Can you think of anyone else who could write a sentence (well, two) like this?
The Pope expresses his belief in the superiority of his faith by tracing how the neo-Platonist trace in Aristotelian empiricism meant that the historical development of science qua falsification was limited by a horizon that it pointed to but could not access. The jihadists express their belief in their faith's superiority by slitting the throats of Jews on camera - and then selling those tapes to millions of other Muslims.
Awesome. And enlightening. But it gets even better.
To observe that someone said something that hurt someone else's feelings is not the same as proving that they should apologize. Enough of this absurd idea that nothing can be allowed to upset the temperamental Muslim Street. If someone has a reason why there was a factual or logical error in Pope Benedict's speech, let's hear it. The intellectual struggle for history and civilization is not a therapy session. Not liking an argument doesn't make it wrong. Not being able to justify irrational beliefs is often frustrating. But to assert that the Pope should apologize to fanatics because they're too illiterate, too uneducated, or too insane to understand or answer him is deeply perverse - it's either a new low of appeasement or evidence for the permanence of the idiot self-esteem affirmation sensibilities of previous decades. Probably both.
Omri has already managed to produce more voluminous and insightful analysis of this issue than most other sources combined. And he promises to have yet more tomorrow. Don't miss.
