Buckingham Inquirer

Building a Church Where #BlackLivesMatter

2016-03-18T10:57:00.000-07:00

This is the extended cut of an essay published on Political Theology Today. Unsurprisingly for a Dominican director's cut, the main change is Aquinas uncut.

Building up the Body of Christ

While consecrated religious may be first responders of a sort, I have arrived at the fast-burning twitter brushfire of l’affaire Douthat (a.k.a. HeresyLetterGate) at a more medieval pace, after the thorns have burned away leaving only scorched grass that withers and fades. Nonetheless I remain consumed by Katie Grimes’ powerful coda to the affair, in which she rightly exhorts us to “build a church in which black lives truly matter and to whom white supremacy appears anathema.” Indeed our guilt must be set out and we must gain wisdom of heart, but I would like to turn Catholic theologians’ attention to the specifically Christological and ecclesiological terrain of Grimes’ exhortation. In order for teachers of theology to “equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ” (Eph 4:12 NRSVCE), we must be able to distinguish the place of teaching among the other gifts of Christ with regard to the end that “all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ” (v13). A body suffering from racism cannot remotely measure up to the full stature of Christ, but what are the contributions of theology to that maturity? This is closely related to Rod Dreher’s question:

Why study academic theology? Does one do it to shore up the master’s house, and maybe to add new rooms onto it, based on the experience of living in it during a different time? Or does one study academic theology to tear the house down and build something more modern on the footprint?

Only in light of the aims of theology can we understand its nature well enough to ascertain who should be doing it and what rules are necessary for its mature practice in a way that transcends the narrative of polarization.

The knowledge of the Son of God

Kevin Ahern gives us the profound reminder that:

Catholic theologians, as with all other Christians, are called to serve God with all our hearts, minds, and actions in life. While this may appear to be obvious, it is not always so clear given the many competing demands on the academic theologian today. It also does little to really guide the specific responsibility or vocation of the academic theologian who seeks to “pursue in a particular way an ever deeper understanding of the Word of God found in the inspired Scriptures and handed on by the living Tradition of the Church.” (Donum Veritatis, 6)

Given Katie Grimes’ affinity for his thought, I suggest that “specific responsibility” can be elaborated with reference to Thomas Aquinas who says that theology, or

Sacred doctrine, being one, extends to things which belong to different philosophical sciences because it considers in each the same formal aspect, namely, so far as they can be known through divine revelation. Hence, although among the philosophical sciences one is speculative and another practical, nevertheless sacred doctrine includes both; as God, by one and the same science, knows both Himself and His works. Still, it is speculative rather than practical because it is more concerned with divine things than with human acts; though it does treat even of these latter, inasmuch as man is ordained by them to the perfect knowledge of God in which consists eternal bliss.

Theologians thus aim at knowledge given by God, both for the sake of union with God and the salvation of humans, made possible by the incarnation, death, and resurrection of the Word who is God. Indeed Katie Grimes, Ross Douthat, and Rod Dreher all yearn for heaven, the fullness of friendship with God, both for themselves and for others.

The unity of the Faith

If, as Katie Grimes clarifies, theology is not limited purely by academic credentials, we need this understanding of the aims of theology to resolve Elissa Cutter’s question “about who has the authority to teach in the modern Catholic Church”—one shared by the Cardinal Newman Society. In the body of Quodlibet III, q4, a1, Thomas Aquinas says that because the theology professor does not receive pre-eminence, but only an opportunity to convey their knowledge, it is eminence of knowledge that is required for the theologian, and seeking to teach without knowledge that makes a theologian presumptuous. That certainly justifies Grimes’ call for real expertise, but since theological knowledge is of divine things, it exceeds what can be known by the natural light of intelligence and therefore according to Aquinas:

it proceeds from principles established by the light of a higher science, namely, the science of God and the blessed. Hence, just as the musician accepts on authority the principles taught him by the mathematician, so sacred science is established on principles [namely, the articles of faith] revealed by God.

In order to be truly theological, then, expertise must include knowledge of the faith, held by faith. Far from using the criterion of knowledge to exclude, it is on this basis that Aquinas argues stridently against theologians being restricted to those of one particular state of life, which is worth quoting at length:

This opinion…deserves censure inasmuch as it detracts from that unity in the Church which, as St. Paul says (Rom 12:5), is based on the fact that “We, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another.” The Gloss interprets these words as meaning, that “we are members one of another, since we are of service to each other, and are in need of the assistance of one another.” This is true of all men alike; neither the greater, nor the lesser amongst us being excluded. Hence whosoever hinders one man from serving another, as far as he be able, impairs the unity of the Church.

Further, it is likewise an infraction of charity:

In all social matters, the companionship of others is of great advantage. “A brother that is helped by his brother is like a strong city” says Solomon (Prov 18:19). “It is better, therefore, that two should be together than one: for they have the advantage of their society” (Eccles 4:9). But in acquiring knowledge, that society is especially of use; for among many students some will know or understand that, of which others are ignorant. Hence Aristotle (I Caeli et Mundi) says “that the ancient philosophers, at diverse meetings, investigated the truth concerning the heavenly bodies.” The exclusion then of any class of men from the society of other students is a manifest injury to the studies of all.

Vanessa White brings the point home:

The moves to visibility, the return of peoples’ “stuff,” the release of entrapped necks begins in our classrooms and in our courses, a lesson I learned from Professor Abrams. It begins with the challenge to be attentive to whose voice is not a part of the conversation, whose face is not a part of the movement, whose perspective is lost in the process. As we reflect on this week’s series of essays, who is invisible, whose voice is not being acknowledged or invited to participate? Where are the Latin@ voices, the Asian voices? How was this series of reflections developed and shaped? Who made the decisions and extended the invitations? Who is made invisible in this well-intentioned endeavor? Whose voice and creativity is omitted from this discourse? It is only when we have the courage to face uncomfortable truths that we can be open to making a change.

Equipping the saints for the work of ministry

Having established the aims of theological discourse and the persons who should participate, what rules ought there be for such discourse? Daniel Cossachi and Kevin Ahern give three criteria for successful theological work:

“thorough argument” supported with “ample evidence”
“faith seeking understanding” by “adding to the literature in provocative ways” by sticking “close to the tradition”
calls for conversion from injustice

These are excellent heuristics, but must be understood more richly than Cossachi and Ahern elaborate. The ample evidence necessary for theological claims can only be, foundationally, that of revelation. Furthermore, the gift of the Holy Spirit to understand and expound this revelation comes with criteria stricter than merely sticking “close to the tradition” as Aquinas continues:

St. Peter (1 Pet 4:10), writes in these terms: “As every man has received grace, minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.” The Gloss thus comments on this passage: “The Apostle signifies by the word “grace” any gift of the Holy Spirit which may be used for the assistance of others, in things either temporal or spiritual. He exemplifies his meaning by the words which follow. “If any man speak, let him speak as the words of God.” The Gloss adds, “If any man knows how to speak, let him attribute his knowledge not to himself, but to God.” Let him stand in fear, lest he teach anything contrary to the will of God, the authority of Scripture, or the good of his brethren; or, lest he be silent, when he ought to speak.

To fail to speak according to the will of God, the authority of Scripture, or the good of the brethren is in some real sense to not know how to speak, since theological knowledge cannot be attributed to oneself, and the faith itself is one. By breaking these rules of theological discourse the theologian corrupts the aim of theology and disqualifies themselves from the expertise needed to speak. Furthermore, they separate themselves from the body of Christ in which we are members “under our Head, the Roman Pontiff” from whom “must we learn what we are to believe and uphold” as Aquinas quotes Cyril of Alexandria (ad 8). Those unjustly silent should also fear this fate, as when theologians ignore the racism that shackles black bodies and has been repeatedly condemned by the Holy See. Aquinas continues, making the point that theologians, in virtue of their gift of knowledge, have a duty to the whole body of Christ:

Now as in the physical body there are eyes, so in the mystical body of the Church there are teachers. Hence the Gloss understands the text in the Gospel of St. Matthew (18:9): “If your eye scandalizes you” etc., to refer to ecclesiastical doctors and counsellors. Physical eyesight is useful to the whole body alike, and one limb serves another in its functions. For, as St. Paul says (1 Cor 12:21), “the eye cannot say to the hand: I need not your help; nor again the head to the feet: I have no need of you.” Therefore, everyone who undertakes the office of teaching must perform it for the benefit of all men, of whatsoever condition they may be.

The duty towards charity and against injustice must also be extended to other theologians, as Fr. James Martin points out. The call to convert from injustice cannot only, however, be for the benefit of both sinners and those human persons they sin against. The greatest injustices from which we must convert are those committed against God who “infinitely surpasses all things and exceeds them in every way” in sins against religion. Jesus said:

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”

There can thus be no competition between on the one hand resisting “every wind of doctrine,” “people’s trickery,” and “their craftiness in deceitful scheming” and on the other “speaking the truth in love” whereby “we must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by every ligament with which it is equipped, as each part is working properly, promotes the body’s growth in building itself up in love” (Eph 4:14-15).

May God give success to the work of our hands as we join M. Shawn Copeland this Lent in a praxis of redemptive love (“other-regarding, neighbor-loving, selfless to the point of self-sacrifice, fearless and loving in the face of persecution, open, and hopeful”) “sustained only through prayer, self-discipline, and remembrance of the Body of Christ broken for the world. This is another expression of solidarity in the here-and-now anticipating the eschatological healing and building up of the broken body of God’s people.”

The Dominican House of Studies

2015-10-07T14:07:00.000-07:00

Some have expressed curiosity about my new(-ish) monastic abode, and now there's a host of new information out there about it, starting with a lovely story in Regina Magazine illustrated with photographs by Fr. Lawrence Lew, O.P. In addition, it seems someone has written a poem about living at the DHS, and here's reportage from one of our lay students. On our official site, there's good pop-scholarly writing, lectures (some with video), and music (some of which you can buy in studio-recorded form). Here's a little video of the end of compline (the night prayer of the church) which we sing at the close of every day:

You're certainly welcome to join us for it any day--the times are on our website. If you want a bigger taste than that, you should join us on the last night of October for the Vigil of All Saints, an awesome event previously covered by PBS:

Summer Blogging

2015-10-01T15:44:00.000-07:00

I spent the past summer interning for World Youth Alliance in New York City. I worked primarily on their Human Dignity Curriculum but I also had the opportunity to write a couple of blog posts for the organization:

A Unified Account of Moral Action

2015-06-01T20:17:00.001-07:00

One way of making the complicated relations in objects of action simpler to understand is to begin at the beginning, with “the first precept of law that good ought to be done and pursued and that evil ought to be avoided” and follow Aquinas’ lead that “all the other precepts of the law of nature are founded upon this principle.”[1] The first way in which one principle may follow from another is by logic, so if practical reason chooses a means, thus making it a proximate end, the form of the reasoning itself has thus shown the Pauline principle that evil may not be done that good may come.[2] If evil were done that good may come, evil would be a means to good, which would make it a proximate end and thus something pursued, a logical violation of the first precept. The next level of analysis, the primary subject of the book under review, can be understood as a kind of metaphysical entailment. To introduce the proper accident of evil into an action is to make it metaphysically impossible for it to be the good action, since good and evil acts differ in species,[3] so the proper accidents of both cannot be present. Finally, consequences must be weighed, because an action cannot be indifferent even if it be indifferent in species,[4] as “not only are human beings good by being directed to the good; more profoundly, they exist for the sake of the good.”[5]

[1] Thomas Aquinas, “Prima Pars,” in Summa Theologiae, trans. Alfred J. Freddoso, accessed September 22, 2014, http://www3.nd.edu/~afreddos/summa-translation/TOC-part1.htm q 94, a 2, c.
[2] Romans 3:8.
[3] I-II, q18, a5, c.
[4] I-II, q18, a9, c.
[5] Steven J. Jensen, Good & Evil Actions: A Journey Through Saint Thomas Aquinas (Catholic University of America Press, 2010), 295.

When do Circumstances give Species to Acts?

2015-06-01T20:15:00.000-07:00

Despite substantial difficulties with interpreting the texts of Aquinas on this point[1] (which Jensen earlier defended against Cajetan’s charge of inconsistency),[2] Jensen arrives at the following formula for when circumstances give species to acts:

Everything hinges, then, on the form that reason seeks to introduce into the materia circa quam. Those aspects by which the material is able or unable to bear this form will give species to human actions. All other aspects of the material will be circumstantial.[3]

He then glosses the above as “[the circumstance] adds something pertaining to reason”[4] or when “[the circumstances] are the proper accidents of some new motive.”[5] Only the last formulation, from the Summa Theologiae, is adequately precise: a circumstance adds something pertaining to reason when it introduces a new form, we know it introduces a new form because the old form is unable to bear the form reason seeks to introduce, and we know the old form is unable to bear the new form (in the case where they are not simply contraries or contradictories) because it has proper accidents which are contradictions or contraries of the proper accidents of the old form. Taking a chalice must be sacrilege as well as theft because consecrated objects are necessarily not reducible to their monetary value. The Sabbath may be for man, but not by way of mammon.

This approach to determining when circumstances give species is also relevant to the case of whether moving cargo off of a ship at sea to avoid sinking is the same act as putting the cargo into the sea.[6] The issue is less that “some negation is involved” but, as Jensen notes, that the cargo becoming waterlogged or sinking is a further result of lightening the ship rather than a means. Why, though, is becoming waterlogged and sinking not a “proper accident” of the act of jettisoning cargo from a ship at sea? It certainly seems to follow with basically 100% certainty, much as shooting a man in the head with a magnum revolver or crushing the skull of a child in-utero lead to their deaths. Aquinas defines a proper accident, however, as “non contingit quin proprium accidens praedicetur de subiecto,”[7] and while jettisoned cargo certainly becomes waterlogged and sinks, it doesn’t necessarily do so. It certainly doesn’t become waterlogged and sink with the kind of necessary force involved in Aquinas’ examples of proper accidents, such as all natural numbers being even or odd, all rational creatures being risible, or all happy states being delightful. The species of the action is thus determined by its intended ends, the chosen means to those ends, and the accidents those ends necessarily entail.

If jettisoning cargo and self-defense are allowed, however, why not craniotomy? The doctor does not, after all, intend the death of the child or harm to the child, and while resizing the child’s head in-utero by crushing it with forceps leads with moral certainty to the death of the child, the death is not itself the means to the end. Unlike in the self-defense case, maiming the organ is not even a means to the end, because whereas in the self-defense case if the bullet passed through without damaging an organ the attacker would continue to pose a threat, in the craniotomy case if the skull somehow squished without being harmed that would be a cause of joy to all concerned, allowing the baby to be delivered alive. Even if the maiming were somehow causally necessary, why should the circumstance of endangering innocent life give species, since maiming is not malum in se? The answer is to be found in Jensen’s remarkably nuanced treatment of the way “things” are the objects of human acts, by their conception in reason.[8] In the case of the jettisoned cargo, it is the same thing which the captain throws overboard to save his ship and would be happy to recover intact after the storm had passed. In the case of the armed defender, the presumptive aggressor is stopped from being an aggressor whether he trips from the noise, is maimed but recovers in handcuffs, or is killed outright. In the case of the consecrated chalice, however, the cup-as-invaluable is stolen, but the cup-as-valuable is fenced. In the case of the craniotomy, the doctor begins by crushing the skull-as-organ, which is to say, crushing the baby, but ends by crushing the postmortem skull-as-calcium-aggregate. His action, which he wishes to describe as “reducing the size of the baby’s head,”[9] turns out to only involve “the head” in an equivocal sense, since at the beginning it is not a thing in itself but a part of a baby, and at the end it is not a thing in itself but an aggregate of flesh and bone. In killing the baby, he has changed the thing upon which he is acting, but the action as he wishes to describe it does not take stock of this fact, and thus cannot be a correct description. The armed defendant, insofar as he attempts to act upon the entirety of the aggressor, which he is deputized to do by the aggressor’s presumptive guilt (thereby explaining the earlier condition), does not suffer from this difficulty.

[1] Steven J. Jensen, Good & Evil Actions: A Journey Through Saint Thomas Aquinas (Catholic University of America Press, 2010), 114.
[2] Steven J. Jensen, “Do Circumstances Give Species?,” The Thomist 70, no. 1 (2006): 1–26.
[3] Jensen, Good & Evil Actions, 125.
[4] Ibid., 113 cf de Malo, 7, 4.
[5] Ibid., 114 cf I-II, q72, a9.
[6] Ibid., 99.
[7] In Post. An. I.10.157
[8] Jensen, Good & Evil Actions, 117–121.
[9] Ibid., 15.

Difficulties with Jensen's Account of Self-Defense: Why maiming is not malum in se

2015-06-01T20:12:00.000-07:00

Jensen rejects most contemporary Thomstic accounts of self-defense because they attempt to place the harm to the aggressor, or particularly his death, outside the intention of the defender, which Jensen finds implausible and contrary to the relevant Thomistic texts.[1] Instead he provides an account of self-defense as implicitly deputized state action, which he acknowledges is not found explicitly in the texts but he judges the most textually compatible means of saving our intuitions that deadly self-defense can be morally justified.[2] While Jensen’s interpretation of St. Thomas is plausible enough, its ability to save our moral intuitions regarding self-defense seems less assured.

