rebeccmeister | Rhetorical Styles

Instead of grading papers last night, I finally got around to reading an article that my father had sent me that was written by Michael Heller, winner of the 2008 Templeton Prize.

Ideas aside, I found myself noting qualities of expression in the article, which I think was an excerpt from Heller's book Creative Tension. To try and explain what I mean, I think I'll first back up and describe one of the only valuable parts of the Dawkins lecture I recently attended. During the Q & A portion of the lecture, someone got up and explained that he had been trying to have conversations with a Mormon friend about their differences in perspective on the nature of reality. He said that he had found such conversations challenging but rewarding, and wondered if Dawkins had anything to offer in the way of advice/support for those trying to encourage dialogue between people raised with different belief systems.

Dawkins first said that basically, he is well aware that he is a poor example of someone able to hold such conversations. He secondly said that he applauds those who are able to do so.

Now, perhaps this response is too punchy, but in the very least it is an admission of individual limitations. So it is still strange to me that both Dawkins and Dennett repeatedly assert that science is a way to truth, glossing over the limitations inherent in scientific processes. I'll grant that Heller makes that point, which he expresses nicely in the context of the scientific realm he's most familiar with, physics.

But to me it seems that Heller is too quick to leap to coping mechanisms after making this assertion, that limitations in what mathematics and physics can accomplish mean that we must recognize existence as the work of some greater force. In contrast, from a philosophical standpoint, Dennett describes in careful, patient detail that this standpoint lacks utility from a rationalist perspective (if one deviates from rationalism, God is a ham sandwich). Basically, existence becomes an all-encompassing Force, which is to say, it leaves nothing out. And so what's the difference between that state of affairs and a state of affairs that does not assign existence some magical name? Is it simply a difference in the degree of flowery language we like to use to relate our lives to the world around us?

I don't think I'm going to be able to come up with a satisfactory ending to this brief essay, as in my mind I'm still trying to decide about the utility of approaches drawn from physics and mathematics relative to approaches drawn from the biological sciences. Biologists generally don't try to play games with concepts of time, but do note how time plays out upon living things, in momentary and daily and seasonal rhythms.

I would guess that neither Dawkins nor Dennett nor Heller would object to an admiration of the beauty and majesty of the natural world on any level. Objections only enter the picture when our perspectives create barriers to meaningful discourse.

And with that, I shall resume grading papers.