Rational Mysticism? September 30, 2005
Posted by Resident Egoist in : Philosophy and Objectivism , add a commentThere’s an interesting essay by Sam Harris, the author of The End of Faith, at Free Inquiry Magazine — the essay is titled “Rational Mysticism“. Knowing my definintions, I know that that is a contradiction in terms — for the last time I chekced, “rationality” and “mysticism” were mutually exclusive terms.
Read the full essay, and witness the workings of a mind that has rejected religious — Abrahamic — faith, but has not yet discovered Reason, which it confuses with “secular-ism” — alas, the fate of a substantial number of people nowadays.
P.S: As perspective, you might also want to read Gus Van Horn’s excellent review of Mr. Harris’ greatly misnamed claim to fame: The End of Faith.
Technorati Tags: Sam Harris, The End of Faith
Pompous Whinos September 29, 2005
Posted by Resident Egoist in : Cultural Criticism , add a commentPompous whinos. Seems like almost everyone’s one of those these days — everyone perceives himself as a victim of something or someone. The events unleashed by hurricane Katrina are evidence enough of this fact. Now here’s another kind of victim — the poor, helpless victims of Aesthetics: flight attendents.
The Associated Press reports:
LOS ANGELES - Three groups representing flight attendants are calling for a boycott of the box-office hit Flightplan. In the Jodie Foster thriller about a mother looking for her missing daughter aboard a plane, a flight attendant colludes with an air marshal as part of a plot to extort a ransom from the airline.
Other flight attendants are shown treating passengers rudely and being unsympathetic to Foster’s character, whom they think might be delusional.
The groups contend that the Disney film could breed distrust of their members among real airline passengers.
This sort of paranoid lunacy and utter underestimation of the mental skills of common individuals can only be matched by the behavior exhibited by some modern governments. If every profession that was negatively portrayed in a movie jumped up in complaints I wonder where we would be. And how much complaining would businessmen have to do?! But then again, they are the ones who produce the movies.
Anyway, Allah be thanked, Disney kept its head about the boycott and released the following statement
There was absolutely no intention by the studio or filmmakers to create anything other than a great action thriller. We are confident that the public will be able to discern the difference between fiction and the incredible job that real-life flight attendants perform on a daily basis.
Yes indeed — all sane people are.
P.S: Flightplan was no.1 at the box office last weekend, with a total collection of $ 24.6 million.
Technorati Tags: Flight Plan Movie, Disney, Jodie Foster