Provoking the Muse

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Ducunt volentem fata, nolentem trahunt.

What Now?

The NY Times has an interview with Justice Ginsburg. The interview focused on the upcoming hearings for Sotomayor, but lots of people have noticed this strange part of the interview (emphasis added):

JUSTICE GINSBURG: Yes, the ruling about that surprised me. [Harris v. McRae — in 1980 the court upheld the Hyde Amendment, which forbids the use of Medicaid for abortions.] Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don’t want to have too many of. So that Roe was going to be then set up for Medicaid funding for abortion. Which some people felt would risk coercing women into having abortions when they didn’t really want them. But when the court decided McRae, the case came out the other way. And then I realized that my perception of it had been altogether wrong.

Populations you don’t want too many of? What could that possibly mean? I bet that Justice Ginsburg misspoke here, but that is quite the misspeak!

Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood and one of the first abortion activists, was a total racist and saw abortion as the way to reduce the “undesirable” races (a process known as “negative eugenics“). It seems that Justice Ginsburg, however unintentionally, is channeling that mindset. More here.

Filed under: Amazing, America, Catholic, Current Events, Education, Elections 2010, Hippies, Politics, Pro-Life, Quotes, Religion

Is that a word?

Fr. Z has posted some encycli-bites for your edification and reflection.

Also, some other reactions to the encyclical.

Filed under: Catholic, Current Events, Economics, Education, Philosophy, Politics, Religion, Rome

Just Needed a Little Help

Via the Anchoress, who must implicitly admit to the moral superiority of Red Sox fans, I saw this nice Youtube video:

That’s great. I don’t think the audience is laughing at the singer, but rather with him (I wouldn’t have posted this if I didn’t think that was true).

Of course, this kind of thing can’t happen in Yankees Stadium. It’s too empty!

Filed under: Amazing, America, Boston, Current Events, Entertainment, Evil Empire, Massachusetts, Music, Red Sox

“Caritas in Veritate” Released

The Pope’s newest encyclical, a social one, has been released. The opening line:

Charity in truth, to which Jesus Christ bore witness by his earthly life and especially by his death and resurrection, is the principal driving force behind the authentic development of every person and of all humanity.

Haven’t had a chance to read it yet; hopefully this afternoon.

UPDATE: Still working my way through it, it’s been a busy day. The Anchoress explains B16 and Pixar. You heard me…

Filed under: Catholic, Current Events, Economics, Education, Politics, Pro-Life, Religion, Rome

What is “Subsidiarity”?

With the pope’s new social encyclical coming any day now, here’s an explanation about one of the more important points in Catholic Social Teaching.

Filed under: Catholic, Current Events, Economics, Education, History, Politics, Religion, Rome

“If you strike me down…”

Is the Force with Sarah Palin? It strikes me as an overly optimistic interpretation from a partisan supporter, but who knows?

My take: she weighed the effect of staying in the public life or returning to her private life. Can anyone blame her for going back? I don’t care if you think she’s the coming of the Anti-Christ, she didn’t deserve any of the (continuing) garbage she got.

That being said, I never really got those conservatives who thought she was (to be blasphemous) the Second Coming. I just never got the strong emotions she unleashed on either side. Seriously, whenever I hear that, I just kind of go *shrug* and move on.

And please, don’t bother explaining why you love/hate Gov. Palin; I don’t care (to be blunt).

No seriously, I don’t care.

Filed under: America, Current Events, Election 2008, Funny, Movies, Politics, Star Wars

Hitler finds out Jackson Died

The Fuhrer was going to have the King of Pop at his birthday.

I didn’t know Adolf was a fan!

Filed under: Current Events, Entertainment, Funny, History, Movies, Music

The Divine Economy

No, not that one!

Fr. Sirico, of the Acton Institute, has a Corner post on Benedict XVI’s upcoming social encyclical. The encyclical is supposed to be titled Caritas in Veritate. The encyclical should be coming soon.

Michael Novak also has some related thoughts.

Filed under: Acton, Catholic, Current Events, Economics, Education, Politics, Religion

Preparing for the Inevitable

ZombieSquad has lots of info on how to prepare for the upcoming Zombie attach. Including PSAs:

Their motto: “We make dead things deader.”

