Human Cloning

The hypothetical cloning of humans is not a great evil, though some characterize it as such.  There is nothing inherently depraved or obligatory about such a thing.  Human cloning is, like many things, capable of being used in a legitimate and immoral manner, but is itself morally neutral.  There are ethical boundaries that govern how clones should be treated, as well as the morality of the purposes they are brought into existence for, but there is nothing wrong about human cloning on its own.

All arguments against the cloning of humans--full humans, not just isolated organs--rely on slippery slopes, appeals to emotion, and circular reasoning.  The objections are based on what might happen, not on what will happen, or are based on emotive grounds or assumptions.  As such, there is not a single sound argument against human cloning itself, as it is not evil by nature.  Christians in particular should recognize these anti-cloning arguments as untrue (Deuteronomy 4:2).

A group of hypothetical human cloners should certainly exercise caution with how it proceeds with research and actual cloning.  However, the need for caution does not indicate that the cloning itself is immoral, only that it could be used, like everything in human life, for immoral purposes.  There is nothing special about cloning that renders slippery slope fallacies valid.  Cloning facilities could be monitored, ensuring to a great extent that clones are not abused.  An example of a behavior that this surveillance could aim to prevent would be the growing of clones for organ harvesting, where clones are created simply for the extraction of organs and then discarded or killed.  This is not a guaranteed outcome; it is merely a way that cloning could be abused.

The presence of human clones in a society would force out into the open some of the same questions that a group of transhuman beings would force.  For instance, should clones be treated differently than natural humans?  Since they would be the same categorical beings as normal humans, with the difference being their origins, they should not be treated as subhuman creatures.  The personhood of human clones must be fully regarded.  A living clone of myself would be a sentient being, just as I am, possessing its own consciousness and its own body.  It follows that it would have the same human rights that I do, being the same type of metaphysical being that I am.

The concept of human cloning is not a thing that merits moral outrage.  The treatment of clones, however, could deserve vehement condemnation.  This is an issue that demonstrates the tendency of some to attack a thing based upon a potential misuse of it or because of a subjective discomfort with it.  Neither of those things has anything to do with the moral legitimacy of the thing in question.

The Usefulness Of Books

Intelligence is wholly separate from one's ability to read and recall the contents of a book; doing so only shows that one has a functional memory.  Now that I have returned to college for another semester, I have observed, yet again, the tendency for many professors and students at my university (HBU) to treat texts with an irrational reverence, as if they are the key to obtaining knowledge.  Books can certainly preserve and transmit knowledge.  That they can do these things is beyond legitimate dispute, but epistemology does not hinge on one's repertoire of finished books--it hinges on first principles, introspection, and deduction. 

Reading the works of philosophers, businesspersons, poets, does not make one more intelligent.  Even if reading a book meant that one would absorb the entire mindset and worldview of the author, reading books would scarcely help, as many books are just as fallacy-riddled as the worldviews of most people!  Books can at best serve as aids to self-education via the supplying of information to readers, with there being no inherent connection between the contents of a book and the intelligence of a reader.

A book is no better than the author(s) who crafted it: only an intelligent author can intentionally produce an intelligent work.  It follows, then, that if many authors are not intelligent, they cannot yield writings that purposefully reflect reality in an accurate way.  This is one of multiple reasons why those who look to books as their epistemological saviors seek something that does not exist, another reason being that even a hypothetical book that contains all knowledge must be verified independently.  Even if a book's contents are true, simply reading the contents does not automatically grant knowledge, since one must prove the claims on one's own wherever necessary.

The best thing one can do to actually develop intelligence is to merely contemplate reality, and the second best thing is conversing with people who are intelligent.  These are the pathways to knowledge and certainty, not the treatment of books as if their authors are correct by nature of being authors.  An irrational reverence for books is, ironically, counter-productive if one's goal is intelligence and education.

A Bias Against Female Leads

New intellectual properties that feature female protagonists (like Horizon Zero Dawn, for instance) sometimes receive criticism because of the gender of their primary characters: stories with female lead characters are sometimes criticized for having female protagonists (or female villains).  I have never heard about a video game or movie being criticized for having a male protagonist or villain, but the inverse is not uncommon.  Some people even try to make it sound as if male lead characters are becoming scarce, when this is far from the truth.

Of course, franchises like Tomb Raider and Metroid avoid this criticism--they have always featured female leads.  It is mostly recent or upcoming games or movies that are denounced on the grounds that there is no need for more stories prominently featuring women.  As if there is a need or justification for women to be excluded from prominence in entertainment!  When one analyzes the content of these objections, a specific trend--a thorough inconsistency--becomes very apparent.  The objectors almost inevitably succumb to the same hypocrisy.

Aloy from Horizon Zero Dawn, a new
IP (intellectual property).

The great irony is that none of these people have ever complained to me about the decades of relentless male-centric films, nor do they complain when contemporary movies have more male leads than female leads.  Instead, they begin acting like the benevolent, egalitarian push for more stories with women at the forefront is itself sexist, when it is only an attempt to bring women alongside men in entertainment, not an attempt to invert the current landscapes of gaming and cinema.  Neither I nor any other legitimate egalitarian wants to see men sidelined in entertainment--that would be antithetical to reality in the same way that sidelining women is.

I certainly do not mean to imply that there is not an increasing number of games and movies that deviate from the traditional character setup where women are mostly secondary or background characters, often serving as love interests for male leads.  There are games and films that do put women in primary statuses.  The problem is that certain people object to female characters in ways that they do not object to male characters.  Beyond showing offense at female characters taking the spotlight, these objections might criticize characters for being "too simple" or "too complex" in their depiction of women, when male characters are practically never called too simple or too complex in a genderized way.  These sexist objections reveal the idiocy of those who make them, with some even mistaking the presence of female primary characters as something that belittles men (ultimately, a person has to be quite unintelligent to interpret an increase in female lead characters as an attack on men).

The world is full of both men and women.  For entertainment to reflect this vital aspect of reality, as well as to welcome people of both genders, it must not exclude either men or women from prominent roles.  Anyone who thinks that intentionally trying to put women in more lead roles is a misandrist move has a pathetic grasp of actual sexism.

Misunderstanding The Brain In A Vat Scenario

The the idea that one could be a brain in a vat is one that is sometimes misapplied, as if the legitimate possibility that my body might be a mere brain floating in a vat means that there might not be an external world.  Not only does the latter, even if it was possible, not follow in any way from the former, but if I am a brain in a vat, being stimulated by electrodes into perceiving stimuli that do not exist outside of my perceptions, then an external world still exists.  Many seem to overlook this crucial point.  Only one's perceptions of particular stimuli would be inaccurate.

For there to be a brain, a vat, electrodes, and any other piece of equipment relevant to this scenario, matter has to exist.  Thus, the brain in a vat hypothesis can never be legitimately used to argue that the material world itself is an illusion, for only one's perceptions of the material world can be misaligned with reality.  At most, the brain in a vat hypothesis can only prove that the external world might have a different layout and appearance than those one perceives.

As long as one feels physical sensations, it is impossible for there to be no such thing as matter [1].  Seeing a thing proves only that one sees it.  Hearing a thing proves only that one hears it.  Touching a thing proves that some sort of physical stimulus exists, as a consciousness, being immaterial, cannot experience physical sensations without inhabiting a physical body that contacts actual matter.

