the video. He simply declares it as truth. According to Wilson there is an infinite divide between Creator and creature, and as God is not a part of the universe, He is not displacing the freedom of man by imposing His will on man. Wilson does try to use Jeremiah 18:5-6 to support his idea, but as I show in my last article, that does not work.

It is true that the divide between Creator and creature is infinite, but it is not true that truth itself changes from one side of the divide to the other. Two plus two equals four, and that is true on the Creator side of the divide and the creature side. It is true on the creature side because it is first true on the Creator side. Evil is evil, good is good, on both sides of the divide. If a man freely chooses to rape a woman on the creature side of reality, it is evil. If God freely predestined the man to rape a woman from eternity past, it is still evil. To suggest that God is doing something good when He predestines the free and evil acts of men is to suggest that good is not the same thing on both sides of the Creator/creature divide.

Read the bible as a whole. What you see is God calling out to His people, to turn to Him, to repent of their evil, to trust in His salvation. Never do you get the sense that God has already predestined some to reprobation and others to salvation. Again, I am no Arminian. I agree with Wilson that we lost our moral freedom at the fall. No one is free-willing themselves into heaven. But the Calvinist understanding of God’s sovereignty is an equally false idea.

Read the first part of this subject here.

Related reading: Calvinism is Pantheism