“Disagreeing with someone is an art, and we have forgotten how to do it well.”
By Aaron Blumer
Jul
11
2018
"The adults polled were presented with ten news-related statements, five that were demonstrably true or false and five that were opinions. Two 'borderline' statements were also presented. Only 26 percent of the adults polled recognized all five of the factual statements as such. About 35 percent recognized all of the opinion statements as opinion." NReview
"Many of those who argue are bright and witty, and they may even advance arguments that are persuasive, at least on the surface. Nevertheless, they are often based on individual, myopic, uniformed opinions."
"The difference between godly emotion and sentiment is tricky, that is why I needed to write this post. Sentimentality takes the will captive to do her bidding. Whereas, healthy emotion and feeling are servants to the intellect and will."
"I wish to briefly introduce author David Bentley Hart’s argument—which may seem shocking to some—that reason also requires faith."
Read the series so far.
Last time I drew attention to some fallacious ideas which circulate on the airwaves and in popular culture. There are many more. In fact, even Christians have manufactured some pretty misleading mottoes and aphorisms which they use as watchwords instead of Scripture. Perhaps I’ll come back to that later, but right now I want to press on with the subject of worldviews.
As we have seen, a worldview is essentially an interpretation and outlook on life and its meaning. This outlook often lies behind the basic beliefs of people, although it must be added that people very often let their worldviews go unexamined. Let’s illustrate this with an example:
Many people will go to well known burger franchises and buy a cheeseburger even while knowing the ingredients are less than healthful. It’s the same with chicken nuggets, which are often made from gizzards and other unmentionables. If we gave critical thought to what we’re eating perhaps we would go for something else? In a similar way, if people tried a bit of critical reflection on their underlying beliefs, perhaps many of them would realize that these worldviews fail to provide healthy support for day to day experience or the societal values they deem important.