From David Warren at the Catholic Thing:
Thirty years have now passed since the publication of an extraordinary book, by a respectable publisher (the Oxford University Press). This was, The Anthropic Cosmological Principle, by the witty British astronomer, John Barrow, and the brilliant American mathematical physicist, Frank Tipler. It included a laudatory preface by John Wheeler, co-inventor or discoverer of “black holes.”
It was an attempt to overturn the Copernican Revolution: to put man back at the centre of a miraculously conceived universe, and make his fate the whole meaning of it. This universe, from its Alpha Point in what is popularly called the “Big Bang,” to an Omega Point that is darkly foreseeable, could be described in no sense of the word, “random.”
For the very existence of man depends upon a large, and constantly increasing number of demonstrably happy coincidences, in the “design” of the universe itself. The thing is incredibly fine-tuned, from what we can already calculate and measure, such that the slightest alteration in any of the physical laws, or the chemical properties, would not only eliminate us, but make it impossible that we had ever been.More.
Warren is one of the bravest Canadian journalists I have ever known. He was, of course, eventually forced out of local media who were attuned to griping neurotics*. These media will soon be defunct and – in many cases, if you ask me – should be collectively panhandling outside a liquor store.
Trust Warren to take the fact of fine-tuning on.
* Griping neurotics? I offer a standard response when some apparent live entity writes me threatening to raise hell over something or other I wrote:
Yes, you are correct. There are only two Free Speech Corners in all of North America, north of the Rio Grande.
One is called the Dominion of Canada. The other is called the United States of America.
You could find out their locations using this map.
There are strict hours. They operate 24/7.
If I was not in one of them when I said what I did, or was there at an hour not covered by the rules, please feel free to contact the authorities.
Otherwise, get the heck out of my mailbox and don’t come back. I have a serious deadline to meet.
See also: Copernicus, you are not going to believe who is using your name. Or how.
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I have been reading David Warren for years. But I have to admit that I find his writing style to be rambling, pompously arrogant and almost unreadable. He has also had some serious issues with attribution.
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I don’t think that it was as simple as that. In the last few years he was writing for the Citizen, his articles became more and more about religion. Which would not be problem if he was being paid to write about religion. But he wasn’t. This is part of his bio that still, for some strange reason, still appears on the Citizen site:
Regardless, even though I disagree with him on almost everything he writes about, I still enjoy reading his essays that still appear on his web site. But I do miss the comments that he used to allow. His argument for getting rid of the option was that he was spending too much time editing those comments.
Rationalitysbane at 1: I do not care whether you like Warren’s style or not. He makes a living as a writer.
He got more serious about religion as a result of various hellstorms that the rest of us go through as well.
I (with others) helped Warren walk through many witch hunts sponsored by griping neurotics who should just have been shown the door politely.
The cowards who would not do that are deservedly seeing their media assets shrink in value.
If it weren’t for people like Warren, my country would be much less free. Freedom is not given by bureaucrats; it is taken from them.
News:
Actually, he doesn’t. Any more. He is retired to the High Dogonate in Parkdale (or is it Parkside?).
With respect, the accusations of failing to attribute many written paragraphs of his published articles are very easy to confirm. We are not talking about a handful of words strung together that are similar to those published by someone else. We are talking about significant chunks of text. I am willing to accept a momentary lapse of judgement on his part, but attributing it to a witch hunt is just the sign of someone not owning up to his own mistakes.
I grew up in the same country you did. Am roughly the same age as you. I grew up in the same city you did (hurricane Hazel, the junction, Christie Pits). Went to the same high school you did (go Redmen), and currently live in the same city you do (go RedBlacks), so please don’t insult me by claiming that Warren had anything to do with freedom in Canada. He was never more than a mediocre journalist. I am named after two friends of my father’s killed in the war. I dare say that they are far more responsible for freedom in Canada than Warren is. But this being said, I always looked forward to reading Warren’s essays. And still do. But please don’t pretend that he was noble, or a martyr, or more important than he was.
But enough of my little rant. Are you aware of the Runnymede 90th reunion in 2017. My father went there, me and my brothers went there, and my brothers’ kids went there.
As to this excerpt from the article:
So apparently it is somehow ‘non-miraculous’ for someone to now believe that human beings, that are supposedly composed completely of mass and energy, to somehow, in their ‘evolved’ future, gain mastery over mass and energy, and space and time so as to reach back in space and time to create all of mass and energy, and space and time?
And this complete failure in logic in this materialistic scenario is missed exactly how by these supposedly brilliant men of science?
OT:
Rationalitys bane and News
Wow. Three of us on this site are from Ottawa? For some reason I find that surprising. Yay for us, I guess.
HeKS