A Difference of Opinion: Leaping to Conclusions

Part Three in a Three Part Series on C.S. Lewis and Sigmund Freud

Lewis also tapped into evolutionary imagery, but with a substantial twist. Instead of suggesting that a biological/psychological evolution would come out of his arguments, he suggested that the spiritual rebirth of Christianity represented a sort of evolutionary leap that has simply been overlooked (220).

Here again, Freud’s progress to a utopia is somewhat more problematic than Lewis’s because of history. Freud admits as much by having his fictional “skeptic of skeptics” point out the French Revolution with Robespierre and, in Freud’s present time, the U.S.S.R. as examples of failures in atheistic societies. Freud acknowledges the dismal track record at attempts to move a culture over to atheism, but suggests a more preferable method would be a slow easing away from religious belief, rather than a violent, quick revolution as the two cited examples had been.

Such a slow progression away from belief seems to be exactly what we are witnessing in the Western World now. Even in a country with a very high surveyed level of belief in God, such as the United States, attendance at churches has dropped every year for the last half century or so, and influence of religious thought in the common activities of Americans seems to be far less influential than in times past. Given this, perhaps we can look to today’s society in an attempt to weigh the usefulness of Freud’s assertion – are things getting better now that school prayer has been banned, nativity scenes do not dot municipal buildings, and many Americans prefer to spend Sunday on the links rather than praying for those who have been placed on their church prayer chain?

There is obviously some room for differing opinions here, but it seems that there are few who will say that our society is getting better. At best, we are forced to concede that the jury is still out or that clearly if this is better, it is a very subjective better. On the other hand, Lewis’s view of improvement carries some weight. Despite all the excesses of the church over the last two thousand years, it does not seem unreasonable to suggest that it has done much good, especially when it was sticking closest to the Bible and its calling in general.

Does this mean that Freud is wrong? By no means, but it does bring to light that Freud has absolutely no historical reason to suspect that his ideology will bring about a better world, whereas Lewis can point to many examples of his side bringing about a better world. No one should believe in God merely because they believe it will bring about a better earth and not because they think He exists, but nevertheless, we can at least say that this is not a smear on the record of theists that must be overcome.

Obviously, which side one end up sympathetic to after reading these two books has a lot to do with which side one is already on. I make no attempt here to disclaim a bias of my own, which most certainly comes through clearly within these pages. On the flip side of the token, at the least, I hope to demonstrate that Freud’s theories depend a lot on conjecture, making him at best in no better position than that of Lewis. While we would expect a metaphysical, theistic system like Lewis’s to be unfalsifiable, it does seem somewhat troubling that Freud too uses many unfalsifiable claims despite his insistence that he is promoting reason and science over illusory wishes (71).

Interestingly enough, it is Freud’s theory that is impossible to prove right, not Lewis’s. There are numerous ways of expressing the idea that while theists will know if they are right, atheists never will. This actually harkens back to Pascal’s wager and its idea that one side of the bet can never really win and one has hardly anything to lose. As John Hick expresses in a more satisfying form than that of a bet, theism is ultimately verifiable, but only positively, not negatively. This is what he terms “eschatological verification,” the idea that those who agree with Lewis will know that they are right after death (103). Is this good science or mere pseudoscience? Ultimately, I think that discussion is irrelevant.

Eventually, everyone must answer the question of God. Even if it is impossible to posit a completely verifiable, scientific proof, that does not negate the need to deal with the question. As has been shown, the reverse assumption finds itself on equally shaky ground, and therefore we are forced to take a leap of faith. It is just a matter of which direction we choose to make that leap in after examining the available evidence.

I choose to leap to God, who reveals Himself in many ways — some perhaps not empirically testable — everyday.

Works Cited
“A Transcendent Experience.” The Question of God. 2004. Public Broadcasting System. 24 Mar. 2005 .

Freud, Sigmund. The Future of an Illusion. Trans. James Strachey. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1989.

“Freud’s theory.” Encyclopædia Britannica. 2005. Encyclopædia Britannica Online 6 Apr. 2005 [http://www.search.eb.com/eb/article?tocId=26014].

Hick, John. Philosophy of Religion. 4th ed. Eaglewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1990.

Lewis, C.S. Mere Christianity. HaperCollins ed. New York: HaperSanFrancisco/Zondervan Publishing House, 2000.

Scupin, Ray. Religion and Culture: An Anthropological Focus. Editor Ray Scupin. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2000.

Shakespeare, William. “1 Henry IV.” The Riverside Shakespeare. 2nd ed. Editors G. Blakemore Evans and J. J. M. Tobin. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1997.

Busy-ness

• I had a 10 page analysis of Hamlet due that took a lot of time this week. Some materials I had ordered through inter-library loan took an extremely long time to arrive, which forced me to finish up later than I had planned. I also had to re-tool my thesis due to limited availability of material. Another paper was due as well, but I managed to get it in a few days early.
• I had a Greek vocab test, so I spent a lot of time going over the 150-200 words we've covered to freshen myself up on words covered several months ago, as well as to get down some newer words I had not yet really properly memorized.
• My grandfather and step-grandmother were in town.
• Continued computer issues that I've been trying to repair.
• Other stuff I can't think of right now.

It does not sound so bad, but I also had trouble sleeping this week, so I have been moving much more slowly than normal. I'm grateful that my clients did not need any work done this past week or I would have been going crazy.

Time Got Away from Tim

Yes, I did… it got away from me today. So, I guess y'all will have to wait until tomorrow to hear from me about what I've been up to. Sorry.

