for some reason I read “oldest” as “oldest son” the first time...no idea why. I do think it’s very likely that your elder daughter will end up atheist, and that’s what the congratulations was about.
No worries. We’ll see about the daughter. I think my wife understands more and more why I hesitate to heuristically decide in advance what’s true for her. I see the point of doing this for certain things, but not ambiguously true ones. For example, a Catholic is advised to teach his son/daughter by age 7 that the Eucharist is really the body of a risen man/god. How could they possibly comprehend this?
I could possibly see a loose analogy in teaching them not to drop things made of glass. I’m heuristically teaching-them-as-truth that gravity exists, exerts a force on matter, and that if PE=mgh is high enough, when it converts to KE it will exceed the modulus of the glass and shatter it.
They can’t comprehend either set of the necessary foundations for these heuristic “nuggets,” but one is clearly more universally accepted than the other. Even a simple appeal to teaching-as-true only what the world has accepted as true seems reasonable.
I find it perplexing that if a divine being only inspired only one true religion, that the world would remain so confused about what is is many hundreds (if not thousands) of years later. I think it should at least give one pause to consider that perhaps things aren’t as obvious or clear as one might think!
Also, importantly, it’s much easier to gather direct evidence to support the heuristic “don’t drop things made of glass” than “the Eucharist is really the body of Jesus.”
Dropping a glass vs. picking up the Bible are equivalently easy :) Whether you need to be sold on the Bible beforehand is a different story.
You’re right, though, and thus I’m far more confident in teaching-as-true those things which are in the “universally discoverable” realm vs. the “incredibly sticky and unagreed upon” realm.
for some reason I read “oldest” as “oldest son” the first time...no idea why. I do think it’s very likely that your elder daughter will end up atheist, and that’s what the congratulations was about.
No worries. We’ll see about the daughter. I think my wife understands more and more why I hesitate to heuristically decide in advance what’s true for her. I see the point of doing this for certain things, but not ambiguously true ones. For example, a Catholic is advised to teach his son/daughter by age 7 that the Eucharist is really the body of a risen man/god. How could they possibly comprehend this?
I could possibly see a loose analogy in teaching them not to drop things made of glass. I’m heuristically teaching-them-as-truth that gravity exists, exerts a force on matter, and that if PE=mgh is high enough, when it converts to KE it will exceed the modulus of the glass and shatter it.
They can’t comprehend either set of the necessary foundations for these heuristic “nuggets,” but one is clearly more universally accepted than the other. Even a simple appeal to teaching-as-true only what the world has accepted as true seems reasonable.
I find it perplexing that if a divine being only inspired only one true religion, that the world would remain so confused about what is is many hundreds (if not thousands) of years later. I think it should at least give one pause to consider that perhaps things aren’t as obvious or clear as one might think!
Also, importantly, it’s much easier to gather direct evidence to support the heuristic “don’t drop things made of glass” than “the Eucharist is really the body of Jesus.”
Dropping a glass vs. picking up the Bible are equivalently easy :) Whether you need to be sold on the Bible beforehand is a different story.
You’re right, though, and thus I’m far more confident in teaching-as-true those things which are in the “universally discoverable” realm vs. the “incredibly sticky and unagreed upon” realm.