The brain in a vat hypothesis, unverifiable and unfalsifiable, can change nothing about base reality even if it is true.  Truth, logic, my consciousness, my body, an external world beyond my body, and time all still exist--with the brain in a vat concept only holding ramifications for the metaphysics of my body and the world of matter outside of it.  The core of reality would still be the same.

Logic, people.  It is very helpful.

(My college classes resume today.  I will try to keep writing frequently, but there may be a drop in post frequency for a brief time after today.)

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/08/matter-is-not-an-illusion.html

Eliminating Errors

Some people might have a favorite error, one that they tend to overlook, tolerate, or defend.  It may grant them a sense of fulfillment or peace, whether they know its falsity or not.  Regardless of what the error is, one thing is very likely: that error is not alone.  Errors are not things that can be easily quarantined, for they often survive in a community of other related errors.  If you find one, others will likely be nearby.

It is very difficult, at best, to hold to even one error without it affecting other aspects of one's worldview.  Every fallacy, assumption, and error is itself rationally unjustifiable, but the cognitive dissonances or behavioral changes resulting from even one of them can prove very destructive on their own.  Unfortunately, many people resign themselves to having errors woven into their worldviews, with some going as far as to say that everyone must have some flaw in their worldview.  This response is fallacious bullshit, an attempt to either deflect away criticism or to exude a false humility, and neither of these motives can make what is false become true.

Just as one drop of water can generate many ripples,
a single error can spawn many other errors.

It is not impossible, despite popular delusion to the contrary, to avoid making even a single error--but to do so one must follow reason wherever it leads.  Just because one person clings to an error does not mean that another person has to make the same mistake, and thus there is nothing about any particular error that makes it a part of human nature.  There is nothing about being human that necessitates that one is incapable of discovering and correcting fallacies; there is nothing logically impossible about having an error-free worldview, though one must be wholly devoted to rationality in order to possess such a thing.  Whether quantitative (having to do with the number of fallacies) or categorical (having to do with the type of fallacy), there is no particular error that anyone has to include in their worldview.

When purging a worldview of errors, there is no basis for stopping until all of them have been identified and tossed out, for only beliefs which are both true and demonstrable can deserve to be held.  All other beliefs, no matter how comforting they may be, can only rest upon assumptions or falsities.  Rationalism is the great light that dispels the darkness of fallacies and ignorance.  Though reason exposes some ignorances that we cannot overcome due to metaphysical limitations, it can expose any intellectual mistake for what it is.  We need not be prisoners to assumptions and errors.

Originality And Truth

There are those who deny the existence of intellectual originality, and then there are those who treat the pursuit of truth as trivial unless original discovery is involved.  Both sets of people are deluded by their fallacies and errors.  While intellectual originality is surprisingly simple to achieve once one understands reason and the intellectual inadequacies of most people, truth's importance does not hinge on originality.  However, the inverse is true: originality's importance hinges on the importance of truth.

Of course, merely rediscovering the same truths that others have already identified through one's own personal reflections and deductions, and not because of faith or consensus, is a manifestation of originality already, for reaching even basic conclusions on one's own means one is not infected by groupthink.  People who pretend like originality, autonomous reasoning, and new discoveries are impossible demonstrate their unintelligence.  There can only be a finite number of truths, many of which have already been uncovered, but I have already found many that historical philosophers and theologians largely or wholly neglected [1].

What matters most, nevertheless, is not that one discovers a truth previously unknown to humanity.  While this may be fulfilling, doable (it is certainly doable, despite the claims of the ignorant), and exciting, it is more important to be correct than to be original.  If a truth has been affirmed by another person, then reaffirming that truth is the duty of subsequent thinkers.  Originality is only valuable when it points to truth, but truth can be valuable even when completely separate from originality.

As my blog regularly evidences, there are many miscellaneous logical, epistemological, metaphysical, and theological truths that have gone unspoken throughout history and that are scarcely known even in the present day.  Still, these truths derive their significance from a source other than originality.  Originality is certainly possible [2], but it is secondary, at best, to truth--though if you search for truth, you will very likely find originality as well!


[1].  See here:
  A.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/07/unique-discoveries-part-1.html
  B.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/07/unique-discoveries-part-two.html

[2].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/07/intellectual-originality.html

Movie Review--Thor: The Dark World

"Long before the birth of light, there was darkness.  And from that darkness came the Dark Elves."
--Odin

"We are not gods.  We are born, we live, we die.  Just as humans do."
--Odin


One of the most underrated MCU movies, alongside The Incredible Hulk [1], Thor: The Dark World does not deserve all of the harsh criticism that has been meted out upon it since 2013.  Though it lacks a developed and complex villain, as many MCU films do, its strengths stand out plainly: the acting, scenery, and effects are superb.  It also lacks the atmosphere of relentless, childish comedy that started overpopulating many of the MCU offerings from the end of Phase Two onward--a trend that Black Panther [2] and Infinity War [3] are just starting to reverse.  As with the greatest films in the MCU (like The Incredible Hulk, The Winter Soldier [4], and the aforementioned 2018 movies), there are actual stakes in the story, which honors the first Thor film while subtly suggesting at the coming events of the third.

Photo credit: The_JIFF on VisualHunt 

 /  CC BY

Production Values

The scenery, costumes, and effects are gorgeous.  Thor: The Dark World portrays barren landscapes and areas of vibrant colors, the contrast accentuating the stark colors of the scenes on Asgard, with many scenes involving Asgard standing out because of the city's foreign technologies, all of which are animated beautifully.  The brilliant visuals enhance some great action scenes.  Thankfully, the acting is also excellent all around.  Chris Hemsworth and Tom Hiddleston have an incredibly lifelike relationship onscreen, one that exhibits complexity, nuance, and emotion.  They are immersed in their roles in the best way.  Both actors are capable of conveying layered characterization with either their words or their body language, each one contributing to some of the movie's most significant narrative scenes.  Anthony Hopkins (Odin), Jaimie Alexander (Lady Sif), and Idris Elba (Heimdall) offer great performances of their own, despite having much less screentime.  Even Natalie Portman does a great job handling many of her lines, easily surpassing her acting from the first two Star Wars prequels.  Also, Kat Dennings' character Darcy Lewis, whom the role of providing comedy regularly falls to, is able to deliver her humor in a way that doesn't detract from the legitimate seriousness of the story's events.  Marvel movies need more of that!


Story

As usual, spoilers are below.

Photo credit: The_JIFF on Visual hunt 

 /  CC BY

In the aftermath of Loki's destructive behavior in The Avengers, the god of mischief is brought before Odin and sentenced to life incarceration in the dungeons of Asgard.  While Asgard experiences renewed peace, thanks to the efforts of Thor and several of his friends, an event called the Convergence approaches: an alignment of the Nine Realms that occurs every few thousand years.  Due to abnormal gravitational phenomena foreshadowing the Convergence, Jane Foster, Thor's human lover, ends up indwelt by the Aether, a powerful weapon once used by the Dark Elf Malekith in an attempt to plunge the universe into darkness.

As the Aether enters Jane's body, Malekith awakens, having survived his last battle with Asgardians thousands of years ago.  He brings elite warriors to Asgard in search of the Aether, killing Thor's mother Frigga when she refuses to disclose Jane's location.  Though Thor chases Malekith away, Asgard is left defenseless and full of uncertainty.  Amidst the tension, Thor turns to Loki, freeing him in exchange for Loki bringing him and Jane to meet Malekith away from Asgard.  In the resulting confrontation, Malekith removes the Aether from Jane, with Loki being mortally impaled and Thor and Jane being abandoned.

