Every now and then, the subject of blog censorship comes up here. It comes up rarely, but it is mentioned. Interestingly, when it is mentioned, it is usually mentioned because somebody is commenting on how much they appreciate the fact that I don’t censor discussion here. As it turns out, usually the comment is made by an atheist after a discussion with me here, contrasting this blog with those that have censored their comments in the past at other blogs, noting how they appreciate the difference. I know how they feel. Every now and then my comments at other blogs are refused – even when I’m replying to blog posts actually written about me! To be fair, I’ve found that believers and non-believers alike are just as prone to censoring me. I take the approach that if you’re going to have comments at your blog and you want a reputation for having a blog where worthwhile discussions can happen, you need to have an open door policy. Unless comments step over the line into inappropriate material (and it helps to state clearly somewhere what this would involve), all comers should be welcome.
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Have you ever had anyone say this? Maybe you’ve said it yourself. Two people are in a disagreement, and one of them gets sick of the discussion and blurts out “You always think you’re right!”

Never mind the fact that if somebody says this, it’s likely that they’ve had a few disagreements with you in the past and always thought that they were right. There’s something more important than hypocrisy here. People who say this must surely think that they are accusing the other person of thinking or acting in a way that they ought not. You’re somehow arrogant if you always think that your right. But think about what they’re saying. How might you deny this accusation? There’s really only one way to deny it, namely by saying: “No, that’s not true. Sometimes I believe and say things that I myself think are wrong.” But who does this? You would deserve a pretty strange look if this was your reply. This is just a confusion of language, because to “think” something is to believe it – that is, to believe that it’s true. When I say, “that was a really bad thing to do,” and someone asks me “do you think so?” they are being rhetorical. Of course I think so, because that’s what it is to believe something – to think that it is so. This is not arrogance. It is sanity.

Every time you think that something is true, you think that you’re right. Otherwise you’re a living contradiction. You think something is the case and you don’t think that it’s the case. Now, it’s possible that when someone says “You always think you’re right,” what they really want to say is “you never listen.” But if that’s what they mean, then that’s what they should say, instead of something crazy. Maybe if you listened, you would change your mind and form a new belief. But you’d still think you were right (unless you thought that your new belief was false, which would, again, be insane).

There’s a difference, of course, between always thinking that you are right on the one hand, and thinking that you’re always right on the other. You should always think that you’re right – in fact you can’t do anything else if you’re a sane person. But you should think twice about saying that you’re always right.

Always thinking that you are right just means that on any given occasion, you believe (i.e. affirm) what you believe (duh). Another way to express this is: “I am not wrong.” Thinking that you are always right means that you believe that on all occasions, what you believe is true. Another way to express this is “I am never wrong.” And that, in my books, counts as arrogant.

[Normal people can stop reading now]

As an observation on similarity, confusing these two sentences:

• Always, I think I am right.

and

• I think that I am always right

Is a lot like confusing these two sentences, which some philosophers have done:

• Necessarily, if God knows that p will c at t, then p will c at t.

and

• If God knows that p will c at t, then p will necessarily c at t.

And if discussions around molinism have shown anything, it is that this is confusion of the highest order.

Glenn Peoples

I don’t usually advertise sellers of goods or services here, but this is something that academics and people interested in good scholarly resources are likely to be very interested in.

My new favourite bookstore in the world is the Book Depository. The price is very competitive with Amazon (I just paid about two New Zealand dollars more at the book depository for this book), but the reason I don’t generally buy from Amazon is the cost of shipping. What was a good deal becomes more expensive than buying locally because the cost of shipping is so high.

Here’s the thing: The book depository doesn’t charge for shipping. Yeah, you might think you read that wrong, but no, you didn’t. Shipping is free, worldwide. That makes it easily the cheapest place to buy new books. If you live in the states where you can already pay the same price that you get on Amazon, sweet. But if you don’t live there, and you end up either paying more locally, or paying high shipping  costs to buy from an overseas seller, this has to be the best option available to you.

They’re not paying me to tell you this, I just discovered this store and I was so impressed that I thought you might like to know.

OK, so it lacks a bit of rhetorical punch, but it’s true. We’re number 27. While the most popular aspect of this site is probably the podcast, which a lot of listeners access via the itunes store, the blog itself isn’t too shabby either. Apparently it’s the 27th most popular blog (not podcast) in New Zealand. Each month you can check out New Zealand’s blog rankings over at “Something Should Go here, Maybe Later,” the halfdone blog, HERE.

As I’ve mentioned, time is a big pressure on the success and regularity of this blog and podcast. The prospect of looking for extra work in evenings (as well as the papers I’m taking) is going to add to this significantly, and I’m searching for ways to free up as much time as I can to work on the podcast without sacrificing anything when it comes to income. So this is as good a time as any to mention another project that I work on:

Podcaster Music is a project I launched to make theme music for podcasters. Over the last week I’ve decided to expand the horizons a little and look at the possibility of making music for radio advertising (or any context when professionals might want some occasional music) as well.

Check the site out (especially the samples page), and by all means spread the word. It would be a tremendous help to be able to drum up a bit of online business, and even just a couple of clients a month would make a difference.

[Note: This blog entry also appears as a guest post over at MandM, the blog of Matt and Madeleine Flannagan.]

I take some things for granted. People with a background in theology, biblical studies and hermeneutics or literature will be familiar with theories of meaning, but not everyone has (or wants) this background, and not everyone is familiar with theories of meaning. I thought it might be interesting to some readers to say a few words about it. Think of this as a very introductory post to the subject.

The question has importance for scholarship in general, but as a professing Christian the issue has a special importance to me because I believe that in the Scripture of the Old and New Testament we have something with a unique type of authority, so the way we interpret it is important. The issue centres on the following question: What does a piece of writing mean? To some the questions seems a bit silly. If you want to know what it means you just read it and find out. It means what it says! But strictly speaking, even someone who says this is likely to admit that not everything means exactly what it says. Writing comes in all genres: literal history, biography, poetry, parable, apocalypse and so forth. There are cases where meaning is bound to be unclear to many readers. So what, in principle, does a piece of writing mean? To the unfamiliar reader, I’m going to outline two major alternatives: an authorial intent theory of meaning and a reader response theory of meaning.
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