Filed under: Amazing, Current Events, Education, End of the World, Funny, Zombies

A Guarantee, as it Were

If our governing officials want to shove government-run healthcare down our throats, we need to make sure they get the exact same kind of care that we will get. You know, the crappy kind, where government bureacrats decide what kind of care you get.

UPDATE: Some more thoughts on mandatory health care.

And Curtis, I agree with your comments. This is just a preemption of sorts.

Filed under: Current Events , , ,

All is Right with the World

Sox are winning.

That is all.

Filed under: Current Events , , ,

Miracle for Newman

It looks like the miracle attributed to the intercession of John Henry Cardinal Newman has been approved. Being in the seminary in Boston, I’ve heard rumors and unofficial reports about this miracle; glad to see it has been determined to be “real.”

Filed under: Amazing, Catholic, Current Events, Prayer, Religion

Acton University 2009 – Day 4

Last day of the conference, and it’s a good thing too: I am soooo tired. Let’s look at what I learned today, shall we?

Again, started with Mass in the EF; Fr. Z had to leave, so we had a priest from Poland Italy pray the Mass. Wonderful.

My first class today was on the nature and function of money. Money is not imposed upon us from on high. Rather, it develops organically. All economic systems start with trade, that is, the basic bartering of goods. But this isn’t the most efficient way to trade: there needs to be a double-coincidence of need (i.e., both parties need what the other has), and the properties are usually indivisible (i.e., you can’t give a horse’s foot to get an egg). So, different common commodities began to be used, usually in the form of precious metals. Eventually, one becomes predominant (though other currencies may still exist) for reasons of the best portability, divisibility, and homogeneous quality (i.e., each piece of currency is roughly the same; cf. with bartering, where the quality of the goods must be taken into account in every transaction, while with good money it can be assumed). Furthermore, money allows for the further division of labor because price is able to quantify and objectify labor; price also helps with a more accurate determination of cost-accounting. Paper money originated as bank-notes. You would make a deposit to keep your money safe, and use the bank notes as currency. [Incidentally, this is where loans begins; bankers don't want that money just sitting around, and so they loan it out to people, which also helps the banks make more money. The problem arises, however, that very often banks cannot meet their deposits. This day, most banks keep about 5% of their total holdings on hand! Wow.] At some point, government intervenes and demands a monopoly on the printing of money. My lecturer looked at this as a bad thing, but I’m not so sure. He argued that government has no right to the ownership of money (true, strictly speaking; but there was no discussion about the benefits of such a policy). In fact, when government takes over money, they generally seek policies which decrease the value of money (i.e., mixing base metals with precious metals, clipping coins, printing more notes). Unfortunately, the lecturer ran out of time, but he also discussed how money is eventually destroyed: it becomes so under-valued that people begin to use other currencies again. And the cycle repeats (at least, I think that is what he would have got at). There was lots of depressing talk in this class; the lecturer believes that within the year, we are going to see hyper-inflation in America. All that bail-out money that went to banks to be loaned out is not now being used totally because most investors are not investing. It’s only a matter of time before investors become confident again and start borrowing, which will result in the release of that pent-up money, resulting in massive inflation (or so the argument went).

My next class was also pretty depressing, concerning the problems that arise from the social market (or what we in American call the welfare state). The lecturer was from Austria, and so is intimately familiar with these problems. America, you ain’t seen nothing yet. What problems does a massive, bureaucratic, welfare state cause? Declining fertility rates, declining moral values, increased cost of living, various price controls on goods, pay-as-you-go pension systems (i.e., Social Security), and mandatory state education. The end result: the soft despotism which Tocqueville worried over. He did note that the systems themselves were unsustainable and that they would have to change (or would simply collapse); the only question is at what cost? Yeah, nice cherry picture: think Paris in the summers of 2005 and 2006.

The final lecture was on the critiques of capitalism from the traditional-values contingent. They point to the despicable state most of modern culture is in and blame capitalism. In fact, the lecturer argued, this is due to the values supported by modernity, which has little use for the True, the Good, and the Beautiful. Capitalism is only a tool. Capitalism is not consumerism, which is the mistake most cultural critics make. Capitalism is a free market supported by the rule of law with robust property laws, which also has a certain optimism about improving the human condition through enterprise and savings. Consumerism is based on an adolescent view of freedom, where anything I want goes, lacking all restraint. Thus, the solution to the ugliness of modern culture is not to turn away from capitalism and towards government (which is what many of these critics suggest, as if government can somehow bring about a “nice” culture), but rather to return to the values which support the Good, the Beautiful, and the True. This was a pretty good lecture.

