My mother, who often reads but rarely comments here, recently complained that I don't write much about philosophy. This was especially odd to her since the tagline at the top of this page has always mentioned philosophy. She's got a point, but only, I think, because I've never discussed my views on philosophy. I sincerely consider almost everything I write here to be about philosophy. She said she'd like to see me write more about that here. Well then, here we go:

Part of the confusion may stem from the fact that I tend to steer clear of the navel-gazing, word games, and feel-goodism that most people think of as philosophy. Similarly, I view the things that dominate most departments of philosophy in universities--postmodernism, moral relativism, and the likes of Sartre and Foucault--as almost completely worthless when they aren't outright destructive.

I believe that the pursuit of truth is man's highest intellectual calling.

I take it as a given that I exist, that the world exists, and that I am not at its center. I believe that objective truth exists. I believe that we may sometimes know the truth completely, sometimes dimly and incompletely, and sometimes not at all. But it can be known, and when we do know it, it's often not a matter of opinion. (See The Brainteaser that Changed My World for more on this.)

I consider history, science, and liberal democratic politics to be the ultimate expressions of modern philosophy. I consider most of what they call "philosophy" in universities these days to be intellectual onanism.

The philosopher I probably respect most is Aristotle. The philosopher I probably respect least is Rousseau, along with his intellectual heirs, Marx and Nietzche. The philosophers I am most ambivalent about are Ayn Rand and John Stuart Mill. Ask me about Plato and you'll get different answers depending on my mood. But clearly, Utopia shall never exist, and efforts to create it have always ended in suffering and death. People who walk about with a Platonic Ideal of society in their heads are therefore often a source of much mischief.

Although he would probably be horrified to hear it, I consider Robert Heinlein to be one of the 20th Century's most important philosophers. His worldview probably matches mine more closely than any other thinker. Yet I would argue with him at great length about a great many things. I'm also arrogant enough to think that he'd enjoy the argument.

Like Santayana, I have no religion. Also like him, I have a deep respect for traditional religion, and a deep contempt for people who treat traditional religion with contempt. I have friends who are Christians, Jews, atheists, and New Agers. I have had friends who are Buddhists and Muslims. I manage to keep them all, and I often surprise them with how much I know about their respective faiths.

About the only thing I can't stand is people who spit on or tell lies about others' beliefs.

I believe that conservative Christians are the most slandered religious group in America, followed by Jews and Catholics. That this is often the result of internecine struggles is a sadly human reality that will probably never go away. But worst of all are the contemptuous atheists and rabid secularists, who feed the beast of contempt with the most gusto by far.

I confess that I tend to snort at New Agers, and consider their epistemology to be like cotton candy: pretty and sweet, but nothing much there when you bite into it. Yet in a very real way I still respect them. My grandmother was one, and I loved her dearly. I don't think anyone was ever murdered in the name of Edgar Cayce, transcendental meditation, or crystal-gazing, which is something you cannot say about atheistic philosophies, secularism, or most other religions. (NB: this may be more due to luck than anything else.)

When people ask me what my views of God are, I generally tell them that I swing wildly between Santayana and C.S. Lewis. They generally either find this baffling and walk away, or immediately grok that it's a deep inner struggle for me. I confess, though, that Lewis, the old fogey, is closer to winning me over these days.

But I still can't decide whether the apostle Paul was completely nuts or profoundly wise.

In short, then: objective truth exists. It is sometimes knowable to the mind of man, and sometimes not. The pursuit of it is man's highest intellectual calling. It is best expressed through science, history, and liberal democratic politics. And, perhaps--just perhaps--through prayer.

So now you know.