“Philosophy is the talk on a cereal box…”

“Religion is the smile on the dog…
I'm not aware of too many things, but I know what I know if you know what I mean.”

- Edie Brickell & The New Bohemians

I am thinking about maybe doing a PhD in Philosophy. This might be the first subject that I have been truly interested in that doesn’t have some sort of practical application in my life. Usually I follow the path of studying things that I like as long as I can earn a living using what I have learned. Not so with this, but it would make good blog fodder!

Ideologies and theologies are interesting to me. About a year ago I listened to the book on CD “Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith” by Jon Krakauer. The book gave a fairly in-depth look at the beginnings of the Mormon faith and the extremes of a few Mormon fundamentalists who took revenge on a wife for not accepting the tenet of plural marriage.

Fundamentalists of any sort are by definition more extreme in their beliefs. There are many examples throughout history of religions fundamentalists of many stripes forcing their viewpoints upon society through acts of violence. There are also plenty of examples of charismatic leaders surfacing and leading near-theological movements with a band of fervent followers.

What are we looking for? Why would otherwise rational people become so deeply immersed in a belief system that from the outside seems obviously strange and rife with implausibility? What causes us to suspend our critical thinking?

Another reason why this is fascinating to me is that I have trouble with people expressing authoritarian viewpoints. For me there are no absolutes. It’s interesting to think about possibilities, but the truth of our existence and our experience is such that our ability to reduce it to words and an overarching ideology is an unending challenge. What is truth for me is unseen by others and vice versa.

So I ordered a book to see if this is a transient interest for me or something I’d like to take a deeper dive into. Should be interesting…