Thanks also to the Good Work Collective, Aromas Coffee, and the gracious staff at the Blue Tractor. GWC makes it possible; Aromas and the Blue Tractor make it delicious!

This month, (Thursday, May 30th, 7:00, at the Good Work Collective)  etcetera will be talking a closer look at “The Same-Sex Marriage Controversy.”  Several panelists will seek to bring insight and clarity from both sides of the legal, moral and religious perspectives that keep this topic in the headlines.

 Etcetera’s format will remain what it has always been: a time to listen, to understand the foundations on which people base their claims and to engage honestly, respectfully, and boldly in our ongoing search for truth.

In preparation, I offer the following links:

• Procon.org has a pretty thorough page outlining the issue.
• The Pew Forum on Religion and the Public Life offers a number of insightful articles.
• The Debate Club at usnews.com: “”Should Gay Marriage Be Legal Nationwide?”

It’s 2013, and philosophy, science, and religion seem to be more spiritedly engaged than ever before. Has the concept of God remained strong as science and reason continue to uncover mysteries of the natural world?  Have we found more reasons than ever to believe that God is at unnecessary, and perhaps even disproven?  

Though Scott and Justin have debated before, etcetera’s format will remain what it has always been: a time to listen to each of them make a positive case for their position; to understand the foundations on which they base their claims;  and then to engage with the speakers (and others) about the truth claims at the center of their arguments.

In preparation, I offer the following links:

• A forum sponsored by the Templeton Foundation entitled, “Does Science Make Belief in God Obsolete?” Featuring Steven Pinker, the Johnstone Family Professor in the department of psychology at Harvard University; Christoph Cardinal Schönborn, O.P., a Dominican friar, the Archbishop of Vienna, Austria; William D. Phillips, a Nobel Laureate in physics and a fellow of the Joint Quantum Institute of the University of Maryland and the National Institute of Standards and Technology; Robert Sapolsky, the John A. and Cynthia Fry Gunn Professor of Biological Sciences and professor of neurology and neurological sciences at Stanford University; Christopher Hitchens, and a few more.
• A presentation of classic theistic arguments presented by William Lane Craig, followed by a rebattal by Daniel Dennett, with concluding remarks from Alistair McGrath. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Wzol00G2MM&feature=player_embedded.
• In this “Arguments for Atheism” from the Secular Web, there are a number of links to connect you to a wide variety of articles.
• Twenty Arguments For The Existence Of God, from philosopher and Catholic theologian Peter Kreeft.
• From Edward Tabash, Attorney at Law, Honorary Chair, Center for Inquiry-LA: “Arguments Against God’s Existence.”

In preparation for this month’s meeting (Thursday, March 28, 7:00, at the Good Work Collective in Traverse City), I offer the following articles related both individual and societal ethics. 

From an article from Santa Clara University, “What is Ethics?”:

“Ethics refers to well-founded standards of right and wrong that prescribe what humans ought to do, usually in terms of rights, obligations, benefits to society, fairness, or specific virtues. Ethics, for example, refers to those standards that impose the reasonable obligations to refrain from rape, stealing, murder, assault, slander, and fraud. Ethical standards also include those that enjoin virtues of honesty, compassion, and loyalty. And, ethical standards include standards relating to rights, such as the right to life, the right to freedom from injury, and the right to privacy. Such standards are adequate standards of ethics because they are supported by consistent and well-founded reasons.”

From Paul Kurtz’s article, “The Ethics of Humanism Without Religion”:

“These common moral decencies express general principles and rules. Though individuals or nations may deviate from practicing them, they nonetheless provide general parameters by which to guide our conduct. They are not absolute and may at times conflict; we may have to establish priorities between them. They need not be divinely ordained to have moral force, for they are tested in the last analysis by their consequences in practice. Morally developed human beings accept these principles and attempt to live by them because they understand that some personal moral sacrifices may be necessary to avoid conflict in living and working together. Practical moral wisdom thus recognizes the obligatory nature of responsible conduct.”