After that, we had some faculty panels, where we got to pick the brains of the various lecturers. The panel I attended had discussions on just war theory, Islamic science and rationalism, the economics of hope and change, and how to engage those who disagree with you. Very lively.

Finally, we had Fr. Sirico’s closing lecture. Most conferences see a precipitous decline by the time the last lecture rolls around; but not at Acton: Fr. Sirico’s closing lecture on piety and technique is the crown jewel of the conference. Telling us about his life, he then exhorts us to live out the principles we support and learn about at this conference. He noted that we are at a time when these values will be challenged in just about every area we will go; but we must persevere. Piety (or good intentions), though important, is not enough: if we believe that the principles and techniques we support are true, then surely we must preach them and argue for them strenuously. It was a wonderful lecture, and I can’t possibly do it justice here.

And so Acton University 2009 draws to a close. We will all leave tomorrow, hopefully a little wiser and better able to engage the current culture and offer it real change. I pray that’s the case.

Filed under: Acton, America, Current Events, Economics, Education, History, Politics, Religion

Acton University Audio

I don’t think Acton will be putting up much audio this time around (though I might be mistaken), but they have put up a few keynote lectures. Have a listen.

Filed under: Acton, Current Events, Education, History, Politics, Religion

Acton University 2009 – Day 3

Another day, and just a little bit more wisdom. Or something.

Once again, started the day with an EF Mass, this time with Fr. Z himself celebrating. He had a nice homily about the upcoming Year for Priests.

The first session today was on Virtue and Liberty in the American Founding. The general theme of the American Founding, according to the lecturer, was the tension between maximizing liberty and maintaining order. Hamilton was, as you may recall, more interested in order, and argued that one needed to use the force of law to control the passions and self-interested actions of the people. Jefferson, on the other hand, argued for a certain virtue instead of the force of law that would develop once the country became the idyllic agrarian republic he wanted it to be. Jefferson hated commerce, while Hamilton was all for it; this attitude, as well, influenced what they thought, in terms of centralized government, tariffs, allies, etc. Washington, however, disagreed with both of these positions and seemed to favor the power of morals from religion to ensure tranquility and liberty. Washington argued that the proper ordering of the union (the Constitution, and the rights enshrined within, I suppose) would lead to liberty, and both (presumably) would be maintained by religion. This isn’t exactly what the Acton Institute argues for when it calls for a free and virtuous society, but it is pretty close: a society can only survive and flourish if its values are good and true.

The next session was my first practical course. it involved the conflict that Acton has to engage in with people who favor a fair and victimless society (i.e., statists and collectivists) over a free and virtuous society. We discussed how the first group approaches the problems of social justice and also (more importantly) why they approach it in that way. Simply enough, they tend to want more government action because they have been “burned” by private individuals in the past. Our job must be to convince them that while yes, people can act in an immoral way, government cannot offer anything better and indeed will offer a solution that is worse in the long run. The lecturer was clear that we cannot approach them with high talk and disregard for how they feel, nor can we doubt their good intentions. Ultimately, however, we must remember the strength of our principles and the factual comparisons of outcomes while approaching them with humility.

