While contemplating life the day after an historic US election, I decided to jot a bit about basic, ironic, differences between political liberals and conservatives, and how small group dynamics (in particular, religious group dynamics) play into this. For background, I highly recommend Jon Haidt’s TED talk athttp://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/jo…. Haidt is one of our most consistently…
I found Jon Haidt’s reference in The Happiness Hypothesis to the literature related to ethics of community versus ethics of individuality to be useful. In particular, it was his suggestion that perhaps we would not want to completely eliminate either one or the other that got me thinking about this concept. There is lots of…
“I Am Hutterite†by Mary-Ann Kirkby I saw this book sitting on a stand in and airport bookstore as I was walking past this afternoon, picked it up on impulse and finished it a few hours later. I highly recommend it. This is not a great work of literature. It is, however, a nicely crafted…
“I am not as happy as I used to be while Mormon†I addressed this in part about with the idea that we will always be restless. However, there is a bit more that should be said. I posted something earlier that was quite extensive with regard to the current social science of happiness. You…
At this time of year, it is still dark when I arrive home from work each evening. A few nights ago, I pulled up to the garage in the usual manner, hit the door opener, waited the required moments, and then drove slowly inside. Our garage is usually a mess, and is particularly disastrous right…
I watched Lyndon’s you tube presentation to the Red Mountain Community Church near Phoenix, and thoroughly enjoyed it. See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECjddl…. He is an eloquent spokesman for the post-Mormon movement. His personal style is folksy, and pleasant. He is the kind of guy that most people would probably love to spend an evening chatting with. I certainly…
Review of Michael Ruse’s “Mysteries of Mysteries – Is Evolution a Social Construction?†bob mccue July 26, 2005 A friend asked some time ago that I write a review of Michael Ruse’s (“Michaelâ€) book “Mysteries of Mysteries – Is Evolution a Social Construction?†(“Mysteryâ€) and post it to a science list on which we both…
One of the last barriers I had to jump on my way out of Mormonism might be called the “Smart Mormon” hurdle. As one approaches it, the hurdle looks like this: There are so many really smart Mormons who believe Mormonism is “true”. The smart Mormons are much smarter and better educated than I am.…
My wife and I toured a local museum yesterday, and found the following African proverbs that I found enlightening enough to record and share: – To not know is bad; to wish not to know is worse. – Choose the neighbor before the house; the companion before the journey. – He who can’t dance says…