I'm Sorry...

…for the lack of posting. Things have been hectic this week, but I'll try to get back to posting something a bit more substantial tomorrow or Saturday (at the latest).

Better Late than Never...

In January of last year, my church started reading through the Bible to go along with a two year, all-the-way-through-the-Bible sermon series. To aid in this, we offered One Year Bibles, and I bought one of them. I intended to finish per schedule on December 31, 2004. As it turned out, I soon fell behind, and despite a few weeks where I read two days worth of readings at a time, I found it was hopeless. As it would turn out, I ended up three months and twenty seven days behind schedule.

Does that twenty seven days sound familar? If it does, that's because today is the day I finally finished. Sure, I should be over a quarter of the way through my second time around, but I'm happy to have made it through once. Tomorrow, I suppose, I shall start back on January 1; part of me thought maybe I should try a different reading schedule and return to this one at the beginning of 2006 (thereby again syncronizing my reading with the actual calendar), but I really liked how this Bible organized the readings and I don't think the dates matter all that much, so long as you can remember which one you did last (or use a bookmark).

At any rate, I'd recommend the One Year Bible to anyone looking for a convenient way to read through the Bible. I have the NLT version, but they have it in other editions as well. Even if it takes you the better part of a year and a half, I think you'll find it works out pretty well.

I'm So Tired I Can't Sleep

That sums it up. I'm tired because I've been working like crazy for the last few days, but my mind is racing from everything I've been doing and so I'm not really in the right state to get to sleep. I think I'm going to go read for a bit and see if that helps.

Though grand, the day does now grant to the night,
I call, 'Let sleep come on before the light.'

Late Night Haiku VI

XIV.
A glorious day,
Brings me to rejoice this eve;
Grasp its dying hour.

XV.
The plan unplanned is
Far greater than the one set,
Life made in moments.

XVI.
A sole dogwood tree,
Waves in wind with grace and joy,
Preview of the day.

Computer Still Reeling

Well, as I noted last weekend, I cloned my old hard disk and switched to a new one after some odd crashes occurred and the old disk started emitting peculiar noises. I thought the problem was solved, but the system kept crashing. And started crashing more frequently. So I disconnected the old hard disk completely (previously, I switched to booting from the new disk, but left the old one connected).

Problem solved. Or not. Things just kept getting worse. Soon my system was freezing in a specific pattern four or five times a day. I placed a terminal window running top on the side of my screen so that I could try to see what was happening at the moment of the crash, but nothing terribly useful was yieled in my quest for the problem. So, I am now attempting the final, most severe attempt at eliminating all software-related problems: I wiped my new hard disk clean and have now completed a fresh install of OS X, redownloaded all of the updates using Software Update, reinstalled iLife '04, reconfigured Mail (partially — still working on that), recopied my data (which I stored on my iPod to the extent that I could fit it on there), synced with .Mac to bring back my address book/contacts/calendar, and so on. The system is almost back to where I had it, save for a few applications I have not yet copied back over (MS Office 2004 and jEdit, for instance). Frustratingly, to keep this test from being compromised, I cannot simply copy my entire old home directory back in place, which would restore all of my settings (afterall, Mac OS X is UNIX-based); thus I have the need to reconfigure everything, just incase the settings files of my user account where corrupt at all.

And now I wait. I wait to see if it crashes. I am hoping this will solve the problem, leaving me in the same position I thought I was last Sunday of simply trying to prove to Apple to give me a new hard disk, rather than searching for other problems too. I am guessing the cloning procedure was corrupted by the fact that the old hard disk had/has a problem and that this ruined the integrity of the data to enough of an extent as to cause crashes, but I do not know that for sure.

I do know that if this works out, I will be installed OS X again on Friday or Saturday. This time, though, I'll be installing Tiger (10.4, which comes out on Friday), not Panther (10.3), and I will be doing it to gain new features rather than hunt down odd bugs.

Photo Quest #1

As I said yesterday, I'm not now participating in Flip's Photo Quest meme. Here are the photos and accompanying descriptions for this month's quest:

1. This is my sock drawer drawer, which also collects other miscellaneous stuff, such as my iPod, which you can see in the small black case on the right side. Normally there are some black socks in there that would add contrast, but none of them are clean at the moment.

2. The second photo is of a gas station. This one is a bp station, located in Chesterfield, MO, that was converted from an Amoco last year. The picture size makes it a bit hard to see the prices, which were $2.10/gallon for regular unleaded and $2.20 for “silver” unleaded (though unlisted, I presume premium was $2.30). All prices have 9/10 of an additional cent on them, so you might as well round up a penny. This was taken last Saturday, and was about in the middle of the range between QuikTrip at $2.05/gal. and a ConocoPhilips station that was charging $2.15/gal. For my European friends, that is €0.42/liter (or $0.55/liter).

3. A generic, empty electrical wall plate. Normally this one is behind some equipment, so it is rarely used.

4. This is my beloved omelet pan, which I submit for the frying pan portion of the quest. This pan is just the right size for a nice, fluffy three egg omelet. It hasn't been getting much attention lately, however.

5. Some shampoo. I'm not picky brand wise.

PhotoQuest

Well, I signed up last week to participate in Flip's PhotoQuest meme. I had good intentions to get the photos up a few days ago, but have not. I have completed the quest, but it is getting late, so I guess I'll have to defer for one more day… but tomorrow, prepare to be amazed. Or maybe not, after all, none of the pictures are amazing, so why should you be amazed?