Jensen sets the case as follows:

To avoid certain confusions we will press the case to its farthest extreme by considering a situation in which merely injuring the assailant is not likely to stop him, so that the only plausible way to defend oneself is to fire the gun with a near certainty that the assailant will die (supposing that one has good enough aim). Later, we will see that the same considerations apply to situations in which one fires the gun thinking that one will would (but not kill) the assailant.[3]

But why should this causal closeness of firing with death be at all relevant to the moral species? The soldier blowing up a bridge is not committing the moral species of murdering a child playing on the bridge, even if it seems certain that the child will die when the bridge is blown up. Only when “injuring the child…is one of the causes that brings about his goal” is the soldier so culpable.[4] No matter the likelihood of death, however, some degree of injury from the gunshot would surely stop the assailant without causing his death, so the death of the assailant is not actually one of the causes (as conceived by reason) that brings about the goal, even if it is a highly likely concomitant effect of some of those causes and also an alternate cause. Rhonheimer’s interpretation thus seems more plausible:

It entirely depends on what is going on in my heart, that is, whether I want the enemy soldier to be dead, or simply to stop his aggression and to win the battle. Therefore, if as a soldier you do not want to be a murderer, you must care for wounded enemy soldiers. This shows that the object of your acting—the intention involved in your action—obviously was not wanting them to be dead, not even in the moment of battle, even if killing them in the moment was the foreseeable and necessary physical outcome of violence proportionate to stop their aggression.[5]

While one might have reason to quibble with Rhonheimer’s construction of a soldier’s actions in wartime as a case of self-defense, the fact remains that showing solicitude for the wounded illustrates a desire not to kill even if death results in the vast majority of cases from the means chosen. On the other hand, a defender who chooses not to call 911 after incapacitating his assailant with gunfire is a murderer, though perhaps a murderer possessed of some mitigating circumstances.

Much of the cast of Jensen’s approach to self-defense, therefore, relies on his claim that maiming is malum in se,[6] since it seems incontrovertible that the destruction of some part of a person is part of the causal chain (and thus the proximate intention) by which a defender stops an aggressor by means of a firearm. Jensen here follows Thomas, who states that “Si ergo membrum sanum fuerit et in sua naturali dispositione consistens, non potest praecidi absque totius hominis detrimento”[7] which would be evil, making an exception only for the judicial case where sin has corrupted the person in a manner analogous to disease corrupting an organ. Since consent cannot make a malum in se action licit, this poses a host of difficulties which go well beyond self-defense. First, an operation to remove a diseased organ (an inflamed fallopian tube, say) requires cutting through healthy organs (skin and muscle, at minimum). Certainly those organs aren’t intended to be completely destroyed (depending on how sharply ‘membrum’ is defined) but the same could be said of those organs damaged by a bullet in self-defense. In both cases the destruction of the healthy organ is a means to the end; contra Long Jensen wants to maintain that the means is indeed a proximate end in itself,[8] and contra Rhonheimer Jensen wants to maintain that this proximate end in itself gives rise to a human act.[9] Thus the puzzle: according to the strict reading of II-IIq65a1c of maiming a healthy organ as an act malum in se, while Aquinas’ example may work for a case of gangrene where the whole part of the body removed by the doctor is already less than healthy and naturally disposed, it does not work for the case of salpingectomy, which Jensen wishes to affirm as morally licit.[10]

Jensen’s reading is too strict to conform with his own moral intuitions or those of the mainstream Catholic bioethics community. His reading also fails for the case of Aron Ralston, who cut off his own (still healthy) arm to escape likely dehydration after being trapped by a rock,[11] in a microcosm of the fat spelunker case that Jensen judges obviously immoral.[12] While Ralston has received plenty of criticism for his lack of prudence in entering the situation in which he became stuck, he does not seem to have received any for the supposedly malum in se action of cutting off his healthy arm for the further end of saving his life. A third difficulty for this reading is that it would decisively prohibit kidney transplants from living donors, where a complete healthy organ is cut out for some further end, yet both the Catechism of the Catholic Church and the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services affirm that “Organ transplants are in conformity with the moral law if the physical and psychological dangers and risks incurred by the donor are proportionate to the good sought for the recipient.”[13] If Pope St. John Paul II, who promulgated both Veritatis Splendor and the Catechism is not to be considered a proportionalist, then maiming must not be malum in se.

Given the difficulties with treating maiming as malum in se, what are the alternatives? Jensen could yield to Rhonheimer’s claim that cutting the skin in surgery is not a human act, or to Long’s that it has an intrinsic teleology, but his arguments against these positions are strong. A better approach would be to make use of openings in the Thomistic text to treat maiming differently, much as Jensen already does with the deputization argument. A start might be made by noting that in II-IIq65a1, Thomas is arguing against those who believe maiming to never be lawful, and provides the counterexample of maiming for explicitly judicial purposes. While that may pass even a very strict standard, as Thomas establishes, that need not imply that such a standard is optimal with regard to cases envisioned neither by Thomas nor his objectors. Indeed the replies to objections open up this strategy. Replies one and two make reference to the common good and the good of the man, respectively, as ends to which the particular nature or member are subjected, and without reference to any defect of the member. The third reply provides an even more explicit criterion: “membrum non est praecidendum propter corporalem salutem totius nisi quando aliter toti subveniri non potest.”[14] This solves the salpingectomy case explicitly, and while it must be extended to solve the live-kidney-donor and self-defense cases, by making bodily integrity only a proportionate good it provides the ground for that solution. The presumption in both cases is that the health of the kidney-recipient and the defender may not be saved by means other than maiming.

The need for consent to maiming in the case of the kidney donor but not in the case of the assailant can be explained in that the latter is either not in a rational state of mind or is already making a choice to forfeit the common good, but in either case has already shown his inability to recognize and respond to the common good in consent. To Jensen’s credit, however, the likelihood of death is not totally irrelevant. As the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services put it, “The transplantation of organs from living donors is morally permissible when such a donation will not sacrifice or seriously impair any essential bodily function”[15] and the Catechism notes that “it is furthermore morally inadmissible directly to bring about the disabling mutilation or death of a human being, even in order to delay the death of other persons.”[16] This restriction makes sense in light of II-II, q65, a1, ad2 where Thomas orders the part to the whole of the person, but why would the same not be true of deadly force in self-defense, triggering the broader common good argument of ad1? In parallel, if maiming is not malum in se, and the blowing up of the bridge is a proportionate common good, why may the soldier not fire to maim the child so as to trigger the detonator and blow up the bridge? The answer is that insofar as each person is a complete instance of the common good,[17] maiming that endangers life requires some (even prima facie) judgment of guilt,[18] which in turn can only be made by a public authority or one deputized as such,[19] for it to be proportional to the life of another. The reason for this will become clearer in the next section, because this is a circumstance which gives a species.

[1] Steven J. Jensen, Good & Evil Actions: A Journey Through Saint Thomas Aquinas (Catholic University of America Press, 2010), 52–66.
[2] Ibid., 219–221.
[3] Ibid., 52–53.
[4] Ibid., 86.
[5] Martin Rhonheimer, The Perspective of the Acting Person: Essays in the Renewal of Thomistic Moral Philosophy, ed. William F. Murphy (Catholic University of America Press, 2008), 88.
[6] Jensen, Good & Evil Actions, 62–63.
[7] II-II, q65, a1, corpus.
[8] Jensen, Good & Evil Actions, 46–48.
[9] Ibid., 88.
[10] Ibid., 211.
[11] Michael Brick, “Climber Still Seeks Larger Meaning in His Epic Escape,” The New York Times, March 31, 2009, sec. Sports / Other Sports,http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/31/sports/othersports/01ralston.html.
[12] Jensen, Good & Evil Actions, 68.
[13] Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2nd ed. (New York: Image, 2003), para. 2296; United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services, 5th ed. (Washington, DC: USCCB, 2009), para. 30.
[14] II-II, q65, a1, ad3.
[15] United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services, para. 30.
[16] Catechism of the Catholic Church, para. 2296.
[17] Jensen, Good & Evil Actions, 155.
[18] Ibid., 221.
[19] Ibid., 64–66.

Is Jensen a Moderate Physicalist or a Moderate Abelardian?

2015-06-01T20:10:00.000-07:00

In Good and Evil Actions, Jensen’s dialectical middle course seems closer to Abelardianism than in previous and later works. In a 1997 article he wrote “physicalism is the view that the exterior action has a moral character in itself, by the very nature of its physical features, and that acts of the will receive their good or evil from the exterior action…I hope to show that Aquinas was a physicalist.”[1] By the end of that article Jensen took the position that this is only true of the exterior action “as conceived” which he calls “moderate physicalism” because it is not controlled by the will,[2] but of course the exterior action “as conceived” is not exactly exterior or physical, either. In this work, however, he criticizes physicalism because it “provides little guidance for identifying the proper order of actions; we are left to our own intuitions of the natural orders of actions, which is to say that the account has not helped us to identify the species of actions”[3] without referring to that view as “extreme physicalism.” Jensen also undercuts some of the motivation for physicalism by joining Finnis against Long in the argument that for Aquinas the end-intention of the interior act of the will regards the means, understood as proximate ends,[4] thus giving the Abelardians a way to reject actions involving immoral means. In Jensen’s understanding, the middle course will not approach too closely to the physicalist shore.

Despite Jensen’s review of Rhonheimer’s 2012 book as “laid upon some not-so-Thomistic foundations, culminating in questionable, perhaps even dangerous, conclusions,”[5] in this work he ends up siding with Rhonheimer more often than not. Of twenty substantive citations,[6] twelve are marks of wholehearted agreement,[7] two are ambiguous (regarding teleology)[8] and three of the disagreements are specific to the act of theft.[9] Jensen does have substantive and important disagreements with Rhonheimer over the line between acts of a human and human acts,[10] whether appeals to intention in specifying acts are infinitely regressive,[11]and whether circumstances can ever give species,[12] all of which continue in his 2012 article. With regard to Stephen Long, however, the physicalist to whom Jensen is most indebted, these ratios are nearly reversed: eleven negative citations on core issues,[13] five more regarding the particular problem of self-defense,[14] and only eight positive citations.[15] Either the dialectical middle course is closer to the Abelardian (“In place of physical actions, they provided mental intentions. Rather than human goods depending upon our physical human nature, they presented human goods immediately grasped by a practical reason that could do without teleology.”[16]) than the physicalist shore, or Martin Rhonheimer’s stress of “a material element that enters into our actions and our moral judgments”[17] must be fairly substantial. Jensen’s position remains largely what he called “moderate physicalism” in his earlier taxonomy, but that approach seems to have more in common with contemporary Abelardians than it does with contemporary physicalists.

[1] Steven John Jensen, “A Defense of Physicalism,” The Thomist 61, no. 3 (1997): 377.
[2] Ibid., 402.
[3] Steven J. Jensen, Good & Evil Actions: A Journey Through Saint Thomas Aquinas (Catholic University of America Press, 2010), 33.
[4] Ibid., 46–52.
[5] Steven J Jensen, “Thomistic Perspectives?,” American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 86, no. 1 (February 10, 2012): 135.
[6] Jensen, Good & Evil Actions, 323.
[7] Ibid., 38n39, 40n42, 41n46, 70, 84n11, 91, 123n90, 125, 126n96, 240–241, 255n24, 265n30.
[8] Ibid., 237–238, 246n20.
[9] Ibid., 184n7, 283n4, 285n6.
[10] Ibid., 88.
[11] Ibid., 80–82.
[12] Ibid., 117–121.
[13] Ibid., 32–33, 46, 48, 49n11, 51, 118n72, 158n32, 265n30, 266–267, 268n36, 272.
[14] Ibid., 56, 58n31, 64n45, 188n18, 218–221.
[15] Ibid., 29, 60n37, 99n41, 102, 152n26, 171n49, 215, 224n76.
[16] Ibid., 4.
[17] Ibid.

Religious Names

2015-04-27T08:37:00.002-07:00

As the vocation director for our province explains:

Taking a religious name when a young man enters religious life is part of the tradition of the Order of Preachers that goes back to the time of St. Dominic.

If you've been wondering about my own name of "Thomas-Martin" it is after my patrons Thomas Aquinas and Martin de Porres, both canonized Dominican Friars recently profiled on our foundation website, with images taken from our church of St. Dominic in Washington, DC:

Reviewing Jensen's Good and Evil Actions

2015-04-17T11:08:00.002-07:00

The flip side of my engagement with Martin Rhonheimer is engagement with his interlocutor Steven Jensen, who wrote the excellent book Good and Evil Actions: A Journey through St. Thomas Aquinas, that I finally got around to reading. You can read a draft of my review as a pdf or as a four-part series here on the blog:

Conference Audio

2015-04-16T19:12:00.002-07:00

Since it's audio posting day and my academia.edu page makes them hard to find, here are pointers to the lectures for which Lonergan Resource is kindly hosting the audio. Sorry I haven't put the work in to sync the slides with the audio.

1. The Diagram is More Important than is Ordinarily Believed (full paper) given at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles for the West Coast Methods Institute 2011.

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2. The Aesthetic Pattern of Experience in Susan Sontag and Bernard Lonergan (full paper) given at Marquette University for Lonergan on the Edge 2011.

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3. From Practical Reason to Natural Law: A Lonergan-Rhonheimer Dialectic (coursepack) given at Marquette University for Lonergan on the Edge 2012.

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St. Benedict Joseph Labre: Tramping with the Cross

2015-04-16T17:06:00.000-07:00

As part of the Dominican student brothers' Lenten series The Cross and Consecrated Life, I gave a talk on St. Benedict Joseph Labre entitled Tramping with the Cross, and the audio is now up on Dominicana Audio's Soundcloud page, where you can also listen to the other talks in the series and/or snippets from our albums of Dominican chant.

Cocktails: A Taxonomy for the Perplexed

2013-05-15T00:50:00.003-07:00

Cocktails are delicious works of art, but like other arts they have a vocabulary all their own and often inconsistently applied. Bartenders presumably understand this vocabulary from the inside, by intensive memorization and experimentation, but many of us would just like to better understand how various drinks are related, as an aid to memory or discovery. I don't claim any expertise in this area and I won't cite any sources, as this is just my overlay on Wikipedia, and not intended to convey precision or universality, but I will define my terms as I go, and I will attempt not to claim any more precision than I can offer.

First, a word on varieties of ethanol for human consumption. If the base substance to be fermented has more than 10% simple sugars, then it is a must and can be directly fermented, yielding wine. If the base substance has less than 10% simple sugars, then its carbohydrates must be converted to simple sugars by malting (germinating) and/or mashing (cooking) before yeast can grow. Yeast dies at roughly a 15% alcohol concentration (30 proof), so higher values must be achieved by distillation after fermentation. The flavor of the resultant fluid is dependent on the original fermented mixture, any flavors added after fermentation and before distillation, and any flavors added after distillation. If the original mixture was a must, and is thus a wine once fermented, the distilled product is a brandy. If the original mixture was a mash, then the fermented product is, broadly speaking, whisky. So all distilled alcohols are either brandies or whiskeys. Their more specific names are the result of particular ingredients, flavorings, process details, brands, or regional appellations. Many of these are strictly governed by law and custom, and as with other taxa governed by law and custom, idiosyncrasy is the rule. Recipes are generally trade secrets and ingredients unlisted, so for labels without strict government regulation, taxa are generally more evocative than explanatory.

Vodka is whisky "in the Russian style," perhaps at one time connoting some potatoes in the mash, but now basically means whisky made cheaply, which is to say first distilled to a very high proof and/or heavily filtered (meaning the quality of the mash is less relevant, since the distillate is nearly pure alcohol with almost no flavor) and then bottled with very little aging, so that flavoring agents must be dissolved directly into the alcohol rather than slowly leached. Southern Comfort is basically traditional American vodka. More traditional whiskeys are distilled to a lower percentage, allowing residual flavors from the mash, and aged which allows flavors to leach into the whisky from the wood and previous contents (usually wine) of the barrel, and some of the whisky (the "angel's share") evaporates each year, lessening the amount of water added at bottling. Naturally the losses, inventory costs, and demand invariance of this process add substantially to the costs. Gin is from this perspective halfway between traditional whisky and vodka in that the flavoring agents (traditionally juniper with other botanicals) are added after fermentation but before distillation. This process yields a cheaper product than traditional whiskeys, because cheaper mash can be used and aging avoided, but it requires more accurate distillation control than vodkas because the aromatics must be distilled with the ethanol. Bourbon is whisky with a mostly-corn mash, and tequila is basically whisky with a mostly-agave mash.

Rum is distillate of fermented molasses, which is boiled down sugar cane. It's nearer to brandy in that sugar cane contains sufficient sugar to ferment directly, so the cooking is just for the physical concentration of the sugar, but this does lend a taste partly reminiscent of a mash.

