More PVS talk
I know I've been posting a lot of links lately, rather than serving up my own thoughts, and further, I know that no one really wants to talk about Terri Schiavo anymore, but this letter from her brother, Haleigh Poutre, to Cathy Young of the Boston Globe is excellent.
The scientific usurpation of morality is a serious problem. In this, as in so many other spheres of life, I think we see the folly of pretending to ignore the pre-scientific philosophical exploration of the issue at hand, while simultaneously assuming a conclusion to such an exploration. Scientists, at least in their popular self-presentation, assume absolute objectivity, and hence claim themselves to be sole defenders of fact and truth. Thus, they claim to be free from the "uncertainty" of philosophy, and especially of ethics. Yet they are rooted in a philosophy of science which says that what is real is what is able to experimentally validated -- a proposition which of course cannot be experimentally validated. Thus they implicitly assume the un-grounded-ness of ethics, and of ethical descriptions of the human. To the extent that we accept science's claims to be the only or highest domain of truth, to that extent we verge on becoming amoral.
posted by Whiskey at 2:37 PM
3 Comments:
I think it is still worthwhile to read and talk about Terri Schiavo, because we cannot let this tragedy pass by. The fact that it happened almost a year ago makes it no less relevant--the relevance is the fact that the same thing can happen to other "PVS" people.
But here is the problem: what should we do to stop these murders? 1. Pray. God's providence finds solutions which we would never think of, or would dismiss as impossible. 2. Vote for politicians who will change the laws. 3. Tell people the true facts so that they will also vote for pro-life politicians. This requires us to continue talking about Terri Schiavo.
Thank you for posting on her!
This is just why I posted on "ideology" a few weeks ago. Many in the scientific community (as well as many of those on the pseudo-scientific fringe) blow off metaphysical or theological arguments as entirely subjective--as ideology--when they are ideology's most blatant practitioners. The lie of scientism is such a thick scale on the public eye, though, that it takes a heck of a lot of argument and prayer to get it off.
Your right, Sebastian. Prayer really is the thing in situations like these. I remember thinking when the whole Terri thing went down that it was really good that all these people were praying, but feeling weird that prayer had become almost political. Prayer needs to be humble -- prayer's power lies simply in God, in the subjugation of the will of the pray-er to God. When prayer becomes political, it's power is simply human ("look at all these holy people!" or "people connected with God think what you're doing is bad!"). But when prayer is humble, when it is done simply out of a simple love for God, that's when prayer is real, that's when prayer becomes an actual union with God, and that's when prayer is most fruitful.
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