Naturalism ≠ Positivism

In the combox of an old thread, I have been chatting a bit with Blair Hodges and Alan Goff about the relationship between naturalism and positivism. Goff treats the two as basically identical, but I think the distinction between them is substantive and important.

Naturalism is the rejection of extrasensory perception and spiritual phenomena. Positivism is the principle that a theory must be empirically proven before we can accept it as true. It is fully possible to be a naturalist, but not a positivist, or to be a positivist, but not a naturalist.

Imagine that we have two naturalists. Naturalist # 1 says, "I don't believe in visionary experiences because they are not empirically verifiable, and thus don't meet my standard of evidence." Naturalist # 2 says, "I don't believe in visionary experiences because so many of them have been falsified that I cannot consider them a reliable way of knowing." Naturalist # 1 has given a positivistic explanation of his naturalism. Naturalist # 2 has not.

Other positivistic claims include the claims that historians must try to be value-free, and that historians can "let the facts do the talking" without offering any interpretation of them. But again, while there may be some naturalists who make these claims, there are also many who don't.

So, in many cases naturalism and positivism may have overlapping constituencies. But in other cases they do not. There is nothing about the former that necessarily entails the latter.

Portrait of Paine

I enjoyed the caption on this portrait of Thomas Paine from an 1898 edition of The Age of Reason, and thought I'd share. (Click the image for a larger version.)

Paine was a hero of the Revolution, but fell out of favor with many of his American admirers when he published The Age of Reason, which among other things includes a rather blistering attack on Christian scriptures. In a passage that would make Richard Dawkins proud, Paine wrote, "When we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness with which more than half the Bible is filled, it would be more consistent that we called it the word of a demon than the word of God. It is a history of wickedness, that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind; and, for my own part, I sincerely detest it, as I detest everything that is cruel." Phew! Don't hold back, Tommy, tell us how you really feel!

My Parents' Dissertations Are on ProQuest

I'm very proud of my parents, both of whom just finished their PhD programs and received their degrees. In an act of sheer blog-nepotism, here is a plug for their dissertations, which are now available on ProQuest.

My mom, Janet Katherine Smith, titled her dissertation, "Dust or Dew: Immortality in the Ancient Near East and in Psalm 49." (Incidentally, I helped edit it.) Here's the abstract:

In the Hebrew Bible, particularly in the Book of Psalms, the Book of Job, and the Prophets, there are many references to sheol , the ancient Israelite version of the nether world of the Ancient Near East. Rather than offering a timeless, theological, systematic understanding of the afterlife, references appear to be contradictory. There are few explicit references to a blissful heaven where the righteous spend eternity with loved ones and God. Those passages that hint at immortality are balanced by others suggesting that a grim and dusty existence in sheol is the final fate for man and beast alike. A few tantalizing insinuations, one of which is found in Psalm 49, suggest that there is a redemptive deliverance for the righteous from sheol by Yahweh, who will receive (take up) the believer to wherever Yahweh eternally exists. However, Psalm 49 should not be read out of the various contexts of the culture and literature of the times. The Korahite collection of psalms appears have been written or edited together to function as a worship drama, reminding the righteous follower of God's faithfulness in delivering them from former crises and in granting them a blessed city and Temple. Psalm 49 and the Korahite Psalter may have been used yearly for the pilgrimage to Zion, perhaps during the harvest when one year ended and another began and the ground awaited the rain to aid in the next year's planting. This study also follows the hints of the renewal of life in Psalms 49, 16, and 73. These psalms paved the way for a full-blown theology of resurrection and judgment day, which came full circle in the Talmudic and Apocryphal literature of the Second Temple era. Another important context for Psalm 49 is Genesis 1-3 and the culture of goddess and serpent worship. Linguistic similarities between Gen. 1-3 and Ps. 49 suggest that the message is similar... right living leads to eternal life and wrong choices pave the road to death.