A liqueur is a distillate produced by any of the above methods with a much sweeter and fruitier than alcoholic flavor. There may be no brightline between orange vodka and triple sec, but the latter traditionally carries fruit flavors from fermentation and distillation as well as infusion, and is thicker and sweeter. Bitters, meanwhile, are similar in process to liqueurs, but with bitter and botanical (often gentian) rather than sweet and fruity in flavor. Vermouth is both a liqueur and a bitter. Liqueurs, bitters, and vermouth can all be drunk neat as semi-medicinal digestifs, but are more popular in cocktails. Juices are relatively newer additions to mass-market cocktails due to their need for refrigeration; traditional non-alcoholic sweeteners are simple syrup (just reduced sugar water, with a high enough sugar content to slow spoilage) and grenadine (reduced pomegranate syrup). Shaking is a way to chill drinks quickly without watering them down or mechanical refrigeration, and is necessary for incorporation of thick or poorly soluble mixers, but is often frowned on for more expensive distillates because it introduces air bubbles which sharpen their alcoholic flavor (called "bruising").

So just what is a cocktail? Originally, a blend of at least one distilled alcohol, at least one bitters, and at least one other ingredient, in contrast to a shot (neat), rocks/lowball (alcohol with just ice or water), or a highball (alcohol with soda water). The original cocktail is now called, without irony, the old fashioned, a blend of whisky, bitters, and simple syrup. As a modifier of mixed drinks, as of wines, dry is simply opposed to sweet. Beyond the old fashioned, the most classic cocktails are the Martini, of gin and vermouth, and the Manhattan, of whiskey (usually rye) and vermouth. These already raise a definitional problem, in that they are drinks of two ingredients, but remember that vermouth is both a liqueur and a bitter. The Negroni is a Manhattan with bitters beyond the vermouth. Substitution of the primary distillate is typically indicated by preface (e.g. vodka martini) whereas substitution of a liqueur (triple sec is the most common) and bitters for the vermouth results in a new cocktail, of which there are innumerable varieties, e.g. the Brooklyn, with whisky, vermouth, cherry liqueur and bitters. Grenadine is also frequently indicated as a sweetener, especially for tropical-themed drinks. If mint is used as the "bitter" botanical, the drink is a julep. Use of a cream or cream liqueur as the sweetener makes an especially large difference to the flavor and texture of the drink, and is sometimes combined with coffee as the bitter flavor, as in a White Russian, Black Russian, Mudslide, etc. A cocktail with egg in addition to the cream is an egg nog.

A mixed drink made with sour instead of bitter flavors is, equally straightforwardly, a sour. Traditional sours, beyond the obvious whiskey sour, include the sidecar (brandy), margarita (tequila), daiquiri (rum), last word (gin), jack rose (apple brandy), and kamikaze (vodka). If you layer rather than mix your sour, that's a -Sunrise. Makers of sours frequently choose citrus liqueurs in replacement, addition, or partial replacement of the citrus and simple syrup, especially in drinks where a strong citrus element is desired without watering down, with triple sec being the most common. Creams and cream liqueurs can't normally be used in sours (because they'll curdle) but the alcohol and acid can "cook" an egg white if properly prepared, which is sometimes used to give a creamy texture and dairy flavor. The egg without the sour is a flip, which has gone out of fashion over health concerns. Sours sometimes have bitters as well, as in Planter's Punch (dark rum daiquiri with bitters). A punch, technically speaking, is just a large-scale sour, which can mean anything with over two shots of liquor, sometimes with the mixer scaled up as well.

A fizz is the marriage of a highball and a sour (i.e. a sour with soda water). The most famous is the Tom Collins (gin fizz). A Tom Collins with egg is a Ramos (which takes ten minutes to make properly), and with champagne instead of the soda water it's a French 75. A whiskey fizz is a hari kari, and a rum julep fizz is a mojito. A fizz with multiple liquours is a -Tea; a fizz without any sweet to counterbalance the sour is a rickey.

In time, a highball came to mean any straightforward drink of alcohol and one substantial mixer, served in something nearly a water glass (to accentuate the vertical bubbling and/or accommodate the volume of the weak mixer), whereas a cocktail came to be any drink of three or more ingredients, served in a conical glass (more appropriate in volume to the stronger drink and said to prevent de-emulsification). Whether a sour was a highball or a cocktail depended on whether it was made in a cheap bar (from pre-made mixer, and weak) or an expensive one (by combining fresh citrus juice and simple syrup, and in lower proportion to the alcohol). This system probably makes a good deal of sense for pricing purposes given the obvious contrasts in ingredients and bartender time, but does little to classify flavor profiles.

With further development, highballs came to be understood as any drink served in a highball glass (including drinks like Planter's Punch and Long Island Iced Tea that are strong and complex), and cocktails as those suited to a cocktail glass, even if you're just calling gin on the rocks a Martini. From the perspective of the recipient, the glass is perhaps a clearer indicator than the ingredients (do people who order vodka martinis extra dry even realize they're just getting chilled vodka?), but it's obviously even less helpful as an aid to memory or discovery of mixed drinks you like. Even more confusingly, the Martini at some point lent its name to the cocktail glass, becoming a Martini glass (and thus anything mixed into it as a -tini) and the Tom Collins at some point lent its name to the highball glass, such that any carbonated highball can be a -Collins. Margaritas are generally served in coupe glasses (invented for cheap sparkling wine) because they offer a more generous rim for salting, and so now any mixed drink served in a broad rather than tall or conical glass is a -rita. Even the shot, as a single pour, has been redefined by its glass, such that a mixed drink in a shot glass (like a B52) is a shooter. Old Fashioneds, because they were invented before the cocktail glass, are frequently served in lowball/rocks glasses, which are now often called Old Fashioned glasses. In short, it's useful to know the names of various pieces of glassware (though beware those who insist on more differentiation than actually exists) and it's useful to categorize mixed drinks, but be careful not to confuse the overlapping terminology.

With the advent of refrigeration, affordable juice cocktails came into style, served as -tini's to foodies, frozen -rita's in chains, and premixed highballs in cheap bars. They provide strong flavors which cover poor alcohol (or the taste of alcohol at all for those less accustomed) and simplify mixing by providing acid, sugar, and flavor in a single ingredient. These include the Cosmopolitan (vodka sour with cranberry juice), Screwdriver (vodka sour with orange juice)(and indeed any alcohol mixed with orange juice as a -Driver), Singapore Sling (gin sour with pineapple juice), Bronx (Manhattan with orange juice), Queens (Manhattan with pineapple juice), strawberry daiquiri, pina colada (daiquiri with pineapple juice and cream of coconut), and Bloody Mary (vodka sour with tomato juice and pepper bitters). Stronger drinks use liqueurs in partial replacement of the juice (and citrus to avoid over-sweetening).

Let me know in the comments if you think I've mis-stated anything or didn't cover a topic you'd like to read about.

UPDATE: It's also worth checking out tips for how to order a drink, and what various drinks mean socially (warning: not-PG) in addition to their flavor profile.

What is Non-Dualism: Comparative Theories of Nonduality by Milton Scarborough

2013-03-07T08:04:00.002-08:00

I am a beginner in Eastern philosophy, but I recently purchased Milton Scarborough's Comparative Theories of Nonduality: The Search for a Middle Way and this entry focuses on the question of what nondualism means in Scarborough's first chapter "Western Dualism and Buddhist Nondualism."

The author begins with racism as an example of dualism ("Dualism Observed"), and ends with an account of the Buddha's journey from the lap of luxury through strict asceticism to the Middle Way ("Buddhist Nondualism and the Middle Way"), thereby framing the importance of nondualism in ethical terms. Positions bordering on dualism are dangerous, even if not strictly erroneous:

binary oppositions and even binary distinctions have become the objects of criticism; such binaries are not, it turns out, utterly innocent. For one thing, they are a first step, a necessary one, toward dualism. This fact alone is not sufficient cause to reject them, but perhaps it should send up a red flag of warning. Moreover, despite being essential to reflection, distinctions are dangerous because of the variety of ways in which they can mislead us into distorting our experience of reality.

This is consistent with an ethical focus, whereby activities not wrong in themselves can still be troubling if they make us more likely to commit wrongs. "More important for the purposes of this volume, however, is the notion of a metaphysical middle way, which is expressed in the Buddha’s doctrines of no-self (Anatman), impermanence (anicca), and dependent co-origination (pratityasamutpada)." So while the impact may be ethical, the underlying question of the volume is metaphysical. So what are the possible Western formulations of the insights underlying nondualism?

Is Non-Dualism Non-Sense?
One strong sense of non-dualism would be conceptual non-dualism, the claim that all distinctions are meaningless. Like verificationism, this seems self-refuting, because it presumes a distinction between the meaningful and the meaningless. Scarborough rejects this sense of non-dualism and its consequent problems, however: "It is important to state that mere difference, opposition, polar opposition, or even contradiction, however, still do not in the strictest sense constitute dualism."

Is Non-Dualism (Physicalist) Monism?
Scarborough follows that denial with the affirmation that

For both the West and Asia, dualism consists of a dichotomy in which the paired terms, concepts, or things have a static substance or fixed essence...Substance is an unchanging, underlying, metaphysical reality in which the qualities or attributes of a thing inhere. A fixed essence consists of changeless attributes, qualities, or meanings that are essential to the nature or identity of a concept or thing. Contradictions or dichotomies with substances or fixed essences are dualisms.

This might be interpreted, especially in light of his reference that "Descartes’s metaphysical dualism of mind and body consists of 'thinking substance' and 'extended substance'" to mean mere substance monism, or physicalism. As I've pointed out, however, there are problems with simultaneously holding to physicalism and common-sense distinctions of physical objects. Insofar as these distinctions are physical, this doesn't necessarily reduce non-dualism to non-sense, but it would vitiate Scarborough's claim that "mere distinctions and the binary terms that usually express them are helpful. They demarcate semantic domains, enabling us to be discriminating." Indeed, he even grants the retorsion argument:

Such distinctions make us intelligent and civilized, give us increased clarity and control, defuse arguments, ease our journey in myriad ways, and even delight us. For both philosophy and other modes of thinking, they are the coin of the realm, the air thought breathes, the energy that propels it forward.They are the indispensable tools for acknowledging boundaries and the ticket price for entry into intelligible reflection or discourse. They are not to be abandoned or disparaged. Indeed, they cannot be abandoned because they are unavoidable. If we think about the matter realistically, utter silence is not an option.

Furthermore, while supervenience physicalism is certainly substance monism, the distinction between that which supervenes and that which is supervened upon would itself seem to be the kind of dichotomy essential to identity of things that non-dualists wish to reject.

Is Non-Dualism Idealism?
Of course there's another substance monism available besides physicalism, namely pure idealism. Indeed Westerners often characterize Buddhism in just this way. An idealist reading of nondualism, however, seems incompatible with Scarborough's worry that "despite being essential to reflection,
distinctions are dangerous because of the variety of ways in which they can mislead us into distorting our experience of reality." He gives three reasons why this is so:

One rather common and simple way they can mislead us is by prompting us to draw boundaries too narrowly and precisely...A guidebook depicted Arkansas as a woodland state dotted with lakes; Oklahoma was said to be a plains state. Yet as we drove across the state line from Arkansas into Oklahoma, the woods did not vanish, the land did not flatten out...Only after continuing for 75 miles or so into Oklahoma did the landscape, which had changed imperceptibly slowly, suddenly appear different. “Woodland” and “plains,” to be sure, are not altogether wrong. In a rough-and-ready way they are helpfully descriptive, yet compared to the actual terrain, they are clearly simplifications.

A second way binary distinctions distort is by numerical simplification...Consider sex, for example. It is usually described by a binary opposition that has become a full-blown dualism...we have believed that there are but two sexes, male and female. But why merely two? Is it because there are two kinds of chromosomes (XX and XY) involved in the genetic determination of sex? Yet the dualism of the sexes preceded our knowledge of chromosomes...

There is a third distortion, one that characterizes dualism in particular. To speak of an essence or substance that is fixed, permanent, or eternal is to deny time and change. Perhaps during the era of Parmenides and Heraclitus it was possible to point to the flowing water of a river as an example of change and to a mountain as an example of the unchanging. At least as late as Newton one could still speak of the “fixed stars.” Edmund Halley, a contemporary of Newton, was the first to understand that even the so-called fixed stars move. Until Charles Lyell, geologists did not understand that rocks were still being laid down by water and also that due to ice, wind, sand, and water were being altered by erosion. Until Charles Darwin, biology continued to speak of fixed species. Until the arrival of the Big Bang theory, astronomers and other physicists could speak of fixed physical laws. Nowadays, we talk of “natural history.” We understand all of these former fixities as flowing; stasis is merely what moves relatively more slowly than other things. If there is something absolutely eternal or fixed, it is beyond perception. At best, such concepts survive largely as “limiting concepts.”

How can an idealist worry about simplifications relative to the actual terrain or the potency of nature discovered in perception? These passages sound too realist for even the weak idealism of Rorty's liberal pragmatic irony, let alone the strong idealism of Hegel or Berkeley traditionally associated with Buddhism. As Scarborough says with regard to Hegel, idealism "for all of its genius, does not fit all situations."

Is Non-Dualism Aristotelianism?
You might be tempted to dismiss this as the nuttiest theory you've ever heard, but hear me out. First, while Aristotelianism might speak of multiple substances, underlying metaphysical realities with fixed essences, they aren't opposed realms, or contradictories. The method of division is not a method of opposition, as species are understood together in their shared genus. Change is attended to rather than denied, and distinctions are drawn carefully from perception, avoiding overreach. Aristotle's anthropology seems resilient to

the seemingly endless pendulum swings of Western culture, what I term the “zigzag effect.” Descartes, Leibniz, and Spinoza, for example, established a rationalist epistemology that affirmed the power of unaided reason to arrive at clear and certain knowledge by means of innate ideas, deduction, intellectual intuition, or a priori categories. This was the zig. Locke, Berkeley, and Hume launched a contrary movement that emphasized the role of sense data generated, in most cases, by causal relations with an external, physical world. Here was the zag. Both movements were overstatements, lacking descriptive sensitivity and nuance.

Furthermore, Scarborough links non-dualism with the Buddhist Middle Way: "Food is neither to be rejected nor pursued gluttonously but ingested as medicine. Neither extreme asceticism nor lavish living eliminates ego; both strengthen it." That certainly sounds very similar to Aristotle's golden mean. And in metaphysics, also, both Aristotle and the Buddha would apparently affirm a contingently existing (neither astitta nor nastitta) self (namarupa) made up of proper parts (skandhas), making choices with multiple causes. They might differ over the temporal directedness of causality, but that would seem to pale next to their commonalities.

Is Non-Dualism Phenomenology?
Without discarding the Aristotelian parallels, it's also worth considering whether nondualism might be well understood as a branch of phenomenology (especially as there are Aristotelian branches of phenomenology, like transcendental Thomism). As Scarborough notes:

Such a metaphysical middle way also implies an epistemological middle way. If the self is constituted in and by a web of causal relations, it is not independent of the world. Thus, while there can be a subject-object distinction, there can be no subject-object dualism. The absence of an inner-outer, subject-object gap to be inexplicably crossed means that the necessity of complete skepticism is ruled out.

That certainly sounds an awful lot like, say, the phenomenology of Cassirer or what is sometimes described as Lonergan's non-dualism. It's not clear, however, why Scarborough jumps from the rejection of naive realism to the rejection of certainty:

On the other hand, since knowledge is based on the self’s experience as part of the web of interacting events, absolutely certain knowledge is rejected as well. The self cannot step outside the web in order to view it as an object arrayed with utter clarity before either the eye or the mind’s eye.

There's no real argument there, especially since Scarborough's treatment of Nagarjuna on interdependence sounds suspiciously like Lonergan's account of explanatory knowing (which gives rise to ontological pluralism rather than dualism):

On the other hand, if asked to define “present,” we would almost certainly do one of two things: (1) supply a synonym for “present” or (2) offer a definition that includes a reference, tacit or explicit, to “future” and/or “past.” In the first case, one might say that the present is “now” or “this very moment,” which may not be helpful because those terms themselves may need to be defined. In the more likely second case, one might say, “The present is what comes after the past and before the future.” Nagarjuna’s tactic is to focus on the second case, pointing out that the meaning of any one of the three terms is dependent on the meaning of the other two. Consequently, the terms are interdependent. Viewing the words as interdependent leads to viewing the three concepts of time and then the three realities of time as interdependent,

It's clear why metaphysics must be interdependent in order to make sense of our experience, but it's not clear why this means it must be destabilizing, unless the fixed essences are understood to be those of naive realism. Lonergan's notion of the empirical residue also seems consonant with Nagarjuna's account of emptiness, since while it's not real (it has no immanent intelligibility to be verified) it is nonetheless the ground of the real. It remains unclear to me whether the Two Truths are better understood as an idealism (transcendence of the conventional world) or as critical realism (acceptance of the conventional world as contingently known). Much of Scarborough's account, which is unfortunately too long to quote, makes the latter seem plausible even if it is ambiguous. The difficulty with ascribing non-dualism as critical realism comes in with his account of attachment:

What concerned Nagarjuna is that if people became bound to the doctrine of emptiness, then liberation would elude them. After all, clinging to views is itself a form of clinging (tanha), the principal cause of suffering, according to the Buddha’s Four Noble Truths). Clinging to “right view” (Buddhist teaching that leads to awakening) itself binds one to suffering. The ultimate meaning of emptiness, then, is the cessation of clinging to any views at all, even Buddhist ones.

