In Song and in Spirit

Spirit and matter. Night and day. Subjective and objective. Right and left brain. Yin and yang. It seems duality is a fundamental aspect of reality, and shapes our perceptions of the inner and outer worlds. However, with the march of the left brain to its present dominate role since the enlightenment and scientific revolution, the objective world is understood better… read more

The 20th century saw the flourishing of the scientific revolution in its attempt to discern the math and logic behind all phenomena. It was a century of endless studies into matter, energy, as well as the mind and human behaviour, and has so far continued into the 21st century. The objective world has been meticulously dissected from the subatomic to… read more

The 20th century left many things wounded or dead in its wake. A shattered Greek vase, a vandalized Madonna and child, a fractured statue of the Buddha. All things that once meant much to humanity, but were abused and tossed out as delusion by modernity. Instead, in their place, reason, science and statistics were elevated to the status of supreme… read more

Reason has always been one of man’s greatest tools. With the long march of modernity from the Enlightenment to the 21st century logic and science has firmly established the mechanical and mathematical nature of matter and the objective world. With this knowledge the engineers have dazzled us for over a century with their mechanical and electronic wizardry, from trains and… read more

As conventional religion has stopped meeting most peoples needs as a way to deal with the mystery and mortality of life in the past century, these needs have been nonetheless met by a new, albeit implicit, source. It seems that the new supreme deity is now science, with its promises of salvation with its statistical studies and inferences, which are… read more

Like a lot of people these days, organized religion doesn’t do it for me, with its rigid rituals and dogmatic positions. Since reading Nietzsche as an undergrad, I have thought like him that Christianity and morality are problematic. I interpreted his statement that “God is Dead” to mean the Christian God was no longer going to meet the needs of… read more

It seems the head reigns supreme these days. The long march of reason, and its offspring science, from the days of Socrates and Plato through the Renaissance and Enlightenment to the present day has put forth rational argument and empiricism as the pinnacle of methods in the search for truth. Man’s left hemisphere or reason not only guides our approach… read more

With all the science and statistics gushing forth from the past century, celebrated by the bright light of the media, it seems to some that the answers to our most profound questions have been answered, and the doctors and engineers have everything under control. Although the rise of reason and humanism was a reaction against religious dogma, and has determined… read more

“Make it new!”, was the rallying cry of the early 20th century, and novelty and the advant guard become the main measure of success in the art world. Since the late 19th century, with the ascent of the machine and the new urban experience, the western world was changing into something new and unknown, and art was expected to express… read more

The long march of reason and science to its present supremacy has not been without its casualties. Starting with Socrates and Plato, who insisted on using their reason to approach the problems of life, the discipline of philosophy was born. Although it was overshadowed by religion in the middle ages, reason again surfaced in the Renaissance with the rebirth of… read more