The duo escape and return to earth via a portal between the realms, allowing them to reunite with some human allies.  Thor, aided by Jane and some of her equipment, then defeats Malekith by teleporting him away from earth.  He returns to Asgard, speaks with Odin, and rejects an offer of the throne, saying that he would rather be a good man than a great king.  As he walks away, Odin changes form into Loki, who now sits upon the throne he previously coveted.


Intellectual Content

There isn't much in the film that could merit a worthwhile discussion about philosophy, save for a few scattered lines--but, when Jane is brought to Asgard after the Aether infects her, Odin says that the Aether is one of several relics that "predate the universe," also adding that the Dark Elves existed before the Nine Realms.  Since the creation of the universe is the creation of matter, it would be impossible for there to be anything material prior to the existence of the universe.  No material object can predate the physical cosmos, for then a component of the universe would exist before the universe existed!


Conclusion

It is unfortunate that The Dark World has such a negative reputation, because it has actual gravity, some very impactful character moments, and some very skilled acting on the parts of both lead and supporting actors.  The final scene alone, even isolated from the rest of the movie, is absolutely splendid in its execution, setting up the comedy film Thor: Ragnarok without even slightly betraying the consistently serious tone the previous scenes built up.  Yes, Malekith is an extremely weak villain, teetering at or around the same ground as Justice League's woefully undeveloped Steppenwolf.  The rest of the movie makes up for it, though!  I wish more MCU movies were like The Dark World, not fewer.

Photo credit: walt74 on VisualHunt.com 

 /  CC BY-NC-SA

Content:
1. Violence:  The usual non-graphic Marvel action is on display here.  The most brutal moments are those when Malekith's arms are detached from his body via teleportation.
2. Profanity:  Only very infrequently does anyone use profanity.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/08/movie-review-incredible-hulk.html

[2].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/02/movie-review-black-panther.html

[3].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/04/movie-review-avengers-infinity-war.html

[4].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/07/movie-review-captain-america-winter.html

A Self-Defeating Multiverse Hypothesis

While the idea of a generic multiverse is certainly one that might be true, there is one particular idea of the multiverse that can only be false, given the nature of what follows from it.  A multiverse is a collection of separate universes, each having their own beginnings, events, and potential endings.  The laws of physics that govern each could vary drastically; the one universal constant would be the necessary laws of logic.  The existence of a multiverse would not necessitate that all possible universes exist, as even two coexisting universes would validate concept of a multiverse.  In fact, all possible universes cannot exist.

If all possible universes exist (an alogical realm cannot exist, since such a thing contradicts necessary truths), then there is a universe in which some natural or artificial event destroyed that universe and all other universes, rendering all matter nonexistent.  Only immaterial things like logic and space would be left.  But what follows, by necessity, is that there could be no universe in the present moment, since all universes were destroyed in this catastrophe!  The conclusion inescapably follows, as there is a possible universe in which a calamity annihilates all matter.

However, there is a universe.  As long as I experience physical sensations, matter of some form exists.  Thus, the notion of a multiverse that contains every possible world is itself impossible.  A key fact about this conception of the multiverse is that it does not reflect how a multiverse would necessarily be: a multiverse does not have to contain all possible worlds, because it only needs to contain more than universe to be a multiverse.  There could be a multiverse--and, if there is, it does not include all possible universes, because then there would be no universe at all.

The existence of a multiverse is only logically possible if that multiverse does not contain all possible worlds.  However, the fact that this kind of multiverse could exist does not grant anyone the ability to verify if it does.  Setting out to prove the existence of a multiverse is setting out to prove an unverifiable thing, for spatial and sensory limitations will necessitate that one will not advance very far in such a quest.  If there is a vast multiverse, I am in no position to discover it, because I can be present in merely one spatial location at a time and because my senses allow me to perceive a very small amount of the external world at most.

The multiverse remains an unverifiable and unfalsifiable concept, but that does not mean that no conceptual knowledge about a multiverse can be obtained.  At the very least, one can know that a multiverse is possible, but only if it does not contain every possible universe.  The idea of a multiverse encompassing all possible universes is a self-defeating one--it carries within itself the facts that dissolve it from the inside out.

The Consensus Of Theologians

The history of the church is filled with a litany of fallacies, exegetical errors, and assumptions.  Ask conservative or liberal Christians alike if this is the case--many of them might agree that the church has succumbed to certain errors from time to time.  What they will often not acknowledge, though, is that some ideas held up as Biblical for millennia are often contrary to the whole of Scripture.  They generally have no problem with denouncing the consensus of secular people, but they forget that a consensus within the church is just as worthless.  Cognitive dissonance is an intellectual disease that festers in the minds of many Christians.

Christian theologians throughout history have generally reached asinine conclusions about many issues, some particular subjects they have distorted being rationalism, the Trinity, hell, egalitarianism, theonomy, and sexuality.  And yet many people will resist a logically or Biblically verifiable idea simply because the majority of Christians have not and do not embrace it!  Indeed, the thought that the majority of Christians can be wrong terrifies or puzzles them, as if mass delusion is an impossible thing!

In elevating the consensus of past theologians to a level of perceived importance, people merely reveal how incompetent their grasp of reason is.  One of the most basic objections that some people raise against certain Biblical truths (like annihilationism or egalitarianism) involves the fact that historical Christians often denied them.  There is a very simple refutation to these objections: the truth of a doctrine has absolutely nothing to do with what theologians claim.  No rational theologian will look to an alleged authority figure instead of consulting logic and Scripture.

Contra-Biblical ideas like eternal conscious torment for all unsaved beings, complementarianism, sexual prudery, and anti-rationalism have been, and still are, claimed by the majority of those within the church.  The church at large has never been a bastion of intelligence and accuracy.  Instead, it falls to individual Christians to wield reason as they dispel the illusory power of myths and traditions.  The consensus of theologians is worthless because a consensus means nothing except that there is agreement.

Logic, people.  It is very fucking helpful.

Lingerie Is Not Sexual

Imagine a society that associates blue jeans with sex.  If people wear blue jeans in this hypothetical culture, it is expected for them to be about to engage in sexual behaviors, or that, at the very least, they are trying to feel sexy.  If a society viewed blue jeans as related to sexual activity, that society would have a false understanding of the nature of both sexuality and blue jeans.  Many Americans would probably see very quickly that there is nothing about blue jeans on their own that has to do with sexual feelings or activities.  Only a highly unintelligent person would fail to realize this.

If one said the same about lingerie, though, those same people would likely disagree.  That lingerie, a type of undergarment, is objectively nonsexual in itself is just as easily demonstrable, though this truth is mostly unacknowledged (as is the fact that there is no logical connection between lingerie and a specific gender, though my culture associates lingerie almost exclusively with women).  The fallacious beliefs about sexuality that people often subscribe to are absurd!

In itself, there is nothing about lingerie that is affiliated with sexual behaviors or feelings, just like there is no connection between sexuality and male muscularity, bikinis, or nudity.  Just like there is no inherent connection between sexuality and a man being shirtless or a woman wearing shorts, what people classify as lingerie is not connected to sexuality by logical necessity.  It is cultural forces, not reason or Scripture, that hold up such clothing as sexual (just like it is solely cultural forces that affiliate such clothing mostly with women, due to false assumptions about men and women).  Transparency and sensual designs don't make clothing itself sexual.  It could have been some other style of clothing that was deemed as having to do with sex.