That's presumably the perspective underlying Scarborough's critique of Kant and his medieval forbears:

Kant’s attempt at a synthesis of the two positions, based as it was on the oppositions of a priori vs. a posteriori, phenomenal vs. noumenal, form vs. content, and theoretical reason vs. practical reason was no more satisfactory than the long disintegrated and overly simple “medieval synthesis” of revealed theology with natural theology and faith with reason. There was merely the substitution of one set of oppositions for another, a sleight of thought that brought but a temporary and illusory relief. The real culprit, the intellectual habit of reliance on simple binary oppositions, was left unidentified and, thus, “allowed” to perpetuate its deleterious effects.

But what's the real objection here? Is it just that the claims are too simple, which the critical realist would affirm in the case of Kant and also in the case of predominant naive realist readings of the medieval synthesis? If the claim is stronger than that, why doesn't it destabilize Nagarjuna's language beyond any capacity for meaning? Scarborough critiques Derrida, saying that deconstruction is predicated on opposition, but couldn't Derrida return the favor here? Or is the claim again about contingency, that what privileges Nagarjuna over Kant is the understanding that knowledge comes from emptiness and will itself be transcended? If so, the transcendental Thomists are on the same page, as "All that I [Thomas] have written seems like straw compared to what has now been revealed to me" (A Taste of Water : Christianity through Taoist-Buddhist Eyes by Chwen Jiuan Agnes Lee and Thomas G. Hand). “Not being able to do the work of the angels in choir, we can at least write about them,” but we should not become so attached to such writing as to not joyously join the angels in choir. It's difficult to understand what stronger claim for contingency against essences could be made without either reverting to naive realism or giving up on meaning itself.

The Abortifacient Controversy

2013-03-05T12:27:00.000-08:00

In my recent post on the German bishops' decision to administer emergency contraception to rape victims at Catholic hospitals, I noted that the bishops' decision had less to do with when contraception is licit (in short, in rape there is no conjugal act to impair) and more to do with their finding of fact that Plan B is not an abortifacient. Much as pregnancy outside of marriage can be painful, especially to rape victims, babies are innocent gifts from God in all cases, and that pain cannot be weighed against their lives, which is why abortion is always illicit even in cases of rape. That God transfigures the effects of evil into gifts of love is the very meaning of the cross of Christ. Knowledge of the wrongness of abortion is fortunately not dependent on faith, but the hope born of faith can be critical for understanding pains as not unreasonably burdensome, as Martin Rhonheimer explains:

What in principle looks intrinsically reasonable and human, such as the ideal of inseparable fidelity in marriage or the unconditional respect for human life, ends up appearing to unassisted human reason, at least in many cases, as unattainable in practice and therefore unreasonable and even inhuman. So—and this is my main point—Christian morality, to a large extent, throws light on the possibility of living a moral life which fully meets the intrinsic demands of human nature. This means that we can speak of a true specific Christian humanism which differs from the purely secular humanism of the nonbeliever. Thus, what initially appears unreasonable regains reasonableness through faith, hope and charity. That is how faith in fact rescues reason and reason recovers all its power to make faith both human and effective. Rightly understood, reason therefore needs revelation for being capable of effectively working as moral reason and to maintain the “reasonableness of morality.”

But why should anyone object to or be confused by the German bishops new policy (indeed, why wasn't it their old policy?) if emergency contraception doesn't impede the conjugal act and doesn't cause abortions? Well, the main problem is that Plan B, the most effective and widely used drug, says on the box that it can impede implantation of an embryo in the endometrium. Others say that labeling is irrelevant. At least two complicating issues are in play here: first, what is the definition of pregnancy, and second, how certain do we have to be about the drug's mechanism of action? The journal article drawn on by NCR provides useful information about how Plan B works, but clouds the issue by assuming that the moral evil of abortion can only be perpetrated on a woman who is pregnant. What? While conception, generally referred to medically as fertilization, is the morally relevant point at which new life begins (contrary understandings of quickening or ensoulment being scientifically illiterate), pregnancy is generally defined as implantation, because that is when the mother's body responds to the conception. So articles or studies which define abortifacient effects as only the loss of the fetus after implantation don't address the full moral question, even if they are scientifically convenient because the results are easier to measure. On the other hand, those who consider emergency conception to be abortifacient often unhelpfully conflate Plan B, the most commonly prescribed drug, with the earlier RU-486 (known to cause abortions) and the more recent Ella (as yet largely unstudied).

But how certain are we of the efficacy of Plan B itself? Despite some skepticism around the timing of the findings, substantial review of the literature shows basically no evidence for an abortifacient effect. Of course absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, and it's certainly reasonable to be cautious when human life is at risk. The notion that only 1-3% of women given Plan B might become pregnant (such that any rare abortifacient effect would be yet more miniscule) is no advantage, because those numbers also mean Plan B is rarely helpful for its intended effect (and they're also a major cause of the difficulty of studying the phenomenon). That's presumably why some women might exemplify heroic virtue and, like pacifists in wartime, put earthly defense aside for eschatological hope. But given the near-total absence of evidence for an abortifacient effect, and the evidence that Plan B does effectively delay ovulation and thicken cervical mucus, any extremely rare abortive effect would clearly fall under the doctrine of double effect. The Church, after all, does not forbid driving because a child might be killed. Hospitals and rape victims should feel no moral qualms, compunction, or guilt about the administration of Plan B given our current medical knowledge. Administration of a pregnancy test first is reasonable, since after implantation Plan B can only be harmful, but administration of an ovulation test is a needless delay and may prevent Plan B from working due to its secondary mucosal effects and the imprecision of the ovulation test. Certainly when facing the alternative of not being able to give rape victims appropriate medical care, the German bishops made the right decision.

Contraception Casuistry

2013-03-01T20:50:00.000-08:00

In response to l'affair Sandra Fluke and the more recent approval by the German bishops for emergency contraception for rape victims at Catholic hospitals, it's worth understanding why the Church's position often seems so complicated (or even contradictory) to outsiders. I'd like to begin by distinguishing between three different realms of moral discourse:

Prophecy, in which the word of God is proclaimed to a sinful culture. Here the goal is not to pinpoint the details of sinful behaviors or judge individual persons, but rather to proclaim the truth to a culture that has forgotten or ignored it. When the prophets of old demanded that Israel stop worshiping Mammon, they didn't generally dwell on the finer points of what constituted worship and what was merely public order or respect for the beliefs of others. Prophecy particularly addresses those who act in willful ignorance of God's law.
Reconciliation, in which the individual sinner, induced by prophecy to contrition for his sin, is guided back to God. Here the focus is frequently less on the sinful act than on the penitent's frame of mind and habitual patterns of behavior, and what can be done to overcome those. Reconciliation particularly addresses those who want to obey God's law but struggle to be consistent in their wills.
Casuistry, in which particular cases are analyzed in the light of prophecy. Casuistry is particularly addressed to those who want to follow God's will but are genuinely unsure of how particular concrete actions would help or hinder that process.

Now obviously what is said in the modes of prophecy, reconciliation, and casuistry cannot contradict each other if all human affairs participate in the same eternal law of God, but as they address themselves to three very different (though overlapping) audiences, their modes of discourse will be rather different. Where prophecy is required, reconciliation and casuistry fail, as they assume the audience desires to know God's will and how to follow it. Where reconciliation is required, prophecy reduces to scrupling and casuistry to laxity. Where casuistry is required, both prophecy and reconciliation are inadequate: neither gives Catholic hospitals detailed guidance in difficult cases. In Lonergan's terms, prophecy addresses the problem of major inauthenticity, while reconciliation addresses the problem of minor (which is not to say less important) inauthenticity, and casuistry navigates the boundary between the two.

So from a prophetic point of view, contraception is morally wrong, and we live in a contraceptive culture. We must proclaim the virtue of chastity, and uphold the model of a chaste marriage. From a reconciliation point of view, if you are using contraception, please embrace the power of fasting and sacraments this Lent to excise the evil and grow closer to God. But what about from a casuistry point of view? What counts as contraception? When is it wrong? Well, that's what this post is all about.

Contraception, a moral evil
So, what is contraception? To contracept is to attempt to prevent sex from achieving its dual natural ends of marital union and fecundity. So contraception is an intentional act, a human act, which interferes with the purpose of sex, another intentional human action. Contraception is evil precisely because it interferes with a good and is never necessary (abstinence is always possible). Murder is still murder even if the gang leader said you'd be next if you didn't follow through. This doesn't mean that from the perspective of reconciliation these pressures can't reduce culpability, but it doesn't mean that contraception is ever appropriate. It is an intrinsic evil, and intrinsic evils are never permissible.

How can any action ever be intrinsically evil, such that nobody can ever morally do it, no matter what other good may come or evil be avoided? Long answer, shorter answer, shortest answer. Which is to say that if you're a Catholic you can take it on authority, or if you're an Aristotelian you can follow the shortest answer, but if you're a reductionist about action you'll have to work through the long answer, and you might need some metaphysics besides. What about contraception in particular, why would it merit joining a list filled with murder, rape, and slavery? Long answer, shorter answer, shortest answer. Again, if you're not a Catholic or an Aristotelian, the assumptions relied on by the shortcuts won't be very palatable to you. Remember that the intrinsic evil of an action is not dependent on the gravity of its effects, which explains why lists of intrinsically evil acts seem odd to modern ears, with contraception, fornication, and masturbation next to rape, murder, genocide, and slavery. The claim is that each can be known to be always wrong, not that their moral gravity is the same. Similarly, because the wrongness of the acts isn't dependent on their moral gravity, performance of an intrinsically evil act can never be justified on the basis of some supposed good. Now this doesn't deny the terrible consequences of contraceptive culture, but it does mean that contraception's evil isn't dependent on statistical arguments.

Things that aren't intrinsically evil because they aren't contraception, even if they look like it
Natural family planning is not contraception, even if it as effective as contraception in governing the timing of births. Why? Is this not just casuistry in the sense of laxity, a consigliere finding supposedly licit means to achieve illicit ends? No, because abstinence is always licit when mutually chosen by the couple, and natural family planning is merely periodic abstinence. It does not presume to remove from God the question of whether a particular act of intercourse achieves its natural end of procreation. Of course, just because NFP isn't contraceptive and thus isn't intrinsically evil doesn't mean it can't be evil in particular cases. A spouse who selfishly desired to avoid children would be committing an evil, just not because he was using an evil means.

Another indisputable case where birth control is allowed is that of rape, as Archbishop Chaput teaches and Fr. Saunders explains. Since the woman victimized by rape did not consent to sexual intercourse, there is no union whose fruit is denied. Just because birth control in such cases is not the human act of contraception, however, does not mean that all methods are licit, because as those two article make clear the health and life of a potentially-already-conceived child is crucial. In cases where an intrinsic evil is not in play, we must weigh consequences, and the potential death of an innocent person is a mighty consequence indeed. The German bishops decided to license emergency contraception precisely because they decided it was not an abortifacient--those wishing to be more cautious can follow the protocol Fr. Saunders describes.

The church has long taught (though it must be carefully understood) the doctrine of double-effect; medicine prescribed for a licit medical purpose is wholly licit, whatever its unintended contraceptive purpose, though the trade-offs must be weighed. Georgetown may have bizarrely and tragically not complied with that policy, but the teaching itself is quite clear and fully elaborated. The church does not presume to argue with doctors on the question of medical fact.

Also quite clear are the cases of oral, anal, and other non-vaginal sexual encounters, whether hetero- or homosexual. In such cases the act itself is basically masturbatory and therefore illicit, but insofar as the act itself has no possibility of procreation, there's nothing to contracept, whatever devices may be used. In heterosexual cases the act itself may be contraceptive, but no further contraceptive device could therefore make it so. In fact, the use of barriers to prevent disease transmission may be a first step towards responsibility, the realization that sex has consequences and must be an act of love for the other person.

Controverted Cases
Beyond the clear cases of contraception and the clear cases of non-contraception, there are of course the controverted cases. In controverted cases, where the connection between the prophesy and the concrete situation is least clear, the wisdom of the person pronouncing judgment is paramount. Since I have little ethical training, have never been married, and hold no ecclesiastical office, I will merely outline the cases and point to further resources while refraining from judgment.

The first controverted case is that of Catholic institutions facing the HHS mandate. Of course, it's not only committing intrinsically evil acts that is always evil, but being an accomplice to them is as well. One who desires the act is a formal accomplice, whereas one who provides support necessary for accomplishing the act without desiring it is only a material accomplice. Material cooperation is not itself an intrinsic evil (no evil object is intentionally chosen), so the evil done is evil done as a consequence, and thereby can be weighed against the good done as a consequence. Since the good done by Catholic hospitals and healthcare institutions is presumably substantial, compliance with the HHS mandate might be justifiable (if not desirable) if the cooperation implied was only material and remote. But of course what degree of cooperation is implied by the legal structures involved is open to question (1, 2, 3, 4, 5). It's also unclear whether the revisions are sufficient to change the situation, with most bishops against for several reasons, but some relieved. Of course no Catholic bishop is going to support a plan which promotes intrinsic evil and burdens his flock just because the Church will only have some remote material rather than formal cooperation, but if that's as much as we're likely to get under the First Amendment and it's sufficient to avoid closing our schools and hospitals, then it's nonetheless an important victory.

A second controverted case is whether spouses may use condoms to prevent STD transmission. The argument for is that preventing the transmission of an STD to one's spouse is clearly a loving intention, and the contraception is not intentional but merely a double effect. The argument against is that abstinence seems like a more loving alternative. Martin Rhonheimer and Janet Smith squared off over this issue (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7).

A third controverted case is that of fornication. Humanae Vitae only speaks explicitly to the marital case, presumably because in fornication the unitive aspect is already severely defective, and thus there is no close connection between unity and procreation. Put differently, the sexual act is already sinful under the species of fornication, and so the species of contraception is irrelevant. One might think that as with non-vaginal intercourse and the STD case, the use of contraception might be a first step towards responsibility. Nonetheless, authorities have been reluctant to give approbation to this use of contraceptives, likely because their use could indicate premeditation or an even more defective view of human sexuality and more presciently because it would be confused as approbation for the fornication itself.

Lent, Confession, and Penance

2013-02-27T09:27:00.003-08:00

"By the sweat of your brow you shall eat bread, until you return to the ground, from which you were taken; For you are dust, and to dust you shall return." - Genesis 3:19

I don't normally offer much of a pastoral nature, insofar as I'm not a pastor and most readers of this blog probably either aren't Catholic or are Catholics with a rich parish life who don't need to be told this stuff. Nonetheless, a major point of this blog is to record thoughts I've frequently shared or links I've frequently referred to people, and I am often asked about Lent, so I thought it was worth passing on some of the better resources I've encountered.

First, an overview from Timothy Cardinal Dolan, Archbishop of New York:

We begin Lent with the humility of ashes, but it also contains many liturgical changes you might notice at Mass, and a number of other canonical norms which Catholics are often poorly informed about. Yes, it's important to know who must give up what on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, but it's important not to add to the law, which many unwittingly do by passing on personal or familial devotions as if they were obligatory. Which doesn't, of course, mean that such devotions aren't valuable, as the Holy Father aptly explains.

"Turn away from sin and be faithful to the Gospel." - Mark 1:15

The other formulation for the imposition of ashes reminds us of the most important task of Lent, the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Going to confession is always scary, especially if you've been away for a long time, because as St. John Chrysostom says, "you have seen the face of Christ in His glory":

But as John Paul II was fond of quoting the Angel's annunciation to Mary: "Be not afraid!" which continues "for behold, I bring you good news of a great joy which will come to all the people." And the Sacrament of Reconciliation is indeed that great joy, in which we offer up our intrinsic disorder to God's transcendence. Without confession, we cannot truly see nor bear the cross. We tire of asking forgiveness, but God the father of mercies never tires of forgiving us. In addition to good advice, a helpful FAQ and the official bulletin inserts, here's a video that may help lessen your fear enough to help you courageously experience this great joy:

UPDATE: Our new Pope Francis reminds us sinners to seek God in mercy and solidarity with the poor.

Healthcare Economics

2013-02-25T18:13:00.001-08:00

If you live in the U.S. and not under a rock, you've likely been hearing a good bit of brouhaha over healthcare costs--both how high they are and who pays them. If you're not quite up on what's going on, this Time article is a great place to start. What that article and most others give, however, is a narrative, not an argument, so let's break this down.

TL;DR:

The cost trend problem is just as bad as in Europe, will likely fix itself, and if not it might be hopeless. We pay 27% more than Europe for the same procedures because in the 70s we brought the government into the market with Medicare and simultaneously reduced residency slots, leading to much higher physician salaries. Solution: pass HR6352.

First, are we actually paying too much?

