tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705190583378659608.post4033026476891112287..comments2023-11-13T03:52:13.643-05:00Comments on Pragmatism Refreshed: God and the Moral PhilosopherChristopherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17755575167245729981noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705190583378659608.post-85561911840249531892007-09-17T16:09:00.000-04:002007-09-17T16:09:00.000-04:00Very briefly, Henry, because I know I won't persua...Very briefly, Henry, because I know I won't persuade you that such ideas aren't nonsensical at all, but are within the scope of rational exercise for the will to believe, let me just address the issue of metaphor. <BR/><BR/>My own reading is that James wants to leave open to the secular reader the possibility of taking the passage I've quoted metaphorically. He believes most of his thesis in the essay can and should be persuasive whether one accepts what he sometimes called the "religious hypothesis" or not. <BR/><BR/>But after reading the final section of the essay, and then re-reading the earlier portion whence came that quote, one has to suspect he also meant it quite literally. <BR/><BR/>If you wish to decide for yourself what he meant, this is the age of the internet, when everybody can read everything. <BR/><BR/>http://groups.yahoo.com/group/james_william/files/ <BR/><BR/>Go to that URL and click on the third file on the list you'll see.Christopherhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17755575167245729981noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705190583378659608.post-44195531894941073582007-09-16T13:02:00.000-04:002007-09-16T13:02:00.000-04:00Why should we take such nonsense seriously? Where...Why should we take such nonsense seriously? Where is James' evidence that every ideal has its "special champion already provided in the shape of some genius expressly born" to fight for it? Not having read the essay, I can only hope that he means it metaphorically -- that some people seem to have been born to fight for a particular ideal. If so, then their seeming that way can derive from some mix of nature and nurture that requires no supernatural being.Henryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10646656656732971583noreply@blogger.com