Whether someone perceives lingerie to be sexy, though, is a totally different matter.  Sexiness is a purely subjective thing, having only to do with a person being sexually attracted to another person or sexually aroused by a situation, thing, or person.  Someone can perceive a nonsexual thing to be sexy [1], just like someone might not be sexually stirred on either a physiological or mental level by something that is inherently sexual.  While sexiness pertains to the subjective perceptions of an individual, a thing--an act, a feeling, or a situation--is either sexual or nonsexual, and only a relatively minuscule number of behaviors and feelings are truly sexual by nature.  The vast majority of things people consider either sexy or sexual are objectively nonsexual in themselves.

The nuances of sexuality can be discovered through reason and experience, and sometimes these nuances, as with other subjects, are far deeper than some might expect.  But these nuances are still true, and they are still provable.  The truth is that there is nothing sexual about lingerie itself, just like there is nothing sexual about a myriad of other things that people might mistake as sexual--always due to faulty epistemology and metaphysics.  When a person challenges social consensus with reason, what comes to light might be very surprising to them.

[1].  “Sapiosexuals are sexually attracted to intelligence, yet there is nothing sexual about intelligence.  Demisexuals experience sexual attraction to people they are very emotionally close to, yet there is nothing sexual about emotional intimacy.  Likewise, some women might be sexually attracted to male muscularity (and vice versa), although there is nothing sexual about muscularity.  Or some people might find a certain hairstyle or smile sexy, when there is nothing sexual about hair or smiling.  Some men might perceive a specific bikini to be sexy and some women might perceive shirtless men to be sexy, although there is nothing sexual about either bikinis or shirtlessness."
--https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/03/the-nature-of-sexiness.html

The Myth Of Normalcy

In an effort to ostracize or silence amoral behaviors they do not like, some people might resort to condemning something because it is “abnormal.”  A rational analysis of the concept of normalcy, though, reveals that there is no such thing as an objectively normal set of behaviors.  Normality cannot exist as long as different lifestyles do.

Since "normal" is a term referring to common behavioral trends, the only things that one could appeal to in order to argue that something is normal are the actions of others--but since human behaviors vary with time and location, the very idea that some actions are inherently normal and others are not is asinine.  Normalcy is not like morality.  There can be universal moral truths even if all people dispute or deny them.  However, there can be no such thing as an objective, universal standard of normalcy if people have different ideas of what normalcy is based upon genuine lifestyle differences.  Specific human behaviors have no fixed rate of occurrence.

It follows that there cannot be such a thing as objectively normal behaviors, only behaviors that a particular person or group perceives as normal, and these perceptions are not uniform.  Since there is no transcendent normalcy, the mere fact that an activity is or is not socially accepted need not have any influence over one's lifestyle decisions: the only things that should deter people from a certain course of action are rationality and morality, not concerns with what other people will think or allegiance to a particular idea of normality.  Whether or not something is allegedly "normal" has nothing to do with whether or not something is permissible or immoral, so there can be no inherent profit from concerning oneself with normalcy to begin with.

Individuality, wherever it is expressed in a nonsinful way, is good, because God did not create humans to have identical personalities.  In an ultimate sense, behavioral normalcy does not exist, for one person might not behave as another does, and any human practice is subject to change as it is.  As long as people do not violate an objective moral obligation, they can express themselves however they please.  The trivial objections of those who believe in objective normality amount to nothing more than social constructs mistaken for reality.

The Relationship Between Consciousness And Biblical Ethics

The only beings that the Bible describes humans as having moral obligations towards are divine entities (that the Bible prescribes certain behaviors towards Yahweh and Jesus is obvious), other humans, and animals.  All three of these categories, though they include beings that are metaphysically distinct from each other in nature, share one commonality: all of the beings contained in each are conscious [1].

All moral commands in Scripture reduce down to having a right relationship with conscious beings.  For instance, you cannot rape a non-conscious thing, because there is no will to violate or force.  You cannot murder a non-conscious thing, because there is no sentience to kill.  You cannot steal from a non-conscious thing, because there is no possession of property.  You cannot emotionally abuse a non-conscious thing, because there is no sentience to harm with words or deeds.

What about the ceremonial rules in Mosaic Law?  For instance, what about the dietary restrictions on eating certain kinds of foods, or the laws about handling certain diseases?  Even these involve having a right relationship with God, because the reason for their inclusion in God's moral revelation was that God required obedience.  They were not about justly treating humans and animals, but had to do with rightly relating to Yahweh, who is defined in the New Testament as a consciousness without a body (John 4:24).

All cultures have some values that overlap, even if only on a very remote level, with the ethical demands found in the Bible.  Which of the Bible's values a culture agrees with depends on its time, geography, politics, and a host of other factors.  Because of this, anyone can read the Bible and find some sort of ethical teaching or principle that matches one that is encouraged in their own society.  Modern Western culture emphasizes the rights of sentient beings, which is, though not often directly recognized as such, a thoroughly Biblical idea.  For instance, the Bible affirms repeatedly that humans and animals are not to be mistreated.

That the Bible does prescribe select forms of execution and flogging should not be ignored.  Where the Bible deviates from Western culture is on the issue of which forms of pain are just or morally permissible, as well as the issue of which contexts make the infliction of certain pains or death on sentient beings just.  But the Bible has always taught a relationship between consciousness and ethics!  Ethical obligations, being rooted in God's nature, always relate to sentience in some way.

[1].  Of course, I cannot know if any consciousness other than my own exists.  I am describing concepts, not making a declaration about the verifiability of the metaphysical existence of other minds, human or animal.

Hypocrisy And Just Condemnation

Hypocrisy is sometimes perceived as something that totally dissolves the moral credibility of a person.  Yes, it does indicate that a person is stupid, apathetic, or weak enough to live out a grave inconsistency, and perhaps the person is all three at once.  But does it render a hypocrite’s denouncement of the same evil they themselves commit entirely worthless?  Can it?

If a kidnapper condemns another kidnapper, does the condemnation have no moral weight simply because the condemner is also a kidnapper?  Of course not!  If kidnapping is morally wrong, then any condemnation of it has authority, regardless of the source of the objection.  This hypothetical person is being inconsistent, yes, but he or she is still not incorrect from a Christian standpoint.  There is an enormous difference between living in a manner inconsistent with a truth and denying a truth.

If a thief is robbed, any potential objection to the theft is not meaningless just because the victim is also a thief.  If theft itself is wrong, it is logically impossible for it to suddenly become just or undeserving of condemnation.  It can only be depraved irrespective of who the thief or victim is.  Thus, it follows by necessity that moral judgment of the theft is just, whether or not the one robbed is guilty of the same offense.

Being in the wrong does not mean that one is incorrect in passing moral judgment on others, even if that judgment also condemns oneself.  It means only that one is a hypocrite.  If someone is hypocritical, we should not deny any legitimate moral points they make, as if their hypocrisy changes the nature of right and wrong; instead, we should call attention to the fact that they do not live in accordance with their own moral judgments and with actual moral truths.  Since morality does not depend on the consistency or feelings of any human, the actions of another person should not affect our consistency in pursuing righteousness.