My dad, Theodore C. Smith, titled his work, "Development of a competency-based curriculum for online instruction in a Christian university: The model and an example." The abstract for this one reads,

This mixed-methods study provides a foundation for a validated, competency based curriculum for an online undergraduate pastor-training degree for Sacramento Valley University (a new institution). Designing a competency-based curriculum for a specific major requires an understanding of how knowledge, skills, abilities, values, and other characteristics (KSAOs) are integrated by practitioners to successfully perform specific tasks or functions. Survey data were gathered from 169 Protestant practitioners in northern California and analyzed. These data and the analysis were provided to a panel of subject matter experts who provided qualitative input. The survey results and panel input next were used to produce an online curriculum that will encourage excellence in ministry and equip graduates with the KSAOs needed for entry-level positions as clergy. The model curriculum includes components to facilitate self-assessment (reflective learner portfolios) by students, validation of outcomes, and critical reflection by faculty leading to foster improvements in the learning program.

Congrats to both my parents for beating me to the educational finish line! Now to turn the red ink on their balance statements into black ink...

Inaugural Bible Verses, and What They Tell Us About Our Presidents

When new presidents are inaugurated, they traditionally lay their hand on the Bible for their swearing-in. Occasionally, as in the cases of Barack Obama and John F. Kennedy, the Bibles are left closed. Usually, however, they are opened-- either to a random page, or to a verse of the president's choosing. (A few presidents were so pious-- or so in need of divine assistance-- that they used two Bibles! One for each hand.)

In the cases where the presidents themselves chose the verses to which the Bible would be opened, the verses they picked say a lot about who they were, and how they saw themselves. The Wall Street Journal has a partial listing on their website. A more complete list is available as an appendix in Jon Meacham's excellent book, American Gospel.

The picks by Wilson, FDR, Nixon, and Reagan were very appropriate to their times.

Woodrow Wilson's second inauguration came in 1917, shortly after the US entered World War I. His chosen passage-- Psalm 46-- expressed both the horror of the war and the hope that it could be brought to a peaceful resolution. "God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble," the Psalm says. "Therefore we will not fear... Come, behold the works of the Lord, what desolations he hath made in the earth. He maketh wars to cease unto the ends of the earth; he breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; he burneth the chariot in fire." The choice of this verse perhaps expressed the popular hope that this would be the "war to end all wars." Wilson was already planning the creation of his League of Nations after war's end, which he hoped would establish a lasting world peace.

Franklin D. Roosevelt used the same passage for all four of his nominations: "Though I speak with the tongues of men and angels, but have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal... faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity" (1 Corinthians 13:13). That the president of the New Deal chose a passage about charity seems very appropriate.

Richard Nixon, who entered the White House with the promise to honorably resolve the Vietnam War, also chose an appropriate verse for the times. "They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more" (Isaiah 2:4).

Ronald Reagan's pick reflects perhaps the conservative Christian agenda with which he allied himself. 2 Chronicles 7:14: "If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land."

A couple of the more disturbing choices came from Grant and Eisenhower.

Ulysses S. Grant seems to have thought he was the Messiah. He picked Isaiah 11:1-3, which famously begins, "And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots: And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him," and so on.

Dwight D. Eisenhower's 1957 inaugural verse seems to reflect a belief in American exceptionalism. "Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord," it says, "and the people he hath chosen for his own inheritance" (Psalm 33:12).

Some of the more pious picks came from Coolidge, Clinton, and Bush Jr.

Calvin Coolidge went with the highly theological Johannine Prologue, which reads in part, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God...And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth."

Bill Clinton, in 1993, picked a surprisingly spiritual passage, Galatians 6:8: "For he that soweth to his flesh shall reap corruption, but he that soweth to the Spirit shall reap life everlasting." I'm sure I don't have to point out the irony.

George W. Bush, in 2005, chose a verse that accords well with his reputation as a praying president. "But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint" (Isaiah 40:31).

I think my favorite pick of all, though, came from McKinley.

William McKinley, in 1897, prayed the prayer of Solomon in 2 Chronicles 1:10. "Give me now wisdom and knowledge, that I may go out and come in before this people: for who can judge this thy people, that is so great?"