The Time article makes much of the "charge master" or list rates--but of course this is an ethical or maybe political problem but not an economic problem. In any industry, whether enterprise software or education, that involves relatively few transactions that consumers are willing to spend a lot of time negotiating, price discrimination will run rampant and price transparency will be low. The trick here is mostly to get uninsured people insurance, which is after all the primary effect of the ACA. Single-payer or what have you might be even better in this regard (after all the Massachusetts system covers 97 rather than 100%) but that's again a question of political will rather than economics. It might also be an ethical issue, in that charitable institutions should probably spend less time terrifying working class people who come to them for help, but this post isn't about ethics.

The second regard in which healthcare is said to cost too much is that it will soon amount to 20% of U.S. GDP. But why is that a problem? Would it be better if we went back to spending more money on houses instead? Do we need more polluting cars, or more household gadgets we don't have space for? More luxury goods? It seems reasonable that sectors like healthcare and education should be more in demand than other sectors as incomes rise, and in sectors where value is identified as time with the provider, productivity gains are hard to realize. But there's nothing inherently bad about any particular sectoral split.

Perhaps the issue arises when the previous two points are combined: if the poor need to receive as much healthcare as the rich, and healthcare grows as a portion of the economy, then non-market (typically government) share of the economy will rise dramatically, which may be a political problem (or even an economic problem if government-managed sectors have lower productivity). The options would be to either accept increasing consumption inequality or improve healthcare productivity, about which more below. Of course, the instinct to care more about productivity and less about inequality could be summarized as "be less like Europe" and one of the key points of the Time piece is that we are paying 27% more than Europeans in total and 100% more in many non-Medicare areas: in other words "be more like Europe." The main problem with the "we're paying more than Europe" story is that their cost growth rates are the same as ours (and cost growth is a much more minor factor than demographics anyway) and of course we have higher-per-capita-GDP than they do now, so we can afford to pay somewhat more than they do now and neither of us will be able to pay what healthcare will soon cost if the trend continues to increase for very long. Paying more than Europe also doesn't mean much absent a good causal story of why and what to do about it: Europeans, after all, pay much more than we do for basically all consumer durables, especially electronics, and for housing and many services as well. They'd obviously love to change this, but not at the cost of their own worker protections.

So in short, we are paying significantly more than Europe, but the bigger problem is cost growth on both continents that will create political trouble regarding government share of the economy over time.

Second, why do we pay more than Europe?

I've read dozens of different sensible-sounding theories, but the data say that it's because our doctors and hospitals have roughly twice the profit for the same procedures as ones in Europe. So why is that? Well, common law medical malpractice tort liability may explain 10% of the difference, but that's only 2% of the total costs. A big part of the answer is that mixed models don't work well to control costs: the U.S. has too much regulation and centralization for market discipline of costs in negotiation with insurers, but does not have a democratically accountable fully single-payer or price controlled system. The rapid increase in doctor salaries corresponds to the introduction of Medicare, supporting this claim. But why did doctor salaries continue to rise, rather than the supply of doctors increase? Because the number of residency slots is capped (last full paragraph). Rather than churning out doctors who can't get residencies, as law schools and PhD programs do, medical school has just gotten massively more competitive over time (last full paragraph).

Doctors used to work for less, and doctors in Europe do work for less. The constraint on doctor supply combines with the elastic demand of a mixed payment system to increase prices. Expanding residency slots costs a drop in the bucket compared to ACA and impedes no one's freedom--people want to be doctors! The eighteen states which allow significant practice freedoms to nurse practitioners and physicians' assistants show such providers achieve the same or better health outcomes than doctors, so some attempts to increase supply are being made. If medical schools couldn't admit more students because they weren't willing to pay or couldn't pass the USMLE needed to practice, non-doctor providers would indeed be the only reasonable method to increase supply. But since the constraint is residency slots, which are directly controlled by the Federal government, increases would not only add to the supply of doctors but allow new medical schools and teaching hospitals to open, reducing cartelization at the same time. This is a complete no-brainer. Matt Yglesias favors straight-up price controls, which he demonstrates won't lead hospitals to lose money, but admits that will decrease supply. Why not just increase supply?

Third, what to do about the health care cost curve?

Increasing the supply of providers is by far the best short-term measure to bend the cost curve, but won't likely make that much long-term difference because nations without similarly constrained supply are seeing similar annual price increases, even with direct price controls. First, it's important to realize that the problem might just fix itself. Long term, we're going to have to improve provider productivity, which means reducing provider patient time, which means drugs and devices. The FDA is the major obstacle to that, so reforming the FDA would help. Patent reform might also help decrease the problematic cost cliff between patent and generic drugs. But the long-term problem is a technology problem, and technical innovation is hard and the social policy necessary to support it is often not obvious.

UPDATE: Bryan Caplan has come up with an ingenious test showing that physician supply is capped by a strict quota.

UPDATE2: If you're wondering why increasing residencies would decrease hospital profits, hospitals are better described as monopolistic competition than perfect monopoly. One piece of evidence for this is that most hospital "profits" are not quite profits but capital depreciation (the Time article equivocates a little too quickly on this). While true that capital depreciation is not a marginal cost and hence indicative of monopolistic behavior, it is indicative of real real capital expenditure rather than pure profit taking--the 'subtle quality differences' the wiki article talks about, e.g. facilities like Hopkins' new $2B building which do create quality differentiation but not proportional to their cost. Further, as the wiki article also makes clear, the main check on price increases in monopolistic competition is market entry: but with residencies capped, new teaching hospitals can't open at all, and new regional hospitals can only open by bidding up the price of doctors: such hospitals do have lower capital depreciation, but salaries destroy most of the advantage. An increase in residencies means more doctors and more hospitals, thus reducing the profits of both.

UPDATE3: Of course hospital expansion may not have its full effect on pricing without reforming certificates of need and Federal anti-trust oversight. Unfortunately these stipulations are staple dysfunctions of half-regulated systems.

UPDATE4: People are starting to get it (especially read the comments).

New Old Posts

2013-02-13T09:02:00.003-08:00

So I finally managed to import all the philosophy posts from the previous incarnation of this blog, hosted on Drupal at reasonablereflection.net. And I did it without spamming the RSS or Twitter feeds! Yay! I'll be importing selected old politics posts at a later date. Since the posts are old, there are likely to be many dead links, a problem of which I am also a cause. I've tried to clean up the self-links and any links really critical to understanding the arguments, but if you come across a dead link and you successfully find the original article in Google, please post a comment and I'll update the original. Conversely, if you want to track down a citation and you can't find it, leave a comment and I'll try to be of assistance.

In any case, thirteen posts from 2005 and nine posts from 2004 are now again available on the internet for your reading pleasure. They were obviously written while I was an undergraduate, but I think most of them hold up pretty well and I'd largely stand behind them. I also imported all of the comments; in addition to my usual interlocutors Byron Borger and Richard Cleary, Brian Weatherson, John Turri, Jeremy Pierce, Stephen Lenhart, Nancy Pearcey, Sean Purcell, and others stopped by to offer their insights. All in all, my back catalog on critical realism has really expanded (though I wasn't any better at explaining phenomenology to analytic realists then than I am now), as has the history of my engagement with reformed (neocalvinist) philosophy. Both are ongoing interests and I hope to have more posts in both categories as time goes on. Perhaps more in the historical curiosity camp at this point, I also wrote a series of five contentious posts on intelligent design.

Debate Tournament Instability

2013-02-01T16:14:00.002-08:00

Palmer has some thoughts up on the decline of Emory in LD and IEs. I can't quibble with his concrete suggestions and call for solidarity, but I think there are some underlying structural factors at work.

Once Upon a Time (tm) the debate community, especially the Lincoln-Douglas debate community, wasn't very well networked. LD was often seen as an adjunct at speech or policy tournaments (a bit the way PF is often seen now). The LD-L carried a lot of email traffic, but personal ties among members were weak and flame-wars common. Airline tickets were expensive. Computer tabbing was young, and judge assignments were largely random and/or at the will of the tabroom. Tab errors were fairly frequent, rounds were few, lag-pairing was not uncommon, and breaks were often steep. In short, most tournaments were local and regional, and luck was an important component of success. Large college tournaments (Harvard, Villiger at St. Joe's, Wake Forest, etc) weren't run much better than local tournaments, but they were the only way to compete against a wider base of students for TOC bids and establish a national reputation. Colleges drew based on their name and college forensics reputation, and made large amounts of money on their tournaments.

Gradually, with airline deregulation and the advance of the internet, high school debate coaches began to form a more cohesive and professional community. The NDCA was founded. As a consequence, the coaches who considered themselves part of that community began to hold each other to higher standards. They ran reasonably priced tournaments with good hospitality and quality hired judges. They tabbed with TRPC which reduced errors and downtime and eventually allowed the proliferation of mutual judge preferences. Expectations for judges went up, with judges who weren't preferred no longer getting rounds. The changes at Bronx were the flagship, but other tournaments like Lexington and Hendrick Hudson weren't far behind. Coaches began to question why they were paying so much money to attend college tournaments, which were run less efficiently, frequently had less preferred judges, and funded already wealthy colleges. Some college tournaments (Yale most notably, with Princeton and Columbia following, and Penn at a distance) brought on high school coaches for tabulation and implemented many of the reforms first made at the high schools. Others like St. Joe's, Wake Forest, now Emory, and even Harvard failed to reform and began to feel pressure.

This, however, has led to an unstable situation. A few tournaments, like Yale and Bronx, are indisputably on the strongest footing, due both to their natural advantages (good weekends, strong brands, obvious judge pool) and the hard work of their directors and tabulators. The unreformed college tournaments are run by policy or I.E. directors who don't especially know or care about LD, but continue to attract competition because they're attractive destinations for teams more focused on policy or IEs, or who want to make one big trip a year. Even the reformed college tournaments, like Columbia and Penn, have trouble matching the efficiency of the higher quality high school tournaments, because their rounds are necessarily more spread out, and their judge pool is more diverse without alumni to pull from. They also don't have parents available to provide high quality hospitality at low cost.

The high school tournaments, however, have a different set of problems. The larger ones (Bronx excepted, of course) will never have the number of rooms available at Harvard or Wake Forest, so they can't accept IE entries, and they obviously don't have the brand power of the major colleges. So LDers from more marginal schools will always prefer the college tournaments. To a certain extent, the improved efficiency and meritocracy are actually a negative for more marginal programs, who can no longer hope for a lucky break, or plausibly ascribe failure to others' incompetence. The smaller high school tournaments have trouble pulling in varsity debaters who can always travel to a TOC bid tournament somewhere on a given weekend. And so as has been noted many times, the debate Gini coefficient rises.

So as a life member of the NDCA, I'm quite convinced that the "NDCA model" of debate, with a strongly cooperative and professional group of coaches and high-efficiency, low-cost, and extremely meritocratic tournament model is the best one. But if we want to have a stable equilibrium, we need to figure out how to keep debate workable for IE-focused schools.

Stuff EMTs Know

2013-01-31T17:30:00.001-08:00

The national Department of Transportation Emergency Medical Technician curriculum is only 110 hours, which doesn't allow a lot of time for theory beyond Biology 101. Most of what EMTs learn is how to be both quick and thorough (not easy in any profession, let alone with lives on the line) and how to function as professionals with difficult patients and within the incident command system during emergencies. Despite that, there are some bits of medical knowledge that EMTs pick up that are worth sharing with the broader public.

Your chances of surviving severe heart problems depend strongly on the causes.

Bradycardia (slow heartbeat, sometimes too slow to feel a pulse). In this case, the heart has normal electrical activity, but (typically) has not received enough oxygen to continue beating normally. Common causes are drowning, and narcotics overdose (which stops breathing). In this case, CPR is extremely effective, since it provides oxygen and circulates it within the body while the causes are treated (liver processes the drugs hopefully assisted by Narcan, water is no longer in the mouth, etc.). This is the basis for the increasing focus on compressions and de-emphasis on ventilations: few or poor compressions (good ones must be 1/3 of the body thickness) never succeed in filling the heart and generating blood pressure, thus failing to actually deliver any oxygen. Inadequate ventilations, however, still allow the (often substantial) oxygen available in the lungs (only a part of the oxygen is replaced with carbon dioxide in each respiration) and blood to circulate, and often just a brief period of CPR is sufficient to restore spontaneous circulation. Basically everybody who gets CPR vomits, so be prepared to roll and clear immediately, rather than treating vomit as a remote possibility. EMTs use advanced airways precisely to avoid this frequent repositioning Hypothermia seems like it should fall under this category, but doesn't, for complicated reasons, and similarly lightning strike seems like it ought to be a very different category but CPR often works.
Ventricular fibrillation (chaotic heart contractions too uncoordinated to produce a strong pulse). In this case, an AED can often provide a shock to restore heart function, and CPR is just a stop-gap measure of a few minutes until the AED arrives. Prolonged CPR is highly unlikely to result in a good outcome, which is why a drop in AED prices and hence wider availability in schools, police cars, etc, is likely to be very good news for heart attack victims.
Asystole (no electrical activity in the heart--the classic flatline on the monitor). CPR and AEDs won't save you; and in fact they won't even shock you since there's no fibrillation to defibrillate. This includes nearly all trauma victims--it's worth a try, of course, but people whose hearts stop from trauma stay dead.
Acute myocardial infarction (heart attack with a pulse, where a coronary artery is blocked). Here cardiac drugs, often epinephrine, and blood thinners (take four baby aspirin ASAP), or nitroglycerin if you're prescribed it, keep the heart going until the hospital can insert a catheter to physically clear the blockage or graft in a bypass.
Pulmonary embolism and pericardial tamponade. These are cases where the heart is failing to pump blood not through any failing of its own but because it can't push the blood against a blockage of some kind. Surgery and/or drugs are extremely effective; though they must be administered in a timely manner to avoid death. Mostly what the EMTs will do is give you oxygen so your heart can work less hard on the way to the hospital.

After heart and respiratory problems, the next most common acute issue EMTs deal with is shock. Many older first aid books are vague about what shock is, but we now know that shock is really simple: hypoperfusion. Not enough oxygen going around to keep cells alive. So the acute circulatory problems above can basically be redefined as cardiogenic shock. Leaving the rarer and more complex neuro/vasogenic shock aside for the moment, what EMTs worry about in trauma cases is hypovolemic shock--not having enough oxygen-carrying blood in the circulatory system to perfuse tissues.

The most common cause of hypovolemic shock is an exterior bleed, especially a pulsating arterial one moving too fast to clot on its own. These can kill fast, but thankfully they're pretty simple to fix--push down hard and keep the pressure on until the bleeding stops. Forget pressure points (no evidence that they work) and elevation (doesn't hurt, but doesn't make much difference, either). Just push and hold until the bleeding stops. If you have a limb with a wound too ragged to find one place to push, make a tourniquet out of anything and place it above the wound, and tighten it until the bleeding slows. The concerns about tourniquets don't really hold up--they can be on for at least an hour without causing tissue damage, and there are no special rules about where to put them. Just get it on before the person loses too much blood, so they don't die before they get a transfusion.
The second most common is breaking a major bone like the pelvis or femur (not, interestingly enough, the narrower hip joint between the two). Major blood vessels run through these bones, and without the compression strength of the bone, the muscles in tension will continually pull the sharp bone ends against the vessels, re-opening clots and causing potentially-fatal internal bleeds. The solution for the pelvis is to use a belt to compress the bone back together, while in the case of the femur traction needs to be pulled on the leg to counteract the contracting muscles. Smaller bones should be re-aligned with gentle traction in order to restore circulation, sensation, and motion in the affected limbs, but are not large enough to cause a fatality.
Internal bleeding in the abdomen or chest are worse, since there's no direct way to encourage clotting. Moving rapidly to surgery is critical for someone with signs of shock (pale, cool, clammy skin) who has swelling in these areas. In general, EMTs can guess at the affected organ by the location of abdominal pain, but can't do much for abdominal problems beyond giving charcoal for some cases of poisoning.
Penetrating chest wounds pose further complications. First, you can't use tourniquets on large wounds, so a clotting agent may be required to stop the bleeding. Second, they require an occlusive dressing so that pressure doesn't build up between the lungs and the chest, inhibiting breathing.

The next thing EMTs worry about is brain problems like stroke/aneurysm and traumatic brain injury (especially its emergent form with rising intra-cranial pressure). Here there's not a lot we can do other than get you to the hospital quickly, but it's well-worth knowing the signs and symptoms so that you can get your loved ones into a doctor's care quickly. Any unexplained decrease or loss of consciousness or awareness is significant and needs to be treated (diagnosed seizure patients and diabetics should know what's normal for them, but seizures are not normally life-threatening unless they continue for a long time without return of normal consciousness, and it's always safe to give a diabetic some sugar if they're conscious and can swallow but not fully alert--they can test themselves when their alertness increases).

We also worry about systemic issues like dehydration/heat exhaustion/heat stroke (and hypothermia) and sepsis (systemic infection). There are of course lists of signs and symptoms for these conditions, but the most important thing is to pay attention to the appearance (especially skin) and level of consciousness of those around you, and take departures from the norm seriously. If someone looks like they're doing worse, they probably are, and that shouldn't be ignored. These conditions are easily treated, but can be deadly when ignored, and frequently don't have unambiguous symptoms.

