Category: Ponderings

You Can Be Intellectually Humble and Dogmatic

ByPaul Rezkalla January 5, 2021 1 Comment
“Merely having an open mind is nothing. The object of opening the mind, as of opening the mouth, is to shut it again on something solid.” -G.K. Chesterton There’s a modern temptation—one that perhaps academics are particularly susceptible to—to equate intellectual humility and a sort of agnosticism…a receptivity to alternatives…a willingness to entertain all viewpoints. The less...

What do religious conversion and scientific progress have in common?

ByPaul Rezkalla November 23, 2020 0 Comments
“I believe in Christianity as I believe that the Sun has risen, not only because I see it but because by it, I see everything else.” -C.S. Lewis I was recently asked what evidence could falsify the theory of evolution. And later that same week, someone also asked me what evidence could possibly convince me that Christianity was false. I’d been wanting to write a blog on this issue for some...

Are Philosophers and Scientists Studying the Same “Morality”?

ByPaul Rezkalla October 13, 2020 1 Comment
“The obvious truth is that the moment any matter has passed through the human mind it is finally and for ever spoilt for all purposes of science.”G.K. Chesterton (Heretics) For most of humanity’s intellectual history, ethics, as a field of study in the Western tradition, was solely a philosophical enterprise. Within the first few centuries of the birth of Christianity, ethics acquired and...

When and Why Should We Believe Experts?

ByPaul Rezkalla September 10, 2020 1 Comment
Professor Quasimodo says that we should brush our teeth twice a day and Professor Mosiquado says that brushing teeth has no dental benefits and is a complete waste of time. They’re both dental experts! How do we figure out what to believe in a case like this? Well, here’s one promising model: We should trust what an expert says about X if and only if the expert is relaying the consensus...

You Can’t Just “Do Your Own Research”

ByPaul Rezkalla September 10, 2020 2 Comments
“Do Your Own Research.” I’ve seen this phrase more times in the last couple of months than I have, probably, in my entire lifetime. It’s often posted in ALL CAPS and served with a healthy dose of exclamation points—or exclamation “marks” to our UK readers (not that we have any, or any readers, at all, for that matter). Links to pop-science blogs about mask inefficacy, YouTube...