I returned to theory in the third session, title “The Limits of Markets – Law and Moral Culture.” This lecture was not on the inherent limits of the market, which usually relate to problems of knowledge and supply. Instead, we focused on what can be limiting factors for the market. As you might imagine, the market can only be limited by the actors within the market. If those actors are corrupt, then the market will be corrupt. Once again, we must turn to the Natural Law and remember man’s proper end. Everything man does is for happiness; but, we must seek the highest possible happiness, which is communion with God. That is the only happiness that is eternal; all other happiness is fleeting. The ultimate end helps determine the first intention; so, if my end if off, then all of my intentions will also be off. We can know by reason what morality entails, and faith also provides a guide and illumination. We support our ultimate ends or values by forming various associations. All of these associations involve some kind of compromise concerning our values: we very rarely join an association that matches our values 100%, and so we make a determination about which values are important and thus which associations we should support. Having done that, all of these associations begin to have an effect on the culture writ large. This culture, in turn, affects each of us, and the cycle begins again. In culture, therefore, there is a tendency to devolve into the lowest common denominator (due to the compromises we make when we form associations). Because of this devolution, man becomes alienated from his own culture because he recognizes, on some level, that the culture does not promote what faith and reason tell him it should. This alienation, however, is not the fault of the market where values are “traded” and “accumulated;” rather, this is the fault of the bad values themselves. This, then, is the first limit we put on the market, by critiquing those values which we know to be bad or false and promoting those we know to be good and true. The second limit is the associations we form around those values: as we have already seen, these have a huge impact on the culture. We cannot rely on the government to limit the market for us; top-down action is always the least efficient, and also (more often than not) results in worse results. To solve the problems in the market, therefore, we must turn to natural moral law and emphasize the proper ethical and spiritual values in the culture through the associations.

The final session was on the Orthodox Christian response to globalization. I thought it was about orthodox Christians, but it turns out it was on Orthodox Christians (if you catch my meaning). Interesting review of information, but ultimately nothing I was overly concerned with.

The dinner lecture was done by Brian Wesbury. I twittered it because it was so fun, so go read it there.

All in all, another great day. I think next year I’ll take courses about which I know much less, just to keep it interesting. Anyone for a discussion on Calvinist social teaching? Hello? Anyone??

Filed under: Acton, America, Books, Current Events, Democracy, Economics, Education, History, Politics, Religion

W Slams O

Bush has now criticized Pres. Obama for spending too much money and relying on government instead of the private sector for economic recovery. I’d be more sympathetic if W hadn’t done basically the exact same things in the last days of his term.

Filed under: America, Current Events, Economics, Election 2008, Irony, Politics

Acton 2009 – Day 2

Well, we have finished our first full day of activities at Acton. This conference is alway such a whirl-wind, it’s hard to keep up in some sense. It always goes by very quickly. I’m noticing that for me, most of the classes aren’t as challenging to understand as they have been in years past; I hope this means I’m actually learning stuff!

We started the day with Mass in the Extraordinary Form, celebrated by a bishop from Brazil (I think). It was great. Wonderful way to start the day.

My first conference was on the the economic thought of Saints Augustine and Thomas. The lecturer explained that both men made some very important contributions to economic thinking. Their proper view of the human being as well as the importance of the rule of law were foundational for almost all later economic thinkers. They also came up with ideas about private property (private property is generally better cared for than public property, and idea that Aristotle first floated). Also, they were the first to argue that utility was what added value to goods, i.e., there is no inherent value in any object (with the exception of humans, of course). The discussed the morality of prices, profits, and interest rates (how amazingly relevant!), and promoted the basic function of money.

The next class was on the economic thought of the school of Salamanca. Salamanca was an incredibly influential school in the Late Scholastic period, especially in areas of economics and political theory. Most of the modern-period’s liberal ideas can be found in the various teachers and students of this school. This school promoted the important idea (at the time) that even those not yet baptized had rights, because rights were according to man’s nature, not his state of grace. Thus, they argued, the natives of South American had rights which needed to be respected. For these thinkers, the right to trade was of the utmost importance: if you had a surplus of one thing over here, and they had a surplus of another thing over there, government should interfere very little (if at all) in the following transactions. Some thinkers discussed the various ways governments try to debase currency, and why that should be considered a kind of theft (again, amazingly relevant!). Finally, St. Robert Bellarmine was one of the most important thinkers who floated the idea that government’s power ought to be limited.

My third lecture today was on Natural Law and Economics. As economics is only a tool, we need to look elsewhere to see how this tool ought to be used. Natural law provides the answer by explaining what we ought to aim at as humans and how one should go about achieving that aim. But, people disagree in good faith about what the natural law is, teaches, etc. Therefore, the lecturer argued, we need a system of exchange that is free, so that the exchange of ideas can happen without restriction. He noted that this very rarely happens at the modern university. In the more purely economic area, this would mean a free market, where the buying and selling of goods allows for a “debate” of sorts about what may lead to human flourishing (i.e., what you buy represents what you think will lead you to happiness, not that what you buy will make you happy; an important but subtle distinction).

