The press is interviewing a former Gitmo prisoner for his opinion on DeSantis' presidential candidacy.
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Question from Chris: who believes that the Chinese--or anybody else, for that matter--would pay an idiot loser like Hunter Biden for anything? That exchange implies a group to influence, not idiot Hunter. (Although the 'Mickey Blue Eyes' painting transactions are provocative.)
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The rationale for the price controls is to save taxpayers and seniors money. But the savings on existing drugs are minuscule in comparison to the loss in health resulting from a decrease in drug innovation, which is already taking place. The Congressional Budget Office finds the Inflation Reduction Act will cut drug spending by $238 billion by 2031. Meanwhile, a University of Chicago analysis predicts the cuts in innovation in new drugs will lead to health losses valued at $18 trillion during the same period.
(This kind of prediction sounds whimsical but is in a new research paper.)
Thomas is not portrayed as a fickle guy in the gospels; he is actually a brave, committed man. When Christ wants to return to a town where they tried to kill Him previously, Thomas, after losing the argument against going, announces he will go with Christ so they can die together. So his caution over the talk of Christ's resurrection stems from only one thing: his desire for the truth.
"Thomas" means "twin." Doubting Thomas is a twin. The other side of doubt is belief. So his other twin is "belief," the product of doubt. Doubt is a process. But that is not true for all.
Solipsism: the position in Metaphysics and Epistemology that the mind is the only thing that can be known to exist and that knowledge of anything outside the mind is unjustified. It is a skeptical hypothesis and leads to the belief that the whole of reality and the external world and other people are merely representations of the individual self, having no independent existence of their own, and might in fact not even exist. It is not, however, the same as Skepticism (the epistemological position that one should refrain from even making truth claims).
There are people who make their livings talking like this.
Several modern currents of thought are rushing us toward the rapids. One is doubt itself, as a philosophy, a tenet of modern life. For many, doubt is the endpoint.
Descartes asked, "What can I know?" He described us as isolated individuals whose knowledge was individually subjective. But this comes at a price. I can doubt the existence of the external world, and I can doubt the existence of what appears to be my body. But when I try to also doubt the existence of my inner self, my thinking, then I find that I am still there--as a doubting mind. Doubting is the thing that in the end I cannot doubt. Doubting, however, is thinking, and the existence of thinking implies the existence of a thinker. Hence Descartes' famous conclusion: "I think, therefore I am." So the self sees us as isolated individuals prioritizing our subjectivity above all else. And the agent of thought is doubt. And, unlike Thomas, those doubts are never answered.
This has implications for more than the individual. "Community" implies shared beliefs, things held in common. So doubt, as an endpoint, is as destructive, as isolating, as paralyzing as any heresy. It is the keep of the immobile and the somnolent. Like the pacifist, doubt requires the efforts, and the sacrifices, of others to exist.
When Christ appeared the second time, He was probably really happy to see Thomas.
Sunday/Thomas
Today's gospel is the "Doubting Thomas" gospel. It could be a short story. It is an insight that unfortunately has become a cliché.
Thomas is not portrayed as a fickle guy in the gospels; he is actually a brave, committed man. When Christ wants to return to a town where they tried to kill Him previously, Thomas, after losing the argument against going, announces he will go with Christ so they can die together. So his caution over the talk of Christ's resurrection stems from only one thing: his desire for the truth.
"Thomas" means "twin." Doubting Thomas is a twin. The other side of doubt is belief. So his other twin is "belief," the product of doubt. Doubt is a process. But that is not true for all.
Solipsism: the position in Metaphysics and Epistemology that the mind is the only thing that can be known to exist and that knowledge of anything outside the mind is unjustified. It is a skeptical hypothesis and leads to the belief that the whole of reality and the external world and other people are merely representations of the individual self, having no independent existence of their own, and might in fact not even exist. It is not, however, the same as Skepticism (the epistemological position that one should refrain from even making truth claims).
There are people who make their livings talking like this.
Several modern currents of thought are rushing us toward the rapids. One is doubt itself, as a philosophy, a tenet of modern life. For many, doubt is the endpoint.
Descartes asked, "What can I know?" He described us as isolated individuals whose knowledge was individually subjective. But this comes at a price. I can doubt the existence of the external world, and I can doubt the existence of what appears to be my body. But when I try to also doubt the existence of my inner self, my thinking, then I find that I am still there--as a doubting mind. Doubting is the thing that in the end I cannot doubt. Doubting, however, is thinking, and the existence of thinking implies the existence of a thinker. Hence Descartes' famous conclusion: "I think, therefore I am." So the self sees us as isolated individuals prioritizing our subjectivity above all else. And the agent of thought is doubt. And, unlike Thomas, those doubts are never answered.
This has implications for more than the individual. "Community" implies shared beliefs, things held in common. So doubt, as an endpoint, is as destructive, as isolating, as paralyzing as any heresy. It is the keep of the immobile and the somnolent. Like the pacifist, doubt requires the efforts, and the sacrifices, of others to exist.
When Christ appeared the second time, He was probably really happy to see Thomas.
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