From “Professional Ethics Without Religion”:

“It seems that writers on professional ethics attempt to dissociate ethics from religion. There are philosophical reasons why this is not only bad strategy but fundamentally flawed logically. If each individual does not have an existential reason for being ethical, all the codes in the world cannot produce ethical behavior. This paper argues that a theistic presupposition is a sufficient, if not necessary, condition to supply the existential motivation.”

From the Huffington Post - “Needed: A New Approach to Ethics in Government”:

“Despite the best of safeguards, bad people will do bad things. There will always be bad apples. But bad barrels should concern us too, for rules will never be enough to shape the culture in government that tolerates at best — and fosters at worst — the unethical behavior of individuals and groups. Even some good people do bad things in unethical environments.”

From “The Moral Animal,” an editorial in the New York Times:

“We are in a position to understand why religion helped us survive in the past — and why we will need it in the future. It strengthens and speeds up the slow track. It reconfigures our neural pathways, turning altruism into instinct, through the rituals we perform, the texts we read and the prayers we pray. It remains the most powerful community builder the world has known. Religion binds individuals into groups through habits of altruism, creating relationships of trust strong enough to defeat destructive emotions. Far from refuting religion, the Neo-Darwinists have helped us understand why it matters.”

For those of you who have a little more time on your hands, here are the transcripts of two different debates. The first is a formal exchange, the second far more informal.

• Can We Be Good without God? A Debate between Dennis Prager and Jonathan Glover at Oxford University
• From debate.org: ”Can man live ethically and morally without the guidance of religion?”

    As always, we are fortunate to have a great lineup of local speakers to walk us through the complexities of the issue.

 Michelle Ferrarese has lived in Michigan most of her life except for a few brief stints on the west coast, east coast and southwest. She got into farming by volunteering at the Community Farm of Ann Arbor (the 1st CSA in MI) after college.  While in grad school, Michelle interned on an organic farm. She went on to manage the Student Organic Farm at MSU through the first three years of its life and helped start their year-round CSA.  In 2006, Michelle took a 5-month bicycle tour of CSA farms in Michigan and ended up in Leelanau County. She has been living and farming at Birch Point Farm since 2007. She possesses a BS in botany (U of M), and a MS in horticulture (MSU).

Laura McCain (RD, CDE, Clinical Inpatient Dietitian at Munson Medical Center) has worked for 17 years at Munson Medical Center, acting as a clinical inpatient dietitian, assisting with recipe development and analysis for Munson’s cafeteria and patient food and working as a RD, CDE for the Outpatient Diabetes Education Program. She is an RD Advisor for the local Celiac Sprue Support Group and was an adjunct professor at Northwestern Michigan College from 1993-2005, where she developed and taught Food and Nutrition Biology. She received her BS in Medical Dietetics from the University of Illinois and a Culinary Arts degree from Northwestern Michigan College.  She is a member of the American Dietetic Association, the Northern Michigan Dietetic Association and the American Culinary Federation.

Jess Piskor is co-owner of Bare Knuckle Farm in Northport, Michigan. This small 5-acre farm produces a wide variety of vegetables available for sale at local farm markets. Jess also raises pigs on his neighbors organic cherry farm. Bare Knuckle Farm is not a certified organic farm, but it generally follows organic guidelines.

My previous post contained a number of links addressing the complexities of the food industry; here are a few more articles looking more specifically at organic farming.

Richard Heinberg’s 50,000 Million Farmers:
http://neweconomicsinstitute.org/publications/lectures/heinberg/richard/fifty-million-farmers

Michael Pollan’s Farmer in Chief:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/12/magazine/12policy-t.html?_r=0

U of M Can Organic Ag Feed the World/UN Urges Agroecology to Feed the World:
http://www.stwr.org/food-security-agriculture/can-sustainable-agriculture-feed-the-world.html

Rodale’s 30-Year Trial, Organic Outperforms Conventional in years of Drought
http://www.mosesorganic.org/attachments/productioninfo/fsOrganicCANfeedWorld.html

We look forward to seeing you on Thursday!

This month’s etcetera will address an increasingly important cultural discussion: “Is There a Morally Correct Way to Grow and Eat Food?”  Look for the bio’s of the speakers to be posted next week here and on our Facebook page. In the meantime, here are some links to get you started on your research. 