Sheum May Not Be Akkadian after All

A while back I blogged about sheum, which in the Book of Mormon is said to be a kind of grain cultivated by the Zeniffites. The similarity of this word to the Akkadian word for barley, s(h)e'um, has been claimed as evidence for the Book of Mormon. It has generally been assumed that the Sumerian root for barley, she, was transferred into Akkadian as a loan word.

Recently, however, some scholars have questioned whether this is really an Akkadian word. Most notably, Alasdair Livingstone, "The Akkadian Word for Barley: A Note from the Schoolroom" (Journal of Semitic Studies, 42:1, Sp 1997), expanded on earlier work by A. Cavigneaux that called the Akkadian word's existence into question.

For his research, Livingstone drew on ancient Babylonian lexical texts designed to help schoolchildren learn the science of cuneiform. (The Babylonians spoke and wrote in Akkadian most of the time, but used Sumerian in their religious texts, so schoolchildren were educated in both languages.) What Livingstone has shown is that whenever the Babylonian word for barley was written phonetically, it was spelled without the initial "sh" consonant. Spellings included e-a-am, a-am, u-um, e-ia, e-u, e-im, e-a-am, e-i, u-um and um. It was only when writing in Sumerian that the she symbol was used for barley. And when Livingstone examined the ancient lexical texts, he found that the schoolchildren were taught that the name of the Sumerian she symbol was u-um. That is, they were using the Sumerian she symbol, but substituting their own Babylonian pronunciation.

Here is Livingstone's conclusion:

If this [u'um] was the common word in Babylonian then it is more than likely that it also existed in Old Akkadian and could then have existed along with se, 'barley', as a loanword in Sumerian. ... In summary, the evidence allows but does not require the existence of a word se'um, 'barley'. It does, however, manifestly require the existence of a word u'um.

So it appears that the existence of an Akkadian word she'um for barley is something of an open question, despite appearing in some recent Akkadian lexica and dictionaries. Add this to the list of reasons why this particular apologetic fails to convince.

(Thanks to Ben Clarke for bringing the Livingstone article to my attention.)

What if "Shelving Doubts" is akin to "Burying Talents"?

"There lives more faith in honest doubt,
believe me than in half the creeds."
- Alfred Tennyson

It is a fairly common conservative Christian notion that this life is a sort of "test" we must pass in order to be admitted to salvation on the Other Side. There are various accounts of what we must do in order to "pass" the test, but usually the list includes something about faith/belief in the face of trials. When doubts arise, we are encouraged to be "faithful" and to treat the doubts as "trials" to be overcome.

But what does it really mean to be "faithful" in the face of doubt? Most conservative Christians would say it means, "do your best to find answers to your questions, then shelve any remaining issues and stay true to conservative Christian faith." This is what several commenters are recommending to David Waltz, over on Articuli Fidei. I'd suggest, however, that this is not the best or even most biblical answer. In the parable of the talents (Matthew 25:14-30), we find another.

In the parable of the talents, a master gives golden talents (an ancient unit of money) to three servants. The first two servants invest the money and earn a return on their investment. The third servant, however, is afraid, and hides his talent in the ground. The master praises the faithfulness of the first two servants, but berates the third for his laziness and wickedness.

I would suggest that the ability to think rational thoughts is one of the greatest gifts of humankind. It is what separates us from the animals. It is what made possible the technological progress of the twentieth century. It is what seems to be meant in the Bible, when we are said to have been created in the image of God. When Jesus is said in the Gospel of John to be the Logos (usually translated as Word), the Greek word could just as easily be translated as Reason.

So if reason, our most unique gift and talent, leads us to doubt and question tenets of the faith, who is the "faithful" one? The one who "buries" his questions and/or puts them on the shelf? Or the one who becomes fully invested in the questions and allows his reason and conscience to be his guide? Who is the one who will pass the test? The one who follows the crowd and never has the courage to question his own convictions? Or the one who overcomes the fear of the unknown and follows the evidence wherever it leads?

I would suggest that "shelving" our doubts is intellectually lazy, just like the servant in the parable. Its consequences are all too often wicked, as well. I'm sure I don't have to list the terrible things that have been done in the name of reactionary, fundamentalist religion. A little reason can be a potent antidote against such abuses, if only we will have the courage to faithfully invest it.