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I thought this would be easy. I have this great quote but can’t verify that it was actually uttered (or written) by the person it is attributed to. It was brought to mind by a couple of things I read. I’ll give the quote here.
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Found on Page 569 of the “Big Book”, aka Alcoholics Anonymous 3rd edition.
There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance – that principle is contempt prior to investigation.
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What first brought this to mind was getting some food for thought with my coffee at Starbucks. I often read the Way I see it on my Starbucks coffee container and usually I like what I read. Only occasionally does it force me to reconsider my opinion (formed prior to investigation) of the author. In this case it did. I tend to dismiss most TV journalists with the label “news reader” as if they have no original thoughts or as if they did not write their own material. As soon as I read it I thought of the quotation by Spencer (if indeed he did originate it).
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The way I see it #130
It will do little good to wire the world if we short-circuit our souls. There is no delete button for racism, poverty or sectarian violence. No keystroke can ever clean the air, save a river, preserve a forest. This transformational new technology must be an extension of our hearts as well as our minds. The old rules still apply. Love your mother – Mother Earth.
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The second occasion for me to remember the quote was finding out via an email from Meighan Pritchard that there was a media blackout on the prayer offered by Gene Robinson at the inauguration of our new president last Tuesday, 20 January 2009. The email included a transcript of the prayer. I read the prayer and frankly was just awed by the thoughts it contained. My second thought was that of course there would be a media blackout on it. If anyone actually heard or read it they might reconsider their opinion of Bishop Robinson. It seems that there is some debate over the reasons why the prayer was left out of the HBO broadcast. As I read here. You can also get the entire prayer here.
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It occurs to me that those that objected (and still do from some of the comments about the posts that discuss Robinson’s prayer) would really object with my applying a quote attributed to Spencer to them. Spencer coined the phrase “survival of the fittest”. He was a passionate advocate of evolution (some would say he overly advocated evolution and applied it to areas where it should not be applied). But, I could be wrong; I wonder if I should investigate that assumption.