If you are driving to a particular place, but following the wrong map, you won’t get there, except by chance. If your cognitive map does not match reality—the terrain of the world in which your actions inhere—outcomes won’t match intentions. Unintentional consequences, like inequality or global warming may appear. Stated otherwise, reality always wins the game of life, sooner or later. This truth governs collective as well as individual life. This should be obvious, but is being ignored in political life today. Democracy and truth are inextricably woven together. The will of the majority is meaningless unless that will fits… Read More
Continue ReadingMorality Without Religion
I recently heard Harvard-based sociologist, Robert Putnam, discuss his recent co-authored book, The Upswing. He claims that US society has fallen to a level of separateness not seen since the 19th century Gilded Era. His research shows an I-we-I pattern with a “we” peak around 1960. Levels of economic inequality, political differences, frayed social capital, and rampant individualism are higher now than in the 1890’s. The social “we” has virtually disappeared. Putnam and Garrett argue that restoring “communitarian virtues” is critical in reversing this trajectory. In the 1890’s, the Gospel Revival supplied them. In today’s secular world, this source cannot… Read More
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