Experiential And Intellectual Understanding

A person can understand something intellectually without knowing it experientially.  I am in no way pitting logic and experience against each other, for they are completely intertwined in epistemology at a basic level [1].  I mean, instead, that one does not have to directly experience something to comprehend, contemplate, or know it intimately.  One can go an entire lifetime without a particular experience and still deeply understand the nature and ramifications of that experience.

For instance, I don't have to see a dinosaur to understand what a dinosaur is.  Likewise, I don't have to be married to understand marriage from a conceptual, relational, and theological standpoint.  Some people might think that a person's singleness means he or she does not, or even cannot, understand marriage, but this is illogical nonsense.  I also have no need to be seven feet tall to understand what it means to be seven feet tall, just like I have no need to struggle with insomnia to understand what insomnia can be like.

I have never witnessed outer space itself.  Does this mean I cannot understand outer space?  I have not graduated from college yet.  Does this mean I cannot understand post-graduate life?  Of course I can understand both of these things!  In fact, I am capable of understanding the concepts themselves with absolute clarity, despite having never visited outer space or graduated from college.  It takes only a brief period of reflection to become aware of this.  Even where there is no direct experiential understanding, a person can have a thorough intellectual understanding of a thing.

Some people might try to deflect away a criticism, suggestion, or comment by saying that the person offering it can't relate to their experiences.  While the latter point may be true, this does nothing to invalidate the criticism or suggestion, because a person can, through reason, understand a thing without having ever experienced it for himself or herself.  All knowledge involves experience, but this is can be merely the experiences of introspection and reasoning, not the direct experience of a situation.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/09/the-necessity-of-experience-to-knowledge.html

Denial Of Nietzsche's Nihilism

There are actually people who think that Nietzsche was not a nihilist and that his worldview is far from nihilism.  What horrendous exegesis skills they have!  Just like people can misunderstand the Bible, people can misunderstand other books, regardless of the author's worldview.  Having to show that Nietzsche was a nihilist is like having to show that the Bible teaches theism--it is extremely simple.  Some are quick to pretend like Nietzsche was more complex, grand, and rational than he was, when he was largely a fallacious, inconsistent, self-refuting imbecile who believed in contradictions and unverifiable premises.  Defending intellectual failures reveals that one is as intellectually unworthy as the failures themselves.

In his work Beyond Good and Evil, Nietzsche makes a direct claim that moral nihilism is true: "There are no moral phenomena at all, only a moral interpretation of phenomena" (85).  Here, he asserts that there are no moral truths which govern our actions, though people perceive and interpret events, actions, and ideas in a moral way.  A declaration of moral nihilism could scarcely be simpler and more direct.  Of course Nietzsche was a nihilist!  Nihilism is synonymous with a denial of values, and the existence of right and wrong is tied to the existence of meaning--if morality exists, then so does meaning.

Nietzsche plainly describes himself in his own fucking writings as a moral nihilist, a denier of objective values, and as someone who denies the intrinsic veracity of logic.  If someone identifies himself or herself as an adherent of a particular idea and those from later generations claim that the person actually didn't believe what he or she blatantly said, the ones denying what the adherent said are guilty of fallaciously misrepresenting someone's worldview.  In some cases, this denial seems to be a consequence of quasi-Nietzscheans trying desperately to defend a person with a largely worthless ideology: they are attempting to make Nietzsche's writings sound more sophisticated and salvageable than they actually are.

I openly admit that Nietzsche occasionally reveals patches of genuine brilliance.  I've mentioned this before, after all [1].  However, a great deal of his worldview is nothing more than incoherent, self-refuting impossibilities combined with misunderstandings of almost every major component of reality.  Apart from a handful of legitimate points and a handful of pure contradictions, Nietzsche embraces concepts that would be utterly unprovable at best even if they were true (like moral nihilism).  He contradicts both himself and necessary truths at his worst.  The most thorough depth is always to be found exclusively in the worldviews of actual rationalists, and Nietzsche was far from being a rationalist.  His contradictions and assumptions only highlight how unintelligent he tended to be.

Not even basic theism automatically disqualifies nihilism from being true.  However, there is no rational argument for nihilism of any sort, since either the conclusion always fails to follow from its premises or the premises themselves are fallacious or untrue.  I cannot refute nihilism, but I can refute every argument for nihilism [2].  Nietzsche's nihilism betrays his stupidity.


Beyond Good and Evil.  Nietzsche, Friedrich.  Trans. Kaufmann, Walter.  New York: Vintage Books, 1989.  Print.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/11/nietzsche-on-external-world.html

[2].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/06/arguments-for-nihilism.html

Movie Review--Alien

"You still don't understand what you're dealing with, do you?  A perfect organism.  Its structural perfection is matched only by its hostility."
--Ash, Alien

"This is Ripley, last survivor of the Nostromo, signing off."
--Ellen Ripley, Alien


Alien deserves its reputation as an iconic science fiction horror tale due to the quality of its acting and pacing.  The first half revels in its slow burn drama, while the second half focuses on the horror elements that the plot forces into the spotlight.  Alien is practically a science fiction slasher film.  It's very appropriate that the movie emphasizes the isolation of its characters from earth, since Alien is entirely self-contained, having no inherent need for the sequels that followed in order to convey its whole story.  In this regard, its story stands out quite plainly from the style of storytelling that is so prevalent and popular in cinema today.

Photo credit: junaidrao on VisualHunt.com 

 /  CC BY-NC-ND

Production Values

Alien relies on a steady development of tension for its horror elements, not on the rapid jump scares that so many contemporary horror movies do.  The alien itself only rarely appears onscreen, though its appearances are used to great effect, since the anticipation of what might happen next is what provides the suspense.  Considering that Alien is a product of 1979, the titular creature looks phenomenal!  The practical effects for the alien still look great.  The sets (particularly when lights are fluctuating) have a look that alienates them--I had to use that word--from the modern era, but they accomplish everything they need to.  As for the acting, Sigourney Weaver proved an excellent choice for Ellen Ripley.  The nature of the script does not allow for significant emotional changes in the characters, but Weaver has opportunities to display firmness, ingenuity, vulnerability, and resolve, and she nails all of them.  Fittingly, the final 20 minutes of the movie belong to her.  Though Alien is certainly Ripley's movie, the other cast members also bring realistic performances, complementing Weaver's own acting.


Story

(Spoilers!)

The seven crew members of a commercial ship called the Nostromo wake up from stasis sleep on a voyage to earth, the ship's computer (called Mother) stirring them because it received a transmission.  The Nostromo is still months from earth, and if the crew neglects to investigate the source of the message, it might forfeit all of its pay.  The group decides to search the region the signal originated from, three of its members entering a seemingly abandoned alien vessel on a foreign planet.

Kane, one of the three who ventured out onto the planet, is attacked by an organism that attaches itself to his face for a prolonged period of time, even after he is returned to the interior of the Nostromo.  The facehugger releases itself and dies, but a new creature erupts out of Kane's torso, scurrying away almost immediately.  It rapidly grows into a large, malevolent being.

During the following period of uncertainty and panic, the science officer, Ash, attacks fellow crew member Ellen Ripley.  Ash is overpowered and killed, but turns out to be an android sent by the ship's company.  Ripley plans to activate the Nostromo's self-destruct system and escape in a smaller craft, and she does manage to leave.  However, the alien boarded her escape vessel.  Without any other plan to defeat the creature, Ripley dons a spacesuit, slowly straps herself into a chair, and opens the air lock.  The alien is pulled out into space, but the scene is not the last time that the species would make an appearance in cinema.