What we don't worry about (much) are unstable spines, anaphylaxis, and North American snakebites. Most spinal damage happens at the time of impact if it happens at all; yes if we have suspicion of spinal injury and a board available we'll strap them on for safekeeping, but don't let somebody die of drowning, fire, hypothermia, shock, or some other hazard because you're worried about their spine! Anaphylaxis from allergies is extremely unpleasant but rarely deadly, even when an epi-pen is not available (which is not to say you shouldn't carry one if diagnosed). And North American poisonous snakes aren't very aggressive, rarely biting people who aren't intentionally handling them. And when they do bite, they don't always inject venom, and their venom rarely causes major injury with timely emergency room treatment. Even without it, death is extraordinarily rare in adolescents and adults. These are all real threats, but they're ones people spend more time worrying about than is warranted.

The bottom line is that the most effective medical interventions are often the most basic. Be aware of dangerous situations, and don't let alcohol (or other drugs) and adventure activities (including driving!) mix. Keep warm and hydrated--being cold and thirsty doesn't make you a hero. Don't take it lightly when people exhibit diminished levels of consciousness or judgment, or have a sickly appearance. Control bleeds with direct pressure. Clear airways with the Heimlich maneuver in conscious patients (it's spectacularly effective, with nearly 100% success rate) and by rolling unconscious patients so they don't choke on their own tongues and vomit. Call 911 so the professionals can come quickly and thoroughly evaluate you or your loved one and get them to definitive care.

Emergency Management

2013-01-31T09:49:00.002-08:00

During my deployment with Team Rubicon on Operation Greased Lightning (Hurricane Sandy response in New Jersey) it came to my attention that while disasters and disaster response get a great deal of news coverage, most people are very unclear on how emergency management actually works, so here's my attempt to remedy that.

Assets
Assets for disaster response are local, regional, state, federal, and international, and encompass both professionals and volunteers. The first, and frankly most important, assets are the existing local police, fire, and emergency medical systems. If they are well funded, well trained, and well functioning, they can handle surprising difficult situations for brief periods (by a week after Sandy, the cops in Brick NJ were practically falling over from exhaustion), and other assets will have an easy time integrating with them. Community Emergency Response Teams have an increasing role. Many important local assets will not initially be thought of as disaster-response assets: in Ocean County NJ, the Little League (turned their snack bar into a major feeding station), Police Athletic League (same), churches (actively beating the streets handing out food and coffee and finding people in trouble), VFW (staging area for regional assets), American Legion (delivering food to the fire hall being used to stage mutual aid assets), and others were just as important as any organization nominally devoted to disaster relief or emergency preparedness. What counts is a group of people with existing high-trust and organization levels who are willing to help. Regional and state assets include the National Guard, VOAD (Volunteer Organizations Against Disaster), reserve medical corps, and state police. Private companies like the telephone and electric utilities and even tree services deployed trucks from across the Northeast. Active duty military personnel and the Red Cross operate foremost at the national level. Assets from other states and localities are made available under the principle (sometimes codified) of mutual aid.

Command and Control
Command and control during disasters functions according to the incident command system/national incident management system. The lowest level is that of the incident commander, sometimes the senior person from the first responding agency, but in some states legislated to be the fire chief or other official. Any incident that involves more than six casualties or fire and police assets from multiple jurisdictions should have an incident commander to ensure coordination. The incident commander is responsible for assigning tasks to responding assets and must additionally deputize at least the following:

Safety officer: any mass-casualty incident, whether an automotive accident, fire, hostage standoff, terrorist act, or natural disaster has important ongoing hazards. Allowing first responders to become additional victims is deeply irresponsible, and someone must be focused on planning to mitigate those hazards and informing the incident commander if responses are unsafe.
Triage/operations officer: a mass casualty incident by definition includes more victims or potential victims than initially responding personnel. Someone must decide which aspects of the problem must be confronted first, whether to minimize immediate loss of life or to contain the incident and thus minimize later threats to life and property.
Liaison/logistics officer: while the triage officer is identifying the most urgent problems, the liaison officer must be arranging for further appropriate assets sufficient to contain and eventually manage the entire incident, and ensuring that arriving assets contribute to the plan of the incident commander rather than clogging key ingress and egress routes.

At larger incidents, these roles might be further subdivided. For disaster incidents which scale beyond a single site, the county-level office of emergency management should be activated. This office can mobilize assets from other municipalities or volunteers not ordinarily available to 911 dispatchers, and request aid from the regional or state level if necessary. The functions of incident commander, safety officer, triage/operations officer, and liaison/logistics officer must be duplicated at the county level in order to ensure that resources flow appropriately to and from the incident sites. For disasters of larger scope, state offices of emergency management and the Federal Emergency Management Agency operate similarly.

Due to the disproportion between disasters and normal police/fire/EMS incidents, most assets deployed in disasters will not be organic assets that routinely report to and train with the incident commander. Thus in addition to being flexible and trained to common standards, it is important for assets to clarify their command relationship to the employing agency or incident commander, particularly whether the commander has operational control over the asset (and must release it before it can move to another incident) or is only being supported, subject to the triage decisions of the command level that does have operational control. Similarly, assets' organic commanders must not depart operational control without authorization, and must not assume that they are entitled to logistics support as if they were attached assets.

Despite the duplication of effort involved in running multiple supply chains, assets in disasters are rarely attached because their supply needs are not generally well understood by the controlling command, and its logistics resources are likely to be stretched already in supply of its organic assets. Assumptions about command relationships need not be committed to paper (they may change rapidly as a disaster unfolds) but should always be verbally formalized so as to avoid dangerous misunderstandings. Assets are often squandered in disasters by assigning them to low-level operational control at an incident where they are not most needed or by holding them in general support at a higher level of control where they have insufficient knowledge of and access to the incident in order to act effectively. Understanding the capabilities and needs of various assets is thus a major goal of table-top disaster preparedness scenarios frequently conducted at the county level and above. Volunteer organizations, especially those responding without many local contacts, will be vastly more effective if they are regularly included in such simulations. Responding organizations which have not been assigned in at least direct support of a particular incident must expect to run their own reconnaissance and triage if they are to be effective, while continuing to be mindful of their resource consumption (fuel, road space, housing) and prepared to follow directives from their controlling agency if and when those are forthcoming.

In general, you can see the discipline of emergency management as an attempt to resolve the public choice issues inherent in a crisis, and I think the current methods are actually doing a remarkable job, perhaps because many of the practitioners reap strong-monetary rewards in adrenaline and altruism.

Church Hierarchy

2013-01-31T08:24:00.002-08:00

The hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church consists in a large number of offices, which are frequently reported by the media as if they exist in a single consolidated continuum. Basic sources like Wikipedia are fairly accurate and informative about each office, but don't convey the relations or lack thereof between different offices. Both Wikipedia and Church sources convey few distinctions between essential attributes of offices and their transitory legal stipulations. So in short, like many of my blog entries, I've had this conversation enough times to write it down for posterity. I hope it's informative (please let me know if I've made any major errors) but it's not intended to be apologetic or complete. While I'll give some nods to history, it's also not intended to convey all of the variation in historical usages. Orthodox churches also frequently use the terms in slightly different ways, and Protestants have borrowed some of them for completely different purposes.

1. Bishops, priests, deacons, and pope.(collectively: clergy)
As the Nicene Creed says, the Church is one, holy, catholic, and apostolic. Apostolic means passed in legitimate succession from the Apostles, those twelve disciples of Jesus whom he sent out to preach the Gospel before his ascension, who founded churches in cities around the Mediterranean. Their successors as heads of these churches are the bishops. As the Church is catholic, called to universality, bishops are required also for those sees which are not apostolic. The Church brings its members (including the bishops) to holiness by means of the sacraments, so the bishops must have the authority to celebrate all seven sacraments (baptism, confirmation, reconciliation, Eucharist, marriage, holy orders, and anointing of the sick). Through the sacrament of holy orders, bishops ordain other bishops, passing along the apostolic succession. The unity of the Church, then, is the inter-communion of the bishops. The bishops are the fundamental officeholders of the Church.

Because Christian communities quickly grew too large for bishops to personally administer the sacraments in an expeditious fashion to all of the faithful in their dioceses, bishops ordained men who were not bishops to a lower level of holy orders, priesthood (bishops are thus also priests). They are called priests because, most fundamentally, they celebrate the holy sacrifice of the Mass (the source and summit of our Christian life) though they can celebrate all of the other sacraments as well other than holy orders, which is reserved to bishops. As delegates of the authority of bishops, they are only able to publicly celebrate sacraments in a diocese when approved by the bishop of that diocese. As the bishops are the preachers of the good news, even teaching in the form of a homily at Mass has not always been delegated to other priests, which is why historically the bishops' homilies from prior years were read (for a modern example, see the reading of the homily of St. John Chrysostom at an Eastern-rite Easter Vigil).

The further delegation of deacons is detailed clearly in Acts 6 as those concerned with leadership over the corporal works of mercy. As the recipients of holy orders, deacons are also clergy, and thus came to have a preferential role in the liturgy as performers of baptisms, ministers of the Eucharist, and proclaimers of the word, but were also subject to restrictions on clergy like the invalidity of marriage after holy orders (whether deacons and priests can receive holy orders after marriage is a matter of canon law, unlike bishops who cannot be ordained while married). Since one can only receive holy orders of a certain rank if he previously has received holy orders at the lower rank, all priests are ordained deacons before they become priests, just as all bishops must previously be priests.

The Pope is the Bishop of Rome, no more and no less. As Rome was the see of Peter, first among the apostles, the Pope is first among the bishops, and the visible sign of their unity. As such, bishops not in communion with Rome do not manifest the unity of the Church, and new bishops are not to be ordained without the Pope's consent. The degree of control the Pope has over the selection of those bishops and how they run their dioceses, however, is subject to dispute and has changed throughout history. He may also in his capacity as the sign of the unity of the bishops speak ex cathedra, that is from and as their unity, and thus teach infallibly with the authority of the Church itself. The Pope also has additional authority over the Latin Church in his capacity as its head, basically the Patriarch of the West, though this title is no longer used.

2. Canonical Authority: Patriarchs, Metropolitans, Ordinaries, Pastors, Rectors, and Vicars
In addition to the clergy, that is those raised to Holy Orders who administer the sacraments, the Church also requires legal authorities to promulgate and enforce its laws. Each sui iuris church, headed by a patriarch, has its own code of canon law, which is why, for instance, eastern bishops frequently ordain married men, while western bishops do not, and why confirmation is given immediately following baptism in the east, while in the west it is not. The Pope thus functions, even if he does not claim the title, as the patriarch of the Latin Church (observing the Roman Rite) and thus is able to issue its canon law and instructions for the celebration of the sacraments.

On the other end of the spectrum, each Catholic lives under the authority of an ordinary, usually the bishop of the diocese in which he lives, but sometimes not, as in the case of monks living under mitred abbots and former Anglicans living under a personal ordinariate with both priests and ordinary consisting of married former Anglican clergy (who thus could not be consecrated as bishops). It is the ordinary who has the authority to make and enforce particular laws over those in his jurisdiction, though these must be in accord with the general canon law of the church (think federalism).

Between patriarchs and lesser ordinaries are metropolitans, who are archbishops with care of neighboring dioceses under their suffragan bishops, as well as their own diocese (which may have auxiliary bishops). Metropolitans have very limited authority outside of their own diocese, but are probably necessary for governance and communication given the extremely large number of bishops in the Latin church. Their role is being somewhat eclipsed as national bishops' conferences are given increasing (though still limited and uncertain) canonical powers.

The ordinary bishop is of course the pastor of his diocese, but again given the large number of Catholic Christians in many dioceses, they are as a matter of course divided into geographical parishes, with priests delegated as pastors. Some of the private juridical authority of bishops is delegated to those pastors, but their public authority to promulgate laws is reserved. The geographical territory of a parish may contain several individual churches and schools, each of which is headed by a rector, though in the frequent case that there is only one church and one school in the parish, the pastor may also be the rector of each.

Most legal authority in the Church can be delegated (often only to persons of certain qualifications, or in certain limited times and places) and thus a vicar is one who has delegated rather than ordinary authority, whether of a parish church (a parochial vicar) or of an entire diocese (a vicar general).

3. Honors: Archbishop, Primate, Prelate, Monsignor, Minor Orders, and Cardinals
These titles are largely honorary, rather than sacramental or canonical, and as such are not always meted out in very consistent ways. Archbishops are the bishops of important dioceses, usually metropolitans, but also certain other bishops, Vatican officials, and ambassadors of the Holy See, lest they be outranked by the metropolitans. A primate is the bishop of the oldest or most important diocese in a nation, which sometimes has current importance (think Dublin in Ireland) and other times not (Baltimore in the United States). A primate is not a super-metropolitan (and if the old diocese has declined may not be a metropolitan at all) and has power from the bully pulpit, not canon law.

Monsignor technically means a priest of the papal household, someone to whom the Pope might go for confession or confidential advice. In practice it is given as an honorific for distinguished senior priests and (all?) bishops. Prelate is an even fuzzier title, but carrying a ceremonial rank nearer that of archbishop (and to which many or all archbishops might be entitled). Laity preparing for the clergy (or occasionally who have served with distinction in other ways) can be honored with minor orders, which also have some liturgical function, especially in the East. Deaconesses, unlike deacons, held minor orders, not Holy Orders.

Last are the Cardinals, variously understood historically as the Pope's kitchen cabinet or the major clergy of his diocese, Rome. Due to their role in electing the Pope, obviously one of great importance to the wider Church, they have tended to be selected increasingly from the metropolitan archbishops of that wider Church as communications have improved (though the college is still disproportionately Italian). It is still given occasionally as the highest honorific for priests who are over the age of 80 (and thus would not be eligible to vote for the Pope) and may refuse episcopal ordination. Thus while social protocol generally recognizes only the more prestigious office instead of the clunkier "Cardinal-Archbishop", sacramental and legal authority flows from the episcopal ordination and installation as metropolitan, not from election to the college of cardinals, which does not affect or effect either.

4. The religious
Technically these aren't part of the hierarchy of the Church, but they're so frequently confused with the above categories that it seems within the spirit of the post. First, it's probably worth mentioning that in the Catholic context religious comes directly from its Latin root, religio, living under a rule. That is, a specific rule, not the commandments of Jesus or general canon law. Only in the reformation, with the blurring of the ministerial priesthood and the priesthood of all believers, were the rules of Institutes of Consecrated Life and the commands of Jesus also conflated, making all believers into "religious." Similarly, the religious were historically contrasted with the secular clergy, from Latin saeculum, those living in the world--i.e. under the authority of a diocesan bishop and canon law, amongst the people they served. Only in the reformation was this good worldliness associated with the snares of the devil.

The oldest religious "orders" are those of hermits, widows, and virgins. These are consecrated forms of life, whose observers take vows of poverty, unmarried chastity, and obedience, but those vows are made directly to the local bishop, and don't involve any corporate constitutions. These orders consist in the personal taking up of the evangelical counsels and date to the earliest days of the Church.

In the wake of St. Anthony of the Desert, and codified in the Rule of St. Benedict, religious began to come together in corporate monastic life, praying the divine office together and taking vows of stability (remaining in a particular monastery for life) and obedience to an abbot. In the late medieval period, monks were supplemented by semi-monastic mendicant friars following St. Francis and St. Dominic. These religious took no vow of stability and supported no monastery, living in provinces among the people but in radical poverty and obedience, begging for their food. During the depopulation of Europe during the plagues, the Popes insisted that the mendicant orders find means of support rather than burdening the population, so their corporate poverty came to an end, though individual friars still hold no property and their houses do not generally have the grandeur of old monasteries. The friars carry into religious life some of the traditions of the older semi-religious canons, who were secular clergy typically assigned to recite the divine office together in the cathedral of the diocese. Some (relatively) newer institutes of religious life, like the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) do not say the office collectively at all, allowing a more flexible schedule for their missions in the world.

Many religious orders also have tertiaries (third order members--the first and second being the ordinary men's and women's communities) who live the charism and vows of the order as far as they can while still living in the world rather than in community, or at least without the obligation to live in community. Secular institutes, like Opus Dei and the Neocatechumenal Way, are set up similarly to tertiaries in traditional orders, except that their charism is not associated with first or second order monks, friars, or nuns living in community. Last are the societies of apostolic life, which are inverse of secular institutes, living in community but taking no permanent vows.

UPDATE: Because you stayed until the end, here is a highly entertaining video which satirizes the hierarchy as a career ladder, but explains more about how moves take place and correctly identifies the difference between clerical, canonical, and honorary hierarchies.

Election Prognostication

2012-12-11T16:04:00.000-08:00

So since I keep repeating the same things to everybody who talks to me about the election, and I don't see them in print anywhere else, I guess it's finally time for an ex post facto election post now that everybody has started to calm down a bit. The first and most important point: be grateful for real elections, but be sad that none of the major or third party candidates ran on any semblance of a Catholic position. Six candidates for President, and not even a single one staunchly anti-abortion (legitimately the most important issue), let alone who follows the broader social teachings of the Church.

