Month: August 2015

Greta Christina on Facing Death without God & Michael Lynch on The Importance of Reason in a Democracy

Audio here!

Death.  There is perhaps no other event in our lives which emotionally and psychologically affects us as strongly.  Trying to keep your head above water when a loved one dies can sometimes feel impossible; facing your own death?  Beyond impossible!  But these are what we are to expect as emotional creatures.  What many cultures and individual people do to soften the existential angst is to invent or follow one or another of the myriad super-natualistic religions.

But what if you are an atheist? Should we concede death to the Christians or Muslims?  How can WE face death without a belief in gods?

We will speak to Greta Christina on this first, and then for the second half of the program, we will talk with philosopher Michael Lynch about the important of reason and critical thinking for modern societies.

What IS reason?  When we say we should build people’s critical thinking skills, what do we mean?  And can a society be healthy and beneficial to all within it if the ideas and beliefs of leaders (and everyone for that matter) are based on falsehood or pure ideology?  Finally, how can we tell what is true and what is false?These questions and more will be discussed in our interview with Professor Lynch in the second half of today’s show.

A Discussion on the Confederate Flag in the 21st Century.

Audio here!

The state of South Carolina has taken a positive step towards combating discrimination as state representatives came together to remove the Confederate flag from the State House lawn.  But other potentially discriminatory practices, such as voter ID laws and South Carolina’s constitutional prohibition on non-theists holding public office, remain intact.

On this weeks program, Matthew LaClair speaks with two members of the house of representatives: “white” Republican Jenny Horne and “black” Democrat Joseph Neal, who came together on the issue of the Confederate flag while disagreeing vehemently on related issues such as the voter ID laws.

You may recognize Rep. Horne from the passionate speech she delivered on the floor of the house on the Confederate flag issue.  We will ask her about this speech, her views on the Confederate flag — both before and after the shooting in Charleston, SC — her justification for passing a voter ID law that was proposed just a few weeks after the first black president was sworn into office, and her views on the South Carolina constitution.

Rev. Neal was chairman of the South Carolina Black Legislative Caucus back in 2000, when citizens gathered before the State House demanding that the Confederate flag be removed from the State House dome.  The decision to remove it from the dome to a flag pole out front was challenged by Neal and the Black legislative caucus, where it remained until last month.  We will discuss this experience with Rev. Neal and asks him about the walkout staged by the 2009 Legislative Black Caucus in opposition to the voter ID bill.

Tune in this Saturday at 2PM on WBAI 99.5FM for this exciting discussion, and be sure to join us for our post-show discussion with Professor Orville Vernon Burton, who delivered expert testimony on behalf of the Department of Justice on the issue of South Carolina’s voter ID bill. Visit matthewlaclair.com to listen to our conversation and learn about the legislative history of the voter ID laws, as well as his take on our program with Ms. Horne and Rev. Neal.