Intellectual Content

Alien, unlike some of its siblings (such as Prometheus), does not have any particular conceptual themes at the forefront of the story.  It falls to the most recent series entries to illuminate the philosophical ideas at the heart of the franchise's general plot.


Conclusion

For modern moviegoers, Alien offers a self-sufficient narrative that particularly stands out in an age of cinematic universes.  While Alien did spawn a rather extensive franchise that includes a two-part crossover with the Predator series, it stands on its own, unique and complete.  This is one of the aspects of it that I admire the most!  It will almost certainly appeal to those who enjoy horror films that do not rush to show the monster, explain every detail of the story, or have the objective of setting up sequels.

Photo credit: junaidrao on Visualhunt.com 

 /  CC BY-NC-ND

Content:
1. Violence:  While the violence is mostly kept at a minimum, there are scenes with relatively graphic moments.  In one, the titular alien erupts out of a man's chest, and in another an android is torn open.
2. Profanity:  Ripley uses variations of "fuck."
3. Nudity:  Part of Ripley's buttocks are visible in one scene.

A Hypocrisy With Gender Roles

Among all the inconsistencies embedded within the very notion of gender roles and gender-specific personality traits, there is one that does not get denounced enough.  It is the tendency for some sexist people to arbitrarily accept it when women act in a so-called “male” way while viewing men who act in a so-called “female” way as if their lifestyle is an abomination.

If a woman displays allegedly “masculine” characteristics, like consistent emotional toughness, thorough competitiveness, and general aggression, her behaviors might be judged threatening or offensive by those who believe the complementarian heresy, but they will likely be judged as less offensive to sexists than if the scenario was reversed.  If a man displays allegedly “feminine” characteristics, like consistent emotional sensitivity, gentleness, and general submissiveness, his behaviors will probably receive far more objections from the same sexists who would reluctantly accept those of the hypothetical woman in the previous sentence.

You’ve probably heard the phrase “real man” get verbally tossed around--and often in an intentionally belittling way--far more than the phrase “real woman,” which only confirms the hypocrisy of those who use the phrases.  The phrases, of course, have no philosophical or moral significance, since anyone who uses them to refer to some “ideal” set of gender-specific attitudes or behaviors can only mean something purely arbitrary and irrational.  What one person means by them contradicts what another person means by them, and logic proves that it does not follow from someone having a male or female body that he or she will have some imagined set of behavioral and personality characteristics.

There’s a very simple way to be a “real man” or a “real woman”: be born with the body of a man or woman!  Gender is merely a category for bodies, having nothing at all to do with personality traits, moral obligations, or individual competencies.  Anyone who claims otherwise is guilty of the no true Scotsman fallacy.  This is analogous to someone characterizing another person as not being a "real" American for not voting for a particular candidate, when whether or not one is an American has absolutely nothing to do with anything other than whether someone was born in America or obtained citizenship through alternative means.  Someone is a man or woman because of their anatomy and physiology, not because they adhere to someone's fallacious ideas about how men and women should think and act.

Matter Is Not An Illusion

Quantum physics continues to fuel the unverifiable speculation of idealists, who, in some cases, hold that matter is an illusion and that it doesn't actually exist.  This nonsense, though easy to refute, remains popular in circles of people who think that quantum physics will come to mark the end of belief in a material world.  The existence of matter is far from self-evident, as only a very small handful of truths verify themselves.  But matter does exist.  One can prove the existence of matter in full.  As long as the delusions of those who believe that matter is an illusion persist, the need for refuting them will also persist.

The existence of some form of matter is not beyond the ability of
 logic and immediate experiences to establish.

Yet again, I will prove the existence of matter as a physical substance outside of my mind, since the proof refutes any notions of matter being illusory--though it does not disprove the idea that matter cannot exist separately from consciousness.  Proving the former does not prove the latter, regardless of the idealists' insistence.  The facts about the material world that reason can establish are very precise, but there are facts that one can know about it, and this knowledge begins with the awareness that there really is a world of physical landscapes and objects.

If I walk around, stand still, or sit, my sense of touch registers physical sensations.  These sensations can only be produced and received by physical things, since a consciousness without a body, being strictly immaterial, could not generate or experience sensations of a physical nature.  Just as it follows inescapably from the fact that I perceive that I exist as a conscious mind, it follows inescapably and necessarily from the fact that I experience physical sensations that my mind resides in a body of some kind and that I am in contact with matter outside of my body.  At least two material things exist, therefore: my body and some sort of matter beyond it.

There is matter outside of my mind.  This cannot be an illusion, though the appearances of material objects are uncertain to me--I might not be perceiving the material world as it is, but there is a world of matter that I am perceiving.  Likewise, though I cannot know if my body looks in actuality as it appears to me now, I know with absolute certainty that I do have a body.  Perhaps I have two heads, one arm, and four legs.  I cannot prove or disprove any of these possibilities, but the fact that my mind inhabits a shell of matter is wholly proven by my experiences with physical sensations.

Even if matter does depend on perception for its existence, this cannot mean that all of reality is mind-dependent or that my consciousness is responsible for creating everything.  My consciousness cannot be a construct of itself; a thing cannot bring itself into existence, since it would have to exist prior to its own existence to do so: an impossible thing!  Logic cannot be a construct of consciousness, since it exists by necessity in the absence of all minds, including that of God [1].  Even space, the dimension that holds matter, cannot be a construct of consciousness, since it, too, exists by necessity even if there were no minds at all [2].  Many people use the term "reality" in a very limited, incomplete way to refer to the way the external world is, though logic, space, and consciousness are themselves parts of reality that are separate from the external world.

Reality is not only divided into the categories of mind and matter; on the contrary, it is divided into a variety of physical and immaterial things, with all existing material objects, the external world in which they reside, and my body existing in one category, and with logic, space, time, and consciousness existing in the other.  Historical and contemporary philosophers have failed to bring attention to the specifics about metaphysics because errors and incomplete worldviews have always been the norm throughout recorded human history.

The existence of matter is not and cannot be an illusion.  Idealists who say that all matter might be mind-dependent--that is, that if all minds were to cease to exist, then so would physical matter--might be correct.  However, they have absolutely no way to demonstrate this to be true even if it does accurately reflect reality, especially through something as limited as the scientific method or quantum physics.  Logic cannot prove or refute this idea, so it is at best unverifiable and unfalsifiable.  But logic does prove the existence of physical matter: anyone who denies its existence is a liar or highly ignorant.

[1].  See here:
  A.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/10/the-immateriality-of-logic.html
  B.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/07/the-metaphysics-of-logic.html

[2].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/05/einstein-on-empty-space.html

Sensuality Is Not Sexuality

In a prudish society, it is easy for many to mistake sensuality for sexuality, despite the former being quite distinct from the latter.  Sensuality pertains to the pleasurable stimulation of the senses.  Sexuality, which goes beyond mere sensuality, pertains to sexual behaviors or feelings.  Clearly, a scenario or action can be sensual without being sexual.  There are many sensual pleasures wholly independent from expressions of sexuality.  For instance, eating food can be very sensual.  But does eating appealing food qualify as sexual simply because it stimulates the senses in an enjoyable way?  Of course not!