Second, my major take on this horse race:
* The economy favored Romney, since a bad economy is always hard on the incumbent. The employment uptick right at the end probably wasn't big enough to be a difference maker, but may help to explain the extent of Obama's victory. Romney might have gotten further on the economy front if he'd had any real plan about what to do differently that didn't amount to mathematical unintelligibility or mere posturing about regulations.
* Demographics favored Obama, since basically every group that voted for Obama in 2008 got bigger, not smaller, by 2012. But of course, political change is frequently faster than demographic change, so that's not a huge advantage.
* Neither base was energized. Romney didn't have the personal characteristics (Southern evangelicalism--the heart of the Republican base is the Atlanta and Dallas suburbs) or the coherent vision, and Obama had moved to the center on policy during his first term.
* There weren't any surprises. Polling is destiny unless it's not, which is to say that polling has gotten extremely good at detecting who intends to vote for a particular candidate and who will actually get to the polls. What it can't predict is surprise events that change the minds of many voters, because they aren't pulled from any kind of obvious distribution.
* So when the underlying factors are tied (economics, demography), the base-vs-center political moves are zero-sum, and there aren't any surprises, charisma and operational quality are destiny. The latter factor may be a medium-term stalwart for the Democrats, since Silicon Valley techies vastly prefer them (which also influences the party), but both parties have had their winners and losers lately on the charisma front.

So what have we learned moving forward? I think anybody who has a particular economic expectation for the 2016 campaign season is foolish, so I won't dare to prognosticate there. On demographics, it's certainly true that Republicans look pretty elderly and WASPy. Since the jingoist strategy didn't seem to pay off against Obama, despite all the noise, and neither did the smoke-and-mirrors tell-everybody-what-they-want-to-hear strategy, it seems like that demographic base is stuck with big government, though they can just advocate less redistribution. That's basically the Yglesias story. Of course, less redistribution sounds harder hearted than smaller government, so it remains to be seen whether this strategy would be a stable one (bringing in converts when they have decent paychecks, buy their own homes, and begin caring for aging parents) or a loser over time as an increasingly diverse country demands a more universal safety net. I personally think that's pretty much a toss-up given the historical evidence. The other possibility is that the GOP will try to stake more libertarian ground. While this has intellectual appeal, and is a growing constituency totally ignored by the Democrats, it's difficult to imagine those Texas and Atlanta suburbanites voting for real immigration, entitlement, or defense reform, and it's even harder to imagine the GOP winning without their votes.

So given more or less the current demographic alignments, what challenges do the major parties face and what can they do about them?

Can the Democrats hold onto the anti-war, civil libertarian, and redistributionist left? Other than on "social issues" and "regulation" Obama has taken all of the Republican ground. Regulation is difficult to articulate other than ideologically, which is a zero-sum game (every independent voter you pick up is a base voter you lose, and vice versa). It seems likely that the GOP will give up on gay marriage, and/or it simply will move out of the campaign spotlight, without the long-term zealous opponents that abortion has. So the Democrats have a slim lead, and no obvious way to pick up voters if they need them to overcome a weaker candidate, economy, or foreign policy gaffe. The wildcard fear for the Democrats should be another Great Awakening. Not only might this increase opposition to core platform planks they can't easily discard, like abortion, it would also likely increase marital and community ties, which are demographic changes correlated with less support for redistribution.

Republicans need to differentiate from Democrats (unless the Democratic coalition comes apart and they're forced to run more to the left, see above). But the base won't stand for cutting entitlements or the military, so they can't actually cut taxes and are left with social issues. In practice, that means abortion and corporate regulation, because the country is moving away from them on gay marriage, contraception, etc (though how long the purely Kantian or fideist--which is to repeat myself, intuitionist--argument against abortion holds steam is very hard to say). The wildcard fear for the Republicans should be a Ross Perot/Ron Paul-like candidate who taps into the half of Republicans who don't believe the last election was legitimate and refuses to compromise with party bosses--a scenario similar to the ones that ended the Whig and Federalist parties. Obviously that's most likely in the event of another nominee who isn't a Southern evangelical. The Republican smoke-and-mirrors game has successfully detached a large chunk of the party from reality, but like in Pakistan, that's an asset than can prove hard to control.

The bottom line is that neither party has room to maneuver, so the guy who can hold the base with personal factors (feels your pain, brush-cutting dynastic evangelical from Texas, black community organizer) allows the run to the center on policy. Expect more candidates like Clinton, Bush, and Obama who excite but fail to deliver. There are, however, two wildcards for the whole system, and like another Great Awakening and the emergence of a more libertarian party, they seem likelier than not to happen eventually, so the real question is when. The first is the steady increase in the costs of caring for the elderly that single-payer reforms won't change. Neither party seems willing to countenance real reductions in benefits, real increases in immigration, or strongly pro-natal policies, so in the absence of a technological breakthrough that reduces the period of infirmity, both parties' ambitions will be increasingly frustrated by mathematics. One of their coalitions will crack first under that strain, and that will provide an opening for a more general reconfiguration. The other looming change agent is the rise of China: a rise we cannot well predict because its own leaders likely have no consensus on the how or the when. If national attention and expenditures are shifted onto defense, import replacement, fully funding our own debt, or other means of foreign policy posturing, that will also likely affect the budget picture enough to crack the existing coalitions, while potentially defusing the electoral power of domestic regulatory issues.

AT: AT: Natural Theology

2012-10-20T10:42:00.000-07:00

I'm not a theologian or even primarily a philosopher of religion, but beyond my confessional and temperamental partisan interests in promoting it, I have relied upon it for a few scholarly projects. So when James K.A. Smith says in Christian Scholars Review and on Twitter that his objection to "natural theology" is strongly based on that of Alvin Plantinga and uses this to object to references to natural law or naturalized methods in the sciences more broadly, it's worth a look at the substance of Plantinga's objections.

First it's relevant to note that Plantinga defines natural theology only as "proof or demonstration" while Smith seems to apply the objection much more broadly to analysis of God without explicit faith commitments. I haven't seen a warrant for that broadening: if one exists I'd appreciate a pointer so I can read and evaluate it. It's also unclear why arguments against the possibility of rational proof for the existence of God would automatically extend to rational proof for ethical norms or scientific methods, though in some cases I'll try to infer the analogy.

Second let's look explicitly at the various arguments Plantinga makes and/or cites.

1. The traditional arguments for the existence of God don't work. That largely depends on how they're construed (at more length, or even more length). When analysis is correctly construed as largely abductive rather than purely deductive, they seem to work pretty well. Also, this argument is by far the hardest to generalize to natural theology broadly, let alone to the possibility of natural law or naturalized scientific method, since it relies on the failure of particular arguments particularly construed.

2. Belief in God is as basic (independent of premises) as belief in the external world, other minds, etc. First, it's again almost impossible to understand how this generalizes--is the whole of ethics and scientific method also known as a first principle? If that seems unlikely, then this argument provides no support for why the principles underlying those disciplines must be based on faith. Second, I think this argument is true but does not go far enough. If you read the link from above you'll see that indeed deductive reasoning is doing little of the work in arguments from God, so in that sense Plantinga is perfectly correct to call such belief basic. However, as I've pointed out before and as is clear from the longer link above, saying that a belief does not rest on other beliefs via deduction does not mean that there's nothing more to be intelligently said about how one comes to such belief. In fact, in Lonergan's account the argument for the existence of God is closely intertwined with the argument for the existence of the "external" world (again, see links above).

3. The Christian's belief in God should not be based on natural theology. Given Plantinga's previous claims (natural theology doesn't work and isn't necessary) this would be trivially true. He also cites various theological reasons for the claim, however. Again, I don't really dispute the claim and this is more or less the position Lonergan came to as well. But of course this is only an argument against natural theology in general (rather than its use for particular purposes, or over-reliance on it) in conjunction with Barth's dilemma about adopting the standpoint of the unbeliever--but of course Plantinga himself successfully argues that this is a false dilemma. So there's no actual argument here about why natural theology (in Plantinga's narrow sense or Smith's broad one) is bad practice, other than that it may not work or isn't necessary (which aren't strong arguments to begin with, and are refuted above in any case).

So maybe the argument against natural theology is more in the vein of tactical advice rather than philosophic proscription. First, Smith admits that advice has limits. Second, I've shown that it's exceedingly difficult to see what that advice entails (how it successfully engages scholarly questions beyond the limits of the merely defensive model). Plantinga is certainly adept at avoiding reductio ad absurdum and retorsion arguments in his responses on the Great Pumpkin and the role of argumentation with respect to faith, but I suggest that his responses more or less amount to lapsing in to the defensive posture Smith wants to avoid. In the quest to make explicit faith commitments into explicit philosophical premises (under what I've suggested is a flawed interpretation of the correct desire that faith in Christ make "all the difference" and/or that Christ is Lord over all things), Plantinga and Smith have not only failed to make much philosophical difference but also given up much of the potential for philosophy to prepare the ground for faith. What Aquinas did for Aristotle, Lonergan does for the Enlightenment: take the philosophers on their own terms to show how their anti-theistic beliefs are self-defeating and their pro-theistic beliefs can be enlarged for consistency. Certainly Plantinga attempts to do that on occasion, but his externalism makes the effort ham-handed. Maybe Plantinga himself isn't obligated to believe in the Great Pumpkin, but he forsakes philosophy as a tool to bring the unbeliever to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob instead. On a stern reading of depravity and a claim of double predestination this might make sense, but absent those philosophically and theologically unmotivated dispositions (yes, I realize that's controversial, but I'm just not seeing it) it's not likely to engender much support.

In short, I suggest that Smith's objections to natural theology (and even Plantinga's) rest more on Kuyper than they do on anybody else before or since. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but it does suggest that Smith needs to either accept that his views won't be shared by those outside the Dutch neo-Calvinist fold, or needs to argue for Kuyper's position in this regard on the merits. Until he does either, his position on natural theology will likely only be narrowly heeded.

On Christian Philosophy: Philosophy--A Student's Guide by David Naugle

2012-09-30T21:41:00.002-07:00

This post began life as a review of David Naugle's brand new book Philosophy: A Student's Guide but inevitably broadened as I realized that many of my issues with the book went back to Alvin Plantinga and indeed John Calvin himself. A more complete treatment would also involve Roy Clouser and Hermann Dooyeweerd, but I haven't had time to read and re-read those sources just yet (if you're at all moved to do so, I'm sure Hearts and Minds would give you a great deal on all of these books together). I'll begin with what I take to be our major point of agreement, then outline our major difference, show its implications, and try to finish by drawing on shared resources for rapprochement.

Our major point of agreement comes under the heading of what Naugle calls Christian Humanism, and treats explicitly in the second-to-last section of chapter three, though I take it to be a major implicit theme of the book. The most fundamental truth about mankind is that we are made in the image and likeness of God, and that cannot fail to have the most profound consequences for our shared self-understanding. Plantinga brings this home in his Advice to Christian Philosophers with the watchwords of integrality and courage. The Christian philosopher, unlike Christ, does not have two natures, the Christian and the philosopher, and so must give an integral account of faith and reason. Insofar as the culture derides faith as irrational, this will require courage as well as intelligence. When Calvin opens the Institutes by noting that "Nearly all the wisdom we possess, that is to say, true and sound wisdom, consists of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves," it would be a mistake to read these two parts as separate rather than merely distinct, as Charles Partee makes clear in the first chapter of Calvin and Classical Philosophy. In my view Martin Rhonheimer spells this out more fully:

What in principle looks intrinsically reasonable and human, such as the ideal of inseparable fidelity in marriage or the unconditional respect for human life, ends up appearing to unassisted human reason, at least in many cases, as unattainable in practice and therefore unreasonable and even inhuman. So—and this is my main point—Christian morality, to a large extent, throws light on the possibility of living a moral life which fully meets the intrinsic demands of human nature. This means that we can speak of a true specific Christian humanism which differs from the purely secular humanism of the nonbeliever. Thus, what initially appears unreasonable regains reasonableness through faith, hope and charity. That is how faith in fact rescues reason and reason recovers all its power to make faith both human and effective. Rightly understood, reason therefore needs revelation for being capable of effectively working as moral reason and to maintain the “reasonableness of morality.”

And indeed Rhonheimer cites Ratzinger as support for this passage. So here the Reformed and Catholic traditions stand together: to be fully human is to be conformed (cruciformed) to Christ-the-new-Adam, and as our shared father Irenaeus said, "the glory of God is a person fully alive."

But from that shared base, I worry that Naugle (directly) and Plantinga (indirectly) read "Christian" as "Reformed," despite all of their advocacy for putting one's assumptions explicitly on the table (what Naugle calls "prolegomena"). Naugle says:

This guide to philosophy, written to help readers reclaim a Christian intellectual tradition in philosophy, is Augustinian in character. Among many possible things, this means I place faith in the lead position before reason, and I define Christian philosophy as faith seeking understanding. To elaborate on this Augustinian tradition just a bit, I would say two things. The first is that unless you believe, you will not understand. This means that in an Augustinian order of knowing, belief renovates reason, grace restores nature, and and faith renews philosophy. Second, Christian philosophy is essentially Christian faith seeking philosophical understanding.

Let's follow the intellectual history here. Augustine is commenting on John 7:14-18:

5. Therefore, to speak briefly, beloved, it seems to me that the Lord Jesus Christ said, My doctrine is not mine, meaning the same thing as if He said, I am not from myself. For although we say and believe that the Son is equal to the Father, and that there is not any diversity of nature and substance in them, that there has not intervened any interval of time between Him that begets and Him that is begotten, nevertheless we say these things, while keeping and guarding this, that the one is the Father, the other the Son. But Father He is not if He have not a Son, and Son He is not if He have not a Father: but yet the Son is God from the Father; and the Father is God, but not from the Son. The Father of the Son, not God from the Son: but the other is Son of the Father, and God from the Father. For the Lord Christ is called Light from Light. The Light then which is not from Light, and the equal Light which is not from Light, are together one Light not two Lights.

6. If we have understood this, thanks be to God; but if any has not sufficiently understood, man has done as far as he could: as for the rest, let him see whence he may hope to understand. As laborers outside, we can plant and water; but it is of God to give the increase. My doctrine, says He, is not mine, but His that sent me. Let him who says he has not yet understood hear counsel. For since it was a great and profound matter that had been spoken, the Lord Christ Himself did certainly see that all would not understand this so profound a matter, and He gave counsel in the sequel. Do you wish to understand? Believe. For God has said by the prophet: Unless you believe, you shall not understand. [Isaiah 7:7-9-- thus says the Lord God: “It shall not stand nor shall it come to pass. For the head of Aram is Damascus and the head of Damascus is Rezin (now within another 65 years Ephraim will be shattered, so that it is no longer a people),and the head of Ephraim is Samaria and the head of Samaria is the son of Remaliah. If you will not believe, you surely shall not last.”] To the same purpose what the Lord here also added as He went on— If any man is willing to do His will, he shall know concerning the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak from myself. What is the meaning of this, If any man be willing to do His will? But I had said, if any man believe; and I gave this counsel: If you have not understood, said I, believe. For understanding is the reward of faith. Therefore do not seek to understand in order to believe, but believe that you may understand; since, except ye believe, you shall not understand. Therefore when I would counsel the obedience of believing toward the possibility of understanding, and say that our Lord Jesus Christ has added this very thing in the following sentence, we find Him to have said, If any man be willing to do His will, he shall know of the doctrine.

So the doctrine of the Trinity requires living faith for understanding, and even then the understanding does not replace the faith but relies on that living faith for its perseverance. It's hard to imagine any Christian denying that. But in the Catholic understanding, this is precisely because God (and hence His trinitarian nature) is disproportionate to our being, even as it was originally created in the Garden of Eden. To say that Grace restores nature is not to say that my knowledge of natural things (proportionate being) is by faith. To say so is not to unify faith and reason from their false separation but to utterly destroy their distinction.

I gather that the reason Reformed thinkers want to problematize the distinction between nature and grace is not only in fear of their separation, but because of the doctrine of total depravity. A Catholic can certainly agree that every aspect and part of nature is touched by sin and requires grace, but if total depravity is distinguished from utter depravity then there's no need to invoke common grace, as Naugle and Al Wolters do, to explain the truths discovered and beauties created by atheists and pagans. Their souls are clearly afflicted, but not to the degree that would uniformly prevent them from attaining such goods by nature. It's not fair to summarize the Catholic perspective as "With the Fall, certain supernatural gifts were lost, but natural reason was substantially unaffected" as Plantinga does. Just read Veritatis Splendor if you have any doubts. Yes, as Calvin emphasizes we all live within the realm of divine providence, but it's important to remember that since God is simple, there is only one act of grace (love by the persons of the Trinity for that which they are not) encompassing creation, sustainment, and salvation. The Catholic distinction between nature and grace is not a distinction of God's acts but a distinction of whether we experience them as proportionate or disproportionate to our being. This is precisely what Calvin seems to misunderstand when he says that "Even the integrity of natural man is not a matter of nature but a special grace of God." Naugle says "grace restores nature" but of course the New Adam goes beyond the Old Adam: the incarnation, resurrection, and post-resurrection appearances show a nature not just restored but lifted up to glory. So there is then common cause between Christians and atheists in knowledge of proportionate being, even if the latter do not understand its first and final cause in disproportionate being, and this grounds the distinction of philosophy and theology. Systematic theology, which attempts to understand the truths of disproportionate being given by the grace of faith, must begin with belief, but the same is not true of philosophy.