From The Food Ethics Blog,  “The Ethics of the Cost of Ethical Food”:

“It’s bad if high prices get in the way of eating a) well or b) ethically, and there are plenty of myths about both. And today alone I’ve read two interesting pieces on the price of food.”

From Health Magazine online, “What Are the Ethical and Environmental Costs of Healthy Food” :

“What’s best for one person’s diet doesn’t always line up with what’s best for a given community, and good-for-you foods aren’t always good-for-earth foods. In fact, some of our healthy favorites have some gnarly implications for Mother Earth and even other humans throughout the world. So we’re breaking down some of the well-known players to figure out the ethical issues involved, and offering an action plan for eating more kindly.”

From Time Magazine, “Getting Real About the High Price of Cheap Food”:

“Unless Americans radically rethink the way they grow and consume food, they face a future of eroded farmland, hollowed-out countryside, scarier germs, higher health costs — and bland taste. Sustainable food has an élitist reputation, but each of us depends on the soil, animals and plants — and as every farmer knows, if you don’t take care of your land, it can’t take care of you.”

From the New York Times, in ” If It’s Fresh and Local, Is It Always Greener? “:

“But now comes a team of researchers from the University of California, Davis, who have started asking provocative questions about the carbon footprint of food. Those questions threaten to undermine some of the feel-good locavore story line, not to mention my weekend forays for produce… While the research is not yet complete, Tom Tomich, director of the University of California Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program, said the fact that something is local doesn’t necessarily mean that it is better, environmentally speaking.”

From Marketplace Sustainability, “Eating Ethically: It’s Complicated”:

“The basic idea is that if you buy your broccoli from your local farmer, you’re not buying it at the grocery store. Which means that the broccoli farmer in another part of the world that sells to your grocery store, won’t have a market for it and won’t make a living. It’s a bit of a conundrum. How do you feed yourself and your family in a way that’s good for them and everybody else and the planet? According to the experts, it boils down to something like this: Buy fruits and veggies in season. Look for fair-trade labels on international foods. Buy local, when it makes sense. Waste less. And, eat less meat.”

Finally, PBS’s Religion and Ethics Newsweekly has a video entitled ” Ethical Eating.”  It features Norman Wirzba, a Research Professor of Theology, Ecology, and Rural Life Duke Divinity School, and it looks at the intersection of sustainable agriculture  and the American Church.

Grand Traverse County Sheriff  TOM BENSLEY is in his second term as sheriff (click here for a link to his re-election website from the past November.)  He has served for 31 years with the Grand Traverse County Sheriff’s Office, including 27  years as a Deputy Sheriff and department supervisor. He  is also a U.S. Army Veteran, and the recipient of two awards of merit. He was recently part of a discussion about gun control on Cross Talk North with one of our other panelists, David Bieganowski.

DAVID BIEGANOWSKI is a native of northern Michigan and a graduate from Boyne City High School. He has an undergrad degree in finance from Walsh College in Troy, MI and a law degree from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. He served in the United States Marine Corps from 1982-1987 where he spent most of his enlistment as an Embassy Security Guard in Africa and Europe. David currently holds an elected position on the Green Lake Township Board of Trustees and sits on the Grand Traverse County Planning Commission and Grand Traverse County Concealed Weapons Licensing Board. He is a SCORE Counselor and a Court approved mediator and case evaluator. He is a senior officer of the Marine Corps League and volunteers for the Young Marines, Toys for Tots, Boy Scouts and the Third Level Crisis Center.

David is an NRA certified firearms instructor and range safety officer. David teaches both the legal and firearms portion of Concealed Pistol License classes and has had over 1,400 students since 2001. He is also a DNR Hunter’s Safety Instructor and woodworker.

FRED GOLEDNEBERG’s Scam Watch column can be read monthly in the Traverse City Record Eagle’s Outlook for Active Living (including a recent one on the topic of gun ownership).  is the owner of Senior Benefit Solutions, LLC and the founder of the Senior Resource Alliance of Northern Michigan. He has been in the financial services industry for over 30 years.

