标签：God

Winter Break Essay No. 2: Relativism

Philosophy & Thought2010.02.01
Winter Break Essay No. 2: Relativism
Modernity is accompanied by a certain nihilism, and that is natural: because the past is severed from the future, the present becomes a void point. But relativism is not necessarily nihilism; or rather, its aim is precisely the opposite. Relativism, or “relationism,” emphasizes not rupture but connection. Relativism does not accept an isolated point; any node has meaning only in the midst of the network of relations that interconnect it. Nihilism loses all aspiration, but relativism is not without aspiration; what it aspires to is connection. Relativism does not reject certainty, but what is called certainty can be understood as those important “nodes” in the whole web of relations. These…
philosophy ontology God relativism
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2010年2月1日
Notes from Today’s Xindao Salon, 09-05-02

Life & Notes2009.05.02
Notes from Today’s Xindao Salon, 09-05-02
Today the throne was actually occupied; apparently it had been booked two days in advance. So I had no choice but to sit in the middle seat by the window next to it instead of in the corner. If a stranger happened to come by looking for me and failed to find me, then there was nothing to be done. This time it was even more miserable than last time: there was practically no one at all. Of course, it is perfectly normal for comrades to be busy and lazy in the latter part of the semester, and this sort of fluctuation in turnout was something I had expected from…
philosophy everyday life history Christianity
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2009年5月2日
This Episode’s Music: BWV 51 Jauchzet Gott in allen Landen (Rejoice in God)

Life & Notes2007.12.20
This Episode’s Music: BWV 51 Jauchzet Gott in allen Landen (Rejoice in God)
http://www.elizabethparcells.com/Music/In%20Concert/Cantata%2051%20Bach.mp3 Thanks to God, thanks to Miyan, thanks to Senior Brother, hallelujah—I’ve managed to get hold of a whole Bach complete works set~~ Among Bach’s works, cantatas are the most numerous, so if you play the Bach complete works at random, what you hear is almost always cantatas. Although in general I prefer to listen to purely instrumental music, it’s also nice to listen to vocal music from time to time, such as《Civilization IV》’s medieval soundtrack, and Bach’s cantatas~ At first I wanted to post BWV-1, because when I opened the complete works and listened, it was the very first piece that sent a shiver through me. But I couldn’t…
everyday life God etiquette
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2007年12月20日
[Repost] Catholic and Orthodox Churches May Be Reunited; the Pope as “First Bishop”

Life & Notes2007.11.17
[Repost] Catholic and Orthodox Churches May Be Reunited; the Pope as “First Bishop”
http://news.qq.com/a/20071117/000772.htm CNS, November 17 — The Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church, which have been split for more than 950 years, have taken a very important step toward reunification. The two sides have recently drafted a joint document and, for the first time, agreed to call the pope the “first bishop,” with a status above that of the Orthodox patriarchs. Yet after the two churches eventually reunify, the pope’s supreme power will inevitably be weakened; on the contrary, the Ecumenical Patriarch of the Orthodox Church may use this to strengthen his influence over Muslim countries, becoming, in effect, the “pope” of the entire Orthodox world. According to Hong Kong Wen…
everyday life faith religion politics
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2007年11月17日
Outline for a Discussion of the Philosophy of Religion: Does the Sacred Reality in Religious Experience Really Exist? How Can We Know?

Philosophy & Thought2007.04.27
Outline for a Discussion of the Philosophy of Religion: Does the Sacred Reality in Religious Experience Really Exist? How Can We Know?
I am a scholar of philosophy of science, so let me begin with a few examples related to science: First question: Can we experience “force,” or how do we experience it? The concept of “force” is used extremely widely: we speak of gravity, pressure, magnetic force, tensile force, and so on. But how do we experience or come to know the existence of “force”? In fact, we do not directly feel “force.” When we touch or weigh something with our hands, we may say that we feel pressure or gravity, but in fact all that happens is that our sense of touch is stimulated in certain ways. And at other…
philosophy faith Aristotle religion
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2007年4月27日
[Eng] Merrill Davis: “Darwin and Fundamentalism”