Now what I have propounded above might be considered the Gilsonian Thomist view, that (as Plantinga puts it):

Christian philosophy is philosophy that receives a certain help from faith, help of two kinds. First, faith functions as a sort of error detector: the Christian philosopher knows she's gone wrong, in following out a line of thought or argument, if she encounters a proposition that is incompatible with Christian faith. Then she knows she's made a mistake somewhere and must go back and check her work. And second, faith can suggest topics for philosophical work to the philosopher: perhaps among the things that she believes by faith, there are some that she can prove by reason; the result of such effort would be a Christian philosophy.

Plantinga goes on to deride the latter as placing a higher priority on reason than faith, but the desire to understand is legitimate in its own right to the extent that it is possible, and does not in any way undermine faith. In response to the overall Thomistic vision of theology and philosophy, Plantinga suggests "an irenic compromise": merely working out the consequences of Christian faith conditionally (if it were true) would still count as philosophy, since it doesn't explicitly assume any truths of faith. If Catholics were just clinging to some merely verbal distinction, that would probably serve well, but there are at least two reasons for Catholics to insist on a substantial distinction here.

The first is that systematic theology is very hard, and when we philosophers indulge in it, we tend to get things wrong: the truths of Christian faith are not obvious or uncontroverted. Not only do Naugle and Plantinga miss the fact or import of the simplicity of God and the finer points of grace and faith, they also make more obvious mistakes like repeatedly referring to God as a person (God is the shared nature of three persons). This is no mere offhand remark: Plantinga says that "God is the premier person, the first and chief exemplar of personhood." If we think that Christian Humanism is important because Christian faith delivers important truths about what it is to be human (precisely where Plantinga is going with this remark) we had better get those truths correct. Naugle says:

First, knowledge is personal. Truth is a person (God), and knowledge of the truth is knowledge of a person and, thus, personal. The implication is that we should know God and people, as well as places and things, in personal ways.

I'm not entirely sure what this means or what significance Naugle takes it to have, but insofar as God is the shared nature of three persons, if in Augustinian fashion it is God we are seeking, we must be seeking knowledge of substantial forms. Far from reinforcing the strong Kierkegaardian point that Christian and pagan knowing are separate worldviews with little to say to one another, this seems to provide dialectical resources to undermine the distinction in modes of knowing. So treating systematic theology and philosophy as distinct disciplines with much to learn from one another can keep philosophy honest and keep theologians from saying silly things like the line Plantinga records from David Tracy.

The second reason for insisting on the distinction between philosophy and theology is that it provides common cause with non-Christian philosophers and a reason to engage them charitably. Naugle and Plantinga are surely kind-hearted, so they mean to be charitable, but they have trouble doing so consistently. Naugle, for instance, calls out Hellenism in Christian philosophy while calling himself an Augustinian, worrying about the contaminating biased assurances and convictions of unbiblical philosophy. There is sense in this view to be sure: Plantinga gives plenty of examples of philosophical positions biased against Christian views. But Naugle gives no account of how Augustine was able to critically appropriate Hellenism, which he admits had insights worth borrowing, and thus no account of how to know when Christians he disagrees with (Thomas Aquinas?) go awry. He suggests that the answer is to be found by looking first to Biblical principles, but the arguments above should give ample evidence that such principles are themselves controverted among honest folk. Surely faith checks false philosophy, as Gilson notes, but a proper philosophical hermeneutic checks false readings of the Bible. And as Naugle notes freely with regard to others, our prolegomena are not easy to disentangle: we all have such a hermeneutic. Only with the aid of philosophy will we ensure that it's a good one. So one of the premier tasks of Christian philosophy (as Plantinga and Gilson both suggest, philosophy responsive to the needs of the Christian community) should be to give an account of the self-correcting process of knowing sufficient to undergird a biblical hermeneutics.

When Naugle insists that "sin is a moral matter, not a metaphysical one" or that "of course, we are not talking about whether we can understand the little 'easy to know' things in life (such as the content of the label on a soup can)" he indulges in an unfortunate Calvinist anti-intellectualism. The question of human freedom is not just "Satan's logic" (which is not to say that Satan can't make use of it) and the question of how we know the content of a soup can label can tell us a lot about how we know the truths of science or those of faith. Plantinga echoes this when we recoils from the notion that there could be anything of intellectual interest underlying "basic belief." Just because a belief is not justified by another belief does not mean that there is no understandable and epistemically important (because liable to error) cognitional process underlying it. If the model for the human is, as Naugle says, a microcosm of the macrocosm (where God inscrutably does good and Satan inscrutably does evil) then perhaps there is nothing further to be said--but "image and likeness" is not obviously interchangeable for "microcosm" and may give clues to a far richer anthropology with rather different epistemic import. I call this anti-intellectualism because it leads to claims like Naugle's that:

If God did use the medium of his deeds and words in history to make himself known, then to reason abstractly about him could rightly be called "faithless rebellion."

Wouldn't this rely on some argument that abstract reasoning diminishes rather than enhances our attention to deeds and words in history? And if so then why does Naugle constantly speak of "canonical trinitarian theism"?! I call this anti-intellectualism Calvinist to the extent that Calvin sees speculative philosophy and theology as themselves damaging rather than merely as occasionally symptomatic of Satan's desire to guide believers astray (Partee does an excellent job of problematizing this question). The important point is that it won't do to dismiss the "independent, fundamental" set as insufficiently intellectual and the Catholic scholastic as overly intellectualist without some principle by which the golden mean may be found. Without such a principle such dismissals seem partisan and capricious.

Engaging non-Christian or non-Calvinist philosophers requires not only charity (if Christianity makes such a difference, we should not be so pained when the unbeliever sees it as nonsense) and evenhandedness but some measure of common cause. While I've indicated my agreement with Plantinga that this is not always to be found, I think he underestimates the extent to which it is available. Not only is his new book positively reviewed by an atheist, his case studies from Advice to Christian Philosophers have largely evaporated: logical positivism has imploded and agent causation is now arguably the leading theory. Naugle's suggestion that many secular philosophers regard knowledge purely as "scientifically derived data, facts, and information" is today a straw man. Surely there are new examples to be found and we are not off the hook with regard to critically appropriating what we read, but is analytic philosophy really so dry and fruitless as Naugle suggests? Reductionism and naturalism sure look more like open questions than given assumptions in my glance at the literature. And for those who are committed to reductionism, Plantinga's arguments aren't convincing precisely because they don't give an account of why we're wrong sometimes and not others: they don't engage. Naugle's book is ostensibly directed at helping undergraduate Christian philosophy students engage their subjects with integrality and courage, yet goes beyond Plantinga's pure defense to an almost complete lack of engagement:

How does "Christian metaphysics" relate to the main achievements of the philosophical field? Grace is certainly worthy of metaphysical treatment (I would suggest in systematic theology) but what problems of philosophical metaphysics does it solve?
It's fine to suggest that we should look to "Trinitarian remnants" as hints of connection and direction but these obviously don't provide any kind of predictive power. What on earth does it mean that physics should look to "Trinitarian metaphysics" in its search for a grand unified theory? Not that theology and physics don't have metaphysical connections, but they're a bit more mediated than that.
Yes, Jesus was evidently an epistemically integrated person--but how does that fact help to solve any of the epistemic problems philosophers struggle with? If it just means that Christians can't be nihilists, well, few people doubted that, few philosophers are nihilists, and the few "Christian nihilists" wouldn't grant any meaning to a sentence about the epistemic integration of Christ.

And even the attempts at direct engagement fail: the question of whether human sexuality is social or biological in origin is neither philosophical nor resolved by appeal to the creation of mankind in the image and likeness of God.

So fundamentally, I applaud Reformed thinkers like Naugle and Plantinga when they urge an integral and courageous Christian philosophy as an important element of Christian humanism. I find their conflation of philosophy and theology antagonistic to this goal, however, insofar as it loses common cause not only with non-Christians but also with non-Calvinist Christians who both see all of the arguments as basically circular ("given that you accept my interpretation of the Bible and its claim to authority..."). Perhaps this approach is of some value in showing Reformed students the implications of their faith, but marketing it as "Christian philosophy" is much too broad for its actual prolegomena. So where shall we go if we want a Christian philosophy in the Gilsonian mold that makes common cause among Protestants and Catholics while allowing productive engagement with non-Christians? My general answer is that Lonergan can rescue the Augustinian synthesis of faith and reason from Kierkegaard's dichotomies. My unhelpful answer is that it's a complex topic which requires serious analysis of Dooyeweerd's claimed dualisms and a holistic theory of conversion, neither of which I've yet done and which would probably require a book to elaborate. I will try, however, to give an answer more specific than "read Lonergan" and more immediate than "wait for a book I haven't started writing yet." I think the generality of Plantinga's approach and the breadth of Naugle's reading and citation provide resources for rapprochement and the foundations of true Christian humanism.

I suggest that an examination of those resources should begin with a reappraisal of the Thomist tradition (I know, you're shocked that I would say such a thing, shocked). Naugle states that Thomism "pretends" to an autonomy of human thought from God, but doesn't elaborate on what he takes that autonomy claim to be or why it's only a pretension. I would suggest that a more careful reading of Augustine, Thomas, and even Calvin fails to bear out that claim. Naugle cites Alasdair MacIntyre, but still seems to fall into the trap of making genealogical arguments against the encyclopedists and encyclopedic arguments against the genealogists without really coming into the hermeneutic of tradition. Protestants are, admittedly, a bit stuck on this front: they can't become genealogists without giving up the idea that Christianity is true in some way that other claims aren't, they can't become encyclopedists (enlightenment thinkers) without diminishing to deism, they can't quite admit to a hermeneutic of tradition without going to Rome (this obviously warrants its own post), and there doesn't seem to be another mode of philosophical reasoning on offer, so the temptation to merge theology and philosophy is strong. But Naugle does provide strong resources for moving into the hermeneutic of tradition, even if he's not quite willing to do so himself: he grants the dialectic between theory and practice, and he recognizes that knowledge is covenantal, always pulling us to greater consistency of life. He even grants a certain natural piety with which to push.

Naugle may worry that this move would undermine his conviction that "Christ changes everything" or "Christ is Lord over all." That's a worry I take seriously. But how does Christ change everything? One answer is in the paper on Kierkegaard I linked above. Another is in Naugle's own quotation of Bernard Lonergan:

Redemption dismantles and abolishes the horizon in which our knowing and choosing went on and it sets up a new horizon in which the love of God will transvaluate our values and the eyes of that love will transform our knowing.

That obviously requires a little unpacking. Lonergan understands knowing as a process of verifying insights by asking and answering further pertinent questions (and eventually having the insight that there are no further pertinent questions). Insight, in turn, is the understanding resultant from inquiry, the process of attending to the phantasm with regard to a particular question and in light of prior understanding. Values are the knowledge of the good, choosing responds to values, and horizon is the arc of our questioning, what Donald Rumsfeld would call the "known unknown." It's all very Thomist (and very Augustinian, and indeed supremely Trinitarian). So what Lonergan is saying is that the impact of conversion is explosive: instead of asking "what's in it for me" we take up the cross. We understand human fulfillment in light of that cross, not in light of pagan pleasures. This Lonergan calls "the way downward:"

If indeed, as Lonergan claimed, every human being is gifted with God's love in the intimacy of her or his consciousness, this loving is still unconditional, unrestricted, and therefore ineffable. Each person is left with the immense, almost impossible task of trying to give finite expression to that ineffable gift in deeds and in words.

Still, Lonergan argued, the effects of the gift of love show up as a shift in people's values, people's experiences, and people's insights and judgments. When we fall in love with another human being, our experiences of the world dazzle and sparkle. This is even more true when we fall in love in an unconditional way. The natural world, other human beings, one's own life, pleasure, money, status, sex, poverty, power--they all take on dramatically new meanings when one is in love.

Likewise, the corrosive effects of bias, bitterness, hatred, despair, and sin begin to melt slowly when love begins to grow in a person's heart. When the love that one falls into is a participation in God's love of everything about everything, all of being becomes precious in a dramatically new way. This shift in a person's values is what Lonergan called conversion, and it begins to change what a person is willing to accept as real and true. It affects people's judgments about reality, and they seek to better understand the new realities revealed by the new eyes of love. It brings about keener attention to experiences previously ignored. This is what Lonergan meant by "the way from above downward" that flows from being in love unconditionally.

Is that not a true Christian humanism in which Christ changes everything? Yet far from taking the transformation of nature by grace, the sheer disproportion of God's love for us, to be a dimunition of nature, Byrne elaborates on the prior page what Lonergan calls "the way upward":

In theological method, the reflective self-awareness of metaphysics becomes reflexive self-appropriation of what Lonergan eventually called "development from below upward." In the context of his book Insight, this meant engaging in the work of intelligent discovery and critical judgment with regard to some realm of being, while at the same time being reflectively self-aware and taking responsibility for that work. "Below upward" refers to the movement from experience through inquiry to insight and further inquiry to judgment and beyond. In the context of theology, it comes to mean self-reflective responsibility directed toward understanding and judging the sources of the Christian religious traditions--especially Scripture and the historical records of Christian practices and teachings.

Now perhaps Calvinists will take this to be arrogance: who are we to judge Scripture? But does the Reformed tradition accept the canonicity of the Gospel of Jesus' Wife? No? Then apparently Scripture is being judged. And do Reformed scholars debate the meaning of Scripture rather than merely taking the conviction of each believer as unassailably beyond reason? Then again Scripture is being judged.

A more philosophical (Kierkegaardian?) objection is that the way upwards and the way downwards are incompatible. Just becomes Lonergan claims that "in theology the reflective self-awareness of development from below upward is complemented by reflective self-awareness of development from above downward" doesn't make it so. Byrne naturally gives a taste of Lonergan's response to this concern:

According to Lonergan, we all have two First Philosophies--one that resides in our unrestricted, inquiring desire to know being, and the other that comes from some paradigm of reality. Initially our two First Philosophies are in conflict with and contradict one another. But when the divine self-gift of unconditional love becomes paramount in a person's life, it displaces the self-limiting paradigm of reality that is the other First Philosophy. Then, the sense of being that is the unrestricted objective of the inquiring spirit, and the sense of being that is the unconditionally loved come into harmony.

The knowing upward from general revelation, which must critically appropriate what Naugle calls "modernist knowledge structures" since we live, after all, in the modern and postmodern era, finds perfect fulfillment in the knowing downward from special revelation.

So what does this mean for metaphysics and epistemology? First, it means that Naugle is absolutely right to reject naive realism and idealism, but wrong to see "common sense realism" as the live alternative. Common sense realism is anti-intellectual, both in its inability to explain the successes of the intellect (you won't appeal much to modern scientists if you can't appreciate what is distinctive about their practice) and its inability to explain the failures of the intellect (Why do some intelligent, honest atheists miss God? Why do some intelligent, honest Christians miss important scientific insights?). The alternative is phenomenology, or critical realism, a term Naugle uses but does not expound upon. I've gone into detail on what that means elsewhere (or read any major work of Lonergan's, or any introduction to his thought, or anything by Cassirer) so I will just gesture rather than belaboring the point here. This doesn't contradict the story Plantinga tells about the externalist warrants of our basic beliefs, but it does suggest that there's a richer internal account that he's missing, and that comes prior to the external account. So our Christian commitments can and should be "control beliefs" as Naugle puts it in conformity with the Gilsonian picture, but the content of those commitments can and must be clarified by the upward and downward dynamic cognitional operations, lest we fall into not just a dogmatism but a subjectivism which resists the formation of conscience.

And what about ethics (which is, after all where we began with Martin Rhonheimer's comments about hope)? Here again, I think Naugle needs a richer Christian humanism if he is to have one at all. He suggests that natural law is an "inborn sense" but of course this gives no account of how our ethical sensibilities develop as individuals or as cultures. And tying natural law, synderesis of ethical precepts, virtue, and casuistry into a single account, as Naugle wants to do, requires a cognitional theory. In fact, that's exactly the project I've recently been working on. Martin Rhonheimer comes close, but doesn't have quite enough cognitional theory to answer the objections. I think this approach also yields a deeper resolution of the tension between voluntarism and essentialism than to say that some of God's properties are voluntary and some are essential, as Naugle does--after all, how does that square with the simplicity of God? The question of human nature runs very deep indeed.

Despite our deep differences on what it means to be a Christian philosopher, I think David Naugle and I more or less begin and end at the same place. Whether Lonergan or Dooyeweerd is right about how to read the Western philosophical tradition against Christianity, we must begin in Augustine with faith, hope, and love and we must end with a commitment to serious philosophical vocation. I've been working for some time on an as-yet unfinished post on what it means to be intellectually serious (in short, it means to be vulnerable, and writing about vulnerability means being vulnerable, which is hard), but in short we must be, as Plantinga reminds us, integral and courageous, and when that seems unattainable in practice, unreasonable, and inhuman, we must go back to where we started, in faith, hope, and love.