We look forward to seeing you there!

From “Debunking Nine Myths in the Gun Control Debate:”

“What do all these misconceptions add up to? Simply that we aren’t even close to having a serious conversation about protecting ourselves from death by gun. I wouldn’t mind having a national debate about the morality of the Second Amendment in the 21st century. But we’re not even having a serious debate on the margins.”

From the New York Times, “Debate on Gun Control Is Revived, Amid a Trend Toward Fewer Restrictions”:

“The legal and political debate over the nation’s gun laws was following a familiar trajectory: toward fewer restrictions. Now, as the country absorbs news of yet another mass shooting, this one claiming the lives of young children, both supporters and opponents of stricter gun laws are asking whether the carnage might change that pattern at the state or national levels.”

From Just Facts: A Resource for Independent Thinkers, which contains a HUGE list of statistics:

“This research is based upon the most recent available data in 2010. Facts from earlier years are cited based upon availability and relevance, not to slant results by singling out specific years that are different from others. Likewise, data associated with the effects of gun control laws in various geographical areas represent random, demographically diverse places in which such data is available.

Many aspects of the gun control issue are best measured and sometimes can only be measured through surveys,but the accuracy of such surveys depends upon respondents providing truthful answers to questions that are sometimes controversial and potentially incriminating. Thus, Just Facts uses such data critically, citing the best-designed surveys we find, detailing their inner workings in our footnotes, and using the most cautious plausible interpretations of the results.

Particularly, when statistics are involved, the determination of what constitutes a credible fact (and what does not) can contain elements of personal subjectivity. It is our mission to minimize subjective information and to provide highly factual content.” 

There is an interesting pro/con graph at clearpictureonline.com:

“The role guns play in our society has long been debated. There are those who believe that guns have no role in the hands of private citizens. Whereas there are those who believe that guns are the very foundation that protects our rights and liberties expressed in the Constitution. The following is a summary of the reasoning of the two positions.”

You can read an interesting pro/con list at you debate.com. For example:

CON : The Bill of Rights, the second amendment to the Constitution reads:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

PRO: Even the First Amendment has restrictions. Freedom of Speech doesn’t mean you can say anything anywhere. Freedom of Religion doesn’t mean you can sacrifice a virgin whenever you want. Using common sense can work with the Second Amendment too.

Finally, from “Is There a Relationship between Guns and Freedom? Comparative Results from 59 Nations” (you have to download the paper, though there is a summary posted at the link):

“There are 59 nations for which data about per capita gun ownership are available. This Article examines the relationship between gun density and several measures of freedom and prosperity: the Freedom House ratings of political rights and civil liberty, the Transparency International Perceived Corruption Index, the World Bank Purchasing Power Parity ratings, and the Heritage Foundation Index of Economic Freedom.” 

     This past year featured a wide range of both topics and panelists (I have added links where I could find them):

April 26: ”The Reason Rally: Hope or Hype?”  Featuring Levi Meeuwenberg and Scott Blair

May 31: ”Occupy America: Jealous or Just?”  Featuring Carey Waldie and Brandon Everest

June 28: “ Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness: The Status of the American Dream in the 21st Century.” Featuring Tom Gordon, Mella McCormick, and Beth MIlligan

July 26: “Orwell, Huxley, and the Hunger Games: The Allure of Power and Pleasure.” Featuring Chris Kuchuris

August 30: “Project X: Does Entertainment Reflect of Shape Us?” Featuring Sonja Olshove, Joe M. Coffman, and Beth Milligan

September 27: “Mandating Contraception – Individual Conscience and HHS.”  Featuring Scott Gordon (and music by Angela Josephine)

October 25: ”Machiavelli, Erasmus and Hobbes: Who should pick the next President?”  Featuring Charlene Lutes

 November 29: ”Outlawing Christmas: Do National Religious Holidays Have a Place in the Public Square?”  Featuring Steve Jentzen 

We are not meeting in December, but 2013 promises to be another invigorating year. Stay tuned for more details!

