gavin's blog

Have lots of spare time on my hands today :) so actually read the whole letter Mr. Dawkins wrote.

I pretty much disagree with everything he says (I'm sure you're not surprised I say that!). That being said, wouldn't want to get into the nitty-gritties of it all (though I would at a different forum shoot each para down gladly!)

I think the sadest thing of it all is that at the end of the day, he does exactly what he warns her against... he passes down his belief system (or a lack of it), his need to question things down to her...

(sigh)

Then again, I guess the ocean we swim in is all the more interesting because of the different fish we encounter, huh?

Posted by: Melody | Sunday, December 11, 2005

Hi Melody,

Rationalism can be as restrictive an ideology as pre-rationalism. But I'm wondering whether you're confusing pre-rationalism with trans-rationalism. Both of them look the same because they are not-rationalism, but trans-rationalism is beyond rationalism, which means it sees realities beyond and higher than that can be seen by only the mind, but faith (of the pre-rational kind, that is, for faith can also be used for post-rational intuition/perception) is below rationalism, for it takes things on faith simply because it takes things on faith, simply because it.......:-)

The Talmud says somewhere that doubt is higher than faith, (and that knowledge is higher than doubt), and this is what I think is the stage-specific truth that Dawkins is giving his daughter.

As I said, I differ with Dawkins, I hold to trans-rational truths meself, but I appreciate his warning his daughter against 'blind' faith for reasons that he argues very well I think.

I agree about the ocean, it's all to the good :-) Ultimately.

Posted by: Gavin | Sunday, December 11, 2005