Please, my friends, look for ways to speak out against injustice and horror that do not promote the us/them ideologies that lie behind so much injustice and horror. I am think now about the horror in Gaza and the horrific attack in October that triggered it. I am no expert on the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or the cultural, religious, political, and economic realities that are in play in shaping the conflict and which need to be taken into account in formulating solutions. But what I want to say does not, I think, rely on any such expertise.  When Hamas attacked Israel on ..read more

Since we're barreling headlong into a national election season, all of us are likely to hear a heightened number of conspiracy theories, often invoked to vilify political rivals or people who don't serve the interests of some party or politician.  As such, some thoughts on conspiracies and conspiracy theories strike me as in order--to help us sort through when we should take conspiracy claims seriously, and when we should be skeptical. Let's start with what we mean by a conspiracy. Generally, a conspiracy exists when a group of people collude (work together in secret) to impact events in ..read more

 My science fiction novel, So Eden Sank to Grief, is now available for purchase in both kindle and trade paperback formats. Check it out here. In honor of release day, here are a few endorsements of the book from philosophers long dead ..read more

For most of my adult life, I’ve been both a philosopher and fiction writer. Through both, I’ve tackled the deep questions that most engage me, especially questions of faith, social justice, human sexuality, and violence. The imminent release of my debut novel, So Eden Sank to Grief, has got me thinking about the relationship between these two things that have so shaped the course of my life.   Two Distinct Roles Fiction and philosophy are two distinct approaches to engaging with questions central to understanding the human condition—questions about our values and basic assumptions, about ..read more

 So Eden Sank to Grief releases in just over a month, on February 27. It's a science fiction adventure about a group of people who wake up in a giant greenhouse that's floating in some star-rich corner of the galaxy--with no memory of how they got there. Think Lost meets Lost in Space.  I've been writing and publishing short stories for years, but I'm always a philosopher--and that leaks through into my fiction, especially when the story is based on a parable I originally developed to make a philosophical point. So Eden Sank to Grief grew way beyond that parable, and as soon as I cre ..read more

 In anticipation of the release of my novel, So Eden Sank to Grief, on February 27, I thought I'd do a series of posts extracting some tidbits and snippets from the novel, especially ones that connect with this blog's theme of wrestling honestly with religion and God. My first snippet, quite short, is inspired by the outcome of tonight's divisional playoff game between my beloved Buffalo Bills and the ever-irritating (if talented) Kansas City Chiefs. If there is one silver lining to the Bills' loss, it is that this snippet still remains fully relevant. Here it is: There are moments when ..read more

 For those who've been wondering what I've been up to while I've been neglecting this blog, the answer is...quite a lot. In addition to working on a new philosophy book, The Problem of Heavenly Grief, I've got a science fiction novel coming out with Quoir Books, So Eden Sank to Grief.  And it's based on a parable I wrote for this blog during it's first year, all the way back in 2008: The Parable of the Spaceship.  The story has evolved so much over the years it's not even remotely the same story, but the bones of that original parable are still there.  Below is the front an ..read more

I've come to love Friday Night Lights: cheering for my high school football team and (more important, since my daughter's in the band) for the pride of Stillwater, the Pioneer Marching Band. I love the fact that I am united with a whole bunch of people I don't know in a shared set of rituals, cheering for OUR team, cheering on OUR band, watching the dance/pom squad and the cheer squad show off their competition routines, cheering for all the young people who have accomplished great things in our community and are brought to the crowd's attention during breaks in game play. You know what wouldn ..read more

Yesterday, Oklahoma State Secretary of Education Ryan Walters asked the Oklahoma State Board of Education to revoke the teaching license of Summer Boismier, who was recently fired from Norman Public Schools for sharing with her students a link to the Brooklyn Public Library (which has recently made access to their digital collection free to teens across the US as a way to help mute the impact of various book-banning efforts at public school libraries). Here's a copy of his letter: Even if I'm not impressed with the substance of his letter, the structure of it is pretty nice--worthy of emul ..read more

The New Book Banning Surge Recently, some parents here in Stillwater, OK, have started following a national trend of trying to get books pulled from school library shelves for being inappropriate. Banning books from school libraries has seen an unprecedented rise in the last year or two, and the evidence indicates that targets for removal are disproportionately books that feature diverse characters and themes, especially books by or about LGBT+ persons and people of color, and books that wrestle with issues of race in America. Accordingto Education Week, in the recent wave 41% of books banned ..read more