As always, thanks to all those who contributed to October’s

November’s  etcetera topic is “Outlawing Christmas: Do National Religious Holidays Have a  Place in the Public Square?”   How do we handle the public expression of religious belief in a nation of both diversity and freedom?  Perhaps more importantly, what role should the state play in allowing (or disallowing) religious expression on government property?  Our speaker will be Steven M. Jentzen, an attorney who has participated in landmark cases in family law, land development, free speech and religious liberty.

Public organizations approach the private celebration of religious belief in different ways.  Though the constitution allows for the expression of faith in schools during the celebration of religious holidays,  it’s not always easy to know when governmental institutions cross the line from accommodation to promotion.The State of New Jersey has quite a list of religious holidays that students are allowed to miss, though the humungous list at the University of Washington puts theirs to shame.  On the other hand, Harvard has been far less inclined to jump on the holiday bandwagon when it comes to any type of public accommodation for private beliefs.  And courthouse lawns? Yeah, they’re divisive. 

This aspect of the church/state controversy will be the topic of this month’s etcetera  (November 29, 7:00, at the Good Work Collective). In preparation for this meeting, here are some links with a variety of perspecites on the issue.

From religioustolerance.org: in an article that includes a brief overview of some mixed rulings:

“One of the functions of the federal, state and local governments and the public school systems is to declare holidays. Three of them have significant religious connotations: Easter, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. Although Thanksgiving has been essentially secularized, Christmas and Easter have retained much of their religious meaning…. Some attempts have been made to have the declaration of these holidays declared unconstitutional. So far, results have been mixed.”

From The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life:

“The lack of clear guidelines reflects deep divisions within the Supreme Court itself. Some justices are more committed to strict church-state separation and tend to rule that any government-sponsored religious display violates the Establishment Clause. These same justices also believe that, in some circumstances, the Establishment Clause may forbid private citizens from placing religious displays on public property.

Other members of the court read the Establishment Clause far more narrowly, arguing that it leaves ample room for religion in the public square. In recognition of the role that religion has played in U.S. history, these justices have been willing to allow government to sponsor a wide variety of religious displays. In addition, they have ruled that the Establishment Clause never bars private citizens from placing religious displays in publicly owned spaces that are generally open to everyone.

A third set of justices has held the middle and, so far, controlling ground. This group takes the view that a religious display placed in a public space violates the Establishment Clause only when it conveys the message that the government is endorsing a religious truth, such as the divinity of Jesus. For these justices, this same principle applies whether the display is sponsored by the government or by private citizens.”

Religious groups, not government, should erect and sponsor religious displays. Religious symbols such as crosses, menorahs and crèches belong on private property, not the shared space of government. In some cases, government land may be used by private groups as a type of free-speech zone, and religious groups might choose to erect religious symbols at their own expense. If this happens, all groups (religious and non-religious) should have access to the space with none receiving special treatment. All messages should be heard in this space, even those that are deemed controversial.”

From the Washington Post:

“It is my opinion that a local governmental entity is never categorically compelled to prohibit holiday displays, including those incorporating recognizably religious symbols, because governments enjoy considerable discretion in accommodating the religious expression of their citizens and employees and in their own recognition of traditional seasonal holidays. It is further my opinion that displays depicting the birth of Jesus Christ are permissible provided the government ensures appropriate content and context.”

(Kent Willis, executive director of the Virginia branch of the ACLU, described the opinion stated above as “accurate,” noting that localities can ban or allow all displays, including religious ones.)

So who had the most insight about political realities and human nature? One wrote about power, the other about morality, the third about social contacts. They all introduced ideas that have resounded in the world of philosophy – but which one gave us the template for a good society?

Join us tonight (10/25/12, 7:00, the Good Work Collective) as we take a thoughtful look at the power and presence of government and its leaders. Going into the election,it’s worth asking some key questions:

• To what degree does a leader need to answer to the people, if at all?
• What motivates (or should motivate) the best leaders? And does motivation even matter if implementation is effective?
• Given the nature of politics, can someone who is genuinely good rise to the top and lead effectively? Or does politics by its nature weed out the good and leave us with the capable?
• Can (and should) morality be separated from capability when it comes to political leadership?