Though the mouth is used for eating food, the exposure of a mouth does not mean that a person is about to eat.  Though the genitals are used for various sexual acts, the exposure of genitalia does not mean either that a person is about to engage in a sexual behavior or that he or she is thinking about sexuality.  Absolutely nothing about public nudity itself is sexual, either on a physical or mental level; even if a person's body becomes physiologically aroused (which can happen for purely nonsexual reasons), exhibiting a penile or clitoral erection or any other aspect of physical arousal, absolutely nothing at all about the situation or thoughts of anyone in the vicinity is automatically sexual [1].  Exposing one's body and viewing the bodies of others, however, can be a highly sensual experience.  This is sometimes mistaken for an underlying sexual atmosphere, when it only means that the experience of being naked or witnessing nudity can please the senses.

For example, the relative sense of physical freedom that nudity can bring is deeply sensual.  The absence of clothing on one’s body can certainly feel liberating and physically, as well as mentally, pleasurable.  But this sense of freedom is not sexual.  Likewise, the visual sight of nudity can be aesthetically pleasing and exciting, and thus it can also be deeply sensual, but it, too, is not sexual.  Activities like sleeping naked can be very sensual--doing so can feel very comfortable.  Again, nothing about this comfort is sexual.  That something can produce desirable sensory sensations or pangs of mental pleasure does not mean that it is in any way affiliated with sexual acts, thoughts, or feelings by nature.

There is nothing wrong with deriving sexual pleasure from the sight or thought of the human body.  The problem arises when someone mistakes the human body for something that is inherently sexual, a mistake that defies reality.  Sensuality is not automatically synonymous with sexuality.  The confusion that comes about when people equate the two can be easily averted through the use of reason.  Though both sensuality and sexuality alike have been the targets of ascetic legalists, any idea that demonizes either of them contradicts the entirety of Scripture.  Our bodies were created with the capacity for experiencing sensual, as well as sexual, pleasure, and anyone who denies or ignores this in the name of Christianity does not understand Christianity.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/12/nudity-and-sexual-arousal.html

Movie Review--A Nightmare On Elm Street (2010)

"Did you know that after the heart stops beating, the brain keeps functioning for well over seven minutes?  We got six more minutes to play."
--Freddy Krueger, A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)


One can still see the impact of the original A Nightmare on Elm Street on popular culture.  The 2010 remake, though, received mostly lukewarm and negative reactions upon its release, having nowhere near the impact that the first one did.  It's not that the remake is entirely awful.  The biggest problems reduce down to a lack of energy on the part of some of the prominent characters, though the new Freddy has some splendid moments.  I haven't yet seen the 1984 film, but I hear that the first Freddy was only a child murderer and not a pedophile.  If so, then the 2010 rendition of Freddy is even darker than the initial character, his sadism expressed quite effectively by Jackie Earle Haley's show of calm malice.

Soon, I'll try to review another 2010 movie about dreams--Inception.  It hopefully won't be long!

Photo credit: jdxyw on VisualHunt 

 /  CC BY-SA

Production Values

The film's premise allows for some unique environments in dream landscapes to be realized onscreen, and many of the effects for these are mostly effective and still hold up today fairly well.  Moments like a recreation of the classic bathtub scene are right at home with the remake's aesthetic and tone.  A key success with the aesthetics is the blending of practical and computer generated effects for Freddy's face, a combination that works quite well by 2010 standards.

It's a shame that the acting doesn't quite live up to the visuals, because many of the performances, though not terrible, are merely average.  Rooney Mara, who plays Nancy, is an obvious example of this: while her acting isn't absolutely horrendous, it is, unfortunately, bland most of the time.  The same goes for Kyle Gallner's character Quentin.  The primary exception is Jackie Earle Haley's Freddy, who at least delivers some fittingly demented, well-placed lines during his scenes.  Haley plays the character like an evil Rorshach (I loved Haley's role as Rorshach in Watchmen [1]).  He has the strongest screen presence here by far, and many viewers will likely consider his scenes the most memorable.


Story

Spoilers are below!

In a town whose adult population concealed a scandal with a pedophile, multiple teenagers are plagued by nightmares in which they are pursued by a man called Freddy, his bladed gloves leaving marks that appear on their bodies even once they wake up.  Freddy kills off many of the "friends" of a girl named Nancy.  She soon discovers, alongside fellow schoolmate Quentin, that she, Quentin, and all of the other victims of these nightmares once attended a preschool where they played with a gardener named Fred Krueger.

After dismissing the dreams as the appearances of repressed memories, Quentin sees in a nightmare what actually happened to Krueger--he was chased into an abandoned building, which was set aflame by infuriated parents.  He briefly considers the possibility that his parents mistakenly thought that Krueger molested them, though leftover evidence from their childhood confirms that the abuse did occur.

Nancy and Quentin manage to bring Freddy from their dreams into the external world, where they attack, (seemingly) kill, and burn him.  However, once Nancy returns home, her mother is killed by Freddy, with viewers unable to deduce if Freddy is still alive in the external world, if Nancy is dreaming yet again, or if Nancy is merely hallucinating.


Intellectual Content

During the movie, some characters talk about how sleep-deprived people can begin having "micronaps," descending into dreams without even realizing it.  One of them even mentions how difficult it has become to discern what is real.  This brings to light an incomplete way that some people linguistically refer to dreams--dreams, though often separated from "reality," are a part of reality because one cannot dream without the experience itself being real, though it does not affect anything in the material world outside of one's mind.  That is the distinction between a dream and a waking experience: the former occurs only within the dreamer's consciousness, while the latter occurs in an actual world of external matter.  The seeming possibility that one might be dreaming at any given time is one that many people treat as unverifiable and unfalsifiable, yet, once one establishes a few basic facts, it is extremely easy to prove with absolute certainty that one is dreaming at a certain moment.  If there is no matter beyond one's mind, then one cannot have experiences of physical sensations; thus, since a dream only occurs within one's mind, then one is not dreaming as long as one's sense of touch is active [2].


Conclusion

A Nightmare on Elm Street definitely lacks any significant emotional development of its characters, as well as energetic performances that could have elevated the impact of the story (with the exception of Freddy himself).  The most successful aspects are Jackie Earle Haley's lines and the greater darkness that the remake brings out of the character of Freddy.  There are reports that yet another remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street is coming.  If so, may it not share the same flaws as its 2010 predecessor.


Content:
1. Violence:  Some of the deaths are fairly gruesome.  For example, in one scene Freddy's blades penetrate a woman's skull and protrude from her eye sockets.
2. Profanity:  Occasionally, some characters say "shit" or variations of "fuck."


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/08/movie-review-watchmen-directors-cut.html

[2].  See here:
  A.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/07/dreams-and-consciousness.html
  B.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/06/distinguishing-dreams-from-waking.html

Reason Does Not Contradict Imagination

The intellect, though it can have a reputation for silencing imagination, is not the enemy of a rich imagination.  Yes, reason (here I will often use "reason" in reference to the human ability to reason, not the laws of logic themselves) and imagination are distinct things, yet they overlap and stimulate each other far more than is often acknowledged.  Fallacious ideas about "right-brained" or "left-brained" people can fuel this misconception further.  Reason and imagination, despite being sometimes characterized as such, are not enemies.  After all, the imagining of anything contrary to reason is impossible!