History of Science & Scholarship2007.01.23
[Eng] Merrill Davis: “Darwin and Fundamentalism”
[English] Merrell Davis: Darwin and Fundamentalism, translated by Zhang Zengyi, Peking University Press, March 2005 I had read this book once before, but apparently I didn’t take any notes. Today I reread it at great speed. A couple of random remarks, by the way: this “Postmodern Confrontation Series” is, in terms of content, all quite good, but… alas, such a thin little book, with only 70,000 characters, already takes 5.375 sheets, and still costs 12.8 yuan! Also, Mr. Jin Wulun’s general preface to the series and Mr. Wang Zhihe’s Chinese translation preface are of course very good, and generally speaking they are not especially long in terms of word count,…
book reading notes history of science faith
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2007年1月23日
God and Immortality

Philosophy & Thought2006.08.11
God and Immortality
Do Not Enter by Mistake if You Dislike This God and immortality—understood respectively as “ultimate or unconditional certainty” and “some kind of infinity or eternity”—are deeply rooted, ineradicable desires and demands of the human intellect. The unrestrained questing and questioning of human reason will ultimately and inevitably touch upon God and immortality—that is, it will touch upon the question of religion. Quite contrary to the common understanding, indulging reason will lead to religion; if one wishes to shake off or keep religion at a distance, one must resort to the intervention of the irrational. A moderate amount of irrationality and a moderate amount of rationality are both healthy for an…
philosophy faith religion Christianity
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2006年8月11日
How to Fall in Love with Mathematics

Life & Notes2006.06.03
How to Fall in Love with Mathematics
I have never lost interest in anything I once fell in love with. Even when it was not yet love, but merely a passing fondness or interest, the same was true: my hobbies always multiplied. For example, in my freshman year I was drawn to philosophy, psychology, and wandering over to Weiming Lake; in my sophomore year, to religion, philosophy of science, and memorizing Tibetan mantras by rote; in high school, to popular science books, wuxia novels, and philosophy in the first year, to history and turn-based strategy computer games in the second year, to economics, Japanese animation, and buying books in the third year; in middle school, to physics;…
philosophy everyday life Peking University mathematics
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2006年6月3日
Science and Judgment

History of Science & Scholarship2006.05.26
Science and Judgment
Bacon believed that the purpose of science was to “torture out nature’s mysteries”; nature must be “pursued relentlessly as she wanders,” made into a “slave,” and “forced to render service.” (This paragraph is from the internet; the source is to be verified.) I For now I will not dwell on the “rape” metaphor for modern science, but instead note that the word “torture” is itself an extremely apt metaphor for a key feature of modern science. In the “rape” metaphor, science’s subject is implied to be “male domination,” while nature, though always “female,” has fallen from “mother” to “female slave”; the “method” of scientific research is “relentless pursuit,” its “attitude”…
science Scientific Revolution nature God
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2006年5月26日
Expanded Bibliography on Science and Religion

History of Science & Scholarship2006.05.19
Expanded Bibliography on Science and Religion
[Austria] Leib, Zhang Heng, Science and Religion / Social Sciences Academic Press Cao Zengyou / Missionaries and Chinese Science / Religious Culture Press [UK] Richard Dawkins / The Blind Watchmaker / Chongqing Publishing House; Hainan Publishing House [UK] Mick Argyle / An Introduction to the Psychology of Religion / China Renmin University Press [US] Michael Peterson, [US] William Hasker, [US] Bruce Reichenbach, [US] David Basinger / Reason and Religious Belief — An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion (Third Edition) / China Renmin University Press [Germany] Hanbury Brown / The Wisdom of Science — Its Relations to Culture and Religion / Liaoning Education Press [UK] Alister E. McGrath /…
philosophy book reading notes philosophy of science
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2006年5月19日