The final lecture today was on Alexis de Tocqueville. If any of you know Tocqueville, you know that he was incredibly prescient about the challenges that would face America and indeed any liberal democracy. We discussed the negative effects of an expansion of equality (yes, there are some! Can you think of any? It’s challenging, but the negative effects of the expansion of equality need to be understood, as well as the negative effects of the expansion of freedom), and also the private associations (including religion) which Tocqueville argued would prevent the fall of America. In the absence of these associations (mostly because the government has assumed many of their functions, as governments are wont to do), the decline of America from the free and virtuous society to the soft despotic society continues. After that class, it became very apparent to me that I need to read more Tocqueville (in addition to St. Thomas and Aristotle).

We finished the evening with a lecture by Robert George on natural law: what it is and why we need it. Very good.

As you can imagine, I’m quite tired, so I’ll have to turn in soon. More tomorrow.

Please note: if any of the above arguments don’t make sense, do not blame the lecturers but he who is attempting to transmit their knowledge. All I can say is, it made sense when I was taking notes!

Filed under: Acton, Books, Classics, Current Events, Economics, Education, History, Philosophy, Politics, Religion

Master Blogger at Work

I had a class this morning with Fr. Z. He took the time to do some blogging:

Filed under: Acton, Blog-related, Catholic, Cool Picture, Economics, Education, Funny, Philosophy, Politics, Religion, Web 2.0

Acton University 2009

Once again, I am attending Acton University, a program sponsored by the Acton Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty (a.k.a., “The Acton Institute”). The lectures once again sound very interesting; I’ll be listening to talks about economics in the thought of the Scholastics, on the American Founding, and on social justice. I’ll try to update this blog each night with some thoughts on the days events.

Fr. Z is back again, as well, and will no doubt blog everything.

If you want, you can follow the action at the Acton Powerblog. In years past, they have put the audio of some lectures online, and I expect them to do that again.

Finally, you can also follow the action on Twitter by following the tag “#actonu”.

UPDATE: First evening is now over. Meet some great religious, a few Presbyterian seminarians (nice to know they also consider complaining about the seminary as pastime), an Anglican priest from Africa, and Fr. Z himself. Fr. Z and I were talking about the number of priests who will be celebrating Mass at various points of the conference, and that’s when he made his comment on concelebration (it should be safe, legal, and rare; I agree!).

Fr. Robert Sirico gave the opening lecture, discussing the proper anthropology needed before one can study economics and politics. Man is both spiritual and physical; errors occur when one discounts one or the other. Disregarding the spiritual part leads to the errors of statism, where control of the individual is mandated by government, treating everyone as denizens of a zoo. Disregarding the physical aspect would lead to anarchy (i.e., there would be no need of government). From the proper anthropology, we proceed to discover that only in a free and virtuous society is man truly man. This means that the power of government must be limited, and that the economy must be (mostly) free. Only in this free and virtuous society can man be allowed to act as a man. He also corrected some false views on free economics. (That’s the general outline of the talk, I missed somethings because I’m pretty tired, so if it doesn’t flow properly, that’s my fault, not his.)

Busy day tomorrow, starting with Mass at 6:30am. Later!

Filed under: Acton, America, Catholic, Current Events, Economics, Education, History, Philosophy, Politics, Religion

Failure is ALWAYS an Option

Adam Savage talks about failure.

Filed under: Amazing, Education, Entertainment, TV

Greatest Mashup Ever?

Filed under: Amazing, Entertainment, Funny, Movies, Star Wars, TV

Wal-Mart’s Weight Effect

Filed under: Amazing, Current Events, Science

Huxley v. Orwell

Is 1984 or Brave New World the truer vision of the future? I’ve always thought that Huxley got it right.

Filed under: Books, Cool Picture, Current Events, Education, End of the World, History, Politics

Why are Conservatives so Mean?

Andrew Klavan has the answer.

Filed under: America, Current Events, Education, Election 2008, End of the World, Hippies, History, Philosophy, Politics, The West

Comedy or Tragedy?

Definitely tragic: a clown’s funeral.

Filed under: Current Events, Irony

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