Imagination can be classified in one of two ways: it can refer to either 1) the ability of a conscious being to visualize things in its mind, whether those things are purely abstract or rooted in sensory experiences, or to 2) the general capacity for creative thought.  Not only can imagination not produce or envision anything that contradicts logic, but rationality can also aid creativity and imagination by allowing one to manipulate concepts and ideas into new forms.  It can spark innovation and facilitate experimentation within one's mind.

Thorough rationality does not mean the death of imagination.  On the contrary, it provides the very metaphysical structure that imagination relies on for its very functioning.  Without a grasp of reason, understandable experiences could not exist, including experiences involving the mental visualization or contemplation of objects that do not actually exist in the external world.  Reason and imagination are allies that both allow for creativity.  Together, their effects can be amplified.

Inversely, a thriving imagination does not mean the death of the intellect.  A powerful ability to mentally visualize concepts can even simplify the process of reasoning, by means of supplying one's mind with imagery to aid the analysis of ideas.  Again, both the intellect and the imagination can have a synergistic impact on each other.  To use one does not weaken, destroy, or forsake the other.

Just like the idea that one cannot possess both deep rationality and deep emotionality at once is false, and even destructive, the myth that logic and imagination are at war is false.  People are often taught directly or indirectly that they must largely ignore or silence portions of their humanity in order to emphasize others.  Such a thing is utterly gratuitous, since these components of their humanity are not opposed to each other by nature.  Applying rationality and imagination is not a zero sum game.  The development or celebration of one does not require belittling or neglect of the other.  People who are extremely or fully logical do not have to be devoid of imagination, and the opposite is true--people who have a strong imagination do not have to be irrational.

Arbitrary Definitions For Profanity

An easy way to illustrate the arbitrary nature of human languages, ask various people what words they consider profanity mean.  The same word can have a plethora of conflicting definitions assigned to it by different people.  Not all of these definitions can be simultaneously correct, but they can all be equally arbitrary--this is the nature of human language.

Human words mean whatever a respective writer or
speaker wants them to.

As an example, I have been told that the word "fuck" always refers to rape because that is what a certain group of people once meant by it.  However, "fuck" does not have to refer to sexual assault.  Even further, it does not have to serve as any kind of sexual reference whatsoever.  When I use it--something I do with great regularity--it means, as with all other words of mine, only whatever I want it to.  I recognize the versatility of the word, a versatility which only exists because there is no intrinsic meaning to the sound the word represents.

The randomness of language is clearly evident when people condemn arbitrary words as profanity or assert that a certain "profane" word always possesses a certain meaning.  Perhaps someone who says "fuck" is referring to sex or sexual assault, perhaps not.  The word could also express general shock, frustration, or anger, and a variation of it can serve as a broadly applicable adjective.  Someone might not even have a perfectly clear understanding of what he or she means by uttering a specific word.

Every time someone uses a word, they do objectively mean a certain thing by it, but that thing will vary from person to person.  Of course an author or speaker must mean something by their own words!  But I can only do my best to assess what they seem to mean; I cannot peer into their minds to know exactly what they intend to convey.  I am not a telepath.  As much as I might despise it in some situations, I can only perceive my own thoughts.  Thankfully, I do not need to have telepathy to understand that just because one person means something by a word does not mean that everyone else who uses that word means the exact same thing.

The Impossibility Of "Absolutely Nothing" (Part 2)

There is no such thing as absolutely nothing, since, as I explained in a prequel post, logic and space, which are things despite not commonly being classified as such, cannot not exist [1].  But one can prove that absolute nothingness is impossible through an alternative means: by demonstrating that even if the necessary existence of logic and space are not taken into account, as logic and space are both things, nothingness itself is something.

Absolute nothingness is impossible not only because logic and space are things that must exist, thereby meaning that some things cannot not exist simply by nature of what they are, but also because nothingness is something itself.  It would be impossible to think about or discuss absolutely nothing; the very fact that someone can linguistically classify, reflect on, and converse about nothingness demonstrates that nothingness is not and cannot be absolute nothingness.  Nothingness is at most the absence of material objects or consciousnesses--animal, human, angelic, and divine consciousnesses.  Nothingness is itself, therefore, something.

The only reason I can even contemplate “nothingness” is because when I do so there is actually something that I am contemplating: the absence of certain other things (matter and minds).  However staunchly someone might deny it, they cannot escape from this.  I cannot think about pure nothingness because then there would be nothing to think about!

If someone opens a closet that does not contain any clothes, boxes, or other items and says that there is “absolutely nothing” in the room is absolutely mistaken!  The laws of logic and the dimension of space are always present in the closet, regardless of the absence of material objects or minds in it.  Since nothingness is never a complete absence of all things, it will always be impossible to speak of nothing as if it is not itself something, as evidenced by natural linguistic references to nothingness as its own noun.

There is no such thing as absolutely nothing, and there cannot be such a thing.  This truth is viciously simple, and yet it is still neglected by every historical or contemporary philosopher I know of.  It is the specific details about reality--complex as a whole but always entirely simple in themselves--that determine if one has an accurate worldview.  Without correct knowledge of the details, one cannot have correct knowledge of the composite series of truths they contribute to.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/04/the-impossibility-of-absolutely-nothing.html

Unilateral Submission In Marriage

Some insist, resorting to to fallacies that invalidate everything in their arguments, that marriages just don’t function healthily when husbands either generally submit to their wives or embrace mutual submission in their marital relationships.  These complementarians do not even bring up the fact that even if husbands generally had difficulties submitting to wives, it is not as if complemtarianism would be affirmed in the slightest way: traditional American ideas about marriage would be responsible for many such “difficulties.”  Being raised with certain rigid, but purely arbitrary, expectations about gender and marriage would heavily distort the way that individuals would otherwise naturally behave.

The truth of the matter is that forcing any person into marital or social roles that don’t fit his or her personality is problematic and likely destined for pragmatic failure.  This is not only true of men.  Complementarians do not admit this because to do so would erode the entire basis for their asinine claims about men, women, marriage, and moral obligations.  Once a person realizes that personality is purely rooted in individuality or in cultural/familial conditioning, he or she sees the only possible foundation for any gender-specific gender roles vanish.

There isn’t anything wrong with either spouse--a wife or a husband--voluntarily submitting to the other in a relatively unilateral way.  As long as the leading spouse doesn’t demand that the submissive spouse sin or demand that he/she comply with extra-Biblical rules, both of which would violate Biblical commands, there is nothing sinful about this.  But to expect or demand that a spouse submit or lead simply because he or she has certain genitalia is inane, irrational, and contrary to the entirety of Scripture.

Because of their individual personalities, some couples may embrace the conservative model of marriage where the husbands generally lead the wives.  It works for them solely because it is a model that only works with such couples.  If a couple practices a “complementarian” model of marriage, even if it is inverted, it should only be because of a mutual decision (Ephesians 5:21)--and I use quotation marks because this element of mutual choice means that such a marriage is not truly complementarian.  Complementarianism is only what it is because it holds that traditional roles should be practiced by default because of alleged pragmatic or Biblical reasons.

Mutuality is the basis of all healthy marriages even if mutual agreement leads to seemingly complementarian practice.  When spouses assume things about each other’s competencies and desires, they set themselves up for disappointment, strife, and frustration.  The only way to avoid the negative consequences of such assumptions is to not make them at all.

It only takes intelligence to recognize this.  Unfortunately, intelligence has been scarce for all of recorded history.