On Fri, 16 Oct 1998 02:39:51 -0400 Richard Gibson <rgibson at pipeline.com>
writes:
>the destruction of reason, as Lukacs so aptly demonstrated, is an
>important
>piece of fascist ideology. To wit:
>
>http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/global/101698pope-encyclical.html
I am not sure exactly what exactly is Rich's point. The Pope purports to defend reason in his encyclical in the manner of Thomas Aquinas. Indeed, as is evident from the excerpts of the encyclical he would no doubt say that he agrees with Lukacs' statement. A serious critique of the Pope's views would focus on the inadequacies of the Church's conception of reason and show how this in fact leads to the very irrationalism that the Pope claims to deplore. Such a critique would also take aim at the Pope's assertion that faith constitutes a valid epistemological method when in fact it is simply a species of irrationalism which helps to lead to the very phenomena that the Pope deplores.
Jim Farmelant
>Rich Gibson
>Program Coordinator of Social Studies
>Wayne State University
>College of Education
>Detroit MI 48202
>
>http://www.pipeline.com/~rgibson/index.html
>http://www.pipeline.com/~rgibson/meap.html
>
> Life travels upward in spirals.
> Those who take pains to search the shadows
> of the past below us, then, can better judge the
> tiny arc up which they climb,
> more surely guess the dim
> curves of the future above them.
>
>
>
>
>
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