doubt

T&S Post: The Assurance of Love

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776 - Hendrick ter Brugghen - The Incredulity of Saint Thomas
This Monday’s Times and Seasons post went live a little late, but it’s live now. The title is The Assurance of Love, and if you want to see how a Mormon who talks about the dangers of epistemic humility works out a particularly tough pro-certainty talk (in this case, President Hinckley’s October 1981 General Conference address: Faith: The Essence of True Religion), well then here you go.

I didn’t really explain the image I picked in the post. It didn’t fit. But I’ll provide the explanation here. It’s a painting of Thomas doing his doubting thing (The Incredulity of Saint Thomas by Hendrick ter Brugghen), and I went with it because President Hinckley’s talk made me self-conscious about not having enough faith. Of course, I’d like to have enough faith. But maybe I don’t, and maybe that’s my fault. And, if so, then Thomas is my hope. He caught a talking-to, but He was still allowed in the presence of His Savior.

Times And Seasons: Should I Stay or Should I Go?

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2014-04-28 Dresdenfiles Quote

I have a new post up at Times And Seasons this morning, continuing the series of posts that has, intentionally or not, sort of become my Internet testimony. Not sure that’s how it comes across to others, but it’s pretty much how I see it. The post also features a quote from my favorite Dresden Files book. Some might take a quote from popular urban fantasy to be an indication that I’m not taking my subject matter seriously. They would actually be underestimating how seriously I take my urban fantasy. I say this partly in jest, partly because of how much I genuinely love the Dresden Files, and partly because I just really like the idea of finding serious lessons about serious topics in unexpected, mundane places.[ref]This is why I’m excited about the new focus for fellow DR Editor Walker Wright’s own blog, The Slow Hunch. He’s a genius at this topic, especially when it comes to business.[/ref]

Also, in case y’all missed the announcement, Walker and I got published in Square Two with an article called “No Poor Among Them”: Global Poverty, Free Markets, and the “Fourfold” Mission. It’s about the topic of poverty and religion, and you should all read it because it’s awesome.[ref]I am not biased.[/ref]

What It Would Take to Not Believe (Times And Seasons)

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2014-04-14 Paul SamuelsonI got up early this morning and the kids cooperated by sleeping until nearly eight. As a result, I was able to finish up a post for Times And Seasons: What It Would Take to Not Believe. It’s a followup to the piece that I wrote two weeks ago called As Much As I Know Anything. In particular, I wanted to respond to a question from one of the commenters: “What would it take to convince you that (in as much as you know anything) propositions such as God exists or the BoM is historical are false? Or do you consider such propositions unfalsifiable?” That’s the question that I answered today, with a little help from Paul Samuelson and Karl Popper.